Works (CSEL) 15 part 19/31

That worldly abundance too, or insolence, is neither to be compared to the heavenly gift, nor again to be left without remedy, since for each one there is the help of repentance. Finally, he opens up the heavenly mystery: that it pleased God to reveal his grace rather to little ones than to the prudent of this world. This the apostle Paul set forth with a fuller pen, saying: «Has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? For since in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save those who believe.» Let us therefore become a little one, who knows not how to exalt himself and to vaunt the artifice of his own prudence with bedizened words, as most philosophers do.

A little one was he who said: «Lord, my heart is not lifted up, nor are my eyes raised on high; neither have I walked in great matters, nor in things too wonderful for me.» And that you might know this little one was such not in age, not in sense, but in lowliness of himself and a certain shunning of boastfulness, he added: «But I have exalted my soul.» You see how lofty this little one was, how sublime in the summit of his virtues? Such little ones the apostle wishes us to be, when he says: «If any man seems to be wise among you in this world, let him become a fool, that he may be wise; for the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God.» A most beautiful passage on faith is here connected, when he says that all things have been delivered to him by his Father.

When you read «all things», you acknowledge the Almighty, not one discoloured, not degenerate from the Father; when you read «delivered», you confess the Son, to whom by nature all things are proper by right of one substance, not conferred as a gift through grace. He added: «No one knows who the Son is but the Father, and who the Father is but the Son, and he to whom the Son will reveal him.» Which passage I remember was not passed over in those little books which I wrote concerning the faith. But that you may know that, just as the Son reveals the Father to whom he wills, so also the Father reveals the Son to whom he wills, hear the Lord Jesus himself saying, when he praised Peter for confessing him to be the Son of God: «Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jona, for flesh and blood has not revealed it to you, but my Father who is in heaven.»

To these is joined the reading in which they are set forth who seem to themselves skilled in the law, who hold the words of the law but are ignorant of the law's force. And from the very first chapter of the law he shows them to be ignorant of the law, proving that at the very beginning the law proclaimed both the Father and the Son, and announced also the sacrament of the Lord's incarnation, saying: «You shall love the Lord your God», and: «You shall love your neighbour as yourself.» Whence the Lord says to the lawyer: «Do this, and you shall live.» But that man, who knew not his neighbour, because he did not believe in Christ, answered: «Who is my neighbour?» And so he who knows not Christ knows not the law either. For how can he know the law, when he is ignorant of the truth, since the law announces the truth?

«A certain man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho.» That we may more plainly resolve the passage which is set before us, let us recall the ancient history of the city of Jericho. We remember therefore that Jericho, as we read in the book which is entitled «Joshua son of Nun», was a great city, hedged about with walls, which was passable neither by iron nor penetrable by the battering-ram; that in it dwelt Rahab the harlot, who received into hospitality the spies whom Joshua sent, devised a plan, answered the citizens who demanded them that they had departed, hid them on the roof, and, that she might rescue herself and her own from the destruction of the city, bound a scarlet thread in the window;

but that the impregnable walls of that very city collapsed at the sound of the seven priestly trumpets and the harmonious shouting of the jubilant people. See how each one preserves his own office: the spy his watch, the harlot the mystery, the conqueror his faith, the priest his religion. These do not fear danger for the sake of praise; she does not betray those received even amid perils; he, anxious rather to preserve his faith than to conquer, charges that the harlot's safety come before the destruction of the city; but the arms of the priest are the insignia of religion. Now who would not think it full of miracle, that out of the whole city no one was preserved except the one whom the harlot delivered? This is the story of the simple truth, which, if it be considered more deeply, marks out admirable mysteries.

For Jericho is a figure of this world, into which Adam, cast out of paradise, that is, out of that heavenly Jerusalem, descended by the lapse of his transgression—that is, migrating from things of life to the depths below, for whom not a change of place but a change of conduct made the exile of his nature. For, far changed from that Adam who enjoyed an unspoiled blessedness, when he turned aside into worldly sins, he fell among robbers, among whom he would not have fallen, had he not, straying from the heavenly command, made himself liable to them. Who are these robbers but the angels of night and darkness, who sometimes transfigure themselves into angels of light, but cannot persevere? These first despoil us of the garments of spiritual grace which we received, and so are wont to inflict wounds;

for if we keep undefiled the garments we have taken on, we cannot feel the blows of the robbers. Beware therefore lest you be stripped beforehand, just as Adam was stripped beforehand, bereft of the guardianship of the heavenly command and divested of the garment of faith, and so received a deadly wound, in which the whole human race would have perished, had not that Samaritan, coming down, healed his bitter wounds. No common Samaritan is this, who did not himself despise the one whom the priest, whom the Levite, had despised. Nor should you despise by the name of a sect him whom you will admire by the interpretation of the word; for by the name Samaritan a guardian is signified. This the interpretation has. Who is the guardian but he of whom it is said: «The Lord keeps the little ones»?

And so, just as one Jew is in the letter, another in the spirit, so also one Samaritan is outwardly, another in secret. This Samaritan, then, coming down—who is he who descended from heaven but he who ascended into heaven, the Son of Man who is in heaven?—seeing the half-dead man, whom no one had been able to heal before, just as that woman who, flowing with an issue of blood, had spent all her patrimony upon physicians, came beside him, that is, made near by the assumption of our compassion and a neighbour by the bestowal of mercy. «And he bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine.» This physician has many medicines with which he is wont to heal. His word is a medicine.

One word of his binds up wounds, another soothes with oil, another pours in wine: it binds up wounds with a sterner precept, soothes with the remission of sin, as with wine it pricks by the announcement of judgement. «And he set him,» it says, «upon his own beast.» Hear how he sets you upon it. He bears our sins and grieves for us. And «the shepherd set the weary sheep upon his shoulders.» For man was made like the beasts, and therefore he set us upon his own beast, lest we should be like the horse and the mule, that by the assumption of our body he might abolish the infirmities of our flesh. Finally, he led us, who were beasts, into the stable. And the stable is that into which the weary, after a long journey, are wont to come.

And so the Lord led into the stable, he who «raises up the needy from the earth and lifts the poor out of the dung-heap», and took care lest the sick man should in no way keep the precepts he had received. But there was no leisure for this Samaritan to tarry long upon the earth: he had to return whence he had come down. And so on the next day—what is this other day but perhaps that of the Lord's resurrection, of which it is said: «This is the day which the Lord has made»?—he brought forth two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper and said: «Take care of him.» What are these two denarii but perhaps the two Testaments, which have in themselves the image of the eternal King expressed, by whose price our wounds are healed? For we have been redeemed by the price of his blood, that we might avoid the sores of the final death.

These two denarii, then—though it is not absurd to understand here also the four forms of these books—the innkeeper received. Who? Perhaps he who said: «And I count all things as dung, that I may gain Christ», so that he might take care of the wounded man. The innkeeper, accordingly, is he who said: «Christ sent me to evangelize.» Innkeepers are those to whom it is said: «Go into all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature; and he who believes and is baptized, he shall be saved»—saved indeed from death, saved from the wound which was inflicted by the robbers. Blessed is that innkeeper who can take care of another's wounds; blessed is he to whom Jesus says: «Whatever you spend over and above, when I return, I will repay you.»

A good steward, who even spends over and above. A good steward is Paul, whose discourses and epistles overflow, as it were, beyond the account which he had received. He carried out the Lord's moderate command with almost immoderate labour of mind and body, that by the dispensation of spiritual address he might relieve many from grievous sickness. A good innkeeper, therefore, of his stable, in which the ass recognized the manger of her lord, and in which the flocks of lambs are shut up, lest, when the rapacious wolves rage at the folds, there be an easy assault upon the sheepfolds. He pledges, therefore, that he will repay the recompense. When do you return, Lord, but on the day of judgement?

For although You are always everywhere and, standing in the midst of us, are not perceived by us, yet there shall be a time when all flesh shall behold You returning. You will therefore render what You owe. Blessed are they to whom God is a debtor! Would that we might be worthy debtors. Would that we might be able to pay back what we have received, and that neither the office of the priesthood nor of the ministry might exalt us! How will You render it, Lord Jesus? You have indeed promised that in heaven the reward for the good is abundant; yet You will render it also when You shall say: 'Well done, good servant, since you have been faithful over a few things, I will set you over many; enter into the joy of your lord.' Therefore, since no one is more our neighbor than He who has healed our wounds, let us love Him as Lord, and let us love Him also as neighbor;

For nothing is so near as the head is to the members. Let us also love him who is an imitator of Christ; let us love him who, by the unity of the one body, suffers together with another's want. For it is not kinship that makes a neighbor, but mercy, since mercy is according to nature; for nothing is so according to nature as to help a partner in our nature. It has therefore been said concerning mercy; but there is not one single form of virtue. By the example of Martha and the works of Mary another form is set forth: the active devotion of the one, the religious intent of the other's mind upon the word of God—which, if it accords with faith, is preferred even to those very works, according to what is written: 'Mary has chosen for herself the best part, which shall not be taken from her.'

Let us therefore also strive to have that which no one can take from us, so that not a perfunctory but a diligent hearing may be offered; for even the very seeds of the heavenly word are wont to be snatched away if they are sown beside the way. Let the desire of wisdom move you as it moved Mary; for this is the greater, this the more perfect work, and let not the care of ministry turn away the knowledge of the heavenly word, nor reprove as idle those whom you see striving after wisdom; for this wisdom that peaceable Solomon took to himself as a companion. Yet Martha is not blamed in her good ministry, but Mary, because she had chosen for herself the better part, is preferred; for Jesus abounds in many things and bestows many things. And therefore the wiser one chose that which attends to what is principal.

Finally, the apostles did not think it best to forsake the word of God and to serve tables. But both offices belong to wisdom; for Stephen too, full of wisdom, was chosen as a minister. And therefore let him who ministers show deference to the teacher, and let the teacher invite and call forth the one who ministers; for the body of the Church is one, even though the members are diverse: the one needs the other. The eye cannot say to the hand, 'I do not require your work,' nor again the head to the feet and the ear, that they are not of the body; for although some parts are principal, yet others are necessary. Wisdom is in the head, action in the hands; for 'the eyes of the wise man are in his head,' because he truly is wise whose mind is in Christ and whose inner eye is lifted up to the things above.

And therefore 'the eyes of the wise man are in his head, but the fool's in his heel.' 'Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go to him at midnight and say to him: Friend, lend me three loaves.' This is another passage of precept, namely that prayer is to be offered at every moment, not only by day but also by night; for you see that this man who set out at midnight, asking three loaves from his friend and persisting in the very intent of his asking, is not defrauded of what he asked. What are these three loaves but the nourishment of the heavenly mystery? And if you love the Lord your God, you will be able to earn it not only for yourself but also for others. And who is more a friend to us than He who handed over His own body for us? At midnight David asked loaves from Him and received them;

for he asked when he said: 'At midnight I rose to give thanks to You'; therefore he merited these loaves, which he set before us to eat. He asked when he says: 'I will wash my bed every night'; for neither did he fear lest he should awaken Him who sleeps, since he knows that He ever keeps watch, ever vigilant. And therefore, mindful of the Scriptures, by night and by day persisting in prayers, let us ask pardon for our sins. For if that man, so holy and occupied with the necessities of a kingdom, gave praise to the Lord seven times a day, ever intent upon the morning and evening sacrifices, what ought we to do, who ought to entreat all the more often the more frequently we offend through the frailty of flesh and mind.

so that to those wearied by the way and heavily fatigued by the course of this age and the windings of this life, the bread of refreshment that strengthens the hearts of men may not be lacking. And the Lord teaches that we must keep watch not only at midnight but at nearly every moment; for He comes at the evening and the second watch, and at the third watch He is wont to knock. 'Blessed therefore are those servants whom the lord, when he comes, shall find watching.' If therefore you desire that the power of God should gird itself and minister to you, you must keep watch always; for many are the snares set for us, and heavy is the sleep of the body, which, if the mind begins to sleep, it will lose the vigor of its own strength.

Rouse therefore your sleep, that you may knock at the door of Christ, which Paul too asks to be opened to him, beseeching that he be helped not only by his own prayers but also by those of the people, that a door may be opened to him to speak the mystery of Christ. And perhaps this is the door which John saw opened; for he saw and said: 'After these things I saw, and behold a door opened in heaven, and the first voice which I heard, as of a trumpet speaking with me and saying: Come up hither, and I will show you the things that must come to pass.' A door, then, was opened to John, a door was opened to Paul, that he might receive for us the loaves we should eat. For the door persevered in knocking in season and out of season, that it might refresh with the abundance of heavenly food the nations harassed by the toil of the worldly path.

Therefore here is a passage of precept concerning praying frequently, of hope concerning obtaining, of reason concerning persuading—first in the precept, then in the example. For he who promises something ought to bring hope of the promise, so that obedience may be offered to the admonitions, and faith to the promises—faith which, by contemplation of human piety, acquires a hope of greater, eternal piety, if indeed what is asked is just, lest prayer be turned into sin. Nor was he ashamed to ask something more often, lest he should seem either to distrust the Lord's mercy or arrogantly to grieve that he had not obtained something at the first prayer—'for this,' he says, 'I besought the Lord three times'—and he showed that God often does not grant when asked, because He judges to be useless those things which we believe will profit us.

'Every kingdom divided against itself shall be brought to desolation.' The occasion of this saying is that He was said to cast out demons by Beelzebub the prince of demons, so that He might show His kingdom to be undivided and perpetual. And deservedly He answered Pilate also: 'My kingdom is not of this world.' And therefore those who place their hope not in Christ but suppose that demons are cast out by the prince of demons—He denies that they belong to a perpetual kingdom, which pertains to the people of the Jews, who by passions of this sort summon the aid of a demon for the casting out of a demon. For how can a kingdom remain when, since the faith is rent asunder, it is divided?

For indeed, since the people of the Jews is under the law, and Christ too according to the flesh was begotten from the law, how can the kingdom of the Jews be perpetual, which is from the law, when that very people divides the law, since by the people of the law Jesus is denied, who is owed from the law? Thus in part the faith of the Jewish people assails itself, and by assailing is divided, and by dividing is dissolved. And therefore the kingdom of the Church shall remain eternal, because the faith is undivided, the body is one; for there is 'one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in all of us.'

How great here is the madness of sacrilegious frenzy, that, although the Son of God assumed flesh in order to crush the unclean spirits and to carry off the spoils of the prince of this world, and gave to men also the power of destroying spiritual wickedness, dividing his spoils—which is the mark of one who triumphs—yet some take to themselves the help and protection of the diabolical power, when it is by the finger of God, or certainly according to Matthew by the Spirit of God, that the demons are shut out! Whence it is understood that the kingdom of the Godhead is, as it were, a certain undivided body, since Christ is the right hand of God, while the Spirit seems to express, under the figure of a finger, the continuity of one body according to the divinity.

Does not the kingdom seem to be undivided, since it is, as it were, an undivided body? For 'in Christ,' as you have read, 'dwells bodily the fullness of the Godhead.' And this assuredly you cannot deny of the Father, and you ought not deny of the Spirit. Nor let any portion of power seem to be made by comparison with our members; for of an undivided thing there can be no division, and therefore the naming of a 'finger' is to be referred to the form of unity, not to a distinction of power, since the right hand of God says: 'I and the Father are one'—yet although the Godhead is undivided, the Person is distinct. When the Spirit is called a 'finger,' however, the operative power is signified, because, just as the Father and the Son, so also the Holy Spirit is the worker of the divine works.

For David says: 'For I will behold the heavens, the works of Your fingers,' and in the thirty-second psalm: 'And by the Spirit of His mouth all their power.' And Paul says: 'But all these things one and the same Spirit works, dividing to each one as He wills.' And when He says, 'But if I by the Spirit of God cast out demons, then surely the kingdom of God has come upon you,' He shows at the same time that there is a certain imperial power of the Holy Spirit, in whom is the kingdom of God; and that we too, in whom the Spirit dwells, are a royal house. Whence also He said in what follows: 'The kingdom of God is within you.' And therefore we ought to esteem the Holy Spirit a partner of divinity and dominion and imperial majesty, because 'the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.'

'When the unclean spirit has gone out of a man, he walks through places that have no water, seeking rest and not finding it.' That this is said concerning the people of the Jews cannot be doubted—the people whom the Lord above separated from His kingdom. Whence understand that all heretics and schismatics too are separated from the kingdom of God and from the Church. And therefore it clearly appears that every assembly of schismatics and heretics belongs not to God but to the unclean spirit. And so in one man there is a likeness of the whole Jewish people, from whom through the law the unclean spirit had gone out.

But because among the nations and Gentiles it could not find rest through faith in Christ—for to unclean spirits Christ is a burning fire, who in the breasts of the Gentiles, which before were dry, but afterward through baptism grew moist with the dew of the Spirit, had quenched the fiery darts of the adversary—therefore it returned to the people of the Jews, who, adorned with an outward and perfunctory appearance, remain more polluted in the inner mind. For neither by the watering of the sacred fount did they wash or quench the heat, and deservedly the unclean spirit returned to them, bringing with it seven spirits more wicked, since with sacrilegious mind they committed the mystery of the week of the law and of the eighth day.

And so, just as for us the sevenfold grace of the Spirit is multiplied, so for them every injury of the unclean spirits is heaped up; for universality is sometimes comprehended by this number, on which account, when the works of the world were finished on the seventh day, God rested. Therefore also 'the barren has borne seven, and she that was rich in children has grown feeble.' Finally, that you may know the people of the synagogue to be disfigured where the blessedness of the Church is praised, He added: 'This generation is a wicked generation; it seeks a sign, and a sign shall not be given it but the sign of Jonah. For as Jonah was a sign to the Ninevites, so shall also the Son of Man be.'

In this also, by the condemnation of the Jewish people, the mystery of the Church is evidently expressed—the Church which is gathered together from the ends of the whole world, in the Ninevites through repentance and in the queen of the south through zeal to receive wisdom, that she might learn the words of the peaceable Solomon. A queen, surely, whose kingdom is undivided, rising up into one body from diverse and distant peoples. And so 'that mystery is great, concerning Christ and the Church'; but yet this present one is greater, because that one went before in figure, but now the mystery is full in truth; for there Solomon is the type, but here Christ is in His own body. The Church, then, consists of two things, so that you may either not know how to sin, or cease to sin;

for repentance abolishes the offense, wisdom guards against it. So much in mystery. But for the rest, the sign of Jonah, just as it is a type of the Lord's passion, so also is a testimony of the grievous sins which the Jews would commit. At the same time one may observe both an oracle of majesty and a token of mercy; for by the example of the Ninevites both a punishment is announced and a remedy is shown. Whence the Jews too ought not to despair of pardon, if they are willing to do penance. 'No one lights a lamp and puts it in a hidden place, nor under a bushel, but upon a lampstand.' Therefore, because in the foregoing He preferred the Church to the synagogue, He exhorts us rather to transfer our faith to the Church; for the lamp is faith, according to what is written:

'Your word, O Lord, is a lamp to my feet'; for the word of God is our faith. The word of God is light, faith is the lamp. 'There was the true light, which enlightens every man coming into this world.' But a lamp cannot shine unless it has received its light from elsewhere. This is the lamp that is kindled, namely the power of our mind and sense, that 'that coin which was lost' may be found again. Let no one, therefore, set his faith under the law; for the law is within a measure, grace beyond measure: the law overshadows, grace makes clear.

And therefore let no one enclose his faith within the measure of the law, but let him bring it to the Church, in which the sevenfold grace of the Spirit shines again, which that Prince of priests illumines with the splendor of the supernal Godhead, lest the shadow of the law quench it.

Finally, that lamp which, according to the ancient rite of the Jews, the prince of priests was wont to kindle at the morning and evening times, set as it were under a bushel, vanished away as belonging to the law; and that city of Jerusalem which is on earth, which slew the prophets, set as it were in a valley of weeping, lies hidden; but that Jerusalem which is in heaven, in which our faith does its warfare, placed on that highest mountain of all—that is, in Christ—the Church cannot be hidden by the darkness and ruins of this world, but shining with the brightness of the eternal sun enlightens us with the light of spiritual grace. 'Now you Pharisees cleanse first that which is outside of the cup and the platter.'

You see that our bodies are signified by the figure of earthly and fragile things, which, dashed down in a brief fall, are broken. And that what the inner mind has resolved is easily betrayed through the senses and the gestures of the body, just as those things which the cup contains within shine outwardly. Whence also in what follows it is not doubtful that by the name of 'cup' the passion of the body is declared, when the Lord says: 'The cup which the Father has given me, do you not wish that I should drink it?' For he drinks his own body who absorbs bodily fragility with spiritual affection and pours it, as it were, into the mind and soul, so that the weakness of outward things may be drunk up by the inner. You discern, therefore, that it is not the outward parts of this cup or platter, but the inward, that defile us.

And therefore, like a good teacher, He taught how we ought to cleanse the contagion of our body, saying: 'Give alms, and behold, all things are clean unto you.' Do you see how great are the remedies? Mercy cleanses us, the word of God cleanses us, according to what is written: 'Now you are clean because of the word which I have spoken to you.' And not in this place only, but also in others, you hold it expressed how great is the grace of almsgiving: 'For alms deliver from death,' and: 'Shut up alms in the heart of the poor man, and this shall make entreaty for you in the day of evil.'

And so from here onward this whole most beautiful passage is directed to this end: that, since it invites us to the pursuit of simplicity, it may condemn the superfluous and earthly things of the Jews, who, by understanding the things of the law according to the body, are not undeservedly compared to glass and platter because of their fragility, and who observe those things which are of no use to us, but neglect those things in which lies the fruit of our hope, and therefore commit a grievous sin while they despise the better things; and yet to that very sin abolition is promised, if mercy follow after.