'and the prophets prophesied in Baal and followed after idols.' After such great benefits, they turned into contempt the privileges of their dignity: so that the priests sought not the Lord; the teachers of the law were ignorant of Him whom they ought to teach others; the pastors through negligence became transgressors; and the prophets, who dispute among the peoples, spoke not to God but to an idol, and venerated their own figments. These words must be used against the masters of our own order, who devour the people of God as though it were bread for food, and through evil works do not call upon the Lord. 'Therefore I will yet contend with you in judgment, saith the Lord, and with your sons will I plead.'
Lest He seem to smite by power, He contends by reason as though with equals, according to that which David sings and the apostle appropriates: 'That thou mayest be justified in thy words, and mayest overcome when thou art judged.' And in that He set down 'yet,' He testifies that He has often done so; and in that He added 'with your sons,' He shows a like obstinacy also in the sons of the wicked. But He secretly signifies that their sons too followed in the ancient denial of God at the coming of the Lord. 'Pass over to the isles of Chittim, and see; and send into Cedar, and consider diligently, and see whether such a thing has been done: whether a nation has changed its gods' — or 'their gods' — 'and surely they are not gods.'
'But my people have changed their glory for an idol' — or 'for that from which nothing shall profit them.' He makes a comparison of that which is incomparable, and sets the true God against lying things. 'Go,' He says, 'to the isles of Chittim,' which we ought to understand of Italy or of the western parts, from the fact that the island of Cyprus — in which is a city called by this name — is near to the land of Judaea; from which also came Zeno, chief of the Stoics. But Cedar is a region of the wilderness and of the Ishmaelites, whom they now call Saracens, against whom in its closing parts a prophecy of this same prophet is woven, and of whom David makes mention saying: 'I dwelt with the inhabitants of Cedar; my soul has long been a sojourner.' And the sense is:
'Either go to the west, or send into the wilderness, and see whether any nation has done what you have done. For none of them despised its gods, nor changed its wooden and stone gods for a comparison of gold ones, but followed and held fast the ancient error which it had received from its forefathers; and surely this — though none of them is a god, but images of men fashioned by hand. But my people have changed truth for a lie, and preferred an idol to me, which in time of need cannot profit them.' We may say this also against those who follow vices with greater zeal than virtues, whom the apostle admonishes saying: 'I speak after the manner of men because of the infirmity of your flesh.'
'As you presented your members to serve uncleanness and iniquity unto iniquity, so now present your members to serve righteousness unto sanctification.' 'Be astonished, O heavens, at this, and its gates, be utterly desolate, saith the Lord; for my people have done two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living water, and have dug for themselves broken cisterns that cannot hold water.' The Septuagint: 'The heaven was astonished at this, and shuddered beyond measure and exceedingly,' the rest similarly. The heaven, to which it was said: 'Give ear, O heaven, and I will speak,' and 'Hear, O heaven, and give ear, O earth,' seeing the precepts of God trampled underfoot, shudders and cannot conceal its stupor.
For every creature groans together and grieves over the sins of men. But the people of God did two contrary things: first, that they forsook God, who is the fountain of life and gave the commandment saying, 'I am the Lord thy God, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt'; second, what is written in the same place, 'Thou shalt have no gods in my sight' — instead of whom they followed demons, whom He calls broken cisterns, because they cannot keep the commandments of God. And this too must be noted: that the fountain is perpetual and has living waters, but cisterns and pools are filled either from torrents or from the turbid waters of the earth and from rains. He calls those the gates of heaven, of which it is also written in the twenty-third Psalm:
'Lift up your heads, O ye gates, and the King of glory shall come in'; for which the Septuagint translated: 'Lift up your gates, O ye princes' — of which more fully in its own place. And in that Aquila and Symmachus rendered 'heavens,' but the Septuagint and Theodotion 'heaven,' let no one be troubled. For the Hebrew 'shamaim' is of common number, and both 'heavens' and 'heaven' are called by the same name, as Thebes, Athens, Salonae. 'Is Israel a slave, or a home-born servant?' I think that from this place the Jews, lifted up into pride, said to the Savior: 'We are the seed of Abraham, and have never been slaves to any man; how sayest thou: Ye shall be free?' — not knowing that everyone who commits sin is a slave of sin, and that each is a slave to that by which he is overcome.
Born therefore of Abraham, the friend of God, they became by their own vice as it were sons of Ham, to whom it was said: 'Cursed be Canaan, a servant shall he be to his brethren.' 'Why then is he become a prey? The lions roared over him and gave forth their voice; they made his land a desolation, and his cities are burned up, and there is none to dwell in them.' The divine word asks, that He Himself may answer. And He calls the princes of Babylon lions, who made his land a desolation and destroyed his cities by fire.
Or certainly, according to the anagogical sense, let us understand the lions to be the adverse powers or the princes of heretics, who, laying waste the land of the Church, devastated all its cities with heretical fire, and with that fire of which it is written: 'All of them committing adultery, their hearts are like an oven.' For those truly give forth their voice and, in this same prophet under the person of the partridge, cry out and gather what they did not bring forth, and make riches not with judgment. And therefore its cities were laid waste and destroyed, because they have not God as their inhabitant, the Scripture saying: 'and there is none to dwell in them.' 'The sons also of Memphis and of Taphnes have defiled thee even to the crown of the head. Has not this been done to thee?
because thou didst forsake the Lord thy God at the time when He led thee by the way?' This which we have said — 'at the time when He led thee by the way' — is not found in the Septuagint. He names the two greatest cities of Egypt, Memphis and Taphnes, and says that their sons defiled Israel even to the crown of the head, in that sense in which Isaiah put it: 'From the sole of the foot even to the crown of the head there is no soundness in him.' So great was the lust of the Egyptians, who are of great flesh, that they spared no member, but defiled all. According to the letter, refer this to the idols of the Egyptians; according to the spiritual understanding, to the masters of perverse doctrine, who pollute the purity of the Church with their own foulness.
But these things shall befall him for this reason, because he forsook the Lord his God, and that especially at the time when he ought to have followed the Guide Himself. 'And now what wouldest thou in the way of Egypt, to drink the water of Sihor? And what to thee and the way of the Assyrians, to drink the water of the river?' For 'Sihor' we have rendered 'turbid,' which the Hebrew word signifies, for which the common edition has 'Geon.' Because, then, He had set down above the sons of Memphis and Taphnes, who defiled Israel even to the crown, now He names Egypt itself more plainly.
And no one doubts that the Nile has turbid waters, and that by 'the river of the Assyrians' the Euphrates is signified, the Scripture saying that the land of promise is from the torrent of Egypt even to the great river Euphrates. But those who have forsaken Christ, the fountain of life, and have dug for themselves the pools of heretics, which cannot hold the waters of doctrines, must needs lie beneath the lions who reduce their land to a desolation and destroy all the churches, and be defiled even to the crown, and drink turbid waters and the streams of the Assyrian river and of the north, whence evils blaze forth upon the earth. 'Thy own malice shall reprove thee' — or 'thy transgression shall instruct thee' — 'and thy turning away shall rebuke thee.'
'Know and see that it is an evil and a bitter thing that thou hast forsaken the Lord thy God, and that the fear of me is not with thee, saith the Lord God of hosts.' It must be noted that even malice or transgression, after it has sated the transgressor and, like quails, has come even to nausea, may instruct the one who does penance: who is commanded to see what he has forsaken, what he has followed, and how, despising what is good and sweet, he has chosen what is evil and bitter. But all this came to pass because he forsook the Lord his God, and the fear of Him is not with him. For the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and because he had not that fear, he is delivered over to evil and bitterness. 'Of old thou hast broken my yoke' — or 'thy yoke' — 'thou hast burst my bonds' — or 'thy bonds' — 'and thou saidst:
I will not serve. For upon every high hill and under every leafy tree thou didst prostrate thyself as a harlot' — or 'there thou didst pour thyself out in fornication.' As it were to a harlot He speaks to Israel, because she broke the marriage covenants and said: 'I will not serve' — understand 'the Lord' or 'my husband' — but upon every high hill and under every leafy tree she was prostrated in idolatry; for pleasant and lofty places are always dedicated to idols.
This may also be said of him who, being from the beginning a Christian and in part instructed in the sacred letters, afterward through desire of secular literature — which is signified in the hills — and in the delights of eloquence — which is shown in the leafy trees — prostrates himself to demons, who under the occasion of learning and of lofty knowledge pollute the souls of believers and make them spread their feet to every passer-by. 'But I planted thee a chosen vine, every true seed; how art thou turned to me into a degenerate, an alien vine?' The Septuagint: 'But I planted thee a fruitful vine, every true one; how art thou turned into the bitterness of an alien vine?' For 'chosen' or 'fruitful' vine the Hebrew has 'sorek,' which is set down in the Canticle of Isaiah.
It is moreover a kind of the best vine, with which shoot the Lord says He planted Israel; and He marvels how the true seed and chosen vine has been turned into bitterness, and has thereby become an alien vine. And let no one be secure, if both the Lord's planting and the true seed and the vine sorek is so far changed by its own vice that through bitterness it departs from the Lord and becomes an alien vine. And in this the clemency of the Creator is to be considered: that He who said in the Gospel, 'I am the true vine,' gave also to His disciples and to the people believing in Him that it should be a chosen or true vine, if it would abide in that in which it was planted.
'Though thou wash thee with nitre and multiply to thyself the herb borith, thou art stained with thine iniquity before me, saith the Lord God.' For 'herb borith,' which we, as it is set down in the Hebrew, have translated, the Septuagint rendered 'poa,' that they might signify the fullers' herb, which, according to the custom of the province of Palestine, grows in green and moist places, and has the same power for washing away filth as nitre has. Now our 'nitre' and 'the herb of the fuller' is penance. And the ecclesiastical discourse also, which reproves and rebukes and corrects the offender, has the likeness of a more biting nitre. But he who is stained with the light filth of sins is cleansed by lighter admonitions.
But grievous sins, which drag down to death, can be washed away neither by nitre nor by the herb borith, but require heavier torments. For the work of each, of what sort it is, the fire shall prove, and it shall be revealed in the fire. And beautifully He added: 'Thou art stained with thine iniquity in my sight,' because, even if thou seem clean to men, thou art not clean to me, who know the consciences of individuals. Whence also in another place it is said: 'In thy sight shall no living man be justified.' 'How sayest thou: I am not polluted, I have not gone after the Baalim? See thy ways in the valley' — or 'vale,' which in Hebrew is called 'ge,' and by the Septuagint is interpreted 'polyandrion,' which in our language may be called 'the sepulchre of the multitude.'
'In vain,' He says, 'thou art unwilling to confess thy crimes and boastest of cleanness, thou who art polluted with the filth of idolatry, and shamelessly deniest that thou hast worshipped the idol Baalim. Look upon the valley of the sons of Hinnom, which is watered by the fountains of Siloam, and there thou shalt discern the shrine of Baal, whom, having forsaken God, thou hast venerated.' And in that it is added, 'Know what thou hast done,' He opens the closed eyes of the denier, that he may discern what he blushes to behold. According to the tropological sense, let us reprove by works the impudence of the brow of those who are unwilling to confess their own vices. For men of this sort do not walk in the strait and narrow way that leads to life, but in the broad and spacious way through which very many enter, which leads to death.
Whence also it was significantly named 'polyandrion,' or according to the history, because there a multitude of the people, slain and destroyed, was lost through the evil of idolatry. 'A swift runner unfolding her ways, a wild ass accustomed to solitude, in the desire of her soul she drew in the wind of her love; none shall turn her away. All that seek her shall not fail; in her menses they shall find her.' The Septuagint: 'Toward evening her night howled; she widened her ways over the waters of the wilderness; in the desire of her soul she was borne by the spirit, she was given over. Who shall turn her back? All that seek her shall not labour; in her humiliation they shall find her.' In this place the Septuagint edition greatly disagrees with the Hebrew truth; yet each has its own sense.
Because above He had said, 'I am not polluted,' and was speaking as it were to a woman who had borne herself basely, He describes her fornication. 'How,' He says, 'like a swift she-goat' — which we have called by the common gender 'runner,' and more significantly Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion rendered 'dromas kouphe' — 'she unfolds her ways and is swiftly borne to her pastures. And as a wild ass accustomed to the wilderness draws in the desire of her soul the wind or the spirit of her love' — for among the Hebrews by one name 'ruah' both 'wind' and 'spirit' are called — 'so also Israel or Jerusalem was borne with all impetuosity toward the desire of lust, and burned with all love of idols, and there is none
who can turn her away from this impetuosity by his admonitions — not that the impossibility of the prophets brought this about, but the perverse malice of her who desires.' 'Whoever seek her,' He says, 'shall not greatly labour; in her menses and in her uncleanness they shall find her' — for which Aquila rendered 'neomenian,' that is 'the Kalends,' Symmachus 'month,' the Septuagint and Theodotion 'humiliation.' Now according to the Septuagint this is the sense: the harlot Jerusalem, like that woman described in Proverbs, howled with her voice toward evening and provoked her lovers to lust, opened the ways of her shamefulness, and spread her feet to every passer-by.
Now there was a place having the pleasantness of flowing waters, which becomes more delightful when there is solitude round about, so that none may see her fornicating. 'In the desire,' He says, 'of her soul she was borne by the spirit' — or was led by a perverse spirit, or drew the refreshment of her love, or certainly sang the songs of her shamefulness. 'She was given over,' He says, to her vices and to lust; none shall be able to turn her back. All who shall wish to find her shall find her in the humiliation of her shamefulness, so that she can never be sated with the love of pleasure. 'Keep back thy foot from nakedness and thy throat from thirst. And thou saidst: I have despaired, I will not do it; for I have loved strangers, and after them will I walk.' The Septuagint:
'Turn thy foot from the rough way and thy throat from thirst. But she said: I will act manfully, for she loved strangers and walked after them.' Those about to keep the Passover are commanded to have shoes on their feet. And the apostle proclaims that the feet of those who are prepared for the gospel are shod, lest, while they walk through the wilderness of this world, they lie open to venomous creatures, which ought to be trodden and crushed by the gospel foot. We keep back the throat from thirst when we receive the precepts of the Savior, who says: 'Whoever thirsts, let him come to me and drink.' She, out of despair of better things, denied that she would do what the Lord commanded, and set forth the cause saying: 'I have loved strangers and I will follow them,' thinking by a shameless confession to avoid her crimes.
Now according to the Septuagint the way of sinners is rough, which is turned by the Lord into a level way. Whoever follows heretics, let him be marked by the epitaph of these verses, in that he said: 'I have despaired' — or 'in my evil purpose I will act manfully' — and 'I will be strengthened in my error.' And it is necessary that he who follows a doctrine alien to the Church should love strangers and follow their footsteps, whether demons or the princes of heretics, who are alien from God. 'As a thief is confounded when he is caught, so are the house of Israel confounded, they and their kings, their princes and priests and prophets.' Although the countenance of thieves is impudent and bold, yet he blushes when he is caught in theft. And Israel therefore, saying to the wood:
'Thou art my father,' and to the stone: 'Thou hast begotten me,' so as to call those parents which he himself had fashioned, is confounded when he is caught in his idolatry. And lest we think He says this of the common folk, He sets down their kings and princes and priests and prophets. Let us use this testimony if ever our princes and those who are thought leaders in the Church are caught in shameful sins. 'They have turned to me the back and not the face.' Those who cast the words of God behind them themselves turn their back against Him and not their face. For when a master gives a command, it is a sign of obedience if one listens with head bowed toward him; but if one turns his back, it is a sign of the despiser, as is written in another place:
'and they turned to me the shoulder, withdrawing.' 'To such a degree,' says God, 'have they despised my precepts, that they were not even willing to hear, but signified the swelling of their mind by the gesture of the body.' 'And in the time of their affliction they will say: Arise and deliver us.' Those who did not perceive God through benefits, let them perceive Him through torments. 'Where are thy gods which thou hast made for thyself? Let them arise and deliver thee in the time of thine affliction.' It is a shameless demand, in the time of need and distress, to seek help from Him whom in peace they despised. And it is to be read with the feeling of one rebuking: 'Let thy gods deliver thee, which thou hast made for thyself,' so that, since God is the Creator of men, and man has made a god, let necessity prove
what those can do whom thou didst securely worship before. 'According to the number of thy cities were thy gods, O Judah.' The several cities worshipped either the same or single and diverse gods, so that not even in impiety did they seem to have consent, but a superstition warring against itself followed a diverse error. And what follows: 'and according to the number of the ways of Jerusalem they sacrificed to Baal,' was added by the Septuagint. 'Why will you contend with me in judgment? You have all forsaken me, saith the Lord.' Human perversity is prone to excuse itself, so that whatever they deservedly suffer, they seem to suffer unjustly, and refer their own guilt to the judgment of God.
'In vain therefore,' He says, 'do you allege complaints and accuse the judge of injustice, when it is of your own impiety that you suffer.' And what follows: 'and you have all dealt unjustly with me,' was likewise added by the Septuagint. 'In vain have I smitten your sons; they have not received discipline' — for which the Septuagint put: 'you have not received.' And the sense in the Hebrew is: 'they themselves who were smitten were unwilling to receive discipline'; but in the Septuagint: 'therefore I smote your sons, that by their death you might be instructed. And lest perchance you should say: Thou wast unwilling to correct sinners, learn by the strokes of your sons that I wished to cure you with a more severe medicine.' 'Your own sword has devoured your prophets.'
'Not my prophets, but yours; in no wise my sword, but your sword devoured them, which you endured by your sins.' Now the Septuagint does not have 'your,' but simply rendered: 'The sword devoured your prophets,' so that either the enemy's sword or my sword is shown, by which your sins were pierced through. 'Your generation is like a destroying lion.' The Septuagint: 'like a destroying lion, and you feared not.' 'The sword,' He says, 'which devoured your prophets' — there is no doubt that it signifies Baal and the soothsayers of the idols — 'laid waste all things after the manner of a lion, and yet your generation, which ought to have been amended by the death of a few, all persevered in wickedness.' But according to the Septuagint this is the sense:
'Thus the sword of the Lord, which manifested the sword of the adversaries, devoured and tore your false prophets like a lion, which most greedily tears the prey it has found; and yet not even by the punishment of your prophets could you be turned to better things.' 'See the word of the Lord: Have I become a wilderness to Israel, or a late-yielding land? Why then has my people said: We have withdrawn, we will come no more to thee?' The Septuagint: 'Hear the word of the Lord: Thus saith the Lord: Have I become a wilderness to Israel, or a land full of thorns, that my people has said: We will not feel, nor will we come to thee?' And Moses saw the voice of God, and John the apostle says that he saw and handled the word of God.
But He marvels how the people of Israel could have held God as a wilderness, since they followed idols as though they were the throng of cities. A late-yielding land is one that receives not the rains of doctrines nor the discipline of the gospel, and is full of thorns because it has not been tilled. Therefore the people once of God is the more wicked in this, that it withdrew from the Lord and will not return further to its God. It is a great offense to be unwilling to appease Him whom thou hast offended. 'Will a virgin forget her ornament, or a bride the girdle of her breast? But my people has forgotten me for days without number.' By these things we learn that Christ is the bridegroom of the virgin Church, which has neither spot nor wrinkle.
But if He Himself is the bridegroom, they are His own words, of whom John the Baptist also speaks: 'He that hath the bride is the bridegroom.' Therefore he loses his ornament who withdraws from the Lord, and forfeits the understanding of doctrines, which is signified in the breast. Whence also John the evangelist reclines upon the breast of the Lord, and for the priests among other things the little breast of the victims is set apart. And the greater the number of the times in which we forget God, so much the greater the punishment of the sin, which could not be tamed even by the length of the ages. 'Why dost thou strive to show thy way good, to seek love?'
'Moreover you even taught your wickednesses to be your ways, and on your wings — or on your hands — was found the blood of the souls of the poor and the innocent. I did not find them in pits, but in all these things, or under every oak.' 'In vain,' he says, 'do you desire to defend yourself by the art of words and to show your works as good, so as to merit love — you who moreover even taught others your ways and were an example to all of evil deeds. For on your wings — or on your hands — was found the blood of the innocent, whom you offered up to idols, or whose souls you destroyed under the guise of sacrifices.' The word 'poor' we have set down from the Hebrew, which is not found in the Septuagint.
'But these poor and innocent ones,' he says, 'I did not find slain in pits' — which most often happens by the ambush of robbers — 'but in all the things I mentioned above, or under the oak' — which in Hebrew is called 'ella,' and which indeed also signifies 'these,' so that the sense is: 'in all these things, or under the oak and terebinth' — 'under whose shade and foliage, as though in pleasant places, you took your delight in the crimes of idolatry.' 'And you said: I am without sin and innocent, and therefore let your fury be turned away from me. Behold, I will contend with you in judgment, because you have said: I have not sinned. How exceedingly worthless you have become — or because you have exceedingly despised — repeating your ways!'
These words are to be used against those who refuse to acknowledge their own sins, but in the time of affliction and distress say that they suffer unjustly what they suffer, and they provoke the wrath of God the more, since it is a second and greater sin not to mourn what one has done, but to hold out empty excuses for one's sins. 'I will contend with you in judgment,' he says, 'because you have said: I have not sinned' — as though it were something greater than that sin to have one thing in one's conscience and to utter another in speech. Let the new heresy sprung from the old hear that it is a very great wrath of God to be unwilling humbly to confess one's sin, but shamelessly to boast of one's righteousness. 'And you shall be confounded by Egypt, as you were confounded by Assyria: for from that one too you shall go forth, and your hands shall be upon your head.'
'For the Lord has crushed your confidence — or your hope — and you shall have no prosperity in it.' In order to escape the assault of the Egyptians, they fled for refuge to the Assyrians, whose protection was in vain; for we read that they were defeated by the Egyptians. Again, in order to flee the wrath of the Assyrians, they relied on the help of the Egyptians, whom history records as overcome by the Assyrians. They are therefore rebuked because, having abandoned hope in God, they rely on the help of men, which is all crushed and so overthrown that they can find no usefulness in it. Whence he says: 'And you shall go forth from that one too,' that is, from Egypt, 'as you went forth from the Assyrians, and your hands shall be upon your head,' and you shall mourn that in vain you looked for protection from the Egyptians.