That this was not spoken of the baptism which is performed by the priests of the Church, the Lord Himself testifies, since indeed after the consummation of the age, when the angels have been sent forth to separate the good and the evil, this baptism is to be, when through the furnace of fire iniquity shall be burned away, that the just may shine in the kingdom of God like the sun itself in the kingdom of their Father. And if anyone is holy, as Peter, as John, he is baptized with this fire. There will come, then, the great Baptist—for so I name him, as Gabriel named him, saying: He shall be great—he will see many standing before the vestibule of paradise, he will brandish the turning sword, he will say to those on the right who have no grievous sins: 'Enter, you who are confident, who fear not the fire. I had also foretold to you:
Behold, I come like fire; and through Ezekiel I had said: Behold, I will set out for Jerusalem and will breathe upon you in the fire of My wrath, that you may melt away from the lead and the iron'. Let the consuming fire therefore soften, which burns away in us the lead of iniquity, the iron of sin, and makes us pure gold. Let it burn my reins and my heart, that I may think good things, that I may desire those things which are of chastity. But because he who is here purified must again be purified there, let Him purify us there too, when the Lord shall say: 'Enter into My rest', so that each one of us, scorched by that flaming sword but not burned up, having entered into that pleasantness of paradise, may give thanks to his Lord, saying: You have brought us into refreshment.
He, therefore, who passes through the fire enters into rest; he passes from things material and worldly to those that are incorruptible and everlasting. One fire is this, by which sins not voluntary but accidental are burned away, which the Lord Jesus has prepared for his little servants, that he may cleanse them from this sojourn which is mingled with the dead; another is that fire which he has assigned to the devil and his angels, of which he says, 'Enter into the eternal fire,' in which that rich man was burning who begged that moisture be dripped upon him from Lazarus's finger. But Lazarus, reclining in Abraham's bosom, was gathering eternal life, which the prophet promises himself when he says, 'I shall live and keep your words.' He says 'I shall live' as though not yet living; for here we live in a shadow.
This life, then, in the body is a shadow and image of life, not the truth; in short, man walks in an image, and we abide in the region of the shadow of death. But if anyone directs the eyes of his mind not toward earthly things but lifts them toward spiritual things, so that he can say, 'The Spirit before our face is Christ the Lord,' he will be worthy to say, 'Under his shadow we shall live.' For Christ is life, and therefore he who lives in the shadow of Christ is in the shadow of life; and rightly elsewhere the holy one of the Lord says, 'Under the shadow of your wings protect me.' All therefore, even the saints, are in shadow as long as they are in the body: they do not see perfectly, they do not know perfectly, but in part. Paul himself says:
'For we know in part'—he, the chosen vessel, to whom Christ restored sight and illumined with his grace, saw not face to face but through a glass; and David asks that his eyes be opened, that the shadow might be removed which hindered the full gaze of his eyes. Who could doubt that this is the region of the dead, when the holy one himself says, 'I shall please the Lord in the region of the living'? For here no one can please perfectly, where, even if it could be brought about that he have no sins of his own, yet by living in the very region of the dead he needs a purification that may absolve him from the contagion of this region. In a shadow, therefore, we live here, and therefore in a shadow we keep the words of God.
And to use an example: surely we were once under the shadow of the law, when we kept the new moons and sabbaths, which are a shadow of things to come, just as the Jews even today, who do not see the true sabbath, serve the copy and the shadow. We too, now living according to the Gospel, follow the shadow of the words of God. Nathanael is seen under the fig tree; David says he hopes under the shadow of the wings of the Lord Jesus; Zacchaeus climbed up into a sycamore tree to see Christ. To us also Jesus stretched out his hands, that he might overshadow the whole world. How are we not in the shadow, who are protected by the covering of his cross? How are we not in the shadow, whom the Crucified defends from the malice of the age and the burning of the body?
Or do we not know that the Word of God, coming into this world, did not come as the Word such as he was in the beginning, such as he was with God, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant? He came in a light cloud, and, though he was the power of the Most High, he overshadowed Mary, that he might transfigure the body of our lowliness to be made conformable to the body of his glory. As he, then, changed his form when he was born of the Virgin, so also the words of God seem transfigured to us when they are read in the Gospel, when their appearance is seen in the Scriptures as through a glass, because the whole truth cannot be comprehended here.
But when that which is perfect shall come, they will shine forth no longer through descent, no longer through appearance, as though transfigured, but in the whole and express truth. Nor let it move you that he says, 'I shall keep many words,' because, when he has known one word, he knows many words. In one there are many, and in the many there is one. It must therefore be shown how one word is many and many words are one word. Nor is it hard to be taught, since the apostle has said that he is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation, in whom all things were created in the heavens and on earth, whether visible or invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers; all things were created through him and in him.
There is therefore one Word which works in each, and while it works in each, it works all things and in all. This sole Word, with the Father, has poured itself out into many, because of his fullness we have all received. And so, if you should look at the individual things of all that were created in him, you will see in each the one Word of all, of which according to our capacity we are partakers. In me is a human word, in another a heavenly word, the word of angels in very many; there are those who have the word of dominions and powers. There is a word of righteousness, a word of chastity, a word of prudence, a word of piety, even a word of virtue. Thus the one Word is many, and the many words are one.
And indeed it is not hard to judge this, when we read that the Spirit of wisdom can do all things. And so, as to one is given through the Spirit the word of wisdom, and to another the word of knowledge according to the same Spirit; to another faith in the same Spirit, to another the grace of healings in one Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another the spirit of knowledge, to another the spirit of fuller counsel, to another the spirit of fortitude, to another the spirit of piety, and in all there is one and the same Spirit, dividing to each one as he wills.
There is the spirit of the prophets, there is the spirit of the apostles, there is also the spirit of craftsmen, as were Bezalel and Oholiab, whom the Lord filled with the divine spirit of wisdom and knowledge and of all craft, that they might make the covering and the tabernacle and the altar according to the understanding which God gave them; but also that the other wise-hearted might understand and perform all the works in accordance with all that the Lord commanded. And so they made things they had not learned nor seen, according to those things which the Spirit showed them. And to very many it seems that the spirit of the apostles is one, that of the prophets another, and diverse in each; but it is not diverse—it is one Spirit, dividing the diverse kinds of powers.
Hence it should not seem doubtful, if to some the apostolic word, to others the prophetic, to others the angelic, to others the operative word is given, that there is yet one Word dividing itself to each according to our capacity or according to its own voluntary bounty. This Word therefore, which is the head of all, I here see through a glass, and therefore I cannot here keep the words of God; but when I shall see his glory with unveiled face, then I shall live, and living the life I shall keep even the divine words. Therefore in the second verse he says: 'Open my eyes, and I shall consider the wonders of your law.' He who asks that his eyes be opened surely also understands that he is burdened; for no one asks the physician except one who seeks a remedy for his sickness.
This one, then, says to the physician coming from heaven: 'Open my eyes.' If the eye is merely disturbed, all the pain is easily soothed by an eye-salve; but if its keenness is overspread by a suffusion of fluid, greater remedies are sought. There is therefore, as in the eyes of the body, so also in the eyes of the soul, a certain affliction of this kind which must grow grievous, unless the good physician removes that veil and a certain mist of congealed fluid, which is judged to hinder—or rather to cover—the gaze of the mind, so that it may not see what it once saw. The sickness has crept in by the old leaven, in that we did not put off either the gentile or the Jewish suffusion when first we came to the church; we did not heed the good physician's teaching that says:
'Putting off the old man with his deeds, put on the new, who is renewed in knowledge after the image of him who created him.' Someone, then, has over-clothed himself, not stripped himself: a graver sickness creeps in, a long-standing veil burdens the eyes, no one can take it away—not an angel, not virtues, not dominions, not powers. The veil remains, it hinders the reading, it overspreads the vision; which is not unveiled, says the apostle—that is, by any other—unless it has been done away in Christ. But when such a one shall have turned to the Lord, the veil will be taken away. You have therefore the means by which to remove the veil that remains over the eyes of your heart: turn to the Lord, and the veil will fall.
Paul was turned to the blessing of Ananias; as it were scales fell from his eyes, and he saw, who for three days before had not seen; at once the eye of the body and of the soul is healed, because the physician from heaven had shown him the medicine—he of whom it is written: 'He sent his word and healed them, and delivered them out of all their infirmities.' This physician is not of the earth, who cures all infirmities and heals whole peoples. Send therefore, O Father, this physician; let your Word come, let him open my eyes. The eyes of the apostles too were closed, unless Jesus had opened them.
In short, to two of these going to a village named Emmaus, when he interpreted the Scriptures and blessed them, 'their eyes were opened,' it says, 'and they knew him.' Therefore, unless Jesus had opened our eyes, no one would have seen; unless Jesus had taken away the veil, to no one would the grace of the Gospel have shone forth. Peter too had closed eyes, and John had closed eyes, and James had closed eyes. In short, on the mountain they were weighed down with sleep, but, roused by the flash of the divine majesty, they opened the eyes of their heart. And because, placed in the body, they could not see fully, a cloud overshadowed them, lest the splendor of heavenly glory should dim the eyes of the body.
Who then is so great that he may open the eyes and see the sacraments of the law, unless Christ shows him? Moses was not so great. In short, at the Lord's bidding he cast down his rod, and it became a serpent and he fled from it; he grasped the serpent's tail, and it became a rod, and still he did not know the mystery. By this it was declared that the Lord Jesus would descend to the earth, who, when he had emptied himself, would suffer to be laid upon the cross and cast into the tomb, from which, rising according to the oracles of the law into the glory of God and the royal fellowship of the divine throne, he would return from the serpent. Let us too therefore grasp the tail of that crucified serpent, that we may be able to recognize his royal power. And she who put ointment on his feet held him.
Moses, then, grasped the serpent's tail, and his mouth was opened. He would not therefore have spoken of him, unless the Lord himself had opened his mouth. David here asks that his eyes be opened, and in the preceding verses said, 'Who will show us good things?' He had been nourished under the law and knew that the law has a shadow of good things to come; he desired to see those very good things no longer through a shadow, but with opened eyes. He had known that those who served according to the law of Moses served the copy and shadow of the heavenly mysteries. He wished to comprehend the very truth of the divine worship, and therefore, that he might shake the veil from his eyes, turned to the Lord he prayed, saying: 'Open my eyes, and I shall consider the wonders of your law.'
He understood that there is truly a heavenly warfare, which everyone might come to know from the law, to whomever the Lord should reveal it. For who could ascend by a human step, without divine guidance, from earthly things to heavenly, from shadow to brightness, from copy to the inner sanctuary of the truth? Who can consider that heavenly altar and the true temple, the priests and Levites—not those according to the offices of the flesh, but those according to the grace of the Spirit? In short, this grace alone, above the greatest things, David desired for himself, saying: 'One thing I have asked of the Lord, this I will seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, and that I may behold the delight of the Lord and consider his temple.'
Who could know that the rich man should offer a great gift, according to what his hand can afford, that his sin might be loosed? Who could understand, if he did not have what to offer—a ram, for instance—that his sin was not being loosed? Who could perceive what those uncleannesses were, which not the law that the Jews suppose, but the spiritual law which Paul recognized, looses? Who could see the true remissions of sins, of which the copy is in the law, the truth in the Gospel, the Lord Jesus saying: 'Your sins are forgiven you'—not through the blood of goats, but through the sacrifice of his own body?
And so that rich man in the law, who, by confessing the fullness of perfect majesty in Christ and as it were offering it with certain hands of faith at that heavenly altar, has loosed his sin; he sees the true priest who sees the prince of priests; he considers the true temple who hears him saying: 'Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.' A great temple, from which power went forth and healed all; that wondrous altar, on which the sacrifice of the one Lamb took away the sins of the world; that most excellent Levite, who came not to exact ministry, but to render to all the ministry of his passion, whose portion is God, who here possessed nothing and yet possessed all things.
But what shall I say of the Hebrew, whom the law bids serve only six years and in the seventh year go out from servitude? Who is this Hebrew servant? Who could be understood to be a free Hebrew? Who is so great that, holding the eternal years in mind, he might see the true Hebrew, who does not remain a servant forever, but, having performed the duty of a servant for six years, in the seventh year obtains the grace of liberty? Of this the patriarch Isaac seems not to have been ignorant—the mystery of servitude and liberty—who says: 'You shall serve your brother.'
'And it shall come to pass, when you shall have laid down and broken his yoke from your neck'—signifying that there shall be a time in which, even if anyone placed here serve his brother, yet afterward, when the years are completed—which are gathered from these days and these months that we spend here—he shall break the yoke from his neck, which happens in the seventh year of remission. We can infer the type of the true Hebrew in Joseph, who bore the yoke of servitude, but no fault took him captive, no prison shut him in, no Egypt discolored him. We infer it in Peter, John, James, who, created and trained under the yoke of the law, yet broke the Jewish yoke of their brother, when the time of the lawful rest arrived, when the remission of sins shone forth upon them.
And yet this was done here still in a shadow, in comparison with heavenly things. But how great is that rest which is inferred from the law, and revealed in the Gospel, the Lord Jesus saying: 'I will that where I am, these also may be with me'! How blessed is he who could earn the fruit of that dwelling, the fellowship of rest there! Then he will understand what it is to have opened the eyes, that he might see the wonders of the law of God. Well did the reading of the Gospel which was run through admonish us, in which that leper was healed who said, 'If you will, you can make me clean,' placing the effect of the power in the will of the Lord. To whom he replied likewise: 'I will, be clean.' The piety of the will went before, the authority of the power followed. To all who do not will that there be sin, Jesus says, 'I will.'
To will is common in Christ toward all; to be cleansed is of the faith of him who believes in Christ. 'And he touched him.' He touches those by whose faith he is touched. In short he says: 'Someone touched me; I perceive that power has gone forth from me.' You have the working of the immaculate body, you have the remission of the Godhead. But that he might be more fully healed, he opened his eyes, saying: 'Go, show yourself to the priest.' The synagogue had many priests; but he who opens the eyes does not see the false priests, but beholds the true one. Who is the true priest except him who is a priest forever? And therefore the Father said to him: 'You are a priest forever.' He opened therefore his eyes, and he saw and understood what gift he ought to offer for his cleansing. Blessed is he who hears these things;
how much more blessed he who sees, who can show himself to the true priest, so that he may have nothing to fear to be seen in himself, who first looks upon himself with unveiled face! For unless he has first seen himself, he will not dare to show himself, like Adam, who desired to hide himself, because he did not recognize himself. But let us now also consider what follows: 'I am a sojourner on the earth; hide not your commandments from me.' This is not the voice of just anyone, but of him who has renounced earthly pleasures and stripped himself of every affection of worldly desire. He is a sojourner in this earth, who can say:
'But our citizenship is in heaven'—who has his portion in the Lord, who can grieve that he lives too long on the earth, who is wearied by the length of this life, to whom the prolongation of this dwelling is a weariness, which the holy one turns away from and says, 'Woe to those who dwell on the earth,' who does not fear to be dissolved and, if he be loosed, presumes that he will be with Christ. This one is truly a pilgrim on the earth, who is a citizen of the saints and of the household of God, and lays up for himself treasure in heaven.
He surely, going out of Egypt, does not desire to return into this intelligible Egypt, nor dreads the borders of laid-aside old age and death, nor builds barns for storing up harvests, as one about to live for other ages already strangers to him; but, rich solely in the fecundity of virtues, gathers those things which not even death can take from him. And rightly he says: 'My soul has longed to desire your judgments at all times.' This surely none does except one free from bonds—not only from the bonds of worldly anxiety, but also from the bonds of human affection. There are very many bonds in this age: bonds are the desires of living, bonds are the delights of pleasures, bonds are those of honors, bonds those of marriage. In short, the good Teacher says to you:
'Are you loosed from a wife? Do not seek a wife.' And yet he who takes one does not sin, but he weaves bonds for his own mind, because he is anxious how he may please his wife—he would be more blessed if he desired to please God alone—and bonds of the flesh, because he is bound who does not have power over his own body. Therefore, because it is the commandment of God, which is set forth by the oracle of the law and the apostolic word, that no one should prefer wife, riches, honor, or kinship to God; and whoever does so prefer becomes liable to the judgments of God; therefore he first asked that God not hide his commandments from him. For he who has known the commandments and kept them does not flee the divine judgments, but desires them, and rightly, as though the commandments were revealed to him, says:
'I have longed to desire your judgments at all times.' He did not say 'I have longed for your judgments,' but 'I have longed to desire.' For just as to live the life is more than to live—for to live is common even to this present life, but to live the life belongs to the blessed—so to long that we may desire the judgments of God is more than to desire the judgments; for we long to desire, as though the desire were not in our own power, but of the grace of God. For when the Lord shall have seen us take delight in the longing of desire for his judgments, he increases the sober affection; but when we sin, we do not long to desire the judgments of God. For neither does the sick man desire to be burned or cut, that he may recover health.
He who is more grievously sick flees, lest he be burned, lest he be cut, lest he be bound, lest he be kept from food; but he who has a healthful constitution meets the physician without fear. Hence also the Lord not idly says: 'With desire I have desired to eat this passover with you,' not only desiring, but with doubled desire longing to grant the remission of sins. Let us too, therefore, long to desire the judgments of God—a good conscience which, when it is examined, is approved—and let us long to desire at all times, that no moment may pass empty of good longing. There follows the fifth verse: 'You have rebuked the proud; cursed are those who turn aside from your commandments.'
Since the Lord Jesus by obedience redeemed the human race and restored righteousness, but the serpent by disobedience introduced sin, we can hence estimate what evil pride has, whose author is the devil, whom the prophet brings in saying: 'I will set my throne above the clouds, and I will be like the Most High.' And so, since he is most wicked in that he did not give honor to the Lord our God, yet he trained even worse disciples. For he exalted himself so as to wish to be made equal and like to the Most High, but his disciple is signified by the apostle as one who will be indignant to be esteemed equal and like to God. For it is written:
'When the man of iniquity and son of perdition shall be revealed, who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God.' The master, then, presumes to be like; this one, to be superior. And therefore the Lord also said to his disciples: 'Greater things than these you shall do,' so that, to those from whom the serpent had taken away more than he himself had lost, Christ might grant to do greater things than he himself had done on earth; for in himself he willed to deceive the prince of the world, in his disciples to triumph. And so, willing to vindicate the human race from so great a crime, he introduced a Pharisee and a publican praying in the temple, and taught that, even if one has other good things, the proud man offends more than the humble who is supported by no endowment of virtues:
for the devil strives to trip up those intent on good works. How much did that Pharisee labor not to seize what was another's, not to be unjust, not to commit adultery! How much did he labor not to sin, as the publican had sinned! How much did he labor to fast twice in the week! How much did he labor to give the tithe of all that he acquired! Who of us does these things? How many have possessions and brood alone over their fruits and store up harvests for themselves alone! The devil noted this and steeped him in a grievous ulcer, so that, puffed up with the mind of the flesh, he did not hold the head, and in that very thing in which he would be believed praiseworthy, there he was judged more reprehensible. For he was giving thanks to God that he was not a robber, an adulterer, unjust.
How harmfully did the serpent wrestle with him and bind him with grievous coils! It made him superior, that it might cast him down from a higher place; it offered itself as inferior, that it might lay him low by a graver fall, the more sublime he was. Evil is the ruin of arrogance, which overthrows the superior; evil is this wrestling of the serpent, by which it twists itself into very many windings. The serpent wished to puff up Paul also. What Paul? That apostle, certainly, not from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ. And it had nearly deceived him, so that he begged that the thorn of his flesh, which humbled him, be taken away. But the good Lord, who wished to make Paul stronger through infirmities, applied to him an angel of Satan, that the devil might be conquered by his own arts. The Pharisee was not lying, indeed he was even speaking true things;
but everyone who exalts himself, even if he speaks the truth, offends. In short, the Pharisee entered the temple more commendable than the publican, and yet went out condemned; how great is the crime of pride, that even adulteries are preferred to it! In short, the Lord, who gives to others, resists the proud, and as it were contends with those who exalt themselves, and claims this contest for himself, and he who has compassion on others rebukes the arrogant; for nothing is graver than that we should despise our poor brethren with a proud eye, repel with intolerable disdain those conformed to us, judging them unworthy of our grace because they are needy—when poverty is more readily acceptable to God than treasure. 'Cursed,' he says, 'are those who turn aside from your commandments.'
Above he had said, 'Hide not your commandments from me,' and therefore, as though knowing the commandments revealed to him, he condemns those who have turned aside from the heavenly commandments. And well did he say 'who turn aside'; for the commandment is straight, therefore let no one bend away from it. But it moves us, on what ground he here said: 'Hide not your commandments from me.' For what is hidden becomes obscure and concealed, when above he had said: 'The commandment of the Lord is bright, enlightening the eyes.' If the commandment is bright, how is it hidden, when no one puts a lamp under a bushel? Unless perchance one commandment is bright, but many commandments are hidden. For 'your judgments,' he says, 'are like a great deep'—not 'judgment like a deep,' but 'judgments' are spoken of. But see the order.