Commentary on the Psalms 1 part 29/34

If then someone is unable to give to all, he ought with discernment to give to those to whom he owes it; but if he is able, becoming compassionate toward the others as well, after the pattern of the Father in heaven, who makes his sun rise not only upon the good, but also upon the evil.

Whenever, however, one is not able to succour all, let him do this with discernment.

This can also be taken as concerning the Saviour;

for it was for our sake that he became poor, and for no other's sake.

He became poor for our sake, that from poverty he might set us free, that from want he might deliver us.

'Him who knew no sin,' he says, 'he made to be sin for our sake'—this is his poverty—'that we might become the righteousness of God in him.'

Even if he became sin, yet it was not that he should remain sin, but that he might set free those who ·····

'You know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for our sake he became poor.'

Though he is rich, he is poor, and this poverty of his makes us rich, or rather is productive of the rich.

He is not absolutely poor, but only in relation to his own wealth.

'In an evil day the Lord shall deliver him.'

He delivered Jesus in an evil day, when those who hemmed him about were saying:

'We have no king but Caesar.'

He became productive of righteousness.

The word 'understanding' is taken in the sense of doing good to the brethren who are in need;

for the Apostle also says concerning the offering:

'For may God give you understanding in all things.'

And understanding is the knowledge of things that can be compared and things that cannot be compared.

Comparable are those things that are made alike and are made equal, whenever we bring one thing together with another and find that it has identity either by likeness or by equality.

The one who has understanding, therefore, knows what things are joined to what, and what things are not.

'May the Lord preserve him and keep him alive and make him blessed upon the earth.'

It can be said of both;

the Lord will guard the poor and needy.

For this reason he also brought the one who considers into the same state as him.

Whenever, for instance, you see a sick man, and a physician who has suddenly arrived there for some other reason, consider that the divine word of Providence has led the physician, a compassionate physician, that having compassion on the sick man he might help him with his medical art.

Either, then, he pronounces blessed the poor and needy and makes him live upon the earth, or the one who considers and has received understanding concerning the poor and needy.

If you speak of the Saviour, he preserves him and grants him to live;

for even though he was crucified out of weakness, yet he lives by the power of God.

Take the phrase 'upon the earth' as applying in common.

'And may he not deliver him into the hands of his enemies.'

He does not deliver such a one into the hands of his enemies.

Such a man has many enemies, he has many lying in wait for him;

for since he is a blessed man and has understanding concerning the poor and needy according to all the explanations given, he also has many lying in wait for him;

for God will deliver him out of their hands.

But the one who gives himself over to them is not delivered from the hand of those who persecute him.

'The Lord will help him upon the bed of his pain.'

Here he speaks concerning the poor man:

even if he should fall sick upon a bed and such a thing be painful to him, God helps him.

Take what is said concerning the paralytics in the Gospels:

he who had lain bedridden for thirty-eight years remained upon a bed of pain, so that he could neither be stirred nor rise up.

And others of the same sort were recorded in the Gospels as paralytics.

But not everyone who has pain and infirmity upon a bed is delivered.

Ahaziah, for instance, fell from his bed out of the upper chamber and died.

But if we take it in the anagogical sense, the body is often named the bed of the soul.

And there are many Scriptures that concur with such a contemplation.

Whenever, then, someone is in the corruptible body and in the earthly tent that weighs down the care-laden mind, he is upon a bed of pain;

but whenever God helps him, he makes him buffet his body and bring it into subjection, and he is no longer laid upon the body, but he himself henceforth takes up his pallet and walks.

The pleasure-lover, the passion-lover, the one who welcomes and does the things of the body, suffers pain upon a bed, but God helps him and makes him whole, that having become whole he may no longer himself be laid upon the bed, but himself carry it—and, as they say, that the soul may rule over the body.

Who are the sixty mighty men, those who are taken up in blessing, those round about the bed? From Abraham unto nineteen, and from...

These, then, are the sixty mighty men, those who ministered about the body of the Saviour at his birth.

It must also be said in this way:

in six days the world came into being, and it is a perfect number, as has often been shown;

for in tens, six is sixty.

The one, then, who has transcended the world and come to be on high is mighty, taught for war, being a man, having a sword upon his thigh.

Round about the bed of Solomon, then, are these sixty mighty men, round about the Lord's body, encircling it, examining for what cause the Saviour took a body.

'Sixty mighty men, then, are round about it, all holding a sword.'

And there are swords which the wise hold;

'they shall exult in their throat, and a two-edged sword is in their hands.'

They have two-edged swords in their hands.

And since the drama is a wedding song concerning the marriage of bride and bridegroom, he means those who are chaste round about the bridegroom, and he wishes to show and says that they have a sword upon the thigh, cutting off shameful desires.

'You have turned all his bed in his sickness.'

He has given no small healing to the one who was gravely sick, but he turned his whole bed away from the sickness, that he might no longer be sick, but be in health, as I said concerning the paralytic.

You may say also concerning Lazarus, who had a body covered with sores, that when he was carried away from here by the angels, his whole bed was transformed, his whole sickness transformed.

And so thereafter he abode in the bosom of Abraham.

'I said: O Lord, have mercy upon me.'

That which lies within our power co-operated toward being delivered from the bed of sickness and being helped up from the couch of pain.

For this I did: I said, 'O Lord, have mercy upon me.'

'Heal my soul, for I have sinned against thee.'

You see that, when he sinned, then he fell ill and then he was cast down upon bed and couch.

Whenever, therefore, someone comes to know the One who is able to deliver, he will obtain that which he earnestly seeks, in like manner to the words:

'I will; be thou made clean'; 'Arise, take up thy bed and walk.'

I, then, said this: 'O Lord, have mercy.'

'O Lord, have mercy upon me': I showed that of myself I was not able to obtain mercy.

'Heal my soul, for I have sinned against thee.'

In much the same way nearly all of us sin against God, being ignorant of many things concerning him, and overlooking many of the things that must be done according to his laws.

'I have sinned, therefore, against thee'; yet, having said, 'O Lord, have mercy upon me,' I obtained the object of my petition.

'Mine enemies spoke evil against me: When shall he die, and his name perish?' They used to say that this psalm is spoken in the person of the Saviour according to his humanity.

And since the Jews became his enemies, being as it were betrayers of the truth, they who did not understand the One who had come to sojourn among them, and since Judas too, being one of the disciples, became such, he speaks concerning the enemies who came against him, at one time referring the word in the singular to Judas, the ringleader of the betrayal, and at another time in the plural on account of those who followed after him and who put Jesus to death.

This happens not here alone, but it is said also in the hundred and eighth psalm:

'They spoke against me with a deceitful tongue, and compassed me about with words of hatred.'

'In return for loving me they slandered me, but I gave myself to prayer.'

'And they laid evil against me in return for good, and hatred in return for my love.'

'Set thou a sinner over him, and let an accuser stand at his right hand'—this he says in the singular concerning Judas—;

'When he is judged, let him go forth condemned, and let another take his office.'

At one time, then, he speaks concerning Judas, and at another time concerning those who were of one mind with him; and for this reason, within the very same verses, in one place he speaks in the singular, in another in the plural.

The evils which they suppose to be evils, they spoke against me:

'When shall he die, and his name perish?' For they supposed that, once Jesus was dead, his teaching and the report about him would be extinguished, and they said:

'When shall he die?' But the very opposite of what they supposed came to pass.

His name did not shine forth so brightly when he was living and in this life as when he was crucified and taken up.

But with a view to the anagogical sense, this is to be taken concerning those of heterodox opinion:

For as many as do not think rightly, but speak deceived and impious things concerning the Saviour, those men spoke evil against him.

And since there is some ringleader of the heresies, the false teacher, or also the devil who prompts him, for this reason too he speaks in the singular concerning such a one.

Did, then, the soul of the Saviour sin?—His soul is every earnest soul, not when it sins.

As we speak of a man, so also of the soul of Jesus.

At one time we speak of the soul of Jesus as that very soul which he assumed, at another time of the soul of Jesus in this sense, as that which has been made his own, according to which signification it is said:

'All souls are mine.'

And if all souls are the Saviour's, then so also is each one.

Does, then, the soul of the saints sin?—The soul of the saints is said to sin in this way, whenever it comes to be in a pre-passion.

And often we have made use of that illustration, namely:

A soiled garment, if it takes on some defilement from a touch, does not show it at all.

But if you take for me a wholly clean garment, come freshly from the fuller's, even if you but touch it, it is said to be defiled.

Does not the body come to be in sin?—My soul comes to be in a pre-passion;

he began, at any rate, to be sore amazed and very heavy.

Hence are refuted those who ascribe to Jesus the so-called irrational appetitive faculty.

The irrational animal is indeed able to begin to be amazed, yet not to be very heavy (distressed in soul);

for to be distressed in soul is foreign to an animal.

From being very heavy and being sore amazed they ascribed to him the beginning (of passion).

But the beginning is not that which follows upon the pre-passion;

for example, the passion is not the beginning, but the pre-passion itself is.

And indeed in another psalm it is said:

What is it 'to be distressed in soul'?—It is the grief of a rational being together with the turning over in mind of the causes of the grief.

'And if he came in to see me, he spoke vanity.'

Thereafter he speaks concerning Judas:

If ever he came in to see me, he spoke vanity;

as I was saying just now, that he who has some advantage in respect of other doctrines has some advantage over other men, so too Judas had some advantage over the other betrayers;

for he had been benefited over a long time, and he had a remnant and a smouldering ember of that instruction.

He would often, then, come in to Jesus, so as even to be found at the common meal of the Passover, but he spoke vanity when he said:

'Rabbi'—and he kissed him.

'That which thou doest, do quickly.'

He displayed words of honour toward Jesus.

For in order to point him out to those who had come for his arrest, he said these things, not so that he might truly display the reverence toward his teacher which he had shown before.

All things, therefore, which are not done truly according to reason are proclaimed in vain.

'His heart gathered iniquity to itself.'

Even if his heart gathered iniquity, yet it was for none other than for himself.

'What are you willing to give me, and I will deliver him up to you?'

His heart gathered iniquity to do, when he gave his heart to the devil:

'And after the morsel the devil entered into him.'

Judas, therefore, has wrought iniquity.

It was lawless to betray Jesus—to be found the enemy of the teacher who had benefited him so greatly.

This iniquity, then, which he gathered, supposing that he would encompass his teacher with death, he gathered against himself;

for he rose from the dead, and all their endeavours ·····

'He went forth outside and spoke.'

And with a certain show of honor he would draw near, or else go outside—his heart concerning t·····

to those who had come for the arrest of Jesus, saying that:

'This is he; seize him.'

Now some are accustomed to say that he was neither outside nor inside,

namely, that he had betrayed Jesus.

'But when he knew,' it says, 'that he had been condemned, he went off and hanged himself.'

Knowing that Jesus had been condemned by Pilate, he repented exceedingly, and going off he hanged himself.

Having seen that he himself was condemned once so great a Teacher had been betrayed, ·····

he betrayed him, and going off he made an end of his life by the noose.

'All my enemies whispered against me.'

None of them spoke against me openly.

And so you find the Jews too seeking how they might secretly lay hold of him, and they whispered to Judas, and he to them, saying:

For surely he did not enter into the synagogue and cry this aloud:

'What are you willing to give me, and I will hand him over to you?'

by day they came to arrest him;

for this is what Jesus himself says:

'Daily I teach in the synagogue, and now you have come out as though against a robber.'

'They laid down an unlawful word against me.'

They read the Scriptures every sabbath, that they might learn the things of the Law;

yet on the contrary, though they ought, reading in accordance with the Law, to have recognized who it is that is prophesied and testified to by the Scriptures, they laid an unlawful word against me, saying:

'This man does not cast out the demons except by Beelzebul.'

'If this man were from God, he would not break the sabbath.'

'Did we not say rightly that you are a Samaritan and have a demon?' This is he against whom they laid an unlawful word.

It is also possible, since 'they laid down' (katetheto) is often taken of records deposited before a judge, that it means:

they lodged statements against him before Pilate.

'Shall not he who sleeps rise again?' Then he himself says:

'Since they surrounded me with death, I fell asleep.'

For in the Scriptures the name of 'falling asleep' sometimes signifies death.

Sleep also is called 'repose' (koimēsis), and the union of a man with a woman is called 'lying together' (koimēsis).

And death too, according to the Scripture, is called 'sleep,' because of the expectation of the resurrection;

for just as one who sleeps, if he suffers nothing contrary to nature, would be awakened, so the one who dies will rise again.

Thus indeed it is said, 'we shall all fall asleep,' and:

'I do not want you to be ignorant concerning those who have fallen asleep,' that is, concerning the mortal dead.

The Greeks too say this.

'For indeed the man of my peace, in whom I hoped.'

The 'I hoped' here means 'I trusted' concerning the man;

for the Gospel also made mention of this, that this man of my peace lifted up his heel to supplant me;

for they said that also in the fifty-fourth psalm he speaks concerning him:

'But you, a man my equal in soul,'

'If my enemy had reproached me, I would have borne it; and if he who hates me had boasted great things against me, I would have hidden myself from him.'

'But you, a man my equal in soul'—we take this of one who is of the same mind, and again the wife in your bosom is your equal in soul—'my guide and my savior.'

I had you as a guide, not as a ruler over me, but as my leader, one running out ahead of me.

'The man of my peace, in whom I hoped.'

It is no wonder if you whispered against me and laid an unlawful word against me, for the man of my peace has become the ringleader of you in this wickedness.

He lifted up, then, his heel, not his head, against me.

'He who eats my bread magnified his supplanting against me.'

The man of my peace, in whom I hoped, lifted up his heel against me; he wished to supplant me.

And Jacob too is called a supplanter;

for he supplanted Esau, when the blessing ·····

To set upon someone with deceit is called 'supplanting.'

···· so that he might take his garment.

But he who deals treacherously to bring about someone's death ·····

'But you, Lord, have mercy on me and raise me up, and I will repay them.'

Set me outside of the evils and of the supplanting of the base word which they laid against me.

These things again are spoken in a more human manner concerning Jesus according to his manhood.

'But you, Lord, have mercy, and I will repay them.'

He who rose again to repay and to judge renders to each according as he finds their dispositions.

Many, having experienced affliction, or beholding that the one whom they once condemned is himself about to judge them, according to the text:

'They shall look on him whom they pierced,' come into condemnation and know how the fitting recompense awaits them.

'In this I knew that you have willed me.'

This is a knowledge and a demonstration that I am willed by you:

for in this those men will come to know me.

The 'in this I knew' refers not so much to his own knowledge; rather, those who are mine will come to know in this.

Will they, having condemned him, come to know him?—all who have gained a perception of his majesty, whether they were formerly enemies or acquaintances.

'Let not my enemy rejoice over me.'

when I am shown to be willed by you, when I rise again and am made known that it is according to your will.

It can refer both to Judas himself and to the devil who worked in him.

In order that they might rejoice, they surrounded him with death;

yet when he has risen they do not rejoice, but rather incur shame and undergo fear, having beheld him whom they pierced.

'But me you upheld because of my innocence.'

For I knew no sin, even though I became sin.

Even though I became a curse, I was not declared a curse on account of any preceding sin, but that I might loose the curse and furnish a blessing.

And just as He became sin, that He might make those on whose behalf He became sin into the righteousness of God, so also He became a curse, not that He might be held fast by the curse.

This very thing, then, He became a curse for the sake of a blessing, sin for the sake of righteousness; He took upon Himself death for the sake of life.

Innocence (akakia), then, often signifies simplicity, but there are times when it signifies complete purity from sin.

The guileless one believes every word; and there is the text:

Evil communications corrupt good manners — by good manners he means the superficial good habits.

But innocence (akakia) is also spoken of as the perfect virtue, concerning which he says:

The innocent and the upright clave unto me.

And Thou hast established me before Thee for ever.

Not for a little while, then, was I unshaken; I was innocent before I fell in with enemies, but I remained innocent.

For Thou hast established me for ever.

Not simply, then, but before Thee.

Yet not everyone who is established is established in the presence of God, but only he who possesses perfect establishment.

Now He who establishes you together with us unto Christ.

Since, then, Thou dost bear witness to my innocence.

Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, from everlasting and unto everlasting.

The God of Israel — that is, of the mind that possesses understanding and beholds God — is blessed.

To Him I ascribe the grace and the victory, not to our own power.

For even if I am innocent, yet I do not attribute the whole to my innocence, but to the co-working of God.

The 'So be it, so be it' (genoito genoito) is as the 'Amen' which the other translators render.

But the 'Amen' is at times taken in place of an oath.

'Verily I say unto you' — Matthew and Luke write the same expression, and Matthew says:

Verily, verily I say unto you; but Luke says:

Indeed, it is also said in the Scriptures:

Behold, then, the handmaid of the Lord:

Be it unto me according to thy word.

It is also said by those who interpret the Hebrew words that it signifies 'that which is believed / trusted'.

For understanding; a psalm for the sons of Korah.

The sons of Korah were three temple-singers.

And their names are recorded in Exodus and in the Books of Chronicles.

These, just as certain ones who from faith receive one soul and one heart, so too these, having received one soul from the Spirit dwelling among them who bestows the gift of psalmody, on this account bring forth the verses of the psalm in the singular.

This psalm is not one of the ordinary sort, but is filled with mysteries.

For this reason it is inscribed 'for understanding'.

Thus, indeed, in the thirty-first psalm as well we were saying that it is 'of understanding, of David', because it contained mysteries and riddles.

And here, too, then, many riddles are laid up.

There is need, therefore, of understanding for the one who encounters such psalms that are thus inscribed.

And just as one must give heed to the reading of God-inspired Scripture — not of the Scriptures alone, but of all Scripture — so too these psalms ought both to be uttered and to be heard with understanding.

But since the term 'understanding', besides what is readily indicated, also indicates something else, as in the text:

And good understanding have all they that do it.

Here the understanding that comes into being and is put into practice is the moral virtue.

For this above all shapes the character of men.

Writing concerning the ministry and the service that is toward the saints, he says:

May God give thee understanding in all things.

For surely he does not mean by 'understanding' the knowledge of things comparable and incomparable, but the practical virtue.

For who is so understanding as the man who has set his own character aright and shaped it? Since —

And this holds for both the speakers themselves and the hearers: he who teaches soberly concerning self-control himself also possesses the virtue of self-control, the very virtue that those instructed by him possess.

For on this account the right reason, being a teacher — and especially the teacher of moral matters — instructs, that the hearers may become such as the one who speaks.

As the hart panteth after the fountains of waters, so panteth my soul after Thee, O God.

It is said that this animal, the hart, is a slayer of serpents.

And when it has slain the serpents, from their venom it becomes exceedingly thirsty and hastens to find a fountain of water, that it may both quench its thirst and behold itself reflected.

For it is said that the serpents, being torn apart by this animal, in their writhing fill the face of the hart, as it were, with blood and other filth, and it goes off to behold itself in the mirror of water, that it may wash away the impurity that has come upon it from the slaying of the serpents.

And yet another thing is said concerning this same animal:

Whenever, it says, it grows old and casts off its hair, it eats a serpent and is renewed.

The eating of serpents makes it young again.

Of what sort of serpents? — Of all the venomous ones, of the whole species of serpents, or even of the whole kind.

And this too: whenever from old age it casts off its horns, it lurks in some hiding-place until the horns spring up again and grow strong.

For it is easily plotted against when it has no horns.

For these are its weapons and its means of defence.

So then, when they pass through the thickets, their horns get caught and are thus torn off.

Wherefore, too, there appears such a proverb:

Woe to harts that have no horns.

But this proverb hints darkly that:

Woe to the man who is without help, who has not sufficient power to help himself.

Here, then, the other of the two significations is spoken of and shown.

As the hart panteth after the fountains of waters, so panteth my soul after Thee, O my God — he likened the longing toward God to the longing of the hart for the fountains.

For God also is a fountain, and His Word is a fountain:

They have forsaken the fountain of wisdom.

They have forsaken Me, the fountain of living water, saith God.

And the Holy Spirit is a fountain, seeing that all the spiritual gifts flow from Him and have their origin from Him.

In the manner, then, that the perceptible hart longs for the springs of waters, so also our soul, becoming a hart and a destroyer of the things that harm, longs for you, O God.

Those who stand ready to avenge every act of disobedience—these are harts, destroying the serpents of unrighteousness.

And those who have received authority to tread upon serpents and scorpions are harts.

And these harts also pursue after the high places.

Just as they pursue the springs of waters, so also the high places;

for the high places are mountains to the harts.

He who makes my feet firm like a hart's, so that, being made firm, they may pursue after the intelligible realities.

And since I have often said that the intelligible realities, according to one and another conception, seem to be diverse and various while in their substance they are the same, the springs of waters which the spiritual hart seeks are also lofty mountains.

Insofar as they are given by way of ascent and from on high, they are lofty; but insofar as they give drink and beget rivers in those who drink of them, they are called springs.

It remains, then, to say also in a moral sense that the serpents are pleasures;

for pleasure is manifold.

But being led away by manifold pleasures and desires—

he speaks concerning the worthless women whom the heterodox lead captive.

These, then, the manifold harts, do not long to find God, nor do they seek one single desire.

But the one desire is our Savior and Lord himself.

Immediately, indeed, when the bride in the Song of Songs inquires concerning the bridegroom, where she can find him, the attendants of whom she inquired say:

'What is your beloved more than another beloved, O fairest among women? Tell of yours, the one beyond the many, among your brothers.'

'My beloved is white and ruddy'—he is not one only, but is both man and God.

Then, as she recounts his praises, she says at the end:

'His throat is sweetness, wholly desire.'

His word is sweet.

You know that there are certain things worthy of desire that are not wholly so, but have something unpleasant mixed in with them;

for instance, the drinking of sweet wine has something desirable in it,

but when it is taken to the point of satiety, it produces drunkenness and is not wholly desire.

Again, the sun, when beheld, is pleasant;

but when its flame lays hold of one, it has something unpleasant.

Nothing, then, that concerns the word of the bridegroom has anything unpleasant; he is wholly desire, he is wholly love, according to the one who said:

'But the loves of others have something painful mixed in them.'

Just as, then, he is wholly desire, so also he is wholly love; and on this account my soul—that which is like the hart, the destroyer of serpents—longs for God.

When, therefore, you see a soul prevailing over manifold pleasures, over many reasonings . . .

It scrapes off the old age of wickedness, the old man, and puts on the new one in its place—whether you wish to take this proverbially or according to the literal sense.

'Let a female hart and a colt of your graces keep company with you.'

Let the discourse be about a woman.

The woman is a female hart in relation to the man, if she destroys the pleasures cast in her way by the hunters.

And further, she is also a colt of graces;

for she ought to be young in respect to self-control, and to be a colt of graces, that is, of the virtues, so that the graces may mount upon her;

for indeed the virtues themselves are often so called, according to what is written:

'with a crown of graces'—with a crown of the virtues.

According to the various conceptions of his contests, being light and truth and righteousness, he is a multitude of graces.

He does not have the multitude in his substance, but in his energies and desires.

'My soul thirsted for God, the strong and living one.'

To thirst is often to conceive love.

So indeed also in another psalm he says:

'O God, my God, early will I seek you.'

For he who yearns for something and asks in order to receive it, thirsts for it.

'To God, then, the living one'—

just as the divine men, those thoroughly filled with the Spirit and lifted up to the knowledge of God, always say:

'As the Lord lives'—thus said Elisha:

'As the Lord lives, and as your soul lives.'

Thus your soul lives, even as he lives in whom you have partaken;

but you, as one who has partaken of him, live in this way.

It is good to consider a certain text which the Arians interpret wrongly:

'As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father.'

And I took an example, namely that:

'As my rational father, I too am rational; and as my father is a living being, I too am a living being.'

Since, therefore, my father is a living being, I too live because of him, by virtue of being the son of one who lives;

just as a man too is said to be a living being because of his father, since he is the son of a living being.

'When shall I come and appear before the face of God?' Those who are still living in this life thirst for God as the hart for the springs of waters.