Commentary on Isaiah 3 part 2/2

and yet the one sin was against himself, but the other against a human being.

And when the sacrifice was set before him, he commanded that the gift be left behind and not be offered first, until he who had grieved his neighbour had put matters right with his brother.

And when he was judging the man who had devoured the ten thousand talents, concerning the sins committed against himself he neither called him wicked, and was quickly reconciled, and forgave the whole debt;

but concerning the hundred denarii, he both calls him a wicked servant and hands him over to the tormentors, and declared that he would not release him until he should pay back the whole debt.

And when Christ himself was struck, he did nothing to the servant who had inflicted the blow, but even answered gently, saying:

'If I have spoken evil, bear witness of the evil;

but if well, why do you strike me?' But when Jeroboam stretched out his hand and attempted to seize the prophet who was then rebuking him, he caused his hand to wither, teaching you also to bear patiently the wrongs done to yourself, but to avenge with great severity those done against the Master.

For this very reason, in giving the law, even though he said that love toward one's neighbour was the second commandment, yet he made it like the first;

and just as he requires the former with all excess, so also this latter.

For concerning the former he says:

'With all your heart and with all your soul';

and one might see from many other places also how great an exactness God requires from us concerning the just dealings we owe one another.

Observe, then, how here too he presses vehemently and heightens the accusation with the weightiest words:

'But you,' he says, 'why have you set fire to my vineyard?' What enemies and some cruel barbarians might have done, this you have done to your own kinsfolk.

He calls the people a vineyard because of the great zeal he bestowed upon them and the care from on high.

And, heightening the charge, he did not say:

'Why have you done this to your fellow servants, your neighbours, your brothers?' but:

'My things,' he says, 'you have destroyed, my things you have ruined.' Then, showing the manner of the burning, he says:

'The plunder of the poor is in your houses.'

For hail is not wont to ravage the vines as the injustice done to the poor and needy is by nature apt to set the soul ablaze, wringing it with a dejection more grievous than any death.

Everywhere, then, robbery is an evil;

but most of all when he who is wronged is in the uttermost poverty.

And he does not merely rebuke in saying this, but also corrects, directing them to the contemplation of the robbery.

For after the very statement, the sight lying before their eyes is sufficient to prick the conscience of one not too dully disposed.

'Why do you wrong my people?' Again he continued in the same manner, just as there:

'My vineyard,' so also here:

'And do you put to shame the faces of the lowly?' Those whom you ought to have set upright you were thrusting down, those whom you ought to have raised up you were casting down.

For along with their robbery they also spat upon the more lowly and treated them worse than slaves, adding arrogance to their covetousness, and from the injustice of this wealth acquiring great insolence of mind.

For the disease of pride is yoked together with covetousness;

and the more a man extends his wealth, the more he aggravates this very disease.

This says the Lord, the Lord of hosts.

Of hosts? He means the angels, the archangels, the powers above, leading the hearer up from earth to heaven, casting him into the contemplation of His great kingdom, so that by this at least, having struck him with awe, He may make him more temperate, and may show that such great forbearance is not a matter of weakness but of long-suffering.

Because the daughters of Zion were lifted up and went forth with lofty neck and with beckoning of the eyes, and with the

gait of their feet, trailing their tunics at once, and toying with their feet.

And God shall humble the ruling daughters of Zion, and the Lord shall uncover their form in that day.

And the Lord shall take away the glory of their raiment, and their ornaments, and the plaited braids, and the tresses, and the crescent-shaped ornaments, and the necklace, and the adornment of their face, and the arrangement of the ornament of glory, and the bracelets, and the armlets, and the wreathed work, and the finger-rings, and the ornaments for the right hand, and the earrings, and the purple-bordered garments, and the purple-mingled robes, and the coverlets throughout the house, and the transparent Laconian fabrics, and the fine linen, and the hyacinth-colored garments, and the scarlet ones, and the fine linen interwoven with gold and hyacinth, and the summer veils fringed with gold.

And it shall come to pass that instead of a sweet fragrance there shall be dust, and instead of a girdle you shall gird yourself with a rope, and instead of the adornment of your head you shall have baldness because of your works, and instead of the purple-mingled tunic you shall gird yourself with sackcloth.

These things shall be yours instead of adornment.

And your most beautiful son, whom you love, shall fall by the sword, and your mighty men shall fall by the sword and shall be brought low.

And the repositories of your adornment shall mourn, and you shall be left alone and be cast down to the ground.

The prophet has here done something strange, extending a long discourse against the women, which nowhere in the Scriptures do we see done in this way.

What then is the cause of this strange thing? It seems to me that at that time the folly of the women had grown great, and that they contributed the greater share to the wickedness of the men.

Therefore he addresses them particularly, bringing against them the most grievous accusations, and he traces the discourse back to the beginning, speaking again in the person of God.

Because the daughters of Zion were lifted up and walked with a lofty neck.

He charges them with the chief of evils: senselessness and arrogance.

For this is everywhere a grievous thing, but most of all when it is born in the female nature.

For a woman filled with pride, being lighter and more irrational, is easily overturned and submerged and suffers shipwreck at the hands of every evil spirit, since conceit and arrogance are drowning her.

He seems to be addressing the women in Jerusalem;

therefore he called them the daughters of Zion.

And they walked with a lofty neck.

Here he both ridicules them and shows the female mind, unable to be contained even within thought, but bursting forth and displaying itself through the motions of the body.

And not only of senselessness but also of wantonness he accuses them, saying this and making it clear from what follows.

And with beckoning of the eyes, which is characteristic of harlot women, to roll the pupils and thereby to display much folly and effeminacy;

and of being enervated and effeminate nothing is so much a sign as this.

And with the gait of their feet trailing their tunics at once.

This is no small accusation, even if it seems small, but a proof of the utmost ruin and of being enervated and dissolute and dissipated—the trailing of the tunics.

Indeed, one even of the pagan comic poets ascribed this to his adversary, saying:

letting down his cloak all the way to his ankles.

And toying with their feet at once.

And this again is a demonstration of the same unseemliness.

For through all things—through the eyes, through the garments, through the feet, through the walk—both chastity and wantonness are made manifest.

For the movements of the senses are, as it were, certain heralds of the soul that sits within.

And just as painters, mixing their colors, portray the images they wish;

so also the movements of the members of the body bring the characters of the soul outward and set them before our eyes.

Therefore another wise man also said:

A man's attire, and the laughter of his teeth, and the step of his foot, shall declare the things concerning him.

And God shall humble the ruling daughters of Zion, and the Lord shall uncover their form in that day, and the Lord shall take away the glory of their raiment.

Having laid down two accusations, senselessness and wantonness, to each

he applies the corresponding remedy, to the first the first and to the second the one that follows:

to the senselessness, humiliation; and to the beautifying of the form, the removal of that adornment.

For when war overtakes them at that time, all these things will vanish away, he says.

For those who are inflamed and senseless, being subdued by fear, shall be delivered from the disease;

and those who are effeminate and enervated in every way, falling into the yoke of captivity, shall be freed from all that folly.

So that, to make the discourse more weighty to them and to lay hold of the understanding of the hearers, he also recounts in detail the adornment of the garments, of the gold ornaments, that upon the face, that upon the rest of the body; and he proceeds also to the ornament of the house.

For they did not adorn only their bodies, but they carried this insolence even to the walls, spending on what was in no way necessary;

and by twisting their hair as well, they spread out on every side the wings of such deceit.

And this then he charges, saying that He shall take away the glory of their raiment, and their ornament, and their plaited braids, and the tresses.

By 'tresses' he means either some ornament about the head or the very fashion of the head-band.

an ornament about the neck, crescent-shaped.

And the adornment of their face.

Here he seems to me to be hinting at cosmetic paints and eye-pencilings.

And the arrangement of the ornament of glory.

the gold ornaments about the arms.

a golden ornament about the head.

And the finger-rings and the ornaments for the right hand;

And the earrings, and the purple-bordered garments, and the purple-mingled robes, and the coverlets throughout the house, and the transparent Laconian fabrics.

For so great was their zeal for wantonness that they used not only the local products, but gathered these even from afar and from foreign lands, and undertook voyages across the sea for their sake.

For great is the distance between Palestine and Lacedaemon, and the sea between is boundless.

Therefore he has not simply set down the homeland, omitting the garments, but so as to display their surpassing licentiousness.

And the fine linen, and the hyacinth-colored garments, and the scarlet ones, and the fine linen interwoven with gold and hyacinth, and the summer veils fringed with gold.

For no kind of thing, neither in garments nor in the rest of the adornment, did they leave out, but they traversed every path of extravagance, having been driven into frenzy by the tyranny of wantonness.

But if these were accusations at that time, before grace and such great philosophy, what pardon could those women obtain who are now called to heaven and drawn to longer contests and to the emulation of the angels, yet with even greater excess outdo this wantonness and put in the shade even the women of the stage? And what is more grievous still, they do not even think they are sinning.

Therefore it is necessary to arm the prophet's voice against them as well.

For not only against those women, but also against these, will what follows be spoken: that There shall be dust instead of a sweet fragrance.

Do you see how he casts out even the anointing with perfumes and appoints a great punishment for it? For here by 'dust' he means that which is raised up after the razing of the city and the incursion of the barbarians.

For with fire and sword they then divided it among themselves, razing part of it and giving part over to burning.

Foretelling these things, then, he said that Instead of a sweet fragrance there shall be dust for you, and instead of a girdle you shall gird yourself with a rope;

bringing before their eyes the fashion of captivity and the deportation to the barbarian land.

And instead of the adornment of your head you shall have baldness—

either because the hair falls out from misery, or because the enemy does this to them, or because they do it to themselves.

For it was a custom in ancient times, in mourning and calamity, to cut off and shave the hair.

For Job too shaved his head when he heard of the calamity that had befallen his children.

And the prophet, going on, declared that this should come to pass with sackcloth and lamentation and shaving.

And you shall shave and shear yourself over your tender children.

And instead of the tunic with the purple border you shall gird yourself with sackcloth.

Do not these things seem fearful and unbearable? Yet in our case the measure of punishment will not stop at these, but a venomous worm and unending darkness shall succeed them.

For if captivity and slavery and the uttermost evils awaited those women in return for their adornment—

and that God indeed exacted this penalty and punished this particular sin, hear how, after enumerating those things, he added also the cause—

These things shall come upon you in place of your adornment.

If, then, Jewish women who adorned themselves endured so great a punishment—their homeland being torn up from its foundations, and after all their luxury being carried away as slaves and captives and stateless persons into a foreign land, and given over to famine and pestilence and countless deaths—

how is it not entirely clear that we shall suffer worse things if we fall into the same sins? For just as the honours are greater, so also the punishments are heavier.

But if some woman who has adorned herself has not yet suffered any such thing, let her not take courage.

For it is God's custom to appoint punishments upon one or two persons, and through them to lay down as law for all the rest the dreadful things that will overtake them.

And to make what I say still clearer: those who once dwelt in Sodom sinned a grievous sin, and paid the uttermost penalty, when those thunderbolts were hurled down and the cities and the peoples and the very land were burned up together with their bodies.

What then? Did no one after them dare to do their deeds? Nay, many indeed, and in many places of the inhabited world.

How then did they suffer nothing of the sort? Because they are reserved for another, more grievous punishment.

For this reason God, having done it once, refrained thereafter, so that those who dare the same deeds, even if they do not pay the penalty here, may know clearly that they will never escape.

For how could it stand to reason that those before grace and the law, who had heard neither prophets nor anyone else, should suffer such things for their sins, while those after them, who had enjoyed so great a providence and were not made more prudent even by the example—which makes the sin far more grievous—should escape the penalty appointed for this? How then have they not paid it even to this day? That you may learn that they are reserved for a far more grievous punishment.

For that it is possible to suffer worse things than Sodom, hear Christ saying:

It shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment than for that city.

So that even if women who adorn themselves now do not suffer the very things that those who adorned themselves then suffered, let them not take courage.

For the very forbearance and long-suffering heaps up a furnace more grievous than fire and produces a greater flame.

This also happened in the case of Ananias and Sapphira.

For they, at the beginning and outset of the preaching, having stolen from those moneys, were suddenly snatched away; but after them many who dared such deeds suffered nothing.

How then could it stand to reason for the righteous Judge, who apportions equal measures to all, to punish those who sinned less, but to let go those who did worse things? Is it not entirely clear that, since He has appointed a day on which He is about to judge the world, for this reason He deferred the punishment—either that by His long-suffering they might become better, or that, persisting in the same deeds, they might suffer worse things? Whenever, then, having sinned the same sins as those already guilty and punished, we do not suffer the same things, let us not take courage, but rather let us fear.

For just as God brought forth the punishment inflicted upon those persons as a law, exhorting all and saying: 'For this reason I punished him who sinned from the beginning, that you also, who commit this sin after him, might expect the same, so that you may change and become better'—

For upon such sins such punishments are laid, even if they do not come immediately.

But on these matters I have dwelt not without reason, but because a wicked disease entered the houses of men through the softness of women—the love of adornment—which also intensified the tyranny of riches, casting men into untimely expenses, and becoming daily an occasion of war and strife and contention, and straining the resources of the poor.

For whenever a woman compels her husband to spend the whole of his substance, or even more than he possesses, upon the wanton indulgence of her body (for the gold that is worn about her is a wanton indulgence of the body), of necessity the hand is drawn back from the generosity of almsgiving.

And one may see many other kinds of sins begotten from this.

But leaving these things to be clearly known by the experience of those who suffer them, let us take hold of what follows.

For after setting forth the appearance of captivity and saying that in place of adornment I bring this upon her, he intensifies the calamity, saying:

And your fairest son, whom you love, shall fall by the sword, and your mighty men shall fall by the sword.

For this is more grievous than captivity.

For there is a life more bitter than death.

For whenever, together with slavery, they are compelled to lament also untimely griefs, consider how great is the magnitude of the calamity, when things bitter even in themselves are joined together with one another.

For even if there were captivity alone, the terror would be unbearable;

and if such griefs befell those living in freedom, life would be more bitter than death.

But now both will be, he says, joined together with one another.

Rather, one ought to call this a twofold calamity, and threefold, and fourfold, when a son—and a fairest and beloved son—and by barbarians, and not by the common law of nature, ends his life;

and along with him all who are in the prime of life, so that they have no good hope left, as far as human help and alliance can reach.

And the treasuries of your adornment shall be brought low and shall mourn, and you shall be left alone and shall be dashed to the ground.

Through all these things he increases the lamentation, intensifies the fear, brings the anguish to its height, sets the terrors before their eyes, amplifies the narration of the calamity, running about everywhere, gathering from every side the things that grieve, on account of the insensibility of his hearers.

For it were a thing to be desired that, shaken by so many threats, they should come to themselves and gain a perception of the grievous things that were about to befall them.

For this very reason he added this also, which seems exceedingly pitiable—to behold the treasury of gold emptied, a memorial of former prosperity, keeping the pain at its height through the sight of it.

For then especially calamities are wont to bite us, whenever we compare them with our former prosperity;

and the comparison makes the wound more grievous.

This indeed Job also once said, lamenting:

Who might set me as in the months of former days? And he recounts all his wealth and the good things that flowed, as it were, from fountains—the honours, the revenues, all his renown—so that by the comparison of these he might show the present terrors that had overtaken him to be far more grievous.

This very thing the prophet has now also done, calling to mind the treasuries, and not content even with this, but bringing them in as mourning.

For this form of speech is more vivid, whenever it fashions such personifications.

Indeed already he brings in even vines lamenting, and wine, so as the more to reach the hearers and to lay hold of their grossness.

But what is it, 'You shall be left alone'? Bereft, he says, both of allies and of the providence of God, stripped of all other renown, and encircled on every side by enemies, and shut up in the midst of barbarians.

Then, wishing to set forth the excess of the humiliation, he says:

And you shall be dashed to the ground.

'You shall be brought down'; but he made use of another expression that more clearly displays all her worthlessness.