Homilies on the Psalms

They belong to those whose name they bear.—There are moreover several writers of the same psalms.

For in some David is set down as author, in some Solomon, in some Asaph, in some Idithun, in some the sons of Core, in one Moses. From which it is absurd to call the psalms by the name of David: since so many authors are made known by the very titles of the inscriptions. And it will more rightly be said to be a Book of Psalms, with the prophecies of various authors and times gathered together into one volume. Now it has seemed good to some to prefix the names of Jeremiah, and Haggai, and Zechariah to the superscriptions of certain psalms: whereas nothing of this kind is found so published in the authentic books of the seventy translators: so much so that even in very many Latin and Greek codices, the simple titles of the psalms alone are set forth without these names.

Those without a name belong to him who is inscribed as the author of the preceding Psalm.

The names of various authors are found under various superscriptions, it is the tradition of the ancients that, from that psalm whose author is set before it in the superscription, those which follow in succession without the superscription of authors are to be considered as belonging to him who is inscribed as the author of the preceding psalm, up to that psalm in which the name of another author is set forth: so that if the superscription of some psalm be, A Psalm of David, the others which follow without a title are believed to be David's, until the name of another prophet is placed in the superscription; and from that point up to another prophet, those which are in between without an inscription belong to him who was begun to be set before them as author in the superscription of the preceding psalm.

That it is no objection to naming Samuel in the psalm of Moses.—But if perhaps someone would detract credence from this understanding on the ground that in those psalms which follow that psalm to which Moses is set as author, it is written, that is, in the ninety-eighth, Moses and Aaron among his priests, and Samuel among those who call upon his name, and that it cannot seem to have been prophesied by Moses, since the name of Samuel, who was born so long after Moses, stands in the psalm: let him remember that it ought to seem wonderful or difficult to no one that so great a prophet should have uttered the name of so great a prophet, even though he was yet to come: since in the books of Kings the name of king Josiah was prophesied before he was born, the prophet saying, O altar, altar, thus says the Lord:

Behold, a son shall be born to David, Josias is his name—by which it ought not to be incredible that Samuel was foretold by Moses: especially since, according to Jeremiah saying, Even if Moses and Samuel were to stand, Samuel is named alongside and made equal to Moses by the merit of his holiness. This tradition, which is believed to have originated with Ezra, who after the captivity gathered the psalms into one book, if it shall be judged false or improbable; it is necessary that those who contradict it demonstrate the authors of these psalms. For it is settled that they could not have been prophesied except by prophets prophesying.

The Psalms sing of the evangelical history.

The prophecies are closed and sealed to those who do not know Christ.—There is indeed no room for doubt that what is said in the psalms must be understood according to the evangelical proclamation: so that from whatever person the prophetic Spirit may have spoken, yet all of it is to be referred to the knowledge of the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and of his incarnation, and passion, and kingdom, and to the glory and power of our resurrection. Now all prophecies are closed and sealed to the worldly sense and wisdom of the age, according to that of Isaiah: And all these words shall be to you as the words of this sealed book (Isaiæ, xxix, 11 et 12). For if indeed it be said to a man who knows letters, Read this, he will say: I cannot read; for it is sealed.

And if this book be given into the hands of a man who does not know letters, and it be said to him: Read this; he will answer: I do not know letters. The ignorance of reading and understanding the book of prophecy is shown under the person of each kind of man, when the understanding of the learned man, who approaches reading but does not approach the seal of the closed mystery, is compared to the ignorance of that unlearned man through the common poverty of understanding of both. For all things are woven together with allegorical and typical powers: through all of which the mysteries of the only-begotten Son of God—of his being born in a body, and suffering, and dying, and rising again, and reigning forever with those who are co-glorified with him who have believed in him, and of his judging the rest—are laid open.

And because the Scribes and Pharisees, not receiving the Son of God born in a body, would deny to all access to prophetic understanding, they are thus rebuked by the Lord under the threat of punishment: Woe to you lawyers, who have taken away the key of knowledge: you yourselves have not entered in, and those who were entering in you have hindered from entering. For by denying Christ, whose coming is the work of the prophets, they took away the key of knowledge: because the knowledge of the law, which proclaimed the bodily coming of the Lord, is shut off when faith in the bodily coming is denied.

The key of the Psalms is faith in Christ.—And this indeed is to be understood as said of every kind of prophetic Scripture: so that unless they have been understood and recognized as pointing to the coming of the Lord, born of a Virgin into man, the force of their meaning is to be held as sealed and closed. Yet that the book of psalms can in no way be understood except through faith in his coming, we are thus taught by the Apocalypse of blessed John: And to the angel of the Church of Philadelphia write, These things says the holy and true one, who has the key of David, who opens and no one shall shut; who shuts and no one shall open.

He has therefore the key of David, because he himself through these seven certain seals which David prophesies of him in the psalms concerning his incarnation, and passion, and death, and resurrection, and glory, and kingdom, and judgment, has unlocked them: opening what no one shall shut, and shutting what no one shall open: because through this prophecy fulfilled in him, he will open what no one shall close; and on the contrary, with faith in the prophecy fulfilled in him being denied, he will shut what no one can open. For no one except he in whom these things were prophesied and fulfilled will impart the key of this understanding. Finally he himself taught this same thing in what follows, saying: And I saw in the right hand of him who sat on the throne a book written within and without, sealed with seven seals: and I saw another strong angel, proclaiming with a loud voice: Who is worthy to open the book and to loose its seals?

And no one was able, neither in heaven, nor on earth, nor under the earth, to open the book, nor to look upon it.

And I wept, because no one worthy had been found to open the book, nor to look upon it. And one of the elders said to me: Weep not, behold the lion of the tribe of Judah, the root of David, has prevailed to open the book and its seven seals This book, containing both past and future things in what was written within and without, is worthy to be opened by no one: and weeping arises in the Apostle from desire of understanding and grief at the difficulty. But the lion of the tribe of Judah and the root of David has prevailed to open the book and its seals: because he alone has unlocked those seven seals, of which we spoke above, by which the book is closed, through the mystery of his incarnation and divinity.

Moreover the Lord himself testified to this same thing after the resurrection, saying: For all things must be fulfilled which are written in the law of Moses and in the prophets and in the psalms concerning me. Through all these things therefore every book of prophecy is both sealed and closed: because, when those things which were fulfilled through him are believed, all those things which are sealed and closed will both be opened and unlocked.

The psaltery bears the likeness of the body of Christ.—And although we know from the Lord's own declaration that all things were spoken by the divine Spirit through David: yet even the very form of this prophecy teaches that the doctrine of heavenly and celestial knowledge was present in it. For the prophecy was uttered on that instrument, called in Greek the Psaltery, in Hebrew Nabla, which is the most upright of all musical instruments, containing in itself nothing perverse or oblique, nor anything that is set in motion from lower places into the sound of musical harmony: but constituted in the form of the Lord's body, the instrument is straight without any bending or deflection; an instrument moved and impelled from above, and animated for the song of heavenly and celestial instruction, not resounding with a lowly and earthly breath, as the other instruments of earth.

For he proclaimed not lowly and earthly things on that very instrument of his body, as he himself testified: He who is of the earth is of the earth, and speaks of the earth; but he who comes from heaven testifies to what he has seen and heard. Through this heavenly Spirit therefore God is sung in the psalms, in the form of the Lord's body, in which the heavenly Spirit has spoken; the form also of this earthly and musical instrument sounding in harmony from above being compared thereto.

The Psalms among the Hebrews were undivided, collected into one by Ezra, arranged in order by the LXX.—It must not be unknown, moreover, that the number of psalms among the Hebrews is undivided, but that they were written down without any notation of order. For there the first or second or third, or the fiftieth or hundredth, is not marked: but they are mingled together without any distinction of order or number. For Ezra, as ancient traditions relate, collected and brought them together into one volume when they were unordered and scattered according to the diversity of authors and times. But the seventy elders, who according to the tradition of Moses remained in the synagogue to guard the teaching of the law, after the care of translating the whole law from Hebrew into Greek was entrusted to them by king Ptolemy, understanding the powers of the psalms with spiritual and heavenly knowledge, reduced them to number and order, assigning to each individual number, according to its own efficacy and completion, the order of perfect and efficacious psalms.

The LXX did not follow the order of times, but of things.—And although this same thing can be understood from the powers of the individual psalms: yet we are most fully taught, in the history of events and times, that the arrangements of the psalms were ordered according to the efficacy of perfect numbers. For the third psalm is, according to history, later than the fiftieth psalm: for the inscription of each is separated by a great interval of time and age. For that one encompasses what was done under Uriah and David: but this one signifies the flight of David, with his son Absalom pursuing him: and yet the power and mystery of number brings it about that this and that are so placed according to their fitting and mutually congruous numbers.

The mystery of the number fifty.—Now the inscription of the fiftieth psalm is, according to history, later than the inscription of the fifty-first psalm. But the power and perfection of the number fifty demanded it, and the impenitent hatred of Doeg the Edomite toward David required, that the former be placed after and the latter before: so that the remission of sins might be placed in the number fifty, and the punishment of faithlessness, exceeding the number of established remission, might lack pardon, since it had lost both the time and the number of repentance. For since in the fiftieth, in which is the sabbath of sabbaths, the remission of sins is established according to the prefiguration of the Jubilee year: fittingly this psalm, in which repentance having gone before the remission of sins is sought, is placed in the order of this number.

What the threefold fifties of the Psalms signify.—The book of Psalms is contained in three fifties, and this arises from the reason and number of that blessed expectation of ours. For let anyone who carefully observes both the psalm of the first fifty and then of the second fifty, and again the conclusion of the third fifty, in which the end of the book is found, understand that the providence of those who arranged the psalms in this order agrees with the dispensation of our salvation.

For since the first step toward salvation is to be reborn as a new man after the remission of sins, and since after the confession of penitence that kingdom of the Lord is reserved for the times of that holy and heavenly Jerusalem, and thereafter, when the heavenly glory has been perfected in us, we advance through the kingdom of the Son into the kingdom of God the Father, in which the whole company of spirits will proclaim the praises due to God: we easily understand that in the individual powers of the psalms arranged under the number of fifty, the mystery of this fiftyfold dispensation is contained.

The fiftieth is the sabbath of sabbaths; the Lord's day is the perfect sabbath.—That these are sabbaths of sabbaths, the number seven multiplied by seven into a sevenfold total shows; yet the ogdoad

because the same day that is first is also the eighth, added at the last sabbath according to the evangelical fullness, brings it to completion. And indeed these sabbaths of sabbaths were celebrated by the apostles with such devotion that during these fifty days no one would worship with body prostrate upon the ground, nor would anyone hinder the festivity of this spiritual blessedness by fasting: which same thing has also been established outwardly in the Lord's days, which go beyond the number of the sabbath through the fullness of evangelical preaching. For although the name and observance of the sabbath was established on the seventh day, we nevertheless rejoice on the eighth day, which is itself also the first, in the festivity of the perfect sabbath.

The perfection of the ogdoad.—And it is fitting to contemplate this perfect power of the ogdoad in heavenly mysteries in that psalm which is placed eighth in number, to which the title concerning the winepresses has been added, with vessels prepared for new fruits and renewed to contain the warmth of fermenting must. And this number is appointed according to the evangelical ogdoad for receiving the evangelical fruits, with these perishable vessels of our bodies reformed. And the text and discourse of that psalm bears witness to this. The power of this ogdoad is also contained in the power of the sixth psalm and its number, in which the prayer is for the eighth; and the logic of the number brings it about that in the sixth there should be a prayer for the eighth, and in the eighth the title concerning the winepresses should be added. This superscription of the winepresses is found in three numbers.

For the eighth, the eightieth, and the eighty-third psalm have this title: so that in perfect numbers the order of this perfect blessedness might stand; yet in such a way that the mystery of the triad (which is called Trinity by our people) should encompass the simple ogdoad and the decade of the ogdoad.—And this perfection of the ogdoad we can also recognize in the hundred and eighteenth psalm. For the

are gathered in groups of eight according to the Hebrews, by the initial letters of individual letters in groups of eight; but the very power of the psalm also teaches the mystery of the ogdoad.

There are moreover twenty-two ogdoads in it. For eight

are assigned to the initials of individual letters; and this is brought about for the reason that, since this psalm brings the perfect man to completion according to evangelical teaching, we might be instructed through all twenty-two letters of the Hebrew tongue under the mystery of the ogdoad.

The twenty-two or twenty-four books of the Old Testament.

The three chief languages.—And this is the reason why the law of the Old Testament is reckoned into twenty-two books: so that they might correspond with the number of letters. These are reckoned according to the traditions of the ancients as follows: five books of Moses, the sixth Joshua, the seventh Judges and Ruth, the first and second of Kings as the eighth, the third and fourth as the ninth, the two books of Chronicles as the tenth, the words of the days of Esdras as the eleventh, the book of Psalms as the twelfth, the Proverbs of Solomon, Ecclesiastes, the Song of Songs as the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth, the twelve Prophets as the sixteenth, then Isaiah and Jeremiah with the Lamentation and the Epistle, and also Daniel, and Ezekiel, and Job, and Esther, complete the number of twenty-two books.

Some however have thought fit, with the addition of Tobit and Judith, to reckon twenty-four books according to the number of Greek letters, with the Latin tongue also gathered in as a middle between the Hebrews and the Greeks. Because it is especially in these three languages that the mystery of God's will and the expectation of the blessed kingdom is proclaimed: whence it came about that Pilate wrote that the Lord Jesus Christ was King of the Jews in these three languages. For although many barbarian peoples have attained knowledge of God according to the preaching of the apostles and the faith of the churches remaining there to this day, yet the evangelical teaching resides especially in the seat of the Roman Empire, under which the Hebrews and Greeks are contained.

The fifteen songs of degrees.—It follows, according to this number of twenty-two ogdoads of eight, together with what is subjoined, that the number of psalms is contained in the fifteen songs of degrees. For after that perfect teaching of the preceding ogdoads, this song of degrees had to correspond in fifteen psalms from two perfect numbers, namely the hebdomad and the ogdoad, that is, the seventh and the eighth number. For through the observance of the law, which is established in the hebdomad, and the evangelical advance, which is perfected by the ogdoad both in present devotion and in hoped-for expectation, one ascends by this song of degrees to heavenly and eternal things.

For also through this number of steps the chief priests ascended into the holy of holies in the temple: so that, since neither the hebdomad of the law without the ogdoad of the Gospels, nor the ogdoad of the Gospels without the hebdomad of the law, could produce the perfect man until one had perfectly believed in both; among these perfect and blessed holy of holies, the one who is perfect in both, who is in the song of the fifteen degrees, 12 might be placed in the number of the hebdomad and the ogdoad.

The various titles of the psalms.—Although these things have been said by us according to numbers completed in the observance of the law and distributed in the evangelical mystery: yet having set aside the individual powers of each number, we shall follow from the superscriptions of the psalms and from the understanding of the words themselves. Now the titles of all the superscriptions are diverse. For besides those which are noted beforehand with the names of their authors, or with indications of causes or times, there are others which have the title "unto the end"; others which have only "a psalm of a canticle" or "a canticle of a psalm"; and it is necessary that diverse causes have given rise to diverse superscriptions. For not without cause is this order of titles varied with such great diversity of things, so that now "unto the end," now "psalm," now "canticle," now "canticle of a psalm," now "psalm of a canticle," is set before the psalm that follows beneath it, for its distinction.

And although we strive to set forth the causes of the individual inscriptions in each and every psalm, yet for the benefit of the studious understanding, we compress the force of all the superscriptions into a brief discourse.

What "unto the end" means.—The end is that for the sake of which all other things exist, while it itself provides its cause to nothing else. For all things tend toward the end, but nothing else comes after the end. For one strives toward the end, but in the end one ceases. Thus the end is both the perfection of what precedes and, extending itself into nothing else, is its own proper possession of itself in itself. Therefore the psalms which are inscribed "unto the end" are to be understood as arising from perfect and absolute teachings and forms of eternal goods: because toward those things which are spoken of in them the course of our faith extends itself, and in them, tending toward no further advance, it rests in the very end of the blessedness it has desired and attained.

The four kinds of musical art.—In the musical arts these are the varieties of functions and kinds.

A psalm is when, with the voice silent, only the stroke of the resounding instrument is heard. A canticle is when a chorus of singers, using its own freedom and not bound to the consonant service of the instrument, exults in the hymn of melodious voice alone. A canticle of a psalm is when, with the instrument playing first, the subsequent voice of the choir-singer, emulating the instrument, is heard, having imitated the manner of the psaltery with the modulations of the voice. A psalm of a canticle is when, with the choir singing first, the art of the consonant instrument is fitted to the hymn of human singing, and the psaltery modulates with equal sweetness to the modulations of the voice singing before it. To these four kinds of musical art, therefore, superscriptions suited to each and every psalm have been adapted.

From the powers of the psalms, moreover, and from the very diversities of musical teaching, the cause of each superscription is shown.

What each thing noted before the psalms indicates.—For in that psalm in which only "Psalm" is inscribed, there is contained either the teaching or the confession of the faithful works and religious deeds of believers, when the prophet, by recalling what he has done, instructs us toward the teaching of similar deeds, with the movement of our bodily instrument tempered to the pious uses of our duties. But when "Canticle" alone is placed before in the title, there exists in it spiritual knowledge and the understanding of a heavenly mystery, which one attains through the knowledge of wisdom: when, without recalling the works of faith, it shows the teaching of perfect knowledge of God alone. For not all knowledge is immediately in good work; nor again does every good work attain true knowledge. On account of which there is also that which is in the third kind of superscriptions, "Canticle of a psalm," when the teaching of knowledge is joined to the performance of good works.

For one must first live in good works, so that the knowledge of the divine mystery which follows thereafter may be perfect, according to what has been said: Hast thou desired wisdom? Keep the commandments, and the Lord will bestow it upon thee. The Lord therefore bestows wisdom upon those who through the merit of good works attain the grace of understanding. From these pursuits of works and knowledge, therefore, the cause of that psalm which is superscribed "Canticle of a psalm" is to be known. But where there is "Psalm of a canticle," there through the knowledge of understanding the practice of good work is treated: when the knowledge of God previously attained renders desirable to us the performance of faithful deeds.

Recapitulation; what is signified by the absence of an inscription.—This fourfold diversity of musical art, therefore, is adapted to the diversity of the psalms: so that a Psalm, through the movement of the bodily instrument in the recollection of deeds, may be; a Canticle, however, through the knowledge of wisdom, may have in itself the knowledge of teaching. A Canticle of a psalm is when, with the merit of deeds going before, the knowledge of understanding is bestowed. A Psalm of a canticle is when, through the knowledge of understanding already attained, the work of faithful deeds is begun and carried out. Through these properties of the superscriptions, therefore, one must seek the understanding of the psalms: because to each kind of prophecy, in the property of the titles, each kind of musical comparison has been adapted.

Those however which are held without any inscription of signification, such as the first or the second, and very many others, are to be understood as having been sung from the teaching of the Holy Spirit for the spiritual knowledge of general understanding: so that each person from among these might seek, according to the sincerity of his faith, the principle of spiritual understanding.

Other superscriptions.—Other superscriptions, which either signify deeds done according to history, or times, or days, or embrace some other thing, show from what matters the psalm consists, either from the interpretation of names, or from the comparison of deeds, or from the likeness of similar things: so that wherever there is "for the sabbath day," or "for the hidden things of the son," or "for the eighth day," through the bodily signification of the superscriptions the spiritual publication of the psalm may be understood; or when "of David," or "to David," or "Absalom," or "Saul," or "Doeg," is noted before in the title under the history of deeds; in that case, either through the qualities of the pronouns, as "to" or "of David," or through the powers of the names, as in Absalom, and Saul, and Doeg, we may attain the prophecy which is in the psalm.—What the diapsalm is. In the diapsalm, which is inserted in very many psalms, it is to be recognized that a change either of person or of sense is begun under a shift of musical mode: so that wherever a diapsalm has intervened, it is to be understood that either something else is being said, or that it is being said by another, or that it is being sung in another mode of musical art.

Concerning the persons and senses, wherever we find a diapsalm intervening, we shall attempt to give an account.

For the rest, the Greek and Latin translation could not preserve the discipline of musical mode. These things, however, this discourse, hastening toward the exposition of the psalms themselves, has gathered into a compendious brevity.

The key of the psalms.—There must be a diligent and careful judgment applied to the exposition of each individual psalm: so that it may be known by what key of understanding each of them is to be opened. For every book is like a beautiful and great city, which has many and various buildings, whose doors are shut with their own proper and various keys: and when these keys are gathered together into one place and mixed up, they bring the greatest difficulty to one who wishes to open any particular building and is ignorant of how to find the key of each building; and it requires either the familiarity of knowledge, to quickly pick out the known key from that collected abundance of variety, or immense labor, to find the fitting and suitable key for opening each entrance: because reason and quality do not permit keys not their own to be fitted to different locks.

And so, according to the mercy of God, as we are about to find the key for opening each individual psalm, let us lay open the entrance of this very first psalm with its own proper and fitting key.

Blessed is the man who has not gone in the counsel of the ungodly, and has not stood in the way of sinners, and has not sat in the seat of pestilence. But his will was in the law of the Lord, and in his law he will meditate day and night. And he shall be like a tree which is planted beside the running waters, which shall give its fruit in its season. And his leaf shall not fall away: and all things whatsoever he shall do shall be well directed. Not so the ungodly, not so; but like the dust which the wind casts away from the face of the earth. Therefore the ungodly shall not rise again in judgment, nor sinners in the counsel of the just. For the Lord knows the way of the just, and the path of the ungodly shall perish.

1. Discerning Who Speaks in the Psalms

Who speaks to whom in the Psalms is to be observed.—This is the principal understanding in the psalms: to be able to discern in whose person, or concerning whom, the things that are said ought to be understood. For their composition is not uniform and undiscriminating, such that they do not have both authors and diverse kinds. For we find in these that the person of God the Father is frequently wont to be set forth, as in the eighty-eighth psalm, where it is said: I have exalted one chosen from my people. I have found David my servant, I have anointed him with my holy oil. He shall call upon me, Thou art my Father, and the upholder of my salvation. And I will make him my firstborn, high above the kings of the earth.

But the person of the Son is introduced in very many places: as in the seventeenth psalm: A people whom I did not know served me; and in the twenty-first: They divided my garments among themselves, and upon my vesture they cast lots. Now, however, that this first psalm cannot be understood either in the person of the Father or in the person of the Son, the matter itself plainly teaches, since it says therein: But his will was in the law of the Lord, and in his law he will meditate day and night. For in that psalm in which we recall that the person of the Father is designated, things proper and fitting to him are recorded, when it is said: He shall call upon me, Thou art my Father, my God, and the upholder of my salvation. And in that in which the Son is shown to speak, he himself declares himself to be the author of the words he recounts, saying: A people whom I did not know served me.

For since the Father says: He shall call upon me; and the Son says: A people served me; they show themselves to be those who speak of themselves. But now when it is said: But his will was in the law of the Lord; no person of the Lord speaking of himself is shown, but rather one proclaiming the blessedness of that man whose will is in the law of the Lord. The person of the Prophet, therefore, in whose mouth the Holy Spirit speaks, is now to be recognized, instructing us through the ministry of his mouth unto the knowledge of the spiritual mystery.

2. Whether This Psalm Speaks of Christ

Concerning whom he speaks.

Many understand this psalm to be spoken of Christ.—And since he speaks these things, we must inquire concerning what man we ought to understand him to be speaking. For he says: Blessed is the man who has not gone in the counsel of the ungodly, and has not stood in the way of sinners, and has not sat in the seat of pestilence. But his will was in the law of the Lord, and in his law he will meditate day and night. And he shall be like a tree which is planted beside the running waters, which shall give its fruit in its season. And his leaf shall not fall away: and all things whatsoever he shall do shall be well directed. I have found that many, either in present discourse or from their writings and compositions, have held this view concerning this psalm: that our Lord Jesus Christ is signified and ought to be understood in it, whose blessedness is proclaimed in the things set forth below.

But they have taught this neither with method nor with reason; moved indeed by the affection of a good opinion

because all prophecy of the psalms is to be referred to him: but where and when the word of the prophecy itself refers to him, is to be discerned by the truth of rational knowledge.

3. Why the Blessedness Does Not Fit the Son of God

It does not befit the Son of God who is God.—But the things which are placed at the beginning of the psalm are by no means fitting to his person and dignity: and that very incautious facility of so proclaiming is refuted by those very things which are contained in the psalm. For when it is said: And his will was in the law of the Lord, since the law was given through the Son of God, how shall blessedness be referred to him on the ground that his will was in the law of the Lord, when he himself is the Lord of the law? That it is indeed his law, he himself testified in the seventy-seventh psalm, when he said: Attend, my people, to my law, incline your ears to the words of my mouth. I will open my mouth in parables. And Matthew the evangelist confirms that these words were spoken by him, saying: Therefore he spoke in parables, that what was said might be fulfilled: I will open my mouth in parables.

The Lord therefore fulfilled his own prophecy in deeds.

For in those things which he had promised he would speak, he spoke in parables. Moreover, what it says: And he shall be like a tree which is planted beside the running waters (in which the progress of blessedness is shown by comparison); how can this be fitted to his person, so that the Son of God should be a planted tree that is more blessed, on account of which he is blessed, because at some point he attains a likeness to it by the progress of blessedness? Furthermore, since according to Wisdom and the Apostle, he exists both before the ages and before eternal times, and is the firstborn of all creation, and all things were created in him and through him: how is he blessed by being made like unto these things, which were established by him?

Since neither does the power of the Creator need, for the perfection of his blessedness, comparison with a creature, nor does the antiquity of the Firstborn, in the phrase that he shall be like a tree, admit the time of a reversed comparison.

For that which shall be through a time still to be awaited cannot be seen as either having been, or as already existing in the nature of things. But whatever already exists has no need of a deferral of time, so as to be begun toward that which it shall be, because it already abides in being by the antiquity of its own origin.

4. The Blessedness Fits the Man Conformed to Christ

To whom it is fitting.—And so

because these things are understood to be foreign to the divinity of the only-begotten Son of God our Lord Jesus Christ: that man is to be thought of as the one proclaimed blessed by the prophet, who has shown himself conformed to that body which the Lord assumed, that is, in which he was born as man, by the pursuit of righteousness and the perfection of all justice. And indeed that it ought to be understood in this way, the fuller exposition of the psalm will demonstrate.

5. The Manifold Teachings of This Psalm

How many teachings are in this psalm.—The Holy Spirit took this most beautiful and most worthy beginning for the psalms that were to be commenced, so as to exhort human weakness through the hope of blessedness to the innocent pursuit of religion, to teach the mystery of God made bodily, to promise a share in heavenly glory, to announce the punishment of judgment, to show the difference of resurrection, to demonstrate the providence of God in retribution. With perfect and complete reason he began the order of so great a prophecy: so that the hope of the blessed man might allure the weakness of men to the pursuit of faith, the blessedness of the tree compared might pledge the blessedness of hope, the severity announced against the ungodly might restrain insolent impiety within the bounds of fear, the order of condition might distinguish the difference of merit in the councils of the saints, the established equity might demonstrate the magnificence of God in knowing the ways of the just.

Now let us treat both the matters themselves and the words concerning them.

1. The Fivefold Observance and the Ungodly Versus the Sinner

The fivefold observance of the blessed man.

The distinction between the ungodly and the sinner.—

Blessed is the man who has not gone in the counsel of the ungodly, and has not stood in the way of sinners, and has not sat in the seat of pestilence.

But his will was in the law of the Lord, and in his law he will meditate day and night. The Prophet records that there is a fivefold observance belonging to the blessed man: the first of not going in the counsel of the ungodly, the second of not standing in the way of sinners, the third of not sitting in the seat of pestilence, then further of placing his will in the law of the Lord, and lastly of meditating in it day and night.

It is therefore necessary that the ungodly differ from the sinner, the sinner from the pestilent; especially since the ungodly have a counsel, the sinner a way, the pestilent a seat: and further since in the counsel of the ungodly one goes rather than stands, but in the way of the sinner one stands rather than goes. That we may be able to understand the reasons for these things, we must discern how great is the difference between the sinner and the ungodly: so that through this it may be understood why the sinner has a way, and the ungodly a counsel: and further why one must stand in the way and go in the counsel; since human custom decrees both that one must stand in counsel and go in the way. Not everyone who is a sinner is also ungodly: but the ungodly cannot fail to be a sinner. And let us take an example from the common experience of conscience.

Sons can love their fathers, even if they are drunkards and wanton and prodigal: and amid these vices they are without ungodliness, who are not without crime. But the ungodly, even if they are distinguished in the chief virtues of continence and frugality, yet exceed in every other crime apart from ungodliness in the dishonoring of a parent. 2. The ungodly are atheists.—According to this proposed example, therefore, it is beyond doubt that the ungodly is distinguished from the sinner. And the very nature of common judgment shows that those are indeed ungodly who disdain to seek the knowledge of God, who with irreligious opinion presume that there is no creator of the world, who recount that this world was constituted in its present state and order by chance movements, who, lest they leave any judgment to their creator concerning their life rightly or wrongly conducted, wish to be born by the necessity of nature and to be dissolved again by the same necessity.

The whole counsel of these men, therefore, is wavering, uncertain and wandering, and is carried along in the same things and through the same things without any fixed point of rest, for it holds to no measure of any definite conclusion. Their disputation has not dared to teach the Creator of the world. For when you ask: why the world, and when, and to what extent? And whether the world exists for man, or man for the world? And death, for what reason, or how long, or of what kind?—around these counsels of their ungodliness it is always moving and going, no place of standing firm having been found in these counsels.

3. Heretics Also Lack a Firm Standing

Nor do heretics stand firm.—There are also other counsels of the ungodly, namely those of men who, having fallen into heresy, are contained neither by the laws of the New nor of the Old Testament. Their discourse, always bent in a circle and circuit of error, holding to nothing and standing firm in nothing, is tossed about in the course and recourse of an undefined opinion. Their ungodliness consists in measuring God not from God's own declaration but from the will of their own judgment; not knowing that it is no less ungodliness to fabricate God than to deny him. When you ask them at what end of their hope and faith they hold such opinions, they are confounded, thrown into confusion, they dissemble, they wander around, and they avoid the very conclusion of the disputation about which inquiry is made.

Blessed therefore is the man who has not gone in this counsel of the ungodly

that is, who has not admitted even that very will of going in this counsel: because whatever things are ungodly, even to have thought them is already a crime.

4. The Way of Sinners in Which None Should Stand

The way of sinners in which one must not stand.—What follows is that he who has not gone in the counsel of the ungodly should likewise not stand in the way of sinners. For there are many who, though they have been separated from ungodliness through confession of God, are not yet free from sin thereby; remaining indeed in the Church, but not keeping the discipline of the Church: such as the covetous, drunkards, the turbulent, the insolent, the proud, dissemblers, liars, the rapacious. And toward these vices the impulse of our nature drives us: but as it is profitable for us to withdraw from this way toward which we are carried, so neither should we stand still there, applying a return out of it that is not sluggish. And therefore blessed is the man who has not stood in the way of sinners, nature indeed bearing him into this way, but the religion of faith bringing him back out of it.

5. The Seat of Pestilence

The seat of pestilence.—This also is the third condition for obtaining blessedness: not to sit in the seat of pestilence.

The Pharisees sat in the seat of Moses teaching, and Pilate also sat on the tribunal: which seat's session, then, shall we judge to be pestilent? Not that of Moses, surely, since the Lord rather reproves those who sit than the session of the seat itself, when he says: Upon the seat of Moses sat the Scribes and Pharisees; whatsoever they shall say to you, do, but what they do, do not. The session of this seat is not pestilent, obedience to which is enjoined by the Lord's authority. That seat therefore will be pestilent, whose contagion Pilate avoids by washing his hands. For many who are established in the fear of God are nonetheless corrupted by ambition for worldly honors: and they wish, being subject to the laws of the Church, to judge by the laws of the forum.

But although they bring with them to the very offices they discharge a religious will, showing themselves benevolent and self-restrained: yet it is inevitable that they be polluted by a certain pestilent contagion of the affairs among which they move. For the order of public causes does not permit those who wish to remain in the sanctity of ecclesiastical law. And although they be tenacious of a religious purpose: yet through the necessity of the seat obtained, they are compelled—though with a reluctant will—now to insult, now to injury, now to punishment. Necessity makes them partakers of necessity itself, as they are imbued with it as with a diseased plague. And therefore the Prophet names their seat the seat of pestilence, because by its contagion it infects even the will of a religious mind.

6. Obeying the Law from Will, Not Fear

The law of God must be obeyed not from fear but from will.—But the blessedness of the man is not yet made complete by having not gone in the counsel of the ungodly, or not having stood in the way of sinners, or not having sat in the seat of pestilence. For these things can be found even in a man of the world: that he may hold the opinion that one God is the creator of the world, that he may restrain himself from sins through the pursuit of modest innocence, that he may prefer the leisure of a private and tranquil life to the dignities of honors. But now the Prophet, fashioning the perfect man for God, and one whom he places in the great examples of eternal blessedness, teaches that he is not to use common virtues for this purpose, but that he must be perfected by those things which follow, in order to be blessed: But in the law of the Lord was his will.

The abstaining from the foregoing things is unprofitable unless intention is applied in what follows: namely, that his will be in the law of the Lord. The Prophet does not wait for there to be fear. Fear restrains many within the law, but will establishes few in the law: for it belongs to fear not to dare to neglect what is to be feared; but it belongs to perfect religion to wish to obey what is prescribed. And therefore blessed is he whose relation to the law of God is not fear, but will.

7. Meditating on the Law Day and Night

The law of God must be meditated upon night and day; how this can be done.—But sometimes something is also lacking to the will: and to will alone does not obtain perfect blessedness, unless operation follow upon the will. For there follows: And in his law shall he meditate day and night. Continual and unwearied meditation on the law perfects this blessed man. But perhaps the nature of human weakness does not permit this, through which one must rest, sleep, and be free for food; on account of which we might fall away even by natural necessity from the hope of attaining blessedness, since at some point the intervention of bodily business must cause a cessation from diurnal and nocturnal meditation. A saying of the Apostle is similar to this saying: pray without ceasing. As if indeed the necessity of our nature, which must be occupied with its own affairs, could always pray without interruption of time.

Meditation on the law, therefore, consists not only in reading words, but also in the religion of works; not merely that we review books and Scriptures, but that we meditate upon the things contained in the Scriptures and books through deeds and actions, and that diurnal and nocturnal works always exercise the law: as that saying of the Apostle is: Whatsoever you do, do all to the glory of God, whether you eat or drink, or do anything else. For by this it comes about that we pray without ceasing: since through works pleasing to God and always exercised to his glory, the whole life of every holy man is prayer, and thus by living according to the law night and day, life itself will be the nocturnal and diurnal meditation on the law.

8. The Blessed Man Likened to a Tree

But with the blessedness of this man now made complete—who, abstaining from the counsels of the ungodly, and the ways of sinners, and the seat of pestilence, willingly meditates on the law of God day and night—it must be shown how great a fruit of this acquired blessedness is to be his in the future. For to wish to be blessed proceeds from the very expectation of blessedness. For there follows,

he shall be as a tree which is planted beside the running waters, which shall give its fruit in its season. And its leaf shall not fall off. This comparison of blessedness may perhaps be thought a ridiculous and inept example: in which the planting of a tree, the running of waters, the giving of fruits, its season, and a leaf not falling are proclaimed. These things indeed may perhaps be reckoned as nothing by men of the world. But let us see, according to prophetic teaching, how great a glory of the blessedness compared is placed in these very things and words.

9. The Tree of Life Signifies Christ

The tree is Christ.—In the book of Genesis, 9 and 10, where the lawgiver shows that paradise was planted by God, he also showed that every tree beautiful in appearance and good for eating was brought forth; and he set forth that there was also in the midst of paradise the tree of life, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; and that paradise was then watered by a river, which was afterward divided into four heads. But what this tree of life was, the prophet Solomon taught, saying concerning the adoration of wisdom: It is a tree of life to all who embrace it, and who lean upon it as upon the Lord. This tree therefore is living: and not only living, but also rational; and rational to such a degree that it gives fruit; and gives it not confusedly, not unseasonably, but in its own time.

And this tree is planted beside the running waters, namely in the possession of the kingdom of God

that is, in paradise, and at the place from which the river going forth is divided into four heads. For it does not say: After the running waters, but: Beside the running waters, from which the divisions of the running waters receive their first course. For there this tree is planted, into which the Lord, who is Wisdom, introduced that thief who confessed him as Lord, saying: Amen I say to you, today you shall be with me in paradise. And because we have shown by prophetic authority that wisdom, who is Christ, is named the tree of life from the mystery of the future incarnation and passion: the proper character of this understanding is also to be established from the Gospels.

For the Lord himself compared himself to a tree, when the Jews said that he cast out demons by Beelzebub: Either make, he said, the tree good and its fruits good, or make the tree bad and its fruits bad; for by its fruit the tree is known. Because, since his fruit was most excellent—to cast out demons—they said he was Beelzebub, whose fruits are most wicked. He also did not disdain to teach the power of this blessed tree in himself, when going to the cross he said: For if they do these things in the green wood, what shall be done in the dry?, signifying by the example of the green wood that nothing in him was subject to the dryness of death.

10. The Blessed Man Made Like Christ

The blessed man is like unto Christ.—To this tree, therefore, that blessed man shall be made like; when, after the manner of the thief translated into paradise, he too is planted beside the running waters: and that blessed and not-to-be-uprooted young plant shall come to be, which the Lord signifies in the Gospels when he complains of an alien planting, saying: Every plant which my heavenly Father has not planted shall be uprooted. This tree therefore shall give its fruits. But wherever the divine word signifies anything concerning the fruits of trees, it records that they make fruits rather than give them, when it says: A good tree cannot make bad fruits, and when according to Isaiah there is a complaint concerning the vineyard: I waited, he says, that it should make grapes, but it made thorns. This tree therefore shall give its fruits, governed by the deliberation and reason of giving. For it shall give in its own time. And in what time at last?

Namely that of which the blessed Apostle says, to make known to you the mystery of his will, according to the good pleasure which he purposed in him, unto the dispensation of the fullness of times. This therefore is the time of dispensation, in which the opportunity both of receiving and of giving is regulated, when it shall be the proper time for those to whom he shall give to receive. But the delay of time depends upon the fullness of times. For the dispensation of giving fruit is reserved for the fullness of times. And what fruit at last shall be dispensed here? Namely that of which the same apostle makes mention, saying: And he shall transform the body of our humility conformed to the body of his glory. These fruits therefore shall he give us, which he has already perfected in the man whom he assumed unto himself, and who is signified in the tree, whom he has transfused into the nature of his own immortality, mortality being absorbed.

That blessed man therefore shall be as this tree, when he himself shall stand conformed to his Lord in the glory of God.

11. The Leaves as the Words of God

The leaves are the words of God.—But the leaf of this tree shall not fall off.

Nor is it any wonder if its leaves do not fall off, whose fruits shall be given rather than fall, driven off not by ripeness, not struck down by external force, but harvested by the dispensation of a rational office. And what he signifies in the leaves is made plain from the comparison of bodily things. For we observe this to be the nature of leaves: that they burst forth placed around the fruits themselves for the protection of the fruits; that they fortify with a kind of rampart the tender beginnings of the fruits. The teaching therefore of the words of God, which clothes the fruits promised to us, is signified in the leaves. For by these words our hopes are overshadowed: by the protection of these they are guarded amid the storms of this age.

These leaves therefore shall not fall off

that is, the words of God; because it has been said by the Lord: Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away. For nothing of those things which have been spoken by God shall slip away or fall.

12. The Healing Leaves and the Tree of Life

The usefulness of these leaves.—That these leaves of this tree are not without profit but are salutary to the nations, the holy John testifies in the Apocalypse, saying: And he showed me a river of the water of life, bright as crystal, going forth from the throne of God and of the Lamb, in the midst of its street, and on either side of the river the tree of life, which bears fruit twelve times, yielding its fruit every month, and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations. The heavenly (that is, spiritual) mystery is so set forth through bodily forms that, although the bodily things themselves cannot fulfill the spiritual reason, they do not mutilate it with respect to bodies. For it would have been fitting to say that there are trees on either side of the river shown, not a tree.

But because the tree of life is everywhere one in the mystery of baptism, ministering the fruits of apostolic preaching to all who come to it from every side; therefore on either side of the river one tree of life stands. For one is the Lamb seen on the throne of God, and one the river, and one the tree of life: all of which embrace within themselves the mysteries of the incarnation, of baptism, of the passion, whose leaves, that is the words of preaching, impart salvation to the nations through the teaching of a word that does not fall.

13. The Fruits of Eternal Glory

The gifts of eternal glory.—And all things, he says, whatsoever he shall do, shall be well directed.

No longer, as in Adam, shall his gift and ordinances be overthrown: for Adam lost the blessedness of established immortality by the sin of transgressing the law, but through the redemption of the tree of life, that is, through the Lord's passion, when we shall be made like to that very tree of life, then whatsoever shall be wrought in us is eternal: eternal, moreover, with the sense of blessedness. All those things which shall come to pass shall be prosperously directed; not by an uncertain announcement, not in a weak nature, when incorruption shall have swallowed up corruption, and eternity weakness, and the form of God the form of earthly flesh.

To this man therefore, planted like a tree, giving his fruits in his season, that blessed man shall be like, himself also planted in paradise; so that the planting of God may remain not to be rooted up, in whom all things made by God shall be prosperously directed, henceforth to be uprooted by no change, whether of our weakness or of time.

14. The Impious Compared to Wind-Driven Dust

What body the impious shall have after judgment.—Having shown the perfect blessedness of this man, it followed to show what punishment awaits the impious. For there follows,

Not so the impious, not so, but as the dust which the wind casteth forth from the face of the earth.

No hope of this comparative blessedness is left to the impious, but a wandering, crushed, winnowed, scattered, and restless condition awaits them, so that, dashed from that firmness of bodily solidity, they are carried off in the mockery of dust to punishment: not dissolved into nothing, so that there may be in them material for punishment; but ground down into something empty and light and dry, so that they may be tossed about in the contemptible instability of punishment. Of which punishment the same prophet makes mention also in another place, saying: I will crush them as dust before the face of the wind, as the mire of the streets I will sweep them away. Thus a comparison is established both of blessedness and of punishment.

For just as it is no labour for the wind to scatter dust, and just as those who walk through the mire of the streets scarcely feel that they have trodden upon it: so easy is it for that punishment of hell to destroy and scatter the impious, whom the account of their sins has both dissolved into mire and ground into dust, leaving them no substance of solidity, since they are dust and mire; and by reason of their being dust and mire, reserved only for the nature of a substance fit for punishment.

15. The Impious Rise Again, Not Unto Judgment

The impious shall rise again, but not unto judgment.—And

because through this transformation of their solidity ground into dust, they shall not be partakers of that good which shall be given to the blessed man from the fruit of the tree in its season; therefore he consequently added,

Therefore the impious shall not rise again unto judgment. It is not the abolition of those who shall indeed be dust that is announced by their not rising again; but resurrection unto judgment is denied to them. For they shall not lack the sense of punishment by reason of their not existing; since it would be a gain from punishment if one did not subsist for punishment. But they shall subsist because they shall be dust. Now to be made dust, whether by drying or by grinding, is not to have lost the nature of subsisting, but to have passed into another nature.

But by the fact that they shall not rise again unto judgment, it is established that they have not lacked the nature of rising again, but have lost the order of rising again unto judgment. Now what order of resurrection and judgment is to be understood, the Lord shows in the Gospels, saying: He that believeth in me is not judged: but he that believeth not is already judged. And this is the judgment, that light is come into this world, and men loved darkness more than light.

16. Who Then Remains to Be Judged

If neither the faithful nor the unfaithful, who then are to be judged.—The word of the Lord's saying troubles the negligence of hearers and the careless ease of readers. For when he says: He that believeth in me shall not be judged; he exempts the faithful from judgment: and when he added: But he that believeth not is already judged; he did not admit the unfaithful to judgment. If therefore he exempted believers and repelled unbelievers, allowing neither to these nor to those any lot of judgment; how shall it be thought that what he says as a third thing agrees with itself: And this is the judgment, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness more than light? For there can be no place left for judgment; since neither the unfaithful nor the faithful are to be judged. And these things will indeed seem to negligent hearers and careless readers to be so: but otherwise the very force of the words contains within itself the proper meaning and understanding of the saying.

17. Those Midway Between the Pious and Impious

Namely, those who are midway between the pious and the impious.—He that believeth, he says, shall not be judged.

For what need is there to judge one who believes? For judgment arises from doubtful matters, and when doubt is removed, the examination of judgment is not required. For the same reason it is not necessary to judge even the unfaithful; because the doubt whether they are unfaithful has not remained. But with judgment removed in the case of believers and unbelievers, the Lord added the cause of judgment and those against whom it is necessary to judge. For there are some who are midway between the impious and the pious, mixed of both, yet properly belonging to neither, because they have constituted themselves from both: not to be counted among the faithful, because something of unfaithfulness is inserted in them; nor to be assigned to unfaithfulness, because they also have something of faith. For the fear of God holds many in the Church: yet the same persons are enticed by the allurements of the world to worldly vices.

They pray, because they fear; they sin, because they will.

They call themselves Christians, because the hope of eternity is good: they do pagan things, because present pleasures are alluring. They do not remain impious, because the name of God is held in honour among them: they are not pious, because they pursue what is alien to piety. And it is necessary that they love more those things through which they cannot be what they call themselves; the will of their works prevailing over the will of their name. And therefore the Lord, after he had said that believers are not to be judged and unbelievers are already judged, added: And this is the judgment, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness more than light. Against those therefore is the judgment which has already been executed against unbelievers and is not necessary against believers: because they loved darkness more than light; not that they did not love the light also, but that their love was more inclined toward darkness.

For love is wont to be preferred to love by comparison: and hence is the judgment, because although they loved Christ, they nevertheless loved darkness more. These therefore shall be judged, who shall neither, as the pious, not be judged, nor shall have been already judged as the impious, against whom judgment comes from a love that was rather preferred.

18. Sinners Judged, the Impious Already Condemned

The impious shall not be judged, but sinners shall.—The prophet also held to the reasoning of this evangelical arrangement, saying: Therefore the impious shall not rise again in judgment, nor sinners in the council of the just. He leaves no judgment to the impious, because they are already judged: but to sinners, whom we have shown in the foregoing discourse to be distinguished from the impious, he denied the council of the just, because they are to be judged. For impiety, which is already judged, makes those men prejudged; but sin holds these others as persons to be judged. And so neither does impiety, which is already judged, share in the judgment of sinners: nor are sinners, who are to be judged, worthy to be in the council of the just, who shall not be judged.

19. How God Knows or Seems Ignorant

How God knows or is ignorant.—And from this the order of this distinction proceeds.

For the Lord, he says, knoweth the way of the just, and the way of the impious shall perish. Sinners do not therefore come to the council of the just, because the Lord knoweth the way of the just. Now he knoweth not with the knowledge of one who was ignorant, but with the condescension of one who deigns to know. For this is not in God a change of human passions, such that he should either know or be ignorant of anything. The blessed Apostle Paul explained by what reasoning we are known by God, saying: If any man among you be a prophet or spiritual, let him acknowledge the things that I write unto you, that they are of the Lord: but if any man be ignorant, he shall be ignored.

He shows therefore that those are known by God who have known the things that are of God: then to be known, when they have known; obtaining, that is, the condescension of being known through the merit of the religion they have known: so that what is known is understood to be not the progress of one who was ignorant, but of one who is known. Moreover the Lord shows absolutely in Adam and Abraham that he is ignorant of sinners but knows the faithful. For to Adam after his sin it was said: Where art thou, Adam? Not because God, who still had him in paradise, did not know that he was in paradise; but because, while he is asked where he is, he is shown to be unworthy of the knowledge of God by reason of his having sinned.

But Abraham, long unknown

that is to say, to whom the word of God had already come when he was seventy years old, when he had proved himself faithful to the Lord by the offering of Isaac, is received into divine intimacy with such condescension: Now I know that thou fearest the Lord thy God, and hast not spared thy beloved son for my sake. He did not indeed ignore the faith of Abraham, which he had credited to him as righteousness when he believed concerning the begetting of Isaac: but because he had given great proof of his fear by offering his son, now he is known, now he is proved, now he is worthy not to be ignored. Thus therefore God both acknowledges and is ignorant; when Adam the sinner is not known, and Abraham the faithful is acknowledged, worthy, that is, to be known by God who ignores nothing.

The way therefore of the just who are not to be judged is known to God: and therefore sinners who are to be judged are removed from their council. But the impious shall not rise again unto judgment, since their way being lost, they shall already have been judged by him who said: The Father judgeth no man, but hath given all judgment to the Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

Why have the nations raged, and the peoples meditated vain things?

The kings of the earth stood up, and the princes assembled together against the Lord and against his Christ. Let us break their bonds asunder, and cast away their yoke from us. He that dwelleth in the heavens shall laugh at them, and the Lord shall deride them. Then shall he speak to them in his anger, and in his fury shall trouble them. But I am appointed king by him over Sion his holy mountain, declaring his commandment. The Lord said to me, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee.

Ask of me, and I will give thee the nations for thine inheritance, and the ends of the earth for thy possession.

Thou shalt rule them with a rod of iron, and shalt break them in pieces like a potter's vessel. And now, O kings, understand, be instructed, ye that judge the earth. Serve the Lord in fear, and rejoice unto him with trembling. Embrace discipline, lest at any time the Lord be angry, and ye perish from the just way. When his anger shall be kindled in a short time, blessed are all they that trust in him.

Many of us are made uncertain by apostolic authority, whether they should think this psalm to be continuous with the first and as it were the outer part of the first: or whether they should rather count it as subordinate and number it as the second. For in the Acts of the Apostles we are taught that this is held and is the first psalm, under the prayer of the blessed Paul, as follows: And we declare unto you the promise made to the fathers: God hath fulfilled this to our children, raising up our Lord Jesus, as it is written in the first psalm, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee, when he raised him from the dead, now no more to return to corruption. On account of this apostolic authority therefore it is believed to come about through the error of scribes that this psalm is numbered second in order, when it is known to be the first by the testimony of the teacher of the Gentiles himself.

We must therefore understand the reason why it is to be understood by us as second, and has been shown by the Apostle to be first.

For in the middle times of the law, before the only-begotten Son of God, the Word of God remaining before the ages as God, was born as man, at the request of King Ptolemy seventy elders translated the books of the Old Testament from Hebrew letters into Greek. Now it had already been established beforehand by Moses that there should be seventy teachers in every synagogue. For Moses himself, although he had set down the words of the Old Testament in writing, had nevertheless separately communicated certain of the more secret mysteries from the hidden things of the law to seventy elders, who were thereafter to remain as teachers. Of this teaching the Lord also makes mention in the Gospels, saying: Upon the seat of Moses, he says, sat the Scribes and Pharisees: all things therefore whatsoever they shall say to you, keep and do; but according to their works do not do.

The teaching of these men therefore remained for posterity, which, received from the very writer of the law, was preserved in this number and office of the elders. These elders therefore, translating these books, and having attained the spiritual knowledge of hidden things according to the tradition of Moses, rendered the ambiguous expressions of the Hebrew tongue and certain things signifying various meanings, according to the force of the matters, with definite and proper significations of words, tempering that manifold understanding of the expressions with the knowledge of doctrine. And from this it comes about that those who translated afterward, interpreting in diverse ways, brought great error to the nations: since, ignorant of that hidden tradition proceeding from Moses, they set forth in their own uncertain judgments those things which were expressed ambiguously in the Hebrew tongue. But we shall bring forward one example of the ambiguity of the Hebrew tongue, from which the rest of this kind may be understood to be such, and to be as they are. Bresith is a Hebrew word.

It has three meanings in itself, that is, in the beginning, and in the head, and in the son. But the seventy translators rendered it as in the beginning, while the others translated it differently: and according to this ambiguity this confusion was made by them in every translation.

The authority of the LXX interpreters.—But the perfect authority of these seventy interpreters remains.

First, because they translated before the bodily advent of the Lord, and the flattery of translating to suit the times cannot be charged against them, given so much earlier an age of interpretation; then because those very princes and teachers of the synagogue, perfected both in the knowledge of the law and also in the more secret doctrine through Moses, could not but be credible judges of translating, who were the most certain and most weighty authorities for teaching. These therefore, translating the psalms among the other books, both reduced them to a number, and arranged them in order, and distinguished them with diapsalms, all of which according to the Hebrews were and are held in confusion. Their translations therefore were not necessary for the Hebrews, who at that time used only their own language.

Yet when all these things had been observed with diligent and devout care, after the Lord had fulfilled the whole law by the sacrament both of his incarnation and of his passion and resurrection, and when they were compared with those books which the same translators had produced for the king, and found to be faithfully consonant, an indissoluble authority was established by the privilege of doctrine and of age.

Why Paul called this one the first.—The blessed apostle Paul therefore, according to his own profession a Hebrew of Hebrews, even according to Hebrew knowledge and faith, said that this psalm is the first, not using the distinction of the translators: whose greatest zeal in preaching to the princes of the synagogue was this, to show from the teaching of the law that our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, was born, suffered, rose again, and reigns forever. He therefore held to this manner, that being himself a Hebrew and preaching to Hebrews he used the custom of the Hebrews. But for us the authority of the translators must be used, translating the law not by the ambiguity of the letter, but by the knowledge of doctrine.

To whom, when, and how far this psalm looks.—Now the apostolic authority furnishes the most complete understanding of the person, the time, and the cause. For what the same Apostles thought in the book of their Acts concerning this same psalm, we shall speak in their own words. For it is written: And as they were saying, Lord, thou art he who madest heaven and earth and the sea and all things that are in them, who by the mouth of our father David thy holy servant didst say,

Why did the nations rage, and the peoples meditate vain things?

The kings of the earth stood up, and the princes gathered together in one against the Lord and against his Christ. For of a truth they gathered together in this city against thy holy son Jesus, whom thou hast anointed, Herod and Pontius Pilate, and the people of Israel, to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel foreordained to be done.

And now, Lord, look upon their threatenings, and grant to thy servants to speak thy word with all boldness.

It is therefore not doubtful what the psalm showed so much earlier by prophecy. For the raging nations and the peoples meditating vain things were mingled together at that time in Herod and Pilate, and stood together in one with their own princes and kings. For by the common judgment both of the praetor and of the tetrarch the passion of condemnation against the Lord was confirmed.

The raging nations.—And indeed, according to prophetic knowledge, the proper meaning of each individual word has been carefully fitted to each kind and name: so that the nations raged, stirred by an unskilled and disorderly impulse, seeing and hearing the Son of God in the body. Who raged to such a degree that they pierced him with a crown of thorns, mocked him clothed in a royal robe with the salutation and honor of a king, struck his head with a reed, gave him vinegar and gall to drink, and pierced his side with a lance. For the cohort of soldiers subject to Pilate did these things out of the unbridled fury of their rage.

But the peoples meditated vain things

that is, occupied with vain meditation upon the teachings of God, they did not understand through the meditation of the law him who was proclaimed in the law. For by that time not only did the people of the synagogue abound from that generation of Abraham according to the flesh; but from many peoples, under the one name of the people of Israel, a diversity of many peoples was contained. And this is written in the book of Acts thus: Now there were dwelling in Jerusalem Jews, devout men, from every nation that is under heaven. These peoples therefore meditated vain things, gathered together from many peoples into one people.

The kings also stood up, namely Pilate and Herod, in whom the kings of the earth are understood: and each, by the necessity of the laws over which they presided, rendered the service of his presence. But those who with impious and irreligious counsel treated against the Lord in many assemblies, these are the princes who gather together in one: namely, when all the chief priests were frequently assembled in the house of Caiaphas. Finally, Herod the tetrarch and Pilate the praetor were named kings of the earth: because they stood up by right of earthly power. But the others who gathered together in one are neither kings of the earth nor chief priests, because those who were subject to the Roman praetor and the tetrarch held no right of their own kingship, nor did they any longer deserve to be called chief priests, because they had shown themselves impious toward God and toward the Lord of that very priesthood.

The foregoing words are spoken by the Father, the following by the Apostles.—And

because it is not doubtful, on the authority of the Apostles, that the psalm was begun from the person of God the Father; since they said, Who by the mouth of our father David thy holy servant didst say: therefore, to make understood the change of person, a diapsalm was inserted by the interpreters, even though it was not contained in the books of the Hebrews. The person therefore which is changed is to be understood as that of the Apostles, saying,

Let us break their bonds asunder, and cast away their yoke from us.

They must needs detest what they are rebuking. These therefore who both raged and meditated vain things—their bonds they break, and their yoke they cast away.

And it is not doubtful that to cast away a yoke and to break bonds differ; which two things each suit the two kinds and names mentioned above: so that they break the bonds of the nations, but cast away the yoke of the peoples: because the nations are bound by the bonds of their sins, from which they cannot free themselves through unbelief, according to what was said, The sinner is bound fast with the cords of his sins. The Jews however are burdened with the yoke of the law, which the Apostles cast away from themselves, as blessed Peter says: Now therefore why do you tempt the Lord, to put upon the neck of the disciples a yoke which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear? This yoke of the peoples therefore they cast away from themselves, because they had been subject to it: but the bonds they break not for themselves, but for the nations. And so the meaning of each expression is preserved.

Where bonds are broken they add no indication of their own person: but where they cast away the yoke, there by saying, Let us cast away from us, they are understood to speak not of others but of themselves: so that, having cast off that heavy and intolerable yoke, they might submit themselves to that sweet and light yoke of evangelical sanctification to which they were invited; and might break the bonds of the nations through the freedom of preaching, according to what they said in the recounting of this same psalm: And now, Lord, look upon their threatenings, and grant to thy servants to speak thy word with all boldness. For these apostolic teachings break asunder all the snares of unbelief and of sins.

Contempt of the Son is contempt of the Father.—And

because above a twofold person was maintained, when it said, against the Lord, and against his Christ: so now also a twofold significance of one who laughs and one who mocks has followed. For the insult of one is not separated from the other, nor is the honor of religion toward each of them distinct. For those who through the genuine and proper nature of Father and Son in themselves are one in the glory of divinity, are also one either in the injury of contempt or in the reverence of honor, and in the other each is either honored or despised. And the Lord himself testified to this very thing, saying, As the Father raises the dead and gives life, so also the Son gives life to whom he will. For the Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son, that all may honor the Son as they honor the Father.

He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him. Honor is not distinguished, insult is not separated: equal devotion toward each is expected, and the injury of contempt of one is the contempt of both. Thus since in one both are despised; who are one in divinity both through glory, they are also one in devotion both through honor. And hence those who gathered against the Lord also gathered against his Christ: and those whom he who dwells in heaven mocks, the Lord also derides.

How the Son descended without leaving heaven.—Not that the Lord was not also always in heaven, since he himself testified of himself: No one has ascended into heaven, but he who descended from heaven, the Son of man who is in heaven. He is therefore not absent from heaven, because when he had descended from heaven, remaining and speaking as the Son of man, he is nevertheless, while he was saying these things, in heaven. The Son of man had indeed descended, but through the power of his nature the Son of God was not absent from whence he had descended, nor had he consumed himself out of what he was before, at the time when he was born as man; nor, having become the Son of man, had he ceased to be the Son of God. But so truly is the Son of man the Son of God, that descending from heaven he was the Son of God, and through the power of his own substance the same Son of man was in heaven.

The distinction of Father and Son.—But the prophet, wishing to signify under a distinction of person the Father, who remained in that eternal and blessed seat of his even while his Son was subsisting on earth as Son of man, and rested without any dispensation of descent, says,

He who dwells in the heavens shall laugh at them, and the Lord shall mock them: so that through him who laughs while dwelling in heaven, the Lord also who mocks from heaven might be understood. Now to mock and to laugh do not differ: for both are accomplished by the action of the mouth according to the disposition of the will.

For according to our understanding the sense of divine things is set forth through bodily forms: so that mockery and laughter might be named in the deriding of those who had gathered against the Lord and against his Christ; not that resolution or contraction of the mouth befalls the incorporeal God, but that from the custom of our own nature we might know with what judgment of the divine will the impious were derided. They were therefore mocked and laughed to scorn. For those who assembled false witnesses, who had purchased the betrayal, who had received his blood upon themselves and their children, who had cried, Crucify him, who had said, Come down from the cross, if thou art the Son of God, who had sealed the tomb, who had bought from the soldiers the silence of the resurrection and the rumor of a stolen body—they lost all the labor of their impiety. He is God whom they had nailed to the cross: he is eternal whose tomb they had sealed.

Impiety is laughed to scorn, while it strives after unlawful things, while it seeks what is not granted, while it loses what it hopes to have obtained, while it recognizes that he whom it condemned as a man is God.

Perturbations do not fall upon God.—For which reason this follows fittingly,

Then shall he speak to them in his wrath, and in his indignation shall he trouble them.

For after the Son of God rose from the dead—upon whom death had fallen through the appearance of the body which he assumed—the rashness of fruitless impiety was mocked: God speaks to those whom he had derided, and troubles them in his indignation. And before we show what this speech of wrath is and what this troubling of indignation is, it is necessary to warn those who read and hear, lest they believe that any changes of passions and disturbances of movements fall upon God.

For nothing new befalls that eternal and perfect nature: nor can he who so exists that he is always such as he is, lest he should at some time not be the same, be made to be anything other than he always is. It is the property of earthly and imperfect kind that they become changeable through alteration of nature, when sorrow disturbs joy, anger disturbs placability, offense disturbs benevolence, envy disturbs equanimity, and anxiety disturbs security: and through these things we are at some time something other than we were, when a movement of another desire, creeping in through our inconstancy and weakness, unsettles the present affection of the mind; and a sudden conversion changes us from what we were into what we are. But God, blessed and perfect, has no need of progress, for he lacks nothing: he who has no origin is not made new by change.

HE IS, who is what he is not from another source: he is in himself, he is with himself, he is from himself, he is his own, and he himself is all things to himself, lacking all change of novelty, who has left nothing else that could befall him, through the fact that he himself is wholly all things wholly to himself.

Why God, needing nothing, created created things.—From this most excellent and benevolent blessedness, then, proceeding through our Lord Jesus Christ: all creations of heavenly and invisible things, all constitutions of spiritual and corporeal things have their origin; not that he might acquire for himself any progress from those to whom he was imparting origin. For no one stands in need of what he bestows from himself, nor does he advance through that for which he is the author of its being what it is. But it is external things that bring progress; because those things that remedy want are foreign to oneself. God, therefore, from whom all things are, has need of none of those things to which he has granted that they are what they are: but he created all things for the progress of those things that were to be begotten. And because the discourse will be long if it is begun even concerning heavenly and invisible things, let us treat of ourselves, to whom the prophecy of the psalm pertains.

Whatever he asks of man profits not himself but man.—He instructs man, not

because he had need of his service in any respect; but because he is good, he created him as a partaker of his blessedness, and perfected the rational animal with life and sense for the use of bestowing his eternity, and this is absolutely understood from his own words. For he says: And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God ask of you, except that you fear the Lord your God, and walk in all his ways, and love him, and serve the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and keep the commandments of the Lord your God, and his justifications, which I command you this day, that it may be well with you? God demands from us no service except that of innocence and religion and faith.

He requires that he be loved by us, not indeed receiving for his own sake any fruit of our love toward him, but rather that love itself will profit us who shall love him. For he desires that he be loved and that we serve him, to the end that it may be well with us, so that we may be judged worthy of the gift of his blessedness and goodness through the merit of love for him and of service. But the use of goodness, like the splendor of the sun, like the light of fire, like the fragrance of sap, profits not the one who provides it, but the one who uses it. What we are, therefore, is our progress rather than that of him who established us in what we are; because God, not begrudging the eternal goods that are in himself, takes us up into the perception and use of his blessed goodness.

He created him to merit blessedness, and therefore free.—But he who is perfect and good did not use his goodness and blessedness toward us without reason and measure. For he granted to each of us the freedom of life and sense, not imposing necessity in either direction, so that a law might compel each one to be good or evil by nature, but because he had created us through benevolence for the use of his blessedness, he established for us progress toward that end through the merit of an innocent and upright life. But what honor would this necessity of the reward of goodness merit, if some force bound up within us did not allow us to be evil? Goodness, therefore, was left to the will: so that the will might acquire for itself the reward of goodness, and that the progress and use of this eternal blessedness might be ours by merit, not an undiscriminating necessity through law.

And although he enticed us toward the will of goodness

that is, toward living well and uprightly, through the hope of meriting and enjoying his goodness, he nevertheless added the punishment of goodness avoided and despised: so that, since he had left us the freedom of will for meriting goodness, because necessity would not have merit of nature, the very freedom itself might daily be constrained by the terror of punishment set before it on the contrary side. And so both through the reason of equity and justice freedom was permitted for the merit of reward, and through the goodness of God the force of freedom was confined by the fear of the ordinance, so that the hope of merit might urge one to will the good, and the punishment of threatened vengeance might persuade one not to will evil.

The wrath of God is the punishment of sin.—And so for those to whom wickedness pleased more, from the freedom of the will, the vengeance that was established is believed to be the wrath of God: not because that immutable and tranquil nature of God grows hot with the movement of turbulent impulse, but because he who remains in punishment through the ordinance of punishment feels that the author of this ordinance is wrathful toward him. For the punishment of the one who suffers is believed to be the wrath of the one who decrees. And so God is wrathful, when those who are punished feel through the pain of punishment that the wrath of the decree is upon them: which wrath was not moved from placability into wrath through a change of nature, but is wrath for those to be punished by the ordinance of punishment. Now that this ordinance of punishment is called and is wrath, John shows in the Gospel, saying: Generation of vipers, who has shown you to flee from the wrath to come?

For since it was owed to them to be punished by the ordinance of punishment on account of their impiety, they were yet fleeing this future wrath by the confession of repentance. The Apostle also makes mention of this wrath in this way, saying: Because if when we were yet sinners, Christ died for us; much more, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him: clearly showing wrath to be the punishment of the abiding ordinance.

The wrath of God is not from sudden impulse.—God, therefore, is not subject to change, nor is he to be transferred from one thing to another: since he is of a certain and constant nature, and remains as he is, inasmuch as he has said: I am who I am, and I am not changed. That blessed and perfect and eternal goodness of virtue does not suffer conversion, nor is it changed from one thing to another by the impulse of an accidental movement. And this same thing the Prophet, speaking here by the Holy Spirit, attests, saying: God is a just judge, strong and long-suffering; does he not bring forth anger every day? Unless you shall be converted, he has brandished his sword, and has bent his bow, and made it ready: and in it he has prepared instruments of death: he has wrought his arrows for those who shall burn. He who is long-suffering, therefore, is not changed into wrath, but the powerful judge has decreed punishment for guilt.

For against those who do not convert he has brandished his sword, and bent his bow, and in it prepared instruments of death, and wrought his arrows for those who shall burn. But he has wrought them not at the impulse of sudden wrath which might be suddenly kindled by the desire of revenge, but he has wrought them for those who shall burn, who through an impenitent will shall have appointed themselves to be burned. And for those who would not be converted the sword has been brandished, not to be drawn forth against each one from a change of wrath (for he who is long-suffering does not grow wrathful on each single day), but because he has decreed judgment, his sword is already drawn forth from the ordinance of punishment. But the spiritual ministries of punitive judgment are mentioned in the sword, bow, and arrows, because they are held in readiness for those who shall burn.

They are not made ready from the impulse of temporary wrath, but God has regulated them from the ordinance of the decree with the most temperate equability of his goodness: not leaving the severity of this very ordinance hidden and unknown, but forewarning its terror by announcements, and delaying even that which is established by a long postponement for repentance from sin.

How God speaks in wrath.—And therefore, after the nations raged, and kings stood by, after the peoples meditating vain things gathered together as one against the Lord and his Christ, and after they were mocked and derided, it is added: Then shall he speak to them in his wrath, and in his indignation shall he trouble them. But how the Lord has always been accustomed to speak in his wrath, we shall bring forward one most weighty and great example of prophetic teaching, Isaiah saying: Hear the word of the Lord, princes of Sodom; attend to the word of the Lord, people of Gomorrah. To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices to me, says the Lord? I am full. I desire not holocausts of rams, and the fat of lambs, and the blood of bulls and goats; nor when you come to appear in my sight (for who has required these things at your hands?) shall you tread my courts. If you bring fine flour, it is vain: incense is an abomination to me.

New moons and your sabbaths and the great day I cannot endure.

Your fasts and feasts and new moons and festivities my soul hates. For you have become a burden to me, I can no longer bear your sins. When you stretch forth your hands, I will turn away my eyes from you: and if you multiply prayer, I will not hear you: for your hands are full of blood. And these things indeed are harsh and full of wrath: that the princes of Sodom should be called the noble family of Abraham, that the people of Gomorrah should be called Israel chosen as an inheritance, that sacrifices should be unacceptable, solemn feasts abominable, fasts wearying. That eyes should be turned away from those who approach, that ears should be closed against those who pray, because their hands are full of blood: what is more grievous than this threat? What is more severe than these warnings? But let us see how God speaks in his wrath.

How the harsh words of God are now full of kindness.—For there follows (after it was said: Your hands are full of blood): Wash yourselves, be clean, put away wickedness from your souls, from the sight of my eyes. Learn to do good, seek judgment, deliver the one who suffers wrong, judge for the orphan, and justify the widow: and come, let us reason together, says: in both is contained, be converted. Says the Lord. And if your sins shall be as scarlet, I will make them white as snow: but if they shall be as crimson, I will make them as white wool. And if you shall be willing and shall hear me, you shall eat the good things of the land: but if you shall not be willing, nor shall hear me, the sword shall devour you. For the mouth of the Lord has spoken. Kindness follows upon terror. And for those to whom the vengeance of their crime is already owed, there yet remains the blessed confession of a penitent conscience.

For God does not immediately destroy in his wrath, but speaks, and with punishment still withheld, troubles only in his indignation. For those who were as crimson and scarlet, discolored with blood overflowing onto their hands, shall grow white as snow, and shall be made bright with the garment of blessed fleece. And let these things indeed be taken from the authority of the Old Testament: let us see whether also in the New the wrath of God is understood to be of such a kind as to save.

For John rebukes those whom he reproaches as a brood of vipers on account of the wickedness of their fathers' impiety toward him, and thus warns them unto salvation: Bring forth fruit worthy of repentance. And again the Lord himself: Come unto me all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will refresh you. But to those who rage against him, and not only in the passion but even after the passion—I say not merely gathering together, but breathing out persecution of the Church, flight of the apostles, slaughter of martyrs—God speaks thus in his anger: Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? And he said: Who art thou, Lord? And the Lord: I am Jesus of Nazareth, whom thou persecutest. But he, trembling and afraid at what had befallen him, said: Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? Thus he speaks in anger, thus in indignation he troubles, when upon those for whom punishment has been decreed on account of the merit of their impiety, fear and terror are brought by the admonition to desist.

How he troubles in a salutary manner.—But the prophet did not pass over even that chief and greatest proclamation of speaking in anger and in indignation, of troubling. For after he said: Then shall he speak to them in his anger, and in his fury he shall trouble them, in order to show what that speech of anger was and what troubling would be born from it, he added,

But I am appointed king by him over Sion his holy mountain, declaring his commandment.

The Lord said to me: Thou art my son, this day have I begotten thee. Ask of me, and I will give thee the nations for thine inheritance, and the ends of the earth for thy possession. Thou shalt rule them with a rod of iron, and shalt break them in pieces like a potter's vessel. Speaking in anger and troubling in indignation, he tempers both the manner of his anger and of his speaking.

For he neither conceals his anger by the power set before them, nor departs from his goodness by the terror first announced; so that fear of him whose power he demonstrates might call us back from impiety. Those who rage and meditate vain things are therefore troubled, when they know him as king, when they hear him as Son of God, when they learn that he is the possessor of the ends of the earth and heir of the nations, when they recognize that the right of ruling with a rod of iron belongs to him, when they understand that peoples are to be broken in pieces with the ease and facility of a potter's vessel. Thus he speaks in anger, thus he troubles in indignation—not punishing the impiety that has been committed, but troubling the impenitent unto the confession of repentance by the terror of the power that has been recalled to mind.

That the foregoing was spoken of Christ.—Although indeed through the prophetic spirit, on behalf of deeds to be done as one recalling them (because God is accustomed through his unambiguous providence to signify future things as past), it can be understood absolutely that all these things were spoken in the person of the only-begotten Son of God our Lord Jesus Christ; and it would be the greatest unfaithfulness to bring to these matters a hesitant mind of doubtful opinion; yet it must also be shown from evangelical and apostolic teachings that the Prophet foretold nothing of those things which were to be done and proclaimed that he had not prophesied beforehand; especially since no small error arises for the ignorant and simple in what was said: I this day have begotten thee. For since the only-begotten Son of God abides before all times, it is understood to be neither fitting nor consonant that he should be begotten on a day, since every day is in time.

For times, according to the knowledge prescribed to us by Moses, were measured out from the origin of the world and its constitution into their own motion and course, when they were distinguished through moments and hours and months and the year in a revolving succession upon itself: and time was established from time, because a mutual substitution of times both begets and terminates all times. And on this account a day is in time, through which all time both ends when begun and begins when ending. But the only-begotten Son of God, as he is the Word of God, so also the Word was God; he is not with times but before times; he is not in anything but before all things. For he existed when times were made, seeing that he made them. He therefore always existed.

For he is not bounded in time, not subjected to number; but he through whom is the origin of all things that are and can be said to be: he himself, from the rising of his infinite eternity, as begotten from eternity, persists in being. In order therefore that the meaning of the prophetic saying, whereby he says: I this day have begotten thee, may be understood, we must employ evangelical and apostolic and prophetic authority: so that we may understand either the prophet through the apostle, or the apostle through the prophet. Moreover the same order of evangelical sayings must be maintained as that of the psalm.

That Christ is king.—For this is the first point: But I am appointed king by him over Sion his holy mountain.

And I know not to whom it would be safe to doubt that Christ is king, since even the thief confessed this in the passion of the cross, saying: Remember me, Lord, when thou comest into thy kingdom. But the confession of the thief professing him to be king does not suffice. The Magi also about to adore him bear witness, when they ask: Where is he that is born king of the Jews? Pilate also bears witness when he asks: Art thou the king of the Jews? And the Lord professes it in answering: Thou hast said. He does not deny when questioned, nor does he glory when about to be humbled unto death. Since confession exists only from a response, thus he neither put himself forward as the author of the profession, nor did he begrudge the one questioning the truth of his knowledge.

That the Son of God is both God and man.—But it does not suffice to have answered that he is king; let us hear also who this one is who is king.

For the chief of the priests even questions him with an oath, saying: I adjure thee by the living God, that thou tell us if thou be the Christ the Son of God. And Jesus says to them: Thou hast said. The question is not now disapproved either, but both boastfulness and the glorying of a spontaneous profession are avoided; yet the truth that was sought is not denied. And thus the modesty of humility and the confession of truth are tempered, so that there is both duty in the response and knowledge in the question.

But we must await what the fruit of this response finally is—that Christ is the Son of God—namely what follows upon what was said, Thou hast said: Verily I say unto you, hereafter you shall see the Son of man sitting at the right hand of the power of God, and coming in the clouds of heaven. He who is the Son of man is likewise the Son of God: the nature of his nobility does not perish in the assumption of the Son of man. For he is not therefore not the Son of God because he is also the Son of man. For the accession of humility does not come about with a departure from divinity: nor did power receive an affront through the fellowship of weakness; seeing that weakness was endowed with the honour of power. For the Son of man sits at the right hand of God, coming to be seen with the clouds of heaven.

By which saying that prophecy is fulfilled which said: The Lord said to my Lord, sit thou at my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool.

What the king of heaven announces.—This king therefore is appointed over Sion the holy mountain of God, announcing the commandment of the Lord: not over that mountain of the ruined city, namely of Jerusalem

that is bewailed and is a murderer and a parricide: but over that Jerusalem which is in heaven, which is our mother, which is the city of the great king, whose inhabitants, as I think, are even to this day those who rose in the passion of the Lord. This king therefore, appointed, announces the commandment of God: so that they might remember that he would come with the clouds of heaven, against whom they raged and gathered together, so that being troubled through the knowledge of the divine coming they might repent of the outrage of the mocked bodily humility. 27. The temporal birth of Christ through the glory of the flesh.—The evangelical teaching maintains the order of the prophecy.

For in this very thing is contained the meaning of both sayings, namely of this saying: I am appointed king by him over Sion his holy mountain, announcing his commandment. The Lord said to me: Thou art my son, this day have I begotten thee. For when he says: Hereafter you shall see the Son of man sitting at the right hand of the power of God, he shows the time at which the Son of man, who is both Christ and the Son of God, was to be deemed worthy of sitting with God: so that because he was beforehand the Son of God, he was then also the Son of man; and that which he then is as Son of man, unto the perfect Son of God—that is, unto the resuming and granting to the body of his own glory of eternity—was to be begotten through the power of the resurrection: which glory he in bodily form demanded back from the Father.

For he who was in the form of God had taken the form of a servant. And for this accepted form of a servant he asks the glory of God in which he remained, saying: Father, glorify thou me with thyself with the glory which I had with thee before the world was. He seeks nothing new, he desires nothing foreign, he asks to be such as he had been: but he prays to be begotten into that which he previously was, that is, into what was his own. But he was not then wholly that same thing which he prayed to become: yet to become wholly nothing other than what he had been was what he asked. But since he is what he was, and is to be what he was not: toward that which he had been, that which was not wholly himself was being born with a certain beginning of a new origin.

This therefore is the day of his resurrection unto the assumption of glory, through which he is born unto that which he was before all times. But being born unto that which he was before all times, that which he was not is nevertheless born in time to be. And therefore the Son of man is henceforth to be seen sitting at the right hand of power, because the nature of the flesh, glorified after the resurrection, was being advanced toward the increase of that brightness which he had previously possessed: when the Son of man, about to sit with the Father, and with the corruption of the flesh absorbed into immortality, was being born into the living and henceforth never-dying Son of God.

He who by eternal birth is the firstborn of every creature, by temporal birth becomes the firstborn from the dead.—The blessed Apostle held fast this new and distinct significance of this temporal birth in him, set apart from that generation which is before all times, and its subdivided meaning. For when he had spoken of that blessed birth circumscribed by no times: The firstborn of every creature, because in him were created all things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible: he also commemorates him as firstborn from the dead in the resurrection, saying afterwards: The firstborn from the dead, that in all things he might hold the primacy. For he is born unto that which he was not, while yet that which he had been was coming to be. For he is the firstborn from the dead who was the firstborn of creation: firstborn from the dead for this reason, that he might remain the firstborn of creation. For he who is the firstborn from the dead is the same who was the firstborn of creation.

How he is reborn at once into something other and into the selfsame.—He is not now something other than he previously was, although he himself was also something other from another: but that which from another was also something other, was reborn into that very thing from which it had previously come forth as other. For he who was born of a virgin as man was even then the Son of God: but he who is the Son of man is likewise the Son of God. But born again from baptism, he was then also the Son of God: so that he might be born both into the selfsame and into something other. Now it is written that when he had ascended from the water: Thou art my son, this day have I begotten thee. But according to the generation of man being reborn, he himself was then also being reborn to God as a perfect son, with the Son of man thus also the Son of God being brought forth in baptism.

These words pertain to the resurrection: today I have begotten thee.—But that which is now in the psalm: Thou art my Son, I have this day begotten thee, belongs not to the birth from a virgin, nor to the generation of baptism, but to the firstborn from the dead, as apostolic authority attests. For in the book of the Acts of the Apostles it is said thus: And we declare unto you the promise which was made to the fathers. God hath fulfilled this to our children, raising up our Lord Jesus, as it is also written in the first psalm: Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee, when he raised him from the dead, to return no more to corruption. This voice of God the Father, therefore, according to the Apostle, came forth on the day of the resurrection: and let us see whether the Evangelists also teach the same thing. For the Lord, rising again, used such words to the apostles: All power is given to me in heaven and in earth.

Go now and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.

For rising again, he obtained all right in heaven and on earth. Moreover, in saying, it is given, he shows that he asked for what he received.

The nations, the inheritance of Christ.—For there follows,

Ask of me, and I will give thee the nations for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession.

He received therefore the inheritance of the nations which he asked for. For he asked when he said, Father, the hour is come; glorify thy Son, that thy Son may glorify thee. As thou hast given him power over all flesh: that he should give eternal life to all that thou hast given him. And again: I pray not for these alone, but for them also who shall believe in me through their word.

This therefore is his inheritance, that he give eternal life to all flesh, that all nations baptized and taught may be regenerated unto life; no longer, according to that divine canticle of Moses, given over to the dominion of angels, nor divided according to their number, but received into the household of the Lord and reckoned among the domestics of God; and translated from the unjust, sinful, and perverse rule of those who dominated, into the eternal and divine kingdom. For no longer is Israel alone the portion of the Lord, nor Jacob the line of his inheritance, but all nations, formerly divided according to the number of the angels, are now, as one and all one, this entire multitude of the nations the people of God: and this is the eternal inheritance of all who rise from the dead, belonging to this firstborn from the dead, the eternal heir.

Not the earth alone is given to his dominion.—In what is added: And the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession; it is not to be supposed that the repeated expression signifies the same thing, as though only the possession of the lands inhabited by the nations were granted to him. For it does not say: And thy possession even unto the ends of the earth, but the ends of the earth. Now that which bounds differs from that which is bounded. Nor is it the same thing to be finite and to set a limit. Nor is it one thing to receive a measure and to impose a measure: of which the one receives its limit from within, while the other is bounded and enclosed by a certain surrounding and opposing nature from without. For the earth is not so sunken in depth, or extended in breadth, or raised in height, that it is not on every side contained by the surrounding or underlying presence of a nature adjacent to it.

For the sunken and immense abyss of the infernal vastness sustains it; the breath of the surrounding and overarching air overshadows and encompasses it. That it is suspended over the abyss beneath it, the prophet testifies saying: He hath founded it upon the seas, and prepared it upon the rivers. And again: Who established the earth above the waters. And Scripture is accustomed to call this immense and infinite vastness the abyss, when Jonas, praying within the whale, is said to have spoken: The abyss hath compassed me about.

And this indeed infinite immensity, which according to the proper meaning of the word is understood to be signified in the abyss, is circumscribed by a spiritual and divine power, according to that word of the Apostle: Because all things are of him and through him, to him be glory for ever and ever. Moreover, that there are many inhabitants of this infernal region and vast abyss, we are taught by the Apocalypse of blessed John. When no one, neither in heaven, nor above the earth, nor below the earth, was found worthy to open the sealed book. This is not to be understood as referring to the dead and buried in the earth: since, for the demonstration of a third habitation, not those who are within the earth, but those who are below the earth; and not those who are dead, but those who are alive, had no one among them who could unseal the book.

When therefore the possession of the ends of the earth is granted to the Lord, it is not so much the earth

that is granted as those things by which the earth is bounded. For he received the ends of the earth, by which the earth itself is delimited.

What was granted to Christ is expounded from the Apostle.—The blessed apostle Paul (in whose mouth Christ spoke of himself) expounded the whole mystery of this matter, 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, becoming obedient unto death, even the death of the cross: wherefore God also hath exalted him, and hath given him a name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, on earth, and under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that the Lord Jesus Christ is in the glory of God the Father. Remaining therefore in the form of God, he took the form of a servant, namely, born as man from God.

And after the death of the cross he is exalted to the name which is above every name: for he is advanced into God, since there is no name beyond God; and this is granted to him as he asks for it, that is, that he might be what he had been before. For remaining in the form of God he had taken the form of a servant. He then received the possession of the ends of the earth, that is, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, on earth, and under the earth: and every tongue should confess that the Lord Jesus is in the glory of God the Father: Not earthly things alone, but heavenly and infernal things also are granted, and those things by which the earth is enclosed. And in the glory of God the Father he is born today, that is, the assumption of the form of a servant is honoured through the reward of death in the form of God which previously endured.

And a new birth comes to pass in time, yet not an unheard-of one: when he who had been found in the form of a servant from the form of God was born firstborn from the dead, to resume the glory of God the Father.

Whether ruling with an iron rod is contrary to God's goodness.—There follows next: Thou shalt rule them with a rod of iron, and shalt break them in pieces like a potter's vessel. To many who either hold wrong opinions or are ignorant of the force and proper meaning of divine words, these things seem contrary to the goodness of God: that the nations which the Son of God asked for as a possession and received as an inheritance, he should rule with the terror of an iron rod, and shatter after the manner of a potter's vessel. For it is not the part of any good person to give and receive things only to destroy them. And he who wills rather the repentance of sinners than their death is not thought, according to his own profession, to be acting in accordance with his nature, if he shatters with an iron rod those whom he asked to be given to him as an inheritance.

The word "rule" here says nothing harsh.—And first, lest any opening be given to this rash and impious presumption, the proper meanings of the words themselves as translated into the Roman tongue must be recognized. For that which we have: Rule them with a rod of iron, although the word rule itself is not tyrannical or unjust, but denotes a rational governance according to the judgment of equity and moderation: yet the Greek idiom signifies an even gentler disposition in the one ruling. For what we have as rule them, in the Greek is ποιμανεῖς αὐτοὺς, that is, rule them as a shepherd: meaning that he will have the care of ruling them with the affection of a shepherd: For he is the good shepherd, whose sheep we are, and who laid down his life for us. But lest we suppose that tyrannical authority is signified in the rod, what is the proper meaning of the word rod must be learned from the New and Old Testament.

The rod in the New Testament is the doctrine of God.—The blessed Paul, writing to the Corinthians, whom he was then calling back from many sins to repentance by a measured and salutary exhortation, says: What will ye? Shall I come to you with a rod, or in charity and in the spirit of meekness? Had Paul the authority of a praetor, that he should threaten with a rod and come to the Church of Christ with the office of a lictor? By no means is this to be supposed.

But because every word of God, by which we are drawn back from error to the truth of God, by which through the threat and terror of judgment we are guided along the path of innocent and holy life, is called a rod, through which, held within the discipline of divine fear, we are restrained by the admonition of a measured and provident ruler: the blessed Apostle added to those he was admonishing the condition of choosing the manner of his coming, whether they would prefer him to come in the severity of doctrine and reproof, or in the spirit of gentleness. Both of which were necessary according to the rule of moderation, so that he might come more gently to the obedient, but more severely to the insolent. And this indeed has been established from the authority of the New Testament.

So also in the Old: Christ is at once rod and flower.—That this doctrine of the word is called a rod is known from the Old Testament likewise, where it is said: The rod of direction, the rod of thy kingdom. Because this same direction of the rod is that by which through doctrine we are directed into the right and profitable way: and that which is the rod of the kingdom must itself be that doctrine of the kingdom. Moreover, that our Lord himself was called a rod on account of the profitable and measured preaching of his doctrine, we have received from Isaiah saying: There shall come forth a rod out of the root of Jesse.

And lest anyone should dare to suppose a tyrannical severity in him through the name of rod; the prophetic word immediately added: And a flower shall ascend from his root, and the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, so that the sweetness of the flower might temper the severity of the rod, while the terror of doctrine brought to each one of us the governance of perfect blessedness. In this rod therefore he will rule the nations given to him: not in one that is corruptible, not perishable, not fragile, but iron, that is, most strong and most firm by reason of the solidity of its nature.

He breaks those given to him in order to reform them.—With this iron rod, as he will rule, so also will he break and shatter: for the Greek idiom according to the seventy translators expresses this more precisely. For it is written thus: Ὡς σκεῦος κεραμέως συντρίψεις αὐτούς. But whether he shatters or breaks, he is not therefore to be thought to ask for an inheritance in order to break and shatter it for destruction and abolition: since a contrite heart is the best sacrifice for him. That breaking therefore or shattering is what in us crushes bodily pleasures and the incitements of worldly vices, and will render us worthy of the Lord's condescension, according to the word of the prophet: A contrite and humbled heart God will not despise. Moreover, the comparison of the breaking of a potter's vessel—how great a clarity of understanding does it impart to this interpretation?

For not without reason does he who rules with an iron rod those whom he asked for as an inheritance break them as a potter's vessel: except that by the example of the comparison he shows that the loss of this kind of breaking profits toward the restoration of the same vessel.

Now what manner of breaking of us by God, as by a potter's vessel, he taught through the prophet Jeremiah, saying: Arise, and go down to the potter's house; and there thou shalt hear my words. And I went down to the potter's house, and behold he was doing work upon the stones. And the vessel which he was making fell in his hands: and again he made another vessel according to what it pleased him to make in his sight. And the word of the Lord came to me, saying: Cannot I do with you as this potter, O house of Israel? Behold as clay in the potter's hand, so are ye in my hands. At one moment I will speak concerning a nation or concerning a kingdom, to pluck up and to destroy it: and if that nation shall turn from its evils, I will repent of the evils which I thought to do unto them.

And at another moment I will speak concerning a nation and a kingdom, to build and to plant it.

And they shall do evil before me, so as not to hear my voice; and I will repent of the good things which I had spoken to do unto them. Thus God will break and crush the nations sought and obtained as his inheritance, in order to reform them. For God breaks in all persons all insatiable desires, and alluring wantonnesses, and burning angers, and vain superstitions, and swelling pride, and impious opinions. But he reforms us to a rational use of life by contempt of money, by shame of luxury, by moderation of anger, by knowledge of truth, by fellowship of living, by the duties of religion: when through the guidance of doctrine and the terror of judgment we revive into these virtues after those vices.

For he does not say, Thou shalt break them as a potter's sherd, lest through a fragment of a potsherd the vessel might be understood as incapable of being reformed; but he says, a potter's vessel, which in the very working of the craftsman would become a vessel, so that according to the example set forth, the repair of that same broken vessel might be ready at the will of the craftsman.

As a vessel is easy for the potter, so is it easy for God to restore the penitent.—But this vessel of irrational matter, fitted also under another understanding to the reason of human will, signifies that men indeed fall through their vices; but if they should repent of these, that is, if they should cease from them, God also would repent in those things which he had appointed as punishment for this fall—not that this movement of mind according to human nature falls upon God, but because for man repentance for things done is a measure of things to be done. God also recalls his repentance unto punishment: because they would cease to be punished who had ceased to be impious. Therefore as it is easy for the potter to reform a lost vessel into the same or whatever shape he wishes: so it is easy for God, after the falls of vices, to restore those who are willing to be raised up, through the institution of his doctrine, from impiety to piety.

The foregoing things are applied to both the spiritual and the bodily resurrection.—But that breaking as a potter's vessel is also not to be ignored, when, with these bodies dissolved and broken by the fall of death, restoration shall be brought according to the will of the craftsman. Both of which things the prophetic word seems to have signified in the same saying. For when it shows repentance to be useful in those things which were formerly done, it teaches that there ought to be a new restoration, as it were, of this present life and body from vices into virtues, the anger of God against them ceasing as the will of their crimes ceases. And although he brought this forth from the comparison of the potter: yet when he says of the same potter: And he made another vessel according to what it pleased him in his sight, there is also understood to be signified that restoration of the bodies of those who rise again which is to come according to the will of God.

For as it pleases him, and as is worthy in his sight, he will repair what was broken, imparting to them the form of beauty pleasing to himself not from any other but from the old and very material of their own origin: so that the resurrection of corruptible bodies into the glory of incorruption may not destroy nature by destruction, but change it by a condition of quality. For it is not another body, though it shall rise into another state, as the Apostle says: It is sown in corruption, it shall rise in incorruption; it is sown in dishonour, it shall rise in glory; it is sown in weakness, it shall rise in power; it is sown a natural body, it shall rise a spiritual body. There is therefore a change made, but abolition is not brought about. And when that which was rises into that which it was not, it has not lost its origin, but has advanced to honour.

Let us therefore rejoice that we are broken as a potter's vessel, either now or then: so that now, after the manner of a potter's vessel, dead and buried together with the Lord in baptism, we may walk in newness of life: and putting off the old man we may be reborn into the new man of Christ, and then through this advance of new birth we may be reformed into that blessed and God-pleasing form of our renewed restoration.

Kings are roused to understanding.—The Prophet, not ignorant of this good, thereafter exhorts and says,

now, O kings, understand; be instructed, ye that judge the earth.

Serve the Lord in fear, and rejoice unto him with trembling. Lay hold of discipline, lest at any time the Lord be angry, and ye perish from the just way. When his anger shall be kindled in a short time, blessed are all they that trust in him. This order of teaching is most useful, that it may make known the blessedness of those things to which it exhorts us: because it is difficult to stretch the mind and hope toward things unknown. Therefore the Prophet, wishing to exhort us to the understanding of those things which he had mentioned above, first recalled the honour of understanding itself, saying: And now, O kings, understand, showing thereby that those who would understand are kings.

But it must be asked what kings he admonishes to the understanding of this prophetic exhortation: lest anyone perhaps understand those to be signified whose kingdom is now over human bodies, and the ministries of wars, and the fear of nations. But these are not eternal and blessed kings before God: since they themselves already fall away from the commandments of God, and are assigned to the devil's kingdom, as he said when tempting the Lord: And the devil led him up into a very high mountain, and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time: and the devil said to him: To thee will I give all this power and the glory of them, for they are delivered to me. But the Gospels show us other kings, namely those upon whom the kingdom of God has drawn near, and those who have conquered reigning sin within themselves, who are kings of their own body, subjecting all incentives of vices to their own dominion: for this is the kingdom of God within us.

So again Christ reigns in us, when through him we ourselves reign by right of lords over ourselves; according to what was said: The kingdom of God cometh not with observation: neither shall they say: Lo here, or lo there. For behold the kingdom of God is within you. The blessed Apostle mentions this kingdom writing to the Corinthians: Now ye reign without us; and would to God ye did reign, that we also might reign with you. This therefore is the kingdom of God where sin is conquered, where death is destroyed, where the enemy does not reign: For death reigned from Adam unto Moses. And the Apostle says: Let not sin reign in you. Through this kingdom of God, with the kingdom of sin dissolved, and the opposing kingdom already overthrown by us who are now kings, this shall be the kingdom of God for us, when all the stings of our vices have been crushed, and the stain of bodily weakness shall have been swallowed up.

What they are to understand.—These kings, then, the Prophet exhorts to understanding: that they may know that kings have raged against the Lord and his Christ, and that peoples have meditated vain things: that they may also understand him who laughs from heaven, and speaks in anger, and is established as king upon Sion his holy mountain, proclaiming the commandments of God the Father: and that they may know him who is begotten as a son; and also that time in which he who made the times was begotten in time. Let them understand in whom he asked for the inheritance of the nations and the possession of the ends of the earth: let them not be ignorant also of what this iron rod is, with which ruling them he breaks them after the manner of a potter's vessel.

For understanding these things, they will acknowledge the whole mystery of the divine will: and when through obedience to the commandments they shall be heirs of God the Father, and joint-heirs of our Lord Jesus Christ; through that whereby they are joint-heirs with the eternal king, it is necessary that they consequently be kings.

The judges of the earth are the saints whose life condemns the impious.—With the Gospels and the Apostle bearing witness concerning kings, it follows that we should know who are the judges of the earth, and who ought to be instructed as kings: especially since he designates kings by bare name alone without any designation of a kingdom, in order to teach that they are their own kings and kings within themselves; but calls them judges of the earth. Now we know from the very practice of earthly custom that a judge and a king differ; because it is not the same thing to reign as to judge; because kingdom is dominion, but judgment is a measure of equity. Therefore all the saints are to be understood as judges of the earth, whose life and faith is the judgment of the unfaithful and the wicked.

And this the Lord shows in the Gospels saying: The men of Nineveh shall rise in judgment, and shall judge this generation

because they did penance at the preaching of Jonas; and behold a greater than Jonas is here. The queen of the South shall rise in judgment, and shall judge this generation: because she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and behold a greater than Solomon is here. Such shall be the judges of the earth, whose comparison of faith and fear shall condemn the impenitent and the impious. For if the repentance of the Ninevites, undertaken at the preaching of Jonas, obtained the fruit of repenting, it is necessary that their obedient repentance judge the insolent impenitence of these others. Or shall not the queen of the South, coming from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon which she had desired, condemn by her foreign hearing the unfaithfulness and negligence of those present?

When nevertheless Christ, the author, accumulates the judgment of disobedience and inattentiveness, deferring it from Solomon and Jonas.

But the Apostle shows these to be absolutely judges of the earth, saying: Know ye not that the saints shall judge the world, and the world shall be judged in you? When through the merit of attained blessedness, holiness compared condemns the life of the criminal.

That fear, joy, and trembling may temper the mind of God's servant.—The Prophet immediately subjoined the work of this understanding and instruction, saying: Serve the Lord in fear, and rejoice unto him with trembling. He does not permit service that is secure or negligent: he wills that fear be mingled in every duty of service. For as fearing servants serve their earthly masters more diligently, when the dread of obedience mingled with the will of more careful service elicits it: so also those serving God, if they fear through imminent fear, will not be negligent in that service which they have undertaken. And lest this fear be thought to be the terror of a tyrant for the faithful; to what he had said, Serve the Lord in fear, he added, and rejoice unto him: so that the exultation of joy might temper the dread of service, since fear itself would bring the cause of gladness through the consciousness of faithful service.

Moreover, lest the freedom of joy should exceed the bounds of fitting moderation; he thus added: Rejoice with trembling

because joy free from trembling would be dangerous toward forgetfulness of fear. And thus this reasoning of the prophetic word was preserved, so that fear might hold service in check, exultation might moderate fear, and consequent trembling might restrain exultation.

There should be fervour in the service of God.—Now the fear that exults and the exultation that trembles in this service he taught to consist in what follows, saying: Lay hold of discipline.

By the force of the word he shows the meaning of an impatient and as it were overeager will toward this, teaching that discipline is not so much to be sought as rather to be seized: not content with a lukewarm faith in the observance of this obedience, but desiring an ardour of spirit in the eagerness of seizing. Thus the Lord, delighted with one who seizes the kingdom of heaven, says: But from the days of John the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away, because when the possession of the heavenly kingdom was proclaimed to Israel, yet the faith of the nations seized this possession for itself while Israel was diffident.

The example of Paul.—So also blessed Paul runs, that he may apprehend, saying: But I follow after, if that I may apprehend, in which also I am apprehended. He hastens not with slow step, nor does he follow with idle running; for he follows in order to apprehend. And he would seem to have said enough, if he followed in order to overtake, but he himself also desires to apply force, and hastens to apprehend, and after the manner of a bodily example to seize. Yet he knows that by this very fact of hastening to apprehend, he is already apprehended.

For if God, through our bodily nature, apprehended us as a man born of a nature at variance with His own, having Himself become what we are; it is ours now to strive toward apprehending that which He Himself is, so that our haste may join itself to that glory into which He lifts the nature of this bodily corruption: and thus we shall apprehend that in which we were apprehended, if we attain to the nature of God, God having first attained to the nature of men. Discipline therefore must be apprehended, and seized with a kind of embrace and held in a bodily bond: lest it slip away or fall from our grasp. 48. Who perish from the just way, being estranged from it.—The prophet added the reason for this diligent embrace and bond, saying: Lay hold of discipline, lest at any time the Lord be angry, and ye perish from the just way. For when his anger shall be kindled in a short time.

For the day of punishment is at hand, which is understood to be signified in the kindling of the Lord's anger: in which, if we shall not hold fast the discipline we have apprehended, we shall be lost from the just way. For to each thing, whatever is taken away from it perishes; and what is lacking seems already lost to that from which it is absent. For although it may remain in its own nature, yet it does not remain for him from whom it is absent. And therefore the ungodly perish from the just way, because they will not be in it. But they perish from the just way when his anger shall be kindled in a short time.

The ungodly immediately after death suffer the punishments of hell.—This anger, through which they perish from the just way, is not slow; lest anyone meanwhile flatter himself with the gain of a delay in punishment during the intervals before judgment. For the anger is kindled in a short time. For hell the avenger receives us immediately: and as we depart from the body, if we have so lived, we straightway perish from the right way. The witnesses for us are the rich man and the poor man in the Gospel: of whom the angels placed the one in the seats of the blessed and in Abraham's bosom, while the other was immediately received by the region of punishment. So immediately did punishment receive the dead man, even while his brothers still remained in the upper world. There is no delay or postponement there. For the day of judgment is either the eternal retribution of blessedness, or of punishment.

But the time of death holds each one in the meantime under his own laws, while it reserves each one either for Abraham or for punishment until the judgment.

Trust in God is needful.—And therefore the Prophet concluded this psalm, so rich in heavenly mysteries, thus: Blessed are all they that trust in him. The perfection of blessedness requires no trembling or uncertain hope. Confidence is needed for this work, that is, of firm conviction and unchangeable will: because to trust is more than to hope. We must therefore trust, lest the anger of God, kindled in a short time, destroy us from the right way. For faithful is he who says: He that believeth in me shall not be judged, but shall pass from death unto life. Our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

Unto the end, for the hidden things of the Son. A Psalm of David.

Some psalms easy, others difficult to grasp.—The understanding of some psalms is straightforward, the sense of others more obscure; the diversity of prophecy naturally brings about this diversity.

For the Holy Spirit instructs man toward the knowledge of God through many and varied kinds of discourse, now comprehending the hidden things of the mysteries through the natures and comparisons of men, now commending the simplicity of faith through the plainness of words, now confirming the order of life through the truth of precepts, now showing through the person of the prophet who writes the psalm what is to be provided for and guarded against: so that through this manifold and rich abundance of teaching, through certain stages and degrees of learning, the edifice of complete understanding may be built up. And there shall be set before us as an example a psalm whose superscription is as follows: Unto the end, for the hidden things of the Son, a Psalm of David.

Therefore through the nature of those things which are both hidden and unto the end, the understanding of the psalm must be sought.

The title is an index of the things treated.—The psalm is not inscribed, Unto the end, for the hidden things of the Son, except for this purpose alone, that it might be known from what things the psalm itself consists. But all things that are added to the title of a discourse bear witness to the sources from which the discourse has been taken up. For it is not fitting that in the discourse there should be one thing, and another in the title; because the title is as it were an index of the things about which one writes. The meaning therefore of that word which is said unto the end must be understood.

The end is that beyond which there is nothing; the end is that which surpasses the present time

because the end comes from all things, not all things from the end: for all things cease in it, and it is a certain last point of a thing done or said: and unless the uttermost limit of the whole universe shall be in it, it will not be the end; because that which has something further beyond itself cannot be the last. From which it is to be understood that whenever the title has unto the end, not present things are contained in these psalms, but final things. Now hidden things are those which are concealed and latent, and which are hidden in recondite and inaccessible and impenetrable places, known only to him who established them, or unless they have brought them forth to be known with some others. The psalm therefore is inscribed unto the end, for hidden things.

And because from the nature of things it is clear what understanding lies in the names of end and of hidden things, it is fitting that the very things which are unto the end and among hidden things should then be explained.

And of these things indeed the blessed Apostle is our witness, speaking thus: As ye read, ye are able to understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ, which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed. And again: Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to make all men see what is the dispensation of his mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God. This therefore is the hidden thing, of which also the Lord says: There is nothing hidden that shall not be known, nor covered that shall not be revealed. But the psalm contains hidden things, not one hidden thing. Rightly so: for the sequel shows that there were many, not one.

For it is a hidden thing, that God, for the cause of human salvation, was present not in heavenly glory and the splendor of His own name, but put on the form of a human body. It is also a hidden thing, that the nature of human flesh in Him was not assumed from the common origin of birth, but came forth from a virgin and was brought forth by a virgin, begotten without the beginning of being born. It is a hidden thing, that He who died lived from death, resuming from the body the glory of immortality. But that indeed is not yet the end.

What end he signifies.—By end he signifies not a certain setting of things, but the measure and consummation of things running their course; not that they should cease in abolition, but that the things of which he treats should be placed at a certain limit of abiding. What therefore this end is, and likewise what is the absolute perfection of all things, and how hidden it is, the blessed Apostle speaks thus to the Corinthians: For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then they that are Christ's, who believed at his coming; then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God the Father, when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power. For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet: for God hath put all things under his feet. The last enemy that is destroyed is death.

But when he shall say: All things are put under him, it is manifest that he is excepted which did put all things under him, then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be all in all. This therefore is the end of the hidden things: the resurrection of the dead, the glorification of the saints, the abolition of reigning wickedness, the destruction of death; and through this the kingdom of Christ, and also the kingdom of God the Father.

For when these things have been accomplished, after all things have been subjected to the Son by the Father, not that by the subjection of the kingdom eternity should be taken away, but that He may lead us, glorified and clothed with immortality and conformed to the glory of His body, into the kingdom of the Father, now worthy of His co-inheritance, now received into the family of the Father, now partakers of His goods and glory, so that He may co-reign with the Father in us, and God may be all in all, when through the subjection of obedience the weakness of the human assumption is absorbed into the divine nature.

This eternal praise therefore is owed to God the Father through the Son, when all who have lived by faith from Adam until the time of the kingdom shall have been raised up, and transformed from the body with a heavenly vesture, and all the iniquity of wickedness removed, and the devil condemned to the punishment of eternal fire, and his name blotted out from the memory of men; these hidden things are sung in the psalm, these things are celebrated at the consummation of the end. And because the Son is conscious of all future things, these things are praised as already accomplished, because in Him, and with Him, and through Him all things are: to Him be glory for ever and ever. Amen.

The fool hath said in his heart: There is no God.

They are corrupt, and are become abominable in their desires: there is none that doeth good, there is not even one. The Lord looked down from heaven upon the sons of men: to see if there be any that understandeth or seeketh after God. They are all gone aside, they are together become unprofitable: there is none that doeth good, there is not even one. Their throat is an open sepulchre, with their tongues they dealt deceitfully, the poison of asps is under their lips. Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness, their feet are swift to shed blood. Destruction and misery are in their ways, and the way of peace they have not known: there is no fear of God before their eyes. Shall not all they know, who work iniquity, who devour my people as they eat bread? They have not called upon the Lord: there they trembled with fear, where there was no fear.

For God is in the just generation: ye have confounded the counsel of the poor man: because the Lord is his hope. Who shall give out of Sion the salvation of Israel? When the Lord shall have turned away the captivity of his people, Jacob shall rejoice, and Israel shall be glad. Or to be heard.—The fool hath said in his heart: There is no God, and the rest. The Apostle, instructing us in many things, teaches us also this, that the word of God must be handled with all reverence, saying: He that speaketh, let him speak as the oracles of God. For in these matters there ought not to be, according to the usage of our own speech, a promiscuous facility; but when we speak the things we have learned and read, honor must be rendered to the author through the care of our discourse. And the custom of human duty furnishes us an example of heavenly teaching.

For if one who interprets the words of a king and conveys his commands to the ear of the people takes diligent and careful pains, through the reverence of his office, to satisfy the dignity of the king, so that all things may be both read and heard with honor and devotion: how much more is it fitting that we, who bring back the eloquence of God to human understanding, should show ourselves worthy of this office? For we are a certain instrument of the Holy Spirit, through which the variety of voice and the diversity of teaching must be heard.

We must therefore be watchful and take care that we say nothing base, fearing the law of this sentence: Cursed is every one that doeth the work of the Lord negligently; with the reward of care and diligence set before those on the other side, who with reverence and fear commend the holy Scriptures to themselves as the very words of God, and with due dignity convey them to the minds of their hearers, the Lord saying: And upon whom shall I look, but upon the humble and meek and him that trembleth at my words. It is fitting therefore both that those who preach should consider that they are not speaking to men, and that those who hear should know that it is not the words of men that are set before them, but the voices of God, the ordinances of God, the laws of God, and that the greatest reverence befits each office.

For it is a matter of the greatest peril either to bring forth anything superfluous from the treasures of God, from His hidden mysteries, from His eternal testament, or to hear it negligently. All things must be sealed in our minds, committed to our understanding, because there is nothing in the words of God that is not to be fulfilled; and everything that has been said has already a certain necessity of being accomplished; because the words of God are decrees.

The psalm which has been read is inscribed "to the end." If all were so inscribed, there would be no difficulty; for the generality would exclude every question. But since one has one inscription and another has another, it is necessary that the diversity of inscriptions arose from diverse causes. Now there is a twofold understanding of those which are superscribed "to the end": for either they will contain the things that shall be at the consummation, or the end of the psalm will impart the conclusion of the things spoken throughout the whole psalm. Now in the psalm all things are harsh, dreadful, wearisome, full of blasphemies, filled with crimes, heavy with complaints. There is no confession toward God, no joy in gladness, no song in choirs; but accusation against the profane, complaint against the contumacious, grief over the afflicted. For it says,

The fool hath said in his heart: There is no God.

They are corrupt, and have become abominable in their desires; there is none that doeth good, there is not even one, and the rest.

Then at the end it follows,

Who shall give out of Sion the salvation of Israel?

When the Lord shall have turned away the captivity of his people, let Jacob rejoice, and let Israel be glad.

A physician is sought for a ruined world.—For as one who has entered a plague-stricken city and beheld all its inhabitants utterly dissolved by disease, burning with fevers, and consumed by diverse kinds of sickness, and finding no physician there groans aloud, and grieves that no help, no remedy is at hand for such great evils, and perceives daily that the pestilence of the members rages ever more fiercely, and knows that a physician placed far away could heal if he were present; having only this left, he cries out in the grief of despair, saying: Who is there who could make him present and bring his salvation?—turning all his anxiety into prayers: in like manner the Holy Spirit, beholding the error of the human race, beholding the evils of this world growing heavier, and the disease spreading with incurable death, where God is denied by the fool, where all are corrupted by the abominable deceits of pleasures, where there is none willing to do good, where their throats are the sepulchres of the innocent, where they have used their tongue for the service of deceit, where the poison of asps is poured forth upon their lips and in their words, where the mouth is full of bitterness and cursing, where the swift course of their feet is to shed blood; and through these things, for those who do not know the way of peace, unhappiness grows heavier in all the ways of their life: where there is no reverence toward God, where the devastation of the people of God is to their persecutors as the food of bread, and the deaths, losses, and torments of the innocent become the satiety of the wicked: where God is not invoked, and there is trembling at nothing; reverencing the creature in idols with the Creator forsaken: where God is despaired of dwelling in the just generation, and the counsel of the poor is confounded, and the hope of patience and the right is mocked: when therefore such evils are thus raging and holding dominion over the whole world, the Holy Spirit, knowing him who alone can bring aid, cries out: Who shall give out of Sion the salvation of Israel?

For Moses had not given it, nor Elias, nor Isaias, nor the Prophets; all the works of the Law were made weak against so great a pestilence of diseases. There was need of a physician who with one and the same power of his aid would cure all things, and would heal so many and various languors throughout the whole world, not by skill, not by labor, (for when would skill and labor applied to individuals have availed?) but by the power of his word. The Spirit seeks him, the Spirit awaits him, at whose coming fever would cease, blindness would end, palsy would be no more, death would not prevail; him he awaits, him he proclaims, him he prays for: Who shall give out of Sion the salvation of Israel? But in each several word, each several virtue is to be unfolded.

Sion is the body of Christ.—What Sion is, the Apostle teaches when he says: Let us draw near to mount Sion, to the holy city of Jerusalem; for we all run to lay hold of that in which we have been laid hold of by Christ, that is, to be found in his body, which he himself took from us, in which we were chosen by the Father before the foundation of the world, in which we were reconciled from being enemies, and acquired from being lost, in which the Apostle desires to be found at the loss of all things, saying: And I count all things as dung, that I may gain Christ and be found in him. Therefore, because these diseases of our body were not to be taken away except through the assumption of our flesh, and through the assumption of flesh all our salvation is in God, for this reason he says thus: Who shall give out of Sion the salvation of Israel?

The name "salvation," promised to the gentiles, is the name of Christ.—But in that which is "salvation," there is the power of a name.

We do not adapt or fashion this ourselves: but we are taught in the books of the Old Testament that the salvation of the Lord our God is so named, and this name has always been properly granted by promise to the gentiles. For Isaias says: The Lord hath revealed his holy arm in the sight of all the nations, and all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God. It has therefore been revealed to all nations, and has been known by all. And again in the psalms the Holy Spirit cries out: Sing ye to the Lord a new canticle, because he hath done wonderful things. The Lord hath made known his salvation, he hath revealed his justice in the sight of the nations. And again: Declare his glory among the nations, and his salvation among all peoples.

And again: Shew us, O Lord, thy mercy, and grant us thy salvation.

The longing of this hope the Lord shows in the Gospel, saying: Many prophets and just men have desired to see the things that you see, and to hear the things that you hear. This salvation Simeon awaited for a long time, and when he had received it in his arms, he recognized it, and amid the cries of infancy and the squalor of the cradle he saw God through faith. In such things, recognizing, he adored, saying: Now thou dost dismiss thy servant, O Lord, according to thy word in peace: because my eyes have seen thy salvation, which thou hast prepared before the face of all peoples, a light for the revelation of the gentiles. This salvation of the gentiles is therefore announced, not to carnal Israel, who on the mountain awaited the Lord of majesty, saw him, heard him; who stoned, fell away, sawed asunder and slew the prophets. But this whole word is to the gentiles, and the salvation belongs to the gentiles.

Thus it says: When the Lord shall turn away the captivity of his people.

Captivity properly belongs to the gentiles, who had said in their heart: There is no God; who had trembled where there was no fear, who had confounded and mocked the hope of the poor, because the Lord is his hope; who had denied that the Lord would dwell in the just generation, held captive by the religions of demons, by the superstitions of the seasons, by the service of the creature. This captivity is named, this servitude is taken away. But Israel will be he who believes, Israel will be he who shall behold God with the eyes of the heart: because Israel means "seeing God," who after the captivity is turned away recognizes this salvation of God. Jacob rejoices, and Israel rejoices with the captivity turned away, with liberty granted, with God contemplated, with Abraham and Jacob the patriarchs named by adoption into the family.

In these things therefore let us rejoice, and in these let us exult, knowing that through our redemption there are joys in heaven among the angels for the salvation of one penitent; and since heavenly joy is on our behalf, it is fitting that our joys in Christ be perpetual, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

Lord, who shall dwell in thy tabernacle, or who shall rest in thy holy mountain?

He that walketh without blemish, and worketh justice; he that speaketh truth in his heart, who hath not used deceit in his tongue, nor done evil to his neighbour, and hath not taken up a reproach against his neighbours. In his sight the malignant is brought to nothing: but he glorifieth them that fear the Lord. He that sweareth to his neighbour, and deceiveth not: who hath not put out his money to usury, nor taken bribes against the innocent. He that doeth these things shall not be moved for ever.

The scope of the psalm.—The psalm which has been read is inscribed "a psalm of David"

because through him the Holy Spirit spoke these things. And this rightly befits the psalm; for nothing is directed to another time, nothing is brought forth from hidden things, but its whole work is in the present. Finally it begins thus,

Lord, who shall dwell in thy tabernacle, or who shall rest in thy holy mountain?

It is a simple prayer of one beseeching the Lord and desiring to know from him what manner of life, what zeal, what will belongs to one who is to dwell together with God, and to rest in his high and heavenly places. For it is not for a humble soul or a mediocre work to be joined to God, to merit the fellowship of the same dwelling.

Therefore concerning those about whom the question is asked, an answer is immediately given: so that, since it is arduous and difficult to obtain these things, it may be understood by what means this is to be achieved.

It contains in few words many and excellent precepts.—For in answer to what was asked it says,

He that walketh without blemish, and worketh justice, and the rest that follows in the psalm. By such precepts is formed, by such admonitions is instructed, he for whom the journey is toward God, for whom the ascent is to his heights, for whom rest is in his eternal places. Moreover every precept is gathered into brevity, so that it may be committed to memory, so that it may cleave to the mind, so that abroad and at home, publicly and privately, by day and by night it may be retained, obeyed, and persisted in. For this brevity is rich and boundless, and drawn from all the precepts and institutions of the Old and New Testament, most fitting for children, women, men, and old men. And that the abundance of this very brevity may be the more commendable, we set forth what sacrament lies in each several word. Here there is no prophecy, no obscurity, no example.

There is the voice of one asking, the goodness of one answering, the confirmation of one hearing.

But in these things the power of the words is to be contemplated. For he distinguished thus: dwelling in the tabernacle, rest on the mountain: and dwelling in the tabernacle comes first, rest on the mountain comes after. Therefore, that the difference between dwelling and rest may be understood, the proper meaning of mountain and tabernacle must be explained.

Tabernacles instituted by Moses.—And the tabernacles which we read to have existed first were light, perishable, withering, covered for a time with boughs, such as are sometimes made by us for the purpose of avoiding the heat, so that beneath their shade we may avoid the burning and heat of the sun. Tabernacles of this kind were instituted for the people through Moses. But these have dried up and been dissolved. For they were figurative and made as a pattern. For God says thus to Moses: See that thou make all things according to the pattern which was shewn thee in the mountain. David also, desiring to build a temple, called it a tabernacle, as he says: I will not give sleep to my eyes until I find a place for the Lord, a tabernacle for the God of Jacob.

But both Moses and Solomon built a tabernacle, and thereafter the Apostles built very many tabernacles, and throughout all parts of the world, in all places that can be reached, and even on the islands of the Ocean, they prepared many dwellings for God. Of whose glory the Holy Spirit bears witness: How lovely are thy tabernacles, O God of hosts! My soul longeth and fainteth for the courts of the Lord. The Prophet therefore does not desire one tabernacle, whether the leafy one through Moses, or the one longed for through David, or the one adorned with all human works through Solomon; but many and innumerable ones: because even if in the world the Church is one, yet each city has its own church; and it is one in all, though there are many, because the one is held in the many.

How blessed is the continual dwelling in temples.—The first and greatest step therefore for those ascending to heavenly things is to dwell in this tabernacle, and there to pass the life of the whole age by night and by day, removed from the cares of the world, and leaving behind the affairs of this world, as many of the saints never departed from the tabernacle: as it is written of Joshua the son of Nun: And Joshua the young man departed not from the tabernacle; and Anna the prophetess departed not from the temple, serving with fastings and supplications night and day. After which things one must rest on the mountain of the Lord: for from here those setting out have their journey thither, and there is no journey at all except through this dwelling. Therefore the question had first to be asked about dwelling in the tabernacle; because from it would be the ascent to the mountain, and then dwelling belongs to time and labor.

But rest is not interrupted from without, but is a continual, perpetual, trouble-free leisure, which remains in its own state: for if unquietness mingles with it, it has lost both the nature and the name of rest.

The mountain in which the body of Christ rests.—But there is no mountain of the Lord upon earth: for all the earth has long since been made subject to curses through the vices of men. For it merited offense both in the works of Adam and in the blood of Abel, and under Noah it was full of the sins of its inhabitants, and even now the lofty and high places of the mountains are defiled by shrines, temples, and sacred rites. Therefore this mountain is not to be awaited in such places as these. But just as the highest parts of the ground are called mountains, so it is necessary to understand under the name of mountain those things which are greatest and most sublime among heavenly things. And what is more sublime than Christ? Or what more exalted than our God? Now his mountain is that body which he assumed from man, in which he now dwells, lofty and exalted above every principality and power and every name.

Upon this mountain is built the city which cannot be hidden: because, as the Apostle says: There is no other foundation except Christ.

Therefore, because those who are Christ's were chosen in Christ's body before the foundation of the world, and the Church is the body of Christ, and the foundation of our building is Christ, and the city is built upon the mountain: this is that mountain upon which it is asked who can be at rest. In another psalm we read thus concerning this same mountain: Who shall ascend the mountain of the Lord, or who shall stand in his holy place? And Isaiah will be our witness: And it shall come to pass in the last days that the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be made manifest, and they shall say: Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob. And again Paul: You have come to mount Sion, and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem.

If therefore all our hope of rest is in the body of Christ, and since rest must be had upon the mountain, we can understand the mountain to be nothing other than the body which he took from us, before which he was God, and in which God is and through which he transfigured the body of our humility, conformed to the body of his glory; provided that we also have nailed the vices of our body to his cross, so that we may rise again in his body. For to that body one ascends after dwelling in the Church, in it one rests in the sublimity of the Lord, in it we shall be joined with the choirs of Angels, when we too are the city of God. There is rest, moreover, because no pain arises from infirmities, no fear from want; but with all things using their own firmness through the power of eternity, rest is to be had in those things beyond which they need nothing.

To avoid vices, to pursue virtues.—Therefore, in answer to what was asked, Lord, who shall dwell in thy tabernacle?

The Holy Spirit answered through the Prophet: He that walketh without blemish, and worketh justice. He then who enters undefiled, and lives free from every stain of sin, is the one who has been answered, upon whom after the washing of baptism no defilements have clung, but who is spotless and clean, and whose body is not contaminated by fornications, whose eyes are not soiled by theatrical spectacles, whose mind is not drunk with wine, whose life is not enslaved to money. It is therefore a great thing to abstain from these things; but rest from the journey already completed is not immediately found in the absence of these things: for the way has been begun in these things, not completed. For it follows: And worketh justice. Good is not so much to be thought upon as to be carried out: and benevolence is not to be entered upon, but to be fulfilled.

For to will justice, this will be its fruit, that it be done. And indeed in these things the course toward the Lord is profitable; yet many things remain.

For there remains,

He that walketh without blemish, and worketh justice. Who speaketh truth in his heart. Those things above, although they are great and excellent, are nevertheless wont to be common even among the gentiles, that they avoid vice, that they acquire a reputation for goodness. But this is the virtue of the animal man, not of the spiritual. For the Apostle set forth both the carnal man, and the animal, and the spiritual: the carnal, who after the manner of a beast neglects things divine and human, whose life is the servant of the body, busied with food, sleep, and lust. The animal man, however, is one who perceives by the judgment of human sense what is fitting and honorable, and withdraws himself from all vices by his own authority, judging by his own proper sense what is useful and honorable; so that he despises money, is sparing in fasts, is free from ambition, resists pleasures, and is venerable for his goodness.

But the use of such a man will be present only in these things and among men.

Concerning these the Doctor of the gentiles says: According to the doctrines and precepts of men, which have indeed a show of wisdom in superstition and humility of mind, and not sparing the body, not in any honor, to the satisfying of the flesh. But the spiritual man is one for whom those higher pursuits toward the Lord are his concern, and what he does, he does through the knowledge of God, understanding and recognizing what his will is, comprehending the secret of the hidden counsel concealed from the ages of the world through the revelation and gift of the Holy Spirit, and knowing what is the reason for the flesh assumed by God, what the triumph of the cross, what the power of death, what the working in the virtue of the resurrection.

These things, as the same apostle teaches, the animal man does not perceive, which are the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness to him: neither can he understand

because they are spiritually examined. But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man.

Works without faith are barren.—The Holy Spirit therefore, being aware that those things which are superior in innocence of life and in works of justice are common both to gentiles and to heretics. For many of them also weary their bodies with fasts, and attest their continence by the generosity of their patrimony, and crown their chastity with virginity. But because these things and many such would abound in them, the Lord spoke thus to his disciples: Amen I say to you, when the Son of man cometh, thinkest thou he shall find faith on earth? He knew that virginity and continence and fasts were to be cultivated; and because these do not profit unto holiness unless they are fulfilled in Christ, that is, unless they agree with the truth of Christ; to what he had said above, the prophet added: And speaketh truth in his heart, showing those things above to be useless unless they have been taken up in the truth of confession.

And in these things indeed the step is lofty for those ascending to the rest of the mountain of the Lord, namely in innocence, and in works, and in confession: but although we have advanced through many things, there are still other things remaining.

To bring forth the truth of faith in word and deed.—For many are wont to put forward a glorious appearance of understanding in words, and to feign the grace of will and judgment even by the elegance of speech; while they think and speak rightly of God, yet by their deeds and actions they give the lie to their words and their own convictions. These are they who hate what they say, and are enemies in their very acts to what they preach. Therefore to the truth of the heart he added, saying: Who hath not used deceit in his tongue; so that he may not betray in words the truth which he feels; so that the profession of Catholic doctrine, and the judgment of thinking and preaching thus, may also be followed by action: because, according to the testimony of the Apostle, as one believes in the heart, so confession is made with the mouth unto salvation.

Therefore, that the ascent to the rest of God may be worthy, one must live in the truth of words and tongue: so that through the faithfulness of our actions our words may not be false.

The officious lie.—But this is a narrow and difficult path through the wickedness and vices of the world.

For a lie is often necessary, and falsehood is sometimes useful, when we lie about someone in hiding to one who would strike him, or we frustrate testimony against one in danger, or we deceive a sick person about the difficulty of his cure; and it is necessary according to the teaching of the Apostle that our speech be seasoned with salt. For this reason the Holy Spirit now tempered the disposition toward falsehood with the conditions of lying, saying: Who hath not used deceit in his tongue, nor done evil to his neighbour, so that the crime of lying would be reckoned in the harm done to another.

Not to be insolent toward others or to trust in oneself.—But even if what we have said above is fulfilled, and one enters innocent, and works justice, embracing truth in his heart, not deceiving himself in what he has spoken, not bringing evil upon his neighbor; he will nevertheless not be perfect in these things. There is still something in us to be tamed, cast out, destroyed: and what that is, the same prophet who confirms the foregoing adds, saying: And hath not taken up a reproach against his neighbours. He drives away, that is, the vices of insolence and self-confidence, and removes that common evil of pride. For what is so empty, so wretched, as a man being proud toward another man, as one trusting in himself for something? Do we not see many who, through the insolence of wealth, when they had reproached the poverty of the poor, come to want after losing everything; and those who disdained the misery of others, have in turn needed those who show mercy?

And many also, through presumption of a long innocent life, have fallen into crimes, and while they were reproaching others for their faults, have themselves barely attained to the grace of penitence? Reproach therefore is not to be taken up against neighbors: but if anything careless, anything wanton, anything negligent, anything incontinent is found in them, it is to be corrected without the bitterness of reproach, with the gentleness of amendment. This humility, this distrust of oneself through fear, which is the strongest guardian of self-confidence, takes care that admonition not be contumely, that correction not be reproach, that instruction not be abuse. Thus the Lord in the Gospels condemned the confidence of the praying Pharisee, when standing in the midst he spoke thus: I give thee thanks, O God, that I am not as the rest of men, adulterers, covetous, as also is this publican. But the publican was praying in secret: O God, be merciful to me a sinner.

To this prayer of his Scripture added, That the publican went down to his house more justified than the Pharisee.

The publican merited the mercy of God by the confession of his sin: but the Pharisee lost the honor of what he had proclaimed of himself through the insolence of reproach.

Humility must not lack constancy.—But perhaps someone may now believe himself worthy of the promises of God, if he has attained all these things; since after innocence, after goodness, after the measure of prudence, he has also moderated himself with humility. But many things still remain. For just as he signified that there is sin in that lie which brings evil to another through the falsehood of the liar; so now where he decrees that reproaches are not to be taken up against neighbors, he added that account must nonetheless be taken of humility itself. And what this account is, is joined in the

hath not taken up a reproach against his neighbours.

In his sight the malignant is brought to nothing. Humility ought not to lack constancy, and the freedom of God is to be retained by us in that service which we owe to all, lest we be terrified at the assaults of the powerful, lest we yield to the judgments of the malevolent.

For sometimes we even serve kings demanding unjust things with shameful flattery, and we fawn upon the vices of others through the weakness of our own conscience. Therefore if one has already broken out into the profession of iniquity, as is explained in the

In his sight the malignant is brought to nothing, such a man ought to be in our judgment not of some account, but of none, so that he is nothing to us, abolished, destroyed.

For it befits one who handles spiritual things and contemplates heavenly things to despise the impulses of human wickedness, and with a lofty and exalted mind to regard such a man of malevolence as though he were nothing.

Honor is to be denied to none who fears God.—The prophet may perhaps be judged to have raised the greatness of our faith too high against the wicked. But one must observe what follows: In his sight the malignant is brought to nothing: but he glorifieth them that fear the Lord. Therefore just as without respect of persons no one who is malignant ought to be anything to us; so also without respect of persons every one who fears the Lord is to be honored. Let not the innocent poor man move us to contempt, nor the fasting old woman, nor the faithful slave, nor the stranger dwelling in the habitation of the church; but let us reverence all with equal judgment, so that such may be the humility in the glorification of those who fear the Lord, as the freedom ought to be in esteeming as nothing those who are malevolent.

What is sworn at Baptism must be steadfastly kept.—And we who, in the birth of our regeneration, swear to these sacraments, renouncing the devil, the world, and sins, make our responses to those who question us; he establishes that the faith of this confession must be kept to the end, saying: Who swears to his neighbor and does not deceive. For even if someone has long remained in the commandments of God, yet if he has at some point failed, he no longer remains once he has failed, and the earlier righteousness is lost in time by unrighteousness. In the Gospel: Blessed are they who shall have remained unto the end. Therefore in Solomon all praise is sung at the close: because in those things which have been promised to God, one must never at any time fail.

The iniquity of usury.—But the heavenly admonition extends even to the fullness of perfection.

For having wiped away every vice from someone, it also turns away from him that greed for money which holds us too tightly, saying: Who has not given his money at usury. This benefit is deceitful, and this humanity is fraudulent, this benevolence is taught to be harmful. For what is so intolerable as to bestow a benefit upon one in need in such a way that he becomes more needy, and to heap up the misery of the poor man when you are about to bring him aid? If you are a Christian, what reward do you expect from God, when you yourself expect from men not benefits but losses? If you are a Christian, why do you put your idle money out for return, and make the poverty of your brother, for whom Christ died, your treasury?

If you are a Christian, I do not ask that you give freely; at least demand back what is owed in such a way that you do not despoil him; and remember that he from whom you exact usury is needy and poor, for whose sake Christ willed to be needy and poor. And so whether you do injury or kindness to a poor man, know that you do it to Christ; because for his sake, though he was God, Christ deigned to take on his poverty and his name.

What use of gifts is lawful, what is forbidden.—But lest the stern word of this admonition be thought, as it were, to have removed entirely under the name of usury all care for having possessions: he did not therefore take away the concern for acquiring, but even moderated the propriety of receiving a gift, saying, in addition to what he had said: Who has not given his money at usury; and has not taken bribes against the innocent. There is a certain custom of gifts which brings honor to the giver, so that it is a matter of the greatest grief to have an offered gift despised, rather than a loss to have given what was received. Therefore he forbade those gifts which would work injury to another. For if he had altogether removed the use of gifts, it would have been sufficient to say: And he has not accepted gifts.

But because the simple use of gifts comes either from respect for a man or even from reverence for God, he forbade those gifts which would corrupt the integrity of judgment, which would purchase injury to the innocent, which would contain in themselves no office of mutual charity. For just as the things we offer to God are not needed by him, yet through us the office of due reverence is fulfilled: so he teaches that this principle must be observed in gifts, that those things be received by us which are pleasing and useful to those who offer them, not such as make us venal, nor such as are treacherous to the innocent, nor costly to those who give them—received rather from a sense of duty than from greed, offered out of honor rather than fear, accepted more from charity than for gain.

He who does these things shall not be moved forever.—Through these things, therefore, is the dwelling in the tabernacle, through these the rest on the mountain. There remains, then, the keeping of the precepts and the work of the commandments. The psalm must be stored in the inmost heart, written in the mind, sealed in the memory, and the treasure of this copious brevity must be acquired to accompany us by night and by day: so that, having obtained this wealth as provision for eternity, and dwelling in the Church, we may at last rest in the glory of the body of Christ.

Unto the end, understanding of David, when Doeg the Edomite came to him and told Saul: David came to the house of Achimelech.

Why do you glory in malice, you who are mighty in iniquity?

All the day your tongue has devised injustice: like a sharp razor you have wrought deceit. You have loved malice above benignity, iniquity more than to speak equity. Diapsalma. You have loved all words of ruin, a deceitful tongue. Therefore God shall destroy you in the end, shall pluck you up, and shall remove you from your dwelling, and your root from the land of the living. Diapsalma. The just shall see and shall fear; and shall laugh at him, and shall say: Behold the man who did not make God his helper: but trusted in the abundance of his riches, and prevailed in his vanity. But I, as a fruitful olive tree in the house of God, have hoped in the mercy of God forever, and for ever and ever. I will praise you forever, because you have done it, and I will wait on your name: for it is good in the sight of your saints.

The very superscription of the psalm demands careful diligence in seeking its understanding.

For at its very beginning it is immediately set down: Unto the end, understanding. For the psalm is shown to contain matters not of its own time, since the title's inscription is unto the end. And since the understanding is in the end, there can be no understanding of any other matter in it so much as of the end. The end, moreover, as we have frequently shown, is that in which all things are concluded, for whose sake the rest exist, toward which all the works of hope, of affairs, and of endeavors hasten.

What this psalm regards.—The understanding of the psalm, therefore, consists in him for whom all things exist, outside of whom there is nothing.

And who this is, the very superscription which is thought to contain a history shows. For it is as follows: Unto the end, understanding of David. When Doeg the Edomite came and told Saul, and said to him: David came into the house of Abimelech. And that we may follow the reasoning of the superscription more completely, the very order of the events must be set forth. Doeg was the overseer of the mules of Saul: who said to Saul: I saw the son of Jesse coming to Nob to Abimelech the son of Ahitub. And he inquired of him in the Lord and gave him food to eat, and gave him the sword of Goliath the Philistine. When the king heard these things, he gave Doeg power over the priests and the city.

Thereafter Scripture adds: And Doeg the Edomite went around, it says, and struck the priests, and killed on that day eighty-five, all bearing the ephod, and he destroyed Nob the city of the priests with the edge of the sword. This, then, is the full account of the events: from which only so much was taken for the title of the psalm as would satisfy both the mystery of the psalm and the prophetic teaching. For only this is in the superscription: When, it says, Doeg came and told Saul, and said: Because David came into the house of Abimelech. And necessarily after the fiftieth psalm (in which the remission of sins is contained according to the power of this sanctified number, as we taught in the introduction to the psalms), this psalm, earlier in time but placed later in order, is set: so that what is inscribed unto the end of understanding may be understood once the kinds of mysteries are on all sides perfected and complete.

What Abimelech signifies.—Abimelech, by interpretation of the word, signifies the rule of my brother.

For what we express as the rule of my brother, the Hebrews call Abimelech. When therefore it is said to Saul: David came into the house of Abimelech; it is announced to that enemy of David that he has entered the house of a brother's rule. But what the house of a brother's rule is, the apostle Peter teaches, saying: And you as living stones are built up a spiritual house for a holy priesthood. And below: But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for possession. Into this spiritual house we are to be built up into a royal race, if through the spiritual building up of our bodies, made conformable to God, we merit to be perfected as a royal race. Into this house of Abimelech, therefore, that is, the house of a brother's kingdom, that true David, holy, king, just, the rising sun, entered; having been made man for our body.

Which house is a brother's kingdom for him

because in the glory of the same body we are co-heirs of his kingdom, as he himself says: Come, you blessed of my Father, possess the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. Moreover, that they are his brothers whose royal house he entered, he testifies through the prophet in the psalm, saying: I will declare your name to my brothers, in the midst of the church I will praise you. Therefore, with the remission of sins granted according to the preceding psalm, the Word made flesh dwells in us, who are both brothers, and a spiritual house, and a royal race.

Who betrays the entry.—But the impious and parricide and betraying people, who is signified in the person of Doeg, the enemy of their own king, namely David, betrays the fact that he is in the house of Abimelech.

And this happens when he is handed over to Pilate, when the man is offered to be crucified, when, with their king rejected, they confess Caesar as their king—betraying him indeed as being in the house of Abimelech, but not understanding that, since he is in the house of Abimelech, he is in the house of a brother's rule, that is, the body, in which the Church of the saints, which is the body of Christ, conformable to him, shall reign together with him—having entered, that is, in which he also took the food he desired: for he desired with desire to eat the passover; and from which he took away the arms of Goliath, that is, of the devil; for he himself despoiled the strong man of his spoils—after which by this same Doeg, that is, the betraying people, the Apostles were slain and the churches overthrown.

Hence therefore the title of the psalm, unto the end of understanding; because in Christ, who is David, the rising sun, just, king, both eternal and shepherd, the consummation of all our hope and the end of the law is understood to be: who both according to the title and order of the psalm was betrayed in that house of his body, which is signified as being the house of a brother's rule for him. 5.

Glory is of two kinds, good and bad.—Why does he glory in malice, mighty in iniquity all the day?

It is the complaint of the Prophet that he who is mighty in malice glories in iniquity all the day. And this glory of iniquity is rebuked.

Yet there is also a glory both to be sought and to be confessed, and to be expressed with a certain feeling of exulting joy: both of which another prophet demonstrates under the same words, saying: Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, nor the strong man in his strength, nor the rich man in his riches: but he that glories, let him glory in the Lord. For having first forbidden the causes of a blameworthy glory, he then shows the cause of a fitting glory. Following this example, the blessed Apostle knows that he must glory in nothing except in one thing alone, when he says: But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world. It is not therefore glory of this kind, but glory of iniquity that gives offense; and of that iniquity which is for the whole day.

We recall that day is customarily used for the age or time of a man, when it is said: I have not desired the day of man: or again when Abraham desired the day of the Lord: or when the Apostle delivers one to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord, indicating not this day bounded by the rising and setting of the sun, but the day of an appointed time or age. He who is mighty in malice, therefore, glories in iniquity all the day.

Doec, that is, the Jews always in iniquity.—But it is understood absolutely that the reason for this complaint does not fit the person of Doec. For what power did the keeper of mules have, and one who had obtained authority over the animals of the royal transport, or who merely reported to David that he had entered the house of Abimelech? Does he glory in iniquity all the day? But under his person, the people for whom every age was spent in iniquity, for whom, out of the dominion of malice, the glory of that very iniquity abounded, is to be understood as signified.

For it was powerful, when, as a servant, it was visited by the Lord; when on its account Egypt was struck with so many plagues; when in the darkness of three days it did not feel the darkness itself, since light remained with it; when it left Egypt itself, despoiled of silver and all its ornament, to its own destruction; when according to the times of day and night it was guided by a pillar now of cloud, now of fire; when it crossed the Red Sea on foot; when it lived on the food of angels; when it saw the majesty of God descending upon the mountain; when it heard the voice speaking out of the fire; when it overthrew many kingdoms in grievous wars; when it watched the Jordan flowing back so that it might dry up before it; when it had prophets; when it made use of priests for the cleansing of sins and the redemption of its soul; when it merited to obtain its kingdom.

But in all these things, though it was powerful, it was nevertheless always powerful in its own malice: when it longed for the onions and other things of Egypt and for flesh; when, out of habit of vices, it preferred impious servitude to holy liberty; when it worshipped the calf; when it cursed Moses; when it abominated God; when it vowed its sons as sacrifices to demons; when it slew the prophets; when it even lifted up on the cross God himself, its own Lord, born as a man for its sake, and delivered him to the governor. And so, glorying in iniquity all the day of its life, though it was powerful, it nevertheless remained powerful in malice.

The office of the tongue.—After this complaint of prophetic grief concerning him, the discourse is now turned upon him directly,

Thy tongue hath devised injustice.

The office of the human tongue is, impelled by natural reason, to distinguish the voice into words by varied and yet regulated movement: and through it there stands forth, from the confused sound of the spirit bursting forth, a speech that, though discordant, conveys the understanding of things. And although indeed this rational movement of it toward that end is its own; yet the tongue itself is understood to be subject to reason rather than understanding by the sense of reason. But that which lacks the sense of understanding also lacks the impulse of reason. And whatever lacks the impulse of reason also lacks deliberation of counsel.

And how is it rightly understood, as said by the Prophet, that the tongue devises injustice, since deliberation proceeds from the rational sense of the living soul, whereas the tongue is appointed not to the nature of entering into reason, but to the ministry of rational nature? But the authority of this perfect and prophetic saying is demonstrated also by another prophet, who says: In the mouth of fools is their heart; because, treating nothing by the counsel of reason and depending on the deliberation of the heart, they utter only by the rash movement of an unconsidered tongue things fortuitous and unformed. And therefore in the mouth of fools is their heart, because they will not speak what they have thought, but will think what they have spoken. And this indeed of the tongue of a fool.

But of the tongue of the wise we read thus: The tongue of the understanding shall meditate wisdom; and again: My tongue is the pen of a scribe writing swiftly

because the tongue of one who understands proceeds from the meditation of wisdom; and the same tongue again, like the pen of one writing, does nothing disordered, nothing uncertain: but obeying those things which have either been thought or read, it swiftly follows from the reason of counsel.

The tongue that devises evil aptly compared to a razor.—And

because the tongue, by the reason of its nature, serves thoughts rather than thinks them; this tongue which devised injustice is shown not to have used the offices of its own nature. For there follows: As a sharp razor thou hast wrought deceit. A razor is sharpened for the adornment of the face, so that, shaving off the rough and bristling beard, it may smooth the face. If it wounds instead, it has wrought deceit: since, having been prepared for adornment, it has rendered its service unto a wound. This tongue, therefore, of him who is powerful in malice, devising iniquity, has wrought deceit: that is, the tongue which nature had prepared for expressing the rational thoughts of a deliberating heart, itself rather devises irrational iniquities.

For that people which is to be understood as signified in Doec, chosen to magnify the name of God and prepared to celebrate his praises, dishonours him, betrays him, and, as far as in it lies, destroys him by the death of the cross: and this it accomplishes by the sharp razor of its tongue, through which it cried out: Crucify, crucify. Thus this tongue, devising iniquity, wrought deceit as with a sharp razor; and what manner of deceit, the following words teach.

The malice which is loved to the neglect of goodness.—For there follows,

Thou hast loved malice above benignity, iniquity above speaking justice.

The guilt of this deceit becomes graver by comparison, when malice is loved with goodness neglected; when iniquity is practised with the speech of justice passed over. This disposition of deliberate malice the Lord condemns in the Gospels, saying: And this is the judgment, because the light came into this world, and men loved darkness more than the light. The people, therefore, for whose redemption from sins the Word was made flesh and God was born as man, so that through the justification of faith it might be free from the curse of the law, since it prefers to serve the curse in the transgression of the law, delivered that very God of theirs to punishment, taking his blood upon itself, so that the governor might be innocent. And doing this, it changes the custom of its own nature. For it loves malice above benignity, and turns its love from good things to the worst.

It also preferred to love injustice above speaking justice.

The hatred of the Jews toward Christ.—The prophetic discourse, according to Jewish custom, maintained its reason in the very force of its words, when it said: Thou hast loved malice above benignity, injustice above speaking justice. For where it says: Thou hast loved malice above benignity; it condemns nothing beyond the love itself by way of comparison. But where it says: Injustice above speaking justice; there it reproves not merely the disposition of a preferred love, but that very hatred in speaking, saying: Above speaking justice. For the Jews are able, and are wont, even if they do not love goodness, yet to simulate it by speaking of it. But to speak of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to the blessed apostle Paul was made unto us justice and sanctification and redemption, they are in no way able.

They cannot contain themselves to any patience of speech, if at any time it is shown to them by us from the prophetic authorities that the only-begotten God, who was born before the ages, suffered and was crucified and died in man; for then they avoid and flee every utterance concerning him: and if there is no place to withdraw anywhere, oppressed by a kind of silent anguish, they stop their ears with their hands and shut out the hearing lest it penetrate into them; not loving so great goodness, yet sometimes speaking of it, but neither loving justice, which is Christ, nor speaking of it.

The diapsalm changes the sense.—The interposition of the diapsalm, even if it has not brought a change of person, is yet understood to have made a change of sense. For although the discourse is still about the same person as before, and addressed to the same person as before, yet the same discourse now signifies something other than before. And indeed the foregoing things were heavy with complaints, so much so that they were rebuked out of the Prophet's grief before they were uttered: when the tongue devises injustice, when like a sharp razor it effects deceit, when malice is loved above goodness, and iniquity above the utterance of justice. On account of which things a certain accusation of the Prophet before God was set forth beforehand, as it were, reproving, when it is said: Why dost thou glory in malice, thou who art powerful in iniquity all the day? And lest the grief of the complaint be found empty, the very cause of the complaint was set forth beneath it.

After the sin is set forth, the punishment follows.—Now indeed, with the diapsalm intervening, no complaint preceded, but after the gravest cause of sin was first demonstrated, then this sentence of condemnation was subjoined,

Thou hast loved all words of precipitation, a deceitful tongue: therefore God will destroy thee in the end, will pluck thee up and remove thee from thy tabernacle and thy root from the land of the living. After the example by which we read in Genesis, spoken in these words: Because thou hast done this, cursed art thou from the earth, and again: Because thou hast hearkened to the voice of thy wife; and also by the Apostle, when he had enumerated the gravest crimes of human impiety, it was said thus: For this cause God delivered them up to a reprobate sense; so also now: Thou hast loved words of precipitation, a deceitful tongue; therefore God will destroy thee in the end. The Latin speech has not retained the force of the word.

For what are with us words of precipitation, these have been expressed by the Greeks as ῥήματα καταποντισμοῦ: by which expression is signified that what with us is precipitation, is with them a plunging into the depth of the sea. Moreover, with us, according to the general sense, precipitation can be understood not only in the sea, but as the fall of those who plunge from heights, whether of buildings or cliffs or places of whatever kind. Therefore, according to the demonstrated meaning of precipitation, because Doec loved words of precipitation, he is subjected to the most severe condemnation.

The unbeliever as a shipwrecked man.—For every unbelieving soul, shipwrecked in the deep of this world as in a sea, is carried about by uncertain and wandering motion, and fluctuates, moved by the surge of diverse desires, deluded by the power of the devil who inhabits the world, and stands firm in no solidity of foundation subject to it for resisting and withstanding him: from which it is easy for it, hanging and wandering, to be tossed about by the incitements of surrounding desires. But that the motions and waves of this world are compared to the surges of a heaving sea, and what is the habitation of the ruling devil, the hundred and third psalm demonstrates according to prophetic and allegorical understanding, yet under the bodily signification of created things: This great and wide sea, there are creeping things without number. Animals small and great: there ships shall pass. This dragon which thou hast formed to play therein.

And again in the sixty-eighth psalm: I am come into the depth of the sea, and a tempest hath overwhelmed me.

The only-begotten Son of God, therefore, both the Word of God and God the Word, descended to rescue us from the shipwreck of the deep of this world, about to draw out in the net of his teaching, to which the kingdom of heaven is likened (Mt. XIII, 47), all these universal kinds of fishes. He is betrayed and dishonoured by the impious people: and the people, conformed to the dragon for mocking, plunges itself as his companion, and precipitates itself into this deep to share his habitation. So also the people of the Egyptians, unbelieving toward Moses, merited to be precipitated and plunged, and the waves of the sea flowing back upon them swallowed up the impious nation, loving words of precipitation when it withstood God.

The Jews torn away from their homeland.—Because therefore the unbelieving Jewish people, betraying their king, loved words of precipitation, saying, We have no king but Caesar: having neglected God as king and confessed a human king, they plunged themselves into this deep of the world; therefore they are destroyed in the end: (for unto the consummation of the age they have lost the kingdom of the destroyed city), and have been plucked up from their tabernacle and removed: now wandering over the whole face of the earth, and everywhere strangers, all their sins having been consummated in the passion of the Lord.

Concerning the rites of the law.—Because they loved words of precipitation, they lack that tabernacle in which the Prophet was always full of the Spirit of God, in which the awesome contemplations of holy virtues and saving visions existed, in which the useful offerings of sacrifices for the redemption of the soul, in which the paschal lamb, guardian of the faithful in the destruction of Egypt and a powerful sign in the blood upon the doorposts, in which the temporal festivals that rivalled the eternal seasons. Torn away therefore from that tabernacle, they lack these honours of spiritual gifts.

Concerning the body of Christ, God and man.—But they were uprooted not only from this earthly tabernacle, but from that one of which it was said: I will raise up the tabernacle of David which has fallen: namely, that holy and venerable body of God born of the Virgin, and the temple, in which whoever believes shall dwell as a sharer in the Lord's flesh. But every unbeliever shall be torn away and removed from this kinship with the body that was not believed in, that is, from the tabernacle of God, unworthy of the dwelling of this spiritual tabernacle: which the Lord is understood to signify when he says: I am the true vine, you are the branches, my Father is the husbandman. Every branch not abiding in me, nor bearing fruit, shall be rooted out. And every branch abiding in me my Father will cleanse so that it may bear more fruit.

If any therefore, incorporated into God through faith, shall deserve to remain in the nature of the body assumed by God, these are cleansed unto the eternal fruits to be brought forth from themselves

because it is necessary that a branch remaining within the vine should hold the nature of the true vine. But whoever shall have been an unbeliever in the body of God born, or even if he remain believing, yet lacks the fruits of his faith, shall be rooted out, either on account of unbelief or on account of the uselessness of the fruits denied. For the Son of God born of the Virgin was not then first the Son of God when he became the Son of man, but in the Son of God also the Son of man, so that the Son of man might also be the Son of God, and he assumed in himself the nature of all flesh, through which, having been made the true vine, he holds in himself the stock of all branches.

If therefore any branch is unbelieving or unfruitful, it presents itself as one to be rooted out; remaining indeed through nature, but torn away through unbelief or uselessness. From this tabernacle, therefore, as from the true vine, this impious Doeg is both torn away and removed, remaining through nature both in the tabernacle and in the vine, but through unbelief worthy to be plucked off.

Concerning the kingdom of Christ.—But having been torn from the tabernacle, he shall also be rooted out from the land of the living.

For he who shall not abide in Christ shall not be an inhabitant of Christ's kingdom. And he shall not be so, not because the dwelling was not open to him (for it is open to all, that they may be sharers in the body of God and in the kingdom; because the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, assuming in himself the nature of the whole human race): but each one presents himself, by his own merit, both to be torn from the tabernacle and to be rooted out from the land of the living; never having been prevented from being within, since through the assumption of nature he was received as an inhabitant; but he is rooted out on account of the crime of unbelief, being found unworthy of the fellowship of nature.

He is rooted out therefore from the land of the living, which is prepared in the blessed region for the saints reigning together with the Lord: of which he himself makes mention in the Gospel, saying: Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth; and this same prophet: And I shall please the Lord in the land of the living, from which the treacherous people deserved to be rooted out, after being destroyed unto the end, and having been both removed and torn from the tabernacle.

The land of the living: and that the dead live to God.—It is called the land of the living for this reason

because every believer in the Lord, though he be dead, yet lives to God; as it was said: I am the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob: he is not the God of the dead, but of the living. And again through Jacob: Let Reuben live and not die; and that: Let Ishmael live in thy sight. But also that saying of the Apostle (if it shall so seem to the reader, since it bears a twofold significance of meaning): And we who live, who shall remain, shall be caught up together with the clouds to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.

The interception of bodies indeed brings a temporary eclipse of death: but the law established for dying does not take away the law of rising again

because the law does not impose necessity upon him who decrees the law: nor does God take away from himself the right of giving life by decreeing for us the law of dying. Death moreover is lawful only against those against whom it has been decreed. But all live to God, from whose law they have died. Nor can death, which prevailed only through the law of him who decreed it, prevail of itself to the point of being unchangeable through the law of renewed life decreed by him who decrees it: since the power of him who decrees changed the law of life established from the beginning in Adam under the condition of the decree, by the law of dying. And so all the holy and faithful live to God.

For when he declares himself to be the God of those who had died, that is, of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob; and immediately testifies that he is not the God of the dead but of the living; he teaches through this that those who are judged dead by human opinion are not dead to him who decrees, but alive.

The interposition of the diapsalm, even if it did not change the person, yet renewed the sense.

For after the foretold condemnation of Doeg, to whom the discourse was addressed as to one present, the Prophet now turned himself to the signification of another exposition,

The righteous shall see, and shall fear, and shall laugh at him, and shall say: Behold the man who did not set God as his helper, but trusted in the multitude of his riches, and prevailed in his vanity. With Doeg destroyed unto the end, and torn from the tabernacle and removed, and rooted out from the land of the living, all the holy ones must needs fear: when they see a people aided and sustained by so many and so great helps of divine mercy, after that immense and surpassing all human resources glory of a splendid kingdom, having furnished the greatest and final example of human calamity from itself.

For who could recount in memory the ancient glories and innumerable blessings of that people, which we have partly recalled above, when after the deaths of Egypt the divided sea gave way for their journey, when a pillar of cloud overshadowed the heat of day, when a pillar of fire dispersed the darkness of night, when heaven provided food through angels, when the rock flowed with a spring, when the Jordan flowed back, when a great city fell to the ground at the mere circuit of the ark of the covenant, when the sun was held back from its course and prolonged the day, and the order of the divine law stood firm against the weariness of battle from that unwearied and undisturbed motion of the heavenly elements: and then after that familiarity with the divine majesty both in sight and in hearing, to see them consumed by wars, dying of famine, and before that fed on the corpses of the dead to delay the famine, and the rest then reduced to servitude, exiles everywhere, everywhere degenerate, known nowhere, always strangers, and always ignoble and always alien through the change of their dwelling?

Now if one raises spiritual eyes, of which the Lord says: Lift up your eyes and see the regions, for they are white unto harvest; then let him know that they have been torn from the fellowship of the body of God, and from that kingdom of blessedness, from that honor of resurrection, and that they are without the Spirit of God, without understanding of prophecy, appointed as fuel for gehenna, whom the immortal worm shall devour and the inextinguishable fire shall burn; whose legislation, whose testaments, whose fathers he knows, from whom Christ according to the flesh, who is God over all. With how great fear therefore shall all the holy ones contemplate these condemnations of their present and eternal calamity; because the contemplation of the punished is terrible by this example? The righteous therefore shall see, and shall fear: understanding that nothing is not to be feared by themselves, given the so great calamity of these. But because they are righteous, although they fear from the example, yet they shall rejoice in the fruit of their own righteousness.

For they shall laugh at him; laughing therefore and fearing, because they are subject to God, terrified by the severity of the punished. Fear therefore tempers laughter: since both the fear is from the example, and the laughter is from merit. But fear in turn moderates laughter, so that they shall rejoice in good things in such a way that the terror of the example is not absent: because it is the mark of an impious and self-distrustful conscience to fear without joy: and it is the mark of an insolent nature to rejoice without fear.

All our hope is in God.—But those who shall laugh while fearing shall also add this to their tempered laughter in fear, so as to say: Behold the man who did not set God as his helper. It is the height of folly and impiety not to understand that one lives under God and from God, but in the things one does and expects, to wish rather to rely on one's own power; since if there is anything in oneself, it is from God. Let all our hope therefore be in God, and let all our confession be in God, following the example of the Prophet saying: O Lord, my helper and my redeemer: and again: I will lift up my eyes to the mountains, from whence shall come my help.

My help is from the Lord, who made heaven and earth [lacuna] Let us therefore always fear, lest at some time that eternal fire burn us, and the immortal worm consume us; when we hear what the righteous say, fearing and laughing: Behold the man who did not set God as his helper; but trusted in the multitude of his riches.

Against the arrogance of the rich.—Opulence renders certain rich men insolent, and above all the trust in riches vainly turns away the fear of God: foolish men, not understanding that they ought to be all the more religious for being rich; because it is fitting to render thanks to the bestower of the good things they desire: and that the guilt of avarice is all the more inexcusable, because opulence does not excuse the necessity of avarice. And indeed how unhappy is the trust in a vain thing: to despise God by possessing gold, as though gold were not among God's creatures; or as though anyone, by the judgment of a sound mind, acquires the advancement of a blessed life through the fact that gold lies buried for him; and that he thereby becomes other than a man of soul and body in general, and can be other than he was born; or that when he departs this life, he shall make use of his gold in death!

He shall indeed make use of it if he uses it rightly in life, if he has fed the hungry with his bread, if he has clothed the naked with his garment, or refreshed the sick at his expense, or restored the captive to his freedom. These are plainly the ambitious embassies of human treasure before God, this is the power of atoning for crimes and the true means of intercession. Thus shall we be transformed by gold, so as to be from earthly, heavenly, and from mortal, eternal.

That faithless people, not thinking on these things, and despising the commandments of God, and thinking itself rich through the law, which is a shadow of future good things, and having made ill use of the riches it had obtained, was rooted out and removed from the land of the living and from the tabernacle, and torn away: believing itself all-powerful in its vanities, namely in the glory of its kingdom, in the gold of the temple, in the commandments of men, according to the prophet saying: In vain do they worship me, teaching the doctrines and precepts of men (acc. To LXX), the law of God having been exchanged for the contemptuous observance of human custom.

David under the law is evangelical.—The Prophet, however, whom it is necessary to understand as just, speaks otherwise of himself with the confidence of his hope,

But I, as a fruitful olive tree in the house of God, have hoped in the mercy of God for ever and ever.

The age of men differs indeed in time: but the spirit of prophecy is the same. The Prophet says that he remains in the house of God as a fruitful olive tree, a tree ever green and bearing fruit of the best kind. The Apostle declares that, when its branches were broken off on account of unbelief, faithful nations from the ignoble wild olive were grafted into this olive tree: so that, contrary to the nature of their kind, they might receive the nature of the root.

But the Prophet, remaining under the law, yet evangelical and prophet at once, persists both in the law and in the Gospels with his fruit in the house of God: not to be broken off in his branches, not to be left as a mere trunk, not to be rendered himself now useless by offering himself for the grafting of a wild olive, nor about to transfuse the virtue of his root into an alien tree; but wholly entire as he is, a preacher of apostolic faith, not to be grafted from the gentiles into the root of the law unto evangelical faith, but even in the evangelical faith of the gentiles, with the proper virtue of his own root and branches, himself wholly fruitful from the rich understanding of the law. Now the house of God, according to the Apostle Peter, is the Church and all followers of the evangelical faith, as he says: Be built up as a spiritual house, a royal priesthood.

And Paul: That thou mayest know how thou oughtest to conduct thyself in the house of God, the pillar and ground of truth, which is the Church of the living God. In this house of God therefore the just and holy prophet, standing as a fruitful olive tree, using his own fruitful and rich root, hoped in the mercy of God; not for a time, not only in the brief age of this bodily life, but for ever and ever. For he extends his hopes to the infinite age of eternity, nor is he bounded by the setting of death: since he knows that he must live in Abraham's bosom after the example of the poor man Lazarus, and knows also that by the transformation of the glorious resurrection he shall remain co-eternal and conformed to God: and he shall remain on account of what follows,

I will confess to thee, O Lord, for ever, because thou hast done it: and I will wait on thy name, for it is good before the sight of thy saints.

The mercy of God is the work toward meriting blessedness.—Hope in the mercy of God for ever and ever and for ever is.

For those very works of justice will not suffice for the merit of perfect blessedness, unless the mercy of God also does not reckon the faults of human changes and movements even in this will toward justice. Hence that saying of the Prophet: Thy mercy is better than life: because although the life of the just is praiseworthy through the working of justice, yet through the mercy of God it will obtain greater merit. For from this life it advances into eternal life: and the mercy of God so rewards the working of justice that, having compassion on the will toward justice, it grants each just person to be a partaker also of its own eternity. Therefore hope in mercy is for ever and ever: but confession is only for ever, not also for ever and ever.

For confession of sins exists only in the time of this age: while each person is left to his own will, and through the freedom of life has the choice of confession. For when we depart from life, we depart at the same time from the right of will. For then, by the law already established according to the merit of the past will, the will of those departing from the body is received either into rest or into punishment. The Prophet shows that the will of that time is no longer free but necessary, when he says: There is no will for me in those days. For when the freedom of will ceases, the effect also of will, if there be any, will cease. For the rich man, wishing to pass over to Abraham, is not permitted on account of the intervening gulf: although through the freedom of will he could have been in Abraham's bosom.

The freedom of will is therefore shut off

because there is no confession for the dead, according to what was said: But in hell who shall confess to thee? The Prophet therefore, hoping in mercy for ever and ever, confesses only for ever: performing the temporal duties of confession in the time of this age, but extending his eternal hope through the eternity of ages. He added the reason for confession, saying: Because thou hast done it: confessing, that is, the Lord to be the author of this universe, teaching that confession is to be made to none other than him who made the fruitful olive tree of hope in mercy for ever and ever.

The Psalmist awaits seeing Christ.—And who this is who has done these things he shows, saying: And I will wait on thy name, for it is good in the sight of thy saints. He will therefore await the name of God to whom he confesses, through whom all things were made, as Paul says: For there is one God the Father, of whom are all things, and we in him: and one Lord our Jesus Christ, through whom are all things, and we through him. He awaits therefore this name, that is, to know Jesus, that is, his saviour, the Angel saying: And thou shalt call his name Jesus; for he shall save his people from their sins. He awaits to behold Christ, so that through the profession of a noble family he may be a Christian. Now this name is good, which Angels and Archangels adore, which demons tremble at and cannot bear, which men take up unto salvation: of which it is written: And whosoever shall call upon his name, he shall be saved.

He awaits, moreover, not secretly, not trembling, not alone; but in the sight of his saints, that is, with free faith not refusing the testimony of his expectation even under the awareness of the heavenly saints, or, after the example of the prophet, offering to all the saints who are on earth in himself an example of expectation.

The fool hath said in his heart: There is no God.

They are corrupt and have become abominable in their iniquities: there is none that doeth good, there is not even one. God looked down from heaven upon the sons of men, to see if there be any that understandeth or seeketh after God. They are all gone aside, they are become unprofitable together: there is none that doeth good, there is not even one. Will not all they know who work iniquity, who devour my people as they eat bread? They have not called upon God: there they feared where there was no fear. For God hath scattered the bones of them that please men, they are confounded; because God hath despised them. Who will give out of Sion the salvation of Israel? When the Lord shall turn away the captivity of his people, Jacob shall rejoice and Israel shall be glad.

The difference between the present psalm and the thirteenth.—

The present psalm is nearly in agreement with the thirteenth psalm: but it has, in this very similarity of words, no small difference of meaning.

First, by virtue of the inscription itself. For the thirteenth is inscribed thus: Unto the end, of David himself, by which title it is signified that that psalm was prophesied by David: but this one: Unto the end, for Maeleth, understanding, of David himself. For where it says, unto the end, understanding, it is a sign of exhortation and admonition, by which we are bidden to bring the judgment of our understanding to bear according to the knowledge of the end: so that we may understand those things to be announced in the psalm which shall be consummated at the end; according to that saying of the Apostle: Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God the Father.

When he shall have brought to nought all principality and power and virtue, then also he himself shall be subject to him who subjected all things to him. And the last enemy that shall be destroyed is death. This therefore is the end which is understood in the psalm. But the fact that the psalm is inscribed of David himself shows that everything is prophesied concerning Christ, who is the true David: because where it is inscribed of him, it indicates him who speaks; but where it says to him, it shows him to whom it is spoken.

That God exists is persuaded to each person, which the impious would not wish.—The fool hath said in his heart, there is no God.

It is a fault of human nature not to dare to commit shameful utterances to the words of the mouth, but, urged by the impulse of inner wickedness, to speak them within the heart: while the will in its iniquity struggles against the necessity of public shame, and what one is ashamed to say, one is not ashamed to think. And therefore the fool says in his heart: There is no God: because if he wished to utter this in the words of his mouth, he would be convicted of being a fool, as indeed he is, by the judgment of public assent. For who, beholding the world, does not perceive that God exists?

But it happens frequently that, while the necessity of truth compels us to the confession of God, yet the delight of vices persuades us that God does not exist for us: and what we believe against faith, that we nevertheless utter from the counsel of an impious heart. Hence that saying of God through the prophet: This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; because they are unwilling to believe what they cannot deny.

Iniquity is the cause of denying God.—He shows the cause of this most foolish utterance in the heart, saying,

They are corrupt and have become abominable in their iniquities.

Whatever is outside the law is iniquitous. And those who transgress the law of God are first subjected to corruption, then to abomination: because iniquity brings corruption, and corruption deserves abomination. For when anyone transgresses the law of God, he will then deny God: and to deny God is corruption. For our Lord, the Word made flesh, came to drive away corruption. For it is necessary, according to the Apostle, that corruption put on incorruption. But he who is iniquitous, and who does not believe that the Word God was made flesh, also speaks in his heart that God does not exist; he will remain corrupt and abominable. The thirteenth psalm, on account of their having become abominable in iniquity, says thus: They are become abominable in their inventions.

Nor does the meaning and the offence differ

because men, pursuing those things which are pleasing to themselves, have transgressed the ordinances of the divine law.

Good things sometimes on the tongue, scarcely in deeds.—Then follows this complaint: There is none that doeth goodness. This

because it is also set down below with an addition, we shall treat in its proper place. Yet it is now opportunely and fittingly added, that when all are corrupt and abominable, no one has been found in works of goodness: because although we sometimes are accustomed to speak things that are good, yet in deeds themselves we with difficulty carry out what is good.

The various lookings down of God upon men.—And lest the will of God toward men should be thought negligent; he added, saying,

The Lord looked down from heaven upon the sons of men to see if there be any that understandeth or seeketh after God.

The looking down of the Lord from heaven is known to have been frequent: as often as, moved by the sins of the human race, for the sake of our salvation he either chooses Noah before the flood, or justifies Abraham through faith, or promises Isaac as the heir of his pledge, or prefigures in Jacob the firstborn rights of the later people, or appoints Moses as prophet and leader and establishes him as the giver of the law, or inspires prophets in every age of the law. Through these efficacies of his power of such a kind, therefore, he looked down upon the sons of men: to see if there were any that understood and sought after God.

The fewness of those who seek God, and the manner of seeking.—Now that for the sake of which God deigns to look down in order to see is not easy: and it is a great thing that is so diligently examined, whether it can be found in anyone. For God looks down from heaven to see whether anyone among men seeks him with understanding. For which of men will you find who wishes to seek God according to perfect understanding? Who, first examining the causes of created things, and then the constitution of the human race, seeks through the reason of understanding the author and parent of so great a universe? Then why the world, why men, why the ages of time; why a patriarch was chosen, why the law was established, why a prophet was sent before, and to what end the origin of all causes has stood firm?

Then moreover what benefit the powers of the heavens, and the ministries of angels, and the powers of archangels, and the kingdom of the devil, and the gift of the Holy Spirit, and God from God the only-begotten Son of God, impart to us from such varied kinds of offices? This man therefore, seeking him through understanding, God looks down to see.

Understanding is proper to man.—For understanding is no small merit, as Solomon says: For good understanding belongs to all who find it; and again through another prophet: O Israel, what does God require of you, but to do judgment and to understand justice? For understanding is the proper function of human reason: and therefore the spiritual nature of the soul has been implanted in us, so that through it we might tend toward the sense of understanding, which alone is a partaker of reason. But overwhelmed by vices, and oppressed by the pleasures of the body through the nature of bodily heaviness, we turn away from the pursuit of inquiring understanding.

Sin produces the disposition to turn away from God.—We turn away, moreover, after we have begun to be unprofitable: for this is what the prophetic word signifies,

They have all turned aside, together they have become unprofitable.

Not when they turn aside do they become unprofitable; but when they have begun to be unprofitable, they turn aside. And the force of the saying is easily understood from the common experience of human change. For when we have begun to be evil from good, and have separated ourselves through vices and disgraces from the company of the prudent and from the honor of public reputation; having thereby become unprofitable, we then shun all encounters with men of worth, pursuing byways, and we avoid the presence of the good out of the shame of our own conscience. Indeed, Adam through sin, having become unprofitable, then turned away from the coming of God.

But while he lived for a time innocent, and profitable through the observance of the commandments, he fled the familiar encounter with God which had previously been his, as soon as he began to be unprofitable.

Whether no one is good—not Abel, not Seth—Now when none are found who seek God with understanding, and when all, as soon as they have become unprofitable, turn aside, the complaint is repeated out of the pain of feeling: There is none that does good, there is not even one. It is a grave declaration of God, and an indissoluble judgment upon human vices, when no one does goodness even to one. And after this it will be asked, how Abel was pleasing, how Seth was approved, how Isaac was made heir, how Enoch was translated, how Noah was preserved, how Melchisedech was sanctified, how Abraham was chosen, how Jacob became Israel, how Job was blameless, how Moses was a friend, how Aaron was anointed, how David was according to God's heart, how the Prophets were spiritual, how the Apostles obtained the keys of heaven, if, with the exception of one alone, no one is good?

And indeed, how will that saying be understood: A good man out of a good treasure brings forth good things; and that: Well done, good servant, enter into the joy of your Lord? For how shall anyone be called good, if no one does goodness?

Upon whom There is none that does good falls.—And first, lest we suppose that this declaration, as a general sentence, falls even upon those men whom we mentioned above as most approved in the judgment of God, the meaning of what was said before stands in the way. For the whole discourse began concerning the foolish and corrupt and abominable: and when God looked down from heaven to see if there were any who sought with understanding, and when all, after they had begun to be unprofitable, turned aside, no one was found doing goodness even to one—that is, from among those who were both foolish and corrupt and abominable, and who, after they had been made unprofitable, had begun to turn aside; the sentence of divine judgment fitting those with whom the discourse also began. But what he says, even to one, does not except one from all; but with all being unprofitable and turning aside, since no one does goodness even to one, he has not set apart even one from all.

For he does not say, except one, but even to one. And in what is except one, the exception of one is signified: but in what is even to one, the universality of all is contained, through the diligence of him who looks down from heaven and knows, under a certain specific and personal number. Ligence, is contained under a certain specific and personal number.

What perfect goodness is: and that this is in no one.—Although we remember that such is the weakness of human nature that, in comparison with the divine goodness, no one is good: yet that incomparable exception of divinity has not shut out the exercise of goodness, so that in human comparison no one among men is good.

For goodness is first and foremost perfect when, subsisting in the virtue of an unchangeable nature, it does not know how to be at any time other than it has been, nor can it fail to be what it always is. But human impulses are for the most part varied by change itself, and the imperfect nature of earthly law becomes otherwise, changing itself as it is disturbed by one impulse after another: and the movements of our various affections drive us in different directions—when we are angered by insult, when we are moved by loss, when we are inflamed by wrath, when we are troubled by fear, when we are bent by love, when we are driven by hatred, when we are carried away by joy, when we are goaded by grief, when we disagree in judgment, when we are changed by age. Subject therefore to these weak movements of nature, we cannot be constant, since we are changeable both in feeling and in time.

And therefore perfect goodness is in no one, because the incitements of natural disturbances change it. Yet nevertheless when we are in goodness either by will or by deeds, we cannot even then fail to be what we are. And although we are imperfect in this, so as not always to be so: yet what we are for a time, even to those who through the weakness of nature are subject to change in goodness, it is not taken from us to be good at least when we are so.

God pardons the falls of weakness in one of good will.—But God alone, who is always good through his unchangeable nature, was not an overly harsh judge of this our changeableness, granting indulgence to our weakness—by which we do not remain good always—according to the merit of the will by which it pleases us to be good: and he has been more propitious toward those things which we will, than he has been angry at those things which we cannot do. For when he had said to Moses, his faithful friend, whom he had appointed as a god to Pharaoh: Because you did not glorify me at the waters of strife, go up onto the mountain and die—him he afterward reserved, his burial place known to no one, seen together with Elijah by the Apostles on the mountain, as a companion and witness of his blessed and eternal kingdom.

And lest I run through Aaron and David and Solomon and many others of this kind as examples of God's goodness—to whom, though the offenses of their changes were rebuked, yet on account of the merit of faith a ready pardon was present—the Lord, knowing the weakness of humanity, when he had said to the Apostles, All of you will be scandalized this night, and had thrice warned the blessed Peter—not so much to announce a condemned denial, but because man is changeable through the fear of the flesh, forewarning him of what he was about to deny—yet did not take away the keys of the kingdom of heaven even from him as he denied: because although the denial had crept in through trembling, yet the will's faith of confessing even unto martyrdom was firmly not lacking. And it is one thing to be unwilling, another to be unable.

For Peter, though terrified, even if through the sense of the flesh he could not maintain the constancy of his answer, yet through the faith of his mind he wept immediately. And when he recognized that he had fallen away from what he willed, he poured out the feeling of his faith in the grief of tears. And that very time of denial and weeping was, namely according to the change of trembling, surpassed by the stronger firmness of will. For soon a steadfast faith wept over the inconstancy of trembling, thereafter confirming the most approved steadfastness of apostolic constancy by the confession of martyrdom. These things we have recalled in the present place, lest we should think it said generally, There is none that does goodness, there is not even one: since these so many and so great men pleasing to God, even if through the changeableness of nature they had fallen somewhat from the purpose of faith, yet by the greatest and most beautiful works of goodness obtained the glory of a heavenly judgment concerning themselves.

And indeed the things that follow resolve this reasoning of our understanding,

Do they not all know who work iniquity, who eat my people as the food of bread?

They have not called upon God: there they feared where there was no fear. Because God has scattered the bones of those who please men, they are confounded; because God has despised them. For if no one does goodness even to one; how is there a people of God, who are eaten as the food of bread by those who work iniquity? The generality of the sentence is therefore removed, since those who work iniquity are separated from the people of God, who without doubt remain in the works of goodness. The workers of iniquity therefore eat the people of God as the food of bread—those who live by the injuries done to the saints, who delight in the vexation of the prophets, and the devastation of the Church, and every work of iniquity.

They also eat the people of God as the food of bread who tear them apart with the bite of detraction and the rending of envy, according to that word of the Apostle: But if you bite and devour one another, take heed that you are not consumed by one another. But there are also those who eat the people of God as the food of bread, of whom, as the same blessed Apostle says, their God is their belly, who count their ministry as a means of gain, enriching themselves with the contributions and gifts of the people: while they pursue sumptuous banquets under the pretext of religion, while they stuff their storehouses with the useless service of the devout (since the custom of this necessary contribution from the apostles was instituted only for the daily sustenance of those renouncing the world, or of those in need through poverty); of whom it is written, Devouring the houses of widows, and making long prayers.

These therefore eat the people of God as the food of bread, and they have not called upon the Lord.

For the foolish have said in their heart, There is no God. They do not therefore call upon him whom they deny. Or certainly if any who are placed in the Church eat the people of God by detraction, persecution, and expense as the food of bread, even if they believe themselves to call upon the Lord, they will hear what was said in the Gospel. For we know that God does not hear sinners. They therefore have not called upon the Lord: because prayer is not the profession of words, but of faith.

They fear what is not to be feared.—But those who do not call upon God add this to their impiety, that they fear what is not to be feared (for there they trembled where there was no fear), venerating stones, metals, timber, fire, water, the aether, dead and dying kings, and the other superstitious inventions of religions: and for this very impious fear of empty things, and contempt of necessary fear, they are to be condemned by comparison; since it is not so much impious to forget the fear of God, as it surpasses impiety to have preferred the dread of empty things to the fear of him. The Lord taught that only the fear of those things which are truly to be feared ought to be in us, when he says: Fear not those who can kill the body, but cannot kill the soul. But rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.

It is therefore an impious fear when what is not to be feared is feared, and what is to be feared is not feared. And often we think we are piously flattering kings, as if in due performance of our duty of reverence, because they have some power over our body: over whom nothing more is permitted concerning us than over a robber, than over a fever, than over a fire, than over a shipwreck, than over a ruin. For they serve in these accidents of bodies as their supreme power: and for the sake of brief pain we surrender the freedom of the Church, the confidence of our hope, the confession of God, not fearing God who punishes and destroys both body and soul in the fire of judgment, and preferring momentary and perishable punishments to the eternal penalties of divine vengeance; while we glory in pleasing them and in remaining in their favor by impious servitude.

When it is wrong to seek human favor.—This very thing divine judgment condemns with a most weighty decree.

For to what he had said: Do they not know, all the workers of iniquity, who devour my people as they eat bread: they have not called upon God, there they trembled with fear, where there was no fear; to this he added, as the sum of the discourse begun: Because God hath scattered the bones of them that please men, they are confounded; because God hath despised them. Those therefore who work iniquity, and devour the people as bread, and have not called upon God, and trembled at things not to be feared—shall they not know that God hath scattered the bones of those who wished to please men? The holy doctor of the Gentiles feared the sentence of this prophetic saying, declaring: For if I yet pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ. The pursuit of human favor is unprofitable and irreligious.

For one must please God rather than men to the dishonor of God: so that one may find favor through divine ordinances and the uprightness of a faithful and innocent life. But to wish only to please men is to displease God. Yet God does not draw away the minds of the just and the reasonable holiness of the faithful from the favor of men. And let us hear him speaking through Paul: Give no offense, neither to the Jews, nor to the Gentiles, nor to the Church of God, as I also in all things please all men, not seeking that which is profitable to myself, but to many, that they may be saved. This is to please not men but God, when through that whereby God is pleased, men also are to be pleased. For from the cause of pleasing God, the cause of pleasing men also becomes praiseworthy.

But the zeal which is spent only in pleasing men is not referred to what must please God

because it is employed solely for the sake of those whom it pleases. Moreover, there is no stronger bond for pleasing men than that no one should wish to please those whom he pleases for his own sake: because what is done for the advancement of one's own profit cannot but sometimes stir up some offense from circumstances that arise, since what is useful to one person often becomes a disadvantage to another. But he who wishes nothing for his own sake, and exercises all things for the advancement of another's profit, must necessarily acquire for himself the ground of an inoffensive agreeableness; because he pleases through the advantages of others, and gives no offense through his own. And the Apostle taught that this was his praiseworthy ground for pleasing all, because, heedless of his own profit, he had devoted himself to the profit of others.

By bones the hope of eternity is signified.—God therefore hath scattered the bones of them that please men.

And these bones are not to be understood as bodily bones that are scattered: but because the hope of eternity is wont to be signified by bones, from which it was said: This now is bone of my bones. Which the blessed Apostle, because it is a great mystery, refers to Christ and to the Church, which borrows the substance of eternity from the eternity of its Adam. Which in the Lord, though his body was wounded and pierced, is not broken. His bone, it says, shall not be broken; because although the wicked had power of suffering over the flesh, yet over the eternal and impassible nature of his divinity suffering had no power.

Moreover, that the hope of eternity, whole and uncorrupted, is signified in bones, we recall also in that place where it is said: The Lord keepeth all the bones of the just, not one of them shall be broken, because according to the resurrection shown to Ezekiel, its mystery was revealed under the signification of bones. Therefore as God keepeth the bones of the just, so also hath he scattered those of them that please men: and scattered them not so that they should lack what they were, but that through contempt of God they should become worthless, as though lost and cast away.

A twofold confusion for the impious after judgment.—For this follows: They are confounded, because God hath despised them.

Each person is confounded both by the shame of his own disgrace and by comparison with another's honor. And here is that which the Apostle signifies, saying: We shall all indeed rise again, but we shall not all be changed. But the prophet also distinguishes both the confusion of the resurrection and the honor, saying thus: And some shall rise to life everlasting, and others to shame and everlasting confusion. They shall therefore be confounded whose bones are scattered, whom God hath despised, whom he hath cast away as unworthy to be conformed to his glory and resurrection. They shall rise again, but only to be confounded: they shall not be changed, and from this they shall be confounded. For this is the established condition of the resurrection: and therefore the discourse is made as if from the past, in accordance with the definition of the decree, because it is decreed that it shall remain so.

Hope, the one solace of this life.—After recounting the human impieties of insolence and iniquity, so that he who is set forth in the title as the understanding unto the end may be understood: with such an exhortation of hope the Prophet confirms the blessedness of the end itself, saying: Who shall give out of Sion the salvation of Israel? When the Lord shall have turned away the captivity of his people, Jacob shall rejoice and Israel shall be glad. For this one hope remained to human weakness and faith, whereby amid so many calamities of the present life it might find rest in the expectation of eternal goods. And therefore the Prophet, certain of this blessedness, cries out as from the vast deep of human miseries, saying: Who shall give out of Sion the salvation of Israel? For according to another prophet: Out of Sion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. This word of the Lord was made flesh.

This flesh is both Sion and Jerusalem, the city of new peace and our watchtower. Hence comes the Savior, hence Jesus. For Jesus, as we have often said, is by his very name the Savior. But the law from Sion was not saving, giving life indeed by its works, but not justifying by faith.

Jesus is the Savior.

But he was given not to carnal Israel.—This Savior was awaited, and was given to Israel: but not to that carnal Israel. For they who are the children of the flesh are not the children of God, but the children of the promise are counted for the seed. John also testifies that they are not sons of Abraham according to the flesh, since they are even children of vipers: and God is able of these stones to raise up children to Abraham. But the Lord himself taught that the right of succession arises from the works of faith, and that the origin of children is not reckoned according to carnal generation, when he said: If ye were Abraham's children, ye would do the works of Abraham. But Daniel also, condemning the elders, says not, Seed of Abraham, but, Seed of Canaan, and not of Juda.

Ezekiel likewise, rebuking the iniquities of the people, says: Thy father was a Canaanite, and thy mother a Hittite, thy root and thy generation is of the land of Canaan. That Israel therefore is not from bodily succession, to whom on account of unbelief the origin of a most profane race is attributed. Nor was salvation given to him who did not receive it when offered: but to him who, when captivity was turned away, was made the people of God.

The captive people are the Gentiles.—The minds of the ignorant Gentiles, taken captive and subjected to the most impious vices and religions, he set free into the liberty of faith and the name of the heavenly family. For those who had been the bondage of demons were made the people of God. And who this is that turns away captivity, he himself testified of himself.

For this captivity was not turned away by the law, nor by a patriarch, nor by a prophet, nor by an angel, nor by any other power of heavenly beings, whether of dominions, or powers, or thrones, or virtues: but by him who, having received the book in the synagogue and read therein these words: The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me, to preach deliverance to the captives, and sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord, signifying the authority and fulfillment of the completed prophecy, said: For this day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears.

This therefore is the turning away of the captivity of the people of God, when the eyes of understanding are opened, when hearts broken by sins are relaxed into rest, when the acceptable year of the Lord is proclaimed, in which the confession of our penitence is acceptable to God, when nothing of past deeds is reckoned as a crime, when all things are new, freedom is new, children are new, and joy is eternal.

Jacob the supplanter.—Jacob shall rejoice, and Israel shall be glad: for the same patriarch received both names by merit.

For because he had held his brother's heel with his hand at birth, he was called Jacob: destined thereafter to supplant, both by buying the birthright and by seizing the blessings. And Genesis set forth the force of the interpretation, that he was called Jacob because he was his brother's supplanter. But through the acknowledgment of God confessed, at the time when he asked to be blessed by that man over whom he prevailed in the wrestling, because he had beheld with the eyes of faith in a body the God against whom the people of his race had prevailed in the wrestling of the flesh according to the mystery of the future passion; he merited to be called Israel, because Israel means one who sees God. And according to the prophecy of Genesis itself, it is established that in Jacob the younger people, who were to believe from among the Gentiles, is signified.

This therefore is: Jacob shall rejoice, and Israel shall be glad. According to the order of the Church this is one people, of twofold profession and honor; for the heavenly discourse does not signify the same thing by doubled sentences. But because the first act of faith, whereby one prays that the name of God may be called upon him, supplants by faith the earlier people, when the Gentile desires to be faithful in place of the unfaithful Jew. This therefore is Jacob, rejoicing in hope of the blessing seized beforehand. But when, reborn in baptism and perfected in faith, he shall have beheld God with the eyes and mind of understanding; then Israel shall rejoice, because, having now supplanted the elder, he sees God by faith, destined to see him with a truer sight, according to that promise of blessedness: Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Of our Lord and God Jesus Christ, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

Unto the end, in hymns, an understanding of David, when the Ziphites came and said to Saul: Is not David hidden with us?

O God, save me in thy name, and judge me in thy strength. O God, hear my prayer: give ear to the words of my mouth: for strangers have risen up against me, and the mighty have sought my soul, and they have not set God before their eyes. DIAPSALMA. For behold, God is my helper: and the Lord is the protector of my soul. Turn back the evils upon my enemies: and cut them off in thy truth. I will freely sacrifice to thee, and will give praise, O Lord, to thy name: because it is good: because thou hast delivered me out of all trouble, and my eye hath looked down upon my enemies. The reason of the title, the passion of David the prophet is the example of the passion of our God and Lord Jesus Christ.

And therefore his prayer also is ordered, even for the understanding of the prayer of him who is the Word made flesh: so that he who suffered all things according to man, the same also speaks all things according to man; and intercedes with God on behalf of those whose infirmities he bore and whose sins he took upon himself. But the properties and force of the words, even against our will and hesitation, demand the sense of this understanding: so that we may not doubt that all things in the psalm are spoken in his person. For he says: O God, save me in thy name. In the humility of the body the only-begotten Son of God utters these prayers under the words of his own prophet, he who also asked back the glory which he had before the ages.

He asks to be saved in the name of God, in which he was both named and born: that in that body in which he was born, the name of God might make him safe in that very thing which was proper to his earlier nature and kind.

namely the name and power of God.—And

because this entire prayer is spoken in the person of the servant's form, for which servant's form assumed even unto the death of the cross, he entreats salvation from that name which is God's; and that he who was to be saved from God's name might follow immediately, he added: And in thy power judge me. For by reason of the merit of humility, because he had emptied himself by taking the form of a servant, he was now again seeking the form as a sharer in God in that humility which he had assumed; the man himself, in whom God had consented to be born, being saved in God's name. And lest he should teach that the honor of this name, in which he prayed to be saved, consisted in bare designation alone, he entreats to be judged in the power of God.

For it is first from judgment that one receives what one merits: He became, it says, obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore God also hath exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name: that the name which is above every name might be given to him. Then furthermore this same judgment is in the power of judgment: because through the power of God he who had died as man from God rose again in turn into God from dead man; according to that word of the Apostle, He was crucified through weakness, yet he rose through power, and again: For I am not ashamed of the Gospel: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth.

For through the power of judgment the weakness of the body is saved into the name and nature of God; and so by reason of the merit of obedience, it is advanced unto the salvation of God's name through the power of judgment, so that in him there is both the name and the power of God. Otherwise, if this discourse had begun from human custom, the Prophet would have asked to be judged in mercy or equity rather than in power. But a judgment of power was needed there, where to the Son of God born as son of man from the birth of a virgin, the name and power of the Son of God was to be restored in turn to that same son of man through the power of judgment.

The confidence of the one praying here befits none but Christ.—There follows next: O God, hear my prayer, give ear to the words of my mouth. It would have been easy for the Prophet to say: O God, hear me. But because he speaks in the person of him who alone knew how to pray, therefore the steadfast petition for his prayer to be heard is shown. The blessed Paul teaches that no man knows how to pray as he ought, saying: For we know not what we should pray for as we ought. It is not therefore of human weakness to ask that one's prayer be heard: since the Teacher of the Gentiles, even after the form of praying had already been established by the Lord, does not know what and how far he prays.

But this is the confidence of him who alone sees the Father, who alone knows the Father, who alone can pray through the night (for according to the Gospel the Lord spent the night in prayer), who through the mirror of words showed the very form of the most hidden mystery under common words while we were praying. And he who asked that his prayer be heard, in order to show this as something peculiar to his confidence, added, Give ear to the words of my mouth. And will anyone think this to be of human confidence, to wish the words of his mouth to be heard? Or those words by which we express the movements and impulses of our soul, both when we blaze with anger, and when we disparage out of hatred, and when we complain out of grief, and when we flatter out of adulation, and when we lie either for hope of gain or out of shame for the truth, or when we speak evil out of the offense of insult?

And who has ever been of so amended and patient a life in all things as not to be subject to these vices of human inconstancy? He alone could wish this with confidence, who did no sin, in whose mouth there was no guile, who offered his back to stripes, did not turn away his cheeks from blows, did not reproach the insult of spitting, and in nothing offended the will of him whose will in all these things he willingly obeyed.

The complaint of Christ is entirely from the affection of human nature.—He then added the reason why he prays that his words be heard,

For strangers have risen up against me, and the mighty have sought my soul, and they have not set God before their sight. The Only-begotten Son of God, the Word of God, and God the Word (since whatever the Father could do, all those things he himself also could do, as he says: For whatsoever things the Father doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise; so that with the name of deity and nature undistinguished, the power also might be undistinguished)—in order to be for us the most perfect example of human humility, prayed for and suffered all things that belong to men. And from our common weakness he entreated salvation for himself from the Father: so that he might be understood to have entered upon our birth together with the very duties of our weakness.

Hence it is that he hungered, thirsted, slept, was wearied, fled the assemblies of the wicked, was sorrowful, and wept, and suffered, and died. And so that in all these things he might be understood to be subject not by nature (by which he is God), but by assumption (by which he is also man), having gone through all these things he rose again. Therefore his every complaint in the psalms is from the affection of our nature. Nor is it surprising that we so understand the words of the psalms: since the Lord himself, according to the evangelical faith, testified that the mysteries of his passion were written in the psalms (Lucæ XXIV, 44).

Who are the strangers.

Who are the mighty. These did not know Christ, who is God and man, as God.—Strangers therefore rose up against him. For they are no longer sons of Abraham, nor sons of God: but a generation of vipers, but servants of sin, but the seed of Canaan, with an Amorite father and a Hittite mother, and sons of the devil, sons of the devil's will. The mighty also seek his soul; when Herod asks the chief priests where Christ was to be born, when the whole Synagogue conspires against him with false witness. But thinking this soul to be of human nature and weakness, they did not set God before their sight: because God, from what he remained as God, had humbled himself even to the origin of a man's birth, that is, so as to be the son of man, who had previously been the Son of God.

For there would not be another Son of God than he who is the son of man; and the son of man not in part, but born—for the form of God emptied itself from what it was to what it was not, that is, so that it could be born, into his soul and body (and therefore he is both Son of God and son of man, therefore both God and man, that is, the Son of God was born in the condition of human origin), even unto the nature of man's birth, who is wholly formed of soul and flesh, with the substance of God humbling itself.

On account of which, when strangers rise up against him, when the mighty seek the soul of his holy one, which is frequently sorrowful and grieved in the Gospels; they did not set God before their sight, because God the Son of God, remaining before the ages, had been born as man from the birth of a virgin in the condition of human nature, that is, of our body and soul: not understanding through the greatness of his works that the son of man, whose soul they sought, had come to be what he had begun to be as man, from the Son of God, which he had always remained.

By the intervention of the diapsalm, the person is changed, not of the one speaking, but of the one to whom it was spoken. For now the speech is the general speech of prophecy. For after that prayer which had been addressed to God, so that the confidence of the one praying might be understood, in that very moment of petition he immediately added what he had sought as one obtaining it,

For behold God is my helper, and the Lord is the upholder of my soul. He shall turn back evils upon my enemies. He rendered the proper effects to the proper petitions, teaching that God is not neglectful of our prayer, nor is the bestowal of his mercy to be considered unreasonable. Of his mercy, when he heard us according to what we had prayed.

For to what he says: Because strangers have risen up against me; that is proper, God is my helper; but to: And the mighty have sought my soul; the particular effect of the prayer heard is in what he says: And the Lord is the upholder of my soul: but to what he says: And they have not set God before their sight, he fittingly added,

He shall turn back evils upon my enemies. God therefore both helps against those who rise up, and receives the soul of his holy one sought by the mighty, and, not set before their eyes nor thought of by the wicked, turns back those very evils upon the enemies: so that while they do not think of God, by seeking the soul of the just man, and rising up against him, when he is helped and received, they might feel him whom they had not thought of amid the works of their iniquities as the avenger by the very retribution of their malice.

The confidence of the just amid calamities.—Let innocent religion therefore have this confidence, that amid human persecutions and perils of the soul it may not doubt that God is its helper: and if at any time the force of unjust death is brought to bear, let it know that the soul departing from the dwelling of the body rests in God's receiving. Let it also have the most certain security of vengeance, since all evils revert upon those who inflict them. God cannot be charged with iniquity; nor is the impulse and movement of malicious will mingled with perfect goodness. For evils are not stirred up by one who is malevolent, but turned back by one who is an avenger: nor does he bring them from his own malice, but converts them into our deserts. For these evils are established for all, for the ministry of vengeances, together with the law of living, the stern equity of just judgment moderating this.

But these are both turned away from the just by the law of justice, and turned upon the unjust by the equity of judgment.

Both are just: that they should be ready for the just as a deterrent yet not applied to them, because they are just; and that they should be turned upon the unjust as a punishment, because they have deserved it: not applied to the just though ready, and not to be wanting to the unjust because they are ready.

The Jews who are scattered in truth.—Then again there is a turning to the person of God, to whom the entreaty had first been begun: In thy truth destroy them. Truth confounds falsehood, and falsity is destroyed by truth. Now we have shown that the entire foregoing prayer is that of the man in whom the Son of God was born, who now also entreats this from God the Father, that he destroy his enemies in truth. And what the truth is, is not in doubt; namely he himself who said, I am the life, the way, the truth. The enemies are therefore scattered in truth, when those who procured condemnation for Christ by false witnesses hear that he has risen from the dead, and learn that he has resumed his glory in the truth of God. For afterwards, punished by God, they were consumed and destroyed by famine and war: having condemned the author of life to death, and not perceiving through the greatness of his works the truth of God in him.

Those enemies therefore the truth of God scatters, when rising again to resume the majesty of his Father's glory, he proved the truth of the absolute divinity in himself.

Hilary's opinion concerning the passion of Christ.—Now as for our frequent, indeed constant, preaching that the Only-begotten Son of God was both brought to the cross and condemned to death—he who by the birth which is natural to him from the eternal Father is eternal—we preach that he was subject to the passion not so much from the necessity of nature as from the mystery of human salvation, and that he willed to submit himself to the passion rather than was compelled. And although that passion was not of the condition and kind that would afflict the unchangeable nature of God with any force of injurious disturbance: yet it was voluntarily undertaken, destined indeed to satisfy the penal duty itself, yet not to harm the sufferer with the sense of pain: not that it did not have, by the very quality of the passion, the nature of causing harm; but that the nature of divinity does not feel pain.

God therefore suffered

because he voluntarily submitted himself to the passion: but receiving the natural forces of the passions rushing upon him (by which pain must necessarily be inflicted on those who suffer), he himself nevertheless did not fall away from the power of his own nature so as to feel pain.

The excellence of Christ's oblation over the oblations of the law.—For there follows,

I will sacrifice to thee willingly.

The sacrifices of the law, which consist in burnt offerings and oblations of goats and bulls, do not carry in themselves a profession of will: because a sentence of curse was decreed for those who violated the law. For whoever had ceased from sacrifice made himself liable to the curse. It was therefore necessary that what was done be done: because the addition of the curse did not permit neglect of sacrifice. From which curse our Lord Jesus Christ freed us, the Apostle saying, Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, having been made a curse for us, because it is written: Cursed is every one who hangs on a tree.

He therefore offered himself to the death of the accursed, that he might dissolve the curse of the law, voluntarily offering himself as a victim to God the Father; so that through the voluntary victim the curse, which had been added on account of the guilt of the necessary and omitted victim, might be dissolved. Of this sacrifice he makes mention in another place in the psalms: Sacrifice and oblation thou wouldst not, but thou hast fashioned a body for me; offering to God the Father, who rejected the sacrifices of the law, a pleasing victim in the body he had taken. Of which oblation the blessed Apostle makes mention thus: For this he did once, offering himself as a victim to God; about to redeem the salvation of the whole human race by the oblation of this holy and perfect victim.

Christ gives thanks for the petitions obtained by him.—On account of all these things thus accomplished, he renders praise to God the Father: I will confess to thy name, O Lord, for it is good;

because thou hast delivered me out of all trouble. He renders to each proposition its proper resolution. For at the beginning he had said, Save me in thy name. After the fulfillment of his prayers, it was fitting that there be a corresponding profession of thanksgiving, so that he might give thanks to that name in whose name he had prayed to be saved; and because he had asked for help against the aliens rising up against him, professing that he had obtained this very thing, he thereby recalled the exultation of joy, Because thou hast delivered me out of all trouble.

But as to the fact that while the strong sought his soul, they did not set God before their eyes, he admirably taught the eternity of his immutable divinity in what was said, And mine eye hath looked down upon mine enemies. For the only-begotten Son of God was not cut off by death. Indeed, to fulfill the nature of man, he submitted himself even to death, that is, to the separation as it were of soul and body, and penetrated to the infernal abodes, as seems to be owed to man: but he remains rising again, and looks down upon his enemies with an immortal eye, glorified into God, and from Son of man into Son of God—from whom also he had begun to be Son of man—now reborn through the glory of the resurrection. He looks down upon his enemies, to whom he had said, Destroy this temple, and after three days I will rebuild it.

Therefore, with this temple of his body built up, he sees from on high those who had sought his soul, and, himself exalted, looks down upon the authors of his death beyond the law of human death—suffering death, yet knowing not how to die—God and man, our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

Unto the end, in hymns, an understanding of David.

Give ear, O God, to my prayer, and despise not my supplication: attend to me, and hear me. I am grieved in my exercise, I am troubled at the voice of the enemy and at the tribulation of the sinner: because they have brought iniquities upon me, and in anger they were troublesome to me. My heart is troubled within me: and the fear of death is fallen upon me. Fear and trembling are come upon me: and darkness hath covered me. And I said: Who will give me wings like a dove? And I will fly, and be at rest. Lo, I have gone far off fleeing: and I abode in the wilderness. DIAPSALMA. I waited for him who saved me from pusillanimity of spirit and a storm. Cast down, O Lord, divide their tongues: for I have seen iniquity and contradiction in the city.

Day and night iniquity shall surround it upon its walls, and labor in the midst thereof and injustice: and usury and deceit have not departed from its streets. For if my enemy had cursed me, I would verily have borne with it. And if he that hated me had spoken great things against me, I would perhaps have hidden myself from him. But thou a man of one mind, my guide and my familiar, who didst take sweet meats together with me: we walked with consent in the house of God. Let death come upon them: and let them go down alive into hell: for there is wickedness in their dwellings, in the midst of them. But I cried to God: and the Lord heard me. Evening and morning and at noon I will speak and declare: and he shall hear my voice. He shall redeem my soul in peace from them that draw near to me: for among many they were with me. And God shall hear me, and shall humble them, who is before the ages. DIAPSALMA.

For there is no change with them, and they have not feared God; he hath stretched forth his hand in retribution. They have defiled his covenant, they are divided by the wrath of his countenance, and his heart hath drawn near. The words of his mouth were smoother than oil, and the same are darts. Cast thy care upon God. And he himself will nourish thee, and will not give the just to fluctuation for ever. But thou, O God, wilt bring them down into the pit of destruction. Men of blood and deceit shall not live out half their days: but I will trust in thee.

This psalm is about Christ.—The superscription of the psalm is without a history,

Unto the end, in hymns, is an understanding.

Some of our translators have called hymns carmina: but most have placed hymns from the very usage of the Greek. Nothing differs in the name, provided it be understood that the matter is one, which will be signified either in hymns or in songs. This therefore is to be understood of the psalm, that what is contained in its hymn or song is to be understood unto the end: that is, by referring all our understanding to our Lord Jesus Christ, whom the Apostle taught to be the end of the law.

Christ is God and man at once.—We have frequently admonished that the principle of our understanding must be so tempered in the knowledge of the psalms, that we remember him, of whom and through whom all prophecy is, to have been born Son of man from the Son of God, and that the nature of God, abiding before all ages, was born into the nature of man from the birth of a virgin: so that the addition of the later nature brought no diminishment to the earlier nature; nor did he who had also begun to be man cease to be what he was before man, namely God.

He therefore, taking on the frailty of our flesh, and remaining both himself and ours, so acts, prays, professes, and awaits all those things that are ours, that in these he also mingles those things that are his own: and speaks at times from the person of man, because he was both man and born and suffered and died; but at times all his speech is according to God, because he had come forth as man from God, and as Son of man from the Son of God: not forgetting, that is, the confidence of his nature in his words, which he did not lack in the assumption of man; and so speaking from us and from our weakness in the manner of human speech, that from himself and from his own power he might speak those things that are proper and worthy of God, as can be recognized in the present psalm, which begins thus.

Give ear, O God, to my prayer, and despise not my supplication: attend to me, and hear me.

I am grieved in my exercise, and I am troubled at the voice of the enemy and at the tribulation of the sinner: because they have brought iniquity upon me, and in anger they were troublesome to me. My heart is troubled within me, and the fear of death is fallen upon me. Fear and trembling came upon me, and darkness covered me. And I said: Who will give me wings like a dove? And I will fly, and be at rest. Lo, I have gone far off fleeing, and I abode in the wilderness. In the beginning of the psalm, even if he used a voice of humility when he said: Give ear, O God, to my prayer: yet he is understood to have spoken this not without some consciousness of a higher confidence proper to himself. For it is not within the innocence of just anyone to ask that God give ear to his prayer.

For the ears of God are always ready for the prompt prayer of men: because he who imparted to the human race the nature of hearing cannot himself be outside the nature of hearing, and he who everywhere works in us this sense of hearing cannot fail to be everywhere in that very thing which he bestows. God therefore hears everywhere and always: but it is not within the merit of all that what he hears he also gives ear to: his hearing indeed being penetrated by the voice of one praying, but the dignity of having what is heard given ear to being merited by the innocence of prayer alone.

The threefold kind of prayers.—Now in the beginning a threefold prayer of supplication has been set forth.

The first is that the prayer be given ear to. The next is that the supplication not be despised. The third is that he attend to him and hear him. And it is necessary that the nature of each kind be distinct: so that to give ear is not the same as not to despise; and again, to attend and to hear differs from both. And since we have shown what can be understood by giving ear to the prayer; what that means—Despise not my supplication—must be treated. Prayers that are frivolous, diffident, useless, anxious with the cares of the world, entangled in desires for bodily things, and unfruitful in the fruits of good works are despised. These prayers therefore are despicable, unworthy of God's regard, concerning which he says through the prophet Isaiah: And when you stretch forth your hands to me, I will turn away my eyes from you.

And he immediately added the reason for despising the prayer, saying: Your hands are full of blood.

Where therefore the working of iniquity is present, there the prayer of the suppliant is despised. But then attention is given to one who hopes, when the faith of silent hope is held in check by the devotion of a pious conscience. And we have in this the most complete example of the property of each. The Lord gave ear to the words of the Canaanite woman crying out repeatedly: he despised the prayer of that young man who asked the giver of eternity for a division of the inheritance; but he attended to that woman who in the silence of faith sought her healing even from the fringe of his garment.

The exercise of Christ in this world.—Having therefore distinguished those kinds of his whole supplication, he now set forth the very cause of his praying: that in his exercise he was troubled by the voice of the enemy, and by the tribulation of the sinner. And indeed exercise is never undertaken except for useful and salutary ends: which, because the impious cannot bear them even in a holy man, they strive to afflict him with every injury, and to wear him down even to the fear of death. But this exercise in the Lord Jesus Christ is the working of our salvation, which the exercise of his various healings, and then of his passion itself, was advancing.

Exercising himself also in this world in the fellowship of our weakness (which exercise Isaac prefigured by his going out into the field, when Christ, exercising himself in this world, met Rebecca brought on a camel, as a bride from the nations), he is also troubled by the voice of the enemy, when he is called a Samaritan having a devil, when, because he does not save himself from the cross, it is denied that there is salvation for others. Those who brought upon him the iniquity of false testimonies and the sentence of death are also troublesome to him in anger, raging with scourges, with blows of the fist, with slaps.

Patience, infirmity with divinity preserved.—But amid these things, having the power to summon twelve thousand legions of heavenly hosts, he is not moved to wrath, nor provoked to vengeance. For what follows is: My heart is troubled within me. He resolved to suffer all things within himself, so long as he might accomplish the sacraments of human salvation. Yet it is most difficult for human infirmity to restrain within itself the disturbances and commotions of the mind, so that the sign of anxiety or indignation does not break forth even to the very change of countenance, though by a silent movement.

But in the only-begotten God, although our infirmity was taken up, yet the nature of his divinity was not abolished, so that he did not discharge all those things which are infirm with the dignity of his majesty preserved, while he endured all things that belong to our death and fear in such a way that these fell upon him rather than were inherent in him, since our infirmity is more truly ours than it is natural in God. And indeed the very next words of the text joined this together, when it says: And the fear of death fell upon me. Fear and trembling came upon me, and darkness covered me. And all these things indeed, which belong to our necessity, rushed upon him; but they were taken up by him through the power of his own nature, since he who was able not to die did not refuse to bear within himself even the fear of death as it came upon him.

He takes his wings from no other source.—And when these same things had fallen upon him as though they would dominate his weakness as upon a man: yet, to show that he was not subject to those things that rushed upon him, he added: And I said, who will give me wings like a dove? And I will fly away, and be at rest. He is not weak, for whom wings to fly away from the darkness covering him and from the fear of death need not be sought from any other source. For when he says: Who will give me? It is the expression not of one asking from another, but of one hoping from no other source. Moreover he hastens to fly away like a dove, that is, to return to his spiritual nature. For also in the form of a dove the Spirit rested upon him by flying down, having found at some point a dwelling in that man who was then ascending from the waters of the Jordan.

And this indeed is the reason for the prayer

because weighed down by the infirmity of the body, he had taken up that which is mortal in us, so that, made flesh, he might fly away into spirit. And of these his own wings he makes mention in another psalm thus: If I take my wings before the dawn, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea. For even there your hand will lead me. He will therefore take his own wings, so that he may be understood to take them up, emptied of these things.

The desert to which he withdraws for rest.—But having taken his wings to rest by flying, he shows where he will find rest, saying: Behold, I have gone far off in my flight, and I remained in the desert. Darkness fell indeed upon the light, but the darkness did not comprehend it. For he went far off in his flight, who could not be comprehended even by the darkness covering him. He fled therefore even from those who were persecuting him, and having gone far from them he dwells in the desert. And what this desert is, or what the solitude may be (for the Greek expressed both by the same word), another prophet also declares thus: Rejoice, O thirsting desert, let the desert exult and bloom like a lily: and let the deserts of the Jordan bloom and exult. Strengthen the weak hands and the feeble knees: comfort the faint-hearted, be strong in understanding, and fear not. Behold, our God will render judgment, he himself will come and save us.

Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall hear, the tongue of the mute shall be instructed.

Then the lame man shall leap like a deer. He had come indeed to the lost sheep of the house of Israel; but driven away by them he gladdens these deserts. For in them he remains, and remains after he has rested by flying. For there is a rest of God, which is denied to the impious when it is said: If they shall enter into my rest. Having resumed his spiritual glory, the only-begotten God rests in these, as in a temple worthy of himself, in bodies that were formerly deserts, because the children of the desolate are now more numerous than those of her who has a husband.

Those who want only the letter in the psalms.—I am not unaware, however, that very many, looking only at the sound of the words and the letter, consider almost nothing in all the psalms to be fitting to the person of our Lord Jesus Christ, and think that the whole is reproached by the complaints of the Prophet. But we do not raise a dispute. For we do not destroy, but we build up, adding rather understanding to obscure things than taking away from simple ones: because whatever David either suffered or lamented has also been fulfilled in the sufferings of him who was made flesh of our whole race. And, as I believe, what follows will confirm the course of our understanding.

Christ awaits salvation.—But the intervening diapsalm changed the sense as well.

For all speech is again directed against those of whom there is complaint, yet with the honor of him to whom he is accustomed to refer all things placed first. For what follows is,

I was waiting for him who saves me from faintheartedness and from the storm.

This expectation of his is not new: for also in that psalm which is without doubt spoken in his person, he prayed thus: Save me, O God, for the waters have entered even to my soul. I am stuck fast in the mire of the deep, and there is no footing. I have come into the depth of the sea, and the storm has overwhelmed me. From this storm therefore and from this faintheartedness (for he was humbled even to the death of the cross) he awaits salvation from him to whom he prayed, saying: Father, glorify me with yourself with the glory which I had with you before the world was.

How the Jews are now submerged and divided in tongues.—But awaiting his own salvation, he now expects more than merely the hope of salvation. For what follows is,

Cast them down, O Lord, and divide their tongues.

The Latin language has not expressed the proper meaning of the Hebrew or Greek word, as in many cases. For what is rendered cast them down was expressed in those languages as καταπόντισον: by which word the prayer is not that they be cast headlong, but that they be plunged into the deep. He prays therefore that they be submerged, and that their tongues be divided. Of which things we know that one was accomplished under Noah, and the other after the building of the tower, when the deep consumed those submerged by the flood, while the division of tongues separated the others to the cause of eternal strife among themselves: so that the conspiracy entered into against God they could not maintain, since they neither knew nor trusted one another.

A punishment not unlike this is therefore now called down upon these, namely that, by the right of the nations, which we recall are signified by the waters, being swallowed up, and divided among all the tongues with which they now dwell and in which they speak, they might lose the dignity of their life and kingdom.

But that we might know these things were to follow on account of the vices of the city and the contradiction of his commandments, he added

Because I saw iniquity and contradiction in the city.

Day and night iniquity will surround it upon its walls, and labor in the midst of it: and usury and deceit have not departed from its streets.

On account of these vices and crimes, therefore, the punishment of future captivity and dispersion is called for; but the chief among the crimes are iniquity and contradiction. For rejecting him whom the law and the prophets had proclaimed, they spurned him with impious contradiction. Which contradiction, surrounding the walls of that city day and night, went beyond them, since even on the very night of his passion, when he declared that he would be seen sitting and at the right hand of power, they tore their garments and contradicted him even with the reproach of blasphemy.

Now in the walls we recall that the protection of salvation is signified: just as when the building and fortification of the new Jerusalem

that is, the construction and guardianship of the heavenly Church, is desired, it is written thus: Deal favorably, O Lord, in your good will toward Zion, that the walls of Jerusalem may be built. There was therefore at that time a spiritual guardianship among that people: and the administration of the law arranged through angels was shared. But when, with the Mediator of the law himself rejected, iniquity surrounding these walls and this guardianship went beyond them: then sin began to be greater than the very fortification, so that iniquity overcame the will of the guardianship, with usury and deceit and the other things forbidden in the law abounding.

Christ complains not of his passion but of the betrayer: why not of the passion.—And showing the unworthiness of so great an iniquity, he added: For if my enemy had reproached me, I would have borne it; and if he who hates me had spoken great things against me, I would have hidden myself from him. But you, a man of one mind with me, my guide and my acquaintance, who took sweet food together with me, we entered the house of God in concord. The complaint is not about the passion, but about the apostle who betrayed him. For since he was bestowing salvation upon the human race by taking up the death of the cross, he cannot be seen to be reproaching this sacrament of great piety. For certainly if it had been an enemy, there would be no cause for complaint: since that which he himself had willed to suffer for our salvation was being accomplished in him.

And just as if one who hated him had spoken great things against him, he would have hidden himself from him

because God in man would not have been known to him, and on this account there would be less guilt in one who did not know (for the nations did not learn from a law announced to them beforehand that the Word was made flesh, which was indeed adapted for those under the law, even in the very deeds fitted to the form of future truth, since Abraham also worshipped a man, and Jacob saw God in a man)—that he would have borne these reproaches of the nations, that being a man he made himself God, that having a demon he was leading the people astray; because they would have been ignorant that all these things are contained in the law which was given to Israel.

But when one of one mind and a guide and an acquaintance does these things: one of one mind, since he was chosen as an apostle; a guide, since while the Lord was still present, he himself was sent ahead to the towns to proclaim his coming, and was appointed by him as leader and prince of the coming kingdom; and an acquaintance, since he had learned all his comings and goings, and recognized in the Son of man also the Son of God, who had also been a sharer in the changing of water into wine and in the sweetening of barley into food for the people, and had used the same table, and had always entered the house of God together with him: he who was taken up into this fellowship of divine ministry showed a greater cause of complaint against himself.

The punishment of the wicked.—But although these things were said specifically against his impiety, yet the decree of punishment is referred to the many.

Let death come upon them, and let them go down alive into hell, for wickedness is in their lodgings in the midst of them, so that death will come upon them in such a way that they descend alive into hell with a sense of punishment, since in their lodgings and in their midst: that is, the works of wickedness surround them entirely within and without.

But he, while these things were being done and plotted by them, showed to whom his hope and prayer were directed, saying, I cried to God, and the Lord heard me.

Evening and morning and at noon I will declare and announce; and he will hear my voice.

He will deliver my soul in peace from those who draw near to me, for they were many with me. And God will hear me, and will humble them, he who is before the ages. The Lord soon hears a faithful cry, and this very thanksgiving for his cry being heard he will declare evening and morning and at noon, showing the whole day in those parts of the day by which the day is contained.

Moreover this order of times is distributed only from prophetic knowledge, so that he announces evening and morning and at noon

because according to the law and the observance of the law the day begun from evening is reckoned as continuing until noon, since the beginning of the day is completed not by the light restored in the morning, but by the night made at evening. He declares therefore and announces the things contained in the psalm, that he hears his voice, and delivers his soul in peace (for he made peace for all things in heaven and on earth) and delivers him from those drawing near to him. For the earlier complaint was about those close to him, since even the one of one mind and guide and acquaintance was doing these things, having been chosen as an apostle along with the other apostles.

God therefore who is before the ages

that is, through whom all things are, because he is before all things, will hear him, and will humble them; since they have been made unworthy of the glory of the eternal resurrection.

The punishment of the Jews on account of their impenitence.—For, with a diapsalma interposed, he cuts off from them all hope on account of their impenitent profession of impiety, saying: For there is no change for them, and they did not fear God. All shall rise again according to the Apostle, but not all shall be changed, because they did not fear God. For it would have been right that those who were ignorant of God in man should yet have believed in God rising from the dead, since repentance and pardon lay open to them even after the expiation of the passion. For not only did they not fear God; but when he had stretched out his hand to repay them, that is, had offered his help, they contaminated his covenant: when they rejected him who had been foretold by the covenant of the law for salvation. For there follows,

He stretched out his hand in repaying. They contaminated his covenant: they were divided from the anger of his countenance.

And therefore no announcement was left to them, because he died once for sin, and rising again granted transformation only to those who through faith both died with him and shall rise again. But those he divided from his wrathful countenance by the overthrow of the city, and placing their portion with the unbelievers, he either scattered them into all lands, or divided them from the saints.

The smooth speech of Judas.—Thereupon from the general complaint the discourse turned to the signification of him who had been both a guide and a close companion and an acquaintance to him: And his heart drew near. His words were smoother than oil, and yet they are darts. Having been admitted among the apostles, and taking charge of the care of the poor, that is, attending to the greatest work of ministry, he drew near his heart (for he rejoiced to be freed from those who draw near): not drawing near, certainly, in the ministry of faith, but to the wrath of God and the contamination of his covenant. But he himself, smooth of speech, with words emollient beyond oil, feigning to take care of the poor, even then when the alabaster jar of precious ointment was poured out, complained as though that ought rather to have been spent on the needs of the poor. But he was seeking an occasion for theft from the collection of money.

And the Prophet in another psalm avoids this kind of smooth-speaking oil, when he says: The oil of the sinner shall not anoint my head

because under the appearance of a good work he stirs up the weapons of malice. Moreover there are also darts in words, just as teeth are a shield and arrows, and the tongue is a sharp sword. He therefore detests these darts of speech, which are the more harmful under the guise of flattery and adulation.

What we ought to care for.—But amid these darts of the enemy he remains undaunted, and shows us a port of security, faithful and safe. For there follows,

Cast your care upon the Lord, and he himself will nourish you: he will not give the just man to fluctuation forever.

The Lord also took away from us in the Gospels the necessity of anxiety, saying: Be not anxious about tomorrow; for sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof. Seek first the kingdom of God and his justice and all things shall be provided for you: that is, all care is to be placed in meriting the kingdom of God and justice. Care is therefore to be cast upon him: for he himself will nourish, according to that saying: He nourished me beside the water of refreshment. And nourishing, he will not leave one in the waves of this age, just as the nourished Jacob escaped every storm both of hatreds and of harsh servitude, saying: God who has nourished me from my youth.

For he is the author of life, he is the giver of food, not of earthly food only, but also of spiritual.

The pit of life, and the pit of death.—But when one has been led up beside the water of refreshment and freed from the waves of the storm, a worthy punishment follows the impious, when he says: But you, O God, will lead them down into the pit of destruction. Men of blood and deceit shall not live out half their days: but I will hope in you, O Lord. There is indeed a pit of living water: but there is also a pit of destruction, according to that saying: Let not the tempest of water overwhelm me, nor let the deep swallow me up, nor let the pit close its mouth over me. The just man therefore not being left to fluctuation, those others shall be led down into the pit of destruction; whose mouth could not remain closed against the only-begotten God rising from the dead.

Moreover after the passion of the Lord, the victory of war immediately consumed them together with the destruction of the city: with every age indiscriminately put to death to satisfy the conquerors, their days of life not halved but their youth laid low. But full days are reserved for the saints and faithful, according to that saying: And full days shall be found in those whose hope is always in the Lord: who is blessed for ages of ages. Amen.

Unto the end, for the people who have been made far from the saints, a psalm of David for the title inscription, when the Philistines held him in Geth. Have mercy on me, O Lord, for man has trodden me down; all day long he has fought and afflicted me. My enemies have trodden me down all day long. From the height of the day I shall not fear: because many who warred against me were afraid: but I will hope in you. In the Lord I will praise my words all day long: in God I will hope, I will not fear what flesh may do to me. All day long my words were execrated: all their counsels against me were for evil. They will dwell and hide: they themselves will watch my heel. As they have waited for my soul, for nothing shall you save them; in anger you shall break the peoples. O God, I have declared my life to you: you have set my tears in your sight, as in your promise.

Let my enemies be turned back, in whatever day I shall call upon you.

Behold I have known that you are my God. In the Lord I will praise the word, in the Lord I will hope: I will not fear what man may do to me. In me, O God, are your vows, which I will render as praises to you: because you have delivered my soul from death, and my feet from falling: that I may please before God in the light of the living.

The passion of David as a prophecy of the passions of Christ.—The superscription of the psalm contains many things which, beyond the account of events that took place, intimate the sense of another understanding: since,

The psalm is for the people who are far from the holy one, since the title inscription is set before it, and since finally the very beginning is prescribed at the end.

For if the present discourse were singing only that complaint about David being held in Geth while fleeing from the Philistines, the whole movement of this rebuked iniquity would confine itself to that alone.

But since these things have been set forth before the account of the event that took place, to instruct and direct the understanding of readers; we understand without doubt that through the effects of the events which were enacted in David, there is impressed upon us, according to the spirit of prophecy, the knowledge of those things which are signified under these superscriptions: so that what David suffered was a prefiguration of the passions of our Lord Jesus Christ: so that what is the title inscription, may be seen to signify the eternity of him who conquered by dying, because the title inscription, which the Greek language calls stelographia, is conferred for the glory of eternity especially upon those who, having led a praiseworthy life, did not fear to die in battle even for the salvation of their country. Now the people who have been made far from the saints is to be understood as Israel, made unworthy of the sanctification of the nations and departing far from it.

And that it is unto the end, let it be understood as proper to him who is the end of the law: which will be recognized in the very end of the psalm, when the discourse by which the conclusion of the psalm is closed declares most fully the completion of this very understanding of ours.

This psalm is to be treated as concerning both David and Christ.—Through these things therefore, which are connected to the superscription beyond the events that took place, we shall also treat the psalm in the person of the Lord, yet not departing from the complaints of the prophet himself. Nor when he endured these things is he to be thought not to have groaned as well; because for this reason the events that took place are connected to these very things which intimate a spiritual sense, so that through the action of the prophet the sense and speech of the prophecy might become known; since the prophet prophesied not so much by the spirit as by his sufferings. The discourse will therefore be balanced between David himself and the man Jesus Christ: so that because he bore the infirmities of all, and frequently used both the voice and the tears of sinners, the feeling and speech that belongs to man may be without dishonor to God.

The aids of demons for the impious against the pious.—

Have mercy on me, O Lord, for man has trodden me down; all day long he has fought and afflicted me; my enemies have trodden me down all day long.

We have recognized that day is frequently used to signify an age, so that where there is a whole day, there the whole time of life is shown. For neither David nor the Lord was vexed by the persecution of only a single day. But he who asks for the mercy of God and complains that he has been trodden down, has the arms of his security and virtue, by which he sustains not only earthly hatreds but also the wars of spiritual wickednesses, against which rather than against flesh and blood the Apostle teaches us that we have our fight. For they make use of the services of the impious for the vexations and tribulations of the saints: penetrating their hearts, they incite them to every assault of a turbulent mind.

The terror of the wicked.—The prophet therefore, not fearing this height which in this age exalts and lifts itself up, says,

From the height of the days I shall not fear, because many who war against me shall be afraid.

He knows the day of eternal judgment, he knows also the eternal fire prepared for eternal punishments: and therefore those who attempt to war against him shall rather be afraid; because, since this holy man does not fear, the terror of judgment presses upon them all the more. But for the confidence of his security he adds,

But I will hope in you.

In the Lord I will praise my words all day long. He places all his hopes in God, and praises his words throughout the whole time of his life. Nor is it obscure what he praises in himself as one who speaks.

He who hopes in God does not fear from the flesh, nor does God who assumes flesh.—For this voice which follows is worthy of a holy man: In God I will hope, I will not fear what flesh may do to me. The terror of the age does not break him, nor do the hatreds of those conspiring against him disturb him. For hope which is in God does not fear the terrors of human hatreds. Moreover we frequently take flesh to signify men, through whom they are contained in the body; either as when he says here of the impious: My spirit shall not dwell in these men, because they are flesh; or that saying: All flesh shall see the salvation of God; or that of the Apostle: Are you not carnal, and do you not walk according to man? He remains therefore undaunted under the mercy of God: and therefore hoping in him, he does not fear all the assaults and persecutions of the flesh.

But this voice is plainly worthy also of the only-begotten God, for whom, emptying himself from the form of God, the servile form did not take away the power and nature of God. For God made flesh, even in the assumption of flesh remained God, exercising the power of his virtue under the fellowship of our body. For he was not weighed down by the flesh, so as not to walk upon the waves, nor so that the power of divine virtue should not go out even to the fringes of his garment, nor so that he should not forgive sins, and with his spittle kindle the nature of sight in eyes blind from the womb, and cover over with a restored ear the wound of a severed ear, nor so that he should not penetrate the solid walls with his body passing through. Therefore neither the prophet fearing nothing from the flesh while hoping in God, nor God accomplishing divine works under the assumption of flesh, feared from the flesh.

In those things also which follow, the signification of the event enacted in him is contained.

For he says,

All day long my words were execrated: all their counsels against me were for evil.

They will dwell and hide: they themselves will watch my heel. For nowhere except by secret counsels were false testimonies and captious questions prepared against him: dwelling together and concealing the counsels of their malice. But they also did not endure the rebuke of his words, by which he did not cease to reproach their impiety, and watching all his goings by the heel, while they conspire together in fraudulent conspiracy for his supplanting: on account of which this worthy sentence of the judge encompasses them.

Salvation to nothing, the resurrection of the impious, this Christ merited for them.—For there follows,

As they have lain in wait for my soul, thou shalt save them for nothing, in anger thou shalt bring down the peoples.

This is a new word of the prophet, that God should save to nothing those who lie in wait for his soul: and since it is one thing to be brought to nothing, another to be saved, now the salvation which shall come upon them is to nothing. Is there then something that is saved to nothing? There plainly is: whatever, though granted resurrection, is not worthy of transformation. For since all flesh has been redeemed in Christ so as to rise again, and it is necessary that all stand before his tribunal; yet the glory and honor of rising is not indiscriminate for all. Those therefore to whom only resurrection, and not also transformation, has been granted, are saved to nothing.

For in anger shall those peoples be brought down, for whom the salvation of resurrection has been appointed for the experience of punishment: from which anger the Apostle promises we are to be rescued, saying: For if when we were yet sinners, Christ died for us; much more being justified in his blood, we shall be saved through him from wrath. For sinners therefore he died unto the salvation of resurrection, but those sanctified in his blood he will save from wrath.

The hope of the just and whence their merit.—Then, with the peoples saved for nothing and brought down in anger, this holy one announces his hope of life, saying,

O God, I have declared my life to thee, thou hast set my tears in thy sight, as in thy promise.

He is worthy of the promise of God on account of his constancy in preaching, and on account of the merit of not keeping silence; for his tears, which either the prophet shed for himself, or the Lord shed for us, are in the sight of God, and he will use their intercession to obtain what God has promised. Are in the sight of God, and he will use their intercession to obtain what God has promised.

The punishment of the impious.—But as he is about to enter upon the grace of the eternal promise, his enemies shall be turned back, so as to show whither they would be led in anger. For this follows,

My enemies shall be turned back, on whatsoever day I shall call upon thee.

While he calls upon God, they shall be turned back to whence they came: God's anger leading them down, and their bodies resumed for punishment.

The Word is God.—But with those turned back after the resurrection into hell for eternal punishment, he here performs the duty of his thanksgiving, saying,

Behold I have known that thou art my God, and in God I will praise the word.

This word of his therefore he praises in God, because he has known that God is his.

A voice worthy of the saints amid human persecutions.—Nor does he praise only that, but also this: that he has hoped in him, not fearing what man may do to him.

This is plainly a voice worthy of all the saints, to hold fast a steadfast faith amid human persecutions, and not to be moved by fear of earthly turmoil, and with most certain hope not to fear that man will accomplish anything against the eternity of the soul: since after the intervention of this death, both our corruption and our weakness are changed into immortal glory. And on this account he praises his own words, by which he declares that, hoping in the Lord, he does not fear the power of man, saying: In the Lord I will praise the word, in the Lord I will hope: I will not fear what man shall do to me. For this reason therefore he praises his word in the Lord, because hoping in him he will not fear man.

Christ is lord of his own resurrection.

The same body shall rise. Who is God in those raised up.—But in order to show that the reason he fears nothing from man is that, if man had exercised any power over his body, the glory of resurrection would restore it again without any defect of the bodies; he added,

In me are, O God, the vows which I will render of praise to thee

because thou hast delivered my soul from death, and my feet from falling; that I may please before God in the light of the living. Those things which he hopes for are not outside himself: nor are the vows of praise, which he will render, to be sought from without. For he is himself the lord of his own resurrection; he himself bestows upon this body, dead and left within the tomb, the fellowship of his divine nature.

For neither is a body acquired from external matter for all who are to rise, nor is a nature of foreign origin and external causes restored: but that very same body emerges for the advancement of eternal glory, and what is new in it comes about by transformation rather than by creation. The vows therefore which he will render are in himself, both when the weakness of bodies shall be taken away, that is, falling and tears; and when incorruption shall devour corruption; and when immortal power absorbs death; and when God shall be all in all; and when he himself, in the light of the living who are in that same God who is the light of the living, is to please. For if at the creation of the world, according to the declaration of Wisdom, the Father rejoiced over the sons of men, far more is he to be understood as about to please the Father in the reconciliation of the world.

For the true light of the world, enlightening every man that cometh into this world, is our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

Have mercy on me, O God, have mercy on me: for my soul trusteth in thee.

And in the shadow of thy wings I will hope, until iniquity pass away. I will cry to God the most high, God who hath done good to me. He sent from heaven, and delivered me: he gave into reproach those that trod upon me. God sent his mercy and his truth: and he delivered my soul from the midst of the whelps of lions; I slept troubled. The sons of men, their teeth are weapons and arrows, and their tongue a sharp sword. Be thou exalted above the heavens, O God, and thy glory above all the earth. They prepared a snare for my feet, and they bowed down my soul. They dug a pit before my face, and they are fallen into it. My heart is ready, O God, my heart is ready: I will sing and give praise to thee. Arise, my glory, arise psaltery and harp: I will arise early.

And I will give praise to thee, O Lord, among the peoples, I will sing to thee among the nations: for thy mercy is magnified even to the heavens, and thy truth even to the clouds.

The connection of this psalm with the preceding.—Concerning the dead left within the tomb, and not to another newly created, the glory of resurrection was granted, which the body obtains anew through fellowship and participation in the divine nature. This therefore is what he means in this one word: To that very body which was dead, he himself who was dead bestows glory. Of the preceding psalm, only this is changed in the following: that whereas for the people made far from the saints there was a speaking in riddles, now it is prescribed: destroy not, or scatter not; which the Greek speech has comprised in the single word τὸ μὴ διαφθείρῃς. For it followed that, since corruption would remain for those who departed far from the saints, the holy one should pray that he not be subjected to it. For in another psalm he shows his thanksgiving for this corruption turned away from him, saying: Neither wilt thou give thy holy one to see corruption.

Nor is it doubtful that this psalm is to be understood, according to the profession of the apostles, as spoken in the person of the Lord.

Exposition of the title.—And so David, awaiting the time of the Lord's resurrection for the glory of human flesh, now both prays that he not be corrupted, and with prophetic foreknowledge gives thanks that corruption has been turned away from him in him in whom are the first-fruits of the resurrection. Therefore,

the inscription of the title is In finem

because both a glorious life taken up for the honor of eternity, and a death salutary to many, are inscribed upon the tombs of brave men; and all these things ought to be referred to him who is either the end of the law, or whom the very end of the psalm may show. But the fact that he speaks these things shut up in a cave is the time of the prophecy, in which he is understood to have written the psalm, prophesying by that very dwelling in the cave the humility of the Lord who was to remain in the body.

For the rest, it cannot appear that one who was hidden within a cave out of fear would make a clamor with psaltery and harp, as the psalm attests, that is, with the full apparatus of all musical art.

Of whom God's mercy is to be hoped for.

To what end, and for how long.—He began thus,

Have mercy on me, O God, have mercy on me: for my soul trusteth in thee.

He asks for mercy; because he trusts in God, teaching that the mercy of God is to be hoped for by those who believe. And what the import and what the effect of God's mercy is, he shows saying: And in the shadow of thy wings I will hope until iniquity pass away. It is the nature of birds to shade the weakness of their young with their wings, and to defend them from the force and violence of those that fly past. Which we observe especially in hens, when they either shade or protect their chicks gathered within their feathers. Whose custom the Lord recalls as an example of his own solicitude, saying to Jerusalem the slayer of prophets: How often would I have gathered thy children together, as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and thou wouldest not?

The holy one therefore hopes in the shadow of God's wings, until iniquity pass away

that is, while either the scandals of the age, or the iniquities of the impious, or the weakness of earthly humility, while (perhaps: just as) this very cave of his dwelling and of his body in which David is now shut up, he escapes.

Prophetic knowledge.

Diapsalma. Death is sleep. The troubled sleep of one sleeping, the passion of Christ. Who are the whelps of lions.—Hoping under the shadow of God's wings, he is ever intent upon the duty of his hope, saying,

I will cry to God the most high, God who hath done good to me.

He cries by faith rather than by voice, who cries while fleeing and hiding. Moreover, in the speech of one hoping there is no thanksgiving for things already obtained: but it belongs to prophetic knowledge and faith to rejoice in things to be done no differently than in things done; and therefore he cries to him who, under the unchangeable constitution of his goodness, has already done good to him: And how far the Lord has done good, he teaches in what follows, saying,

He sent from heaven, and delivered me, he gave into reproach those that trod upon me.

God sent his mercy and his truth, he delivered my soul from the midst of the whelps of lions; I slept troubled.

It was fitting, even if there were no change of person and meaning, that a diapsalma should intervene: because the understanding of the hearers was to be raised to the comprehension of what was said. God did good to his holy one by sending from heaven: so that, with him delivered, those who trod upon him were given into reproach. And he sent his mercy and truth to deliver his soul from the midst of the whelps, when he had slept troubled.

If death is signified in sleep, either when David is about to sleep with his fathers, or when Lazarus sleeping was raised up, or when the daughter of that centurion is not dead but sleepeth, or when those who have fallen asleep we shall not prevent in the resurrection: if the troubled sleep of one sleeping is a sign of the passion, when it is said: Now is my soul troubled exceedingly: yet he had previously prayed that his soul be delivered from the hand of the dog thus: Deliver me from the mouth of the lion, and my lowness from the horns of the unicorns—which demonstrates that the descent of Christ's soul to hell was both foretold in the psalms and proclaimed by apostolic teaching.

Me from the mouth of the lion, and my only one from the hand of the dog: and no others can be understood as the whelps of dogs or lions than those who are also a generation of vipers, from whose midst the soul is delivered, and is delivered through the mercy and truth sent from heaven; according to that: Mercy and truth have met together, and if mercy and truth is the Lord Jesus Christ: there is no doubt that those are given into reproach who, treading upon the Lord in his passion, do not believe these things; for whom it is indeed a reproach to have lost the coming of the only-begotten God and the forgiveness of sins.

The vices of minds are designated by the functions of bodies.—And

because the hatreds of persecutors and the opposition of deniers would always stand against this hope of the saints; having recalled the sacraments of human salvation, he added: Sons of men, their teeth are arms and arrows, and their tongue a sharp sword.

The divine word signifies the vices and movements of souls under bodily functions: as in the canticle of Deuteronomy, He grew fat, and kicked, the beloved rebuked for the wantonness of impiety under the signification of a bodily habit; or that: Who devour my people as the food of bread; or also: Thou hast broken the teeth of sinners; and likewise that of the Apostle: But if you bite and devour one another, take heed that you be not consumed one of another: so that whatever is enjoined upon each individual member as its function and action, that is referred to the efficacy of minds and souls: so that now the effect of persecutors or detractors is recalled, he says: Sons of men, their teeth are a shield and arrows, and their tongue a sharp sword, since both the vices of power would consume themselves, and they would wound with the darts of detraction.

God cannot be exalted unless he first descended.

By the gift of the Holy Spirit the whole earth is full of the Lord's glory.—But amid these things the Prophet, who knows and awaits them, did not keep silence. For having prayed that he might not be corrupted, he longs for the time when this corruption shall be swallowed up, saying,

Be thou exalted above the heavens, O God, and thy glory above all the earth.

Those things which are raised on high from lowly places are seen to be exalted: because by a certain advance they attain to that which is more sublime. But that which is to be exalted above the heavens must first have descended from the heavens to the lower regions, through which it may again be exalted above the heavens. This very thing the Apostle states most fully thus: Who when he ascended on high, he led captivity captive, he gave gifts to men.

Now that he ascended, what is it but because he also descended into the lower parts of the earth?

He that descended is the same also that ascended above all the heavens, that he might fill all things: hereby signifying that the cause of being exalted above the heavens was that the humility of descending even to the lower parts of the earth had been assumed. Out of desire, therefore, the prophet foretells that God is exalted above the heavens. And because, being exalted above the heavens, he would fill all things on earth with the glory of his Holy Spirit; he added: And thy glory above all the earth: since the gift of the Spirit poured out upon all flesh would bear witness to the glory of the Lord exalted above the heavens.

How David calls the glory or passion of Christ his own.—But all this advance is desired not for the divine nature, but for the weakness of man

because the prophet is not ignorant that he is to be established in the heavens through the assumption of flesh, seeing that we have been made fellow-members of the same body and fellow-partakers in Christ Jesus. And therefore he joined these things to the weakness of his own flesh, which was both to be afflicted in the sufferings of the Lord and to be exalted above the heavens,

They have prepared snares for my feet, and they have bowed down my soul.

They have dug a pit before my face, and they have fallen into it. Through the faith of compassion, even with himself suffering in the Lord who suffers, as though he too had suffered, he makes this complaint.

But upon those who persecuted the Lord of majesty, when they have fallen into the pit they prepared, the punishment and the very sense of that death is brought back upon them.

Diapsalma. David signifies himself by the psaltery and harp.—And

because the faith of suffering together and dying together glorifies us in Christ: the prophet stands as it were in the readiness of this hope and faith, saying,

–: O God, my heart is ready: I will sing and give praise to thee.

Arise, my glory, arise psaltery and harp. I will arise early, and I will give praise to thee among the peoples, O Lord, I will sing praise to thee among the nations. Having interposed a diapsalma, the prophet directed this speech to God, meanwhile harmonizing by the faith of the psalm these same things for which his heart is ready: and having exhorted the joys of his soul and body under the signification of the psaltery and harp, he shows himself in the fact that he sings and gives praise.

For he says: Arise, my glory, arise, psaltery and harp: I will arise early; plainly declaring that he himself is shown in the psaltery and harp, since when the harp and psaltery are summoned to arise, it is rather he himself who is signified in them that arises. And arising early, when he sings with his glory the glory of evangelical hope, it is at the fitting time of dawn both for prayer and for salvation. For this follows: And I will give praise to thee among the peoples, O Lord, I will sing praise to thee among the nations. Being about to praise God among the peoples and among the nations, he must needs praise in him the salvation of the nations: because now the cord of inheritance is no longer confined to Israel alone, nor is Jacob the portion, but the fullness of the earth is now God's; nor are we any longer the image of the earthly, but the image of the heavenly.

What truth reaching to the clouds means.

Mercy reaching to the heavens, flesh free from corruption.—But he shows what was to be confessed among the peoples and sung among the nations.

For thy mercy is magnified even to the heavens, and thy truth even to the clouds. This therefore is the confession among the peoples and nations, that mercy is magnified even to the heavens, and truth even to the clouds. For when the Saints shall be caught up to meet the Lord in the clouds, being themselves borne up in that cloud in the body of resurrection, and all creation according to the Apostle is to be freed from corruption, and all things both in heaven and on earth are to be pacified through him, rightly is our truth in him raised even to the clouds in the resurrection, and his mercy magnified even to the heavens, when the groaning of creation is driven away by the removal of corruption.

But of these things the raising even to the clouds and even to the heavens is signified, yet it is proper to him alone to pass beyond the heavens and to escape all sense of imagined sublimity.

The glory of God surpassing all sense, which remains on earth.—And so the prophet, repeating the prayer of his hope, closed thus,

Be thou exalted above the heavens, O God, and thy glory above all the earth.

There is no measure to the exalting of God; for his elevation is above the heavens. For the Lord of creatures is to be understood as beyond creatures. And since for us there is nothing else in knowledge than heaven, he who is exalted above the heavens surpasses all sense, exceeding the sense of understanding. His mercy indeed has overflowed even to us: but magnified even to the heavens in those who are soon to be in the heavens.

And while his truth is raised even to the clouds, for us who are to be caught up to meet him in the cloud, yet he himself, who is to pass beyond all the heavens at the right hand of God, transcends them, and his glory also remaining on earth, that is, with us, when he says: Behold I am with you all days even to the consummation of the age, our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

If indeed ye speak justice, judge rightly, ye sons of men.

For in heart ye work iniquities, in the earth your hands weave injustice. Sinners are estranged from the womb: they have gone astray from the belly, they have spoken false things. Their indignation is according to the likeness of a serpent, like the deaf asp that stoppeth her ears, which will not hear the voice of the charmers, and of the benefit that is charmed by the wise. God hath broken their teeth in their mouth: the Lord hath broken the jaw-teeth of the lions. They shall come to nothing like water running down: he shall bend his bow until they be weakened. Like wax that melteth they shall be taken away: fire hath fallen on them, and they shall not see the sun. Before your thorns could know the brier, as living, so in wrath he shall swallow them up. The just shall rejoice when he shall see the revenge: he shall wash his hands in the blood of the sinner.

And man shall say, if indeed there shall be fruit for the just.

Indeed there is, God who judgeth them in the earth.

Concerning the superscription of the psalm above, only some signification of events is lacking.

For both unto the end, and destroy not, and the inscription of the title are present. For the psalm contains nothing of prophecy through the events of things done; so that, as in the others, holy David both prophesies in words and in deeds: but a rebuke against the impious, and a denunciation of God's judgment upon sinners, and the repayment of joy to the saints, and the fruit of justice to man are contained. This therefore is the end in the psalm, this is the confidence of corruption to be driven away, this is the inscription of the title to him who redeemed us through death.

The word of justice is common, not the zeal for it.

The sin of the heart. The heart lies open to God.—And indeed the whole psalm presents itself as such.

If indeed ye speak justice, judge rightly, ye sons of men.

For in heart ye work iniquities, in the earth your hands weave injustice. The word of justice is common; but the zeal and practice of equitable judgment belongs to few. But plainly one is then to be considered as truly speaking justice, when he holds to the judgment of truth; God judging not human words but the works of the heart, that is, the machinations of thoughts. Now iniquity is wont not to be carried out under the shame of public conscience: and therefore although the hands may not have embraced iniquity, yet the heart works iniquity before God on earth.

Hence adultery conceived in the heart alone is already a crime: hence according to Paul's Gospel God judges the secrets of men, God beholding the wills of men in the very beginnings of human birth. For since the power of the mighty nature enters not so much into the fibres of the viscera as into the desires of the mind, it must needs not take its beginning of discernment through the movements of the senses, but by the knowledge of nature apprehend even the future movements of the senses by foreknowledge.

Foreknowledge of sin does not impose necessity.—And therefore concerning those who accomplish in the heart the iniquities embraced by the hands, he immediately added,

Sinners are estranged from the womb, they have gone astray from the belly, they have spoken false things.

Thus Esau was estranged from the womb, when the elder is announced as destined to serve the younger, even before he existed, God not being ignorant of the future will, since both the falseness of speech and the error of life are from the womb: it being rather that God knows this, than that anyone is born to necessity and a nature of sin. And lest the vice could be referred to origin; he reproaches the crime of a will hardened in them against obedience, saying,

Their fury according to the likeness of a serpent, like the deaf asp that stoppeth her ears: which will not hear the voice of the charmers, of the charmed remedy from the wise.

No certain natural necessity is excused in the crime.

For the serpent could have been innocent, to whom ears are blocked up as though deaf of themselves: and it does not hear the voice of the charmer, since it does not receive the charmed remedies from the wise. Nor does he here recall the song of the Marsi and the lulled hissings of vipers, because these same things grow torpid with even greater sluggishness through faith in the name of God and his power; but he teaches that contumacious and insolent disobedience of the ancient serpent growing deaf against the songs of the saints and the remedies charmed by the wise; since daily it is commanded him, even under the denunciation of the divine name, that he deceive not, that he creep not upon, that he bite not, and yet he rages with stopped hearing; from which those who do not obey the Gospel are a generation of vipers.

The crushing and emptiness of the impious.—But

because his power and that of his followers is crushed, and all the weapons of savagery in them are broken, these things are set forth below.

God hath broken their teeth in their mouth, the Lord hath broken the grinders of the lions.

They shall be despised like running water: he shall bend his bow until they are weakened. As melted wax they shall be taken away: fire hath fallen upon them, and they have not seen the sun. We have spoken frequently of the teeth of sinners and the grinders of lions, because in these is signified the impulse of raging malice. When these therefore are broken and crushed, they shall be despised like running water. For every superfluous course of waters is idle, since each person draws from them only what he thinks useful to himself, while the rest perish as the flow passes by, being carried all the way to the seas only to be destroyed.

And of this nature and contempt in them he makes mention in another psalm, where it is said: I am poured out like water, and all my bones are scattered. My heart is become like wax melting in the midst of my bowels. And many things which are dissolved from solid into liquid change their form without the destruction of their nature, so that they flow from being rigid: but wax, once fire is applied, melts in such a way that it perishes. In the same manner he has now set forth an example from each kind of creation for the destruction of sinners: They shall be despised like running water, he shall bend his bow until they are weakened: as melted wax they shall be taken away. First therefore they shall be despised without hope of standing firm or remaining, flowing away uselessly: then the bow of the Lord shall be bent until they are weakened: and when weakened they shall be taken away like melted wax.

And we have frequently shown that the severity of God's judgment is signified in the bow, always bent against the punishments of sinners upon those who are to be punished. And indeed, with the bow bent, the following words declare that they are to be taken away by the fire of judgment like melted wax: Fire hath fallen upon them, and they have not seen the sun. The fire cast upon them will therefore take them away, so that they may not behold the sun of justice; for they are unworthy to be co-heirs of the eternal light.

The impious suffer the punishments of fire immediately after death.—And lest what is said about their being taken away like melted wax by the fire falling upon them so that they do not see the sun should signify their annihilation rather than their punishment; he added,

Before your thorns can bring forth the buckthorn, as living things, so in wrath he swallows you up.

The buckthorn is a kind of thorn-bush which puts forth many dense thorns from itself after the manner of a bramble: and it blossoms when warmed by spring along with the rest. Therefore before the buckthorn brings forth the thorns of sinners, the fire swallows them up in wrath as living beings. For it was not fitting that sinners should rest without punishment while the time of judgment was still suspended: and so the fire swallows them up as living beings, that is, with the capacity to feel punishment, even before they rise again.

For the resurrection of bodies is signified in the buckthorn, which will themselves display within them the thorns by which they are to be pierced: while others will have the fruit of the eternal flower, these will be roused only to bring forth upon themselves the pricks of thorns after the manner of buckthorns. And we recall that the force and pain of sins is signified in the thorn, where it is said: I fell into misery, when a thorn pierces; because humbled even unto death he condemned sin in the flesh on account of sin, as one who is pierced is pierced by a piercing thorn. And each person, according to the Apostle, shall receive either good or evil in the body, since the sinner will have the very matter and capacity for feeling in which he may be pierced. Before the resurrection of the flesh, that is, before the buckthorn sends forth its thorns; his soul is swallowed up alive unto punishment, to be punished as a living soul according to the rich man in the Gospel.

Hands washed in the blood of the sinner signify innocence.—But amid these things, the joy of every just man, as of Lazarus resting in the bosom of Abraham, is shown. For there follows,

The just man shall rejoice when he shall see the vengeance, he shall wash his hands in the blood of the sinner.

And he shall say: If indeed there shall be fruit for the just? Indeed God is judging them in the earth. The joy of the just man is when he shall see the vengeance; because, while sinners are being punished, he rejoices that he has been led by Angels into eternal rest: washing his hands not in the blood of sinners, but since sinners are in blood, because they are guilty of blood, he will keep his hands washed clean of all guilt of blood. He testified to this same thing in another psalm, where he says: I have hated the assembly of the malignant, and I will not sit with the wicked: I will wash my hands among the innocent.

And having recalled the duties of innocence, he added: Destroy not my soul with the wicked, nor my life with men of blood.

That is, he will wash his hands among the innocent in the blood of sinners. And so greatly are these men of blood, that the blood of all those slain from Abel to Zacharias is to be required of them, and when Pilate washed his hands, they professed that the blood of the just man was upon themselves and their children.

But while the just man washes his hands and rejoices, a man shall say: Will there be fruit for the just?

And he says that there certainly is, because God is judging them in the earth. When therefore a man says: whether there be fruit for the just, he is understood to await judgment; yet the just man has already been judged in the earth, because he has been led by Angels into the bosom of Abraham, according to that saying: He who believes in me is not judged, but passes from death into life: but he who does not believe is already judged. Since therefore the holy man who is to pass from death into life is not to be judged, and the unbeliever is already judged unto punishment: it is understood that the remaining judgment is for those who, according to the quality of their deeds, are to be judged between sins and faith, through our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

Unto the end, destroy not, for David in the inscription of the title, when Saul sent, and watched his house, to kill him.

Deliver me from my enemies, and free me from those who rise up against me.

Deliver me from those who work iniquity, and free me from men of blood: for behold they have lain in wait for my soul, and the mighty have rushed upon me. Neither my iniquity nor my sin, O Lord, without iniquity have I run, and have directed my course. Rise up to meet me, and see, and thou, O Lord, God of hosts, God of Israel, attend to visit all the nations: have no mercy (not) on all who work iniquity. DIAPSALMA. They shall return at evening, and shall suffer hunger like dogs, and shall go round about the city. Behold they shall speak with their mouth, and a sword is in their lips: for who hath heard? And thou, O Lord, shalt laugh at them, thou shalt hold all the nations as nothing. My strength, I will keep watch for thee, because God is my protector. My God, his mercy shall go before me.

God hath shown me among my enemies, slay them not: lest at any time they forget thy law.

Scatter them by thy power, and bring them down, O Lord my protector. The sins of their mouth, the word of their lips, and let them be taken in their pride. And from cursing and lying they shall be cut off in their consummation: in the wrath of consummation, and they shall be no more. And they shall know that God will rule Jacob and the ends of the earth. DIAPSALMA. And they shall return at evening: and shall suffer hunger like dogs, and shall go round about the city. They shall be scattered abroad to eat: but if they are not filled, they shall murmur. But I will sing of thy strength, I will extol thy mercy in the morning: because thou art become my protector and my refuge in the day of my tribulation. My helper, to thee will I sing: because God is my protector, my God is my mercy.

The passion of Christ foretold in this psalm.—

The superscription of the psalm does not differ from the preceding one: but the psalm differs in that certain things are set forth from what was done to David himself, when Saul sent and watched his house to kill him. But if on that account prayer was to be directed to God: those earlier words, that is, unto the end, and destroy not or corrupt not, and in the inscription of the title, need not have been placed before it. But these things, though distributed according to a spiritual plan—since Christ is the end of the law, and his eternity was not subject to corruption, and the title of his glorious death is in the salvation of the nations—yet even those things which are written beforehand concerning his deeds declare them to be prophetic, since the prophet, not ignorant of the Lord's passion, both showed himself to be a prophet by suffering and taught it by speaking, under the occasion and time of the hatreds he endured.

We shall treat the psalm so as not to burden the understanding of those who are wise according to the letter: but also so that what is said of his being watched by Saul for killing may be no less a prophecy of that time than that he was shut in by the people, and in Jerusalem as in his own house, and watched unto death.

The progress of iniquity.—

Deliver me from my enemies, O God, and free me from those who rise up against me.

Deliver me from those who work iniquity, and free me from men of blood. He has encompassed the causes and progressions of human vices: so that we might know whence impiety arose and whither it would lead. And therefore the Gospel suppressed anger and quarrels and enmities, (since to be angry with a brother without cause is the guilt of hell, and the offering of a gift is not permitted except after reconciliation of a quarrel, and it decrees that enemies are not only to be loved, but also that prayer is to be made for them, because from these things one arrives at being a man of blood. For first they are enemies: then they rise up against him whose enemies they are: and those who rise up are workers of iniquity: finally the workers of iniquity have advanced to being men of blood. And men of blood are made complete not only by murder committed, but also by murder contemplated.

The complaint of David is more fitting to Christ.—For there follows,

Because they have lain in wait for my soul, the mighty have rushed upon me. Neither my iniquity nor my sin, O Lord, without iniquity have I run, and have directed my course. The soul of David was lain in wait for when he was shut up in his house to be killed. And although he was rescued from the hands of Saul: yet they are men of blood who desire his blood. But according to the superscription of the psalm it would have been fitting for the prayer to be against one person, namely the king who willed these things. But the prophetic prayer had to be moderated in its speech: so that the complaint might be referred to the people, since the mighty rush in and lie in wait for his soul: namely those whom the strong one armed, who also entered into the heart of Judas for the ministry of betrayal.

These mighty ones therefore lie in wait for his soul, and for the soul of him in whom there is neither iniquity nor sin, who said he had run without iniquity and directed his course.

David was not without sin.—And I do not know whether the earlier psalm permits these words to be referred to David in such a way, where it is said: Behold I acknowledge my iniquity, and my sin is ever before me. So great a diversity does not accord with the order of the psalms, that both should be understood to have been said by the same person. But if, because the earlier psalm of confessed sin is later in time, David might seem to have spoken these words before his sin, as one ignorant of sin: let us remember that under that same sin he spoke from the confession of human necessity: For behold I was conceived in iniquities, and in sins did my mother bear me; according to that saying: For who shall boast that he has a clean heart before God, even if he be an infant of one day? Since the origin and law of sin remains in us even according to the Apostle.

These words therefore will not be fitting as the voice of a human conscience.

Christ is ignorant of guilt.—But let us see whether perhaps the speech of denied iniquity concerning himself befits the complaints of him who did no sin, and in whom no guile was found, who also said: Behold the prince of this world cometh, and he shall find nothing in me, meaning that no accusation of sin would be found in him; through which he was to condemn sin in the flesh on account of sin. He therefore is to be understood as complaining that his soul has been lain in wait for, and that the mighty have rushed upon him; who also had this security of complaint, that he professed there was neither iniquity nor sin in him, and who said he had run without iniquity; according to that saying: He shall rejoice as a giant to run his course, his going out is from the highest heaven, and his meeting is even to the highest thereof.

He prays that God come to meet him on his return.—He alone, therefore, running set a straight course, who, having taken on the humility of our weakness, went forth from the heavens and returned to the heavens: who, bearing us back with him and about to offer a gift to God, prayed,

Arise to meet me, and see, O Lord, God of virtues, God of Israel.

Attend to visiting all the nations: be not merciful to all who work iniquity. For he prays that the God of virtues arise to meet him for the visiting of all nations: for in him the nations have been raised up together and placed at his right hand in the heavenly places. And it was fitting that his return should be adorned with the honor of a heavenly meeting; lest, as he entered the heavens, the fatherly condescension from heaven should be wanting.

Nor is this surprising: since even to Stephen, the first martyr of his name, a descent from God the Father was made as if from the foremost places of heaven to meet him. He prays, therefore, that all nations be visited at his meeting, according to that saying: For God did not send his Son into this world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through him. For the angels rejoicing and the powers of heaven honored his descent into the flesh and his birth from Mary. This prayer for his meeting is therefore not shameless, to whom, for the salvation of the nations—as is contained both in another psalm and in apostolic testimony—this voice of one coming to meet the firstborn from the dead was spoken: Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee.

He prays, therefore, for this significance of his meeting in the visiting of the nations in himself; yet not with the severity of judgment set aside, since mercy is turned away from all who work iniquity: all nations indeed being visited in him because he was made flesh, but equally all who work iniquity being judged.

The misery of the Jews.

They are forbidden to enter Jerusalem.—For with a diapsalma interposed, he declares what things were to remain as a consequence of the impiety of the people. For soon after, the desolation of the temple, the overthrow of the city, and captivity itself followed upon them. Indeed even now they are prevented by an edict of the Roman king from entering that same city. And when they recall the deserted holy of holies, and the silencing of prophecies, and the absence of propitiatory sacrifices, and all the dignity of the Levitical ministry disfigured, they now turn back, afflicted with hunger for the word of God and for saving food, and are accustomed to go around the city for the consolation of their present miseries. For this follows,

They shall return at evening, and shall suffer hunger like dogs, and shall go round about the city.

Announcing this hunger of the present time through another prophet, he says: Behold, I will bring a famine upon the land: not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water; but a famine of the word, that the word of God may be heard: rebuking their shamelessness and rage in the designation of dogs, according to that saying: Deliver my soul from the mouth of the lion, and my only one from the hand of the dog. And this indeed is the pain of their inner conscience, when they lament themselves scattered, captive, and tributary, without temple, without priest, without kingdom: and this after they laid impious hands upon the Lord of majesty and Savior of the world.

Their envies.

Why all nations, that is, most of them, are to be mocked.—

But when they are convicted of the sin of crucifying the only-begotten Son of God, they do not cease to be impious: and inflamed with grief at the divine knowledge transferred to the nations, they still rage with mouth and words. For it follows: Behold, they shall speak with their mouth, and a sword is in their lips.

But this impiety of disparaging and assailing, not only in these but also in the nations that refuse to hear, the divine word condemns thus: For who has heard? And thou, O Lord, shalt mock them, thou shalt hold all the nations as nothing. They are mocked by God with no one listening; because where the word who? Is used, either the rare or the none is signified: none, according to that saying: Who is like thee among the gods, O Lord? But the rare, in that which is said: Who shall give out of Sion the salvation of Israel? Those who do not listen are therefore mocked, and in whose mouth and lips there is a sword: because God dwelling in the heavens shall laugh to scorn the kings and princes gathered against God and his Christ.

He shall also despise all the nations, visited yet not obedient: because although from among them there is some small portion of believers, yet the whole is reckoned in the majority, according to that saying of the Lord: When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith upon the earth? Not that it will not be found in some, to whom it will also be said: Come, ye blessed of my Father, possess the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: but since the faithful from all nations are few, it is not brought about through the few that all nations are not unbelieving. The chief reason why the nations are to be mocked is this: that while they reproach with the foolishness of worldly wisdom one crucified, dead, and buried, not understanding the sacrament of great piety, they do not believe that the Son of God rose from the dead and is the Lord of majesty.

God the receiver of Christ in death.—But he who has power to lay down his soul and to take it up again

because he received this commandment from the Father, with the nations mocked and despised, added,

My strength I will keep for thee, because God is my receiver: my God, his mercy shall go before me, my God has shown me among my enemies.

He will keep his strength for God, that is, his soul which he laid down, by taking it up again, for no one takes it from him; and because his virtue and his refuge is he in whose hands he commended his spirit.

Whose mercy shall go before him, so that he may be understood to be the Son of God even before the resurrection, since as he died the light perished with the sun darkened, as he hung on the cross the earth trembled, as he descended to the underworld the underworld does not hold his saints, as he gave up his spirit the veil of the temple is torn asunder as if a spiritual guardian bursting forth from within, and finally the centurion proclaims: This was truly the Son of God. His strength therefore being kept for God, because the light shines in the darkness and the darkness did not comprehend it, and his mercy going before him, he showed him among his enemies that he was his receiver, since this had also been made plain by the confession of enemies; for the centurion truly proclaims him to be the Son of God. And these things were then known in this way.

The Jews are to receive the faith of Christ at the end of the age.—But

because according to that saying: And they shall look upon him whom they have pierced; God will also show in the future among his enemies that he is his receiver: inasmuch as, according to the Apostle, when the fullness of the nations has entered in, that which remains of Israel shall be saved; so that what is written may be fulfilled: There shall come out of Sion he who shall deliver and shall turn away impieties from Jacob. And this is my covenant with them, when I shall take away their impieties. For the signification, therefore, of this stored-up mercy and hope, he added,

Slay them not, lest at any time they forget thy law.

Scatter them in thy power, and bring them down, O Lord my protector. The offences of their mouth, the word of their lips, and they shall be caught in their pride, and from cursing and lying they shall be uprooted in the consummation.

The consummation in the wrath of consummation, and they shall not be, and they shall know that God of Jacob rules the ends of the earth. Enemies indeed on our account, but beloved on account of the fathers; that which remains of them is reserved for mercy. Scattered indeed for the time being among almost all nations, but by their holy mingling they shall equally be freed by the root. They shall therefore be destroyed according to the prophecy, not slain but scattered, and shall be destroyed in the offences of their mouth and the word of their lips, when the deliverer comes from Sion, of whom they cried: Crucify, crucify; and to whom they said: We have Abraham as our father; and again: Who gave thee this authority? And: By what authority doest thou these things?

In this pride therefore they shall be caught, when they do not acknowledge that these things were inflicted by them upon their Savior: and with impiety turned away they shall be uprooted from cursing and lying, and this in the consummation, because when the fullness of the nations shall have entered in, then what remains of Israel shall be saved. But in the wrath of consummation they shall not be: because he who comes from Sion shall turn away impieties. But they shall not be as those who are not, for they are also to know, and shall know, that the God of Jacob rules the ends of the earth: no longer to be known in the cord of inheritance and in the portion of Jacob; but the God of Jacob, that is, he who in the man Jacob was understood and seen as God, is to be confessed as the ruler of the ends of the earth, of which he is also the creator.

The dispersion of the Jews, spiritual hunger, empty foods, impenitence.—But in the meantime the punishment of their desolation and dispersion awaits them.

For even if this dispensation of mercy is reserved for the consummation of the ages on account of the fathers and the elect: yet with a diapsalma interposed, it is shown by a repeated signification what has been decreed against them in the meantime. For it follows,

they shall return at evening, and shall suffer hunger like dogs, and shall go round about the city.

They themselves shall be scattered to eat: but if they are not satisfied, they shall murmur. Having lost the city, with the temple deserted, and going round but not entering the city according to the edicts of the Roman king, a hunger not of this bread and food but of oblations, sacrifices, and visions—with all of which they shall not be satisfied—shall afflict them: barking with the shamelessness of dogs against their own guardian.

And they shall be scattered to eat

because through various places they imitate the form of that lawful priesthood, and of the holocaust, and of circumcision: whereas these things are lawfully established only within Jerusalem. But scattered to eat they are not satisfied. For they will not be filled except by holy and God-pleasing solemnities that are religious by reason of the very constitution of that place of the temple. But they shall still murmur: not even subdued by this hunger of their festivals, so as to recover their senses in the quiet of repentance according to the murmuring by which in the desert they provoked God.

The thanksgiving of the prophet in God.

It fits well with the resurrection of Christ.—But amid all these things he concludes all his hopes and thanksgivings at the end of the psalm, saying,

But I will sing of thy strength, I will exalt thy mercy in the morning: because thou hast become my receiver and my refuge in the day of my tribulation.

My helper, to thee will I sing psalms: because God is my receiver, my God is my mercy. All these things can be referred to the thanksgiving of the prophet; but they are not different from the confession of the Lord. For this dispersion of theirs followed upon the impiety of the passion.

But that he is to exult in the mercy of God in the morning

because he has become his receiver and refuge; this seems to be referred to the time of the resurrection: because although praise of God is to be sung by the prophet at all times, yet to the Lord Jesus Christ rising from the dead at dawn and returning to the heavens, the exultation of morning thanksgiving is proper—who is blessed unto all ages of ages. Amen.

O God, thou hast cast us off, and hast destroyed us: thou wast angry, and hast had mercy on us.

Thou hast moved the earth, and hast troubled it: heal thou the breaches thereof, for it has been moved. Thou hast shown thy people hard things, thou hast made us drink the wine of compunction, thou hast given to them that fear thee a token, that they may flee from before the bow. DIAPSALMA. That thy beloved may be delivered, save with thy right hand, and hear me. God has spoken in his holy place; I will rejoice and will divide Sichem, and will measure out the valley of tabernacles. Galaad is mine, and Manasses is mine, and Ephrem is the strength of my head, Juda is my king, Moab is the pot of my hope. Into Idumaea I will stretch out my shoe, to me the foreigners are made subject. Who will bring me into the city of circumvallation? Who will lead me even into Idumaea? Wilt not thou, O God, who hast cast us off?

And wilt thou not go forth, O God, in our armies?

Give us help from trouble, for vain is the salvation of man. In God we shall do mightily: and he himself shall bring to nothing them that afflict us. Thousands. In which the psalm wholly disagrees with the history. For when Sobal was struck together with Mesopotamia and Syria, which was stirred up and inflamed by him to war and then taken captive; an immense joy of thanksgiving followed upon this victory of a great war. But the psalm is entirely sad and mournful; there is grief over a people repulsed and destroyed, there is lamentation over an earth shaken and disturbed, there is prayer for the healing of its contriteness. Moreover, that which is mentioned concerning the Valley of Salt is found neither in the history, nor in the understanding of any of the translators. For according to Aquila, who was a translator of the law for the Jews after the passion of the Lord, it is written thus: When he struck the valleys.

But he, writing according to the letter and remaining outside spiritual understanding, set forth the place of battle.

But that translation of the seventy elders, both legitimate and spiritual, received before the passion of the Lord and the deeds accomplished, now also, as in all the psalms, makes plain the cause and meaning through the forms of names and natures, showing in the commemoration of deeds not the argument of the psalm but its time; so that it may be known to have been written not on account of what is contained in the deeds, but as having been written at the time when those deeds were done.

To whom, for what purpose the psalm was written.

At what time it was written.—But before we speak of the time of the prophecy, since it greatly profits the understanding of the psalm to know when it was written, let us treat of the superscription, which is to be understood as referring to the end and to those who shall be changed: namely those who, ceasing from impiety and vices, shall be transferred to religion and innocence, and shall be changed from the sins of the Synagogue to the grace of the Church: as we showed in that psalm which is the first written for those who shall be changed, where it is said: Hear, O daughter, and see, and incline your ear, and forget your people and your father's house; for the king has desired your beauty: and again in the same: Instead of your fathers, sons are born to you, you shall appoint them princes over all the earth.

Therefore, when the change of sons has been made in place of the fathers, she forgets her father's house, about to please God the king all the more as queen, by whose death she is renewed unto life.

And therefore the inscription of the title for those who shall be changed is ascribed to the glory of his death who died for all, the inscription of the title bearing witness: and bearing witness unto the teaching of David, so that all together with David, who is both the rising sun and the just one and the king and the eternal one, may know; who slew the enemies and hostile powers together with their leader, all those who were accustomed to kindle against us the wars of vices being extinguished: not in the valley of weeping, nor in the valley of tabernacles, but in the valley of salt; for the Greek speech declares this rather than "of salt-pits": since this valley of the present world now exhibits not tearful habitations nor lamentable tabernacles, but rather salt—namely those and those like them to whom it was said: You are the salt of the earth, among whom especially that ancient enemy who inflames us has been extinguished.

For those therefore who are to be changed at the end, and who are to be taught under the witness and inscription of the title unto David, this psalm is written: at no other time than when the prophet Nathan announced that the king of the eternal throne would be from the seed of David. For in that time the things which are prefigured in the deeds were brought to effect, in which the prophecy of the eternal king was revealed. The psalm therefore is to be understood as written for those who shall be changed, in the teaching of David unto the eternal king, and who shall be sons by the change in place of the lost fathers. For thus it begins.

The merciful wrath of fathers toward sons, of God toward men.—

O God, you have cast us off and destroyed us: you were angry with us, and you had mercy on us.

You have moved the earth and troubled it: heal its contritions, for it has been moved. You have shown your people hard things, you have made us drink the wine of compunction. You have given to those who fear you a sign, that they may flee from the face of the bow. According to the common understanding of the world, wrath and compassion are not compatible: nor will both these affections of the same person toward the same persons be fitting, so that the will of compassion should be mingled with the will of vengeance.

But this befits only fathers who are piously angry, so that their wrath may be merciful in the sins of their sons, according also to that of blessed Paul, when he thus delivers one to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, so that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord, showing that the severity of present punishment profits unto the salvation of the spirit. Therefore that eternal heavenly father of all, who also said: I will kill and I will heal, so repels and destroys his own that he has mercy in his anger. For he destroyed Jerusalem and the temple, but restored to the saints a heavenly city: he repelled them from the works of the law, but granted the justification of faith, justifying the ungodly by faith: he dissolved the earthly kingdom, but appointed them kings of the heavens. Thus mercy followed upon wrath, while by the loss of present earthly things, an immense recompense of eternal goods is repaid.

The foregoing words of the psalm regard the whole human race.

The bow, the preparation of punishment. Signs of Christians. The cup of wrath, the cup of life.—And these things indeed are fitted not more to Israel than to the whole of the human race: because from one the sentence of death and the toil of life went out upon all, when it was said: Cursed is the earth in your works; but now through one the gift of life and the grace of justification has abounded upon all: so that those whose earth was cursed, their bodies may now be conformed to God; and that which was moved by fear, and troubled by ignorance, and broken by toil, and stung by that very draught of gladdening wine, may now, secure in the power of the sign received, flee the power of the wrath to come. For in the bow, as we have frequently treated, the terror of wrath prepared as punishment for the ungodly is shown, according to that: Will he not be angry every day?

He has bent his bow and made it ready, he has prepared in it vessels of death, he has wrought his arrows for those who shall burn. To those who fear him therefore he gave a sign, whether of the sign upon their foreheads, or of faith in their hearts, or of testimony in their works, or of glory in their confessions, or of victory in their martyrdoms: so that they may flee from the face of the bow and of wrath, as it was said: O generation of vipers, who has shown you to flee from the wrath to come? This therefore is the voice of the human race giving thanks, after the reign of death, after the terrors of the devil, after the burdens of toils and sins, after the sorrow of unhappy joy; because the pleasures of vices, when they are understood, cause compunction. For in wine according to the Apostle there is wantonness.

And just as there is wine that gladdens the heart of man, so also there is wine that causes compunction in the heart of man.

For there is both a cup of wrath and a cup of life.

After these things therefore, and after this wine of compunction, with the sign of fleeing from the bow and from wrath granted, the whole body of the faithful exults in eternal hopes. For this is what the diapsalma intervening presently declares,

That your beloved may be delivered, save with your right hand, and hear me.

The right hand of the Lord has wrought virtue, and the virtue of God roused up together with God from the right hand sat down with the flesh of our humility. Therefore, with the sign of fleeing from the face of the bow given, the beloved are delivered and saved through the right hand of God. And from the face of whose bow they are delivered and saved, the Apostle taught, saying: Who has delivered us from the power of darkness, and has translated us into the kingdom of the Son of his love. The beloved therefore are to be delivered and saved through the right hand of God.

Christ the Holy One.

Samaria divided by faith, to be divided by judgment.—But the prophecy of this salvation must be known for the firmness of faith. For there follows,

God has spoken in his holy one: I will rejoice and will divide Shechem, and I will measure out the valley of tabernacles.

Gilead is mine, and Manasseh is mine, and Ephraim is the strength of my head, Judah is my king. Moab is the pot of my hope. Into Idumaea I will stretch out my shoe: the foreigners are subject to me. God has spoken in his holy one—namely in him to whom even the demons cry out: We know that you are the Holy One of God; and of whom the angel proclaims: And that which shall be born of you shall be called holy, the Son of God. In this holy one therefore he has spoken, when he says: The Father who dwells in me, he himself does his works.

God therefore having spoken in the holy one, exults at the beginning of his speech.

For he shall exult as a giant to run his course; and he shall exult in the dividing of Shechem. Shechem is Samaria, which is also Sichem, which Jacob assigned to his son Joseph under the blessing of the spirit. This, having remained in impiety through all the preceding times of the law, received the Gospel of the Lord in part. For even today a part of it is held back by most irreligious pursuits from its former devotion. For there the calves were adored, there a mountain was chosen in place of the sanctuary, there a kingdom was stirred up against Judah. But the Lord, coming there first, even with the Samaritan woman believing and asking for a draught of living water, brought in faith: soon also with the apostles preaching they were made partakers of the Holy Spirit. Shechem therefore has been divided, when the faithful are separated from the unfaithful.

And there is a certain division of future judgment, as it is written: The lord of that servant will come on a day he does not expect, and at an hour he does not know: and will divide him, and will appoint his portion with the hypocrites. Samaria therefore has been divided, either by judgment or by faith, according to that: I came not to send peace on earth, but division.

The measuring of mortals.—Nor has God speaking in the holy one only divided Shechem, but has also measured out the valley of tabernacles: namely this sunken and lowly seat of human habitation, which in another place also, on account of the infirmities of life and the lamentations of calamities, he recalls as being a valley of weeping, saying: They have placed it in the valley of weeping: He has therefore measured it out, because the fullness of the gentiles is awaited. And where the measure of those who are to believe is to be, there is the reckoning of the measuring; partly within. Within the Church to be gathered, and another part remaining in the same valley.

Gilead and Manasseh.—But whoever measures anything must of necessity measure what is his own.

For Gilead is his own, and Manasseh is his own. This mountain belongs to the Phoenicians, bordering on Arabia and Mesopotamia, assigned as a possession to the part of Manasseh: and therefore Manasseh is his own, showing under the name of Manasseh the fullness of the land to be his, just as also under Gilead he shows the whole world to be his. But in claiming these things nothing beyond the right of ownership has been shown.

Ephraim as a type of the Church.—But Ephraim is the taking up of his head, and Judah is his king.

The holy one speaks these things with God speaking in him, who also through Jacob blessed Ephraim with the crossing of hands in sanctification, and showed that a king from Judah, who was also to be the expectation of the nations, would come. The taking up therefore is of Ephraim, and not also of Manasseh: though both are sons of Joseph. But since in the head the significance of the body also is contained, according to that: He shall drink from the torrent in the way, therefore shall he lift up his head; and every saint is the head of the body of Christ: therefore the taking up of his head is Ephraim, because contrary to the order of generations, for the prefiguring of the sanctification of the Church in the preferred Ephraim and the placed-after Manasseh, the lesser was set before the greater.

The taking up therefore of his head is Ephraim

that is the people whom he prefigured in Ephraim: or rather the Church is taken up into the body.

Christ to be born from Judah.—Judah also is my king, that is, appointed and chosen by him.

Certainly Judah is not king to David himself (since the king himself is the first from Judah), nor is he king to God speaking in his holy one: but this holy one in whom God speaks is to be understood as speaking these things, who also filled Jacob with the spirit for the prophecy of this eternal king, when he said: The prince shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler from his thighs, until he comes for whom it is reserved: and he himself is the expectation of the nations.

Christ to be born of sinners.

The spiritual pot.—And because the assumption of flesh for this Holy One of God was to be undertaken not only from this generation of the holy, but also from the origin of sinners; because God sent his Son in the likeness of sinful flesh: therefore Moab also is the pot of his hope. And indeed this Moab generation, according to the sentence in Genesis, received the reproach of divine malediction. But after ten generations it becomes worthy of the holy lineage through the degrees of succession: and this Holy One, taking his origin from Judah and from Moab, with the rawness of flesh boiled away as through a pot, is signified in the form of eternal food, since his flesh is truly the food of life.

There is also a pot according to Jeremiah that burns and takes away sins: just as the Lord himself came to cast fire upon the earth: and many according to the Apostle shall be saved as though through fire: when, with their vices purged and burned away, they are judged as refined silver. Hence therefore Moab is the pot of his hope, for whom also from Moab—raw and corrupt as it is—that heavenly sanctification of flesh unto the food of life is already held in hope.

The whole human race to be imbued with the Gospel.—Furthermore he says that his sandal is to be extended even into Idumaea

that is, even to the defection of Esau; because Idumaea is the seat of Esau, and he directs the steps of apostolic preaching. For beautiful are the feet of those who preach the gospel: and in the sandal the feet are shown, and in the feet the steps. Nor does he extend the course of preaching into Idumaea alone, but the foreigners also are made subject; according to that word: Hear my prayer, unto thee shall all flesh come: because it is fitting for God that all nations be subject to him, and that the whole of flesh be instructed unto the confession of this eternal mercy.

The Jews first forsaken, then to be received.

Without God, no strength.—But when those who shall be changed according to the inscription of the title are known, and the teaching of him who is the eternal David is received, the prophet hastens to enter that eternal city of the firstborn in the heavens at Jerusalem and of the saints standing around God, awaiting a guide to lead him there. For it follows,

Who will lead me into the city of the surrounding?

Who will lead me even into Idumaea? Is it not thou, O God, who hast rejected us, and wilt not go forth in our armies? Esau is defection: and Edom according to Genesis is the one who is failing: and according to the Apostle, what remains of Israel is to be saved. The prophet therefore, desiring to be led into the city of the surrounding, knows that he must first come even into Idumaea, that is, into that defection of the former people, whereby the greater shall serve the lesser.

And the last preaching shall turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, when he who comes out of Sion shall take away sins and impieties from Jacob. But this same one who shall lead him also previously destroyed and rejected on account of impiety: because when Jerusalem was taken and the kingdom laid waste, he abandoned the unworthy and despised, he who was accustomed before to cherish them with spiritual aids and to protect them against the wars of enemies with a heavenly host. But now, with the guardianship of the Holy Spirit withdrawing from them, there is no aid of divine protection in their armies, that is, in their forces. And therefore, because he has destroyed them, he will not go forth in their armies.

Our salvation depends on God.—But with hope laid up

because he will save what remains of Israel, the prophet did not pass over in silence the mercy, saying,

Give us help from tribulation, and vain is the salvation of man.

In God we shall do mightily, and he himself shall bring to nothing those who afflict us. He knows that the salvation which is hoped for from men is vain: because even the use of this life without the mercy of God is nothing, according to that word: Thy mercy is better than life: because unless life be taken up for the advancement of eternity, it will be in us rather the origin of miseries, not of life. Help from God in tribulations therefore surpasses all, because the salvation of men is vain.

He asks therefore for help from tribulation, about to do mighty deeds in God once help is granted: when all, freed from the law of sins, we abide rather in the justification of God: when we wage our battle not against flesh and blood, but against spiritual wickednesses and the powers of the world, with God slaying Satan himself by the breath of his mouth: when sin, which formerly afflicted us, shall no longer reign in our mortal body: when death is swallowed up by life in the contest of victory, through our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

Hear, O Lord, my supplication, attend to my prayer.

From the ends of the earth I cried to thee, when my heart was in anguish. Upon a rock thou hast exalted me. Thou hast led me; because thou hast become my hope, a tower of strength against the face of the enemy. I shall dwell in thy tabernacle for ever. DIAPSALMA. I shall be protected under the shelter of thy wings, for thou, O God, hast heard my prayer, thou hast given an inheritance to those who fear thy name. Days upon days thou shalt add to the king: his years even to the days of generation and of generations. He abides for ever in the sight of God: who among them shall seek out his mercy and truth? So shall I sing to thy name, O God, for ever and ever, that I may pay my vows from day to day.

The psalm is of one rejoicing in eternal hope.—

The psalm is simple, containing a prophecy of eternal thanksgiving.

For the inscription comprehends neither deeds accomplished nor the designations of any signification: it is simply a hymn unto the end: so that what has been sung by the Prophet is understood to be unfolded at the end either of the psalm or of the ages. Moreover it is the prayer of a just man hoping for eternity, and giving thanks that he has been raised up together with Christ in the heavenly places. For it begins thus.

The confidence of the just man.

It comes from the fact that in the flesh he is a stranger to the flesh.—

Hear, O God, my prayer, attend to my supplication.

From the ends of the earth I cried to thee, when my heart was in anguish. This holy man asks that his prayer be heard, and his confidence is such that he wishes his prayer to be attended to, whether it be innocent, chaste and faithful, and proceeding from the inmost fear of conscience and heart; because according to Paul, one must both believe with the heart and confess with the mouth unto salvation. The reason for his petition that his prayer be attended to is this: that while his heart was in anguish, he cried from the ends of the earth. He who cried from the ends of the earth with an anxious heart did not dwell in the outermost solitudes or on the shores bordering the Ocean.

But knowing that he dwells indeed in the flesh, which is earth, and already inhabits the end of the flesh, while according to the Apostle, dwelling in the body he is absent from the body, while living he no longer lives for himself; nor does he himself live, but Christ lives in him: yet groaning in this his dwelling, and hastening to be clothed upon, and therefore crying from the ends of the earth with an anxious heart, because he has both the necessity of living in the flesh and holds the hope of ceasing from the vices of the flesh, saying:

Christ his hope and strength.—

Upon a rock thou hast exalted me.

Thou hast led me out; because thou hast become my hope, a tower of strength against the face of the enemy. I shall dwell in thy tabernacle for ever. Hence therefore the holy man already cries from the ends of the earth because he has been exalted upon the rock. Now the rock according to the Apostle is Christ, whom God has exalted and given him a name which is above every name. In whom also he chose us before the foundation of the world in the heavenly places. For through him we have been led into the hope of eternity, and in this hope we are not confounded; because this same hope has become for us a tower of strength against the face of the enemy. For although there is a strong and firm fortification in walls, yet all the firmness of the walls themselves is in the towers.

And therefore God, exalting us upon the rock, has become a tower of strength, because through this hope we withstand the force of the devil and his snares, enclosed in the most secure fortification of faith against him and his spiritual wickednesses: since we are to dwell in the tabernacle of God for ever, that is, to remain for eternity in the ages and times flowing on without any limit of age.

His protection is the mercy of God.

This is merited by prayer.—But because these things, although already laid up in hope for the saints, are nevertheless still deferred under the dispensation of the ages; he shows by what protection he is meanwhile kept safe, inserting a diapsalma, saying,

I shall be protected under the shelter of thy wings, for thou, O God, hast heard my prayer.

The divine word signifies the protection of God's mercy under the shelter of wings: concerning which, since it has been treated in the preceding psalms, the discourse would now be superfluous and idle. But the merit of protection is granted on account of the faithfulness of prayer, according to that word: Ask and it shall be given to you.

The inheritance of the saints.

Christ the king of kings to come, after the general resurrection.—Furthermore he shows to what hope he was to be overshadowed by the protection of God's wings, saying: Thou hast given an inheritance to those who fear thy name.

Days upon days thou shalt add to the king, his years even to the days of generation and of generation.

He abides for ever in the sight of God. For this is the inheritance of the saint: life and incorruption and the kingdom and habitation coeternal with God. This inheritance is written not for Israel alone, but for those who fear the name of God.

For the days of the eternal king are either those of the saints, who shall not be servants of sin and are kings, according to that word of the Apostle: Already you reign without us, and would that you did reign, that we also might reign with you: or because this same one is also the king of the Prophet, or because it is fitting that he who sits at the right hand in the eternal kingdom should reign until he puts his enemies under his feet, not so that the king himself shall then cease to be king, but when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God the Father, he himself shall reign together with those who are kings.

From which it seems to me that this order is now observed: that years upon years of days of his days are added unto the days of generation and of generation; but that he abides in the sight of God for ever; so that the time during which it is fitting for him to reign until he puts his enemies under his feet is comprehended from generation to generation, because the generation of spiritual birth is followed by the generation from the dead; but the exception of his eternity, while he is for ever in the sight of God, is proclaimed. Moreover he himself is the firstborn from the dead. But the Lord recalls this regeneration to the apostles thus: Amen I say to you, that you who have followed me, in the regeneration when the Son of man shall sit on the throne of his majesty, you also shall sit on twelve thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel.

He therefore shows the time of this generation, and up to this point the years of the days of the king's days are increased. But he himself shall remain eternal in the sight of God, when all whom he has redeemed are now taken up as kings of the heavens and co-heirs of eternity, delivering them as a kingdom to God the Father.

The blessed have nothing to desire.—And

because they have already been made sharers and co-members and conformed to him in these things, with corruption and death no longer holding dominion, since they are filled unto all the fullness of God; the spirit of prophecy added: Who shall require his mercy and truth of them? For these generations shall no longer be in want of his mercy and truth—those, namely, whom he shall regenerate from the dead unto life in himself, and who shall have remained in the hope of the glory of God: then, when delivered into the kingdom, they shall be received by God the Father as kings, his mercy and truth being consummated toward all, through whom they rejoice to have been redeemed unto life, and there is access for all to the Father. After which nothing of mercy and truth shall be required of the Lord, since they are filled unto the fullness of God.

Now similar to this saying of the prophet is that which the Lord spoke to the Apostles: Now indeed you have sorrow; but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no man shall take from you. In that day you shall ask me nothing, because now no one is about to take away their joy from them.

The work of the blessed.—In this hope of eternity, therefore, the Prophet confirms himself, saying,

So shall I sing praise to thy name for ever and ever, that I may render my vows day by day.

He shall sing praise for ever and ever, and shall render vows day by day, enclosed by no limit of time, destined to render in eternal hymns the joys of eternal vows: since, with all the weakness of earthly bodies put away, he leads the heavenly and angelic life, rendering vows day by day; according to that saying: I will render my vows to the Lord in the courts of the house of the Lord, in the sight of all his people, in the midst of thee, O Jerusalem—of the heavenly mother, that is, and the free, through our God and Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

Shall not my soul be subject to God?

For from him is my salvation. For he himself is my God and my saviour, my helper: I shall be moved no more. How long do you rush upon a man? You all slay him as a leaning wall, and a tottering fence? Yet they have thought to cast away my honour, I ran in thirst: with their mouth they blessed, and with their heart they cursed. Yet shall my soul be subject to God: because from him is my patience. For he himself is my God and my saviour, my helper, I shall not depart. In God is my salvation and my glory, God is my help: my hope is in God. Hope in him, all ye assembly of the people, pour out your hearts before him; for God is our helper. DIAPSALMA. Yet the sons of men are vain, the sons of men are liars in the balances: that they may deceive by vanity in the same. Trust not in iniquity, and covet not robberies.

If riches abound, set not your heart upon them.

God hath spoken once: these two things have I heard, that power belongeth to God, and mercy to thee, O Lord? For thou wilt render to every one according to his works.

The scope of the prophecy.

What this psalm teaches.—The word of prophecy is written for no other purpose than for the profit of its hearers, so that it may either teach knowledge, or confirm them unto innocence of will: as now this psalm.

It is sung by David for Idithun, in which one is instructed unto the fear of God, unto steadfast endurance of human or spiritual wickednesses, and is strengthened unto contempt of riches, because avarice is the root of all evils. For in these things the sure condition of the blessed and eternal life consists, if there be both piety toward God, and patience in adversity, and contempt of wealth. The psalm therefore begins from the confession of God.

The theology of the pagans, dark and wandering.

How great a light shines forth from the sacred books. Through faith the soul has whereon to rest.

Shall not my soul be subject to God?

For from him is my salvation. And he himself is my God, and my saviour, my protector; I shall be moved no more.

The confession of God is begun by the prophet with the common feeling of men, so that after a long night of ignorance, after the ambiguous and uncertain teaching of human opinions, after the varied notion of diverse religions, after long wandering and searching concerning God—whether he be one or many, and of sex whether of one or of two, and of power whether equal or unequal, and of age whether uniform or varied, and of nature whether unborn of all, or at some time generated of some—then after some had striven with great age and long labour to show either that there are none at all, or that they are absent from the care of human life: and further, after many had maintained either that the sun and the other stars are gods, or that the world itself, abiding in the appearance of this eternity and its changes with all things that it brings forth from itself, is God: and indeed as many had bestowed the divine name and honour upon fire, or waters, or spirit: while others had worshipped wood, stones, metals under the likeness of men, birds, and beasts: and finally, after all their efforts had grown weary and abandoned, and most of them, and especially (Socrates, in Cic.

Acad. Quaest. L. IV) the wise, had taught that they knew this one thing

that is, that man knows none of these things: then after this, as it were, necessary confession of ignorance, any prudent person, turning to the prophets and apostles, shall have received the whole law of God under the sacrament of the eternal dispensation, in which he shall have treated the reason of the soul brought down into this body and bound to it, in which he shall have received the division of the nations according to the number of the angels, in which he shall have heard both that there is a prince of this world, and the election of one nation, in which he shall not have been ignorant of the author of human death, and shall have felt and groaned that the law of sin dwelling in his flesh strives against the law of his mind;

after he shall have known that the Spirit of God, the Power of God, the Wisdom of God, the Son of God, and the only-begotten God, was born as man for the remission of sin and the condemnation of sin through the law, who, having undergone the lot of human passions, died in order to condemn in himself the impious temptations of heavenly wickednesses, so that he might bring eternity to all who were dying through the law of sin dwelling in our flesh; and then, having received this sacrament of piety, placed in the light of knowledge after the night of ignorance, he thus says: Shall not my soul be subject to God?

For from him is my salvation. For he himself is my God, my saviour, my protector: I shall be moved no more. And so, having found the resting-place of faith after wandering errors and the sentence of impiety, because he has known his protector and saviour, he is moved no more. For what further remains for the ignorance and anxiety of men, since the eternity of soul and body, that is, of the whole man, is proclaimed, since the assumption and taking up of our earthly flesh by God has been shown under the sacrament of this great piety, since the remission of sins has been granted with the law of sin condemned, since a seat at the right hand of God in the heavens has been given to our man?

Those who deny the incarnation of God.

How pernicious their disputations are.—But the endeavours of pagan impieties diminish this hope of human blessedness, denying by the vanity of worldly wisdom man's advance toward God, and detracting from God the fellowship of the body assumed, as arbiters and regulators of divine power: as though it were more difficult for God to have assumed man than to have formed him in such a plan of his nature and life. This impious detraction of theirs the prophet therefore straightway rebukes, saying,

How long do you rush upon a man?

You all slay him as a leaning wall, and a tottering fence? For these ignorant and impious disputations drive a man who is already inclined toward vices, and plunge him down already shaken and falling, slaying him by the counsels of false and harmful exhortations: as though the will itself, that conciliator of vices, were a small thing, which the despair of eternal judgment and retribution still further urges toward the use of present and bodily things alone.

David thirsts for justice.

He gives no place to detraction.—But this wall of his body, which lust, drunkenness, avarice, and anger had previously pierced through, he knows to have been already built up in himself as a house of God with living stones, and he recalls that it was created in the image of God: and being certain that he is being prepared to be conformed to the glory of God, he added,

Yet they have thought to cast away my honour, I ran in thirst.

While they were thinking to take away his honour, he ran in thirst. For there is a thirst for eternal goods and a spiritual hunger in the saints, of which it is said: Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after justice. Thirsting therefore for the course of his justice, he maintained his whole life intact, preserving it even from the very detraction of those who contradicted him.

For he also learned from his Lord that all his works should be praised even by the judgment of pagan testimony, when it is said: So let your works shine before men, that they may glorify your Father who is in heaven. So also Paul, pleasing all in all things, is a scandal neither to Jews, nor to Greeks, nor to the Church; lest his adversary have anything evil to say of him—that adversary indeed retaining the desire and will to detract, even though he showed himself free from every occasion of detraction; which we also recognize in this holy man running in thirst. For it follows: With their mouth they blessed, and with their heart they cursed: since those who preserved his honour blessed him with the confession of his praiseworthy life, and cursed him with the malice of inward hatred.

He cultivates patience in the meantime.—But that which is most salutary for himself, this holy man repeats even with a diapsalma intervening, showing that the perseverance of unwearied confession must be in us. For it follows,

Yet my soul is subject to God, because from him is my patience.

For he himself is my God and my saviour, my helper, I shall not depart. In God is my salvation and my glory, God of my help, and my hope is in my God. Let those men indeed drive against the leaning wall and the fence already shaken, and though blessing with the mouth, let them curse with the heart: yet he knows that his soul must be subject to God, because his patience is from him. For he learned from him not to turn away his face from spitting, nor to withdraw his cheeks from blows, nor to refuse to drink vinegar mingled with gall, nor after buffets and scourgings to curse.

For he himself is his God and saviour, himself also his helper, lest, moved from the perseverance of this patience and the confidence of his hope, he depart. For in him is his salvation and glory and hope, who shall raise him up together with himself and render him conformed to his heavenly glory.

He stirs others to the pouring out of the heart. What that is.—And because he himself also, as a prophet, is a preacher of this hope to others; he added: Hope in him, all ye assembly of the people, and pour out your hearts before him; for God is our helper. Nothing hidden, nothing closed, nothing bound up is to be kept in the heart under the confession of God. Every affection is to be poured out before him: so that there be no confidence in ourselves, but that through him, before whom we pour ourselves out as it were for sin, we may be helped. Our hearts are to be poured out before him in tears and weeping; according to that saying: My tears have been my bread day and night, while it is said to me daily: Where is thy God?

These things I remembered, and I poured out my soul in me; showing that the pouring out of the soul consists in the outpouring of tears

because through them must he be entreated who is the only faithful helper. 1697. Among the vain it profits nothing. The vain are liars.—But the prophet, having fulfilled his duty, knows that his admonition is of little weight among the impious: for immediately, with a diapsalma intervening, he added,

Yet the sons of men are vain, the sons of men are liars in the balances; that they may deceive by vanity in the same.

Vain men because either they themselves hope for vain things, or it is vain to hope in them, and liars also; because by the sense of their impiety they are either deceived or deceive: and liars in this, that they deceive in the balances, performing unjust things under the name of justice.

For where they promise the examination of a moderate prudence concerning themselves, there they exercise the pursuits of immoderate impiety: entangling themselves in the very error which they professed to drive away from others. And therefore they themselves from vanity into the same, that error, namely, falling back upon them from which they glory in having departed.

The desire for riches must be cut away.—But the root of iniquity is chiefly in the desire for money: and whoever pursues it is plunged in the shipwreck of a most grievous storm. For there follows,

Trust not in iniquity, and covet not robberies.

If riches flow in, set not your heart upon them. For great are the enticements of desire and love in these things: they seize upon minds and take hold of wavering thoughts. Therefore not only are the plunderings of riches not to be coveted, but our will must be drawn back from them even if they are offered and flow in abundance; lest, having been desired and sought after, they gain dominion over us. For these things are not goods coeternal with our hopes, nor do they either descend with us into hell or rise again with us from hell. Faith, piety, continence, and kindness are to be sought after: and above all the knowledge of God is to be pursued.

But these vain things, which by their very nature are ensnaring toward every necessity of iniquities, are to be avoided.

The Father and the Son are one God.

The power of each is one.—And that this was more to be sought after for the hope of eternity, the prophet added, saying,

Once God has spoken, these two things have I heard: that power belongs to God, and to thee, O Lord, mercy, for thou wilt render to every man according to his works.

With God speaking once, he heard two things: and it is necessary that those things be connected to one another which have been made known under the signification of a single utterance.

For at the beginning of the psalm he had referred his prophetic confession to God, saying: Shall not my soul be subject to God? For from him is my salvation. Therefore the fury of Jewish impiety had to be absolutely driven away: so that it might be taught that the Son also is signified in God the Father, as now in the one the other also is shown. For he testified that this was the faith of his soul's subjection to God: that from him was his salvation. And that Jesus is salvation has often been treated. Now with God speaking once, two things were understood and heard: just as that saying, Father, I have manifested thy name to men, signified in the Father also the Son, so now with the Lord God speaking once he heard these two things: That power belongs to God, and to thee, O Lord, mercy, for thou wilt render to every man according to his works.

Paul knew how to confess both in one

that is, neither without the other, saying: There is one God, and one Lord, because both the Lord is signified in God, and God is signified in the Lord. Therefore with God speaking once these two things are heard: That power belongs to God, and to thee, O Lord, mercy. For from him is his salvation; and the Son has received all things from the Father: and therefore in him the power of God is either received or born. For the Father judges no man, but has given all judgment to the Son. He therefore is the rewarder of each one, who is the judge. But the power is his from whom the only-begotten God was born as judge; and his power is from God, who received judgment from the Father: and thus neither is he lacking in power who is judge, nor in compassion who is God.

Certainly it is necessary that one who is guilty before the eternal judgment remain so, if he does not confess both in one, since nevertheless he who is both is not to be understood as one, saying: The Father is in me, and I in the Father, our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

O God, my God, to thee I watch at break of day: my soul has thirsted for thee, how simply my flesh also.

In a desert land, and pathless, and without water, so have I appeared before thee in the sanctuary, to see thy power and thy glory. For thy mercy is better than life: my lips shall praise thee. Thus will I bless thee in my life: and in thy name I will lift up my hands. Let my soul be filled as with marrow and fatness: and my lips shall praise thee with joyful lips. If I have remembered thee upon my bed, I will meditate on thee in the morning watches, because thou hast been my helper. And in the shadow of thy wings I will rejoice: my soul has cleaved close after thee, thy right hand has upheld me. But they have sought my soul in vain, they shall go into the lower parts of the earth, they shall be delivered into the hands of the sword, they shall be the portions of foxes.

But the king shall rejoice in the Lord: all they shall be praised that swear by him

because the mouth of them that speak wicked things is stopped.

David, a type of Christ, intent upon divine things in the desert.—

That David dwelt in the desert is contained in the book of Kings: so that he who prefigured the sufferings of the Lord, even then when he dwelt in the desert was prophesying them, since the only-begotten God was likewise to dwell in the desert. But as was fitting for a holy man and worthy of so great a prophet, when he had withdrawn from the hatred of the impious and given himself to solitude: he is occupied with the greatest mysteries of heavenly things, and removed from every company of human impiety or ignorance, he directed his mind toward those things by which the knowledge and merit of eternity are acquired. Not occupied, not hindered by the cares of common affairs and of the world, but in that quiet and leisurely retreat of his solitude, where nothing of offense fell upon his eyes or his mind, he was busied solely with divine pursuits.

And let us see from what point the discourse of the psalm began.

O God, my God, to thee I watch from the light of dawn.

For him the day has begun plainly for the rejoicing in and knowledge of God, for whom the very beginning of prayer to God is the same as the beginning of light. He prays to God indeed as the God of all, yet through the knowledge of understanding as his own God.

The hope of eternity implanted in us.

That souls are implanted by God. As of the soul, so shall be the eternity of the flesh. They are to be distinguished. The spiritual thirst of David. He thirsts to see God.—But prayer is not so much a matter of words as of affection: and therefore he added,

My soul has thirsted for thee, how simply my flesh also.

In a land desert, and pathless, and without water. His soul therefore thirsts for God, in whom is the fountain of life, intent with desire upon drinking. And indeed the mind of every person is carried by a certain natural instinct toward the knowledge and hope of eternity: because it is as though implanted and impressed upon all to believe that a divine origin of souls is present in us, since the mind itself recognizes in itself no small kinship with its heavenly stock.

But these earthly bodies, which are compacted for the material of vices, while they are infected with those things in which they take delight as though by nature, despair of being able to attain the fellowship and gift of heaven: as though the vices of the body in which it takes delight did not also infect the nature of the soul; or as though, when the delight of the body overflows into the mind, the body does not also draw the mind back with it toward the affection of delight. But it is necessary that what shares in the same pleasure should share in the same condemnation of pleasure.

But we, instructed by spiritual teachings, know that salvation has been given by God to both soul and body, provided that after the grace of regeneration the senses of the body are imbued with the joys of the mind, that is, if we have lived not according to the flesh but according to the spirit: because the works of the spirit and of the flesh, according to the Apostle, are distinguished by the pursuits of vices and of continence. But it is a difficult yet most true thing to hope for the eternity of the body just as of the soul. And therefore to the thirst of the soul the prophet added: My soul has thirsted for thee, how simply my flesh also, retaining nothing uncertain within himself under the ambiguity of unbelief: but that his flesh also may thirst for God as simply as his soul thirsts. For he thirsts not for the body, but for God.

For although while dwelling in the desert and in a pathless and waterless place the very necessity of nature kept him in bodily thirst: yet even through these sufferings of hunger and thirst he knows that the faith of believers must be proved; so that the soul may thirst for God more than for the body, while thirsting also for the body: because neither famine, nor distress, nor any kinds of sufferings were going to separate the Apostle from the charity of God which is in Christ. The holy man therefore thirsts for God. And what he thirsts for, he testified in another psalm, saying: My soul has thirsted for the living God, when shall I come and appear before thy face? This is the desire of the soul, this is the thirst of his hope: that the sight of God may come to him, that as soon as possible, caught up in the clouds, he may appear elevated to meet God Christ.

Prophecy recounts as accomplished what is yet to be done.

He who appears to the Son appears also to the Father.—And the prophet now also declares the affection of this desire. For after the declaration of thirst, after the destitution of the desert and the pathless and the waterless place, because in these things there is as it were the warfare and victory of faith, he added,

So have I appeared before thee in the sanctuary, to see thy power and thy glory: because thy mercy is better than life.

It is the nature of prophecy to recount as accomplished what is yet to be done. And hence there is frequent authority, as when they gave vinegar to drink while the passion of giving it to drink was still to come, when they divided the garment which was afterward to be divided.

So now, thirsting for God in bodily thirst, he appears to him in his Holy One in such a manner: in the simplicity of the flesh, in the thirst of the soul, in the prayer of the dawn: because only those who have been proved by these things will either be taken up by Christ or caught up to meet him in the clouds. But in the Holy One of God they will not appear to God otherwise than according to that saying: He who has seen me has seen the Father also; and that: I and the Father are one. Because in the nature and name of the Son the signification of the Father's nature and name is contained; one who appears to the Son, or is received by the Son, will appear to the Father in the Son.

He who thirsts for the Holy One desires to see the Son.—And in order to show, in this signification of his thirst, what was the desire of the holy one before whom he was about to appear to God; he added: That I might see thy power and thy glory: namely, that he might see him who, according to the Apostle, is both the Power of God and is in the glory of God: and he was to see him for no other purpose than to merit fellowship in eternity and to obtain the eternity of the heavenly kingdom: because these things are prepared through the mercy of God beyond the blessedness of this life.

The future hope surpasses the present life.

The resurrection is the mercy of God.—For this follows,

Because thy mercy is better than life. It is indeed a great gift of God that we come into life: and led by nature itself we rejoice that we are born. But because our whole age is full of anxieties and sorrows, there is more hope in the mercy of God than in life; because death follows this life by the law of sin, whereas that mercy restores eternity out of death. Just as the sowing and very dissolution of wheat is more excellent than the preservation of the wheat itself; for God clothes this as he wills in the ear: so it is a great gift of the mercy of God, if having died together with Christ we live in Christ. For even the very death of Adam, lest he should remain in the punishment of eternity, was established under the signification of mercy, and the Apostle judges it better for himself to be dissolved.

And the prophet shows his joy at the death

that is to abide, saying: Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints; because through it, with the law of sin dissolved, the eternity of soul and body—now without the body of sin—shall be repaid with the advancement of glorious transformation.

The lifting up of hands is an arduous work.

Life in the bosom of Abraham. Another life more blessed.—Certain therefore of the mercy of God, which is better than life, the prophet performs the duty of thanksgiving, saying,

My lips shall praise thee, O Lord.

Thus will I bless thee in my life, and in thy name I will lift up my hands. He praises and blesses God both in word and in deed; for blessing him in his life, he will lift up his hands in his name. We have frequently taught that in the lifting up of hands there is signified not the posture of praying, but the indication of lofty work. In this life of his therefore he praised God, because his mercy is better than lives.

For there is also a life after life, because one must live in the bosom of Abraham, in which the name of God is blessed in the repose of the poor man; according to that saying of the prophet: The dead shall not praise thee, O Lord, nor all they that go down to hell; but we that live bless the Lord. Beyond these lives therefore is that mercy which has prepared for those who love the Lord what eye has not seen, and ear has not heard, and has not ascended into the heart of man.

God is to be worshipped with a living and intelligent sacrifice.—He therefore praises and blesses Him, not now awaiting sacrifices of the law from burnt offerings of cattle and the fatness of suet, but setting himself before God as a sacrifice in the sole confession of the soul and the praise of blessing; according to that word: The sacrifice of praise shall glorify me; and that: Offer to God the sacrifice of praise, and that: For if thou hadst desired sacrifice, I would indeed have given it; thou wilt not delight in burnt offerings: because, with the prescription of the letter and the allegorical law ceasing, God is to be honored with the praises of a living and intelligent sacrifice. For he added,

Let my soul be filled as with fat and marrow, and lips of exultation shall praise thy name.

Nor does he condemn those former things as if they were to be abominated, but confirms these latter as more truly expected; since he begs that his soul be filled, as with fat and marrow—which were held to be the first-fruits of sacrifices—with the praise of exultation.

Nocturnal and morning meditation upon God.—But these things belong not so much to the duties of words as to those of the mind, so that the sacrifice of praise may descend from the holiness of works. And so he immediately added,

If I have been mindful of thee upon my bed, in the morning watches I meditated upon thee.

The nocturnal remembrance completes the morning meditation: and therefore he keeps watch for God from the light, because from the purity of the bed, that is, of the couch, comes both the confidence and the conscience of morning prayer. And so he suppressed the thoughts that crept in under the secrecy of night by the remembrance of God; and the fear of the name of his God aided him as he struggled against the incitements of the flesh. For it follows,

Because thou hast been my helper, and in the shelter of thy wings I will hope—being protected by the meditation upon God, through which God is his helper.

For he has no other care than that of pleasing God, of whom alone he is mindful upon his bed. In this also he meditates in the morning from his nocturnal remembrance, because God is his helper: and he exults under the shelter of His wings, that is, he is kept safe under the covering of the One who protects him.

Those who love cleave to one another even when apart.—But the source and cause of all these things is this

because it follows,

My soul hath cleaved after thee; thy right hand hath received me.

This is the power of love, that we cleave to those whom we love, even if they be absent: since neither place nor time can in any way tear away the affection that has been implanted. The prophet therefore cleaved to God, with neither the flatteries of the world nor the vices of the body drawing his love and charity away from Him: because, according to the Apostle, he who cleaves to God is one spirit, and the Lord prayed for his disciples: Father, as we are one, so that they also may be one in us.

Cleaving therefore to God, he was received by the right hand of God

that is, through the power of God, which is signified in the right hand, he was taken up by Him who is both the Power and the Wisdom and the Word of God made flesh, henceforth to be conformed to the glory of His body.

The security of the just, the lot of the wicked.

Foxes, demons.—And he who was received by the right hand of God cast away from himself all fear that could come from his enemies, and did not keep silent about the security of his confidence, nor is he ignorant of the severity of God's just judgment, saying,

But they have sought my soul in vain; they shall go into the lower parts of the earth, they shall be delivered into the hands of the sword, they shall be portions for foxes.

In vain, therefore, have they sought his soul. For according to the Gospel man does not destroy the soul together with the body, and the mercy of God is better above lives, and he has already been received by the right hand of God.

But they shall go into the lower parts of the earth

because they are separated from the saints by an impassable gulf: and they shall be delivered into the hands of the sword; because, as in the case of the rich man, the power of punishment, which is signified in the edge of the sword, shall be exercised upon the wicked. They shall also be portions for foxes, obtaining the lot of those deceitful little beasts: because Herod also is a fox, and foxes destroy the vineyard of the bridegroom, and they have dug a den for themselves in the hearts of the wicked, while the Son of Man had nowhere to lay his head: and it is not doubtful that the wickednesses of demons are signified in these, for whom together with their prince the fire of Gehenna has been prepared.

Christ is to be acknowledged as God, and it is no longer lawful to deny it.—But amid these things he shows the joy of him who, for the sake of the gladness of human salvation, frequently exulted before the Father,

But the king shall rejoice in God, and all who swear by him shall be praised: because the mouth of those who speak wicked things has been stopped.

He indicates the reason why the king rejoices, because whoever shall swear by him shall be praised in God by the religion of this oath: namely, he who knows that Christ Jesus is king, who also is God over all things, who according to Paul testifies to the coming of the great God and Saviour, who according to Isaiah, swearing shall swear by the Lord, shall be praised. In the true God.

For the mouth of those who speak wicked things has been stopped; because it is proclaimed from the law and from the prophets; and by the Apostle we are taught that in him the Father both chose us and blessed us before the foundation of the world, and that he himself has raised us up together and seated us at the right hand of God in the heavenly places, and when they shall see him in his majesty judging the living and the dead. By these things, therefore, the mouth of those who speak wicked things is stopped. For he himself is king forever, and in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ every knee shall bow, of those in heaven, on earth, and under the earth: and every tongue shall confess that the Lord Jesus Christ is in the glory of God the Father, who is blessed unto all ages of ages. Amen.

Hear, O God, my prayer when I make supplication to thee: deliver my soul from the fear of the enemy.

Thou hast protected me from the assembly of the malignant, from the multitude of those who work iniquity: because they have sharpened their tongue like a sword, they have bent their bow, a bitter thing: that they may shoot in secret at the blameless one. They shall shoot at him suddenly, and shall not fear: they have strengthened for themselves an evil word. They have reasoned that they might hide snares: they said: Who shall see them? They have searched out iniquities, they have failed in their searching with a close search. A man shall approach and a deep heart, and God shall be exalted. The arrows of little ones have become their wounds, and their tongues have prevailed nothing against them. All who saw them were troubled, and every man feared. And they declared the works of God, and understood his deeds. The just man shall rejoice in the Lord, and shall hope in him, and all the upright in heart shall be praised.

unless that a form of spiritual doctrine has been established therein?

As improbable we pass over; but there are certain other things in the psalm which hinder the order of this understanding. Yet the discourse of our exposition will not differ far from these. 5. This psalm belongs to every just man amid the storms of the world. Various temptations.—For we consider that the present psalm contains the confession not only of the Apostles who were first, but of any holy man hoping in the Lord. For we are placed amid the greatest storms of the world, and the most grievous impieties of the human race against God: the faithful and true confession of which through us philosophy now mocks, now the fury of heretics assails, now the pursuits of avarice condemn, now the favor of ambition disturbs. For the dissembling, enduring, avoiding, and refuting of all these things, our mind is not sufficient unless it has been instructed through God.

For with how many and how troublesome stings of disputation does philosophy assail the providence of God, and His principal and unbegun dominion over the world created by Him: now bestowing the name of God upon waters, now upon the earth, now upon atoms, now upon the sky? And with what ingenious use of cunning does the heretic counterfeit the doctrine of faith? With what great peril then to the hearers does the miser affirm the glory of riches? With what great ruin also of continence does the asserter of bodily pleasures pursue their joys? And how pestilential is the eloquence of the ambitious in their exhortation to honor? Against all these things, watchful care, all-night prayer, and eternal confession to God shall fight back. On account of these destructions therefore of our faith and eternal salvation, the prophet is understood to pray in the psalm, showing from his own person how far it befits us to hope in God.

They are to be averted by watchfulness and assiduous prayer.

Even before they have broken in.—For he says,

Hear, O God, my prayer, when I am in tribulation; deliver my soul from the fear of the enemy.

When those things which we mentioned above break in, through which our faith and hope are endangered, prayer is directed to Him who alone can heal these things. For there is fear lest the heat of allurements creeping in from every side absorb the soul, weak by nature and through fellowship with the flesh. For they are present daily, and fight with deceitful flatteries, bringing up certain engines of destruction. And so we are admonished, through the teaching of heavenly instruction, to apply watchful care to faith, to fear the enemy who is always lying in wait, lest he, posted in his lookouts, assail our incautious security.

We must therefore keep watch in prayer to God, and pray always: so that when the soul has begun to be wearied and afflicted by the stings of creeping allurements, God, always prayed to, may hear, and may deliver us from those things which we fear. For he says: Deliver my soul from the fear of the enemy. For God is not to be prayed to only when the things that are feared have broken in; but those things are to be feared which, when they have begun to be present, hold dominion: and He is to be prayed to always and with unwearied supplications, that He may deliver us from the fear of those things whose dominion we fear. For it is written in Proverbs: When I called, you did not hear; and when I stretched out my words, you did not attend; but you made my counsels vain, and did not attend to my counsels. And I will laugh at your destruction. It shall come to pass then, when you call upon me, that I will not hear.

The prophet therefore, though earlier in time (than Solomon, for instance, whose are the words just cited), is nevertheless not ignorant of what would be said afterward; but, anxious always at impending tribulations, and solicitous at every fear of the enemy, he prays to God on account of what he fears: and he entreats both that God be with him in tribulation, and that He hear him. For it is not our fear but our faith that merits the mercy of God: and there is need of the evidence of long preparation, that we may deserve to be heard. The prophet therefore remembers that he is to be freed from all these things by prayer: and he teaches that his prayer arises not from the dominion of the things he has feared, but from fear of their dominion.

The murderous tongue.

Aimed against the newly reborn.—For he says,

Thou hast protected me from the assembly of the malignant, from the multitude of those who work iniquity, who have sharpened their tongues like a sword, have bent their bow, a bitter thing, that they may shoot in the dark at the blameless one. Here the prophet does not fear weapons of war, nor swords, or javelins, or the engines of the bow. For all his fear is in the tongue: its swords, its darts he dreads. From these indeed he is safe by his faith; for he says: Thou hast protected me from the assembly of the malignant: but the bow of the murderous tongue is always bent, and the sharpness of the sword is ever ready in its tongue. Its deadly arrows fly, and it is not doubtful what they accomplish: namely, that they shoot in the dark at the blameless one. And the proper meaning of the word is to be understood.

Not the holy, not the faithful, not the just, but the blameless one they shoot at—him from whom, through the sacrament of Baptism, the filth and stains of former sins have been freshly washed away, not yet firm in faith, not yet instructed in spiritual doctrines, not yet contending against the weapons of this combative tongue, but simple, and tender from the infancy of new birth. Him therefore, without fear of any contradiction, with the bow already long since bent, they will wound, placed as he is in the dark through ignorance of things. For he says,

They shall shoot at him suddenly, and shall not fear: at a simple nature, and one inexperienced in the newness of the blameless one.

For they deceive this one, they stretch out hidden snares for him, glorying in the secret lurking-places of their ambushes.

Snares are always at hand against faith.—For it follows: They have strengthened for themselves an evil word, they have reasoned that they might hide snares: they said: Who shall see them? A distinction is made between the time of inflicting the wound and the time of the settled plan. For when it is said: They shall shoot suddenly, the work of a future time is taught: but when it is said: They have strengthened an evil word, the plan of a will already long since settled is shown from the past. For destructions are always at hand against faith, and the deceits of pestilential exhortation lie close in hidden and deceptive snares, which they suppose are seen by very few. And therefore it is said: They have hidden snares, and said: Who shall see them?

For if a heretic attempts to pervert faith, it is incredible with what great deceits he strives to subvert it; if a philosopher assails our hope of eternity, he will in a wondrous manner place all the good of the present life in the body: each of them searching out, with all the alertness of his wit, those things by which the institution of heavenly doctrine may be undermined.

They avail nothing against God.

The world is not from chance. The soul is immortal. Resurrection of the flesh. God's care for man.—But what is human perversity to God? What is the ingenuity of a work against its maker? Let them seek by all the petty questions of their argumentation the destruction of truth; yet the assertion of falsehood will fail in its destruction of truth: and therefore what follows is,

They have searched out iniquities, they have failed, searching with a search.

The failure of those who search shows the failure of their superfluous exhortation against God. For what devices, bent upon contradicting truth, will not be brought to ruin? Let them probe all the secrets of natural causes, and with the stubborn vigor of their studies scrutinize even the inner workings of the celestial motions: yet in the very intent of their own work they will fail, refuted by spiritual teachings.

For those who teach that all things are driven by chance motions will hear from us that the God of eternal power does not dwell in chance, but is the creator of the world, of essence as indefinite as his power; that he is from no one, but all things are from him, governing and containing all those things. But he who shall proclaim the perishing of the soul together with the body will hear that the soul is not earthly, but sprung from the breath of God and mingled with the elements of the body; and that death is not annihilation, but the departure of the soul from the body. He who denies the resurrection of the flesh will learn that its restoration will not be difficult for him to whom its first beginning was easy.

Furthermore, he who removes from God the care of human conduct will come to know God as the judge of the eternal kingdom: and that man was not created merely in order to exist (for what use was it to God that man should exist?) but that, brought forth into the knowledge of God, he might hope for advancement for himself from the knowledge of his maker.

The nature and works of the Son of God.—Now if the heretic shall destroy the faith, he will come to know that the Son of God has always existed, separated from the Father by no interval of time; that he is the Word, the Power, the Wisdom of God; that he was the maker of the world, and also the creator of man; that he washed away the first sins of the world with the flood, that he gave the law to Moses, that he was in the prophets and through them sang those great mysteries of his incarnation and passion; that rising again in the body he brought the glory of spiritual splendor to perishable flesh, and absorbed the beginnings of earthly corruption into the nature of his divinity.

Profane knowledge yields to divine.—Those who search will therefore fail against these things: and through a man learned in the teaching of God, and raising the humility of his heart on high, these proclamations of divine working will be set forth: so that this eminence of God will be praised by the very confession of those who hear these things. And therefore what follows is thus,

They have searched out iniquities, they have failed, searching with a search.

A man shall draw near, and a deep heart, and God shall be exalted. For when the failure of those who search is known, and a man of deep heart draws near, the magnificence of divine goodness is acknowledged. But how great will the progress of spiritual teaching be? For who will not magnify God, once he has come to know him as the creator of this world? Who will not fear him, once he knows him as judge? Who will not wish to be reborn into innocence, when the sacrament of new birth grants remission of sin?

Who, once reborn, will not cease from sin and wish to remain in the innocence of a little child, knowing that the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these? This our profession weakens the devices of those who search: these darts of our teaching, which through the beginning of the reborn are the arrows of little ones, wound the foolish disputations and ridiculous dogmas about God. The contradiction of profane tongues cannot stand against these things; and for the faith of all these our disputations and exhortations, there is both trembling among those who refuse and fear among those who hear.

Our faith terrifies the wicked, refreshes the just.—For when the works of God have been proclaimed, then his deeds will begin to be understood, then the just man will rejoice in them, then all the upright in heart will give praise. And the psalm itself teaches this very thing thus,

A man shall draw near, and a deep heart, and God shall be exalted.

The arrows of little ones have become their wounds, and their tongues have had nothing against them. All who saw them were troubled, and every man feared. And they declared the works of God, and understood his deeds. The just man shall rejoice in the Lord, and shall hope in him, and all the upright in heart shall be praised. Against the wounding arrows of little ones the tongue of the adversaries had nothing to say.

And those who saw the little ones shooting are troubled and afraid; when they recognize themselves to be in error, when they acknowledge the day of judgment and the recompense of the life lived in the body, when they hear the works of God and understand his deeds. In these things is the joy of the saints, in these things the most firm hope. For these reasons those who are upright in heart praise God, knowing him to be the remitter of sins, the destroyer of death, and the vanquisher of the devil, the judge of the age, the bestower of eternity, our God and Lord, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

A hymn becometh thee, O God, in Sion, and a vow shall be paid to thee in Jerusalem.

Hear my prayer, all flesh shall come to thee. The words of the wicked have prevailed over us, and thou wilt be propitious to our impieties. Blessed is he whom thou hast chosen and taken to thee, he shall dwell in thy tabernacles. We shall be filled with the good things of thy house, thy temple is holy, wonderful in equity. Hear us, O God our saviour, the hope of all the ends of the earth, and in the sea afar off. Preparing the mountains in thy strength, girded with power, who troublest the depth of the sea, the noise of its waves. The nations shall be troubled, and all they that dwell in the ends shall fear at thy signs: the outgoings of the morning and of the evening thou wilt make joyful. Thou hast visited the earth and watered it, thou hast multiplied to enrich it.

The river of God is filled with water, thou hast prepared their food, for so is its preparation: water its streams abundantly, multiply its generations, in its drops the springing forth shall rejoice. Thou shalt bless the crown of the year of thy goodness, and thy fields shall be filled with plenty. The ends of the desert shall grow fat, and the hills shall be girded with exultation. The rams of the flocks are clothed, and the valleys shall abound with grain; yea, they shall cry out, and shall sing a hymn.

What the psalm foretells.—

This psalm which follows has opportunely succeeded the preceding one. It is also itself unto the end: and it announces the gathering of the nations who are to praise the Lord. It will itself render proof of our interpretation.

Nothing is to be begun without praise of God.

Sion is the Church.—In its opening, moreover, according to his custom, the prophet directs all prayer to God. For every matter and word of ours must be entered upon with confession of God. But the prophet, knowing that many linger in vain things according to the diversity of their affairs and pursuits, requires from us a special and proper honor of God, saying,

To thee a hymn is fitting, O God, in Sion.

Sion is indeed a mountain adjacent to Jerusalem; but this mountain and its name, and also the city itself, we have always understood to signify the Church which is the body of Christ, the Lord saying in the psalms: But I have been established as king by him upon Sion his holy mountain. And lest we should think him established as king of this hill, it is said in the Prophets, and also in the Gospels: Rejoice greatly, daughter of Sion, proclaim it, daughter of Jerusalem: behold thy king cometh to thee.

And the Apostle: But that Jerusalem which is above is free, which is our mother.

This hymn therefore befits God, which in spiritual and ecclesiastical song in Sion is innocent and sweet in the praises of God.

The austere life of philosophers and heretics.

Vows outside the Church are empty, the Spirit not interceding.—He condemns all kinds of superstitions that exist outside the religion of God. For there are many placed in the deepest abyss of error who commend the perversity of their teaching by a certain probity of empty toil. For we see philosophers enduring cold with bare bodies: their teachers abstain even from the use of marriage: heretics live on dry bread. But what profit in the end is there in this idle way of life? All this is empty and ridiculous, and together with the very causes of their superstition it is pitiable. Therefore contempt of the body, the keeping of chastity, the endurance of fasting are to be vowed to God. And therefore he says: And to thee shall a vow be paid in Jerusalem. For vows are useful only to ecclesiastical religion.

When these shall be approved both by songs worthy of God and by zeal for the observance set forth in the Church, then shall we be worthy to have the Holy Spirit intercede for us.

For he himself speaks through the Prophet and teaches. He himself, according to the Apostle, intercedes for us with unspeakable groanings: and therefore it is said here thus,

Hear prayer: for what follows is not, my; so that the person of the speaker might be understood.

For although many have added this as though it were lacking, it does not appear in the authentic texts. For the prophet speaks these things not by his own sense, but inspired: Hear prayer.

All flesh is every man.

He is to be freed from error and sins through the blood of Christ.—What follows is to show whose prayer is to be heard. Nor does he defer our expectation far: for he added: All flesh shall come to thee. Scripture designates the universality of the human race under the name of flesh: as in the law: And God said, my spirit shall not remain in these men, because they are flesh; and in the same: Because all flesh had corrupted his way, and in the prophet the Lord says: And I will pour out of my spirit upon all flesh; and in the Gospel: And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us. God therefore will hear the prayer of this human race, which was held by the vain teachings of unhappy superstitions: since gentile precepts imbued them all with zeal for impiety, proclaiming God in wood and stones and metals, and placing the maker of the world and the parent of our soul within lifeless matter.

The nations therefore confess this error, that the eloquence of philosophy kept them in error: knowing at last that their old sins and the crimes of their ancient impiety are to be propitiated to God through Christ. For he according to the Apostle is our propitiation: for he says: Whom God hath set forth as a propitiation through faith in his blood, and again: He himself is the propitiation for our sins. All flesh therefore shall come to him, saying,

The words of the wicked have prevailed over us, and our impieties thou wilt be propitious to.

Who is every man that is to be freed.—But what in the end is the effect of propitiation?

Or what will it profit to have left behind gentile error and to have spurned impious teaching? And he did not conceal this very thing, saying,

Blessed is he whom thou hast chosen and taken to thee, that he may dwell in thy tabernacles.

All flesh indeed shall come, that is, we are gathered from every race of men: but blessed is whoever shall have been chosen. For many according to the Gospel are called, but few are chosen. But those who are chosen are conspicuous in the wedding garment, resplendent in the pure and whole body of new birth. And so election is not a matter of indiscriminate judgment: but it is a distinction made from the selection of merit. Blessed therefore is he whom God has chosen: blessed for this reason, because he is worthy of election.

But it is fitting for us to know for what purpose this blessed man has been chosen, namely for what follows: He shall dwell in thy tabernacles. All perfection of good things is in the rest of heavenly habitation. The Lord testifies that there are many mansions in heaven: but he prays the Father that the apostles may remain where he himself is, saying: Father, those whom thou hast given me, I will that where I am, they also may be with me. From the many mansions therefore he shares with his apostles that which is proper to himself. The Prophet knows how great a blessedness it is to be in the tabernacles of God, saying in another place: My soul longeth and fainteth for the courts of the Lord. But the hope of heavenly goods is not admitted on that account, if not all shall be chosen for cohabitation with God. For many mansions are prepared for the varying dignity of those who dwell in them.

But although the dignity is diverse; for star differeth from star in glory, yet however many shall be deemed worthy of habitations, though varied, they shall obtain the fruit of faith and the honor of heavenly glory.

What the house of God is, what its goods are, by what merit they are obtained.—For after the blessedness of him who shall have been chosen to dwell in the tabernacles of God, this follows: We shall be filled with the good things of thy house: holy is thy temple,

Wonderful in equity.

With these good things of the house of God, therefore, we shall be filled; because the blessed man shall dwell in the tabernacles of God. And indeed for the present we can form an estimate of what the good things of the house are, namely the gifts of the Church, which Christ has granted to her according to manifold fruit; because she herself also, according to the Apostle, is the house of God: That thou mayest know, he says, how thou oughtest to conduct thyself in the house of God, which is the Church of the living God, the pillar and ground of truth. This house therefore bears thirtyfold, sixtyfold, and a hundredfold fruit.

With these good things of the house of God, then, the house of the faithful shall be filled, which is for the present adorned with distributions of gifts, as it is written: For to one is given the word of wisdom, to another the word of knowledge, to another faith in the same Spirit, to another gifts of healings, to another kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. But there are also other full and perfect gifts of the house of God, by no means to be estimated by the natures of carnal senses. These things the Apostle, caught up to the third heaven, knows; and he proclaims, saying: What eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor hath it entered into the heart of man, what things God hath prepared for them that love him. With these good things of the house of God, therefore, we shall be filled. And the merit for receiving these fruits he teaches, saying, Holy is thy temple, wonderful in equity.

For the Apostle teaches that all the bodies of believers are the temple of God, saying, Know you not that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? But if any man violate the temple of God, him shall God destroy. For the temple of God is holy. This temple of God must therefore be adorned with holiness and justice, that it may be filled with the good things of the house of God, that it may be wonderful in works of equity and faith. Moreover, it will be readily understood that the house of God also signifies the very man assumed by the Son of God: because in him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead, and by the property of nature the Father dwells in him; and so with his good things, that is, of power, glory, and eternity, each one is filled who shall have kept himself a temple holy to God and wonderful in equity.

The hope of all of us, therefore, is this: that we be filled with the good things of the house of God, that we be his holy and wonderful temple. Blessed indeed are those who have already been chosen by God to dwell in his tabernacles; but it is fitting that we hasten to share in this blessedness, seeking it by works and prayers.

No nation is excluded from the hope of blessedness.—For which reason the following comes next: Hear us, O God our saviour, hope of all the ends of the earth, and in the sea afar off. This prayer does not befit the Jew. And although this book belongs to the law, yet the prophecy is not of one nation alone. For this hope belongs to all the ends of the earth; and wherever the temperate zone of this habitable world extends, Christ is the hope of all. Indeed even the islands of the inner and outer sea rest in the power of this name. For he is the hope of all the ends of the earth, and in the sea afar off. But hope ought not to be presumed upon from empty grounds, lest it be rather a presumption of uncertain things than an expectation of things known.

The mountains signified here are not earthly ones.—And so why he is the hope of all, he teaches in what follows, saying,

Preparing the mountains in thy strength, girded with power, who troublest the depth of the sea, the noise of its waves.

This discourse does not pertain to the nature of earthly mountains; for they have been established, not prepared; but preparation is the beginning of a future work. Furthermore, the preparation of the mountains mentioned is in the girding of power and strength: but all the earth was commanded to subsist from nothing; and that thing had no need of a girding of power which depended on the ease of commanding. It is useful, however, to know wherever mention of mountains is made in the Scriptures. For the prophet says: Hear, all ye peoples, and let the earth give heed, and all that dwell therein. And the Lord God shall be a witness to you, the Lord from his holy house.

For behold the Lord shall come down from his place, he shall come down upon the high places of the earth, and the mountains shall be crushed under him, and the valleys shall melt as wax before the fire, because of the wickedness of Jacob. All these things because of the sins of the house of Israel. And again: The earth was moved and trembled, and the foundations of the mountains were troubled and were moved, because he was angry with them. Smoke went up from his wrath, and fire shall blaze from his face, coals were kindled by him. He bowed the heavens and came down, and darkness was under his feet. And in what follows: He sent forth his arrows and scattered them; and he multiplied lightnings and troubled them.

And in these passages, as the reading teaches, the Holy Spirit shows through the Prophet the descent of the Lord from heaven, the fear of the earth, the trembling of the mountains

because the Lord was angry with them, with smoke arising from his wrath, and fire thereafter to be kindled from his presence. In the smoke that ascends, the matter belongs to past time; but in the fire to be kindled, the signification of the future is contained. Then, lest anything should be thought to have been said of a dull and immovable nature, arrows sent forth scatter these mountains, and multiplied lightnings trouble them.

The mountains signify the devil with his own.

These are crushed by Christ.—By this name of mountains, therefore, every pre-eminent power must be understood: which, exalting and lifting itself up against God, has been subjected to the wrath of God. God the Word, therefore, descending and girding with power the man assumed to himself, first pressed down these summits of the mountains, that is, crushed the insolent eminence of the devil and his own, whom through this power of the first crushing he prepared for the punishment of eternal judgment. The prophet, moreover, preserved this same reasoning, saying: Smoke went up from his wrath, and fire shall blaze from his presence. For smoke envelops them who are meanwhile about to burn with fire; and for this reason in the present psalm it is written thus: Preparing the mountains in thy strength, girded with power. The girding of power is fitted to the body which stood in need of it.

For Power itself is not girded; but in the power of God, the man whom the Lord assumed is girded with might.

The sea signifies the world.—We must consider, however, what follows upon the preparation of the mountains: Who troublest the depth of the sea, the noise of its waves. He troubles not the sea, but the depth of the sea; and not its waves, but the noise of the waves. Now the sea, as the prophetic word teaches, is named in place of the world: as he says, The Lord shall bring his great and strong sword upon the dragon, the crooked serpent, and shall slay the dragon that is in the sea. And again: This great and wide sea; there the dragon resteth, whom thou hast formed to play therein. Or certainly that more absolute passage: I am come into the depth of the sea, and a tempest hath overwhelmed me. The mountains, therefore, that is, all the adverse and pre-eminent powers, are prepared for the punishment of judgment, and the foundations of the sea are troubled.

For in the confidence of these hostile powers the world stood firm, and these lay hidden in the invisible depths of this world. But the noise of the waves is troubled together with the depth of the sea. For when the devil is troubled, all the ministries of his terror are troubled; and the very noise of the opposing powers, by which the nations trembled, is itself struck with fear. Let us recall the murmurings of soothsayers, and the disordered ravings of the frenzied, and how sometimes, with the senses of the hearers thrown into confusion, the air rang with some uncertain sound of idols, and finally the whole world resounding with the profane chant of ceremonies.

But now, with the Lord Christ proclaimed, all things are silenced, confounded and trembling, when in temples and among nations the gods are subjected to punishment by the power of the faithful; when they are tormented, torn, burned by the words of believers, and natures invisible and incomprehensible to us are restrained, punished, and driven away by the word; when soothsayers are silent, when temples are mute. Through these things, therefore, they are now being prepared for judgment. And what does this preparation accomplish? It has accomplished this: The nations shall be troubled,

shall fear; beholding, that is, their gods mute, and groaning with the voices of their punishment only at the laying on of our hands.

But after the troubling of the nations, others shall fear; for the troubling will bring fear. Shall all who are troubled also fear? Not all who are troubled shall also fear.

Those shall fear who neither wholly pursue nor wholly abandon the things of the flesh.—Who then shall fear?

They that inhabit the ends. Scripture did not add, as it is wont, the ends of the earth; for it was not speaking here of the ends of the earth. Therefore the logic of the discourse does not allow us to suppose that this was added. For it says, They that inhabit the ends. Surely the nations that are within the ends will not fail to fear; and only the outermost parts of the lands will fear God, while the rest that are held in the middle are strangers to his fear? Now an end is not the thing itself, but the outermost part of the thing. But the outermost part is that in which the thing itself will cease. Who then inhabit the ends?

Namely those who, placed in the flesh, neither yet live entirely according to the flesh, nor yet hold entirely the end of sin by the habit of ceasing from sins; but wishing to cease, yet not ceasing entirely, and still inhabiting the end, that is, a certain proximate failing of sin in the flesh, they are neither absent from the flesh nor wholly exercise the inner things of the flesh. The Apostle, though in the body, is absent from the body. The Apostle, though in life, yet dies daily; but he himself no longer lives, yet Christ lives in him. He has passed beyond all those ends of ambiguous will, dwelling even outside the ends of the body of sin; by being absent from the body while in the body, and by dying daily while living, and by no longer living in himself but Christ.

But the trembling of those who fear arises from the uncertainty of their ambiguous dwelling: while still inhabiting the ends they fear, not yet having entirely passed beyond what they already inhabit; and yet by the will to cease they already inhabit the end of ceasing.

Signs of God's mercy.

Morning and evening praises of God.—But let us see why those who inhabit the ends shall fear, and whence fear comes upon them. Nor is this hidden: for what follows is: And they that inhabit the ends shall fear at thy signs. All fear therefore arises from the signs. But what were these signs? The outgoings of the morning and the evening are thy delight.

Thou hast visited the earth and watered it, thou hast greatly enriched it.

The river of God is filled with water, thou hast prepared their food, for so is thy preparation. From these signs, therefore, fear has arisen. For there is a great sign in each one of them. For after the preparations of the mountains in the girding of power, and the troubling of the depth of the sea and the noise of its waves, the progress of the Church into the delights of morning and evening hymns is the greatest sign of God's mercy.

The day is begun with prayers to God, the day is closed with hymns to God, according to what was said: Let my praise be pleasing to him, and again: The lifting up of my hands as an evening sacrifice.

Spiritual inebriation and abundance.—There follows therefore also this next sign,

Thou hast visited the earth and hast made it drunk, thou hast multiplied to enrich it.

This earth which we use is not enriched, but enriches from the abundance of its fruits. The discourse will therefore not apply to that which both lacks the sense of enriching itself, and whose office it is to enrich. But God has visited the earth, that is, the birth of the human race; and that earth, visited by God, grows rich with multiplied gifts of graces. As the Apostle says: In all things you are made rich in him, in all utterance and in all knowledge. For with these good things we are filled, and drinking without ceasing we draw daily the gift of heavenly goods, full and drunk with divine abundance. For the enrichment has been shown to be that which was above called inebriation.

The gift of the Holy Spirit.—And the fruit of this enrichment and inebriation is to be contemplated.

And what that fruit finally is, is not left unspoken: The river of God is filled with water; thou hast prepared their food, for such is thy preparation. And there is no room for doubt concerning the river. For the Prophet says: The rushing of the river maketh glad the city of God. And the Lord himself says in the Gospels: Whosoever shall drink of the water that I shall give him, rivers of living water springing up unto eternal life shall flow from his belly. And again: He that believeth in me, as the scripture hath said, rivers shall flow from his belly. Now this he said of the Holy Spirit, whom they that believed in him were to receive. This river of God, therefore, is filled with water. For we are flooded with the gifts of the Holy Spirit, and the river of God filled with water is poured into us from that fountain of life.

We have also food prepared.

And what is this food? That food, namely, by which we are prepared for fellowship with God, through communion of the holy body, so as to be thereafter placed in communion of the holy body. For the present psalm signifies this, saying: Thou hast prepared their food, for such is thy preparation: because by that food, though we are saved in the present, we are nevertheless prepared for the future.

The foregoing things look to the future.—The Prophet maintains his custom of distinguishing the times of which he speaks.

For the foregoing discourse was as if concerning the past; but the things that were yet to be done he recalled by faith and knowledge of things to come as though already accomplished. But in order to teach that all these things belong to future time, he says,

Drench its channels, multiply its generations; it shall rejoice in its drops when it springs forth.

All this is the speech of one praying, and entreating God to fulfil the things that have been recounted. The earth has been visited and made drunk; and how now are its channels made drunk? But we ought to remember that if anyone shall have drunk of the water of the Lord, rivers shall flow from his belly: therefore drinking of the water is needed, that rivers may flow. We ourselves are made drunk when we receive the Holy Spirit, who has been called a river.

Then, because from us diverse channels of graces flow forth, the prophet prays that the Lord would make these same channels drunk: that when these are made drunk and drenched with the gift of the divine bounty, our generations may be multiplied; that is, the good earth, according to the evangelical comparison, receiving the seed of the word, may be enriched with fruit thirtyfold and sixtyfold and a hundredfold. Moreover, for us who are reborn through the sacrament of baptism there is the greatest joy, when we feel certain beginnings of the Holy Spirit in us, when the understanding of the sacraments comes upon us, the knowledge of prophecy, the word of wisdom, the firmness of hope, the charisms of healings, and dominion over subjected demons. For these things penetrate us like drops, which, having begun little by little, overflow with manifold fruit. In these drops, therefore, when it springs forth the earth shall rejoice. But the drops are multiplied that they may become channels; and the channels are made drunk that they may become rivers.

It follows that the prophet should confirm our every expectation, and teach what the preparation of the mountains, the troubling of the bottom of the sea, the visitation of the earth and its inebriation, and the fullness of the river are to have at their consummation. He teaches this, therefore, in what follows, saying,

Thou shalt bless the crown of the year of thy goodness, and thy fields shall be filled with abundance.

The borders of the desert shall grow fat, and the hills shall be girded with exultation. The rams of the flocks are clothed, and the valleys shall abound with grain; yea, they shall cry out and sing a hymn. We have come to know the year of God's goodness from prophetic and apostolic teachings.

For it was said in the person of the Lord: The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, therefore he hath anointed me, he hath sent me to preach the gospel to the poor, to proclaim release to captives and sight to the blind, to call the acceptable year of the Lord and the day of retribution (Esa. LXI, 1, 2): he declares without doubt the year of that eternal and blessed age. For this year of the Lord's goodness is the one from which those weary times of gracious retribution are to take their beginning. The crown of this year of God, therefore, shall be blessed by the most joyful and most sweet fruit of the earth visited and made drunk. For this is Christ, the victory by which the corruption of our bodies is driven away and the power of death destroyed. This crown, blessed with the flower of our sanctified earth, is the Lord glorious in the choir and company of his saints.

Then the fields shall be filled with abundance, then the borders of the desert 193 shall grow fat, then the hills shall be girded with exultation, then the rams of the flocks shall be clothed. For that is the time of retribution.

The distinction of glory among the saints, among the martyrs, among the leaders of the Church.—But the distinction of that retribution itself is to be contemplated. For in the fields, whose cultivation is in use, those works that shall have been done under the law and cultivation of God shall attain abundance. But where the borders of the desert shall grow fat, the people of the Church, which was long a desert, is enriched with the goods of the promise. In the hills girded with exultation, the glorious joys of the martyrs are announced; for these are loftier than the other lands. But when the rams of the flocks are clothed, that eternal and blessed garment of the patriarchs and prophets and apostles, who are the leaders of the holy flock, is displayed; concerning which the blessed apostle Paul says: For this corruptible must put on incorruption; and again: In which we would not be unclothed, but clothed upon, that this mortal may be swallowed up by life.

With this garment, therefore, the rams of the flocks are clothed, and they are vested in this habit of glorious immortality.

But although diverse gifts of retributions have been shown, God nevertheless grants no small hope of his mercy beyond these, saying through the prophet, And the valleys shall abound with grain

that is, men of humbler but not impious faith and works shall obtain the fruit of life. For they shall not be filled with abundance as the fields, nor shall they grow fat from the desert, nor shall they be girded with exultation as the mountains, nor shall they be clothed as the rams of the flocks—in all of which the gift of a defined glory is shown—but they shall abound with grain, that is, they shall not lack the substance of living, because through weakness of faith they are humble, and pressed down in the manner of valleys by the hills rising around them.

The foregoing things are to be understood spiritually.—And lest the prophetic word should be thought to signify by these fields, these deserts, these hills, these rams, these valleys, which lie before our sight, things without voice and sense, he added: Yea, they shall cry out and sing a hymn, singing with unwearied and mighty voices the praises of God for these diverse rewards of retribution.

Shout with joy to God, all the earth, sing a psalm to his name, give glory to his praise.

Say to God: How terrible are thy works, O Lord; in the multitude of thy power thine enemies shall lie to thee. Let all the earth adore thee and sing psalms to thee; let them sing a psalm to thy name. DIAPSALMA. Come and see the works of God, terrible in his counsels over the sons of men. Who turned the sea into dry land; in the river they shall walk on foot: there shall we rejoice in him, who ruleth in his power for ever. His eyes look upon the nations: let not those who provoke to wrath be exalted in themselves. DIAPSALMA. Bless our God, ye nations, and make the voice of his praise heard.

Who hath set my soul unto life, and hath not suffered my feet to be moved.

For thou hast proved us, O God, thou hast tried us by fire, as silver is tried. Thou hast brought us into the snare, thou hast laid tribulations upon our back: thou hast set men over our heads. We have passed through fire and water, and thou hast brought us into refreshment. And I will enter into thy house with burnt offerings, I will pay thee my vows, which my lips have uttered. And my mouth hath spoken in my tribulation. I will offer thee burnt offerings full of marrow with the burning of rams, I will offer thee bullocks with goats. DIAPSALMA. Come and hear, and I will tell you, all ye that fear God, how great things he hath done for my soul. I cried to him with my mouth, and I exulted under my tongue. If I have regarded iniquity in my heart, God will not hear. Therefore God hath heard, and hath attended to the voice of my prayer.

Blessed be God, who hath not turned away my prayer, nor his mercy from me.

The superscription of this psalm differs from the preceding one in that it contains A Song of a Psalm, whereas in the former A Psalm of a Song was set forth.

Otherwise they are equally inscribed to the end. And so, according to that account of the inscription of titles which we set forth at the beginning, it is clear that this psalm is sung on account of the institutions of spiritual doctrine attained through the merit of good work: because when in the superscription it is A Psalm of a Song, the preaching of good work done is contained in the psalm through the knowledge of heavenly things; but when it is A Song of a Psalm, a hymn of spiritual knowledge attained through the obedience of action is shown.

For a song is the function of the voice; but a psalm is compared to an instrument by reason of the fitting together which they call harmony, and from unequal and dissimilar modes there is produced by the skill of the artist an apt and consonant and pleasing melody. After this example, through the varied ministries of our duty and knowledge, we compose a work pleasing to God and consonant with itself. And of this understanding the psalms themselves shall be our authors; since when it is A Psalm of a Song, the preaching of good work is understood through the doctrine of knowledge and understanding, but in A Song of a Psalm the thanksgiving for knowledge attained is understood through the merit of deeds done. For this reason, therefore, in the present psalm the spirit of prophecy began from the doctrine of thanksgiving. Moreover, that the psalm consists in the person of the prophets, the matter itself and reason demonstrate.

Shout with joy to God, all the earth, sing a psalm to his name, give glory to his praise.

Say to God: How terrible are thy works!

In the multitude of thy power thine enemies shall lie to thee. First, therefore, he forewarns that there must be shouting with joy to God; second, that a psalm must be sung to his name; then, that glory must be given to his praise; next, that it must be said to God: How terrible are thy works!; and lastly, that this must be confessed: In the multitude of thy power thine enemies shall lie to thee. But that we may understand the reason and order of this discourse so arranged, it is necessary to resolve in a few words that which presents difficulty.

What jubilation is in common usage.

According to the force of the Greek word it is a military sound.—In the Latin codices we read thus: Shout with joy to God, all the earth. And as far as pertains to the usage of our own speech, we call jubilation the sound of a pastoral and rustic voice, when in solitudes, either answering or calling out, the sound of a voice drawn out at length and pressed forth with effort is heard. But in the Greek books, which are closest to the Hebrew, the same meaning is not written. For they read thus: ἀλαλάξατε τῷ Θεῷ πᾶσα ἡ γῆ, and among them ἀλαλαγμὸς, which in Latin they render as jubilum, signifies the voice of an army fighting, either pressing upon the enemy in the charge, or testifying to the success of victory with a shout of exultation. Which matter, where the manner of translation has so tempered it, we understand as fully expressed in another psalm, where it says: All ye nations, clap your hands, shout with joy to God with a voice of exultation.

Now the voice of exultation differs from jubilation; but by reason of the condition of the translation

because a proper designation of the voice of one exulting was not found, through what is called jubilation the voice of one exulting is shown.

Those fighting against the devil are admonished to use it.—Placed therefore in the battles of this life, and in this contest of our flesh and blood fighting with spiritual arms against the devil and his hosts, we are admonished to shout with joy to God with a voice of exultation. And lest the discourse should be referred to this inanimate mass of earth, our whole company, born of earth in our first parent Adam, is shown under the plural number when it is said: Shout with joy to God, all the earth. For both the duty of all and their origin are taught at once. Every profane hearer, therefore, is to be terrified by the word of our confession; and against the devil and his weapons we must contend with the sound of our prayers, and the victory of our warfare must be shown with a voice of exultation.

Let one standing outside the church hear the voice of the praying people, behold the solemn sounds of hymns, and receive amid the offices of the divine sacraments also the response of devout confession. Every adversary must needs be terrified, and war is waged against the devil, and he conquers death by faith in the resurrection, by such a jubilation of our exulting voice, as has been said. Let him know that this is pleasing to God, that this is the testimony of our hope, that the public and victorious voices of our exultation resound: of which the prophet is not unmindful, recalling in another place: I went round about and offered in his tabernacle the sacrifice of jubilation. And lest we should think this teaching and observance of jubilation to be empty, he declares elsewhere: Blessed is the people that knoweth jubilation. It is therefore necessary to our faith, in the knowledge of which there is blessedness.

That we must also please God with the body.—For the prophet arranged first in the order of admonitions that all the earth should shout joyfully to God, and second that it should sing a psalm to his name. To God, therefore, joyful shouting is due; because the service of an exulting voice is owed by us to him. But a psalm is to be sung to his name; because just as a psalm is played through an instrument, so also through our body, which is the instrument of the soul and of all affections and activities, we must please him with skillful works. We must therefore act worthily of the name of God, so that insofar as it can be done, we comply with the words of the Lord saying: So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven. For the uprightness of our life is to be referred to the praise of him for whom we live.

This same thing is then taught from what follows. For it continues: Sing a psalm to his name, give glory to his praise: because from the psaltery of our instrument, that is, from the deeds of the body serving the soul, a glorious praise is rendered by us to God; when the nations, beholding our works, glorify our Father who is in heaven. And glory will be given to his praise, if we worthily sing a psalm to his name by the operation of our instrument, that is, of our body.

How tremendous God is.—We are also taught by the following admonitions concerning the order of obedience, the Prophet or the Spirit through the Prophet admonishing thus: Say to God: How terrible are your works! For who would not tremble at the majesty of him who established the ages, founded the world, measured out the times in their revolving succession and course, adorned the heaven with stars, filled the earth with fruits, enclosed the sea with barriers, and chose man to use or to have dominion over these things? For through all these things the eternity of his power and authority is known, the Apostle saying: For the invisible things of him, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and divinity. These things make the name of the Creator terrible; and the dignity of his works shows the majesty of him who wrought them.

Therefore God must both be proclaimed by us as the creator of these works, and be confessed by all others: it must not be falsely asserted that all these things are gods.

The various errors of the pagans concerning God.

Whence they invented many gods.—For some record that these things came into being by chance, others affirm that they have existed eternally. And therefore they contend that the world itself is God: either because it subsisted by its own power when it willed, or because, lacking a beginning, it lacks the will of a ruler. But others call only the heaven God, because it is fiery; others the air, because it is borne about by motion and by an indivisible nature; others the waters, because they flow without ceasing. Many have worshipped the metals of the earth, trees, rocks, and herbs as gods. Some have falsely claimed that the bones of putrefied bodies, or the ashes of burning funeral pyres, are gods: not knowing God as the creator of all these things. And therefore the prophet taught that such must be the order of our confession: Say to God: How terrible are your works!

In the multitude of your power your enemies will lie to you

that is, from the multitude of the powers of God, they falsely attribute the veneration of false names to gods.

Man is called back from these to the one God.—But because the enemies lie, what ought to be done by all is taught thus,

Let all the earth adore you, and sing a psalm to you: let it sing a psalm to your name, O Most High.

When the lie of the enemies in the gods they name has been shown, the ordinances of our salvation are set forth: that our every earthly origin should adore and sing a psalm to the Most High, recognizing the true God and the creator of all things, having abandoned the lies of impieties.

Those who are far from God are called to behold the works of God.—The diapsalm marked a division of sense.

For the speech directed to God with prayer is now turned to men: whom the Prophet, as though they were standing far from the knowledge of God, calls to what is near, saying: Come, and see the works of God. The Apostle also taught that there are many placed far from God, whom the exhortation of teaching has placed as it were in the vicinity, when he said: And when he came, he preached peace to you who were far off, and peace to those who were near. For many from the law believed as those dwelling near, while the gentiles were called from afar.

Namely those works by which he provided for human salvation in the time of the law.—The prophetic proclamation therefore called all to behold the works of God: but not those works which are set before the sight of all, of heaven, air, earth, and sea (for all behold these); but those which are known only to the diligent among the faithful, and by which provision was made for human salvation with the great terror of wondrous powers, Pharaoh being restrained by the punishments of his impiety as an example of human fear, so that the terror of condemnation might begin religion through the dread of the irreligious; when the sea dried up into a path of land, and the waters were turned into dry ground: when the people crossed the Jordan on foot, and as Israel was about to enter the land of promise, the flowing waters were commanded to stand still, and the remaining channel of the river ran down to provide safe passage for walking.

To behold these works of God belonging to the law and the prophets, therefore, the Prophet calls the nations, saying,

Come, and see the works of God, terrible in his counsels over the sons of men.

Who turned the sea into dry land, in the river they shall pass on foot. For he is to be understood as God, by whose terrible counsels provision was made for human salvation through these works: so that the knowledge of such works and of their author might confirm us beyond mere opinion about God (since no one looking upon the heaven fails to perceive that God exists).

How those things pertain to all.—But although these are works of the powers of God, they do not nevertheless satisfy the hope and salvation of all. For it was only for the people of the law that the sea was changed into land, and the Jordan dried up for their journey. But what does this profit for the salvation of the whole earth? For the word Come applies to all; because it had been prescribed concerning all: Let all the earth adore you. What then does the Jordan, dried up at that time, impart to me for salvation, born so long afterward? It imparts plainly. For first in its waters, the washing away of sins was granted when John was preaching repentance: and through him by whom a path had been made for the people into the land of promise, a way to the heavenly kingdom is begun for us, and through the washing of new birth the possession of eternal bodies is begun, the very waters having been consecrated by the baptism of the Lord.

On account of which, from what had been said: Come and see the works of the Lord, how terrible in his counsels over the sons of men, who turned the sea into dry land: in the river they shall pass on foot. Lest from the things that were done before, the assurance of our hope should be cut off, since he had said of the future they shall pass; therefore it was added: There we shall rejoice in him. For through these waters of the Jordan, into those good things of the land promised by the prophets, passage has been and is being made by the step of bodies to be washed: and there we rejoice in the beginnings of the heavenly sacrament. Another prophet testifies to both the time and the cause of this rejoicing, saying: Let the thirsty desert rejoice, and let the desert exult, and let it bloom as a lily, and let the deserts of Jordan bloom and exult.

Strengthen the weak hands and the feeble knees, comfort those of little courage, grow strong in understanding, fear not.

Behold our God will render judgment, he himself will come and will save us. Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall hear, and the tongue of the mute shall be heard. Then the lame man shall leap as a hart. This therefore is what is signified: There we shall rejoice in him. These things were fulfilled at the coming of the Lord, in the baptisms of the Jordan and in the healing of all infirmities. And the words, there we shall rejoice, pertain to the Jordan. For it was said thus: in the river they shall pass on foot, there we shall rejoice.

Christ will rule over us.

In what respect as man, who as God always reigns.—As to the words in him, who this one is in whom we shall rejoice in him, the Prophet added, saying,

Who shall rule in his power forever.

We do not doubt who this one will be, if we recall this evangelical saying: All power has been given to me in heaven and on earth: go now and teach all nations; and the Apostle saying: Wherefore God also has exalted him, and has given him a name which is above every name; that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue should confess that the Lord Jesus is in the glory of God the Father. And these things were not said of the power of his divinity. For that power, as it always rules, so also will it always rule: but the nature of the flesh assumed from the Virgin is transferred into his eternal glory.

For Jesus is the name of that man who was born of Mary: and the name of Jesus, which is above every name, was given. For here, unlike in other places, it is not Jesus Christ, but Jesus alone. For to him, adored by those in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and confessed through every tongue to be in the glory of God the Father, the authority of the eternal kingdom is granted. But as in many other places, so here too our Latin has not expressed with sufficient precision the meaning of the Greek saying. For what is written among us: Who shall rule in his power forever, is read in the Greek texts thus: τῷ δεσπόζοντι ἐν δυναστείᾳ αὐτοῦ τοῦ αἰῶνος. What among us is in æternum; that is simple and common to all time without the property of any definition: but what among them is τοῦ αἰῶνος, that has the meaning of a definite and designated age.

When he will obtain that kingdom of his.—For the only-begotten Son of God, even if he always reigned, did not nevertheless always reign in a body.

Therefore where the dominion of a designated and as it were pointed-out age is contained, through what is said τοῦ αἰῶνος, by the force of the word itself; that time is shown in which both the name of God and the kingdom are given to the body glorified into the glory of God. And the Apostle teaches the time of this age of ruling absolutely, saying: When he shall have abolished all principality and power and virtue, the last enemy, death, shall be destroyed: then he alone will rule over the age in his power.

For now, although he reigns, yet the prince of this age sought to sift the apostles as wheat: and there are spiritual wickednesses in the heavenly places, against which the blessed Paul armed us with spiritual weapons, and the Angels of our faith, who according to the Gospels daily behold God the Father in heaven, accompany us as we fight against them, and the mercy of God protects us.

How God either turns away or turns toward his eyes.—And therefore it follows: His eyes look upon the nations.

For from everyone who remains in sins, the face of the Lord is turned away. For this is the signified unchangeable turning of God: not that he turns himself away or back in any direction as though through a bodily nature; but that, remaining always equal and the same in like manner, he is either absent from or present to the aid of each individual according to the diversity of their merits. For from the person of sinners it is thus written: Turn away your face from their sins: and again: Why do you turn away your face and your right hand; and again: You turned away your face, and I became troubled.

But where the person of the just is treated, these things are said: The eyes of the Lord are upon the just, and his ears are open to their prayers, and again: Let your eyes see equities; and further: The light of your countenance, O Lord, is signed upon us: therefore the incorporeal God, with the eyes of his mercy and as it were through the ministry of ministering angels, both protects the nations, and pours out upon all believers the gift of divine compassion.

The Jews who provoke God to wrath.—This the Jews deny; against these works of God the faithless people contends, arrogating to itself glory in Abraham as a chosen race. And the Prophet demonstrates this by the words that follow, connecting to what he had said—His eyes look upon the nations—this: Let those who provoke to wrath not be exalted in themselves. This self-exaltation the Lord condemns in the Gospels, saying: Do not begin to say among yourselves: We have Abraham as our father; for God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham. That they provoke to wrath, the prophets declare in every way: Isaiah: You have provoked to anger the Holy One of Israel: and to Ezekiel also the Spirit speaks: Son of man, I send you to the house of Israel, who have embittered me: and in the Psalms: They embittered his spirit; and again: I delivered them often, but they embittered me.

All therefore who deny the working and mercy of God for the salvation of the nations provoke to wrath the author of mercy and salvation

because, glorious and exalted in themselves, they embitter the wrath of him who alone can make men glorious.

Hitherto the speech is prophetic, now it is apostolic.—The interposition again of the diapsalm signals a change both of sense and of person.

For under this sign one or the other is frequently distinguished, and sometimes both. For the preceding speech was entirely from the person of the Prophet, saying: Come and see the works of God, how terrible in his counsels over the sons of men; but the following speech had to be apostolic: so that, with the former inviting and the latter proclaiming, the same teaching might contain the preaching of both the Old and the New Testament.

An exhortation to praise the true God.—The exhortation of these men is therefore addressed to the nations, when it is said,

Bless our God, O nations.

The Prophet did not add our without purpose. Not those whom you used to think gods—names of heroes, or creations of the elements, or the substance of metals—but our God, and him whose works are recounted, who is terrible in his counsels over the sons of men, who turned the sea into dry land, who rules in his power forever. For this is the proper work of apostolic teaching: to preach God from the law and the prophets in the Gospels.

God is to be praised publicly.—But what follows—And make the voice of his praise to be heard—confounds the understanding.

For the voice of praise is heard from him who praises, not from him who is praised. And how are the nations admonished to hearken to the voice of his praise? But here too our Latin rendering did not preserve the property of the expression in translation. For what is written among us—and make the voice of his praise to be heard—was expressed by the Greeks thus: καὶ ἀκουτίσατε τὴν φωνὴν τῆς αἰνέσεως αὐτοῦ. By this word it is signified that they should cause the voice of his praise to be able to be heard: which he will understand more fully who remembers that the Lord said in the Gospels: What I say to you in darkness, speak in the light, and what you hear in the ear, preach upon the housetops. For God must be praised with steadfast and public proclamation: nor ought our faith to tremble in recounting his mighty deeds.

On the constancy of the apostles and martyrs.—But what voice of his praise is finally to be made heard?

Namely this: that he placed the soul of believers in life, that he granted to apostolic preaching and to the confession of martyrs constancy and perseverance in confessing, by whose journeyings the preaching of the heavenly kingdom traversed the whole world as if on certain feet. For their sound went out into all the earth. And elsewhere the Holy Spirit proclaims the glory of the spiritual journey: How beautiful are the feet of those who preach good things, who preach peace! This voice of God's praise, therefore, is to be heard in the proclamation of those who preach, as the Prophet testifies,

Who placed my soul in life and did not allow my feet to be moved.

For the apostles were not turned aside from the course of their preaching by the terrors of human threats: nor was the firmness of their feet as they pressed forward moved from the step of faith, because they would always preach the Lord of judgment and of the eternal kingdom.

What applies to many is expressed of one on account of their unanimity.—The Spirit of prophecy, having spoken in the person of one, signifies that the matter itself does not pertain to one name alone. For having said: And did not allow my feet to be moved, he added,

For you have proved us, O God, you have tried us with fire, as silver is tried. The speech begun from one is thus referred to many. For there is one Spirit and one faith of believers; according to what is written in the Acts of the Apostles: The soul and heart of the believers was one. And so when what was begun from one is shown to extend to many, unanimity among many is taught. But what finally is the force of the comparison, that they were tried by fire as silver is tried?

And, as I think, the sole purpose of trying silver is that the dross which clung to it from the original earthly matter may be burned away, and that what was fraudulently mixed in from the nature of another metal may be purged. God therefore does not try those who believe in him as though ignorant of their faith: but because, even according to the Apostle, temptation brings proof, believers are tried not for the knowledge of God but for their own proving: so that, purified by fire and cleansed from the admixture of carnal vices, they may shine with the brightness of tested innocence.

The sufferings and victories of the martyrs.—Contemplating the kinds of temptations and the diverse victories of the martyrs, we know in what ways the soul is placed in life, by contempt of which, while the ingenuities of punishments rage, they are not moved from the step of faith and from testimony. For some glory in the chains of prisons, others rejoice when beaten with stripes, others submit the necks of their blessed heads to be cut off by the power of the irreligious: many run toward the erected pyres, and while the ministers of punishment tremble, they leap into the fire with a bound of devoted eagerness: others, about to be plunged into the deep, fall not into waters that will kill them but into the refreshment of eternal blessedness, offering their whole bodies to God as a sacrifice, as it were as holocausts.

David foresaw these things.—The prophetic speech therefore runs through these kinds of sufferings in the person of the apostles, evangelists, and martyrs, saying: You have tried us with fire, as silver is tried by fire.

You brought us into the snare, that is, into the chains of custody.

You laid tribulations upon our back, namely the punishments of stripes, in which Peter rejoices together with the apostles, and Paul exults.

You set men over our heads.

We passed through fire and water. He commemorates, that is, the glorious deaths of the martyrs: by sword, by fire, by the deep. But he who passes through fire and water is not destroyed in them, but is led through them into something else. And whither he is led the Prophet does not fail to know, saying: And you brought us out into refreshment. Of this refreshment he makes mention also in another place, saying: Return, my soul, to your rest, for the Lord has dealt bountifully with me.

He has delivered my soul from death, my eyes from tears, my feet from falling. I will please the Lord in the land of the living: exhorting his soul, that is, to the rest of that blessed resurrection, in which after the time of this death, all the stain of human calamities being wiped away, there is no sorrow, no weeping, no sinning, but only living. Into the refreshment of this blessedness, therefore, they were led through fire and water.

That water, fire, and refreshment are to be understood spiritually.—And lest the swimming of one passing through waters, or the leap of one jumping over fire, or the introduction into refreshment should be thought to signify the rest of some common and earthly place, he added,

I will enter your house with holocausts.

Holocausts are the whole bodies of victims: which, because they were entirely given over to the fire of sacrifice, are called holocausts. Through these kinds of punishments, therefore, the martyrs vowed their bodies as holocausts in testimony of faith: so that they might enter the house of God, that is, the habitation of the heavenly dwelling, their sacrifices as victims being consummated.

The martyrs vow both themselves and those who are to imitate them to God.—But what did they finally vow in this offering of their bodies? Namely, that through these examples of their martyrdom they might instruct the nations in the hope of the eternal kingdom. For those who then preached Christ were preaching not for themselves, to whom he was then known, but for us who were yet to come, or for those to whom he was then unknown. Their preaching kindled the faith of all posterity toward the desire of martyrdom. For they preached for no other reason than to instruct more martyrs by the example of their faith and martyrdom. This Paul taught, saying: I Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus for you Gentiles. And for this reason they confess that they render their vows to God in the fruit of this preaching, saying: I will render to you my vows,

15, which my lips have distinguished.

And my mouth has spoken in my tribulation.

I will offer to you fat holocausts with incense and rams, I will offer to you oxen with he-goats.

Does the Prophet not know that he has spoken in the Spirit from the person of God: I will not take calves from your house, nor he-goats from your flocks? And: Shall I eat the flesh of bulls, or drink the blood of he-goats? And again: For if you had desired sacrifice, I would indeed have given it; you will not delight in holocausts? Let the error of our opinion therefore cease, so that we think the martyrs vowed these things. But in the martyrdoms of those who come after, they render to God the vows they spoke, vowing themselves first to God and offering themselves as holocausts: because in these things they will enter the house of God, crying out in the tribulations of their sufferings with the voice of Paul: Who shall separate us from the love of God? Tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or hunger, or nakedness, or danger?

And: I am confident that neither death, nor life, nor things present, nor things to come, nor any other creature will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus. These therefore are first the vows of the blessed Martyrs in their tribulation, which they speak and pledge in their tribulations: and then, that from us they may complete fat holocausts. Fat, for this reason: because faith is the work of the soul and heart, and this matter belongs to the inner will. Rams also are offered with incense. But what incense is, we are taught thus in this same book of psalms: Let my prayer be as incense in your sight, signifying that in incense, prayers are to be understood.

But who are shown under the name of rams, the preceding psalm shows, when it says: The rams of the sheep are clothed: for in these, as in the leaders of the flocks, he signifies priests, whom the instruction of apostolic teaching, together with the fragrance of prayers—for we are, according to the Apostle, a good fragrance in Christ—accompanies toward zeal for martyrdom. Not only, however, are rams offered with incense, but oxen also are offered, that is, cattle of a stubborn nature are tamed for the worship of God, subdued to this martyrdom of Christ's name by apostolic teachings.

In what is said: I will offer to you oxen with he-goats, the Latin speech did not retain the force of the word changed from Hebrew into Greek. For what is among us, I will offer to you oxen with he-goats, is found in those others thus: ἀνοίσω σοι βόας μετὰ χειμάῤῥων. Χείμαῤῥοι among the Greeks is not a proper but a common name for he-goats, and especially for those born in the very season of winter. And Scripture in this place called them χειμάῤῥους only; but in other places it used τράγους, which we call he-goats. The translation of others, consonant and concordant with itself, confirms the sense of the spiritual understanding, those who rendered τράγους καιρίους in place of χειμάῤῥοις. Now τράγοι καίριοι signify those born from the very season; but χειμάῤῥοι, those whom winter begot: whence also the Greek language uses the same word for torrents, which winter has swelled from nothing into rivers.

Martyrs by example underwent martyrdom while ignorant of the faith.—Therefore when he says βόας μετὰ χιμάρων, the prophetic word shows that it is not speaking of cattle, but that in the oxen men present themselves as belonging to the Church, and in the χειμάῤῥοις, those whom the very storm of persecution brought forth in the glory of martyrdom. For we know that many who were ignorant of the divine sacraments ran to martyrdom by the example of martyrs: and having lived before outside the knowledge of the faith, they were taught by the act of the present faith, and attained that very glory of faith consummated in martyrdom. Such was he who confessed the Lord in the very moment of his own condemnation, saying: Remember me, Lord, when thou comest into thy kingdom: who presently received from the Lord this gift of martyrdom: Amen I say to thee, today thou shalt be with me in paradise.

Of this man, therefore, the instruction of apostolic doctrine offers like souls to God, souls born among men of long and fruitful cultivation, under the very storm of the raging winter. But when God says: To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices to me? I am full. I desire not holocausts of rams, and fat of fatlings, and blood of bulls and goats. Who hath required these things at your hands? It is superfluous to suppose that in oxen and goats, as it were, the perfect vows of the solemn feasts were pleasing.

Diapsalma. David recounts to the pious what has been granted to him and to God. The interposition of the diapsalma changes, as in the other cases, the person and the sense, yet without the order of the teaching being at variance. For after he had shown, in the person of the apostles, evangelists, martyrs, and prophets, in what ways his soul had been placed into life—that is, through the penalties and deaths of sufferings, through which it had passed into the place of blessedness, rendering vows to God in holocausts—after this discourse, then, which he had addressed entirely to God, he now addresses those whom he had instructed in the solemnities of the holocausts, saying,

Come and hear, and I will tell all you that fear God.

He calls not uncertain persons to uncertain things. For he teaches who they are whom he calls: All you that fear God; for the irreligious have no will either to approach or to hear.

Then he indicates what he is about to recount: How great things he hath done for my soul.

For he placed it into life, he brought it into refreshment, it shall enter the house of God in holocausts.

What he merited by the cry of mouth and heart.

But in order that these things might come to pass for his soul, he merited that they should come to pass through certain causes. And what causes he merited by, he declares,

To him I cried with my mouth.

He merited therefore the good things of the soul, because he cried to him with his mouth. But the cry of the mouth is often deceitful: and the sound of words does not always express the disposition of the mind. The sense, therefore, ought to follow the cry of the mouth: and it did follow. For the Prophet added: And I exalted under my tongue: not in the tongue, but under the tongue: that is, in the hidden places of the tongue, and in a certain inward utterance of silent will. Which same thing pleased the Lord in the Gospels when he said: Enter into thy chamber, and shut thy door, and pray: and thy Father who seeth in secret will repay thee.

Therefore now God, who was cried out to with the mouth, is exalted under the tongue.

He merited it on account of purity of heart. But he who exalts God under the tongue must worship him with all purity of heart: nor is it sufficient not to have done anything impious, if impiety is thought in the mind. But the Prophet taught that this thought of impiety must be absent from him who exalts God under the tongue, saying,

If I have regarded iniquity in my heart, let not God hear me.

Therefore God hath heard me, and hath attended to the voice of my prayer. He not only did not commit iniquity in deed, but did not even regard it in his heart. Or certainly he did not regard iniquity in his heart, beholding, that is, no vice of his own iniquitous will in his heart: and on that account he was worthy to be heard.

For his soul was placed into life, and his feet were not moved, and he was brought into refreshment, and he shall enter the house of God, and he paid to God the vows which he had distinguished with his lips. Supported by the confession of honour and glory, he says,

Blessed be God, who hath not turned away my prayer, nor his mercy from me, confessing at the end the praise of God begun at the opening of the psalm, to whom is glory for ever and ever. Amen.

Unto the end, a hymn, a psalm of a canticle of David.

May God have mercy on us, and bless us: may he cause the light of his countenance to shine upon us, and may he have mercy on us. DIAPSALMA. That we may know thy way upon earth, thy salvation in all nations. Let the peoples praise thee, O God, let all the peoples praise thee. Let the nations be glad and exult: for thou judgest the peoples with equity, and directest the nations upon earth. DIAPSALMA. Let the peoples praise thee, O God, let all the peoples praise thee: the earth hath yielded her fruit. May our God bless us, may God bless us, and may all the ends of the earth fear him.

Who speak in this psalm.—

The psalm is brief, and complete in its evangelical proclamation.

For it is both unto the end, and a psalm of a canticle: whereby confession through knowledge of things to be done, and deeds advancing through teaching are sung. And its beginning has been taken from where it ought to have been taken. Now all the discourse in it belongs either to the prophets or to the apostles: of whom some taught that the only-begotten God was to come in the body, others that he had come, illuminated by the Holy Spirit and filled with the honour of heavenly glory. The prayer of these, therefore, is to be recognized as being at the opening of the psalm.

The remission of sins is gratuitous.—

May God have mercy on us, and bless us; may he cause the light of his countenance to shine upon us, and may he have mercy on us.

According to the order of the teaching, the mercy of God is sought first. For out of the abundance of his goodness he bestows mercy in the remission of sins: and the remission of sins is not the merit of uprightness, but the will of spontaneous indulgence, a gift of compassion overflowing from the riches of goodness. Therefore he who is merciful is prayed to that he may bless. And the fruit of blessing we have already come to know at the beginning of man's formation, when such a word was spoken to Adam, still ignorant of sin: Increase and multiply, and fill the earth, and have dominion over it. These words, although many consider them to have been spoken only in a bodily sense, have nevertheless offered more of their power to those instructed in spiritual teaching.

For this blessing was not bestowed upon Adam merely for the bodily succession of his offspring. For although his descendants were to be fruitful, they could not fill the earth: which, though it is inhabited in proportion to the number of men, is nevertheless not filled. But he willed that the earth of our body should be filled with spiritual teachings, and that the knowledge of God should multiply and grow. For through Adam and in Adam himself, who had been the first work of God, the knowledge of God ought to have begun: but since he was defiled by sins, the Prophets and Apostles pray for themselves the fruit of that blessing. Which the blessed Apostle having attained, thus glories concerning himself: Blessed be God, who hath blessed us with every spiritual blessing in heavenly places in Christ. These therefore grow, multiply, are filled, who are heavenly in Christ: and they are blessed, who are blessed with spiritual blessing in heavenly places. And let us see whether the prayer of the present psalm entreats the fruit of this blessing.

Our light is the gift of God.—For after mercy and blessing this follows: May he cause the light of his countenance to shine upon us, and may he have mercy on us. The blessing of God is needed, that his countenance may illuminate us, that he may irradiate our darkened hearts with the light of his knowledge, that the Spirit of his majesty may bestow light upon the obscured senses of our understanding; and that we may thereafter be permitted to glory, saying: The light of thy countenance, O Lord, is signed upon us. Now this illumination of his countenance upon us is bestowed by his mercy, which has begun in us in the remission of sin. And to what end they pray for the illumination of God's countenance upon themselves, the following discourse teaches.

Knowledge of the way of God is prayed for among the Gentiles.—Diapsalma.

That we may know thy way upon earth, thy salvation in all nations.

The interposition of the diapsalma, even if it has not brought a change of person, has nevertheless changed the sense. For now the discourse is addressed to him who until now had been the object of the vows. Now what is written in the Latin books thus: That we may know thy way upon earth, is in the Greek thus: τοῦ γνῶναι ἐν τῇ γῇ τὴν ὁδόν σου. Between γνῶναι and cognoscamus, the difference is this: that γνῶναι is without definition of person; but cognoscamus shows those very persons who are speaking these words. Therefore according to that true rendering of the Greek, they pray to be illuminated by the face of God for this purpose, that the way of God may be made known upon earth, which is the teaching of the religious life. For through it one proceeds to God.

Now the teaching of the religious way is Christ, whom he showed himself to be in the Gospels, saying: I am the truth, the way, and the life; and again: No man cometh to the Father but by me. And that he is the way, that very connected discourse of the psalm itself attests. Which way is to be made known and rendered known upon earth, that is, either to those born of earth, or to those inhabiting the earth. That Jesus is called salvation, the very word of the property itself declares. For what among us is salutare, that among the Hebrews is Jesus. And this the Angel confirms, speaking to Joseph concerning Mary: She shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name Jesus: for he shall save his people from their sins. Jesus therefore the angel showed was to be so named because he was to be salvation to the people.

They show themselves therefore unequal to so great a proclamation unless they are illuminated: unless they shine with a certain splendour of the countenance of the Lord. For they too, according to the Gospel, are the light of the world (but the Lord himself is the true light), illuminated by the light, so that the apostles and prophets might be light. Otherwise it would be superfluous to wish to be illuminated in order to know those things about which they were preaching as if already known.

Whence the joy of the Gentiles.—Now all this prophetic and apostolic teaching must necessarily be followed by the confession of the peoples, and the joy of those whose sins have been remitted. And not only of those whose sins have been remitted: but because they know that he who remitted sins will be the judge of equity to come, and that through him all nations inhabiting the earth are directed into the way of life, instructed in the knowledge of God after abandoning the error of idols. Therefore these things follow,

Let all the peoples praise thee.

Let the nations be glad and exult; because thou wilt judge the peoples in equity, and wilt direct the nations upon earth. When the peoples praise, those seem to be designated from the twelve tribes who believe or shall believe. When all the peoples praise, no exception is made of the nations.

When the nations are glad and exult

because he will judge the peoples in equity and will direct the nations into the land, the cause of joy is proclaimed from the hope of eternal judgment and of the nations directed into the way of life.

Twofold confession.—The interposition of the diapsalma seems here to have introduced nothing new, especially since the sense has been repeated in the same words,

Let the peoples praise thee, O God, let all the peoples praise thee. But when there is added,

The earth hath yielded her fruit, it is understood that the repetition of the same words was not made for nothing; if at least we ought to understand that the same thing is signified under the same words. For we find that confession is to be treated under a twofold meaning: one confession of sins, where in the desert of the Jordan they were confessing their sins: another of praise of God, where the Lord speaks to the Father, I confess to thee, O Lord, Father of heaven and earth, because thou hast hidden these things from the wise, and hast revealed them to little ones.

That first and earlier confession, therefore, is to be believed to be one of sins, especially that which is connected with the prophetic and apostolic preaching: this following one is to be understood as a confession of praise of God by the peoples, then of all, that is, of all the nations; and for this reason, because the earth hath yielded her fruit.

The fruit of the earth, lost through the first Adam, restored through the second.—But it must be asked what fruit the earth has given, on account of which all peoples praise God. The cause of praise owed to God is indeed eternal, that the earth supplies these bodily fruits necessary to us: but they are not of the earth. For either they belong to us to whom they are provided, or they belong to God through whom they are ministered. Let us therefore seek what fruits the earth both had and lost. Moreover, through what it lost, we shall show that it had them. We recall that the earth of Adam, after his sin, was stripped of the honor of the blessings given to it. For to him it was said: Because you are earth, and into earth you shall go.

Therefore, because he is earth, he is condemned after his sin with this curse: Cursed is the earth in your works, in sorrow you shall eat of it all the days of your life, it shall bring forth thorns and thistles for you. The element of earth was outside the crime: therefore it lacks the curse, because it also lacked the crime. But here the earth of Adam, which was criminal through the enticement of food, is cursed. This earth, then, is consumed by him in all the sorrows of the present life, and is eaten up in all the pains of afflictions, pierced by the thorns and thistles of vices and the stings of desires. Therefore everyone who is like the earthly Adam renders these cursed fruits of his earth. But he who is now conformed to the heavenly Adam has the innocent fruit of his earth, first rich in the knowledge of God, then glorious in the works of chastity, justice, and mercy, the old man with his vices and concupiscences having been put off.

For this reason, therefore, confession is to be rendered to God, that the earth has given its fruit. Its own: because Adam, when he had it, had lost it. It gave therefore what is its own, that is, the fruit which belongs to it also in the knowledge of God, it displayed first in that very Lord of ours, who assumed an earthly body, sinning in nothing.

The God of the Patriarchs now ours as it were by inheritance.—For the purpose of demonstrating and teaching these things, again the gift of God's blessing is prayed for, when it is said:

he himself, it says, will guide the nations into the earth.

Let God bless us.

And lest the blessing should be thought to be hoped for from an uncertain and unknown God, it was added: our God: namely, of the patriarchs and prophets, and now proper to the apostles themselves as it were by the inheritance of succession: in whom the earth gave its fruit, of continence and faith and justice and mercy, and indeed even among them the torments and deaths of the most savage persecutions, now itself devoted to martyrdom of the divine name.

What the fear of God ought to be.—Then the prayer for blessing is repeated, when it is said: Let God bless us.

These petitions are not repeated without reason: but so that through the blessing of God, with doctrine increasing, all the ends of the earth may fear God. For he says: And let all the ends of the earth fear him. Let all the ends of the earth therefore fear God, but our God, but God who blesses. Fear is not a small duty of faith. For it is numbered among the chief gifts of spiritual graces, when it is said through Isaiah: And the spirit of the fear of God filled him. And through Solomon: The beginning of wisdom is the fear of the Lord. Blessed is he to whom it has fallen to fear not from the trembling of human nature, but from the knowledge of reason. For he who fears from weakness in fearful circumstances, in prosperous circumstances again grows insolent from the fault of his nature.

But he who fears from knowledge always fears, and dreads prosperity no less than adversity.

Wisdom therefore takes its origin from fear, by pursuing useful and praiseworthy things, which are the proper and peculiar works of wisdom. The Prophet therefore wishes this fear of God for all the ends of the earth, so that no nation dwelling on earth may be outside his fear, the Apostle unfolding the sum of that very wish, when he says: and every tongue shall confess that the Lord Jesus is in the glory of God the Father, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

Let God arise, and let his enemies be scattered: and let those who hate him flee from his face.

As smoke fails, let them fail; as wax melts before the face of fire, so let sinners perish before the face of God. And let the just rejoice with joy: let them exult in the sight of God, let them feast in gladness. Sing to God, sing psalms to his name, make a way for him who ascends above the west; the Lord is his name; and exult in his sight. They shall be troubled before his face, the father of orphans and the judge of widows. God in his holy place: God makes those of one mind to dwell in a house. The bound in strength, likewise those who provoke, who dwell in tombs. O God, when you went forth before your people, when you passed through the desert, the earth was moved. Even the heavens dropped before the face of God, mount Sinai before the face of the God of Israel.

A willing rain you will set apart, O God, for your inheritance: and it was weakened, but you perfected it.

Your creatures shall dwell in it: you have prepared in your sweetness for the poor, O God. The Lord God will give the word to those who preach the gospel with great power: the king of powers of the beloved: and for the beauty of the house to divide the spoils. If you sleep among the midst of the lots, the wings of the dove covered with silver: and the hinder parts of her back in the greenness of gold. God distinguishes the kings of heaven over it, they shall be made white as snow in Selmon: the mountain of God, a fat mountain, a curdled mountain, a rich mountain: why do you look with envy at the curdled mountains? The mountain in which it has pleased God to dwell: for the Lord shall dwell in it even to the end.

The chariot of God is attended by ten thousands, thousands of rejoicing ones: the Lord is among them in Sinai in the Holy place, he ascended on high, he led captivity captive, he gave gifts to men. For even those who do not believe that the Lord God dwells. Blessed be the Lord God from day to day, the God of our salvation will make our journey prosperous. Our God is the God of saving: and of the Lord the Lord are the issues of death. But he shall crush the heads of his enemies: the crown of the hair of those who walk in their sins. The Lord said: I will return from Basan, I will return into the depth of the sea: that your foot may be dipped in blood: the tongue of your dogs from the enemies, from him. Your ways have been seen, O God, the ways of my God, of the king who is in the holy place.

The princes went before joined with those singing psalms: in the midst of young damsels playing on timbrels.

In the churches bless the Lord God from the fountains of Israel. There is Benjamin the younger in ecstasy, the princes of Judah their leaders, the princes of Zabulon, the princes of Nephtalim. Command, O God, your strength. Confirm, O God, what you have wrought in us. From your temple in Jerusalem, kings shall offer gifts to you. Rebuke the wild beasts of the wood, the assembly of bulls among the cows of the peoples, so that those who have been tried with silver may be excluded. Scatter the nations that desire wars. Ambassadors shall come out of Egypt, Ethiopia shall prevent her hands unto God. Kingdoms of the earth, sing to the Lord and sing psalms to the Lord. Sing psalms to our God, who ascends above the heaven of heavens to the East. Behold he will give to his voice the voice of power: give glory to God. Above Israel is his magnificence, and his power is in the clouds.

God is wonderful in his saints, the God of Israel himself will give power and strength to his people: blessed be God.

This whole psalm is woven together from the mysteries of the old and new law.—

The psalm is inscribed not by David, but to that David unto the end.

Then it is not a Canticle of a psalm, but a Psalm of a canticle: so that in it the utterance of prophetic knowledge and understanding might be taught. Moreover, the psalm itself is entirely woven together with the mysteries of the Law and the Gospels, and is filled with a great interpretation of allegorical sayings drawn both from past and future things: which both contains broadly within itself the teaching of the law, and brings knowledge of the flesh assumed by the Lord, and reproaches the impiety of the former people, and announces the faith of our future knowledge, and embraces the ascension of the Lord above the heavens, and comprehends the glory of his future kingdom. The Prophet took his beginning from that point in which the effect of our salvation consists. For he began thus.

The resurrection of Christ is desired, and through it the flight of demons.

Let God arise, and let his enemies be scattered, and let those who hate him flee from his face.

This is a word of wishes, not of one asking from uncertainty, but of one hoping from knowledge and understanding: for the time of resurrection is now desired in God: when, condemning sin in the flesh through sin, he made a show of the powers of this world, having triumphed over them openly in himself. For he came to conquer the world, and to nail down the prince of the world together with the law of sin, and to blot out the decree of death by the remission of sin. The Prophet therefore awaits this flight of his enemies.

For this crowd of those who hate him together with the demons could not endure his encounter as he rose from the dead, since at the first exercise of apostolic faith, after the spiritual powers of wickedness had been subjected to them, it was proclaimed that Satan had fallen from heaven like lightning, and the prince of this world was judged in the passion. But those who flee from the face of God, while they flee, show their trembling; yet they cannot escape the face of God, however much they flee. For the trembling of those same spiritual wickednesses is also declared in the preceding psalm, where it says: He sent out his arrows, and scattered them; and he multiplied lightnings, and troubled them. They are troubled therefore, and flee scattered. But they do not escape the power of God's countenance, according to that: Smoke ascended in his wrath, and fire shall blaze from his face, coals were kindled by him. And so this punishment of destruction and judgment follows upon the flight of these enemies.

And indeed the same prophetic order is now distinguished here as in the preceding psalm. For it follows,

As smoke fails, let them fail; as wax melts before the face of fire, so let sinners perish before the face of God.

When smoke has risen, although it is dense and thick, yet it gradually fails and is abolished so as not to remain; just as wax before the face of fire melts away so as not to exist: smoke indeed dissolving in fire through its own lightness and thinness, but wax consumed by the force and heat of fire; because being weak in itself, it is seized by the burning of a stronger nature: in which manner all the power of the wicked melts away before the face of God, that is, by the judgment of God.

What the joy of the just is like.—And this destruction of sinners before the face of God must necessarily be followed by the joy of the just. For immediately thereafter it is added,

let the just rejoice with joy.

For it is the equal and just moderation of heavenly judgment, both to destroy sinners with death, and likewise to reward the just with joy. And this same thing was added to display the scrutiny of judgment: Let them exult in the sight of God, let them feast in gladness. For those who are pure in heart, according to the merits of the evangelical blessing, are worthy of the sight of God. But to rejoice in joy is of a higher significance, namely showing the cause of perfect joy. For many rejoice in things that will be harmful to them: as the wanton man rejoices in harlots, as the thief rejoices in thefts, as each person is delighted by the things he practices according to his own vices.

But he who rejoices in joy receives the cause of his joy from the honorable and useful truth of joy itself.

And therefore he says: Let them rejoice in joy, because they shall exult in the sight of God: and he teaches that the joy of exultation is that which is made perfect by the delight of beholding God. Moreover, holy Moses in that divine canticle of Deuteronomy makes mention of the joys of this exultation and of those feasting, from which comes the joy of the just, saying thus: Rejoice, O heavens, together with him, and let all the angels of God adore him. Rejoice, O nations, with his people, and let all the sons of God strengthen them. In this joy therefore the just also shall rejoice, unanimous in heavenly gladness, rejoicing in the fellowship of divine exultation.

An exhortation is more effective if the reason for acting is not passed over in silence.—To the rejoicing of which time the Prophet now calls us under the confession of evangelical faith, saying,

Sing to God, sing psalms to his name, make a way for him who ascends above the west.

The Lord is his name: and exult in his sight. Every exhortation, although it greatly advances a certain impulse both of our will and of our mind, when we are led to desire and do something by a concurring or enticing occasion: yet if the cause of the exhortation itself is set forth to the greatest degree, the mind now leans upon reason and a path as upon a most certain guide.

As now the Prophet, having exhorted us to sing to God and to sing psalms to his name, lest he should leave any ambiguity, showed both to what God and to whose name psalms were to be sung: so that now not an exhortation applied, but a knowledge received, might place us in the exultation and song of God.

The reason why we must sing to the Lord: his victory over death.—We must therefore sing to him, and prepare his way, who ascended above the west.

By the west, all things that come into life are understood to be abolished. The abolition of all things that set, according to common human opinion, is reckoned to be in death. To him therefore we must sing, and his way must be prepared by us, who ascended above the west of death, that is, who passed beyond every setting, not being held by the setting itself. Now his name is Lord, who, emptying himself from the form of God and taking the form of a servant, made himself obedient even unto the death of the cross.

On account of which God exalted him, and granted him a name above every name, that at his name the knees of heavenly, earthly, and infernal beings should bow: and every tongue should confess the Lord Jesus in the glory of God the Father. He ascended therefore above the west, whose name is Lord: and passing beyond that whereby all things set, he went forth from the dead as the eternal one, beyond the law of death. To him therefore a way must be prepared, according to that saying: Prepare the ways of the Lord, make his paths straight. Every valley shall be filled, and every hill shall be brought low. When our way is prepared, that is, when either the swellings of our vices and unbelief are pressed down, or the lowliness of earthly defilement is raised up, he will descend into our hearts to walk with us along the straight paths of righteousness and life.

In the sight of him therefore we shall rejoice, for whom a way must be prepared with the swellings of insolence leveled and the abysses of lusts filled, and in whom we shall behold ourselves rising from the dead. For he ascended above the west of our death, who sought life for us from the dead in his own resurrection. This is that joy of the apostles, when after the resurrection they saw him as they gazed upon him and handled him.

The twofold meaning of orphans and widows: God is father of the former, judge of the latter.—But this joy of the saints is followed by the trembling of those whom he conquered together with the world: for he says,

They shall be troubled at his face, the father of orphans and judge of widows.

He also taught the cause of this trembling, namely that he is the father of orphans and judge of widows (for they shall flee from the face of the father of orphans and judge of widows), not leaving as orphans those who, acknowledging a father in heaven, have renounced the devil as father, and judging those widows who, dead to the law, have followed the bridegroom. For the blessed Paul taught that a widow who is free from the law may pass to marriage with another without the charge of adultery: and he applied this whole example to the Church, which, dead to the law, would thereafter be joined to Christ.

There is also a most fitting meaning according to the condition of this age, so that God, who gave us another advocate from the Father lest we be orphans in the world, is the father of the bereaved and judge of widows: because he both has compassion on the desolate childhood of those bereft of parents, and is judge of widows who have rested their hope in him. He is called judge, moreover, because under the name of widows many are not truly widows, who either in their wantonness wish to marry in Christ, or deceive human judgments: and because the dignity of the name consists in the preserved purpose of the will; God, who searches hearts and reins, is therefore judge, because he alone discerns their mind and intention. And indeed these things, as I said, are spoken of orphans and widows according to the desolation of the human condition.

The time of grace, by which God leads out the bound who provoked him, those dwelling in tombs.—But that these things may be understood to have been signified so as to point to the whole Church, he immediately added: God in his holy place,

God makes those of one manner to dwell in a house, leading out the bound in strength, likewise those who provoked him, who dwell in tombs.

This therefore is the holy place for God, where there is a widow from the law, where there is an orphan from the world, where there is a peaceful and unanimous assembly of one manner and will (for according to the Acts of the Apostles the multitude of believers was of one soul and one heart), where those who are bound are led out in strength.

For having first bound the strong man within his own house, he loosed those who were bound by their sins: as he led out in the freedom of a word of power the daughter of Abraham who had been bound for seventeen and ten years. He also led out those who had previously provoked him, that is, those who by transgression of the law stirred up the wrath of God the judge against themselves, or who argued against his name in gentile speech, and instructed them in the knowledge of divine teaching: as he appointed Paul, from being a persecutor, to be the apostle and teacher of the gentiles. These provokers, therefore, who had previously dwelt in tombs, that is, buried within the dead habitations of their own bodies, he led into heavenly and spiritual life. For many among the living are dead.

For even in the Gospels those not thought to be dead are taught to differ not at all from the dead, the Lord saying: Let the dead bury their own dead: and the Apostle knows that certain women who are dead live, that is, that while they live they are already dead. But all these the Lord led out from their tombs, who are regenerated as sons of God.

God is the same in the Law and in the Gospel.—But this God who, ascending above the west in us through the power of the resurrection, has wrought these things, is the same who accomplished all things foreshadowed in the law in preparation for this our hope: so that no other God of the prophets and another God of the Gospels can be understood. And therefore he fulfilled these things toward us also with the same mighty acts by which he led the people out of Egypt. For our fathers also were under the cloud and were baptized into Moses in the sea, and were satisfied with manna falling from heaven in the likeness of heavenly bread, and were given drink with Christ providing water from the rock: which things, wrought among them for their salvation, also bore within themselves the figure of our salvation, as the following word of prophecy declares, saying,

O God, when you went forth before your people, when you passed through the desert, the earth was moved.

For the heavens dropped at the face of God, even Sinai at the face of God, the God of Israel. We know that God went before his people on their journey as they passed through the desert, in a pillar of cloud and fire, and that manna dropped from heaven until the people went astray. But since he had recalled all the things above that are proper and fitting to the Church, namely when the Lord ascended above the west, when he is the father of orphans and judge of widows, when in his holy place, that is, in the house, he gathers those of one manner, and leads out the bound in strength and the provokers from their tombs: yet he is recalled to have accomplished these things going forth before the people and passing into the desert, so that now from the past it is recounted that the earth was moved, the heavens dropped, and this was brought about at the face of the God of Israel in Sinai.

This is so that, since he accomplished those things which belong to the Law, he might be known to have prefigured in them also those things which belong to the Gospels. For going forth before his people he passed through into the desert: into that desert of the Jordan, namely, in which lilies have flowered, in which the fountain of living water has irrigated the desolate and arid places. For the portion of Jacob's inheritance was formerly a desert, and the desolate nations were subject to the power of the elements. But now, while he who was the people of God looks on, God has passed over to those things that were formerly desolate; and the deserts of the regions, now watered by him, grow fertile. And this same one is he who gave manna from heaven to the people.

For if the law was ordained through angels, and man ate the bread of angels, and the heavens are written to have dropped at Sinai; it is certainly beyond doubt that this ministry was fulfilled from heaven, that is, by angels. And the same bestower of that bread which is from heaven is he who had granted the manna at Sinai.

The foreknowledge and predestination of God.—But God, passing over to the desert

that is, transcending the once arid and desolate hearts of the gentiles, set apart that blessed rain of good will. For he himself set apart Paul from his mother's womb as an apostle: because those whom he foreknew, he also predestined. This rain also of speech and preaching, Solomon announced in the psalm to the earth for the security of hope, saying: And he shall come down like rain upon a fleece, and like drops of rain falling upon the earth.

And we recall that certain clouds were commanded not to rain upon the vineyard.

The holy Moses also, who under the veil of common words concealed the mighty sacraments of heavenly hope, sang that his words should be received as rain and shower, a rain watering the deserts and arid places and the heritage of God prepared. And therefore it follows,

A voluntary rain you shall set apart, O God, for your inheritance: and it was weakened, but you have perfected it.

Your creatures shall dwell in it; you have prepared in your sweetness for the poor. For God, foreseeing wills, set apart the voluntary rain by foreknowing it. Which was weakened, when Paul had the sentence of death in himself, when Peter was moved by the scandal of the cross, when he denies him three times though warned not to deny, when the Apostles fear, flee, and lose confidence. But because in these there was the affection of good will, they were so perfected as to become the foundations and pillars of churches.

This rain therefore is set apart for the inheritance of God.

What the inheritance of God is.—What the inheritance is, is not obscure: namely that which was given to one who asks, when it is said: Ask of me, and I will give you the nations as your inheritance. The nations therefore, not understanding after the manner of living creatures and cattle (and therefore, since God has no care for cattle, that inheritance set apart in this voluntary rain is shown to dwell in it. For it follows: Your creatures shall dwell in it, you have prepared in your sweetness for the poor. The creatures shall dwell therefore either in the inheritance of God or in the voluntary rain: and this inheritance or rain is prepared in sweetness for the poor. For the words of God are sweet to the throats of the saints, and blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. But though they were creatures, they were made spiritual. All these things therefore are set apart for the use of the inheritance, or for the ministry of the voluntary rain.

The many powers of the one Christ's apostles.—And that it might be understood that, according to the sweetness prepared for the poor, either the gathering of the Church, which is the inheritance of God, or the word of apostolic preaching was signified; he added,

The Lord God shall give a word to those who preach the gospel with many powers: the king of the powers of the beloved, and for the beauty of the house to divide the spoils.

To the rain set apart for watering the Gospel, the Lord shall give the very word, spreading it into our understanding and mouths; according to that saying: For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you.

But the many powers who preach the gospel are those to whom he will give the word, so that there may be power in Paul, power in Peter, and power in John, and power in the rest, and thereby he signifies that there are many powers for preaching the Gospel, to whom, though God and Lord and King shall give the word, yet these powers are of the beloved, that is, of him who is beloved by the King and Lord and God. The Latin translation sets this forth more laboriously and obscurely, since it does not alter the arrangement of the words: but the whole of this is expressed more completely by the speech rendered from the Greek, namely that this God and Lord is king of those powers which belong to the beloved: so that the powers are referred to the Apostles, but the beloved is referred to Christ, whose powers either in these or all of these are understood to be.

It was necessary, moreover, on account of what follows, that mention should be made of numerous powers, even though in all of them there was one and the same Spirit: because for the beauty of the house he himself would divide the spoils of power. For the spoils of the nations, stripped from the devil for the adornment of the Church, are divided, and from these spoils also the beauty of the house is perfected, when they are drawn away from the altars and temples of demons to serve as priests of God for the sanctification of ministry, and, watered by the Holy Spirit, having become those who preach the gospel, are made the powers of the beloved.

Here those adorned with the gifts of the Holy Spirit are afterwards to be graced with immortal glory.—For to these same virtues which either divide the spoils for the beauty of the house, or are themselves the spoils, the divine word referred itself, saying,

If ye sleep among the midst of the lots, the wings of a dove covered with silver, and the hinder parts of her back with beauty.

Remaining. He discerns. In the greenness of gold. These are the vows of the Prophet, by which he desires that these spoils divided for the beauty of the house should remain among the midst of the lots: that even unto the day of their consummation (since death is wont to be signified in sleep) they may persevere in the beauty of the house. These indeed are for the use of preaching, as the silver-covered wings of a dove, that is, precious through the gift and adornment of the Holy Spirit.

But in those things which come after them, they shall stand in the greenness of gold: so that to these, after the preaching of the Gospel, royal honour and unwearied eternity from the fruit of their conscience may be rendered in the greenness of gold: since gold refers to honour, and by greenness eternal vigour is shown. The hinder parts of the back, therefore, which the Greek word more precisely signifies as the space between the shoulders, τὰ μετάφρενα, that is, those things which are posterior in time to good conscience and honour, are to be honoured beyond the honour of this preaching: while meanwhile the silver-covered wings, remaining under the gift of the Holy Spirit, shall afterwards also attain to the greenness of gold from the fruit of their conscience, that is, the flower of perpetual honour.

Kings are with Christ: peace and brightness befit them.—But that these spoils divided for the beauty of the house, for which it was desired that they should sleep among the midst of the lots

that is, that such persons should be consummated by death, may be understood as referring to the princes of the churches, through whom the beauty of the house consists, he immediately added,

While the heavenly one discerns kings over her, they shall be made white as snow in Selmon; the mountain of God, a fat mountain, a consecrated mountain, a rich mountain.

While therefore the heavenly one discerns these kings over her, that is, while the Lord descending from heaven constitutes those who shall have been the spoils as kings, and appoints each one over that house which is most beautiful through them; in Selmon they shall be made white as snow, namely in peace, because Selmon is interpreted as peace, they shall receive the glory of eternity.

For this mountain of God, in which the peace of God is signified by the power of his very name, is both fat and consecrated and rich. Moreover that they are kings is not obscure, of whom it is said: Already ye reign without us, and would that ye did reign, that we also might reign together with you. The heavenly Lord therefore (for as the heavenly one is, so also are the heavenly) shall set these as kings in Selmon. Regnastis, our manuscript consistently has, wherever it presents this passage of Paul. Kings over his house, through whom it shall be adorned by the division of the spoils, exalted, shall appoint as kings in the snow. For his place was made in peace and Phoenicia, according to Isaiah, shall be made white as snow. But kings, in whose keeping the beauty of the house resides, must needs be granted something beyond the whiteness of snow.

For they are the light of the world: and whosoever shall be worthy to ascend with the Lord the mountain of the heavenly kingdom, shall be made whiter than snow: because when he showed himself to the apostles in the form in which he was to reign together with the saints, his garments were seen to be white above snow. This mountain, therefore, and this kingdom belongs to the God of peace.

Heretics feign peace.—But there are many who feign the peace of the Church under the fellowship of heretics, dissolving the connected and joined reason of the New and Old Testament: while many fashion one God of the Gospels and another God of the Law. Some indeed, coming against the nature and name of the only-begotten God, confess that he was born in time as a mere man: and they fabricate that he was not led from the form of God into the form of a servant, but that he began to exist only from the form of a servant. Many moreover argue that he does not subsist as God of true divinity, nor from the property of the paternal majesty and nature: but of a substance external and diverse from God, which was chosen for adoption as a son, and came into being after the manner of creatures from nothing, which have no prior origin.

Many also speak of the Father as a body extended and prolonged from himself: so that that assumption of flesh from the Virgin received the name of son, not that he who was previously the Son of God was himself born as the Son of man in a body. And indeed all these things are adapted to the appearance of human wisdom, after they have failed to comprehend the reason of heavenly wisdom: to which, as I hope, a fuller and more copious answer has been given in other places.

Heresy is like cheese.—Since therefore the one seat of true faith is this which is pleasing to God, and this one mountain of the eternal kingdom is in peace; the Prophet rebukes us for having received many others, saying,

Why have ye received curdled mountains?

(Ἔρη τετυρωμένα.) When milk is corrupted, it thickens, and from its fault grows dense into the appearance of curd and cheese. For a single word of weight encompasses both. Therefore just as milk itself degenerates from its own nature when corruption sets in, and coalesces through a certain corruption of itself: so these kinds of doctrines, which draw the beginnings of knowledge from harmless and sincere milk, are corrupted into faults, and become by their own corruption curdled or cheesed so as not to be milk.

This same thing he recalls in another place thus: Their heart was curdled like milk: but I have meditated on thy law: because the heart infected by the counsels and deeds of impiety, when through the simplicity of infancy it had possessed the nature of milk, afterwards degenerating through the corruption of vices, was thickened and congealed into a curd. Both sense and zeal must therefore be turned away from all these things: and no other mountain is to be inhabited more than this mountain of peace. For after the reproach of the curdled and coagulated mountains, he immediately added: The mountain in which it hath pleased God to dwell: for therein shall the Lord dwell unto the end: showing that the seat of eternal habitation is pleasing to God in that mountain, which was chosen as the seat of peace.

The giver of the old and new law is one, the faith is one.—But

because after the times of the law, and the prescriptions of circumcision, and the precepts of sacrifices, through the faith of evangelical confession, a certain change of the peace of God seems to those who glory in the law, that is, to carnal Israel, to have been made by us, and the confession of a knowledge other than that prescribed in the law to have been introduced; since we teach that all things whatsoever were commanded by the law were foreshadowed in evangelical hope through the Lord Jesus Christ, while they on the contrary boast that God the Father spoke with them and gave the law: it must be answered that by this very prophecy of the psalm the law was rather disposed through angels by the hand of the Mediator, and that nothing has been changed by us, but that we abide in those things which alone are, that is, we inhabit the one and the same seat of the peace of God:

since we have the same Lord Jesus Christ as the preacher of the Gospel whom we also have as the giver of the law.

For after the seat of the one mountain pleasing to God, which the heavenly one shall inhabit unto the end, in order that this seat of evangelical peace might be understood in the law as prefigured through the Mediator of the law; he immediately added,

The chariot of God is ten-thousandfold manifold, thousands of the rejoicing: the Lord among them in Sina in the holy place ascended on high, he took captivity captive, he gave gifts among men, yea even those not believing to dwell.

The sum of all faith, the glory of God's seat, Christ the giver of the law.—These brief words signify the whole of faith, yet words which have embraced great and infinite things by their powers. Moreover this dignity of the chariot or seat of God, Daniel the prophet described not dissimilarly, saying: His seat was a flame of burning fire, a great river of wheels drew before him: thousands of thousands served him, and ten thousands of ten thousands stood before him. And in these things indeed, whether under the appearance of such adornment, or under the example of signification, the opinion and sense of heavenly escort is brought to us in the chariot: so that under the harmonious yoke of thousands of the rejoicing we may understand the heavenly service. And this those burning torches in Sina, and the shining fires, and the deepening thunders, and the terror of the whole coming of the Lord showed, namely that the ministries of angels, disposing the law by the hand of the Mediator, were present.

This chariot of God therefore is ten-thousandfold manifold, and there are thousands of the rejoicing. And because the Mediator of God and men is the Lord, in whose hand the law was borne through angels, as has been said; the following word added: The Lord among them in Sina, among those rejoicing thousands, that is: and the manifold number of the chariot of ten thousands, that is, the understanding of infinite things subjected under the multiplication of ten thousands. In these therefore God is in Sina.

The Gospels are supplements of the Law.—But lest perchance the Gospels should seem in some measure not to be supplements of the Law, he who is Lord among them in Sina, here again in the holy place ascended on high, and took captivity captive, namely in that holy place, whose form he received when emptied from the form of God. That he is holy, both many prophecies and the angel Gabriel testify to Mary, saying: And that which shall be born of thee holy, shall be called the Son of God; and the demons cry out: We know who thou art, the Holy One of God. In the holy place therefore he ascended on high. And what that ascending on high is, Paul taught under the signification of this very saying, saying: But that he ascended, what is it but that he also descended into the lower parts of the earth? He that descended is the same also that ascended above all the heavens.

Ascending therefore on high, and bearing himself back as man from the dead into the heavenly places, he received those who had been taken captive by the devil, whom also he divided as spoils for the beauty of the house. Thereafter he received gifts among men, when the firstborn from the dead testifies of himself, saying: The Lord said to me: Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee. Ask of me, and I will give thee the nations for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession. He received therefore gifts among men, namely the nations as an inheritance; among whom the firstborn from the dead, having taken captivity captive, ascended on high in the holy place.

And because it surpasses the hope of human expectation that he should have transferred the corruption of earthly flesh into heavenly glory, and that the impious nations, previously overrun by the frenzy of vices and superstitions, should have been led to the knowledge of God and to fellowship with him; on this account he received gifts among men, among those who did not believe that they would dwell together with God. And so the knowledge of this Mediator is consummated from the law: so that he who had been among the rejoicing thousands in Sina, this same one ascending again on high in the holy place with captivity taken captive, might receive us as gifts, who had been despairing of dwelling together with him.

God is to be blessed for ever.—After this inheritance of gifts received among men against the despondency of our hope, this worthy confession to God is added by the Prophet,

The Lord God is blessed from day to day, the God of our salvations shall make our journey prosperous.

Blessed therefore is the Lord and God, ascending on high, taking captivity captive, receiving gifts among men, namely those who did not believe that they would dwell. But day by day through the accession of the believing people the confession of blessing is multiplied and increased, when gentile superstitions and impious fables about gods, when the altars of demons, when the emptiness of idols are abandoned, and the way and progress of all is directed unto salvation. This therefore is the Lord and God of our salvations, whose eternity of blessings is signified from day to day. For in that which is daily, it is continued and always; since the infinity of time is extended as great as the succession of days following upon days.

The wisdom and power of the Cross.—The prophetic word has always been most carefully guarded, lest anyone through gentile fables and philosophical doctrine should disturb our understanding of the knowledge of divine truth; for their varied and most impious opinions have embraced many things concerning God in a foolish and profane manner. But we, instructed in the knowledge of God the Father and God the Son, have attained the sacrament of true and heavenly wisdom in this, that the Word was made flesh. For that very thing which is to the Jews a stumbling-block and to the gentiles foolishness—that is, the passion of God, the cross, death, burial—is, whether considered through the reason of the divine will, perfect and heavenly wisdom, or through the power of the resurrection, the eternity of virtue.

To the knowledge of this God, therefore, who both suffered and died and rose again for us and is Lord, the Prophet instructs us, saying,

Our God is the God of saving, and of the Lord are the issues of death: making known to us that God who, though he was God, took upon himself all things for the increase of our salvation. And therefore this God is ours: because he is the God of those who shall be saved. But our God made us saved by this, that the issues of death are an egress: for this is contained in these words, which have been translated into Latin less expressly and absolutely. For I have noted above that nearly all interpreters, when they dare not alter and adjust the arrangement and order of words, have declared the proper meaning of the sayings less clearly.

Nevertheless in what has been said—Our God is the God of saving, and of the Lord are the issues of death—both our God of salvation and his issue beyond the issue of death is shown. What the issues of death of the Lord are. For to all who come into life, the entrance into death is universal: but to the firstborn from the dead alone was the egress from death properly his own. And therefore the proper issue of death belongs to the Lord, because this is the virtue of the flesh assumed by him, that it should carry the corruption of our nature into heavenly glory after the issues of death. But neither the cause nor the reason of this death which he underwent was to be concealed: and what help the only-begotten God, emptied from the form of God and taking the form of a servant, would bring to us, it was necessary to reveal for the security and knowledge of our faith.

It was fitting that God should restore life to us in himself.—And first indeed it can seem not foreign to the mercy and goodness of God that he should restore life to all in himself from the dead, since he who first poured out upon us the soul for the breath and respiration of living, when he constituted man according to the image and likeness of himself, poured it forth from the treasuries of his power and divinity. For according to the Apostle we are his offspring: and according to the same: All things are from him, and through him, and in him: namely, that in him our habitation and sojourn should be shown as a dwelling-place, while he encompasses all things with the immense power of his virtue; through him, however, the work and effect of the origin begun should be shown, since he has wrought in us that very thing which we are; and from him the beginnings of life granted at the commencement of the spirit should be made known.

It was therefore not foreign to the beneficence of divine goodness that he who had bestowed upon us, who are his offspring, from himself the elements of life and spirit, should also in himself through the only-begotten God begin for us the origins of our eternity: and that we might truly now both be from him and through him and in him; since when he placed us in this very habitation and dwelling-place of this world, who is all in all, he would again, now more fully and perfectly, in himself and through himself and from himself, having entered into fellowship with our flesh, place us after the eternal issues of death. These things indeed have been said thus for the signification of divine goodness.

Christ rising from the dead restored this.—But a grander and deeper reason for the only-begotten God's taking on flesh, approaching death, and rising again is treated both through the Apostle and now through the Prophet. And first let us understand through the Apostle what was accomplished in the sacrament of the cross and death by the only-begotten God and Lord of majesty; so that, taught by him as our guide, we may attain the knowledge of the prophecy. For he says thus: And you, when you were dead in sins and the uncircumcision of your body, he quickened together with him, forgiving us all sins, blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and he took it out of the way, nailing it to the cross, despoiling himself of the flesh, he made a show of principalities and powers openly, triumphing over them in himself.

The sacrament of our salvation, therefore, he himself first fulfilled by rising from the dead, and by dissolving in himself—who now remains eternal from the dead—the decree of our death by which we were previously held.

But in that very fact that he is in himself the author of life for us, while through the assumption of a body he was born a man and died, and is now again eternal from the dead: he also made all the hostile powers, and the powers of the world, and the princes of this air a show—that is, he made them spectacles either of our hope or of their own condemnation, and made them as it were certain portents of the gods of this age—triumphing over these very ones in himself with confidence; since both through the security of eternity death itself is confidence in God dying, and the authors of human death, while through the heart of Judas occupied by Satan they are also authors of death, he triumphs over from the dead: so that they should not be absent from the punishment of death, since the Eternal had subjected himself even to the weakness of death; and they should receive the whole punishment of human death as its authors, since they had become authors of death against the Lord of eternity, through the fact that the Word was made flesh.

These things indeed the Apostle says thus.

What Paul now teaches, David already taught.—But the Prophet, though briefly, has encompassed the same understanding with significant words.

For where he had shown the Lord in the issue of death, he added,

But he shall crush the heads of his enemies, the crown of the hair of those who walk in their sins.

For the principalities and powers, which are signified by the heads of enemies, he made a show of. These therefore he crushes in the issue of death, whose spiritual wickedness and nature he teaches in this, that they walk about the crown of the hair: since they both press upon the heads of men as though dominating them, and as spiritual wickednesses, without the awareness of those upon whom they press, trample upon that very crown of the hair: because they also slip in and penetrate even the bodies themselves up to the seat of the soul and mind without the awareness of those they enter.

For they are powers of this air: and therefore they walk about the crown of the hair, either by the lightness of their pressing upon it, or by the power of dominating, and traversing the whole world at every moment. But these things they do in their sins, while they are the authors for each person of what he transgresses; according to that word of the apostle: God sent his Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and of sin condemned sin in the flesh: since he condemns the cause and origin of sin in them from that very fact that in his own flesh through the impulse of betrayal they sin—that is, from the sin of the flesh—sin in the flesh.

The deeds of the Gospel are foreshadowed by the Law.—The prophetic word therefore holds to the order of the divine dispensation: and it declares, through those very works of the Law themselves, that the works of the Gospels were foreshadowed through the Law. For many things have frequently been expressed and set forth through the proper meanings of names in such a way that they were expended not so much upon things to be done in the present as upon things to be signified for the future: so that now, after such great and so manifest proclamations of evangelical hope, the following order of words brings something deeper to us and beyond the sense of the ears.

The Lord said: From Basan I will return, I will return into the depth of the sea.

For this seems to have been the word of the Lord when he turned to divide the sea for the journey and to pour out his wrath upon Pharaoh. But did the Law teach that he was turned from Basan? Not at all.

Now Basan is a city of a formerly hostile kingdom, which was the dwelling of King Og: but the interpretation of the name signifies shame and confusion. It can indeed seem that from the shame of the people serving in Egypt, when oppressed by Pharaoh he had lost that very freedom of preserving and leading forth the race, God was turned into the depth of the sea—that is, to the magnificence of liberating his people.

But he who, according to the psalm next to this one, said: Save me, O God, for the waters have come in even unto my soul; I am stuck fast in the mire of the deep, and there is no standing; I am come into the depth of the sea, and a tempest hath overwhelmed me: it is not to be doubted that after the shame of the human body—because those very origins of our bodies and elements are shameful—he was turned into this sea, that is, into this storm of the world, so that, subjected even to the shame of the utmost confusion in the death of the cross, he might through it crush the heads of enemies in himself, rendering a show of the spiritual wickednesses and all powers and principalities of this air, triumphing over them, when he destined them to the punishment of eternity after he himself had both suffered and died.

For this reason therefore he is to be understood as having turned into the depth of the sea—that is, as having descended to the uttermost passions of the world—so that, trampling upon the heads of enemies, he might put forth the vengeance of divine power.

Divine vengeance is expressed by the example of human vengeance.—The following words seem to encompass this same thing, when it is said,

That thy foot may be dipped in blood: the tongue of thy dogs from the enemies, from him.

The wrath of divine vengeance is signified under the example of human revenge. For he was turned from Basan into the depth of the sea for this purpose, that the foot might be dipped in blood: and from that same blood which is from the enemies, the tongue of the dogs also might be dipped. These things are wont to happen to all who are consumed in war, and destroyed in captivity, and punished at the will and vengeance of the victors. Through the custom of human usage, therefore, as I said, when the sword, when the bow, when the arrow, when the spear, when the remaining instruments of punishments and deaths are mentioned, the offices of divine severity are signified.

And all these things indeed happened to the Jews after the cross and death of the Lord, when, captured by the Romans, they suffered every kind of punishment and misery: so that the feet of those walking were dipped in the blood of the slain, and the tongue of the dogs was satisfied. But this is no less to be referred to the punishment and condemnation of those who, made a show of, are triumphed over with confidence.

The salvation of the gentiles was begun in the times of the Law.—And

because under those things which were fulfilled in the people of the Jews in the times of the Law, the salvation of nearly all the gentiles was begun as a token of future mercy; so that through what was then done, what was also to be done afterwards might be taught: since those very persons upon whom those things were then being done were enclosed in evangelical hope and faith by the overshadowing of the cloud, and the passage through the sea, and the spiritual food of manna, and the spiritual drink from the rock: now also, as always, in these very things a connection of the New and Old Testament has been made through the Prophet, when he says,

Thy ways were seen, O God, the ways of my God, the king who is in the holy place.

The princes went before joined with those singing psalms, in the midst of young women playing timbrels.

In the churches bless ye the Lord God from the fountains of Israel.

There is Benjamin the younger in fear, the princes of Juda their leaders, the princes of Zabulon, the princes of Nephthalim. The ways of God were indeed seen, when the waters were compacted into ice, and he going before in a pillar of fire and cloud, the path was dried for the people, when in the midst of young women playing timbrels the young men singing psalms gloriously glorified the Lord in song. But we know also other ways of the king in the holy place, when his way is preceded by heavenly virtues and the souls of the saints, in him in whom the psalm of the first day of the week is sung: Lift up your gates, O ye princes, and be ye lifted up, O eternal gates, and the king of glory shall enter in? Who is this king of glory? The Lord of virtues, he is the king of glory.

And these therefore are the ways of our God and king in the holy place that were seen, when such great joys of the heavenly hosts go before his entry.

Prophecy of the election of the Apostles, of Paul from the tribe of Benjamin, of others from Zebulun and Naphtali.—But

because those things which had been prefigured beforehand in Pharaoh and in Israel were fulfilled in the destruction of the devil and his followers and in the salvation of all peoples: the prophet exhorts us not to the confession of the synagogue, but to the blessing of the Church, that he might confirm that the journeys of God and of the king in the holy place had been seen by them, saying: In the churches bless ye the Lord God from the fountains of Israel: recalling, that is, that the teaching of the Church had flowed down from the beginnings of the law and the shadowing forth of its deeds.

And lest any ambiguity should arise for those blessing in the churches, he shows who would be the greatest future herald of evangelical hope, saying: There is Benjamin the younger in fear

that is, Benjamin the younger was to remain in fear at the fountains of the Church; for after the consternation of fear, Paul was chosen from the tribe of Benjamin for the Gospel of Christ, devouring the prey in the morning and dividing the spoil in the evening unto salvation. He also shows the other princes of Judah, lest they be unknown: that is, those who were to be chosen from him who from the branch of Judah was to be the expectation of the nations, revealing: The princes of Zebulun, the princes of Naphtali. For from these, as the Gospels declare, the choosing of the apostles began, showing these to be the princes of those who would be gathered in the churches.

For although from all the tribes princes were appointed for each several people according to the law: yet now, where the princes of the evangelical dispensation were being declared, only the names of those tribes were mentioned from which they were to be called. For when a great light arose in the borders of Zebulun and Naphtali after the shadow of death, fishers of men were appointed from these. Therefore only that was recorded under the significance of prophecy from that whole multitude of princes, which was to be fulfilled unto the confirmation of the Gospel by the very effects of events and by the election of the Apostles.

The coming of Christ is longed for.—And

because they were held in the hope of so great an expectation (for it is not doubtful that all the saints and prophets desired with heavenly longing the time of evangelical blessedness, the Lord saying: Amen I say to you, that many prophets and just men have desired to see the things that you see, and to hear the things that you hear), he prays that what he so greatly desires may be consummated, saying,

Command thy strength, O God; confirm, O God, what thou hast wrought in us.

From thy temple in Jerusalem kings shall offer gifts to thee. He distinguishes the meaning of the understanding, lest anything confused and ambiguous creep in regarding what he says, Command thy strength, O God: which he has certainly spoken contrary to human sense and the usage of natural custom.

For no one seems to command anything to his own strength, because through it the effect of inward power is present; and since all things are done by strength, it is not thought that anything is usually commanded to strength itself to be done. But the strength of God and the wisdom of God is the Lord Jesus Christ, who also received the commandment of laying down his soul and taking it up again from the Father. Therefore it does not seem to be spoken contrary to the sense of common understanding, though it has been recorded with the propriety of prophetic knowledge, that God should command his strength, namely the only-begotten God, who is also the strength of God.

Then, because a new and sudden undertaking does not befall God, whose knowledge is not eluded by the things that are to be done, since his nature has encompassed by the power of his strength all things that shall be; the Prophet now asks that what the same God has already wrought in us be confirmed, according to that word of the Apostle: Blessed be God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places: as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and unspotted in his sight. God therefore, who according to the Prophet made the things that were to come, confirmed in the Lord those things which he had already wrought in us before the foundation of the world through the determination of things to be done (acc. To LXX).

What temple, and what kings bearing gifts thence to God.—And what

that is, the sequence of the words immediately continues: From thy temple in Jerusalem kings shall offer gifts to thee. There is a temple in Jerusalem, in which the lawful offerings of sacrifices were made: but now gifts are to be offered by kings from the temple in Jerusalem.

Which is certainly contrary to the significance of the places and the logic of the deeds: that from the place whither gifts ought rather to be brought in

that is, from the temple, gifts should be offered. But because that heavenly Jerusalem is our mother, and the assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled and who frequent it, and every one reborn in Christ is a temple of God, especially one in whom not death but life shall reign; and who is himself king of that of which he had formerly been a servant, namely of sin, offering himself as a living and rational sacrifice pleasing to God: then therefore from this temple, that is, from this holy habitation of his body, in that assembly of the angels who frequent it, that is, in that heavenly Jerusalem, if there be any who are kings, that is, who no longer serve sin, they shall offer themselves to God as a gift. The assembly of bulls.

Wild beasts of the forest tried with silver.—And

because carnal Israel, while it claims for itself alone the peculiar mercy of God, seems as though it were proper to defend it as belonging to itself alone; the prophet immediately added,

Rebuke the wild beasts of the forest, the assembly of bulls among the heifers of the peoples; that those who have been tried with silver be not excluded: scatter the nations that want war.

That heifers were worshipped in Samaria is known from the books. But that the princes of this people are now not leaders of a people but of herds is the prophetic word, when it is said in the person of the Lord: Fat bulls have beset me. By wild beasts of the forest, however, the signification of spiritual wickednesses walking in their sins above the height of the hair is to be understood, according to that: The boar out of the wood hath laid it waste, and a singular wild beast hath devoured it.

In which place both the savagery and the power of the prince of this world himself, that is of Satan, is signified.

The Prophet therefore now asks that he rebuke either these wild beasts of the forests, or this assembly of bulls among the heifers of the peoples: lest those who have been tried with silver be excluded. Now those tried with silver are those who, refined according to silver, and smelted in the fire of all passions, now shine spotless and without admixture of earthly filth.

Knowledge and peace are wished for the elect of God.—For when the prophetic word proclaims the faith of the nations, and very frequently rebukes the wicked will of this exasperating people, and salvation from God is now known to all and through all, and this is known from the knowledge of God's dispensation: when the impiety of the people has been rebuked, all the holy ones are called to the hope of the heavenly kingdom (For God is not the God of the Jews only, and not of the Gentiles: yea, of the Gentiles also: For there is one God, who justifieth circumcision by faith, and uncircumcision through faith); after therefore those who deserved to be princes of Sodom and princes of Gomorrah have been rebuked; then the knowledge and understanding of God flowed down to the nations, and they are no longer held within error nor the contradiction of ignorance.

But when the wild beasts of the forests and the assemblies of bulls and the heifers of the peoples have been rebuked, he condemns those who still persist in perpetual hatred of unbelief against the hope and salvation of the nations, striving against them, saying: Scatter the nations that want war. For the Lord made peace for all things in heaven and on earth, and according to the Apostle, God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself. He therefore announces the scattering of those nations which refuse the covenant of heavenly peace and prefer rather to wage wars of dissension, yet under the gathering together of diverse nations.

Egypt almost entirely faithful, baptism, apostolic ministry.—For to preserve and connect the whole sense, when the assemblies of bulls and the wild beasts of the forests have been rebuked, and the nations wanting war have been scattered, lest Israel, impious and arrogant, should presume anything further for itself; he added,

Ambassadors shall come out of Egypt, Ethiopia shall prevent his hands.

Sing to God, ye kingdoms of the earth: sing ye to the Lord. For these same things were fulfilled, either when the Magi came from the East, or when the Holy Spirit came upon the apostles in the manner of divided fire. For there it is written that even from Egypt men came together to the knowledge of the evangelical preaching, and through them, as ambassadors announcing the greatness of the divine gift, Egypt is now almost entirely faithful.

Ethiopia moreover anticipated in the eunuch of Candace by the confession of faith; and by his own hand, while he himself asks for the grace of baptism for himself, saying: Behold water, who doth hinder me from being baptized? Anticipating the sacrament of baptism itself with the eagerness of impatient desire: as they confirm: by his own hand, while he himself asks for the grace of baptism he, eager for his own salvation, demanded from the deacon the ministry of the apostolic office. And because from that point the preaching of divine knowledge shone forth through almost all nations; because all kingdoms too, though late, are to come to know the Lord Christ as God, and every tongue shall confess that the Lord Jesus is in the glory of God the Father, he longs for the consummation of this time, saying: Sing to God, ye kingdoms of the earth: sing ye to the Lord.

He exhorts all, that is, to sing to God and to sing psalms, either because he rejoices with prophetic solicitude for the salvation of all, or because when all kingdoms have come to know God, the eternity of the heavenly kingdom succeeds.

The divinity of Christ.—

as he is wont to do in other places, so now too he shows to what God and Lord singing and psalm-singing was to be directed, saying: Sing ye to God, who mounteth above the heaven of heavens to the East; behold he will give to his voice the voice of power. Fittingly now is the honour of God ascending above the heaven of heavens to the East sought: so that, because his humility had been signified above, when he either ascends above the west, or goes forth from the departure of death; now, where he is known to have passed beyond not heaven but the heaven of heavens, the eternity of his divinity and majesty might not be unknown.

To the East, moreover, for this reason

because he himself, according to the prophet, is the Orient from on high, so that he might be known to have returned to whence he had descended, and that he himself might be for men the author of rising again unto this ascent to the heavenly seat.

The voice of power.

The resurrection of bodies.—For the following words signify this same thing, when it is said: Behold he will give to his voice the voice of power. In all things indeed which he performed while remaining in the body, he gave the voice of power; when he says to the paralytic: Arise and walk; when he calls Lazarus from the tomb; when he says to Peter and the other Apostles: Whatsoever you shall bind upon earth, shall be bound also in heaven; and whatsoever you shall loose upon earth, shall be loosed also in heaven. This is plainly the voice of power, to grant to human weakness so great an ability. But we know that there is yet another voice of power remaining, concerning which he himself testified, saying: Amen amen I say to you, that the hour cometh, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live.

Can any voice be greater in power than to gather the dust of dissolved bodies into the form and solidity of members, and to call life back again into men and souls, and to change the corruption of weak nature with the incorruption of heavenly nature?

This is the true and perfect steadfastness of human hope, this is the complete goodness of divine majesty. On account of which he exhorts all to the honour of so great a power, saying: Give honour to God: that we may refer the praise of the immortality received to the honour of him who is the parent of so great a gift to us.

Whose resurrection shall be glorious.—

Then, lest either carnal Israel or the whole multitude of the impious nations should presume anything for themselves from these merits of piety and knowledge of God, he shows from whom this honor is to be rendered to God, saying: His magnificence is over Israel, and his power is in the clouds: demonstrating, that is, that his magnificence shall be over that Israel which, by comparison with the clouds, would already be spiritual, or which, according to the Apostle, would be worthy to be caught up to meet Christ in the clouds.

And therefore his power is in the clouds: because to those who, living beyond earthly origin and mortal condition, had raised themselves to a heavenly understanding and, so to speak, an airy life, and had stood lifted up to meet him in the clouds, it would be proper to rejoice in the power and magnificence of God. (For I recall that these very clouds, as beings perfect in reason and knowledge, were commanded not to rain upon the impious vineyard of Israel: because those whom thorns and thistles, that is, earthly vices, had already beset, were unworthy of the holy word.) For although the voice of power must be used by all for the new origin of resurrection, yet the glorious honor of resurrection is not prepared for all alike, as the Lord says: Marvel not at this, for the hour cometh in which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice: and they that have done good shall come forth unto the resurrection of life, but they that have done evil unto the resurrection of judgment.

And therefore his magnificence and the power of God is over that Israel which would be in the clouds: because, according to the distinction of innocent and impious life, the diversity of resurrection is distinguished, either unto life or unto judgment.

The unity and immortality of the blessed with God.—Then the following discourse designates this same thing, saying: God is wonderful in his saints.

Wonderful, that is, in those whom he shall raise up eternal unto the resurrection of life. He is wonderful when he shall bestow upon them the whole will of his beneficence, when he shall place them within the perfection of heavenly glory: as he prayed to the Father on their behalf, saying: Father, I will that where I am, they also may be with me; or that other: That they all may be one, I in them, and thou in me.

God therefore is wonderful in his saints, whom, when he shall have made them conformed to the glory of his body, he shall also assume, through himself who is the mediator, even into the unity of the paternal majesty; since both the Father is in him by nature, and he in turn is in us through the fellowship of flesh: those whom he shall have placed to obtain the kingdom prepared for them before the foundation of the world, to whom, death being swallowed up, he shall have restored immortal and eternal life.

For no longer shall the change and toil of human life be endured through the growth of bodies, the nourishment of food, and the accidents of infirmities: but eternity shall be granted to all, which, containing itself by the power of its own nature, that is, which feeds and preserves itself; and all shall be certain that they will be everlasting, because they are no longer sustained unto life from elsewhere, that is, not from without, but from God, through whom they shall have risen, and they shall remain both immortal and eternal. And therefore the Prophet concluded these sacraments of human hope with such a faith of confession,

God is wonderful in his saints, the God of Israel himself shall give power and strength to his people, blessed is God.

God therefore gives power and strength to his people, which, made immortal, may be contained within life and power, and, having put off the body, may be clothed with heavenly honor: so that, all corruption and infirmity being driven away, it may bless God with the praise of his eternity, through his only-begotten and first-born, God and our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

Unto the end, for those who shall be changed, a Psalm of David himself.

Save me, O God, for the waters have entered even unto my soul. I am stuck fast in the mire of the deep, and there is no substance. I am come into the depth of the sea, and a tempest hath overwhelmed me. I have labored with crying, my jaws have become hoarse: my eyes have failed, while I hope in my God. They are multiplied above the hairs of my head, who hate me without cause. My enemies who persecute me unjustly are grown strong: then I was required to pay what I had not taken. O God, thou knowest my foolishness, and my offences are not hidden from thee. Let them not be confounded in me who wait for thee, O Lord of hosts: let them not be ashamed on my account who seek thee, O God of Israel. Because for thy sake I have borne reproach, shame hath covered my face.

I am become a stranger to my brethren, and an alien to the sons of my mother

because zeal for thy house hath eaten me up, and the reproaches of them that reproached thee have fallen upon me. And I covered my soul with fasting, and it became a reproach to me. And I made sackcloth my garment, and I became a parable to them. They that sat in the gate spoke against me, and they that drank wine made songs about me. But as for me, my prayer is to thee, O Lord, the time of thy good pleasure, O God. In the multitude of thy mercy hear me, in the truth of thy salvation. Deliver me from the mire that I may not stick fast, and from the deep waters. Let not the tempest of water overwhelm me, nor the deep swallow me up, nor the pit shut its mouth upon me. Hear me, O Lord, for thy mercy is kind to me: look upon me according to the multitude of thy tender mercies.

Turn not away thy face from thy servant: for I am in trouble, hear me speedily.

Attend to my soul and deliver it: rescue me because of my enemies. For thou knowest my reproach and my confusion and my shame, in thy sight are all they that afflict me: my heart hath expected reproach and misery. And I looked for one that would grieve together with me, and there was none: and for one that would comfort me, and I found none. And they gave me gall for my food, and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink. Let their table become a snare before them, and a recompense, and a stumbling block. Let their eyes be darkened that they see not, and their back bend thou down always. Pour out thy indignation upon them, and let thy wrathful anger take hold of them.

Let their habitation be made desolate, and let there be none to dwell in their tents

because they have persecuted him whom thou hast smitten, and they have added to the grief of my wounds. Add iniquity upon their iniquity: and let them not come into thy justice. Let them be blotted out of the book of the living, and with the just let them not be written. But I am poor and sorrowful: and thy salvation, O God, hath taken me up. I will praise the name of God with a canticle, and I will magnify him with praise: and it shall please God better than a young calf that bringeth forth horns and hoofs. Let the poor see and rejoice: seek ye God, and your soul shall live: for the Lord hath heard the poor, and hath not despised his prisoners.

Let the heavens and the earth praise him, the sea and everything that creepeth therein: for God will save Sion, and the cities of Juda shall be built up, and they shall dwell there, and acquire it by inheritance. And the seed of his servants shall possess it: and they that love his name shall dwell therein. When it is prefixed: yet in that the psalm is inscribed in the end not of that David but for that David; the prophecy is to be understood as referring rather to that David who is both the Orient and the Just One and the end of the law. For by this it is taught that the psalm was sung not by him but for him. Now in those who shall be changed, we have shown (On, n.

2) that the faithful of evangelical hope are signified, who, changed from either the observance of the law or from gentile impiety to the knowledge of God, as if being reborn, would flourish in the brightness of incorruptible eternity; which same thing shall be treated at the end of the psalm. Moreover it is not doubted that the psalm itself contains the sacrament of the Lord's passion. For besides the apostle John, who testified that the consummation of the Scriptures consisted in the drinking of vinegar, since also this saying was taken up by the same under the recollection of the apostles: The zeal of thy house hath eaten me up; this removes all ambiguity and confirms that all things were said and done with reference to him.

Therefore, having fulfilled the lot of all human sufferings, he speaks according to the infirmities he took upon himself: and he grieves, placed indeed beyond the necessity of fear and pain, yet accommodating himself to those things which he took upon himself: so that he who was born a man of our flesh might speak both with the complaints of our sorrows and with the prayer of infirmity. He began therefore thus.

The law of death upon all.

Christ as man prays for salvation.—Save me, O God, for the waters have entered even unto my soul. Death, appointed against all, prescribes to all the end of living. And what does this prayer now mean, which entreats that it be saved; since the law of death is appointed against all? Then the reason for now praying for salvation is this, that the waters have entered even unto the soul; and the power for the waters to enter unto the soul comes from this, that he is stuck fast in the mire of the deep; and for one fixed in the mire of the deep there is no substance. Therefore, because no one prays for anything except what he hopes for (and no one hopes that he will not die), such is rightly his prayer, who, though about to die, was not to be held by death.

The assumed infirmity therefore had the duty of praying for salvation, while the consciousness of divinity held the hope of salvation to be hoped for in death. He therefore prays to be saved, who also said: God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?

What the waters are.—For with the waters entering even unto the soul, he was made subject to the death of the cross, when the assault of all passions broke through even unto the death of the soul. Now that the persecutions of the people and the commotions of the nations are customarily signified by waters is not in doubt, when it is said: My soul hath passed through a torrent, or that other: And my soul passed through immense water. There are also waters that undermine a house built on sand and drive it to fall and ruin. These waters therefore, now entering even unto the soul, compelled him to the prayer of entreating salvation.

Whence death and passion come to Christ.

The self-emptying of God. By what power God and man are united in Christ.—But the power and capacity of these incoming passions comes from nowhere other than from the assumption of flesh. For this terror of our infirmities could not fall upon God, nor could the passions exert themselves except in the flesh of our body, as in a subject matter lying beneath. Moreover the heavenly (divine) nature had to be drawn down, so that, emptying itself from the form of God, it might descend into the form of a servant and of man. And therefore the waters penetrate even unto the soul: because there is no substance for him, fixed in the mire of the deep. Not that the substance which was assumed was not there, but that which had emptied and drawn itself down. But in no way was he lacking himself, who emptied himself by evacuating: yet that which he had already yielded into something else by evacuating himself did not appear to subsist as the same.

There is therefore no substance, by reason of his being fixed in the mire of the deep.

For the first man was from the mire of the earth: and the second Adam, descending from the heavens into the depth of this mire, fixed himself as one coming from on high. Emptying himself therefore, since he had no substance, he descended now not only to the depths of flesh but even to the depths of death, and the whole terror of the tempest raging against us pressed upon him. For when he fixed himself, against the diversity of heavenly and earthly nature, into this mire by the power of his own authority; because things that are discordant by nature do not come together to a certain solidity of their connection by the affinity of their kind itself, but are joined as if fastened together by a stronger force: then he also began to be able to suffer and to die, descending through the setting of death into the lower regions.

A prophecy of Christ's death.

In what words Scripture expresses the seat of death.—For there follows: I came into the depth of the sea, and a tempest overwhelmed me. That imitator of the Lord's death and its timing, Jonas, submerged in the sea and received by the whale, testifies that he was placed not so much in the sea as in hell: I cried in my distress to my God, and he heard my cries from the belly of the underworld. And although the whale had swallowed him in the likeness of infernal death, he says: The water compassed about even to my head, I went down to the earth whose bars are fast-holding and eternal.

To holy Job also, after that most glorious battle of all his sufferings, when he was now worthy of the divine word and knowledge of nature, after the gates of the sea broken within itself and its terrors roaring in its mother's womb, the Lord again revealed what was also signified in the sea, saying: But hast thou entered into the springs of the deep, or hast thou walked in the search of the depth? But are the gates of death opened to thee for fear, signifying that in the tracks of the sea, as in the depth or height of the sea, are the gates of death. For since the depths of the sea are lower than the earth, it is necessary that in the depth of the sea, that is, in the lower regions, the seat of death be shown. Coming therefore into this depth of the sea, he was overwhelmed by the tempest, of which he makes mention in the preceding psalm, saying: All thy heights and thy waves have passed over me.

But also that imitator, as I said, of the Lord's death, whom that most monstrous whale of this sea vomited forth from the fast-holding and eternal bars of the earth, made similar laments: All thy suspensions and thy waves passed over me. Coming therefore to the depth of death, he was overwhelmed by the very tempest of death, and was pressed down by the storms of hostile powers.

The cry of Christ.

For what reason.—Yet not in silence toward those who were about to offer themselves to the devil as instruments of ministry for sin (for he both at times reproached the counsels of his death that had been plotted, and often cried out while standing in the temple, and frequently directed his eyes raised to God, so that for each great work of his divinity he is understood to have looked toward the Father); on account of which there follows,

I laboured with crying, my jaws are become hoarse: my eyes have failed, whilst I hope in my God.

Taking up our infirmities and bearing our sins, he spoke in the manner and custom of human weariness: for he who often committed himself to sleep and fatigue, even to the necessity of thirst and hunger. His jaws therefore are hoarse, and his eyes have failed.

But the reason for his great crying and the direction of his eyes he showed to be this, that he hoped in God, either when he cries saying: He that believeth in me, believeth not in me, but in him that sent me: or when, about to call Lazarus with a loud voice, raising his eyes on high, he says: Father, I give thee thanks that thou hast heard me.

Why the number of those who hate is beyond the hairs.

How they hate without cause.—But while he either bears witness to the greatness of the Father's name, or labours at the work of human salvation, hatreds are multiplied against him in vain. For there follows,

They are multiplied above the hairs of my head, who hate me without cause.

My enemies who persecute me unjustly are strengthened: then was I paying for what I had not taken away. The number of those who hate is manifold beyond the hairs of the head: whether on account of the copious multitude of the impious, or because they are unworthy of God's care (for we know that the hairs of the Apostles are numbered, because God has such great care for them), or because the number of unbelievers is beyond the number of believers.

For since the glory of the head is in the hair, and all the adornment of the Church, which is the body of Christ, is in the beauty of the Apostles: beyond this glory of his head is the multitude of those who hate. But they hate him without cause, that is, having no reason for hatred. And the enemies, growing strong, persecuted him unjustly. For he had committed no sin, nor had he any guile: and therefore he was called upon to pay back what he had not taken away. For since he was not a debtor of sin and death, he was held as a debtor of sin and death, by those, namely, who were exercising in him the law of sin which is in our members. For of sin he condemned sin in the flesh.

The cross is the foolishness of Christ.

The fruit of this is the expectation of the just.—Because in this he was fulfilling the great counsel of divine wisdom, and the death of the cross seemed foolishness to the Gentiles in God, and there was in him a great expectation of heavenly and earthly hope; he added,

O God, thou knowest my foolishness, and my offences are not hidden from thee.

Let them not be ashamed in me, who wait for thee, O Lord of hosts: let them not be confounded over me, who seek thee, O God of Israel. God is aware of his foolishness, and his offences are not hidden from him: namely, the penalties of foolishness and offences, which he was called upon to pay back though he had not taken them away. Even to the foolishness of the cross (that is, because it is foolishness to the Gentiles that our sins should be taken up in this way), so that as a sinner and fool he is vexed without cause and unjustly.

But because he had taken up foolishness and offences for the sake of our wisdom and life, that he might judge the prince of this world, and condemn sin in the flesh of sin (since when in himself, namely in the flesh of his body, in which nothing of sin could be found, according to what he says: Behold the prince of the world cometh, and he shall find nothing in me, this prince of the world coming and finding nothing, yet exercised the penalty of sin, that is, the right of death; through which the author of human death, because he plotted death against the author of life who knew no sin, is judged: and this was the expectation of the saints, that all flesh should be redeemed in Christ, that in him the first-fruits of eternal resurrection should arise): he asks that those who await the Lord not be confounded in him, and that those who seek the God of Israel not fear or be ashamed on his account: because the time desired for the flesh to be assumed by him had come, according to that saying: Many prophets and just men have desired to see the things that you see, and to hear the things that you hear.

He therefore prays that nothing weak and feeble remain in him: lest the weakness of body and flesh confound the hope of those who wait. For through him and in him is all our expectation toward God. Coming therefore into a body, he prays that the hope of the saints not be confounded in him.

The weakness of Christ is assumed, not natural.

The necessity of sin is in no one.—But that he took up our infirmities for the salvation of the human race by the will of the Father, because he came not to do his own will but the will of the Father who sent him; this he now also declares through what follows,

Because for thy sake I have borne reproach, shame hath covered my face. I am become a stranger to my brethren, and an alien to the sons of my mother: because zeal for thy house hath eaten me up. There was therefore in the only-begotten God no natural weakness, but an assumed one: because for his sake he took up these reproaches of the passions. Although indeed not even in the natures of men is there any necessity of sin; but the practice of sin is seized upon through the appetite of the will and the delight in vices.

And therefore the Lord shows that he had not taken away what he was called upon to pay back: because those things which are desired contrary to nature are seized upon, with all who are to pay back the last farthing of such debts: and on this account, by the prescription of the Lord's prayer, we beg that our debts be forgiven us. He endured reproach therefore for God's sake, while he assumes a body alien to his own nature, while, according to the Apostle, the Father makes him who knew no sin to be sin, while he becomes obedient even unto the death of the cross, while it is reproached to him that saving others he does not save himself, while he endures the insults of those who strike and slap him.

Who is separated from us.

His zeal.—Covered therefore with this shame for God's sake, he becomes a stranger to his brethren, and is made an alien to the sons of his mother, estranged, that is, from the vices of those who were reckoned as his kinsmen according to the flesh; while entering the temple he overturns the tables of the money-changers, while he forbids the markets of sheep and oxen, while he reproaches those selling doves for having made his Father's house a house of trade. For filled with zeal for the house of God he did these things. Now this is the indignation of holy love, that we are moved by the insults done to those we love as if by a burning zeal. For it was with this zeal for the defiled house that, as the Gospel (as I showed above) testifies, he entered the temple and drove out the whole crowd of buyers and sellers.

But to have pleased God through zeal for him even to the severity and end of death is praiseworthy.

He stirred up reproaches against himself.—Through this indignation at the desires reproached in them, therefore, all the insults of every curse were heaped upon him. And whatever reproaches are customarily directed against the impious, these were brought against him: when he is called a blasphemer, when a Samaritan, when Beelzebub, when one having a demon. For he added: And the reproaches of them that reproached thee fell upon me. The reproach of blasphemy is rather cast upon him who heaps insult upon God; just as the infamy of a demon is more properly the mark of one who is estranged from God. Since all these things were reproached to him on account of his zeal for the house of God, the reproaches of those who reproach God are heaped upon him. And the Apostle writing to the Romans makes mention of this saying with an understanding of this significance.

The deeds of Christ are disparaged by every kind of person.

Why he wept when about to raise Lazarus.—Even the very practice of fasting falls into reproach, when he is tempted by the devil, when he is placed on the pinnacle of the temple, when he is carried up onto the mountain, when finally he is tempted with the habitation of the whole world to adore Satan. He weeps at times, and groans, and is sorrowful, and this very thing is attributed to him as an example of weakness. In short, he becomes both an object of disparagement and a song to every kind of person. For even those who sit in the gates for the sake of food and sustenance speak against him and detract: and the drunk sing of him. But all these things he laments as having been done to him either according to the truth of the events, or according to the manner of human custom.

I covered my soul with fasting: and it was made a reproach to me.

And I made haircloth my garment: and I became a byword to them.

They that sat in the gate spoke against me: and they that drank wine made me their song. His fasting therefore was a reproach to him: because through the reproach of hunger he was tempted even to the insult of adoring Satan. But the garment of sackcloth is the habit of mourning. And every affection of mourning is in weeping. And when, about to raise Lazarus, he weeps, he was mourning the unbelief of the human race: for in the habit of mourning, the affection of weeping is signified. But that he did not weep for Lazarus, in whose death he even rejoices, and whom he was about to raise from the dead, the whole text of the Gospel itself declares.

But since, in the very act of resurrection, he had wept

because there would be no faith in the resurrection; his weeping became a byword, so that he is said to have given at that time a proof of his love toward Lazarus by weeping: and by many today he is charged with weakness because he wept. But in the drunken who sing and those who sit in the gate and detract, the insults of all the weak against him are also taught through this custom of the common people. So manifest is it that no kind of person was silent about him, that Cleophas is written to have answered him, who as if ignorant of events asked the reason for the conversation: Art thou only a stranger in Jerusalem, and hast not known the things that have been done there in these days? For it is astonishing that one person should be ignorant of what all know.

The prayer of Christ.—But amid all these disparagements and insults about himself, he was accomplishing the sacraments of human salvation: and he prays to God for the salvation of the man he had assumed. For there follows,

But as for me, my prayer is to thee, O Lord, for an acceptable time, O God.

In the multitude of thy mercy hear me, in the truth of thy salvation. Draw me out of the mire, that I may not stick fast: deliver me from them that hate me, and out of the deep waters. Let not the tempest of water drown me, nor the deep swallow me up, nor the pit shut her mouth upon me.

While the others were intent upon insults and reproaches against him, he himself is wholly turned to God in his prayer; bearing indeed our infirmities taken upon himself, yet in those things by which he is afflicted he fulfils the gift of heavenly mercy toward us: and taking these things not unwillingly, he shows in the multitude of mercy that the time is well-pleasing to God. In this well-pleasing time, therefore, he prays: because he is not ignorant of this prophecy of the Father concerning himself, acknowledged also by the Apostle Paul: In an accepted time I heard thee.

Evil is nothing of itself, but arises from human vice.

What well-pleasing time has been granted to the world through Christ. All things indeed are to be understood as pleasing to God in respect of the magnificence of the works that have been done: and when it is written in Genesis: And God saw that they were good, no fault is left in the creatures of things.

For even if certain things have been corrupted by the wickedness of human ingenuity—as poisons from remedies, as the sword from iron, as conflagration from fire, as indigestion from food, as drunkenness from wine, as finally the very parts and members of bodies, formed for natural and useful purposes, have lent themselves to the service of vices and crimes—and while all things are pleasing to God, yet this is the well-pleasing time, in which the only-begotten God, in the blood of our body, was to reconcile all things in heaven and on earth to God, as things hostile and at variance: when that manifold Wisdom of God, hidden in other ages and known to none of the princes and magistrates of this world, was to be revealed to the praise of the glory of God; when the nations were to become co-heirs and co-corporeal and co-partakers with Christ; when in him all powers adverse to God were to be put to shame; when death, after it had raged against God, was to cease; when the law of sin which is in our flesh was to be taken away; when all creation, groaning together, was to hope for the revelation of the sons of God; when in the passion of the only-begotten God the effect of all causes and origins established before the foundation of the world was to be consummated—by judging the prince of this world, by redeeming man from the law of sin, by freeing creatures from the vanity of corruption to which they had been subject, by condemning spiritual wickednesses through the death of the Lord, by praising God in all and through all with the gift of eternity and the glory of our immortality.

All these things, moreover, he fulfilled by the power of the resurrection

because through the firstfruits from the dead, death having been driven away from the human race, the penalty of eternal death was decreed against the authors of death. For in himself he triumphed with confidence over principalities and powers put to shame.

The incorruption of Christ and his two natures.

The pit is hell.—And therefore after the signification of the well-pleasing time, the whole prayer is for the granting of true salvation: so that that very truth of salvation might be understood, which is hoped for from the resurrection. Next, he who had been sunk in the mire of the deep prays that he might not cleave to the mud, according to that word: Because thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, nor wilt thou give thy holy one to see corruption. For he who is of the earth, and shall return to the earth from which he was taken, will cleave to the mud and mire in which he is sunk, dissolved into the origin of his own nature, that is, of the body. He also prays to be freed from those who hate him, and from the deep of waters: because the hatred of his persecutors had broken out even to his soul, that is, even to his passion.

Coming also into the depth of the sea, and overwhelmed by the storm, he now prays that he may not be overwhelmed: so that the earlier part is the profession of our infirmity taken upon himself, when he declares himself to have been overwhelmed; but now there is the confidence of salvation consciously present in him, when he prays that the storm of waters may not overwhelm him. For it does not belong to the same nature both to have already been overwhelmed and to pray not to be overwhelmed: but to that nature which, though submerged through the body, is yet not to be held fast through the spirit. And therefore he now prays that he may not be swallowed up by the deep, nor that the pit close its mouth over him.

For that the seat of infernal death is signified by the pit, another psalm also bears witness, when it says: But thou, O Lord, shalt bring them down into the pit of destruction, showing that this sunken and deep place of pits signifies the lower regions of the earth. He asks therefore that the pit may not close its mouth over him. For it is impossible that the God of life should be held fast by the gates of hell.

That Christ bears something beyond the human.

–. And lest, in that he assumed the death of our infirmity, he should grieve over anything of the bitterness of death according to human necessity; he therefore added: Hear me, O Lord, for thy mercy is sweet to me: according to the multitude of thy mercies look upon me. For in the multitude of mercy this is the well-pleasing time, when God, taking pity on the life of all men in himself, was as a merciful God to bestow life from the dead. But because he testified that this mercy of God was sweet to him, he does not relax the solicitude of our infirmity taken upon himself, saying: Turn not away thy face from thy servant: for I am in trouble, hear me speedily. Attend to my soul, and deliver it: rescue me because of my enemies. All things he both suffers and speaks as man.

For from the assumption of flesh he is also a servant, according to that word: Behold my servant whom I have chosen, my beloved in whom my soul is well pleased; and he prays for swift help in his tribulation, and asks that God attend to his soul: so that through God's attending to it, it may be worthy to be delivered. And these things indeed, as our man, obedient unto death of the cross, he prays. But when he asks to be rescued because of his enemies, he exceeds the custom of human hope and manner. For no one who is saved wishes to be so for any reason more than for the cause of his own salvation: and anyone will wish to be rescued from evils for this reason, that he may not be afflicted by evils.

But now he asks to be rescued not for his own sake, but

because of his enemies, from those things by which he is afflicted: because these enemies were soon to be put to shame in him as he suffered, and to be triumphed over with confidence in him as he rose from the dead.

He does and suffers nothing for his own sake. He longs for the passion. The sacrament of divine communion.—Finally he teaches by what follows that he does and suffers nothing for his own sake, saying. For thou knowest my reproach and my confusion and my shame: all they that trouble me are before thee. My heart hath expected reproach and misery. The earlier profession is not unlike this, when he says: O God, thou knowest my foolishness, and my offences are not hidden from thee. For against the error of human opinion, this infirmity assumed by him was known to God alone as assumed rather than natural.

And because these things had to be endured by him for the sake of his enemies, through which he was providing for the salvation and eternity of mankind; he bears witness to the disposition of this well-pleasing time, saying: My heart hath expected reproach and misery; signifying that the sufferings of this time were desired by him, according to that sacrament of divine communion: With desire I have desired to eat this: because in these desires of his passion the effect of the well-pleasing time consisted.

Our faith is the consolation of one who mourns.

Christ is the fullness of the law.—But awaiting suffering for the advancement of our salvation, he was also held by the desire of another expectation. For there follows: And I looked for one that would grieve together with me, and there was none; and for one that would comfort me, and I found none. He seeks not the solace of one grieving with him and comforting him, but his faith: so that if anyone coming from the law, and understanding the prophecy of all these sufferings, might stand with him as at the very consummation of the law itself; as afterwards Paul, filling up the sufferings of Jesus Christ, and buried with him in baptism, knows Christ to be the end of the law. For at the consummation of human sufferings and prophetic words, he who was to be the future end of the deeds is likewise the end of the complaints.

For what follows is this,

they gave me gall for my food, and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink.

For these things were fulfilled exactly as they are read written. For the Gospels testify that both gall was offered to him and that he was given vinegar to drink. Refusing the gall offered according to Matthew; but according to John, he thirsted that he might drink the vinegar. The very passage is stated in these words: "After this Jesus knowing that all things were now accomplished, that the scripture might be fulfilled, said: I thirst; and there was a vessel set there full of vinegar. They therefore putting a sponge full of vinegar upon hyssop, put it to his mouth.

Jesus therefore, when he had taken the vinegar, said: It is consummated." He had come to the lost sheep of the house of Israel, and waiting he had none to grieve with him and comfort him: not that he needed consolation, willing as he was to suffer and die, but one who would grieve with him over the impiety of the whole people, and who would console him with the very salvation of one grieving with him: so that, with all having committed so great a crime, he might receive consolation at least in those who would be saved, according to that word: And he will be comforted in his servants: because Israel not believing, the nations were to believe in him. But it is written prophetically that he did not thirst, but he said that he thirsted that all things might be fulfilled: because all our infirmities which were in him are not natural, but assumed.

Then, that he might be known to have satisfied the prophetic Scripture, having drunk the vinegar he testified that all things were consummated: so that he who was consummating the law and the prophets might be the fullness of the law and the prophets.

The table of sacrifices.

The table of knowledge. The Jews struck with blindness; weighed down under the burden of the law.—Now indeed because within the consummation of the gall offered and the vinegar to be drunk, the prophecy of the whole passion was also to be consummated; the discourse turned to those things which afterwards followed upon the impiety of so great a crime, saying. Let their table become a snare before them, and a recompense, and a stumbling-block. Let their eyes be darkened that they see not, and their back bend thou down always. That there is a table of sacrifices—to say nothing of the law, which has embraced in itself the figure of what was to come—the Apostle has testified, saying: You cannot be partakers of the table of the Lord and of the table of devils.

But that there is also a table of knowledge, as is recognized in several places, so also in these very words it ought to be understood; the same blessed Apostle writing to the Romans is the interpreter, when he testifies that they have been blinded so as to understand nothing.

This table, therefore, from which the food of spiritual life is received, has become before them a snare and a recompense and a stumbling-block: when either the precepts of the law or the words of the prophets are treated by the men of the Church for the revelation of the divine counsel; when the only-begotten God, for faith in the assumption of flesh, is shown in human form both adored by Abraham and wrestling with Jacob; when the prince coming from Judah is announced as the same expectation of the nations; when in the seed of Abraham all the families of the nations are to be blessed; when the Lord of the eternal kingdom is proclaimed from the womb of David; when, according to Isaiah, the Lord led as a sheep to the slaughter turned neither his cheeks from blows nor his face from spitting; when, according to Jeremiah, this is our God, who after delivering all his disciplines to his beloved Israel, was afterwards seen on earth and conversed among men; when finally the words of all the prophets agree concerning his coming.

This table of doctrine, therefore, or this word of living food, is both a snare and a recompense and a stumbling-block: when it is shown by us that the God of Jacob is he who was crucified by them. For this is the recompense of so great impiety, that what is to us the power of God is to them a stumbling-block. For though they are ensnared and caught by the scriptures, they yet lack the sense of understanding: and therefore their eyes have been darkened that they see not, that is, that they might not behold the light of understanding; because according to the Gospel: To every one that hath shall be given; but from him that hath not, even that which he hath shall be taken away: unworthy, that is, to receive the sense and light of understanding; and therefore not having attained the knowledge of evangelical freedom, they are still weighed down by the perpetual burden of the law, so that they bear what they cannot sustain.

For this is signified in the bending of the back, under the figure of bodily works.

The Wrath of God.—But this ignorance of their blinded hearts is followed by yet another punishment of deserved vengeance.

Pour out upon them thy wrath, and let the fury of thy anger take hold of them.

Let their habitation be made desolate, and let there be none to dwell in their tents. We have often treated of how the wrath of God signifies the establishment of punishment, not a movement of the mind inflamed toward the will of vengeance—a punishment which he would not inflict suddenly, but into which one worthy of punishment would fall. Now this condemnation, announced to this people by all the prophets, has remained. For when the city was soon overthrown and demolished, they were destroyed, that most glorious adornment of the temple being abolished and its splendor stripped away. And therefore, with the habitation made desolate, no one dwelt in their tents.

The crime of the Jews and the cause of their punishment.

But further still, in accordance with the increase of their impiety, the prophecy of punishment and vengeance is also extended.

Because they have persecuted him whom thou hast smitten, and they have added to the grief of my wounds. Add iniquity upon their iniquity, and let them not enter into thy justice. Let them be blotted out of the book of the living, and let them not be written with the just. He shows that the cause of adding iniquity upon their iniquity, of repelling them so that they should not enter into justice, and of blotting them out of the book of the living and not writing them with the just, is this: that they persecuted him whom God had smitten, and added to the grief of his wounds what would cause further grief.

Whether one smitten by God is not unjustly smitten.

The smiting of God is merciful.—And perhaps they may seem not to have acted unjustly in persecuting one whom God had smitten. And concerning those things which have been smitten by God, what ought to be thought must first be treated: so that it may be understood how far both this smiting is salutary, and the persecution of the one smitten is impious. The Lord smote Sodom and Gomorrah, defiled and abominated by the worst crimes: and I find that their being smitten has availed twice toward reconciliation to mercy; since it shall be more tolerable for them on the day of judgment than for those cities from which the dust was shaken off the feet of the Apostles. The synagogue of Dathan and Abiron was also smitten with a most deserved plague, as is well known: but in their souls the works in which they had most greatly sinned were sanctified.

And lest I run through each instance, which are many, since even the Apostle delivers one to the destruction of the flesh for the salvation of the spirit; the Lord himself shows what he accomplishes by smiting, saying: See, see that I am he, and there is no God beside me. I will kill, and I will make alive; I will smite, and I will heal: so as to show that the cause of smiting proceeds from the cause of healing.

Christ smitten by God.

He is also smitten by the Jews.—The Lord therefore was smitten, taking upon himself our sins and suffering for us: so that, he being smitten in him even to the weakness of the cross and of death, health might be restored to us through the resurrection from the dead. Moreover he himself testified that he was smitten, reminding his disciples of this saying: I will smite the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock shall be scattered. But the Apostle also confirms the meaning of this saying in no dissimilar manner, saying: Who spared not his own beloved Son. He spared not therefore his own beloved Son: whom he also sent to the tenants of the vineyard, not ignorant that they would kill him.

He had not spared that first Adam formed from the clay of the earth, whom after his fault he cast out of paradise, lest touching the tree of life he should remain in the eternity of punishment: so that the second Adam from heaven, assuming the nature of his body, and being smitten by an equal death, might call it back again into eternal life, now without the eternity of punishment. Him therefore, thus smitten by God, they persecuted, adding the grief of this persecution to the grief of his wounds. For according to the prophet he suffers for us; and therefore they reckoned him to be in sorrows. For what hatred of his name they afterward took up, how they bought the silence of the resurrection with money, with what terrors and injuries they harassed the Apostles, is well known. And because they added these things to the grief of his wounds, iniquity shall be added upon their iniquity.

Therefore the Jews are excluded from the justice of God, blotted out of the book of the living, and not written with the just.—The punishment of the added iniquity is that they should not enter into the justice of God, that is, that they should not become fellow-members and fellow-partakers with Christ, who according to the Apostle has been made unto us justice and sanctification and redemption from God. But being excluded from the entrance of justice, they must necessarily be blotted out of the book of the living. For they had been written in the blessings of Abraham, whose seed should abound as the stars of heaven and as the sand of the sea upon the shore of the sea. From which book, when Moses feared that all the people would be blotted out, he prayed first that he himself might be blotted out, wishing, as I think, according to the Apostle, to be anathema for his brethren.

And because, by adding the grief of persecution to the grief of his wounds, they lost the recourse of repentance, blotted out of the book of the living, they did not deserve to be written thereafter with the just: so that it may be understood that the book of the living is one, and the book of the just is another. And it is not doubtful that those are in the book of the living who previously, without any knowledge of Christ, lived piously in the law and fulfilled all the precepts of the law: of whom according to the law the Apostle Paul taught thus: Because he that doeth those things shall live in them. But they are written in the book of the just for whom Christ has been made justice. For the just man lives by faith. Concerning which book the Lord speaks thus to the Apostles, saying: Rejoice and be glad, because your names are written in heaven.

And therefore there was a twofold significance of being blotted out of the book of the living and of not being written in the book of the just: because after the book of the living there would remain the further book of the just. Moreover, to the Apostles a cause of great rejoicing is here suggested: because it is a greater thing to be written in the book of the just than not to be blotted out of the book of the living.

In Christ there is a twofold nature; the human was received through glory into the divine.—Now he holds within himself that manner of confession which ought to be in us by faith, so that in him both the nature of man and the nature of God may be known. For coming in the form of a servant, he emptied himself of the form of God. For how could one who remained in the form of God exist in the form of man? But the form of God could not be abolished so that there should be only the form of a servant.

For he is both the one who empties himself from the form of God and the one who assumes the form of man: because neither is that emptying from the form of God the destruction of the heavenly (divine) nature, nor is the assumption of the form of a servant a nature of genuine origin and condition, as it were; since that which was assumed is not an interior property but an exterior addition: which he himself teaches in what follows, saying,

I am poor and sorrowful; and the salvation of thy countenance, O God, hath taken me up.

He is poor who, according to the Apostle, though he was rich in all things, made himself poor that we might be enriched: he is sorrowful who according to the prophet suffers for us. But this poor and sorrowful one was taken up by that salvation which is the countenance of God. Form and countenance and face and image do not differ. For it is the common understanding that the same thing is signified by either of these.

This poor one therefore the salvation of the countenance of God, which is the form of God, took up, that is, the only-begotten God, who is the image of the invisible God, placed the man assumed by himself in the life of his own eternity, which is understood to exist in God alone. For every tongue shall confess that the Lord Jesus is in the glory of God the Father, that is, the assumed man received into the nature of divinity.

The sacrifice of praise in Christ; it is preferred to the victims of the law.—Moreover, that in him is the end of the law and the sacrifice of praise is the evangelical confession: so that, with the blood of victims and oblation ceasing, the sacrifice of grace and praise is set before them. For upon this poor and sorrowful one being received into the salvation of the countenance and form of God, this continues and follows,

I will praise thy name with a canticle, I will magnify him with praise.

And it shall please God above a young calf that bringeth forth horns and hoofs. This praise of the name of God therefore, and the magnification of his praise, shall please above a young calf. For such a one was formerly offered in the law for sin; whose age he signifies through the tender growth of hoofs and horns.

The honor of praise shall therefore please above the calf of sin; according to that saying, The sacrifice of praise shall glorify me, and there is the way by which I will show him the salvation of God. The way therefore of showing the salvation of God is in the sacrifice of praise.

The cause of our salvation.—And the psalm itself shows this in what follows.

For after the magnificence of praise that shall please above a young calf, it added,

Let the poor see and rejoice.

Seek God, and your soul shall live: because the Lord hath heard the poor, and hath not despised his prisoners. Let those who see rejoice at this time, whose sacrifice is in praise: because there the salvation of God shall be shown. And therefore God shall be sought by these for the life of the soul. For he forbade fearing the judge of flesh and body: because God alone is able to cast the soul into hell.

The cause of seeking God for the life of the soul is this

because God heard the poor one, namely him who made himself poor that we might be enriched, whom he received into the salvation of his countenance, in whom he forgave us our sins; not despising his prisoners, whether those who are prisoners of Christ, as Paul glories in his chains, or those whom Satan, armed and mighty, held bound by sins; according to that saying: Thou hast broken my bonds, to thee will I offer a sacrifice of praise. Let the poor therefore rejoice in what they see: because it is written: Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

All created things praise God for our salvation.—And

because, with those who are poor in spirit established in the kingdom of heaven, all creation groaning and travailing together is to be freed in the glory of the sons of God, subjected to vanity not of its own will; now also on account of the rejoicing poor and those seeking life, and the poor one who was heard, and the prisoners who were not despised, that very creation itself, awaiting the revelation of the glory of the poor, is called to the praise of God,

Let the heavens and the earth praise him, the sea and all things that creep therein: signifying under the mention of these elements the sense and mind of all creatures that are to be freed: so that while heaven and earth and sea are named, it may be known that things celestial and terrestrial and infernal bow the knee to the Lord Jesus Christ.

For in those things which creep in the sea (though among water-creatures swimming is more natural than creeping), those which dwell in the lower regions are taught; since we understand the depth of the sea to be the abode of hell.

The cause of praise: the praise of heaven.

The fruitfulness of earth.—Now the reason why heaven and earth and sea should still praise God he shows by saying,

Because the Lord will save Sion, and the cities of Judah shall be built. And they shall dwell therein, and shall inherit the land. And the seed of his servants shall possess it, and they who love his name shall dwell therein. All praise proceeds from the admiration of things. For something is seen to be worthy of praise when the work itself is so magnificent and illustrious that it contains both the wisdom and power of the one who performs it, and the glory and usefulness of the things performed. Therefore that which surpasses the sense and opinion of common understanding merits, through admiration of itself, also praise.

Heaven therefore which is adorned and filled with such great splendor, and preserves such great motions and courses with incredible constancy and variety, so as to regulate and bound the year between winter and summer's heat through the tempered seasons of autumn and spring. The earth moreover, which, overshadowed by the powers above, either embracing within itself or receiving in its bosom seeds, both contains and nourishes and makes them fruitful, and according to the nature of each kind consolidates them through use and ripeness. The sea moreover, which, after the manner of our life, is animated and sustained now by breath drawn in, now by breath breathed out, and regulates its motion in such great variety of itself by the principles of the waxing and waning of the moon, and surpasses the depth and infinity of itself by a barrier that exceeds the mind of human opinion, so that we can grasp by pursuing sense neither what is outside it nor what is within.

Yet amid such great and so admirable powers of things and natures, shall heaven, earth, and seas praise God for this—that Sion is saved, and the cities of Judah are to be built?—works of human hands, perishable, and destined to be dissolved by time itself and old age. But if it be worthy of praise that they were built so as to exist, would it not contribute more to praise that they were preserved so as not to be destroyed?

All things are not stirred to praise God on account of Sion or earthly cities.—Therefore these natures of sea, earth, and heaven—the greatest and most excellent of all things, or rather those by which all things are contained and nourished—are not summoned to praise works that are nearly empty and trivial: that is, because Sion has been saved, and the cities of Judah have been built, which after the victory of the Babylonians and Antiochus, the war of the Roman king would also consume. Furthermore, the knowledge and reason common to all things condemns this very poor and impious interpretation. For the prophetic word declares that the cities of Judah are built for this purpose, that they may dwell in Sion which has been saved. And what place is there here for understanding according to human constructions and the building of cities?

Since there is no praise at all in building those which are afterwards to be destroyed, nor does reason and nature allow that cities be built for the purpose that they (the cities themselves, that is) may dwell in a city.

Sion: contemplation.

Sion: the glorious body of Christ.—But there is praise plainly worthy of God, to be rendered by the confession of heaven, earth, and sea: that that daughter of Sion, who was brought into Jerusalem with so great a company going before and following after, has been saved through God—she into whom Angels desire to look, toward whom all creation groaning and grieving looks forward, in whom we contemplate the glory and praise of our eternity, in whom the cities of the churches that have been built shall abide. For Sion, although it be a hill joined to the temple that was in Jerusalem, yet according to the interpretation from Hebrew into Latin and Greek speech is called contemplation. In this body of the Lord therefore, which rose from the dead, which sat down at the right hand of power, which is in the glory of God the Father, we contemplate our hope and life.

And because all creation, itself also to be set free into the same, awaits the revelation of our glory in him; it praises the salvation of this Sion under the figure of heaven and earth and sea: because all things in heaven and on earth have been pacified and reconciled through it to God (Colos. I, 20), because in the glory of resurrection—the hope of which we contemplate in him rising from the dead—sin, death, and corruption have been swallowed up and drained away by life and immortality. For if over the repentance of one sinner there is great joy in heaven among the Angels: how much greater joy shall there be at the reconciliation of the whole world?

The cities of Judah: the Church, not the Synagogue.—And

because the psalm is for the end, for those who shall be changed: the cities of Judah also are praised as destined to be built, so that they might dwell in Sion. And who would doubt that cities themselves are assemblies of men? But it is well known that the Church is formed from the assembly of peoples. In this Sion therefore, which embraces within itself also that city of the firstborn enrolled in heaven, our habitation is accomplished—we who, as the seed of Abraham, so also remain the seed of Judah. For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly in the flesh, but he who is one inwardly in the spirit.

For which reason in our assemblies we are also cities of Judah.—And lest impious Israel should claim for itself the glory of the city of Judah, on the ground that it is according to the flesh the seed of the servants of God; he shows that the inheritance, the habitation in Sion, belongs to those who love the name of the Lord; so that the election is one of piety rather than of lineage: because the love of God which is in Christ surpasses all things; and our Lord Jesus Christ the Son of God, who is blessed unto all ages of ages, asks Peter nothing other than whether he loves him. Amen.

For the end. A Psalm of David, in remembrance, because the Lord saved me.

O Lord God, attend to my help; O Lord, make haste to help me.

Let them be confounded and ashamed who seek my soul. Let them be turned backward and blush who wish me evil. Let them be turned away immediately blushing, who say to me: Well done, well done. Let all who seek thee, O Lord, exult and rejoice in thee, and let those who love thy salvation say always, Let the Lord be magnified. But I am needy and poor: O God, help me. Be thou my helper and my deliverer, O Lord, do not delay.

Concerning what the prayer of remembrance is made.

What is sought in this psalm.—

This is another psalm in remembrance: for the thirty-seventh has the same inscription. From the very meaning of this word and its common usage, we are taught what is to be understood as prescribed in remembrance. For the prayer of remembrance befits one who fears that he may fall into forgetfulness on the part of him from whom he seeks either help or pardon: and who desires either that a remembrance of himself be made for his salvation, or of those who are always hostile to him for their punishment. And indeed in the earlier psalm of this same superscription, pardon and salvation were treated: which consists entirely in the person of the Lord grieving for us and bearing our sins. But in this one the necessity of seeking pardon has not been left aside: because the preceding psalm, which is contiguous to this one, was concluded with the praise of Sion saved and the cities of Judah built.

But in it there is remembrance of vengeance upon the impious, and of retribution upon the saints.

And because the psalm is for the end not of that David but in that David; according to the principle set forth in earlier psalms from the property of the name, it shall be treated from the person of the Lord, as shall be known from the very end of the psalm.

That Christ prays in it.—

O Lord God, attend to my help.

This is a voice of devout confession, to hope for help from the Lord and God: but the word signifies here now more than is customary in prayers of hoping for aid. For he who has been placed as a help over the mighty one may seem to be praying now that the help into which he has been placed may be attended to. And who this is, is not in doubt from the psalm in which it is written: I have laid help upon one that is mighty, and I have exalted one chosen out of my people. I have found David my servant. And lest anything in that David could be referred to Jesse, he added: And I will make him my firstborn, high above the kings of the earth.

And lest

because he is firstborn, this could be drawn toward the firstfruits of the kingdom granted to him by God; he shows what would be proper to the Lord Jesus Christ alone, saying: And his throne shall be as the sun before me, and as the moon perfect it shall endure for ever, and as a faithful witness in heaven.

The punishment of the adversaries of Christ.—Now therefore he who has been placed as a helper against the mighty one, and who prays that he may be attended to in his help, demands punishment upon those who are adverse to him, saying,

Let them be confounded and ashamed who seek my soul: Let them be turned backward and blush who devise evil against me.

Let them be turned away immediately blushing, who say to me, Well done, well done. The divine word is to be weighed by the words of our human speech. Shame and confusion arise from disgrace; turning away arises from repulsion; but return is not to other places so much as to those from which one has departed. Those therefore who seek the soul of this holy one who prays that his help may be attended to, shall first be confounded, then also turned away, then turned away not to other places but backward. And the order of the words is the same as the order of the events.

For they shall be confounded by seeking his soul, when, having slain him, they shall know that he lives: because God is the Lord of life and resurrection. Then afterwards they shall be turned away, so as not to meet the saints caught up in the clouds to meet Christ Finally, turned away not to other places but backward. For rising from the dead, they shall return again to the judgment of punishment and vengeance in the lowest parts of the earth from which they had emerged. For all flesh shall rise, but not all shall be changed: and it is appointed that each one receive in the flesh, whether good or evil, according to what he has done. Therefore both those who seek the soul of the just one, and those who devise evil, and those who say well done, well done, shall both be confounded and turned away and turned back—confounded by the resurrection, repelled from the meeting, recalled to the depths.

Now well done, well done is the voice of those who mock, namely those who said: He saved others, himself he cannot save.

The reward of those who seek God.

God in need of nothing. Who is magnified by us.—But after this prayer concerning the impious, because the psalm was one of remembrance, prayer had also to be made for the hopes of the saints. For there follows,

Let all who seek thee exult and rejoice in thee, and let those who love thy salvation say always, Let the Lord be magnified.

As confusion and shame belong to those who seek the soul of the just one, so exultation and joy belong to those who seek God: because according to the prophet some shall rise to confusion, others to joy. And as those who devise evil, who say well done, well done, shall be turned backward blushing; so those who love the salvation of God advance to the confession of the magnificence of God: so that from the grace of the exultation granted to them by God, the confession of praise may be increased.

For God, who is the same and eternal, is in need of nothing, nor is there anything in the natures of things and the opinions of minds which he awaits. For that which is capable of change by increase is often changed also by decrease. But God, who is himself the origin and cause of things that beget, sufficient to himself for the nature of eternal blessedness, leaves nothing outside himself that he might lack, so as to await it from elsewhere. But he is magnified among us through the increase of his benefits, when his magnificence is accumulated both by the sense and enjoyment of our advantages and by the praise of thanksgiving rendered. Therefore as often as we say let him be magnified, it is either a vow of a gift to be sought for us from God, or a confession of one received and obtained, with the praise of his magnificence arising among us through the increase of our advantages.

That the Psalm befits Christ, not David.—It was fitting that the psalm, which is one of remembrance for the end, should be concluded with an ending worthy of the remembrance itself. For there follows,

But I am needy and poor: O God, help me.

My helper and my deliverer art thou, O Lord, do not delay. The profession of poverty and want befits neither the dignity of a king nor the wealth of a kingdom; but it is the voice of him who made himself poor that we might be rich, and is ours, as also the very context of the discourse. In the preceding: for God who is eternal is in need of nothing. For whom not even for the Passover supper was there a house unless one sought out and borrowed another's. He asks therefore to be helped. For in the form of a servant he became obedient even unto the death of the cross.

He also prays for swift aid that he may be delivered; lest there be any slowness of remembrance: he who, not even enduring those very delays of the passion, said to the betrayer: Do what you do quickly. While our Lord Jesus Christ hastens to be delivered, by the power of a timely resurrection, from the weakness of the flesh assumed in himself, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

The Law profited by faith rather than by effect.—It is good to give thanks to the Lord, and to sing praise to thy name, O Most High, and the rest.

After the times of the Law and the knowledge of truth, it is fitting to contemplate the body itself rather than the shadow of the body. For the Law embraces the form of those things which were to be fulfilled in our Lord Jesus Christ. Not truth itself, but the meditation of truth in it, useful by faith rather than by effect, by imitation rather than by kind. For those things which were commanded to be observed were not profitable by the power of their own efficacy, but were salutary by the faith of those observing them, such as the varieties of sacrifices, and the rites of burnt offerings, and the care of circumcision, and the rest of the sabbath.

For all these things both incurred guilt when omitted, and when performed under faith in things to come were profitable, as the blessed Apostle says: But before faith came, we were kept under the law, shut up unto that faith which was to be revealed. Therefore the law was our schoolmaster in Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster; for ye are all children of faith. Therefore as often as something from the law is read, in the work of present commandments, a mirror of things to come is to be contemplated.

And indeed it would have been fitting to bring forward a reason for each of the matters treated above in turn; so that according to the teaching of the Apostle all things might be understood to have profited by faith in things to come rather than by the power of their own efficacy: yet lest all things gathered together into one should bring to the hearers not so much knowledge as a burden, let us take up again one part from the foregoing, and that one namely which is necessary for the occasion, that is, the sabbath day; because the psalm is so inscribed, A Psalm of Song on the sabbath day: so that when, through the authority of the heavenly Scriptures, we have come to know what reason is contained in the rest of the sabbath, we may perceive the like efficacy of the other things also which are in the law.

The Jewish Sabbath.

Another is sung in the Psalms.—And indeed many precepts have been given concerning the rest of this day. For on it the Lord rested after the completion of the solidity of this world: for it is written, And God rested on the seventh day from all his works which he had begun to make. And again this same day is sanctified in the law, to such a degree that all work is forbidden to be done, as it is written in Exodus: Remember the sabbath day to keep it holy: six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy works; but the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: thou shalt do no manner of work on that day. For the Greek text and the context itself commend it.

Therefore on the sabbath there is both the rest of God and the idleness of men. But what will this profit us with regard to the psalm, in which the work of God is joy, and his thoughts are deep, and the sinner is to spring up like grass, and the just man to flourish like a palm tree and to be multiplied like a cedar? Here no rest of the seventh day, no idleness from human works is sung. Therefore, because the psalm contains nothing concerning the rest of this sabbath, the proper character of the rest and of the sabbath which is prescribed in the law must be sought in the psalms. We read therefore, said of the ungodly, As I swore in my wrath, if they shall enter into my rest. God confirms by the solemnity of an oath that they shall not enter into his rest: he does not signify, as I suppose, the rest of this sabbath, in which after the building of the world he is written to have rested.

For all Jews, glorying in this day, enter into the solemnity and joy of it, among whom it is necessary that many live and act in sins: for they honour this day as a kind of testimony of God's condescension toward them. If therefore this is the day of God's rest, which be it said with reverence, then God is already a liar, since those who are contumacious against him, who are parricides against the Son, obtain the rest of this day.

God does not cease to work.—Furthermore, since it was commanded to all absolutely, without any exception, to do no work but to rest in idleness; how again did the Lord dissolve the sabbath, saying, Know ye not that the priests in the temple violate the sabbath, and are without blame? Therefore this is not the rest of the sabbath, nor is this its idleness; since when those who do not rest on the sabbath are accursed [lacuna] receiving under the law the confirmation of its firmness.

If the sun and the other heavenly bodies complete their courses, and have from him the substance of continuing in those states in which they are, from whom they were composed for these courses and these offices: if the earth brings forth its fruits, taking day by day the material of its fruitfulness, through which a certain nature of fertility is subjected to it according to the succession of seasons: if daily the origins of souls and the formations of bodies proceed by the hidden and unknown working of divine power: and it is a great thing to perceive the gifts of so great a bounty, even though the manner of their institution be unknown. But even if these are the work of God, yet in them there is no labour. And although they have from their author and giver the fact that they are such, yet they do not weary him from whom they sprang and through whom they are daily such.

And indeed these are great works of God: to hold the heavens together, to give light through the sun with the other stars, to supply the growth of the earth's seed, to strengthen man, to restore the soul: but works far greater than these have been accomplished. For Moses narrated only the creations of divisible things to the untrained minds of men, setting forth for the knowledge of God those things which could be understood and seen: so that through the greatness of these visible works the power of him who wrought might be known; so that the authority of the Creator might be understood through the admiration of the creature.

But Paul the interpreter of the Testament, offering not the food of milk but of bread, handed down concerning the Lord as follows: Who is the image of God, the firstborn of every creature

because in him all things were established in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether Thrones, or Dominions, or Principalities, or Powers, all things were made in him and through him, and he is before all, and all things consist in him. The teacher of the Gentiles therefore draws us from knowable matter into the understanding of invisible things, and leads us from earthly and lowly things to the knowledge of principalities and powers and thrones and dominions. But these things by the nod of God the Father both in heaven and on earth abide and exist: and although all things are through the Son, yet all things are from God.

For he is the head and beginning of all things, and in him all things were founded; although afterwards he brought forth each individual thing from the treasures stored up in himself, according to the will of eternal power. But since Christ works in all things, yet the work belongs to him who works in Christ; and therefore, My Father, he says, works until now, and I work, teaching that he wills nothing other than what he wills who sent him. Therefore the Son looks upon the will of the Father as a pattern of his working; because all things are formed within the providence of the Father's thoughts by a certain predestination of things to come. He looks upon it moreover through mutual love and nature: for he says, The Father loveth the Son, and showeth him all things that he himself doeth. Thus it is open to this God, who is born of God, to know his will; and to him, who has begotten in the Son the knowledge of his will, it is a kindness.

But that we may understand more fully what the work of God is, and how the Father working works and the Son, we ought to know the origin of this saying. For among the other healings by which the Lord in the flesh of man taught that he was God, showing the power of invisible virtue over visible matter, he found in the pool of the portico of Solomon a paralytic of thirty-eight years waiting for the help of someone by whom he might be carried to the movement of the water stirred by an Angel. Now this was both useful in time and in the man of power, so that when the spring of the pool was stirred, he who had first entered the waters might escape every infirmity by which he was afflicted! And these things were both profitable for the effects of present things, and figured as a mirror of things to come, since at the Angel's call to the waters there was ready abolition of all diseases.

This paralytic therefore the Lord, when he saw him on the sabbath day, heals by a word, effecting the salvation of the sick man by a command. He says therefore to the paralytic: Rise, take up thy bed, and walk. Now the paralytic was made not only healthy, but also fit to bear a burden. The Jews accuse the paralytic of violating the sabbath, saying: It is the sabbath, it is not lawful for thee to take up thy bed. To whom he answered, He that made me whole, he said to me, Take up thy bed and walk; setting forth the same author of his deed as of his salvation; so that guilt of violating the sabbath might not be thought able to proceed from him in whose word the restoration of the human body had consisted. Therefore because the Lord had healed the paralytic on the sabbath, where the veneration of the deed ought to have followed, there the hatred of all the Jews is stirred up.

To whom the Lord answered: My Father worketh until now, and I work.

The equality of the Father and the Son.—But here there arises a more grievous indignation at the violation, as they supposed, of the sabbath

because he said that God was his Father, making himself equal to God. But whence comes this pain to the Jews? For he did not speak thus, God is my Father. But truth brought force to bear, and reason extorted confession from the unwilling; for the works declared him to be equal to God. They are angry at what they do not hear, and are unwilling to suffer what they cannot be ignorant of; and they hate in Christ what they are compelled to understand. In what then does the work of the Father consist? In that, namely, which the Son does: for he says, The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father doing. He did not take away power from himself; but bound himself by obedience to the will of the Father.

For he does not say in bare words, The Son cannot do, but he added, of himself anything except what he seeth the Father doing. Therefore what he does is service: because he does nothing of himself, but what he has seen; the ministry coming from example, not of work, but of will; because the work of the Father is in the will. For the Lord says, I came not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me, teaching that he wills nothing other than what he wills who sent him. Therefore the Son looks upon the will of the Father as a pattern of his working; because all things are formed within the providence of the Father's thoughts by a certain predestination of things to come. He looks upon it moreover through mutual love and nature: for he says, The Father loveth the Son, and showeth him all things that he himself doeth.

Thus it is open to this God, who is born of God, to know his will; and to him, who has begotten in the Son the knowledge of his will, it is a kindness.

God works on the sabbath.—Therefore to the sabbath day, from which the hatred was stirred up, the answer was given, My Father worketh until now, and I work. Is there therefore a work of God on the sabbath? There plainly is: for unless there were, the heavens would fall apart, the light of the sun would fail, the earth would not stand, the increase of all fruits would cease; the lives of men would perish, if by the law of the sabbath the constitution of all powers were to rest. But there is no rest, and the course is the same, and as on the six days, so also on the sabbath the offices of all the elements are maintained. Therefore in all time the Father works through these things; but he works in the Son, because the Son is from him; and through whom all these things are his work, who works these things in himself as he works: and the work of the ministry is referred back to the work of the author.

And so the Son worked in the paralytic, as in the others, on the sabbath: and through the Son the work of the Father is on the sabbath: and thus there is no rest in God, since no day is without work for God.

The Rest of God.—Since therefore the works of God stand forth, what his rest is must be sought.

The work of God, then, is the work of Christ; but also the rest of God is God Christ: because all things that belong to God are so truly in him that the Father rests in them. For the Perfect is from the Perfect, because, as the Apostle says, all things hold together in him. And as he himself testified, As the Father has life in himself, so also he has given to the Son to have life in himself; and again the Apostle says: Because in him dwells all the fullness of divinity bodily. Therefore what is in him, or what is through him, is perfect, and what subsists and abides no longer needs or awaits anything from elsewhere, but rests in the love and power of the Father. So also in the Son there is life, such that although he is born from the Father, he yet exists in that life in which the Father also lives.

For in him they established the principles of all things that were thereafter to be created; and contemplating all things in him, he took delight when all things were consummated through him: since he both rested in the Son as creator, and rejoiced in those things which were created as worthy of a beloved Son. Hence that passage in Proverbs: When he prepared the heavens, I was there. And, I was with him ordering all things: he rejoiced with me when he was glad in the finished work. This is the rest in which the Father rejoices, which also the impious shall not enter, as is confirmed by the seal of the sacrament. There is also to be understood as a rest for the Lord Jesus Christ those things which are invisible: Thrones, Dominions, Principalities, Powers—for all these remain incorrupt, unwearied, perpetual. And therefore rest is to be reckoned in them, because, eternity having been granted, one rests in their perfect creations.

The rest of the just, and to whom it lies open.—It must be understood how the pious and those subject to God will be able to enter into the rest which the impious shall not enter: for it is necessary that the hope denied to the wicked be left to the good. But if Christ is the rest of God, then those who shall be in Christ will be in the rest of God.

Now the Apostle cries out that he wishes to be in Christ, saying: But I press on, if I may apprehend, in whom also I have been apprehended: and again, But all things I have counted as loss, and I reckon them as dung, that I may gain Christ: and again, Blessed be the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, in whom he chose us before the foundation of the world in him, that we should be holy and blameless before him in love: who predestined us beforehand for adoption through Christ in him; because the Word was made flesh; because when we were once alienated and enemies in mind through evil deeds, we have now been reconciled in the body of his flesh.

Therefore through the union of the flesh assumed we are taken up into Christ: and this is the mystery of God hidden from ages and generations in God, which has now been revealed to his saints, that we are co-heirs and co-corporeal and co-partakers of his promise in Christ. The way into Christ therefore lies open to all through the union of the flesh, if they put off the old man, and nail him to his cross, and are buried with him in his baptism unto life from the things they formerly did; and that they may enter into fellowship with the flesh of Christ, they nail the flesh with its vices and concupiscences. For he will configure bodies of this kind in the transformation of his body, and will transfer their lowliness into the glory of his flesh—those who, crushing all the stings of desires and washing away the filth of pleasures through the sacrament of new birth, remember that they bear not their own flesh, but Christ's.

What must be prepared beforehand.—Now this is the perfect sabbath, this the true rest, for which, after the manner of the worldly sabbath, we are commanded to prepare all the necessities of life on the day before. For the Jews, according to the precept of the law, on the day that precedes the sabbath prepare all things necessary for the sabbath; and all food and drink must be provided, prepared, and stored beforehand; not understanding that in this the shadow of a future truth is shown. For just as, in order to obtain the leisure of the sabbath, the duties of the preceding day must be doubled (for what is needful both for that day itself and for the sabbath must be attended to); so also for us who await the eternal sabbaths, the things by which we may enjoy them there must be prepared through the business of the present life—necessary now, but destined to purchase the rest of the sabbath.

Therefore, lest we be shut out from the rest of this sabbath—that is, as we showed above, from fellowship with Christ and the angels—and also from the mystery of God; we must labor and merit, and through diligence in prior works the rest of eternity must be prepared: by vigils of prayer, by frequent reading, by voluntary fasting, by the tranquility of humility, by works of goodness, by the brightness of chastity, by the virtue of patience. These things must be prepared on the day before for the leisure of the eternal sabbath; so that when the weakness of our corruption has been transformed into heavenly glory, the will may not desire vice, nor ambition glory, nor pride honor, nor labor rest, nor the body food, nor the weariness of day desire the sleep of night: but there may be for us an eternal light, a wakeful life, a common use of good things, a heavenly satisfaction in the word of God, and an eternal hymn of praise to God and with the choirs of angels.

This is the reward of faith, this is the glory of bodily resurrection, in which nothing is to be desired, because nothing is to be lacked; nothing to be striven after through envy, because life is to be lived in communion; nothing to be grieved over through any weakness, nor to be grown through age, because it is to endure in immortality. But rather the devil is to be burned, and all evil destroyed, and the flower of our eternity obtained. For the rest of this sabbath, therefore, the Son gives thanks to God the Father. This is sung in his person at the end; this, as we shall learn from the interpretation of the individual

is celebrated with the immortality of men having been won.

This psalm hands down the elements of a pious life.—Those who are being prepared for the teaching of rational and perfect wisdom must be instructed from the very first elements of letters: so that they may attain perfect and true reason as from the beginning of their first formation. The holy Apostle Paul, knowing this, that the only truly useful doctrine of the word of God is the wisdom which would begin from the beginnings of age and from the very outset of infancy, so that the other members might respond somewhat better, writes these things to Timothy among the great and illustrious commendations of faith and zeal in the second epistle: But you, continue in the things which you have learned and believed, knowing from whom you have learned them, and that from infancy you have known the sacred scriptures, which are able to instruct you unto salvation.

This has been said on account of the present psalm, in which, since the knowledge of truth was to be set forth for the instruction of human ignorance, the order of teaching has been distributed through the very beginnings of letters and elements. For according to the letters of the Hebrews, individual letters are placed before individual groups of eight

Now the total number of

is one hundred and seventy-six.

For since all Hebrew speech is composed of twenty-two letters, and individual letters unfold eight

each, this number of

is completed by multiplication into eight parts.

I therefore consider this to have been the reason why the order of this entire psalm runs through the letters: so that just as children and the unlearned and those being trained to read would first come to know through these the elements of letters by which words are woven together for them; so also human ignorance might be instructed in morals, in discipline, in the knowledge of God through this singular octenary number of letters, as through the very beginnings of childlike teaching.

The grace of God is necessary for receiving teaching.—For it is arduous and most difficult for a man, through himself or through the teachers of the world, to attain the reason of heavenly precepts: nor does the weakness of our nature admit of being instructed in divine institutions except through the grace of him who gave these very things. For those who simply read whatever falls into their hands suppose that there is no difference in words, no difference in names, no difference in things. But if ordinary conversational speech does not allow that under different designations of things different meanings are not to be understood; do we really believe that the utterances of God are so unskilled, so confused, that they either labored under a poverty of words to use, or were ignorant of the kinds of distinctions?

Law, precepts, judgments.

Are different things.—For many, when they hear of law, justification, precepts, testimonies, judgments—all of which Moses arranged under the distinct force proper to each kind—suppose them to be one and the same thing: not knowing that law is one thing, justification another, precept another, testimony another, judgment another; that these differ and diverge greatly from one another is witnessed to us by the eighteenth psalm, in which the property of each designation and kind is contained. For the law of the Lord is unspotted, converting souls. The testimony of the Lord is faithful, giving wisdom to little ones. The justices of the Lord are right, rejoicing hearts. The commandment of the Lord is lightsome, enlightening eyes. The fear of the Lord is holy, enduring for ever and ever. The judgments of the Lord are true, justified in themselves.

There are therefore distinctions in each and every thing: and it belongs to a prudent and understanding man to discern in what is written where law is established, where precept, where testimony, where justifications, where judgments: lest what the prophetic word distinguished with the wonderful property of each thing, the weakness of our ignorance confound with the uninstructed opinion of inexperience. And so through the individual letters this greatest and most copious of all psalms has distinguished all these things: so that through these elements of words the reason and distinction of the teaching of believing and living and being instructed in the Lord might be taught.

Bare faith does not suffice, nor does natural uprightness.

How complete the number eight is.—Many, however, suppose that simplicity of faith can suffice for the full hope of eternity: as though innocence according to the judgment of the world has no need of the institutions of heavenly teaching. And because the matter stands otherwise, therefore the knowledge of living innocently in God, and of remaining religiously in innocence, has now been set forth with great abundance of prophetic speech; because it is difficult for anyone through himself—that is, through the institutions of the world—to attain this knowledge of religious innocence and the true practice of a pious and innocent life. The Apostle also knew human nature to be weak of itself for grasping this knowledge of living. For when he was teaching about the gifts and graces of God, after he had first set forth the word of wisdom, he immediately subjoined the word of knowledge.

For this gift of knowledge following after wisdom is from God: because the use of wisdom is perfected in the use of knowledge.

There arises for us in the present psalm also this difficulty, that whereas we have received only two psalms written through the Hebrew letters—namely the hundred and tenth and the hundred and eleventh—in such a way that from the first to the twenty-second letter the number of

corresponded according to the Hebrews, and individual

began from the beginnings of individual elements: in this psalm now individual elements obtain eight

each. But since all the precepts of living, believing, and pleasing God are contained in the psalm, all the beginnings of the letters are contained in that number which, chiefly according to the full and religious virtue of that same number, is the first of all numbers perfect by the equality of its parts converging upon itself from every side.

For first it is equal through two parts into parts of itself, then again it agrees through four equal parts: so that the virtues of the psalms which are placed in this number, whether in its singular or multiplied form, may teach that the fullness of this number is holy and religious. Now this number is also holy in the law. For it was commanded that one who was born should receive the sign of circumcision on the eighth day. This same principle was observed in the circumcision of the Lord: and in this number of days, though he himself had no need of circumcision, he was presented in the temple, that in his body the weakness of human flesh might be cut away. This number also purifies all kinds of cattle so that they may be held worthy for sacrifices; for they are commanded to be offered on the eighth day. And in this number, in the days of the flood, the origin of the human race is again chosen.

The consummation therefore of our teaching and instruction is now enclosed under the completeness of this perfect number through the individual elements: before which number neither was there a clean offering to God, nor was anyone received into the family of the race without circumcision, and from which the beginning of a generation to be renewed again commenced. These therefore are the

of the first letter.

Blessed are the undefiled in the way, who walk in the law of the Lord.

Blessed are they who search his testimonies, who seek him with their whole heart. For they that work iniquity have not walked in his ways. Thou hast commanded thy commandments to be kept exceedingly. O that my ways were directed to keep thy justifications. Then shall I not be confounded, when I shall look upon all thy commandments. I will praise thee with uprightness of heart, in that I have learned the judgments of thy justice. I will keep thy justifications: forsake me not utterly. Forgetting, but stretching himself forth to those things which are before. And so he who travels this way is blessed, who, with forgetfulness of things past, is stretched out in hope toward things to come. And what way it is in which each one walking is blessed, the Lord teaches, saying: I am the way.

Whoever therefore shall have persevered in his commandments, this man is blessed: while he restrains the vices of the flesh, while he tames the wantonness of the mind, while he overcomes the hunger of avarice, while he avoids the glory of earthly honors. He therefore who shall have remained in these things, this man is undefiled in the way, and walking in the law of the Lord.

3. The Law of God Versus the Law of Sin

The law of God and the law of sin.—Moreover that addition by which it is said, in the law of the Lord, is not idle. For there is also a law of sin, of which the blessed Apostle says, I see another law in my members warring against the law of my mind, and leading me captive into the law of sin. Therefore because there was also a law of sin, for this reason it is called the law of the Lord. For unless there were also an exterior law, the prophetic word would not have said the law of the Lord with the addition of a distinguishing qualifier.

4. The General Sense of the Word Law

The law in general.—The next

then is of the first letter: Blessed are they who search his testimonies, and seek him with their whole heart.

In the first

it is, Who walk in the law of the Lord: in the second, Who search his testimonies; in the fourth, because the third supplied a supplement to the second, concerning commandments it says, Thou hast commanded thy commandments to be kept exceedingly: in the fifth concerning justification, that my ways were directed to keep thy justifications: in the sixth again concerning the effects of commandments, I shall not be confounded, when I look upon all thy commandments: in the seventh concerning judgments, I will praise thee, O Lord, with uprightness of heart, in that I have learned thy judgments: in the eighth concerning justification, I will keep thy justifications, forsake me not utterly. If therefore law is one thing, commandment another, judgment another, justification another, testimony another, it is necessary that we pray to him who established and ordained all these things for the grace and gift of understanding.

All of this, however, is called law in common.

But there is something particular among these things, which has in itself the proper designation of law.

5. The Law as Shadow, the Commandment Defined

The law a shadow of things to come.

What a commandment is.—What therefore is the law? A shadow, namely, as the Apostle says, of things to come: which is written nowhere of the rest, namely that justification, or testimonies, or commandments should be a shadow of things to come: but this alone is proper to the law, as the Apostle teaches in many places, that the Law is not to be treated according to the understanding of the letter, but that according to spiritual teaching a shadow of things to come is to be recognized in it. For he says, Thou shalt not muzzle the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn: and he added, Doth God take care for oxen? Are not these things written for our sakes? And again: Have ye not heard the law, that Abraham had two sons, one by a bondwoman, and one by a free woman? But he who was of the bondwoman was born according to the flesh; but he of the free woman, according to the promise.

And because the law was a shadow of things to come, he added, Which things are said by an allegory, for these are the two Testaments. Therefore whatsoever things have embraced a shadow of spiritual teachings, these are to be called law; because the law is both spiritual and a shadow of things to come.

6. The Commandment Enlightens Through Observance

Now a commandment of the Lord is that in which the observance and keeping of precepts is contained; as that, Thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not commit adultery (Exodi, xx, 13), and the rest of things like these. And because these are simple and bright, and directing us through their observance into the true light; therefore it is thus said, The commandment of the Lord is lightsome, enlightening the eyes. But concerning the law it would not have been fitting to say those things, which is holy through the shadow of things to come, and converting souls through the knowledge of things to come; whereas the commandment enlightens through its own observance.

7. The Testimonies of God and the Witnessing Angels

What the testimonies of God are and how many.

The whole world is full of angels.—Therefore because they are blessed who search the testimonies of God, and as we have said law is one thing, commandment another, testimony another as are the rest; what these testimonies of God are must be known. For the whole book of the Law was given under testimonies. For Moses, about to hand over the book of the Testament, called heaven and earth to witness. And many things are established for the purpose of testimonies, when Jacob says, This heap shall be a witness between me and thee, and this stone shall be a witness. And in Joshua it is written, Take up twelve stones, that these may be a testimony to your children. Also when the leper was healed, the Lord says, Offer thy gift for a testimony, which Moses appointed for them.

The Apostle, speaking many things to Timothy through his letter, makes a solemn declaration before witnesses, saying: I charge thee before many witnesses, and before God who quickeneth all things, and Jesus Christ, and the elect Angels, that thou keep these things. Many therefore and innumerable are the testimonies of God, which if anyone should wish to search through knowledge of the Law, the Prophets, the Gospels, the Apostles, he would remain in blessedness; nor, living as though in an empty and solitary world, would he know how to sin except under a witness. For all things are full of divine testimonies: and all this void which is thought to be empty is filled with the angels of God, and there is nothing which this multitude of divine ministries does not inhabit.

8. Angels as Witnesses Against Sin, and the Devil's Malice

Their presence ought to deter us from sins.—Angels are witnesses of our will.

The power and malice of the devil.—Whoever therefore has attained knowledge of these things through teaching, knows that he lives under witnesses. And although the nature of human weakness is prone to vices, yet it shrinks from sinning even under a witness: which the principle of common custom itself teaches us. For who does not fear to steal under a witness? Who has chosen to commit a crime except in secret? Who has not desired either solitude or night for adultery? And if at any time, when vices are inflamed and the mind is already ready for crime, yet the fury of a raging will is restrained by the encounter of a witness: and sometimes a sudden intervention has recalled the abrupt nature of human wantonness back into itself.

If therefore the fear of intervention delays a deed already resolved upon in the mind; what will it befit a Christian man to do, knowing himself to be beset on all sides by so many testimonies of spiritual powers, not, I say, of his deeds, but of his very will alone? Shall we not, when we are stirred by the goads of our weakness into some desire of turbid affection, fear the choirs of Angels standing around us on every side, and the world full of heavenly ministries? For if the Angels of little ones daily behold our Father who is in heaven: we can fear the testimonies of those whom we know both to remain with us and to stand daily before God. Indeed we ought also to fear that very devil himself, through whom those incentives of our vices are furnished, and all his own witnesses, who traverses in a moment of time the whole breadth of this world: to whom it is sweet that we sin, that he may glory in the testimony of our sins.

For this is his own peculiar cunning, to instigate to sinning, and to accuse those who sin. For it is said, Or knowest thou not that the devil is present as the accuser of your brethren.

9. Seeking God's Testimonies with the Whole Heart

The testimonies of God are to be sought with the whole heart.—And

because there were powers hostile to us remaining in testimony along with the rest, it was fitting for the prophet to make mention only of the holy ones, saying, Blessed are they who search his testimonies: not those of others, of course, but those which are God's. Moreover the searching of God's testimonies ought not to be negligent; on account of which it is said, They seek him with their whole heart. Study is not to be applied to heavenly teaching in part; but the testimonies of God are to be sought with the whole heart: so that, since there are also other things which are not of God, those things which we learn to be of God we may search with a heart not called away to other concerns.

10. The Many Ways and the One True Way

What the many good ways and the one best way are.—

Then follows this

For they that work iniquity have not walked in his ways. In the first

a way is mentioned in the singular, in this third

ways are more numerous.

From which it is to be understood that through many ways one arrives at the one way; in which if anyone is undefiled, this man is blessed. Concerning the many ways and the one, Jeremiah has testified to like things, saying, Stand ye in the ways, and ask for the eternal ways of the Lord: and seek what is the good way. In the many ways therefore one must stand, and the many must be inquired of: and these indeed are many and are the Lord's and eternal, and among them it must be discerned which is the best way.

The ways are many, and many are the commandments of God, many are the prophets through all of whom one proceeds into the one way: but in these the workers of iniquity have not walked. For if they had remained in the law, they would have arrived even at that best way of the New Testament. There is a way through Moses, through Joshua, through David, through Isaiah, through Jeremiah, through the Apostles; and through all these it is necessary to arrive at him who said, I am the way; and No man goeth to the Father, but by me. Something similar is to be understood to have been said under the figure of the pearl. For the merchant must be one of many pearls, so that he may obtain one pearl of great price.

When speech is made of pearls, it suffices for their honor that they are called pearls; but that one pearl which is found is said to be of great price: so also when many ways are prophesied of; it is said that they are both the Lord's and eternal; but when among these ways it is sought which is the useful way, that which is found is proclaimed the best. Therefore although those ways are eternal, and the pearls are honorable by their very name: one must stand in the many ways, so that the good way may be found; and all the pearls must be sold, so that the one which is found to be of great price may be purchased.

11. Keeping the Commandments with Diligence

Then follows this

Thou hast commanded thy commandments to be kept exceedingly.

Above we noted that commandments signify one thing, the law another. And concerning the law, as I judge, the Apostle was our witness, that it is a shadow of things to come, in which the form of truth is described as a body in a shadow. A commandment, however, is that which is to be fulfilled through observance: as that, Thou shalt not commit adultery, thou shalt not kill (Exodi, xx, 13). For in it the form of a future image is not contained, but it has its present effect of action: Thou hast commanded thy commandments to be kept greatly. Nothing therefore is to be done with a dissolute mind, nothing carelessly, but we ought to pursue the care of God's commandments with solicitude and anxiety: so that what we do, we may carry out for the advancement of our faith, with reverence toward him for whom we do it.

Otherwise if we do anything with a relaxed will and a mind occupied with other things; the bodily duties will indeed be occupied in the doing, but we shall not obtain the merit of devotion through negligence.

12. The Many Justifications of God and Their Grace

The justifications of God are many; their connection; they are not obtained without grace.—

Would that my ways were directed to keep thy justifications.

We have now, after the keeping of the commandments, also the observance of the justifications. And we have shown above what we thought the commandments to be. But the justifications are many and various, to be measured in the observance of each individual kind of duty: for the keeping of which, unless we are directed by God, we shall be weak by our own nature. We must therefore be aided by his grace and directed, so that we may attain the order of the justifications that have been enjoined. There is a justification distributed for us with regard to a servant, there is one with regard to a son, one with regard to a father, one with regard to brethren, one with regard to faithful men, one with regard to the rulers of the Church, one with regard to Angels, one with regard to God and our Lord the only-begotten Word of God.

In each and every kind and name, therefore, the principle of justification must be maintained

because unless all these things are held by the corresponding duties of a devoted will, we shall not hold the justification of God. One who is dutiful toward a father, if he hates his son, has lost the measure of justification. One who is dutiful toward a brother, if he hates his servant, has lost the order of God's justification. One who is dutiful toward the Lord, if he hates the priest, has by no means fulfilled the observance of justification in the worship of God, exercising hatred against the very ministries of divine justification.

Now indeed in the very truth of faith

that is, concerning the understanding of God the Father and the Lord, by which our justification will chiefly be proved, how great is the grace of God we need, that we may think rightly, that from the prophetic and evangelical authorities we may hold one and the same thing, lest in one point or another our opinion and speech be at variance, but that we may be directed toward all the justifications of God with an equal and uniform observance of works and doctrine.

13. Keeping All the Commandments, Not in Part

All the commandments are to be kept, not in part only.—

When we shall have attained this, then it will be lawful to say what is contained in the following

Then shall I not be confounded, when I shall look into all thy commandments.

For unless we are attentive to all his commandments and devoted to them, and some are passed over while others are observed according to our own will, we shall not hold the order of justification. But if, with our ways directed, there shall be an equal and uniform keeping of all things, we shall rejoice with confidence in the observance of all the commandments, confused by no shame of forgetfulness or negligence.

14. Uprightness of Heart in Learning God's Judgments

God is the author of an upright heart and of known justice.—

Then follows this

I will give praise to thee with uprightness of heart, in that I have learned the judgments of thy justice.

I will keep thy justifications. All perversity of soul must therefore be cast away, and confession must be made with a heart directed and turned aside in no other direction: lest the mind turn aside to care for the world, lest it wander from those paths of God's teaching into byways. But the cause of this upright confession is that which is contained in the following

In that I have learned the judgments of thy justice.

First, therefore, he prayed that his ways might be directed to keep the justifications. Second, he declared that he would not be confounded in anything, when he looked upon all the commandments of God.

Third also, he pledged that he would confess to God with uprightness of heart

because he had learned the judgments of his justice; rendering praise to God, that is, through the teaching of an upright heart and of known justice. But the fruit of known justice is this, that the justifications of God be maintained: and therefore he added: I will keep thy justifications. For what is the fruit of having learned the judgments of God, unless the observance of the justifications follows upon our knowledge?

15. Praying Not to Be Forsaken in Temptation

God must always be prayed to, lest he forsake us in temptation.—But we must remember that, although knowledge is to be granted by God, yet we must always pray that he may favour those things which we wish to keep in keeping his justifications: knowing indeed that we are frequently abandoned by him on account of temptations, so that our faith may be proved through them. Nevertheless, according to the Prophet, we must beseech him not to forsake us utterly: for he says, Do not forsake me utterly and exceedingly. Which is also contained in the order of the Lord's prayer, when it is said, Lead us not into temptation which we are not able to bear. The Apostle knows that we are forsaken for the purpose of being tempted: but he also knows that God knows the measure of our weakness, saying: God is faithful, who will not suffer us to be tempted above that which we are able.

God, permitting Job to temptation, withdrew the power over his soul from the right of the devil, and left the right of tempting according to the measure of human weakness. The Prophet therefore, conscious of his weakness, prays that he may not be greatly forsaken: that the Lord may take up his frailty, as that of Peter sinking in the waves: that although he is about to leave him to be tempted, yet he may not forsake him utterly and greatly, that is, not to the point of peril to his soul and faith.

Wherewithal doth a young man correct his way?

By keeping thy words. With my whole heart have I sought thee: cast me not away from thy commandments. In my heart have I hidden thy eloquence: that I might not sin against thee. Blessed art thou, O Lord: teach me thy justifications. With my lips I will pronounce all the judgments of thy mouth. I have been delighted in the way of thy testimonies, as in all riches. I will meditate on thy commandments, and I will consider thy ways. I will meditate on thy justifications.

1. A Young Man Corrects His Way by God's Word

It is better to be imbued with good morals from boyhood. The power of habit.—In the second letter of the following eight

the Prophet himself proposed to himself what he was to answer, saying,

Wherewithal doth a young man correct his way?

These words are spoken in the person of one who proposes the question. Then, as the confession of one who answers, there follows: By keeping thy words. Now it must be maintained, according to the discourse we had at the beginning, that the true and perfect principles of the fear of God are contained under these elements of letters, by which we are formed, as it were, for the practice of confessing God through the very rudiments of childhood. The Prophet must therefore be understood not to have spoken idly when he said, Wherewithal doth a young man correct his way?

It is indeed desirable that every age be transferred from the vices of the body to the pursuit of innocence: because even a late amendment, though it be late, is useful through the forgetting of vices. But the Prophet, forming a man who is to please God, does not wait for him to be instructed by the teaching of God and the precepts of fear after a long and prolonged habit of sins: but he wishes the years that are unacquainted with sins, and the age still ignorant of crimes, to be imbued not only with the pursuits of innocence at some point, but also with the very habit of youth. For it is difficult to cease from what is customary, difficult to be drawn away from what is familiar; habit has a great bond upon itself: and therefore that man will be the best worshipper, whom not only the remission of offences has established without guilt, but whom that very ignorance of vices has rendered innocent.

2. The Blessing of Bearing the Yoke from Youth

The prerogative of a young man consecrated to God.—The prophet Jeremiah knew the blessedness of this age, saying: It is good, he says, for a man when he hath borne the yoke from his youth: he shall sit solitary and hold his peace (Thren. III, 27). He does not wait for years grown cold with old age, nor for the habit of vices already dead through age. He wants a soldier of a long campaign: he wants that servant of Christ whom not even the recollection of past crimes may defile. For in those who have believed at a more advanced age, there is indeed through the gift of grace the pardon of past things; but through the nature of conscience the recollection of deeds done is not absent. "It is good," he says, "for a young man to bear the heavy yoke." Years unaccustomed to obedience bear this burden with difficulty: but tender age does not feel the hardship of a heavy burden through the growth of virtue.

But having taken up the burden in youth, what shall he do?

He shall sit, he says, solitary and hold his peace. Rare is he with whom the perfection of the fear of God grows together with the increase of years: and therefore he shall sit solitary, forsaking the wanton gatherings of youth, and removed even from the assembly of those who have recently come to believe: because it does not befit him to say, Remember not the sins of my youth, O Lord. He shall also be silent, deeming silence befitting faith and youth: not mingled in the tumults of worldly affairs, but silent through modesty, occupied solely with the divine knowledge of the sacraments, and keeping the words of God by the silent observance of deeds and works.

3. Does God Cast Anyone from His Commandments

Whether God repels anyone from his commandments.—The Prophet then returns to his own person, so that what he had said above might be known to have been said of himself, saying,

With my whole heart have I sought thee: cast me not away from thy commandments.

It does not seem to befit the goodness of God that he should repel anyone from his commandments: but the addition of the words and the force of the expressions, which are arranged according to the perfect principle of heavenly teaching, has nothing doubtful, nothing contradictory in itself. He therefore who, according to the prophet, prefers the repentance of sinners to their death, is he to be thought to repel anyone from his commandments? Far be it to think so. But neither does the Prophet now mean this, especially since he has sought God with his whole heart.

4. To Him Who Hath Shall More Be Given

What David did not mean by this.—But the resolution of the difficulties must be sought in those very things from which they seem to arise. For what the Prophet meant is easy to know.

We read written in Jeremiah, Cursed is he that doth the work of the Lord negligently. We read also written in the Gospels, For to every one that hath shall be given, and he shall abound: but from him that hath not, even that which he hath shall be taken away. Therefore he that hath shall abound; but he that hath not shall be in want of that very thing which he hath. The Prophet is not subject to the condition of the curse; because he did not do the works of God negligently, seeking him with his whole heart. Then he confidently asks not to be repelled from the commandments of God; because he seeks him with his whole heart.

For according to the Gospels, to him that hath shall be given, and from him that hath not even that which he hath shall be taken away. God therefore will not take away except from him that hath not, just as he will not repel except the negligent. Moreover he is so full of goodness that he rewards him that hath with abundance of gifts: and so truly does he not wish anyone to be without, that he takes away from him that hath not even that which he hath.

5. God Repels Only the Negligent

Whom he will repel.—He repels no one therefore except one who resists, he rejects no one except the negligent.

For the Prophet set forth this as the reason why he prayed not to be repelled from the commandments of God: because he had sought God not in part, nor through sloth, but with his whole heart: by which we understand that he is repelled from the commandments who through great carelessness shall be unworthy to be admitted: and what proceeds from the fault of one who does not deserve is outside the scope of the envy of one who forbids.

6. Hiding God's Word Within the Heart

To reveal certain secrets of God is a sin.—

This is the third

of the second letter: In my heart have I hidden thy eloquence, that I might not sin against thee.

We remember that a saying similar to this is wont to be read where it is said, It is good to hide the secret of a king. We remember also that Paul, writing to the Corinthians who were still little ones in faith, concealed certain eloquences of God, when he says: I gave you milk to drink, not meat; for you were not able as yet, but neither indeed are you now able. We read also in the Gospel that a treasure found in a rich and fertile field is hidden, and the field is bought to conceal it. We know that neither are pearls to be cast before swine, nor is it right to give what is holy to dogs.

We understand therefore that we are to keep certain things in the secret of our heart, which if divulged will bring the guilt of an inexpiable sin.

For he said thus: In my heart have I hidden thy eloquence, that I might not sin against thee: because, while other sins according to the differences of things are directed either against ourselves or against others; yet they then become sins properly against God, when those things which ought to be kept in the secret of hidden hearts are brought forth into the knowledge of profane understanding.

7. The Justifications as a Gift of God

The knowledge of the justifications is a gift of God.—The order of teaching in this fourth following

must be considered. The first

dealt with the keeping of the commandments of God by a young man: the next

because he had sought God with his whole heart, with not being repelled from the commandments of God: then, that he had kept in the secret of his mind the hidden sacraments of wisdom and the secret mysteries of God. Now in the fourth he prays that God may show him his justifications: and he prays with the honour of confession set forth first, saying,

Blessed art thou, O Lord: teach me thy justifications.

We have touched upon some things concerning the justifications in an earlier discourse, and it is superfluous to repeat the same things frequently.

The greatest and most important labour therefore is to attain this knowledge of God's justifications, and the weakness of human nature attains with difficulty the knowledge of so many and such great things: and for this reason he prays to be taught, because it is the gift of divine goodness to temper the ignorance of the human mind to the fitting and proper observance of duties befitting each kind.

8. The Judgments of God's Mouth on the Lips

The judgments of God are unspeakable, not the judgments of the mouth of God.—There follows then also a discourse concerning the judgments of God, in which he says,

Upon my lips I have declared all the judgments of thy mouth.

How great is the difference of things and of names. First, from youth the commandments of God are kept; then God is sought with the whole heart; then the words of God are hidden away, and there is a desire to learn the justifications; now the judgments are proclaimed. But the Prophet will perhaps be thought to have fallen away from himself, and to have been unmindful either of his own words or of those of others. For in this book of psalms we read: Thy judgments are a great deep. The apostle Paul says: The judgments of God are unsearchable, and again the prophet: For great and unspeakable are thy judgments: and how will the prophet dare to say: Upon my lips I have declared all the judgments of thy mouth?

But the prophet has now said nothing either against himself or against another of the same spirit.

For he does not say, Upon my lips I have declared all thy judgments; but he says, All the judgments of thy mouth: knowing that there is some difference between the judgments of God and the judgments of the mouth of God. When he says, Thy judgments are a great deep, did he say, The judgments of thy mouth are a great deep? But now he says, I have declared the judgments of thy mouth. Those things, therefore, which could be known through the prophets or from the words of God to be judgments, the prophet also did not keep silent: which were therefore proclaimed, that they might be taught.

9. Delight in God's Testimonies as All Riches

The security of a right conscience.

The prophet rejoices in spiritual riches.—After the public and steadfast proclamation of the judgments of the mouth of God, this follows,

In the way of thy testimonies I have been delighted, as in all riches.

The prophet does not fear those who witness and observe his life, but delights in them: and the consciousness of those who watch and behold him is pleasant to him. For the fear of a polluted conscience trembles at every scrutiny; but where there is the steadfast confidence of an innocent life, the intervention of many witnesses is welcome. But the prophet's joy is not of the kind common to ordinary gladness: for he delights as in all riches; not merely in riches, but in all riches.

There are riches in gold, there are in silver, there are in money, there are in garments, there are in houses, there are in fields; and in their vines, or olive trees, or crops: but the prophet of the Lord is perfected in the fruit of doctrines, and is rich in the resources of the law and of prophetic institutions: and though of an earlier time, he is not ignorant of the precepts of the Gospels and the apostles. For Paul also knows these riches, speaking to the Corinthians: I give thanks to my God always for you for the grace of God which is given you in Christ Jesus: that in all things you are enriched in him, in all utterance and in all knowledge. In these things, therefore, the prophet is rich, and in these he delights. Moreover, he is not to be thought to have been delighted by comparison with worldly riches, who could not be rich in the Lord except with contempt and poverty of the world.

10. Exercise in the Commandments, Consideration of the Ways

He preserves these exercises.—Delighted in the ways of the testimonies of God, he was bound to perform the work of his delight; and there is no doubt that he does perform it. For he says,

I will be exercised in thy commandments, and I will consider thy ways.

Exercise and assiduity are therefore necessary, so that the practice of needful things may be retained; because the idleness of human minds is dangerous and burdensome: and lest the habit of leisure steal upon one, the assiduity of exercise must be applied. But the order of reason is also preserved here. For one must first be exercised in the commandments of God; and then afterwards his ways are to be considered: because unless the practice of faithful works has gone before, the knowledge of doctrine will not be grasped; and we must first act faithfully, so that we may attain knowledge.

The ways, therefore, according to the earlier exposition, we consider to be the law, the prophets, all the Gospels, and the apostles: which the Prophet, exercising himself in the commandments of God, considered, that he might know them.

11. Meditation in the Justifications, Exercise in the Commandments

Commandments. Justifications. The use of meditation and exercise. He has concluded the eighth number with this,

I will meditate in thy justifications, I will not forget thy words.—The Prophet does not depart from perfect doctrine in order.

In the justifications of God, which he prayed to be taught, he is exercised, just as he meditates in the commandments. For this is the nature of commandments, that they instruct us in the observance and practice of innocence: as for example, Thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not commit adultery, and the rest like these. In these therefore he is exercised (because in these is the practice of action), confirming himself through the exercise of present things toward future things.

The justifications, however, are those by which a Hebrew boy who has been a slave for six years shall thereafter be free in the seventh year; and after six years of produce, the field is to be left idle, and the other things established for the observance of justifications, which contain within themselves a great meditation of future hope through the accomplishment of present business. And therefore he meditates in these, just as he is exercised in the commandments: because exercise retains the practice of an established habit; but meditation extends itself toward that which it has not yet obtained; so that through meditation it may attain what it seeks: which meditation of justification attains this, that forgetfulness of words and promises does not steal upon one.

Render to thy servant, and I shall live: and I will keep thy words.

Open thou my eyes, and I will consider the wondrous things of thy law. I am a sojourner on the earth: hide not thy commandments from me. My soul hath coveted to long for thy justifications (Hilarius, that I may desire thy judgments) at all times. Thou hast rebuked the proud: cursed are they who decline from thy commandments. Remove from me reproach and contempt: because I have sought thy testimonies. For princes sat and spoke against me: but thy servant was exercised in thy justifications. For thy testimonies also are my meditation, and my consolation (Hilarius, and my counsels) are thy justifications.

1. Render to Thy Servant: A Voice of Innocence

RENDER is the voice of one who is innocent.—Those who do not have the steadfast conscience of a cleansed heart cannot pray with this voice of the Prophet,

Render to thy servant.

For if retribution shall come according to our works, we shall remain in the punishments of our sins and transgressions. It is enough, however, if at least this confidence of giving thanks to the Lord belongs to anyone: He hath not dealt with us according to our sins, nor rewarded us according to our iniquities: for according to the height of heaven from the earth he hath put far our iniquities from us; for he himself hath known our formation. It is a great thing to acknowledge so great a mercy of God in oneself, and to know that the habit of crimes is far removed from oneself, and to have begun to be worthy of the mercy of God.

But this Prophet, in whose body a dwelling worthy of God exists

because being full of the Holy Spirit he does not think and utter these common earthly things, it belongs to his freedom to pray, Render to thy servant.

2. David's Plea Made Without Presumption

It is not uttered presumptuously by David.—But perhaps this is an act of insolent audacity, to have desired the merit of retribution without any modesty of confession, and not to have remembered that he is placed in a body, that is, in a lowly and humble condition. But the Prophet has excluded every opinion of vanity and boasting about himself. For when he had said Render from the confidence of innocence, he added to thy servant from the duty of servitude and from the confession of his own condition. He therefore asks these things with confidence, who remembers that he is a servant of God, not of sin: because everyone who sins is a servant of sin.

3. True Life Belongs to the World to Come

True life does not belong to this present time.—I shall live, he says, and I will observe thy words.

I shall live and I will observe is not a matter of the present time; but the meaning of this utterance extends itself into the future time. For the Prophet knows when that blessed and true life of the living shall be. For now we both remain in the dust of death, and are in the body of death, from which the Apostle prays to be freed, saying: Wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? We have moreover even now mingled within us a matter which is subject to the law of death and of sin; and in the dwelling of this perishable and weak flesh we borrow the taint of corruption from its companionship: and unless the body be glorified into the nature of the spirit, the nature of true life cannot be in us.

Let us hear him who remembers that he dwells in the body of death, saying: For our life is hidden with Christ in God.

But when Christ our life shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory. This retribution, therefore, the Prophet prays for himself, that he may live: teaching the time of this future life in another place, where he says: And I shall please the Lord in the land of the living. He knows that this seat of the world is not the land of the living. He knows that we must still be cleansed according to the prefiguration of the law. For now we are mingled with the dead: and in the law, whoever touches a dead body is unclean.

4. The Law Against Touching a Dead Body Explained

The law concerning not touching a dead body; how it is to be understood.—But far be it that any of these things in the law should be understood in a bodily sense, as though anyone should become unclean through the touching of a dead body. Moses himself, the giver of the law, took away the bones of Joseph when going out of Egypt; Elisha lay upon a dead boy to bring him back to life: the Lord himself drew back the dead to life by taking them by the hand: and if the touching of a dead body were going to make one unclean, the law would by no means have been violated by such great men, nor by the Lord, who himself said: I am not come to destroy the law, but to fulfil it.

But because the law is a shadow of future good things, it therefore taught us through this prefigured signification that we cannot be clean in this dwelling of an earthly and dead body, unless through the washing of heavenly mercy we obtain cleansing, after the transformation of the resurrection, when the nature of our earthly body has been made more glorious.

5. The Diverse Baptisms of Water, Spirit, and Blood

The baptisms are diverse.—And perhaps if anyone thinks that in the Sacrament of baptism that perfect purity of innocence worthy of heavenly life has been restored to him; let him recall that John the Baptist said, I indeed baptize you in water unto penance; but he that cometh after me is mightier than I: he shall baptize you in the Holy Ghost and fire: and let him remember that the Lord himself, baptized by John while he was still in the body, said, I have yet another baptism to be baptized with. There is therefore, as far as one may judge, a cleansing of that perfect purity laid up even after the waters of baptism: which may sanctify us by the coming of the Holy Spirit, which may refine us in the fire of judgment, which through the injury of death will purge us from the defilement and companionship of the dead body, which will wash us clean through the passion of martyrdom with devoted and faithful blood.

6. Perfect Keeping of the Commandments Awaits the Future

The perfect keeping of the commandments does not belong to this present time.—And therefore the holy Prophet says that he shall live when he lives, being transferred through this shadow of life to that true land of the living. According to which example, as he said I shall live; so also I will keep thy words. They are kept for the present, according to the apostle Paul, in part and through a glass. For there are many scandals of the world which prevent the perfect keeping of the commandments in us. I say nothing of the natures of bodies, which compel us in the meantime to be imperfect either through infirmity or through the incitements of vices. But truly when death is conquered, and its sting is blunted, and when we shall hear and see face to face; then shall we truly both live and keep the commandments of God.

7. The Law's Wonders as Shadows of Things to Come

The Law foreshadowed: this is what David desires to behold.—The order of understanding contained in the first

is the same in what follows.

For he says,

Open my eyes, and I will consider the wonders of thy law.

He knows that a cloud of obscurity stands in the way of mortal and bodily eyes. He knows that the things which are commanded in the law according to the letter are a shadow and mirror of things to come. He reads the law indeed: but he desires to behold the wonders of the law. He remembers that the sabbaths are holy: but he longs to rest in the repose of the eternal sabbaths. He uses unleavened bread: but he hastens to cast out the leaven of the old nature. He sacrifices the paschal lamb: but he yearns to stand before the Lamb who is revealed through John. He fulfils the law of the seventh year: but he himself, when seven thousand years are completed, demands to be free from the age.

He fulfils the law of the fiftieth jubilee year: but he hastens to obtain the remission and renewal of Pentecost. He knows that both the altar was instituted by Moses according to the heavenly pattern at God's command, and Aaron was clothed in priestly garb and adornment: but he hastens to attend the ministries of the Prince of priests (Christ), in whose image these things were done. He also desires to be brought into the holy land, a land flowing with milk and honey. With milk and honey, as a pilgrim of this whole world, he prays. All these things the Jews perform according to the letter: but Paul understands them otherwise, saying: For we know that the law is spiritual. Therefore the Prophet prays that he may behold these wonders of the law, which are shadowed forth to veiled eyes: namely, that being freed from the frail and weak body, he may look upon those things which are prefigured in heaven as great and wonderful through the bodily observance of the law.

8. A Sojourner on Earth Longing for Heaven

We must be pilgrims from the flesh.—The disposition of the one praying is not changed. For after this he says,

I am a sojourner on earth; hide not thy commandments from me.

A sojourner does not dwell on land that is his own, but on another's: nor does a stranger await the fruit of his temporary labour from it. The Apostle knows the order of this sojourn, saying that we must journey away from the body and remain with Christ. And so the Prophet, perceiving by faith certain images of heavenly ways of life, though he inhabits a body, yet inhabits something not his own, with the eyes of his mind raised to heaven. He knows that treasures are to be laid up in heaven; because where the treasure is, there also will the heart be.

He was not in that sense a sojourner in his own land, who in the gospel parable builds barns large enough for great harvests, and urges his soul toward pleasures through the abundance of present things; a fool who was to be deprived of that very soul the same night.

9. The Bright Commandment That Gives Light

One commandment is bright, others are hidden.—Therefore the Prophet, confessing himself a sojourner, prays that God's commandments may not be hidden from him.

For no one but a pilgrim from his own body is worthy of the knowledge of God's commandments. Since there is a commandment of God that is bright and enlightening the eyes; it will now seem absurd that he said, lest God's commandments be hidden from him, which have this nature in themselves, that they are both bright and give light. But the negligence of ears brings difficulty of understanding. For there the commandment is bright and enlightening, here the commandments are hidden. The bright commandment is that through which we are enlightened to behold the light of the commandments. Through the commandment which is first in the law, by which we are commanded to love God with our whole soul and with our whole strength, we are made worthy of the enlightenment of knowledge.

And just as we shall pass from glory to glory; so also shall we see light in light, and so also shall we one day behold the face itself through a mirror. For through this commandment of bodily life we are now enlightened by the sacrament of baptism and the precept of God, and we make use of light, and we abide in glory. Through this again from commandment we shall behold commandments, through this from light we shall see light, through this from glory we shall be transferred to glory.

10. The Diverse Ministries of Angels

The ministries of angels are diverse.—Moreover the Prophet knows that in heaven there are many commandments of God, he knows that through the diversity of ministries there are diverse observances of precepts, of angels, archangels, thrones, dominions, powers, and principalities. These it is necessary that, as they differ in names, so also they differ in offices, yet retaining the perpetual keeping of commandments in accordance with the firmness of their nature. And for this reason he prays that the mysteries of the heavenly commandments may be revealed to him: because he knows himself to be a pilgrim in the body of this earth.

11. The Soul's Longing to Desire God's Judgments

This is the fourth

of the third letter: My soul hath longed that I should desire thy judgments at all times.

The speech of this Prophet is not common with others or with the age: under the significance of familiar words he has raised the sense of his understanding higher, saying: My soul hath longed that I should desire thy judgments at all times. For to many it will seem that it would have been more correctly said, my soul desireth thy judgments at all times. And perhaps some think that this very thing is contained under these words.

12. The Fearful Nature of God's Judgments

How dreadful are the judgments of God to man.—But the Prophet remembers that it is arduous and most perilous to human nature to desire the judgments of God. For since no living person is clean in his sight; how can his judgment be desirable? Or when we are to render account for every idle word, shall we long for the day of judgment, in which that unceasing fire must be undergone by us, in which those heavy punishments of the soul being purged from sins must be undergone? The soul of blessed Mary a sword shall pierce, that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed. If that Virgin who was capable of God is to come under the severity of judgment, who will dare to desire to be judged by God?

Job, having endured and triumphed in the warfare of all human calamities, who when he was tempted said: The Lord gave, the Lord hath taken away, blessed be his name for ever, confessing himself to be ashes, upon hearing the voice of God from the cloud decided that he must speak no more. And who will be bold enough to desire the judgments of God, whose voice from heaven not even so great a prophet could endure, nor could the apostles standing on the mountain with the Lord bear?

13. Desiring Judgment Through Perfect Innocence

David desires for himself that innocence by which they become not dreadful.—And so the Prophet kept within the measure of human nature and conscience, saying, My soul hath longed that I should desire thy judgments at all times. For he does not desire judgment, but longs that he may desire: the longing for desire, not for judgment, held him. For he longs to desire, namely that he may remain in such great innocence that he may now safely and without the terror of a judgment to be feared desire it: not yet desiring the thing itself through the consciousness of the human condition; but longing through perfect conscience that it may come to pass through innocence. He knows moreover that this longing for desire must be continuous and unceasing: and therefore he added: at all times, teaching that we must have no leisure, so to speak, but must always be held by the longing of this desire.

14. Pride as the Chief Provocation of God's Wrath

Pride provokes the wrath of God against us.—Then follows,

Thou hast rebuked the proud: cursed are they who decline from thy commandments.

O wretched pride, which disdains to live under heavenly precepts, which scorns the divine commandments with the swelling of an unbelieving mind! The crimes of human vices are very many, and the workings of sins are diverse and innumerable: but nothing more provokes the wrath of God against us than the cause of pride. For thou hast rebuked not the covetous, not the wanton, to whom rebuke is certainly due, but the proud: because many through pride, by which they despise human things, also scorn to obey God.

15. Pride Renders Good Works Vain: The Pharisee

It renders good works vain.—But though the other works of faith be excellent, and devotion dwell in the keeping of all divine precepts: yet when pride creeps in, the memory of those things which we do rightly will be blotted out. With what great labour did that Pharisee in the gospel set himself on the path of life, that he should not be rapacious toward another's property, that he should not be injurious toward anyone, that he should not be dissolved in adulteries? He laboured fasting twice on the sabbath, and wore down his body through abstinence from food with the great virtue of patience. With what great labour then, in order to overcome avarice, did he bring in tithes of his substance for the use of the needy? What is more excellent than these things? What is more difficult than their performance?

But he fell into the snare of pride, saying

Because I am not like this sinner and publican: and the wretch by this vice fell from great works into guilt, and having become insolent through this glory of his virtues, departed while the publican was justified rather than he.

16. Paul's Deliverance from the Temptation of Pride

Paul, who was freed from it.—But what do we say of the Pharisee?

The Apostle, not from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ, against whom the devil strove with all the art of his strength, received an angel of Satan to buffet him: so that through the unceasing troubles of all sufferings, no occasion for pride could creep in through any leisure of time. He himself also, laying down a certain law for the choosing and appointing of a priest, when he had already placed him in those virtues in which a bishop ought to be worthy, forbade a neophyte to be chosen, lest he should become proud, saying: Not a neophyte, lest being puffed up he fall into the judgment of the devil: that is, lest he grow insolent through the recently received grace of regeneration, he wishes him first to be tried by much warfare of sufferings, he wishes him to be advanced by many campaigns of humility and faith.

For a humbled heart God does not despise, and a contrite heart is the best sacrifice, because he who exalts himself shall be humbled; and he who humbles himself shall be exalted.

17. Cursed Are Those Who Decline from the Commandments

Human pride despises, neglects divine things.—And therefore cursed are they who decline from thy commandments

because the proud are rebuked: because through the pride of an insolent mind, we both despise human things and neglect divine things. But the force of the word placed here must not be heard carelessly. For it would have been easy to say, Cursed are they who do not obey thy commandments. (We have said what is fitting concerning one and several commandments in the verse above (above. But cursed are those who, instructed through this prophetic teaching, decline from the commandments of God, that is, fall away from the hope of the eternal commandments through the desires of present vices. For he who declines avoids that in which he is, and is led from one side to another, and by a certain deflection departs from the path. Even one who declines only slightly from the commandments of God is therefore caught by the sentence of cursing: so that we shall understand how great a danger it would be to be entirely ignorant of those things, from which to decline is accursed.

18. Sins Deserve Reproach and Contempt

Sins deserve reproach.—

Take away from me reproach and contempt; because I have sought thy testimonies.

Sins are worthy of reproach: and therefore sinners shall rise to eternal reproach. That all sins are worthy of reproach, let us learn in the Gospels, when the Lord began to reproach those cities in which most of his mighty works had been done and they had not repented, Chorazin and Bethsaida. What was begun against them must necessarily be done against all who are equal in the same crime; and then he will reproach the human race that does not repent and does not walk in the evangelical way, with that which is contained in the psalm: What profit is there in my blood, while I descend into corruption? For he reproaches the proud and the cursed, asking why they have thought there was no profit for themselves in the sacrament of his blood and death; since he was born and suffered and died for our sake.

19. Confession Averts Reproach and Contempt

Confession averts it, provided God's testimonies are also sought.—The Prophet also kept in mind the condition of human weakness.

He knows that there are certain things which must be taken away from us through God's mercy. He knows that God must be prayed to with such a confession of our sins, that even if we have things worthy of reproof, we may yet not be reproved: for the fault must be confessed, so that pardon may also be obtained. He knows further that after reproof the nations are reckoned in contempt, that is, as nothing; because it is written: All nations are as nothing, and all things that are of malice are reckoned as nothing. But according to the Prophet's example we ought to pray that reproach and contempt be taken away from us with this hope and confidence: so that we add to what is said, Take away from me reproach and contempt, also what follows: Because I have sought thy testimonies.

He both seeks the testimonies of God, so that he ought not to be reproved; and prays that reproach and contempt be taken away from him, so that he may not abandon shame: confessing indeed that in his own nature there is a cause of reproof and reproach which he prays to be taken away from him; but hopes that it will be taken away through the devotion of the testimonies he has sought.

20. The World's Princes Oppose the Faithful

Faith is hateful to the princes of the world.—The Prophet seeks out the testimonies of God not in leisure, nor in the insolence of prosperous circumstances, but seeks them out with many sitting against him, with many speaking against him, saying,

For princes sat and spoke against me. He knows that all the faith of prophecy is hateful to the princes of this world; he knows that the Apostles will be odious to all on account of the Christian name. Princes sit against the Prophet and speak against him, even when they hear him saying, Hear the word of the Lord, ye princes of Sodom; attend to the law of God, ye people of Gomorrah.

For by the counsel of such men Isaiah is sawn asunder, Jeremiah is also shut up in prison, Daniel is thrown to lions goaded to savagery by hunger, Zechariah is slain between the temple and the altar, the apostles are beaten, cut down, crucified: so that the preaching of God may be taken away, so that the doctrine of prophecy may be suppressed, so that the way of eternal life may be blocked. But steadfast faith has despised these assemblies of princes and these words of detraction. For it follows: But thy servant was exercised in thy justifications. While they, that is, were making an uproar and restraining with all the weapons of punishments, the spirit perseveres in the exercises of the justifications of God.

21. Meditation on the Law Prepares for Eternity

Meditation and practice of the law is a preparation for eternal things.—But, as we have already treated above, the exercise of justifications and the meditation on testimonies is that by which, when the works of the law are exercised through bodily acts, yet by the exercise of justifications and the meditation on testimonies, a certain preparation for eternal goods is obtained through the meditation on present things. But he shows whence the meditation on testimonies arises. For he added,

my counsels are thy justifications; confessing

that is, that all the care of life, all the various and diverse movements of counsels, are intent upon the justifications of God in Christ Jesus, to whom be glory and honour for ever and ever. Amen.

My soul hath cleaved to the pavement: quicken me according to thy word.

I have declared my ways, and thou hast heard me: teach me thy justifications. Instruct me in the way of thy justifications: and I will be exercised in thy wondrous works. My soul hath slumbered through weariness: strengthen me in thy words. Remove from me the way of iniquity: and in thy law have mercy on me. I have chosen the way of truth: I have not forgotten thy judgments. I have cleaved to thy testimonies, O Lord: put me not to shame. I have run the way of thy commandments, when thou didst enlarge my heart.

1. The Soul's Cleaving to the Body's Dust

The fellowship of earthly flesh is burdensome to the Prophet.—A manifold understanding cannot have in itself the difficulty of the words, when with all obscurity removed, the choice of understanding rather abounds: as we observe in the first

of the fourth letter.

For he says,

My soul hath cleaved to the pavement: quicken me according to thy word.

This can also be understood of the assiduousness of prayer, as though the Prophet, prostrated to the ground from the confession of sins, had cleaved to the pavement. But that we may understand something deeper beneath these words, having examined more carefully the force of the words, we judge it necessary. For he does not say, I have cleaved to the pavement; but: My soul hath cleaved to the pavement: and we are admonished to understand that here he has complained about the fellowship of soul and body. And there are many things that admonish us to consider this the more probable.

For the Apostle said, the body of our humiliation; and the prophet also said: My soul hath been humbled in the dust; and again, And thou hast brought me down into the dust of death. Therefore, either because we dwell upon the soil of this earth, or because we were formed and fashioned from earth, the soul, which is of another origin, is believed to have cleaved to the earth of the body: taking upon itself the greatest struggle, that it may, even while remaining in it, tear itself away from fellowship with it, so as to use it as a sojourner uses a place of temporary abode.

2. A Prayer to Be Quickened Into Life

He desires a better life.—The Prophet is not ignorant, though earlier in time, of the apostolic saying, that they who cleave to the Lord are one spirit. He also knows that it has been proclaimed by himself, My soul hath cleaved after thee. Moreover he has read in the law, Thou shalt walk after the Lord thy God, and shalt cleave to him. He therefore desires to cleave to the latter rather than to the former. But because he remembers that from fellowship with it he has contracted some stain of sin; he prays that through the word of God, although his soul is mingled with earthly and mortal nature, he himself may nonetheless be animated into the life of heavenly life. For he knows that he now cleaves to the pavement, not lives: but according to the word of God, to whom the dead live, he prays to be quickened into life.

3. One's Own Ways Versus the Way of God

What it is to walk in one's own ways, what in the way of God.—Then follows,

I have declared my ways, and thou hast heard me; teach me thy justifications.

Those who live according to the pleasures of the body walk in their own ways. But those who, having abandoned every habit of carnal vices, live in the precepts of God, have their journey no longer in their own way, but in the way of God. And let us hear this in the precept of Deuteronomy: But now, Israel, what doth the Lord thy God require of thee, but that thou fear the Lord thy God, and walk in all his ways, and love him, and serve the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul, and keep the commandments of the Lord thy God and his justifications, which I command thee this day, that it may be well with thee? Therefore he who cleaves to God is in the way of God.

4. Confessing Sins Before Receiving God's Teaching

The confession of sins is the way to the teaching of God.—And in what sense shall we consider the Prophet to have spoken here, saying: I have declared my ways, and thou hast heard me; teach me thy justifications? For if he declares his ways, he must necessarily declare the ways of sin: because whoever is not in the way of God is in the way of sin. But agreeing with this present saying appears to be that which was said, I will declare my iniquities against myself to the Lord; and again, A just man is his own accuser at the beginning of his speech. Therefore the declaration spoken of here is not a praising, but a confession of his ways, that is, a penitent profession of his sins. And the Prophet, that he might be worthy of the spirit of prophecy, first confessed his ways, that is, his sins, so that after this declaration of them he might be capable of receiving the teaching of the justifications of God. Both things are taught absolutely.

For when he says, I have declared, he shows that this confession belongs to past time; when he says, Teach me, it is a prayer looking to the future, because one must first confess sins, and after confession is completed, learn.

5. The Law's Justifications as a Shadow of Things to Come

He asks to be taught not the works of the law, but its aim.—The Prophet, remaining in the law, does not ask to be taught from those things which were then performed by bodily ministry; but from those things which through the appearance of present things were to contain the sacraments of the future.

Make me to understand the way of thy justifications; and I will be exercised in thy wondrous works.

The present text is understood to have distinguished the justifications from the way of them. And as far as the matter itself is understood, everything toward which one tends by a way is not the same as the way itself by which one travels. The reason must therefore be sought why the Prophet prayed that it be granted to him to understand the way of the justifications rather than to know the justifications themselves.

For he remembers that all the justifications of the law contain within themselves a shadow of the holy justifications: when after six years of servitude the Hebrew boy is free, when the fruits of the seventh year are left for the poor and the beasts of the earth, when after the fiftieth year all things revert to the right of the family from which they had passed. And because these things established in the law are the way of those things of which the example is prefigured in them; he prays that, understanding the way of these justifications, he may be exercised in the wondrous works of God, that is, may be conversant with the works of the law: because the law was established as a mirror of future goods.

6. Defending the Septuagint's Rendering of a Slumbering Soul

Among various versions the version of the LXX is preferred.—Concerning the following

I have found that many have held various opinions, because it was not rendered from the Hebrew with the same propriety by the other translators as it was written by those Seventy interpreters.

For some, in place of what was said by them ἐνύσταξεν ἡ psyche, soul μου, put ἔσταξεν ἡ psyche, soul μου. But one of them translated not ἐνύσταξεν, but κατέσταξεν. And ἐνύσταξεν, ἔσταξεν, and κατέσταξεν are understood to signify different things. But it is not safe for us to depart from the translation of the Seventy interpreters: and indeed the reason and sense of the words so admonishes us that we understand the

to have been translated rightly and probably.

For with them and with us it stands thus,

My soul hath slumbered through weariness.

And all the preceding and following speech contains in itself a confession of humility and weakness; when the soul cleaved to the pavement, when the ways of sins are confessed, when he prays for understanding of the way of justifications.

It follows therefore that now he has complained that his soul slumbers through weariness of the mortal dwelling, which does not yet understand the way of justifications, which has even now cleaved to the pavement. And on this account he prays that he be strengthened in the ways of God, because he slumbers through weariness.

7. The Difference Between Slumbering and Sleeping

The reason for slumbering.—But here this distinction is observed, that he says he slumbers, not that he sleeps

because one who sleeps is in the very act of sleep; but one who slumbers, slumbers before he sleeps. Which distinction is also observed in another place, when it says, Behold, he shall neither sleep nor slumber, who keepeth Israel. But also there, where he says, If I give sleep to mine eyes, and slumbering to mine eyelids; he said that slumbering belongs to the eyelids, but sleep to the eyes, because it is the office of the eyelids to bring on sleep from slumbering. The Prophet therefore, even if he slumbers, does not yet sleep: and on this account, lest while slumbering he fall asleep, he added, Strengthen me in thy words: that is, that being strengthened through the understanding of all the justifications which he mentioned above, he may not only not sleep, but may also keep watch without any slumbering.

8. A Prayer to Remove the Way of Iniquity

David is estranged not from sin, but from the way of sin.

He prays for the blessedness promised by the law.—He says after these things,

Remove from me the way of iniquity, and in thy law have mercy on me.

It would have been straightforward to say, Remove iniquity from me: but although conscious of his weakness, since he remembers that there is in his body a way of sinning, yet through the fear of God he is wholly estranged from the commission of any sin. He therefore prays that the way of sin, by which it is easy to proceed to sin, be removed from him, that is, that all desires of bodily pleasures be taken away, and that no temptation of concupiscence or ignorance, by which one travels as by a road to sin, assail him. Nor does he pray God for this alone, but also that through his law he may have mercy on him.

Through the law, however, he obtains mercy in this way

because, as I showed above, it is thus written in the law: And now, Israel, what doth the Lord thy God require of thee, but that thou fear the Lord thy God, and walk in all his ways, and love him, and serve the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul, and keep the commandments of the Lord thy God and his justifications, which I command thee this day, that it may be well with thee? Therefore since the law teaches that one must walk in the ways of God, so that it may be well hereafter for the one walking in them; and the Prophet now prays that the ways of injustice be removed from him, and that God have mercy on him according to the law: he prays for that which is contained in the law, that walking in the ways of God he may be placed in blessedness. By which one travels.

9. The Way of Truth Amid Many Ways

The way of truth is judgment.—Then follows,

I have loved the way of truth, and I have not forgotten thy judgments.

Many love a way, but not all love the way of truth. And all who enter upon the way of pleasures or of riches or of honours, and also those who are led astray, uncertain and impious, by the doctrines of heretics, are indeed on a way, but they are not on the way of truth. But the Prophet speaks from the spirit of him who, having taken on a body, was afterwards to say, I am the way, the truth, and the life. And because this is the judgment, according to what is contained in the Gospels, For this is the judgment, that he who believeth in me may have eternal life; rightly does the Prophet say, I have loved the way of truth, and I have not forgotten thy judgments. For these things were said to us for our knowledge at a later time; but the Prophet both lives and speaks in them.

10. Freed From Shame by Clinging to God's Testimonies

By clinging to the testimonies of God we are freed from confusion.—The discourse of prophetic teaching and confession coheres within itself: for he says,

I have clung to thy testimonies, O Lord, be not thou confounded with me: because by clinging to the testimonies of the Lord he has merited pardon for old and former sins.

For he knows that it was said in the words of God: Behold, I will blot out as a cloud thy iniquities, and as a mist thy sins. The Lord is powerful enough to remove all those things which bring us shame and confusion, if we too are able to say with freedom, I have clung to thy testimonies. For by clinging to these, we are freed from the confusion of shameful and former crimes.

11. The Narrow Way of God's Commandments

Steps toward running in the way of God.

The way of life is narrow.—But all things are concluded in their own order, in their own matters. For above he said, Remove from me the way of iniquity: then he added, I have loved the way of truth: a third thing follows upon this, I have clung to thy testimonies: now at last he concludes thus,

I have run in the way of thy commandments, when thou didst enlarge my heart.

The arrival at this point came by degrees. The ways of iniquity having been removed, the ways of truth having been loved, by the inseparable fellowship of the testimonies; so that one might run in the way of God's commandments. But the way that leads to life is both narrow and tribulated; narrow, because one must enter upon it carefully and cautiously; tribulated, because it is approached through many tribulations and sufferings. And will the Prophet be thought presumptuous who glories that he runs this way?

12. God Enlarges the Heart to Run the Way

One does not run unless God enlarges the heart: who enlarges it.—He remembers that between the pursuit of innocence and the confession of humility, the force of his words must be moderated.

Therefore after he had said, I have run in the way of thy commandments, he added this, when thou didst enlarge my heart. The heart is enlarged which, through faith, is opened wide to receive the teaching of God. And this was said of believers: And I will dwell in them and walk among them.

The heart, therefore, is enlarged in which the mystery of the Father and the Son abides, in which the Holy Spirit delights to dwell with spacious habitation. Solomon also remembers this, saying, Wisdom is sung in the ways of going forth, in the broad places she acts with freedom. The Latin rendering of each of these two words either brings us obscurity or offers us the impression of another meaning. For what we render as in exitibus, the Greek has translated from the Hebrew as ἐν ἐξόδοις. And exodus properly is the place where from many narrow ways one comes together into one open way. But what we call plateae, the Greek has named by the same word (πλατείας). Yet the Greek word designates plateae as breadths: and we suppose these to be the streets of cities. Therefore Wisdom, which is Christ, is sung in that way in which the going forth from many things has been made for us; but in the breadths she acts with freedom, in which he promised not only to dwell but also to walk about.

Therefore the Prophet freely runs the way of the Lord, after he has begun to be one whose heart has been enlarged. For he could not run the way of God before he himself had become a dwelling worthy and spacious for God.

Set before me a law, O Lord, the way of thy justifications: and I will seek it always.

Give me understanding, and I will search thy law, and will keep it with my whole heart. Lead me in the path of thy commandments: for this same I have desired. Incline my heart unto thy testimonies, and not unto covetousness. Turn away mine eyes lest they behold vanity: quicken me in thy way. Establish thy word unto thy servant in thy fear. Cut away my reproach which I have suspected; for thy judgments are pleasant. Behold I have longed after thy precepts: quicken me in thy justice. And may know. For he asks not merely for the law of the way, but for the law of the way of justifications.

2. The Law of the Way Through the Wilderness

The law of common ways.

The law of the way of the people going out of Egypt.—And what then will be the law of the ways of justifications? For in common and earthly ways we remember there to be a law concerning measurements of spaces: when at the interval of a thousand paces certain signs of the law of the way are set up, when the rest of stopping-places is arranged, when the intervals of stopping-places suited to the refreshment of travellers are measured out again as far as the city. But also when the people passed on foot out of Egypt through the Red Sea, we remember that a certain law of the way was established for them not by the judgment of human will but of the divine, in the pillar of fire and of cloud. For when it was necessary for the people to make their journey, the pillar of fire went before them in the night season, but by day the pillar of cloud.

But when it had pleased God to keep the people long in the same encampments, the pillar of fire was not moved forward by night, nor did the pillar of cloud go before by day. He established therefore this law of the way. And if we carefully review those stations and encampments and the conditions of the places which are contained in Exodus xv and following; we shall see great wonders of the heavenly journey in them. On account of which the Prophet frequently prayed, saying, I will consider the wonders of thy law. But the Prophet does not pray to be contained by these laws of the way any longer: for he asks not for the law of the way, but for the law of the way of justifications.

3. The Many Ways and the Perfect Way

The way is manifold.

What law of the way David desires. He knows there is a way of testimonies, when he says: I have delighted in the way of thy testimonies. He knows there is a way of commandments, when he says: I have run in the way of thy commandments. He knows there is a way of the law, when: Blessed are they who walk in the law of the Lord. He knows there is this way of justifications, concerning which he now makes supplication. He knows also that there is a way in the Prophets, he knows there is a way in the Gospels, he knows there is a way in the Apostles, of which he has often given testimony. He wishes therefore through the law of this way to press on to that perfect way of life. For there are many among the heretics who approve the way of the law, many who approve that of the prophets, many who approve that of the Gospels, many who approve that of the apostles.

We know also that some are not content with all these ways.

But the learned scribe knows, after the example of the rich householder, to bring forth from his treasures things new and old. This law therefore of the way of justifications the Prophet desires. For the law of justifications is contained within certain disciplines of a devout heart, and has confined us within the bounds of its own ordinance by which we should use it: lest by exceeding them, we should wander off into the opinions of heretical understanding. He does not wish therefore to depart from that law which he prays to be established for him.

4. Christ as the End of the Law

To what end.—But to what end does he pray for this law to be established?

Namely, that he may seek it. The law of justifications had been written through Moses: and this the Prophet was exercising in his works. He does not therefore pray for that to be established for him which was already established and was being devoutly practised by him; but for that which he desires to seek out. What then does he desire to seek out? The end of the law, namely. And what will be the end of the law? Let us hear the Apostle: For the end of the law is Christ. But through these ways of justifications, by which the law shall have been established, he desires to seek out the end of the law: and not only to seek it out, but to seek it always. For thus he says: And I will seek it always. The duty of seeking had not been sufficient through will alone, unless it were also carried out by him with unceasing continuity of time.

5. A Prayer for Understanding to Search the Law

The prerogatives of David, and by what law he desires understanding.—

Give me understanding, and I will search thy law, and will keep it with my whole heart.

We remember it to be written in the Proverbs of Solomon, In seeking to understand wisdom, wisdom is reckoned to the one who asks (acc. To LXX). By which sense it seems to be shown that one who does not understand, and yet asks wisely, is believed to be wise. This therefore profits to this end, because the Prophet, remaining in the law, and according to the Apostle a Hebrew of Hebrews circumcised on the eighth day, and according to lineage from the tribe of Judah, and according to the grace of bodily anointing both an elected king and a Christ, and according to the mystery of the Lord's nativity worthy to be he whose son Jesus Christ should be, prays as a stranger to the law: Give me understanding, and I will search thy law, and will keep it with my whole heart.

He does not yet keep it therefore, he has not yet searched it, he does not yet understand it. He is not speaking therefore of that law in which the Prophet was born, was instructed, and has laboured. Knowing therefore that the first part of prudence is that one who does not understand should ask those who are wise; and that one should understand what he does not know: for this reason he asks to receive understanding. But knowing that once the spirit of understanding has been obtained, the effort of searching is needed, he says: And I will search thy law. And recognising that the fruit of searching is the keeping of the thing found, he said, And I will keep it. But understanding that the perfect diligence of keeping consists in the whole office of the heart, he completed the entire order of his discourse, saying: Give me understanding, and I will search thy law, and will keep it with my whole heart.

6. The Feasts and Ordinances of the Law

The various rites of the law.

But what at last is this which he desires to understand, which he promises he will search and keep with his whole heart? For he remembers that the six days of Moses are shown in the book of the creation of this world as not idle. He knows that the rest of the seventh day is not superfluous. He recalls that in the observance of the new moon the mystery of a heavenly festival is figured as in a mirror. He knows that year in which after six years of servitude the Hebrew is free, in which after much labour the land rests, its fruits being left for the poor proselyte and the beasts of the earth, in which also all debts are remitted to all Hebrews. He also desires to search the laws of the fiftieth year. He wishes to know what is the observance in the first month from the tenth day until the fourteenth, and then until the twenty-first.

He also ponders that solemnity of the seventh month, the memorial of which is in trumpets; also the propitiation of the tenth day in it, and after the fifteenth the joy of eight days in tabernacles, how from these both the first is holy and the eighth is holy. He knows that circumcision was first performed, he knows also that it was repeated and carried out by Jesus. He desires the holy unleavened bread, he longs to offer the passover, concerning which it is written in the very immolation of the lamb, This is the passover of the Lord. He knows that the land of promise, the land flowing with milk and honey, has not yet been truly obtained by the people who were circumcised a second time. For these reasons therefore he prays for understanding; understanding these things, he promises he will search them; having searched them, he has professed he will keep them; keeping them, he will guard them with his whole heart.

7. The Meaning of Path in Greek and Latin

After which follows,

Lead me in the path of thy commandments; for this same I have desired. And in this

too, the force of the discourse has not been properly expressed through the condition of the translation.

For what our translators have rendered thus, Lead me in the path, the Greek has expressed thus: ὁδήγησόν με ἐν τῇ τρίβῳ. And what is called τρίβος among them is understood as a path worn and frequented by passage: but among us semita can be said, and be a semita, and yet not be a worn path. Therefore because the Greek has comprised both meanings under the same name, let us also understand it thus; and let us know that the semita is the same as that which is worn.

8. The Ancient Path Walked by the Patriarchs

The path of commandments worn from of old.—And it is to be observed that here he says the path is not of the law, but of the commandments.

For the way of the law had those walking from Moses, after it was itself established. But the path of commandments is so called because in the commandments of God the journey has already been made from the founding of the world. For in this path Abel also ran, and Seth persevered, and Enoch was pleasing, and Noah merited to be preserved, and Melchisedech both was able to bless and received tithes, and Abraham is the friend of God, and Isaac is the heir, and Jacob is Israel, and from Judah is the expectation of the nations, and Joseph is set as a testimony, Job free from the Law triumphs over the enemy of the law, and Moses vindicates the Hebrew, and Jesus circumcises Israel a second time, and Samuel is chosen as worthy in anointing a king.

9. Christ as Guide Along the Path

We need a guide to lead us to it.

Christ is the guide.—And now in this life he who is both anointed and king and prophet prays to be led. For he knows that his nature is weak, and that he cannot enter upon this path without a guide. For God is a guide to all who travel this path. He is a guide when it is said, Walk after the Lord your God, and cleave to him: and again: Walk after him, for he himself will lead you. He leads also when he says, He who does not take up his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. He leads also in that he first trod every path of the evangelical sufferings. If the Apostles teach, he taught first; for Wisdom established the friends of God and prophets. If anything just is now done by us, he is the prince of our justice; for he himself is justice. If for the sake of faith we are scourged unto terror, he offered his back to the scourges.

If we are struck with blows unto injury, he received these.

If we are spat upon unto contempt, he did not turn away his face from the spitting.

10. A Note on Gender in the Greek Text

That is, for those who love the law.—He is a guide in all things: but he is a guide to those who love the law, which the prophet above professed he would keep with his whole heart. For here, according to the manner of the Greek language, when it is said: Because I willed it, this cannot be referred to the path of commandments: because in the Greek, where the word for path is written in the feminine gender, what he wills is expressed in the masculine gender, saying, ὁδήγησόν με ἐν τῇ τρίβῳ τῶν ἐντολῶν σου, ὅτι αὐτὸν ἠθέλησα. For the law is named by us in the feminine gender, which in Greek is called νόμος, which by them is expressed in the masculine gender. And since there the path is named in the feminine gender, what he willed is referred to that which, by the property of the Greek language, is expressed in the masculine gender.

11. All Good Things Are Gifts From God

All things are from God's gift.—There follows now,

Incline my heart unto thy testimonies, and not unto covetousness.

The prophet referred all things to the gift of God, whether that the law of the ways of justification be established for him by the Lord, or that understanding be granted to him, or that he be led in the path, or that his heart be inclined unto testimonies, that is, unto those things which were written before witnesses. For the law was delivered with heaven and earth as witnesses.

12. Answering an Objection on Grace and Free Will

Objection and reply.—But perhaps through this devout modesty of the prophet, someone will dare to speak impiously thus: If, he says, all things are from God, then human ignorance is without fault; since it can obtain nothing except what it has received as a gift from God. And first, this is the will of impiety, to suppose that one does not attain those things which are proper to believers for the reason that they have not been granted to one by God. But the prophet removed every occasion for this impious excuse. For first, in praying, he performed the duty fitting to his weakness: then he joined the efforts of human devotion to the gifts of God. For when he says, Establish for me, O Lord, the way of thy justifications; he showed what, according to the humility of our prayer, belongs to God. But when he added, And I will seek it always; he set forth the duty of his own devotion.

And in the other matters too he bound both together in a certain embrace: when he asked to be led in the path, and when he himself willed that very thing.

For he first set before all, with honour, those things which are from God; and then subjected, with confession of his own humility and duty, those things which belong to man. He prays therefore that God may grant. The beginning is therefore from us, when we pray, so that the gift may be from him: then, because from our beginning his gift follows, it is again from us that it be sought and obtained and retained.

13. Covetousness and Worldly Profit as One Thing

That covetousness and profit are the same thing.—Now in that which reads thus, Incline my heart unto thy justifications, and not unto profit; some have translated, Incline my heart unto thy testimonies, and not unto covetousness. What is contained in the Hebrew codices, being ambiguous in its definition, is suited to both interpretations. But we, as is fitting, follow the devout and ancient authority of the Seventy interpreters, yet adapting the property of each translator's understanding to the desire of the reader. For when the former said, unto profit, and the latter said, unto covetousness; through this very identity it will be understood how profit is here made subject. For men of the world call money, silver, gold, and the other instruments of wealth, profit. Therefore when the prophet prays that his heart be inclined unto God's testimonies and not unto profit, he is without doubt turning a heart inclined unto God's testimonies away from those things which by human judgment are reckoned profitable. And indeed the

which follows confirms the sense of our understanding.

14. Turning the Eyes Away From Worldly Vanities

Which eyes, and from what vanity it is fitting to turn them away.—For he says,

Turn away mine eyes, lest they behold vanity, and quicken me in thy way; teaching the vanity of those things which are reckoned profitable by men.

And it must be asked which eyes, and from what vanity, he prays to be turned away. He prays for both the eyes of the soul and of the body to be turned away—those, namely, which are held captive and fixed upon theatrical games, those which are enslaved to the contests of the Circus, those which marvel at the prices of garments, those which are occupied by the splendour of gold and the variety of gems. Unless perhaps the course of the stars is not more pleasing than the running of horses; and those divine utterances of human hope are not sung more pleasantly than those obscene tales of shameful spectacles.

Unless perhaps to the honour and glory of the riches of eternity laid up in store, the use of earthly metals is not more to be preferred: and the appearance of gold will be more pleasing to me than man and earth and light and heaven. He therefore prays that both these eyes of his body and those of his soul be turned away from their vanities: of which, when blinded, the blessed Apostle teaches, saying, In the vanity of their mind darkened, alienated from the life of God.

15. The Reward of Eyes Turned From Vanity

The reward of eyes turned away from vanity.—And what reward there is for eyes turned away from vanity is not far to seek.

For there follows, And in thy way I shall live. For the eyes must be turned away from vanity, so that life may be ours in the way of God: not that life which now is, but that which is laid up in the heavens and hidden in Christ. For thus throughout this whole psalm he has spoken as one who is yet to live, not as one who merely lives now. The eyes must therefore be raised, by which the glory of Christ rather than the empty and vain things of this world may be discerned. For in the way of God, turning our eyes away from vanity, we shall live.

16. The Fear of God and the Cutting Away of Reproach

The words of God are to be received with fear.—Then there follows,

Establish thy word unto thy servant in thy fear.

The prophet knows that the words of God are received by many without fear. For many hear the Scriptures of the heavenly eloquence and neglect them as a tale of empty things, and mock the words of God—which cannot pass away even when heaven and earth pass away—with great peril of irreligious rashness. He knows that the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom. He knows that in that sevenfold grace of the Spirit, fear is numbered last as the foundation of those things which are said above. He therefore prays that the words of God be established in him in the fear of God: because he knows that those words will be profitable to us which are feared as God's words. Then he added,

Cut away my reproach which I have suspected: for thy judgments are pleasant.

The prophet speaks while placed in the body, and knows that no one living can be without sin.

He remembers that there is one who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth. Therefore when he prays that reproach be cut away from him, he prays that sins be cut away; because reproach follows upon sin. But when he prays that it be cut away from him, he has not confessed as of something committed and perpetrated; but because he suspects it to dwell in him through the weakness of his flesh. For he does not say, Cut away the reproach which is in me: but he says, Cut away my reproach which I have suspected, showing the suspicion of reproach from the consciousness of his own weakness. For in the judgments many shall rise to reproach.

Because these judgments are pleasant to those in whom the reproach of sin shall not remain; he prays that that very suspicion of reproach which is in him be cut away from him, so that the judgments of God may be pleasant to him.

17. Longing for God's Precepts and Prayer to Be Quickened

Whom God quickens.—And lest he should be thought to have prayed out of consciousness of a sin committed, he concluded the whole prayer which he offers under each group of eight

with this freedom,

Behold, I have longed for thy precepts: quicken me in thy righteousness.

Above he prayed that the words of God might be established in him in the fear of God; then that the suspicion of reproach might be cut away from him: now he shows his longing and desire toward the precepts of God, and prays to be quickened in the righteousness of God; knowing it to be the proper gift of divine righteousness to quicken him who has both desired the precepts of God, and for whom the suspicion of reproach has been cut away so that the judgments are pleasant, and in whom the words of God are established in the fear of God.

Let thy mercy come upon me, O Lord, thy salvation according to thy word.

And I will answer those who reproach me with a word, because I have hoped in thy words. And take not the word of truth utterly out of my mouth; for I have hoped in thy judgments. And I will keep thy law always, for ever and ever. And I walked in a wide place: because I sought thy commandments. And I spoke of thy testimonies in the sight of kings, and was not confounded. And I meditated on thy commandments, which I loved exceedingly. And I lifted up my hands to thy commandments which I loved, and I was exercised in thy justifications.

1. Answering Those Who Call Scripture Imperfect

Those who despise the Scriptures as destitute of wisdom.

Nothing in them but what is perfect.—There are many, according to the Apostle, who following the wisdom of the world have rejected the wisdom of God: on account of which God made foolish the wisdom of the world. For what is more foolish than the unbelievers, who beyond that common error of the irreligious add also this sin, that they think the divine eloquence of the Scriptures lacks the reason of perfect doctrine? And because, by reason of the impiety of their mind, they are not capable of receiving divine words, they break forth into insult against heavenly words as an excuse for their own dullness, saying that there is nothing reasonable in them, nothing perfect: wishing that what they themselves say should alone be learned, and polished with the teachings of true wisdom; foolishly denying to God what they dare to claim for themselves. Nor is it surprising if they hold irreverent opinions about those things whose meaning they do not attain, after the manner of brute beasts.

But although in the discourse which we held above I consider that for those who follow the wisdom of God the knowledge of heavenly words has perfection, and that there is nothing among them which is not consummated and perfect in every part: yet this too will be understood more fully even in these

of the sixth letter.

2. Mercy and Salvation as God's Gift

Our salvation is God's gift.—For after the foregoing sense he speaks thus,

let thy mercy come upon me, O Lord, thy salvation according to thy word.

He prayed first for mercy, then for salvation. For our salvation is from the mercy of God, and this is the gift of his goodness in us: and the prayer begins where also the salvation of the one praying begins. Then, lest the Prophet should be thought to pray from an uncertain and unexpected hope, he first mentions mercy, then salvation, and thirdly added, according to thy word: so as to show that this confidence in praying proceeds according to the word of God, that is, according to the teaching of the law.

3. Answering Reproach Through Hope in God's Words

After this order of perfect prayer, therefore, there follows,

I will answer those who reproach me with a word, because I have hoped in thy words.

Perfect reason holds its order: If, he says, thy mercy shall have come upon me, and thy salvation according to thy word, and I shall have obtained mercy from thee, and been preserved as thou didst promise; it will follow that I answer those who reproach me with folly, and with the error of my hope, and with this word which I hope in thee. What then will the irreligious mind be able to reproach against this response of the prophet? Mercy is first prayed for from God, salvation also is awaited from God: and then God is shown to have promised this through his word.

The impiety of those who reproach is therefore confuted by those who hope in the words of God: since when God is prayed to, the faith of believers hopes for both mercy and salvation from him, and this is the teaching of our hope, that when prayed to he both has mercy and saves.

4. The Prayer of David Rests on Mercy, Not Merit

The prayer of David rests on God's mercy, not on his own merits.—Next follows,

take not the word of truth utterly out of my mouth; for I have hoped in thy judgments.

Let human insolence receive the teaching of humility and modesty. The prophet first prays that something be granted to him, before showing that he deserves to obtain it. He wishes all things to begin in him from the goodness of God: yet he does not withdraw the ground of his confidence. For he says, And take not the word of truth utterly out of my mouth. In which he first confesses the majesty of him who must always be prayed to: then he submits that he does not hope in vain, saying, For I have hoped in thy judgments. But it is the custom of human rashness to put forward merit before it is merited, in order to obtain something; and to address him from whom something is sought as though from the obligation of a duty owed.

5. A Preacher of God's Word Must Be Free from Crime

A preacher of the word of God must be free from crime.—But it does not suffice for us that the Prophet has maintained only the principle of modesty: the arrangements of the words and their force must also be understood, as to why he said: And take not the word of truth utterly out of my mouth. Every function of the mouth serves the sense and movements of the heart. And why the Prophet prays that the word of truth not be taken from his mouth, the sequence of this

teaches. For it must not be supposed that the Prophet's fear was that the word of truth might be taken from his heart: for he says, For I have hoped in thy judgments. Hoping therefore in the judgments of God, he does not fear that the word of truth will be taken from his heart. But he knows that there are certain sins which take the word of truth from the mouth. For God said to the sinner, Why dost thou declare my justices?

For he did not say, Why art thou unmindful of my justices? But warned the sinner who had remained in sin to abstain from the office of preaching. For he wills the preacher of heavenly doctrine to be free from crime; he wills his words to be handled by the chaste mouth of a chaste body. Care must therefore be taken lest at any time the word of truth be taken from our mouth. Hence that which the Apostle warns: Neglect not the grace that is in thee: lest through negligence and sloth we be unworthy of preaching the word of God.

6. None Without Sin but Christ Alone

One alone without sin.—But the Prophet does not dare to wish to be made so free from sin as to forget that there is one alone who did no sin, and in whose mouth no guile was found, and therefore he added, utterly. That is, through the modesty of confession, he prays that the word of truth not be taken from him: and through reverence for him who alone is without sin, he entreats that it not be taken from him utterly; because he remembers that he is a man, who through the weakness of nature cannot be without sin.

7. Keeping the Law and the Realities It Foreshadows

David pledges that he will keep the law, and those things which are foreshadowed by the law.—

I will keep thy law always, for ever and ever.

The Prophet fears no end of his life. For his faith is not confined to ages: but extends itself into the infinity of times in the duty of keeping the law. He knows that the altar built by Moses was constructed as a likeness of the higher altar. He knows that Aaron the priest was adorned in the likeness of the priest shown on the mountain. For God said to Moses: Go, make all things according to the pattern which was shown thee in the mountain. He hastens therefore toward those laws of the eternal ages. For since the law is a shadow of what is to come, it is necessary that the body of the true law be eternal. Moreover he distinguished the present duty from that unwearied continuity of perpetual duty, saying, And I will keep thy law always, for ever and ever.

When he says, always for ever; he admitted no time in this temporal life for forgetfulness to creep in.

But when he added, and for ever and ever, he knows that through this shadow of the law one ascends to the ministry of the true and eternal law. For he says, for ever and ever, as it were time of time, which by a certain succession of this age shall be the age to come.

8. The Laws of God After This Life

The laws of God after this life.—He knows that there is, according to the rich man in the Gospel and the poor man Lazarus, a law for the soul freed from the body, by which one is separated from another by an impassable gulf. He knows, according to the apostle Paul, that there is also a law of the resurrection, in which one star differs from another star in glory. He knows that there are laws of the Angels, since some standing by praise God with unwearied voice, while others stand before the sight of God invisible to us as though by the law of a closer duty. He knows also that the Angels of the little ones behold the face of God daily by a certain law. He knows assuredly that there are eternal laws, and is confident that he will keep all of them in that age of ages: because those things which are established through shadow, he now always observes in this present age.

9. A Broad Heart from Seeking God's Commandments

What is the fruit of a broad heart, and what is its cause.—

I walked at large: because I have sought thy commandments.

The prophet is not narrow: and above he had already said: I ran the way of thy commandments, when thou didst enlarge my heart. He knows that amid the sufferings of human tribulations he must always be open-hearted toward God. This the Apostle himself teaches, saying: In all things we suffer tribulation, but are not distressed. He knows that the same Apostle glories in this very breadth of heart concerning himself, when he says to the Corinthians: You are not straitened in us, but you are straitened in your own bowels. The prophet also is open here, God saying: And I will dwell in them, and walk among them. The hearts of sinners therefore are narrow, and a polluted mind does not receive God as a guest.

For a spacious dwelling is needed for the incomprehensible God: and therefore the prophet walks in breadth, because in him is the habitation of God speaking within him. But he teaches the cause of his breadth, saying: Because I have sought thy commandments. Let us recall the custom of our nature: whenever, devoting ourselves to reading, we search out the commandments and precepts of God, into what breadth of understanding the narrowness of our minds is enlarged, and how open the sense of our humility becomes toward divine desires. But through the consciousness of our sins all breadth of soul is contracted within us: and all things are difficult and narrow, when we are unworthy of the habitation of the divine word.

10. Kings as Either Earthly Princes or Saints

By kings are understood either princes of the earth or saints.—But the prophet walking in breadth must be engaged in an office worthy of the breadth he has attained: and he is indeed so engaged. For there follows,

I spoke of thy testimonies before kings, and I was not confounded.

This is the office of the enlarged heart, that from it words proceed in abundance of divine doctrine. For the prophet speaks boldly before the princes of the earth, proclaiming God. And indeed this sense has a twofold meaning, because according to the dominical precepts it is fitting that Christ be proclaimed by us before kings and powers; nor is it right for us to be terrified by earthly powers, so as not to, with all confusion cast aside, confess with steadfast and public faith God who will deny those who deny him.

The discourse can also be referred to those of whom the Apostle also says: You reign without us, and would to God you did reign

that is, as though in the sight of the saints, who are indeed frequently called kings of the earth, the prophet spoke the testimonies of God, and was not confounded in offering through his preaching the teachings of heavenly doctrine. Moreover the reading presents a twofold understanding from itself: so that, since both can readily be understood from the testimonies of the Scriptures, either both meanings are considered to be signified, or whichever shall seem more probable is chosen.

11. The Law in Mouth, Mind, and Heart

The law must be in the mouth, in the mind, in the heart.—

I meditated on thy commandments, which I loved exceedingly.

It is fitting therefore not only that we speak in the testimonies of God: but that we review all the commandments of the law by prolonged meditation. Nor is meditation alone useful, unless the law itself which is in meditation be loved: nor will it suffice to love with common love, unless also that which is loved be loved exceedingly. And therefore the prophetic word runs through this whole order of perfect reason, saying: And I meditated on thy commandments, which I loved exceedingly.

12. Works of the Hands Fulfilling the Law

Let it be also in the hands.—But neither meditation on the law, nor even devoted love of it will suffice, unless the fruit of works and the efficacy of the will follow. Nor did the prophet cease in this: for he says,

I lifted up my hands to thy commandments which I loved greatly.

He lifted up his hands to the commandments which he loved; not indeed insolent or presumptuous hands, but hands serving the commandments of humility, persisting in works of mercy, carrying out the precepts of faith. But the duty of work must always be intent, and must at no time cease through any dissimulation of negligent idleness. In this also the prophet testifies that he remains, saying: And I was exercised in thy justifications. Exercise shows the continuity of action. He teaches therefore that the observance of the precepts is frequent and always intent in him, toward those efficacies of heavenly justifications of which we made mention above, now exercising himself in the justifications of the present, and those of the future law foreshadowed.

Be thou mindful of thy word to thy servant, in which thou hast given me hope.

This hath comforted me in my humiliation: because thy word hath enlivened me. The proud dealt unjustly in every place: but I declined not from thy law. I remembered thy judgments from of old, O Lord: and I was comforted. Faintness of soul seized me because of sinners forsaking thy law. Thy justifications were the subject of my song in the place of my pilgrimage. I was mindful in the night of thy name, O Lord: and I kept thy law. This was made to me: because I sought thy justifications.

1. Scripture's Call to the Hope of Eternal Goods

All Scripture calls us to the hope of eternal goods.—Every word of God, which is contained in the divine scriptures, calls us to the hope of heavenly goods.

And therefore the prophet, confident that he has remained in all the precepts of God, says steadfastly,

Be thou mindful of thy word to thy servant.

Is God forgetful of what he has permitted? Far be it that any kinds of human weaknesses should be believed to creep into the eternal and unwearied Power. But the prophet, who believed in the promises of God, who was held by desire for heavenly things, who hoped for future things by contempt of present things, does not admonish God to remember his word; but prays that God be mindful of his word in him as his servant, that is, that he be counted worthy that God deign to be mindful of his word in him, in which word he gave hope.

And hope must not be empty, nor be proclaimed only in words, but be taught by the things themselves: so that if at any time weaknesses, persecutions, losses, bereavements, insults befall; we may console these threats and powers of the present age with the hope of eternal promises.

2. Hope and God's Word Console the Afflicted

Hope consoles the afflicted; the word of God gives life.—And to all these things indeed we are taught: but the prophet has already himself passed through all of them, saying,

This hath comforted me in my humiliation: because thy word hath enlivened me. This refers to the hope which God caused him to hope. But it comforted him in humiliation: that is, when he is despised, when he is mocked, when he is harassed with injuries, when he is dishonored with insults; knowing this to be his warfare of present trials. But amid these battles of his weakness, the hope furnished by the Lord consoles him: and he is enlivened through the words of God. He knows that in these things the glory of his humility in heaven is surpassing: he knows that the soul refreshed by the words of God contains within itself, as it were some food of life, eternal life. Living in the words of God, he is not moved by the empty glory of the proud.

For he knows that his own poverty is richer than their wealth. He knows that his fastings are satisfied with heavenly and evangelical blessing: he knows that his humility is to be rewarded with the glorious prize of honor. And therefore he added,

The proud dealt unjustly in every place: but I declined not from thy law.

Amid the excessive and consummate iniquities of the proud (for they dealt very unjustly) the prophet turns aside from the law of God by no deviation.

3. Constant Remembrance of God's Judgments

Let there be constant remembrance of the judgments of God.

But one who does not turn aside from the law of God must be mindful of the judgments of God. For in every kind of our life the memory of divine judgment must be implanted and held within us; so that when we do anything, with the memory of judgment dwelling in us, or rather never departing from us, our works may serve the precepts of God. Blessed will be whoever has done all things not without the memory of divine judgment. This the prophet professes of himself, saying,

I was mindful of thy judgments from of old, and was comforted.

This now is from of old only, not also from age to age: because all the judgments of God upon us have been established from the times of this age and world.

In these, however, he exhorted himself—namely, amid these storms of the world, and amid these battles of bodily passions—to endurance and victory over the assailing evils, his own humility being urged on by the memory of the judgments of God.

4. Faintness of Soul Over Sinners Who Forsake the Law

The holiness of David.

The holy man, when struck, grieves not for his own lot but for that of the one who strikes him.—Then follows,

A faintness of soul took hold of me because of sinners forsaking thy law.

The prophet's own virtues do not suffice him for the hope of eternal life: neither that he had hope in the word of God, nor that he consoled himself in that same hope, nor that he is quickened by the eloquence of God, nor that he does not turn aside from the law, nor that he is always urged on by the memory of the judgments of God—nay, he is also wearied by grief at human impiety, and is faint of soul on account of the irreligious wickedness of men.

For whenever a holy man is struck, he takes pity not on the fall of his own humility, but on the insolence of the one who strikes: as a father suffers insult from a frenzied son, as a physician from a raving patient—he feels pain not from what he himself has endured, but because the one whom he wished to be well has in his frenzy done him injury. Moreover, when one member suffers anything, according to the Apostle, the other members suffer with it. Faintness therefore, according to these things, takes hold of the prophet over sinners forsaking the law of God: with the feeling of one who pities and grieves, and as though for his own members that are in part sick, he is wearied by the peril of the wicked and irreligious.

5. How to Read, Hear, and Sing the Psalms

How it is fitting to read, hear, and sing the Psalms.—He himself, however, as far as concerns himself, remains always intent upon the justifications of God: and in whatever place he dwells, the hymn of devout confession never departs from his mouth. For he says,

Thy justifications were songs to me in the place of my sojourning.

By his own example he teaches that the songs of the psalms, once received into the ears, are to be held in the heart: and that these offices of the mouth are always to be repeated. Not negligently, as he himself declares, does he read and hear: nor after the manner of our irreligion does he read the divine words with eyes occupied with other things or heedless, nor receive them straightway with forgetful ears: but they are songs to him, that is, sung without intermission. Moreover, in every kind of place he teaches that the custom of singing psalms is never to be absent from him, when he says, In the place of my sojourning.

For he does not say, In my sojourning; but says thus, In the place of my sojourning—that is, in whatever seat he might have remained: understanding himself to be a pilgrim in this world, yet that the justifications of God are always songs to him.

6. The Usefulness of Nocturnal Prayer

The usefulness of nocturnal prayers.—But how much songs the justifications of God are, he shows; since he omits no time in which he is not engaged in that work of heavenly mysteries.

For he says,

I was mindful in the night of thy name, O Lord, and I kept thy law.

He knows that especially in the nocturnal hours the divine name must be recalled by us. He knows that then especially must the keeping of God's law be maintained by us, when impure desires steal upon the soul. When the goads of vices agitate the body through food recently taken, then the name of God must be recalled, then his law must be kept, establishing chastity, continence, and the fear of God. He knows that especially at this time God must be prayed to, entreated, propitiated, saying in another place, I will wash my bed every night, I will water my couch with my tears.

The soul must not be relaxed in the dangerous idleness of nocturnal vigils: but it must be occupied in prayers, in supplications, in confessions of sins: so that when opportunity is most given to the vices of the body, those same vices may then especially be broken by the remembrance of the divine law.

7. Seeking God's Justifications Brings Lasting Memory

Then follows,

This was made to me: because I sought thy justifications. This is referred to the memory, through which he was mindful in the nights of the name of God. But what he says, Was made to me, means not suddenly recurring, nor assumed for a time: but always remaining in him, and established within him by a certain work of faith: and made to him for this reason, because he had sought the justifications; it is therefore useful to search the justifications of God without any intermission of time: because through the seeking of them, we hold his memory perpetually in us in Christ Jesus, to whom is glory for ages of ages. Amen.

The Lord is my portion.

I said I would keep thy law. I entreated thy face with my whole heart; have mercy on me according to thy word. Because I thought on my ways, and turned my feet unto thy testimonies; I am ready, and am not troubled, that I may keep thy commandments. The cords of sinners have encompassed me: and I have not forgotten thy law. At midnight I rose to give praise to thee, upon the judgments of thy justification. I am a partaker with all them that fear thee, and that keep thy commandments. The earth is full of the mercy of the Lord: teach me thy justifications.

1. Resolving the Division Between the Seventh and Eighth Letters

The book of Psalms corrected among the Greeks from the Hebrew.—Reading many codices of the psalms, we too were of the opinion that the

which is first of the eighth letter, that is this one, The Lord is my portion, was contained in the preceding eight

of the seventh letter: because it was so written and contained in the Latin codices and even in some Greek ones: and indeed the sense seemed more complete in that way.

But reading the book of Psalms corrected among the Greeks according to the Hebrews, we found that this

is not the last of the seventh letter, but the first of the eighth.

And so according to this knowledge we too have undertaken to treat of it.

2. The Lord as One's Portion

Whose God is their portion.—For it begins thus,

The Lord is my portion.

I said that I would keep thy law. Rare is the person who has this confidence, that he dares to say that God is his portion. One must renounce the world and all its things: so that God may be our portion. But if ambition detains us, if the care of money occupies us, if the allurements of lusts ensnare us, if the business of household affairs delays us; God will not be our portion, held as we are in the possession of worldly cares and vices.

3. The Levites Given No Earthly Portion

For the ministers of God the law assigns no earthly portion.—When Moses was commanded to distribute portions of habitation to the twelve tribes of the children of Israel, the precept was given to him concerning the Levitical tribe thus: The sons of Levi shall have no portion nor lot in the midst of their brethren, because the Lord God is their part. And again we recall it is written, I the Lord am their part. Therefore the law given willed that those serving God should have no earthly portion: because God is their part.

4. Peter's Portion Without Silver or Gold

Peter has no possession.—That preacher of the Gospel, Peter, also recalls that he has no portion of human possession, when he answered one begging alms, Silver and gold I have none; but what I have, this I give thee. What is this, Peter, that you possess? You had renounced all things to your Lord, saying: Behold we have left all things, and followed thee, what therefore shall we have? And he had answered you: Amen I say to you, that you who have followed me, in the regeneration shall sit on twelve thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel. And by your example he had promised to the rest who left all things, that they would both receive a hundredfold, and thereafter would possess eternal life. What then is this, Peter, that you have? You have plainly, and I dare not say that you obtain more than a hundredfold: yet I say that you possess without multiplication of reckoning.

For you say, What I have, this I give thee: in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, rise up and walk. O happy possession, O perfect portion of God! You bestow not earthly things, but restore the riches of nature, and repair the losses of a defective birth. You bid one born lame to walk, and urge a man of many years to movement with an untried step. These riches he bestows whose God is his portion. Paul also knows the glory of his riches, saying: But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world. Such is the glory, such is the portion of the Apostle.

5. The Hundredfold Reward of Renouncing the World

The portion of those who renounce the world is better than the world.

What the hundredfold in this life is.—After the manner of human inheritances, therefore, let us choose the portion that is better and more useful. If in the division among co-heirs concerning earthly patrimonies someone strives to seek the lot of a more advantageous portion, with how much more eager care shall we choose the part of the heavenly inheritance? The Lord promises a hundredfold: and a hundredfold not in eternity, but in the present. The retribution of eternal goods, however, is immense and infinite: but under the definition of a hundredfold, the measure of present things is enclosed. I moreover doubt whether Peter's portion has exceeded this hundredfold. Certainly according to the Lord's precept, the gift of a hundredfold is to be hoped for now in this age, all the things of the world having been left behind. For God is our portion, who says, And I will dwell in them.

Now therefore the reward of the hundredfold is this, that God dwells in this our earthly little body.

But why do I say dwells? He himself also says, And I will walk among them. The possession of a faithful breast is open and spacious for God: that he may dwell and walk. But he who dwells, who walks—what third thing has he added? And I will be their God. Behold the portion promised to us by him, that we should be a habitation for God; and while he walks in us, he himself should be our possession—if we leave the world, if we renounce the slipping away of earthly possession, if we reject the inheritance of perishable things, if we depart from the world while still living. For what reward is it to have left the world when bodies are dead and the soul is departing at dissolution? We must be deprived of it through contempt of it. We must be ignorant of it through ignorance of its pleasures.

We must die to it in it, while we do not live to it.

Paul knows that he no longer lives to himself, saying: For I live, now not I live, but Christ liveth in me.

6. Pledging Again to Keep the Law

The prophet therefore, not living to the world according to the Apostle, says steadfastly and freely: The Lord is my portion.

I said that I would keep thy law. He maintained this manner which he had in the foregoing passages, when he pledged that he would keep the law of God. For he is not understood to speak of that which he was bodily doing; since he confesses that he will keep it rather than that he keeps it.

7. Desiring to See God, Not with Fleshly Eyes

David desires to see God, not with the eyes of the flesh.—Then follows,

I entreated thy face with my whole heart: have mercy on me according to thy word.

We recall that Moses entreated that he might see God. And perhaps the prayer of this Prophet will be thought akin to his petition. But he recalls that it was said by God: No man shall see my face, and live. Does he then ask that what he recalls was denied to Moses be granted to him? But although he is earlier than the evangelical saying, he nevertheless recalls that this beatitude of faith is reserved, in which it is said: Blessed are the clean of heart, for they shall see God.

And so, since he knows it is said in the law that no man may see the face of God and live, and does not doubt from the evangelical beatitude that all who are clean of heart shall see God; with the restraint of perfect modesty he expressed the longing of his desire, saying: I entreated thy face with my whole heart. He knows that it is now impossible for him to see what eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor hath it entered into the heart of man. He knows that the glory of God is invisible to fleshly eyes. He recalls—I say not that the light of human vision is dimmed by the brightness of angels—but that the very glory of Moses' face the eyes of the human body could not bear.

8. Measuring Desire by the Longing of Men for Kings

How burning is his desire.—But let us measure the Prophet's desires by human desires.

With what anxious expectation of waiting do men run to the departures of kings? And what joy is it to those who see them, when they have presented themselves to be gazed upon? What shall we think that man, capable of the heavenly spirit, wishes? With what burning ardor of desire does he long to behold God, who measures that very invisible majesty through these glories of angels and through this glory of Moses; and knows that even those who are worthy of the sight of God are to receive glory from the beholding of glory, in that the vision alone and the condescension of the contemplated majesty illumines them? This the holy Apostle, understanding it thus, expresses: We all, he says, with unveiled face beholding (that is, looking upon) the glory of God, are being transformed into that same image from glory to glory, as by the Spirit of the Lord.

And now, because he knows this to be impossible for these bodily eyes, he desires it with his whole heart.

And he whose portion is God, confidently entreats His face: because, although no man may see the face of God and live, yet all the pure in heart shall see God. He therefore asks this mercy of God, that the blessedness of seeing His face may befall him: and he asks it not without reason and a manner of its being granted.

9. The Goodness and Severity of God

The goodness and severity of God are both to be regarded.—For he says: Have mercy on me according to thy word.

It is the voice of modest faith, to entreat the mercy of God not according to the consciousness of one's own sins, but according to the very words of God. He knows that God is also a consuming fire to sinners. For Moses says: Our God is a consuming fire. He knows that the same is light to the faithful, of whom the Prophet himself also says elsewhere: Thou who dost wondrously illuminate from the holy mountains. The Apostle also distinguishes this custom of God's goodness and severity, when he says: See therefore the goodness and severity of God; toward those who have fallen, severity, but toward thee, goodness; and again: But thou, unless thou remain in goodness, shalt be cut off: but they, if they do not remain in unbelief, shall be grafted in. The Prophet awaits the goodness of God when he says: Have mercy on me.

For he knows that no one who lives is without sin, and that all who are placed in the flesh need the mercy of God. But he is not unmindful of his own duty and devotion, when he says: according to thy word; namely, that word which both announces punishment to sinners, and promises to those who believe in Him the blessedness of eternal life.

10. Considering One's Ways Before Acting

Each person ought to premeditate what he is to do.—Next follows,

Because I thought on my ways, and turned my feet unto thy testimonies. From those things which the Prophet records himself as doing or having done, he teaches what we also ought to do. For he thinks upon his ways, and having thought upon them, turns his step to the testimonies of God. He did nothing which he had not first revolved in thought. He moved not his tongue to its office, he put not his foot forward toward any work he was about to do, he stretched not out his hand to do anything, unless he had first thought upon all these things, and when thought had brought operation and effect to his deeds.

He therefore saw beforehand all the ways of his life: and when he found one pleasing and approved to himself, then he set his foot upon it: that is, having surveyed all the ways of human action, after he had thought what was profitable for him, he turned the step of his faith toward the divine testimonies. For thought can fear nothing sudden, nothing new, nothing unexpected, since by the deliberation of counsel all things that are wont to happen are hoped for, predetermined, and approached. And this is taught in the following

11. Prepared Against Every Disturbance

One thus prepared is disturbed by nothing.—For after the Prophet had thought upon his ways and turned his step to the testimonies of God, he speaks freely,

I am ready, and am not troubled, to keep thy commandments.

He who prepares himself for something is prepared by long practice for that in which his meditation lies: lest some force of sudden disturbance shake him, negligent and incautious, from the resolution of his purpose. The Prophet therefore knows that there are very many scandals of the world. He knows that there are virtues lying in wait against and opposing human nature. He knows how dangerously sweet is the reputation and ambition of worldly glory. He knows that the encounters of wanton women are snares to the eyes of the continent. He knows that base bodily lusts creep in with the allurement of pleasing pleasure. He knows that the other kinds of vices press in through enticing approaches.

He knows also that he is subject to the hatred of very many irreligious men, and that on account of the preaching of God and the teaching of piety, he is to be vexed with various insults from persecutors. Therefore, lest he might be troubled by so many and so great ambushes pressing upon him, he prepared himself against all these destructions of faith, saying: I am ready, and am not troubled, to keep thy commandments.

12. Paul's Confidence Amid Tribulation

The example of Paul.—The blessed Apostle has a like confidence in his own preparation, saying: Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?

Tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written: For thy sake we are put to death all the day long, we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter. But in all these things we overcome and conquer, through him who loved us. And because, against the endurance of these things, he had prepared himself lest he might be separated from love through them; he added: For I am confident, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor virtues, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. No kinds of things that can happen disturb the Apostle, prepared and strengthened by such hope.

13. An Exhortation to Constancy in Faith

Exhortation to constancy.—Let there be therefore in us both this confidence and this voice, so that when desires creep in, when passions press upon us, when dangers weary us, when torments torment us, we may dare to say: I am ready, and am not troubled, to keep thy commandments. Our Lord, the only-begotten Son of God, among other precepts commands his disciples, saying: Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid. Against disturbance, of whatever kind it may arise from circumstances, the strength of long preparation is needed: so that a robust and firm faith may keep the commandments of God.

14. The Cords of Sinners

Why sins are called cords.—And toward what progress, and for what cause the Prophet had prepared himself, and was not troubled so as to fail in keeping the commandments of God, he immediately subjoined, saying,

The cords of sinners have encompassed me; and I have not forgotten thy law.

That there are cords of sinners we are taught through Isaiah, who says: Woe to those who bind sins as with a long cord, in the manner of a cord growing from many small things into much, sins always stretching as a long cord. These are also the bonds of transgressions, by which human minds are bound, of which it is written in Proverbs: Each one is bound fast with the cords of his own sins. For the devil binds and ties us, and entangles us in these cords of vices, spreading snares throughout the whole course of our life. That he binds, we have learned in the Gospels, where it is said: And this daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has bound for eighteen years.

He binds therefore with every kind of vice, with the habit of drunkenness, with the desires of pleasures, with the guilt of unbelief. But amid these snares of cords, forgetfulness of the law must not be admitted. For we ought to be prepared, so that we may be freed from these snares whenever they encompass us: so that we may remember the law of God at all times.

15. Rising at Midnight to Give Thanks

Why the Prophet rises at midnight.—And the Prophet plainly remembers, saying,

At midnight I rose to give thanks to thee for the judgments of thy justification.

He does not give himself over to sleep through whole nights, nor is he kept idle in bed: he rises to give thanks to God not only at night, but even at midnight. He remembers that this is the time when the firstborn of the Egyptians were struck with the most deserved destruction for their impious obstinacy: at these hours therefore he does not relax into sleep, lest he be mingled in the destruction of Egypt. At this hour of night, when the bridegroom enters, the wise virgins shall enter with their lamps into the wedding feast: he watches therefore, lest he deserve to be shut out with the foolish. At this hour, while Paul and Silas the apostles were singing psalms, chains and bonds are loosed: he does not sleep therefore, lest he be bound.

Nor does the whole sleep of the night hold him, nor does forgetfulness of his duty creep upon him in the rest of midnight; for he rises to give thanks to God. Now confession is not always to be referred to sins: but it is also to be understood in the praises of God. Now therefore he gives thanks to God for the judgments of His justifications. He praises God therefore, because He has decreed nothing except in the justification of judgments.

16. A Partaker With Those Who Fear God

The partakers of Christ are many.

The modesty of David. Who is a partaker of those who fear God.—Then follows,

I am a partaker of all them that fear thee, and keep thy commandments.

We remember that the Apostle said: We are made partakers of Christ. But also in the forty-fourth psalm we remember that certain partakers of God are signified, where it is said: God, thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows. There are therefore, according to the Apostle and according to the Prophet, many partakers of our Lord Jesus Christ. And a partaker of Him shall be whosoever remains in justice; because He himself is justice: and a partaker of Him shall be whosoever persists in truth; for He himself is truth: and whosoever shall walk in newness of life shall be a partaker of Him; because He himself is the resurrection.

Therefore, since the Prophet knows that there are many partakers of God, now through a modest and humble declaration concerning himself, although he remembers that he is a partaker of Christ, since he himself has both been made and called Christ; yet he has rather confessed himself to be a partaker of all those who fear God. Moreover he is then also a partaker of those who fear God, when he suffers with those who suffer, when he weeps with those who weep, when as a member of the same body he grieves in the pain of another member. In this communion of sufferings therefore let him be a partaker of those who fear God. But whosoever through his own insolence disdains, exasperates, and dishonors one who believes in Christ and has been redeemed by Christ, that man is not a partaker of those who fear God, since he is not a sharer with them in bearing their sufferings.

17. Two Kinds of Those Who Fear God

Two kinds of those who fear God.—The Prophet did not set this down nakedly and alone, when he says: I am a partaker of all them that fear thee. There are many who fear God, and yet are disobedient: there are many who fear God and yet are unfaithful; whom the condition of their nature subjects indeed to the fear of God, but the perversity of their own will draws away from the service of God. And for this reason it would not have sufficed for the Prophet to have said thus: I am a partaker of all them that fear thee; unless he had added: and who keep thy commandments. For the fear of faith consists in obedience alone, and the dread of religion consists in compliance. He therefore is a partaker of those who will prove their fear in the keeping of the commandments of God.

18. The Earth Full of God's Mercy

God bestows His gifts upon the just and the unjust.—Next follows,

The earth, O Lord, is full of thy mercy; teach me thy justifications.

The earth is full of the mercy of God—the earth that is defiled, that is corrupted, that is irreligious, that is faithless, that is lost. And if anyone should perhaps dare with impious mouth to accuse the Prophet of falsehood, as though he thought the mercy of God were not diffused over all the earth; let him recall that the Lord said in the Gospels: Be good as your Father who is in heaven, who maketh his sun to rise upon the good and the evil, and raineth upon the just and the unjust. For God, patient and merciful, while He prefers the repentance of sinners to their death, bestows His gifts upon the just and the unjust, granting to each one through the patience of His long-suffering a time for repentance.

19. Desiring God Alone as Teacher

David desires the Lord as his teacher.—And

because the Prophet remembers that this goodness of God's patience and perfection, which is foreshadowed bodily under those justifications of the law, is always to be hoped for by him; he says: Teach me thy justifications. He had read all the justifications in the law: but because he hoped for the heavenly ones, which were prefigured in the earthly, he has no need of an earthly teacher. For he prays to be taught by Him who says: Ask and it shall be given to you; seek and you shall find; knock and it shall be opened to you. The Prophet disdains to have the key opened and given to him by a teacher of the law, awaiting our Lord Jesus Christ as the master of heavenly knowledge, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.

You have dealt well with your servant, O Lord, according to your word.

Teach me goodness and discipline and your knowledge; for I have believed in your commandments. Before I was humbled, I transgressed: therefore I have kept your word. You are good, O Lord: and in your goodness teach me your justifications. The iniquity of the proud has been multiplied over me: but I with my whole heart will search out your commandments. Their heart has curdled like milk: but I have meditated on your law. It is good for me that you have humbled me: that I might learn your justifications. The law of your mouth is good to me, above thousands of gold and silver.

1. Giving Thanks to God in Adversity

The scope of Psalm.

Thanks are to be given to God in adversity.—Already in the opening of the psalm we noted that it contains nothing other than the teaching of human life, through which we might be instructed in the knowledge of God, as if by the very first elements of letters, like little children. For the Prophet confirms to us from his own person how we ought to conduct ourselves in every kind of divine service, so that through the discipline of the instruction received we might hold the order of faith, as is taught in that very first

of the ninth letter. For it is said thus,

You have dealt well with your servant, O Lord, according to your word.

And perhaps some will suppose that the Prophet spoke of prosperous circumstances, and gave thanks to God for those things which had fallen out favorably for him.

But he knows that thanks must be given to God even in adversity: he knows that in every suffering and tribulation, he at whose judgment these things come upon one is to be honored with expressions of gratitude. He knows that a physician who does not spare the festering recesses of wounds is a caring one. He remembers that the severity of fathers toward their sons is a pious thing. He desires to be tested through temptations and proved through patience before God: and in those things which are reckoned adverse he gives thanks.

2. God's Goodness in All His Dealings

He consults well for us in all things.—And that we should believe the Prophet prayed this, our understanding is taught by the

which follows, saying: You have dealt well with your servant, O Lord, according to your word.

Teach me goodness and discipline and your knowledge: for I have believed in your commandments.

Whatever therefore God does to his servant is good; for he does it according to his word. And whatever is according to his word cannot be reckoned evil: because in him who alone is good, the will is full of goodness.

3. A Prayer for Goodness, Discipline, and Knowledge

David, believing this, also asks to know it.

Discipline, its usefulness, knowledge.—The second

then, as we said, sets forth the Prophet's disposition, when he prays saying: Teach me goodness and discipline and knowledge.

He confessed above that goodness had been shown toward him: how then does he pray to be taught it as though ignorant of it? Unless it be that there was then a rejoicing from the confession of faith, when he believed that whatever was being done to him was good: but now there is, through human nature, a cause of ignorance, when he prays to be taught. But he wishes to learn that goodness to which discipline is joined. For discipline is the necessary office of severity, rebuking sins and correcting vices. The correction of vices, however, brings great progress in goodness. The discipline of severity is therefore good: but the Prophet is still ignorant of it.

For he wishes to be taught not only goodness and discipline, but also knowledge: showing in this the disposition of his faith, since he confesses that goodness and discipline, which he does not yet know, are nonetheless good for him from God. Concerning knowledge, moreover, we have noted in many places that both the Apostle and the prophet have numbered it among the chief gifts of spiritual graces. Therefore just as goodness and discipline, so also knowledge he prays to be taught: and to be taught for this reason, because he believes in the commandments of God; showing that only the faithful and believing can attain to the teaching of knowledge.

4. Humbling as the Correction of Transgression

Humiliation, the amendment of transgression.—The sense of the same understanding also remains in the third

For he says,

Before I was humbled, I transgressed, therefore I have kept your word.

The tribulation of sufferings does not come upon one before transgressions precede it: nor are we humbled through suffering before we are made worthy of sufferings through the iniquity of sins. The Prophet therefore teaches that his humiliation is the amendment of one who is beloved: and for this reason he knows that whatever comes from God is good for him, because he deserved to suffer what he began to suffer. And he knows that discipline is the amendment of vices. He transgressed first, then was humbled, and through the discipline of humility he must be taught not to transgress, and to remain in the words of God; because, having already transgressed, he was humbled, and is to remain in the commandments of God so that he may no longer be able to sin.

5. Justification as the Work of a Righteous God

Justification, the work of a just thing.—

You are good, O Lord: and in your goodness teach me your justifications.

The Prophet knows that the justifications of God are good; because he who established them is good. He knows that nothing befalls him except from the justification of God; because he has professed that he first transgressed, and thereafter was humbled. And because above he had prayed to be taught goodness and discipline and knowledge; now he prays to be taught the justifications of God in goodness: because justification is the work of a just thing, which is unknown to him; because the justifications which are established in the law contain within themselves a shadow of the heavenly justifications.

6. Resisting the Reproaches of the Proud

The reproaches of the wicked against the just.

How they are to be resisted.—Then he added,

The iniquity of the proud has been multiplied over me: but I with my whole heart will search out your commandments.

The Prophet, bearing all things patiently and with equanimity, has been brought into the reproach of the proud and the wicked. For if anyone recalls the rebukes of the three kings against Job, he will understand how greatly one is stung by the reproach of those who mock. For when irreligious persons observe the servants of God being corrected through certain sufferings, they are wont to reproach them thus: Where is your faith? Where is your hope in God? Where is the power of one who helps? Where is the mercy of the good God?

Against these things a firm and faithful mind is needed, one intent and occupied upon the commandments of God: lest it yield to the iniquities of so many proud persons multiplied against it, but let it always say: You have dealt well with your servant, O Lord; as that glorious and blessed victor over human sufferings says: The Lord gave, the Lord has taken away, blessed be the name of the Lord.

7. The Proud Turned From Milk to Curds

Smooth as milk in prosperity, bitter as curds in adversity.—Then follows,

Their heart has curdled like milk: but I have meditated on your law.

He says the heart of the proud is like curdled milk. Milk is most pleasant in appearance and taste, and when corrupted by some fault it is wont to curdle, and departing from the sweetness of its nature, is spoiled with a useless and bitter flavor. Therefore formerly the wicked, when they observed the Prophet to be in prosperous circumstances, being friends of happy fortune and flattering with the appearance of simplicity, were like milk. But when pride and disdain seized them on account of this humility of the holy man, they were curdled from milk, and from smooth and sweet flatteries were reduced to the bitterness of a spoiled and congealed flavor. Yet against those who were curdled like milk, the Prophet nonetheless meditated on the law of God: and he meditated to the end that he might say what is contained in the following

8. The Profit of Affliction

What tribulations profit.—

It is good for me that you have humbled me. Although the iniquity of the proud be multiplied, and their heart be curdled like milk, the Prophet nonetheless knows that his humiliation is good for him: he knows, according to the Apostle, that virtue is perfected in weaknesses. Every suffering is good, all tribulations are good, through which the justifications of God are known: so that he may amend sinners through humility, restrain transgressors through severity, and teach the ignorant through doctrine. For this reason he says it is good for him that he was humbled, because through humiliation he would learn the justifications of God. For he transgressed before he was humbled: and humility is good for him, because through it the justification of God is learned.

9. The Law of God's Mouth Above Gold and Silver

The law of God's mouth, the law of Christ.—He concluded, however, in this manner,

The law of your mouth is good to me above thousands of gold and silver.

The language of this conclusion is not simple. For it would have sufficed for the Prophet's thanksgiving to have said: The law of yours is good to me. But when he says, the law of your mouth, he wished more to be understood. God spoke the law through Moses, he spoke through the prophets: but this is the law of God, not also the law of the mouth of God.

Now the mouth of God is he who is also the power of God, who is also the wisdom of God, who is also the arm of God, who is also the image of God, namely God and our Lord Jesus Christ, saying: Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven, saying: Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted; saying: Bless those who persecute you, and pray for those who slander and persecute you. The Prophet confessed that this law of the mouth of God is good for him: and good not with a number of comparison and definition and measure, but above thousands of gold and silver. This expression is indefinite, when thousands is said: because the law of the mouth of God is indefinitely good. From the comparison of things most precious on earth, it signifies the usefulness of those goods which are established by God in Christ. Amen.

Your hands have made me and formed me.

Give me understanding that I may learn your commandments. Those who fear you will see me and rejoice: for I have hoped in your words. I know, O Lord, that your judgments are equity, and in your truth you have humbled me. Let your mercy come to comfort me according to your word to your servant. Let your mercies come to me, and I shall live: for your law is my meditation. Let the proud be confounded, because they have unjustly wrought iniquity against me: but I will be exercised in your commandments. Let those who fear you turn to me, and those who have known your testimonies. Let my heart be undefiled in your justifications: that I may not be confounded.

1. Man's Excellence Among God's Earthly Works

Man more excellent than the earthly works of God. How he ought to use created things.—It is a common judgment that among all the earthly works of God nothing is more useful than man, nothing more beautiful: because even if some things are fair and adorned, they testify indeed to the greatness of him who brought them forth so finely, yet they themselves do not perceive the fruit of their own beauty and adornment and constitution. For we speak of those things which are subject to human sight, namely of those created in earth and sea and air, and those which are mingled with each individual kind and nature. These things are beautiful; but what good in the end will those things which are created in them attain from the Ocean or the earth or the sky or the air, by reason of having been created such? In man, however, whatever exists profits himself.

And this one rational, understanding, discerning, perceiving animal has been established on earth: and of all these kinds of things which are in him, nothing profits anything else, except that he himself may use both the other things and those among which he was born: and may use them to know and venerate him who is the author and parent of so many goods in him.

2. When Man Loses the Name of Man

When man is great.

When he loses his name.—From this is understood that great and wonderful saying of Solomon, which is as follows: A man is great and precious, and a merciful man is a work to be found. For what is so difficult, or what is so arduous a task, as to find one who remembers that he was made according to the image and likeness of God, who, intent upon the study of the divine words, has come to know the reason of his soul and body, and has grasped the origin and nature of each kind; and to what end at last his constitution and birth tend? And for this reason man is something great. For this name, when through neglect of the knowledge of the things mentioned above he has fallen into vices, he loses; being judged, that is, no longer worthy to be called man.

And he who was made according to the image and likeness of God, according to the prophetic and evangelical reproaches, is called either serpent, or brood of vipers, or horse, or mule, or fox: and the proper character of his own name is taken from him when he has fallen from innocence.

3. Made and Fashioned by God's Hands

The twofold origin of man.—But one who has searched out the teaching and precepts of God with studious faith, and who wishes to show himself worthy through zeal for innocence, as one made according to the image and likeness of God, will also be able to use the voice of the Prophet, who says,

Thy hands have made me and prepared me.

And in some manuscripts we find it written thus: Thy hands have made me and fashioned me: give me understanding, that I may learn thy commandments. And without doubt it must not be thought idle that it was not enough for the Prophet to have said: Thy hands have made me; unless he had added, fashioned, or, prepared. But the Prophet, understanding the honor of his own condition, wished in this to signify the special dignity of his origin, saying first, Thy hands have made me.

4. Man's Creation Deliberated Beforehand

All things created by the word.

The making of man is treated of beforehand.—In the creation of the world we have received that all things were brought about by the word, when it is said: Let there be light; when it is said: Let there be a firmament; when it is said: And let the dry land appear; when it is said: Let the earth bring forth the herb of pasture bearing seed according to its kind; when it is said: Let there be lights in the firmament; when it is said: Let the waters bring forth the creeping things of living souls. Therefore everything from which or in which the body of the whole world was created takes its origin from a word spoken, and began to subsist in what it is from the word of God. But concerning man, God spoke thus: Let us make man to our image and likeness.

The nature and origin of man therefore differs from the institution of the whole creation: and it is proper that he alone is both treated of and confirmed beforehand that he should be made, whereas the rest were commanded to exist without any such deliberative counsel. The origin of man therefore has this as its first dignity, that it was proper to him that he should be treated of beforehand.

5. Fashioned by Hands, Not by a Single Hand

Another privilege, that he is fashioned by the hands of God.

What is here to be examined.—But also in this present prophetic saying there is contained a great privilege of human origin. For the hands of the Lord did not make cattle and water-creatures and birds; nowhere have the Scriptures handed this down. This therefore is something distinguished and illustrious in man, that he is set apart from the rest by the dignity of the work. Now concerning the establishing of heaven we read in a certain place: I with my hand have established the heaven (acc. To LXX). Is that element therefore made equal to the work done upon man, since it is recorded that it was established by the hand of God? But although heaven by a hand; man however by hands. The work of two hands therefore surpasses the service of one hand: and what suffices for the establishing of heaven does not suffice in the fashioning of man.

But it must be understood why the Prophet says he was made by hands: and not only made, but also fashioned or prepared.

6. Man's Twofold Beginning in Creation

All things perfected by one command of God, but not man.—The creation of all the other elements was at the same moment instituted and brought to effect as it was commanded to subsist: nor does any interval of time distinguish their beginning from their completion; for the beginning received its consummation in the very act of beginning. But man, since he contains within himself an inner and an outer nature discordant one from the other, and is constituted as one rational animal out of two kinds, was established with a twofold beginning. For first it was said: Let us make man to our image and likeness; then secondly, And God took dust from the earth, and fashioned man.

7. The Soul in God's Image, the Body From Earth

His soul made according to the image of God.

His body then formed from the earth.—The first work does not have in itself the origin of another nature assumed from elsewhere. Whatever is then begun from the deliberation of counsel is incorporeal: for it is made to the image of God. Not the image of God; because the image of God is the firstborn of all creation: but to the image of God, that is, according to the likeness and similitude of the image. That which was then being made according to the image and likeness of God was to be fashioned as something divine and incorporeal: namely, a certain exemplar of the image of God and of likeness is established in us. Therefore in this rational and incorporeal substance of our soul there is first that which was made to the image of God. But how greatly does the effect of the second work differ from the first institution? God takes the dust of the earth.

For dust is taken up, and earthly matter is formed into man, or prepared: and by the work and care of the craftsman it is refined from one thing into another. In the first, therefore, he did not take but made: in the second he did not make as in the first, but took; and then formed or prepared.

8. The Breath of Life Uniting Soul and Body

Prepared can also rightly be said.

Why by the hands of God, not by the hand.—Both however can rightly be understood, since we find both written: that he formed into what it is, namely the form of the body; or prepared for what is said: And he breathed into him the breath of life, and man became a living soul. He was therefore prepared or formed for this inspiration: through which the nature of soul and body would be held together in the perfection of life by a certain bond of the breathed-in spirit. The blessed Paul knows that there is a twofold nature in himself, when according to the inner man he delights in the law, and when he sees another law in his members which leads him captive in the law of sin. What therefore is made according to the image of God pertains to the dignity of the soul. But what is formed from earth is the beginning of the form of the body and of its nature.

And because God is understood to speak to another when he says, Let us make man; or because the perfection of man made and pre-formed is known to be threefold: since he is both made to the image of God, and formed from earth, and moved into a living soul by the inspiration of the spirit: for this reason the Prophet testifies that he was made and formed by hands, not by one hand only, because in his constitution not only a solitary and the same operation is shown to have been threefold.

9. Praying for Understanding of His Own Making

Human ignorance of itself.

Understanding to be sought from God.—And because the Prophet knows this to be very hidden and recondite, namely in what manner he was formed by the hands of God: yet in order to attain the full and complete account of this understanding, he says: Give me understanding, that I may learn thy commandments. He speaks as one who does not know these things, and as one who has not yet obtained understanding, he prays that understanding be given to him: and not only, I will not say, men of the Church, but the sophists of the nations dare to wish to treat of certain things concerning the institution of human nature; we also dare to boast that we have attained the knowledge of a right and perfect life. But we ought to be taught by the example of this prophet, that we either confess our ignorance of divine things, or pray for understanding of things not yet known.

Now it is best to seek from God through prayer the knowledge of heavenly commandments, and to acknowledge the weakness and poverty of our understanding.

For the first, according to the Apostle, among the gifts of graces is the gift of wisdom, the next is that of knowledge: and therefore this prophet also observed this order here, saying: Give me understanding, that I may learn thy commandments. He prayed first for understanding, and afterwards also for knowledge.

10. The Righteous Rejoice at the Sight of the Faithful

The sight of the pious is sad to the impious, joyful to the just.—There follows then,

They that fear thee shall see me, and shall rejoice, because I have hoped in thy words.

It is the custom of the impious to be saddened at the sight of religious men. For the drunkard must needs hate the sober man, the unchaste man the continent, the unjust man the just: and as though it were a burden upon the conscience, he cannot endure the presence of any holy person. On the contrary, at the sight of a faithful man, all the religious who have the fear of God rejoice, and are glad even at the mere sight of bodily contemplation, after the manner of certain birds and herbs, which when seen and beheld alone heal certain diseases and infirmities. The presence of a holy man is therefore also useful to those who fear God: because they must needs derive some profit from the contemplation of him.

But the Prophet does not think that in himself only that is to be looked upon which is subject to transient and common eyes.

He wishes the uprightness of his life to be seen, he wishes his justice and religion and continence to be discerned. For those who fear God will rejoice not merely because they see him; but because they see him hoping in the words of God: and hoping not in a mediocre way, nor with the confused error of human opinion; but speaking with freedom that which follows.

11. The Present Judgments of God Known Through Affliction

The present, not the eternal, judgments of God known to the Prophet.—

I have known, O Lord, that thy judgments are equity, and in truth thou hast humbled me.

In other places we recall that the Prophet was accustomed to say thus: Give me understanding, and teach me, and I will observe thy precepts. But now he professes as of things already attained, saying: I have known, O Lord, that thy judgments are equity. But here the discourse is not about those eternal judgments, but about the present ones. For those eternal judgments, according to the same prophet, are like a great deep; and according to the Apostle: The judgments of God are unsearchable and inscrutable.

But in those judgments which now exist, he knows that whatever is wrought in him comes about by the judgment of God: all tribulations, all pressures, all the hatred of persecutions, all the assaults of persecutors, are present in him by God's judgment upon him, so that through these he might be proved, through these corrected, and as though examined and purified through fire.

12. Faith and Knowledge Distinguished

The difference between knowledge and faith.—There is something more in knowledge of a work than in faith of it: and therefore here he did not believe, but knew

because faith has the merit of obedience, but does not have the confidence of known truth. The Apostle distinguished that knowledge and faith differ very greatly, numbering the latter in a lower place among the gifts of graces. For he proclaimed wisdom first, knowledge next, faith third: because one who believes can be ignorant of what he believes: but one who has already known cannot, once knowledge is attained, fail to believe what he has known.

13. The Just Judgments Behind His Humbling

The judgments of God are just.—Therefore the Prophet admits no ambiguity here, but knows that the judgments of God are just

that is, his humiliation and tribulation and contempt and injury and pain. For he says thus: I have known, O Lord, that thy judgments are equity, and in truth thou hast humbled me. Not without cause, that is, is he subject to tribulations, not without cause given over to sufferings, not without cause humbled by injuries; but for the expiation of the sins of human vices, he is subject to humiliation by the just and true judgments of God.

14. Enduring Affliction Through God's Encouragement

David does not ask to be freed from these things; but to bear them bravely with God's help.—But

because he is engaged in these sufferings by the equity of divine judgment: he prays for the encouragement of present humiliations from the mercy of God; because human weakness is unequal to the endurance of sufferings, saying,

Let thy mercy come to me, that it may encourage me according to thy word to thy servant.

But he remembers that it is good for him to be humbled, good for him to be subject to sufferings, and that all those things by which he is vexed are for him a purging of earthly vices. For he does not pray that humility and tribulation be taken away from him; but that encouragement in tribulation be granted to him from the mercy of God. He desires therefore to serve in a long battle amid these infirmities of his body: he desires to stand firm in a long contest against the wickednesses of this world.

But he hopes for encouragement from the mercy of God: so that, though troubled and afflicted, he may be strengthened by the aid of divine encouragement. The blessed apostle Paul also, himself having passed through every kind of temptation, knows how to use the encouragement of divine mercy, saying: Blessed be God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all encouragement, who encourageth us in all tribulation. And the Prophet knows that this encouragement has been promised to him by God the Father and Lord of mercies, who through temptations examines him who believes in him: and therefore he added, according to thy word to thy servant: that is, according to that promise by which he pledged that he would not abandon those who are troubled in their sufferings. For he said in the Gospels: When therefore they shall deliver you up, be not thoughtful how or what you shall speak; for it shall be given you in that hour what to speak.

For it is not you that speak, but the Spirit of your Father that speaketh in you. And this indeed pertains to the present time.

15. Eternal Life Through the Mercy of God

Eternal life from the mercy of God.

We do not yet truly live. By what hope of true life is it nourished.—But the Prophet is not unmindful of future hope, saying,

Let thy mercies come unto me, and I shall live: for thy law is my meditation.

The weakness of bodily nature has need of the mercies of God. For it will not be able to attain the blessedness of that eternal life by its own merit, unless it be advanced by the mercies of him who is the Father of mercies.

The Prophet knows that he does not yet live that life which is truly life: for none of us will dare to consider what we now live as life. For now we are in the body of death, as Paul says: Who will deliver me from the body of this death? And this same thing is attested by this same prophet thus: And into the dust of death thou hast brought me down. For our true life is hidden with Christ in God. But neither is this region in which we now dwell the land of the living: that is the one of which this same prophet says: And I shall be pleasing to God in the land of the living. And therefore he said "I shall live," because he does not live by the use of this present life, but is to live in the mercy of God. But he hopes for this, because the law of God is his meditation.

Let us therefore give ourselves to divine reading, let us give ourselves to the precepts of God, and let us carry out the works of the law in the duties of our life

because on account of his meditation on the law, with the mercy of the Lord coming upon him, the Prophet hopes that he shall live.

16. A Prayer for the Proud's Confusion, Not Revenge

David does not pray for the punishment of his enemies, but for their conversion.—But it is not sufficient for this prophet to be solicitous only for himself, and to be mindful of himself alone. He must take up the care of the human race, and submit to the feeling of public solicitude, and pray for those who are engaged in sins and irreligion. He therefore teaches the solicitude of this his feeling in the following

saying,

Let the proud be confounded, because they have unjustly done iniquity against me.

This is not the prayer of a curse, nor does he pray for the repayment of the injury inflicted upon him. And far be it that the Prophet, a preacher of the Gospel, should have exceeded the principle of evangelical charity. For since the Lord says: Love your enemies, and pray for those who slander you and persecute you, reason does not permit that he should now pray for vengeance upon the proud and injurious.

But because one who ceases from sins is ashamed of them; and one who abandons vices must necessarily abandon them

because he hates them: the Prophet prays that those who have been proud against him unjustly may, through the knowledge of their own vices, be ashamed of what they have done. For as long as anyone sins, he is not confounded in those things wherein he sins, by reason of the habit and will of sinning. But when he has ceased to sin, he has the end of sinning from shame at sin. He himself, however, is exercised in the commandments of God, living justly, preaching religiously, not returning injuries, and bearing patiently. For on this account he endured the contradictions and iniquities of many who were proud against him.

17. Turning Those Who Fear God to His Teaching

But in the following

he is understood to have signified absolutely that which we are treating concerning the confusion of the proud. For there follows,

Let those who fear thee be turned to me, and those who have known thy testimonies.

The Prophet therefore wishes those who have begun to fear God to be turned to him, so that through his teaching they may be ashamed of their vices and crimes: namely, having come to know the testimonies of God, of which we have already said much, and being confounded over their former transgressions, they may betake themselves to the instruction and teaching of the Prophet; whose conversion from pride and sins to piety and modesty this is.

18. An Undefiled Heart Without Boasting

The modesty of David rebukes our pride.—But he concluded after his manner of modesty, saying,

Let my heart be undefiled in thy justifications, that I may not be confounded.

He is exercised in commandments, he meditates on the law, he has known the justice of the judgments of God, those who fear the Lord rejoice in his sight, he has been made and formed by the hands of God; and he does not dare to say that his heart is undefiled: and do we sometimes dare to put forward our innocence, to boast of our abstinence from vices, and to glory that we are pure from sins and iniquities? But as faith, so also humility and modesty it befits us to learn from the Prophet, who prays that his heart may be made undefiled. For he knows that evil proceeds from it, according to what has been said: For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, lasciviousness, fornications, thefts, falsehoods, blasphemies, and things like these.

He therefore prays that this may be made undefiled, from which the beginnings of so many and such great vices are suggested, as from a certain tinder. But knowing that this is made undefiled in this way, if one remains in the justifications of God: he understands that this is the fruit of the justifications, that remaining in them one may not be confounded. For confusion arises from the consciousness of sins, and from the reproach of transgressions. Where therefore there will be no confusion, there will be no sin either. But where there is no sin, one will remain in the justifications of God. And the justifications of God will bring it about that the heart is undefiled.

My soul hath fainted for thy salvation, and in thy word I have hoped.

My eyes have failed for thy eloquence, saying: When wilt thou comfort me? For I am become as a bottle in the frost, I have not forgotten thy justifications. How many are the days of thy servant? When wilt thou execute judgment on them that persecute me? The wicked have told me fables; but not as thy law. All thy commandments are truth; they have persecuted me unjustly, help thou me. They had almost made an end of me upon earth: but I have not forsaken thy commandments. Quicken me according to thy mercy, and I shall keep the testimonies of thy mouth.

1. The Soul Fainting for the Saviour Jesus

Great desire produces a fainting of the soul.

The Saviour is Jesus.—It is of human nature that when it cannot obtain what it desires, it is held in a fainting of the soul through the continual longing of desire. And this is easy to know from the very movements of our own affections, into what fainting of soul we are reduced by the expectation of those whom we desire. The Prophet therefore, whose every expectation is toward God, whose every desire is in his commandments, speaks and says,

My soul hath fainted for thy salvation, and in thy word I have hoped.

He has no other things to occupy his desire: and the longing of a holy man is not empty of the things of the world. He faints therefore in the desire of the Saviour: and he faints for this reason, because he hopes in the word of God: for the end of the law is Christ Jesus, and this is he of whom Moses and the prophets wrote.

Now the Saviour is so by that very name which is called Jesus.

For Jesus according to the Hebrew tongue means Saviour: and the Angel himself teaches this same thing speaking to Joseph, when he says: And thou shalt call his name Jesus: for he shall save his people from their sins. The cause therefore of the fainting is the desire of the Saviour. But the origin of the desire is from this, that he hopes in the word of God. For our Saviour is Jesus, who was both desired and born. But we must understand what follows upon the fainting of the desiring soul.

2. The Eyes Failing in Expectation

The fainting of the eyes.—He says,

My eyes have failed for thy eloquence, saying: When wilt thou comfort me?

There follows therefore upon the fainting of the soul the fainting of the eyes. But as we have treated of the nature of the fainting of the soul, let us see what manner of fainting the eyes are wont to have. Imagine therefore in expectation either the wife of a man on a journey, or the father of a son long absent, whom he supposes will return at any time: will he not always be intent upon that road by which he thinks he will come? Will not the attention and gaze of his eyes fail in the very expectation of beholding him? The Lord attests these desires in the prophets themselves, when he says: Amen I say to you, many prophets and just men have sought to see what you see, and to hear what you hear. The Prophet therefore fails both in soul and in eyes.

3. The Mind's Eyes and the Saints Awaiting Comfort

The eyes of the mind are here designated.

Exhortation to the saints resting in hell.—But these eyes of the Prophet now, although they have desired to see the Lord, are nevertheless not the eyes of the body; for they speak and wait: and this beholding and speaking belongs rather to the mind, not to the body. For they say: When wilt thou comfort me? He knows that the saints resting in hell desire this comfort. He knows, as the apostle Peter testifies, that when the Lord descended into hell, comfort was also preached to those who were in prison, and who had once been unbelievers in the days of Noah. In these eloquences of God therefore he fails with speaking eyes: awaiting the Lord announced from the eloquences of God not so much by bodily sight as by the contemplation of the soul and mind.

4. A Bottle in the Frost: The Body's Continence

A bottle in the frost: the body chastened by continence.

Burning desire does not forget the justifications of God.—Next follows,

For I am become as a bottle in the frost, I have not forgotten thy justifications. This is a cause of a new kind, that he has not forgotten the justifications of God for this reason, that he has become as a bottle in the frost. And if we measure the matter by the ears alone, the Prophet's speech will be thought empty and ridiculous. But he remembers that a bottle is used to denote human bodies, the Lord saying in the Gospels: No man, he says, putteth new wine into old bottles. And it is not doubted that he meant by the bottles bodies grown old in their sins.

Now through the pursuit of continence the bodies of the faithful grow cold: and with the heat of the inner nature extinguished, they will be cold bottles: which, though they may grow warm inwardly through the nature of seething vices, yet outwardly grow stiff through the patience of continence as though by the cold of frost. Therefore in this coldness of bodies we cannot be forgetful of the justifications of God. But whoever has grown warm through the ardour of vices like a full bottle, and does not grow cold through the fear of God and religion, must necessarily forget the justifications of God. Which a holy man will not be able to forget, since growing stiff outwardly after the manner of a bottle in the frost, he is cold through the instigation of all inward desires.

5. The Judgment Sought Against the Devil's Powers

The judgment sought here is not the last judgment, but the power by which the devil with his ministers may be crushed.—Next follows,

How many are the days of thy servant?

When wilt thou execute judgment for me against them that persecute me? The Prophet is not ignorant that the judgment after the consummation of the age is that of which he says: Therefore the wicked shall not rise in judgment, nor sinners in the council of the just: what then does he now pray to be done in judgment against those who persecute him? Not that judgment certainly which he remembers will come in the resurrection of the age, since he knows himself to be of few days now according to his bodily life. For he says thus: How many are the days of thy servant? When he says how many, he knows they are not many. And above he had said that he was as a bottle in the frost.

Therefore because he knows himself to be of few days, he desires that judgment be executed upon those who persecute him, namely upon the devil and his ministers. For there are spiritual wickednesses in the heavenly places. But he knows also that the devil is to be judged in the age of the resurrection. Since he himself is of few days, he desires that this judgment be done: namely that, being perfected in holiness and perfectly pleasing to God, he may crush within himself the devil, crush the powers that oppose and are hostile to him, and subject the spiritual wickednesses to the faith of his soul. He does not yet therefore trust in the firmness of his own nature, although he already grows cold like a bottle: but he prays that through the mercy of God judgment may be upon his enemies. This power of judgment the Lord gave to his apostles, saying: Behold, I have given you power to tread upon serpents and scorpions, and upon all the power of the enemy.

This word of the Lord dwelling in the body the Prophet had not yet heard: but he prays that such power be granted him, that such a judgment be established for him against those who persecute him. For he is tempted on every side, since within him through the nature of the body there is the innate material of vices; and the devil strives to kindle it with the ardour of twofold desire, when he is wounded by the impious voices of the irreligious, when he endures the profane disputations of the gentiles against God and their frenzied utterances.

6. The Wicked's False Teachings Against the Law

The wicked counterfeit the truth of doctrine, they do not possess it.—Therefore in what follows he says,

The wicked have told me their exercises; but not as thy law.

For how many are there who assert that they teach certain institutions of human life, when they inflame our soul, which serves God more rightly, toward the virtues of the world through secular pursuits? How many also are there who, falsely claiming to have knowledge of the divine Scriptures, preach heretical and perverse doctrines? But the Prophet, knowing that the perfect learning of human teaching is in the law of God, says: The wicked have told me their exercises; but not as thy law. For those who preach these things are wicked. And therefore the voice of God forbade the sinner to recount the holy utterances; because iniquity does not receive the truth of heavenly teaching. For God said to the sinner: Why dost thou declare my justices, and take my covenant in thy mouth? Seeing thou hast hated discipline, and hast cast my words behind thee.

These exercises therefore the Prophet does not endure, knowing that nothing is to be equated to the recounting of the law.

7. The Unjust Persecution of the Righteous

The persecution of the just is unjust.—He then added,

All thy commandments are truth: they have persecuted me unjustly, help me.

Whoever persecutes a just man must necessarily persecute him unjustly: because injustice is the effect of an unjust act. The Apostle also knows this iniquity of persecutions, when he says: All that will live godly in Christ shall suffer persecution. For many are the tribulations of the just. Now Satan assails, now his ministers attack, now the pretense of false brethren creeps in with crafty deceit to cause harm. But the Prophet, who remembers that the commandments of God are truth, endures the persecution of unjust iniquity with a faithful spirit. And because he knows that persecution is a proof of faith, he does not pray that it be removed from him: but he asks to be helped in it, and implores the aid and assistance of God's mercy, not ignorant of this evangelical precept: He that taketh not his cross, and followeth me, is not worthy of me.

8. The Necessity and Usefulness of Persecution

Truth. The necessity and usefulness of persecution.—Truth therefore is in the commandments of God. Truth has nothing false, nothing uncertain, nothing imperfect. But persecution directed against the just is unjust. For iniquity must necessarily hate the preacher of truth: but help from God is given to the preacher of truth. For he remembers that these troubles of persecutors are grievous: and because they are useful to the just man, he does not think they should be removed. For the peace of an idle faith is dangerous, and snares are easily laid for those who keep watch carelessly. But a man exercised in wars will not quickly be caught by stratagems: and a glorious contest is needed, so that the crown of victory may be bestowed. For this reason he does not pray that the cause of striving be taken from him, but that help for conquering be granted.

9. Nearly Overcome by Temptation, Yet Steadfast

David nearly yielded to temptations.—He remembers moreover that he is in no light struggle of temptations. For there follows,

They had almost made an end of me upon earth: but I forsook not thy commandments.

The unjust persecutions reduced the Prophet almost to the very end of faith, namely those of which we spoke above, the spiritual wickednesses in heavenly places, which urge us toward bodily vices by thrusting upon us the enticements of desires. The Prophet therefore was almost consumed upon earth, that is, cast down into the vices and sins of the body. For just as there is a consummation of good things, so also of evil things. But though these most destructive enemies assailed and persecuted him, he did not forsake the commandments of God: and though weakened by the frailty of his nature, he remains in the precepts of God; remaining in the commandments of God all the more gloriously because the weakness of his nature was nearly overcome.

10. A Prayer to Be Quickened and Keep God's Testimonies

He desires the life to come, intending meanwhile to keep the Gospel.—He then concludes after his manner of modesty and hope, saying,

Quicken me according to thy mercy, and I will keep the testimonies of thy mouth.

He prays to be quickened as though not yet living: and he promises that he will keep the testimonies of God's mouth, as though he does not keep them now. But though he lives in the body, he does not desire the life of this age: and though he keeps the testimonies of God in the law, he nevertheless promises that he will keep the testimonies of God's mouth: which, renewed by the evangelical precepts, are fulfilled by those who abstain not only from adultery but also from the desire of adultery, through the sanctification of faith alone: through our Lord Jesus Christ, who is both the mouth and the right hand and the power and the wisdom of God, blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

For ever, O Lord, thy word endureth in heaven. Thy truth unto all generations: thou hast founded the earth, and it abideth. By thine ordinance the day continueth: for all things serve thee. Unless thy law had been my meditation, I should then have perished in my affliction. I will never forget thy justifications: for in them thou hast quickened me, O Lord. I am thine, save me: for I have sought thy justifications. The wicked have waited for me to destroy me: I have understood thy testimonies. I have seen an end of all perfection: thy commandment is exceeding broad.

1. The Word of God Enduring in Heaven

Heavenly knowledge, a gift of God.—It befits the discourse of the Prophet not to linger upon lowly or commonplace matters, but always to treat of lofty things worthy of God: and so, that while it instructs us in the observance of an innocent life, it may also raise the humility of our understanding to the knowledge of divine and invisible mysteries. Nor indeed would human weakness advance of itself into heavenly knowledge, unless it were instructed unto the knowledge of the divine and inscrutable nature by God's gift of knowledge bestowed through the teaching of the Spirit. The Prophet therefore, wishing to make us worthy of God and to perfect us, and knowing that it is stored up as the hope of mankind that it should ascend into heavenly glory if it followed the discipline of heavenly obedience, thus began,

For ever, O Lord, thy word endureth in heaven.

2. The Heavens' Obedience to God's Word

The obedience of the heavens to God's word.—He says in heaven

because he knows that on earth it does not remain, on account of the falseness of men. And how it remains in heaven is perceived by the very faith of, as it were, bodily contemplation. There is no transgression there, no change, no weakness, no idleness. Let us contemplate the annual course of the sun, and the monthly return of the moon, and likewise the stations or revolutions or changes of the stars: are they not contained within their own bounds and appointed limits and decreed alternations? Nothing there is changed, nothing deferred, nothing neglected: but each remains in the law of its constitution, and perseveres in the unwearied ministries of obedience.

3. The Word's Endurance Beyond This Age

The word of God after this age will also remain in other creatures.—But the Prophet preserved this account of offices that cease and pass away, saying,

For ever, O Lord, thy word endureth in heaven. Latin translators have rendered this with an ambiguous and less proper meaning. For what the Greek has, εἰς τὸν αἰῶνα, κύριε, has been translated among us as in aeternum, Domine, that is, for ever, O Lord. Now aeternum can be understood in such a way that what is eternal is understood to have no end. But saeculum, which in Greek is αἰών, is contained within the span of a defined period of time. For he does not say, in saeculum saeculi; nor, in saecula saeculorum: but, thy word endureth in saeculum. He knows that after this age heaven and earth shall pass away, the Lord saying: Amen I say to you, heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away. He also remembers that this age shall pass away, so that there shall be a new heaven and a new earth.

Therefore he says, For ever, O Lord, thy word endureth in heaven: because after this age, when heaven passes away, this word of the obedience established in creatures, which await the revelation of the sons of God, must necessarily remain.

4. Where God's Word Dwells or Departs

In whom it already dwells, whom it forsakes, whom it flees.—But for this reason God's word is not also sometimes on earth, even though the Prophet declares that it remains only in heaven. For there is none among us who does not sometimes feel the gift of spiritual grace, who does not sometimes have within himself the word of God, when he is sober, when he is tranquil, when he is continent, when he is benevolent, when he is merciful (for when we are in these states, the word of God remains in us), when we serve his precepts by obedience in good things. But when the stirrings of turbulent passions creep in, when anxiety about money arises, when the heat of base and wanton desire is kindled, when an impulse of anger is aroused, when drunkenness is desired; then the word of God no longer remains in us.

But it is in those who, according to the Apostle, having put off the old man with his sins, have put on the new; who, having died with Christ and been buried with him, have now risen to newness of life, and have been placed in heavenly places; who, having laid aside the image of the earthly, bear the image of the heavenly. For in these, as in heaven, the word of God remains, in whom this word is not offended by anger, drunkenness, hatred, faithlessness, or wantonness. For even if it sometimes remains in us: yet it does not endure these indignities to its dwelling, so as to remain always within. But if these vices I have mentioned shall always be in us, it will not even deign to enter the polluted dwellings of our bodies.

5. The Word of God Knocking at the Door

The word of God is at hand for each one.

Like the sun it pours itself into an open place, denies itself to a closed one.—It is moreover near to each one, as it is said: for the word of God stands at the door and knocks at the door of our soul, and says: Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if any man shall open to me the door, I will come in to him. It wishes therefore always to enter: but it is shut out by us lest it enter. For through these vices of the body we close the entrance to our soul. If the soul shall begin to lie open with all things cleansed, it will immediately enter, after the manner of the sun, which is prevented from entering when the shutters of a window are closed, but when they are open is poured in entirely: the sun itself is always ready to give light; but the house shuts out its own light by barring the entrances.

For the word of God is the sun of justice, standing by each one to enter: nor does it delay to pour its light through entrances it finds open. This word of God therefore remains in the heavens through the unwearied obedience of heavenly things: by which example the word of God is to be believed to remain also in the saints, who are heavenly according to the image of the heavenly.

6. Two Generations That Held God's Truth

As in heaven, so it remains in the saints.

Two generations, in which alone God's truth exists.—There follows next,

Thy truth unto generation and generation. This

which follows confirms the twofold understanding of our sense, by which we hold that the word of God remains as in heaven so also in holy men.

For he does not say, unto the generation of generations, or unto generations of generations: but thy truth unto generation and generation. He mentions each generation with a simple expression. We have therefore recognized two generations in two peoples: one of which is that of the law and the prophets, the other is that of the Gospels and the Apostles. The truth of God therefore remains in these two generations alone. But when the former generation had the truth of God within itself, no other generation had it at that time. For there were many generations of nations and peoples.

And now, since this same generation has shown itself unworthy to have the truth of God within it, no other generation possesses this same truth of God, apart from that which has believed in the Gospels.

7. The Earth Founded to Remain: The Human Body

The earth founded and destined to remain: the earthly mass, more properly the human body.—There follows: Thou hast founded the earth, and it shall remain. It would have suited the order that after heaven the earth should next be named: but I think that what stands in the middle, that is, thy truth unto generation and generation, intervened for this reason, that the twofold understanding concerning heaven, in which the word of God remains, might be confirmed. Now therefore the order is kept as if complete: since after heaven, in which the word of God remains, the founded earth is destined to remain. And indeed this may perhaps also be understood as said of this earth which, founded, remains, which according to Solomon God founded through wisdom: which, though it is of a fluid nature spread over the waters and floats upon an unstable underlying element, was yet so founded by the wisdom and power and spirit of God that it remains.

But to me the prophetic word seems also to have spoken of the earth of the human body: which is so founded that the word of God may remain in it as in heaven. For heaven and earth shall pass away: and how shall this earth, founded, remain? Unless perhaps it is destined to remain founded only in this age, that is, according to the constitution of this age it too is destined to remain. But if it is destined to remain (by which word it is signified that it shall remain in perpetuity), it must necessarily be believed that the earth founded and destined to remain is that of those generations to whom, on account of the truth of God remaining in them, the heavenly glory of their now earthly bodies is being prepared. And this can be understood more fully from the following

8. The Day That Continues: The Light of the Saints

The day, the light of the saints.

Not all things serve God now.—For he says,

By thine ordinance the day continueth, for all things serve thee.

This day which now is does not continue, being interrupted by the intervention of night. Or if he had spoken of the times of this day, mention ought also to have been made of the night, which persists by an equal ordinance of God as does the day. But because the day is light, and every holy man is the light of this world; the day of this light is therefore unambiguously believed to continue by the ordinance of God: and it shall continue, because all things serve God. For not all things serve God now. Do sinners also serve God? Do those also serve him who are still to be made the footstool of the Lord's feet? For David said: The Lord said to my Lord: Sit thou at my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool.

And according to the Apostle: He must reign, until he hath put all enemies under his feet.

Therefore the day, that is, the light of the saints, shall then continue, when all things shall have begun to serve God.

9. Both the Literal and Spiritual Senses True

In the foregoing, what the letter sounds is also true.—These things have been recalled by us according to prophetic and apostolic teaching: so that, although in the present words the time of future goods is understood to be signified—in which both a new heaven and a new earth, and the blessed glory of bodies to be transformed, and the eternal day of our light, with the nights of earthly vices abolished, is prepared for our hope and expectation—yet also all the creations of this present world may bear witness to the magnificence of God by the unchangeable ordering of their offices, since all things are so firmly, founded, and established that they persevere in the perpetual courses of their constituted order from the beginning of the ages in which they shall remain.

10. Meditation on the Law Amid Affliction

Meditation on the Law is not to be abandoned in temptations and afflictions.—But the prophet asks that he may persevere as the day, and recalls that he is already a servant of his Lord, saying,

Unless thy law had been my meditation, I should then perhaps have perished in my humiliation.

We have frequently noted that humiliation signifies when the soul is subjected to temptations and, abandoned to its own weakness, is made humble. The Law therefore is also his meditation: and unless it had been his meditation, he would perhaps have perished in his humiliation. Meditation on the Law of God is therefore not to be abandoned when we are troubled and distressed: but when we are afflicted with various infirmities of the body, when we are harassed amid the battles of persecutions, there ought to be in us a steadfast meditation on the Law.

For though fires may burn to destroy the faith, though scourges may also tear to endanger our salvation, though the iron claws may also dig into bodies redeemed by God to extort a confession of impiety: we ought nonetheless to be mindful of the prophetic word, so that we may be partakers of it. Let us also say, suffering and conquering: Unless thy law had been my meditation, I should then perhaps have perished in my humiliation. And the prophet recalls the blessedness of this meditation at the beginning of the Psalms, saying: Blessed is the man who hath not walked in the counsel of the ungodly, and hath not stood in the way of sinners, and hath not sat in the chair of pestilence. But his will was in the law of the Lord, and in his law shall he meditate day and night. And truly blessed shall he be, whosoever shall meditate in the law of God: because by meditation he shall be preserved even in the humiliation of tribulations.

11. The Law as the Beginning of Life

The Law is the beginning of life.—Next follows,

I will never forget thy justifications; for in them thou hast quickened me.

The prophet knows, according to the Apostle, that the end of the law is Christ, in which the observance of justifications is established; he knows also that the law is a pedagogue for those who are to believe in the Gospel; he knows also that the just man lives by faith; he knows also that the law is spiritual; he knows that he who shall have done those things which are in the law shall live; and therefore he says: I will never forget thy justifications; for in them thou hast quickened me: so that, although the evangelical faith is to be preached with the works of the law brought to an end, he may nonetheless not be unmindful of the justifications of the law, which is for him the beginning of life; because the justification of the law is the pedagogue of evangelical justification and faith.

12. Belonging to God Rather Than to Vice

He belongs to God who serves God alone. He belongs to vices who obeys them.—But steadfastly, since no forgetfulness of the justifications of God can steal upon him, he has professed what follows, saying,

I am thine, save me; because I have sought thy justifications.

The voice of this profession does not befit all: and rare indeed is he who dares to call himself God's. He will surely dare who said: For me to live is Christ, and to die is gain; and: I live, now not I, but Christ liveth in me. And those who shall be like unto this faith will not impudently confess that they are God's. This is the voice of a soul always intent upon God: this is the work of unwearied mercy, of immovable continence, of habitual fasting, of unrepenting generosity. For how shall he profess himself to be God's who burns with lust, is quick to anger, is anxious for avarice, thirsts for drunkenness, is vain for worldly glory?

He will rather belong to these, not to God. In whomsoever these vices of the passions shall abound, how shall he not belong to those whom he serves? There are many gods of the Gentiles: but for Paul there is one God from whom are all things, and one Lord Jesus through whom are all things. Steadfastly therefore the prophet confesses to him alone whom he serves that he is his: and because he is his, he prays to be saved. But he is his by reason of the fact that he seeks his justifications. While others seek the glory of the world, while others seek fields, houses, money, he seeks the justices of God, and glories in being God's.

13. The Devil's Contention Against the Just

The devil's contention against the just.

The weapons of the just.—There is moreover a great hatred of the irreligious toward men of this kind who are pious and devout. And the prophet knows that he who professes himself to be God's is odious to the men of the world, or to the devil and his ministers. He teaches this also in the following

in which he says,

The wicked have waited for me to destroy me: I have understood thy testimonies, O Lord.

The devil or his ministers strive to take away all the glory of the faithful man: and not to let him be sincerely of God's portion, but to draw him into the fellowship of their own damnation. And so a long and protracted battle is waged against the faith of the Prophet. But he, mindful of the commandments of God and understanding his testimonies, resisted and persevered.

And he frustrated the hope of those who awaited his destruction in no other way than by understanding that the teaching of life was for him in the testimonies of God. But it is arduous and difficult to understand the testimonies of God: and the understanding of them advances beyond the knowledge of present cognition. We have already treated of the testimonies at the beginning of the psalm. For through these present testimonies of the law, knowledge of the eternal testimonies is granted. And indeed the following words demonstrate this very thing.

14. The Prophet's Vision Beyond Every Consummation

Every consummation is manifold.

The kingdom of Christ before the judgment was not hidden from the Prophet.—For there follows,

I have seen the end of all consummation.

We have frequently noted that a satisfactory understanding cannot be conveyed from the Latin translation. For the force of this saying as expressed in Greek is different: for it is, πάσης συντελείας εἶδον πέρας. What is called πέρας among the Greeks is beyond the end of things established, and is not contained by any limit so as to cease; but transcends every boundary under an indefinite signification. But what is written among us as in finem will be thought to contain within that end, by which it is signified, the matter under discussion. But the Prophet, who understands not the corporeal nor earthly testimonies of the law, strains beyond every consummation according to the Greek signification. He knows that there is a consummation of the times of the law, when after the fullness of times God is to be beheld in a body: but beyond this consummation he sees! For he sees the time of evangelical hope.

But even the consummation of this is not unknown to him; for he extends the eyes of his understanding beyond it.

For he also sees the consummation of the resurrection; for he knows that an order of transformation has been established, the Apostle saying: But every one in his own order; and again: We shall all indeed rise again, but we shall not all be changed. He knows also the days of the kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ, from which we are brought forward into the kingdom of God the Father, and shall be transferred into those unsought and unsearchable judgments of God. He knows also that there is a time of judgment. And it was permitted him to know these things from the breadth of the commandments of God: because the divine word has poured itself out into the teaching of an immense knowledge.

15. The Exceeding Breadth of God's Commandment

Why the commandment of God is broad.

The precepts of God are not difficult.—For he says: Thy commandment is exceeding broad. Broad it plainly is, either because it extends the knowledge of human ignorance to infinity; or because there are many things in which obedience is rendered to the precepts of God: and obedience is rendered according to the divisions and gifts of graces. For not all things are expected of all, nor can all persons fulfill all things to the full measure of pleasing. One pleases by fasting, another merits by simplicity of faith, another redeems vices by almsgiving, another consumes himself in charity: just as to some the power of healings has been granted, to another the knowledge of prophecy has been contributed, to another firmness of faith has been given, to another wisdom and knowledge has been bestowed.

The commandment of God is therefore broad, and is spread out over all the kinds of our hope: so that it is not difficult, if the will be present, to obey the commandment of God; since it is broad and diffused for pleasing by the variety of dutiful devotion. And not only broad, but exceeding broad: the infinity of its breadth shown by this very superlative addition.

How have I loved thy law, O Lord!

It is my meditation all the day. Through thy commandment thou hast made me wiser than my enemies: because it is ever with me. I have understood above all them that teach me: because thy testimonies are my meditation. I have understood above the ancients: because I have sought thy commandments. I have restrained my feet from every evil way: that I might keep thy word. I have not declined from thy judgments: because thou hast set the law before me. How sweet are thy words to my palate! Above honey and the honeycomb to my mouth. Through thy commandments I have had understanding: therefore have I hated every way of iniquity.

1. The Purpose and Usefulness of This Psalm

The usefulness of this psalm.—This work of the Prophet is useful and necessary for us, by which we are taught to the perfect knowledge and obedience of God. He instructs us in two things most suited to our weakness: that we may both know God who has been unknown, and obey his commandments according to the will of his decree. For the Prophet forms throughout the whole body of this psalm the perfect man of the Law and the Prophets and the Gospels, whether from his own person or from the person of another whom he instructs, in whose confidence it is fitting to proclaim these things which are set forth below concerning himself. And it is worthy of consideration with what diligence of words, with what completeness of understanding, the Prophet confirms us in each and every kind of saying.

2. Loving the Law Rather Than Fearing It

How doing and loving differ.

How great was David's love of the law.—For he says in the

of the thirteenth letter,

How have I loved thy law, O Lord!

It is my meditation all the day. It would certainly have been ready to say: How have I done thy law! But because it is a greater merit to do something out of love rather than out of fear, he therefore says: How have I loved thy law. For the service of love differs greatly from the duty of fear: nor does the operation of necessity have the grace of the will. For those things do not suffice of themselves for the consummation of perfect service which, although they fulfill their work, yet because they are compelled, rightly lack the fullness of grace. The Prophet therefore wishes his work to be one of love rather than of terror: and that his service be received from charity, not from fear. Many fast while they fear being rebuked by us.

Many give something for the use of the needy while they dread being reproached for the irreligious and unprofitable desire of their avarice.

Many come to church while they are ashamed of being accused of their absence and negligence. But not all love what they do. Necessity of service therefore cannot fall into love: because no one does not will what he loves. But in a deed, love may be absent, when that is done which, had it not been done, would be a cause of terror or shame. But the Prophet is weak in nothing. What he loves he does, and what he does he exercises without ceasing. For the law, which he loves, he meditates upon every day and without intermission. No other pursuits of occupations steal upon him, no varied agitations of worldly cares intervene, nor does forgetfulness fall upon him through the interposition of some new thought: he is always the same, and in the same. He himself is as great in the meditation of the law he loves as the whole day is in time.

3. Wiser Than the Worshippers of Idols

That he is wiser than the worshippers of idols is no great thing.—

because, as we recalled above, the Prophet demonstrates in himself the man of the law and the prophets and the gospels; he says in the following

Through thy commandment thou hast made me wiser than my enemies; because it is ever with me.

The Prophet understands the commandments of God more wisely than his enemies. But what do we and our enemies have in common regarding the precepts of God, who not only do not have even a moderate acquaintance with them, but do not even pursue the beginning of knowing them? And what great thing is it, if the Prophet is wiser than his enemies in the commandments of God? For when could those who venerate inanimate stones or metals or wood attain anything of the knowledge of the living and eternal God, so that the Prophet, compared with these, should become wiser?

But all this error of the impious rejects, spurns, and shudders at that very name itself together with the Law and the prophets and the apostles.

4. Enemies Who Hold the Law Without Understanding It

Heretics and Jews, enemies whom prudence surpasses.—But this holy Prophet has other enemies, over whom he has been more prudently instructed in the commandments of God. Heretics have the commandment of God in the prophets and in the law: but none of them make use of it, through the ignorance of their irreligious will. The Jews claim the commandment of the law as their own and hereditary possession, but to those who do not have the author of spiritual circumcision, what will circumcision, established only as a sign, now profit? What help will the observance of the sabbath bring to those who do not know the Lord of the sabbath? What aid will the lamb of the passover, the blood on the doorposts, and the feast of unleavened bread provide to those who are ignorant of the Lamb of God, the unleavened bread of sincerity, and the blood of salvation? They perform the commandments; but they are ignorant of the efficacy of the commandments and of their time.

They read the law; but while the Jew reads and does not understand it, the Christian understands it.

This enemy is plainly the enemy of the Prophet, laying murderous hands upon the only-begotten Son of God, and condemning, as far as in him lies, by death the Saviour of the human race and the bestower of eternal life. Over all these, therefore, he is more prudent in the commandment of God.

5. Understanding Beyond All His Teachers

Those teachers who are enemies.

David's knowledge from God.—And that it might be understood that he had signified these enemies absolutely, he added what follows,

I have understood above all my teachers, because thy testimonies are my meditation.

You learned the law from Moses, O David, and Aaron is your teacher in all sacrificial matters, Joshua is your master in the repeated circumcision, Samuel showed you the sacrament of anointing, both of prophet and of king, in your own person: what is this that you have dared to say, that you have understood above all your teachers? But the preceding

shows over whom, above all his teachers, he understands

that is, above his enemies. And again this present lower

declares who the enemies are, that is, all his teachers.

For they profess to hold the keys of the heavens, and they glory in being teachers of the law.

And since all the testimonies of the law bear witness to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Prophet understands above his teachers

because, meditating on his testimonies, he always awaits the only-begotten Son of God coming in the flesh. O blessed understanding of the disciple! O wondrous ignorance of the teachers! Those who teach do not know; and those who are taught understand. The Prophet is free from the fault of boasting: for he shows whence he obtained the excellence of understanding. For above he said that he had been made more prudent than his enemies by God in his commandments. For all understanding is from him who made him more prudent. He understands therefore above his teachers.

6. Understanding Beyond the Elders Through Seeking

It is given to one who seeks. The elder, the former people.—And because it sometimes happens, from diversity of nature, that a disciple is more prudent than his master; yet he shows that this very thing belongs to his own diligence and study. For he says,

I have understood above the elders: because I have sought thy commandments.

He understands above his teachers, and he understands above the elders, demonstrating the office of his teaching and understanding together with the very antiquity of time, that is, signifying the age of the people that came before him. In which both things agree, that it is both more ancient, and thinks itself to be the teacher. But above it understands he who is both taught and is younger. He understands, however, because he has sought the commandments of God, which the teacher, while he thinks himself to be teaching, does not know.

7. Restraining the Feet from Every Evil Way

The fruit of knowledge.—It follows, moreover, that he who understands above the elders and teachers should render the fruit of his understanding, namely, that he should practise those things which he has begun to hold as known and perfected. And let us see whether he bore the type of him whom Moses foretold as a prophet, and Isaiah as a king to come. Himself in what follows. For he says,

I have restrained my feet from every evil way, that I might keep thy word.

This is a perfect utterance, and the utterance of a man of the Gospel, to abstain from every way of wickedness, and, with so many paths of error meeting one everywhere, to walk in none of them by which iniquity is approached.

8. Restraint from Vice Before Keeping God's Word

Vices must be kept away, so that there may be keeping of the word of God.—But the Prophet signifies something deeper, I know not what, when he says, I have restrained my feet.

By the nature of our body we are carried into every course of crimes: and the impulse of human desires drives us into this way. But he who understands above the elders and teachers has restrained himself through the teaching of understanding, and has called back what was going out and rushing forward. We must therefore resist and struggle, so that we first keep ourselves away from every evil way, and then, if any impulse begins to carry us away, we draw ourselves back: and we must first be restrained by our own power, so that we may thereafter keep the word of God. But prior self-restraint is needed, so that there may be keeping of the word of God. For no one will keep the word first, and then be able to restrain himself.

For restraint is precisely this: that what was being done is prevented from being done; but keeping is then firm, when one, restraining himself from evils, observes good things without interruption of keeping.

9. The True Keeping of God's Word

The true keeping of the word of God.—What manner of keeping of the word of God ought to be, the following

teaches. For there follows,

I have not declined from thy judgments: because thou hast set a law for me.

This therefore is the true keeping: to turn aside in no direction from the judgments of God, and not to deviate even by a slight departure; but always intent, and always immovable, to remain in that wherein one has taken one's stand.

10. The Gospel Law Contained in the Law of Moses

The evangelical law is contained in the law of Moses, and gives man hope of the glory of God.—He does not decline, moreover

because the Lord has established a law for him. Moses indeed had established a law; but this same prophet had prayed in another psalm, saying: Lord, appoint a lawgiver over them: let the nations know that they are men. For the law which Moses had written was our pedagogue unto Christ: and therefore he understood above his teachers and elders, because he understands the evangelical law, which is contained in the law of Moses. This therefore was given through our Lord, this instructed every man in the knowledge of God. And therefore to what he had said: Appoint a lawgiver over them; he added: Let the nations know that they are men: that is, born of earth and formed from clay unto the knowledge of God.

For what they previously did not know through ignorance of the law of Moses, they now know through the preaching of our Lord Jesus Christ: and as they recognise their origin, that is, the nature of the body, in the new giver of the law, so also they await the glory of this new giver of the law, already constituted from their beginning in the image and likeness of God.

11. The Sweetness of God's Words to the Soul

The words of God are sweet, but only if they penetrate the soul.—And the Prophet bears witness in what follows to the sweetness of this evangelical preaching.

For he says,

How sweet are thy words to my palate, sweeter than honey to my mouth!

Honey is sweet in the mouth, but not also in the palate. For beyond the region of the mouth there is no sense of bodily flavours. But the words of God are sweet in the palate, flowing down into the soul, that is, and penetrating the inward parts: pleasing not only in the mouth as food, but sweet there where the sense of knowledge and prudence and understanding is. And therefore the words are sweeter than honey both in the palate and in the mouth.

But as honey, through the sickness and heat of fevers, soothes the bitterness of whatever has befallen the mouth; so the words of God, poured in, soothe the bitternesses of our soul and the sad fevers of unwholesome desires, provided they are not merely held in the mouth, but swallowed down into the palate.

12. Understanding Gained by Fulfilling the Commandments

Precepts make wise those who fulfil them.

Knowledge from God is not given to those who do not seek it.—There follows then,

From thy commandments I have gained understanding; therefore I have hated every way of iniquity.

The precepts make us understanding; but precepts fulfilled in deed and in act: that is, that we fulfil, as far as we are able, the things contained in them. The precepts therefore must be carried out, so that we may be understanding. And although understanding is perfected by God, yet we must make a beginning from ourselves, so that we may be able to merit perfect understanding. For to those who do not begin this of themselves, all things are closed by God. And this same prophetic word teaches through Isaiah saying: Do not say of my commandments that you have known them: neither have you known them, nor believed them, nor from the beginning have I opened your ears. For I knew that in scorning you would scorn, and that you would be called iniquitous still from the womb.

Knowledge therefore is not granted to those who do not seek it.

And because God is the searcher of hearts, to those who were going to despise it, ears are made dull and sense is made blunt. But the Prophet understands from the commandments of God: having followed understanding, that is, by carrying out the commandments: and understanding, he hates every way of iniquity.

13. The Right Ordering of Love and Hatred

The right use of human affections.—For all the movements of diverse affections are adjacent to human nature, such as hatreds and loves.

But love must be expended in the cherishing of good things, and hatred must be taken up from offence at evil things. It is therefore our part to tune our bodies, as instruments of useful service, to fitting and harmonious modes, so that we do not love vices, so that we do not hate good virtues, so that we fit ourselves to each kind fittingly and usefully. The Prophet loves the commandments of God: and he who loves the commandments of God hates the ways of iniquity. For as it belongs to the obedience of perfect faith to love obedience, and to fulfil from the affection of charity what one does, and to anticipate the necessity of acting with the will of one who loves; so also it belongs to great innocence not only not to commit iniquities, but to hate them, since sometimes fear and terror turns us away from them.

But hatred of them instils in us the judgment of a true and perfect opinion concerning them.

Let us therefore love justice, modesty, frugality, mercy; and let us hate quarrels and drunkenness, murders, pride, fornications, together with which we must necessarily also hate the devil. But loving peace, truth, justice, we shall love him who is peace, justice and truth, our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

Thy word, O Lord, is a lamp to my feet, and a light to my paths.

I have sworn and am determined to keep the judgments of thy justice. I have been humbled exceedingly, O Lord: quicken me according to thy word. Make the willing offerings of my mouth well-pleasing, O Lord, and teach me thy judgments. My soul is in thy hands always: and I have not forgotten thy law. Sinners have laid a snare for me, and I have not strayed from thy commandments. I have acquired thy testimonies as a heritage for ever: because they are the joy of my heart. I have inclined my heart to perform thy justifications for ever, for the sake of recompense. Not idle, nor do we hide it as useless in the midst: but let us offer this light first to ourselves, and then from ourselves to all the nations. The Lord also admonished this in the following commandment, saying: Let your loins be girded, and your lamps burning.

He commands therefore that we do nothing in darkness: because everyone who acts in sins hates the light, and loves darkness. He wills that these lamps of ours be always lit, lest at any time we be left in the night of this age. For the Jews a lamp is lit in the tabernacle of testimony, and this burns throughout all the time of their feast. They do not know what they do. But let us in the testimonies of these our tabernacles, that is, of our bodies, always have burning lamps, and let us celebrate the feast of our hope by their light.

4. The Apostles as Lamps and Eyes of the Church

The Apostles are the eyes of the Church; John is a lamp.

The wise virgins.—The Lord also calls the Apostles the salt of the earth and the light of the world, and through this signification shows them to be lamps of the Church as well, saying: The lamp of thy body is thine eye, that is, of the body of the Church, which is one body in Christ, and we are members of one another. For first, to each one of us the word of God is an eye or a lamp: then the apostolic man is a lamp to his whole body, that is, to the Church. For not every part of the body is a foot, or an eye, or a hand. Therefore if the eyes, the most luminous part of the whole body and thereby surpassing the other members, shall be in darkness, that is, if the lamps of the apostles shall not burn, with the very light placed in darkness, how great a night shall remain for the whole body?

John, the preacher of repentance, was a lamp both to the Jews and to the Gentiles, the Lord saying: He was a burning and shining lamp, and ye were willing for a season to rejoice in his light. We have therefore the light of doctrine: let us rejoice in it, not for an hour, but always; not for a time, but unto eternity. Those blessed virgins, and profitable merchants of oil, alone entered the bridal chamber with the bridegroom in the light of their lamps, while the rest, being negligent and sleeping, were shut out from entry into the bridal chamber.

5. The Word of God as Lamp and Light

The Word of God, who is lamp and light.—For every step of our soul, therefore, let us use the word of God as a lamp; but a lamp always burning, always made ready for its office by our foresight. Now the word which is a lamp to the feet is itself also a light to the paths. For those who walk gently and within the household, a lamp is needed; but for those who enter upon a foreign and public road, a light is rather necessary, lest a robber lie in wait, lest the error of an ambiguous way confront them. For by degrees one ascends from the lesser to the greater: so that for him to whom the word of God is first a lamp to his feet, that same word may become a light to his paths. But the lamp to the feet and the light to the paths ought to afford useful progress. And let us see whether the prophet has added something worthy.

6. The Oath to Keep God's Judgments

What sworn things and established things are.—For he says,

I have sworn and am steadfastly purposed to keep the judgments of thy justice.

Now he wanders not in the night of the age, nor fears to strike his foot. For every sacrament is a matter of confirmed knowledge, and the obligation of swearing is undertaken from the knowledge of truth. The prophet therefore swears; and not only swears, but also is steadfastly purposed; because the bond of an oath is the firmness of established purposes. He is therefore steadfastly purposed, swearing to keep the judgments of the justice of God. And it is difficult for established purposes to be overthrown, and it is best to establish what has been sworn.

7. The Justice of God's Judgments

The judgments of God are just.—But he is mindful that there is nothing unjust in the judgments of God.

For if human judgments are truly considered judgments when they are sanctioned by the decision of a just judgment: how should it be doubted that there is nothing unjust in the judgments of God? We lose our children; we deem this an unjust judgment. Did God unjustly give power over Job's children to the devil? We grieve over our losses as though they befall us wrongfully. Did God permit that perfect man to be in want without a reason of justice? We are tormented by pains, and we reproach God with the complaints of our impatience. Was he perhaps consumed by worms, flowing with corruption, pierced through with sores, by uncertain counsel? Certainly all these things served for a proof of faith and for the reward of glorious patience. Our weakness causes us to deem that which we suffer to be an evil.

But the will of God is always that we be proved by the patience of sufferings: yet we, while we wish to remain hidden without a proof of faith, condemn the justice of the divine judgment.

8. Christ's Precept and Example of Humility

Christ gave both the precept and the example of humility.—But he who above had both sworn and been steadfastly purposed to keep the judgments of the justice of God, ought to render something worthy of his oath and resolution in observing the judgments. For that is not a light thing which he, having sworn, has resolved to keep. And what that thing is, the following

declares. For he says,

I have been humbled exceedingly, O Lord: quicken me according to thy word.

The only-begotten Son of God, taking to himself a body of our nature from the Virgin, when he had presented in himself the true and perfect form of human wisdom, it must be known what he wished to be learned from himself as an example of teaching. For he says: Come unto me all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will refresh you. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me, for I am meek and humble of heart: and ye shall find rest for your souls.

He himself, assuredly perfect and without sin alone, and the one in whose mouth there was no guile, wished this chief example to be taken from himself, namely of meekness and humility, through which rest might be found for souls.

9. The Causes of Pride Removed by Humility

He removed the causes of pride.—He knows that the weakness of our nature is insolent and incapable of prosperous circumstances. Some grow insolent through riches; not knowing that it was said concerning the giving of riches, For almsgiving hideth sin; and again: He hath dispersed, he hath given to the poor, his justice remaineth for ever; and that God himself said to those who had fed the hungry, given drink to the thirsty, received the stranger into their home, clothed the naked, visited the sick, consoled the imprisoned: Come, ye blessed of my Father, possess the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. Others are puffed up by worldly glory; not knowing that this was the chief blessing of the heavenly discourse: Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Others are raised up by carnal nobility to a pinnacle; not considering that it was said to those who are reborn in Christ: But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation.

The laws of the world are one thing, the gifts of God are another.

The devil, when he dared to tempt the Lord, boasts that the world is his. But the Lord commands us to die to the world, that we may live to him. With the Lord, contempt of riches is wealth; with the Lord, disdain of earthly honour is the kingdom of heaven; with the Lord, humility of heart is the adornment of a noble and royal birth. This therefore he wished to be learned from himself, which is the greatest of all virtues.

10. The Reward of Christ's Humility

The reward of Christ's humility.—The Apostle also, teaching us unto humility, exhorts with such words: For let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus, 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, and was found in habit as a man. He humbled himself, becoming obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. We have an example of humility from the only-begotten God: but let us also see the reward. For on this account God also hath exalted him, and hath given him a name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow of those that are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue should confess that the Lord Jesus is in the glory of God the Father.

This was the reward of humility, that the body assumed should remain in the glory of God the Father, that at his name the heavenly and earthly and infernal beings should bow the knee. For remaining in the form of God, he did not think that what he was, namely to be equal to God, was to be seized upon by any force or robbery. For he was in the form of God, and nothing of his glory was lacking to him in whose form he remained; but he received the form of a servant through humility, and was found in habit as a man, humbling himself through obedience unto death: and not only unto death, but unto the death of the cross. He himself established the heaven at the command of God, adorned the world at the Father's bidding into this appearance of such great beauty, created the earth and the things that are in it. But did he merit on account of those things to place the assumed man in the glory of the eternal Father?

This is the reward of humility, this is the recompense of humility: that because, remaining formerly in the form of God, he was thereafter made in the form of a servant; and remaining in the form of God, and made in the form of a servant, he should be known to be in the glory of God the Father by the confession of the heavenly and earthly and infernal beings.

11. Paul's Guard Against Spiritual Pride

Paul guards his own against elation.

God calls them away from it.—The same Apostle also, fearing lest the very grace of divine gifts should make some insolent, says: But to every one is given the manifestation of the Spirit for profit. For in that he says, for profit, he taught that it is to be used humbly: lest perchance the confidence of spiritual gifts should make someone insolent, and the grace of God should become idle through the vice of insolence. From his own person he himself shows that he had obtained this also from the grace of God, lest through confidence in the many graces in him he should be lifted up into any swelling of pride, saying: And by reason of the excellence of the revelations, there was given to me a sting of the flesh, an angel of Satan, to buffet me, lest I should be exalted.

Even that vessel of election and teacher of the Gentiles feared this, lest beyond the nature of human weakness he should grow proud through confidence in the spiritual gifts in him. Scripture praises King Hezekiah, that he did what was right and good in the sight of God: but this praise could not remain to the end. For it is written in the second book of Chronicles: And Hezekiah fell from the height of his heart (II Chron. Xxxii, 26). When he had raised his heart on high, when he had lifted himself up in pride through confidence in his praise, he lost by the crime of pride the grace of his past deeds.

12. David's Humility Despite Every Cause for Pride

David most humble, though he had many causes for pride.—The prophet therefore, swearing and resolving to keep the just judgments of God, took this as his first work, to become humble: and not only humble, but humble exceedingly: teaching by this addition the modesty of a consummated humility in himself. And there were in him many causes for pride. His nobility from Judah afforded causes for insolence, and in him the power of the royal blessing was first begun. For the family of royal power from the tribe of David remained for some time, from which according to the flesh the eternal King arose. He was also most wise. For he says: The invisible and hidden things of thy wisdom thou hast made manifest to me. He also merited to be a prophet, when it is said: I will open my mouth in parables, I will utter things hidden from the foundation of the world. He also abounded in the resources of human wealth.

For he himself says: Behold, I have gathered in my poverty a hundred thousand talents of gold, and a thousand thousand talents of silver, and of brass and iron there is no number (I Chron. Xxii, 14). Hence the nobility of family, hence the power of a king, hence the confidence of wisdom, hence the merit of prophecy, hence the abundance of resources, did not however raise him up into pride, nor lift him up into any swelling of eminence. He therefore asks with confidence, saying: Quicken me according to thy word; that is, that as one not yet living he may earn the life of eternal life according to the word of God, because he kept himself within the discipline and teaching of the evangelical proclamation with the modesty of humility.

13. David's Voluntary Deeds Beyond the Law

David voluntarily does more than the law commands.—Next follows,

Make the freewill offerings of my mouth well-pleasing, O Lord, and teach me thy judgments.

The prophet worthily carries out the oath of his resolution. For first he was made humble exceedingly: now in what follows he prays that the freewill offerings of his mouth may be well-pleasing. He is not content to be contained even within the prescriptions of the law, nor to be subject only to the necessity of obedience. The law commanded that evil should be returned for evil. This David, when he had frequently had Saul, who was pursuing him with all the forces of his power, captured and enclosed, not only did not slay him, but even dismissed him with honour, saying: I will not lay my hand upon him, because he is the Lord's anointed. And when he learned that he had been slain in battle, he wept and avenged him. His son Absalom also seizes the kingdom, gathers an army, pursues his father with parricide war.

But David says to his soldiers: Spare the young man Absalom.

Upon him indeed the necessity of resistance was imposed, as upon a king; but piety and goodness were present for sparing, as upon a prophet. He also mourned for him when dead with fatherly affection and grief. For these things are freewill, not legal: and to comply with these is an office of freedom rather than of necessity.

14. Voluntary Devotion Commended by Paul

Works of voluntary devotion commended by Paul.—The Apostle has this custom of voluntary teaching, not of legal obligation, saying: But concerning virgins I have no commandment of the Lord, yet I give counsel. Or when he praises the glory of widowhood and continence, he does not forbid the power of marrying, but proclaims the merit of celibacy. He establishes beyond the law, and exhorts beyond the precept, placing voluntary things before legal ones. And again he says: Have we not power to eat and to drink? Have we not power to lead about a woman, as the other apostles and the brethren of the Lord and Cephas? Or I only and Barnabas, have we not power to do this? But we have not used this power. Power belongs to what is lawful, when the (evangelical) law, sparing our weakness, does not burden us with heavy prescriptions.

But truly the profession of the will comes from an increase of faith, when in those things in which the law is moderate toward us, we restrain ourselves by the zeal of voluntary devotion.

15. Praying to Understand the Judgments He Performs

David performs the judgments of the law but does not understand them.—The Prophet therefore prays that these voluntary things may be pleasing to God

because those things which are done according to the prescription of the law are carried out by the very necessity of their servitude. But he always sets forth the reason for his supplication. For after he prayed that the voluntary offerings of his mouth might be well-pleasing, he added: And teach me thy judgments. He performs the judgments of the law, and as far as in him lies exercises them in deeds and works; but he does not yet understand them. For he knows the law to be spiritual. And he hastens to know what is contained under the appearance of present operations: for one must needs ask to be taught those things which he does not know.

16. Giving the Soul Wholly into God's Hands

He gives himself wholly to God.—The Prophet has given himself wholly to God according to the constitution of his covenant. He has been greatly humbled, the voluntary offerings of his mouth are pleasing; now his soul is always in the hands of God, and he does not forget the law of God, saying,

My soul is always in thy hands: and I have not forgotten thy law.

All that he lives, he lives to God. His every sense and spirit is in God: no time is admitted in which forgetfulness of the law might steal in. In all his works and thoughts God is thought upon. The law is in memory, the soul of the living man is always in the hands of God.

17. Snares Set by Sinners Along the Way

How necessary this is for each person.

Snares everywhere.—He also knows how useful this is for him, he knows how necessary it is daily to commit himself into the hands of God through his deeds and works, and through unceasing memory of the law. For he says,

Sinners have laid a snare for me: and I have not erred from thy commandments.

He knows that in this forest of the world many snares are spread, many traps for his life are prepared. Our speech, thought, and deed always have snares lying close at hand: when sometimes an occasion of anger arises, an affection of grief, a necessity of complaint, an occasion of evil desire. These snares the devil and his angels, transgressors from the beginning and sinners from the start, always spread. But he whose soul is in the hands of God, and who is never unmindful of the law of God, though snares be cast around him on every side, will nevertheless not stray from the commandments.

For always thinking of God he flies away from them, as he speaks in another psalm: Like a sparrow, delivered from the snare of the hunters. And the Lord himself says through the Prophet, Deliver yourselves from the snare of the hunters, and from the word of trouble.

18. The Peril of the World to Those Who Renounced It

How harmful the world is to those who have renounced it.—For nets are not spread unjustly for birds.

You have been educated in heavenly knowledge: what have you to do with earthly works and deeds? You have been made a bird: why do you not dwell in the element of your own nature? For they are called birds of heaven: not unjustly therefore are snares laid for them in the possession of earthly habitation. You have renounced the world: what have you to do with the things of the world? Why do you complain of being caught in the world?

Why do you complain of the injury of a snare in a region not your own?

Rather speak and use yourself the voice of the Psalmist saying these things: Who will give me wings like a dove? And I will fly away, and be at rest. It is the nature of birds that they do not rest while they fly; but you, now made a dove, find rest in flying, that is, by lifting yourself on the flight of a faithful soul from earthly snares into heavenly dwelling and knowledge.

19. Testimonies of God as an Inheritance

David desires to be a witness of God and to suffer for his cause.

Testimonies obtained as an inheritance.—Then follows,

I have inherited thy testimonies for ever; because they are the exultation of my heart.

An heir, according to human custom, obtains all things of him whose heir he also is. But the Prophet disdains human inheritances, who has inherited the testimonies of God. It is pleasing to him, if he himself becomes a witness of God, because it is the exultation of his heart, if he bears witness to God amid the battles of persecutions. So too we recall that the apostles rejoiced in these testimonies, when going out from the assembly of the persecutors, they rejoiced because for the name of God they were judged worthy of injuries. The testimonies of him therefore were the exultation of their heart.

But the Prophet, like the apostles also, although amid many persecutions he retains these testimonies of God

that is, the bearing witness to him with exultation of heart as an inheritance; yet he also has those testimonies of God acquired as an inheritance which were spoken before witnesses. Moses gave the law before witnesses of heaven and earth, Isaiah before witnesses rebuked with heaven and earth (Esa. I, 2), the Apostle used yet loftier testimonies as a preacher of the gospel, saying: I charge thee before God and Christ Jesus and his angels. These testimonies therefore, written before these witnesses, and attested before them, and attested in them, he takes possession of as heir of a new patrimony: not in part, but in whole. For the right of inheritance is from the whole. Even if among several persons an inheritance is divided according to human succession, yet the inheritance itself is whole in the name of the heir.

20. God's Gift and the Will's Own Beginning

Perseverance is a gift from God, a certain beginning is from us.

The fault of our origin.—And lest what is often said by many should have any authority of reason, when they assert that it is God's own gift that anyone should be occupied in the things and works of God, excusing their own unfaithfulness on the ground that they remain unfaithful because God's will toward them has ceased: there is indeed a gift from God of remaining in faith, but the origin of beginning is from us. And our will ought to have this as its own from itself, that it wills: God will give increase to the one who begins: because our weakness does not attain consummation by itself, yet the merit of attaining consummation comes from the beginning of the will. Therefore the Prophet concluded the psalm thus,

I have inclined my heart to perform thy justifications for ever because of the retribution.

He himself inclines his heart, and bends it from the sins of human nature into obedience to God.

For the nature and origin of his flesh held him back: but the will and devotion of his heart inclines it from that fault of origin in which it remained toward the works of justifications. And he inclines it throughout all the time of his life: not within some defined span of time, but throughout the whole age of his life. He inclines it moreover because of the retribution, being certain that those things are reserved for the merits of faith, and that in these is his retribution, which eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, which God hath prepared for them that love him in Christ Jesus, to whom be glory both now and always, and unto ages of ages. Amen.

I have hated the unrighteous, and have loved thy law.

My helper and my upholder: and in thy word have I hoped (I hope). Depart from me, ye malignant: and I will search the commandments of my God. Uphold me according to thy word, and I shall live: and let me not be confounded in my expectation. Help me, and I shall be saved, and I will meditate in thy justifications always. Thou hast despised all them that fall away from thy justifications: because their thought (meditation) is unjust. I have counted all the sinners of the earth as transgressors: therefore have I loved thy testimonies always. Pierce thou my flesh with thy fear: for I am afraid of thy judgments.

1. Loving Enemies and Hating the Unrighteous

To love enemies is a commandment.—The teaching of the evangelical precept is that we should love our enemies: and we owe love not only to those who love us, but also to those who hate us. Therefore this profession of the Prophet seems to be contrary to the dominical commandments: so that when love of enemies is enjoined upon us, he sets forth as a good work the fact that he hates the unrighteous, saying,

I have hated the unrighteous.

2. When Hating Father and Mother Is Commanded

Hatred of father, mother, is commanded when they call one away from martyrdom or from the service of God.—But the reason for this very saying is to be understood from the gospels themselves.

For the Lord, who commanded that enemies be loved, and established that those who curse father or mother are guilty of death, again in another place commanded, saying: If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea and his own soul also, he cannot be my disciple. These things therefore seem to be contrary to one another, so that he by whose precept not only hatred toward parents but even mere cursing is worthy of death, himself again says that no one can be his disciple unless he (as it were, unless he who) hates father and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, and his own soul. This is a hard saying, and a grave commandment, to impose the necessity of impiety for the perfection of religion.

3. Hating Those Who Hinder Martyrdom

But nothing hard, nothing impious, nothing contrary to earlier precepts is commanded by God.

Now these names most dear to us, namely father and mother, and wife, and children, cannot be angry that we are commanded to hate them; since we are commanded to hate even our own soul.

For the Lord knows that there are many of such inconsiderate love that when they see their children persisting in the glory of martyrdom, they beg them to yield to the time; they entreat them to change their sentence; and they employ toward them an affection of impious devotion: when an aged mother and an old father display their pitiable grey hairs to their son in the very contest of martyrdom with envy of his hard resolve: and on the other side a wife is present with the ambitious company of children, praying that he live rather for them and for her: and on the other side brothers and sisters entreat with the endearing familiarity of their names: and the soul itself also, long since captivated by the allurements of living, steals in with certain silent counsels toward a connivance of deflecting the will. In this time therefore the Lord commanded us to hate father, mother, wife, children, brothers, sisters, and even the soul itself.

For he closed this same discourse thus, after the hatred of all, saying: And whosoever doth not carry his cross, and come after me: cannot be my disciple. They are therefore to be hated at that time when they are unwilling for us to carry the cross of martyrdom, when they dissuade us from following God by the example of his passion. This hatred is honorable and useful, to hate those who endeavor to draw us away from the love of Christ.

4. Hating the Unrighteous, Not the Gospel's Enemies

By hating the unrighteous David does not oppose the Gospel.—And so now the Prophet seems to have said nothing contrary to the evangelical precepts by which we are commanded to love enemies, saying, I have hated the unrighteous. For he does not say his enemies, but the unrighteous: that is, transgressors of the law. The Greek language designates this by a more precise word, saying παρανόμους, that is, those acting outside the law. But he who hates the transgressors of the law cannot but love that which he hates to see neglected: and therefore he says: And I have loved thy law. Moreover it is fitting that because he loves the law, he should hate those who are enemies of the law.

5. God as Helper and the Ground of Hope

Great is the help of God we need.

Hope prevails. All merit comes from hope and faith in Christ.—Then follows,

Thou art my helper and my upholder: and in thy word I hope.

Great is the aid of God we need in so great and unceasing a battle of this age. For our struggle, according to the Apostle, is not against flesh and blood, but against powers and the mighty rulers of this world of darkness, against spiritual wickednesses in the heavenly places. These therefore are the enemies we have; against these God must be besought as helper, that he may receive us into his protection. But this prayer ought to be not so much of fear as of merit. For fear arises from the trembling of the human condition, whereas the Prophet hopes in the word of God. Hope does not obtain things present, but things future. He hopes therefore for those things which are contained in the word of God, that is, in prophetic utterances.

Moreover he hopes either for the rewards of faith unto spiritual life, or he awaits that very coming of our Lord, who is the Word of God. For this hope merits the aid and help of God. Neither do we merit, nor did any before us merit, in any other way than by having hoped that the Word of God would clothe himself with the flesh of our nature as one who would dwell therein, or by having believed that he has dwelt therein.

6. The Malice Hidden in Every Heart

Malice is present in all.

Manifold malice in the heart.—But the Prophet remembers that there are many things within himself that strive to resist his hope; and therefore he adds,

Depart from me, ye malicious; and I will search out the commandments of my God.

The principle of heavenly teaching advises that this saying be understood as referring to the person of men in whom malice resides. For the Prophet, who teaches the nations, who preaches the word of God, commands that all the malicious depart from him: because the assembly of the saints is unworthy of workers of malice. And I know not whom he could except. For malice is present in all through the will of changeable nature, and even in the apostles themselves, though already cleansed and made holy by the word of faith, the Lord taught that malice is nonetheless not absent through the condition of our common origin, saying: If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children.

But it is ours both to love the evil and to teach the good toward goodness, after the example of him who rather invites all to himself, saying: Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will refresh you. But the Prophet knows that there are many forms of malice hidden in the secret places of the human heart. For according to the Lord's saying, Out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false testimonies, blasphemies. For these are the things that defile a man in common. He therefore asks that such things, which oppose his faith, depart from him. For they hinder the pursuits of innocence, they hinder spiritual teaching; and when these thrust themselves upon him through the constant familiarity of their counsels, the mind has no leisure to search out the commandments of God: because the presence of a malicious man greatly hinders one who would search out the commandments of God.

7. Prayer Against Mockery of Christian Hope

Calumnies against Christian hope.

Prayer against them.—And because it is the work of God's mercy that, being received into his household, we may be freed from the dominion of these malicious ones; the Prophet prays, saying,

Receive me according to thy word, and I shall live, and let me not be confounded in my expectation.

The Prophet expects and hopes: he pursues nothing present, nothing temporal. But there are many who challenge and mock this expectation of our faith, saying such things as: What will fasting, what will continence, what will chastity, what will the loss of patrimony bring of benefit? Where is your hope, O Christians? Death holds equal dominion over all: it has a common right over the nature of all bodies. Nay rather, we enjoy all the good things of this age, and make use of the freedom of true life: and in what respect at last do you surpass us by the expectation of your hope?

The Prophet therefore prays that he be not confounded in this his expectation: but that he may remain confident, and receive the fruits of that true life which he expects.

For he knows that he does not yet live, though he lives. For our life, according to the Apostle, is hidden in Christ. And therefore he says: Receive me according to thy word, and I shall live: because he is held by the expectation and hope of that true and unfailing life. For he hopes for eternity, he hopes for the kingdom of heaven, he hopes for the kingdom of God, he hopes for spiritual blessings in the heavenly places in Christ. In this hope, in which he shall not be confounded, he asks to be received and to live.

8. Prayer to Be Helped Rather Than Spared

Prayer not that adversaries be absent, but that they be overcome.—Then follows,

Help me, and I shall be saved, and I will meditate in thy justifications always.

Above he had said, My helper and my upholder; but now he prays for the reality of the names he has mentioned, that he who is the upholder may uphold, and he who is the helper may help. He prays that the help of the one who helps may not be absent from him. He does not pray that he may have no malicious persons against him, because faith is proved through the endurance of sufferings: but he prays that he may be helped against them, because help must always be sought from the Lord. But just as in the former

being received, he will live: so also in this one, being helped, he will be saved.

For he must still undergo death, he must still endure the underworld.

Then will he be saved, when, transformed from bodily and earthly nature into spiritual glory, he fears no danger from the opposing enemy, lives among the elect angels, is an inhabitant of paradise, and, corruption being swallowed up, exists immortal from being mortal.

9. The Eternal Meditation on God's Justifications

The eternal meditation of justifications.—But as to his saying that he will meditate in the justices of God, and will meditate always: does he not meditate who has also hoped in meditation? It can indeed be taken as referring to the present work of life, so that as long as he is in the body, he may always meditate on the justifications: but the word extends no less into the future as well. He knows that in heaven all the angels are in meditation of the justifications of God. For there nothing is idle, nothing is inert: all the heavenly powers remain in the work of their ministry. And since we must then live the life of angels, it is possible that, after the manner of those who always work, there may be for us also an eternal meditation of justifications.

10. Falling Away Distinguished from Sin

The distinction between a sinner and an apostate.—Then follows,

Thou hast despised all them that fall away from thy justifications; because their thought is iniquitous.

The Prophet prays for help and reception for this reason, lest he too be despised along with those who fall away from the justifications of God. But here this principle is observed, that it is not said, thou hast despised all sinners; but, Thou hast despised all them that fall away. For if he were to despise sinners, he would despise all without exception: because there is no one without sin. But he despises those who fall away from him, whom they call apostates. Nor does it matter whether one was ever among the justifications of God. For whoever has fallen away is to be despised by God: because the completion of persevering preserves the merit of one who perseveres.

But falling away differs from sin

because for sin pardon is reserved through repentance, whereas falling away condemns itself by its very falling away even together with repentance; which arises from this, that the will of those who are about to fall away is iniquitous.

11. All Sinners of the Earth as Transgressors

Who are commonly called transgressors.

In what sense all. The natural law.—Then follows,

I have counted all the sinners of the earth as transgressors; therefore I have loved thy justices.

The Prophet's word always extends far and beyond the common understanding. For we consider those to be transgressors who abandon the faith they have received and the knowledge of God they have attained, having promised one thing and now doing another. But here all the sinners of the earth are considered to be transgressors: none is excepted, the name of transgression is referred generally to all. For there is as it were a natural law, to do injury to no one, to seize nothing belonging to another, to abstain from fraud and perjury, not to lay snares against another's marriage. The Apostle also knows this law, saying: For when the Gentiles, who have not the law, do by nature the things of the law, such men, not having the law, are a law unto themselves, who show the work of the law written in their hearts.

Those therefore are considered transgressors who abandon what they receive from the natural law.

One will convict a thief caught in the act, or an adulterer, or a murderer, by the law of nature. But if he himself is engaged in these things, he is a transgressor of the law.

12. Sinners of Heaven and Sinners of Earth

Sinners of heaven.—He also knows, when he says sinners of the earth, that there are other sinners of heaven as well.

For let us hear the prodigal son of the Gospel's proclamation, lost and dead, confessing his sin to his father: I have sinned, he says, father against heaven and before thee. Whoever, having been made a partaker of heavenly teaching and of such grace of the Spirit, shall remain in sin; that one is not a sinner of the earth, but of heaven. For our Lord Jesus Christ has co-raised all believers in himself, and has placed them in the heavenly places: from which whoever departs is convicted as a sinner of heaven. Since therefore the Prophet considers the sinners of the earth to be transgressors, because they have transgressed the law of nature by sinning; for this reason he himself loves the testimonies of God, because, while transgression consists in departing from the law of nature, yet departure from the heavenly law is already without pardon.

13. The Flesh Pierced by Fear of God

The vices of the flesh must be nailed to the cross.—He concludes thus,

Pierce my flesh with thy fear; for I have been afraid of thy judgments.

The prayers of the Prophet are new and unusual, that his flesh be pierced by the fear of God. But he remembers that those who wish to reign together with Christ must suffer together with him and die together with him. And the Latin translation has expressed this with less force than the power of the saying requires. For what in our version is confige, there καθηλωσον signifies this, that a nail should pierce. We must therefore die, and all the vices of our flesh must be nailed to the cross of the Lord. For we die, according to the Apostle, with Christ, and are buried together in baptism. And this the Prophet, though he has it in his own will, yet entreats that he may obtain it through the mercy of God.

For he prays that his flesh be pierced by the fear of God, because he fears the judgments of God. For he fears the sentence of the eternal judgment, he fears that he may not be pierced together with Christ and die together and be buried together, understanding that he will not become a new man unless the old man is stripped off together with his vices and lusts.

I have done judgment and justice: deliver me not up to them that persecute me.

Receive thy servant in that which is good: let not the proud calumniate me. My eyes have failed for thy salvation, and for the word of thy justice. Deal with thy servant according to thy mercy, and teach me thy justifications. I am thy servant: give me understanding and I shall know thy commandments (that I may know thy testimonies). It is time to act, O Lord (for the Lord): they have dissipated thy law. Therefore I have loved thy commandments above gold and topaz (topazion). Therefore I was directed toward all thy commandments: every way of iniquity I have hated.

1. The Lessons of the Sixteenth Letter

What we are chiefly taught in this octonary.—Both at the beginning of the psalm and frequently thereafter we have recalled that through these elements, as it were, of learning proper to each letter, we are instructed by the teaching of piety, continence, understanding, faith, and fear: and that, as raw infancy is trained in the very first sounds of the human voice toward the knowledge of speaking, which the teaching of acting also follows, so are we trained; which may be understood from the present eight

of the sixteenth letter.

For the Prophet teaches all men from his own person what it is profitable for each one to will, to do, to profess according to the conscience of his own weakness and nature: what also ought to be feared, what avoided, what cleansed. Blessed is this same prophet, who through the mercy of God is to himself and to all a teacher and overseer and cleanser and judge.

And it is most fitting to his dignity that he who speaks by the Spirit of God should utter those things which pertain to human salvation and eternity.

2. Work Placed Before Prayer

Work is to be placed before prayer.—For he speaks thus,

I have done judgment and justice: deliver me not up to them that harm me.

He has done works pleasing to God: and because he has done them, he prays that he be not delivered up to those who harm him. The work of meriting is placed first; and then the reward of merit is sought. For first that which pleases is done: and then the favour of him who is pleased through the work is prayed for. But we neither work nor please; nay rather we give offence by impious and irreligious deeds: and because such as we are we do not please, we grow angry. But it is fitting to consider what manner of things the Prophet does, when he prays that he be not delivered up to those who harm him.

3. Virtues That Profit Only Oneself

The virtues of David are profitable to him alone.—And all things whatsoever one fearing God shall do are profitable and beautiful to him.

One who cultivates chastity has brought a glorious and shining light to the sordid flesh of his body. One who takes up contempt of money has preserved himself free from earthly dominions. And one who loves frugality and thrift has not abandoned the nobility of the heavenly soul as a captive to drunkenness. But although these things are great and excellent, yet, because they are the Prophet's own and profitable to him alone, they are not referred to merit.

4. Judgment and Justice for the Good of Others

Judgment and justice, moreover, are of benefit to others as well.—But what has he done, that he prays not to be delivered to the wicked? Judgment and justice, namely; doing nothing inconsiderate, nothing unjust: but first exercising judgment; for he handles all things by reason, measure, and truth: so that what he does toward another, having been weighed beforehand and clearly seen, he now carries out from the decision of deliberation. Yet he does not leave the sentence of judgment to his own counsel alone: but with judgment he also performs justice. And this is the greatest work of one who judges with deliberation, that what he judges should be just. For justice is the harmony of friendship, the bond of unanimity, the foundation of peace, the operation of divine and human reason. These things, therefore, the Prophet has done: in which, though the work is his own, yet there is also benefit for those toward whom he has exercised judgment and justice.

5. Delivered to the Devil's Dominion

The sinner is the devil's house.

He is delivered to him by God. To be cut off from the Church is to be delivered to the devil.—He prays, moreover, that he not be delivered to the wicked. For everyone in whom there is a will to sin is empty of God: and where God is not, there is the devil's place: who, lying in wait and besieging, wherever he has had the opportunity to enter, occupies it as an empty house, which has been delivered to him, God having abandoned it. And the Prophet indeed, because he was speaking in the person of all, prays that he not be delivered by God.

But the Apostle already has such confidence in himself that he himself delivers sinners to the devil: when he writes to the Corinthians concerning him who, surpassing all fornications, had taken his father's wife: But I, absent in body yet present in spirit, have already judged as though present him who has done this, when you are gathered together and my spirit with the power of the Lord my Jesus, to deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord. But although the Apostle delivers; yet he knows that he will deliver both in the power of Christ and in his own spirit. But also in another epistle he says concerning Phygelus and Hermogenes: Whom I have delivered, he says, to Satan, that they may learn not to blaspheme. For those who are cast out from the body of the Church, which is the body of Christ, as strangers and aliens from the body of God, are delivered to the dominion of the devil.

6. Demons Prevail Only When God Withdraws

The various temptations of demons.

They do not prevail except over those whom God abandons.—But the Prophet prays that he not be delivered to the wicked. For there are present hostile and threatening powers which disturb the resolve of faith, which blot out the fear of God, which entice toward earthly desires and longings, which stir the weak nature of the body into vices by certain stings of allurements. The Apostle also knows this multitude of ruling powers, saying: Among whom you also once walked according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience. The Prophet therefore has exercised judgment and justice: and he prays that he not be delivered to the wicked: and to these wicked ones, when they drive into sin, when they puff up with pride, when they kindle to anger, when they embitter to hatred, when they entice to wantonness, when they provoke to avarice.

But although they hasten to do harm through these things, they will nonetheless not be able to prevail over those who are innocent, unless they have been delivered to them through God's withdrawal.

7. The Proud, the Devil, and His Slanderers

The proud, the devil and his ministers. Those who slander.—Next follows,

Receive thy servant unto good: let not the proud slander me.

The Prophet advances toward his hopes, and now climbs to a higher degree of his supplication. For he who had prayed not to be delivered to the wicked, now prays to be received into the ownership of a servant, beseeching that blessed dominion of God over him with his own glad reception. And not for a trivial reason does he pray to be received unto good, namely lest the proud slander him. And who are the proud? Surely those whose prince Isaiah introduces speaking thus: for he said: By my strength I will act, and by the wisdom of my understanding I will remove the boundaries of nations and their power, and I will shake the inhabited cities, and I will seize the whole world in my hand like eggs, and I will carry them off as broken eggs.

This is the voice of the proud one, namely the devil, who even dared to say to God and our Lord Jesus Christ, when the glory of earthly kingdoms was shown to him: All these things I will give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me. But that this one is not alone, but that many ministers of spiritual wickedness attend him, we learn through him who says: Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, which my Father has prepared for the devil and his angels. From the slander of these proud ones, therefore, he prays to be free. For they slander; because while they themselves supply the incentives to sin, they bring a charge of the sin which we have committed through them before the Lord; for they cast the cause of sin as a crime, and aggravate the odium of the crime through slander, the Scripture bearing witness in the Apocalypse that he is a slanderer.

8. Eyes Failing for God's Salvation

David's eyes of the mind fail toward Jesus.—But now the Prophet stretches himself further toward a higher advance, saying,

Mine eyes have failed for thy salvation, and for the word of thy justice.

Eyes fail when the gaze, intent upon some expectation, grows weary. The Prophet therefore has fixed the eyes of his soul upon God's salvation. And what ought to be understood by salvation, we have often discussed; namely that he is Jesus, who will save his people from their sins. While others therefore occupy their eyes with worldly desires and direct them toward the pleasures of present things, the Prophet is fixed upon God's salvation. And lest we should suppose that it is his bodily eyes that fail under this intensity of contemplation: they fail not only for God's salvation, but also for the word of justice.

9. The Justice Hidden in God's Hard Words

The words and deeds of God are just, even if hidden.—He confesses, therefore, that the words of God are just.

He knows that there are certain things which in the opinion of the inexperienced and the impious are held to be words of injustice: when the heart of Pharaoh is hardened to stubbornness and afflicted with the will of irreligious obstinacy: when of two nations still in the womb the greater is to serve the lesser, and with neither having merited any good, servitude is imposed on one, dominion granted to the other; when Adam is expelled from paradise lest he touch the tree of life: which things men, incapable of divine power and goodness and justice, since they cannot understand them, declare to be unjust. But the eyes of this prophet fail for the word of justice of this kind: because he knows that there is nothing unjust in these words of God, but that all these words are both to be fulfilled and to be understood as justice at the coming of God's salvation.

And he advances through this expectation, intent to the point of failing eyes, so that he may dare to pray for something beyond.

10. Mercy Needed to Accomplish the Good

Whence David's confidence.

Man needs God's help to accomplish good.—Having confessed the word of justice, he added these words,

Deal with thy servant according to thy mercy, and teach me thy justifications.

The voice that says, Deal with thy servant, might perhaps be thought presumptuous. For what is said, Deal; is a presumption of asking, as it were from some confidence. But he would not say this impudently, who had exercised judgment and justice, who had prayed to be received as a servant, and whose eyes had failed for God's salvation and for the word of justice. But not even in these things is the Prophet presumptuous. For in the very fact that he said, Deal; he added, with thy servant. And because our servitude, in order that it may remain in the faithfulness of servitude, has need of the Lord's mercy; he added further, according to thy mercy: because his compassion is needed, that we may remain in this profession of our servitude.

For human weakness is feeble of itself to obtain anything: and this alone is the duty of its nature, to wish and to have begun to attach itself to the family of God. It belongs to divine mercy to help those who are willing, to strengthen those who are beginning, to receive those who are drawing near: but the beginning is from us, that he may bring it to completion.

11. The Hidden Meaning of the Law's Rites

Something great lies hidden in the rites of the old law.—But what does he finally ask that God do with his servant according to his mercy? Namely that he teach him his justifications. He knows that in the justifications which Moses was commanded to establish, something great and incomprehensible to human understanding is contained. He also desires to know, as we have often said, who that purchased Hebrew boy is, who is to serve only six years. He has read these things indeed: but what is read is not immediately understood. He wishes to know what that servitude is, what the freedom of the seventh year, what the piercing of the ear with an awl if he is unwilling to be free, who that wife of the Hebrew is, what it means that he himself should go out without the wife: what further the second justification contains, what the third, what the following ones contain as prefigurations of future sacraments.

It is not within human capacity to attain these things: a heavenly teacher is needed, and it is necessary that we merit many things through the merits of our faith, in order that we may deserve to be taught these things.

12. True and False Professions of Servitude

In David's words nothing is lowly or commonplace.

No one denies himself God's servant in word; many do so in deed.—We ought to know that in all the words of the Prophet there is nothing lowly. Nothing commonplace with the rest, but what is proper either to himself or to those like him is declared: yet beneath familiar words there lies hidden the greatest profession of conscience and faith, as we now understand in what follows. For he says,

I am thy servant: give me understanding, that I may know thy testimonies.

There is none of us who does not confess himself to be a servant of God, either in the prayer of his supplication or in the custom of common speech. And what great thing has the Prophet done by professing himself a servant, which no one has dared to deny? But the profession of the rest is false, which, though it has the necessity of conscience, does not have the truth of confession.

This is proper to the Prophet, that he professes himself a servant of God, fulfilling the duty of his condition in every kind of life, whether walking or sitting, whether waking or sleeping, even in food and in fasting being hungry or full for God, and at no time withdrawing from the duties of his servitude. He says freely: I am thy servant. But he who sleeps in debaucheries, keeps watch for robberies, travels abroad for gain, rests for luxury, if he says: I am thy servant, professes indeed what he is, but does not do what he is.

13. True Understanding Versus a False One

Understanding is from God; a false one is thrust upon us by the devil.—But the Prophet, although he confesses the condition of his duty even by his very service, is nonetheless mindful of his weakness; for he prays that understanding be given to him. For understanding is stored up in a certain treasury of spiritual graces: which the devil sometimes insinuates into the minds of the imprudent under the error of false opinion. But the Prophet asks understanding from God, lest a vain understanding steal upon him, such as that of the gentiles, such as that of the Jews, such as that of the heretics: and he asks for this purpose, that he may know the testimonies of God, which were handed down in the presence of witnesses, which are reproached as having been neglected and violated in the presence of witnesses, which will be avenged as having been neglected and despised at the coming of him, for the testifying of whom they were spoken.

14. The Law Dissolved, the Gospel's Time Come

The law being dissolved, the time of the Gospel has come.—And the Prophet is not ignorant of the time of these testimonies, saying,

It is time for the Lord to act: they have dissipated thy law. The law was given to the people in the presence of witnesses, and when it was dissipated and cast aside by the Jews, then was the time for the Lord to do those things which were contained in the law. For he promised in the law that he would give salvation to the gentiles, that he himself would assume for himself the body of a man, who was made according to the image and likeness of God, that with the law dissipated he would bestow the grace of faith. He recalls this time through the prophet Isaiah, saying: In an acceptable time I have heard thee, and in the day of salvation I have helped thee.

The Apostle, as interpreter of this saying, writes these words: Behold, now is the acceptable time, behold the day of salvation

that is, the law being dissipated, the time of evangelical preaching has come.

15. Loving the Commandments Above Gold

Why David loves the commandments of God.

To love is more than to do.—But while those others are destroying the law, the Prophet has a different work. And what that is, we learn from what follows. For he says,

Therefore I have loved thy commandments above gold, and the topaz. What he says, therefore, he referred to what he had said: A time for the Lord to act; because he knew that it was a time for the Lord to act, when they had destroyed the law. He loved the commandments, therefore, because in them was contained the time for the Lord to act. For the whole law bore witness to the coming of the Lord, as he himself says: If ye believed Moses, ye would surely believe me also; for he wrote of me. The Prophet therefore loved the commandments of God for this reason, that in them he understands the coming of the Lord's incarnation. Moreover, in the fact that he loves, he signifies something more, I know not what.

But to do something is less than to love

because for the most part that which we do is a matter of necessity; whereas love is an affection of one's own will.

16. Loving God's Commandments Above Gold and Topaz

Perfect love.—But that love is at last perfect which is greatest, and which is equalled by no comparison with like things.

He loves the commandments of God above gold and the topaz. Human error reckons nothing more precious than gold and gems: and these are the things which have subjected the desires of men to the dominion of their price and honour. By gold the honour of chastity is for sale to men: through gems, moreover, the more excellent appearance, as they think, of the human body is adorned to the insult of nature. And therefore neither sex has anything more precious, since men wish to be able to do all things with gold, while women believe themselves made more beautiful through gems. But as gold surpasses other metals, so does the topaz surpass other stones. For it is itself the rarest and most beautiful and greatest of all. It is usually found in a place in the Thebaid, called Alabastra.

The writings of secular history also relate that it was found on the island of Topazos by its inhabitants

that is the Troglodyte Arabs, and was brought as a gift to the mother of Ptolemy king of Egypt, under whom the scriptures of the law were translated from Hebrew into Greek. It contains within itself alone the appearance of all the other finest and most precious gems, and in that one stone is contained a mingling of very diverse colours. Above this topaz, therefore, and above gold, the Prophet loved the commandments of God, signifying that he is held not by earthly but by heavenly desires.

17. Directed to All Commandments, Hating Every Wicked Way

He cuts away all desire.—Having despised the desire for worldly riches, he cuts away from himself every occasion of perverse and wicked will. For loving the commandments of God above gold and the topaz, he then says,

Therefore I was directed toward all thy commandments, every wicked way I hated. He is not turned aside, he is not twisted by earthly desires, but is directed toward all the commandments of God: things that come in his way do not occupy him. He saw gold, he knew it to be mud of the earth: he saw gems, he remembered them to be pebbles of mountains or of the sea: he saw a face alluring to wantonness, he knows that from these snares he must escape as birds of the sky escape. He resists therefore the vices of his own nature that have grown together with him, and hates every way of iniquity.

And so he is both directed toward all the commandments

because he loves them above earthly desires: and he is directed, lest he become a partaker of those to whom it is said: A perverse and crooked nation. And he hates every way of iniquity, that in him may be he who is the way, namely our Lord, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

Thy testimonies are wonderful, O Lord: therefore my soul hath loved them.

The declaration of thy words giveth light, and giveth understanding to little ones. I opened my mouth, and drew in breath: because I longed for thy commandments. Look upon me, and have mercy on me according to the judgment of them that love thy name. Direct my steps according to thy word, and let not (nor let) any injustice have dominion over me. Redeem me from the calumnies of men: and I will keep thy commandments (that I may keep thy precepts). Make thy face to shine upon thy servant, and teach me thy justifications. My eyes have sent forth streams of water: because they have not kept thy law.

1. Wonder at the Testimonies Before They Are Searched

Wonder is not of the unknown.

Whence the testimonies of God are wonderful, whence undiscovered.—It is the nature of human perception to hold those things wonderful which it has previously discovered. For the judgment of wonder arises from things already known. Otherwise no one can wonder at things unknown. These things have been mentioned beforehand so that the reason of the prophetic saying might be sought more carefully. For he is thought to have said this,

Contrary to the opinion of common perception: Thy testimonies are wonderful, O Lord: therefore my soul hath searched them out.

For whereas according to human custom one must first search and find, and then wonder at what is found: to this man the testimonies of the Lord are wonderful beforehand, and for that reason are worthy of searching out. The reason of this saying, which is perfect and most beautiful, is as follows.

For the testimonies of God, that is, those things which were written in the presence of witnesses, even if through the observance of the law they instruct human weakness toward the knowledge and service of God—inasmuch as chastity, piety, modesty, charity, truth, innocence, frugality, and religion are commanded therein, and through certain customs of religious observances and varieties of sacrifices the duty of divine honour is enjoined—in which things, though there is great wonder, namely a victim offered for sins, and a gift given for the redemption of the soul, and a lamb slain in the sacrament of the Passover; yet in these things there is contained even more of wonder in the hope and teaching of things to come. These things therefore are wonderful to this Prophet. But because through present wonders they are wonderful by reason of examples of future and eternal goods, he searches them out.

He does not merely inquire, in which there is a diligent seeking of hidden things; but he also searches them out, by the addition, that is, of a more diligent seeking, showing his labour in the searching. Nor does he merely search them out, but he searches them out from his soul, with the intention of the soul joined to the service of the will.

2. The Declaration of God's Words Gives Light

The words of God, the sayings of the prophets, are obscure.—There follows then,

The declaration of thy words giveth light, and giveth understanding to little ones.

This saying also seems perhaps to differ from the custom of our nature. For whereas one must first understand, and then use the light of understanding—since he calls the night of ignorance the light of understanding attained—the Prophet nevertheless says that the declaration of the words of God first gives light, and after the illumination bestows understanding. But what the words of God are must first be learned: and then the reason of the illumination, and afterwards of the understanding, must be set forth. The words of God are whatsoever the prophets have spoken. For although Moses announced to the Hebrew people the observance of the law in his own words, yet in the book of that same law it is written thus: And the Lord said to Moses, Say to the children of Israel (Exodi III, 14). The lawgiver therefore used those words which he was commanded to use.

The words of God therefore are those which, though heard through the service of a human mouth, are his.

But also that great prophet, well spoken of by the very judgment of our Lord Jesus Christ, when he had said: Hear, O heaven, and give ear, O earth; says, because the Lord hath spoken: and after some things which were rebuked with the greatest complaints, he said: For the mouth of the Lord hath spoken these things. All these things therefore are the words of God.

3. The Hidden Meaning of Scripture Requires Declaration

But the declaration of the words is most necessary.

For some things are proclaimed under the veil of another meaning, some are, according to the Apostle, spoken allegorically, some are ambiguous through comparative significations. The Lord is witness that these same things were spoken thus to the unbelieving Jews through Isaiah, reproaching them and saying: Hearing ye shall hear, and shall not understand (Esa. VI, 9). For all things are sealed, and are to be unsealed through spiritual teaching alone. For these things were said to Daniel, a man of desires: Go, Daniel, for the words are closed up and sealed. Isaiah also says: This book shall be given into the hands of a man that knoweth letters, and it shall be said to him, Read these things, and he shall answer: I cannot read, for it is sealed (Esa. XXIX, 11).

4. The Gospel Declares the Law to the Little Ones

By whom the Gospels declare.

Who the little ones are.—But the declaration of mystical words is provided through the Gospels, where the hidden and secret things of the law and the prophetic things are laid open while the Lord remains in the body, from which faith is first learned. For there, those things which were spoken by the prophets are fulfilled through him in deeds and works. When a virgin gives birth, when the Lord is the Word, and the Word is made flesh and dwells among us, when the dumb speak, when the deaf hear, when the lame walk, when lepers are cleansed, when the blind see, when the possessed are healed, when the dead rise: this declaration of the words of God illuminates this obscurity of our nature with the light of faith. For now we understand the glory of the resurrection, the power of judgment, the honour of eternity. And we understand these things as little ones: either reborn to innocence, or unskilled through ignorance.

That this declaration of the words of God and understanding bestowed upon little ones was a matter of what time and age, the Lord shows in the Gospels, saying: I confess to thee, O Lord, Father of heaven and earth, because thou hast hidden these things from the wise and understanding, and hast revealed them to little ones. Behold the time of declaration and illumination and understanding. For things hidden until these days are declared, and when declared they illuminate, and when illuminating they furnish understanding to little ones: and through this understanding they become now capable of the Holy Spirit.

5. Opening the Heart's Mouth to Draw In the Spirit

The mouth of the heart must be open to the Spirit.

He takes food for the life of the soul.—Finally the following words add this very thing, saying,

I opened my mouth and drew in breath; because I longed for thy commandments.

He did not say this of the mouth of the human body, which is closed and opened through the lips. For we draw in breath more by the service of the nostrils than of the mouth. It is conveyed into the soul with more difficulty through the entrance of the mouth: but it passes more freely through the natural course by the service and office of the nostrils. But Scripture is accustomed to call not only the lips but also the heart a mouth. For when the heart is opened through faith, and gapes through desire to drink in, the understanding of heavenly teaching is received. This is not the office of the soul, but of the heart.

For the Apostle says, the natural man perceiveth not the things that are of the Spirit: for it is foolishness to him. And the same teacher of the Gentiles says: For the law written not in tables of stone, but in tables of flesh of the heart. Opening therefore this his mouth, the Prophet drew in the Spirit. For he does not rush in of his own accord. He must be sought, he must be drawn in, and must be drunk in after the manner of infants as innocent milk. The Prophet therefore opened his mouth, because he remembered that it was said to him in another psalm, Open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it: and he knows it to be written in the law, write these things in the breadth of thy heart. For the preaching of God is received in the heart, not in the mouth. And according to the evangelical preaching, the evil one snatches the word of God from the heart, which delights in the mouth more than honey and the honeycomb.

For as through the mouth we take food for the nourishment of the body, so also through the heart we receive the food of heavenly teaching to give life to the soul: which, unless they have been in some manner drawn in by an enlarged and open heart, will not enter.

6. Praying for God's Regard and Mercy

God looks to punish, to terrify, to have mercy.—There follows then,

Look upon me, and have mercy on me according to the judgment of them that love thy name.

To what he had said, look upon me, he immediately added, and have mercy. For he knows that the Lord also looks upon the ungodly for vengeance and punishment. For he looked, as it is written, upon the camp of the Egyptians, and bound the axles of their wheels. And again: The Lord looked upon Sodom and Gomorrah. He looks not only for punishment, but also for terror, when it is said: Thou shalt look upon the earth, and make it tremble. The Prophet therefore does not pray for this alone, that God should look upon him, but that he should look with compassion: nor with compassion only, but according to the judgment of them that love his name.

7. Mercy Merited Through the Pursuit of Innocence

This regard is to be merited by innocence.—There is indeed mercy from the goodness of God; but this must be merited by us through the pursuit of innocence: that He may look upon us, as He looked upon Abraham, as He looked upon Isaac, as He looked upon Jacob, as He looked upon Joseph, as He looked upon Job, as He looked upon Moses. For he knows that God is accustomed to look upon these works of His mercy, when it is said: The Lord looked down from heaven upon the earth, to hear the groaning of those in chains, and to loose the children of the slain, and again: He looked upon the children of the poor, and did not despise their supplication.

According to this judgment of those who fear the Lord, therefore, he prays that God may look upon him and have mercy: so that if He sees him fasting, if He beholds him showing compassion, if He perceives him to be pious and devout in every work, then according to the judgment of those who love His name, he too may be worthy of God's mercy.

8. Human Weakness Needs God to Direct Its Steps

Man is not sufficient by his own powers for doing good.—Next follows,

Direct my steps according to your word, and let not all injustice have dominion over me.

The Prophet indeed walks by his own will in the steps of justice: but he knows that on every side the dominions of injustice are threatening. Above he had prayed that God would look upon him and have mercy according to those who love His name. But he perceives this to be the fruit of the mercy he prays for: that his steps be directed, not according to the ways of the world, not according to human glory, not according to the pleasures of the body, but according to the word of God. If no hindrance were to arise anywhere, if there were no adversaries pressing upon him from every side; he would be strengthened by his own powers in those things which he wished to do.

But where there are snares, where there is war, the help of one mightier is needed, lest all injustice have dominion over him.

9. The Purpose of Temptation and Prayer Against Its Dominion

The usefulness of temptations.

We must pray that they do not conquer.—He prays not that it be absent from him, but that it have no dominion over him. He knows that glory is attained through temptations. He remembers that Abraham was tempted by the injury of exile, by the fear of losing his wife, and by the grief of offering his son in sacrifice. He knows that Job was exercised in the full warfare of temptations. He recalls that Joseph, when sold by his brothers, when pressed by his master's wife to adultery, when kept in prison as punishment, merited the glory of the greatest faith through these trials of injustice. The Prophet fears the dominion of injustice: but he does not refuse its temptation. He remembers that his steps must be directed by the Lord according to His words: lest iniquity, which shall tempt him, be able to have the power of dominating.

10. Calumny from Those Nearest, as Suffered by David

What calumny is.

It is hard to guard against. The saints assailed by it.—After these things follows,

Redeem me from the calumnies of men: that I may keep your commandments.

Human temptation is not grievous, as the Apostle says: But let no temptation take hold of you, except what is human; but calumny is grievous. Calumny is either when the name of an evil crime is ascribed to a good work, or when the poison of inner malice is concealed under a pleasing appearance. For it does not require open malevolence, but is deceitful and cunning, and rages in the working of malice under the appearance of good will. And it is difficult to guard against those who are enemies under the name of brothers, who are foes under the name of friends, who are parricides under the appearance of sons, who are an unavoidable evil under the appearance of unanimity, as wives. The wicked Cain killed the just Abel through the familiarity of brotherhood. Ham, his son, mocked Noah who was approved by God.

Esau caused Jacob to be an exile from his father's house.

Job, that most valiant warrior of the devil, his own wife alone attempted to bend. This same holy prophet—what calumnies of men deceived him? How many times was he betrayed to Saul? How many times was it reported in what places he was staying? Everywhere the snares of calumniators were present against him.

11. Cutting Off Scandals from Within the Household

How it is to be avoided.—The Lord knows that these scandals of domestic calumny are accustomed to bring the most grievous ruin to faith, saying: But if your right eye scandalizes you, and if your right foot or hand scandalizes you, pluck it out and cut it off from you. He did not speak of the members of bodies, since neither foot nor hand can bring scandals; but He commands this concerning those members most closely joined to us and most necessary, because we are all one body in Christ: lest, while domestic calumnies and scandals remain among us, some stain of vices cling to us. Therefore the Prophet, if he were redeemed from these, promises that he will keep the commandments of God: because these calumnies of all those within the household would frequently bring an impediment to faith.

12. Praying for the Light of God's Face and Justifications

How we receive the light of God who sees us.—Next follows,

Make your face shine upon your servant, and teach me your justifications.

The face of the Lord is indeed against those who do evil, to cut off the remembrance of them from the earth, but just as God looks to punishment, so He looks also to mercy; and thus He turns His face to both. But the Prophet prays for this face of the Lord to shine upon him. For from the majesty and countenance of God who sees us we receive light, and His face of mercy turned down upon us radiates grace of spiritual virtue. Or certainly when the day of judgment shall come, when He shall stand visibly before us in the glory of the Father's majesty; then He will illuminate us with the light of His face.

For just as certain metals and gems pour forth the brightness of their nature upon those things nearest to them, and bestow a reflected appearance from their own neighboring splendor; and as Moses received light from the contemplation of the glory of God, so that the people could not look upon the honor of his glory: so also the Prophet, confessing himself to be a servant of God, prays to be illuminated, and according to the Apostle to be made conformable to the glory of God, and to be taught the justifications of God, so that He may be seen by him not in part, nor through the shadow of the law, but face to face, and by spiritual contemplation.

13. Tears of True Penitence for Past Sin

Penitence must not cease. What it is.—Next follows,

My eyes have poured out streams of water: because they have not kept your law.

Conscious of his former sins, as the history itself teaches, although he directed himself with his whole heart to God; yet because he had already written of his own grief for his sin in an earlier psalm, when at the reproof of the prophet Nathan he acknowledged his crime and wept: now too he does not cease to wash away the crime of his former deed with the tears of true penitence, saying, My eyes have poured out streams of water: that is, that the fountains of his tears, the fountains of rivers, had overflowed. For this is the voice of penitence: to pray with tears, to groan with tears; and through this confidence to say: I will wash my bed every night, I will water my couch with my tears. This is the pardon of sin: to weep with a fountain of weeping, and to be drenched with a copious shower of tears.

But he preserved, in accordance with the measure of time and the firmness of faith now immovable, also the most temperate measure of what he said.

For he spoke of the past: Because they have not kept your law. The confession of a crime is indeed always timely; because the penitence for sin ought not to cease: but the end of the former sin belongs to past time: because the true confession of sin is to repent without intermission of time; but the penitence for sin is to have desisted from that which you have understood must be repented of. And for this reason the Prophet neither ceases to confess sin, and confesses the sin as belonging to the past.

You are just, O Lord, and your judgment is right.

You have commanded justice, your testimonies, and your truth exceedingly. Zeal for your house has consumed me (your zeal has made me waste away): because my enemies have forgotten your words. Your word is exceedingly fiery: and your servant has loved it. I am younger and despised: I have not forgotten your justifications. Your justice is justice forever (your justices forever), and your law is truth. Tribulation and anguish have found me: but your commandments are my meditation. Your testimonies are equity forever: give me understanding and I shall live (of them, and I shall be made alive).

1. God's Judgments Are Just Even in Affliction

Faith confesses God to be just, even when He punishes.—It is necessary for an unwearied and persevering faith that our confession be immovable and unshaken within us; lest, moved by some injury of the times or by the pain of persecutions, we relax the zeal of our devotion: but if at any time sicknesses afflict us, passions and torments of the body rage, losses wear us down, grief and bereavements distress us; let us always use this voice which the Prophet now uses, saying,

You are just, O Lord, and your judgment is right.

You have commanded justice, your testimonies, and your truth greatly. For let us remember first that He who is Lord of all is just, and that His judgments are right. For why should He be unjust toward His own? Why should He be unjust toward those whom He Himself begot? The immensity of His goodness does not permit this to be thought of Him.

He begot us not for injury, He begot us not for the pain of the nature of our origin: if there is anything we suffer, it comes from the judgment of His goodness. He delights in the devil being overcome by the virtues of our patience, and desires that we be proved through griefs and pains and losses: so that the power of the world may understand that it has no right of jurisdiction and condemnation over His servants.

Whatever He has commanded is just and attested and true with the addition of increase; for they are exceedingly true.

2. Zeal for God Against Impatience and Vice

Impatience in adversity is an insult to God.

The cause of zeal. The day of fasting.—And because it is rare to be observant of these things; and it is also difficult to direct an unshaken faith amid these storms of the world and amid these shipwrecks of human vices; because if anything adverse happens, complaint against God is ready at hand. For the miser accuses God amid his losses. The bereaved man rages against God with the envy of his tears. He who is proved to the glory of confession by persecutions reproaches God with injustice. This is the most foolish complaint of all, when the impious accuse God of injustice through impatience of their pain. And therefore the prophet added, saying,

Your zeal has made me waste away; because my enemies have forgotten your words.

The prophet is consumed with zeal for God at all our vices and crimes.

Human nature also has this custom, that if at any time we see some persons opposing the will of those whom we love, we are moved by zeal for the one who is not obeyed. But how great is our grief when we see one of God's people become a servant of the world, and a worker of the devil, and a vessel of death, and material for gehenna? With zeal for God, therefore, is he angered who has seen a Christian reveling in feasts on a day of fasting. With zeal for God is he angered who has seen one insolent toward brothers and ministers. With zeal for God is he angered who has detected a body already consecrated in Christ wallowing in debaucheries.

3. Examples of Zeal: Christ, Phinehas, and Elijah

Examples of zeal.—We have received that the Apostles also remembered this zeal, when the Lord entered the temple and drove out all those buying and selling with a whip of cords: and that zeal of which it is written, Zeal for your house has consumed me. For we make ourselves at times a temple of God, or a house of commerce, or a den of thieves. For the temple of God, according to the apostle, are the bodies which have been sanctified in Christ. And these same bodies, when we think and do fornications, murders, thefts, falsehoods, rapines, we make into a den of thieves; but when we labor at the affairs of the world and the transactions of commerce, then we make the house of God a house of commerce: so that what ought to have been a seat of prayer becomes either a hiding place of robbers or a house of commerce. By this zeal, therefore, the Lord is moved to cast out men of this kind from the temple.

Men approved and accepted by God also made use of this zeal.

For Phinehas by this zeal merited the judgment of eternal peace. For when the children of Israel had committed fornication, and he had been stirred by zeal for God to punish them; then the Lord said, Phinehas the son of Eleazar the son of Aaron the priest has turned away my wrath from the children of Israel, in that my soul rested from its indignation: because he was zealous with my zeal. That holy prophet Elijah, caught up in the body into a heavenly dwelling, says, I have been very zealous, because the children of Israel have forsaken you and have slain your prophets: and I alone am left.

4. Hatred for Those Forgetful of God's Word

Those unmindful of the Word of God are worthy of hatred.—This same zeal, then, holds this prophet also.

For he sees irreligious complaints of loss, impious tears of mourning, profane forgetfulness of the law of God: and therefore those who do these things are his enemies. For no right of friendship can exist between religious men and such persons, since the irreligious are to be shunned and detested with hatred. For this very thing is taught in another psalm, where it is said: Those who hate thee, O Lord, I have hated, and I pined away over thine enemies: I hated them with a perfect hatred. The Lord also said to Abraham, Whoever shall curse thee shall be cursed, and I will be an enemy to thine enemies, and will oppose those who oppose thee. If the enemies of Abraham are enemies of God; what ought those to be to us whom we see to be enemies of God?

5. God's Word Purified Like Fire

In the words of God nothing is empty, nothing untrue.—He then gives the reason why he hates those who have been forgetful of the words of God: for they are not empty, not earthly, not trivial. For he says,

Thy word is exceedingly fiery: and thy servant hath loved it.

The Latin translation does not fully express the property of this word. For what among us is ignitum, is written in Greek πεπυρωμένον. Now πεπυρωμένον signifies that which has been purified as if melted by fire. Whatever metals are melted by fire do not retain within themselves any foreign and useless dross; everything that remains in them is true and perfect and purged of all taint of imperfections: as the word of God is, containing within itself the assurance of eternal goods. Hence that saying of the Lord in the Gospels: One iota, or one tittle shall not pass from the law, until all these things be accomplished.

For all things are true, and the words of God are established neither idly nor uselessly: but beyond all ambiguity of superfluous emptiness they are fiery: and fiery exceedingly, lest anything there be thought to exist that is not perfect and proper. These things, therefore, his servant loves. He not only does these things, but also loves them: because the work of love surpasses the work of obedience. For obedience alone is for the most part a matter of fear: whereas love proceeds only from the devoted will of the mind.

6. David Chosen as King Though Young and Despised

David, young and despised, was chosen as king.—Next he says,

I am younger and despised: yet I have not forgotten thy justifications.

The prophet speaks these things indeed in his own person; but they also apply to the people of our time: and insofar as this is believed to have been said by David of himself, it is plainly shown. For the prophet Samuel was commanded by God to go to the house of Jesse, to anoint one of his sons as king. When he had come there, he orders all the sons of Jesse to be present. He then sees the eldest, handsome in appearance, distinguished in bearing and stature: but he is warned by this response: Look not upon his beauty and his greatness, for it is not as man sees that God sees. For man sees the face, but God sees the heart. The second is present, and the third, and all those whom Jesse had present at that time: but none of those present proved to be pleasing.

But because the prophet Samuel knew that he who had commanded him to come was not a liar, and understood from those who were present that none of them had been chosen by God; Jesse says, Hast thou yet another son? Who answered: I have a little one, whom I have left in the pasture. He therefore was chosen by the Holy Spirit, and anointed as king: and from being young and despised, he received the glory both of prophet and of king.

7. The Younger People Supplant the Elder, Like Jacob and Esau

The younger people buys the birthright.—To the people, however, who are also younger and were formerly despised, these things apply in the following way.

For it was in the vices of the world, it was in the night of ignorance, it was in the rough and rustic and ruinous dwelling of the earthly body. But this people does not forget the justifications of God, this people, with the older people rejected, is chosen as younger into the inheritance of the family. For Jacob bought the birthright of Esau, which Esau reckoned useless to himself as one about to die. The younger people knows that these firstfruits of its birth are eternal and cannot be cut off by death. These, therefore, it does not forget, which the elder both despaired of and sold.

8. The Law Becomes Truth for the Younger People

By faith it buys what the elder lost by unbelief.

The law which has now become truth.—

Then the same thing is taught in the following

Thy justice is eternal, and thy law is truth.

These justices the people that went forth from Egypt did not consider, for whom the sea dried up, for whom a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night served, for whom the morning heaven supplied manna, for whom twenty-seven kingdoms yielded, for whom the Jordan stood dry, for whom the walls of Jericho fell at the sound of the army and the circuit of the ark of the covenant. The people who are younger know these justices of God to be eternal. Because it knew them to be eternal, it bought them by faith: because the elder believed itself about to die, it sold them by unbelief. For to the younger people the law is truth.

For now by it circumcision of the heart is truly renewed through Jesus unto life, truly it passes through the sea of this world into the land promised to it, truly it receives the heavenly manna eternally, truly it rejoices reborn in the Jordan, truly it sacrifices the Passover lamb to be freed by the blood of the Lamb, truly it feasts on the unleavened bread of sincerity, and is purged of the leaven of ancient malice: now it has not the shadow of the law, but the truth.

9. Tribulation Met with Meditation on the Commandments

The voice and work of those who suffer for the cause of truth.—Now this younger people knows that on account of this confession of truth it is pressed by many persecutions. Hence come the blessed confessions of the faithful and the holy martyrdoms throughout the whole world. Hence many have been stripped of their patrimonies, scattered into exile, bound, beaten, burned, slain: but always by faithful meditation on the commandments they have overcome by the virtue of a confirmed faith all things whatsoever that have assailed them. And therefore he says,

Tribulation and distress have found me: but thy commandments are my meditation.

Let battles press, let exiles be threatened, let proscriptions be applied, let deaths not merely I say be inflicted, but be renewed with ingenious torments: yet the voice of a faithful man ought always to be this, Tribulation and distress have found me: but thy commandments are my meditation.

It is not fitting that the meditation of God's commandments should be absent from us, whether by force taking hold or by the creeping of forgetfulness over time.

10. Praying for Understanding of God's Eternal Testimonies

Understanding, a preeminent gift.—Next he says,

Thy testimonies are equity for ever: give me understanding of them, and I shall live.

He is not content merely to reckon and expect the testimonies of God to be equitable for the present: he hopes for their equity for ever, and strives through the tribulations and distresses mentioned above to obtain those things which are eternal. That rich man in the Gospel, reckoning nothing to be eternal, exchanged his present happiness for a death of punishment. But Lazarus the poor man, awaiting the eternal testimonies of God, is both held in the bosom of Abraham, and exchanges the misery of a laborious life for the honour of blessed rest. The prophet prays for understanding of these things, namely a gift preeminent among the many gifts of spiritual graces: and he entreats that through it he may be made to live.

For just as he now meditates in the present on the testimonies and commandments of God; so he awaits the eternal: and just as he lives by the life of the body, so also he begs that through the understanding which he shall have received from God, he may live unto eternal glory.

I cried with my whole heart, hear me, O Lord; I will seek thy justifications.

I cried to thee, save me: and I will keep thy commandments. I prevented in the morning, and I cried: in (and in) thy words I hoped. And my eyes prevented the dawn, that I might meditate on thy words. Hear my voice, O Lord, according to thy great mercy: quicken me according to thy judgment. They that persecute me have drawn nigh to iniquity: but they are far from thy law. Thou art near, O Lord, and all thy commandments are truth. From (in) the beginning I have known of thy testimonies: because thou hast founded them for ever. Stood in the way, Israel already seemed shut in on all sides and destined for death, with the enemy close at hand and the sea blocking the way. Amid all this, Scripture testifies that Moses uttered no voice to God: he stood sorrowful, he stood silent, but resounding in the secret of his heart, and crying out by the faith of his prayer.

For the divine voice testifies to this, saying: And the Lord said to Moses, Why dost thou cry to me? He was silent; but the prayer of his faith was a cry to God. The Apostle also knows this to be the cry of the Spirit in faithful men, when he says: For the Spirit in our hearts cries, Abba, Father. This cry of silence penetrates even to the ears of God; but ears that hear not the cry, but the faith; the faith which does not ask for earthly riches, does not desire vain and fleeting glory, does not pray for the joys of the body which are to die. The Apostle writes his letters indeed in small characters, and the common form of elements and strokes is his: but he knows his letters to be great, saying: Behold with how large letters I have written to you with my own hand: comprehending in such letters the greatness of meanings and the usefulness of precepts. The Prophet therefore cries from his whole heart.

And because he cries from the heart, he prays to be heard: and being heard he asks this, that he may seek the justifications of God. He knows these to be hidden and concealed, and covered over by the shadow of the law. He desires to inquire into these, for which many great things are needed: the cry of the heart, the merit of being heard, the duty of inquiry. He added further also the merit of obtaining salvation, saying,

I prevented in the morning, and I cried, and in thy words I always hoped.

He did not wait for an old age grown weak toward vices, nor did he choose the time of a cold age when the heats of long-practiced lust had died down: but he anticipated all maturity by faith and religion, overcoming youth by continence, and restraining the wanton years, anticipating the maturity of old age by the tranquility of a modest and chaste adolescence.

And the cry of the Prophet is that of one hoping in the words of God; not at some time, but always.

For there is no end to our hope: but it is always extended toward heavenly things, and proceeds toward the eternal promises of God. It has no time empty, no time idle.

5. Rising Before Dawn to Meditate on God's Words

The vigils of pre-dawn meditation.—Then this follows,

my eyes prevented the dawn, that I might meditate on thy words.

He who had anticipated by his cry in the morning, now anticipates the very days themselves by meditations. He keeps vigil at dawn, he does not wait for the light poured in to drive away eyes heavy with sleep. He keeps vigil, and covers with prayers the very returning rise of light: now occupied with the words of the prophets, now intent on the hymns of the psalms, now busy with the deeds of the patriarchs and saints, meditating on the word of God at all times and with assiduity.

6. Trusting in Mercy Rather Than Personal Merit

To trust in the mercy of God, not in one's own merits.—Next follows,

Hear my voice according to thy mercy, O Lord: quicken me according to thy judgment.

Let us learn modesty from the words of the Prophet in all the foregoing things, the cry of the heart, the inquiry into justifications, the keeping of the testimonies of God, and the continence of youth, and the vigils of pre-dawn meditation: and placing through all these his entire hope in the mercy of God, he finally asks that his voice be heard according to mercy, and begs for mercy according to the judgment of God.

We, if we fast once, think we have done enough: if we give something from the abundance of our domestic means to the poor, we believe we have fulfilled justice: fasting either to please men or to relieve bodies wearied by food, and amid the very fasts thinking of fornications, murders, injuries, hatreds; and giving some trifle or other, either because we cannot endure the poor man knocking at our doors, or because we pursue a reputation for goodness by the vain and idle opinion of men: and we think it is owed to us that we be heard. But the prophet hopes all from God, expects all from his mercy. In the works of all goodness he is himself perfect: but he does not think this sufficient for his salvation, unless he obtain mercy according to the compassions and judgments of God.

7. Persecutors of the Faithful Depart from God's Law

Approaching to harass the faithful, he withdraws from the law of God.—But he is never idle, never are those who harass and pursue the neighbor not close at hand: his whole life, according to the testimony of Scripture, was spent in ambushes. But also whoever now wishes to please God must necessarily displease the impious. And therefore he says,

They that persecute me have drawn near to iniquity; but they are far from thy law.

These words are believed to have been spoken concerning himself, whose life was harassed on every side. But he who in this psalm maintains the order of human instruction has tempered all things for our edification: that we might know that those who draw near to injure the faithful are far from the law of God. For by as much as the approach to injury against the saints increases, by so much does the departure from the law of God increase.

We must beware, however, lest anger ever move us against our brethren, lest envy ever goad us, lest rivalry ever provoke us: so that we do something irreligious or contemptuous against those whose injury, when we stand by it, causes us to stand away from the law of God.

8. God's Nearness, Like the Soul Within the Body

God is wholly everywhere, as the soul is wholly in all the members.

When it is unharmed, the rotten member is cut away.—Next follows,

Thou art near, O Lord, and all thy commandments are truth.

In another place we read: I am a God at hand, and not a God afar off, saith the Lord. God is not contained in bodily places, nor is the immensity of divine power confined within limits or spaces. He is present everywhere, and wholly wherever he is: he is not anywhere in part, but in all things he is wholly present. The blessed Apostle, answering in public assembly the Athenians who were ridiculous in the emptiness of their philosophy, says: We seek God who dwells not far from us: for in him we live and move and have our being. And the Spirit of God, according to the prophet, hath filled the whole world. And again: Do not I fill heaven and earth, saith the Lord? Nothing is empty of God, nothing lacks him.

He is everywhere, after the manner of the bodily soul, which, diffused through all the members, is absent from none of the individual parts. Even if there is a certain private and sovereign seat for it in the whole body, yet it is poured into the marrow, the fingers, the joints. Now if, when certain members of the body have become corrupted, amputation shall be necessary, since those same members, dead through their defects, will no longer have their proper function: that which is rotten of the decaying flesh is cut away without detriment to the soul. For the soul of our body is mingled with the sound and whole members: and when those same members have become both rotten and in need of cutting away, it does not follow after them.

9. God Everywhere Present, Yet Absent from the Vicious

God, though everywhere, is not present in the vicious.—These things are indeed brought forward as superfluous comparisons by way of similitude with the divine nature

because whatever is eternal is incomparable, nor does the exception of the beginningless divinity admit the form of a configured (created) truth. But an example of this kind is fitted to our understanding: that through it, according to the authority of heavenly words, we might understand the incorporeal and immense God to be mingled with this circumscribed and bodily world, yet not to be present in the vicious and those who are dead through their own works. Indeed, the understanding of divine and invisible things still pursues its course from the contemplation of bodily things and their natures.

We see the sun lingering in a certain part of the sky, according to its course: and yet it extends everywhere, is present everywhere, and as great as it is through all things, so great is it poured forth wherever it is. But if it falls upon the closed windows of houses, its light is indeed at hand, but those things which are shut will deny themselves its light.

10. The Presence of God Demands Caution

The presence of God should make us cautious.—In all the works of our life, therefore, we ought to be circumspect and open toward God: first, that he may deign to pour his light into our hearts when they are free and open through innocence; then, that we may believe ourselves to act within the bosom of his divinity, and not think him absent when we are angry, when we strike, when we show contempt, when we curse, when we are drunk, when we give ourselves to lust, when we neglect things divine and human, sinning with greater insult against him within whom we do these things.

11. The Truth of God's Commandments

But to this there is also added the fact that his commandments are truth.

There is nothing doubtful there, nothing uncertain; all is perfected by the completeness of truth: which things are neglected with the greater peril, the more they are established as precepts of truth.

12. God's Testimonies Known from the Beginning

The testimonies of God from the beginning of the age and thereafter.—How far the prophet has come to know this he has shown by adding,

Of old I have known from thy testimonies, that thou hast founded them for ever.

Although the prophet says these things of himself, knowing the law of God from the beginning, they are nevertheless fitting for every age which has been instructed in the teachings of God from the foundation of the world.

For he who remembers the law of will established for Adam, who has learned of the very creation of Eve, who has heard the curse upon the serpent, who has read of the tree of life closed off by the Cherubim with a flaming and turning sword, who has known the crying blood of the slain Abel, who reckons the number of punishments both upon Cain and upon Lamech, who has searched out Enoch translated, Noah preserved, the blessing of Shem and Japheth and the curse of Ham, who understands Melchisedech the priest, Abraham the chosen, Isaac the promised, Jacob the preferred, Joseph the sold, Judah the sanctified, Moses nourished, instructed, and after the great sacraments of the law given, dead in the word of God, and Jesus the divider of the promised land and the author of the renewed circumcision: he will surely be able to use the voice of the prophet: Of old I have known from thy testimonies; because thou hast founded them for ever.

For in the life and deeds of all the men mentioned above the hope of eternal goods is contained: and through them we are imbued with the teaching of the evangelical preaching. But the things that have been founded are prepared for the building of the future house. For we are built, according to the blessed Paul, upon the foundation of the prophets and apostles, in whom the testimonies of God are founded for ever, where that heavenly and royal holy city Jerusalem shall be raised up: which is the house of the Angels who frequent it and of the elect firstborn, whose foundations are living stones and precious gems living, rising, and reigning in Christ, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

Look upon my humility and deliver me: for I have not forgotten thy law.

Judge my judgment and redeem me: for thy word's sake give me life. Salvation is far from sinners: for they have not sought thy justifications. Thy mercies are many, O Lord: according to thy judgment give me life. Many are they that persecute and afflict me: from thy judgments I have not declined. I saw the breakers of the covenant and I pined away: because they kept not thy words. See that I have loved thy commandments, O Lord: in thy mercy give me life. The beginning of thy words is truth: all the judgments of thy justice are for ever.

In sum, all the names and rewards of faith.—The holy prophet has indeed set before us in this whole psalm many and great examples of his faith and confession: through which he has established in himself a form for others of believing, acting, understanding, not knowing, hoping, and praying, perfecting the evangelical man in the complete observance of the law. And although he either performs or testifies or hopes for all things that are either pleasing to the divine will or set before human hope; yet he remembers in what kind of observance the head and sum of all the commandments consists; and he knows what was sought by his Lord even from the Apostles themselves, to whom the keys of heaven were to be entrusted.

For when they were divided among themselves in opinions and ambitions, and each one individually was claiming for himself the primacy by human contention, while each desired or demanded to be superior to the rest; the Lord, showing whence the reward of this merit and name was to be sought, said: Whoever wishes to be the greatest among you, let him become the least of all: for everyone who humbles himself shall be exalted, and whoever exalts himself shall be humbled. In humility, that is, he taught that all the names and rewards of faith are contained. It is therefore most profitable, for those who are obedient to the divine precepts, to restrain within themselves all the vanity of human arrogance and insolence, broken and crushed, and to contain themselves, with the greatness and mercy of God taken into account, within the modesty of humility.

2. David Leaves Vengeance to God

David displays humility alone.

He reserves vengeance for himself to God.—On account of this, the holy prophet and king, reckoned also as belonging to God and his Lord according to the flesh in the origin of his seed, amid these harassments of the age and the battles of spiritual wickedness, cries out to God with this sole and such an ambition of his prayer,

Look upon my humility and deliver me: for I have not forgotten thy law.

He prays that not the resources of a kingdom, not the spirit of prophecy, not any other titles of human boasting be seen in him, but humility. For he does not resist with weapons of war those who pursue him, nor, impatient of human indignation, does he seize for his own vengeance the moment of power and of kingship.

But knowing this to be the sentence of the divine will: Vengeance is mine, and I will repay, saith the Lord, he does not forget the law of God to be kept in humility, but prays to be delivered on the ground that he is humble: declaring that the remembrance of the law of God consists in the preservation of humility.

3. The Judgment of a Secure Conscience

His judgment is right.—Reserving all things therefore to the divine judgment, and laying down that he is to be delivered on the merit of humility, who was moved in nothing against the ordinances of God, against human hatreds, against patience under present troubles, and who determined that nothing of these things was to be judged for him in this present age, he consequently added these words,

Judge my judgment and redeem me; for thy word's sake give me life.

It is the voice of a great and secure conscience to demand the judgment of one's own judgment: so as to desire even the examination of the divine sentence upon that which has been determined by oneself and found pleasing to oneself. Here he is not deflected by the opinion of a corrupt mind in judging either others or himself: nor does he depart from true judgment through anger, or favor, or hatred, or love: not ignorant of this evangelical commandment: For with what judgment you judge, you shall be judged.

4. Awaiting Redemption Through Christ

He awaits redemption through Christ.—But neither does he fear the judgment of his own judgment, who says: For I judged not myself to know anything among you, but Jesus Christ, and him crucified. In this security of his own judgment, therefore, the prophet awaiting the time of redemption prays to be redeemed and to be given life on account of the words of God. For we who have been sold under sin shall be freed by redemption and justification in the blood of the Lord. This the legislation, this the whole spirit of prophecy, this the hope of the patriarchs, this the voices of the Angels, this the word of divine eloquence testified throughout the whole age of the world: on account of which he prays to be redeemed and given life.

5. Voluntary Ignorance Has No Excuse

Voluntary ignorance has no pardon.—But these same words of God, as they announce life and redemption to the pious in their hopes, so they leave the impious without excuse.

For the prophet's expectation is immediately followed by these words concerning sinners;

Salvation is far from sinners; because they have not sought thy justifications.

Ignorance of the will has no pardon: because not to know when knowledge is within one's capacity is the guilt of a science rejected rather than not found. For this reason salvation is far from sinners, because they have not sought the justifications of God: since they have certainly been committed to writing for no other reason than that they might flow down to the knowledge and understanding of all.

But the prophet, knowing that while salvation is far from sinners who do not seek the justifications of God, yet the Lord is near to those who are of a right heart; and according also to that word of the Apostle, You who were far off are made nigh; lest both he himself and salvation be far from him, he seeks the knowledge of the justifications of God.

6. The Sabbatical Year and Jubilee as Prefigurations

Eternal things were prefigured in the sacraments of the law.—He is not ignorant of how great a sacrament of our salvation is expressed in these things through certain notions of eternal prefigurations in present realities; namely in the Hebrew serving only six years, and after this same period of six years the land also to be left entirely at rest, and its fruits to be assigned even to the beasts; and also in the law of the Jubilee year, that is, the fiftieth, through which, with the bonds of debtors released and all fields returning to the rights of their lords if any had perhaps come to them, a new and heavenly remission and reformation of all things is foretold. And because salvation is far from those who have not sought these things, the Prophet, wholly occupied in seeking them and contemplating the justifications of the divine and eternal mercy as in a mirror, added,

Thy mercies are many, O Lord, exceedingly; according to thy judgment give me life.

Exceedingly many, therefore, are the mercies of God: for they exceed the measure of human opinion.

7. Not Turned Aside Despite Persecution

David is not moved by God in his afflictions.—But the Prophet, trusting in these things and hoping to be made alive in the judgments of God, is wearied by the hatred and persecutions of many from without. Yet, not unmindful of His mercies, of which, according to the same Prophet, there is no number, he has not turned aside from His testimonies. For there follows,

Many are they that persecute me and afflict me: from thy testimonies I have not declined.

He is not driven, he is not moved: and though many persecute him, he does not even turn aside.

8. Grief over Those Who Forsake the Law

His zeal for the law of God.—But he who so perseveres in the commandments of God that he cannot be driven or turned aside by those who assail him, has that which disturbs him with a heavy grief, and not only disturbs but even dissolves him to a kind of wasting away of the soul melting, as it were: when, while he himself does not turn aside from the testimonies of God, others fall away from the law of God and corrupt the faith and covenant of the law they had received. These are the ardors he has, these are the great weariness the Prophet feels, when he says,

I beheld the transgressors, and I pined away; because they kept not thy word.

Israel, sealed as heir of the covenant, was called by name, and answering the voice of the Lord spoken from the mountain, replied: All things whatsoever God hath said, we will hear and we will do.

But when it worshipped strange gods, when it defiled itself with the vices of all manner of wickedness, it lost the covenant both of the name it had heard and of the observance it had professed. For they did not keep the words of God, which they had answered that they would do and hear. Nor is this wasting of the prophet over the transgression of the people a new thing: since we know that the Lord Himself wept over the impiety of Jerusalem, and that the Apostle, from the same teaching, weeps over the impenitent, and moreover that he himself is on fire if anyone is scandalized.

9. Loving the Commandments Rather Than Fearing Them

He fulfills the law out of love, not fear.—But he who grieves over those who keep not the covenant, and wastes away, does not shrink from the examination of God's commandments in himself. For he says,

See that I have loved thy commandments, O Lord: quicken me in thy mercy.

It is too little for the Prophet to fulfill the commandments out of fear: rather he loves them; because the work of love lies outside the necessity of fear. And although love of the law is more excellent than fear, yet he is not so confident in himself as not rather to beseech that he be made alive through the mercy of God. He does not now think himself to be living: but he awaits life after this mortal body has been taken away and absorbed into the glory of immortality.

10. Man Made in the Image of God

The first word of God concerning man.—For he knows that this was promised to him at the very beginning of his creation, when God says: Let us make man in our image and likeness.

This is the beginning of God's word concerning man, when the origin of our nature was founded in the image of the boundless eternity. Certain therefore that he shall live by that life and image of God, he says,

The beginning of thy words is truth: all the judgments of thy justice are everlasting.

The words of God do not pass away though heaven and earth pass away. Whatsoever has gone forth from His lips is not void. The justifications are eternal, and the justice is eternal. The beginning of the words of God, therefore, is truth: nor does he know of any other earlier word of God concerning himself, that is, concerning the creation of man, than that he should be made according to the image and likeness of God.

This, then, is the ordinance for the transformation of truth: thus the beginning of the words of God is truth, so that the new man, regenerated in Christ, may henceforth live according to the image of the eternal God, that is, of the heavenly Adam, himself now eternal.

Princes have persecuted me without cause: and my heart hath been in awe of thy words.

I will rejoice over thy eloquence, as one that findeth great spoil. I have hated and abhorred iniquity; but I have loved thy law. Seven times a day I have given praise to thee, for the judgments of thy justice. Much peace have they that love thy name: and to them there is no stumbling block. I have looked for thy salvation, O Lord, and I have done thy commandments. My soul hath kept thy testimonies and hath loved them exceedingly. I have kept thy commandments and thy testimonies: because all my ways are in thy sight.

1. Enduring the Hatred of Princes

God must not be denied amid the hatred of princes.—The prophet David indeed endured the grave hatred and persecutions both of King Saul and of the princes of the people

because professed impiety could not bear the constancy of a devout conscience. But conforming the evangelical and apostolic man to God, he is not ignorant of the evangelical word, which says: For they will deliver you up, and will scourge you in their synagogues, and you shall stand before kings and powers for a testimony to them and to the Gentiles. Moreover, urging constancy of preaching and teaching the glory of confession, He had beforehand exhorted them saying: Every one therefore that shall confess me before men, I will also confess him before my Father who is in heaven: but he that shall deny me before men, I will also deny him before my Father who is in heaven.

Whether therefore consecrated under the law, or also prepared for the glory of the Gospel, he who had given neither Saul nor his people cause to persecute him, and knew through the many hatreds of princes and nations that the kingdom of heaven required renouncing the world; speaks these things confidently to God,

Princes have persecuted me without cause: and my heart hath been in awe of thy words.

For he feared to be denied, if he should deny.

2. Finding Spoil in Victory over Impiety

The voice of victorious faith.—But since he is not ignorant of the rewards of this blessed persecution, the Lord saying: Blessed are ye when they shall persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you for justice's sake; rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven; after the hatred of princes and the awe of the true words of God, he so tempered what follows,

I will rejoice over thy eloquence, as one that findeth great spoil.

There was therefore an awe lest, through the persecutions of princes, he might either unworthily submit or yield: because both to have given cause for hatred is not the mark of a holy man, and to have lost the grace of God through fear of the world is without pardon. But to have found spoil belongs to the victor: certainly to have furnished it from oneself already belongs to the vanquished.

Since therefore the prophet is not broken by these persecutions, and conquers the hatred of princes by faith, he carries off certain spoils of impiety from the vanquished. For he knows, according to the Gospels, that the strong man has been bound in his own house and stripped of the arms of his power, and has now furnished spoils from himself to be plundered by the faithful. He rejoices therefore now in the words of God, as one who finds much spoil: since, with the power of the wicked broken, and remaining a victor in faith, he has stripped them of all their arms, whether of impiety or of cruelty.

3. Hating Iniquity and Loving the Law

It befits only those who love the law.—But this disposition of joy is not present unless there be both love of the divine law and execration of iniquity: because no one will desire to flee except what he hates, nor will he strive to obtain except what he loves. Having rejoiced therefore as over much spoil, he added,

I have hated and abhorred iniquity; but I have loved thy law.

He hates iniquity, therefore, and loves the law of God.

4. Seven Times a Day I Praise Thee

The law says something other than what it commands.—But he who loves the law of God is not intent only upon those things which are fulfilled through obedience to the law: he must also extend himself to something else through the work of the law. And let us hear in what further duty he stands,

Seven times a day I have given praise to thee, for the judgments of thy justice.

The holy prophet first loves what he does, namely the work of the law, because both the practice and the will of all vices is cut off. But afterwards he praises the judgments of the justice of God. For these, as we have often noted, signify more than they accomplish, since the things done suggest to us a knowledge of the eternal dispensation: as the rest of the sabbath, as the Hebrew boy, as the land that is to lie fallow, as the fiftieth year, are understood under the sacramental moments of the image. This therefore is praised seven times in the day.

5. The Sacred Meaning of the Number Seven

The number seven.—And there is no doubt why this is the number of praise.

For these same things, whether in the day, or in the boy, or in the land, or in the year and years, are contained under the sanctification of this number: since the sevenfold number is completed up to that eternal rest of the fiftieth, which is the sabbath of sabbaths. Many things moreover are known concerning the sanctification of this number: as the very constitution of the days, as the election of the angels standing before the throne of God, as the fullness of spiritual powers and of graces resting in the Lord. Certainly it is fitting that the judgments of the justice of God be praised by the Prophet in this number, through which and in which the power and constitution of those same justifications is contained.

6. Love of Neighbor as the Sum of the Law

Love of neighbor.

The disposition of charity.—Now the order of prophetic preaching is no other than that of faith. For both the endurance of persecutions, and the awe of the words, and the joy of the eloquence, and the hatred of iniquity, and the love of the law, and the praise of justice, and absolutely everything else, if there be any other commandment in the law, is summed up in the observance of this one precept alone: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. This is greater than all burnt offerings and all sacrifices: for one who is Christ's to remember that he and another are one body, and to love his neighbor as his own body, that is, as himself. For there follows,

Much peace have they that love thy name, and to them there is no stumbling block.

The Apostle, thinking not of his own things but of those of others, declared that he would abstain from flesh forever, lest he scandalize his brother.

So perfectly did he hold the disposition of charity and peace, that he abstained even from the common use of life, provided he might cut off the cause of offense. Peace therefore must be maintained: and not what is fitting for each individual, but what is fitting for all must be sought: because, according to the Gospel, it is more profitable not to have entered into life than to have brought scandal upon the least.

7. The Coming of the Savior Foretold

Abiding therefore in these precepts of peace and charity, the prophet is held by the desire of evangelical hope.

For he knows in whom and what the end of the law is, when he says,

I have looked for thy salvation, O Lord, and I have done thy commandments.

Jesus is the Savior. This is the declaration from the Hebrew name, this is what the Angel said to Joseph, this is what Simeon, thenceforth to be dismissed in peace, acknowledged, this is what the salvation restored to us through Him teaches. Moreover he professes that he has done the commandments of God in this, that he looks for the salvation of the Lord; declaring that all the commandments of the law contain the coming of the only-begotten of God.

8. Walking Uprightly in the Sight of God

The presence of God.—He also kept the testimonies of God and loved them exceedingly, saying,

My soul hath kept thy testimonies, and hath loved them exceedingly.

I have kept thy commandments and thy testimonies; because all my ways are in thy sight. The prophet, acting under God as judge and searcher of hearts, perseveres in the keeping of the commandments and testimonies of God: he walks not in the ways of the world, nor in the ways of vices and impiety. For whatever course of his life he has pursued, he conducts it so uprightly and so innocently as to be worthy of the sight of God: God knowing the very thoughts and movements of hearts, and one who is of impure heart not being worthy of His sight; for our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed for ever and ever, spoke these things as a faithful witness in heaven. Amen.

Let my prayer come near in thy sight, O Lord: give me understanding according to thy word.

Let my supplication enter in thy sight, O Lord: deliver me according to thy word. My lips shall utter a hymn: when thou shalt teach me thy justifications. My tongue shall pronounce thy words: because all thy commandments are equity. Let thy hand be to save me: for I have chosen thy commandments. I have longed for thy salvation, O Lord, and thy law is my meditation. My soul shall live and shall praise thee: and thy judgments shall help me. I have gone astray like a sheep that is lost: quicken thy servant, for I have not forgotten thy commandments. The prophet also presently added, saying,

Let thy hand be to save me; for I have chosen thy commandments.

While others choose the glory of the world, while others embrace the veneration of the elements and of demons, while others seek earthly riches, this holy man chose the commandments of God.

He chose them moreover not by natural necessity, but by the will of piety: because to each person a way of living is set before him according to what he wills, and freedom of desiring and acting is permitted. And on this account the choice of each person will be affected either by punishment or by rewards.

5. The End of the Law Is Salvation

The end of the Law.—But what the end of the Lord's commandments was he shows, saying,

I have longed for thy salvation, O Lord, and thy law is my meditation.

This man stretches himself wholly toward the coming of Jesus, that is, of the Saviour: and that which was proper to the blessedness of the Apostles to behold, he desires with impatient longings: yet signifying that this very thing which he does in the law is a meditation of future hope; because all meditation is understood to be undertaken not for the effect of present things, but for the advancement of things to come.

6. The Reward of Meditating on the Law

The reward of meditation.—And what the reward of this meditation would be he shows,

My soul shall live, and shall praise thee: and thy judgments shall help me.

He does not reckon himself to live in this life, seeing that he had said: Behold, I was conceived in iniquities, and in sins did my mother bear me. He knows that he was born under the origin of sin and under the law of sin: but he has chosen the meditation of God's law for this purpose, that he may live. In the preceding psalm he exhorted his soul to the joys of this life, when he said: Return, O my soul, to thy rest, for the Lord hath dealt bountifully with thee: because he hath delivered my soul from death, mine eyes from tears, my feet from falling. I will please the Lord in the land of the living.

He hastens to render these praises to God, aided by the judgments of God, with the weakness of earthly corruption absorbed, unto the advancement of eternity: for this reason assuredly, because he chose the commandments, and longed for the salvation of the Lord, and because his meditation is always in the law of God.

7. Restored Like a Lost Sheep

But he closed all things with a worthy end of the evangelical mystery, saying,

I have gone astray like a sheep that is lost: quicken thy servant, for I have not forgotten thy commandments.

For he hastens to be carried back as a wandering and lost sheep upon the shoulders of his shepherd, so that through his Saviour and eternal shepherd he may afford eternal joys in heaven to the angels upon his being received. For the Son of man came to save that which was lost, the Lord Jesus Christ, sent to the lost sheep of the house of Israel, who is blessed unto all ages of ages. Amen.

1. On the Titles of the Psalms

The titles of the Psalms.—The titles of the Psalms, as we have shown in very many instances, have their own proper significations, containing most briefly the rationale and argument of the writings that lie beneath them, and directing us by a certain indication of teaching into the path of understanding: concerning which it is not now necessary to treat of anything. For that ought to be done when each individual psalm is treated. For since the psalm and the title mutually lend authority to each other, the discourse will be weak if one of them is discussed without the other. But now we touch upon the Songs of Degrees, whose inscription is both continuous and uniform, and therefore, with the fitting signification of the titles, the rationale of all of them will be found to have been shown under the judgment of a single exposition.

2. Historical Titles and Their Spiritual Sense

A historical inscription does not exclude the allegorical sense.—In very many psalms we read that much has been set forth in their superscriptions according to the order of history: as when David fled from the face of his son Absalom, when he changed his countenance before Abimelech, when after the matter of Bathsheba he is admonished by Nathan, and in the rest wherever the truth of events is contained in the very titles of the psalms. But we ought to remember that these same psalms are not therefore all to be understood in a bodily sense, because the signification of bodily affairs is placed before them: but rather we ought to pursue the spiritual understanding beneath this certain commemoration of events: of which it is not now the time to speak, but consulting the simplicity of readers, it was fitting to warn the reader. Therefore, lest these psalms of degrees also, like the aforementioned titles drawn from many sources, should contain something from history, this must be examined.

3. The Steps in the House of Hezekiah

The steps in the house of Hezekiah.—For in the book of Isaiah, when Hezekiah prayed, a sign of his prolonged salvation was placed for him in the steps (acc. To LXX). Now in his house there were ten steps, which the sun ascended beyond the course of its time with its light advancing, and again descended, at his death, from the limit of its time with its light receding. But there is no likeness of this history to the psalms, since not even the number of the steps agrees. Yet this sign which was given to Hezekiah manifestly shows that the light of God draws near to those upon whom the blessedness of the future life shall be bestowed on account of the merits of their worldly affairs; but departs from those to whom it has been denied.

4. The Fifteen Steps of the Temple

Whether the steps in the temple, built after these psalms, are here referred to.—History has told us that there were fifteen steps in the temple, and that the ranks of those standing were arranged, whereby a certain dignity was obtained by those in the foremost positions: so that the Levites stood first, then the Israelites, then the proselytes, and after them others. But what do we presume from a later history concerning psalms written earlier: since if anything is to be taken from it, it ought to be taken in such a way that the psalms follow the history? Unless something has been prophesied with reference to a future history. But contemplating that very construction of the temple and altar, as being the shadow of the incorruptible temple and the image of the sanctified altar: we would understand those things which were prefigured bodily in the same, were it not that authority were presumed from the psalms.

But the psalms do not announce only the affairs of their own time, nor do they apply only to those ages in which they were written; but the word of God has provided for all who should come into life, being itself most fitting for the advancement of every age.

5. Christ the Eternal Priest Ascends to Heaven

Christ the true Priest ascends into the holy of holies.—For there was that law of the priesthood, which Luke in the Gospel carefully expounded according to the observance of the law under the birth of John the Baptist, that no one should ascend into the holy of holies except the chief of the priests, and he only on one day in the whole year. All of which things, having been done beforehand in likeness, have been fulfilled in our one Lord, as both our faith and the Lord himself is our authority in the Gospel, saying: I came not to destroy the law, but to fulfil it. The Apostle also testifies that the entire consummation of the law is in our Lord Jesus Christ, saying: For the end of the law is Christ. But also here the same prophet David teaches that he is an eternal priest, saying: Thou art a priest for ever according to the order of Melchisedech.

This chief of priests therefore, having entered the heavens, sitting at the right hand of God, praying to the Father that where he was we also might be, who both raised us up and made us sit in the heavenly places: he had already forewarned through the prophet by what means and by what works of life it was possible to ascend to himself. But through Isaiah he speaks thus: Wash yourselves, be clean, put away iniquities from your souls out of the sight of my eyes: cease from your wickednesses, learn to do good, seek judgment, rescue the one who suffers wrong, judge for the orphan, and justify the widow: and come, let us reason together, saith the Lord Almighty. These therefore are the steps of that perfect and eternal temple, which the chief of priests ascended, having made propitiation for our sins through his own blood, after the manner of the earthly priest according to the law, whether ascending by steps into the holy of holies, or offering the sacrificial victim of atonement for the people.

6. The Mystery of the Fifteen Steps

The mystery of Numbers.

What the psalms of degrees teach.—And concerning the fifteen steps indeed and the superscription of the canticle, we have already treated something at the beginning of the psalms, when the discourse fell upon numbers and superscriptions, namely that this number agrees, being composed of two numbers, the hebdomad and the ogdoad, of which one belongs to the sabbath of the law, the other to the eighth day added to the sabbath, which is also the first, belonging to the Gospels (Prol. Through which, by the steps as it were of those canticles of the Law and the Gospels, we ascend to the heavenly and eternal things: knowing that we are to be placed with the chief Priest in the heavenly places, if at least according to the Apostle our conversation be in the heavens. Let us seek these steps of the canticles, by which we may be able to ascend to the places that are the holy of holies. For the ascent to them is steep and of a narrow way.

We know that there were fifteen steps in the temple: we also read fifteen psalms of degrees.

The ascent to that longed-for dwelling is numerous. For perhaps, as in the temple one ascended gradually and by individual steps to the holy things, so through the individual advances of the psalms we shall be taught that, having ascended by these steps which are sung, we can be placed in the high and holy and eternal places.

7. The Babylonian Captivity and Return

But there are many who think that in these psalms only the captivity of the people, by which they were held in Babylon for seventy years, has been prophesied; and also the return of the same people with the restoration of the lost city. With these we do not now find fault. For it is not doubted that the prophet was able to know those things which threatened this people on account of their impiety. But what captivity of the people, and the building of what city the Prophet commemorates, the psalms themselves will be our authorities, who began thus.

In my trouble I cried to the Lord: and he heard (thou didst hear) me.

O Lord, deliver my soul from unjust lips and from a deceitful tongue. What shall be given to thee, or what shall be added to thee against a deceitful tongue? Sharp arrows of the mighty (mighty ones) with coals of desolation (desolating coals). Woe is me! That my sojourning is prolonged: I have dwelt with the inhabitants of Cedar: my soul hath been long a sojourner. With those who hated (with those hating) peace, I was peaceable: when I spoke to them, they fought against me without cause.

Tribulations are not to be feared by the Christian.—The prophetic word, although it makes use of the common usage of human speech, yet does not contain the same significance that attaches to common understanding. For although it has tempered the announcement of heavenly things so that we might understand as best we could, it has nonetheless preserved the force of its significance, though with a measured choice of words. For it began thus,

To thee, O Lord, when I was in trouble I cried, and thou didst hear me.

For perhaps from custom and from the affection of human feeling this cry of the Prophet to God will be judged to be a common sort of grief, on account of which he also beseeches God with outcry; because many are compelled to raise their voice to God either by fear of danger and terror of death, or by anxiety over loss and grief over money, or by the blow of bereavement and the wounds of sorrows; as though all those things which befall them were not most fitting for good hopes. The Apostle testifies that to be dissolved and to be with Christ is better for him, he condemns the love of money as the root of all evil, and the Gospels said that the living are rather to be wept for: and what place, against these things with the purpose of our faith firmly established, will the world have against us, when death obtains fellowship with Christ, want of money provides want of sin, the departure of our own is an accelerated hastening of our common hope?

What tribulations are to be guarded against.

They are guarded against by prayer.—But if those are not the tribulations; what then will be the tribulations on account of which one cries to the Lord? There are indeed very great ones, dragging us into the depth of sin. For the Prophet, forming in his own person a man ascending by steps to eternal things, teaches from what evils especially he ought to beware; namely from those things which, by the authority of counsels and the impulses of exhortations and the enticements of flatteries, plunge us into hell; when one urges us toward honors, another detains us for the present life by leisure, sleep, gluttony, and luxury, another leads us to the superstition of false religions, another urges us toward schisms, another solicits us toward heresy: concerning which it is written, evil communications corrupt good manners. For against all these things the weak nature of our mind is helpless. For they run around on every side, and prick us with the various stings of their flatteries.

And the first hope of life is this, that when they break in upon our mind by force, fraud, and domination, we cry to the Lord as from the midst of tribulation; so that our turning to him, amid the assailing calamities, may be heard with all the strength of faithful crying. But that very cry to him will be our rest, and the very turning of supplication is the greatest part and hope of salvation. And therefore he says: To thee, O Lord, when I was in trouble I cried, and thou didst hear me. For he is wont to say to those who pray, Behold, I am here.

Iniquitous lips.

Epicureans. A deceitful tongue.—And since he is present, he must be entreated concerning those things which follow,

Lord, deliver my soul from iniquitous lips, from a deceitful tongue.

For this alone is a dangerous tribulation to the just: the company of evil exhortation, and the habit of pestilential counsel, from which the mind must be recalled and the ears must be stopped. He distinguished, moreover, iniquitous lips and a deceitful tongue. And indeed iniquity is shameless: it dares openly, plots openly, accomplishes openly. These are they who, denying God, assert that no profit in the religion of God remains for human affairs; but that this alone is their good, to live for luxury and the body, taking away from God care, providence, judgment, and power. The lips of these, therefore, are iniquitous. But the work of a deceitful tongue is treacherous, and harmful through pretense, in that it overturns religion under the name of religion, and through the hope of life leads into death.

These lies also belong to heretics, who, concealing with falsehood the words of the prophets and the powers of the Gospels and the prescriptions of the Apostles, hand down and teach all things otherwise than they are written. From these, therefore, praying through the mercy of God we are delivered: and amid their tribulations, crying out to God we shall be heard.

Why God asks a question.

The fruit of confession.—There follows,

What shall be given to thee, and what shall be added to thee against the deceitful tongue?

Well, in response to what was said, To thee, O Lord, when I was in tribulation I cried, and thou heardest me: Lord, deliver my soul from iniquitous lips, from a deceitful tongue, there is subjoined, What shall be given to thee, and what shall be added to thee against the deceitful tongue? So that through the Prophet might be fulfilled what was said by the Lord, Behold, I am present with thee; as though at the very moment of the entreaty this voice of the Lord is reported: And what shall be given to thee, and what shall be added to thee against the deceitful tongue? Now we frequently read the person of the Lord asking questions both in the New and in the Old Testament: as to Adam, Where art thou, Adam? As to Cain, Where is thy brother?

As to the crowds when the woman had touched the hem of his garment, Who touched me?

As to the disciples, Whom do men say that I the Son of man am? But whom do you say that I am? He does not wish to be taught, who is God searching hearts and reins, and the inspector of our thoughts: but through the confession of those questioned, he asks in order to render either pardon for sins or honor for faith. In the end, Adam, having confessed, was reserved for pardon and glorified in Christ: Cain, denying, was made equal to the curse of the devil; for he is already designated from the beginning as a murderer, (namely the devil). The woman, having confessed, was healed by faith: Peter, answering in faith, obtained the keys of heaven. And thus the entire reward of our hope consists in confession: so that we bear witness that we shall attain those things which we have believed we could attain.

The arrows of the Lord and the coals of desolation: the word of God.—And therefore a certain turning of the question was made by the Prophet: but a response worthy of faith followed. For in answer to what was asked, What shall be given to thee, and what shall be added to thee against the deceitful tongue? That is, What aid shall be brought to thee against the falsehood of this one? The answer is given,

Mighty arrows, sharp, together with desolating coals.

For only the arrows of the Lord are mighty and sharp, which are able to pierce the deceitful tongue, having within themselves the power of burning up and laying waste all deceitfulness; concerning which he says in the seventh psalm, He hath wrought his arrows for those that shall burn: which two things are mutually consistent. For the word of God pierces all wickedness, and wounds every impulse of wantonness, and pricks that most vehement sting of death itself.

For when a sinner hears that God is eternal, God the creator of the world, God the judge, and understands himself as a man to owe to God the fact that he was born; by how great a dart of God's teaching will his conscience and his error be struck, when he recognizes that he is to be burned by unquenchable fire, separated like chaff from wheat, and desolated from the fellowship of good fruits? Of this teaching, to be revealed through the apostles, he makes mention in another psalm, saying: The arrows of children have become their wounds. These mighty arrows, these coals of desolation, every faithful person prays to be given to him, and expects them to be set against the deceitful tongue, for the correction of those who afflict, whether by the dart of teaching or by the fear of punishment.

The torments of the flesh.—But also blessed Job, not knowing his enemy by whom he had been pierced, said that the torments and pains of his body were arrows of the Lord, saying: For the arrows of the Lord are in my body, whose indignation drinketh up my blood. And perhaps the Prophet also imprecates these arrows of avenging punishments against iniquitous lips and the deceitful tongue, by which, once the deceitful tongue is pierced, all iniquitous lips may be burned up together.

The coal of desolation: the cleansing of sins.—Although there are many who wish the precepts of heavenly teaching, spiritually received by the faithful, to be understood as arrows, and the coals of desolation as the cleansing of sins: and thus think that coals of desolation should be understood in this way, because the Lord said: I am come to send fire on the earth; and what will I, if it be already kindled? Now there is no doubt that he brought the washing away and remission of sins; which he said was a fire already kindled, because through it the purging of all vices and defilements takes place. They apply to this that which was said to Isaiah, when with a coal taken up by tongs his lips were touched: Behold, I have taken away thine iniquities, and have purged thy sins.

The arrow: Christ.—Moreover we recall that the Lord himself is named an arrow in the same Isaiah, in this manner: And he hath made me as a chosen arrow, and in his quiver he hath hidden me, and said: It is a great thing for thee to be called my servant. We understand therefore that this one also is a useful and mighty arrow, piercing the stings of our vices, penetrating us with a wholesome wound; concerning which arrow that bride in the Canticles said: I am wounded with love.

Why the arrows are to be sought.—Let these arrows therefore be awaited in both senses: either piercing the wicked and deceitful with punishment of conscience, or wounding sins and vices in the bodies of those beloved to him. And let the coal be either devastating or purging, provided that it consumes through punishment those who deny God, but purges to perfect innocence those who confess.

We show by our deeds what we judge to be good.

The Prophet longs for the kingdom of God.—But what is the Prophet's response that follows upon the things said above?

Woe is me!

That my sojourning is prolonged. Good things cannot truly be seen to be judged good by us unless they are sought after. For how shall we demonstrate the trustworthiness of our judgment, except by the efficacy of those things concerning which we have judged well? We esteem chastity to be good: what then is the fruit of our opinion, unless it consists in the very pursuit of chastity? Innocence is good: but unless we hasten toward it and practice it, we shall not be understood to truly feel this way. For the judgments of minds are not to be signified by words, but to be fulfilled by deeds. It is fitting, therefore, that the Prophet, awaiting after the arrows of the Lord and those coals of desolation the glory of that blessed kingdom and eternal time, should desire what he awaits.

And he desires it plainly.

Nor does he only desire it, but he hates the delays, and grieves over that very postponement of not yet obtaining so great a desire, saying: Woe is me! That my sojourning is prolonged.

For this reason death has been longed for by many saints.—We have frequently heard this kind of complaint from many saints, lamenting the slow dissolution of their bodies as a delay of their hope. The Lord in his Gospels taught that the hastening of the heavenly kingdom is to be prayed for. For it is fitting that the love of those things which one loves should be impatient: and therefore what we are commanded by the Lord to say must be said: Thy kingdom come, thy will be done. Blessed Paul groans over his dwelling in his body, complaining that through the sojourning in the flesh he is a pilgrim away from God.

Against which he knows that he must sojourn in the flesh, so that his dwelling may be with God: but nevertheless it is better for him to be dissolved and to be with Christ; and Ecclesiastes says: And I praised all the dead above all the living who are yet alive: namely, that the soul, freed through the dissolution of the body, is stripped of the burden and fellowship of this weak and perilous flesh. In this sojourning in the body, therefore, which seems to him too prolonged, the Prophet groans, hastening to be a pilgrim from earthly things and to dwell in heavenly things; so that, leaving behind corruptible and present things, he may attain invisible and eternal things.

Job and Jeremiah, who curse the day of their birth.—Holy Job, worthy of the testimony of God, not only groans over the sojourning in this body, but curses that very day of his birth, saying: Let that day perish in which I was born, and the night in which they said, Behold a man child is born: and Jeremiah likewise: Cursed be the day in which I was born; cursed be the man who brought the tidings to my father, saying, A man child is born to thee. And yet the same man had heard from the Lord: Before I formed thee in the womb, I knew thee; and before thou camest forth from the womb, I sanctified thee. What then? Should he curse his own existence, who, before he existed, was both known by God and sanctified by God? Far be it.

For he does not hate in himself the fact that he was sanctified: but he curses those things which followed upon his sanctification, namely his being advanced through the growth of the body into these troubles of bodily sojourning. For having been formed within his mother's womb, and fashioned through the power of his Creator in the substance of the soul according to the image of God, he does not groan over his conception or the beginning of his formation, but over that advancement of the born body which came with growth, in which he must live amid the evils of the age and the weaknesses and vices of the flesh. Yet, already formed in the womb and sanctified in the womb, bearing in himself the eternal likeness of a heavenly origin, it is beyond doubt that from God's sanctification, after this law of death, he was to remain eternal.

Cedar: the nation of the Ishmaelites.

The Saracens.—But the feeling of this Prophet is not much different from that of Job and Jeremiah. For he does not complain of his sojourning, but of his prolonged sojourning. For after the complaint of this prolonged sojourning of his, he continues from what he said: Woe is me! That my sojourning is prolonged; and I have dwelt with the inhabitants of Cedar. Cedar is a nation of Ishmaelites dwelling in the desert, whose borders extend as far as the Medes and Persians. For Cedar was a son of Ishmael, as Genesis testifies: The firstborn, it says, of Ishmael was Nabaioth and Cedar (1 Chron. I, 29): these are now called Saracens. Those therefore who think these psalms are to be understood in an earthly sense wish to hold that the Prophet complained in the person of the captive people, that their sojourning among the dwellings of Cedar had been long.

But not understanding the power of the word, nor perceiving the spirit of the Prophet, they take the authority of the name to confirm a foolish opinion, while the psalm contains nothing at all

that is fitting to the captivity of the people.

Cedar: darkness.

The body: a dark prison of the soul.—For Cedar according to the Hebrew language means what is pronounced among us as darkness. For in this dark and shadowy dwelling-place of bodies, that invisible conformation of our souls is contained: and the noble nature of heavenly origin, held captive, has this prison of its contagious sojourning. The bride in the Canticles makes mention of this tabernacle, saying: I am black and comely, O daughters of Jerusalem, as the tabernacle of Cedar: confessing herself black from the darkness of this tabernacle; but not denying that, since she is the bride of Christ, she is comely. For everyone who pledges herself to Christ already stands in eternal beauty. In these tabernacles the Lord commanded us to be illuminated, saying: The lamp of thy body is thine eye: and If the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness? And again: You are children of light, not children of darkness.

The saints are with the flesh, not in the flesh.—The Prophet also observed this principle, that he dwelt with the habitations of Cedar, not in the habitations. For although the saints live in the flesh, yet if they have weapons of warfare that are not carnal but mighty before God, they will dwell alongside the tents of Cedar, they will not dwell within them. For sojourning away from the body, as neighbors of God, they will hear from the Apostle: But you are not in the flesh, but in the spirit: if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. He dwelt, therefore, in such a way as to dwell alongside those who dwell there, showing by that sojourn in which he grieves that he is a stranger.

And because he hated the fellowship of the wicked and the cohabitations of those dwelling in darkness, although he had already complained of the future, he speaks yet again of the past,

My soul has long been a sojourner, namely in the many tribulations of wicked lips and a deceitful tongue, on account of which he cried out to the Lord.

But what manner of sojourn was his he shows, saying,

With those who hate peace I was peaceable.

This is proper and worthy of the Prophet: to restrain by the peace of his own will the enmities and impulses of an alien nature, and to contain all the faithless and turbulent affections of souls with every moderation of peaceableness. And this the Lord taught, himself making peace in himself between things in heaven and on earth, to pray for persecutors, to hate no one, to love enemies. And the Apostle admonishes: If it be possible, as much as lies in you, have peace with all men. And the Lord seals this as the very sum of his precepts: My peace I give to you, my peace I leave to you. This therefore will keep our hearts in Christ, this will make us equal to the patriarchs, this will also hold in peace, through peace, even those who hate peace, rendering them obedient.

But there remains for the prophet yet another duty, namely to press the teaching of God upon all men steadfastly, and to preach continually the word of eternal life.

He was not unmindful of this ministry either: for he says, When I spoke to them, they attacked me without cause. He was indeed peaceable with the enemies of peace, but the enemies of peace hated the preaching of peace itself, and were stirred up at the teaching of God—those whom the Prophet's moderation restrained in peace by his silence: and so the Prophet is peaceable with the enemies of peace, and the Prophet does not cease to preach peace; but the enemies of peace attack the preacher of peace.

I lifted up my eyes to the mountains, from whence shall come my help.

My help is from the Lord, who made heaven and earth. Let him not give thy foot to be moved (let him not give thy foot into commotion), neither let him slumber who keeps thee. Behold, he shall neither slumber nor sleep, who keeps Israel. The Lord keep (shall keep) thee, the Lord is thy protection, upon the hand of thy right hand. By day the sun shall not burn thee, nor the moon by night. The Lord shall keep thee from all evil: thus upon the hand of the right hand let the Lord keep thy soul. The Lord keep thy going out and thy coming in, from this time forth and for ever (shall keep thy going out and thy coming in from this). The use of those who are absent. To what end this tends, therefore, we shall presently see.

Here the eyes of the mind are lifted up.—The Prophet lifts his eyes to the mountains. What eyes? Namely those of which it is written: Open my eyes, and I shall perceive the wonders of thy law: and again: The commandment of the Lord is clear, enlightening the eyes. Are not these our eyes kindled by bodily light for the purpose of seeing? Have they not received the nature of sight? What illumination or what opening will be necessary? Then what wonders are they to see in the law? Unless perhaps the feast of boughs in booths, the blood of cattle in the temple, the sacrifice of a lamb at Passover, the rest of the sabbath as the height of religion? But, as I think, these things were seen to be done by those who were present as spectators. Therefore the eyes are not to be opened for that which was seen, but for that which was desired to be understood in the law.

The prophetic books are mountains.

Angelic ministries.—The prophet therefore lifted the eyes of his mind to the mountains. To what mountains? Not certainly to these defiled with groves and altars and impious assemblies, nor to those bristling with forests, bare with rocks, impassable with precipices, bound with snows: for what admiration or hope is placed in these? But we take mountains to mean the prophetic books raised up from earth on high, by which there is ascent to higher things and steps toward eternity. We may also understand as mountains the angelic ministries and the virtues and powers of the heavens, through whose ministry ascent to the heights is granted to us. For if according to Daniel the Lord himself is a great mountain, there is no doubt that those are called mountains who are ministers of his command and will and of the blessedness to be shared with us.

The eyes are lifted to these mountains, but help is not awaited from them.—Lifting therefore the eyes of his heart to these mountains, and contemplating within himself all their counsels, ministries, offices, and gifts, and directing the light of his understanding upon them, the prophet rendered to his own perception the full and perfect nature of the vision he had contemplated, and held in his mind the whole of what he had seen in thought, knowing from whence his help was to come, saying,

From whence shall come my help.

And straightway he answered himself with a blessed confession: My help is from the Lord, who made heaven and earth. To the mountains indeed the eyes are lifted: because through them is the progress, the ascent of the ministry of teaching. But when it must be confessed from whence help comes: My help is from the Lord, who made heaven and earth. This is a blessed faith, this is a true confession, this is an eternal hope, and worthy of the gifts of heavenly blessing.

Whose this

is, of whom, and to whom.—Finally, because all prophecy is in the Spirit, immediately upon this blessed confession of his, the blessing of the Holy Spirit followed in the person of the prophet,

Let him not give thy foot into commotion, neither let him slumber who keeps thee.

The sense itself indicates that a change of person has been made. For the speech is turned to him who spoke above: Let him not give into commotion. Who? Namely he who made heaven and earth. Thy foot. Whose? We ask. Namely his who lifted his eyes to the mountains, and who confessed that his help was from the Lord. But also that phrase, let him not give, is the expression of one wishing and blessing. And who wishes? He who is for us, besides the Lord, another advocate, of whom he says: And he will send you another advocate: who also speaks in the prophets. What then does this advocate say?

He blesses the confessor of this faith and hope: Let him not give thy foot into commotion, neither let him slumber who keeps thee. But both of these are unworthy of God, both that he should deliver to commotion, and that he should slumber and rest after the watch of his keeping as though from some continuance of labor. But before we touch upon that, we must treat what significance there is in the foot.

What the foot of the flesh is, and the foot of the soul.—The foot is a part of the body, carrying the whole body about in the accomplishing and doing of things.

And because Scripture teaches spiritual things through bodily things, and demonstrates invisible things through visible things; under the name of foot it signifies the movements and progress of our mind, as in this same prophet: But as for me, my feet were almost moved. Surely these feet of the body are always moving in the body: and how is it a matter of danger that they were almost moved, when it is their proper office to be always moving? But also in the Gospels the Lord, signifying other feet, commanded the right one that causes scandal to be cut off, saying: And if thy right foot scandalize thee, cut it off. If the scandal is in the right foot, will the left scandalize less?

Or what can that part of the body bring of temptation, when it itself, without any impulse of desire, has only the ministry of necessary service in the matter?

Therefore just as the eyes of the mind, so also the feet are to be understood, having in themselves both the sight of understanding and the movement of the will.

Why God, who does not deliver into vices, is said to deliver.—It is not to be understood that this blessing exists—Let him not give thy foot into commotion—as though God delivers some persons into the vices into which we are carried by the feet of a corrupt mind. He does not deliver us, but when we depart from him it follows. For when we are carried by the feet of a corrupt mind, he does not deliver us, but we fall away from him through sins. And since he himself does not dwell among sinners, our departure from him is followed by his withdrawal from us; because we depart from him through sins. And when he departs from us, we fall into all the pits of transgressions, and run along the broad way of death, subjected to the dominion of demons, to whom the withdrawal of God from us abandons us. And his desolation is therefore a delivering over, because the devil cannot gain possession of sinners unless God withdraws from them.

Who sleeps and who watches.

The holy man, and the perverse.—But for us remaining with him, or for him remaining in us, there is a watchful keeping and an unwearied protection. But if through the lukewarmness of faith we sleep, he himself sleeps in us. For in the eternal Power there is no sleep or rest, whose Angels are watchful both in name and in nature; for these things are necessary for earthly bodies: but because according to our faith, whether it be wakeful or sleeping, the help of God will either watch or sleep with us: therefore the Lord is frequently signified both as watching and as sleeping. After which example that saying in this same prophet is spoken: With the holy thou wilt be holy, and with the perverse thou wilt be perverted. Is God not always holy, so that he might also at some time be perverse? By no means.

For nothing is in him except what is good and eternal: but because God is present to each person according to the character and pursuits of each individual; therefore he is turned away from the perverse, and holy among the holy.

God is without sleep.

Who is Israel. For whom God keeps watch.—And in order to show that the sleep of the keeping arises rather from our own slumbering toward faith, and that the rest of sleep does not befit the nature of heavenly keeping, because it is unwearied and eternal, he immediately added,

Behold, he shall neither slumber nor sleep, who keeps Israel.

Having prayed above that he should not slumber, he now says he neither slumbers nor sleeps: signifying above the slumbering from our departure from him; but now demonstrating that he neither slumbers nor sleeps, because his eternity is unwearied. But who is this who neither slumbers nor sleeps? He, namely, who keeps Israel. Genesis explains Israel to be one who has seen God. For the patriarch Jacob, after the wrestling which he had with God, received this name. Beholding God beyond human nature with the eyes of his faith, he is worthy of this name. And he so saw God as to pray to be blessed by him.

Paul also remembers that there is now among the people of the Gentiles

that is, in the people of the Church, an Israel, saying: Peace upon him and upon the Israel of God; lest perchance this name should be thought to have belonged only to that ancient people. Therefore if he who keeps Israel does not sleep, and the proper name of Israel belongs to one who sees God; it is necessary that he be kept who, lifting his eyes to the mountains, saw and said: My help is from the Lord, who made heaven and earth. Heavenly keeping is therefore bestowed upon this faith, and this confession obtains the protection of eternal watchfulness—which is to be perfectly followed, obtained, and retained, the keeping of him whom we shall thus confess never sleeping over us.

The right hand.

What the right hand is. The hand.—And lest it should be thought that the sleepless watch of some other was being indicated, it is added: The Lord shall keep thee: he, namely, who made heaven and earth. Then the manner of his keeping is set forth distinctly,

The Lord is thy protection above thy right hand.

We have already said above that by things which are bodily, incorporeal things are signified. For the weakness of our understanding cannot attain to invisible things except by comparison with visible ones: so that what is now said does not reach our sense except through the name of hand and right hand. Although here the hand and right hand are placed contrary to the understanding of nature. For it is said thus: The Lord is thy protection above the hand of thy right hand. The matter would be straightforward if it had been said above thy right hand.

But since it is said thus, above the hand of thy right hand, it seems to signify a right hand having both a right hand and a left hand. This neither the nature of man nor reason admits. But Scripture always shows the right side to be the best and most useful. And indeed the Gospels, through those who are on the right and on the left, will show the significance of each kind of understanding. The hand, however, we take to mean the effect of every work. Hence that saying also by this same prophet: Deliver my only one from the mouth of the lion and from the hand of the dog. For this part of the body did not suit that barking and rabid animal; but he prays to be delivered from the works of malice.

Therefore, because the demonic powers that oppose us strive to weaken and wound the best and most powerful works of our faith: for this reason the watch of God is promised to be vigilant above the hand of the right hand, so that the works of good will may persevere unharmed in us; and while these remain, we shall enjoy the kingdom of that eternal and blessed time, with all the weakness of bodily corruption wiped away.

The property of the sun and moon.—For this is what the spirit of the Prophet promises us in what follows, saying,

The sun shall not burn thee by day, nor the moon by night.

The nature of these elements has this efficacy in itself, that each of them in its own season weakens the strength of human bodies through the alteration of the frail substance within us: the sun by heat, the moon by cold burns; and through the course of the year there is such a cycle of these same elements that in winter the sun does not burn, while the moon burns, but rather dissolves; and again in the summer months the sun burns, and the moon dissolves.

These psalms are not to be understood in a bodily sense.—Those therefore who think these things are to be understood in a bodily sense: I ask what they assert the Prophet promises to him who lifts up his eyes to the mountains, in what is said: The sun shall not burn thee by day, nor the moon by night? For while the nature of our body remains, the nature of the elements will not also become changeable, so that they cease to persist in their customary effect upon our nature. Or will anyone dare to hope for such firmness of body in this age, that he cannot be burned by night and day, when the blessed patriarch Jacob complained that he was scorched by the cold of night and the heat of day, saying: And I was burned by day with heat, and by the frost of night.

The happiness of eternal rest.—But the Prophet now, or the Spirit through the Prophet, knows that blessedness of times in which all change of bodily weakness departs from us, in which there is no cold, no heat, no night and change, but an eternal day and blessed mildness, with the sun of justice reigning over us. The Lord, prefiguring the rest of that time already in the desert, tempered for his people the heat of day by a pillar of cloud, and the cold and darkness of night by a pillar of fire. In this eternal and blessed mildness of times, therefore, whoever shall have merited the keeping of the Lord shall remain: so that the nature of the body is not burned by the frost of the moon and the heat of the sun; but, freed from the evils and injuries of this age, resting in the eternal and blessed and temperate, he takes on the solid and unchangeable nature of his glorified body.

Supposed evils.

True evils truly to be guarded against.—There follows then,

The Lord shall keep thee from all evil.

And from what evils shall the Lord keep? Not, I think, from those which are supposed to be evils: for these are owed to our weakness and body—to die, to be sick, to be in want—which, if they were evils, neither would Abel have died, nor Job have been tormented, nor Peter have lacked the money which was asked of him for alms. Therefore the Lord keeps the faithful soul from all evil, that is, lest the moth of the devil corrupt it, lest the thief creep in, lest the dog bark at it, lest the wolf tear it, lest the bear rage against it, lest the leopard leap upon it, lest the tiger fly at it, lest the lion lay it waste.

For these are now the ministries of the devil, these are all his offices in the time of this age: to consume with vices, to creep in with flatteries, to tear with pleasures, to leap upon with ambition, to fly at with wantonness, and to lay waste with the full power of his strength. From this therefore, from all evil, the keeping of God is to be awaited. And because he rages chiefly against the soul—for it is owed to us that we fight against him in the body, since victory comes only from contest—therefore it follows: The Lord shall keep thy soul: lest any of the so many and so great evils mentioned above should have power over it.

The just reserved in Abraham's bosom for the kingdom of heaven.—The prophetic word maintained its own order, saying: The Lord shall keep thy going out and thy coming in from this time and for ever. For it is not of this present time and age to be unburned by sun and moon and to be preserved from all evil; but it is the expectation of a future good, when all the faithful, going out from the body, shall be kept through the Lord's keeping for that entry into the heavenly kingdom, placed meanwhile, that is, in the bosom of Abraham, to which the interposed chasm prevents the impious from coming, until the time arrives for entering again into the kingdom of heaven. The Lord shall therefore keep the going out, while those departing from the body, separated from the impious by the interposed chasm, rest in quiet. The Lord shall keep the coming in, leading into that eternal and blessed kingdom.

For he himself is the one who says: I am the door; and, No one goes to the Father except through me; that is, our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

I was glad when they said to me: We shall go into the house of the Lord.

Our feet were standing in the courts of Jerusalem. Jerusalem which is built as a city, whose participation is in the selfsame. For thither the tribes went up, the tribes of the Lord, the testimony of Israel, to give thanks to the name of the Lord: because there the seats sat in judgment, seats upon the house of David. Pray for the things that are for the peace of Jerusalem: and abundance for those who love thee. Let peace be in thy strength, and abundance in thy towers. For the sake of my brethren I spoke peace of thee. For the sake of the house of the Lord our God (of the Lord my God), I sought good things for thee.

He who yearns for heaven grasps this psalm. Our hope.—He who is held by the hope of heavenly desire will find nothing obscure in the psalm: for from his own sense he will attain the understanding of the prophetic grandeur of speech; for when he remembers that it is written that he is a co-heir of God and a sharer in eternal goods, and is to be renewed like the angels through resurrection, and with corruption laid aside is to be conformed to the glory of the body of our God and Lord Jesus Christ, and is to be a future inhabitant of the heavenly city built of living stones, of which it is written in the Gospel, when the Lord had forbidden swearing by heaven, he added, saying: Nor by Jerusalem, because it is the city of the great king—meaning not, of course, that one which kills and stones the prophets, but that one of which the blessed Paul makes mention thus:

You are fellow citizens of the saints and members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the Apostles and prophets: and when he shall have read that the things which now are, are in part, and that we see for the present through a mirror and in an enigma, but that when the perfect comes, the things which are now in part are to be destroyed, and we shall contemplate face to face, as with bodily sight, those things which are now invisible to us, where there is no sickness, no death, no grief, no fear. When one has recognized these things announced by angels, prefigured in the law, set forth by the prophets, represented by examples by the Lord, preached by the Apostles, and has recognized these same things as possible for himself through faith; it is necessary to proclaim, following the example of the Prophet,

I was glad in those things which were said to me.

Joy at the approach to the house of God.—But what are those things which were said, from which joy was received?

Namely what follows: We shall go into the house of the Lord. Hence there is joy, hence exultation, because these things were said, that we must go into the house of the Lord. What the house of the Lord is, he taught in another psalm, saying: Because the Lord has chosen Sion, he has preferred it for his habitation. This is my rest for ever and ever, here will I dwell, because I have preferred it: not, as we said, this earthly and perishable one paying the penalties of its impiety, but that free and heavenly Jerusalem, because it is also Sion; by dwelling in which, because it is the house of God, we too are fellow citizens of the saints and members of the household of God. Hence therefore is the joy, that it was said we would go into the house of the Lord.

The Apostles, feet standing in the courts.—But those who said these things, lest they perhaps be ignorant of and wander as strangers from that very house into which they announce we are to go, say,

Our feet were standing in the courts of Jerusalem.

They announce no uncertain things, they promise no unknown things. We have recognized this house as desirable and beloved by many. For Scripture says: One thing I have asked of the Lord, this will I seek, that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, that I may see the delights of the Lord, and visit his temple. And again: Lord, I have loved the beauty of thy house, and the place of the habitation of thy glory.

This desirable house, this joyful hearing—its foundation of twelve living gems is built of living stones, hewn first for the work of building by Moses in the law, by the prophets in their sufferings, by the Lord in the body, by the apostles in their martyrdoms, by the Holy Spirit in virtues. These are the builders, these the buildings, this the city. These are the feet standing in its courts, the guardians, namely, to whom the keys of this house were given: for it was said: To you I will give the keys of the kingdom of heaven. Blessed feet announcing to those ignorant of the appearance of the house, and rightly praised by the Prophet: How beautiful are the feet of those who preach peace.

The heavenly Jerusalem is built day by day.—But lest any of these things should be thought to apply to that Jerusalem which was earthly, this followed,

Jerusalem which is built as a city.

Not a city but as a city; because that building of the earthly city and the construction of the temple and the institution of the tabernacle prefigured the form of that eternal and heavenly city. And because through all time, and until the consummation of the age, and through the age of all generations, the building of this heavenly city is to be completed; therefore it signifies that it is being built without any definition of time, saying: It is built as a city: until, as the Apostle says, the fullness of the Gentiles enters in, and then what remains of Israel shall be saved.

We are joined to it by unity.—But

because the body of the Church is one, not mingled in some confusion of bodies, nor with individuals gathered into an indiscriminate heap and shapeless mass, but through unity of faith, through fellowship of charity, through concord of works and will, through the one gift of the sacrament in all, we are all one, to which Paul exhorts us saying: I beseech you, brethren, that you all think the same thing, exercising the same charity: and when it shall be, as it is written: Now the multitude of those who believed were of one heart and one soul; then we shall be the city of God, then the holy Jerusalem: because Jerusalem is built as a city, whose participation is in the selfsame. But those who dissent from the assembly of the saints and separate themselves from the body of the Church by sins that cast them headlong, have no participation in this holy house: because the participation of this city is in the selfsame.

For those who are of one mind cannot have participation in what is diverse, being of the perfect city's fellowship, but in the selfsame. All therefore who shall be one shall be in it, as the psalm bears witness: for it says,

Thither went up the tribes, the tribes: not one, but many.

None build except those who are the Lord's.—But perhaps the city will seem to need to be built by all without any exception

because no exception is made among the named tribes; and will there be common entry into this house for peoples who do not know the Lord? But Scripture does not permit that understanding, adding to what it had said,

Thither ascended the tribes, the tribes of the Lord.

For there are those who are not the Lord's, to whom it was said: You are of the devil: and again: Depart from me, ye cursed, into the fire prepared for the devil and his angels. Therefore the tribes that shall be the Lord's shall ascend.

Nothing here for carnal Israel.—But perhaps Israel has claimed this as owed to itself

that is, to those who are according to the letter and not according to the Spirit; who are carnal and not heavenly; who crucified the Lord rather than adoring him? But it has been repulsed from this hope. For thither ascended the tribes, the tribes of the Lord, a testimony to that Israel. Not the tribes of Israel as a testimony to the nations, but the tribes of the Lord as a testimony to Israel. For we are the tribes of the Lord, and we shall enter into the house of the God of Jacob, and he shall announce to us his way, and we shall walk in it. For the tribes of the Lord said: Come, let us ascend to the mountain of the Lord, and to the house of the God of Jacob: and he shall announce to us his way, and we shall walk in it.

For out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord out of Jerusalem. For the word of the Lord, going forth from Jerusalem, came to the nations. These enter into the holy city, as a testimony to Israel.

The prerogative of the Israelite people; a testimony against its crimes.—As a testimony to what end?

To confess, he says, the name of the Lord. For the tribes of the Lord confess the name of the Lord. But this is the testimony of Israel. That Israel, vindicated by the Lord against Pharaoh, washed in the sea, fed in the desert with the food of angels, instructed in the law, rebuked by the prophets, received at his birth by the Lord through the fellowship of the body, saved on the cross if it had believed, glorified in the resurrection if it had confessed—it believed none of these things to be its own, it wished none of these things to remain its own. Having manna, it longed for the cucumbers of Egypt; awaiting the law of life from God, it worshipped the calf; hearing the prophets, it killed them.

It defamed the foretold birth of the Virgin, did not believe God in the flesh, falsely accused the remitter of sin as guilty of sin, purchased him for death, raised him on the cross. It bribed the witnesses of the resurrection to silence; it slew the Apostles with death. As a testimony to this its wickedness, the tribes of the Lord ascend. To that people it was promised; these obtain it. That people's is the testament, but these are the heirs. Him whom that people crucified, the tribes confess as their God. In this testimony, therefore, Israel recognizes him whom it pierced, and is barred from approaching him whom it did not believe to have risen. Him the archangels adore, him all the heavenly powers serve, he makes his tribes conformed to the glory of his body. They confess therefore the name of the Lord, because he is God, because he is the only-begotten Son of the unbegotten.

In this testimony therefore to Israel, the tribes of the Lord ascend into the house of the Lord, confessing the name of the Lord.

The judgment of carnal Israel.

The type of the Church.—But that confession is a judgment. For judgment is rendered through those to whom it was said: You shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. Not only these shall judge, but also the queen of the South shall condemn, and the Ninevites shall condemn; because these did penance at the preaching of Jonah, and she, coming from the uttermost parts of the earth, heard the wisdom of Solomon: in whom there is a prefiguration of the Church, which, being a stranger and unknown, both believed in repentance and desired to hear wisdom.

Where the seat of judgment shall be.

Christ as man is called by the name of David. The prophets declare future things as accomplished.—There therefore shall be the seat of judgment, where the tribes of the Lord shall ascend in testimony to Israel to confess the name of the Lord, namely in the Church, the city of holy stones, which is the house of the Lord. For he says,

Because there sat thrones in judgment, thrones over the house of David. David now also, as in other places, is the name given to the Lord from his body. For wherever Scripture makes mention of the assumption of the body, it is accustomed to call him David, taking his name from the parent of his flesh. Nor should any confusion of understanding be taken from the fact that the prophets have spoken certain things in the past tense: for we have already given the reason for this same thing in many places and frequently. For to God, who embraces all things in himself, future things are as accomplished.

And his foreknowledge is so faithful that what has not yet come to pass is nevertheless already held by him as completed and reckoned among past and accomplished things. Presently the Prophet shows that the matter speaks of itself as belonging to future time.

The Church is built up in peace.—For when he had recalled, as of the past, that the tribes of the Lord had ascended thither, and had sat upon the thrones of the house of David; now, as with the disposition of public teaching and admonition, he admonished for the future, saying,

Ask for the things that are for the peace of Jerusalem: so that he might show the faithfulness of foreknowledge in those things which he had spoken of as accomplished, yet preserve the order of times in things to be accomplished. Its construction therefore is in peace, and its participation is in the selfsame, and that house is of one mind and faith and charity. The teaching of peace must therefore be learned. For now rogate (ἐρωτήσατε) is, according to the proper sense of the Greek, a word not of praying but of inquiring. But to learn peace is in the will of those who hear.

For when they shall have inquired about its peace, then they shall rejoice to be told: We shall go into the house of the Lord.

The fruit of peace.—For the fruit of peace inquired after is not small: because this follows: And abundance for those who love thee.

The love of peace awaits perfect fruits, and hopes for an abundant supply of happy increase. Which the very same blessing prefigured in Jacob for the hope of the faithful signifies: for he was blessed thus, after the blessings of his brother had been taken: Behold the smell of my son, as the smell of a full field which the Lord hath blessed. The full and fertile field, yielding a hundredfold fruit, shall abound for him with eternal plenty. And now indeed in the meantime we abound in blessed fruits, which the sacrament of the Church and the unity of peace supply to us in the likeness of eternal fruits. But this sacrament of common hope has been shown under the names of bodily and common things: which those who know shall understand.

For the same Prophet recalls this abundance and plenty in another psalm, saying: Thou hast given gladness in my heart, from the time that their corn and wine and oil were multiplied in the selfsame. This therefore is the abundance in the selfsame. For through this abundance of peace and sacraments, that blessed and unfailing and eternal abundance of heavenly goods is prepared.

The strength of the house of God is not without peace.—Then follows,

Let peace be in thy strength, and abundance in thy heavy towers (ἐν πυργοβάρει σου).

The peace and strength of this house are bound together. For it will not be able to do anything except from peace; because its participation is in the selfsame: but peace alone brings it about that one is in the selfsame. But the perfect and peaceful strength belongs only to those who are gathered together in the selfsame: and therefore he says: Let peace be in thy strength.

The towers of the Church are its princes.

To these belongs abundant blessedness.—A city must necessarily consist of different kinds of buildings. For not every part is wall, gate, tower; nor every part streets, porticoes, shops; nor house, forum, temples, palace: but the dignities of the inhabitants also differ according to the differing magnificences of their dwellings. But in every kind of city, nothing is either stronger, or more useful, or loftier than towers. Now Scripture is accustomed to call things heavy which are firm and immovable: as it says: In a heavy people I will praise thee. Now also, when it had made mention of the peace of strength, it assigned the abundance of perfect and eternal blessedness to the princes of this city as to its most firm members, saying: And abundance in thy heavy towers. Above it had said: And abundance for those who love thee: therefore the abundance is not for all, but for those who love God. Then it added: Let peace be in thy strength.

For the peace and unity of the Church bestows on us strength and firmness: according to that word of the Apostle: And the peace of God, which surpasseth all understanding, shall keep your hearts in Christ Jesus. Now also it recalls that this abundance, which it had promised to those who love, belongs properly to the heavy towers; signifying by heavy towers those, whoever they may be, who have loved. By which it is to be understood that this abundance is not indiscriminate, nor of the whole city altogether: but only of those holy and faithful men who have provided for the rest of the building of this city as with the firmness of towers.

The distinction between the city of God and the house of God.—Then follows the great affection of the Prophet, and his solicitude of pious admonition toward every believing person.

For he says,

For the sake of my brethren and my neighbours I spoke peace of thee: for the sake of the house of the Lord my God I sought good things for thee. He signifies the multitude in his brethren and neighbours of this city, for whose sake he spoke peace of it (namely the city): so that those who heard might fit themselves into the building of this city to be completed. But he who speaks peace of it for the sake of his brethren and neighbours, seeks good things for the same city for the sake of the house of God, saying,

For the sake of the house of the Lord my God I sought good things for thee. Good things therefore were sought for the city for the sake of the house of the Lord.

For distinguishing the glory of the house of God from the whole body of the city, because the adornment of the royal house must be preferred to the building of the whole city; he sought good things for that same city. For first his brethren and neighbours, through the preaching of peace, became the city of the Lord. Then the city itself, now constituted from his neighbours and brethren, hearing the dignity of the house of God, hastened to be itself the house of all God. And so good things were sought for this city, as it advances from the city of the Lord into the house of God; according to that word of the Apostle: You are the temple of God, and the Spirit of God dwelleth in you. For faithful is he who says: Father, I pray thee for these, that we all may be one, I in them, and thou in me: our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

Unto thee have I lifted up mine eyes, thou who dwellest in heaven.

Behold, as the eyes of servants are upon the hands of their masters, as the eyes of a handmaid are upon the hands of her mistress: so are our eyes unto the Lord our God, until he have mercy upon us. Have mercy upon us, O Lord, have mercy upon us: for we are greatly filled with contempt: for our soul is greatly filled. A reproach to the prosperous, and scorn to the proud. Begetting the only-begotten God, remains in him whom he begot by the property of begetting. But our whole hope is in this, that we know the only-begotten God. For concerning the unbegotten God, no one is so senseless that, beholding the heaven, he does not perceive that God exists. In this heaven therefore God dwells, in a habitation worthy of his majesty and divinity.

Through Christ God dwells in us.—But there is also another dwelling pleasing and chosen by God, namely of those of whom it was said: I will dwell in them, and walk among them, and they shall be my people, and I will be their God; of whom also the Apostle says: You are the temple of God, and the Spirit of God dwelleth in you. The same Apostle also says: As is the earthly, such also are the earthly; and as is the heavenly, such also are the heavenly. The second Adam therefore is heavenly: and heavenly for this reason, because the Word was made flesh, man born of the Spirit and of God.

In this Word therefore—not in an empty sound of a voice, but in God the Word; not in a substance differing and diverse from himself, but in the Word of God—God dwells as in heaven, remaining in that which is from himself and his own: dwelling through him also in those who are heavenly, as he himself says to the Father: That they all may be one, I in them, and thou in me. Therefore if we who were clay in Adam are now heavenly in Christ, and Christ is the dweller in us, then through Christ dwelling in us, he also (namely the Father) is likewise the dweller in us, who is the dwelling of Christ dwelling in us.

The common opinion concerning God's seat is not excluded.—And

because, according to a bodily understanding, that sense underlies our thinking, whereby God is believed to dwell in the heaven that lies beyond the nature of this firmament; we do not exclude that common opinion concerning the seat of God, that the heaven of heaven is His throne; but we also believe that this dwelling worthy of God is signified in the heavenly Adam (Christ). Therefore God is to be known as dwelling in this heaven also, inhabiting through Him those whom He has established to be heavenly in Him.

A mind devoted to God must not be drawn away.—Now those who have raised the eyes of their mind toward God ought not to turn them back and deflect them

because, as it is said in the Gospels: No one looking back while holding the plough is fit for the kingdom of heaven. For those who have left behind temples, altars, lusts, wantonness, and the whole abyss of vices, it is fitting to persist with unwearied gaze and unconquered resolve.

For if the nations, blinded by their own error, are held fast to false religions with unchangeable stubbornness, so that they cannot be turned back from their superstitions by the force of truth, serving various gods, as they call them, with persevering folly; and if the soul of sinners, captured by the enticements of vices, serves most devotedly as though to a body commanding it; how much more does it befit us, who know God the creator of heaven and earth (who, as He was powerful enough to animate a man from inanimate earth, so also is powerful enough to raise up a man who, already animated, has died, into fellowship with eternity), to venerate Him without any deflection or deviant religion, and not to turn the steadfastness of our faith in any direction?

Hands mean works.

Servants of sin. Upon what works they fix their gaze.—And the prophet teaches that these eyes of his mind are always to be fixed upon God with unchangeable gaze, saying,

Behold, as the eyes of servants are upon the hands of their masters, and as the eyes of a handmaid upon the hands of her mistress: so are our eyes unto the Lord our God, until He have mercy upon us. The prophet set forth a comparison by way of example, so that just as the eyes of servants are upon the hands of their masters, so the eyes of his faith should be fixed upon God: because a faithful servant is attentive to every obedience of his master's will, and always keeps his eyes fixed and undeflected.

But if the discourse were about bodily servants and masters, it would have been said that the eyes of servants are upon the eyes, or the tongue, or the countenance of their masters, or upon their nod—for by nod or by mouth are they commanded. But Scripture frequently uses hands to signify works. Now there are those who are servants neither of men nor of God; but they are servants of sin, as the Lord says: Everyone who commits sin is a servant of sin. These servants of those spiritual wickednesses in the heavenly places are always fixed upon their works as upon the hands of their masters, with the eyes of their mind, fastened upon them in desire and admiration of vices. Now these are the diabolical works—that is, the works of the gods of the gentiles—which are signified in the hands: the belly, idleness, luxury, lust, pride, avarice, ambition.

Upon these works, then, of those under whose dominion they lie, they fix the eyes of their senses, they for whom there are many gods and innumerable masters, according as the inclination and nature of each individual has chosen for itself the author of its religion.

God is one for us, but not alone.—For us, however, there is one God, yet not denying to our Lord Jesus Christ what He is—God—by reason of the oneness of God; but following the Law and the prophets and the Gospels and the apostles, we profess the unity of divinity in the unbegotten God and in the only-begotten God according to their proper character and nature, with faith and truth. For the prophetic discourse nowhere used the plural form, calling them either gods or lords; but named each one in his own order. For Genesis says: And the Lord rained sulphur and fire from the Lord; and the Prophet: God, your God, has anointed you; and, The Lord said to my Lord; and the Gospels: And the Word was with God, and the Word was God; and the Apostle: One God from whom are all things, and one Lord Jesus through whom are all things; and again: Of whom is Christ, who is God over all.

This therefore was said on account of the Lord: that we might understand that, by reason of the fact that there is one unbegotten God, it cannot be taken away from the only-begotten God that He is God. For each is one God: not in the sense that (as Hierax held) one is divided into two, nor that each is the same person (as Sabellius thought), so that mere naming made father and son, not the nature of begetting: but for this reason one God, because there are not two unbegotten, nor two only-begotten, but one from one, and both one, with a divinity in each that is not dissimilar or differing from itself in substance.

Why there are many servants and masters, but one handmaid and one mistress.—There follows then: And as the eyes of a handmaid upon the hands of her mistress. The Prophet maintained the same order, so that in the example of comparison he also recalled that the eyes of a handmaid are fixed upon the hands of her mistress: to teach that these desires of servants are fixed rather upon the efficacies of works. But whereas many servants of many masters are set forth in the example, it must be asked why one handmaid of one mistress is mentioned. For many servants, as we said above, belong to very many gods. But now there is one handmaid and one mistress: because the nature of the human soul is one, just as the nature of earthly flesh is also one.

And because the discourse is now about sinners who are servants of sin, this handmaid—the soul—is given over to the flesh as her mistress, subjected through the allurements of bodily pleasures and vices: and she suffers the dominion of her lower part through the kindling of enticements, beholding the fruits of its works. Therefore, just as these servants and this handmaid are held unchangeably by their own vices, so as to persist in them with a kind of devout steadfastness of their folly; so too let faith be such that it is not temporary and unstable, nor worn out when temptations are sent forth, but remains immovable and unchanged until the consummation of God's mercy.

The steadfast hope of the Prophecy.—And therefore the Prophet demonstrates the steadfastness of his hope until the end of receiving mercy, saying: So are our eyes unto the Lord our God, until He have mercy upon us. He does not cease, he does not desist, though the Lord may delay His mercy as a trial of faith: because faith ought to render the expectation of its trust steadfast, and all despair is a confession of distrust. But the Prophet is not uncertain of God's mercy: for his eyes are fixed upon Him until He show mercy. And so fixed, indeed, that a doubled prayer is appended to their fixedness. For he says after this,

Have mercy on us, O Lord, have mercy on us.

He is fixed, and fixed he prays: with that same perseverance with which the servants of vices linger in the vices that dominate them, he perseveres with most certain hope of eternal goods and with confidence in the perfect mercy of God toward himself.

The faithful, vexed by injuries, grieve over their injuries and over the sins of those who vex them.

Relief for them comes from God alone.—There follows, as we have very often observed, upon this hope of the faithful a grievous disparagement by the wicked, and a troublesome persecution by the malicious. For the wicked man hates that justice should be preached by us; if we praise chastity, the unchaste is offended; the drunkard execrates our fasting. But when we exhort to generosity, the miser accuses us of folly. When we preach Christ God crucified, the Jew and every persecutor from among the gentiles reproaches our religion. When we await the judgment of God, the kings of the world are offended, and each refuses God as the judge of the life he has led. When we announce the resurrection, the bodies of unbelievers, dead with their vices, contradict. All the falsehoods of heretics also refute our faith received from the Law and the Prophets and the Gospels and the Apostles.

We are beaten, cursed, driven into exile, killed by sword, by flames, by the deep; fury is unleashed upon our modesty, fury upon our bodies: we feel grief from our own injuries.

And because our injuries are death to those who inflict them, we feel grief from compassion for the perishing. And therefore after the doubled prayer in which he had said: Have mercy on us, O Lord, have mercy on us; he added: Because we are greatly filled with contempt.

Because our soul is greatly filled: God alone being powerful to help against these things, so as to deliver from contempt and scorn one who is always fixed upon Him unto the end of His mercy.

And therefore he is fixed until God show mercy upon him, therefore with doubled prayer he entreats God's mercy upon himself, because he himself and his soul are greatly filled with contempt, God alone, as we said, being powerful to show mercy in great contempt: and not only powerful in that, but powerful also to turn all things to the contrary, and to grant a certain recompense to the one who suffers.

The reversal of fortune of poor Lazarus and the rich man.—Witness to us is both the poor man resting in Abraham's bosom, and the rich man burning in punishment.

For the poor man had sat before the rich man's gate upon a heap of dung, wasting with hunger, dripping with the discharge of his sores, while dogs licked his open wounds. But this was the warfare of the body, this the battle against the world. Yet inwardly his soul was invulnerable through faith, and inaccessible to every dart of pleasure and vice: and therefore, after the dissolution of the flesh, it is carried by Angels, blessed, into Abraham's bosom.

But the rich man, whose every garment was purple, to whom the nobility of the whole city was subjected in heavy servitude, for whom the riches of air, earth, and sea were gathered for the use of his banquets, with all the services of all the elements ministering to his one belly, who had shut his door against this poor man, had refused him the crumbs falling from the table, and had reproached the sight of him as an insult to himself: departing from this body of which he had made evil use, he is separated from the saints by an impassable gulf, is received by every ministry of punishments, grieves, is tormented, is burned, and begs to be sprinkled and cooled by the least finger of the poor man resting in Abraham's bosom. To whom Abraham answered: Son, remember that you received good things in your lifetime, and Lazarus likewise evil things: but now he is comforted, and you are tormented. An alternate reversal takes place: and joy is changed into sorrow, and sorrow into joy.

And let us see whether what the Gospel has set forth, the Prophet also now signifies.

The end of the rich and of the humble or needy.—For he says: Reproach to the abundant, and contempt to the proud.

After the persecutions of kings, nations, Jews, heretics, and also often of our own people, which we have mentioned above, here too an evangelical reversal is made, so that reproach falls upon the abundant, and contempt upon the proud. Pride is changed into contempt, and abundance is changed into want: and again contempt is changed into pride, and want is changed into abundance, the prophet showing both of these through the same words, when he says: Reproach to the abundant, and contempt to the proud—whether because those who will afterward abound in the kingdom of the Lord now bear reproach, and those who are now in contempt will afterward be proud through the confidence of faith: or because at the time of judgment reproach and contempt revert upon those who now abound and are proud in the world.

Examples of humility.—Paul glories in his weaknesses and in his distresses.

He also commanded that judges be chosen for the powerful from the contemptible of the Church. He and Peter establish a mutual law between themselves, that they should be mindful of the poor and take careful thought for them. The angels of the least ones see God daily; the humble shall be exalted; and the best sacrifice to God is a contrite heart. Let us not therefore cast down the humble, let us not despise the poor, let us not pass by the needy: lest we be separated from them by a deep gulf, lest they disdain to cool us with their least finger, because reproach falls upon the abundant and contempt upon the proud.

This reversal is changeable, and a worthy recompense for the good and the wicked, which He showed in the Gospels saying: Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted; and again: Woe to you who laugh, for you shall weep, says our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

Unless the Lord had been with us, let Israel now say, unless the Lord had been with us; when men rose up against us, they would perhaps have swallowed us alive. When their anger was kindled against us, the water would perhaps have overwhelmed us. Our soul passed through a torrent: our soul would perhaps have passed through the immeasurable water. Blessed be the Lord God, who has not given us as a prey to their teeth. Our soul has been delivered as a sparrow from the snare of the hunters. The snare is broken, and we are delivered. Our help is in the name of the Lord, who made heaven and earth.

The voice of Israel after the example of the prophet.—The preceding psalm has brought us great benefit: for from it we ascend to this one.

For the eyes of our mind were fixed upon God until the end of mercy, with many contempts and reproaches surrounding us on every side. After these things, having obtained mercy, and being placed from reproach into abundance, from contempt into honor, the prophet shows what we ought to do and say, speaking thus,

Unless the Lord had been among us, let Israel now say, unless the Lord had been among us; when men rose up against us, they would perhaps have swallowed us alive.

And indeed the very wording is such that it is understood to be the prophet's, instructing what ought to be said by the rest. For first the matter itself is stated: then it is shown how it is to be said. And this was the order, that what was to be done should be shown, and then to what extent it was to be done.

Unless the Lord had been among us, let Israel now say.

It has therefore been stated what Israel ought to say. Concerning Israel we have frequently noted that he is to be understood as one who has contemplated God with the eyes of the mind. Now therefore, according to the prophetic teaching, having learned what Israel ought to say, he speaks,

Unless the Lord had been among us; when men rose up against us, they would perhaps have swallowed us alive.

This therefore Israel says, taking the example from the prophet: because he heard: Unless the Lord had been among us, let Israel now say.

Man has no cause for glorying in himself.—Now that commandment is not a light one, which it was necessary to demonstrate by a certain prophetic proclamation going before. For in those matters which are difficult, an example is desired. For the whole nature of men is insolent toward prosperous circumstances, and forgetful of its own weakness, rashly boastful in prosperity, which ought to be absent from a man instructed in the teaching of God. For what place of glorying is left to us, when we recall that all things are from God? If we have implanted life in ourselves, we owe also to ourselves the form of our bodies: if we ourselves regulate rains and heats, let us glory that the produce of fruits comes from our own doing: if in all things the mercy of God is not needed, let us also claim all things as though from ourselves. Will the strong man glory in his strength, whom bodily sickness will make weak?

Will the rich man glory in his riches, from whom a thief, a plunderer, a tyrant will perhaps snatch all these things away?

Will nobility glory, when it has sometimes become an unworthy and miserable servitude? Will the wise man glory, uncertain what may befall him from moment to moment? But if we enjoy any of these things without the interruption of some trouble; we are delighted, we are elated. And if from some sorrow we return to joy, we are lifted up beyond the sense of human weakness, scarcely capable of bearing even the joy we have obtained; forgetful of this saying: Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, nor the strong man in his strength, nor the rich man in his riches, but let him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth that I am the Lord.

Therefore the prophet, by a certain prescribed form of confession, has shaped us who are insolent through the vice of our custom: and has taught us by the example of admonition to render honor to God and to glory in him, saying: Unless the Lord had been among us, let Israel now say.

All good things are to be attributed to God from whom they come.—Having therefore heard from the prophet what we ought to say, let us also say: Unless the Lord had been among us; when men rose up against us,

They would perhaps have swallowed us alive.

For having endured the persecutions of men, the impious decrees of kings, the enticing exhortations of counselors, since we remain in the faith, since we abide in the fear of God, since we dwell in the hope of eternal goods, aided by the mercy of God, knowing him to be faithful who said: Behold I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world, let us refer our joys to him who dwells in us: let us owe to him whatever is in us, taught by the blessed Paul that nothing is to be reckoned as our own, when he says: For what hast thou that thou hast not received? And if thou hast received it, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?

And learning the modesty of rendering thanks from the holy patriarch Jacob, when he says: God who hath fed me from my youth, and the angel who delivereth me from all evils.

The death of the living.—Now it is not the custom of men to devour others alive, nor do hatreds proceed so far as to swallow flesh. But neither now is there joy over a body rescued from death; but over a soul freed from fellowship with sins. Therefore he says that the living would perhaps have been swallowed, namely those still placed in the body, overtaken by death and consumed by sin. For this is the death of the living: to live for luxury, sleep, sacrileges, adulteries, buildings. Thanks therefore are to be given to God who abides in us: that living through his faith and teaching we are not swallowed by these things. There is therefore here in thanksgiving an order which corresponds to that of iniquities. For first we shall not be swallowed by those who rise up against us; but neither afterward, when their souls are stirred to anger, shall we be absorbed by the water, the Lord protecting us.

The diverse kinds of waters.

What they signify.—For he says,

When their soul was enraged against us, perhaps the water would have swallowed us up.

But what is this? Do avenging waters stand ready at the stirrings of inflamed minds, or are they animate so as to swallow? Those who are submerged in water can be drowned; but that which is inanimate cannot swallow. We must therefore inquire what ought to be understood here. And it is necessary to recall those passages in which mention is made of waters. And indeed at the beginning of the book of Genesis it is written thus: And darkness was upon the deep, and the Spirit of God moved over the water; and again: God said: Let a firmament be made in the midst of the water, and let it divide the water from the water; and again: Let the water that is above the heavens praise the Lord; and again: The waters saw thee, O God, the waters saw thee and were afraid.

Therefore, since the law is spiritual, and the faith of the history is not endangered if we suppose that effects inhere in things and that a significance connected to them from without exists; we see both that there are waters over which the Spirit of God moves, and waters that are above the heavens, and waters that are on the earth, and waters that praise, and waters that fear. By which we rightly understand that waters signify peoples, among whom some are spiritual, some are dark; some are heavenly, some are earthly; some are about to praise the glorious coming of the Lord, and some are fearful. These therefore are the fearful, earthly, dark ones, wishing to swallow us up, their souls stirred to anger, and moved with the whole force of diabolical fury, as if by the greatest winter storm rushing in torrents and plunging headlong.

What the assaults of the devil accomplish in those full of God, and in those empty of him.—And so in the order of our confession to the Lord the prophet added,

Our soul hath passed through the torrent, perhaps our soul would have passed through the impassable water.

Behold the rushing assaults of the devil and his own, and the raging onrushes stirred up from turbulent commotions, and the torrents of a passing storm; but this intolerable water has not passed through the soul in which God dwells. It is intolerable, however, to those empty of God; but to those in whom God is, it is a sudden torrent, yet soon after dried up and exhausted so as to allow passage.

The teeth of the devil.—And lest any understanding here should be taken from the waters; it follows,

Blessed be the Lord, who hath not given us as a prey to their teeth.

And what are the teeth of these torrents? They are plainly vehement for tearing and seizing: wrath, lust, wantonness, hatred, gluttony, avarice. These are the evil and tenacious teeth. For through these they dominate over us when we are captured and torn, while they make us either ministers or companions of their vices: by which not our flesh, but our souls, would be devoured, unless God were in us.

The snares of souls.—For he says,

Our soul hath been delivered as a sparrow out of the snare of the fowlers.

Those who hunt spread snares secretly and deceptively, either hidden in valleys, or covered with grass, or smeared with bait, or matching the color of clouds. And these things indeed are for beasts and other birds: but against our soul these things are prepared for us. For there is a snare for us in idleness, money, ambition, wantonness. These are spread out, these flatter, these deceive: but from all these our will must be withdrawn. For these snares are spread out for all, as it is written: For not unjustly are nets spread upon the earth for birds. For it is perfect glory to fly away from these snares that are spread out.

One must remain steadfastly in the Church.—Finally the psalm says thus: Our soul hath been delivered as a sparrow out of the snare of the fowlers: not indeed of those who hunt, but of those for whom snares have been stretched in the hunt. For it is not when someone has fallen into a snare that he becomes a sinner, but when snares are stretched for all, only he who is already a sinner is in the snare; as it is written: The eye of a harlot is the snare of a sinner. Therefore we must abstain from all sins, lest we fall into the snare. For we are spiritual, and we fly away like sparrows. The sparrow is a domestic bird, and an inhabitant of buildings: not momentary, not temporary, but abiding without any change or observance of season. We therefore, inhabiting the Church without alternation of seasons, let us abstain from sins, that we may fly away from the snares.

For the snare is broken through God dwelling in us: because it follows thus: The snare is broken, and we are delivered.

Our help is in the name of the Lord, who made heaven and earth.

By this help the snare is broken, by this help we are freed, in the name of the Lord who made heaven and earth: which is indeed above every name, at which every knee shall bow of those in heaven, on earth, and under the earth: and every tongue shall confess that the Lord Jesus is in the glory of God the Father, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

They that trust in the Lord shall be as mount Sion; he shall not be moved for ever who dwelleth in Jerusalem.

Mountains are round about it, and the Lord is round about his people, from henceforth now and for ever: for the Lord will not leave the rod of sinners upon the lot of the just; that the just may not stretch forth their hands to iniquity. Do good, O Lord, to those that are good and to the upright of heart. But such as turn aside into bonds, the Lord shall lead out with the workers of iniquity: peace upon Israel.

Against those who follow the letter alone.—Many create obscurity for us by wishing to judge the prophetic Scriptures by the judgment of the ears alone, and to understand in them nothing other than what is heard under the individual names of each thing. When they wish this, they leave us nothing to understand, and they establish that the prophets have spoken rationally not only of heavenly things, I will not say, but not even of earthly things. For what will either be fittingly treated by us, or rightly judged to have been said by them, when we hear of waters praising, seeing, fearing, and clapping their hands, unless we show from the authorities of those same Scriptures that under the name of waters something else is signified which is of another kind? Namely that which is living and sentient, and moving itself by its own motion and sense toward the judgment of each matter: which is understood to be man, praising, seeing, fearing, clapping, judging.

For the prophetic word has declared these kinds of human affection to be in the waters: and since these do not belong by nature to waters, neither has the prophet spoken of waters, nor shall we understand it to have been said of waters. These things are fittingly reconsidered on account of what is in the present psalm, which is as follows.

The literal sense here does not cohere with itself.—

They that trust in the Lord shall be as mount Sion; he shall not be moved for ever, who dwelleth in Jerusalem.

Mountains are round about it. The name of mount Sion, and only our regions are inhabited by such as the swallow, the quail the dwelling of Jerusalem, and the mountains round about her, have no basis in an interior understanding, the psalm is empty, and the Prophet is a liar, in whom the Holy Spirit is believed to have spoken. For there is a mount Sion overhanging the city of Jerusalem; there is the same city, around which on the outside there are several mountains. He therefore who has been founded in the Lord—what profit will he have, that he should be as mount Sion? That from a rational man he should become a stone, a tree, a clod, and be transferred from an animate nature into an inanimate nature?

And indeed how faithful is this saying, that he who dwells in Jerusalem shall not be moved for ever?

Did Jerusalem itself bring sanctification to its inhabitants, so that dwelling therein should be an eternal stability—when from that place came the sacrilegious slaughter of the prophets, the sentence of death upon God, the flight of the Apostles, the scandal of the cross? And how often were those dwelling therein taken captive, how often slain? In the end the city itself was utterly razed, and those who remained after its devastation were taken captive and scattered: the prophet having previously announced this destruction to her impiety, saying: Your land is desolate, your cities are burned with fire; strangers devour your region in your sight, and the daughter of Sion shall be left desolate and overthrown by foreign peoples, as a booth in a vineyard, and as a lodge in a garden of cucumbers. Empty therefore is the saying, empty is the prophecy, which added: Mountains round about her, and the Lord round about his people from henceforth and for ever.

Jerusalem has been overthrown, her peoples have been destroyed, her remnants have been scattered: today she is not inhabited, no priest, no prophet, no prince; but she herself is trodden down, desolate, without fruit. And how shall her inhabitant not be moved for ever? And the Lord round about his people from henceforth and for ever? Therefore it cannot be seen to have been prophesied concerning her, from whom the truth of the prophecy will differ. It follows therefore that we should seek upon whom the meaning of these words is fitting.

The mount of the Lord is the Church.

Christ who passes from the mountain into a stone, and from the stone back into a mountain.—And indeed first it must be observed that mention is made of no other mountain than Sion. For we read that there is a mountain of the Lord, even Choreb, to which Moses first came after he had gone about much: and there is also the mountain of the Lord Sinai, on which the law was written for the people. There is also mount Sion overhanging Jerusalem. But because in this mountain the prophecies bear no fruit, it must be seen what ought to be understood by the mountain. And we have Isaiah as an excellent guide to understanding. For when he had previously signified the high mountain of the Lord, to which the nations were to come, he says: Therefore thus says the Lord: Behold, I lay in the foundations of Sion a stone, glorious, chosen, a corner-stone, precious in its foundations; and he who believes in him shall not be confounded.

And it is not ambiguous that the Apostle signified Christ as the foundation, through which that blessed Church of the Lord's body, whose foundation is Christ, is seen to be signified in the mountain. The same Apostle also calls her Jerusalem, saying: She who now is Jerusalem, and is in bondage with her children; but the Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all.

We have therefore mount Sion of the Lord, and we have also the city of God, Jerusalem: and the interpretation of the name Sion is "watching." Thus therefore we understand the mountain of the Lord in Daniel, from the mountain into a stone, and again from the stone into a mountain: for he emptied himself, being established in the form of God, and took the form of a servant, and through his passion, the world with its superstitions and terrors being cast down, he is in the glory of God the Father, and is God above all things; emptied from the mountain into a stone on account of the weakness of the flesh, made again from the stone into a mountain on account of the glory of the passion: a mountain overhanging and lofty, in which we ourselves contemplate ourselves through the assumption of our flesh and body.

We contemplate our resurrection in Christ.

The present Church is the form of the future one.—For in him we are, contemplating our resurrection in the resurrection of our body in him: for mount Sion is a mountain of watching. Let the Hebrew tongue, in which it was said, Mount Sion is a mountain of watching, declare this interpretation. Let Paul speak, and say, But our citizenship is in heaven, from which also we await the Saviour, our Lord Jesus, who will transform the body of our humility, conformed to the body of his glory; and let him say again, And when we were dead in sins, he quickened us together with Christ, and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places. Let the Gospel also say, But as many as received him, to them he gave power to become sons of God. Let the Prophet therefore now also say, They that trust in the Lord shall be as mount Sion; he that dwells in Jerusalem shall not be moved for ever.

Let us follow the Apostle, let us follow the Gospel, let us follow the Prophet.

Let us trust in the Lord, that we may be conformed to the body of the glory of God. Let us now dwell in the Church, the heavenly Jerusalem; that we may not be moved for ever. For dwelling in this one, we shall dwell also in that one; because this is the form of that one. For we know in part, and we prophesy in part. And now we see through a mirror in an enigma, but then face to face. But both this one is heavenly, and that one is heavenly; and this one is Jerusalem—that one indeed is the church of the multitude of thronging angels: but there is the church of the firstborn, and there is also the church of spirits founded in the Lord. We must therefore be founded in the spirit, and those who dwell must stand firm, not wander about, as was said to Moses, But stand thou here with me.

Let us not be wanderers in our goings, nor uncertain in our ways, nor carried away by the wind of empty doctrine.

For we must remain for ever, if we have stood without being moved.

The mountains round about us.

The saints and the Angels.—But neither are the guardianships of the saints lacking to those who wish to stand firm, nor the defences of the Angels. For it is said, Mountains round about her, and the Lord round about his people from henceforth and for ever. For we shall consider these mountains, according to the examples given above, to be such as exceed the lowness of the earth, firm and lofty and immovable. For since we read that the Church also is signified by a mountain, that is, the Lord in the body, and we find that the mountains of God exult and rejoice—for it is written, The mountains exulted like rams—how can we fail to understand that those are signified by the mountains who, already glorious above earthly nature, exult in the things of God?

We need the help of Christ.

Our dangers. God is everywhere.—And lest we should believe the protection in the apostles, or the patriarchs and prophets, or rather in the angels who surround the Church with a certain guardianship, to be a slight one; it was added, And the Lord round about his people from henceforth and for ever. But perhaps the guardianship of the apostles or of the angels might be thought sufficient. That indeed is true; but let us also hear Moses. For when the Lord had said to him, Behold, my angel shall go before thee; he answered, Unless thou thyself wilt go with me, cast me not hence. Good indeed is the protection of an angel, but better is that of the Lord. Our soul is assailed by many snares, many weapons are wielded against us. Neither land, nor sea, nor air is free from peril to our faith.

The rare gems of an unknown sea catch our eyes, the gold of the earth occupies the mind, spiritual wickednesses and the powers of this air flutter around with all the enticements of our death, lying in wait through the troubles of the present life, through the habits and wantonness of another's will, that we may grow angry, that we may hate, that we may love: on every side we are watched for and assailed. The Lord therefore, knowing that our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the powers of this world and spiritual wickednesses, says, concluding the Gospels: Behold, I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the age. For he is present: and when he is faithfully invoked, he is present through his own nature. For he is a Spirit penetrating and containing all things.

For he is not corporeal as we are, so that when he is present somewhere he is absent elsewhere: but by his present power, reaching out wherever there is anything, since his spirit fills all things and is in all things, he nevertheless stands by him who believes in him. For he will be present even with three or two gathered together in his name, and he is round about his people from henceforth and for ever.

The rod is the emblem of power.

Our tribulations are brief. The work must be both upright and voluntary.—But what does it mean, that he is round about his people from henceforth and for ever?

Because he will not leave the rod of sinners upon the lot of the just, lest the just stretch forth their hands to iniquity. By the rod it is fitting to understand power; for it is the emblem of power. Moses received a rod, with which he could do all things: there was also the rod of Aaron. But there was also the rod of Pharaoh, and there was also the rod of Nebuchadnezzar. Therefore the Lord guards us round about: lest the rod of sinners be left upon our lot. Tribulations come indeed, but they do not remain: persecutions come, but they do not persist. Many wish to bring the freedom of our faith into captivity: but no one has dominion over our confidence, which we have in Christ.

For the rod of the sinner shall not be left upon our lot. For the Lord is round about his people for ever: lest, overcome and wearied by the command of the rod, we stretch forth our hands to iniquity. But when the rod has fallen upon us, it will be taken away: and when the sinner has pressed down upon us, he will not be left there. Brief is whatever we shall suffer from the enemies of God: and it has the reward of victory, even if it does not have the toil of a long battle. The Lord is present. Even if some force compels us, let us keep our hands from iniquities, let us not stretch forth our works into sins: because, with the Lord established round about us, the rod of the sinner shall not be left to remain. 8. After these things the Prophet turns, praying for retribution from the Lord upon him who has kept his hands from iniquity.

Do good, O Lord, to the good and to the upright in heart; signifying the uprightness both of deed and of will in each.

For in many cases the work of a deed is good either for the sake of human favour, or for the sake of danger and fear. But unless we are good from the will, even if we shall seem good to men, we are nevertheless not good before God: because perfect goodness consists in the disposition of an upright heart.

The worker of iniquity who turns aside from the law.—But as retribution is present for the good, so it is not absent for the evil. For there follows,

But those who turn aside to entanglements, the Lord shall lead away with the workers of iniquity.

And here too the saying has a twofold significance, of those who turn aside to entanglements, and of those who work iniquities. Those who turn aside, turn aside from one thing to another, that is, from the good works of an upright heart to entanglements. And what shall we consider these entanglements to be? Surely those which the prophet warned must be loosed, saying, I have not chosen such a fast, says the Lord; but loose every bond of iniquity, undo the entanglements of violent exchanges. If therefore anyone, turning aside from the commandments of God, has bound himself with these entanglements, he shall be led away with the workers of iniquity, into the same punishment of sentence, being about to be a transgressor and unjust.

For he who works iniquity is a stranger to the observance of the law: but he who turns aside from the law, transgresses the law in which he previously remained.

The bonds that hinder faith.—We must not therefore turn aside to entanglements: nor must our freedom be inserted into the bonds of the world and the fetters of worldly affairs. The blessed Paul knew that those who are loosed ought not to be bound, when he says, Art thou loosed from a wife? Seek not a bond. And he did not mean this of the criminal bond of a necessary binding. But there are other bonds, which hinder and entangle our faith and connect it to themselves: chiefly the labour of increasing money, and the insincere gain of trading. For these so bind us with sins, oaths, and dealings, that they hold us captive and possessed by themselves. From these therefore the mind, the will, and the zeal must be freed: because those who turn aside to entanglements shall be led away together with the workers of iniquity.

But Israel shall be peaceful, with no rod of the sinner left upon him: but remaining in perfect faith and eternal hope, he shall hear said to him for his portion, Peace upon Israel.

For he is our peace, who made both one, our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed unto the ages of ages. Amen.

When the Lord turned the captivity of Sion, we became as those who are comforted.

Then was our mouth filled with joy, and our tongue with exultation. Then shall they say among the nations, The Lord hath done great things with us: we are rejoicing. Turn, O Lord, our captivity, as a torrent in the south. They that sow in tears shall reap in joy. Going they went and wept, casting their seeds. But coming they shall come with exultation, bearing their sheaves.

The spiritual understanding of the Psalms cannot be wholly rejected.—Unless there were in the psalms certain prophecies of such a kind that they did not fit the events and persons of the times in which they were written, many would surely dare to suppose that nothing in the psalms was said spiritually, and would think that we are seeking out certain fabricated assertions and false interpretations, by which we might seem to have understood something higher and deeper, I know not what, than the sense of others: as though we were fitting what is written to our own sense, and not rather deriving the sense of diligent and careful understanding from what is written. For the scripture of the law remains and exists, completed by the prophets in the times before the Lord was present, published by the Jews, handled by kings, received by the nations; but understood and proved by Christians.

The understanding of the Law granted to Christians by God.—This may perhaps be thought presumptuous.

It is plainly presumptuous, if we claim this glory for ourselves, if we wish so much to be permitted to our weakness, that things hidden for so many ages, obscure through so many ages of the human race, in the understanding of which kings labored in vain, in which the very doctors and teachers of the law went astray, we—fools to the world, and the offscouring of the world, and the madmen to their wise men—should boast of understanding. But yet we understand, because he is not a liar who says: Ask, and it shall be given to you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened to you.

And it is written, that he who said, It was necessary that all things should be fulfilled which are written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the psalms concerning me, then opened their understanding, that they might understand the Scriptures, and said to them, Thus it is written, that Christ should suffer, and rise from the dead on the third day, and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name to all nations. Therefore it is not from ourselves that we understand; but from him who caused things that were unknowable to be understood. And so understanding is to be hoped for from him: who will also open to those who knock, and will show to those who seek, and will not deny to those who ask.

This psalm does not narrate a bodily captivity. The argument of the Psalm.—For how can this psalm be understood, which disagrees with the history of events? For nowhere is a captivity of this people recorded up to the times of David: but long after Solomon his son obtained the kingdom, Israel served in captivity to the Assyrians, and then Judah to the Babylonians. How then does David in this same psalm pray as one who is captive? Or how does he rejoice at the captivity being turned away from him? Saying,

When the Lord turned away the captivity of Sion, we became as those who are comforted.

Then was our mouth filled with joy, and our tongue with exultation. Then shall they say among the nations, The Lord hath done great things with them.

Although it may be a pious view to suppose that the reversal of a future captivity was foretold according to prophetic knowledge; and that things which were indubitably to be done were commemorated through faith in their doing as though already done; yet the meaning of the words and the force of the language does not now allow us to understand this as the rejoicing over that return which was granted after the Babylonian captivity: especially since a more grievous captivity followed upon that same return, and it is unworthy of a prophet to rejoice as one ignorant, with all the reproach of captivity removed, when captivity repeated succeeded again with unchangeable reproach. But now the whole psalm is, as we shall show by the exposition of each thing, the rejoicing of a soul returning from the captivity of vices into the freedom of the knowledge of God.

The captivity of the soul is more grievous than that of the body.—And indeed bodily captivity is grievous, which, with the right of liberty lost, is subjected to the dominion of conquerors. Bodies then serve, but the freedom of a faithful soul is by no means taken captive. My witnesses are the three youths singing amid the flames; my witness is Daniel in the den of hungry lions, satisfied by the meal of the prophet; my witness is Eleazar amid the laws of his masters, free under his ancestral laws; my witnesses are the seven Martyrs with their mother, giving thanks to God amid new torments of death. But how much more wretched is the captivity of the soul!

If avarice has taken it captive, it plunders and ravages through the body: if lust has conquered it, it shares its servitude with the body: if excess, anger, hatred, rashness, drunkenness, envy have subdued it; with these as its ruling masters, both soul and body serve in common: and so the captivity of the body follows upon the captivity of the soul. Moreover the nobility of a religious soul despises the condition of the body. The service is indeed hard, yet not altogether pitiable for a man, because he is served by servants: but how wretched is the captivity of the soul!

The servitude of avarice, lust, drunkenness, and other vices.—The miser, who is about to lack himself, fears to lack money; busy, sad, anxious, without any rest, he is always held by fear of loss; unmindful of honor, heedless of friendships, fleeing from humanity, he knows not religion, he utterly hates goodness. But he over whom lust is mistress—in what a mire of disgrace does he wallow! He hangs upon opportunities for adultery: anxious about the thefts of his wantonness, he is wholly in harlots with his eyes, his mind, his body. Seeing and hearing daily the human laws against adulterers, he meditates adultery in the very forum; he fears what he does, and does not flee what he fears. What indeed is more wretched than the dominion of drunkenness? To pour into the belly beyond its capacity, to begrudge the body its proper function, to take away reason from the senses, not to speak, not to remember, not to stand, and to impose a kind of death upon an unimpaired nature?

How disgraceful too is the agitation of those who rage, the impulse of rashness, the sting of hatreds, the anxiety of envy?

How great then is the disturbance of those, how great the calamity, who serve the evils mentioned above!

The voices of those freed from vices.—But if, with the teaching of wisdom known, and the preaching of God, and the remission of sins, and the resurrection of bodies, and fellowship in eternity, and the heavenly kingdom, we pass from the aforesaid ruling vices—from avarice to generosity, migrate from lusts to continence, return from drunkenness to fasting, fly from fury, rashness, hatred, envy to peaceableness, reason, mercy, kindness: learning all these things from the law and the prophets, the gospels and the apostles; and singing from the law: The Lord crushing wars, the Lord is his name (Judith.

Xvi, 3); acknowledging from the prophet: I am he who made heaven and earth from nothing (Esaiæ xlviii, 13); rendering from the Gospel: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God; declaring from the Apostle: Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature, because in him all things were established in heaven and on earth: and when the nations shall marvel at our conversion from vices to virtues, from ignorance of God to confession of him; then we shall testify that the prophecy of the psalm can be understood by us, saying: When the Lord turned the captivity of Sion, we became as those who are comforted. Then was our mouth filled with joy, and our tongue with exultation. Then shall they say among the nations, The Lord hath done great things with them. For the Lord turned our captivity through the remission of sins.

For he freed the soul from the dominion of vices, not reckoning former offenses, and renewing us into a new life, and transforming us into a new man, establishing us in the body of his flesh. For he himself is the Church, containing the whole of it in himself through the sacrament of his body. Sion did not exist before it was freed; but Sion is that which has been freed. The name goes with freedom. For this name belongs not to one remaining in captivity, but to one whose captivity has been turned away.

Now we have some, but not full, consolation.—As for what he says: We became as those who are comforted, the Apostle also remembers that he is for the present as one comforted, saying: Wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? And he who now knows in part and prophesies in part, and who knows that Jerusalem is laid up for us in heaven, and when he says: To be dissolved is better, and to be with Christ. We are now indeed comforted: because the Lord says: He will send you another Comforter. When he says another, he teaches that he himself remains. For he remains: for all creation awaits the revelation of the sons of God. That revelation is the consummation of consolation. For the present, however, it is as a consolation; not lacking it in the meantime, though the perfection of its consummation remains still to come for us.

Our conversion is God's gift.

How much better is the state of the converted than the state of sinners.—Our mouth is also filled with joy, and our tongue with exultation: for the offices of our tongue and mouth are not sufficient for rendering praises to God. We have exchanged crimes for innocence, vices for virtues, ignorance for knowledge, the present for immortality: and this from God, who grants grace and restores the beginnings of new goods to the penitent. For what time is more desirable for us? That in which we committed adultery, or that in which we would have preferred to have been virgins? That in which we were drunk, or that in which we rejoice in fasting? That in which we served money, or that in which our money is used for generosity? That in which we worshipped demons, or that in which we command the demon? That in which we strove to please the world, or that in which we overcome the world?

That in which we knew not God, or that in which we are prepared as heirs for God?

The nations, beholding this faith of our hope, say: The Lord hath done great things with them.

Contemplating this change of vices into virtues, they marvel at the magnificence of God toward us. This same thing also, from the sense of this blessedness attained, we ourselves confess in the joy of the mouth and the exultation of the tongue: The Lord hath done great things with us: we are made rejoicing. For we rejoice that we have now been cleansed from the deep and wretched mire, and have been established anew from all the vices of our former life.

Why the foregoing things are in the past tense, and the following in the future.—And

because the prophet was speaking of the joys of future hope, although according to the custom of Scripture he gave thanks as though concerning past things: yet through the subsequent prayer he declares that these things do not belong to his own time, saying,

Turn, O Lord, our captivity.

If he was as one comforted when the captivity was turned away, how does he now pray that it be turned away from him? But in the foregoing passages the discourse belonged to prophetic knowledge announcing the joys of future things as though from the past: but now the prayer for the turning away of captivity is common, in which the prophet mingles himself, though he himself is not captive, as one who recognizes that he is still in the same condition. For it is written: A just man at the beginning of his speech is himself his own accuser; and again: Confess your sins first, that you may be justified (Esa.

Xliii, 26): and: Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted. The prophet knows indeed that he is free; but as one captive he is subject to God, whether through the discipline of his own confession: because where there is confession of sin, there also is justification from God; which the Lord testified in the case of the publican and the Pharisee, when the Pharisee boasted himself just, but the publican had prayed for his sins, for he says: Amen I say to you, that the publican was justified more than the Pharisee. Whether therefore the prophet prays in common for the captivity to be turned for this reason, or because he knew that the whole people was held captive by sins; and as, with the Apostle (according to the Apostle), the whole body suffers with one member, so also the prophet is co-captive with the people captive to sins.

Two sowings.—Yet he shows that it is good for him to pray concerning his captivity, saying,

He that soweth in tears shall reap in joy. Going they went and wept, casting their seeds. But coming they shall come with exultation, bearing their sheaves. What discourse is this addressed to the Jews, that the captivity of that people may seem to have been prophesied in this psalm? And what reason is there with respect to the common custom of the human race? For who has ever wept while sowing? Or is there anywhere among the Jews a usage from the law for this lamentable sowing? By no means, therefore, has this ever been written as having been done anywhere: but it is a prophecy connected with the words above.

Now the holy apostle Paul taught that there are two sowings, of the flesh and of the spirit: having set forth and enumerated the seeds of each sowing, since the flesh sows adulteries, poisonings, revellings, drunkenness, avarice, idolatry, and other things like these; but the spirit sows peace, joy, continence, charity, sobriety, meekness, and those things which follow from these; and each one is to reap what he has sown. Since, therefore, the best sacrifice to God is a contrite heart, and blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted, and each one shall reap what he has sown, bearing the fruits of his works into judgment as sheaves: we must sow with confession of sins, with mourning over the weakness of the body, with lamentation and grief of our conscience, because we can in no way worthily fulfil the precepts of God according to the purpose of our will.

Then what we have sown in tears we shall reap in joy: and going forth weeping, we shall come with exultation, filled with our fruits, and laden with the sheaves of the harvest we have laboured over, comforted through Christ, who is blessed unto ages of ages. Amen.

Unless the Lord shall have built the house, they have laboured in vain who build it.

Unless the Lord shall have kept the city, he hath watched in vain who shall keep it. It is vain for you to rise before the light: rise after you have sat down, you who eat the bread of sorrow. When he shall have given sleep to his beloved, behold the inheritance of the Lord are sons, the reward of the fruit of the womb. As arrows in the hand of the mighty, so are the sons of those that have been shaken out. Blessed is the man who hath filled his desire from them: they shall not be confounded when they shall speak to their enemies in the gate.

The understanding of this psalm is not what presents itself.

Hilary does not forbid it to be understood of earthly captivity.—The nature both of the times and of the prophecy demands that careful diligence of understanding be applied to the present psalm: lest perchance some certain absolute appearance of words and that very order of bodily events sollicit us toward an empty understanding: especially since many, not knowing the inner causes of prophetic teaching, are of the opinion, with a Jewish sense, that the prophecy of past times is contained in these songs of degrees; so that the captivity of Jerusalem which came to pass in the days of Jeremiah was foretold, and likewise the joy of that same captivity being driven away is prophesied; and that what is announced in these psalms is either the grief of servitude or the gladness of return. We do not disapprove of this sense, nor do we refute their understanding.

For it is fitting that the spirit of prophecy, according to the knowledge of providence, should speak beforehand of the pitiable fall of the people, and the punishment owed to their impiety, and the sufficient satisfaction for grave sins after long servitude, and the merciful will of God toward them in granting their return.

He contends that eternal things are foretold therein.—But since a heavier and unremitted captivity followed upon the return from that captivity, and a miserable and unchanging devastation remains upon the rebuilt city that was recovered, and since they know that the glory of a spiritual return is reserved for the remnant of Israel, and that the building of the heavenly and holy Jerusalem is being prepared until the times of the blessed and lordly kingdom; and especially since the hopes and realities of those days, the powers and kinds of all these psalms, bear witness: I do not understand why they would have the grief of the prophet be only about transient and changeable evils, and not also about eternal ones; and why they understand the joy shown forth to be rather of temporal gladnesses, and of those things which were afterwards to change into the most grievous calamities, rather than of unchangeable and eternal things; since it is more worthy of prophetic magnificence to have proclaimed blessed and eternal and heavenly things.

Although, therefore, the preceding psalms have been shown to contain not only bodily and earthly captivity, just as they contain not a perishable, not a present, not a worldly freedom: yet also this psalm too is understood to embrace nothing earthly in itself, nothing lowly, nothing suited to past times: but according to prophetic and evangelical and apostolic authority to foretell all those hopes toward which the desire of the patriarchs, the expectation of the saints, the faith of the apostles, the confession of the martyrs, and the course of all believers is extended, that is, toward holy times, toward the habitation and assembly of the eternal city, toward the blessedness of the lordly kingdom, toward the new glory of spiritual freedom, toward fellowship in the divine eternity and kingdom. And that this may be understood more fully, let us treat the very powers and properties of those words.

Those who interpret this of the temple of Solomon to be destroyed and restored are disapproved.—

Unless the Lord shall have built himself a house, they have laboured in vain who build it.

Unless the Lord shall have kept the city, they have watched in vain who keep it. It is vain for you to rise at dawn. Many wish that holy Solomon, being intent upon the building of the city and the temple, prophesied at that very time of his undertaking the overthrow of the city and the temple which he was founding: because the title placed before it shows him to be the author of this psalm. For he was striving with great forces and with all the resources of his kingdom to accomplish something magnificent and worthy of God. For up to a hundred and fifty thousand men, as it is written, were occupied in various uses and ministries of the building.

And although, by the custom he had established, the greatest care for the keeping of the city and temple was to be applied once all was completed: yet since he was not ignorant that the labour of so great a work would be in vain, the same city being destined to be destroyed by the Babylonians on account of the sins of the people, he said these things: Unless the Lord shall have built himself a house, they have laboured in vain who build it. Moreover they think that this prophecy was fulfilled in those times in which, after the captivity of the people, king Darius granting their return, the city was built again by Zerubbabel and Jeshua (Aggaei II, 3; I Es. V, 2).

The very completion of the building could refute the poverty of their sense.

For through the prophet Haggai the Lord spoke thus to these same restorers of Jerusalem: Yet once more, I will move heaven and earth, and the sea and the dry land; and I will overthrow the thrones of kings (Aggæi II, 7). The force of the psalm, therefore, is to be understood as applying not only to the times of Solomon, but also to those of Haggai. For the labour of each building is in vain. For the city built by Zerubbabel today offers from itself only the ash of its conflagration and the foulness of deformed ruins. And these thrones of kings, which the builders thought they were restoring to the glory of an eternal kingdom, a repeated devastation overthrew, with the seat of the remaining kingdoms still also to be overthrown.

The works of men are vain.—Well did the prophet prophesy that the works of human labour are vain.

He knows that the watches of human guards are useless, he knows that the morning anxieties of those who rise early are in vain. The city, both founded by him and restored by others, now is nothing: neither the first nor the subsequent building availed. And rightly is he himself the prophet of the city's overthrow who had been the author of its construction. A house must therefore be built by God if it is to endure: because unless it has been built by the Lord, it will not endure. A city must be kept by God lest it perish: because unless a city has been kept by God, it will be destroyed. And first let us understand what the house of God is: so that through this it may be possible to know how far it is to be built by him so as to endure.

What is commonly called the house of God.

God is not enclosed by places.—A house is the habitation of one who dwells. For the divine word tempers itself according to the custom and nature of our understanding, with the common names of things adapted to the signification of its teaching and instruction. For it speaks to us, not to itself; and therefore it uses our words in speaking. Indeed the assemblies of churches, or at that time of the temple, which the enclosures of buildings shut in for the secret religion of the sacraments, our custom has been accustomed to call either the house of God or the temple. Scripture too, both prophetic and apostolic, has used these names to designate places. But we are taught from his own words that this is not the house of God which is so named by us and among us. For he says: Heaven is my throne, and the earth is the footstool of my feet: what house will you build me, or what is the place of my rest?

Have not all these things my hand made (Esaiæ LXVI, 1 and 2)?

The infinite God, therefore, is not enclosed in houses of buildings, nor is the immense power which made all things contained in any place: the Apostle bearing the same witness thus: God who made the world, and all things that are in it: he, being Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands.

What is the true house of God.—Is there then no rest for God, and no habitation?

And perhaps he is not believed to exist at all who is nowhere. Let us therefore hear him bearing witness concerning his rest and habitation: for he says: This is my rest unto ages of ages: here will I dwell, for I have chosen it. Now he chose Sion: but is it that Sion of which the present complaint of this prophecy speaks, Unless the Lord shall have built the house, they have laboured in vain who build it? The Sion in which the temple had been is overthrown: and where is the eternal seat of the Lord? Where the everlasting rest? What habitable temple? Surely that one, of which it was said, You are the temple of God, and the Spirit of God dwelleth in you.

This is the house and this the temple of God, full of the teachings and virtues of God, and capable through holiness of heart of the divine indwelling, concerning which this same prophet here bore witness thus: Holy is thy temple, wonderful in equity. Human holiness, equity, continence, is a temple to God.

The structure of the house of God.—This house, therefore, must be built by God.

For built up by human works it does not endure, nor does it stand when established by the teachings of the world, nor will it be kept by the care of our vain labour and anxiety. It must be built up in another way, it must be kept in another way: not upon the earth, not begun upon shifting and crumbling sand; but its foundation must be laid upon the Prophets and Apostles. It must be enlarged with living stones, held together by the cornerstone, and built up through the increases of mutual connection into a perfect man and into the measure of the body of Christ, and adorned also with the beauty and comeliness of spiritual graces. This house, thus to be built by God, that is, by his teachings, shall not fall. The building of this house captive Israel will attain after the fullness of the gentiles.

This house will grow into many houses through the various buildings of the faithful in each one of us, for the adornment and enlargement of that blessed city.

That the Lord watches over it from the beginning.—Of which city the Lord has long been the watchful guardian, when he protects Abraham as a stranger, when he preserves Isaac to be offered, when he enriches Jacob in his servitude, when he sets Joseph sold into Egypt over it, when he strengthens Moses against Pharaoh, when he chooses Jesus as leader in wars, when he delivers David from all dangers, when he endows Solomon with the gift of wisdom, when he is present with the prophets, when he takes up Elijah, when he chooses Elisha, when he feeds Daniel, when he bedews the boys in the furnace, when as a fourth he stands with the three, when in being born of a virgin he instructs Joseph through an Angel, confirms Mary, sends John before, chooses the Apostles, prays to the Father, saying: Holy Father, keep them; when I was with them, I kept them in thy name: when finally he himself after the passion promises the watches of his eternal keeping over us, saying:

Behold I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world.

This is the eternal keeping of that blessed and holy city, which is a city to God from many coming together into one and in each one of us. For this is the pleasing possession of a holy body and faithful soul to him.

It is to be built by the Lord.—That it is to be built through the Lord, He Himself testifies in the Gospel, saying: Amen I say to you, you shall not finish the cities of Israel until the Son of Man comes. And of this time and building the blessed Apostle makes mention, saying: But when the fullness of the Gentiles shall have entered, then what remains of Israel shall be saved. These cities, therefore, that is, the God-pleasing dwelling and assembly of each holy body and soul, have this one artificer of this perfect building. This city is therefore to be built through the Lord, that it may grow unto the increase of its consummation. For the building that has begun is not yet perfection: but through building, the consummation of perfection is obtained.

Human art fails here.—Moreover, in the building of these houses of bodies and cities of souls, human arts are of no avail.

For all the vigils of the philosophers are vain, and their anxieties idle, and their study frustrated in investigating the secrets of nature and in scrutinizing the labors of the world. But such work builds a house that will soon fall. Vain also will be their morning resurrection: which, although it is appointed for all bodies that have come into the light, yet those which have not been built through the Lord shall by no means attain that glory of the morning resurrection which has already begun in the Lord rising from the dead.

How here there is no word of earthly building.—And lest the psalm should admit any opinion of an earthly and bodily understanding of itself, it teaches the time of this perfection and the meaning of what is to be built by the very order of its own words. For having condemned human buildings, and earthly watchings, and their morning resurrections, it says: Arise after you have sat down, you who eat the bread of sorrow. When He shall have given sleep to His beloved, behold the inheritance of the Lord are sons, the reward of the fruit of the womb. No place is left for doubt in these words: only the faith of understanding is necessary; for the words express the thing. For the truth of prophecy is thereafter consummated by deeds: but knowledge of the deeds is furnished by evangelical and apostolic teaching. The city therefore that shall endure is to be built by God; because human building is weak and perishable.

And lest we should suppose this city to be stones, mortar, and timber, he teaches what this city is and when it shall be perfected, saying: Arise after you have sat down. The sitting of those at rest is rest: from which those are commanded to arise who are to be made ready for this perfect city.

They eat the bread of sorrow who know the good, yet cannot attain it by their own effort.—And who then are those who are commanded to arise after they have sat down? Surely those who eat the bread of sorrow. Whoever remembers that he was born a man in vices and lives in them eats the bread of sorrow. For when our will strives through fear of God and hope of eternal things toward the perfect works of innocence, and against this a certain natural habit of vices detains us in those very things from which we strive to emerge: we receive the sorrow of life through the weakness of a will that has failed, according to the saying of the prophet: He who adds knowledge adds sorrow. For when the knowledge of truth urges our will toward the progress of attaining what is beneficial, and the habit of nature detains the will that knows it ought to make progress; the progress of knowledge, and of the better codices, and by the support of the edition of Zeno.

Is sorrow's progress: since it grieves to be so held back by nature, in proportion as it understands through knowledge that nature must be left behind. Hence therefore is the sorrow of life, hence is the bread of sorrow. Of this life and sorrow this same prophet makes mention, saying: You shall feed us with the bread of tears, and shall give us drink of tears in measure. But we must always press on, and not cease: nor must we fail to strive toward perfection because we grieve that what is striven for cannot be reached. But in the very persistence of striving, we must grieve that we cannot reach what we strive for. Of this sorrow the Lord makes mention, saying: Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted; bestowing the blessedness of consolation on account of the mourning and sorrow of a consummation not yet attained.

On account of the certainty of the prophecy, what is promised for the future is set forth in the present.—The prophetic power preserved that very order of words disposed according to times, saying: Arise after you have sat down. Of these, one is in the present, that is, arise, lest faith should waver as though concerning uncertain and doubtful things: since the truth of the prophetic admonition brought as it were a present efficacy, and instilled into us who are living the confidence of a hope that does not hesitate. But the time of this command, which is present, he deferred to the future in what he says, when you have sat down. In commands that are not to be doubted, therefore, the truth is present; but in attaining them, the dispensation of a time yet to be awaited is reserved.

The time of resurrection; the death of the saints is sleep.—But that they may know when they are to arise after they have sat down, the fullness of that very time is shown: When He shall have given, it says, sleep to His beloved. God very frequently calls the death of the saints sleep: as to this same David: When you shall have slept and rested with your fathers, then I will raise up from your seed one who shall be a son to me, and I will be to him a father; and the Lord concerning Lazarus: Lazarus sleeps; and the Apostle concerning those who shall rise says: For we who are alive shall not prevent those who have slept. When therefore the fullness of the Gentiles has been received after the sleep of death, and the remnant of Israel has been saved, then after this sitting and sleep is the time of resurrection.

And because while the fullness of the times is being concluded, the fullness also of the Gentiles who are to believe will be consummated, according to the Apostle, therefore he says: When He shall have given sleep to His beloved: showing that this is the time both of the arising of those who sit and of the giving of sleep to the beloved, that is, when all fullness has now been received.

The inheritance of the Lord and the reward are the nations whom He begets as sons.—

But who the sleeping beloved are, and who the sitting ones that shall rise, he immediately shows with a certain indication of a present thing, saying: Behold the inheritance of the Lord.

The sleeping saints, that is, and the sitting ones who shall rise, are the inheritance of the Lord: not that carnal Jacob, nor the earthly Israel, made from the division of the nations a portion and cord of inheritance, according to Moses saying: When the Most High divided the nations according to the number of the angels of God, the portion of the Lord became Jacob, the cord of His inheritance Israel. And because this Israel now no longer merits to be the inheritance on account of its impiety, he shows what the inheritance is, saying: Behold the inheritance of the Lord are sons, the reward of the fruit of the womb.

That inheritance therefore is in the sons of the Lord, which He shall have received as the reward of the fruit of the womb.

For this fruit is not empty when God who previously existed is born from a virginal womb. For His reward is the inheritance, and the inheritance itself is the sons. As many as, it says, received Him, He gave them power to become sons of God, and again: Little children, yet a little while I am with you. These sons therefore are the inheritance, and this inheritance is the reward of the fruit of the womb. The Lord therefore is the fruit of the womb, whom the Virgin brought forth, bearing Him from herself as the fruit of our life. And this is His reward, who by being born of a Virgin willed to be the fruit of the womb: that the nations, whom He would beget as sons through faith, might be His inheritance.

He merited the reward because He was made man.—That He received this reward of inheritance because He was made the fruit of the womb, another psalm testifies, saying: Ask of me, and I will give you the nations for your inheritance, and the ends of the earth for your possession; and the Apostle also testifies, saying: Who, when He was in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal to God: but emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, made in the likeness of men, and found in habit as a man; He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even the death of the cross; wherefore God also exalted Him, and gave Him a name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue should confess that the Lord Jesus is in the glory of God the Father.

This therefore is the reward of the fruit of the womb, which is given in the name, which is conferred in honor, which is bestowed in glory. And this retribution is had from His immortal nature by the nativity of human weakness that was assumed: so that because He Himself became the fruit of the womb, the inheritance of the nations also becomes His reward, and the inheritance itself is the sons.

The arrows of prophetic and apostolic teaching.—Then follows,

As arrows in the hand of the mighty, so are the sons of those who have been shaken out.

The use of arrows here is that when shot they are carried with swift flight, and are directed along a bent line to each appointed mark. That there are arrows which the Lord uses, we read thus when He says: He sent His arrows, and scattered them. In Isaiah also it is written thus, which can also be understood to have been said of the Lord Himself: And He made me as a chosen arrow, and hid me in His quiver, and said to me, It is a great thing for you to be called my servant. Such arrows of God therefore are swift in flight, faithful in their stroke: which, insofar as spiritual reason demonstrates, must be understood to signify the prophetic and apostolic teachings, in which the word of God is, sent everywhere; piercing, reproving, flying.

The sons of those shaken out are the prophets or apostles.—Although we remember that in very many places there are also deadly and lethal arrows, of which it is written: He has wrought His arrows for those who shall burn. But that something is said here about avenging arrows cannot be understood: because now it is as arrows in the hand of the mighty, so are the sons of those who have been shaken out. Pharaoh was shaken out in the Red Sea to destruction on account of the crime of his impiety. We also know that the dust shaken off by apostolic feet is a sentence of a curse.

And because either the prophets themselves, who as sons of those shaken out, that is, of sinners and of the accursed, were sent forth as flying and faithful arrows of heavenly teaching: or the apostles and teachers of the churches believed from among the nations shaken out into a curse through their own impiety: therefore he says: As arrows in the hand of the mighty, so are the sons of those shaken out: traversing the globe of the earth in their flight, wounding faithless hearts with the dart of teaching, and piercing all the incentives of sins with a saving shaft.

And that it might be understood from these words that those whom God sends forth from the sons of those shaken out as arrows of saving teaching are meant; this follows in the words,

Blessed is the man who has filled his desire from them; they shall not be confounded when they shall speak to their enemies in the gate.

Blessed therefore is he who shall have been able to fill his desire from them, that is, either from the arrows, or from the sons of those shaken out; namely, to fill himself with the desirable words of teaching, and to be satisfied from the proclaimed fruits of future goods that are awaited. And that he might show these to be the builders from God's teaching of that city which he mentioned above, he therefore closed thus: From them they shall not be confounded, when they shall speak to their enemies in the gate.

What he says, from them, either pertains to the blessed man who filled his desire from them: or it will be proper to the sons of those shaken out themselves, that from them they are not confounded, when they speak to their enemies in the gate.

The confidence of the righteous against their enemies.—Nor is there any doubt who they are that shall speak in the gate of the city built by the Lord through their preaching. We recall that in another psalm it was said: Who exaltest me from the gates of death, that I may declare all thy praises in the gates of the daughter of Sion. And here indeed there are many gates, in which the prophet, exalted from the gates of death, proclaims all the praises of God: but we know there is one royal, lordly, heavenly gate, of which it was said: This is the gate of the Lord, the just shall enter through it.

And since the sons of the shaken are not confounded when speaking to their enemies in the gate; it is necessary that those who speak to their enemies are not confounded—those who shall not deserve to enter with the just—reproaching them for their impiety toward God, their disobedience toward those who preach, their faithlessness toward eternal promises, their hatred toward the innocent, and their savagery against the very members of the Church: while they themselves are confident, and tremble with no uncertainty of their faith and religion, but bar these their enemies from the approach and entrance of him who says: No one goes to the Father except through me, our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

Blessed are all they that fear the Lord, who walk in his ways.

Thou shalt eat the labours of thy fruits: blessed art thou, and it shall be well with thee. Thy wife as a fruitful vine on the sides of thy house. Thy children as young olive plants round about thy table. Behold, thus shall the man be blessed that feareth the Lord. The Lord bless thee out of Sion: and mayest thou see the good things of Jerusalem all the days of thy life. And mayest thou see thy children's children: peace upon Israel.

The distinction between the fear of God and human fear.—As often as there is mention of the fear of the Lord in the Scriptures, it must be observed that it is never left alone, as though sufficient of itself for the perfection of faith: but many things are added after it, or placed before it, from which the nature and perfection of the fear of the Lord may be understood: as we know from what was said through Solomon in the Proverbs: For if thou shalt call for wisdom, and incline thy voice to understanding, and seek it as silver, and search for it as for treasures, then shalt thou understand the fear of the Lord. For we see by how many steps one arrives at the fear of the Lord. For first wisdom must be invoked, and every duty of reading must be devoted to understanding, and wisdom must be sought and searched out: and then the fear of the Lord is to be understood.

But as far as the common sense of human opinion is concerned, fear is not thought of in this way.

For fear is the trembling of human weakness, dreading to suffer what one would not wish to happen to oneself. It arises and is stirred in us from consciousness of guilt, from the right of one who is superior, from the assault of one who is stronger, from the chance of illness, from the encounter with a wild beast, and from the suffering of every evil. This fear, therefore, is not taught; but it arises from the nature of our weakness. Nor do we learn what is to be feared; but the very things that are feared cast their own terror upon us.

The fear of God is not natural.

It consists in obedience and love.—But concerning the fear of the Lord it is thus written: Come, ye children, hearken to me, I will teach you the fear of the Lord. The fear of God must therefore be learned, because it is taught. For it consists not in terror, but in the reason of doctrine: nor is it to be entered upon through the trembling of nature, but through the observance of precepts and the works of an innocent life and the knowledge of truth. For if God is to be feared because many things have been burned by lightning, things have been struck down by thunder, lands have at one time fallen by earthquake and at another time been swallowed up by a chasm; there is no merit of faith in a fear that is stirred by the terror of accidents. But for us all fear of God consists in love: perfect love consumes fear of him.

And this is the proper duty of our love toward him: to obey his commands, to comply with his ordinances, to trust in his promises.

Let us therefore hear the Scripture saying: And now, Israel, what doth the Lord thy God require of thee, but that thou fear the Lord thy God, and walk in all his ways, and love him, and keep his commandments with all thy heart and with all thy soul, that it may be well with thee? In agreement and accord with these words the prophet spoke at the beginning of the psalm, saying,

Blessed are all they that fear the Lord, who walk in his ways: showing that it is not from our trembling

because this is the author of fear in our mire in the rest; nor from terror of him who is terrible, that those who fear are blessed; but from the fact that they walk in the ways of God. For fear, as we have said, consists not in dread, but in obedience: and the testimony of fear is compliance.

Otherwise if anyone fears, yet does not obey; he will indeed be one who fears through the trembling of nature, but he will not be blessed through the duties of fear.

The ways of the Lord are many, and one.—The ways of the Lord are many; though he himself is the way.

But when he speaks of himself, he calls himself the way, and shows the reason why he called himself the way, saying: For no one can come to the Father except through me. But when the discourse is about the prophets and their writings, through which one proceeds to Christ; then the ways are many, all converging from every side into one way: both of which things are signified in the same passage through the prophet Jeremiah, who says: Stand ye in the ways of the Lord, and ask for the ancient paths of God, and see which is the good way, and walk in it. Many ways therefore are to be inquired into, and one must press on through many; so that we may find the one that is good, namely through the teaching of many, we shall find the one way of eternal life.

For there are ways in the law, ways in the prophets, ways in the gospels, ways in the apostles: there are also ways in the various works of the commandments, in which those who walk through the fear of God are blessed, to whom it is said.

All are one in Christ.—

Thou shalt eat the labours of thy fruits.

A discourse begun to many is referred to one, teaching us that all of us who have believed in Christ are one, as the Apostle confirms, saying: For you are all one in Christ Jesus. Whether therefore he speaks to one or to many; it will be of the same significance in one as in many.

The labours of fruits are not usually eaten.—It must be considered, however, that this prophetic utterance differs from the usage of common understanding.

For in this manner of life, those who eat, eat the fruits of their labours, taking from the proceeds of their worked toil. But the prophet says that the labours of fruits are to be eaten. Human understanding does not follow the meaning of this saying. For fruit comes from labours, not labour from fruits. Moreover, labour is the ministry of the body: but fruit is the reward of labour. Now the ministry of the body is incorporeal, though it is performed by the body. But we can eat nothing except what is corporeal.

This labour is the food of the soul, the fruit comes after.—But the prophet treats of nothing earthly and present: for his discourse is about the blessedness of those who fear the Lord and walk in his ways. For those who walk in the ways of the Lord shall eat the labours of their fruits. For here the eating is not bodily; because neither is that which is to be eaten bodily. But we have here a spiritual food, nourishing our soul unto life, namely good works, of goodness, chastity, mercy, patience, tranquillity, in which we must labour against the vices of our bodies. The fruit of these labours is in eternity: but this labour of eternal fruits must first be eaten, and by it our soul must be nourished in this bodily life, obtaining through the food of these labours the living bread, the heavenly bread, from him who said: I am the living bread from heaven: whoever receives it unworthily, according to the Apostle's command, acquires judgment for himself.

These therefore are the labours of fruits to be eaten, namely of those fruits which shall be reaped in the heavens.

Now while we are on earth, works must be taken up. For these now satisfy the soul, these shall follow it to heaven with their fruits. Finally in the following

the prophet shows the blessedness of each of these two times, saying, Blessed art thou, and it shall be well with thee.

Of these, the one is obtained in the present, namely that thou art blessed: but that it shall be well with thee is laid up for the future, because in the meantime the labour of future fruits is eaten.

Temporal blessing is not promised to the just.—

Thy wife as a fruitful vine on the sides of thy house.

Thy children as young olive plants round about thy table. Behold, thus shall the man be blessed that feareth the Lord. To many perhaps this discourse will seem suited to the joy of a present blessing: so that through the mercy of God there may be available a peaceful and beneficial welfare of a spouse in the home, and the most sweet gathering of children around the table. But if these things had been perfectly good—which, while they are good, are nevertheless not heavenly goods—yet if blessedness in the fear of God had consisted in these things, Abraham, the prince of faith and the fear of God, would surely have obtained it; yet his wife, long barren, was twice taken from him; his one son, born of promise, was commanded to be offered as a victim, and being brought to the sacrifice, brought him the grief of bereavement.

Then Isaac's two sons were at strife, and enemies to the point of deadly hatred.