Commentary on the Psalms (Fragments) 1 part 22/40

And he makes firm the pillars of the melted earth—those who possess a vigorous life and a true mind, or rather the heralds of the truth—concerning whom it is said, 'The pillars of heaven were spread out,' being winged with heavenly wings, so that it is said concerning them, 'As is the heavenly One, such also are the heavenly ones.'

And it is also written concerning the whole glorious Church, which Christ presented to himself, that it is 'a pillar and ground of the truth.'

All these pillars, then, are made firm by the Saviour who establishes them in this present order within the house of God, when He says, 'I will lay the foundation of my holy house.'

He says it is a desert, that is, devoid of virtue and piety.

A sign of their wickedness is that they seek to avert harm by sacrifices, as though the gods would do them injury unless they received libation and smoke and the savour of burnt fat.

But the pious, who know God, are free from the notion of fate and sorcery.

The faithful, being pious, know that the works of providence are brought about not by the rising and setting of the stars, nor by evil overseers, but by God.

He Himself sets up kings and removes them; He raises the poor from the earth and lifts up the needy from the dunghill.

The verse is to be understood of the nations and of the people from the circumcision: he from the circumcision being brought low, and he from the nations being exalted.

A contradiction seems to be signified by the cup being full of mixture, while there is unmixed wine within it.

But 'unmixed' is not opposed to 'mixture.'

For the word 'unmixed' is used in more than one sense: sometimes it denotes wine itself, so that there is no difference between saying 'wine' or 'unmixed'; at other times it presents wine that has no admixture with water.

It also presents a third meaning, when a blend has been made of wine and water and the wine predominates, and we call the blend 'unmixed.'

It is therefore this third meaning that the text before us indicates: God mingles into the blend, which is set against those under judgement, mercy and a kindly disposition, so that the one being punished is not chastised as fully as his deeds deserve; for no one would stand if God, scrutinising the sins committed, brought judgement upon him according to which the transgressor is punished.

This cup in the hand of God is tilted from one to another, in that often the one who ought to be punished for the evils he did is justified through repentance, while the one who seemed for a little while to be good falls away.

Yet even though He tilts it from this to that, He does not pour out the dregs upon men, but upon the sinners of the earth, and upon the devil and the wicked demons.

When those who spoke unjustly against God have been refuted, and what follows has been accomplished, I give thanks, having been found not answerable for any of the charges laid.

Wherefore I also rejoice and will sing praise forever to the God of the patriarch Jacob, who has given me strength, as He gave it to him, to shatter all the horns of the sinners which they, being goring bulls, used against the weaker.

Who these are was made clear in the words, 'The assembly of the bulls among the heifers of the peoples.'

But having said this, he did not add, 'And my horns shall be exalted,' but 'those of the righteous.'

This is customary among the saints because of the freedom from vanity that belongs to them.

And they teach that it belongs to every man who is in Christ and is righteous, having crushed the horns of the sinners, that his horn should be exalted.

It is well also that he speaks in the plural of the sinners whose horns are broken, but in the singular of the righteous whose horns are exalted.

For every sinner is a multitude, in that the vices do not coexist with one another, whereas the virtues, following one upon another, are found to accompany each other, because they consist in means.

And so, even though many men possess righteousness (and this is virtue as a whole), the righteous man is called in the singular.

'To be known' and 'the knowable' are not the same thing, since even that which is unknown is knowable, when it is possible for it to be known.

Since, then, in the manner spoken of, God is knowable in Judaea, it follows accordingly that in Israel, who dwells in Judaea, His name is great—I mean the name of Him who is knowable.

By every means the turmoil of the passions and the war of the vices must be driven away, so that, having the peace which surpasses all understanding, we may become a place of God.

For thus we shall also be His dwelling-place, having set ourselves to be watchmen of the truth and of virtue.

For His dwelling-place happens to be in the Zion that has been expounded.

The things said may be referred to the holy Church, which is a place of God, established in peace, and His dwelling-place.

'Sing praise,' he says, 'to the Lord who dwells in Zion.'

And since these things were accomplished not by our own power but by the grace of God, the word, referring to Him the cause of the peace, says, 'There He broke the might of the bows, shield and sword and war.'

For thus has peace been established, in which is the place of God, once those who wielded the bows have been shattered—the bows from which the evil one, shooting his fiery darts, wrought passions and disordered impulses, of which he was also the author.

Those who make use of them are called 'war.'

For the Lord is the one who shatters wars.

And the holy men too, gazing upon the everlasting mountains—that is, upon the things unseen and eternal, from which God in various ways sheds the light of the knowledge of Christ: before His coming through the prophets and Moses, and after it through the apostles and evangelists, so that those who are enlightened become light—as Paul says, 'God who said, Let light shine out of darkness, has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God.'

He added 'wondrously' to the enlightening, because, whereas others also profess to give knowledge and to enlighten thereby, God more marvellously, leading into knowledge and wisdom through revelations and visions, enlightens wondrously from the mountains that have been spoken of.

And if, Judaea being (as the Scripture has said) the mountains thereof, its high contemplations and the doctrines of godliness, then from these too God wondrously enlightens those who come to the knowledge of the truth.

And in many places of Scripture the mountains are the intelligible things and the angels, from which again God enlightens, sending them forth for service on account of those who are to inherit salvation.

To each of the versions the words 'Draw near to the everlasting mountains' will fit, commanded by God to those who long for godliness, while the understanding are benefited by the virtue present within them.

'For good understanding belongs to all who practise it.'

The unintelligent are troubled by the passions and by wickedness, sometimes also by deceivers both sensible and invisible, according to the words, 'Their foolish heart was darkened.'

For to be darkened and to be troubled are the same thing.

For each of them signifies ignorance, since in both cases the mind is darkened.

And He is called the God of Jacob, of the ascetic and manly and righteous man, as a reproof to the one who, through his own slackness, falls away from these things and is rendered liable to penalties. It has been said by some that the bodies are as chariots and horses of the souls.

Mounting upon these horses in pleasure-loving fashion, they receive the beginning of sleep, being dragged down into a blameworthy slumber—unlike those who buffet the body and bring it into subjection, sitting upon the horses with knowledge.

One may indeed see in Scripture that the rider is for the most part named in a blameworthy sense, as also in the prophet Zechariah, in the threat of God:

'And I will strike every horse with confusion and its rider with madness';

and in Moses, 'Horse and rider He cast into the sea'—and yet the horseman is also taken up in a praiseworthy sense:

Elisha, then, said to Elijah, 'My father, the chariot of Israel and its horseman';

and to the Saviour it is proclaimed, 'You will mount upon your horses, and your riding is salvation.'

None of the poor is able to withstand God when He is angered, striking fear into those under judgement by the fact that He overlooks nothing, inasmuch as He is the knower of hearts.

Those, then, who have their plea before Him as before a judge say, 'If You should mark iniquities, Lord, Lord, who shall stand?' Yet even if no one will be able to withstand His wrath, He being fearful, nonetheless He Himself, through the goodness that belongs to Him, judges together with mercy.

'For I will sing to You of mercy and judgement, O Lord.'

'From heaven He causes judgement to be heard,' judging by the principle of providence so that each thing may come about according to its own advantage.

In agreement with the passage before us is the saying in the prophecy of Amos, which runs thus:

'The Lord who works judgement on high, and has set righteousness upon the earth.'

For inasmuch as He is in heaven, He works every judgement on high;

and inasmuch as He causes judgement to be heard from heaven, sending it forth to those on earth, He has set righteousness upon the earth, which is the end of the judgements.

The inward thought is the hidden part of man.

He who keeps this pure will confess to God with thanksgiving.

Then he will keep festival in doing the things that profit, and he will be able to think what is true.

But if the phrase 'He shall confess' also signifies the acknowledgement of sins, the understanding of the passage before us will be as follows:

since one who wishes to be perfectly holy must be pure not only in deeds and words, he must also make confession concerning even the slightest thought, blaming himself.

This can be shown from the words, 'Cleanse me from my secret faults.'

If, then, even concerning one who is in such a state that it may be suspected whether perhaps some acknowledgement is needed, confession is made, he will thereafter keep festival, the remnant of the inward thought of man having been found free of all wickedness;

or, by the removal of the ambiguity concerning himself, when his purity has been demonstrated, the saint keeps festival—not sometimes yes and sometimes no, but without interruption and always knowing the truth and acting according to righteousness.

For this is properly a festival, according to the apostle who said, 'Let us therefore keep festival, not with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.'

Being fearful before the kings of the earth, He drowned Pharaoh; He drove Nebuchadnezzar from among men, altering his understanding so that he had his abode among the beasts; He took away the spirit from Saul when, despising Samuel, he transgressed the covenant of God.

For it is said, 'The spirit of the Lord departed from Saul, and an evil spirit from the Lord choked him,' being sent upon him by judgement and decree.

And if these things are to be taken also concerning ecclesiastical rulers, give heed to the God-inspired Scripture.

For Paul said to the elders of Miletus, summoning them: 'Take heed to yourselves and to all the flock, over which the Holy Spirit of God has made you overseers'; and, after other words: 'And from among your own selves shall arise certain men speaking perverse things' — that is, when the divine Spirit, that awesome Judge, withdraws itself from such men.

But when the one who speaks stands far removed from the one to whom the word is addressed, there is need of a raised voice.

Since, therefore, the created being is separated from its Maker, there is need of a crying out according to the understanding.

He calls Him God because He has made all things, and Lord because He rules over the things that have come into being from Him.

And one might also call the Father God, and the Son Lord.

The 'day of affliction' for the speaker is either the whole of his life, or rather the present age, in which he seeks God for deliverance, as one who calls a physician for a disease that troubles him.

And he seeks Him by action and by disposition, not being deceived like those who, amid distressing circumstances, are ignorant of the end — as Saul, who went off to a woman with a familiar spirit and was deceived.

But the holy man, in proportion as he is troubled, seeks God in the night that is called the ignorance of surrounding circumstances, according to the saying in Isaiah.

'My soul refused to be comforted by any mortal' — since the remembrance of God is sufficient for every consolation.

To this same purpose you will take also the saying in Isaiah: 'In affliction I remembered the Lord.'

According to the common usage of most people, the word 'I babbled' (or 'meditated aloud') signifies something blameworthy; but according to Scripture it also stands for something praiseworthy.

Thus Hannah, praying to God in sincerity, when told by the priest to persist in her prayer even from a young age, answers: 'Out of the abundance of my meditation (babbling) I have been consumed until now.'

And concerning Isaac too, that 'He went out to meditate (babble) in the field.'

But in a blameworthy sense you will take: 'The lawless recounted to me idle babblings.'

Whenever, then, this word is used in the divine oracles, we shall take the expression — attending to the sequence and to the person speaking — either in a better sense or in a bad one.

Now, then, both the person and the word are praiseworthy — 'my spirit was faint,' signifying the soul.

For thus also Stephen said: 'Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.'

And having grown faint because of the enemies pressing upon him, he gave himself over to God.

'My eyes anticipated the watches.'

Since many watch-posts surrounded me, I kept the commandment that says: 'With all watchfulness guard your heart.'

All my enemies anticipated them, in so far as concerns my having grown faint of spirit.

For not one, but many — nay rather all together — were filled with wrath against me.

For the reckoning of forethought stood firm for me, since I had not fallen at all into the passion of fear.

I uttered, at any rate, nothing of the things which those who have been made cowardly are wont to say.

But if the 'watchers' be spoken of in the masculine, he will say that all my enemies forestalled all the thoughts which I ought to have set about myself for guarding me, casting in, instead of the guarding ones, ruinous and harmful thoughts.

Let these things be said concerning the invisible enemies.

But if the divisions of the night are also called 'watches' (should it happen, he says, that one be filled with sleep the whole night, according to Ephraim), all the enemies, anticipating these watches, will set upon him.

For they will not sleep unless they have done evil.

When these things befell me, he says, I roused myself to remember the things of old and the many trials that had come upon me beforehand (not only upon me, but also upon my fathers who lived in virtue), from all of which the Lord delivered both me and them.

Whereupon I also became more cheerful of soul, so as to endure to the end, that I might, as the prize of such contests, attain salvation.

'For he who endures to the end, this one shall be saved.'

For having reasoned upon the days of old and having remembered and pondered the everlasting years, I found that often both I myself and the rest of men had fallen into such perplexity as to despair of salvation and to abandon every hope.

But when confidence toward God arose, every resource appeared amid the straits that had overtaken us.

You may call to mind, for the matters before us, the Hebrew multitude that came to the shores of the sea.

For when no good hope remained there, suddenly God provided breadth in the narrows and a way out in the impassable places.

Since the whole of this present life is named 'night' because of the ignorance of affairs that prevails, I have not, like other men, given myself over to sleep and torpor, but have roused myself to sobriety and wakefulness.

For those who sleep, sleep by night, and those who are drunk are drunk by night.

'With my heart' — that is, with my mind — conversing with myself concerning the things to be done and the natures of things (for I knew that present things are but temporary), I learned that the surrounding evils will have an end.

And I dug at my spirit as with the farmer's craft, wishing to sow into it, that from it I might reap life eternal.

'For he who sows to the spirit shall from the spirit reap life eternal.'

But one must not suppose that 'spirit' is here said synonymously, but rather homonymously, in the present expression and in the one set down before.

For there the soul was called 'spirit,' but here it is the spirit of the man that is in him.

For if here too the spirit is spoken of instead of the soul, who is it that digs at his spirit and babbles with his heart? For it is not possible for the body to do these things.

It is therefore the soul, which is properly the man, that both babbles with the mind and digs at the spirit which is yoked together with the mind.

'For I will pray with the spirit, and I will pray also with the mind.'

'I will sing praise with the spirit, and I will sing praise also with the mind.'

For it would be corruption to depart from the goodness that is according to nature, the substance no longer remaining if any of the things that belong to it by nature were taken away from it.

For I formerly saw Him well pleased to help and inclined to grant to those who asked, when 'I considered the days of old.'

Did His kindness, then, stand only until those times, He no longer continuing to be well pleased? Far from it!

For neither does He cut off His mercy from the former generation without its reaching to the one to come.

For this is the notion of those who suppose that His mercy will have an end — if in one generation He should do good and show mercy, but in another not.

For neither will He forget to have compassion, just as neither will fire and light forget to give light and warmth.

For even if, on account of a temporary wrath because of sin that has occurred, He should seem to withhold His compassions, yet they will not be withheld forever.

The things narrated in all the foregoing expressions followed in due course; but also, having attended to the matters, I beheld that God does not thrust me away unto the ages, nor does the other things that have been recounted, so that I, in a certain manner, might lay down another beginning, as it were, of life.

For upon all the things which I have gone through, I said: 'Now I have begun,' since all the things that troubled and frightened me had changed, so that I became bold for the rest of the way.

This change, then, being according to quality (for I have passed from one disposition into another disposition), is an alteration, effected by none other than the right hand of the Most High.

For this same right hand both furnished these thoughts and worked together for my being altered.

This meditation (babbling) is like the good one from above.

For to speak often of the wonders of God is a good thing.

Since God dwells and walks about among the saints, He has His own way in each of the saints, journeying through the mind of each of them.

And since His Word is called a way ('For I am,' He says, 'the way'), and His Word is in nothing base insofar as it is a way, but rightly said to be in the saints alone, the expression here set down is fitting.

'Great,' applied to the intelligible substance, is spoken according to the pre-eminence of power, and not according to quantity.

None, therefore, is found so great a god as ours.

He calls them 'gods' — not the images nor the demons (for both of these are called gods) — but those to whom the word of God came and deified them.

For these are not bestowers of divinity, but partakers of it.

But the present expression is spoken with reference to the Savior, as what follows will show, He being a great God and Father, since He is the Son of the great God.

The Savior is called God with the article, that He might be shown to be other than those to whom it was said: 'I said, You are gods.'

Whence none of them, as surpassing his fellows of the same kind, is called God with the article.

Of such a kind also is the saying: 'The only-begotten God, who is in the bosom of the Father,' inasmuch as He alone is God according to substance.

For none of the others is only-begotten, but is God together with those of the same kind.

According to the same Godhead as the only-begotten God, the Father too is God.

For if it is said to the Savior (since His Godhead and the Father's are one), 'In You is God, and there is no God besides You';

'for You are God, and we knew it not';

for how, if God is in Him, is there no God besides Him, and He Himself is God, unless we understand the same Godhead of Father and Son, so that Father and Son are one God, yet Son and Father are not one and the same person? For the Father is Father of a Son, and the Son is Son of a Father.

Hence also comes the saying, 'I and the Father are one', where 'I and the Father' is followed consistently by 'are one'; the Son no longer says 'I and God',

for the Father is another than the Son, yet He is not another God, since the Godhead of the Begotten and of the Begetter is the same.

The Savior made known His power among both peoples, that of the Gentiles and that of the circumcision, working many marvels and wonders among them;

'For power came forth from Him and healed them all.'

But also by His arm (I mean by His working and action) He redeemed His own people, made one out of the two, having by the grace of God tasted death for all, giving His soul as a ransom for many;

'For by His precious blood we were redeemed from our vain manner of life handed down from the fathers.'

And the peoples among whom He made known His power, whom He also united into one people which He redeemed, are the sons of Jacob and Joseph—those believers of the circumcision being called sons of Jacob, and those of the Gentiles sons of Joseph.

For 'Joseph' is interpreted 'addition of the Lord';

for God truly added to those being saved from the circumcision the believers from among the Gentiles.

But the word 'You made known' does not signify a beginning of being known, but that which is recognized and acknowledged anew;

for having said 'the One who works wonders', He acknowledges these anew through these words.

The gods being overthrown together with the oracles through which the demons deceived;

but also, as men bound to earthly things through prior passion were being transferred to Christ the Word, the earth endured shaking and trembling.

And the sea also—that is, this present life—Jesus alone, being God, traversed, so as to leave tracks and tokens of the way, that those who wish might follow after Him;

for it says, 'Your paths are in many waters, and Your footprints shall not be known', because the manner of His journeying is incomprehensible.

And the sheep of Christ were led by God in the practice (symbolically called a 'hand') of the spiritual law and the priestly word.

And Christ has become both for us, being Himself the spiritual law, the initiator into the spiritual mystery of God, and the great High Priest who has passed through the heavens.

And it signifies by Moses the law, and by Aaron the high priest;

wherefore they are also brothers, being sons of the divine providence which begot this law and the priestly word corresponding to it;

for by its will these good things came into being for men.

By 'law' in the present passage it can mean the whole of the old Scripture.

But if by the word 'law', according to the verse before us, the commanding and prohibiting word is signified, He enjoins attention to the law, so that those who have received the precept may have their characters set aright, choosing good things and fleeing evil ones.

These things those who have the mind of Christ heard and understood spiritually;

for it was not hidden from them, since the fathers had recounted it to them with knowledge.

And these in turn made manifest to their own children, begotten by them, through instruction, the enigmas from the beginning, so that even to the following generation of them these things might be known and not hidden.

For he who comes to be with God in spirit is, from this very being together with God, assured and confirmed according to the spirit.

And one must suppose that 'spirit' is here spoken of as the understanding, in accordance with what was said concerning the virgin, 'that she might be holy in spirit and body';

for by 'spirit' in these passages He calls the disposition itself and the inner attitude, from whose sanctification it follows that the body too is sanctified, being ministered to by sanctifying operations.

But if the soul itself is here also called 'spirit', consider this as well.

The manna was given before the contention; the psalm says that after the contention both the manna and the flesh were given.

But this would be no real problem;

for the psalm joins together things that occurred at different times, gathering under one cause one contention that had taken place at different times.

For if someone should suppose that the first contention was that before the making of the tabernacle, in the second month of the exodus, he places that history in the psalm out of due season;

for the water from the rock had not yet then been given, nor indeed had the punishment of fire followed, seeing that they were still novices and not unreasonably still unbelieving toward the marvelous giving of food, and fainthearted because they did not at once obtain abundance.

Wherefore neither did Moses grow weary at the fainthearted murmurings of the people.

But in the second contention, concerning the meat, even Moses now bears it hard;

and fittingly the punishment from God then came upon them, and they were consumed by fire.

Though they ought to have believed on the basis of what had gone before, they did not believe the divine power; and though they ought to have hoped for the salvation that comes from Him, they did not hope.

But it must also be said according to the anagogical sense, thus:

in the wilderness of the Son, where great ignorance of things prevails,

having divided and distributed His most steadfast word, named a 'rock', much watering came to those benefited, so that the flowing water was likened, on account of its boundlessness in depth and breadth, to an abyss.

And the rivers concerning which the Savior said, 'He who believes in Me, as the Scripture said, out of his spiritual belly (that of the inner man) shall flow rivers of living water';

'And this', says the author, 'He said concerning the Spirit, whom those who believed were about to receive.'

For the water of these rivers is brought forth from a rock, concerning which Paul says, 'They drank from a spiritual rock that followed them';

Christ Himself therefore, in that He is a rock, said concerning the water of the rivers, 'For He shall take of what is Mine and shall declare to you all things.'

'And they added still to sinning against Him'—not that all who sin sin against God, but only those who knew His will and did not do it.

Indeed David too, not being ignorant of God's purpose, said, 'Against You only have I sinned.'

Or perhaps the sin of those who sin in moral matters is committed against men, whereas the sin of those who speak evil of God and of providence, being a kind of impiety, ascends against God.

'For if a man sin against a man, one shall also pray for him;

but if he sin against the Lord God, who shall pray for him?' Indeed then it is added that 'they provoked the Most High in a waterless place', being deprived of the spiritual waters;

for they turned away from the water from the aforesaid rock;

and being in a waterless place, they did nothing of those things that sweeten the goodness of God.

And what sweetens it are the things done and contemplated according to virtue and wisdom.

'They tempted Him therefore in their hearts'—not superficially but from the depth of their ruling faculty, devising things against God and doubting concerning His power, 'in asking food for their souls'—not for those made according to God's image and likeness (for these are nourished by the bread of life and the fruit of the tree of life), but for those souls which are being changed into flesh through their attachment to material things, craving foods not profitable and healthful but pleasant and disease-producing.

Or perhaps the soul that craves food is the appetitive and desiderative, irrational power in us.

For concerning this it is said, 'And you shall eat flesh, as much as your soul desires.'

Of this the irrational animals too partake, being creatures that crave and desire food.

'And they spoke against God and said, Can God prepare a table in the wilderness?' and what follows. But indeed He gave bread that had come down from heaven and prepared a table before His people.

Wisdom said, 'She has slain her victims and, having mingled her wine into the bowl, has prepared her house';

and none of the unbelieving shall taste of them.

To this end you may take the saying, 'For I tell you, None of those men shall taste of My supper.'

'Therefore the Lord heard and put it off', even so as to attend to them still.