'I am a God at hand, and not a God afar off,' and through David also it is proclaimed that there is no place apart from him, how does the son journey into a far country and depart from his father? It is to be understood, then, that we are with God or depart from him not by intervals of place, but by disposition. For just as he speaks to the disciples: 'Behold, I am with you all the days, even unto the consummation of the age,' so to those who parade their own boasting and do not deserve to be with the Lord, he says: 'Depart from me, I never knew you, ye that work iniquity.' So the younger son departed from the father with his substance and journeyed into a far country.
And Cain, going out from the face of God, dwelt in the land of Nod, which is interpreted 'fluctuation.' Whoever withdraws from God is straightway shaken by the waves of the world, and his feet are moved. For after men were moved from the East and withdrew from the true light, then against God they built the tower of their impiety, then they devised the arrogances of doctrines, wishing by unlawful curiosity to penetrate into the very heights of heaven. And that place was called Babel, that is, 'confusion.' 'And there he wasted his substance, living riotously.' Riotous living, the enemy of God, the enemy of virtues, squanders all the father's substance, and, soothing with present pleasure, does not suffer future poverty to be thought upon.
'And when he had spent all, there arose a mighty famine throughout that country.' He had received resources from the father, that through the things which are visible he might know his invisible attributes, and from the beauty of created things might consequently understand the Creator. But he, holding the truth in unrighteousness and worshipping idols in the place of God, consumed all the goods of nature, and, all being consumed, began to be in want of virtues, having forsaken the fountain of virtues. 'There arose a mighty famine throughout that country.' Every place that we inhabit while the father is absent is one of famine, penury, and destitution. But the country of a famine 'with vehemence' mighty is that of which it is said through the prophet: 'Ye that dwell in the region of the shadow of death, light shall shine upon you.' But on the contrary...
there is another country, which we shall possess if we are pure in heart and living, which the holy man desires, saying: 'I believe to see the good things of the Lord in the land of the living.' 'And he began to be in want, and went and joined himself to one of the citizens of that country.' Having deserted the Nourisher, who at his first word had bestowed all good things upon him, he joined himself to the prince of this world, that is, the devil, the ruler of these darknesses, whom Scripture names now the enemy man, now the judge of iniquity, now the dragon, now Satan, now the hammer, now the partridge, now Belial, now the roaring lion, now Leviathan, now the sea-monster (tannin), and by many other names. But as to his saying 'one of the citizens':
it is to be understood that there are many who flit through this air and, by the deceit of divers vices, subject the race of men to their own bondage. 'Who sent him into his field, to feed swine.' The swine is an unclean animal, which delights in mire and filth. Such is the multitude of demons, which by idols made with hands is fed on the blood of cattle and on victims, and at last is glutted with a fatter sacrifice, the death of man himself. He sent him therefore into his own possession, that is, made him to be his own servant, to feed swine by sacrificing to them his own soul. 'And he desired to fill his belly with the husks that the swine did eat, and no man gave unto him.' That which in Ezekiel is said with rebuke to Jerusalem:
'And it came to pass in thee, in thy fornication, a perverseness beyond that of women; and after thee they have not committed fornication, in that thou gavest hires, and hires were not given to thee' — we see fulfilled in the younger son. He lost his substance in the country of the prince, and after his resources were lost, being sent to the swine, he wasted away with destitution. The food of demons is drunkenness, riotousness, fornication, and all vices. These are alluring and wanton and soothe the sense with pleasure, and no sooner have they appeared than they provoke to their use. With these, therefore, the riotous youth could not be sated, because pleasure ever has hunger of itself, and when past does not satisfy.
And Satan, when by his art he has deceived someone and imposed on him his own yoke, no longer procures for him an abundance of vices, knowing that he is now dead — as we see many idolaters worn out with rags, misery, and destitution. These are they in whom the prophetic word is fulfilled: 'To all harlots hires are given; but thou hast given hires to all thy lovers, and hast received no hires.' But we may also interpret the husks otherwise. The food of demons is the songs of poets, secular wisdom, the pomp of rhetoricians' words. All these delight men by their own sweetness, and while they captivate the ears with verses running in sweet measure, they penetrate the soul also and bind fast the inward parts of the breast.
But when they have been read through with the highest zeal and labour, they yield to their readers nothing else but an empty sound and a din of words: no satiety of truth, no refreshment of righteousness is found there. Those devoted to them persevere in hunger for the true and in penury of virtues. A type of this wisdom is described also in Deuteronomy under the figure of the captive woman, concerning whom the divine voice commands that, if an Israelite wish to have her as wife, he shall make her bald, pare her nails, remove her hair, and, when she has been made clean, then she may pass into the victor's embrace. If we understand these things according to the letter, are they not ridiculous?
And yet we too are wont to do this, when we read the philosophers, when the books of secular wisdom come into our hands: if we find anything useful in them, we turn it to our own doctrine; but if anything superfluous — about idols, about love, about the care of worldly affairs — these we scrape away, upon these we impose baldness, these we cut off in the manner of nails with the sharpest steel. Hence the Apostle also forbids anyone to sit at meat in an idol's temple, saying: 'But take heed lest by any means this liberty of yours become a stumbling-block to them that are weak. For if any man see thee which hast knowledge sit at meat in the idol's temple...'
'...reclining, shall not the conscience of him that is weak be emboldened to eat things offered to idols? and through thy knowledge shall the weak brother perish, for whom Christ died?' Does he not seem to you to say under other words: do not read the philosophers, orators, poets, do not rest in the reading of them? Nor let us flatter ourselves, if we do not believe the things that are written, when another's conscience is wounded and we are thought to approve what, while we read, we do not reprove. Otherwise, what will it be, that we should reckon the Apostle to have approved the knowledge of him who ate in the idol's temple, and to have called that man perfect whom he knew to eat of things offered to idols?
God forbid that from a Christian mouth should sound 'Jupiter omnipotent' and 'by Hercules' and 'by Castor' and the rest of the portents rather than deities. But now we see even priests of God, laying aside the Gospels and the prophets, reading comedies, chanting the amatory words of bucolic verses, holding Virgil, and making that which in boys is a matter of necessity a crime of the will in themselves. We must beware, therefore, lest we wish to have a captive as wife, lest we recline in the idol's temple; or, if indeed we have been ensnared by her love, let us cleanse her and purge her of every horror of filth, lest the brother for whom Christ died suffer scandal, when from the mouth of a Christian he hears songs composed in praise of idols resounding. 'And coming to himself he said:'
'How many hired servants of my father's have bread enough and to spare, and I perish here with hunger!' The hired servants, according to another interpretation, we take to be those of the Jews who keep the precepts of the Law only for the sake of present goods — that is, who are righteous and merciful, not for the sake of righteousness itself and of the good of mercy itself, but that they may obtain from God a reward of earthly fruitfulness and long life. But he who desires these things is driven by fear to the obedience of the precepts, lest by transgression of what is commanded he lack what he covets. Moreover, where there is fear, there is not love. For perfect love casteth out fear.
For he who loves keeps what is commanded not because he is driven either by fear of punishments or by greed of reward, but because this very thing which is commanded by God is best. And so this is the sense: 'How many of the Jews, for the sake of present goods only, do not withdraw from the obedience of God, and I am consumed with destitution!' 'Rising, I will go to my father.' Beautifully he says 'rising'; for while the father was absent he had not stood. To lie down belongs to sinners, to stand to the righteous. To Moses it is said: 'But stand thou here with me'; and in the hundred and thirty-third psalm: 'Behold now, bless the Lord, all ye servants of the Lord, who stand in the house of the Lord' — the prophet exhorts to the blessing of the Lord those standing in the house of the Lord. 'And I will say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and before thee;'
'I am no more worthy to be called thy son.' He had sinned against heaven, who had forsaken Jerusalem the heavenly mother; he had sinned before the father, who, having deserted the Creator, had worshipped wood; he was not worthy to be called the son of God, who had preferred to be the slave of idols. For everyone who commits sin is born of the devil his father. 'Make me as one of thy hired servants.' 'Make me,' he says, 'as one of the Jews, who worship thee for the promise of present things only. Receive thy penitent son, thou who hast very often spared thy hired servants when they sinned.' 'And he came even unto his father.' We come to the father when we withdraw from the feeding of swine, according to that word: 'As soon as thou art converted and dost groan, thou shalt be saved.'
'But when he was yet a great way off, his father saw him and was moved with compassion.' Before he returned to the ancient father by worthy works and true repentance, God — with whom all things future are already done, and who is foreknowing of all things to come — ran forward to meet his coming, and through his Word, which took flesh of the Virgin, anticipated the return of the younger son. 'And running he fell upon his neck.'
He came to the earth before that son entered the house of confession; he fell upon his neck, that is, took a human body; and, just as John reclined upon his breast, who was made a partaker of his secrets, so he laid his easy yoke, that is, the easy precepts of his commandments, upon the younger son by grace rather than by merit. 'And he kissed him,' according to that which in the Song of Songs the Church prays concerning the coming of the Bridegroom: 'Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth' — saying, 'I would not have him speak to me by Moses, I would not have him speak by the prophets; let him himself assume my body, let him himself kiss me in the flesh' — so that we may fit to this meaning also that which is written in Isaiah:
'If thou seekest, seek; and turn, and dwell with me in the wood.' For there too the weeping Church is bidden to cry out from Seir, because Seir is interpreted 'hairy' and 'shaggy,' so that it may signify the ancient horror of the Gentiles — with that similitude likewise answering: 'I am black and comely, O daughter of Jerusalem.' 'And the son said to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and before thee; I am no more worthy to be called thy son.' He says he is not worthy to be called a son, and yet by the voice of nature, by that substance which the father had once bestowed upon him, trembling he bursts forth into the name of truth: 'Father,' he says, 'I have sinned against heaven.'
In vain, therefore, do some argue that the name of father befits the saints only, since here too he calls God father who confesses himself unworthy of the name of son; unless perhaps he dares to call him father for this reason, that he is converted with a full mind. 'But the father said to his servants: Bring forth quickly the first robe' — the robe which Adam lost by sinning, the robe which in another parable is called the wedding garment, that is, the vesture of the Holy Spirit, which whoever does not have cannot be present at the King's banquet. 'And put a ring on his hand' — the seal of the likeness of Christ, according to that: 'Believing, ye were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise.' And to the prince of Tyre, who had lost the likeness of his Creator, it is said:
'Thou art the seal of likeness and the crown of beauty; thou wast born in the delights of the paradise of God.' Isaiah too speaks of this seal: 'Then shall they be made manifest who are sealed.' This seal is given in the hand, when Scripture signifies the works of righteousness, as there: 'The word of the Lord came in the hand of Haggai the prophet'; and to Jerusalem: 'I adorned thee,' he says, 'with ornament, and put bracelets about thy hands.' Again, to that man who was clothed with the long robe, another passage points out the seal: 'Pass through the midst of Jerusalem and set a mark on the foreheads of the men that groan and grieve for all the iniquities that are done in the midst of them.' Why? That they may afterwards be able to say: 'The light of thy countenance is sealed upon us, O Lord.'
'And shoes on his feet.' For he had lost the dignity of the bridegroom. With bare feet he could not celebrate the Passover. These are the shoes of which the Lord says: 'And I shod thee with hyacinth.' 'And shoes on his feet,' lest anywhere the lurking serpent should assail the sole of the walker, that he might walk more safely over scorpions and serpents, that he might be prepared for the gospel of peace, now walking not according to the flesh but according to the spirit, and that the prophetic saying might befit him: 'How beautiful are the feet of them that preach peace, that bring glad tidings of good things!' 'And bring the fatted calf and kill it, and let us eat and make merry; for this my son was dead and is alive again, was lost and is found.'
The fatted calf, which is slain for the salvation of the penitent, is the Saviour himself, on whose flesh we daily feed and with whose blood we are given to drink. Faithful reader, thou understandest with me by what fatness we are filled when we burst forth into the belching of his praises, saying: 'My heart hath uttered a good word; I speak of my works to the King' — although some, superstitiously rather than truly, not considering the text of the psalm, suppose this to be understood of the person of the father. But as to his saying: 'Let us make merry, for this my son was dead and is alive again, was lost and is found,' it pertains to the same sense of the earlier parable, in which it is said: 'So, I say unto you, there shall be joy before the angels of God over one sinner that repenteth.' 'And they began to make merry.'
This banquet is celebrated daily, daily the father receives the son: Christ is ever sacrificed for those who believe. 'Now his elder son was in the field.' Thus far it has been argued concerning the person of the younger son, whom according to the present parable we ought to take to be among the publicans and sinners who were called by the Lord to repentance, but according to the mystical understanding to be prophesied of the future calling of the Gentiles also. Now the discourse passes over to the elder son, whom many refer simply to the person of all the saints, many properly to the Jews. And concerning the saints indeed the interpretation is not difficult in what is said:
'I never transgressed thy commandment' — although that seems to stand in the way, that he envies his brother's return. But in the case of the Jews, though envy at a brother's salvation fits them, this is repugnant, that he should say he never transgressed his commandment; concerning which what we think we shall try to explain in its proper places. 'Now his elder son was in the field,' sweating with labour in earthly works, far from the grace of the Holy Spirit, an exile from the father's counsel. This is he who says: 'I have bought a field, and I must needs go out and see it; I pray thee, have me excused'; this is he who buys five yoke of oxen, and, weighed down by the burden of the Law, enjoys the pleasure of earthly senses;
this is he who, having married a wife, cannot go to the wedding, and, having become flesh, is by no means one with the spirit. To his person the labourers of that other parable also correspond, in which, at the first, third, sixth, and ninth hour — that is, at various callings — they are sent to the vineyard and are indignant that the labourers of the eleventh hour are made equal to them. 'And when he came and drew near to the house, he heard music and dancing (chorus).' That which in a certain psalm is superscribed 'for Meleth' fits this sense, since 'Meleth' is said to be a choir singing together in one. But wrongly do some of the Latins suppose a symphony to be a kind of instrument, whereas by this word is signified a concord agreeing together in the praise of God;
for 'symphonia' is rendered in Latin as 'consonance.' 'And he called one of the servants and asked what these things might be.' And now Israel asks why God rejoices in the reception of the Gentiles, and, tormented with jealousy, cannot know the father's will. 'Who said to him, Thy brother is come, and thy father hath killed the fatted calf, because he hath received him safe and sound.' The cause of joy — that in equal voice throughout the whole world it is sung in the praises of God — is the salvation of the Gentiles, the salvation of sinners. The angels rejoice, all creation consents in joy, and of Israel alone it is said: 'But he was angry and would not go in.' He is angry that in his absence his brother has been received, he is angry that he lives whom he thought extinct.
And now Israel stands without, and now, while the disciples hear the Gospels in the church, his mother and his brethren stand without, seeking him. 'But his father, going out, began to entreat him.' How kind and clement a father! He entreats his son to become a partaker of the house's joy; and he entreats through the apostles, the preachers of the Gospel. Of whom Paul says: 'We beseech you for Christ's sake, be ye reconciled to God,' and elsewhere: 'It was necessary that the word of the Lord should first be spoken to you; but because ye judged yourselves unworthy, lo, we turn to the Gentiles.' 'But he answering said to his father, Lo, these many years do I serve thee.' The father as a suppliant entreats to concord; he, following the righteousness which is in the Law, is not made subject to the righteousness of God.
But what greater righteousness of God can there be than to forgive the penitent, to preserve the returning son? 'Lo, these many years do I serve thee, and I never transgressed thy commandment' — as if this very thing were not to transgress the commandment: to envy another's salvation, to vaunt one's own righteousness before God, when no one is clean in his sight. For who shall boast that he has a chaste heart, not even if it were of one day? David confesses and says: 'Behold, I was conceived in iniquities, and in sins did my mother conceive me,' and in another place: 'If thou, O Lord, wilt mark iniquities, who shall stand?' And this man says he never transgressed the commandment, he who was so often delivered into captivities for idolatry. 'Lo, these many years do I serve thee, and I never transgressed thy commandment.'
This is what Paul the Apostle says: 'What shall we say then? That the Gentiles, who followed not after righteousness, have attained to righteousness, even the righteousness which is of faith; but Israel, following after the law of righteousness, hath not attained to the law of righteousness. Why? Because they sought it not by faith, but as it were by the works of the Law.' It can therefore also be said of the person of him who, according to the same Apostle, was found blameless in the righteousness which is of the Law — although it seems to me that the Jew rather vaunts himself than speaks the truth, after the example of that Pharisee: 'God, I thank thee that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican.'
I pray thee, does he not seem to thee to say of his brother the very things which that Pharisee had said of the publican: 'This son of thine, who hath devoured all his substance living with harlots'? But as to his saying, 'I never transgressed thy commandment,' the father's word does not agree; for he did not confirm as true the things which the son had said, but restrained him in his anger by another reasoning: 'Son, thou art ever with me.' Does he say, 'Thou sayest well indeed, and hast done all things which I had commanded'? But 'Thou art with me,' he says, 'ever. Thou art with me by the Law, by which thou art bound; thou art with me, while thou art instructed by me even in captivities; thou art with me, not because thou hast fulfilled my precepts, but because I have not suffered thee to go away into a far country.'
'You are with me to the very end, according to that which I spoke to David: If his sons forsake my law and walk not in my judgments, if they profane my ordinances and keep not my commandments, I will visit their iniquities with a rod and their transgressions with scourges; but my mercy I will not take away from him.' By this testimony that also in which the elder son glories is proved to be false, since he did not walk in the judgments of God nor keep his commandments. And we are taught how, while not doing these things, he was nevertheless always with the Father: since, though he sins, he is visited with a rod, and to the one visited mercy is not denied.
Nor is it to be wondered at that he dared to lie to the father, who was able to envy his brother—especially since on the day of judgment certain ones will lie yet more shamelessly: 'Did we not in thy name eat and drink and work many mighty deeds, and cast out demons?' But what the words mean—'and all that is mine is thine'—will be more fittingly explained in its own place. 'And thou never gavest me a kid, that I might feast with my friends.' 'So much blood,' says Israel, 'has been poured out, so many thousands of men have been slain, and not one of them proved to be a redeemer of our salvation. Josiah himself, who was pleasing in thy sight, and lately the Maccabees, who fought for thy heritage, were cut down by the swords of the enemy against all law of holiness, and no blood restored liberty to us:
behold, we are still subject to the Roman empire. No prophet, no priest, no righteous man was ever offered up for us, yet for the profligate son—that is, for the Gentiles, for the sinners of the whole creation—glorious blood was poured out; and while thou gavest lesser things to those who deserved them, thou hast bestowed greater things on the undeserving. Thou never gavest me a kid, that I might feast with my friends.' Thou errest, Israel; say rather: 'that I might feast with thee.' Or can there be any joy for thee unless the Father celebrates the banquet together with thee? At least be taught by the present example. When the younger son returned, both the father rejoices and the servants. 'Let us eat,' he says, 'and feast'—not 'eat ye and feast ye.'
But thou, with that mind by which thou enviest thy brother, by which thou withdrawest from the father's face and art ever in the field, dost even now wish to enter the banquet in his absence. 'Thou never gavest me a kid.' The father never gives worse gifts. Thou hast the calf slain: enter, eat with thy brother. Why dost thou seek a kid, to whom a lamb has been sent? And, lest thou pretend not to know that he has been sent, John points him out to thee in the wilderness: Behold the Lamb of God, behold him who taketh away the sins of the world. And the father indeed, as one merciful and granting repentance, exhorts thee to the calf, not slaying the kid, which he knows stands at the left hand.
But thou, at the end of the age, art thyself about to sacrifice to thyself as a kid the Antichrist, and with thy friends, the unclean spirits, to be sated with his flesh, the prophecy being fulfilled: Thou hast broken the heads of the dragon; thou gavest him as food to the Ethiopian peoples. 'But when this thy son came, who devoured all his substance living with harlots, thou didst kill for him the fatted calf.' Even now Israel confesses that it was a fatted calf which was slain; they understand that Christ has come, but they are tormented by envy and, though the brother does not perish, are unwilling to be saved. 'But he said to him: Son, thou art ever with me, and all that is mine is thine.' He calls him son, though unwilling to enter. But how are all things of God the Jews'?
Are the angels, thrones, dominions, and the other powers theirs? Let us therefore understand 'all things' to be the law, the prophets, the divine oracles. These he gave to him, that he might meditate in his law day and night, according to that canon of the Scriptures which we have often expounded, that 'all' is to be referred not to the whole but to the greatest part—as here: All have turned aside, together they have become unprofitable; and elsewhere: All who came before me were thieves and robbers; and Paul to the Corinthians: To all, he says, I became all things, that I might gain all; and to the Philippians: For all seek the things that are their own, not the things that are of Christ Jesus. And yet he must be believed never to have denied anything to the one whom he exhorts to eat of the calf.
'It behooves us to feast and rejoice, because this thy brother was dead and is alive again, was lost and is found.' Let us therefore also be confident that we can live through repentance, we who had been dead through our sins. And here indeed this same son returns; but in the earlier parts—namely in the sheep and in the drachma—what had strayed is brought back, and what had been lost is found. And by a like ending the three parables are closed, since in this one too it is set down: 'was lost and is found,' that we may understand that by diverse similitudes the same reception of sinners is signified. And let these things be said of the person of the heathen and of the Jew; but let us see how this parable can be understood of the holy man in general and of the sinner.
That the rest suits the righteous man is not doubted; the difficulty is this, in which a scruple is stirred in the reader: why the righteous man should envy the salvation of the sinner and be filled with such wrath that he is overcome neither by the brother's mercy, nor by the father's entreaties, nor by the joy of the whole house. To which we shall briefly reply that all the righteousness of this world, compared to God, is not righteousness. For just as, from the sins of Jerusalem, Sodom is justified—not that she herself is righteous, but that by greater offenses the lesser offenses become righteousness—so also all the righteousness of men, set beside God, is not righteousness. In short, Paul, who had said: As many therefore as are perfect, let us be thus minded, confesses and cries out in another place: