Breviarium In Psalmos

I will praise the name of my God with a song: I will magnify him in praise. This means that he has either triumphed over the devil or overcome the world.

He shall please God. That is, the Father. Upon a new calf. He who offered himself to the Begetter. Producing horns. Giving strength to the Church. And hooves. With which he may trample down and tear apart the sacrileges of the nations.

Let the poor see and rejoice. Because, with the superstition of the nations humbled, the kingdom of the Lord's Church is exalted. Seek the Lord, and your soul shall live. Which is now dead in sins.

Because the Lord has heard the poor. That he might raise them up. And he has not despised his bound ones. Because, having broken the devil's chains, he has taken them up into his kingdom.

Let the heavens and the earth praise him: the sea and all the creeping things in them. Let all things in heaven, on earth, and under the earth bend the knee to him.

Because God will make Zion safe. The heavenly Jerusalem, in which he will gather his elect according to their merits into one body of that heavenly mother. And the cities of Judah shall be built up. The souls of the saints, which through confession are brought into the holy temple like living stones.

And they shall dwell there, and acquire it by inheritance, and the seed of his servants shall possess it, etc. Certainly the saints who are transferred into it. Or their seed, that is, those who were converted through them. But because the title of the psalm is inscribed "For those who shall be changed," let us pray to the Lord that, having converted us from the Gentiles, he may build us up as cities of Judah, and having freed us from the yoke of the devil, that he may love his own offspring. That those whom he redeemed through the bitterness of gall, through the harshness of vinegar, through the torments of the cross, through the wounds of the nails, through the reproach of death, through the glory of the resurrection, he may deign so to guard in this world that he may make them partakers with his saints in the kingdom. Amen.

PSALM 69.

Unto the end. A psalm of David for remembrance, because the Lord saved him. This psalm is sung in the person of the incarnate Lord, beseeching the protection of the Father.

O God, attend to my help: O Lord, etc. Christ is our help, who now asks the aid of the Father to confute those who oppose him.

Let them be confounded and put to shame who seek my soul, to take it away. For in this they are confounded, when they recognize that he whose soul they wished to take away has risen again.

Let them be turned backward and blush for shame who wish me evil. Let them not be changed in the resurrection with the saints, but turned backward and blushing: because him whom they judged as a man, they see judging as God.

Let them be turned away and immediately blush for shame: who say to me, Well done, well done. This is the voice of mockers, which refers to those who said: If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross; and again: He trusted in God: let him deliver him, if he will (Matt. 27). But after the punishment of the wicked, it is turned to the glory of the blessed.

Let all those who seek you exult and rejoice in you. Who through the tears of penitence seek you, who are merciful. And let them say always: Let the Lord be magnified. Having received forgiveness of sins. Who love your salvation. Loving you: because you are the life of all.

But I am needy and poor: the Lord, etc. Christ the Lord often calls himself needy and poor, whose care consists in the love of the Father's goodness.

You are my helper and my protector, my God, do not delay. For this reason, in the time of his passion, he said to the disciple: What you do, do quickly (John 13); that is, so that the swift aid of the resurrection might come before the suffering of the body. He who was wounded for our sins, and rose again for our justification: may he himself now grant us aid in the time of tribulation by his accustomed mercy, so that, rejoicing with his saints, we may be able to magnify and extol him. Amen.

PSALM 70.

A psalm of David, of the sons of Jonadab, and of the former captives. This psalm contains the voice of the prophet: complaining of that bodily lowliness of the Redeemer, and singing of his glorious resurrection.

In you, Lord, I have hoped, let me not be confounded forever. Therefore our Mediator prays that this confusion of death may not be, as that of all others, long-lasting. And in your justice deliver me, and rescue me. Incline, etc. For your justice is that whoever has done your will may pass from death to life: through which I also now pray to be rescued. Or otherwise: Incline your ear to me, and save me. The ears of the Lord are spoken of when he deigns to hear: because, taking the form of a servant, he became obedient to the Father unto death, even death on a cross.

For this reason God also exalted him, and gave him a name that is above every name.

Be to me a protecting God, and a fortified place, that you may save me. For without you neither refuge nor fortification, nor protection can be provided by anyone. Is God local? Although he is local to those who come to him, yet he is not local, because he is everywhere.

For you are my firmament and my refuge. Firmament, when an equal substance consists in him. Refuge, according to bodily weakness.

My God, rescue me from the hand of the sinner: and from the hand, etc. From the power of the Jewish people, who did not understand that I would come in the Law. And of the wicked. Always of the malignant one. Not all sinners are also wicked. Sinners are transgressors, that is, Jews, and bad Christians, who transgress the Old and New Testament. The wicked are those who do not believe, as Paul says: Those who sinned without the law will also perish without the law.

For you are my patience, O Lord. Because I suffer for your will. My hope from my youth. From the beginning of my bodily life. Therefore hope is not put to shame: because the love of God has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.

In you I have been strengthened from the womb. Of the Law, surely, from the time I began to believe. From the belly of my mother. Of the synagogue from which I came forth. You are my protector, O Lord. In you is my song always. May I be protected by you in passion, and may I sing your name among the nations.

I have become like a portent to many. For they said to him: You are a Samaritan, and you have a demon. And you, O Lord, are a strong helper. You said to me: This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased: listen to him.

May my mouth be filled with your praise, that I may sing your glory, and all day long your greatness. One day is for your saints in this world, which no night obscures: in which, and with whom, I sing your praise, glory, and magnificence: because I am among them. I sing to you. But even now the Lord himself opens our mouth, that we may be able to proclaim his glory and set forth his praise.

Do not cast me off in the time of old age, when it fails, etc. In the consummation, surely, of that age.

Because my enemies have spoken against me. Saying, this man is not of God, who does not keep the sabbath (John 9). And those who were guarding my soul took counsel together, saying: God has forsaken him, etc. The impious said these things, and they erred: for their heart has been blinded by malice. But even in the passion itself they said, as though God had forsaken him: Let Elijah come, and deliver him (Matt. 27).

O God, do not withdraw far from me: my God, etc. That, bound perhaps, I may return as a victor from hell.

Let those who disparage my soul be confounded and fail, let them be covered, etc. When I have been raised again. But I will always hope in you. O Lord, etc. That the things which the law has commanded you to offer in its visible sacrifices, the redeemed people may carry over into their conduct.

My mouth will declare your justice, all the day your salvation. For rising again I will gather the Church, in which I will sing your praises.

Because I have not known letters, I will enter into the powers of the Lord. He knew the business of business, who sold the master. For I have glorified you upon the earth, I have finished the work which you gave me to do (John 17). Lord, I will remember your righteousness alone. The prophet says that he is mindful of the Father's righteousness, just as he himself says in the Gospel: What I have heard from my Father, these things I speak (John 8).

O God, you have taught me from my youth, and until now I will proclaim your wonderful works, and even to old age and senility: O God, do not forsake me. For was he ever forsaken by the Father? But he always bore witness, because he is true.

Until I announce your arm to every generation, etc. All these things he announced to the Christian generation: which he acquired with his own blood and for which he suffered the things that follow. What great things you have done, O God! Who is like you? You who sent me by merciful counsel for human redemption.

How many tribulations, many and evil, you have shown me! And turning, you gave me life. Many tribulations were indeed shown to him in the weakness of the flesh for the salvation of the human race, but he bore them all with vigor. And from the depths of the earth you brought me back again. That is, from the depth of hell. Let the Jews now say—those who wish to sing this psalm of David alone—when he was led out from the deep abyss.

You have multiplied your magnificence, O God, etc. When those who were held in hell returned with me.

For I too will confess to you in vessels of the psalm. Those filled with that new wine of the evangelical and apostolic preaching understand me in the psalms as having been proclaimed beforehand: Your truth, O God, I will sing to you on the harp, O holy God of Israel. In those who hold you in their mind.

My lips will rejoice, etc. The prophet says these things at the close of the psalm. And my soul, which you have redeemed. Lest the second death have dominion over it.

But my tongue also will meditate on your righteousness, when those who seek evils against me have been confounded and put to shame—whether they be vices or the powers of the air, which bring wicked assaults upon me. But let us entreat the Lord, that with the human mouth filled with his praises, we may always meditate in our hearts those things which we may bring forth to him with pleasing words.

PSALM 71.

For Solomon. And this psalm is properly referred to Christ. For Solomon means peaceful, and Christ is peaceful; and he shall endure with the sun, and before the moon, from generation to generation. If this psalm is understood as concerning Solomon, this cannot stand at all. For Solomon neither endured with the sun nor with the moon. But if we wish to understand it of Christ, it must be asked how Christ has no end, since the moon, and the heaven, and all things are said to grow old and pass away. But this seventy-first psalm, which the prophet sang, shows the Son of God about to come into the world; and that after the injuries of the flesh he assumed, and after the poor were delivered from the hand of the powerful, he was returned to the heavens and received all judgment from the Father. Such, then, is the beginning he takes:

God, give your judgment to the king. The prophet therefore speaks, as we have said, to the Father, that judgment be given to the Son—not that the Son, subsisting in one Godhead, does not have it, but that he may show him as one who is to come in the body. And your justice to the son of the king—to the people who has been taken up into adoption as sons, and reborn in him through baptism. For it fittingly accords that the people live by justice, while the king exercises the judgment which he received from the Father, as the following verse confirms.

To judge your people in justice—whom you have acquired through his passion and resurrection. And your poor in judgment—so that, after present hardships, they may receive everlasting consolation.

Let the mountains receive peace for the people, and the hills your justice. That mountains and hills have a twofold meaning we have often warned, that is, of the divine part and of the adverse part. Therefore let those who, seduced by the adversary, have been lifted up like hills and mountains by favoring riches, now made subject to God, receive that peace and justice which the people whom we called adopted above holds fast—that is, Christ, who is our peace and justice.

He will judge the poor of the people. So that those who have been made poor for his sake may be enriched with the heavenly kingdoms. And he will save the sons of the poor. Those who have been converted through them. And he will humble the accuser: by bestowing reward upon the just, he humbles the devil, who now stands as their accuser.

And he will remain with the sun. With the Father's brightness. For these things cannot be applied to this sun alone, because it will be dissolved with this world. And before the moon, through generation of generations. For he will stand first before every congregation of the Church, and will remain forever.

And he will descend like rain upon the fleece. For just as the rain descended upon Gideon's fleece (Judg. 6), when the dry earth failed, so too here he came down into the virginal womb through the infusion of the Holy Spirit. And like drops dripping upon the earth. For the earth of the human body was dry when he came, and could bring forth no fruit of holiness; but he, having made it fertile by the drops of his preaching, filled it with eternal fruits.

In his days justice shall arise, and abundance of peace. This was fulfilled in the days of Augustus Caesar, when the Lord came forth from the virginal bridal chamber. For in those days all wars so ceased that even that saying of another prophet was fulfilled: They have turned their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks (Isa. 2). Now his days are when he is conceived, when he is born, when he is nourished. His days are when he does the works of the Father, when he suffers, when he descends to hell, when he rises again, when he shows himself to his disciples, when he ascends to the heavens. Until the moon be taken away. Let the Church be lifted up.

And he shall rule from sea to sea, etc. The prophet testifies that this whole world was acquired and made subject to Christ the Lord by his passion.

The Ethiopians shall fall down before him. Those darkened by sins. And his enemies shall lick the earth. According to that saying: They shall adore you, and lick the dust of your feet (Isa. 49).

The kings of Tarshish and the islands shall offer gifts; the kings of the Arabs and of Saba shall bring presents, etc. Here the prophet declares that all worldly empire, honors, and ranks shall come to Christ the Lord, bow their necks to him, and bring the gifts of good morals: which we understand began with the gifts of the magi. For they are shown to have borne the type of the kings of the nations.

Because he delivered the poor from the powerful. The faithful people from the power of the devil. And the poor who had no helper. He shall spare the poor and the needy, etc. Those who, casting aside the riches of the world, have done penance: they are spared, and they shall be saved.

From usuries and iniquities he shall redeem their souls. Lest they lay up treasures on earth from perishing usuries, but let them place in heaven purses that do not grow old. But usuries are also sins, when the malice received from Satan is multiplied. And their name shall be honorable before him. Before God the Father.

And he shall live. In his saints, as Paul also was saying: "It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me" (Galatians 2). And there shall be given to him of the gold of Arabia. They shall offer also the purity of mind, like Arabian gold, gleaming with most beautiful splendor. And they shall adore him continually. Because they have been freed from iniquities. All the day they shall bless him. Gathered together in one body of the Church.

And there shall be a firmament on the earth. For his advent, his passion and resurrection, brought a great firmament to the sliding earth; on the tops of the mountains his fruit shall be lifted up above Lebanon. For above all the heights of the world the grace of baptism has been raised, through which sins are taken away. And they shall flourish from the city. That is, from the heavenly Jerusalem. Like the grass of the earth. Grass has a twofold meaning. There is grass that withers and falls, and there is flowering grass, enduring with green foliage, from which the crowns of the saints are adorned. The saints, therefore, reborn through baptism, shall flourish from the heavenly Jerusalem, splendid with the adornment of good works. Like the grass of the earth. Not of that earth subject to the curse, but of that which flows with honey and milk.

And his name shall be blessed forever. By those whom he has brought over in that place, it shall be blessed perpetually. Before the sun his name endures. That is, the power of his name: according to that saying, "Before the morning star I begot you" (Psalm 109).

And we shall be blessed in him, all the tribes of the earth: all nations shall magnify him. For the Evangelist recalls this, when the Lord says: "This Gospel shall be preached in the whole world" (Matthew 24). But also all nations shall come and shall adore before you, O Lord.

Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, who alone works marvels. For he has worked in the Old Testament; he works also in the New, when he graciously calls those things that are not, as though they were.

And blessed be the name of his majesty forever. According to that saying: "And to those who believe in me there shall be a new name, which shall be blessed in the lands," that is, Christian. And all the earth shall be filled with his majesty; let it be done, let it be done. When he has poured out his Holy Spirit upon all flesh: which we read has already been fulfilled in the Acts of the Apostles (Acts 2). May he also now deign to pour into us the Paraclete, that is, the Consoler, that we may be able to understand that for our redemption he took up an earthly body, underwent death, penetrated the underworld, and returned as victor to the heavens.

PSALM 72.

The hymns of David, the son of Jesse, have come to an end. A psalm of Asaph. It must be known that the seventy-first psalm is the end of the second book; hence it also has at its close, "let it be, let it be," for which we have shown above that in Hebrew "amen, amen" is said. This too must be observed more carefully, that "the hymns of David, the son of Jesse, have come to an end" belongs to the end of the seventy-first psalm; but what follows, "A psalm of Asaph," is the beginning of the next.

How good is God to Israel, to those who are right of heart. For he is good to those who are to see him: as the Lord says: Blessed are the clean of heart, for they shall see God (Matt. 5).

But my feet were almost moved, my steps were almost poured out. Because, etc. The stability of his holiness and his advance toward God was slipping, because he had been an emulator of the peace and felicity of the impious.

Because there is no regard for their death: and firmness in their plague. And in the labor of men, etc. From weakness and plagues they quickly recover, nor, like just men, are they shaken by the scourges of tribulations.

Therefore pride held them fast; they were covered over by their iniquity and their impiety. For through the arrogance of prosperity, with iniquity multiplied, they are weighed down.

Their iniquity came forth as if from fat. In the fatness of riches, too, iniquity, once forgotten, proceeded from them. For of this fatness Moses also says: Jacob grew fat and kicked back (Deut. 32);

They passed over into the affection of the heart. So that they might do their own will, and not God's.

They thought and spoke wickedness, etc. Either the Jews, who, blaspheming God placed in the flesh, spread the snares of wickedness in perverse thoughts; or the heretics, who disparage God through iniquitous interpretations.

They set their mouth in heaven, and their tongue passed over the earth. Through the pride of knowledge they spoke against the inhabitant of heaven, but their wicked speech was brought low even to the earth, and passed away, because it had no firm standing. Therefore the Lord speaks through these prophecies concerning his own, saying:

Therefore this people of mine will be turned, and full days will be found in them. The righteous, seeing these things, who had previously been zealous against sinners, beholding their peace, are turned back to God, so that they may receive the fullness of eternal days, knowing that the wicked do not even come to the half.

And they said: How does God know, and is there knowledge in the Most High? For sinners do not know that God can know all things, not knowing in their misery that nothing is hidden from his eyes.

Behold, these very sinners, abounding in the world, have obtained riches. Abounding in the riches of the world, they have lost the gifts of paradise.

And I said: Therefore have I justified my heart without cause, and washed my hands among the innocent? Did the righteous man, seeing these things, justify himself in vain, or did the innocent man do his work to the contrary? But the Lord himself says these things in the person of the righteous man, as the following words teach.

And I was scourged all day long. For the Lord was often scourged by their deceits, but on the day of his passion he was beaten with certain insults and true blows. And my chastisement was in the morning. Judas indeed said: What will you give me, and I will deliver him to you, that he may be seized (Matt. 26)? But he himself was scourged in the morning, when on the following day he departed from the Lord's betrayal and hanged himself with a noose.

If I said: I will speak thus, behold, I have transgressed against the generation of your children. The order of the reading and its sense is this: while I accuse myself in my morning prayers, I have found this, that I should say: If I have spoken thus, if I have wished to search out the hidden things of God, I begin to become a stranger to your children; as though no one is justified, nor does he do a righteous work. These who proclaim me, and through me have been made your children, rise up against me. Hence the prophet speaks.

I thought that I might know this; this is labor before me. I have searched out all things, and if laboriously, yet I thought with the Apostle that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the future glory which will be revealed in the saints (Rom 8).

Until I enter into the sanctuary of God, and understand in their last things. I have understood even concerning these saints, entering in mind into their assembly: that even if in the first life they were vexed in a few things, yet in the last they will be well disposed in many. Hence the words are turned to those who trusted in the deceitfulness of riches.

Nevertheless, because of their deceit you have set them. Because they oppressed the righteous with iniquitous frauds. You cast them down while they were at ease. In their riches they were made at ease by you, and cast down.

How have they become a desolation? This is the manner of a questioning voice, and the answer follows. Suddenly they failed, they perished because of their iniquity. For he set forth the order of the matter, according to that which the Apostle says: when they shall say peace and security: then sudden destruction shall appear to them (1 Thess 5).

As a dream of those who arise. As one sleeping sees in a vision great treasures of gold and silver, and rising loses all: so also these their riches after the life of this world, in which they were occupied as in a sleep. Lord, in the city. In the heavenly Jerusalem, surely. You will bring their image to nothing. When these knock at the heavenly palace, you will say: Depart from me, workers of iniquity: because I have not known you (Luke 13).

Because my heart was inflamed. That I may do the will of the Father. The Lord Christ speaks these things. And my kidneys were changed. Lest the luxury of human thought prevail against me. And I was brought to nothing, and I did not know. He calls himself humbled and ignorant, so as to show himself a true man. For God is deceived by no ignorance, but he does not know sinners only.

I was made like a beast of burden before you. Bearing in the flesh the sins of your people. And I am always with you. I in you, and you in me.

You held my right hand. When I descended into hell, because the left hand of the devil opposed me. And in your will you led me. Rising again. And with glory you received me. Returning to the heavens.

For what is there for me in heaven, and what have I desired from you upon the earth? This must be read with emphasis: you prepared such great things for me in the heavens, and I, wretched, was seeking small things from you on the earth? Alternatively: Neither in heaven nor on earth have I sought another besides you. For by you my will has been fulfilled, so that every knee should bow to me, of things in heaven, on earth, and under the earth. There follows the voice of the Church saying:

My heart and my flesh have failed: God of my heart, and God my portion forever. After the God of his heart, that is, Christ the Lord, whose portion he has been made, he longs with heart and whole body alike. For the failing that he says he has must be taken not as diminution but as longing.

For behold, those who remove themselves far from you shall perish: you have destroyed all who commit fornication against you. All who commit fornication sin without God. But whoever sins is far from God, and therefore is near to perdition.

But for me, to cling to God is good. By whose blood I have been redeemed. To place my hope in the Lord God. Because it is vain to trust in the goods of this world.

That I may proclaim all your praises in the gates of the daughter of Zion. For through the contemplation of the hope that he has in God, he hopes to be led into the gates of the heavenly Jerusalem, to grasp the future blessedness with his elect. Into their fellowship may Christ the Lord admit us, not as an inspector of merits but as a bestower of pardon. Amen.

PSALM 73.

The understanding of Asaph. Therefore "understanding" is prefixed in the title: because a twofold captivity follows—namely, the carnal and the spiritual.

Why, O God, have you cast us off to the end: your wrath has raged against the sheep of your pasture. It is an immense gift of the Lord's loving-kindness, that he so casts off as to call back: he is angry, that he may correct.

Remember your congregation which you have possessed from the beginning. Namely, the ecclesiastical congregation, which you prefigured by the callings or sacrifices of the patriarchs and prophets.

You have redeemed the rod of your inheritance. The rod of God's inheritance is Christ, as it is said to Jeremiah when he saw the watchful rod: You see well, because I watch over my people (Jer. 1); and again: There shall come forth a rod from the root of Jesse, and a flower shall rise from his root, and the Gentiles shall entreat him (Isa. 11). This rod, therefore, has been delivered from pursuing enemies. Mount Zion, in which you have dwelt in it. Whether in the body he assumed, or in the Church. For both belong to the holy mount.

Lift up your hands against their pride unto the end—those who attempt to assail your Church. How greatly has the enemy done wickedly in the holy place! So that by evil counsels he might make these men persecutors of them.

And those who hated you have boasted, etc. For by the instigation of the devil they boast, when out of hatred for God they afflict the holy martyrs with punishments.

They have burned your sanctuary with fire upon the earth; they have defiled the tabernacle of your name, etc. These things were indeed done according to history: either when Nebuchadnezzar led them away into Babylonia (2 Kings 25), or when Titus and Vespasian, having set the city and the temple on fire and laid low the multitude with the sword, led away the rest of the common people captive. But even now we must beware lest what then happened to Jerusalem should now happen to the Christian people: just as above, in that verse which we passed over, it said how: They set up their signs, and they did not know the signs, as in the going forth from above: so the Babylonians, lifted up by the swelling of arrogance over victory, set up their signs in your temple, as trophies over enemies are customarily set up above the arches of gates. Symmachus translated this more plainly, saying: They set up their signs openly in a high place, at the entrance of the gates. Therefore let each one of us have in his heart the banner of the cross—not the sign of the adversary—lest he be cut down by his axe from grace, but be cleansed by the gospel sickle for glory. Let him not be set on fire in lusts, but be kindled by spiritual sacraments.

Let him not be defiled by vices, but filled with virtues. Nor let him think that God cannot know anything, but let him confess that nothing is hidden from His eyes. Finally, let him not give consent to the devil's reproaches, but glorify the name of his God.

Why do you turn away your hand, and your right hand from the midst of your bosom unto the end? The bosom is His sanctuary, as He says through another prophet. For just as a shepherd cherishes his flock and carries the young in his bosom, so the Lord nourishes His people (Isa. 40). Therefore He turns away from this bosom either His regard or His power when we have sinned against Him.

But God is our king before the ages. As through Solomon, from Wisdom, which is Christ, He says: He established me in the beginning of His ways, before the ages He founded me (Eccl. 24). He wrought salvation in the midst of the earth—whether in Judaea, which is called the midst of the earth, or in the virginal womb.

You have strengthened the sea by Your power—the world, or the things that are in it. You have crushed the heads of the dragon in the waters. You have subjected the power of the demons in baptism. You have crushed the heads of the dragon in the waters, that is, of the devil. And You have given him as food to the peoples of the Ethiopians—so that, by a reversal, those whom he had first devoured in vain persuasions might be devoured and crushed by them through the sign of the cross.

You have broken through the fountains, etc. The apostles, or the other preachers.

Yours is the day, and yours is the night. The brightness of the Gospel, or the obscurity of the Law: because both proclaim you. You have made the sun. That man through whom those sitting in darkness saw a great light. And the moon. The Church, which shines in the darknesses of the world.

You have made all the boundaries of the earth. For by your command all things were created. Summer and spring you formed them. Although God made both the seasons of the year and all the elements of the world, nevertheless according to the allegory, we call it spring when the righteous flourish in this world with good works: summer, when they receive the fruit of their labor.

Remember this, the enemy has reproached the Lord, and a foolish people has provoked your name. Your martyrs stand in the contest, the devil reproaches, the gentile people exasperates. You, Lord, remember those who for the love of your name suffer such things.

Do not hand over to beasts the souls that confess you. O devil, O ministers of the devil, who do not wish to devour bodies but souls. For then is the soul devoured by the mouth of the beast, when it gives assent to the diabolical will. Do not forget your poor unto the end. And if for a time they are subjected to tribulations, let them not perish; but being tested, let them be made manifest.

Look upon your testament, because they are filled up, those who have been darkened by the thorns of iniquities. Thorns are interpreted as briars. Those therefore who have darkened your earth by their persecutions are filled with the briars of iniquity. But you, O Lord, who through your Testament, whether old or new, since both proceeded from you and are held as it were one, have promised to protect your people, now that the thorns are cut down, deliver us.

Let not the humble man, made confused, be turned away. Let him not forget you, who is worn down in many tribulations. The poor and the needy shall praise your name. When they have received your promises.

Arise, O God, judge your cause. For those reproaches which either you endured for us, or the Church now endures. Remember your reproaches: those which are from the foolish one all day long. That they may be confounded in judgment.

Do not forget the voice of your enemies. Those who surely call upon you in present pressures, let them be consoled by you. The pride of those who hate you ascends always. For unless their pride ascends, these are not humbled. For so also the Lord says in the Apocalypse: Let the impious one act impiously, and let the unjust one do iniquity all the more (Apoc. 22). Behold, I come quickly, and my reward is with me. We also, suppliant, beseech you, O Lord, that having snatched us from the thorns of iniquities, from the buskin of ruinous pride, after contempt of the world you may deign to raise us to heaven.

PSALM 74.

Unto the end, corrupt not, a psalm of the Canticle of Asaph. Asaph is interpreted synagogue. In the Hebrew it does not have "unto the end," but it has "Victory." And the Seventy translators did not greatly err, since victory is perfect. Well did he say, Unto the end, corrupt not. This word is interpreted in many ways. David also says to a certain one of his friends: Corrupt him not: that is, Saul. See what he says. And in another place we read that David blessed the Lord, because his hands were kept, that is, that he not kill Saul. And we therefore, when we do not kill anyone, our hands are kept.

Others say that this psalm was composed by David and sung by Asaph. Others, however, say that Asaph himself both composed and sang it. Therefore, according to the Septuagint, he says this: O Lord, you who kept me, so that I would not lay my hand upon your Christ Saul, keep me to the end.

We will confess to you, O God. Here, "we will confess" does not signify repentance, but glory. And we will invoke your name. The name of God is "Father," for previously it was unknown. For the Lord says: Father, I have revealed your name to men (John 17). For every Son is the name of the Father.

We will tell of your wondrous works. This the Church says; this the multitude of believers says. We will tell of your wondrous works. This verse is joined with the preceding ones; but the one that follows is spoken in the person of the Lord. For thus the ancients interpreted it.

When I receive the time, I will judge justices. For now he is not judge, but will be. For if he were judge now, sinners would not be raised up, and would not obtain riches in the world. Does this scandalize you: that the just flee, and sinners persecute? Does this scandalize you: that iniquity reigns in the world? Hear the Lord saying: When I receive the time, I will judge justices. For the time of judgment has been reserved. In the present there is not judgment, but contest. For the Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son.

Hearing this, then, do not be scandalized and say: "The one who receives is lesser than the one who gives." But see what he says in the Gospel: "For neither does the Father judge anyone, but he has given all judgment to the Son, because he is the Son of Man" (John 3). He gives the reason why he received judgment: because he is the Son of Man. You hear "Son of Man," and do you doubt why he received it?

PSALM 75

Unto the end, in songs, a psalm of Asaph, a canticle against the Assyrians.

God is known in Judaea; in Israel his name is great. Before the cross enlightened the world, and before the Lord was seen on earth, God was known in Judaea, and in Israel his name was great. But when the Savior came, their sound went forth into all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world (Psalm 18).

And his place was made in peace. In Hebrew this is said as "in Salem." According to the letter, then, he seems to speak of Jerusalem, which was formerly called Salem, and afterward Jebus, and then was called Jerusalem, in which Melchizedek was king. We read: "You are a priest forever, according to the order of Melchizedek" (Psalm 109). He did not say "according to the order of Aaron," but "of Melchizedek." What did he mean to say: "You are a priest forever, according to the order of Melchizedek"? It is clear that in that place it is said of Christ. But what does he say, "according to the order of Melchizedek"? Aaron offered victims, Aaron poured out the blood of sacrifices. Melchizedek did none of these things, but only offered bread and wine (Genesis).

14). This, then, is what Melchizedek did, and for this reason it is said, according to the order of Melchizedek. In the Hebrew it has: And his tabernacle was made in Salem. See what he says according to tropology: there is no tabernacle of the Lord except where peace is. Where there is zeal and discord, there God is not the protector. Let us also speak according to the Septuagint. There is no place of God except in a soul that has peace. Therefore, whatever soul does not have peace, let it know that it is not a place of God. My peace I give to you: my peace I leave to you (John 14). This is the Savior's inheritance. And his dwelling place is in Zion. According to the letter we can say Jerusalem and Zion, since the temple was there. According to tropology, however, and anagogy, we say: because the dwelling place of God is in Zion. Zion is interpreted as watchtower. Therefore, in whatever soul there is knowledge of the Scriptures and doctrine, there God dwells.

There he broke the strength of bows. Where? In Jerusalem and Zion. Jerusalem is interpreted as peace; Zion, as watchtower. Let us see, then, what peace is, and what the watchtower is. Let us interpret it in two ways: either the human soul in which the peace of God and contemplation are, or certainly the Church, or certainly the holy Scripture. For there peace is, and there is the dwelling place and watchtower of God. There he broke the strength of bows—those burning arrows that the devil was sending. Shield, sword, and war—that war of which it is said in another place: Scatter the nations that desire wars (Psalm 67). And what follows?

Sela, which the Seventy interpret as diapsalma, is called in Hebrew "always." See, then, that the Lord always breaks the belt, the sword, and the war.

Illuminating you wondrously from the eternal mountains. We interpret the mountains in two ways: in the Old Testament, the prophets; in the New Testament, the apostles. Of these mountains it says: I lifted up my eyes to the mountains, whence my help will come (Ps. 120). Upon these mountains the city of God is also placed. A city set upon a mountain cannot be hidden. We all sat in darkness and in the shadow of death, and the Lord shone upon us from the eternal mountains (Matt. 5), that is, from the prophets and the apostles. All the foolish in heart are troubled. We can say this verse of the unbelievers.

They slept their sleep, and found nothing, etc. Truly this life is a sleep, and so are riches. For when we seem to hold them, we immediately lose them. As that which is written in the prophet: As when someone sleeps thirsty and, if he finds water, drinks, afterward when he has awakened the thirst itself remains (Isa. 29), so also are riches in this world: while we hold them, we lose them.

They slept who mounted horses. Let us speak according to the tropological sense. Finally, Pharaoh mounted horses, and he slept, and he perished. The Egyptians had horses, but they perished. Hence it was also commanded in the Law: let not a Hebrew have horses. Finally, Solomon did not have a horse from Jerusalem or from Judea, but he bought them for himself from Egypt. Horses are always sold in Egypt. Some in chariots, and some in horses: but we will call upon the name of the Lord our God. Those, therefore, who mounted horses, slept and perished. Our Lord also has horses; he also has shining mountains. On the contrary, the devil also has dark mountains. Just as, therefore, there are shining mountains and dark mountains, so there are also good horses and bad horses. We have spoken of bad horses; let us speak also of good horses. At that time when they came to Elisha to seize him, the servant went out and saw the army around the Assyrians, and he said to Elisha: Do not fear, for those with us are more than those with them. And there it is written: Lord, open the eyes of your servant, that he may see. And, with his eyes opened, the servant saw chariots and horses. These were helpers. See, therefore, what it says: chariots and horses. There was no man upon them, but they were chariots and horses only—this is what it means to say. The multitude of angels, they themselves were both chariots and horses; but the rider was the Lord. Therefore it says in the Canticle of Habakkuk: And your riding is salvation.

iii). This is said to God. O if only we were God's horses, and God would deign to mount upon us! Those contrary horses, then, slumbered, and their riders.

From that time your wrath. From what time is God's wrath? When the people cried out to Aaron in the wilderness, saying: Make us gods whom we may follow (Exod. 32). For this Moses, who led us out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has happened to him. You led them out of the land of Egypt, and at once they denied you.

You made a judgment heard from heaven. You spoke from heaven, all the people heard, and trembled: and yet they did not believe in you. The earth trembled, and was still, but Israel neither feared nor was still.

For the thought of man shall confess to you. This is what is said in another place: Cleanse me from my hidden faults, and spare your servant from those belonging to others (Ps. 18). Belonging to others, away from you, whom the devil sends in. And what follows? If they have not had dominion over me: then I shall be spotless. If evil thoughts have not conquered me, then I shall be clean in your sight. And what follows at once? And I shall be cleansed from the greatest transgression. See what he says. If a thought has not conquered me, and has not brought me to the deed: I have been freed from a great sin. For the thought of man shall confess to you. For no one is clean in the sight of God, not even if his life be but one day. The stars are not clean in the sight of God, and against his angels he has devised something perverse (Job 15 and 25). Why all this?

For if the stars are not clean, if perversity is found even among the angels, how much more in the thoughts of men! Where are those who say, "Depart from me, for I am clean"? Every day we suffer something; what goes on in our thoughts, we know, and we blush to speak of it. Many are those who have not done evil deeds, and others who have not even spoken evil; but apart from them, no man is found who has not sinned in thought. Therefore he now says, "For the thought of man shall confess to you."

To the terrible one. To whom? To God. And to him who takes away the spirit of princes. When we see certain powerful men—for example, emperors, prefects, and those exceedingly powerful in this world—let us too say to God: "Who takes away the spirit of princes." We can understand "spirit" as referring to the soul, and we can also understand it as referring to pride. Let us understand it as referring to pride, and also in another way: "who takes away the spirit of princes." By "princes" here we understand the saints. As if he were saying: Solomon was a prince, the saints of foreign nations were princes, the Apostle Judas was also a prince, and because they sinned, God took the Holy Spirit from them. Let no one therefore say: I am a bishop, or a deacon, or a monk; I am a prince in this world; God is able to take away the spirit of princes. Finally, so that you may know that God takes away the spirit: the good Spirit of God departed from Saul, and an evil spirit suffocated him. It follows: "And the evil Spirit of God suffocated him" (1 Kings 16). So does God have an evil spirit?

By no means; but the Spirit of God had withdrawn for this reason, that afterwards the evil spirit might choke him: therefore the Spirit of God is called evil. Finally, holy David, knowing that the spirit takes away princes, asks God and says: Take not your holy Spirit from me (Ps. 50). He is terrible among the kings of the earth. And this is understood according to the letter. Otherwise, may God grant us to be kings of the earth. Kings of the earth, that we may rule our flesh. Whence the Apostle also says: Let not sin reign in your mortal body (Rom. 6). And in another place it is written: Why do you rule in the hand of God (Prov. 21)? The heart of Julian the persecutor was in the hand of God. The heart of Saul was in the hand of God. The heart of Manasseh was in the hand of God, and the hearts of all the impious kings of Judah were in the hand of the Lord. You see that it cannot stand according to the letter. The holy kings, then, are those whose heart is in the hand of the Lord. And so let us also ask God that we may be kings, that we may rule our flesh, that it may be subject to us. Whence the Apostle also says: Therefore I chastise my body and bring it into servitude, lest perhaps, preaching to others, I myself become a castaway (1 Cor. 9). Let our soul rule, let the body serve, and at once Christ will come and dwell in us. Finally, what does he himself say in the Gospel? I will come, he says, and I will stand before the door and knock: and if anyone opens to me, I will enter and dine with him (Apoc. 3). Every day Christ stands before the door of our heart and desires to enter.

Let us open to him, and he will enter into us, and he will be our guest and our table-companion, that is, he will also eat with us; to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.

PSALM LXXVI.

Unto the end, for Idithun, a Psalm of Asaph. In the Hebrew it is "for Idithun," meaning that the psalm was sung not on his behalf but through him. But what follows, "a Psalm of Asaph," is not found in the old copies.

With my voice I cried to the Lord: with my voice to God, and he gave heed to me. In the day of my tribulation I sought God. See how, being in tribulation, he entreats both the Lord and God, and yet there is one God. With my voice I cried to the Lord. To cry out is necessary at that time when he who cries is far off. Therefore this man says this, that is, because on account of my sins I am far from you; for this reason I cry out that you may hear me. With my voice to the Lord, and he gave heed to me. This is the same as what he says also in another place: When I was in trouble I cried to the Lord, and he heard me (Psalm cxix).

In the day of my tribulation, I sought God. He says a difficult thing: when we are in tribulation, we are cast down to the earth; we think of nothing but our tribulation. But this man is stirred in tribulation to entreat God. As if he plainly said, I have lost my son; my house has been burned; I have come to beggary: I do not seek what I lost, but I seek the Lord. For if I find him, in him I find all things. Seek first the kingdom of God, and all these things shall be added to you (Matt. 6). My hands by night before him: and I was not deceived. The Hebrew has it otherwise: My hand is stretched out by night, and does not rest. My hands by night before him—the word "I cried" is understood. See, then, that our works also, while we are silent, cry out to the Lord; for this reason it is said: The word of the Lord was made in the hand of Haggai the prophet (Hag. 1). It is not made in his mouth, that is, in speech, but in his hand, that is, in deed. My hands by night—that is, I cried with my hands. For this reason it is also said to Moses: Why do you cry to me? And yet it is not written there that Moses cried to God, but that his heart cried: Abba, Father (Exod. 14). Hence what is said in Jeremiah: My eye's pupil has not been silent (Lam. 2).

See, therefore, that even the pupil of our eye is not silent, but as often as we pour forth tears, so often do we cry out to God: My hands are before God by night—that is, what is said: In the nights lift up your hands in the holy place, and bless the Lord (Ps. 133). In the night of this world, and in the darkness, when others were hastening to vices, I lifted up my works to you alone. And I have not been deceived: for so I cried out, and cried out in deed. I have not been deceived. This is understood in two ways: either I obtained what I wished, or certainly I was not deceived by the snares of the devil, who desired to circumvent me. But in the Hebrew it is written: My hand is stretched out in the night, and does not rest. The hand is always stretched out to virtues, sometimes drawn back to sins.

My soul refused to be comforted. As far as it was in my sins, I could be comforted by no hope. I remembered God, and was delighted. As far as it was in my sins, I could find no consolation. Again I thought upon God, and in his mercy I was delighted. In the Hebrew it reads otherwise: I remembered God, and was troubled. I considered his gentleness, I considered his loving-kindness, I considered his purity, and seeing myself impure, I was vehemently troubled. I was exercised, and my spirit failed. In the Hebrew it reads better: I spoke within myself, and my spirit failed—whether from despair, or from desire for God.

My eyes anticipated the watches. In the Hebrew it reads otherwise: I was restraining the suspect thing of my eyes, I was stunned, and I did not speak. What he says is this: Considering my sins, I did not dare to raise my eyes to heaven; for God says to the sinner: Why do you declare my righteous deeds? Therefore I was stunned, I was afraid, I could not speak. This according to the Hebrews. My eyes anticipated the watches: Before anyone was keeping watch, I was watching. We read also in Daniel: And behold, he says, ir, that is, watchful. He who keeps Israel has not slumbered nor will he sleep. Therefore a monk who does not keep watch cannot say this verse.

I was troubled, and I did not speak. This is what the Apostle says: Let not the sun go down upon your anger. I was troubled, as a man; I did not speak, as a Christian. Anger began in my heart; but I did not bring forth anger into words.

I considered the days of old, and I held the eternal years in my mind. As far as my sins were concerned, I was despairing, and my soul had refused to be comforted. I began to consider from the beginning of the world, when God made man, up to my own year; from Adam up to my own time.

I meditated in the night with my heart, and I swept my spirit: I was not thinking about anger, I was not thinking about my enemy; but all my thought was about God. The night, which is accustomed to be for rest or for lust, was for me a thought about the virtues. I meditated in the night with my heart, and I swept my spirit: that is, I was digging, as it were, a field, so that I might sow there the seed of the Lord's teachings.

Will God cast off forever? This was all my thought: God made man from the earth, and promised him eternal life: how then was he cast out of paradise? And will he not add to him, that he may please him still? Or will he cut off his mercy to the end from generation to generation? That is, will he cast off both generations, both of the former people and of the following? And if he has cast off the people of the Jews, will he also cast off the peoples of the Gentiles?

Or will he hold back his mercies in anger. He could not have put it more beautifully: although he holds himself back so as not to show mercy, nevertheless his mercy conquers him.

And I said, now I have begun. In the Hebrew it reads differently: And I said, my weakness: that is, this which I suffer is not from the cruelty of God, but from my sins. This is the change of the right hand of the Most High: that the Lord may show mercy, that he may give his grace to the whole world: that he may not hold back his mercies in his anger. This is the change of the right hand of the Most High: unless his right hand, that is, his Son, has been changed and has taken up the body of a man, we cannot receive mercy. And I said, now I have begun, this is the change of the right hand of the Most High. Who, though he was established in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant (Philippians 2).

I was mindful of the works of the Lord. Which he had done for Moses, which he had done for the saints. Because I will be mindful from the beginning of your wonders, and I will meditate on all your works, etc. My whole thought is concerning your virtues. I consider how you have shown mercy to them, and I do not despair concerning myself.

God, your way is in the holy one. Therefore whoever is not holy, the way of God is not in him. What is the way of God? I am the way and the truth. The Savior says this. The way of God, therefore, is the Son, but the way of God is not except in the holy one. We wish Christ to dwell in us; let us be holy. For the way of God is in the holy one. Who is a great God as our God? For just as there are many gods and many lords—the Apostle says this: God stood in the synagogue of gods. I said, you are gods, and all sons of the Most High. And to Moses: I have made you a god to Pharaoh. The saints are called gods. They are gods by grace; but you are God by nature. You are the God who works wonders. He did not say, "who worked wonders," but "who works wonders." Every day God works wonders, and the Son works, and the Holy Spirit. You are God, who works wonders. Yesterday a thief, today a Christian. Yesterday a fornicator, today continent. Yesterday you were seizing what belonged to others, now you extend your own.

You have made your power known among the peoples. Christ, the power of God and the wisdom of God, has now made known among the peoples the mystery that had been hidden from ages past. You have redeemed your people with your arm. Lord, who has believed our report, and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? You have redeemed your people with your arm: that is, in Christ. The sons of Jacob and of Joseph: both peoples, both of the Jews and of the Christians. Jacob in the people of the Jews, and Joseph in the people of the Gentiles. Finally, Joseph in the Hebrew tongue is interpreted as increase. Those, then, came first, and we have been joined to them; therefore he says, the sons of Jacob and Joseph.

The waters saw you, O God: the waters saw you, and they were afraid. Meanwhile let us speak according to the letter, and let us cling to the earth for the sake of the simpler sort. When the people passed through the Red Sea and through the Jordan, the waters understood their Creator, and the people did not understand. And the deeps were troubled. The sea saw and fled: the Jordan was turned backward (Ps. 113).

The multitude of the sound of waters, the clouds poured down. Instead of "clouds," the Hebrew has "waters." What he says, "The clouds gave forth a voice," they interpret as when God was seen on Mount Sinai.

For indeed your arrows went about: the voice of your thunder in the wheel. And this they interpret concerning lightnings, and they say: when God thunders, he makes a voice like a wheel. You see how I still cling to the earth, and speak according to the letter that passes away.

Your lightnings shone forth to the orb of the earth. Here what do you do, O Jew? In the sea is your way, and your paths in many waters. And do this, either to be said of the sea, or of the Jordan. And your footsteps will not be known. How do you understand this according to the letter? For the sake of the simpler ones we have spoken according to the letter: let us return, then, to the spiritual understanding. The waters saw you, O God. Let us speak of the revelation of John. Many waters, he says, are many peoples (Rev. 17). The waters saw you, O God. Which waters? Even the waters that are above the heavens, let them praise the name of the Lord (Ps. 148). The waters saw you, O God. Minds and souls that are pure. The waters saw you and feared. The fear was not from hatred, but from faith. And the deeps were troubled. Let us say something according to the spiritual understanding. In the beginning of Genesis it is written: And over the waters, he says, the spirit was being borne. And then it is written: Over the deeps, he says, darkness was being borne.

See, then, what is said at the beginning of Genesis—that is, according to the spiritual understanding. "Over the waters," it says, "the spirit was borne." Even at that time baptism was being signified. For baptism could not exist without the spirit. But over the abysses there were darkness. This is the abyss to which the demons beg not to be sent by Jesus. Over the abysses, then, darkness. In the waters there was purity; in the abysses, darkness. What the abysses are, you understand even while I keep silent—since the demons dread to go into the abyss. The clouds gave forth a voice. The clouds are the prophets: they were silent to the Jews, but for us they have spoken. The clouds gave forth a voice, for indeed your arrows have passed through. The preaching of the word of Christ has run through the whole world. The voice of your thunder in the wheel. Thunder is properly a great voice. Finally, at that time when God spoke—"This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased"—the voice was made like a wheel (Matt. 3). Wherefore it is written: Deep calls to deep in the voice of your cataracts (Ps. 41)—that is, the two Testaments, the New and the Old. The voice of your thunder in the wheel. The voice of your preaching in the wheel. Therefore it is called a great voice, because great is the preaching. The voice of your thunder in the wheel: throughout the whole world, in a circuit. What you speak is heard not only in Judea, but also in the world. We have said this in a general way. But let us speak specifically about the inner man.

The wheel stands on the earth with a kind of slight trace, and not only stands but, as it were, runs through: it does not stand, but touches and passes by. Finally, when it rolls, it rises to higher things. So too the holy man, since he is in the body, has the necessity of thinking some things from earthly matters: and when he comes to food and clothing and other such things, having food and clothing, he is content with these, and touching the earth, he hastens to higher things (1 Tim. 6). He who runs and hastens to higher things—your word is in him (Zach. 9). We read also in the prophet, holy stones are rolled over the earth (Ezech. 1). See what he said: Holy stones are rolled over the earth. For because they are wheels, therefore they are rolled over the earth and hasten to higher things. Do you wish to know of more wheels? We read also of a wheel within a wheel. We read also in Ezechiel: The wheels cling to one another. The two wheels are the New and the Old Testament. This wheel clings to that, and that to this. Yet see what is said, and in Ezechiel: And wherever, he says, the spirit led, there the wheels also followed. This is also said in Ecclesiastes: that at the consummation of the world the wheel will roll over the lake (Eccli. 12). There are many things that may be said about the wheels; but our discourse hastens to the remaining matters. Your lightnings shone upon the orb of the earth: the apostolic preaching. It was moved, and the earth trembled. Unless our earth had been moved and thrown into confusion, we would not be Christians. It was moved, and the earth trembled.

For the Spirit of the Lord rests upon no one except the humble, the quiet, and the one who trembles at his words (Isa. 66).

Your way is in the sea. Where there are waves, where there is bitter water, where the dragon dwells, where tiny little fish cling. Your way is in the sea. You who were in heaven have descended to earth. According to the letter we can say: At the time when Moses led Israel out, you were the one leading them (Exod. 14). Your way is in the sea. Then we can also say in another way, according to the history: the seas were a way for you. But that he did once. Otherwise, daily he speaks to the sea: Be silent, be still. The Lord calms you, so that we may pass through this age. Your way is in the sea. He came, the fountain of life, to sweeten the sea. The bitter sea, the dead sea. Therefore, according to Ezekiel: from the temple of the Lord goes out a fountain of living water, and it goes to the Dead Sea, which had nothing living in it (Ezek. 47). For no little fish could exist in the Dead Sea; nothing was alive in the Dead Sea. From the temple of the Lord, that is, from his bosom, the Savior went forth, and he sweetened the Dead Sea and the bitter waters. Your way is in the sea, and your paths in many waters. Therefore your way is in the sea: so that you might make a way, and your apostles might follow you.

And your paths are in many waters, and your footsteps will not be known: you led your people like sheep. The good shepherd led his people like sheep. By the hand of Moses and Aaron. He did this according to the letter. But otherwise he does it daily in us. By the hand of Moses, that is, in the law. But we know that the law is spiritual. In your spiritual law and Aaron: that is, in the priesthood. In your spiritual law and in your spiritual priesthood, you have led us, your people (Rom. 7). Let us understand this according to the letter concerning Moses and Aaron. Moses and Aaron were indeed led out, but not brought into the land of promise. Jesus succeeded him. See what is written: Moses died in the desert; Aaron died; Miriam died, and this is what is written in the prophet: and I will strike, he says, the three shepherds in one month. They died; for they could not enter into the land of promise (Zech. 1). They only saw the land of promise from afar, and could not enter. The Jews saw the land of promise, and could not enter. For they died in the desert, and their corpses are in the wilderness, of those who died in the desert. We, as sons under the leader Jesus, came to the Jordan and entered the land of promise, and came to Gilgal, and were circumcised a second time with a spiritual circumcision, and the reproach of Egypt was taken away from us.

Now Jesus himself, our leader, holds the sword, and always goes before us, and fights for us and conquers our adversaries, and for seven days we marched around Jericho: that is, this world. We sing with the priestly trumpets, and we march around Jericho: that is, this world, and its walls fall, and we enter in, and we come out as victors. Then we conquer the city of Ai: afterward we come to Jebus: we come to Azor: we come to other cities, we conquer the adversaries whom we could not conquer under Moses. Let us therefore give thanks to our leader Jesus; for with him as our leader, with him fighting, we conquer. He commanded the sun to stand still, and it stood still: and in his type that great man was the one commanding, but the Lord was the one effecting it. He came out as victor, he—as I have often said—killed five kings in the cave, he led us into the land of promise. To him let us give thanks; he is the son of Nun, which we read as Nave; he is the one who was called Osee, which we read as Ause. For it is not said Ause according to the Hebrew truth, but Osee, that is, savior. Truly a savior: for he saves us, and led us out from the desert, and brought us into the land of promise, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.

PSALM 77.

Divine Scripture instructs us that when we have been invited to a rich man's banquet, we should put our hand to the dishes with understanding. Therefore for us too a rich banquet of the Scriptures has been set before us. We have come into a meadow where the herbs are in flower: here the rose blushes, there the lilies shine white, and there are various flowers. Our soul is drawn hither and thither, so that it may gather the fairer flowers. If we pick the rose, we leave the lily; if we take the lily, the violets remain for us. So too in the seventy-seventh psalm, which is mystical and wrapped in very many sacraments: whatever letter you look at, they are flowers. The flowers are various, and we cannot gather them all. But let us choose all that we can; from a few the dignity of the other flowers can also be contemplated. The understanding of Asaph. By this title it is prefaced. The title itself summons us to understanding. Asaph was one of the choir-masters, as were also the sons of Korah, and Jeduthun, and the others. So from the other choir-masters, this man too is one prophet. Since, then, the understanding is simple, and in the psalm the history is narrated, we are compelled by necessity to understand everything that has been written according to the understanding. It is written: In the land of Egypt, in the field of Tanis; He divided the sea and led them out in a cloud by day, and all night in the light of fire, and the rest. We see that the history is narrated in a simple manner.

If therefore we have understood it as it is written, the title prefixed, "Understanding of Asaph," is without cause; but if we have understood it as the title is prefixed, we are compelled by necessity to have one thing in the letter and to find another in the spirit.

Attend, my people, to my law: incline your ear to the words of my mouth. I will open my mouth in parables, and I will speak propositions from the beginning. You see that it is well written above: "Understanding of Asaph." Finally, the prophecy itself begins thus: Attend, my people, to my law—not the law of Moses, but my law. Incline your ear to the words of my mouth. This is what he says in the Gospel: He who has ears to hear, let him hear (Luke 8). I will open my mouth in parables. I will open to you what was closed to the Jews. I will open my mouth in parables. And without parables, he says, he did not speak to them; but to his disciples he explained the parables in private (Mark 4). I will open my mouth in parables. What I speak to them in parables outwardly, I will open to you inwardly. And I will speak propositions from the beginning. For "propositions," the Hebrew has "in a riddle." Therefore everything that is said is a riddle. A riddle is not this thing that is said, but something else is signified. Let someone say to me: You are doing violence to Scripture; for since the title has "Understanding of Asaph," you interpret this saying to me from the person of Christ. Let us interpret this saying from the person of Christ, if we are Christians.

But we are Christians, who have received the baptism of Christ, and we not only confess but also profess that we are Christians. We ought therefore to believe the Evangelists. It is written in the Gospel according to Matthew: When, he says, our Lord and Savior had spoken in parables, and they did not understand (Matt. 3): and the rest which is written in the Gospel. And afterward, what did the evangelist add? All these things, he says, were done that it might be fulfilled which is written: I will open my mouth in parables, and I will speak dark sayings from the beginning. You see, therefore, that the evangelist Matthew understood this as spoken in the person of Christ. For when he had brought in the Lord speaking in parables, and they did not understand: this, he says, was done that it might be fulfilled which is written: I will open my mouth in parables, and I will speak dark sayings from the beginning. It seems to us that no question remains, but attend carefully (John 5): for it is my study not to declaim in the manner of a rhetorician, but to lay open the sense of the Scriptures. Finally, what did the Lord and Savior also say? Search the Scriptures, and there you will find how it is written of me. And elsewhere he said to the Jews: You err, not knowing the Scriptures, nor the power of God. See what he says: You err. Why? Not knowing the Scriptures (Mark 12). But because you do not know the Scriptures: therefore you do not know Christ, who is the power of God and the wisdom of God.

It is therefore said in Matthew: “These things,” he says, “were done, that what was written in the prophet Asaph might be fulfilled.” Thus it is found in all the old manuscripts, but ignorant men have removed it. In short, many copies of the Gospel even to this day have it thus: “That what was written by the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled: I will open my mouth in parables, and I will speak dark sayings from the beginning.” Isaiah does not say this, but Asaph. Indeed, that impious Porphyry also brings this very charge against us, and says: “Your evangelist Matthew was so unlearned as to say: ‘What was written by the prophet Isaiah: I will open my mouth in parables, and I will speak dark sayings from the beginning.’” So let us say plainly: just as it is written in the Gospel, so it is written in Matthew and John, that our Lord was crucified at the sixth hour. Again it is written in Mark that he was crucified at the third hour. This seems to be contradictory, but it is not contradictory. It was an error of the scribes; and in Mark it was written “the sixth hour,” but many took the Greek episemon to be something else, just as there too there was an error of the scribes, so that instead of Asaph they wrote Isaiah. For we know that the first Church was gathered from unlearned Gentiles. Therefore when they read in the Gospel: “That what was written in the prophet Asaph might be fulfilled,” the one who was first writing the Gospel began to say: “Who is this prophet Asaph?” He was not known among the people, and this he did, so that while he corrected an error, he made an error.

Let us say something similar, and in another place in the Gospel according to Matthew: when Judas returned the thirty pieces of silver, and the priests were unwilling to accept them, nor to put them into the treasury, because it was the price of blood; and they bought with them the potter's field for the burial of strangers (Matthew 27). The price of Christ is our burial, and that field is called Akeldama, which means, field of blood. The field of blood is not the burial place of the Jews, but ours. For we were strangers and foreigners, and we had no place where we might rest. He was crucified and died, and we were buried together with him. That it might be fulfilled, he says, which was written in the prophet Jeremiah: He returned, he says, the thirty pieces of silver, the price at which he was valued, and the rest. As it is written, he says, in the prophet Jeremiah: this is written in Matthew. We have searched in the prophet Jeremiah, and we have not been able to find this at all, but we have found it in Zechariah: You see, therefore, that here too there was an error, just as there.

How much we have heard and known. These verses from "Attend, my people, to my law" up to this verse "I will speak parables from the beginning" are spoken in the person of Christ, and the Savior himself speaks. But the remaining verses up to the end of the psalm we must understand in the person of the apostles. Therefore, when the Lord says, "Incline your ear to the words of my mouth," he says: O apostles, what you have heard in secret, preach upon the housetops. What do the apostles say? "How much we have heard and known," and the patriarchs and prophets spoke to us. "And our fathers have told us." "They are not hidden from their children," etc. For this reason they spoke, so that we, their children, might know. And he placed a law in Israel: how much he commanded our fathers. To them these things were spoken carnally, but we understand them spiritually. "So that they might make them known to their children." That is, to us. For this reason it was spoken to them, so that they might pass it on to us.

To the sons who will be born and rise up, and will tell their sons. Instead of your fathers, he says, sons have been born to you (Ps. 44). We are their sons. They told us, and we have told our sons; we are their sons.

That they may set their hope in God. That they may no longer believe in idols, but believe in God. That they may not forget the works of God. That they may see the order of creation, and from the creation understand the Creator. And that they may seek out his commandments. Let them not despise them as the Jews did, but seek them out as Christians do (1 Cor. 10).

Nor let them become like their fathers. Let them not murmur as some murmured in the wilderness and perished. A crooked and provoking generation. It is not I who say this: your Prophet says this of you. A crooked and provoking generation. An adulterous and most wicked generation seeks a sign, and no sign will be given it except the sign of Jonah (Matt. 16). Why did he say crooked? Because they have become a crooked bow. For a bow is never drawn against the one who shoots it, but against adversaries. But this generation, though it was created upright by God and was held in God's hand like a bow, so that he might shoot arrows through it, has been turned, as it were, into a crooked bow, blaspheming against its Creator.

A generation that did not direct its heart. To this day Israel is perverse. And his spirit was not believed with God. Because it did not receive the Son, therefore it did not receive the Holy Spirit. Finally, the Holy Spirit, when he descended in the form of a dove, did not descend upon the crowds of the Jews, but upon one man, Jesus. If you wish, therefore, O Jew, to receive the spirit, believe in Jesus, because the Holy Spirit rests in Jesus.

The sons of Ephraim, bending and shooting the bow. O how great are the mysteries! O how many are the flowers! I do not say days, but not even a whole month could suffice for the understanding of this psalm. In each word there are meanings. We have also a treasure in these clay vessels. Many interpret this of the body and of the Holy Spirit: that is, we have a treasure in clay vessels. This understanding is indeed valid, but that one is much better, because we have a most precious treasure in clay vessels: that is, in the rustic words of the Scriptures. The sons of Ephraim, bending and shooting the bow, were turned back in the day of battle, and the rest. We read in the books of Kings that under Rehoboam the son of Solomon, Jeroboam the son of Nabath split the people from the rest of the people, and led ten tribes into Samaria (III Kings xii).

But the tribes of Judah and Benjamin remained under the rule of Rehoboam, and many from the tribe of Levi, the priests and Levites who lived in Jerusalem, as it is written in Paralipomenon, returned to the temple of God, that is, to Jerusalem (2 Par. 11). So there were three tribes: that is, Judah—Judah itself the royal tribe—and Benjamin, and afterward the Levites had come there from various tribes to the temple. Those, then, who were in Samaria had a king from the tribe of Ephraim. For just as those who reigned in Judah had a king from the tribe of Judah and the line of David, so those who reigned in Samaria had a king from the tribe of Ephraim, and their kings will be called Ephraim. Let us read the prophet Hosea, and we will find all his prophecy against Ephraim (Osee 7). And it is said there: Ephraim, he says, has become like a foolish dove. See what he says. For a foolish dove leaves the temple and lives in the woods. A dove always lives in houses. But Ephraim, my dove, has left the temple, has left the house, and lives in the woods, lives in the deserts. This for now according to the letter, for we must also set down the history. But now, after the letter, we must ascend to greater things, as it were by certain steps. Let us say, then, that the sons of Ephraim are all heretics. For they too have withdrawn from the house of God, and they too have abandoned David, and they were living in the deserts. And they are indeed called doves, because they themselves read the Scriptures, but they understand them foolishly.

Many are those who are called sons of Ephraim, bending and shooting the bow. Look at all the heretics, who have forsaken Jerusalem, who have forsaken the temple of God, who dwell in Samaria. Where did they make the golden calves? In Bethel and in Dan. And see what it says: They made golden calves in Bethel, in the house of God, and became idolaters. And they did this in Dan: that is, to their own judgment and condemnation. They forsook the house of the Lord, and think of nothing but gold. Let someone say, Why did they make golden calves? Our treasure is stored in vessels of clay. For the ecclesiastics are rustics and simple, but all heretics are Aristotelians and Platonists. Finally, so that you may know that all secular eloquence is called gold—that is, because their tongue is called, as it were, for the splendor of gold: Babylon is a golden cup in the hand of the Lord. See what it says: Babylon of confusion. Therefore this world is a golden cup. From this golden cup all nations are given to drink (Jer. li). The sons of Ephraim, bending and shooting the bow. Whatever writing of the heretics you see, they all have superstitions. They have turned back in the day of battle. They do not know him who said: My peace I give you, my peace I leave you (John xiv); but they are prepared for words. They have words, but they will hear what is written: Scatter the nations that desire wars (Ps. lxvii).

Let someone say that this is our meaning: let us consider what follows.

They did not keep the testament of God, and they were unwilling to walk in his law, and they forgot his benefits. They rose up against him who regenerated them in baptism. And they forgot his wonders which he showed to them. See the sense of the Scriptures, how from the sons of Ephraim it comes to past histories: so that what is written, I will open my mouth in parables, I will speak dark sayings from the beginning, he shows to have been said figuratively.

Before their fathers he did wonders in the land of Egypt, in the field of Tanis: he divided the sea and led them through, he set the waters as in a wineskin, and he led them in a cloud by day. Let someone say: You are doing violence to the Scripture; for it is said simply of the people of Israel, when they were led out of the land of Egypt, and therefore it is said according to history. And we have read of the ten tribes that they forsook God, and became idolaters, and as it were followed the golden calves. Let us see at what time Asaph the prophet was. Surely at that time when David was, for forty years. Again Solomon for another forty years. After eighty years under Rehoboam, afterwards the ten tribes were divided. You see, then, that what is said is not said of the ten tribes, but is prophesied of the heretics. Before their fathers he did wonders. The heretics, then, forgot their father, who did wonders in the land of Egypt, in the darkness of this world, how he delivered them.

In the Church they were reborn, and afterward, where they were born, the Church displeases them. In the land of Egypt, in the field of Tanis: where there is idolatry, where the king of Egypt is, where the cavalry of Egypt is, where Jannes and Jambres, the adversaries of Moses, are, where idolatry is. We were all in Egypt, and we have been set free by the Lord. He broke the sea, and brought them out. The Lord was walking upon the sea, and he calmed the waves of the sea, and he led us through. He broke the sea, and brought them out. To this day, O faithful monk, when you are led out of Egypt, the sea is broken, and so you are led out. He set the waters as if in a wineskin. In the Hebrew it does not have "wineskin," but "as a heap." And he led them in a cloud by day. Behold, the Lord has come into Egypt upon a light cloud. We ought to understand the light cloud either properly as the body of the Savior, which was light and weighed down by no sin, or certainly we ought to understand the light cloud as holy Mary, weighed down by no human seed. Behold, the Lord has come into Egypt, that is, into this world, upon a light cloud, the Virgin. And he led them in a cloud by day. Rightly he said "by day," for that cloud was not in darkness, but always in light. And all night in the illumination of fire. And the darknesses are not hidden from you. As the light is to you, so also is the night to you. And all night in the illumination of fire. Our Lord is a consuming fire. A consuming fire. He did not say what he consumes; he has left the understanding to us. Those who have built upon the foundation of Christ, wood, hay, stubble.

The Lord is a consuming fire to them. Fire has a twofold nature: it both gives light and burns. If we are sinners, it burns us; if we are righteous, it gives us light.

He split the rock in the desert. The rock was split for us in the wilderness. The rock was struck, and waters flowed. That rock which says: Let him who thirsts come and drink; from whose belly rivers flowed (John 7). And he gave them drink as in a great deep... In the desert, where there was no water, an abundance of waters was made for us.

And he brought water out of the rock, and brought forth waters like rivers, and they still went on to sin against him, etc. O the perversity of a depraved heart: it speaks evil against God, and he who ought to hunger for righteousness seeks meat and vegetables. For just as Moses struck the rock in the wilderness and brought forth waters for the people (Num. 20), so the Lord, whom Paul says was struck because of our sins (Rom. 4), brought forth for us immense fountains: namely, the apostles, whom the rock showed forth, and through whom torrents flowed. And by torrents we understand the teachers: through these torrents, that is, the subsequent teachers of the Churches, they were filled. From their preaching we quench our thirst for the word of God. But the same rock also showed forth for us the fount of baptism and of martyrdom. For when his side was struck, blood and water came forth, which prefigured baptism and martyrdom (John 19).

But the torrents are called teachers, because before they believed, they were filled from the rains and mire of this world. Now, however, washed by baptism, they have overflowed from the fountain of everlasting life. The Jewish murmuring adds, saying:

Can he also give bread, or prepare a table for his people? He thinks the power of God difficult: as though he who brought water out of the rock could not, as it were, give manna from heaven.

Therefore the Lord heard, and deferred. Surely he deferred to himself, lest they enter into the land of promise. And fire was kindled in Jacob, and wrath went up in Israel. Jacob is not always understood as the supplanter of vices, nor is Israel in all things taken as the one who sees God. But the Apostle teaches that there is an Israel according to the flesh (1 Cor 10), of whom it is said: And Israel committed fornication (Judg 8). For if he had seen God in his mind, he would certainly not have committed fornication. So too of Jacob, when he adored the one polluted with idols, saying: I see your face as the face of an angel of God (Gen 33); or when, grown fat, he kicked back, he was not the supplanter of vices. Therefore here too it must be understood thus: that the earthly fire of concupiscence was kindled in Jacob, and so in divine vengeance it went up over the carnal Israel.

Because they did not believe in God, nor hope in his salvation. They believed neither in the Father nor in the Son, who is the salvation of the world.

And he commanded the clouds from above, and opened the doors of heaven. And he rained manna upon them to eat. These things were granted to the Hebrews; but even now in the Church it is commanded to the prophets and apostles that they announce to us the word of preaching, by which the soul is spiritually fed. He gave them the bread of heaven; man ate the bread of angels. He himself provided food for man, who said: I am the bread of life, who came down from heaven; he who eats of it will live forever (John 6). For from this bread of heaven, the saints and the angels are refreshed. He sent them provisions in abundance, so that they might no longer be filled with the barley of the letter, but with the doctrine of spiritual wheat.

And he brought the south wind from heaven, and brought in the west wind by his power, and rained flesh upon them like dust, etc. In the winds he shows the breath of the Holy Spirit. But the gathering of the multitude, which is likened to dust or to the sand of the sea, proves their earthly and hard understanding.

And they fell in the midst of their camps, around their tents, and they ate and were more than satisfied. By camps he means the synagogues; by tents, their hearts, into which these things flowed down. But in saying they were more than satisfied, he rebukes their carnal gluttony: that those who ought to have been refreshed by God's commandments feel themselves filled with dusty flesh. And he brought them their desire: they were not deprived of their desire. Vast is the Lord's mercy, that he feeds with earthly food those who hunger: so too, whoever desires him he fills with the heavenly bread we mentioned above. Therefore let us see what those who desired only flesh and not God afterward endured.

While their food was still in their mouths, the wrath of God rose up against them, and it killed their fat ones. This is said of those who abandoned God after receiving the manna. For even now in the Church, if anyone is refreshed by the Flesh and Blood of Christ and turns aside to vices, let him know that God's judgment hangs over him, as the apostle Paul says: Whoever receives the body and blood of Christ unworthily takes judgment upon himself and drinks (1 Cor 11). And it hindered the elect of Israel. Even now the elect of the Church are hindered: if only the priests themselves would receive these sacraments without guilt.

In all these things they still sinned: and they did not believe in his wonders. And they failed, etc. The wicked sin daily, until they fail, and they fail with haste: those who despise obeying the priests of God, just as that people also murmured against Moses, the servant of God.

When he slew them, they sought him, and they returned, and at dawn they came to him. Having been scourged for their sins, they returned: and having shaken off the sleep of faithlessness, they made haste to hear the word of God.

And they remembered that God is their helper, and the Most High God is their redeemer. They understood that no help could be brought, except by him who freed them from the slavery of Egypt.

And they loved him with their mouth. When they said: All things whatsoever Moses has commanded, we will do (Exod. 2). And with their tongue they lied to him. Saying to Moses: All things whatsoever the Lord has said, we will do.

But their heart was not right with him, nor were they counted faithful in his covenant. For the Lord also, using the testimony of the prophet Isaiah, was saying: This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me (Isa. 29).

But he himself is merciful, and will be propitious to their sins, etc. For the multitude of his mercies restrains him, so that while he awaits repentance, he does not punish the offender: because he does not will the death of the sinner, but that he be converted and live (Ezek. 18).

And he remembered that they are flesh. For he knows that the flesh always resists the law of God. The spirit going and not returning. For he knows that man, once the spirit is lost, returns to dust. For even the Holy Spirit, when he withdraws from sinners, does not return to them as long as they are in the wallowings of sins.

How often they provoked him in the desert: they stirred him to anger in the waterless place. In unbelief, certainly, and in the dryness of their heart.

And they turned back and tempted God, and provoked the Holy One of Israel. Moses was then the holy one of Israel, who saw God both in mind and with his eyes, whom they kept provoking. But even now they provoke him, when they hear that he proclaims the Lord Christ who was to be born in the flesh.

They did not remember his hand: on the day when he redeemed them from the hand of the oppressor. Of Pharaoh, surely, who is figuratively called the devil.

As he set his signs in Egypt, and his wonders in the field of Tanis. For just as Moses then freed the people from Egypt by ten signs, that is, plagues, so too the apostle Paul by ten Epistles pressed down the darkness of the present world.

He turned their rivers into blood, and their rains, that they might not drink. The empty words of the philosophers, which in the Platonic teachings were killing the little ones of the Church, were turned against them by divine vengeance, even into gore, so that those who were shedding blood, that is, who were slaughtering souls by seducing them, might thereafter drink blood.

He sent among them the dog-fly, and it devoured them. In the dog-fly he indicated the sect of the Cynics, which proclaims lust and luxury to be the highest good. And the frog, and it destroyed them. In the croaking of frogs are designated the poems of the poets, which through the inflation of wordiness brought in the fables of destruction.

And he gave their fruits to the mildew. In the mildew, or blight, the form of fornication is shown. For just as this, creeping with slow effort, most cruelly lies in wait for the fruits of trees, so too this one, alluring men with flattery, most savagely devours them with iniquitous and hidden bites. And their labors to the locust. In the locust the discords of the human race are confuted. For though it leads its army in order without a king, yet the human race always disagrees and is at discord.

He killed their vineyards with hail, and their mulberry trees with frost. And he delivered their beasts of burden to the hail, and their possessions to fire. In the hail the divine chastisement is shown, in which either vineyards or trees are scourged—namely those which, instead of good fruits, had brought forth thorns. For by this hail even the beasts of burden are killed, so that the foolishness of those who gave the divine name to beasts may be reproved. Fire also is sent to consume vices and to enlighten the hearts of believers, as the Lord says: I came to send fire on the earth, and what do I desire but that it be kindled (Luke 12)?

He sent upon them the wrath of his indignation: indignation, and wrath, and tribulation, a sending by evil angels. So that those who were not reproved by divine plagues might be beaten by diabolical snares. But who these angels are, the Lord himself declared in the Gospel: Go, he says, into the fire which my Father prepared for the devil and his angels (Matt. 25).

He made a way for the path of his wrath, and he did not spare their souls from death, and he shut up their beasts in death. Divine wrath has a way, when in the avenging of sin someone handed over does not free his soul from the punishment of Gehenna. Or when foolishness, which is like beasts, is shut up in eternal death.

And he struck every firstborn in their land: the firstfruits of all their labor in the tabernacles of Cham. As these things are reported to have been done in Egypt, so also the Lord destroyed the principalities and powers, whether of demons or of vices, in this world by his sacrosanct advent, and triumphed on the wood of his cross, and drove them from the heart of those who had been devoted to diabolical cunning, because Chaima is interpreted as cunning.

And he took away his people like sheep, and led them like a flock in the desert. By these plagues Egypt was struck, and the Lord led his people out of the servitude described above, a people whom he had redeemed by his own blood, and he settled them in the Church, which had formerly been barren and deserted; of which it says: Many are the children of the desolate, more than of her who has a husband (Isa. 54).

And he led them out in hope, and they did not fear, and the sea covered their enemies. Once they were settled in the hope of eternity, the sea covered their enemies—that is, so that when they were washed in baptism, the devil with his armies might be drowned.

And he brought them into the mountain of his sanctification: into the mountain which his right hand acquired. Into that very Church which he acquired by the power of his glorious resurrection.

And he cast out the nations from before their face, and divided the land to them by lot with the line of distribution, and made the tribes of Israel dwell in their tabernacles. When the nations of sins had been cast out from human hearts, the possession of the land of the living was given to them; and it came about that where once the soothsayer and diviner had dwelt, there now dwells one who sees God with the mind.

And they tempted and provoked the most high God, and they did not keep his testimonies. And they turned away and did not keep the covenant, like their fathers. The discourse is now turned to the Jews, whom neither power nor divine benefits softened; but just as their fathers killed the prophets, so these also persecute the Lord himself. They were turned into a perverse bow. For that bow is perverse which, while it is thought to shoot an arrow against enemies, wounds the one holding it. So too the Jews, who shoot iniquitous arrows of words against God their deliverer.

They stirred him to anger on their hills, and provoked him to jealousy with their carved images. For having abandoned him, they served idols and graven images, worshipping even on the mountains.

The Lord heard and despised, and brought Israel very much to nothing—that Israel which was so in name only, and not in vision.

And he rejected the tabernacle of Shiloh, his own tabernacle, in which he dwelt among men. Either in the tabernacles of Shiloh under Eli, or in Jerusalem under Solomon. But these being rejected, he chose rather the temple of the virgin king uncorrupted, or of the holy Church called forth from the Gentiles.

He delivered their strength into captivity, and their beauty into the hands of the enemy; and he shut up his people in the sword, and he despised his inheritance. Their young men, etc. Here he plainly foretold that destruction which was carried out at Jerusalem under Titus and Vespasian. And because he foretold things as though already done, let the reader know that with God future things are already done. But would that this also be done in us, with the Lord cooperating, so that concupiscence may fall, with the power of the virtues raised up. Let the form of wicked love collapse, with the beauty of the Church raised up. Let the people of the vices be slain, with the multitude of the virtues brought to life. Let the earthly inheritance be rejected, let the kingdom of God be acquired. Let the little youth, that is, the beginning of sin, be burned up by the power of the Holy Spirit, and let the virgin soul rejoice together. Let the inciters of vile things be slaughtered by the sword, that is, by the word of God, so that minds widowed from these things may exult with Christ.

And the Lord was aroused as if from sleep, as a mighty man drunk with wine, and he struck his enemies on their hind parts, and gave them over to everlasting reproach. As one sleeping and, so to speak, drunk, the Lord is regarded in the hearts of the wicked. But when they begin to repent, he is aroused. And when their vices have been struck down even to the hindmost parts of their times, and they have been handed over to everlasting reproach, he keeps watch within them.

And he rejected the tabernacle of Joseph, and did not choose the tribe of Ephraim: but he chose the tribe of Judah, Mount Zion which he loved. He did not reject the tribe of Joseph or Ephraim for this reason, that he might spurn it forever: but he was unwilling to take flesh from it, choosing the tribe of Judah, from which blessed Mary would come forth, from whom he himself would be born, so that he might raise up the mountain of his love, that is, the Church.

And he built his sanctuary like that of unicorns on the earth, which he founded for the ages. He established that same Church of his with singular power, so that it might endure immovable through everlasting ages.

He chose David his servant, and took him from the flocks of sheep, and from following the ewes he received him. To pasture, etc. All these things must be referred to Christ the Lord, who by the Father's counsel was chosen for our redemption from the flock of mortals: taking flesh, pasturing the Christian people, whether as the supplanter of vices, or as one seeing God on the mountain. May he deign now to pasture his Church, clinging to his wills, in the goodness of his heart, and to place it in the heavenly Jerusalem. To him be glory with the eternal Father and the Holy Spirit, for ever and ever. Amen.

PSALM 78.

A psalm of Asaph. This psalm contains the voice of the prophet lamenting the captivity of the earthly Jerusalem: which captivity must be referred not so much to that city as to the soul, which is often written of as a city.

O God, the nations have come into your inheritance: they have defiled your holy temple. The Apostle says: You are the temple of God, and the Spirit of God dwells in you (1 Cor 3). If anyone violates the temple of God, God will destroy him. Therefore if the Christian soul succumbs as vices increase: then the inheritance which ought to have been God's is subjected to the adversary, and then the temple dedicated to the Holy Spirit, defiled by the crimes of the nations, is destroyed. They have set Jerusalem as a storehouse of fruits.

For just as fruits, when they begin to ripen, are guarded by their keepers, and when ripe are more easily devoured, so too our adversary, when vices rush in, keeps watch over the soul that consents to him, until by leading it to the full consent of his will, he may be able to devour it. For as long as a spark of faith shines in it, it is bitter to the teeth of the enemy.

They have set the corpses of your servants as food for the birds of the sky: the flesh of your holy ones for the beasts of the earth. They have poured out their blood like water around Jerusalem, and there was no one to bury them. These things were indeed done in Jerusalem before the Savior's coming: but they prefigured the passion of the infants, when their flesh was exposed to beasts and birds, that is, to persecutors, and such a multitude of blood was poured out that scarcely the little bodies of all could be buried. But the circuit around Jerusalem is understood as the mourning of the weeping Church, according to that saying: Rachel weeping for her children, and she would not be comforted, because they are not (Jeremiah 31; Matthew 2).

We have become a reproach to our neighbors, etc. They become a reproach to the saints who were formerly brothers, and then, separated from the Church, they persecute those who fear God: which is referred to the heretics.

How long, O Lord, will you be angry unto the end, will your zeal be kindled like fire? Pour out your wrath upon the nations that have not known you, and upon the kingdoms that have not called upon your name, etc. Do not be angry with us, we beseech you, O Lord, who know you: but rather turn back your fury upon those who do not know your Christ.

Because they have devoured Jacob, and laid waste his place. That carnal one, who was seduced by the cunning of the enemy.

Do not remember our ancient iniquities: let your mercies quickly come before us, O Lord, for we have become very poor. Let your mercy, we beseech you, O Lord, which is your only-begotten, come before us, that coming it may be propitious to our iniquities, and deliver us from our sins. For we have become poor in the world on account of him.

Help us, God, our savior; for the glory of your name, Lord, free us, and be propitious to our sins, etc. Then you either help us or are propitious to us: if the clarity of your name, which is blessed among the nations, snatches us from death by its death.

Lest perhaps the nations say, where is their God? and let it become known among the nations before our eyes. The nations, or peoples, are the adverse powers, which prevail against us, saying: Where is your truthful God? As the pagans often said to the martyrs.

The avenging of the blood of your servants which has been shed. Here he invokes judgment: whereby the blood of the martyrs is required by the Lord, who says in the Apocalypse: Rest a little while, until the number of your fellow servants is fulfilled (Apoc. 6). Let the groaning of the imprisoned enter into your sight. Those who seek you through long tears desire to be absolved and to be with you.

According to the greatness of your arm, possess the sons of the Mortified—that is, those who, running after the examples of the martyrs, have crucified themselves to vices and lusts.

Render to our neighbors sevenfold into their bosom. That they may not be condemned by the punishment of judgment, but in this world may dissolve the sevenfold recompense by repenting. Now "bosom" is often understood as the breast of a man, in which the soul rests. The reproach of them which they have reproached you, O Lord. For they reproach you, because they afflict your martyrs, in whom you dwell, with insults.

But we are your people, and the sheep of your pasture. By reason of the innocence which they bear they are called sheep, or because they have Christ as their shepherd. We will confess to you forever, and from generation to generation. That is, from the prophets even to the Gospels. We will announce your praise. Because to you is honor and glory with the eternal Father and the Holy Spirit, forever and ever. Amen.

PSALM 79

Unto the end, for those who will be changed, a testimony of Asaph. This psalm contains the voice of the prophet praying and recounting the mighty works of God.

You who rule Israel, give heed. He is ruled by God who sees God in his mind. Therefore the prophet begs that he give heed to him. You who lead out like sheep Joseph. Not that Joseph whose type he rejected in another psalm, but that one who, sold by his disciple for thirty pieces of silver, was led out from hell by the Father's power with the flock of the righteous.

You who sit above the Cherubim. Above the fullness of all knowledge. Appear. Show yourself to be seen by this world. Before Ephraim, and Benjamin, and Manasseh. He calls to mind Ephraim and Manasseh, whom elsewhere he calls the strength of his head, that is, the Church or the apostles. But that he placed Benjamin in the middle signifies the apostle Paul, who descended from the tribe of Benjamin, to be joined with the other apostles (Philippians 3).

Stir up your power. Which you showed to the Egyptians and the children of Israel. And come, that you may save us. That thus—as you delivered them from Egypt, so you may save us from the power of demons.

God, convert us. To knowing you. And show your face, and we shall be saved. Show your Son, that we may be saved.

Lord God of hosts, how long will you be angry over the prayer of your servant? For he is not angry if we seek justice; but the conscience of a fault thinks that he is angry even at prayer.

You will feed us with the bread of tears, and you will give us drink in tears in measure. Often, because of longing for God, or the remembrance of sin, tears become bread and drink for us. But what he says, in measure, indicates this: that in this prayer, in which we desire to be absolved from sins, or to see God, a slender sustenance be taken, if it is offered in supplication, not in much speaking.

You have set us as a contradiction to our neighbors, etc. To the Jews and heretics, who clamor around the Church and attack us.

Lord God of hosts, convert us to you, and show your face, etc. He who said: He who sees me sees also the Father (John 14).

You brought a vine out of Egypt: you cast out the nations, and planted it. You were a guide on its journey in its sight, etc. Although these things prefigured the synagogue, they must be referred to the Church, which from the darkness of the world to heavenly dignity, with the viler nations cast out, was transferred by the favor of faith. To it also a way was given, that is, the commandments by which it might walk, with teachers planted in it, through whom the sound of the Gospels would be proclaimed into all the earth. It too is guarded by the Lord who sits above the cherubim, is directed, and is nourished.

Its shadow covered the mountains, and its branches the cedars of God. With the patriarchs and apostles of his brightness.

It stretched out its shoots. We are the vines, who have sprouted from that vine. As far as the sea. That is, we have come as far as baptism, who previously were tossed about in the vanity of this world. For the sea in the Apocalypse signifies baptism. And its offspring as far as the river. So that those who were reborn in it might be washed by baptism. From here he returns to the synagogue.

Why have you destroyed its wall? For then the fortress of the synagogue was laid low, when blindness fell upon it, until the fullness of the Gentiles should come in. And all who pass along the way pluck at it. It is despoiled by those who pass through the way of this world to God, while by their preaching they cause the Jews to be converted.

The boar from the forest has ravaged it, and the solitary wild beast has devoured it. In the boar and the solitary wild beast the savagery of the devil is understood, by whom it was ravaged because of unbelief.

Lord God of hosts, convert us. The synagogue to the Church.

Look down from heaven, and see, and visit this vine. Of which I spoke above. And perfect it, which your right hand has planted. Which your power, that is, your Son, established by his resurrection. And upon the son of man. The son of the virgin. Whom you have strengthened for yourself. Whom, death being conquered, you have placed at your right hand.

Burned with fire and dug up, they shall perish at the rebuke of your countenance. The synagogue, surely, together with the unbelieving Jews.

Let your hand be upon the man of your right hand, upon the people whom your right hand, that is, your Christ, will save. And upon the son of man whom you have strengthened for yourself—that same Mediator and our Savior.

We do not depart from you; you will give us life. If we cling to you in faith, then we are refreshed by that bread of life which you sent from heaven. And we will call upon your name—that same name to which you have given a name above every name.

Lord God of hosts, convert us, and show your face, and we shall be saved. That same one who is your image, that same one who is your face, who is the illumination of your countenance, in whom you abide and who abides in you. May he deign to enter into our purified minds, and to show himself to us as the Savior of the world, and to save us by his holy inspection. To him be glory and dominion with you, and with the Holy Spirit, both now and forever and ever. Amen.

PSALM 80

Unto the end, for the winepresses, a psalm for Asaph himself. In the law it is written that there are three solemnities: of the Passover, of Pentecost, and of Tabernacles. Before the Tabernacles, ten days before, there was a fast, and the fast lasted until evening. At that time they sounded with trumpets—that is, they fasted, and in the fast they sounded with trumpets; and after ten days came the Tabernacles. Attend carefully: three solemnities are recorded in the law. First the Passover, then Pentecost, then Tabernacles. Before the Tabernacles, a fast; and in the fast they sounded with trumpets. Take note of what the Scripture signifies.

Take away the veil that was placed before the eyes of Moses, and see that we cannot become tabernacles unless we first fast. But unless that fasting has the sign of victory, which may deter our adversaries, Amalek is not conquered. Since, therefore, there are three solemnities—Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles—for this reason also three psalms have titles "for the winepresses": the eighth psalm, the eightieth, and the eighty-third. You see, then, how three psalms are written in the psalter which are prefixed "for the winepresses." See what the eighth psalm, the eightieth, and the eighty-third say; and before we dispute about the number, let us say what the winepresses are meant to signify. "For the winepresses." The winepresses are nowhere else but where there are vines and a boundless vintage. "For the winepresses." Therefore the Lord and Savior says: I have trodden the winepress alone, and of the nations there was no man with me (Isa. 63). Therefore he brought the vine out of Egypt and planted it. And he says in Jeremiah: I planted you as a whole true vine, a chosen one: how have you turned to me into the bitterness of a foreign vine (Jer. 2)? And Noah drank wine and was drunk. It is said also by Solomon, and said also in mystery: Drink, friends, and be drunk (Cant. 5). We read also in another place that Joseph, that holy man who went before as a type of the Savior, who was sold by his brothers—whom his brothers sold, and he reigned in Egypt (Gen. 43).

Thus our Lord and Savior was sold by the Jews, and he reigned in the Egypt of this world. That holy man Joseph, then, that eminent one who overcame cruelty by piety—who for this reason came into Egypt, that he might feed Egypt, and his brothers who sold him. That Joseph, therefore, invited his brothers. But see: he is said to have become drunk at midday. Yet this cannot stand according to the letter, that a holy man should have become drunk. Noah also became drunk, but he had truly been drunk. Joseph became drunk as Noah did, and he became drunk in his own house. See the mystery: let us first see what it signifies in mystery, and afterward let us discuss what it signifies in sense. After the flood of this world Noah drank, and became drunk in his own house, and his thighs were uncovered, and his shame appeared; and the elder brother came and mocked, but the younger brother covered it (Gen. 9). All this is said of the Savior, because he said on the cross of his passion: Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me (Matt. 26). He drank, and became drunk, and his thighs were uncovered, and the ignominy of the cross appeared. The elder brother, the people of the Jews, came and mocked; and the younger, the people from the Gentiles, covered the ignominy. Therefore Canaan is cursed, he shall be a servant to his brother. Behold, that curse persists to this day. We, the younger people, rule over the greater people of the Jews.

Just as therefore the Lord was intoxicated in his Passion, so also the saints are daily intoxicated in the Holy Spirit in the ardor of faith. You who yesterday were gathering gold, today you throw it away—do you not seem insane to strangers? Finally, also the apostles, when the Holy Spirit had descended upon them and filled them, and they spoke in various tongues, were for that reason said to be full of must (Acts 2). There are many things that may be said about the mystery of wine and about drunkenness. Unto the end, for the winepresses, Asaph. The eighth psalm, and the eightieth, and the eighty-third. No other could have the numbers of the winepress, except the eighth, and the eightieth, and the eighty-third. The eighth day is the day of resurrection in the singular number. Again, in eight decades, the eightieth is another, greater number. You see, therefore, that these winepresses are not assigned except on the day of resurrection, the eighth and the eightieth. Let someone say: Why is it later said in the eighty-third that there are winepresses? These winepresses pertain to the mystery of the Trinity. For this reason there are also three choir directors. In the eighth psalm, David; in the eightieth, Asaph; in the eighty-third, the sons of Korah. The eighth is David, which is interpreted as strong in hand. For our first victory has a battle and a wrestling. For this reason David is called strong in hand. The second, however, that is, in the eightieth, is Asaph. But Asaph is interpreted as Synagogue. In the eighth, therefore, we conquer, and in the eightieth we are gathered together with the Lord.

In the eighty-third psalm, however, for the sons of Korah. Korah is interpreted as Calvary. Ascend, Bald One; ascend. Bald One (2 Kings 2). The boys also said this to Elisha, because he had suffered in the place of Calvary. There are many things that are said about how Elisha was mocked at Bethel by forty-two boys. These are the winepresses of which the Savior also says: Make for yourselves friends from the unjust mammon, so that they may receive you into eternal dwellings (Luke 16).

Rejoice in God, our helper. He who freed us from the darkness of Egypt. Shout for joy to the God of Jacob. To the supplanter of enemies.

Take up a psalm and give the timbrel, a pleasant psaltery with the lyre. A hymn from a pure heart, or mind, and from the thinning away of the sins of the world.

Sound the trumpet on the new moon, on the notable day of our solemnity. They used to sound the trumpet at Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles. We now in the Church, though we ought to sing to God at every time, yet especially in the resurrection, in the remission, and in the renewal of the house: that is, when we rise again in Christ; when we receive remission; when the house of our breast has been renewed after its ruin.

Because the commandment is in Israel, and the judgment belongs to the God of Jacob. For his is the commandment and the judgment, that we are saved by grace, and not of ourselves.

A testimony in Joseph. In Christ, who was sold for us. He set it when he went out from the land of Egypt. Either in the bush, or in the fire, or in other mysteries. He heard a tongue which he did not know. That people of the Gentiles, in the Church, received the commandments which it formerly did not know.

He turned away his back from the burdens. When we were in Egypt, we were building the cities of Pharaoh, we were carrying mud and brick, and our whole soul was seeking straw. We did not have grain, we did not have the heavenly bread which comes from heaven; not yet had we received manna from heaven, not yet had the serpent been lifted up for us in the desert; not yet had the rock sent water to us; not yet were we stretching out manna, and Amalek was falling. We were sitting in the mud, and we were doing the works of Egypt, we were building the cities of Pharaoh. He turned away his back from the burdens. How great were the burdens we had before! Therefore our Moses says: Come to me, all you who are burdened with sins, and I will refresh you (Matt. 11). His hands served in the basket. Whose? Israel's. The baskets of Egypt are one thing, and those of Jesus another. Jesus also has his baskets, and our Savior filled twelve baskets from the fragments (Luke 9). O wondrous thing, and one signifying mighty mysteries!

Five thousand of the people were fed in the wilderness, apart from little children and women: in a deserted place no more than five loaves are found, for the place was deserted. I ask you who follow only the letter: in a deserted place no more than five loaves are found, and how are twelve baskets found? If the place was deserted, it certainly could not have had twelve baskets; but all this signifies that the Lord led his people out of Egypt in the wilderness of this world; he fed them with his loaves, and whatever was left over he stored in twelve baskets, that is, in the twelve apostles, so that what had perished in the twelve tribes might be saved in the twelve apostles.

In tribulation you called upon me, and I delivered you. Prophecy and psalm are obscure for this reason: suddenly, when you do not expect it, the person is changed. And so up to this point the prophet has spoken: now suddenly the person of God speaking to the people is introduced. In tribulation you called upon me, and I delivered you. Whoever you are who are in tribulation, be secure; call upon me, and you will be heard. I heard you in the hidden place of the storm. When that storm was pressing upon you and was dragging you hither and thither as if by waves, I was in the midst of the storm. I tested you at the water of contradiction. According to the letter, this is said of Moses and Aaron: that at the water of contradiction they offended God (Exod. 17; Num. 20). And so for this reason they did not enter the land of promise. But to us God says: I tested you at the water of contradiction.

Simon was tested at the water of contradiction, because he received baptism in hypocrisy (Acts 8). Therefore whoever receives baptism in hypocrisy, that one is tested at the water of contradiction.

Hear, my people, and I will testify to you. God speaks to us. Whatever he said to the people, he also speaks to us. Israel, if you will hear me. Why do you seek that they hear? Let us see what he commands. There shall be no new God in you. For whom God is the belly, for him God is new. However many vices we have, however many sins, we have that many new gods. I was angry: anger is a god to me. I saw a woman and lusted: lust is a god to me. For each one, what he desires and venerates, that is God to him. The covetous man has gold as his god. Nor shall you adore a strange God. Our God is virtue; the gods of others are vices.

I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt. We are those who have been brought out of the land of Egypt: if indeed we have gone out, if we are in the desert, if we desire to see the land of promise. If we have left Sodom, let us not look back at Sodom. We have been saved on the mountain; let us not desire the flesh of Egypt, nor say: How well it was with us in Egypt, when we ate flesh in the pots, and garlic, and cucumbers (Num. 11)! Do you wish to receive the Lord's foods? Do you wish to eat the Lord your God and Savior himself? Hear what he says: Open your mouth wide, and I will fill it. Open wide your mouths—he himself is the Lord, and the bread. He himself urges us to eat, and he himself is our food.

However much you extend, so much you will receive. It is therefore not in my power, but in yours. If you are willing, you will receive me whole; if you are unwilling, at least receive a part.

And my people did not hear my voice. I stand before the door and knock. I wish you to open and let me enter, and you do not wish to open (Rev 3).

And Israel did not attend to me: and I let them go according to the desires of their heart, etc. Unhappy is the one who is not corrected by God. If anyone sins and is not struck, that one is wretched. Therefore he says: I let them go according to the desires of their heart. Therefore I let them go: because I struck them often, and they did not receive discipline. I pleaded, they did not hear; I struck, they did not feel pain. I send them away into their own desires, so that, once sated with their vices, they may at least in this way do penance.

If my people had heard me. O most merciful Father, O compassionate God! He pleaded, and was not heard: as if angry, he sends away a wanton son. Again he sees him perishing, and grieves, because he perishes. And what does he say: If Israel had walked in my ways, for nothing, etc. Was it a great thing for me to free you from tribulation? Could I not send my majesty and snatch you from danger? But because I have let you go with free will, and have set the contest before you, and no one is crowned unless he has fought, therefore I leave the victory to your will (2 Tim 2).

The enemies of the Lord have lied to him. In Hebrew it reads better: The enemies of the Lord will deny him, that is, the Jews; for his enemies have denied him. But these enemies who are going to deny him—will they therefore perish? Will there therefore be no remnant? And how did you swear to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, that their seed would be like the stars of heaven and like the sand of the sea? Why did you promise to the fathers and not repay to the children? The enemies of the Lord will deny him. But what does it say? And their time will be forever. When the fullness of the Gentiles has come in, then all Israel will be saved (Rom. 11). In the future they will believe; for now they have not believed. Now I will speak to the Jews. They are accustomed to applaud themselves and say: And their time passes into eternity. Let us say: It is true; for some of the Jews are going to believe. Finally we read in the Apocalypse of John that twelve thousand from each tribe, that is, one hundred and forty-four thousand, are going to believe, and this is said to be of virgins. But where there will be such a number of virgins, how great will the number of non-virgins be? Therefore let us also say to the Jews, and your time will not be forever, that is, in the future age. But to you who do not believe today, what does it pertain to? And their time will be forever. What kind of time will the enemies of God have?

And he fed them with the fat of wheat. He brought them into the land of promise: he fed them not with manna as in the desert, but with wheat that fell and rose again. And he fed them with the fat of wheat. See the mystery of the Scriptures: With the fat of wheat. Wheat has fat—did it also have entrails? But he wished to show the abundance and richness of spiritual grace, and therefore he called it fat. And from the rock he satisfied them with honey. He himself is the wheat; he himself is the rock, who satisfied the people of Israel with water in the desert. Spiritually he satisfied them with honey, and not with water, so that whoever believed and received food might taste honey in their mouth. How sweet to my jaws is your eloquence, sweeter than honey and the honeycomb to my mouth (Ps. 118)! Finally, the Lord too, after the resurrection, ate the honeycomb for this reason, and was satisfied with honey from the rock (Luke 24). Therefore I speak a new thing: The rock itself ate honey, so that it might give us honey, and sweetness, so that those who had drunk myrrh in the Law—that is, bitterness—might afterward in the Gospel eat the honey of the Gospel: to whom is glory for ever and ever. Amen.

PSALM 81.

A psalm of Asaph. This psalm exhorts us that, if we wish the Lord to dwell with us, we should always do those things that are pleasing to him.

God stood in the synagogue of gods. There are many figures. For we frequently sit, sometimes we stand, sometimes we lie down, sometimes we run, sometimes we walk; so too God is described according to the variety of men, and his posture is introduced in different ways. If we are holy and are like Moses, it is said to us: But as for you, stand here with me. For God said this to Moses. For Moses was standing upon the rock, and therefore the Lord also stood by him. But if we were holy first and afterwards sinners, God no longer stands by us but walks—that is, he moves from his place, he who before stood by us. After we have been moved, he too is moved together with us. Finally, as long as Adam was in paradise and kept the commandment, God stood by him. But after he transgressed, he heard the voice of God walking in paradise. Do you wish to know that God was walking by him? What did he say to him? Adam, where are you? He who had not fled from God standing before him afterwards fled from him walking. We have spoken of God standing, we have spoken of him walking, let us speak also of him sitting. Whenever God is introduced as sitting, he is introduced in two ways: either as a king or as a judge. If as a king, he is seen as by Isaiah: I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne high and lifted up. There he is introduced as a king reigning.

But when he is introduced as a judge: thrones are set, and books are opened, as it is written in Daniel: what is said? Thrones were set, and books were opened (Dan. 7): that is, the Lord is about to sit as a judge, and to reread the works of all. The books that now are folded up will then be opened. Every thing that we do, that we speak, that we think—even for an idle word we shall give an account. It is written in the books of God. Does someone suppose that there are books in heaven, where our sins are written? I think the books are our consciences, which will then be opened, and each one will see what he has done. No hidden thing that will not be revealed. Therefore thrones are set, and books are opened. How many things are written in my book that I dare not confess even to my brother, nor to my friend. The angels know what I have done, the Thrones know, the Seraphim know; the Father knows, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. We have spoken of God, that to some he stands, to others he walks, but to others he sits: either as a King, or as a judge: but to others he sleeps. If at any time he has abandoned us to temptations, though we be holy, nevertheless we are left to temptations that we may be proved: at that time the Lord sleeps for us. Finally, what does the Psalmist say: Arise, why do you sleep, O Lord (Ps. 43)? And the apostles, when they were in the boat, and the boat was being battered by the waves, the Lord was sleeping for them: for on this account the boat was being battered by the waves. Finally they wake him, and he awakens, and at once the storm is stilled (Mark

iv). We have spoken of the four postures of God: that he stands for some, walks for others, sits for others, and for others is, as it were, asleep; but for others he wakes and rises. God has stood in the synagogue of gods. Because they were gods, therefore God stood for them. In which synagogue, ours, God has different postures: for some he stands, for others he sits, for others he walks, for others he sleeps. Though he himself is unchangeable, he is changed according to our variety. See the dignity of man. God has stood in the synagogue of gods. He grants us the name, that he may grant the merit as well. But in the midst he judges the gods. As a commander in the midst of an army judges. God judges gods. A fearsome thing, a thing full of terror. If he judges gods, what does he do to the sinner? The prophet spoke these two verses, as it were; but what follows:

How long will you judge iniquity? God himself speaks to the judges, that is, to the princes of the people. Specifically, these verses that follow are spoken to judges. If they are judges of the world, it is manifest. But if they are judges of the Church, let us understand this of bishops and presbyters. How long will you judge iniquity? He who judges iniquity is a judge of iniquity. That man was a judge of iniquity, of whom it is said in the Gospel: who did not fear the Lord, and did not respect man. How long will you judge iniquity? I have given you power over my flock, and over the people of God: you ought to be judges, and not wolves. And you take up the faces of sinners.

Judge for the orphan and the poor; justify the humble and the needy. Rescue the poor and the needy, etc. When judgment comes before you, you do not consider the case, you do not consider the judgment, but the persons of those who have cases. As if he were saying: If a poor man comes with a just matter, and a rich man comes with a bad matter, you look at the person, not the matter. This is for now according to one interpretation. But there is also another, more sacred interpretation. In the theaters one man often has different roles: now he enters as a woman, now as a man, now as a king, and he who came out as a king comes out again as a slave. I have given this example so that we may be able to move from the carnal to the spiritual. We too take on different roles. For when I am angry, I assume the role of a lion. When I seize another's goods, I assume the role of a wolf. When I am cruel and kill, I assume the role of the cruel one. But just as sinners have different roles in sins, so on the contrary the saints also have different roles, but in good. When I give alms, I have the role, so to speak, of the merciful. When I judge well, I have the role of a good judge. When I suffer injury and am humble, I have the role of the humble. Unhappy is the one who has many roles in evil. Happy is the one who has different roles in good.