Apologia Prophetae David Ad Theodosium Augustum

We have taken up in the present work to write an apology for the prophet David, not because he stands in need of this service—he who shone forth with such great merits and blossomed with virtues—but because many, upon reading the sequence of his deeds, not penetrating the force of the Scriptures or the hidden mysteries, marvel how such a great prophet did not avoid the taints of adultery first, and then of homicide. Therefore it has been our concern to review the history itself. It seems to have been laid open to sin. For in the second book of Kings we read that, while walking in his royal house, David looked upon a woman bathing—her name was Bersabee—of outstanding beauty, graceful and comely in countenance, and of exceedingly fair appearance. Enticed by these allurements, he conceived a desire to possess her. Now the woman was married to a husband; the husband’s name was Uri, for whose death a scene was contrived by royal commands. For although his life was thought to be no hindrance to his desire, it was nevertheless considered a great obstacle to the shame of adultery.

Therefore, to begin with clearer matters: do not judge one whom God has justified. "It is of little account to me," says Paul, "to be judged by you or by any human court; but I do not even judge myself." And he was still situated in the body, still subject to temptation, but for that reason he did not judge himself, because a spiritual man is judged by no one except by God alone. Finally he added: "He who judges me is the Lord." So do not judge before the time. But David has already fulfilled his time, earned grace, and been justified by Christ, since the Lord Himself rejoiced to be called the son of David, and those who confessed Him in this way were enlightened. Why do you summon a man of God from his reward to judgment? The Lord has already judged concerning him, of whom He said to Solomon: "If you walk before me, as your father David walked in holiness of heart and in righteousness, so as to do all that I commanded him." Is this man, then, worthy of judgment or of reward, who did all the heavenly commandments, walking in holiness and righteousness of heart? Where the sins and vices of others lie hidden, there David received divine testimony of his virtue and glory. And we idly dispute about his sin, when on account of his merit and grace the sins of others were revealed! For when Solomon offended, because he had not kept the Lord's commandments, and God had arranged to tear his kingdom into many parts, He said to him: "Nevertheless, I will not do this in your days, on account of your father David.

from the hand of your son I shall receive it. Yet I shall not accept the entire kingdom; I shall give one scepter for the sake of my servant David. Therefore, when the Lord justifies, who is there who so judges a man? "What God," he says, "has cleansed, do not call common." Nevertheless, with the heavenly judgment preserved, by which you yourself honor so great a prophet, enter into his acts and his ways. Do you not marvel that a man equal to angels you judge so much by his life? Indeed, from boyhood dwelling in wealth, honors, and commands, placed in many temptations, he gave way to error only once, and to that error by which even the angels of heaven, as Scripture records, were cast down from their grace and virtue? There is also read another error of his, that he caused the people to be numbered. Each one of us, hour by hour, commits so many sins, and yet each one of the common people does not think his sin should be confessed: that king, so great and powerful, did not allow the consciousness of his offense to remain with him even for a brief moment, but by premature confession and immense grief he rendered his sin to the Lord. Whom now can you easily find, honored and wealthy, who, if accused of some fault, does not take it ill? But he, illustrious with royal command, proven by so many divine oracles, when rebuked by a private man for having gravely sinned, did not grow indignant and rage, but confessed and groaned with the pain of his fault.

Finally, the Lord’s innermost feelings were stirred by grief, so that Nathan said: “Because he has repented, and the Lord has removed your sin.” Thus the maturity of the forgiveness declared that the king’s repentance had been profound, which had expunged the offense of such a great error. Other men, when they are rebuked by priests, aggravate their sin while they wish to deny or defend it, and there their fall is greater where correction is hoped for. But the holy servants of the Lord, who desire to complete the pious contest and run the course of salvation, if anywhere by chance they have fallen as men, more from the frailty of nature than from a lust for sinning, rise again sharper to run, spurred by the goad of shame, renewing greater contests, so that the fall is judged not only to have brought no hindrance, but even to have heaped up incentives for speed. Therefore, if the course of runners is not broken when some have chanced to fall, nor the struggle of wrestlers, but the contests remain unimpaired—indeed, many after one or another fall have conquered with greater grace—how much more should those who have entered the contest of piety not be judged by the offense of a single slip, since blessed is he who can restore himself after a fall, because rising again even after death is the gift of the blessed.

We can also understand that sin sometimes serves a purpose, and that faults have crept in upon the saints by the Lord’s providence. For they are set before us to imitate, and therefore it was arranged that they too should slip at times. For if they had completed the course of this life, amid so many slippery pitfalls, without offense from vices, they would have given us weaker ones occasion to think that they were of some higher and divine nature, so that they could not receive sin or share in guilt—an opinion which would certainly have withdrawn us, as having no share in that substance, from the impossible imitation. Therefore the grace of God forsook them for a little while, so that their life might become a discipline for us to imitate, and we might take from their deeds a teaching not only of innocence but also of penitence. So when I read of their lapses, I recognize them as also sharers in weakness: when I believe them to be sharers, I presume that they are to be imitated. The apostle Paul also warns that our Lord God provided, lest by the sublimity of revelations or by the continuous progress of works, human feeling even in the saints should be puffed up, and they should attribute to themselves and to their own virtue what had been conferred upon them by divine operation. Therefore, lest they fall into such great judgment and into the pit of faithlessness, the Lord allowed guilt to creep in upon them, so that they too might notice that they need divine help and recognize that the leader of their salvation must be sought.

Finally, Paul testifies that his own weakness was beneficial to him, when the Lord said to him as he prayed that the goad of his flesh might depart from him: "My grace is enough for you; for virtue is perfected in weakness." And rightly does he glory in his weaknesses; for he knew that many, even saints, had fallen without remedy from an excess of strength. How much more advantageous, then, to have given place to one or two reproaches than to have drawn down upon oneself the perpetual offense of the divinity? Why should I not also add those things which we can infer from the very practice of the world, that when we have tested many in some duty, we wish to try them, as if they were industrious and diligent, in another task? How many athletes, having prevailed in one type of contest, are called to another kind of struggle! What if your Lord God, when you have given some proof of your virtue, wishes to test you in another kind of virtue? He allowed holy Job, running without stumbling, to be tempted nonetheless by the death of his children and the ulcers of his whole body, so that he might also test his virtue in this, whether, constrained by injuries and harshness, he would diminish the devotion of his affection. Is it not clear that He also wished to test holy David, noble in faith, most excellent in gentleness, strong in hand, as to how he would conceal a fault, correct a lapse, so that he might teach us how we could cover over a committed sin?

Unless perhaps it seems a trivial reason to someone that such a great prophet erred for the sake of our correction, when Christ, for the redemption of all, took upon himself our weaknesses, he who became sin for us, though he knew no sin. And it is considered unworthy and not believed credible that David incurred the disgrace of a single lapse for the benefit of posterity, when the Lord himself became a reproach for us, as he himself says: "But I am a worm and not a man, the reproach of men and the abjection of the people," and elsewhere: "And the reproaches of those who reproach have fallen upon me." Therefore, he prefigured in his own person the mystery of the future dispensation, and the servants indeed, because of the condition of their own sins, bore their own faults, and thus could not themselves be exempt from sin; but the Lord took upon himself the burden of another, and therefore he alone was without any share in transgressions. In summary, we have also learned from the teaching of the apostle that many things were done as types, which were performed in earlier times. For when he had said that the fathers in the desert, wounded by serpents, could not be healed otherwise than by Moses hanging up a bronze serpent, at the sight of which those deadly bites and harmful infusions of venom were cured, he added: "But these things were done in figure for them for our correction.

in the type, the bronze serpent was fixed as if to a cross, because the true one who was to be crucified for the human race was announced, who would empty the poisons of the serpent-devil; in the type, he was cursed, but in truth, he who would erase the curses of the whole world. Elsewhere also, that is, in the letter to the Galatians, he says that Abraham had two sons, one from a slave woman and one from a free woman, and he added: "But the one from the slave woman was born according to the flesh, while the one from the free woman was born according to the promise." These things are said allegorically. What is meant by allegory he then clearly explained in what follows, saying that those two generations, one from a slave woman, the other from a free woman, are two testaments: one from Mount Sinai, generating into servitude, on which mountain Moses received the law from the Lord; the other from Jerusalem, which is free, which generated into the sons of Isaac, that is, into the freedom of grace, not the servitude of the letter; for punishment is decreed for slaves, grace is conferred on free men. Did not Jacob, in the type of the twin people, take two wives, from whom he produced diverse offspring?

Why is it read that the patriarch Judah sought intercourse with his own daughter-in-law after the death of his son, from which the birth of twins was produced, unless as a type it prefigured both testaments of the Lord Jesus, of which one was established in the type of his future death, the other in the truth of the Gospel, that two peoples were to be generated, of whom the later, under the sign of the cross, would cut through every hedge and fortification of the earlier people — this is the people earlier in hand, later in origin — or because the Lord Jesus himself, born from the tribe of Judah, sent his works ahead before he was born to us from the Virgin? What shall I say of Joseph, who, assailed by his brothers, stripped of his paternal garment, cast into a pit, sold into slavery, expressed a clear sign of the Lord's incarnation, in that he, beloved of his father, while in the form of God, would not consider it a robbery to be equal to God, but would empty himself, so that, taking the form of a servant, he would come and humble himself even to the death of the cross, by whose price, both bought and sold by his brothers, he redeemed the human race? In whose type David, the lesser chosen from among his brothers, anointed to the kingdom, alone in the grave danger of war, by a single combat freed the entire people, triumphed over ten thousand, so that maidens with timbrels sang: Saul triumphed over thousands, David over ten thousand. What figure is in those young women, if not of souls, which sing a triumphal psalm to Christ?

He begot from himself sons, one an incestuous man and the other a parricide, because the incestuous and parricidal people were about to violate the flesh of their own author, fixed to the cross. Finally, in the third psalm, the title of Absalom is prefixed, and the passion of the Lord is prophesied. Why should I speak of the holy Solomon, whose later deeds are not without grave error, yet the Jewish common people themselves consider him to have come in place of Christ? And how many has the offense of grave error recalled! Therefore, the greater fault profited more, lest he be believed to be above man who had not lacked human vice. Thus there was in him an invidious wisdom and a persuasive fault, which proved him a man. What then prevents it from being believed that even Bathsheba was joined to the holy David in a figure, so that the congregation of nations might be signified, which was not united to Christ by a legitimate marriage of faith, which was to enter into his grace through certain hostile vestibules, beyond the prescription of the law, in which the bare sincerity of mind and open simplicity, through the justifying mystery of the bath, would transfuse the mind of the true David and eternal king, and provoke his love? Rightly he came hidden, and one who would deceive the prince of the world as if he were Uriah, who by interpretation is called "my light," transforming himself into an angel of light. He came, I say, into this world, and came hidden, as an adulterer entered, so that he might claim legitimate right.

We have distinguished the valid allegations, as we judge, and have proven that the text of this history was in figure: now let us repeat the earlier matters and, as if stripping away the spiritual garments, let us look into the error from within. David sinned, as kings are wont to do, but he performed penance, wept, groaned—which kings are not wont to do—confessed his fault, begged for pardon, prostrate on the ground deplored his misery, fasted, prayed, and transmitted the testimony of his confession to perpetual ages by publishing his grief. What private persons blush to do, the king did not blush to confess. Those who are bound by laws dare to deny their sin, disdain to beg for pardon, which he who was bound by no human laws sought. That he sinned is of condition; that he supplicated is of correction. The fall is common, but the confession is special. To have incurred guilt, therefore, is of nature; to have washed it away is of virtue. "Who boasts," he says, "that he has a chaste heart?" That not even a one-day-old infant is pure is declared by the testimony of Scripture.

Give me someone without a slip into sin. Samson, the strongest of all, is read to have strangled even a lion with his own hands; but would that he could have smothered his own love! He set fire to the harvests of the Philistines, and he himself burned with the little flame of one woman. Jephthah returned victorious from the enemy, but, bearing back the triumphal standards, he was conquered by his own oath, so that he thought he must reward the piety of his daughter who came to meet him with parricide. First of all, what need was there to swear so easily and to vow uncertain things for certain ones, whose outcome he did not know? Then, does anyone render sad oaths to the Lord God, so as to discharge his own vows with bloody funerals? Nor do I think I should be silent about the priests, lest I seem to conceal our own faults. Aaron himself, the high priest, under whose leadership together with Moses the people of the Hebrews crossed the Red Sea on foot, when asked by the people to make them gods to worship, demanded gold, cast it into the fire, and the head of a calf was shaped, to which sacrifices were offered. By which sign it became clear that the desire for gold is the material of faithlessness, and that sacrileges are accustomed to be generated by zeal for avarice. Again, such a great priest fell into a place of offense with his sister Mary. For while both were disparaging their brother because he had taken a foreign wife, immediately Mary blossomed with the contagion of spotted flesh.

In this place there was an evident figure of the mystery, that the priestly people of the fathers would detract from the fraternal people of later times, ignorant of the sacrament of that Ethiopian woman. For if they had known, they would not have reproached what agreed with the ancient mystery. And so when the Jew says that the one who believed from the Gentiles is common and wishes to separate him from the law, he has a leprosy which he will not be able to escape, unless the recognition of the spiritual law for him has obtained pardon. Therefore David also, who knew himself to be a man born for falling, sought pardon, but did not despair of the Lord’s mercy. Nor does the parable seem to differ from the mystery. For who is rich except our Lord Jesus, who said of himself, as was read today, that a certain man, when he was rich, went into a far-off region to receive a kingdom and return. And truly he was rich in the wealth of his majesty and the fullness of his own divinity, to whom angels and archangels, virtues and powers and principalities, thrones and dominions, Cherubim and Seraphim served with unwearying obedience. But although he was rich, he left ninety-nine sheep in the mountains and sought one sheep that had remained weary. This sheep the prince of this world, in contemplation of that rich man, needy and poor, was nourishing as a daughter with his own sustenance. Rightly, therefore, had it failed, whose substance was the food of the world. This sheep had gone astray in Adam, solicited by the snares of the serpent.

and not a bad sheep, which was full of the Word, as the daughter of a rational week and the gift of a holy author: yet it was nourished not by any precious things, but by the cheap resources of a poor man for a long time. Finally, it says, she ate from his bread and drank from his cup and slept in his bosom. Not good food of the Ethiopians, not the harmful golden cup of Babylon, which intoxicates the nations: not useful sleep for those sleeping, it is better to be awake. Indeed, all the foolish in heart were troubled, they slept their sleep and found nothing. Therefore, for the sake of hospitality, because she had received a guest, to offer him a feast, she took that poor sheep; for if she had sacrificed any animal from her own flocks or herds, it could not benefit us, whom she would not have redeemed unless she had sacrificed it. Therefore, our weaknesses of fragility in her own flesh she took up with a certain hospitable affection, for the purpose of lightening them or rather restoring them, she offered her own flesh to that saving passion, so that she might provide us with the food of eternal life. And scripture rightly called her a lamb, because she was the offspring of a virgin. Rightly is this rich man pronounced worthy of death by prophetic judgment, because even Caiaphas prophesied saying: it is expedient that one man die for the people. But only the Lord Jesus was chosen worthy of such a death, by which he would take away the sin of the world. It also beautifully added: she will restore the lamb, because she resurrected her own flesh, she restored that flesh of virginal integrity.

Nor is it idle that he says: "he shall restore fourfold"; for the resurrection of the dead is fourfold, as the apostle teaches, saying: it is sown in corruption, it rises in incorruption; it is sown in ignobility, it rises in glory; it is sown in weakness, it rises in strength; it is sown as an animal body, it rises as a spiritual body. He plainly restores the ewe fourfold also in that way in which a man can now say: if I have taken anything from anyone, I restore it fourfold. Fittingly also he added this: "because he did not spare"; for Christ did not spare himself, that he might come to the aid of all. And therefore it was said by the Lord Jesus Christ to his servant David, to declare the mystery: "Since you did this in secret, I will do this word before all Israel in the sight of this sun." And at first, indeed, not knowing the sacrament, David was stirred with indignation, but he did not err in his affection. Afterwards, however, when he recognized the great mystery—for it is a great sacrament of Christ and the Church—seeing the future remission of all sins, foreseeing the splendor of grace through the laver of regeneration and the infusion of the Holy Spirit, he said, secure in his pardon: "I have sinned against the Lord," so that he himself might enter into the fellowship of those to whom remission of guilt was granted. Do you perceive how he lamented his own sin? Who, then, would wonder that it was forgiven him?

Now let us consider his works, by which he was able to cover over sin. For since human frailty cannot be without sin, we must take care that there are not more sins than works of virtue. This Saint Paul expressed with great force of his wisdom, saying: the sins of some men are manifest, preceding to judgment, but for others they follow after; that is: no one is found untouched by fault; a man has good merits, he also has vices and sins. All our deeds, therefore, are weighed as if in a balance. If, then, sins outweigh good deeds, they precede to judgment; for sins sink as if into the deep, those which are manifest sink either by weight and severity or by multitude. "But for others," he says, "they follow after," that is, those who have conducted themselves soberly, but due to the frailty of their condition have sometimes given place even to error—good deeds precede, evils follow. These are more honorable, yet still men fallen into lighter vices and errors. Therefore, sins follow the just, they do not precede them; they precede the unjust. Sins which sink down outweigh, but if any deeds are rightly done, they follow, as if weighed down by a certain prejudice of preceding sins. Similarly, good deeds are also manifest. For they shine by the work of virtues and the splendor of merits, and those which are otherwise cannot be hidden.

Therefore such things are not covered over, nor does the charity which conceals a multitude of sins overshadow them, nor does the grace of good works cover them, nor does a multitude of virtues hide them: they are exposed as if naked and uncovered. For there is no one among these who says: protect me under the shadow of your wings; for the cross of the Lord blots out and conceals all errors. Who, then, covered and concealed more than Saint David, who also says elsewhere: and I hoped in the shadow of your wings until iniquity passes, and so loved the Lord that with excessive charity he covered and concealed every sin. For if the holy apostle Peter blotted out his fall by the confession of charity, and when questioned by the Lord, who said to him three times: Simon, son of John, do you love me? so that he whom he had thrice denied he thrice confessed, and thus with a certain triple veil of love he concealed the fall of triple denial: if because Peter wept once he obtained pardon, how much more David, who washed his bed each night and watered his couch with tears, whose tears were his bread day and night, who ate ashes like bread and mixed his drink with weeping! For if Jesus has mercy on one who, having converted, has groaned, if he looked upon Peter and he wept, how much more did he who wept for a long time not depart from the sight of the Lord?

Peter denied and did not weep, because Jesus had not looked at him; he denied a second time and did not weep, because the Lord had not looked at him; he denied a third time, Jesus looked, and immediately he wept, and wept most bitterly. Therefore David, who always wept, used to say: "My eyes are always toward the Lord"; he who was always seen by Christ used to say: "My eyes have run down with streams of water." But let us now also consider his deeds. Who would not overshadow the odium of a single crime with the praise of so many virtues? Chosen by divine examination, he immediately proved himself not unworthy of such a judgment. He went forth into battle, and while the others trembled, he alone laid low the Philistine Goliath, terrible with the boastfulness of his words and the bulk of his monstrous body, by rushing upon him with faith and courage together. The valor of one man became the victory of all. Let the private crime, if you will, be compared with the triumph of all, the death of one with the life of so many peoples whom he delivered from death.

Let us come to other matters. He was suffering plots from the king; the king sought to extinguish his life, but by divine arrangement the king was placed in his power. When he lay wholly exposed to the blow, as his companions were about to strike, holy David ran up and turned the lethal wound away from the body about to perish, saying: "Do not touch the Lord's anointed." Moreover, he avenged the death of that enemy of his, wept over his end quite tearfully, and long deferred the rule due to him, which he knew was owed to him by God's authority. By this alone he taught all men that a kingdom is not to be seized, even if it is owed, but is to be awaited so that it may be conferred in its own time. Would that later men had imitated this man! We would not have endured such great bitterness of wars. You reproach him for having killed one man; you do not consider that he taught how peace might be preserved forever for the Roman world. With how great a devastation do we still atone? With what a public funeral of the whole world, as it were, do we pay for the murder of a king? Alas, harsh punishments! Even now the barbarian enemy mocks us, while arms prepared against him are turned against us. Thus public strength has fallen, thus Roman valor, broken by its own movements, has grown old, while what is undertaken out of the religion of paternal care is snatched away by public parricide. And he took such precautions that, when he discovered that his son Adonijah was usurping the kingdom for himself and sowing assemblies, he chose not the one who was eager to snatch it, but the one who would wait.

He danced before the ark of the Lord, the most powerful of kings, and when he was rebuked by his own wife for being uncovered before the faces of the maidens, he replied: "I shall yet be uncovered before the Lord and be a fool in your eyes, so that the Lord may be honored," he said, "who chose me for the kingdom in place of your father, teaching that the regard for royal power is not to be maintained where obedience is shown to religion." For it is honorable to act for the sake of religion, even if it is incongruous with power. Behold another memorable thing. A parricidal son had violently invaded his father's kingdom. At first his father yielded to his fury and avoided the place of battle, so that the impious one might thus come to his senses from his madness. He also did not wish to take part in the war; he asked those setting out for battle to spare his son. He was secure in victory, who asked that they spare him, nor was he lacking in piety, who did not think that even an impious son ought to perish. He wept and with great mourning lamented the death of the parricide, saying: "My son Absalom, who will give me death in your place, my son Absalom?" He thought that the one who had killed for the sake of avenging paternal piety ought to be punished.

How patient he was of injuries and grief! He yielded, as you know, to the fury of his son Absalom, surrounded on the right and left by strong warriors; a man named Shimei cursed him, calling him a bloody man and a man of blood, and saying that by the worthy judgment of the Lord he had been cast down from the kingdom. But he was not moved even by such insults, though his companions were moved. Finally, one of his associates—a man named Abishai—threatened to take his head as the price of the injury. But the king, turning to Abishai, said: "What is it to me and to you, son of Zeruiah? He curses me because the Lord told him to curse." How morally he taught that the times of our injuries or dangers are the contests of temptations and the tests of trials, and that these are not customarily inflicted without divine judgment! The good athlete is exercised by insults, he is exercised by labors and dangers, so that he may be worthy to receive the crown of justice. And therefore what are thought to be adversities must be borne patiently. Finally, divine Scripture also teaches you this elsewhere, saying to the just man: "If we have received good things from the hand of the Lord, why do we not endure the things that are evil?

And the holy prophet added, saying: Behold, my son, who came forth from my womb, seeks my life. But if the Benjamite curses me, let him curse, because the Lord told him to see my humility, and the Lord will repay me for this curse. O height of wisdom! O mark of patience! O great discovery for devouring insults! "Are you moved, Abishai," he says, "that a stranger curses me, whom my son assails with parricide? The Lord told him to curse me. But the Lord is not a curser nor does he delight in insults." See how carefully he observes each detail. He does not accuse the Lord as the author of the injury, but rather praises him for allowing it. We suffer lesser things... so that we may obtain pardon for greater sins. Behold, the insult of words has lightened the burden of parricide, has absolved the insolent man, whose curses are more beneficial, since they are granted with divine recompense. Who would not balance such an injury with himself, so that the one whom a man has injured is consoled by God with a better reward?

Let us also consider his other deeds. He fought against the race of giants, when one of them had almost struck the king while he was engaged in battle—an audacity which the adversary, however, atoned for with the price of a life accepted as ransom. Having also achieved this triumph over a fierce conquered people, he again undertook a monstrous war in the Valley of the Titans, no less against the enemy than against nature. For while he was engaged in battle, he was thirsty and had nothing to drink. "Who," he said, "will give me a drink from the pool which is at Bethlehem, near the gates?" But between the pool and the holy David the enemy was interposed, and the midst of the hostile camp's enclosures lay between. Three men cut through the multitude of adversaries, filled water from the pool which was at Bethlehem, and offered it to the king to drink. But the king refused to drink and poured it out for the Lord—for it was worthy of so great a gift that what had been a mark of vigorous valor should become a sacrifice of piety—and he spoke a saying worthy of a prophetic spirit: "Let it not befall me to do this, lest I drink the blood of the men who have gone forth from their souls." Thus he conquered nature, so that, though thirsty, he did not drink, and he provided from himself an example by which the whole army might learn to endure thirst. He also trained his subjects in the duty of valor, so that even through dangers willing soldiers would obey the royal command.

But that he refused to drink made clear that he had commanded it for the sake of testing the soldiers, not because he was overcome by the necessity of thirst; he also took care that the practice of drinking should not be sought for any king at the cost of others' dangers; and finally, he prayed for the wound of a pious conscience, because water obtained at the price of so many men's blood could not have the sweetness of drinking, since it was fixed with the horror of imminent death. But if you wish to look more deeply and to examine the mystery, David was thirsting not for water from the pool which is in Bethlehem, but he foresaw in spirit Christ, who was to be born from a virgin. Therefore he wanted to drink not the water of a river, but the drink of spiritual grace—that is, he was thirsting not for the element of waters, but for the blood of Christ. Finally, he did not drink the water offered, but poured it out to the Lord, signifying that he thirsted for the sacrifice of Christ, not for the stream of nature—that sacrifice in which there would be remission of sins; he thirsted for that eternal spring, not one sought at the cost of others' dangers, but one that would drive away others' dangers.

So many works, so wondrous, and do we not believe that the blood of one man is concealed? Rightly did the voice of the blood of the just Abel cry out to the Lord, because the impious Cain was covered by no good works, because he was a parricide, because he did not confess the crime, but denied it. David, indeed, had killed a man who was in no way guilty, but he had killed him not driven by a zeal for cruelty, but to conceal shame, to hide the modesty of his desire. I dare not say that he was overwhelmed by the force of crime—for he was not overwhelmed who knew how to raise himself from that ruin of sin—yet I say that he was bent by the force of temptation. For he had said above: "Test me, Lord, and tempt me, burn my reins and my heart," and elsewhere: "But I said in my abundance: I will not be moved forever," and: "You have examined me by fire, and no iniquity was found in me." The Lord wished him to be subject to temptation, lest he arrogate anything to himself beyond human measure; for virtue is perfected in weakness. For he did not act with a bloody disposition: nothing less can be ascribed to the holy prophet, who even departing from life with his final voice summoned his son Solomon to remove from himself the innocent blood which his army commander Joab had shed, when Abner, while treating of an alliance, though a commander of the enemy host, fell, attacked by treachery. He wept for him and, walking after his bier, having laid aside the insignia of power, he took care of the proper rites of the funeral.

By this act he taught that even to adversaries a promise of faith must be kept, and that virtue must be honored even in an enemy. Is it not so that, by the inheritance of his own gentleness, he also wiped away the stain of this error? How splendid, moreover, that when three conditions were offered to him, from which he might choose whichever he wished—when, after the people had been counted, he incurred offense, and it was proposed whether he would prefer that a famine occur over the land for three years, or that for three months he flee from the face of his pursuing enemies, or that for three days death occur in the land—he chose the third, because he would rather entrust himself to the power of the Lord than to that of men; for the Lord, quickly moved to pity, would forgive. And so he spoke thus: “I am in great distress among these three, but I would rather fall into the hand of the Lord, because his mercy is very great, than fall into the hands of men.” By this humility, prudence, and gentleness, he brought it about—to use the words of Scripture—that the Lord repented of his own anger. Indeed, it is written thus: that the Lord repented of the malice.

How admirable too is this: that when an angel was striking the people, he offered himself, saying, “What has this flock done? Let your hand fall upon me and upon my father’s house!” By this act he was immediately judged worthy of sacrifice, he who was thought unworthy of absolution. No wonder that by such an offering of himself on behalf of the people he obtained pardon for his sin, since Moses, by offering himself to the Lord for the error of the people, even wiped away the people’s sins. Did he then conceal his sins or not? But who would deny this, when this same prophet taught that iniquities are forgiven, sins are covered, and are not charged by the Lord? He himself taught that sin was remitted to him, as it is written: “I acknowledge my fault, and I have not hidden my injustice. I said: I will declare my injustice against myself to the Lord, and you have forgiven the impiety of my heart.” If he said “I will declare” and earned pardon before he declared, how much more, when he declared concerning himself, saying, “I acknowledge my iniquity,” was every sin remitted to him? Although concerning this, the prophet Nathan also specifically answered: “And the Lord has exposed your sin.

Therefore he both earned remission of his iniquity and covered his sins with charity, and concealed them with good works. Nor was the sin imputed to him, because there was in him no deceit of malice, but a lapse of error. Then, because it was not a heat of wickedness, but a shadow of mystery. And yet he confessed his fault, acknowledged his iniquity, saw the bath, and saw and believed. He loved so much that with excessive charity he could cover any error. But let him now defend himself; for he wrote the fiftieth psalm to that history. And although he placed the history of his earlier deeds first, such as the betrayal of Doeg the Syrian, whose title is in the fifty-first psalm, and of the Ziphites, which seems to be comprised in the title of Psalm LIII, he set this later history first, although Doeg had betrayed earlier, or the Ziphites before David the prophet assumed the kingdom, since while fleeing King Saul he was still wandering as an exile through various hiding places, whereas he took Bathsheba when he was already reigning.

Why, then, does the order of the psalms not correspond to the order of events? Because he wished the mystery to correspond to the deeds rather than the order to the order, and therefore he chose to adapt the number of remission to this history. For the number fifty is the number of remission, as the Lord himself taught us in the Gospel, saying: "There were two debtors to a certain moneylender. One owed five hundred denarii, the other fifty. When they had no means to repay, he forgave both. Which of them, then, loves him more?" And in the Law you have that the number of fifty years is called the Jubilee, a recurring cycle to be celebrated, whereby debts are cancelled, the liberties of the Hebrews are confirmed, and possessions are restored. This number we joyfully celebrate after the Lord's passion, with the debt of all guilt remitted and the bond cancelled, freed from every tie, and we receive the grace of the Holy Spirit coming upon us: on the day of Pentecost, with fasting suspended, praise is said to God, alleluia is sung. Finally, the father of that girl who, having suffered forced intercourse, was betrothed to no one, receives fifty silver didrachmas, while she herself remains in marriage. By this number, therefore, even faults are turned into grace. Great, then, is this psalm, by which we are taught how penance is to be performed.

Have mercy on me," he says, "O Lord, according to your great mercy, and according to the multitude of your mercies blot out my iniquity. Wash me thoroughly from my injustice and cleanse me from my offense. For I acknowledge my iniquity, and my offense is always against me. I have sinned against you alone and done evil before you, so that you may be justified in your words and prevail when you are judged. For behold, I was conceived in iniquities, and my mother bore me in offenses." Who among us, even if he confesses his offense, thinks it should be repeated rather than merely touched upon? Who would repeat it a second or third time? See how many verses this great prophet resounds his sin, how no verse is without confession of offense. He has heaped together all his iniquities at once, sounding forth injustice, joining offenses to sins and often repeating them, and justly demands great mercy, and not only great mercy but also a multitude of mercies. What sin, therefore, would such lamentation not wash away? What fault would a prayer of this kind not cleanse? He, for one sin, prays for a multitude of mercies; we, for many sins, scarcely believe that his mercy should be besought even once. Then we read that in his great might and with his exalted arm he freed his people from the land of Egypt, when he led them through the Red Sea, in which was a figure of baptism.

If, therefore, there was great power in the figure of the sacraments, how much greater is the mercy in their truth. Rightly also is a multitude of mercies sought there, where there is a multitude of sins. "Wash me thoroughly from my injustice and cleanse me from my offense." He asks not so much to be washed more often as more fully, so that he may be able to wash away the filth he has contracted. He knew that according to the law there were indeed many means of purification, but none full and perfect. Therefore he hastens with all his intention toward that perfect one, by which all justice is fulfilled, which is the sacrament of baptism, as the Lord Jesus himself teaches. For when he had come to John, the Baptist said: "I ought to be baptized by you, and you come to me?" The Lord replied: "Wait for now; for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all justice." But after Christ was baptized and the Holy Spirit descended upon him like a dove and the Father signed the Son from heaven, all justice was fulfilled. Therefore the prophet says: "Wash me thoroughly from my injustice"; for great squalor and stain is removed not by a small, but by a great washing.

But if someone wishes to understand it otherwise, he can shape his understanding accordingly. Divine speech cleanses, our confession cleanses—the former while it is heard, the latter while it is uttered; good thought cleanses, honest action cleanses, and also the practice of good conduct. Cleansed in this way, each person more easily drinks in and, as it were, draws into himself the splendor of spiritual grace. Finally, the precious dye does not immediately radiate from a single infusion of the fleece, but first the fleece is steeped in a base juice, then its natural appearance is frequently washed away by other and yet other juices, and it is changed often by a different color, and thus afterward the dyeing is applied as of a fuller bath, so that a truer and more perfect gleam of purple shines forth. Therefore, just as there is a great abundance of the murex in the dyeing of purple, so in the bath of regeneration there is a multitude of heavenly mercies, so that iniquity may be blotted out. Thus, he who is washed in a great bath is cleansed from injustice and from offense, and he lays aside a certain ingrained habit in his pursuits and character of sinning, and forgets its quality. And he is well washed from injustice or iniquity, which is greater, and is cleansed from offense, which is lesser.

Therefore he added: "Because I acknowledge my iniquity and my fault is always against me." It is no small thing for each one to acknowledge his own sin. Hence he also said above: "Who will understand the fall?" That is, who is so great as to understand? As in that passage: "Who will dwell in your tabernacle, or who will ascend the mountain of the Lord?" Not that no one can, but that few can; for he who is able to acknowledge is able to turn aside, able to choose what follows. Many glory in their falls and think that what are crimes are to be praised: if someone has defiled another's marriage bed and overcome the affection of a chaste woman, if he has changed a widow's resolve by some deceit; another thinks it is a virtue to live by murder, by the snares of banditry, and by plunder; some think it is wisdom to circumvent and deceive. None of these can say: "Because I acknowledge my iniquity," but only he who can grieve over what he has done, condemn what he has committed, whom his own vices prick. Hence the prophet also says: "What you say in your hearts and in your chambers, you are pricked by." Many horses, when they have fallen, are accustomed to throw themselves about, and those whom the fall has not injured are weakened and broken by their own thrashing. Others, such as the nature of Greek horses is said to be, when they have been thrown either in a chariot race or have fallen by accident, are by no means accustomed to move themselves and maintain a certain discipline of stillness and patience.

If the fall did not harm, does quiet benefit? Certainly the offense is not aggravated. Are not those who boast in their own shameful acts and consider it a mark of virtue where there has been a lapse into crime to be judged worse than dumb animals? Therefore it is said to the dumb beast, as it were: "You have sinned; be quiet." Hence he beautifully added: "And my fault is always against me." For the fool delights in his errors and thinks he is helped by obscuring old sins with new ones, and therefore he exults in crime. But the wise man judges his own fault to be against him, and like hostile battle lines, the lapses of his own faults, as if opposing him, he considers to obstruct him. Whatever resounds, whatever thunders, his own fault always meets him: whatever is said or read, he thinks it is said against him; whatever he looks at, he thinks he is marked by a nod, by eyes. If he feasts, if he thinks, if he prays and entreats, his own error is always before his eyes, and at every moment guilt strikes his conscience, not allowing him to rest or forget. Like a harsh judge, he harries himself with perpetual terror. Therefore, he who displeases himself has all things adverse; he is his own accuser, he is his own witness, and he finds no place to flee who himself pursues and goads himself. But this is the wound of a good mind: to feel the sin.

For those who are without the experience of pain do not feel the bitterness of the wound, which is a sign of incurable sickness; but those who are stung by some pain, just as they are not lacking in the sensation of pain, so also they are not lacking in the progress of health. For where there is the sensation of pain, there also is the sensation of life; for to feel is a mark of vital vigor and function. Hence also he who does not acknowledge his own error is insane, raves, is foolish; but he who acknowledges it certainly comes to his senses, does not reject the remedies of health, but restrains himself, repents of his fault, always thinks about it, and by thinking condemns himself; for a just man, at the beginning of his speech, is his own accuser. He who accuses himself is just; he who is just is sober, is sound. A just man does not know how to favor himself, does not know how to soften the rigor of judgment even concerning himself, shudders at the recollection of his own fall, blushes at the error committed, fears, dreads, and recoils from all memory of it; he judges himself harshly, flees from himself as judge, and dares not entrust himself to himself, because he thinks no one is more severe toward him than the one whom he cannot hide from, cannot deceive, cannot escape or avoid, unless he denies himself to himself and takes up the Lord's cross.

The power of a guilty conscience is great, and its punishments are great. Eve and Adam were afraid, and when they heard the voice of the Lord walking in paradise, they wished to hide themselves, though no one was seeking them. Cain also feared that everyone who met him would kill him. Thus he himself bore within himself the sentence that he was worthy of one to whom no one would grant forgiveness. Hence it is well said: "And my sin is always against me," that is, without any interval, the recollection and the very image of my error assails me. Consider how it confounds us when we have done something wrong, how it rushes before our eyes, how it always recurs in memory. He who is ashamed of a committed wrong knows nothing of later committing something of the sort from which he would similarly blush. Injustice, however, precedes; sin follows. Injustice is the root, and the fruit of the root is guilt. Hence injustice seems to refer to the dishonesty of the mind, sin to the lapse of the body. Injustice is graver, as the material of sins; sin is lighter. Finally, injustice is remitted through baptism; sin is covered over by good deeds and overshadowed by works as if by wings. Hence, well does this same speaker say above: "Blessed are those whose iniquities have been remitted and whose sins have been covered." For love hides error and covers a multitude of sins. Love also remits many sins themselves, as it is written of the woman who poured ointment over the Lord: "Her many sins were remitted, because she loved much.

There are also those who take the first verse to be about baptism, the second about penance. By this grace even Peter, who had been baptized before, is questioned after he was seen to have denied the Lord: "Simon, son of John, do you love me?" He says to him: "Surely you know, Lord, that I love you." And he is questioned again: "Simon, son of John, do you love me?" And again he answers: "You know that I love you." And he is questioned a third time: "Simon, son of John, do you love me?" And he was grieved, because he said to him a third time: "Do you love me?" and he says to him: "Lord, you know all things; you know that I love you." And it was said to him three times: "Feed my sheep; follow me," as one who had concealed his sin by excessive love. Nor is it without purpose that after the confession of excessive love he is ordered to rule the people, he who, even when disturbed, had not lost how he himself should rule? We have said this on account of the grace of love, because it conceals sin. Finally, some have said that the threefold questioning about love was made because the denial had been threefold, so that the threefold fall of denial might be erased by the profession of love repeated as many times.

It follows: "I have sinned against you alone." He was a king, bound by no laws himself, because kings are free from the bonds of transgressions; for they are not summoned to punishment by any laws, being safe under the power of empire. Therefore he did not sin against a man, to whom he was not held accountable. But although safe by virtue of his imperial power, he was nevertheless subject to God in devotion and faith, and, recognizing himself to be subject to God's law, he could not deny his sin, but confessed it with bitterness as one guilty, knowing that he was held by greater bonds because he owed more, since more is demanded from him to whom more has been entrusted. We can also understand it in this way: who judges me, when all are under sin? Finally, the Lord said of that adulteress, "Let him who is without sin cast the first stone at her." And no one cast a stone. Therefore the prophet says this: "I have sinned against you alone, who alone are without sin." For one who is subject to sin cannot judge another as a sinner. For every man is inexcusable who, in another, condemns the very things he himself does; for in judging another, he condemns himself. "I have sinned against you," he says, "and have done evil before you, so that you may be justified in your words and prevail when you are judged. I have sinned against you, who summoned me to the pursuit of virtue, who instructed me in your law. I have sinned against you alone, whom alone the hidden thoughts of the mind and the secrets of the heart do not deceive.

And I have done evil before you, whom alone holiness befits. We avoid human testimony, yet we commit unworthy acts in your sight. It is an injury for a man to witness shameful deeds; we know that God is the judge of all, and with him as witness we sin: and yet in these things our Lord God is more justified, because our injustice commends God's justice, and our falsehood celebrates God's truth; for God is truthful, but every man is a liar. That you may be justified in your words. The words of God are full of truth and justice, and therefore whatever the Lord has spoken concerning human frailty is true, because their heart is inclined to wickedness, it leans toward deceit. And because he has defined that there is no man who does not sin—for all have declined and become useless—therefore he conquers while being judged, since by the fall of all he has proven whatever he judged concerning our deceit. Therefore, if we say that we have done wrong, we justify God in his words; but if we say that we have not sinned, we make God a liar; but it is impossible for him to lie.

Therefore it is evident that we are all under sin. How great a crime, then, for a man to deny that he is a sinner, since by doing so he seems to accuse and refute the supreme God’s own truthfulness—God who is so moderate and patient that He prevails even when He is judged. For judgment is approached: God says, “My people, what have I done to you, or how have I grieved you, or how have I been burdensome to you? For I led you out of the land of Egypt, and freed you from the house of servitude, and sent before you Moses and Aaron and Miriam. My people, keep in mind what Balak plotted against you.” He places each of His benefits before your eyes, so that you may judge concerning those things which you ought to have preserved, that you may be all the more guilty for having been unable to stand firm amid divine benefits. “What have I done to you?” He says, as if He makes Himself the defendant and you the judge. “Or how have I grieved you?” He does not deny the offense of a displeased countenance, if you are grieved by God, the author. “Or how have I been burdensome to you?” He confesses the injury of an interruption, if He was considered too troublesome. He adds the benefits, for whose grace the one who was deemed ungrateful did not blush. In this matter also, consider how the Lord offered Himself to be judged by David Himself, so that He might prevail; for Nathan says: “Thus says the Lord God of Israel: I anointed you king over Israel, and I freed you from the hand of Saul, and I gave you all that was your lord’s, and I gave his wives into your bosom, and I gave you the house of Israel itself; and if these are few, I will add more to you.

And why did you hold the Lord as nothing, so that you acted wickedly in his sight? Reminded of these things, when he saw himself to be inferior, while he judges, he says: “I have sinned against the Lord.” Thus he justified the Lord, who did not dare to deny his sin. We can also understand it in this way: he justifies the Lord who confesses his sin. Finally, in the Gospel you have that the publicans justified God when they were baptized by the baptism of John. But John the Baptist performed a baptism of repentance. Whoever repents does not deny his offenses. Therefore, because David always had his sin against himself, he certainly did not deny what he also blushed at, he did not deny what he also acknowledged. By not denying, he certainly performed repentance for the error he had committed, and thus by confessing the offense he justified the Lord and was himself justified by the Lord. For the Lord is justified when his justice is proclaimed and pardon is sought from him. At the same time, he also justifies the one who confesses, and he is justified in his words, as it is written: “Speak your iniquities, so that you may be justified.

He continues: “Behold, I was conceived in iniquities, and my mother bore me in transgressions.” Who performs penance with such great feeling? He lay prostrate on the ground, dissolved in tears, he did not taste food, he denied himself the bath. Why should I now mention the rest, that he abstained from royal adornment and retinue? He added the confession of his iniquity and transmitted it to be sung throughout the whole world for perpetual ages. “Behold,” he says, “I was conceived in iniquities, and my mother bore me in transgressions. Turn your face away from my sins, and blot out all my iniquities. Do not cast me from your face, and do not take your Holy Spirit from me. Deliver me from bloodshed, O God, God of my salvation.” Before we are born, we are stained by contagion, and before we enjoy the light, we suffer the injury of our very origin. We are conceived in iniquity—he did not express whether of our parents or our own—(and in transgressions each one’s mother gives birth). Nor did he declare here whether the mother gives birth in her own transgressions or whether there are already some transgressions of the newborn. But see, perhaps both are to be understood. Nor is the conception free from iniquity, since parents are not without fault. And if an infant of even one day is not without sin, much more are those days of maternal conception not without sin. Therefore we are conceived in the sin of our parents and born in their transgressions.

He continues: “Behold, I was conceived in iniquities, and my mother bore me in transgressions.” Who performs penance with such great feeling? He lay prostrate on the ground, dissolved in tears, he did not taste food, he But even childbirth has its own contagions, and nature itself does not have only one contagion: marriage is good, the union is holy; yet those who have wives should be as if they did not have them. The marriage bed itself is undefiled, and no one ought to defraud another of it, except perhaps for a time, so that they may be free for prayer: nevertheless, according to the Apostle, one is not free for prayer at the time when he engages in the use of that bodily union; and a menstruating woman’s cloth is polluted, nor can she offer sacrifice during those days of her purification; and a woman who has given birth, the days of childbirth, and many others, are excluded from sacrifice until the offspring is purified by legitimate rite. Therefore, in whom the Lord wished there to be no contagions of this kind of origin, the Lord says to him: “Before I formed you in your mother’s womb, I knew you, and before you came forth from the womb, I sanctified you and placed you as a prophet among the Gentiles.” Who is so great, to whom such great things have been granted? Was it Jeremiah? But he was not placed as a prophet among the Gentiles at that time, but in Judea at that time, and now also among the nations that have believed in the Lord Jesus. Yet see whether it is said to him who, before he was born of a virgin, already was and always was and was working even while established in Mary’s womb, and was so holy that he sanctified his prophets. In him alone both the virginal conception and the birth were without any defilement of mortal origin.

It was indeed fitting that he who was not to have the bodily lapse of sin should feel no natural contagion of generation. Rightly, therefore, did David weepingly deplore in himself those very defilements of nature, that a stain begins in man before life. While he says these things and confesses the cesspool of both special and common sins, suddenly the splendor of truth and the brightness of spiritual grace shone upon him. For, having surpassed the shadow in spirit, he himself saw with prophetic vision the sacraments of the heavenly mysteries, whose type Moses prefigured in the law. Wounded, therefore, with the wound of love and seized by the desire of searching out truth, he extended the gaze of his mind into higher things and, looking into the future, saw the treasures of wisdom and knowledge in Christ; he foresaw the sacrament of baptism and, marveling at the grace, suddenly exclaimed, saying: "Behold, you have loved truth... the uncertain and hidden things of your wisdom you have manifested to me." Not uncertain mysteries, for they are certain, nor uncertain secrets and hidden things of wisdom, but not manifested. For this signifies that they had been manifested to none; for what the eye has not seen nor the ear heard nor has ascended into the heart of man, this God prepared for those loving him. Seeing these things, therefore, he says: "Behold, now not in shadow nor in figure, not in type, but in truth an open light shines forth: behold, now I behold truth, I recognize the splendor of truth, now I venerate you, Lord our God, with greater affection.

For behold, you have loved the truth: not through a mirror, not in a riddle, but face to face you have shown yourself to me, O Christ; I find you in your sacraments. These are your true sacraments of wisdom, by which the hidden places of the mind are cleansed. Therefore, already joyful and secure, because the fullness of wisdom had flashed upon him, he says to the Lord: "You will sprinkle me with hyssop, and I shall be cleansed; you will wash me, and I shall be made whiter than snow." Rightly does he neither nullify the sacraments of the Old Testament nor fail to teach that the mysteries of the Gospel are to be preferred. He asks to be cleansed according to the Law with hyssop; he desires to be washed according to the Gospel, and he thinks that, if washed, he will be made whiter than snow. Through a bunch of hyssop, the blood of the lamb was sprinkled on one who wished to be cleansed by a typological baptism. But one is washed who is cleansed by the water of the eternal font, and one is made whiter than snow to whom guilt is forgiven. Finally, concerning the soul itself it is said: "Who is this that ascends, made white?" Before it was baptized, it was the same that said: "I am black but beautiful, daughter of Jerusalem." For it was black, deformed by the dark horror of sins, but after it was washed through baptism and obtained remission of its faults, it ascended, made white, to Christ. Hence also the Lord spoke through Isaiah, saying: "If your sins are like scarlet, I will make them white as snow," that is: "If they are bloody, if they are foul, I will cleanse them.

This is the intelligible snow, of which it says in the Gospel that the garments of the Lord Jesus shone like snow, because his flesh, when he clothed himself coming into this world, knew no sin, being pure from every stain. Why do you marvel that he saw the sacraments of baptism, when he said above, where he described the Lord’s passion: The Lord feeds me, and nothing will be lacking to me; in a green place he placed me, he raised me upon the water of refreshment, and elsewhere: The voice of the Lord upon the waters, the God of majesty? And concerning the same sacrament he said more fully: You have set a table before me; you have anointed my head with oil, and your intoxicating cup, how splendid it is. Rightly, therefore, exulting in these things, he says: To my hearing you will give joy and gladness; the humbled bones will exult. You have proved, Lord Jesus, that your words never pass away; you have proved that Gospel saying which you spoke: Many prophets and just men wished to see what you see and hear what you hear. Behold, David rejoices in hearing alone, because the remission of sins was to come, and he prophesies that the humbled bones will exult. Just as all the bones of the just will say: Lord, who is like you? So the humbled bones will exult, that is, of the just man humbling his soul. Therefore, the bones are called virtues; the bones are called, as it were, certain motions of the mind or soul, which motions are humbled by sins, and exult by the gift of heavenly grace.

The bones of the people of the churches are also spoken of, whence you have it said in the Psalm: "My bone is not hidden, which you made in secret." He called his bone the church and the sacred gatherings of the devoted people, because we are members of the body of Christ, from his flesh and from his bones. Therefore he says this, that the church of the Lord will know all divine works and will receive the faith of the resurrection. It follows: "Turn your face away from my sins and blot out all my iniquities." It is a customary entreaty, that we ask those whom we have harmed to forget the offense itself. Morally, therefore, the prophet asks God to turn his face away from his sins and, as it were, to assume forgetfulness of his sins. But because he sees everything and nothing escapes him, he cannot forget as we can, whom memory of what we have known slips away within a brief interval of time. Therefore he well says that he should turn his face away, not from him, lest he fail, being abandoned, but from his sins, so that his sins may have no power. For those whom the Lord looks upon he illuminates, and in the face of the Lord there is piety and indulgence. Hence this same one says: "Let my judgment come forth from your face"; for from the face of the Lord comes pardon, not punishment. Therefore he must be asked to look upon us, but to turn his face away from our sins, so that he may blot them out.

For what does not see, it destroys, and what it has destroyed, it buries in oblivion, just as the Lord himself says: "I am, I am the one who blots out your iniquities, and I will not remember; but you remember, and let us be judged." Now sin is either pardoned, or blotted out, or covered over. It is pardoned through grace, blotted out through the blood of the cross, covered over through charity. Similarly with iniquity, which is considered a disposition of an unjust mind, although John in his epistle says that whoever has committed a sin has also committed iniquity, as we have it written: "Everyone who commits sin also commits iniquity." Sin is iniquity, because in sin itself there is iniquity; yet, as it seems to us, sin is the work of iniquity, but iniquity is the worker of fault and offense. It is therefore more that iniquity itself be blotted out, that the root and seedbed of sins be cut away. Let the evil root be removed, lest it produce evil fruits; let every affection for error be abolished, let all kinds of iniquities be taken away.

Therefore, just as the discipline of wisdom, entering the soul, removes imprudence, and knowledge removes ignorance, so perfect virtue removes iniquity, and the remission of sins blots out every sin. Hence the Apostle says excellently that the Lord Jesus forgave us our sins, blotting out the chirograph of the decree that was contrary to us, and, he says, he removed it from the midst, affixing it to the cross, blotted it out—with his own blood he blotted out the ink of Eve, he blotted out the obligation of the inherited debt. Faith, therefore, diminishes sin. And so the Lord, forgiving sins, said: Let it be done for you according to your faith. It follows: Create a pure heart in me, O God, and renew a right spirit in my inward parts. Above, he sought to be cleansed from hidden things; here he asks that a pure heart be created for him, which comes to one who is renewed in spirit; for in the new man there is a pure heart, in which the filth of old offenses has been blotted out and no image of iniquity remains inscribed. But it is a great gift to have a pure heart. Hence Solomon says beautifully: Who will boast that he has a chaste heart? And the Lord in the Gospel: Blessed are the pure of heart; for they will see God. For this reason David also desired to have a pure heart, lest he be cast out from the face of the Lord.

In whom, however, the heart is pure, the spirit is renewed in his inner parts. For the viscera are like the inner parts of the body: so also there are intelligible viscera of the soul, such as the viscera of mercy, such as the inner parts which bless the Lord, concerning which he says: bless, my soul, the Lord, and all my inner parts, his holy name. But the viscera of the soul are the inventions of the senses, the pursuits of good thought, the perseverance of virtues, finally those which are called in Greek. But the right spirit, which directs well, which leads into the right path; this is the spirit of truth or certainly the right conscience of a man unbent by any sins or the spirit which is in man. We have not omitted what others think; nevertheless it seems to us that, since the reading speaks of mysteries and the grace of future renewal is expressed, the infusion of the Holy Spirit is sought. Finally it follows: do not cast me from your face and do not take your Holy Spirit from me. If someone offends us among our servants, we are accustomed to turn our face away from him. But many of the rich are accustomed to correct their slaves and relegate them to their little fields, and this punishment is considered more severe. Finally, they are more accustomed to offer themselves for beatings. If among men this is considered grave, how much more so before our Lord God.

as if the grief of parricide, which indeed should have been restrained if any piety could have tempered it, had not burst forth from this—that God turned His face away from Cain’s offerings but looked upon Abel’s offerings. Thus, with silent countenance, He pronounced one innocent, the other a sinner. Therefore, like the lowliest servant, he humbles himself and, as if caught in sin and guilty of offense, begs to be scourged rather than cast out from the face of the Lord. Hear how God casts one from His face when He says: “Take him into the outer darkness; there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” He who is not corrected by His face is placed in darkness. Therefore, the just man, lest he suffer darkness, says: “I will seek Your face, O Lord.” For where the Lord’s face is, there is light, as it is written: “Illuminate Your face over Your servant.” Finally, when He first looked upon Peter, He saw him and illuminated him. Thus, it is a great punishment to be cast from the face of God. Adam was cast out of paradise, and not undeservedly; for he himself had first hidden from the face of God. Cain also went out from the face of God, not only after the parricidal crime, but also after he thought God could be deceived by denying the crime. Therefore, the sinner is excluded from the face of God, but the just man says: “Here I am.” Finally, David himself, when he saw the people perishing, offered himself, saying: “Here I am; I have sinned, and I, the shepherd, have done wrong,” and thus the Lord’s anger was mitigated and pardon was granted.

At the same time, it shows that the holy remain, the criminal are cast out. And therefore the spiritual grace must be preserved by us, lest it be taken away from us on account of our sins. For he in whom the Spirit is holy is not cast out, but with the unoffending fruit of his gift he strives always to offer himself to the Lord, like the one who, when the Lord said, “Do you also wish to depart?” replied, “To whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and do we believe?” At the same time, this is to be considered: that the Spirit is not taken away except by the will of the Lord, just as He is not given except by the will of the Lord. Who, indeed, when He is given, does not act as if compelled, but is distributed according to His own will, as it is written, the apostle saying: “But all these things one and the same Spirit works, dividing to each as He wills.” Since, therefore, He is not taken away except by the will of the Lord, it appears that the will of the Trinity is one. Give me back the joy of your saving grace and confirm me with the principal Spirit. To whom it is owed and is given back: the joy of saving grace is given back to the rational nature. But joy and gladness are the fruit of the Spirit; our firmament also is the principal Spirit. Finally, he who is confirmed by the principal Spirit is not subject to servitude, knows not how to serve sin, knows not how to waver, knows not how to err, nor does he totter uncertain in his zeal, but, fixed on the rock, he is established with a solid footing.

Whom do we think is called the principal spirit? Many refer the right spirit to the Lord Jesus, who took away the sin of the world and renewed the whole human race by the shedding of his blood. And therefore it is said: "and renew the right spirit in my viscera," but the Holy Spirit, concerning whom he says: "and do not take your Holy Spirit from me," they understand as the spirit of truth; but the principal spirit they judge to be God the Father. How morally, however, he says: "Do not cast me from your face!" Faithfully he fears that the grace he has received may be taken from him. And therefore elsewhere he says: "My eyes are always toward the Lord," and later: "Behold, as the eyes of servants are in the hands of their masters, and as the eyes of a handmaid are in the hands of her mistress, so are our eyes toward our Lord God, until he takes pity on us." Certainly this is the spirit, the author and prince, which rules the mind, strengthens the affection, draws it whither it wills, and directs it into the higher life.

There are also those who have received the spirit of a man, which is in him. Concerning this the apostle says: For who knows the things of men that are of man except the spirit which is in him? Who can know all things, whom the hidden things of man do not deceive, can have preeminence in man. It follows: I will teach the wicked your ways and the impious will turn to you. That preeminent helmsman who steers the ship on a rocky shore, that good teacher who sharpens harder intellects for the progress of learning, that outstanding warrior, that wonderful leader, who kindles the more timid for battle and, having explored the places, supports them with the advantage of a suitable position, so that the weakness of their strength may compensate for the opportunity of a favorable station: that one is likewise great, even a preacher of the faith, who teaches the wicked. Hence he beautifully says: I will teach the wicked. He did not say: I will teach the just—for the just already know the ways of the Lord—but he says I will teach the wicked. Finally, the author of prudence and teacher of all says: I have not come to call the just, but sinners. And that heavenly physician says: There is no need for a physician for the healthy, but for the sick.

Whether, therefore, he spoke from the perspective of the one who called the Gentiles or from his own, he rightly set down: "I will teach the unjust," because heavenly teaching and divine operation can change the innermost affections and convert the purpose, instilling the pursuits of piety into sacrilegious hearts, so that those who lived without law may be converted to the true Lord, from whom they formerly turned away; and also, by the example of royal penitence, those who practice iniquities and harsh crimes may be corrected, and, converted in faith and deed, may receive the remedy of salutary teaching, and enter the ways of the Lord, in which they encounter no winding paths of error, no byways of headlong lapse. For just as there is a specimen of good life and an example of virtue in those men who have run through the times of their life without offense, so those who, renouncing past crimes or errors of unbelief, have corrected the course of their later age, are set forth for imitation to those who slip either in deed or in thought.

He continues: "Deliver me from bloodshed, O God, God of my salvation." And this can be referred to the death of Uriah, because, conscious of the ordered slaying of him, he seeks pardon for so great a crime, and although a king is absolved by the laws, he is nevertheless guilty in his own conscience. Desiring to untie these bonds, he prays for divine help for himself, so that he may be cleansed from every stain of the crime committed. And indeed, since the holy prophet, gentle and meek of heart, always gave outstanding proofs of his own gentleness and piety, so that he frequently forgave his adversaries and thought he should refrain from killing them, it is no wonder that he grieves so deeply that the sin of shedding innocent blood crept upon him. Therefore he demanded to be delivered from bloodshed, that is, from mortal sins. He praised his Lord God, he proclaimed the justice of the Lord, and therefore he added: "My tongue will exalt your justice." "O Lord, you will open my lips, and my mouth will announce your praise." For he who praises the Lord will be safe from his enemies, as it is written. And certainly he had said above in the forty-ninth psalm: "But to the sinner God said: Why do you recount my justices?" Since, therefore, he said through his own mouth that God forbade the sinner to recount his justices, he certainly, by recounting the justice of God, declared that this committed sin was by no means imputed to him.

And he added: "You will open my lips, and my mouth will proclaim your praise." God closes the mouth of a sinner, so that he does not speak the righteousness of God; He opens the mouth of a righteous man, so that he may speak. Therefore, whose lips He opens, that man He absolves from the guilt of sin. But the Lord opens the lips of him who receives the word in the opening of his mouth. Hence the Apostle also asks to be helped by the prayers of the people, so that the door of speech may be opened to him to proclaim the mystery of Christ. We take "tongue" for the speech of him who exults in the praises of God. Hence that passage is also understood thus: "My tongue is the pen of a scribe writing swiftly," the word infused into the prophet. But if we take this as spoken from the person of Christ, see whether the scribe is not the one writing swiftly the word of God, which runs through and penetrates the inmost parts of the soul and inscribes in it either the gifts of nature or of grace, while the tongue is that holy body born of a virgin, by which the poison of the serpent was emptied and the works of the Gospel were spread throughout the whole world to be celebrated. He proceeds to empty out sin, because He took on humility; He crushed His own heart, because the Lord chose sacrifice more than holocausts for sins, which according to the law were customarily offered. Finally, above He says: "You did not even demand holocausts for sin; then I said: 'Behold, I come,'" that is: Not deeming it a robbery to be equal to God, I come taking on the form of a servant, I come in the form of human assumption, in the truth of the cross, by the humility of death proving obedience, so that disobedience may be blotted out.

Rightly, therefore, does he also say here: "For if you had wished, I would certainly have offered a sacrifice; you will not delight in holocausts." A sacrifice to God is a contrite spirit: a contrite and humbled heart God will not spurn. And, as I said above, it is certain that it accords with the mystery that the Lord Jesus Himself seems to speak here also in His own person, who above set forth that statement with evident testimony of His person. For He is the true David, strong of hand, truly humble and meek, first and last, first in eternity, last in humility, through whose obedience the guilt of the human race was erased and justice restored. He, I say, Jesus, the end of shadow and law, came as the teacher of humility to teach those swollen with pride of mind and puffed up with arrogance of heart to pass over to meekness and simplicity. How, then, can sin be imputed in the type of His mystery, when in the mystery itself there is remission of sins? Unless perhaps David confessed his iniquity and sin of that committed offense so that he himself might pertain to the remission of sin and the grace of the mystery.

For what does it mean that the man confessing his sin sings of Sion and Jerusalem, saying: "Do good, O Lord, in your good will to Sion, and let the walls of Jerusalem be built," except that it pleases him that the gathering of the Church be hastened through the calling of the nations, which would spread the lineage of its faith throughout the whole world not to the sons of a handmaid, but to free Jerusalem—that Jerusalem which is in heaven—and would establish the enclosures of spiritual walls by the assertion of apostolic teaching? Therefore, the walls of Jerusalem are the bulwarks of faith, the fortifications of disputations, the summits of virtues; the walls of Jerusalem are the assemblies of churches founded throughout the whole world; for the Church says: "I am the wall, and my breasts are the tower." And rightly are the walls of Jerusalem the meeting-places of churches, since whoever enters a church in good faith and deed becomes a citizen and inhabitant of that heavenly city which descended from heaven. The structure of living stones builds these walls of stone.

Therefore, seeing the true Jerusalem and Sion, he said: "When you have blessed Jerusalem and Sion in your will, then you will accept the sacrifice of justice," that is, the sacrifice of the body of Christ, who, speaking of his own passion, said: "Open the gates of justice for me, and entering them, I will confess to the Lord." And in the Gospel he says to John: "Wait for now; for thus we must fulfill all justice," and further on: "Blessed are those who suffer persecution for the sake of justice." Justice is Christ; therefore, he asserts that the sacrifice of Christ will be acceptable to the Father. This, then, is what he also said above: "Sacrifice the sacrifice of justice and hope in the Lord." This is the spiritual offering of justice and the holocaust of fervent devotion and infusion of the Holy Spirit, which he says will come when the souls of the faithful, renouncing pleasures and delights as if drawing a plow through their own entrails, begin to be brought to that spiritual altar of the Lord, so that they may bear the fruits of pious cultivation.

Or certainly thus: when you have blessed the church acquired from the Gentiles and the spiritual sacrifice of justice has begun to be frequented, then also the holy martyrs, who offered their own bodies to be ploughed for Christ, will be offered like calves at the sacred altars, just as we find written in the Apocalypse of John that under the altar were the souls of those who offered their bodies to martyrdom for the name of the Lord Jesus, so that they might purchase for themselves the grace of Christ. To whom is honor, glory, perpetual praise with God the Father and the Holy Spirit from the ages, and now, and always, and unto all ages of ages. Amen.