以賽亞書註釋 第 1 章 第 32/65 段

And yet he says plainly, 'God did not send his Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world through him might be saved.' How then does he say that there is a judgment of this world? For we are those who of old cried out through the voice of the prophets:

'Arise, O Lord, and attend to my judgment, my God and my Lord, unto my cause.' For, a righteous judgment having also come upon us, we say in thanksgiving, 'I will confess to you, O Lord, with my whole heart;

I will tell of all your wondrous works, I will sing praise to your name, O Most High.' And for what cause? 'Because you have executed my judgment and my cause.'

'You sat upon the throne, judging righteousness; you rebuked the nations, and the ungodly perished;'

for the throngs of the demons were rebuked, and together with them perished the ungodly one — that is, Satan.

'They shall therefore be left' — that is, they shall be preserved — 'in a spirit of judgment;'

for he judged and justified, as I said, 'for judgment and strength' — that is, by right judgment and by power, evidently the power befitting God — 'restraining from destroying' those who believe in him.

'For these have gone astray through wine;

they have erred through strong drink, priest and prophet have gone mad through wine;

they have been shaken by the drunkenness of strong drink;'

'This is an apparition.' He points out, in a certain manner, those who have slipped, and who through such long disobedience have offended God.

'For such as these have gone astray,' he says, having drunk wine and intoxicating drink — not sensible or bodily, but rather having taken into the mind a darkening, which the utterly grievous serpent instills into those wont to be slothful.

For the divinely-inspired Paul writes that 'the god of this age has darkened the minds of the unbelieving, so that the light of the Gospel of the glory of God should not dawn upon them.'

Wine, therefore, and strong drink, he very rightly calls the darkness that is instilled into the souls of men by the wickedness of the devil.

And he is, as it were, struck with amazement, not because the utterly ignorant multitude of the common herd alone appears to suffer this, but because, besides those, still further, 'priest and prophet have gone mad through wine.'

And again he calls wine the intoxicating drink that comes from ignorance.

And it is marvelous that one might behold priest and prophet having suffered this together with the rest.

For those whom it was likely could set all the others straight toward the pursuit of what is profitable, and could point out the path of salvation, these perhaps even before the others received the darkness, so as to be shaken and to be carried about by every wind — and this from a spiritual drunkenness.

And one might say that the matter came to be like some apparition — that is, a stupor or amazement.

And by prophet in these words he means not at all the true one, and the one from God, but rather that one who fashions to himself, as it were, the prophetic dignity;

concerning whom he says through the voice of Ezekiel:

'Woe to those who prophesy from their own heart, and not from the mouth of the Lord.'

For he says somewhere concerning Jerusalem, 'Her leaders judged for gifts, her prophets divined for silver.'

'A curse shall devour this counsel;

for this counsel is for the sake of covetousness.' Saying that priest together with prophet has gone astray, and moreover has departed from a sound mind because of the wine that is from the vine of Sodom, and the spiritual intoxicating drink, and having added further that this is an apparition — that is, a consternation and a kind of stupor — he at once shows the pretext of their being confounded, and the charges of the priests' derangement and drunkenness.

For this reason indeed he says, 'A curse shall devour this counsel.'

For the design of the Jews has become truly accursed — I mean that against Jesus Christ the Savior of us all.

For God the Father sent beforehand the holy prophets, and they killed them.

Then, after those, he sent his Beloved to receive the fruits of his vineyard, according to the parable in the Gospels.

But the most senseless husbandmen set over the vineyard, although they understood that he was the son and the master of the estate, said, he says, among themselves:

'This is the heir;

come, let us kill him, and let us take his inheritance for ourselves.'

'Accursed, therefore,' he says, 'is such a counsel.'

'You shall pull them down, and shall not build them up, because they have inclined evils against you, they have devised a counsel which they shall by no means be able to establish.'

For as far as it lay within the power of their undertakings, they killed the son, supposing that they themselves would hold the master's inheritance;

but he came back to life as God, and destroyed the evil ones wretchedly — the villainous and senseless husbandmen — and gave out the estate to others, evidently to the holy apostles and evangelists, and to the teachers of the holy Churches.

Accursed, therefore, is the counsel of the Jews, for it came to be for the sake of covetousness.

For it is truly covetousness that servants should wish to rise up against their master, and to make their own the inheritance over which they were appointed as husbandmen, although they had a sufficient wage — the honors of the priesthood, and the distinctions that came from being ranked above the others.

'To whom did we announce evils? and to whom did we announce a message?' It is customary for the holy prophets, and for all divinely-inspired Scripture, to urge and to constrain man toward choosing to live rightly by two things.

For either, by the terrors of punishment, they shatter, as it were, the hardened mind and turn it toward the better; or, by the promises of rewards, they render men more courageous concerning the necessity of enduring hardship for the sake of deeds of valor unto godliness;

such as is that spoken through the voice of Isaiah to the Jews, 'And if you are willing and hearken to me, you shall eat the good things of the land;'

nor listen to me, the sword shall devour you.

For the mouth of the Lord has spoken these things. And so, as it were, he all but exposes rebellious Israel as having dishonored the words of the holy prophets, saying:

To whom have we announced a tiding? For behold, behold, to whom? he says; that is, we ministered to a hard, disobedient, and senseless people, and having conveyed the words that came from God above, we announced to it evil things—that is, the punishments, the threats, which will in every way and altogether be brought down upon the heads of those accustomed to disobey.

'We announced a tiding,' that is, we brought the good news of the good things prepared by God for those accustomed to do good.

But hard-to-move Israel, fixed fast in transgression and grievously sick with disobedience, was not profited at all.

Therefore, when he says 'To whom?', he shows the one who is in no way worthy of it.

For indeed, even after so clear a foretelling by the holy prophets, they were nonetheless implacable and wicked, having a heart full of every perversity.

And they became swift servants of diabolical bitterness;

for they delivered up to the cross the Savior and Redeemer of all—I mean Christ—through whom and with whom be glory to the Father together with the Holy Spirit unto the ages.

And we affirm that the punishments prepared for those accustomed to transgress are 'evils,' while the tidings that bring honors upon good hopes are good.

Since, then, those of the blood of Israel were in no way whatsoever profited, even though the prophets announced to them the things from God—I mean both threats and promises of the good things to come—'To whom,' he says, 'did we announce evil things? and to whom did we announce a tiding?' And when the holy prophets had, as it were, fallen silent and had halted their own discourse up to this point, God himself, the God of all, calls out to the saints, saying:

Those who have been weaned from milk, those who have been drawn away from the breast, expect affliction upon affliction, hope upon hope.

For those who are unadmonishable, he says, and grievously sick with rebelliousness, were justly cast out, and having become partakerless of the salvation in Christ, they will go their way to destruction.

But you, henceforth, who have been called through faith to the knowledge of the truth, who as it were have been drawn away from a breast and from milk—that is, from the tutelage under the Law;

you who of old received food fit for infants and had a rather uninstructed mind, but who have now advanced into a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, and have passed over to the food befitting the perfect, and have not remained inexperienced in the word of righteousness: direct your own hearts to the reception of the new proclamation of the evangelical polity, of the ordinances given through Christ.

Be manly unto endurance, and if affliction should come frequent and one upon another, when trials have been stirred up and the cruelty of the persecutors is unleashed upon you, endure a little while, and for a little while receive the afflictions, that you may also be rich in hope—I mean that which is beyond the human mind.

'For eye,' he says, 'has not known, and ear has not heard, and it has not come up upon the heart of man, what things God has prepared for those who love him.' Then he shows what sort the first affliction against them will be.

The sense of the prophecy is as follows.

There came from heaven a sound as of a rushing mighty wind. Then he says:

There appeared to them divided tongues as of fire, and it sat upon each one of them, and they began to speak in other tongues, as the Spirit gave them to utter. For Christ had commanded them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to await the promise of the Father, until they should be clothed with power from on high.

Then, having come down, they spoke to those of Israel, and also to all those from other lands, in the tongues given to them by God; and the hearers were amazed, and they even said, 'Behold, are not all these that speak Jews? And how do we all hear them speaking each in our own language?' But others said, he tells us, that 'They are full of new wine,' that is, they are drunk—this, I think, is what was meant, through the scorn of lips by means of another tongue.

For indeed they were speaking in other tongues, God who is mighty in all things having foretold this also.

'For in men of other tongues,' he says, 'and by the lips of others will I speak to this people, and not even so will they believe.'

But although they ought to have received the sign for full assurance, taking to heart the foretelling made concerning it by God, this they did not do, but continued reproaching them for being drunk, remaining in disobedience.

That they will speak to this people, saying to it:

This is the rest for him who drinks, and this is the crushing; yet they were not willing to hear. God once said, being indignant at the follies of the Jews:

Behold, I bring a famine upon the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but a famine of hearing the words of the Lord.

And from the east to the west they shall run to and fro seeking the word of the Lord, and they shall not find it.

Therefore a spiritual famine has been brought upon those of Israel, and since they did not receive through faith the bread of life which came down from heaven and gives life to the world;

for this very reason, and quite fittingly, they have come into want of the God-given food;

'For man shall not live by bread alone,' he says, 'but by every word that proceeds through the mouth of God.' And they behaved outrageously toward the Savior and Redeemer of all;

but since he is good, although they had committed grievous impiety, he called them insufferably—no, unwearyingly—to repentance through the holy apostles.

At any rate the blessed Peter proclaimed to them that they had denied the Holy and Just One, and had killed the Author of life, and had asked that a murderer be granted to them.

Yet he added this also: 'And now, brothers, I know that you did it in ignorance, as also did your rulers.'

'Repent therefore, and let each one of you be baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus, and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.'

'For to you are the promises, and to your children.' Those, then, he says, who have been drawn away from breast and from milk, who have been called to apostleship;

and having become the sacred ministers of the new proclamations, they will speak to this people, showing plainly what rest there will be for him who drinks, and what the crushing is—that is, what is profitable, and what is the contrary.

Whence, I think, one of the saints, being moved, said to them:

Stiff-necked and disobedient in heart, you always resist the Holy Spirit. For consider how, although they had committed grievous impiety, they had, insufferably to their pride, the holy apostles as tutors, bringing them back to repentance and instilling in them the knowledge of what is profitable;

but they were haughty, and exceedingly hardened, and had turned aside uncontrollably toward the disobedient and hard-to-guide character of their ways.

And the oracle of the Lord God shall be to them, affliction upon affliction, hope upon hope. To whom shall it be? To the holy apostles, clearly, and to the evangelists, who, ministering the divine proclamation, went about the whole world under heaven, netting the wandered ones, bringing to Christ through faith those who of old said to the wood:

You are my father, and to the stone, You have begotten me;

being ill-treated, and enduring the plots of the God-hating.

The oracle of the Lord became to them, then, affliction upon affliction, and not this only, but indeed also hope upon hope.

For having endured the contests on behalf of piety toward Christ, they will be in hopes that are long—rather, even unending—and they will be crowned with the crown of incorruption, reigning together with Christ.

Yet a little, yet a little, that they may go on and fall backward, and be endangered, and be crushed, and be taken. He whets them to courage, and anoints them for endurance—the holy initiators into the mysteries.

But they leaped upon them like untamed beasts, brought them into the councils, and, accusing them of the genuineness of their love for Christ as though it were some most outrageous thing, they used bitter revilings against them, and having maltreated them and torn them with the blows of scourges, they said:

Did we not strictly charge you not to speak to anyone in this name? And behold, you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching. And attacking them in other ways too, and cruelly plotting against them, they became the occasion of crushing and of sweat to them.

The God of all, therefore, weaves for them an abundant consolation, and foreshows the destruction of the persecutors that is all but already present, saying:

For the time, he says, will not be long before they too fall backward, and are crushed and endangered, and indeed are taken and go their way to destruction.

And these things we say befell the peoples of the Jews both spiritually and at the same time bodily—that is, perceptibly.

For they were endangered and destroyed in two ways: on the one hand, being consumed by war and sieges;

on the other hand, having become sweet prey even for Satan himself, and having drained down upon their own heads the destruction that comes from impiety.

We have made a covenant with Hades, and with death agreements.

If a rushing storm should pass by, it shall not come upon us;

we have made lying our hope, and with the lie we shall be sheltered.' Since, he says, the things that will come against you are unbearable, and a bitter and hardly-escapable judgment will receive those who are said to be impious to the uttermost;

for this reason, hear the word of the Lord.

For it was possible to turn aside from evil, by directing the mind to the apostolic proclamations, and by assenting without neglect to whatever Christ might say.

Hear therefore the word of the Lord, you afflicted men, and rulers of this people in Jerusalem.

He calls 'afflicted' those of Israel, inasmuch as they were burdened by the condemning Law.

For the Law works wrath, and one who has set aside the Law of Moses dies without mercies upon two or three witnesses.

Therefore also the most wise Paul writes to those who wish to slip back to the shadows of the Law after the faith—the faith in Christ, that is—and says:

Our mouth is open to you, O Corinthians, our heart is enlarged. You are not straitened in us, but you are straitened in your own affections. Now for a recompense in kind—I speak as to children—be enlarged also yourselves. Do not become unequally yoked with unbelievers. Afflicted, then, would be those who still lie under the commandment of Moses and are in a manner oppressed, having the burdensomeness of the Law upon mind and heart.

He addressed, then, both rulers and peoples.

Then, in between, he inserts a certain saying of the Jews, impiously devised by them out of folly and as it were out of desperation.

And what sort this is, it is necessary for me to say.

For the God of all, being long-suffering and forbearing of evil, did not straightway let loose the punishment upon those who stumbled, but deferred his wrath, terrifying them with dreads, and by the foretelling of the evils to come sometimes driving them on toward repentance;

'Yet a little,' and 'how much, how much.'

For as soon as they heard the prophet saying, 'Yet a little, yet a little, how much, how much,'

they at once said to one another, 'Long times will lie between the words of the prophet and the fulfillment of the things foretold.'

We ourselves shall die, but upon those who come after us the divine wrath shall leap.

And indeed God said to the prophet Ezekiel: 'Son of man, the sons of your people say:'

'The vision which this man sees is for many days off, and he prophesies concerning distant times.'

'None of my words which I shall speak shall be prolonged any longer.'

'For I shall speak a word and I shall perform it, says Adonai the Lord.' He therefore reproaches those of Israel as being accustomed to show contempt, and all but to say:

'We have made a covenant with Hades, and with death agreements.'

And what are these agreements? 'If a rushing storm should pass by, it shall by no means come upon us.'

For it is all but as if, he says—even if they do not say it in words, yet by their very deeds they cry aloud—that: 'Agreements'

'we have made with Hades, for it shall receive us.'

'Even if perchance the storm should come upon us—that is, the danger threatened to befall us—it shall by no means come upon us.'

'For we have made falsehood our hope, and by falsehood shall we be sheltered.'

For those who fashioned for themselves what seemed good, and who asserted that 'We shall die before the storm'—that is, before the calamities—how did they not make their own hope a falsehood? For it did not lie within their power to be able to escape and to outstrip by death the onset of the things threatened; rather it lay within the authority of the divine and ineffable power and supremacy.

'Behold, I lay in the foundations of Zion a precious stone, chosen, a chief cornerstone, honoured, for her foundations;'

'and he who believes in him shall by no means be put to shame.'

'And I will make judgment for hope, and my mercy for a plumb-line.' These words must be joined to those above, over the passages thrown in between.

And what then has he commanded them to hear? 'Behold, I lay in the foundations of Zion a precious stone, chosen, a chief cornerstone, honoured, for her foundations, and he who believes in him shall by no means be put to shame.'

By the chosen stone, then, precious and honoured, he names our Lord Jesus Christ, who is pre-eminent in the glory and supremacy of the Godhead.

And that he himself has become the base and support and unshakable foundation for the spiritual Zion—that is, for the Church—he makes clear by saying that he has been laid in the foundations by the Father.

And he says that he is a chief cornerstone, inasmuch as through the one faith he binds together into spiritual unity the two peoples—I mean the people from Israel and also the people from the nations;

for in the corners of buildings two walls always somehow come together, and being fitted to one another they are bound firmly into unity.

'But he who believes,' he says, 'in him shall by no means be put to shame.'

And observe how in a certain manner he gives relief to those who have been pressed down, and enlarges for the afflicted the freedom of the evangelical polity.

'For O you who are afflicted,' he says, 'behold, I lay the chosen stone in the foundations of Zion.'

And what is the benefit from this? 'He who believes in him shall by no means be put to shame.'

And through this he persuades them to release their neck from the heavy burden of the Law, and to depart from its senseless and feeble shadow, and rather to choose in exchange the grace that comes through faith, and to seize the justification in Christ which involves no toil at all.

'And I will make judgment for hope,' he says, 'and my mercy for a plumb-line.'

For as the Saviour himself says:

each shall receive the things done through the body, according to what he practised, whether good or evil. We therefore hope that the judgment shall come to pass, and that mercy shall be shown to each just as befits him, and clearly in proportion to the good deeds accomplished.

For this, I think, is what is signified by 'mercy being made a plumb-line by him who judges us'—that is, according to the standard of the just, and, as it were, in even balance with the good works done.

'And you who have trusted in vain, you liars, because you say a storm shall by no means pass over you—shall it not take away your covenant with death, and shall your hope toward Hades by no means endure? When a rushing storm comes upon you, you shall be for it as a thing trodden underfoot.'

'When it passes by, it shall take you.'

'Morning by morning it shall pass by, by day, and in the night there shall be an evil hope.' I said that when the holy prophets foretold to those of the blood of Israel the things to come, and all but pointed out to them the divine wrath as already present, they, exalting themselves in monstrous madness, reasoned and asserted that: 'Even if these things should perchance come to pass, yet it shall be for a postponement of times, and the end of the things announced shall not be present at once, but the time of our life shall be spent, and the terrible things shall come after us.'

And in saying and pondering these things, they all but seemed to be making agreements with death, and, as it were, a hope toward Hades.

For this reason, therefore, he says to them:

'You who have trusted in vain, you liars, because you say a storm shall by no means pass over you.'

'Fear lest he also take away your covenant with death, and your hope toward Hades by no means endure.'

When, therefore, holding such a hope, it says:

'Might he not perhaps, knowing the things among you, remove this agreement of yours with death?' And in what manner will he remove it? For if the things of wrath should come upon you—that is, the storm—it is not certain others of those after you, but you yourselves who shall become a thing trodden underfoot.

'And it shall take you morning by morning'—that is, not far off, but as it were at dawn and on the morrow.

There shall be no rest at all from evils, but by day and by night there shall be an evil hope—that is, at every season you shall be consumed with the expectation of terrible things.

For when God wills to bring harm, who is there to turn aside the onset of the calamity? Or who contends against the divine wrath? Learn to hear, you who are hard pressed:

'And we ourselves are too weak to be gathered together.'

'As a mountain of the ungodly he shall rise up, and it shall be in the valley of Gibeon.'

'With wrath he shall do his works, a work of bitterness;'

'and his wrath shall deal in a strange manner, and his bitterness shall be foreign.' Being exceedingly good, the God of all wills all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.

For this reason, admonishing those who have grown weak and bringing back to the straight and unerring path those who have neglected their own soul, he comes by every manner and every word.

For at one time, by the threats of punishments and by the terrors that come from wrath, he strikes them beforehand with fear toward what is better; at another time, by the promises of good things, he draws them as with a net toward what is profitable.

Therefore, having threatened and having foretold both that they shall be altogether and by every means captured by the storm—that is, by the calamity all but now about to come upon them—and that at every season they shall be in evil hopes;

he then bestows a word of consolation and does not permit them to despair.

Just like one of the most skilful and most accomplished of physicians, who treat the ailing members of the body sometimes with a pungent drug, and by the very strongest remedies check the advance of the maladies toward the worse, and at other times, all but charming them with mild and, as it were, most gentle applications, they very well soften them.

Therefore, having threatened, he admonishes and enjoins them to submit their mind to the evangelical proclamations, saying:

'Learn to hear, you who are hard pressed.'

Then, he says the words: 'We are not able to fight.'

But I think it necessary to relate the things from the history.

For thus, even if with difficulty, what is signified will become plain to those who love learning.

When, therefore, Joshua the son of Nun was commanding and leading those of Israel, and was descending intolerably upon the lands of the nations, and very many had perished, those from Gibeon—this being one of the cities of the foreigners—fearing to suffer the like, ran to him, and, speaking falsely, escaped notice at first, and indeed were received.

But since after this it became known who they were and whence they came, they became drawers of water and hewers of wood for the congregation.

Having learned this, the kings of the nations—these being five—marched out against Gibeon, charging that they had taken refuge with those of Israel.

But since those of Gibeon were in extremity, and reckoned resistance to be impossible for themselves, they besought to be saved by the hand of Joshua.

And he, aiding those who had once come under him, arrayed himself against the generals of the foreigners.

Then what came to pass at that time through the hand of God, the sacred Scripture will teach.

And since Joshua came upon them suddenly—he had marched the whole day from Gilgal—and the Lord threw them into confusion before the face of the sons of Israel, and he crushed them with a great crushing at Gibeon, and they pursued them by the way of the ascent of Beth-horon, and cut them down as far as Azekah and as far as Makkedah.

And in their fleeing from before the face of the sons of Israel on the descent of Beth-horon, the Lord also cast upon them stones of hail from heaven, as far as Azekah.

'For you,' he says, 'who are hard pressed'—that is, who have advanced through the greatest anguish, who have been in a manner crushed by the destructions and by the terrors of the things to come—'learn to hear'; call, you also yourselves, upon Jesus for help, say, just as indeed did those from Gibeon:

'We are not able to fight, and we are too weak to be gathered together'—that is, clearly, for resistance against the enemies who are coming on.

And what shall this be, they say? 'You shall know,' he says, 'that even if there be borne against you, as a mountain, an assault of ungodly men, there shall be against them the things that took place in the valley of Gibeon.'

'For against those who make war on you he shall do his works with wrath, and works of bitterness'—that is, of anger.

And who, then, but clearly God who defends? 'And his wrath shall deal in a strange manner, and his bitterness shall be foreign.'

'For a wrath,' he says, 'strange and unwonted marches out against those who persecute you.'

'And heaven, from on high and from above, shall war against them, pouring down like a kind of hail the things that come from unmingled wrath.'

He says something of this same kind also through the voice of the psalmist: