Commentary on Isaiah 1 part 11/23

As many, then, as join to the doctrine of faith — which has our Lord Jesus Christ as its foundation and beginning — doctrines that are foreign and alien to true religion, these are the ones whom the word laments as acting contrary to what is fitting in joining house to house.

For that the doctrines of true religion are called a "house," the Lord himself taught us through the parable, saying: "Everyone who hears these words of mine and does them shall be likened to a wise man, who built his house upon the rock."

And Paul too, in his First Epistle to the Corinthians, seems to teach us that each of those who have believed in Christ builds himself a house.

"For no one," he says, "can lay any other foundation than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ."

"But if anyone builds upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, or straw..."

And since, among those who construct doctrines, some, holding opinions worthy of laughter and mockery, build, as it were, a laughingstock, while the more refined construct serious things, Micah, tearing down the buildings of those worthy of ridicule, says:

"You who are in Gath," he says, "do not magnify yourselves;

and you who are in Acharim, do not rebuild out of the house of your laughingstock."

And again the same prophet, rebuking wicked teachers, says:

"Hear now this, you leaders of the house of Jacob, and remnant of the house of Israel, who abhor judgment and pervert all that is right, who build up Zion with blood, and Jerusalem with iniquities."

For everyone who constructs alien doctrines builds Zion — that is, his own watchtower — with blood;

and he who forms a congregation of evildoers builds Jerusalem with iniquities.

If, then, there are two kinds of building — the one good, upon the rock and upon the foundation of Christ;

and the other base, which is both ridiculous and a cause of ruin — the word rightly pronounces wretched those who join the good house to the baser one, as it were mingling things that cannot be mingled.

For those who possess, as a good house, the common notions implanted in them by the Creator, whenever, straying from the truth, they introduce through outward deception things alien to divine teaching, thereby join, as it were, a worse house to the good house.

And so much, then, for the discourse concerning the house.

But since the holy one is not only God's building but also God's husbandry, as the blessed Paul says, and this same soul has been founded like a house and rooted like a plant ("rooted and founded in love," as he says), come, let us also treat of the encroachment upon the field, whereby those who act wrongly and mistakenly become liable to the condemnation set down here.

Let us, then, examine together whatever has been said concerning husbandry, as being akin to the matters before us.

There is, then, a noble planting — that of which Solomon speaks, saying:

"I planted for myself a vineyard, I made for myself gardens and orchards, and I planted in them every kind of fruit tree."

But there is also a certain planting which the heavenly Father did not plant, and which is uprooted according to the threat of the Lord.

This planting has its vine from the vine-stock of Sodom, and its shoot from Gomorrah, and it cultivates grapes of gall, and bears clusters of bitterness for those who possess it;

"Their wine is the venom of dragons, and the incurable venom of asps."

He, then, who has planted his own governing faculty with every kind of spiritual fruitfulness, and who, upon those roots naturally implanted in him by the Creator for the display of the fruits of righteousness, grafts on the produce of the evil husbandman — this is the one who, on account of the forbidden encroachment of field upon field, is pronounced wretched by the word.

"For where ten yoke of oxen labor, it will make but one jar."

The literal wording speaks of the local custom of those in Phoenicia who plow the vineyard with oxen;

but the passage indicates those who waver between both sides, and who touch upon and join opposing doctrines to one another;

whose souls are unfruitful.

"Woe to those who rise up early in the morning and pursue strong drink, who linger on until late..."

For wine will inflame them.

For they drink wine to the sound of harp and psaltery and timbrels and flutes;

but they do not look upon the works of the Lord, nor do they consider the works of his hands.

This present portion of the prophecy contains the exposition of the apostolic saying:

Drunkards will not inherit the kingdom of God;

Woe to those who rise up early in the morning and pursue strong drink,

For among the Hebrews it is customary to call "strong drink" any beverage capable of producing drunkenness.

Those, then, who from the very start of the day, according to the Proverb, give their eyes to cups and bowls, and look about to see where the drinking-parties are, going around to wine-shops and taverns, and taking one another along to banquets, and spending all the soul's concern on care for such things —

these are lamented by the Prophet.

who give themselves no time at all for the consideration of God's wonders, nor allow their eyes leisure to lift up toward heaven and the beauties therein, so as, from the ordered arrangement of these things, to conceive the thought of the One who brought them into being;

but rather, adorning their banqueting-hall with varied carpets and flowered hangings, they display an excessive zeal and diligence in preparing drinking-vessels — coolers and rhyta and bowls and wooden cups, and mixing-bowls — devising such names and shapes for the furnishing of their drunkenness, so that the variety of vessels might steal away from them the sense of being sated, and the exchanging and shifting of cups might provide them ample occupation for drinking.

And besides these there are certain feast-masters, and chief cup-bearers, and chief stewards, and order amid disorder, and arrangement in a disorderly affair.

The overseers are drunk, the servants are drunk;

everything is full of those laughing and those drunk;

a pitiable spectacle in the eyes of Christians.

Then indeed, just as among worldly rulers the dignity of the bodyguard enhances their power, so also, having set up around drunkenness, as though around a queen, a kind of attendant retinue, they conceal its disgrace by the very excess of their zeal.

In addition to these, garlands and flowers strewn over the banquet, perfumes and incense, and countless outward delights contrived, prepare greater preoccupation for those who are perishing, procuring for them, to match their present cheerfulness, an eternal punishment of equal measure.

Then, further on, as the drinking proceeds, flutes and harps and timbrels — which in truth mourn for those who are perishing, though the drunkards put them to their own use —

so that all the pleasures of the soul are stirred up in them by the melody, as though, wine not being sufficient by itself, the melody by its own warmth were to arouse a swarm of desires in the wretched soul of the drinker.

But so that all their senses might be held captive, bewitched by pleasure: their hearing is charmed by the flute, their sense of smell is filled with rising fumes, the mouth is put to the service of wine's passage, the eyes see what is happening — or rather, they look amiss, having had the accuracy of their perception taken away by drunkenness.

For when might they be taught concerning God? In the morning? But as soon as they rise from sleep, they pursue strong drink.

But at midday? But then, above all, their drinking gains increase and advance.

But in the evening? But they are still drinking.

And the day has failed them, but their drunkenness does not fail;

but above all they cling to the night, as though it especially belonged to them.

Woe, then, to those who rise up early in the morning and pursue strong drink, who tarry until late!

Then the Prophet states the cause by which they are able to hold out in their drinking:

"For wine will inflame them" — stating the cause by which their desire for drinking remains insatiable.

Because, he says, when much unmixed wine is taken in, bringing greater heat into the body, it parches the drinker's natural moisture.

Then, I think, the wine, itself becoming fuel for itself, the wine that came first prepares room for that which enters afterward.

And just as ravines, while the water is flowing in, seem to be full, but once it has passed by, are left dry and stony and without moisture, so also the bodies of drunkards, having been made like dry riverbeds by the excess of wine, have their natural moisture swept away along with it.

For wine will inflame them.

And the fire arising from wine, kindled in the flesh, becomes tinder for the fiery darts of the enemy.

For wine drowns reasoning and the mind, but like oil it kindles desires and pleasures into flame;

so that we understand the saying, "Wine will inflame them," as referring not only to the desire for drinking, but also to the rest of the body's burning.

Then the discourse proceeds, further increasing the absurdity of their conduct:

"For," he says, "they drink wine to the sound of harp and psaltery and timbrels and flutes."

For certain young harpists, who, having wretchedly gone astray, are drunk in their very eyes, and flute-girls and lyre-girls, who wickedly squander their youthful bloom, and choruses and consorts of wicked persons, their bodies dissolved into licentiousness, breaking down souls with vulgar music, incite those who are in their cups to every shameful and lawless pleasure.

And what results from this? Not looking upon the works of the Lord, and not considering the works of his hands.

"To look upon" suggests the apprehension of visible things;

while "to consider" represents the contemplation, through the mind, of invisible things.

Since, then, the invisible things of God are clearly seen, being understood through the things that are made from the creation of the world, the one who does not look upon the works is not led, either, to the understanding that comes through the mind.

What, then, is meant? That drunkenness is the beginning of godlessness, being a darkening of the intellectual faculty by which, above all, God is naturally known.

And the works of his hands, and the recompense that awaits them — that fire, and the punishment in Hades: a tongue utterly parched, longing for the comfort of a tiny drop;

a flame on every side, not even allowing a breath of air to cool the burning heat that remains in the inward parts.

In place of flute-players, groaning;

instead of immoderate drunkenness, a longing for a single drop, while the flesh of the drunkards is roasted in the furnace as on a griddle;

instead of licentious spectacles, deep darkness;

instead of the sleepless desire, the sleepless worm.

Those, then, who have submerged their mind in drunkenness are unable to consider these works of his hands;

and because they do not foresee what awaits them, the discourse reasonably laments them as though they were already in the midst of these terrible things.

Let those hear this who keep harps and lyres in their houses instead of the Gospels — that the Prophet calls out to them as those already lost, bewailing their destruction out of loving compassion.

"Woe," he says, "to those who drink wine to the sound of harps and flutes and timbrels and psalteries."

But for you, the lyre, adorned with gold and ivory, is set up on some lofty pedestal like a statue and idol of demons;

and some wretched woman, instead of being taught to press her hands to the spindle, has been taught by you, under the compulsion of her servitude, to stretch them out upon the lyre — you having perhaps even paid the fees for this, and perhaps having handed her over to some procuress, who, after having contended in every wantonness with her own body, now presides over the young women as a teacher of the same things.

On her account a twofold evil will meet you on the day of judgment:

both for the acts of wantonness you yourself commit, and for those by which you have alienated a wretched soul from God through wicked teachings.

Then she takes her place at the lyre and lays her hands upon the strings;

her forearm bared, her face without shame.

Then the whole banquet turns toward her, and the eyes of all are carried there, and ears fall silent before the strokes of the strings;

and the uproar there is checked, and laughter is hushed, along with the contest of licentious words.

And all who are in the house fall quiet, charmed by the wanton melody.

But he who is silent there does not fall quiet in the church of God, nor does he fall silent before the voices of the Gospel.

For the enemy who there imposes silence is the same one who here instigates the uproar.

It is a pitiable sight to chaste eyes: a woman not weaving at the loom, but singing to the lyre;

not being recognized by her own husband, but being gazed upon by others;

not singing a psalm of confession, but the songs of a harlot;

not supplicating God, but hastening toward Gehenna;

not hastening to the church of God, but dragging others down along with herself.

and how to draw down the warp, or twist the weft, she neither knows nor wishes to know.

Being in company with the drunken, she takes up their practices.

Indeed they weave a spider's web: as though laying their hands upon certain taut threads of the warp, and moving the shuttle-like center rapidly this way and that, they display no end to their activity.

For among the crafts that are necessary for life, the end lies plain before the eyes — as of carpentry, the bench; of building, the house; of shipbuilding, the ship; of weaving, the garment; of smithing, the knife;

but of the vain crafts — such as lyre-playing, or dancing, or flute-playing, or other things of this kind — once the activity ceases, the work vanishes along with it.

And indeed, according to the apostolic word, "their end is destruction."

...at times of festive gladness — weddings or banquets — with flutes and lyres and dances, has of necessity been examined by us, so that, having learned the divine word's censure of such pursuits, through fear of the threatened evils you may at least henceforth change your wicked habit of life for the better.

But it is also possible, by examining the sense of these words according to another interpretation, to find something else profitable for our souls.

"Woe," he says, "to those who rise up early and pursue strong drink."

That is, those who — no sooner has the darkness of ignorance been dispelled for them through their introduction into the knowledge of God, and the Sun of Righteousness has risen upon them (so that, instead of their former lawless and impious selves, they have come to be called godly and enrolled among the Church of God) — are nevertheless so overpowered by the passions of the flesh that they are driven out of their right reason and overturned no less than those darkened by drunkenness.

Such men, then, the word calls wretched — those who, after receiving the teaching of God, give themselves over to the drunkenness of the passions. For he who speaks the following knows that men are often drunk even without wine:

"Woe to those who are drunk without wine."

For just as wine, poured in beyond what is needful or beyond the drinker's capacity, naturally brings darkness upon the reason, so too the passions of desire, or grief, or anger, once they overpower the reason, drive those possessed by them out of their minds.

Wretched, then, and thrice wretched, are those who are steeped in drunkenness not only at the beginning of life, but who remain so even to the late hour — that is, who abandon themselves to the passions right up to the sunset of their life.

In one sense, then, the illumination that comes to hearts from the full knowledge of God is called "morning";

but in another sense, it is that time at which we begin the life of reason, once reason has been brought to completion.

For in either case the former life is darkness and night — whether because reason is not yet perfected and the soul lies submerged in irrationality;

or because, on account of estrangement from God, the mind is veiled in deep darkness.

"Woe, then, to those who rise up early" — that is, to those who have but just now put off the folly of youth, yet instead of vigorously wrestling down the passions by the power of reason, are overturned by them and pursue the passions as though pursuing a kind of drunkenness.

Most wretched indeed are those who, both at the beginning of life and at its ending, never cease from such drunkenness.

For some ceased their drunkenness immediately after dawn, others went on a little further before stopping, while others prolonged it much further still.

It is good, then, as soon as we have risen, to seek to live soberly and in a priestly manner, that we may become worthy of entering the holy places, drinking no wine or strong drink.

And the Lord spoke to Aaron, saying:

"You shall not drink wine or strong drink, you and your sons with you, whenever you enter into the tabernacle of witness,"

But since it is difficult for sinlessness to be attained in human nature, the second-best course, as they say, is to rise up from drunkenness immediately after morning.

But as for those who linger long over wine, and who seek out where drinking-bouts are to be had, their mind is so preoccupied with the search for these things that it is unable to gaze upon the works of the Lord, or to consider the works of his hands.

But the lyre and the harp — the inventions of Jubal, who descends from the line of Cain — intensify their drunkenness all the more.

For "Lamech," it says, "took to himself two wives:"

"the name of the one was Adah, and the name of the second was Zillah."

"And Adah bore Jabal."

"He was the father of those who dwell in tents, keepers of cattle."

"And the name of his brother was Jubal:"

"he was the one who introduced the harp and the lyre."

Laban was a devotee of such lyre-music, with which he wished to send Jacob on his way.

"For if you had told me, I would have sent you away with gladness and with music, with tambourines and lyre."

But the patriarch fled, seeing that such things were an obstacle to gazing upon the works of the Lord and considering the works of his hands.

...at the sound of the pipe and the lyre, the sackbut and the psaltery in symphony, and every kind of instrument sounding together, the peoples and tribes and tongues fell down to worship;

but those who, from the start, had not endured to drink Babylonian wine, and had abhorred the luxury of the royal table, neither fell down to worship, but despised all human dominion, and even quenched the very power of the fire.

But if it is a sin not to look upon the works of the Lord and not to consider the works of his hands, let us lift up the eyes of our mind and come to know the creative principles of God's works, and, in proportion to the magnitude of the beauty of the creatures, behold the Author of the origin of the things made, corresponding to what has been created.

And since "the invisible things of God, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen, being understood through the things that are made," the sensory apprehension of the things made is, one might say, called "sight," while the intelligible apprehension of the things above the world is termed "understanding."

"The works of the Lord," it says, "they do not look upon" (that is, they do not gaze with their eyes upon sensible things);

"and the works of his hands they do not consider" — that is, they do not seek out, through the activity of the mind, the apprehension of things invisible.

But in order that the meaning of the word "morning" may be made still clearer to us: the return from darkness — whether from the irrationality that comes with youth, or from the ignorance of God that arises in souls — that is, the first entrance into the truth, is called "morning."

You may also gather together the many passages throughout the Prophets concerning "morning" or "dawn," so that, by the comparison of several together, the matter in question may become plain.

For example: "I sent forth the Prophets betimes;"

and: "In the morning you shall hear my voice;"

and: "In the morning I will present myself before you, and I will watch;"

and: "From the night my spirit rises early to you, O God;"

and: "O God, my God, I rise early to you;"

and: "In the mornings I destroyed all the sinners of the land;"

and: "Weeping shall lodge in the evening, but joy comes in the morning."

How then, in a manner fitting to the benefit that God bestows upon men, are the Prophets said to be sent "in the morning"? Because every word that comes from God comes to us who are able to hear and heed the divine will — it does not touch those who are in childish folly, but those who already possess the natural conceptions for the discernment of good and evil.

The word, then, concerns these: that as soon as they had begun to glimpse understanding, and had, as it were, raised the eyes of the soul out of the ignorance that preceded, and had received some ray of light in the eyes of the heart, the word of God came rushing in together with this, marking out what was to be done and what was of value.

Of the same sense too is the verse of the psalm:

"In the morning you shall hear my voice; in the morning I will present myself before you."

For as long as night still surrounds our soul, and the sun has not yet risen, it is not possible to be heard by God;

but when the soul, purified from ignorance concerning God, offers up its supplications, having come to be within the brightness of the rational and spiritual day, it finds God hearkening to its voice.

"In the morning I will present myself before you, and I will watch."

For if you are about to stand before God, do not attach yourself to anything wicked, but do what was commanded to Moses:

"But stand there before me" — firm, unshaken, and immovable, presenting yourself to him in faith, so that you may become worthy to behold the visions of truth.

"I will present myself before you," he says, "and I will watch."

For as long as someone is a contemplator of the beauty manifest in visible things, he is called a natural philosopher, or physiologist;

but when a man, having transcended these things, stands before God himself, having come to know how it is that all things are "exceedingly good," and having run up from the beauty found in them to the truly beautiful and lovable — whose vision is by nature revealed only to pure souls — then, having advanced beyond the realm of natural philosophy to what some call "metaphysics," he can become a beholder of the mysteries.

...I shall take up this contemplative activity through the illumination that comes by knowledge.

In harmony with this is the saying, "The heavens declare the glory of God" — not that they emit a voice perceptible to our ears, but that one who has been trained in the principles of the constitution of the cosmos, and has come to know the arrangement of all things in the heavens, will, through these things as if uttering a voice, be taught the majesty of the glory of him who made them.

To this end the Prophet also rouses us, saying:

"Lift up your eyes and see who has displayed all these things."

For "to lift up the eyes" means to contemplate loftily, and to be led through the things that are seen to a conception of the Maker.

As for "rising early from the night toward God," it is something like this:

when the night is far spent and the day draws near, and we begin to walk decently, as in the day, having put off the works of darkness — revelling and drunkenness, chambering and wantonness — then we are able to say:

"From the night my spirit rises early to you, O God."

Then he also shows, by what follows, what it is that produces the dawn in him.

For the precepts are light, dissolving the darkness of ignorance;

wherefore also it is said, "The commandment of the Lord is radiant, enlightening the eyes."

But what is said in the hundredth Psalm ("In the mornings I put to death all the sinners of the land") is, I think, plain to everyone, that it is spoken in a covered and enigmatic way.

For it is not that at the beginning of every day I defiled my hands with the blood of men;

for this, besides being impious, is also implausible;

for how could one, every single morning, become with his own hand the slayer of all the sinners of the earth? For it was not possible for one man to prevail over all of them, since, as is likely, those who sin were many;

and even if he had overcome them in war, he would certainly have killed them all together in a single morning, but would not have become their slayer with his own hand on every single morning.

What, then, is the meaning of "In the mornings I put to death all the sinners of the land, that I might destroy out of the city of the Lord all who work lawlessness"? Let us listen to what is said with more understanding, so that we may not accuse the prophetic oracles of what is not permitted.

The city of the Lord is the constitution of the human frame;

and the sinners of the land are none other than those about whom the Savior speaks:

"For out of the heart come forth evil reasonings: envies, murders, adulteries, thefts, false witnesses, and things like these."

These sinners of the land, then — those who proceed from the earthly flesh — he who purifies himself annihilates from his own constitution with every thought concerning God.

Morning and dawn, then, come to be in the soul with every rising of a saving doctrine;

and in it all the reasonings that work lawlessness must be blotted out.

For if the soul's first movements toward wickedness are not cut off, its inward thoughts must necessarily proceed into action.

For example, a sinner of the land is the reasoning that suggests adultery, the one that brings about looking at a woman so as to desire her.

If, then, it is not put to death out of the soul, as it were by some sword — the word that cuts and destroys the passions — and this be done in the morning, that is, before it is disclosed in the open, then, after the adultery committed in the heart, it will lead the man on to a sin greater than this, calling him forth to act through the body.

We consider what is said by Jeremiah to be in harmony with this:

"Cursed is he who does the works of the Lord carelessly, and who withholds his sword from blood."

Such, then, is also what is now said concerning "morning."

Woe to him who, out of darkness and the night of ignorance — after the word has dawned in him following his first stage of life, at the very moment of rising from sleep — pursues strong drink.

But those who have purified their mind both look upon the world of visible things and understand the substances and essences of intelligible things.

For visible things require only steady gazing;

but intelligible things require discursive reasoning;

yet one must first look upon the works of the Lord, and only then proceed to understand them.

Such was he who said concerning himself:

"For he himself gave me unerring knowledge of the things that are, to know the constitution of the world and the working of the elements, the beginning and end and middle of times, the changes of solstices and the alterations of seasons, the cycles of the years and the positions of the stars, the natures of living creatures and the tempers of wild beasts, the violence of winds and the reasonings of men, the differences of plants and the powers of roots."

"Therefore my people have become captives, because they did not know the Lord;

and there arose a multitude of dead through famine of bread and thirst for water."

In the historical sense, these things can find their explanation with reference to the time of the final siege of the Jews, when some were led away into captivity, while others perished by famine and thirst.

And the reason for which they suffered these things is clear:

because when the Lord dwelt among them, they did not recognize him.

But that the exhortation arising from the text may also become fitting for us,

we say this: those who pursue drunkenness, and drink wine accompanied by forbidden music, and occupy their eyes with unseemly spectacles, but do not endure to look upon the works of the Lord — because they are lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God — become captives and subject to their adversaries.

But also among them there arose a multitude of dead through famine and lack of water.

For those who do not receive the food that is fitting for souls become dead through their transgressions;