There is no lack in this place of an abundance of reasons by which it may be effected that this homily is to be ascribed to Saint Maximus. Of these there are chiefly three. The first is drawn from its connection and linking with the preceding homily, in which he had discoursed of those things concerning which, at the beginning of this one, he goes on to discourse. The second is a reason taken from the codices of Sangallensis, Taurinensis, Holy Cross in Jerusalem, and Laurentianus, in which this same homily follows the previous one and bears the name of Saint Maximus. The last is supplied by the agreement of the editors Gymnicus, Galesinius, Raynaudus, Combefis, and Margarinus. The connection of style and of the sequence of thoughts is the same in this as in the preceding homilies. Therefore they have erred who have noted that it must be ascribed to Saint Ambrose;
and on this account the Benedictine monks of the Congregation of Saint Maur are to be praised, who removed it from the number of the works of that same holy archbishop. Some days ago we pursued the point that the judgment of holy Susanna was very like the judgment of the Savior, and that the chastity of that famous woman labored under the same accusations under which the integrity of Christ labored. For in like manner did chastity suffer persecutors in Susanna. For she, while she convicts the elders of adultery, is herself detained as though an adulteress; here, while He arraigns the Pharisees of sacrilege, He Himself is accused as though a sacrilegious man. Which sacrilege, indeed, in the Pharisees can be called an even greater adultery; for it is graver to be an adulterer against religion than against the body;
and it is more to injure the integrity of the divinity than to violate the integrity of a man. Condemned, therefore, is Susanna, condemned also the Lord; she, because she was guarding the chastity of the body; He, because He was defending the chastity of religion. The cause of the judgment, therefore, was similar in both, except that Susanna had a better judge than the Lord. For a governor judges Him, a prophet her; a man hears Him, who was terrified by the seditions of the Pharisees; a boy hears her, who was filled with the Holy Spirit. The one—what he perceives, he constantly pronounces, he does not defend. For Susanna's judge acquits and frees her; the Lord's examiner, whom he acquits, condemns and hands over. Similar, therefore, was the judgment of Susanna and of the Lord in almost all respects.
Indeed, not even the accusation in these cases was itself dissimilar. For the elders inform against Susanna, Judas accuses the Lord; her teachers accuse her, His own disciple arraigns Him; Susanna, I say, the false elders arraign; a false bishop betrays the Savior. For Judas too was a bishop, as the Prophet says of him, saying: 'Let his days be few, and let another take his bishopric' (Ps. 108). But neither, brother, does the place seem dissimilar in either case. For Susanna in the paradise-garden is surrounded by her accusers; the Lord in the garden-paradise is encompassed by His betrayers; she there suffers ambushers, He here endures a betrayer. But let us see the outcome of each judgment.
Susanna's accusers, as false witnesses, are struck down by the prophetic sentence; and they are punished as guilty of the same crime of which they were eager to condemn the blood of the innocent. But the Lord's betrayer I do not find to have been condemned by a judge; for Pilate does not condemn him, the people do not condemn him: but, what is graver, he condemns himself, and, justice ceasing, he is judged. For whom another judges may in some way be excusable; but he is guilty without excuse who is condemned by the judgment of his own conscience: whom another judges may sometime hope for pardon from his judge; but he who judges himself, from whom shall he ask pardon? For Judas, bringing back the price of the Lord's blood, says to the Jews: 'I have sinned, in that I have betrayed innocent blood.'
'innocent' (Matt. 27). A great testimony, therefore, of the Lord's innocence it is, when His accuser confesses concerning the crime, and is guilty concerning the reward; for while the wretched man refunds the price of the sale, he thinks he can dissolve the contract of his own misdeed; but not even so is he absolved; for while he is the author of his own sale, it is established that these men entered into a criminal contract with a sacrilegious man. By his own sentence, therefore, is Judas the traitor condemned. It may perhaps seem wonderful to you, that the people did not judge him, the governor did not deliver him up. This is wont to be the judgment of a sacrilegious man: that he himself, while he remembers his impiety, may also punish it; that, while he recognizes his crime, he may also avenge it;
for he surpasses the sentences of all, who is condemned by his own sentence from his own conscience. This, I say, is wont to be the judgment of a sacrilegious man: that, conscious of the deed, he damns himself, as the apostle Paul says, speaking of the heretic: 'A heretical man, after the first and second correction, avoid, knowing that such a one is subverted, and sins, being condemned by his own judgment' (Titus 3). For the heretic damns himself, when he casts himself out of the Church, and, with none compelling him, departs from the assembly of the saints; for he himself shows what he deserves from all, who by his own judgment separates himself from all. He himself, I say, damns himself, the heretic:
for whereas all criminals are cast out from the Christian fellowship by the bishop's sentence, the heretic, anticipating all things, is cast away by the sentence of his own will. By such a penalty, therefore, is the heretic condemned as also Judas: that he may be both the accused of his own crime and the judge of his own punishment; by such a penalty, I say, is the heretic condemned as also Judas; and not without cause, since the Lord whom the one sold, the other blasphemes; whom the one handed over to persecutors, the other daily persecutes. For the heretic persecutes the Lord when he detracts His divinity, and asserts Him to be a creature.