A demonstration of the chapters which are contained in the divine Scriptures. Those things which in the Old Testament were written figuratively are to be understood spiritually through the New Testament — things which through Christ have been fulfilled in truth. For to us, through Jesus Christ, spiritual understanding has been given by Jesus himself: to us indeed it has been given to understand the mysteries of God, but to others in similitudes. We find written in the Gospel according to John: 'The law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.' This law of Moses was given on Mount Sinai. Yet again we find written: 'For out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.' In what way ought we to understand this?
Whether Mount Sinai, where the law was given by God to Moses, and Mount Zion, whence the law went forth, are one, or whether Mount Sinai is one and Mount Zion is another. For we find these to be the names of two mountains in Hebrew; but the Latin interpretation of the names differs from one another, showing that Mount Sinai is one thing and Mount Zion another. This is the interpretation from the Hebrew tongue into Latin. Mount Sinai is interpreted 'eternal temptation and hatred'; likewise Zion is interpreted 'temptation of exasperation and watching.' You see, then, that in the Hebrew interpretation they are not alike to one another, nor are they one mountain, but rather two differing between themselves in grace and honour. Moreover, since David the prophet says in the first psalm:
'But I have been established as king by him over Zion his holy mountain, proclaiming his commandment.' Behold, in what way he designates Mount Zion as holy. Whence it is manifest that Mount Zion is heavenly and spiritual, and that Sinai is earthly. For nothing that is on the earth can be holy, since the whole world has been defiled by the evil deeds wrought by the devil, as Jesus says: 'The world hates me, because I also hate it, for its deeds are evil deeds.' From which fact, whatsoever is in this earthly world cannot be holy. But Mount Zion, from the prophetic saying, is established to be holy and spiritual, on which mountain the Holy Spirit, the Son of God, has been established as king, proclaiming the will and the commandment of God his Father:
and that Mount Sinai is earthly, situated in a dry land, which is in Syria Palestina, where the land of Judaea is, where also is that city, the slayer of the prophets, before whose gates Christ was crucified by the Jews in a garden — that city which is called Jerusalem, cursed and forsaken by a spiritual word through Isaiah the prophet, and not without cause. And God, from that same earthly Mount Sinai, through Moses, gave the law to the earthly and carnal people of the Jews, still set in the earthly flesh of the first man.
He received it from God to be handed over to them, written by sacred fingers on two tablets of stone — sacred fingers indeed, yet fingers in the figure of the flesh, as it were for a carnal and most hardened people, just as the stone tablets were most hard, on which tablets they received the law. Therefore on two: signifying that out of the unity of the people two parts should be divided, the part that is saved and the unbelieving part that perishes, as the angel says to Rebecca the wife of Isaac: 'Two nations are in thy womb, and two peoples shall be divided from thy belly, and the one people shall overcome the other people, and the greater shall serve the lesser.' Now Rebecca bears the figure of the Church, just as Isaac her husband bore in himself the type of Christ. Therefore when he says: 'Two nations are in thy womb':
because he was also designating that two parts would come from the nations — the idolatrous, perishing part and the believing part, living through faith — he designates this one part of the nations to remain in the womb of the Church, a generation unto eternity, in the figure of Rebecca; and the part of the unbelieving people of the Jews to be then divided from Rebecca's belly and separated from the birth of the Church. This was the prefiguration in Genesis, spiritually announced through the angel. And these names of those mountains have such an interpretation in the Latin tongue, showing the truth: what these two mountains, Sinai and now Zion, are — which indeed we shall tell after a little while. For thus we have proved this interpretation of the truth as coming from the beginning of the human race.
For thus almighty God, from the beginning of the world and thenceforth, for every man being born in his time — and it was done that they received names from their parents: not indeed of themselves, but they were prompted in mind by God, who is foreknowing of things to come before they come to be, of what sort they would be after the increase of their age. In a later time, vigorous, they are held to be designated in Hebrew names, as to what should befall each; the interpretation of the names designated the truth: even as it was then fulfilled in the case of the Patriarchs, according to the flesh of the first man, to be from the mud of the earth. From the very first-formed man we prove the truth. He received a name from God.
The Hebrew 'Adam' is interpreted in Latin as 'earth made flesh,' because he was grasped by a fist out of the four cardinal points of the circle of the lands, as it is written: 'By a span I measured the heaven and by a fist I grasped the earth, and I formed man out of all the mud of the earth: after the image of God I made him.' It behoved him to bear in himself the name Adam out of these four cardinal points of the circle of the earth: we find in the Scriptures that, throughout the several cardinal points of the circle of the earth, four stars were established by the Founder of the world at the several cardinal points. The first, the eastern star, is called Anatole; the second, the western, Dysis; the third, the star of the north, Arctos; the fourth, the southern star, is called Mesembrion.
From the names of the stars, four in number, take from each of the star-names a single initial letter: from the star Anatole, A; from the star Dysis, D; from the star Arctos, A; from the star Mesembrion, M: in these four cardinal letters you have the name Adam. For also in a fixed number, by four Greek letters the name is designated, ADAM: thus Alpha is one, Delta four, Alpha one, and Mu forty makes the number forty-six. This number forty-six designates the passion of the flesh of Adam, which flesh of Adam Christ bore in himself in figure and suspended it upon the tree. Which flesh of the Lord was called Jesus by God the Father: the Holy Spirit who descended from heaven was called Christ, that is, the Anointed of the living God, called God; the Spirit mingled with flesh, Jesus Christ.
This number, then, the forty-sixth, declares the passion, in that in the six thousandth year, at the sixth hour, he suffered, and, rising again from the dead, ascended into the heavens on the fortieth day: or because Solomon built the temple for God in forty-six years, in the likeness of which temple Jesus said his own flesh to be, saying to the Pharisees: 'Destroy this shrine, and in three days I will raise it up.' And the Pharisees said: 'Forty-six years was this shrine built, and will he raise it up in three days?' But Jesus was speaking of the shrine of his own body. Then Abel, the son of Adam, received a Hebrew name, designating the slaying of a brother and the mourning of parents.
Likewise Enoch, who before the flood pleased God as a just man, and therefore was translated alive from this world, in the nativity of his flesh, into a place where God knows: from which place, at the consummation of the world, he is to be renewed in this world, whence also he was translated, in order to confound and confute Antichrist; by whom, being slain, they shall complete their martyrdoms, living unto eternity, world without end.
And therefore Enoch is interpreted 'renewed.' Then Job the just, who before the day of judgment was accounted worthy to be praised by the voice of the Judge, and therefore, the devil being conquered and overcome, Job is interpreted 'most dear to God.' Likewise Abraham too, at his nativity, was called by his parents Abram; but, being tempted by God, he was found faithful, and by God, being blessed, was appointed father of many nations: and therefore, the name being changed by God, he was called Abraham, which is interpreted 'father of many peoples.'
Behold, meanwhile, out of many proofs we have said a few, that, coming to the names of the two mountains, we may prove the interpretations of the names of those mountains — in what manner they have been designated for our instruction, so that from this interpretation of the names we may understand that Mount Sinai is earthly and Mount Zion is heavenly. Spiritually Sinai is interpreted 'eternal temptation and hatred,' and Mount Zion 'temptation of exasperation and watching.' Thus it is understood when it says Mount Sinai is 'eternal temptation and hatred,' in that from that mountain Moses received the law for a most hardened and obstinate people. Through which law, being tempted by the eternal God, they were found unable to sustain that same law forever, and thereafter were turned to God in hatred.
Therefore, in the name of Mount Sinai, whence they had received the law, the interpretation of the name designated the people tempted by God and turned to eternal hatred: therefore it says Sinai is 'eternal temptation and hatred.' For we find in the Scriptures that they were tempted by God, so set down, as the Lord says to Moses: 'Let this people go out and gather for themselves a daily portion day by day, and I will tempt them, whether they be able to sustain my law or not.' And, being tempted by God through the law, they were found strangers to that law. Thereafter they were turned to God in eternal hatred, and the interpretation of Sinai was fulfilled and made manifest.
Now Moses too, through whom God tempted them by the law, is likewise interpreted in Latin: Moses, 'temptation of God and finding out'; through whom, being tempted by God, they were found strangers to the observance of the law, and therefore were turned to God in eternal hatred. This hatred we find written in the very race of the Jews, as Isaac says of his two sons, Esau the elder and Jacob the younger: 'Jacob I loved, but Esau I held in hatred.' Now Esau the elder was hairy all over — 'like a hairy hide,' he says — in the figure of the greater people, established in the impiety of their transgressions.
And Jacob was smooth and younger, in the figure of the newer people, who out of obedience, through the faith of belief, was turned from the roughness of the age into smoothness toward Christ the Lord and Son of God. Behold, we have proved through the faith of the Scriptures that the greater and older people were turned to God in hatred, according to the interpretation of Mount Sinai, which says 'eternal temptation and hatred.' Likewise Mount Zion too is thus interpreted 'temptation of exasperation and watching.' Now this Latin interpretation designates the passion of the sacred tree, as Solomon says concerning that very Lord's passion: 'Let us question him with contumely and torment, that we may know his reverence and prove his patience, and let us try what things shall befall him.'
'For if he be truly the Son of God, he will take him up and deliver him from the hands of his adversaries: let us condemn him to a most shameful death.' These things they devised and erred: their own malice blinded them, and they understood not the mystery of God. Behold the tempters, the Jews. Likewise it is written: 'And they tempted the Lord in a waterless place.' Now the 'watching' declares the height of the tree, as Solomon says: 'They set me as the keeper of an orchard,' in that in a garden he hung fastened upon the tree between two robbers. And from the height of the tree he watched both, in the figure of two peoples of evildoers — the nations lying amid the evil deeds of the ages, and the Jews, slayers of the prophets.
These are the two peoples of evildoers, whose figure the two robbers bore in themselves, between whom the innocent one hung: the one blasphemed, but the other confessed that the innocent one was suffering wrong. But Jesus watched both from the tree of watching, the blasphemer and the confessor; the confessor he saved, and the blasphemer he destroyed, even as he did with the two peoples. The persecutors, forsaken, who in the sentence of eternal death would not believe in themselves — if they so depart from the world, they shall perish; but the nations, turned to him and having faith in themselves, because he is the Son of God, being saved, shall live unto the eternal ages of ages with their emperor and king.
Truly, in his very passion, hanging on the tree, foreseeing the two parts of the people, he watched from the high tree: the part of the people who had seen his wondrous and divine mighty works wept, grieving over him as he suffered wrong; but the other Jews, mocking, struck his head with a reed, blaspheming and saying: 'Hail, King of the Jews! Where is thy Father? Let him come and deliver thee from the cross.'
Thereupon the Father, provoked to wrath, made the heaven to be laid open, and thunders were made, and darkness unendurable; the earth was shaken, the tombs were opened and cast their bodies forth from themselves, the veil of the Temple was rent, and at so great a crashing of heaven and the trembling of the earth all who were standing before the wood—some grieving, but others blaspheming and mocking—fell prostrate upon their faces and lay trembling like dead men. Then the Jews understood that they had offended God, and they were turned to mourning, and there was bitter provocation. For at that very time in which He hung fastened upon the wood, they were the days of unleavened bread, which are the festal days of the Jews.
On that day, fearing that an earthquake and a crashing of heaven had come to pass, they fell with their faces to the ground, wailing, and were turned to mourning; and in His very Passion was fulfilled the prophetic saying: 'And I will turn your festal days into mourning, and your songs into lamentation.' For formerly, when they were held captive by the Babylonians, the Babylonians said to them: 'Sing us songs from the songs of Zion'; and the Jews, lamenting their captivity, said to the Babylonians, as we have said, lamenting for themselves: 'How shall we sing the song of the Lord in a foreign land?' Behold to what extent the interpretation of Mount Zion has been fulfilled: 'the trial of provocation and the watching.'
Whence it is manifest that Mount Zion is the kingdom of the holy wood, justified in holiness, as David says: 'Proclaim among the nations the kingdom of God, for the Lord has reigned from the wood, and has passed over into the nations.' Concerning this kingdom of the royal wood the same prophet says: 'But I say to you: I have been set up as king by Him over Zion, His holy mountain, proclaiming His dominion.' Which prophetic saying He fulfilled when, under Pontius Pilate, He hung upon the wood in His Passion; and Pontius Pilate, prompted in mind by God, took a tablet and title and wrote in three languages, Hebrew, Greek, and Latin: JESUS THE NAZARENE, KING
OF THE JEWS; and with a nail he fastened at the head of the wood the tablet bearing the name of the King of the Jews, and made manifest the prophetic saying, in that spiritually Mount Zion is the Cross, which is the power of God, as the Apostle Paul says: 'The Cross of Christ is foolishness to those who do not believe, but to those who believe the Cross is the power of God'; and again he says: 'But we proclaim to you Christ, and Him crucified—to the Jews indeed a stumbling-block, but to the Gentiles foolishness; but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, the power of God and the wisdom of God.' So too another prophet declares that the wood of the Lord's Passion is the holy Mount Zion, saying thus in the spirit: 'Who shall ascend into the mountain of the Lord, and who shall stand in His holy place?'
'He who is innocent in hands and clean of heart'—with right and left stretched out, nails fixed, demonstrating His innocence. Therefore he says, 'innocent in hands and clean of heart. He who has not taken his soul in vain, and has not sworn deceitfully to his neighbor: he shall receive a blessing from his Lord, and mercy from God his Savior.' Every passion of men falls to the earth; this passion of the Cross alone shows the man standing: whence we truly say that the holy mountain is the wood of the Passion. Hence, 'innocent in hands and clean of heart': by this prophetic saying he refuted the Jews who set Moses above Christ their Lord, in that Moses, when he had ascended Mount Sinai to receive the Law for the Jews, was not innocent in hands nor clean of heart. For he was clean neither in mouth nor...
but in heart—in that he struck the Egyptian with his heel in Egypt, and slew him with his own hands, and they buried him in the sand. But Christ ascended into the holy mountain, the wood of His kingdom, that He might be put to death by the Jews, rather than that He Himself should put any man to death, save only the devil, the enemy of the human race. Thence, ascending into the mountain, innocent and clean of heart—and therefore the prophet says: 'Who shall ascend into the mountain of the Lord, and who shall stand in His holy place? He who is innocent in hands,' and the rest—he declared that the holy Mount Zion is the holy Cross, as the prophet likewise says: 'Out of Zion shall go forth the Law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.' The Law of Christians is the holy Cross of Christ the Son of the living God, as the prophet likewise says: 'Thy law is in the midst of my belly.'
Being struck in the belly at His side, from His side blood mingled with water flowed forth abundantly, whence He fashioned for Himself the holy Church, in which He consecrated the law of His Passion, He Himself saying: 'Whoever thirsts, let him come and drink. Whoever believes in Me, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.' Likewise in the Psalms: 'And he shall be like the tree which is planted beside the running waters, which shall give its fruit in its season.' Behold the prophetic word to be understood spiritually of the fruit of the resurrection on the third day, saying: 'For out of Zion shall go forth the Law,' that is, out of the royal wood, 'and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem,' which is the Church. The Flesh, fastened to the wood, sent forth the Lord's word, saying: 'Eli, Eli.' And the prophetic and spiritual saying foretold before was fulfilled:
'Out of Zion shall go forth the Law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.' He calls Jerusalem the new city descending from heaven, foursquare by reason of the four Gospels, having twelve foundations of the twelve prophets and twelve gates of the twelve apostles: through whose proclamation Christians have entered into this holy and new city, which is the spiritual Church. Behold, we have proven, by the faith of all the deified Scriptures, that the two mountains—Sinai on earth and Zion in heaven—bear the figure of the two Testaments, of the old Sinai and the new Zion: from which two mountains, that is, the two Testaments, two peoples are shown and made manifest in the latter time, the old and former people of the Jews, and the new and later people of the Christians:
the earthly Jews, to whom the land was promised by God (which, carnal men, they received), and the heavenly Christians, to whom the kingdoms of heaven have been promised by God (which they are to receive in the age to come). For the flesh of Christians shall be spiritual and immortal. We make another proof of the truth set forth in the Scriptures, and from it a heavenly, spiritual truth; we make a figurative comparison drawn from the course of this world. For we have said of the holy Mount Zion, which is the royal and sacred wood, that its interpretation from the Hebrew into Greek or Latin is 'the trial of provocation and the watching,' in that from the wood He watched those standing before Him, both the good and the wicked.
Thus we find that the Savior Himself was called by Solomon 'the spotless mirror of the Father,' in that the Holy Spirit, the Son of God, is, as it were, doubled, that He may behold Himself—the Father in the Son and the Son in the Father, both beholding themselves in themselves: therefore 'a spotless mirror.' For we also, who believe in Him, see Christ in ourselves as though in a mirror, while He Himself instructs and admonishes us in the epistle of John His disciple to the people: 'So behold Me in you, just as each of you beholds himself in water or in a mirror'; and He confirmed the Solomonic saying, speaking of Himself: 'Who is the spotless mirror of the Father.' Truly He also said that He is the true vine, and His Father the husbandman.
If, therefore, Christ is the true vine, it certainly stands firm that we also, who believe in Him and have put Him on, are the true vine which is in the Lord's vineyard, and Christ is the keeper of His own vineyard, as Solomon says: 'They set me as keeper in the vineyard.' Now we find, in the course of this world, in a spiritual likeness and figuratively, that there is a vineyard having its lord and possessor. Truly, in the ripe season, near the days of the vintage, they set in the midst of the vineyard a boy as keeper, fixed upon a tall pole in the middle of the vineyard, and on that pole they make a foursquare watch-booth of shaken reeds, and along each of the four sides of the square booth they make three openings, which come to twelve openings:
through which square arrangement of openings the boy keeper, surveying the whole vineyard, may keep watch while singing, lest a traveler entering the Lord's vineyard entrusted to him should ravage it, or lest thieves should track out the way into the vineyard. But if a troublesome, needy thief should wish to enter the vineyard and take away a grape, there the boy, watchful over his vineyard from within the booth, gives a cry, cursing and threatening, lest the traveling thief dare to approach the vineyard, saying: 'Walk straight!' But the thief, fearing the boy's voice threatening him, flees from the vineyard; he sees the booth, he hears the voice, but he does not see the boy within the booth threatening him, and, afraid, he goes on his way. This worldly course is likened to spiritual grace. For so it is also among the deified people, as in the earthly vineyard.
The Lord's vineyard and spiritual people is the people of the Christians, which is guarded, by the command of God the Father, by the boy Christ upon the watch-booth of the wood, lifted on high. But if the traveler, the devil, walking about the worldly way, should dare to separate and ravage a man of the Lord's people from the spiritual vineyard, at once he is rebuked by the heavenly boy and, chastened by spiritual scourges, driven off, he flees to the hundredth part into arid and desert places. This keeper is the boy, the Lord's Son, who holds His own vineyard, entrusted to Him by the Father, to be saved and preserved: of whom the prophet Isaiah sang, saying: 'Behold my boy, my most beloved Son, I will set my Spirit upon Him, and He shall proclaim judgment to the nations: He shall not cry out nor contend.'
'A bruised reed He shall not break, and smoking flax He shall not quench, until He drive out judgment unto victory: and in His name shall the nations believe.'