Book of Rules 2 part 4/7

Nineveh, he says, was a great city (Jonah 3:3) — so much so that, though it was opposed to God, being the metropolis of the Assyrians, which both destroyed Samaria and ever oppressed all Judea, yet in the figure of the Church, with Jonah preaching — that is, Christ — it was wholly delivered. The same Nineveh in the following Prophet is described as about to perish, the Lord preaching to it: 'It is the sign of Jonah in the belly of the whale' (Matt. 12:40; Luke 11:30). And, that the Prophet himself might show it not to be a particular city, he interposes some things that exceed the measure of the species. There was no end, he says, of her gentiles, though she was the city of one nation. And again: You have multiplied your traffickings above the stars of heaven — that is, the Church.

And again: Upon whom has not your malice ever come? Could the malice of one city have come upon every man, or come for ever, except that city which Cain founded with his brother's blood, in the name of his son — that is, of his posterity? Yet more manifestly the Prophet teaches that Nineveh is the Church. And He shall stretch out, he says, His hand against the North (that is, the people estranged from the sun, set against the South), and shall destroy the Assyrian (Zeph. 2:13). And this: Nineveh, a desolation, without water, into a wilderness; and flocks shall feed in her midst, all the beasts of the earth, and chameleons and goats shall lie in her ceilings, and beasts shall give voice in her hollows, and ravens in her gates, for her cedar height is laid low.

This is the city that despises, which dwells in confidence, which says in her heart: I am, and there is none after me (Ibid. 13, 15). And further: How is she become a desolation, a pasture of beasts? Everyone who passes by her shall hiss and shake his hands (Ibid. 15). O illustrious and redeemed city, the dove, that heard the voice yet received not correction, that trusted not in the Lord, and drew not near to her God! Her princes in her midst are as roaring lions; her judges are as the wolves of Arabia, leaving nothing till the morning. Her prophets, puffed up in spirit, are men of scorn. Her priests prophesy holy things, and profane the law; but the Lord who is just, in the midst of her will do no unjust thing (Zeph. 3:1, 5).

Egypt likewise is twofold. Behold, he says, the Lord sits upon a swift cloud, and comes into Egypt (Isa. 19:1, 3). [The cloud is the spiritual body after Baptism, and the brightness of the Son of man. For the first coming of the Lord is His continually coming in His own body, as He says: 'Henceforth you shall see Him coming in the clouds of heaven.'] And the things made by hand in Egypt shall be shattered before His face, and their heart shall be diminished within them; and the Egyptians shall rise up against the Egyptians, and a man shall fight his brother and a man his neighbour, and city shall fight against city, and nation shall rise against nation (Matt. 24:30) — that is, Egypt against Egypt, and law against law, namely by diversity of meaning under one law:

And the spirit of the Egyptians shall be troubled within them, and their counsels will I scatter. And after He had mingled now species into genus, now genus into species, He added, saying: And in that day there shall be an altar of the Lord in the region of the Egyptians, and pillars at its borders to the Lord. And it shall be for a sign for ever to the Lord, in the region of the Egyptians (Isa. 19:19). He did not say: it shall be permitted that there be an altar at the borders of Egypt for ever — but, it shall be. Ezekiel indeed shows more openly that the whole world is Egypt, saying: O day! for the day of the Lord is near, a day of cloud, the end of the nations it shall be; and a sword shall come upon the Egyptians. And He joins the species:

And there shall be a tumult in Ethiopia, and the wounded shall fall in Egypt, and her foundations shall fall; Persians and Cretans and Lydians, and all the mingled people, and the sons of My covenant, shall fall by the sword in her together with them (Ezek. 30:3-5). Now this came to pass when, after the destruction, they went down into Egypt and were slain there by Nebuchadnezzar, according to Jeremiah's prophecy. But it shall also come to pass generally in the last day, when together with the Egyptians the sons of the covenant shall fall, living after the manner of the Egyptians. Likewise through Ezekiel God threatens the king of the Egyptians and his multitude, that they were terrible against the saints, reckoned among the circumcised:

which fits none but those who flatter themselves with circumcision, that is, with holy rites. Since therefore he set his terror upon the land of the living, so that Pharaoh should sleep in the midst of the uncircumcised, wounded by the sword, he and all his multitude with him, says the Lord. And there from genus to species: Thus says the Lord: I will cast you down upon the land of many peoples, and draw you out with My hook, and stretch you out upon your fields; and I will set upon you all the birds of heaven, and fill all the beasts of the whole earth; and I will give your flesh upon the mountains, and fill the hills with your blood; and the land shall be drenched with that which proceeds from you;

from your multitude I will fill the mountains with thorns from you, and I will cover the heaven when you are extinguished, and darken its stars; I will veil the sun in a cloud, and the moon shall not shine its light. All the lights that shine with light in heaven I will darken, and I will set darkness upon your land, says the Lord. He joins the species: And I will provoke the heart of many peoples, when I bring your captivity among the nations, into a land which you knew not (Ezek. 32:4-8). He exceeds the species: And many nations shall be grieved over you, and their kings shall be appalled with derangement of mind, when My sword shall fly over their faces; in their midst it shall be unto ruin from the day of your downfall. He returns to the species: For thus says the Lord:

The sword of the king of Babylon shall come upon you, with the swords of giants; and I will cast down your might — plagues from all the nations — and they shall bear the dishonour of Egypt, and all her might shall be broken. Into the genus: And I will destroy all the cattle from the many waters; and no foot of man shall trouble it any more, nor shall the track of cattle tread it. Then their waters shall rest, and their rivers shall flow like oil, says the Lord (Ibid. 9-14). The species: And I will give Egypt over to destruction, and the land shall be made desolate with its fullness, and I will scatter all that dwell in it (Ibid. 15). The genus: And they shall know that I am the Lord. I will cover, He says, the heaven when you are extinguished:

and darken its stars; I will veil the sun in a cloud, and the moon shall not shine its light. All the lights that shine with light in heaven I will darken over you, and I will set darkness upon your land (Ezek. 32:7, 8). [In the passion of the Lord, not in the land of Egypt only was there darkness, but in the whole world. Yet not even when Egypt was taken were the nations astounded, awaiting their own ruin from the day of her downfall. For of Soor too it is thus written: Thus says the Lord to Soor: Shall not the islands be shaken in your midst, from the day of your downfall, at the groaning of the wounded, when they are slain by the sword in your midst? And all the princes of the sea shall come down from their seats, and take off their mitres and the vestments of their finery;

they shall strip themselves in amazement of mind, they shall be appalled and afraid at your destruction, and shall groan over you, and take up a lamentation, and say to you: How are you destroyed out of the sea, that famous city, which gave her terror to all that dwelt in her? And the islands shall fear from the day of your downfall (Ezek. 26:15-18, according to the Septuagint). At the sound of your voice your pilots shall fear with fear, and all your rowers and passengers and the prow-men of the sea shall come down from the ships and stand upon the land; and they shall howl over you with their voice, and cry out bitterly over you, and cast earth upon their heads, and strew themselves with ashes; and they shall take up over you the lamentation of sons, the dirge of Soor.

How great a gain did you find from the sea? You filled the nations with your multitude, and from your trafficking you enriched all the kings of the earth. But now you are brought to grief in the sea, in the depth of the water; your trafficking and all your assembly in the midst of you. All your oarsmen have fallen; all who dwell in the islands are grieved over you, and their oarsmen were stunned with derangement of mind, and the face of them wept over you. The merchants among the nations have hissed at you; you have become a ruin, you shall be no more forever, says the Lord (Ezek. 27:28-36, according to the LXX). Surely the things that have been said do not converge upon a single island? Or could one island alone have enriched all the kings of the earth?

But we leave some matters to suitable places; for although they are stated briefly, they can nonetheless be perceived. Tyre is twofold, as is said through Isaiah, who, after many things concerning the particular and the general, added this also, saying: It shall come to pass after seventy years that Tyre shall be like the song of a harlot. Take a harp, go about the city, you harlot city forgotten; play the harp well, sing many songs, that you may be remembered. And it shall come to pass after seventy years that God will visit Tyre, and she shall be restored again to her former state (Isa. 23:15-17). Is it believable that all the kingdoms of the earth came to Tyre for the sake of trading? But if they should come;

what use was it to foretell future commerce to Tyre with all the kingdoms of the earth, if Tyre is not the Church, in which the whole earth's trade is that of eternal life? For it follows and shows what her trade is, saying: And her trade and her wages shall be holy to the Lord (Isa. 23:15-17). For it is not gathered into those things, but for those who dwell in the sight of the Lord. All her trade is to eat and drink and be filled, for a sign of remembrance in the sight of the Lord (Ibid. 18). If, then, her trade is holy to the Lord, how can it belong to all kingdoms, unless this Tyre is everywhere? For it follows and plainly shows what Tyre is, saying:

Behold, the Lord will corrupt the whole world and lay it waste, and will lay bare its face; he will scatter those who dwell in it, and the people shall be as the priest (Isa. 24:1-6). Surely it is of that world whose trade is holy to the Lord? And the servant shall be as his lord, and the maidservant as her mistress. And the buyer shall be as the seller, and he who owes as he to whom it is owed, and he who lends on interest as he who borrows on interest; for with corruption the earth shall be corrupted, and the earth shall be laid waste with desolation. For the mouth of the Lord has spoken these things. The earth mourned, the world of the earth was bent down, the high ones of the earth mourned. But the earth committed a crime because of those who dwell in it, because they transgressed the law and changed the ordinances of the eternal covenant.

Therefore the curse has devoured the earth, because those who dwell in it have sinned. On account of this, those who dwell in the earth shall be in want (Isa. 24:1-6). Surely those cannot be Gentiles whose trade in all the kingdoms of the earth is to eat and drink and be filled, not at some particular time, but for a sign of remembrance in the sight of the Lord? And few men shall be left. The vine shall mourn, the wine shall mourn. All those whose soul rejoices shall groan. The joy of the timbrel shall cease, when wantonness and the riches of the ungodly shall cease. Shall the voice of the saints' harp cease? They are confounded; they have not drunk pure wine, the wine has become bitter to those who drink it. Every city is laid desolate;

all clap their hands that they may not enter; howl, you diviners; everywhere all the joy of the earth shall cease, and the cities shall be left desolate, and the houses left behind shall perish (Ibid. 6-8). All these things shall come upon the earth in the midst of the nations. If every city is laid desolate, what are the nations in whose midst they do these things? Even though some of these things seem to be done obscurely, yet they are all spiritual. Every desolate city he calls spiritually dead; but it is the city of that harlot Tyre, not the one whose trade is holy throughout the whole world. But in Jerusalem few men shall be left, the state of those who destroy being surely preserved. Few shall be left of those whom he calls spiritually dead;

those who lived through remembrance, whom the Ecclesiastic has not slain, as we read in many places. But since we have our purpose to fulfill, we are content with two examples. God threatens fire from the fire of Israel against the king of the Assyrians, that is, against the adverse body, and he says to the Syrian, or to the stubble, that fire will come a little while afterward. The Lord of Sabaoth, he says, will send dishonor upon your honor, and upon your splendor a burning fire; and the light of Israel shall burn, and there shall be fire for you, and it shall sanctify it in a burning flame (namely the light of Israel), and it shall devour the forest as hay. In that day the mountains shall burn, and they shall flee through the precipices, like one who flees from a burning flame;

and those of them who remain shall be numbered, and a child shall write them down (Isa. 10:16-19). Those who remain, he says, of them. For the fire that consumes cannot itself burn? But those who survive the burning shall be made fire. In Zechariah we read that those return whom the Church has not killed, in that they are converted to itself; but the rest are spiritually slain by torments. Indeed, while they stand he plucks out their eyes and makes their flesh waste away: He shall dwell, he says, in Israel trusting; and this shall be the slaughter with which God will strike the peoples, as many as have warred against Israel. Their flesh shall waste away while they stand on their feet;

and their eyes shall flow out from their sockets, and their tongue shall waste away in their mouth. And in that day there shall be a great derangement upon them, and each one shall seize the hand of his neighbor, and his hand shall be joined to the hand of his neighbor (that is, the blind leading the blind). And Judea shall fight against Jerusalem, and it shall gather the men of all peoples, and gold and silver and clothing, in exceeding abundance. And this shall be the slaughter of horses and mules, of camels and asses, and of all the cattle that are in those camps, according to this slaughter.

And it shall come to pass that whoever is left of all the nations that came together against Jerusalem shall go up every year to worship the King, the Lord God Almighty, and to celebrate the feast of the Feast of Tabernacles (Zech. 14:11-16). Elam belongs to the strangers. Here he joins the particular to the general, and shows it to be twofold. Thus says the Lord: I will shatter the bow of the noblemen, the chief part of them, in Elam. And he passes beyond the particular: I will bring, he says, four winds from the four quarters of heaven, nor shall there be a nation which does not come thither, which shall drive out Elam. He returns to the particular:

And I will terrify them before their enemies who seek their lives, and I will bring upon them according to the wrath of my indignation, and I will send my sword after them, until it consumes them. He joins the general: And I will set my throne in Elam, and I will destroy from there the king and the mighty ones. Elam shall be in captivity forever in the last days, says the Lord (Jer. 25:33-38 according to the LXX; but according to the Vulgate 49:35-39). Is it to be believed that there was no nation which did not come to assault Elam, or that the throne of the Lord, whose captivity he overturns, was there, unless it be an ecclesiastical figure? But what are the particulars: Only the left-hand ones, like Sodom, as it is written: Hear the word of the Lord, you princes of Sodom (Isa. 1:10).

And which is spiritually called Sodom and Egypt, where also their Lord was crucified (Rev. 11:8). Out of these Sodoms shall go forth Lot, which means a departure, that the man of sin may be revealed (2 Thess. 2:3). Babylon is a city against Jerusalem; the whole world is on its own side, which is in opposition to Israel. These shall be gathered together: A vision, he says, against Babylon; and he says that the holy soldiers of God shall come against the whole world: Lift up the standard and exult in turn over them, do not fear, encourage one another; open the hands, you magistrates; for behold, I give command. The giants are sanctified and called; they come, rejoicing to soothe my wrath and at the same time doing harm.

A voice of many nations on the mountains, like that of many nations, a voice of kings and of nations gathered together (Isa. 13:1-4 according to the LXX), when a nation and the king of the Medes have overthrown Babylon. For it follows and tells who these kings are, and what Babylon is. The God of Sabaoth has commanded a warlike nation to come from afar, from the uttermost foundation of heaven. God and his warriors have corrupted the whole world of the earth. Howl, for the day of the Lord is near, and destruction from God shall be present. Because of this, all hands shall be loosened, and every soul of man shall tremble. The ambassadors of her who is in labor shall be troubled, and the walls standing round about; one toward another they shall be terrified, and their faces shall be changed like a flame.

For behold, the incurable day of the Lord comes, of indignation and wrath, to make the world of the earth desolate and to destroy sinners out of it (Ibid. 4-9). He calls it the day of the Lord, from the time he suffered: from the time the world is spiritually slain, the army of God doing the slaying; while the wicked do not see his light, as it is preserved, saying: For the star of the outer heaven and all its luminaries shall give light, and it shall grow dark, and its light shall not endure.

And I will inflict evils upon the dead of the earth, and upon the unjust their sins, and I will destroy the wrong of the wicked, and the wrong of the proud I will humble. And there shall be those who remain (that is, whom the soldiers mentioned above have not killed), more honored than gold which has not touched the fire, and the honored man shall be more than a stone of sapphire; for heaven shall be indignant, and the earth shall be shaken from its foundations, because of the kindling of the wrath of God in the day in which his indignation shall be present. He joins the particular: And it shall be that he who is left is like a fleeing roe-deer, and like a sheep wandering, and there shall be none to gather them, so that a man returns to his own people, and hastens to come into his own tribe. For he who falls shall be overcome;

and if any are gathered together, they shall fall by the sword, and their daughters shall fall before their eyes, and their houses shall be plundered, and they shall possess their wives. Behold, I stir up the Medes against you, who reckon not money, nor have they need of gold (Isa. 13:10-17). He subtly inserts the general: for when you are starving, there is no need of gold and silver, except for the Ecclesiastic, who spiritually enjoys life. They shall break in pieces the fattened bodies of the young men, and they shall have no pity on your sons, nor shall their eyes spare your grandsons (Ibid. 18). All these things were written spiritually, as concerning the same Babylon: Happy is he who shall lay hold and dash your little ones against the rock (Ps. 137:9).

For he did not call the king of the Medes happy in that he prevailed against Babylon, but the Ecclesiastics, who prevail and dash the sons of Babylon against the rock of stumbling. And he prevails, as it is written: He who now prevails, let him hold fast, until he be taken out of the midst (2 Thess. 2:7). And after many things of the particular and the general, the close of the enclosure plainly shows all things to be Babylon, and that they perish in his land and on his mountains, that is, in the Church. Thus says the Lord: I will make Babylon a desert, that hedgehogs may dwell in it, and it shall come to nothing, and I will make it a sink of mire unto perdition. Thus says the Lord of Sabaoth, saying: As I have spoken, so shall it be;

and as I have purposed, so shall it stand, that I may destroy the Assyrians in my land and on my mountains, and they shall be for a trampling, and their yoke shall be taken away from them, and the glory shall be taken from their shoulders. This is the counsel which the Lord has purposed against the whole world of the earth, and this is the high hand over all the nations of the world of the earth. For who shall scatter what the holy God has purposed, and who shall turn away that strong hand of his (Isa. 14:22-27)? But as often as, after a destruction of a city, he threatens its ruin to be the dwelling of beasts, he means that unclean spirits shall dwell in the men whom the Holy Spirit has forsaken. For the slain inhabitants cannot suffer this injury, nor feel the ruin.

The words (says Amos) which he saw concerning Jerusalem, and he began: For three impieties of Damascus and for four I will not turn away from her, because they cut with iron saws those who had children in the womb (Amos 1:1-3). And again: For three impieties of Idumea and for four I will not turn away from her, because she persecuted her brother with the sword (Ibid. 11). And he brings together many other cities of strangers in the figure of the Church. Wherever he names Idumea, Teman, Bozrah, or Seir, he signifies evil brothers. These are the possessions of Esau. By the iron saws he means hard and harsh men, who cut in pieces the Churches in labor. Likewise:

Jeremiah testifies that all the nations under heaven shall drink the wrath of God in the city of God and be smitten there, saying: Thus says the Lord God of Israel: Take the cup of pure wine from my hand, and you shall give it to drink to all the nations to which I send you; and they shall vomit and rage at the face of the sword which I send into their midst. And I took the cup from the hand of the Lord, and I gave the nations to drink to which the Lord sent me, to Jerusalem itself and the cities of Judah, and its kings, and its princes:

so that they should be set in desolation and devastation and hissing, and Pharaoh king of Egypt, and his servants, and his mighty ones, and all his people, and all his mixed multitude, and all the kings of the strangers, Ashkelon and Gaza and Ekron, and the remnant over against Ashdod, and Idumea and Moab, and the sons of Ammon, and the king of Tyre, and the king of Sidon, and the kings who are beyond the sea, and Dedan and Teman and Bozrah, and all who are shaven round about, and all the mixed multitude who dwell in the desert, and all the kings of Elam, and all the kings of the Persians, and all the kings from the east, those who are far off and those who are near, each one to his brother, and all the kingdoms of the earth which are upon the face of the earth; and you shall say to them:

Thus says the Lord Almighty: Drink and be drunk, and vomit, and you shall fall and rise no more from the face of the sword which I send into your midst. And to those who refused to take the cup so as to drink, you shall say: Thus says the Lord: Drinking you shall drink, for in the city in which my name is called upon, upon that very city I begin to afflict you, and you shall not be cleansed with cleansing; for I call a sword upon the inhabitants of the earth (Jer. 25:15-29). You shall give to drink, he says, to Jerusalem, the cities of Judah, and its kings and its princes. Then he says: And all the kingdoms of the earth which are upon the face of the earth:

so that he might show that he had made a transition from the particular Jerusalem to the general one, in which are all the nations of the earth whom God will smite there, just as he also interpreted it, saying: Because in the city in which my name is called upon, in that very city I begin to afflict you, and you shall not be cleansed with cleansing. Surely Jeremiah, who while he was in the body never went out of the prison of Judea except dragged, and even into Egypt, did not plainly give that drink, with the pure wine added in the cup, to all the nations under heaven; or does he now prophesy through the Church? But if then also and now there is a place in the Church, it is manifest that all the nations to whom that Jeremiah speaks are convened in their principal part.

For if Satan has anything supreme, anything weighty, anything right-hand in his own body, he has mingled it with the heavenly things, as is the custom of those who war, to set the strong against the strong. Whence the Apostle says that for the saints the battle is not against humanity, but against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places (Eph. 6:12). On Times. The quantity of times in the Scriptures is frequently mystical by the trope of synecdoche; or by numbers, which are set down in many ways and are to be understood according to the place. By synecdoche, the whole is taken from a part, or the part from the whole. By this trope, Israel served 400 years in Egypt. For God says to Abraham:

Knowing you shall know that your seed shall be a stranger in a land not its own, and they shall enslave them and afflict them for 400 years (Gen. 15:13). But the Scripture of Exodus says that they were 430 years in Egypt (Exod. 12:40). Did it serve the whole time? It must therefore be inquired from what time; which is easy to find. For the Scripture says that the people did not serve except after the death of Joseph and all his brothers, and of all that generation. But the children of Israel grew and multiplied, and from the Hittites they were and prevailed, and the land multiplied them. But another king arose over Egypt who did not know Joseph, and he said to his people:

Behold, the people of the children of Israel are a great multitude, and stronger than we. Come therefore, let us deal craftily with them (Exod. 1:7-10). But if after the death of Joseph the people began to serve, and out of the 530 years for which it dwelt in Egypt we subtract the 80 years of Joseph's rule (for he ruled from 30 years to 110), there will remain of Israel's servitude 340 years, which God called 400. But if Israel served the whole time of its sojourning, it is more than God said. If it is from the death of Joseph according to the faith of holy Scripture, it is less. Whereby it is manifest that the 100 is a part taken from the whole. For after 300 years, the part of the others is 100 years. Therefore he said 400 years.