Indeed, I understand that in some codices this homily is inscribed to no author, as in the Vatican 6452, of the basilica of St. Peter marked G, and in the Orvieto codex; but in some it is inscribed to St. Ambrose. Yet in several manuscripts I see that it has been copied as the same one as the preceding, and that it bears the name of Saint Maximus; in the codex of the Holy Cross in Jerusalem it is announced with this title: 'On the fasts at the beginning of Lent, homily XXXII'; in the St. Gall codex: 'Likewise the following, namely the fifty-eighth, on Lent'; in the Turin codex: 'Likewise on Lent, sermon XX'; and in the Holy Cross in Jerusalem 99, homily 19, and in the Laurentian X, shelf XIV, it is likewise inscribed 'On Lent.'
This homily is published by the monks of St. Maur among the sermons of Ambrose in the third place, but by us, who have followed the old editions and the manuscript codices, in the second. I believe you have understood, brethren, why I have compared these our fasts to those stations, in which the people of Israel, set as it were in battle array, overcame Pharaoh the king by daily toil, and defended themselves from their enemies as though by certain camps of the stations; so that whoever of that accompanying number did not complete the spaces of the daily station, either Pharaoh seized him, or the wilderness overran him.
So therefore we too ought to complete with all toil the journey of forty days set before us, and to fortify ourselves with the devotion of fasts as with certain camps. For our fasts are our camps, which defend us from the diabolical assault. Finally they are called stations, because, standing and remaining in them, we repel the ambushing enemies. Fasts are plainly camps to Christians, from which if anyone stray, he is invaded by the spiritual Pharaoh, or devoured by the wilderness of sins. But he suffers the wilderness of sins who is forsaken by the fellowship of the saints. Fasting, therefore, is a certain wall to the Christian, unassailable by the devil, impassable by the enemy. For what Christian ever fasted, and was taken captive?
Who remained sober and was conquered? The devil attacks the drunken, the enemy assaults the wanton. But when he sees a fast, he is laid low by hunger and by weakness: laid low, I say, by weakness, because Christian weakness is strength. Whence the Apostle says: When I am weak, then am I stronger (2 Cor. XII). But someone asks, how can weakness be strong? Then is weakness strong, when the flesh wastes away by fasts, and the soul grows fat by purity. For as much as the juice of foods is withdrawn from the former, so much is the virtue of righteousness increased in the latter. Then indeed a man is feeble for worldly things, but strong for divine works. For then he thinks more of God, then he fears judgement, then he conquers the enemy.
For the Saviour says of the devil: This kind is not cast out except by fasting and prayers (Matt. XVII). He says surely that the man possessed by the devil cannot be cleansed except by fasts. See then how great is the virtue of fasting, how great a grace it bestows upon its own man, in that it affords so great a medicine to another: how it sanctifies its own man, in that it thus purifies another. For it is a marvellous thing: one man fasts, and the benefit of the one fasting profits another. Therefore, brethren, let us by no means lay down the arms of abstinence, and let us attend to the forty days' fasts without intermission. For this is the perfect number for conquering;
for the Lord conquered the devil after He had fasted forty days, not that He could not have conquered him also by fasting fittingly for a shorter time; but that He might show us that we can then be the conquerors of the devil, when for forty days we have by fasting become conquerors of carnal desires; but that whoever violates this consecrated number by the intemperance of the belly can, as feeble and wretched, easily be overcome by the enemy. For how can he conquer the wickedness of the devil in another, who does not conquer the intemperance of the belly in himself? Be therefore first the conqueror of thyself, that thou mayest be able to be the conqueror of another. For within thee are thy own enemies, who daily assail thee.
Behold, avarice besets you with the craving for riches, luxury takes you captive with the sweetness of feasting, heresy perverts you with the perversity of a false knowledge. Overcome, therefore, your own enemies, that you may be able to overcome those that are foreign. For it is no light sin, brethren, not to fast the Lent appointed for the faithful by the Lord, and to break the consecrated fasts by the gluttony of the belly. It is written: 'He who says that he abides in Christ ought himself also to walk even as He walked' (1 John 2). If, then, you wish to be a Christian, you ought to do what Christ did. He who had no sin fasted the Lent; you who sin do not wish to fast the Lent. He, I say, had no sin, yet He fasted for our sins.
What sort of Christian, then, are you in your own conscience, when you feast while Christ hungers for you? When you refresh yourself while the Saviour fasts for you? It is not, therefore, as I have said, a light sin to violate an appointed fast. For, to prove this briefly by examples, we read in the books of Kings that when Saul, king of Israel, was waging war against the Philistines, he enjoined a fast upon his whole army, and when all abstained, he began to fight against the adversaries (1 Kings 14:24ff.). Truly a good king, who overcame his foes not so much by arms as by devotion, and who fought more by religion than by weapons.
When therefore Saul had enjoined the day's abstinence upon all his people, and Jonathan his son, unaware of the command, advancing victorious into the midst of the enemy's ranks, had tasted honey by dipping the tip of his staff into the honeycomb, so great an indignation was suddenly aroused that both the victory was delayed and the Divinity was offended. In the end, neither was an end put to the war, nor was a prophetic answer given to the king. From this we understand that Saul overcame his enemies not so much by the valour of his soldiers as by the soldiers' abstinence. And so the fault of one brings sluggishness upon all, and by the offense of one weakness is engendered for all. For valour fails in the army where fasting fails in observance.
As soon as Saul recognized this sin from the very offense given to the Divinity, he at once declared that Jonathan must not be spared, but that the sin committed must be expiated by the shedding of his blood. See how great was king Saul's observance of religion, who chose to appease the offended God even by the slaying of his own son; and see how great is the guilt of a broken fast, which is punished by nothing less than the shedding of blood. And if Jonathan, unaware, is condemned to death because he broke the fast enjoined by his father—what does he deserve who knowingly breaks the fast enjoined by Christ? Therefore, brethren, let us keep the appointed fast in the observance of our fasting, that we may overcome our enemies both spiritual and carnal. For we have, as you know, carnal enemies.
Let us therefore fast, that both our army and Saul may overcome and prevail over them. For the honeycomb is a certain pleasure of the world, or the vices which, as it is written, 'for a time indeed anoint the throat, but in the end are more bitter than gall' (Proverbs 5). Let us therefore pray that, as we fast, the Lord may bestow on us that spiritual honeycomb which grows sweet on the palate of the soul's throat in eternal blessedness. With the help of Him who lives and reigns for ever and ever. Amen.