以賽亞書註釋 第 1 章 第 7/65 段

For when the God who is over all holds us together unto spiritual strength, we preserve within ourselves the radiant beauty of our own nature.

But when He withdraws His aid, we shall assuredly be stripped of every good, and having cast off the comeliness of the boasts that come from virtue, we shall be subject to the passions of dishonour, and shall be enslaved to our enemies.

'And seven women shall take hold of one man, saying:'

For he said that All your mighty men shall fall by the sword. What manner, then, is the demonstration of the things I have spoken of? It is very ingeniously and gracefully contrived.

For, the Law given through Moses saying to the sons of Israel, 'There shall not be among thee one that is childless nor barren,' among the Jews it was reckoned as the utmost reproach for a woman not to bear children, or for anyone of those numbered among men to be childless.

For at once the blemish of the childless and barren woman was rubbed off upon them.

And the Law was spiritual.

For the God of all had promised that the spiritual Israel—that is, the mind that beholds God—would not be barren, nor rendered childless, but rather fruitful, and like a certain fair and choice land.

Yet the Jews understood carnally, for they were natural men, not having the Spirit.

Therefore, he says, there shall be so great a scarcity of males throughout the land, since war has consumed the race, that seven women—that is, many—shall take hold of one man and say:

We will eat our own bread and wear our own clothing;

only let your name be called upon us; take away our reproach. You see how they dread the reproach of childlessness, and how greatly they decline the name of the barren and unfruitful woman? For they come not seeking the customary things, nor all that it is the custom for women to receive from those who dwell with them;

for they say that they themselves will suffice for this, and they ask only, as I said, for the removal of the reproach.

Consider, then, the depth of the passage.

For if he who was being entreated had been rich, the women would not have said:

We will eat our own bread and wear our own clothing.

But since they know that those who have been saved out of the war and have barely escaped have fallen into utmost poverty and are in great misery, they seek from them nothing whatsoever, but ask only to become mothers of children. And the plain sense of the history is contained in these words.

But certain persons carry over the passage to a spiritual contemplation—somehow not altogether rightly.

they would have been worthy of all praise.

For they say that the seven women are the seven spirits;

and that the one man is Christ.

Then, having given little thought to what is fitting, they say that the seven spirits speak thus:

Take away our reproach, and we will eat our own bread and wear our own clothing.

And yet, how is it not better to say that the seven women are many souls, who also laid hold of Christ through faith, seeking him as bread and as a garment of salvation, and seeking the fruit that comes from him?

He who settles the barren woman in a house as a joyful mother of children. And it is said that the barren woman bears seven, that is, many.

And in that day God shall shine forth in counsel with glory upon the earth, to exalt and glorify the remnant of Israel.

And it shall come to pass that the remnant in Zion and the remnant in Jerusalem

all who are enrolled for life in Jerusalem shall be called holy. Since some are in doubt at what time the things concerning the women of the Jews—or rather concerning their whole land—foretold through the voice of the prophet will come to pass, whether before the Saviour's coming or after it, the force of the passage before us makes it fully and unerringly clear that the prophet indicates to us no other time than that very one in which, on account of their impiety toward Christ,

For the wretches acted with drunken insolence against him, and paid the penalty most fitting for them, when Jerusalem was encircled by armies.

when we say that the mind of the Jews was reduced to such terror that they said to the mountains:

Cover us; and to the hills:

Fall on us. Therefore, he says, in that day—that is, at that season in which the things foretold shall run their course—God shall shine forth in counsel, with glory upon the earth, to exalt and glorify the remnant of Israel.

For the Word who is of God the Father counted it not a thing to be grasped to be equal with God;

but he purposed something deep and ineffable concerning us.

For being in the form and equality of God the Father, he became as we are, and appeared indeed to those upon the earth;

yet not without glory, even though he became flesh.

For he wrought things befitting God, and became the worker of signs, which are counted worthy of all report and wonder.

For having shone forth, he had mercy upon Israel; for it has not utterly perished.

But the remnant has been preserved, and has been exalted and glorified, and has been written in the book of life, distinguished in sanctification.

And one might see that the word of the prophecy is true, as fulfilled among the first-fruits of those who were saved, in the holy apostles, who were truly exalted, and being made resplendent with the divine gifts of grace, grew rich in the splendour that is in glory.

For they received authority over unclean spirits, so as to cast them out.

For they healed also many who were in sickness;

but they were also written in the book of life.

And indeed they rejoiced that the demons were subject to them; and when they said this, Christ met them, teaching them to delight in things yet greater still:

Rejoice not, he says, that the demons are subject to you;

but rather rejoice that your names are written in heaven. Therefore those of Israel were exalted, being preserved as in the portion of the remnant;

for they were counted worthy of the munificence and grace that come from Christ;

and were made his brethren and friends;

they were appointed partakers of his glory;

and they were counted worthy also of the enrolment above and in the heavens, and were named citizens of the spiritual Jerusalem, the mother of the saints, of whom the prophet Isaiah himself makes mention, saying:

Your eyes shall behold Jerusalem;

a wealthy city, tabernacles that shall not be shaken. For the Lord shall wash away the filth of the sons and daughters of Zion;

and the things that shall sometimes come to pass, which some declare by superfluous inventions of argument, and forbidding by no means any to rise up in revolt against the judgments of God, he usefully makes his defence beforehand;

for as though someone were crying out that saying:

The sons of Israel shall again be exalted;

they shall be glorified, and shall gain the enrolment above, even though they have acted impiously beyond measure—they slew the prophets, stoned those who were sent, and at last added to their crimes the killing of Christ himself, and their hands became full of blood.

What then does the prophet say? The Lord, he says, shall wash away the filth of the sons and daughters of Zion, and shall purge the blood from their midst, by the spirit of judgment and by the spirit of burning. For they had indeed transgressed, by their own confession;

but the grace that is through Christ justified all, and to those very ones who had committed murder it granted amnesty.

And now, brethren, I know that you acted in ignorance, as did also your rulers.

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

for to you belong the promises, and to your children. He therefore, he says—the Maker and Lord of all, who is abundant in mercy, who overcomes human faint-heartedness with gentleness;

who does not will the death of him that dies, but rather that he should turn from his evil way and live—he shall wash away the filth of those who have sinned, and shall purge the blood from their midst by the spirit of judgment and by the spirit of burning.

And we say that the spirit of judgment is the sentence pronounced upon us by God with right judgment—that is, with righteousness.

For thus somewhere the Saviour says:

Now is the judgment of this world. For he passed judgment on this world and on Satan;

and the one he has cast out as having done wrong;

but he has justified those in the world through faith, as having been wronged.

And we say that the spirit of burning is the grace bestowed at holy baptism, which comes to be in us not apart from the Spirit.

For we have been baptized not in bare water, nor yet with the ashes of a heifer, and have been sprinkled unto the purity of the flesh alone, as the blessed Paul says, but in the Holy Spirit, and in the divine and spiritual fire, which consumes the filth of the vileness within us, and melts away the defilement that comes from sin.

Another of the holy prophets has likewise foretold to us the Saviour's coming in this manner, saying:

For behold, he comes in like the fire of a smelting furnace, and like the herb of those who wash, and shall sit refining as silver and as gold. For concerning the Jews, who have remained liable to the charges of unbelief;

The bellows, he says, has failed from the fire, the lead has failed; in vain does the silversmith refine silver.

Their wickednesses have not been melted away;

call them rejected silver, for the Lord has rejected them. But upon us who have believed, the silversmith has not laboured in vain, nor indeed has the bellows failed from the fire, nor the lead, for we have been purified by the spirit of judgment and by the spirit of burning.

But if one should wish to say that the purification in the spirit of burning came to pass upon the peoples of the Jews, through the calamity of the war and the things they endured—for punishments do purify, and the paying of penalties to the Judge of all sometimes delivers from many transgressions—

even so the passage will bear the truth.

And it shall come, and it shall be, that every place of Mount Zion, and all that is round about her, a cloud shall overshadow by day, and as of smoke, and as of the light of burning fire by night, with all the glory shall it be covered.

The word, then, whether one should say that these things were spoken concerning the time of the sojourning,

or whether one should wish to understand it as spoken of Christ himself,

For when he had come, he crowned with his own grace the sons of the spiritual Zion and of the free Jerusalem, and declared them blessed, and became for them a kind of shelterer, as it were suspending over them that ancient cloud which of old overshadowed Israel in the wilderness.

And he will come, and every place of Mount Zion, and all that is round about her, a cloud will overshadow by day.

For that those who dwell in the spiritual Zion — that is, the Church — may escape the scorching heat of the present life, and the trials, or rather the fiery testings that come from temptations, Christ, he says, will be their shelterer, like a cloud, all but hanging over them.

And the same one again drives away the darkness that arises from ignorance and from the crookedness of the devil, shining upon the mind like light in darkness, and like the radiance of fire.

And it is written concerning the sons of Israel that 'He led them in a cloud by day, and all the night in the light of fire.'

But those things were types, and images of spiritual realities;

while the truth is that which comes through Christ.

For he himself is the truth.

Those deemed worthy of his aid will be, he says, in every way and by all means as in a shadow from the heat, and in a shelter and in a hiding place from harshness and rain.

By harshness and rains he again likens the fierceness of temptations and their most violent assault.

For thus, in a certain place, Christ says:

Everyone therefore who hears these words and does them shall be likened to a wise man who built his house upon the rock;

and the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew;

and they beat upon that house, and it did not fall;

for it had been founded upon a rock. And by adding that 'he shall be sheltered by all the glory,' he gives us to understand that the grace from Christ to those who have believed in him will not be partial, but that in complete readiness will be his sparing care over them.

And they will be within the covering and tabernacle of him who is mighty to save, and who sets every evil outside.

'I will sing now to the beloved a song of the beloved concerning my vineyard.' The first verse of the passage before us would be, as it were, a heading and a preface to what is about to be said.

For what the prophet intends to do he indicates, saying:

For thus also did God and the Father name him for us, saying:

This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. Shall we then, O prophet, hear your voice? and do these words well up as from your own thoughts alone? But he sees — declare toward what the aim of the song looks.

Therefore, even if it be through me, he says, yet the word is not mine, but belongs to the beloved;

and it has been made concerning my beloved vineyard;

or, as the other translators say, concerning his vineyard.

But if indeed he does say 'concerning my vineyard,' he says such things not as though the vineyard perhaps belonged to himself, but as being one of those who belong to the vineyard.

For we shall find the prophets sometimes using such expressions even concerning the people of God.

As for instance the prophet Jeremiah:

Who will give me in the wilderness a last lodging-place, that I may leave my people and depart from them? For as being one of the people, he calls his own people those who are his kindred by blood and race.

The prophet therefore sings to the beloved, and his song is spoken concerning the beloved vineyard — that is, concerning Israel.

For it is written that 'The vineyard of the Lord of Hosts is the man of Judah, a beloved new plant. A vineyard came to be for the beloved, on a horn, in a fertile place.'

And I set a hedge around it, and staked it, and planted a Sorek vine, and built a tower in the midst of it, and dug a wine-vat in it, and I waited for it to produce grapes, but it produced thorns. Having likened Israel to a vineyard, he continues throughout with the metaphor of the word;

the 'horn' signifying to us nothing other than this very thing.

For Israel inherited the land of the promise, having conquered through God those who of old dwelt in it.

Therefore it says to him, in the forty-third psalm:

In you we will gore our enemies, and in your name we will bring to nothing those who rise up against us. And the 'horn' is taken in the divine Scripture for strength, and for power, and for royal glory.

My horn shall be exalted as that of the unicorn; and at another time again concerning Christ:

His horn shall be exalted in glory. For most illustrious is the kingdom of Christ.

And that the land of the promise is fertile, the sacred Writing has borne witness.

For everywhere it names it a land flowing with milk and honey.

And the divinely-inspired Psalmist also confirms the word, singing and saying concerning Israel:

You brought a vine out of Egypt, you cast out nations, and planted it. Do you see the 'on a horn,' which in these words signifies 'as in the power of God'? For it was planted when the nations had been cast out.

But it seems also to have been said by others that 'on a horn' means 'as in a lofty and elevated place';

for such is Zion, situated upon a mountain.

So then, having planted the vineyard, he says, 'and I set a hedge around it, and staked it, and planted a Sorek vine.'

For Israel had been bound about as with a kind of hedge — with angelic powers and with the aids from above.

And what is this? Those skilled in the cultivation of vineyards, skillfully fixing reeds beside each vine, raise them up on high, and bind them up from the ground.

For thus the fruit from them will be safe and unspoiled.

Something of this kind the God of all also did, all but staking the spiritual vineyard by the law given through Moses, so that it might not, being cast down to the ground and minding only the things of the flesh, be corrupted in manifold ways, but might be able also to mind the things above.

For the law of God carries the mind away from earthly things, as it were holding aloft the mind of those under its tutelage.

And that the vineyard is also noble, he makes clear by saying that it was not merely any chance vine that was planted in the fertile place, but rather a Sorek — that is, a choice one.

And it seems to the Hebrews that a kind of vine, or rather the name of a fine and most fruitful vine, is signified by 'Sorek.'

And I built, he says, a tower also in the midst of it, and dug a wine-vat in it. For there was raised up in Jerusalem that renowned temple, like a kind of tower and dwelling-place of God, and indeed a wine-vat too was dug.

And there was set in it an altar, and a korban — that is, a treasury — into which all the offerings of gifts from those who approached were gathered together.

But since I made the vineyard, he says, to be in good condition in all respects, I expected it to produce grapes.

For I thought — I thought — that it would produce nothing other than the noble fruit of the vine;

Therefore Israel failed of the hope, and proved false, and brought forth thorns instead of clusters.

For indeed it did not become a keeper of the law, nor was it adorned with the fruits of righteousness, but ran aground in a perverse manner, and produced thorns — that is, works of fire, or rather all such things as wound those who touch and draw near to them.

And whatever sin may come from us grieves God, and what the thorn is among us, this also with him is a manner of vileness.

But as the blessed Paul writes:

For the ground which has drunk the rain that often comes upon it, and brings forth herbage suitable for those for whose sake it is also tilled, receives blessing from God.

But that which bears thorns and thistles is worthless, and near to a curse, whose end is for burning. And now, O man of Judah, and you who dwell in Jerusalem, judge between me and my vineyard.

slothful, and in addition to this their shamelessness toward the law.

For though it was in their power, and that quite easily, to walk the glorious and honorable path of life in the law — that is, of the citizenship in Christ — they themselves honored the crooked one.

And indeed, having abandoned the ability to bear fruit as something stale, they became like a kind of ground that is no nourisher of cultivated fruits;

but rather wild, and thorn-bearing, and rank with weeds.

Let those among you who are wise come, then, he says, let them give judgment between me, the master of the vineyard, and the very vines themselves.

What good thing, then, being lacking to them, have they become useless? For if perhaps anything of the necessary things for their benefit was overlooked by me who planted them, let someone convict me and I will cease.

I will withdraw the charges, and I will not demand penalties.

For what shall I do, he says, that I have not done for it? But since I made it full of useful things and lacking in nothing, and then it became thorn-bearing, although I was expecting to behold it luxuriant with fruits in their season.

What, then, will be the verdict of the one who judges? Will he name the vinedresser negligent and slothful, or will he rather lay the blame upon those who had a share in my care, yet so neglected their own fruitfulness as to bring forth worthless thicket and a throng of thorns instead of clusters? That his discourse is not about the thorn perceived by the senses, nor indeed about clusters or the grape, is plain to everyone.

For if the vineyard is spiritual, then such altogether are its fruits also.

'And now I will declare to you what I will do to my vineyard:'

'I will take away its hedge, and it shall be for plunder;'

'and I will pull down its wall, and it shall be trodden underfoot.'

'And I will forsake my vineyard, and it shall neither be pruned nor dug;'

'and thorns shall come up upon it, as upon waste land.'

'And I will command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it.' The form of the discourse is, as it seems to me, not without wonder.

For, as though those summoned to sit in judgment—both himself and the vineyard—had all but fallen silent, he thereupon fixes the sentence for them,

and clearly foretells the things in which it shall consist.

For since nothing at all of the things useful for its well-being was lacking to it, it was by its own resolve that it turned itself into waste land.

'Therefore I will take away,' he says, 'its hedge, and it shall be for plunder; and I will pull down its wall, and it shall be trodden underfoot.'

For a vineyard bereft of hedge and wall lies utterly exposed as a most ready feast to those who wish to plunder, and as a path to those who pass through, with none to keep them out.

For when God hedges us round about, and by certain ineffable succors all but fortifies us with a wall, we shall not be trodden nor set as a highway for the unclean spirits;

nor indeed ready for plunder by the beasts of the field, and a delight to foxes.

Concerning these it is also written in the Song of Songs:

'Catch us the little foxes that spoil the vines.' And there are said to have come to be certain portions of foxes.

And when God gives leave to those who wish to do wrong, and strips off his care from above, we shall come to the trial of every evil;

and every one whosoever will revel over the things against us, even if it be some spiritual robber;

even if it be the law that rages wild in the members of the flesh;

and our every movement of thought shall bear fruit to Satan.

Therefore, apart from a hedge, the vineyard, being also without a wall, shall be given over to plunder to those who wish it.

'And it shall neither be pruned nor dug'—that is, it shall meet with no care able to set it right and restore it to a better state, and to deliver it from so grievous a wasting.

'For I will command even the spiritual clouds'—that is, the holy prophets, or rather the angelic powers—'that they rain no rain upon it;'

and it is plain that the spiritual rain is that which is wrought as a comfort unto mind and heart, and by the divine word.

But this was when they had drunkenly outraged Christ.

For it is not possible—not possible—to name, or rather to point out, a time in which Israel had passed his life apart from the holy prophets.

For they became captives from time to time, and departed into the land of the Persians and Medes together with their wives and their dearest ones;

yet not without the holy prophets did they go down into Egypt, when the Babylonians had from time to time taken the renowned Jerusalem; but the prophet Jeremiah was with them, ministering the words that came from above and from God.

But since they had drunkenly outraged Christ, they have continued bereft of a hedge, and all their safety has fallen.

For this, I think, is what it means to say that its wall is pulled down.

And all discourse of the holy prophets over them has ceased, and, like rain, has in a manner held back;

and the voices of the saints have failed;

and this, I think, is what was spoken to them by God through one of them:

'Behold, the days come, says the Lord, and I will bring a famine upon the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water,'

'but a famine of hearing the word of the Lord.'

For they thrust away from themselves the Lord of hosts, who waters souls and hearts spiritually, and enriches them with spiritual dews;

'As the dew of Hermon that descends upon the mountains of Zion.' And in place of that one, a new vineyard has been raised up, that of those called through faith unto sanctification.

And concerning them the Bridegroom from heaven—that is, Christ—says:

'The vines are in blossom, they have given forth their fragrance.'

And he himself is the first and all-holy and true vine;

and we are attached to him after the manner of branches, being filled full of the life-giving richness that comes from him.

And indeed he said plainly:

'I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser;'

'every branch in me that bears not fruit he takes away, and every branch that bears fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit.' And since we are grown into him through kinship—plainly the spiritual kinship—we have been made fruit-bearing;

and to this very end he establishes us, himself saying:

'Abide in me, and I in you.'

'As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine;'

'so neither can you, unless you abide in me.'

'I am the vine, you are the branches;'

'he that abides in me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit, for without me you can do nothing.' I say, then, that we must cleave, through faith and love and obedience in every single thing, to the true vine—that is, to Christ.

For he himself will make us fruit-bearing, he himself will set a hedge around us, and will raise up the wall, and will drive away those who pass through.

And to him a sacred oracle somewhere says:

'And your everlasting waste places shall be built up, and a memorial from generations to generations, and you shall be called a builder of hedges, and you shall cause the paths between to cease. For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and the man of Judah is a beloved new plant.'

'I looked for it to do judgment, but it did iniquity, and not righteousness, but a cry.' In these words he has shown plainly that his discourse was not rather about a perceptible vineyard, but about a spiritual one.

'For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts,' he says, 'and the beloved new plant, is the house of Israel, and the man of Judah.'

But although he had been counted worthy of my sparing and love, and had enjoyed all care, he did not become well-clustered, nor a noble vine; he did not honor the law, nor did he live out a seemly and holy life;

but he belied, as it were, even the hope of the one who tended him.

'For I looked for judgment'—

that is, the right and blameless choice, or judgment, proceeding from a sincere mind in all practical matters.

And yet, how could a vine bring forth thorns? Therefore it belied the hope, as I said just now.

For whence it was likely that the fruits of righteousness should spring up, thence an unexpected manner of life has come forth, one holding a repudiation of the sacred laws and of the things enjoined by the divine commandment.

Therefore it did iniquity, and not righteousness, but a cry.

And by 'a cry' he means, I think, to show somewhere this: that their life had become for them one driven in a frenzy to wrath and full of tumult.

'Let all clamor, and wrath, and anger, and blasphemy be put away from you, with all malice.' For it would befit, not those who have a settled mind, to make use of unseemly cries, but rather those whose life is unsafe;

or rather those who lightly fall to every kind of evil, and are governed by passion rather than by understanding.

And he seems also to hint darkly at the utterly grievous cry of the Jews, which they made against Christ himself.

For when Pilate reproached them, asking whether indeed they wished their own king to be crucified, they, casting aside all decency together with all reverence for God, cried out:

'Away with him, away with him, crucify him!'

'We have no king but Caesar.' A wicked cry, then, is the fruit of the synagogue of the Jews, on account of which it has been deprived both of hedge, and of wall, and of the watering from the holy clouds.

And they have been deprived of all care and cultivation.

For He said: 'I will forsake My vineyard, and it shall not be pruned, nor shall it be dug.'

It was left wholly a barren waste, having brought forth thorns, which are fuel for the flame.

Woe to those who join house to house, and draw field near to field, that they may take away something belonging to their neighbour.

'Shall you dwell alone upon the earth? For these things have been heard in the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth.' That no one might suppose that He had brought His charges against Israel in vain, or that He was reproaching the vineyard groundlessly—as one that had by no means brought forth the grape-cluster, but rather thorns, that is to say, iniquity instead of judgement, or righteous verdicts, and a cry instead of righteousness—