Commentary on the Psalms 1 part 6/34

And just as I call fire hot, so also I call water that has been heated hot; but the water admits of the more and the less.

Wherefore it is also able at some time to lose it and to regain it.

But the heat that is in the fire does not admit of the more and the less.

The knowledge of God is substantial, so that it is incomparable with knowledge that is according to disposition.

And things that are incomparable admit of no likeness to one another.

Yet they do not say these things in vain.

For since the argument establishes that the Son is consubstantial with the Father and of the same Godhead, from his being known by the Father and knowing the Father, they wish to make his knowledge common with ours, saying that:

As we know God, so also he knows, namely that we understand him perfectly, as he himself knows himself.

And the Son likewise possesses knowledge concerning him.

Their hearts shall live unto ages of ages.

Often the accidents are called by the same name as those things to which they belong as accidents.

We say that there is a substance of the soul.

Fear not them that kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul.

The name 'soul,' then, here signifies the substance.

'Spirits and souls of the righteous, bless ye the Lord'—this signifies the substance.

For often the name of the soul signifies some accident that belongs to the soul.

For when it is said in the Wisdom of Jesus (Sirach):

'A wicked soul shall destroy him that possesses it'—here it names as 'soul' the disposition and the manner of thinking;

for he that possesses it is the soul, that is, the human being.

'Having purified your souls in the obedience of the truth as ye draw near'—

From this that other usage too has been derived by a change of name:

'But thou, O man of equal soul with me,' that is, one having a purpose equal to mine.

And again, if it should be said that:

'And thou shalt eat of the grape as much as thou wilt fill thy soul'—here he calls 'soul' the appetitive faculty.

Not all things, then, that are spoken of denote the underlying substances, but there are times when they also signify the accidents belonging to them.

Now it belongs to man as an accident to know God.

Wherefore the human being is never called 'knowledge,' but 'one who knows.'

Here the accident is not homonymous with the subject.

For if I say that the Saviour is righteousness, I do not call him a habit, nor a disposition; and if I call him righteous—but ye denied the Righteous One—I do not speak of him as a quality, but as the very righteousness.

In this way too we speak of 'righteous' in the case of God universally.

I do not say that God is righteous by participating in righteousness, but by supplying righteousness.

And the soul, insofar as it is according to substance, does not admit of the more and the less.

But that soul according to which certain people are called 'fair-souled' (noble of soul) does admit of it.

The disposition, therefore, is called 'soul' homonymously with the substance.

The heart and the mind signify the same thing:

'Where thy treasure is, there also will thy heart be'—there also will thy mind be.

'Blessed are the pure in heart.'

It is the same thing, therefore, to say 'mind' and 'heart.'

Not in the case of all beings, however, but in the case of human beings.

The soul of man and the mind are immortal.

It is inquired whether, if it is immortal, they are one thing and another (distinct).

And even the sinner, having an immortal soul, is never destroyed;

for we must not give heed to those who say that the souls of the base collapse into non-being, as the Stoics among the Greeks maintain, and as, among those reputedly Christian, the Hieracites do.

The soul, then, is immortal and possesses a natural life according to which it moves.

And it is possible even for the sinner to have this life according to which he is immortal.

It is not concerning this natural life that he now speaks, when he says:

'Their hearts shall live'—but according to that other life which the one who believes has, and which the one who knows God has.

If the hearts live unto the age of the age according to the blessed life, it is manifest that they also abide forever according to the substantial life, which is common to both sinners and the earnest.

And just as I say that all have sight, when they are living creatures possessing sight, yet I say that the one who sees well has sight in the primary sense—he would not see well unless he had the power of seeing, and again he would not see badly unless he had the power of seeing—

So then both the soul and the heart possess life forever, whether it be base or earnest.

But the natural life is prior;

for it would not be able to live according to God and to live according to faith, unless it were immortal, unless it had substantial life.

The hearts, therefore, of these very ones who ate and were filled, of those who fear God and praise him, shall live—not for one age, but unto the age of the age.

And a multitude of ages is signified;

and just as 'sabbath of sabbaths' is spoken of, and 'year of years'—the one having as many years as there are days of the year—shall he live unto the age of the age.

All the ends of the earth shall remember and shall turn back to the Lord.

He prophesies concerning the salvation of all human beings;

for that must come to pass concerning which, again in another psalm, this same holy one says:

'All the nations, as many as thou hast made, shall come and shall worship before thee.'

For surely God did not make rational beings in order that they might sin, in order that they might raise up counterfeit gods and serve these, but in order that they might honour God.

And since this is the purpose of the Maker, but the purpose of the things made intervened, the purpose of God must prevail.

When, therefore, he remembers, it is we who furnish the cause of his remembering;

for he remembers those who remember, just as he knows those who understand.

When we remember, then he remembers us and calls us unto salvation.

The phrase 'they shall turn back' shows that no one is evil according to substance, but according to purpose.

But if evil had the strength to drive the purpose otherwise, in another direction, the good will have the strength to recall it to its former state.

And all the families of the nations shall worship before Him.

It is after being converted that they worship.

They do not first worship and then afterward turn back; rather the reverse.

Therefore this signifies their progress.

And it is a great thing to worship in the presence of God.

That man worships before Him who worships Him as one ought.

For the kingdom is His.

In the gathering together of peoples in one place, and of kingdoms, to serve the Lord.

If they had been base by their very constitution, they would have belonged to another.

And He Himself is Lord over the nations.

Since the kingdom is His, and He Himself has made the nations, He is also their Master.

Therefore they return to their own Master.

They do not enrich God by being converted.

The Lord will shepherd me, and I shall lack nothing.

In a place of green pasture, there He has caused me to dwell.

The soul of man is signified under many names.

For it is said to be both a sheep and a man and a plant and many other things, indeed even a stone.

'And you yourselves, as living stones, are being built up': by 'stones' he means men.

But man is none of these in his essence, so that it is fitting to understand all these things concerning him in an allegorical manner.

The soul itself increases and is multiplied, not according to its essence, but according to the practical and contemplative life.

It possesses intellectual virtue and is able to accomplish practical virtue.

Accordingly, the progress of the soul is spoken of as that of a man.

For at one time it is named an infant, at another a child, at another a young man, at another a full-grown man.

And we do not take these according to the features of the body or according to bodily ages.

For the soul does not pass from age to age except according to virtue, according to progress, according to improvement.

There are then certain infants unable to be improved by any other food than milk.

'I gave you milk to drink, not solid food.'

'As newborn babes, long for the rational, pure milk.'

And rational milk is not that which is perceptible to the senses, nor that which is bodily, but the nourishment suited to the rational nature.

The Apostle therefore writes also to the Hebrews, saying:

'For though by reason of the time you ought to be teachers'—for they had been reared for a long time in the Scriptures—'you again have need that someone teach you what are the rudiments of the beginning of the oracles of God.'

Being obligated to be teachers, yourselves bringing perfect instruction to others, you have been so diminished according to the inner man as to be infants in need of milk.

By 'milk' he means the beginning of the oracles of God, the introductory teachings, the elementary ones.

'Everyone who partakes of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is an infant.'

He does not possess the word of righteousness.

'Wherefore, leaving the word of the beginning of Christ, let us be borne on toward perfection.'

Leave behind the elementary word;

for it is the beginning of the teaching of Christ.

Let us be borne on toward perfection, that thus, having become perfect, we may be able to be perfect hearers of Christ;

'for we speak wisdom among the perfect.'

The soul is sometimes called, as I have already said, also a sheep.

When it is a sheep, it has need of green pasture, not of meats, not of the flesh of Jesus, not of bread.

It is not yet able either to have an appetite for these foods or to manage them, even if they be set before it.

Sometimes too it is called a plant and requires rain, and has need of the husbandman's art, that having grown it may bring forth perfect fruit; and somewhere it says:

'But I am like a fruitful olive tree in the house of God.'

And here, accordingly, it signifies the sheep-like condition—the one that is, as it were, more devoid of reason—together with meekness and steadfastness, by saying:

'The Lord shepherds me, and I shall lack nothing.'

I suffer no lack; and I suffer no lack precisely as a sheep.

It is as if even an infant should say:

My nurse feeds me, and I shall lack nothing—clearly, of the foods proper to infants.

'In a place of green pasture, there He has caused me to dwell.'

There is a grassy teaching, fitting for sheep.

And perhaps this is none other than that of the voice of Christ:

'My sheep hear My voice.'

Having become such as no longer to be sheep, they no longer hear a voice, but use Him as their Teacher:

'The Lord and the Teacher; and you say well.'

'In a place of green pasture, then, there He has caused me to dwell.'

He did not say 'settled me permanently,' but 'made me to tabernacle.'

And the tent signifies progress;

'I shall pass through in the place of the wondrous tabernacle, even unto the house of God.'

He who is making progress has a portable dwelling, namely virtue itself.

But when he attains to the very end and consummation of it, he no longer tabernacles, but dwells permanently.

The saint, knowing this greatness and this progress, said:

'One thing I have asked of the Lord, this will I seek after:

that I may dwell in the house of the Lord'—not merely sojourn—'all the days of my life.'

Now the one being initiated has life, and so has the one making progress, and so has the one being perfected.

Wherefore he who says the following knows a multitude of lives:

'Your mercy is better than lives;'

for in whatever kind of life I may come to be, I am held fast and helped by Your mercy.

By the water of rest He has nourished me; He has restored my soul.

He guided me into the paths of righteousness.

Water is the drink suited to the sheep.

Those who are brought to pasture and are nourished are given water to drink, not wine; for where there is bread, there also wine is named.

'Bread strengthens the heart of man'—and by bread the perfect nourishment is signified—'and wine gladdens the heart of man.'

Where, then, there is green pasture, there also is water; and where there is bread, there wine also is found.

But the perfect feast is completed of bread and wine.

For the state proper to sheep is sustained by green pasture and water.

The water may be called the water of rest, because the one who draws it does not grow weary.

For 'whoever drinks of the water that I shall give will have a spring welling up to eternal life.'

The water is not drawn up from below, but of itself it comes leaping up to the one who drinks.

Hence it is water of rest.

This water, in addition to nourishing, also cleanses.

And since the soul, being cleansed, casts off sin—for sin was compared to a talent of lead—the water provides rest.

It expels both together—the thirst and the filth.

Then, since he has made mention of shepherding and green pasture and water, he immediately transfers the discourse to the inner man and says:

By the 'conversion' a change is signified.

I no longer remain a sheep, I am no longer under a shepherd, I no longer have appetite for water.

And what has come to my soul once it has been converted? God has guided it into the paths of righteousness.

The paths of righteousness are the specific virtues, or the practices of the virtues.

In many places of the divine instructions the name of righteousness signifies virtue as a whole.

For there is also a particular virtue called righteousness in this specific sense.

If we say that there are four generic virtues—courage, righteousness, temperance, prudence—then one of the virtues is signified by 'righteousness.'

'And you, masters, render equity and justice'—here the justice according to desert is signified.

'Just weights and a just balance'—this speaks of what produces righteousness.

And from it he derives by paronymy the just that renders according to desert and that which, as they say, is corrective.

For righteousness is spoken of in two ways: either corrective, or distributive according to desert.

This, then, is called corrective justice—and, that I may establish it from the Scriptures:

'A tooth for a tooth, and an eye for an eye.'

He who has violently assaulted someone and gouged out his eye takes pleasure in avenging himself on his enemy.

He who has been deprived of his eye, or his tooth, is grieved.

God, the Law, grants that the one who has wrongfully inflicted harm should suffer the same.

And a subtraction is made from his pleasure, and it is added to the one in pain, on account of his suffering what is grievous; and thus equality comes about.

This, then, is called corrective justice.

The distributive kind appears not in the equality of the nature of the thing, but in the proportion of the distribution.

Its ways are the well-worn roads, those trodden by many.

But the paths of righteousness may also be the practical activities of righteousness.

For then most of all is righteousness trodden and worn, when it is put into practice.

And that practical virtue is signified by this name of righteousness is confirmed from the following:

'He who walks blameless and works righteousness, who speaks truth in his heart, who has practiced no deceit with his tongue and has done no evil to his neighbor.'

'He who does these things shall never be shaken forever.'

You see that, gathering all the species of virtue into one, he named it generically 'righteousness.'

'He guided me, then, into the paths of righteousness.'

And those before the written Law also traveled this way of righteousness.

Concerning Abraham, then, it is said that he kept all the ordinances and commandments of the Lord.

And yet they had not yet been given; but he kept them, he lived according to them.

Abel too, then, is testified to on account of righteousness.

The conversion of the soul, then, is the journey that leads up to the paths of righteousness, so that it may no longer be a sheep.

'He guided me into the paths of righteousness for his name's sake.'

Not so much on account of my worthiness as on account of his own appellation did he grant this to me.

For even if someone runs after what is good, even if he has a longing for it, unless God shows mercy, the things earnestly pursued are not accomplished.

Indeed, in the one hundred and eighteenth Psalm it is likewise said:

'I ran the way of your commandments when you enlarged my heart.'

When you had enlarged my heart and given breadth to my understanding, I ran the way of your commandments.

Always, then, it is on account of God that the things earnestly pursued are accomplished.

For he created rational beings so that they might partake of his naming.

And by 'naming' I mean not one composed of syllables, but one arising from a quality that manifests the thing named.

For the definition of a name has been rendered thus:

A name is a summary appellation exhibiting the proper quality of the thing named.

And this is possessed above all by the paronymous derivation.

From wisdom someone is called wise, and he does not have a bare appellation, not one composed of syllables, but one that manifests the quality which wisdom has bestowed on the soul.

A summary appellation, then, is properly the name that exhibits the quality of the thing named.

So even if you say 'man,' it is exhibitive of the quality of the man—and by 'quality' here I mean the distinctive property.

For you have spoken the proper quality of the thing named.

And the proper quality of man is humanity.

For if you name another quality, others too partake of it.

Let someone be called a disciple of a physician, though he knows nothing of medicine.

He does not have the quality of medicine, and it is a reproach to the one who taught him the medical arts, when he knows none of them and practices none.

'For even if I walk in the midst of the shadow of death, I will fear no evils, for you are with me.'

Since for his name's sake he has converted my soul, he is with me.

And since he is with me, warding off every evil, no evil draws near to me, nor even the shadow of death.

Now 'evils' are spoken of in two ways in Scripture, and perhaps also in common usage.

The forms of vice that are contrary to virtue are called evils;

'In laughter the fool works evils,' and again:

'Turn aside from evil and do good.'

But people also call unpleasant things 'evils,' since men say that pleasant things are 'goods.'

And there are indeed things that men call goods which are not truly goods.

For this reason Abraham also said to the rich man:

so that, had he been speaking of the virtues, he would not have said:

'The Lord will give good things to those who ask him.'

'If we received good things from the Lord, shall we not endure the evil things?' By 'evils' he means the ulceration, the most pitiable death of the children, and the rest.

This is shown most clearly by the passage from Isaiah, where the prophet speaks thus concerning God:

'And he, being wise, brought evils upon them.'

these being evils belonging to affliction, and by no means henceforth belonging to God.

And the wicked themselves, indeed, when they feign virtue, do not say that:

But it is said concerning God that, as one who is wise, he brings evils.

And consider the purpose of the bringing on of evils:

'and his word shall by no means be set at nought.'

It is for the sake of his word not being set at nought that the painful things are brought on;

for since they heard by a commanding word what they must do and what they must abstain from, and yet despised this word, and, so far as it lay in their own depravity, it was set at nought, he brings on evils, so that his word may not be set at nought.

And surgery too, the medical kind, and cauterization that brings health to the one suffering these, are not evils.

By 'shadow' here he means not that shadow which we say the Law possesses—for the Law, having a shadow of the good things to come—but here he calls 'shadow' that which precedes death.

And sin precedes death.

But by 'death' I now mean not the common one.

Painters, before the images and the forms, sketch a shadow-outline.

And that shadow is the beginning of the image.

And so death too has a shadow, namely sin.

And this prefigures and foreshows death.

If, then, I come to be in the midst of the shadow of death, I do not fear it.

For example, Joseph—as far as concerned the enticement of her who wished to drag him down into licentiousness—came to be in the midst of the shadow of death, and did not fear the evil, and she did not take hold of him.

the shadow that is in the midst?—Since the discourse is not about the common death, neither ought one to think thus about its shadow;

for just as that prefiguration which you speak of, being something perceptible and subject to sight, brings with it also that which comes after the shadow, being perceptible and visible, so also here: since the shadow comes to be according to the soul, so also the death touches the soul.

Sin—which was a shadow—when brought to completion becomes the mother of death, that is, it brings forth and produces death.

'If therefore I walk in the midst of the shadow of death.'

Did he come to be in afflictions?—Yes; if he had been afraid, he would have sinned.

Is the 'in the midst' in sin?—That is not what I say.

I do not say that being afflicted is the shadow of death, but rather the yielding and cowardice that come from being afflicted.

For the martyrs came to be in the midst of the shadow of death, but not in death itself.

They were afflicted, but that which the affliction brought on threatened did not subsist in them.

A thought of the same kind was expressed also in this:

'Lead us not into temptation.'

If this were so, the apostles would never have spoken truly when they said:

By 'not entering into temptation,' therefore, we mean this: not to be captured by the will of the tempter.

'I will not fear evils, for you are with me.'

Having you with myself, I fear nothing of the things that seem to harm.

'Your rod and your staff, they have comforted me.'

You see that he was not inexperienced in the shadow of death.

Your staff, which becomes my support, and your rod, which disciplines me, have comforted me; they have brought me outside of death, even though I came to be in its shadow, even though I passed through the midst of its shadow.

The rod and staff of God are taken both in the sense of discipline and in the sense of support;

'He who utters wisdom from his lips smites with a rod the man who is without heart.'

He named the disciplinary and reproving word a 'rod.'

And to the Corinthians Paul writes:

'What do you wish? Shall I come to you with a rod?' And it is also taken in the sense of support:

'the staffs in your hands;'

'and you shall eat it in haste;'

'You have prepared a table before me in the presence of those who afflict me.'

Henceforth we join the present words to the prooemium;

for it was for their sake that they came about, when we were saying that after the drinking of the milk solid food is given, which is the wisdom of God spoken among the perfect.

And this, here too, after the beast-like nurture—even though it came about with steadiness and gentleness—being shepherded by you, I remained without delay;

for a table succeeded the green grass.

and of things having the power of water.

But when I advanced, my soul having been turned by you toward the paths of righteousness, so as to be comforted by your rod and your staff, I became a man.

For this reason you no longer prepared grass, but a table, and before me you made manifest to me its nourishing, its edible beauty.

Your wisdom made ready for me this table.

Having slaughtered her own victims, she set them upon it.

And she set out her own wine, having mixed it, upon this table, and she calls all to eat and drink from this table.

And we say that 'table' here means the divine instruction of wisdom.

And upon this lie victims;

for whenever we perform the sacred rite and slaughter the doctrines of piety, so that we may make them ready for nourishment, then the victims lie upon the table.

And no other slaughtered them than Wisdom herself, who prepared her own table;

she prepared a table—but her own.

But the table of wisdom has set upon it no other dishes than wise instructions.

Then she also mingled her own wine.

She added water to it, so that we, being unable to receive it undiluted, might take the wine mingled.

There are certain unspeakable words which are not to be uttered.

Whenever someone is able to bring these into expressible teaching, he has mingled them, blending in for them a perceptible water.

The examples drawn from Scripture, the sayings declared in parables.

Again, since Wisdom is God the Word, and we were not able to receive the Word undiluted, He mingled Him with the Incarnation, and thereafter we received a wine blended both from the word of the Incarnation and from the majesty of the Only-Begotten.

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory.

This mingling belonged to none other than Wisdom herself.

You know that one who mixes the drink sometimes makes the blend according to the condition of the one who is to drink.

And so Wisdom too mingled her own wine, and does not give the same blend to all, but that which each one can hold.

There are, then, those who are childlike, in whom this blend seems to be rather more watery.

The element of the Incarnation predominates.

But whenever someone beholds His glory, glory as of the Only-Begotten from the Father, the wine predominates.

This table, then, He prepared not behind the back of the one who calls upon Him, nor far from him, but before him and over against those who afflict him.

This riddle the Apostle, transforming it into something clearer, writes thus:

For a great and effective door has been opened to me, and there are many adversaries.

Whenever someone has a word, and a door for the word, that is strong and effective, he has many adversaries.

And the devil himself is set against him, wishing to hinder the benefit that comes from the working of the word, as are sophists and other wicked men.

Yet they are not so set against him as ever actually to plot against the one being benefited.

He prepared the table over against those who afflict me.

I once spoke concerning that saying about the infant Jesus:

That before He knows to call 'father' or 'mother,' He shall take the power of Damascus and the spoils of Samaria before the king of the Assyrians.

It would have been no great thing if He had taken the spoils under the king's power while the king was absent; but over against him, in his very presence, He tore away what the king held under his own control.

Or did He not, over against the king of the Assyrians, despoil the Magi? For they were engaged in magic.

It was not after they had first repented that they came to the child, but while the demons were still at work.

Something of this sort, at any rate, has been observed in the tradition of the Church: that when those men performed their customary rites to summon demons, and did not have them obedient, they recognized that magic had been overthrown by the child signified through the appearing star.

So, when something of this kind came upon me, these afflicters were present, and the deeds of the benefaction took place before their very eyes.

The phrase 'over against' can also be understood thus:

They were present with a contrary purpose, wishing to hinder, so far as it lay in them, or wishing to harm him.

You have anointed my head with oil.

According to which sense it is said:

Do not touch my anointed ones.

And this holy one was one of the anointed ones, anointed with the oil of gladness above his fellows in Christ.

This very man was anointed above his fellows, above the other anointed ones, concerning whom it is said:

Go forth for the salvation of Your people, to save Your anointed ones.

You have anointed my head with oil, then.

In many places the head signifies the mind:

The eyes of the wise man are in his head.

Indeed, common usage too says of the more foolish that they have no brain, that they have no head.

The ruler of a body of men is called the head of that body.

Since, then, the mind also rules and governs our whole constitution, it is named the head.

And many Scriptures teach this, which we have often cited.

He did not say simply 'was anointed,' but 'with oil':

For there is also a base kind of oil, concerning which the holy one prays to be delivered, saying:

But let not the oil of the sinner anoint my head.

And Your cup which inebriates, how excellent it is!

Since not everyone is able to drink dry the whole bowl which Wisdom has mingled, she apportions to each a cup which he is able, upon receiving, to be gladdened by.

'Inebriating,' then, it is, 'how excellent.'

It brings upon the drinker the most excellent inebriation, a sober inebriation.

The word 'inebriating' stands here for 'gladdening.'

For we often call the man who drinks much wine a drunkard.

And the very act of touching and tasting is called 'inebriation.'

And they derive the etymology of 'inebriation' thus:

In ancient times there was no abundance of wine, when the fruit of the vine that makes wine had just been discovered, and at feasts and public festivals they used to drink after having sacrificed.

And for this reason it is called 'inebriation' [methē, i.e. 'after the sacrifice'].

And 'inebriation' often signifies simply the act of touching:

They shall be inebriated with the fatness of Your house, that is, they are gladdened.

For in another sense 'inebriation' is spoken of with reproach:

Those who are inebriated are inebriated at night.

These are inebriated with darkness and ignorance.

But those who are inebriated having received the divine draught, that is, being gladdened, are inebriated soberly.

'Eat, drink, and be inebriated, brethren,' the Bridegroom says in the Song of Songs.

By 'be inebriated' He does not mean this, He does not say 'be overpowered by wine,' but 'be gladdened.'

And Your mercy shall pursue me all the days of my life.

Your mercy, in that You anointed my head:

It anoints my head not for a little while, but always:

Since He is present with me, and in this way each of the anointed becomes an eternal anointed one.

All the days of my life, then, it pursues me:

It does not allow me to become far from Him.

For he is abiding, since he is present with me; and thus each of those who have been anointed becomes an eternal Christ.