Gospel of Matthew, Chapter 1
[p. 9]
Ver.
1. The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the Son of David, the Son of
Abraham.
Jerome,
Ez, i. 5. Hier. Prolog. in Com. in Matt.: ‘The face of a man’ (in Ezekiel’s
vision) signifies Matthew, who accordingly opens his Gospel with the human
genealogy of Christ.
Rabanus:
By this exordium he shews that it is the birth of Christ according to the flesh
that he has undertaken to narrate.
Pseudo-Chrys.,
Hom. in Matt., Hom. i: Matthew wrote for the Jews, and in Hebrew [ed. note: It
seems to be the general witness of antiquity that there was a Hebrew copy of
St. Matthew’s Gospel, whether written before or after the Greek. This Hebrew
copy was interpolated by the Ebionites.]; to them it was unnecessary to explain
the divinity which they recognized; but necessary to unfold the mystery of the
Incarnation. John wrote in Greek for the Gentiles who knew nothing of a Son of
God. They required therefore to be told first, that the Son of God was God,
then that this Deity was incarnate.
Rabanus:
Though the genealogy occupies only a small part of the volume, he yet begins
thus, “The book of the generation.” For it is the manner of the Hebrews to name
their books from that with which they open; as Genesis.
Gloss.
Ordinaria: The full expression would be “This is the book of the generation;”
but this is a usual ellipse; e.g. “The vision of Isaiah,” for, ‘This is the
vision.’
“Generation,” he says in the singular
number, though there be many here given in succession, as it is for the sake of
the one generation of Christ that the rest are here introduced.
Chrys.,
Hom. in Matt., Hom. ii: Or he therefore entitles it, “The book of the
generation,” because this is the sum of the whole dispensation, the root of all
its blessings; viz. [p. 10] that God become man; for this once effected, all
other things followed of course.
Rabanus:
He says, “The book of the generation of Jesus Christ,” because he knew it was
written, ‘The book of the generation of Adam.’ He begins thus then, that he may
oppose book to book, the new Adam to the old Adam, for by the one were all
things restored which had been corrupted by the other.
Jerome,
Hier. Comm. in Matt., ch. 1: We read in Isaiah, “Who shall declare His
generation?” [Isa 53:8] But it does not follow that the Evangelist contradicts
the Prophet, or undertakes what he declares impossible; for Isaiah is speaking
of the generation of the Divine nature; St. Matthew of the incarnation of the
human.
Chrys.:
And do not consider this genealogy a small thing to hear: for truly it is a
marvellous thing that God should descend to be born of a woman, and to have as
His ancestors David and Abraham.
Remigius:
Though any affirm that the prophet (Isaiah) does speak of His human generation,
we need not answer to his enquiry, “Who shall declare it?” - “No man;” but,
“Very few;” because Matthew and Luke have.
Rabanus:
By saying, “of Jesus Christ,” he expresses both the kingly and priestly office
to be in Him, for Jesus, who first bore this name, was after Moses, the first
who was leader of the children of Israel; and Aaron, anointed by the
mystical ointment, was the first priest under the Law.
Hilary,
Quaest. Nov. et Vet. Test. q. 40: What God conferred on those, who, by the
anointing of oil were consecrated as kings or priests, this the Holy Spirit
conferred on the Man Christ; adding moreover a purification. The Holy Spirit
cleansed that which taken of the Virgin Mary was exalted into the Body of the
Saviour, and this is that anointing of the Body of the Saviour’s flesh whence He
was called Christ.
[ed. note: This passage is from a work
commonly ascribed to Hilary
the Deacon. The Fathers bear out its doctrine; e.g. “Since the flesh is not
holy in itself, therefore it was sanctified even in Christ, the Word which
dwelt in it, through the Holy Ghost, sanctifying His own Temple, and changing
it into the energy of His own Nature. For therefore is Christ’s Body understood
to be both holy and hallowing, as being made a Temple of the Word united to it
bodily, as Paul says.” Cyril
Alex. lib. v. in Joann. p. 992.
In like manner, Gregory of Nazianzus speaks of “The Father of the True
and really Anointed (Christ), whom He has anointed with the oil of gladness
above His fellows, anointing the manhood with the Godhead, so as to make both
one.” Orat. 5. fin]
Because the impious craft of the Jews
denied that Jesus was born of the seed of David, he adds, “The son of David,
the son of Abraham.” [p. 11]
Chrys.:
But why would it not have been enough to name one of them, David alone, or
Abraham alone? Because the promise had been made to both of Christ to be born
of their seed. To Abraham, “And in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth
be blessed.” [Gen 22:18] To David, “Of the fruit of thy body will I set upon
thy seat.” [Ps 137:11]
He therefore calls Christ the Son of both,
to shew that in Him was fulfilled the promise to both. Also because Christ was
to have three dignities; King, Prophet, Priest; but Abraham was prophet and
priest; priest, as God says to him in Genesis, “Take an heifer;” [Gen 15:9]
Prophet, as the Lord said to Abimelech concerning him, “He is a prophet, and
shall pray for thee.” [Gen 20:7] David was king and prophet, but not priest.
Thus He is expressly called the son of
both, that the threefold dignity of His forefathers might be recognized by
hereditary right in Christ.
Ambrose,
in Luc. iii: He therefore names specially two authors of His birth - one who
received the promise concerning the kindreds of the people, the other who
obtained the oracle concerning the generation of Christ; and though he is later
in order of succession is yet first named, inasmuch as it is greater to have
received the promise concerning Christ than concerning the Church, which is
through Christ; for greater is He who saves than that which is saved.
Jerome:
The order of the names is inverted, but of necessity; for had he written
Abraham first, and David afterwards, he would have to repeat Abraham again to
preserve the series of the genealogy.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Another reason is that royal dignity is above natural, though Abraham was first
in time, yet David is honour.
Gloss.:
But since from this title it appears that the whole book is concerning Jesus
Christ, it is necessary first to know what we must think concerning Him; for so
shall be better explained what this book relates of Him.
Aug.,
de Haer, et 10: Cerinthus then and Ebion made Jesus Christ only man; Paul of
Samosata, following them, asserted Christ not to have had an existence from
eternity, but to have begun to be from His birth of the Virgin Mary; he also
thought Him nothing more than man. This heresy was afterwards confirmed by
Photinus.
Pseudo-Athan.,
Vigil. Tapsens. (Athan. Ed. Ben., vol ii, p. 646): The Apostle John, seeing
long before by the Holy Spirit this man’s madness, rouses him from his deep
sleep of error by the preaching of his voice, saying, “In the beginning was the
[p. 12] Word.” [John 1:1]
He therefore, who in the beginning was with
God, could not in this last time take the beginning of His being from man. He
says further, (let Photinus hear his words,) “Father, glorify Me with that
glory which I had with Thee before the world was.” [John 17:5]
Aug.,
de Haeres. 19: The error of Nestorius was, that he taught that a man only was
born of the Blessed Virgin Mary, whom the Word of God received not into Unity
of person and inseparable fellowship; a doctrine which Catholic ears could not
endure.
Cyril
of Alexandria, Ep. i. ad Monachos Egypti.: Saith the Apostle of the
Only-begotten, “Who being in the form of God, thought it no robbery to be equal
with God.” [Phil 2:6]
Who then is this who is in the form of God?
or how emptied He Himself, and humbled Himself to the likeness of man? If the
abovementioned heretics dividing Christ into two parts, i.e. the Man and the
Word, affirm that it was the Man that was emptied of glory, they must first
shew what form and equality with the Father are understood to be, and did
exist, which might suffer any manner of emptying.
But there is no creature, in its own proper
nature, equal with the Father; how then can any creature be said to be emptied?
or from what eminence to descend to become man? Or how can he be understood to
have taken upon Him, as though He had not at first, the form of a servant?
But, they say, the Word being equal with
the Father dwelt in Man born of a woman, and this is the emptying. I hear the
Son truly saying to the Holy Apostles, “If any man love Me, he will keep My
saying, and My Father will love him, and We will come unto him, and make Our
abode with him.” [John 14:23]
Hear how He saith that He and the Father
will dwell in them that love Him. Do you then suppose that we shall grant that
He is there emptied of His glory, and has taken upon Him the form of a servant,
when He makes His abode in the hearts of them that love Him? Or the Holy Spirit,
does He fulfil an assumption of human flesh when He dwells in our hearts?
Isidore,
Epist. lib. iv. 166: But not to mention all arguments, let us bring forward
that one to which all arguments point, that, for one who was God to assume a
lowly guise both has an obvious use, and is an adaptation and in nothing
contradicts the course of nature. But for one who is man to speak things divine
and supernatural is the highest presumption; for though a king may [p. 13]
humble himself a common soldier may not take on him the state of an emperor.
So, if He were God made man, all lowly things have place; but if mere man, high
things have none.
Aug.,
de Haeres. 41: Sabellius they say was a disciple of Noctus, who taught that the
same Christ was one and the same Father and Holy Spirit.
Pseudo-Athan.,
Vigil. Tapsens. (ibid. p. 644): The audaciousness of this most insane error I
will curb by the authority of the heavenly testimonies, and demonstrate the
distinct personality of the proper substance of the Son. I shall not produce
things which are liable to be explained away as agreeable to the assumption of
human nature; but shall offer such passages as all will allow to be decisive in
proof of His divine nature.
In Genesis we find God saying, “Let Us make
man in Our own Image.” By this plural number shewing, that there was some other
person to whom He spoke. Had He been one, He would have been said to have made
Him in His own Image, but there is another; and He is said to have made man in
the Image of that other.
Gloss.:
Other denied the reality of Christ’s human nature. Valentinus said that Christ
sent from the Father, carried about a spiritual or celestial body, and took
nothing of the Virgin, but passed through her as through a channel, taking
nothing of her flesh. But we do not therefore believe Him to have been born of
the Virgin, because by no other means He could have truly lived in the flesh,
and appeared among men; but because it is so written in the Scripture, which if
we believe not we cannot either be Christians, or be saved.
But even a body taken of spiritual, or
ethereal, or clayey substance, had He willed to change into the true and very
quality of human flesh, who will deny His power to do this? The Manichaeans
said that the Lord Jesus Christ was a phantasm, and could not be born of the
womb of a woman. But if the body of Christ was a phantasm, He was a deceiver,
and if a deceiver, then He was not the truth. But Christ is the Truth;
therefore His Body was not a phantasm.
Gloss.:
And as the opening both of this Gospel, and of that according to Luke,
manifestly proves Christ’s birth of a woman, and hence His real humanity, they
reject the beginning of both these Gospels.
Aug.,
cont. Faust, ii, 1: Faustus affirms, that “the Gospel both begins, and begins
to be so called, from the preaching of [p. 14] Christ, in which He no where
affirms Himself to have been born of men. [ed. note: The Ebionites, as well as
the Manichees, rejected the beginning of St. Matthew, vid. Epiphan. II arr.
xxx. 23. And the Marcionites the beginning of St. Luke. Epiph. Haer. xlii, 11.
But what exact portion they rejected is doubtful.]
Nay, so far is this genealogy from being
part of the Gospel, that the writer does not venture so to entitle it;
beginning, ‘The book of the generation,’ not ‘The book of the Gospel.’ Mark
again, who cared not to write of the generation, but only of the preaching of
the Son of God, which is properly The Gospel, begins thus accordingly, “The
Gospel of Jesus Christ the Son of God.” Thus then, all that we read in Matthew
before the words, “Jesus began to preach the Gospel of the kingdom,” [Matt
4:!4] is a part of the genealogy, not of the Gospel. I therefore betook myself
to Mark and John, with whose prefaces I had good reason to be satisfied, as
they introduce neither David, nor Mary, nor Joseph.”
To which Augustine replies, What will he say then to the Apostle’s
words, “Remember the resurrection of Jesus Christ of the seed of David
according to my Gospel.” [2 Tim 2:8] But the Gospel of the Apostle Paul was
likewise that of the other Apostles, and of all the faithful, as he says,
“Whether I, or they, thus have we preached the Gospel.”
Aug.,
de Haer., 49: The Arians will not have the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, to be
of one and the same substance, nature, and existence; but that the Son is a
creature of the Father, and Holy Spirit a creature of a creature, i.e. created
by the Son; further, they think that Christ took the flesh without a soul.
But John declares the Son to be not only
God, but even of the same substance as the Father; [margin note: ref Id. de
Trin. i. 6] for when he had said, “The Word was God,” he added, “all things
were made by Him;” whence it is clear that He was not made by Whom all things
were made; and if not made, then not created; and therefore of one substance
with the Father, for all that is not of one substance with the Father is
creature.
I know not what benefit the person of the
Mediator has conferred upon us, if He redeemed not our better part, but took
upon Him our flesh only, which without the soul cannot have consciousness of
the benefit. But if Christ came to save that which had perished, [p. 15] the
whole man had perished, and therefore needs a Saviour; Christ then in coming
saves the whole man, taking on Him both soul and body.
How too do they answer innumerable
objections from the Gospel Scriptures, in which the Lord speaks so many things
manifestly contrary to them? as is that, “My soul is sorrowful even unto
death,” [Matt 26:38] and, “I have power to lay down My life;” [John 10:18] and
many more things of the like kind.
Should they say that He spoke thus in
parables, we have at hand proofs from the Evangelists themselves, who in
relating His actions, bear witness as to the reality of His body, so of His
soul, by mention of passions which cannot be without a soul; as when they say,
“Jesus wondered, was angry,” and others of like kind.
The Apollinarians also as the Arians
affirmed that Christ had taken the human flesh without the soul [margin note:
Id. de Haeres. 55]. But overthrown on this point by the weight of Scripture
proof, they then said that part which is the rational soul of man was wanting
to the soul of Christ, and that its place was filled by the Word itself.
But if it be so, then we must believe that
the Word of God took on Him the nature of some brute with a human shape and
appearance. But even concerning the nature of Christ’s body, there are some who
have so far swerved from the right faith, as to say, that the flesh and the
Word were of one and the same substance, most perversely insisting on that
expression, The Word was made flesh; which they interpret that some portion of
the Word was changed into flesh, not that He took to Him flesh of the flesh of
the Virgin.
[ed. note: Some of the Apollinarians thus
hold. vid. Nyssen. vol. ii, p. 694. A.Theodor. Eranist. p. 174. ed. Schulz. The
same doctrine was afterwards ascribed to the Eutychians, vid. Vigil. Taps. in
Eutych. iv. Theod. Haer. iv. 13]
Cyril,
Ep. ad Joan. Antioch.
tom. 6, Ep. 107: We account those persons mad who have suspected that so much
as the shadow of change could take place in the nature of the Divine Word; it
abides what it ever was, neither is nor can be changed.
Leo,
Epist. 59, ad Const.: We do not speak of Christ as man in such a sort as to
allow that any thing was wanting to Him, which it is certain pertains to human
nature, whether soul, or rational mind, or flesh, and flesh such as was taken
of the Woman, not gained by a change or conversion of the Word into flesh.
These three several errors, that thrice false
heresy of the Apollinarists has brought forward. Eutyches also chose out this
third dogma of Apollinaris, which denying [p. 16] the verity of the human body
and soul, maintained that our Lord Jesus Christ was wholly and entirely of one
nature, as though the Divine Word had changed itself into flesh and soul, and
as though the conception, birth, growth, and such like, had been undergone by
that Divine Essence, which was incapable of any such changes with the very and
true flesh; for such as is the nature of the Only-begotten, such is the nature
of the Father, and such is the nature of the Holy Ghost, both impassible and
eternal.
But if to avoid being driven to the
conclusion that the Godhead could feel suffering and death, he departs from the
corruption of Apollinaris, and should still dare to affirm the nature of the
incarnate Word, that is of the Word and the flesh, to be the same, he clearly
falls into the insane notions of Manichaeus and Marcion, and believes that the
Lord Jesus Christ did all His actions with a false appearance, that His body
was not a human body, but a phantasm, which imposed on the eyes of the
beholders.
But what Eutyches ventured [margin note:
Id. Ep. 35 ad Julian] to pronounce as an episcopal decision, that in Christ
before His incarnation were two natures, but after His incarnation only one, it
behoved that he should have been urgently pressed to give the reason of this
his belief.
I suppose that in using such language he
supposed the soul which the Saviour took, to have had its abode in heaven
before it was born of the Virgin Mary [ed. note, e: This opinion, which
involves Nestorianism, the opposite error to Eutychianism or Monophysitism, is
imputed to Eutyches by Flavian, ap. Leon.
Ep. xxii. 3. Ephraem, Antioch,
ap Phot. p. 805. Leont. de
Sectis 7 init].
This Catholic hearts and ears endure not,
for that the Lord when He came down from heaven shewed nothing of the condition
of human nature, nor did He take on Him any soul that had existed before, nor
any flesh that was not taken of the flesh of His mother. Thus what was justly
condemned in Origen [ed.
note, f: Vid. Origen in Joan.
t. i. n. 37. t. xx. n. 17. Patriarch. ii. 6. n. 4. ix. Cels. i. 32, 33], must
needs be rebuked in Eutyches, to wit, that our souls before they were placed in
our bodies had actions not only wonderful but various.
Remig:
These heresies therefore the Apostles overthrow in the opening of their
Gospels, as Matthew in relating how He derived His descent from the kings of
the Jews proves Him to have been truly man and to have had true flesh.
Likewise Luke, when he [p. 17] describes
the priestly stock and person; Mark when he says, “The beginning of the Gospel
of Jesus Christ the Son of God;” and John when he says, “In the beginning was
the Word;” both shew Him to have been before all ages God, with God the Father.
2.
Abraham began Isaac; and Isaac begat Jacob; and Jacob begat Judas and his
brethren.
Aug.,
de Con. Evan., ii, 1: Matthew, by beginning with Christ’s genealogy, shews that
he has undertaken to relate Christ’s birth according to the flesh. But Luke, as
rather describing Him as a Priest for the atonement of sin, gives Christ’s
genealogy not in the beginning of his Gospel, but at His baptism, when John
bare that testimony, “Lo, He that taketh away the sins of the world.” [John
1:29]
In the genealogy of Matthew is figured to
us the taking on Him of our sins by the Lord Christ: in the genealogy of Luke,
the taking away of our sins by the same; hence Matthew gives them in a
descending, Luke in an ascending, series. But Matthew, describing Christ’s
human generation in descending order, begins his enumeration with Abraham.
Ambrose,
in Luc. cap. 3. lib. iii. n. 7,8: For Abraham was the first who deserved the
witness of faith; “He believed God, and it was accounted to him for
righteousness.” It behoved therefore that he should be set forth as the first
in the line of descent, who was the first to deserve the promise of the
restoration of the Church, “In thee shall all the nations of the earth be
blessed.” And it is again brought to a period in David, for that Jesus should
be called his Son; hence to him is preserved the privilege, that from him
should come the beginning of the Lord’s genealogy.
Chrys.,
Hom. iii, and Aug. City of
God, 15, 15: Matthew then, desiring to preserve in memory the lineage of the
Lord’s humanity through the succession of His parents, begins with Abraham,
saying, “Abraham begat Isaac.” Why does he not mention Ismael, his first-born?
And again, “Isaac began Jacob;” why does he not speak of Esau his first-born?
Because through them he could not have come down to David.
Gloss.:
Yet he names all the brethren of Judah with him in the lineage.
Ismael and Esau had not remained in the worship of the true God; but the
brethren of Judah
were reckoned in God’s people. [p. 18]
Chrys.,
Hom. iii: Or, he names all the twelve Patriarchs that he may lower that pride
which is drawn from a line of noble ancestry. For many of these were born of
maidservants, and yet were Patriarchs and heads of tribes.
Gloss:
But Judah
is the only one mentioned by name, and that because the Lord was descended from
him only. But in each of the Patriarchs we must note not their history only,
but the allegorical and moral meaning to be drawn from them; allegory, in
seeing whom each of the Fathers foreshewed; moral instruction in that through
each one of the Fathers some virtue may be edified in us either through the
signification of his name, or through his example.
[ed. note: Origen considered that there were three senses of Scripture,
the literal or historical, the moral, and the mystical or spiritual,
corresponding to the three parts of man, body, and soul, and spirit. Hom. in
Lev. ii, 5, de Princio iv, p. 168. By the moral sense is meant, as the name
implies, a practical application of the text; by mystical one which interprets
it of the invisible and the spiritual world.]
Abraham is in many respects a figure of
Christ, and chiefly in his name, which is interpreted the Father of many
nations, and Christ is Father of many believers. Abraham moreover went out from
his own kindred, and abode in a strange land; in like manner Christ, leaving
the Jewish nation, went by His preachers throughout the Gentiles.
Pseudo-Chys.:
Isaac is interpreted, ‘laughter,’
but the laughter of the
saints is not the foolish convulsion of the lips, but the rational joy of the
heart, which was the mystery of Christ. For as he was granted to his parents in
their extreme age to their great joy, that it might be known that he was not
the child of nature, but of grace, thus Christ also in this last time came of a
Jewish mother to be the joy of the whole earth; the one of a virgin, the other
of a woman past the age, both contrary to the expectation of nature.
Remig.:
Jacob is interpreted, ‘supplanter,’ and it is said of Christ, “Thou hast cast
down beneath Me them that rose up against Me.” [Ps 18:43]
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Our Jacob in like manner begot the twelve Apostles in the Spirit, not in the
flesh; in word, not in blood. Judah
is interpreted, ‘confessor,’ for he was a type of Christ who was to be the
confessor of His Father, as He spake, “I confess to Thee, Father, Lord of
heaven and earth.”
Gloss:
Morally; Abraham signifies to us the virtue of faith in Christ, as an example
himself, as it [p. 19] is said of him, “Abraham believed God, and it was
accounted unto Him for righteousness.” Isaac may represent hope; for Isaac is
interpreted, ‘laughter,’ as
he was the joy of his parents; and hope is our joy, making us to hope for
eternal blessings and to joy in them. “Abraham begat Isaac,” and faith begets
hope. Jacob signifies, ‘love,’ for love embraces two lives; active in the love
of our neighbour, contemplative in the love of God; the active is signified by
Leah, the contemplative by Rachel. For Leah is interpreted ‘labouring,’ [ed.
note, h: Leah full of labour, Jerom. de nomin. Hebr. from לאה, to weary one’s self.] for she is active in labour; Rachel
‘having seen the beginning,’ [ed. note, i: Rachel, in ewe, (as Gen. xxxi, 38,
&c.) Jerom. ibid. who also gives the interpretation in the text, from ראה and חלל (החלה beginning.] because by the contemplative, the beginning, that
is God, is seen. Jacob is born of two parents, as love is born of faith and
hope; for what we believe, we both hope for and love.
3-6.
And Judas begat Phares and Zara of Thamar; and Phares begat Esrom; and Esrom
begat Aram; and Aram begat Aminadab; and Aminadab begat Naasson; and Naasson
begat Salmon; and Salmon begat Booz of Rachab; and Booz begat Obed of Ruth; and
Obed begat Jesse; and Jesse begat David the king.
Gloss:
Passing over the other sons of Jacob, the Evangelist follows the family of Judah, saying, “But Judah begat Phares and Zara of
Thamar.”
Augustine,
City of God,
15, 15: Neither was Judah himself first-born, nor of these two sons was either
his first-born; he had already had three before them. So that he keeps in that
line of descent, by which he shall arrive at David, and from him whither he
purposed.
Jerome:
It should be noted, that none of the holy women are taken into the Saviour’s
genealogy, but rather such as Scripture has condemned, that He who came for
sinners being born of sinners might so put away the sins of all; thus Ruth the
Moabitess follows among the rest.
Ambrose,
in Luc. 3: But Luke has avoided the mention of these, that he might set forth
the series of the priestly race immaculate. But the plan of St. Matthew did not
exclude the [p. 20] righteousness of natural reason; for when he wrote in his
Gospel, that He who should take on Him the sins of all, was born in the flesh,
was subject to wrongs and pain, he did not think it any detraction from His
holiness that He did not refuse the further humiliation of a sinful parentage.
Nor, again, would it shame the Church to be
gathered from among sinners, when the Lord Himself was born of sinners; and,
lastly, that the benefits of redemption might have their beginning with His own
forefathers: and that none might imagine that a stain in their blood was any
hindrance to virtue, nor again any pride themselves insolently on nobility of
birth.
Chrys.:
Besides this, it shews that all are equally liable to sin; for here is Thamar
accusing Judah
of incest, and David begat Solomon with a woman with whom he had committed
adultery. But if the Law was not fulfilled by these great ones, neither could
it be by their less great posterity, and so all have sinned, and the presence
of Christ is become necessary.
Ambrose:
Observe that Matthew does not name both without a meaning; for though the
object of his writing only required the mention of Phares, yet in the twins a
mystery is signified; namely, the double life of the nations, one by the Law,
the other by Faith.
Pseudo-Chys.:
By Zarah is denoted the people of the Jews, which first appeared in the light
of faith, coming out of the dark womb of the world, and was therefore marked
with the scarlet thread of the circumciser, for all supposed that they were to
be God’s people; but the Law was set before their face as it had been a wall or
hedge. Thus the Jews were hindered by the Law, but in the times of Christ’s
coming the hedge of the Law was broken down that was between Jews and Gentiles,
as the Apostle speaks, “Breaking down the middle wall of partition;” [Eph 2:14]
and thus it fell out that the Gentiles, who were signified by Phares, as soon
as the Law was broken through by Christ’s commandments, first entered into the
faith, and after followed the Jews.
Gloss:
Judah begat Phares and Zarah
before he went into Egypt,
whither they both accompanied their father. In Egypt,
“Phares begat Esrom; and Esrom begat Aram;
Aram begat Aminadab;
Aminadab begat Naasson;” and then Moses led them out of Egypt. Naasson
was head of the tribe of Judah under Moses in the desert, where he begat
Salmon; and this Salmon it was who, as prince of the tribe [p. 21] of Judah,
entered the land of promise with Joshua.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
But as we believe that the names of these Fathers were given for some special
reason under the providence of God, it follows, but “Naasson begat Salmon.”
This Salmon after his father’s death entered the promised land with Joshua as
prince of the tribe of Judah. He took a wife of the name of Rahab. This Rahab
is said to have been that Rahab the harlot of Jericho who entertained the spies
of the children of Israel, and hid them safely. For Salmon being noble among
the children of Israel, inasmuch as he was of the tribe of Judah, and son of
the prince thereof, beheld Rahab so ennobled through her great faith, that she
was worthy whom he should take to wife. Salmon is interpreted ‘receive a
vessel,’ [ed. note: שלמון. Probably as if from מאן Ch. a vessel; perhaps נשא
למאן]
perhaps as if invited in God’s providence by his very name to receive Rahab a
vessel of election.
Gloss:
This Salmon in the promised land begat Booz of this Rahab. Booz begat Obeth of
Ruth.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
How Booz took to wife a Moabitess whose name was Ruth, I thought it needless to
tell, seeing the Scripture concerning them is open to all. We need but say thus
much, that Ruth married Booz for the reward of her faith, for that she had cast
off the gods of her forefathers, and had chosen the living God. And Booz
received her to wife for reward of his faith, that from such sanctified wedlock
might be descended a kingly race.
Ambrose:
But how did Ruth who was an alien marry a man that was a Jew? and wherefore in
Christ’s genealogy did His Evangelist so much as mention a union, which in the
eye of the law was bastard? Thus the Saviour’s birth of a parentage not
admitted by the law appears to us monstrous, until we attend to that
declaration of the Apostle, “The Law was not given for the righteous, but for
the unrighteous.” [1 Tim 1:9]
For this woman who was an alien, a
Moabitess, a nation with whom the Mosaic Law forbad all intermarriage, and shut
them totally out of the Church, how did she enter into the Church, unless that
she were holy and unstained in her life above the Law? Therefore she was exempt
from this restriction of the Law, and deserved to be numbered in the Lord’s
lineage, chosen from the kindred of her mind, not of her body.
To us she is a great example, for [p. 22]
that in her was prefigured the entrance into the Lord’s Church of all of us who
are gathered out of the Gentiles.
Jerome:
Ruth the Moabitess fulfils the prophecy of Isaiah, “Send forth, O Lord, the
Lamb that shall rule over the earth, out of the rock of the desert to the mount
of the daughter of Sion.”
[Isa 16:1]
Gloss:
Jesse, the father of David, has two names, being more frequently called Isai.
But the Prophet says, “There shall come a rod from the stem of Jesse;” [Isa
11:1] therefore to shew that this prophecy was fulfilled in Mary and Christ,
the Evangelist puts Jesse.
Remig.:
It is asked, why this epithet King is thus given by the holy Evangelist to
David alone? Because he was the first king in the tribe of Judah. Christ Himself
is Phares ‘the divider,’ as it is written, “Thou shalt divide the sheep from
the goats;” [Matt 25:33] He is Zaram [ed. note, l: זרח; in Zech. 6:12, it is זרח], ‘the east,’ “Lo the man, the east is His name;” [Zech 6:12];
He is Esrom [ed. note, m: חצרון, as if from חץ, and so Jerome.],
‘an arrow,’ “He hath set me as a polished shaft.” [Isa 49:2]
Raban.:
Or following another interpretation, according to the abundance of grace, and
the width of love. He is Aram the chosen [ed. note, n: רם to be lofty, vid. infr. p.23], according to that, “Behold my
Servant whom I have chosen.” [Isa 42:1] He is Aminadab, that is ‘willing,’ [ed.
note, o: עמי
נדב My
people is willing, - Jerome;
comp. עמך
נדבת,
Ps 110:3], in that He says, “I will freely sacrifice to Thee.” [Isa 54:6] Also
He is Naasson [ed. note, p: נחשן, from נחש to augur from
serpents, and so Jerome],
i.e. ‘augury,’ as He knows
the past, the present, and the future; or, ‘like a serpent,’ according to that,
“Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness.” [John 3:14] He is Salmon [ed.
note, q: And so Jerome], i.e.
‘the feeleth,’ as He said, “I feel that power is gone forth out of me.” [Luke
8:46]
Gloss:
Christ Himself espouses Rahab, i.e. the Gentile Church; for Rahab [ed. note, : רחב, to be wide or broad. (רהב might רעב hunger)] is interpreted either ‘hunger’ or
‘breadth’ or ‘might;’ for the Church of the Gentiles hungers and thirsts after
righteousness, and converts philosophers and kings by the might of her
doctrine. Ruth is interpreted either ‘seeing’ or ‘hastening’ [ed. note, s: And
so Jerome, from ראה, and perhaps רוץ for the second.], and denotes the Church which in purity of
heart sees God, and hastens to the prize of the heavenly call.
Remig.
Christ is also Booz [ed. note, t: And so Jerome; perhaps בעז =بعز
activity; here, as if בעז “with might.”], because He is strength,
for, [p. 23] “When I am lifted up, I will draw all men unto Me.” [John 12:32]
He is Obeth, ‘a servant’ [ed. note, u: עובד Obed, and so Jerome],
for “the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister.” [Matt
20:28] He is Jesse, or ‘burnt’ [ed. note, x: As if from אש], for, “I am come to send fire on earth.” [Luke 12:49] He is
David [ed. note, y: And so Jerome],
‘mighty in arm,’ for, “the Lord is great and powerful;” [Ps 24:8] ‘desirable,’
for, “He shall come, the Desire of all nations;” [Hag 2:7] ‘beautiful to
behold,’ according to that, “Beautiful in form before the sons of men.” [Ps.
45:3]
Gloss:
Let us now see what virtues they be which these fathers edify in us; for faith,
hope, and charity are the foundation of all virtues; those that follow are like
additions over and above them. Judah is interpreted ‘confession,’ of which
there are two kinds, confession of faith, and of sin. If then, after we be
endowed with the three forementioned virtues, we sin, confession not of faith
only but of sin is needful for us.
Phares is interpreted, ‘division,’ Zamar
‘the east,’ and Thamar, ‘bitterness.’ [ed note, z: תמרורים bitterness, from מרר Jer. 31:15, Hos 12:15] Thus confession begets separation from
vice, the rise of virtue, and the bitterness of repentance.
After Phares follows Esron, ‘an arrow,’ for
when one is separated from vice and secular pursuits, he should become a dart
wherewith to slay by preaching the vices of others.
Aram is interpreted ‘elect’ or ‘lofty’ [ed.
note, a: Lofty from רום], for as soon as one is detached from this
world, and profiteth for another, he must needs be held to be elect of God,
famous amongst men, high in virtue.
Naasson is ‘augury,’ but this augury
is of heaven, not of earth. It is that of which Joseph boasted when he said,
“Ye have taken away the cup of my Lord, wherewith He is wont to divine.” [Gen
44:5] The cup is the divine Scripture wherein is the draught of wisdom; by this the wise man divines, since
in it he sees things future, that is, heavenly things.
Next is Salomon [ed. note, b: שלם peace, and so Jerome], ‘that perceiveth,’ for he who studies divine
Scripture becomes perceiving, that is, he discerns by the taste of reason, good
from bad, sweet from bitter.
Next is Booz, that is, ‘brave,’ for who is
well taught in Scripture becomes brave to endure all adversity.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
This brave one is the son of Rahab, that is, of the Church; for Rahab signifies
‘breadth’ or ‘spread out,’ for because the [p. 24] Church of the Gentiles was
called from all quarters of the earth, it is called, ‘breadth.’
Gloss:
Then follows Obeth, i.e. ‘servitude,’ for which none is fit but he who is
strong; and this servitude is begotten of Ruth, that is ‘haste,’ for it behoves
a slave to be quick, not slow.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
They who look to wealth and not temper, to beauty and not faith, and require in
a wife such endowments as are required in harlots, will not beget sons obedient
to their parents or to God, but rebellious to both; that their children may be
punishment of their ungodly wedlock. Obeth begat Jesse, that is, ‘refreshment,’
for whoever is subject to God and his parents, begets such children as prove
his ‘refreshment.’
Gloss:
Or Jesse may be interpreted, ‘incense.’ [ed. note: See p. 29, note i] For if we
serve God in love and fear, there will be a devotion in the heart, which in the
heat and desire of the heart offers the sweetest incense to God. But when one
is become a fit servant, and a sacrifice of incense to God, it follows that he
becomes David (ie. ‘of a strong hand’), who fought mightily against his
enemies, and made the Idumeans tributary.
In like manner ought he to subdue carnal
men to God by teaching and example.
6-8.
David the king begat Solomon of her that had been the wife of Urias; and
Solomon begat Roboam; and Roboam begat Abia; and Abia begat Asa; and Asa begat
Josaphat.
The Evangelist has now finished the first
fourteen generations, and is come to the second, which consists of royal
personages, and therefore beginning with David, who was the first king in the
tribe of Judah, he calls him “David the king.”
Aug.,
de Cons. Evan., ii, 4: Since in Matthew’s genealogy is shewed forth the taking
on Him by Christ of our sins, therefore he descends from David to Solomon, in
whose mother David had sinned. Luke ascends to David through Nathan, for
through Nathan the prophet of God punished David’s sin; because Luke’s
genealogy is to shew the putting away of our sins.
Aug.,
Lib. Retract., ii, 16: That [p. 25] is it, must be said, through a prophet of
the same name, for it was not Nathan the son of David who reproved him, but a
prophet of the same name.
Remig.:
Let us enquire why Matthew does not mention Bathsheba by name as he does the
other women. Because the others, though deserving of much blame, were yet
commendable for many virtues. But Bathsheba was not only consenting in the
adultery, but in the murder of her husband, hence her name is not introduced in
the Lord’s genealogy.
Gloss:
Besides, he does not name Bathsheba, that, by naming Urias, he may recall to
memory that great wickedness which she was guilty of towards him.
Ambrose:
But the holy David is the more excellent in this, that he confessed himself to
be but man, and neglected not to wash out with the tears of repentance the sin
of which he had been guilty, in so taking away Urias’ wife. Herein shewing us
that none ought to trust in his own strength, for we have a mighty adversary
whom we cannot overcome without God’s aid. And you will commonly observe very
heavy sins befalling to the share of illustrious men, that they may not from their
other excellent virtues be thought more than men, but that you may see that as
men they yield to temptation.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Solomon is interpreted, ‘peace-maker,’ because having subdued all the nations
round about, and made them tributary, he had a peaceful reign. Roboam in
interpreted, ‘by a multitude of people,’ for multitude is the mother of
sedition; for where many are joined in a crime, that is commonly unpunishable.
But a limit in numbers is the mistress of good order.
8-11.
And Josaphat begat Joram; and Joram begat Ozias; and Ozias begat Joatham; and
Joatham begat Achaz; and Achaz begat Ezekias; and Ezekias begat Manasses; and
Manasses begat Amon; and Amon begat Josias; and Josias begat Jechonias and his
brethren, about the time they were carried away to Babylon.
Jerome:
In the fourth book of Kings we read, that Ochozias was the son of Joram. On his
death, Josabeth, sister of [p. 26] Ochozias and daughter of Joram, took Joash, her brother’s son, and
preserved him from the slaughter
of the royal seed by Athalias. To Joash succeeded his son Amasias; after him
his son Azarias, who is called Ozias; after him his son Joatham. Thus you see
according to historical truth there were three intervening kings, who are
omitted by the Evangelist. Joram, moveover, begot not Ozias, but Ochozias, and
the rest as we have related.
But because it was the purpose of the
Evangelist to make each of the three periods consist of fourteen generations,
and because Joram had connected himself with Jezebel’s most impious race,
therefore his posterity to the third generation is omitted in tracing the
lineage of the holy birth.
Hilary:
Thus the stain of the Gentile alliance being purged, the royal race is again
taken up in the fourth following generation.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
What the Holy Spirit testified through the Prophet, saying, that He would cut
off every male from the house of Ahab, and Jezebel, that Jehu the son of Nausi
fulfilled, and received the promise that his children to the fourth generation
should sit on the throne of Israel. As great a blessing then as was given upon
the house of Ahab, so great a curse was given on the house of Joram, because of
the wicked daughter of Ahab
and Jazebel, that his sons to the fourth generation should be cut out of the
number of the Kings.
Thus his sin descended on his posterity as
it had been written, “I will visit the sins of the fathers upon the children
unto the third and fourth generation.” [Ex 20:5] Thus see how dangerous it is
to marry with the seed of the ungodly.
Aug.,
Hilsr. Amast. V. et N. Test. q. 85: Or, Ochozias, Joash, and Amasias, were
excluded from the number, because their wickedness was continuous and without
interval. For Solomon was suffered to hold the kingdom for his father’s
deserts, Roboam for his son’s.
But these three doing evil successively
were excluded. This then is an example how a race is cut off when wickedness is
shewn therein in perpetual succession.
“And Ozias begat Joatham; and Joatham begat
Achaz; and Achaz begat Ezekias.”
Gloss:
This Ezekias was he to whom, when he had no children, it was said, “Set thy
house in order, for thou shalt die.” [Isa 38:1] He wept, not from desire of
longer life, for he knew that Solomon had thereby pleased God, that he had not
[p. 27] asked length of days; but he wept, for he feared that God’s promise
should not be fulfilled, when himself, being in the line of David of whom
Christ should come, was without children.
“And Ezekias begat Manasses; and Manasses
begat Amon; and Amon begat Josias.”
Pseudo-Chrys.:
But the order in the Book of Kings is different [2 Ki 23], thus namely; Josias
begot Eliakim, afterwards called Joakim; Joakim begot Jechonias. But Joakim is
not reckoned among the Kings in the genealogy, because God’s people had not set
him on the throne, but Pharoah by his might. For if it were just that only for
their intermixture with the race of Ahab, three kings should be shut out of the
number in the genealogy, was it not just that Joakim should be likewise shut
out, whom Pharaoh had set up as king by hostile force? And thus Jechonias, who
is the son of Joakim, and the grandson of Josiah, is reckoned among the kings
as the son of Josiah, in place of his father who is omitted.
Jerome:
Otherwise, we may consider the first Jeconias to be the same as Joakim, and the
second to be the son not the father, the one being spelt with k and m, the
second by ch and n. This distinction has been confounded both by Greeks and
Latins, by the fault of writers and the lapse of time.
Ambrose,
in Luc., cap. 2: That there were two kings of the name of Joakim, is clear from
the Book of Kings. “And Joakim slept with his fathers, and Joachim his son
reigned in his stead.” [2 Ki 24:6] This son is the same whom Jeremiah calls
Jeconias. And rightly did St. Matthew purpose to differ from the Prophet, because
he sought to shew therein the great abundance of the Lord’s mercies. For the
Lord did not seek among men nobility of race, but suitably chose to be born of
captives and of sinners, as He came to preach remission of sin to the captives.
The Evangelist therefore did not conceal either of these; but rather shewed
them both, inasmuch as both were called Jeconias.
Remig.:
But it may be asked, why the Evangelist says they were born in the carrying
away, when they were born before the carrying away. He says this because they
were born for this purpose, that they should be led captive, from the dominion
of the whole nation, for their own and others’ sins. And because God foreknew
that they were [p. 28] to be carried away captive, therefore he says, they were
born in the carrying away to Babylon.
But of those whom the holy Evangelist
places together in the Lord’s genealogy, it should be known, that they were
alike in good or ill fame. Judas and his brethren were notable for good, in
like manner Phares and Zara, Jechonias and his brethren, were notable for evil.
Gloss:
Mystically, David is Christ, who overcame Golias, that is, the Devil. Urias,
i.e. God is my light, is the Devil who says, “I will be like the Highest.” [Isa
14:14] To Him the Church was married, when Christ on the Throne of the majesty
of His Father loved her, and having made her beautiful, united her to Himself
in wedlock.
Or Urias is the Jewish nation who through
the Law boasted of their light. From them Christ took away the Law, having
taught it to speak of Himself.
Bersabee is ‘the well of satiety,’ that is,
the abundance of spiritual grace.
Remig.:
Bersabee is interpreted, ‘the seventh well,’ or, ‘the well of the oath’ [ed.
note, c: באר
שבע the well
of the oath, the origin of the name is given, Gen 21:28-31. “satiety” as if
from שבע], by which is signified the grant of
baptism, in which is given the gift of the sevenfold Spirit, and the oath
against the Devil is made.
Christ is also Solomon, i.e. the peaceful,
according to that of the Apostle, “He is our peace.” [Eph 2:14]
Roboam [ed. note, d: So Jerome, from רחב; or the foolishness of the people, Ecclus. 47. 23] is, ‘the
breadth of the people,’ according to that, “Many shall come from the East and
from the West.”
Raban.:
Or; ‘the might of the people,’ because he quickly converts the people to the
faith.
Remig.:
He is also Abias, that is, ‘the Lord Father,’ according to that, “One is your
Father who is in heaven.” [Matt 23:9] And again, “Ye call me Master and Lord.”
[John 13:13]
He is also Asa [ed. note, e: So Jerome; as if from נשה=נסה; but אסא means a physician], that is, ‘lifting up,’ according to that,
“Who taketh away the sins of the world.” [John 1:29]
He is also Josaphat, that is, ‘judging,’
for, “The Father hath committed all judgment unto the Son.” [John 5:22]
He is also Joram, that is, ‘lofty,’
according to that, “No man hath ascended up to heaven, but He that came down
from heaven.” [John 3:13]
He is also Ozias, that is, ‘the Lord’s
strength,’ for “The Lord is my strength and my praise.” [Ps 118:14]
He is also Jotham [ed. note, f: And so Jerome, from תמם], that is, ‘completed,’ or ‘perfected,’ for “Christ is the end
of [p. 29] the Law.” [Rom 10:4]
He is also Ahaz [ed. note, g: אחז to seize or hold, and so Jerome.], that is, ‘turning,’
according to that, “Be ye turned to Me.” [Zech 1:3]
Raban.:
Or, ‘embracing,’ because, “None knoweth the Father but the Son.” [Matt 11:27]
Remig.:
His is also Ezekias, that is, ‘the strong Lord,’ or, ‘the Lord shall comfort;’
according to that, “Be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.” [John 16:33]
He is also Manasses, that is, ‘forgetful,’
or, ‘forgotten,’ according to that, “I will not remember your sins any more.”
[Ezek 28]
He is also Aaron [ed note, h: A strong
mountain; Jerome. It has no
Hebrew root.], that is, ‘faithful,’ according to that, “The Lord is faithful in
all His words.” [Ps 145:17]
He is also Josias, that is, ‘the incense of
the Lord,’ [ed. note, i: A sacrifice to the Lord, - Jerome; from אשה fire in the ritual service, or incense, Lev 24:7], as, “And
being in an agony, He prayed more earnestly.” [Luke 22:44]
Raban.:
And that incense signifies prayer, the Psalmist witnesses, saying, “Let my
prayer come up as incense before Thee.” [Ps 141:2] Or, ‘The salvation of the
Lord,’ according to that, “My salvation is for ever.” [Isa 55]
Remig.:
He is Jechonias [ed. note, k: יכניהו “the Lord establisheth,” also
“prepareth.”], that is, ‘preparing,’ or ‘the Lord’s preparation,’ according to
that, “If I shall depart, I will also prepare a place for you.” [John 14:3]
Gloss:
Morally; After David follows Solomon, which is interpreted, ‘peaceful.’ For one
then becomes peaceful, when unlawful motions being composed, and being as it
were already set in the everlasting rest, he serves God, and turns others to
Him.
Then follows Roboam, that is, ‘the breadth
of the people.’ For when there is no longer any thing to overcome within
himself, it behoves a man to look abroad to others, and to draw with him the
people of God to heavenly things.
Next is Abias, that is, ‘the Lord Father,’
for these things premised, He may proclaim Himself the Son of God, and then He
will be Asa, that is, ‘raising up,’ and will ascend to His Father from virtue
to virtue: and He will become Josaphat, that is, ‘judging,’ for He will judge
others, and will be judged of none.
Thus he becomes Joram, that is, ‘lofty,’ as
it were dwelling on high; and is made Oziah, that is, ‘the strong One of the
Lord,’ as attributing all his strength to God, and persevering in his path.
Then follows Jotham, that is, ‘perfect,’
for he groweth daily for greater perfection. And thus he becomes Ahaz, that is,
‘embracing,’ for by obedience knowledge is increased according [p. 30] to that,
“They have proclaimed the worship of the Lord, and have understood His doings.”
Then follows Ezekias, that is, ‘the Lord is
strong,’ because he understands that God is strong, and so turning to His love,
he becomes Manassas, ‘forgetful,’ because he gives up as forgotten all worldly
things; and is made thereby Amon, that is, ‘faithful,’ for whoso despises all
temporal things, defrauds no man of his goods. Thus he is made Josias, that is,
‘in certain hope of the Lord’s salvation;’ for Josias in intepreted ‘the
salvation of the Lord.’
12-15.
And after they were brought to Babylon, Jechonias begat Salathiel; and
Salathiel begat Zorobabel; and Zorobabel begat Abiud; and Abiud begat Eliakim;
and Eliakim begat Azor; and Azor begat Sadoc; and Sadoc begat Achim; and Achim
begat Eliud; and Eliud begat Eleazar; and Eleazar begat Matthan; and Matthan
begat Jacob.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
After the carrying away, he sets Jeconiah again, as now become a private
person.
Ambrose:
Of whom Jeremiah speaks. “Write this man dethroned; for there shall not spring
of his seed one sitting on the throne of David.” [Jer 22:30]
How is this said of the Prophet, that none
of the seed of Jeconias should reign? For if Christ reigned, and Christ was of
the seed of Jeconiah, then has the Prophet spoken falsely. But it is not there
declared that there shall be none of the seed of Jeconiah, and so Christ is of
his seed; and that Christ did reign, is not in contradiction to the prophecy;
for He did not reign with worldly honours, as He said, “My kingdom is not of
this world.” [John 18:36]
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Concerning Salathiel [ed. note, l: This Gloss. from Pseudo-Chrys.
is not found in Nicolai’s edition.], we have read nothing either good or bad,
but we suppose him to have been a holy man, and in the captivity to have
constantly besought God in behalf of afflicted Israel, and that hence he was
named, Salathiel, ‘the petition of God.’ [ed. note, m: שאלתי
אל “I have asked
of God.”]
“Salathiel begot Zorobabel,” which is
interpreted, ‘flowing postponed,’ or, ‘of the confusion,’ or here, ‘the doctor
of Babylon.’ [ed. note, n (p.31): The teacher of Babylon; Jerome; perhaps from זר “crown;” זרב Ch. flowed, poured away,” Syr.
“contracted, bound;” hence another of the meanings in the text.]
I have read, but know not [p. 31] whether
it be true, that both the priestly line and the royal line were united in
Zorobabel; and that it was through him that the children of Israel returned
into their own country. For that in a disputation held between three, of whom
Zorobabel was one, each defending his own opinion, Zorobabel’s sentence, that
Truth was the strongest thing, prevailed; and that for this Darius granted him that
the children of Israel should return to their country; and therefore after this
providence of God, he was rightly called Zorobabel, ‘the doctor of Babylon.’
For what doctrine greater than to shew that Truth is the mistress of all
things?
Gloss:
But this seems to contradict the genealogy which is read in Chronicles. For
there it is said, that Jeconias begot Salathiel and Phadaias, and Phadaias
begot Zorobabel, and Zorobabel Mosollah, Ananias, and Solomith their sister. [1
Chron 3:17] But we know that many parts of the Chronicles have been corrupted
by time, and error of transcribers. Hence come many and controverted questions
of genealogies which the Apostle bids us avoid. [1 Tim 1:4]
Or it may be said, that Salathiel and
Phadaias are the same man under two different names. Or that Salathiel and
Phadaias were brothers, and both had sons of the same name, and that the writer
of the history followed the genealogy of Zorobabel, the son of Salathiel. From
Abiud down to Joseph, no history is found in the Chronicles; but we read that
the Hebrews had many other annals, which were called the Words of the Days, of
which much was burned by Herod, who was a foreigner, in order to confound the
descent of the royal line.
And perhaps Joseph had read in them the
names of his ancestors, or knew them from some other source. And thus the
Evangelist could learn the succession of this genealogy. It should be noted,
that the first Jeconiah is called the resurrection of the Lord, the second, the
preparation of the Lord. Both are very applicable to the Lord Christ, who
declares, “I am the resurrection, and the life;” [John 11:25] and, “I go to
prepare a place for you.” [John 14:2]
Salathiel, i.e. ‘the Lord is my petition,’
is suitable to Him who said, “Holy Father, keep them whom Thou hast given Me.”
[John 17:11]
Remig.:
He is also Zorobabel, [p. 32] that is, ‘the master of confusion,’ according to
that, “Your Master eateth with publicans and sinners.” [Matt 9:11]
He is Abiud, that is, ‘He is my Father,’
according to that, “I and the Father are One.” [John 10:30]
He is also Eliacim [ed. note: So Jerome, אל יקים “God will raise up”], that is, ‘God the
Reviver,’ according to that, “I will revive him again in the last day.” [John
6:54]
He is also Azor, that is, ‘aided,’
according of that, “He who sent Me is with Me.” [John 8:29]
He is also Sadoch, that is, ‘the just,’,
or, ‘the justified,’ according to that, “He was delivered, the just for the
unjust.” [1 Pet 3:18]
He is also Achim, that is, ‘my brother is
He,’ according to that, “Whoso doeth the will of My Father, he is My brother.”
[Matt 12:50]
He is also Eliud, that is, ‘He is my God,’
according to that, “My Lord, and my God.” [John 20:28]
Gloss:
He is also Eleazar, i.e. ‘God is my helper,’ as in the seventeenth Psalm, “My
God, my helper.”
He is also Mathan, that is, ‘giving,’ or,
‘given,’ for, “He gave gifts for men;” [Eph 4:8] and, “God so loved the world,
that He gave His only-begotten Son.” [John 3:16]
Remig.:
He is also Jacob, ‘that supplanteth,’ for not only hath He supplanted the
Devil, but hath given His power to His faithful people; as, “Behold I have
given you power to tread upon serpents.” [Luke 10:19]
He is also Joseph, that is, ‘adding,’
according to that, “I came that they might have life, and that they might have
it abundantly.”
Raban.:
But let us see what moral signification these names contain. After Jeconias,
which means ‘the preparation of the Lord,’ follows Salathiel, i.e. ‘God is my
petition,’ for he who is rightly prepared, prays not but of God.
Again, he becomes Zorobabel, ‘the master of
Babylon,’ that is, of the men of the earth, whom he makes to know concerning
God, that He is their Father, which is signified in Abiud.
Then that people rise again from their
vices, whence follows Eliacim, ‘the resurrection;’ and thence rise to good
works, which is Azor, and becomes Sadoch, i.e. ‘righteous;’ and then they are
taught the love of their neighbour. He is my brother, which is signified in
Achim; and through love to God he says of Him, ‘My God,’ which Eliud signifies.
Then follows Eleazar, i.e. ‘God is my
helper;’ he recognizes God as his helper. But whereto he tends is shewn in
Matthan, which is interpreted ‘gift,’ or ‘giving;’ for he looks to God as his
benefactor; and as he wrestled with and overcame his vices [p. 33] in the
beginning, so he does in the end of life, which belongs to Jacob, and thus he
reaches Joseph, that is, ‘The increase of virtues.’
16.
And Jacob begat Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is
called Christ.
Gloss:
In the last place, after all the patriarchs, he sets down Joseph the husband of
Mary, for whose sake all the rest are introduced, saying, “But Jacob begot
Joseph.”
Jerome:
This passage is objected to us by the Emperor Julian in his Discrepancy of the
Evangelists. Matthew calls Joseph the son of Jacob, Luke makes him the son of
Heli. He did not know the Scripture manner, one was his father by nature, the
other by law. For we know that God commanded by Moses, that if a brother or
near kinsman died without children, another should take his wife, to raise up
seed to his brother or kinsman. [Deut 25]
But of this matter Africanus the
chronologist [ed. note: In his Epist. ad Aristidem, vid. Reuth Reliqu. vol. ii,
p. 114. Africanus], and Eusebius
of Caesarea, have disputed more fully.
Euseb.,
Hist. Eccles. i, 7: For Matthan and Melchi at different periods had each a son
by one and the same wife Jesca. Matthan, who traced through Solomon, first had
her, and died leaving one son, Jacob by name. As the Law forbade not a widow,
either dismissed from her husband, or after the death of her husband, to be
married to another, so Melchi, who traced through Matthan, being of the same
tribe but of another race, took this widow to his wife, and begat Heli his son.
Thus shall we find Jacob and Heli, though
of a different race, yet by the same mother, to have been brethren. One of
whom, namely Jacob, after Heli his brother was deceased without issue, married
his wife, and begat on her the third, Joseph, by nature indeed and reason his
own son. Whereupon also it is written, “And Jacob begat Joseph.” But by the
Law, he was the son of Heli; for Jacob, being his brother, raised up seed to
him.
Thus the genealogy, both as recited by
Matthew, and by Luke, stands right and true; Matthew saying, “And Jacob begot
Joseph;” Luke saying, “Which was the son, as it was supposed, (for he adds this
withal,) of Joseph, [p. 34] which was the son of Heli, which was the son of
Melchi.”
Nor could he have more significantly or
properly expressed that way of generation according to the Law, which was made
by a certain adoption that had respect to the dead, carefully leaving out the
word “begetting” throughout even to the end.
Augustine,
de Cons. Evan., ii, 2: He is more properly called his son, by whom he was
adopted, than had he been said to have been begotten of him of whose flesh he
was not born. Wherefore Matthew, in saying, “Abraham begot Isaac,” and
continuing the same phrase throughout down to “Jacob begot Joseph,”
sufficiently declares that he gives the father according to the order of
nature, so as that we must hold Joseph to have been begotten, not adopted, by
Jacob. Though even if Luke had used the word, “begotten,” we need not have
thought it any serious objection; for it is not absurd to say of an adopted son
that he is begotten, not after the flesh, but by affection.
Euseb.:
Neither does this lack good authority; nor has it been suddenly devised by us
for this purpose. For the kinsmen of our Saviour according to the flesh, either
out of desire to shew forth this their so great nobility of stock, or simply
for the truth’s sake, have delivered it unto us.
Aug.,
de Cons. Evan., ii, 4: And suitably does Luke, who relates Christ’s ancestry
not in the opening of his Gospel, but at his baptism, follow the line of
adoption, as thus more clearly pointing Him out as the Priest that should make
atonement for sin. For by adoption we are made the sons of God, by believing in
the Son of God. But by the descent according to the flesh which Matthew
follows, we rather see that the Son of God was for us made man.
Luke sufficiently shews that he called
Joseph the son of Heli, because he was adopted by Heli, by his calling Adam the
son of God, which he was by grace, as he was set in Paradise, though he lost it
afterwards by sinning.
Chrys.,
Hom. 4: Having gone through all the ancestry, and ended in Joseph, he adds,
“The husband of Mary,” thereby declaring that is was for her sake that he was
included in the genealogy.
Jerome:
When you hear this word, “husband,” do not straight bethink you of wedlock, but
remember the Scripture manner, which calls persons only betrothed husband and
wife.
Gennadius,
de Eccles. Dog., 2: The Son of God was born of human flesh, that is of Mary,
and not by man after the way of nature, as Ebion says; and accordingly it is
significantly [p. 35] added, “Of her Jesus was born.”
Aug.,
De Haeres, ii: This is said against Valentinus, who taught that Christ took
nothing of the Virgin Mary, but passed through her as through a channel or
pipe.
Wherefore it pleased Him to take flesh of
the womb of a woman, is known in His own secret counsels; whether that He might
confer honour on both sexes alike, by taking the form of a man, and being born
of a woman, or from some other reason which I would not hastily pronounce on.
Hilary,
Quaest. Nov. et Vet. Test. q. 49: What God conveyed by the anointing of oil to
those who were anointed to be kings, this the Holy Spirit conveyed upon the man
Christ, adding thereto the expiation; wherefore when born He was called Christ;
and thus it proceeds, “who is called Christ.”
Aug.,
de Cons. Evan., ii, 1: It was not lawful that he should think to separate
himself from Mary for this, that she brought forth Christ as yet a Virgin. And
herein may the faithful gather, that if they be married, and preserve strict
continence on both sides, yet may their wedlock hold with union of love only,
without carnal; for here they see that it is possible that a son be born
without carnal embrace.
Aug.,
de Nupt. et Concup., i, 11: In Christ’s parents was accomplished every good
benefit of marriage, fidelity, progeny, and a sacrament. The progeny we see in
the Lord Himself; fidelity, for there was no adultery; sacrament, for there was
no divorce.
Jerome:
The attentive reader may ask, Seeing Joseph was not the father of the Lord and
Saviour, how does his genealogy traced down to him in order pertain to the
Lord? We will answer, first, that it is not the practice of Scripture to follow
the female line in its genealogies; secondly, that Joseph and Mary were of the
same tribe, and that he was thence compelled to take her to wife as a kinsman,
and they were enrolled together at Bethlehem, as being come of one stock.
Augustine:
Also, the line of descent ought to be brought down to Joseph, that in wedlock
no wrong might be done to the male sex, as the more worthy, providing only
nothing was taken away from the truth; because Mary was of the seed of David.
Hence then we believe that Mary was in the
line of David; namely, because we believe the Scripture which affirms two
things, both that Christ was of the seed of David according to the flesh, and
that He should be conceived of Mary not by knowledge of man, but as yet a
virgin.
The
Council of Ephesus: Herein we [p. 36] must beware of the error of
Nestorius, who thus speaks; “When Divine Scripture is to speak either of the
birth of Christ which is of the Virgin Mary, or His death, it is never seen to
put God, but either, Christ, or Son, or Lord; since these three are
significative of the two natures, sometimes of this, sometimes of that, and
sometimes of both this and that together. And here is a testimony to this,
‘Jacob begot Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called
Christ.’ For God the Word needed not a second birth of a woman.”
Pseudo-Aug.,
Vigil. Cont. Fel. 12. ap. Aug.
t. 8. p. 45: But not one was the Son of God, and another the son of a man; but
the same Christ was the son of both God and man. And as in one man, the soul is
one and the body is another, so in the mediator between God and man, the Son of
God was one, and the son of man another; yet of both together was one Christ
the Lord. Two in distinction of substance, one in unity of Person.
But the heretic objects; “how can you teach
Him to have been born in time whom you say was before coeternal with His
Father? For birth is as it were a motion of a thing not in being, before it be
born, bringing about this, that by benefit of birth it come into being. Whence
it is concluded, that He who was in being cannot be born; if He could be born
He was not in being.”
(To this it is replied by Augustine:) Let us imagine, as many
will have it, that the universe has a general soul, which by some unspeakable
motion gives life to all seeds, so as that itself is not mixed up with the
things it produces. When this then passes forth into the womb to form passible
matter to its own uses, it makes one with itself the person of that thing which
it is clear has not the same substance.
And thus, the soul being active and the
matter passive, of two substances is made one man, the soul and the flesh being
distinct; thus it is that our confession is, that that soul is born of the womb
which in coming to the womb we say conferred life on the thing conceived. He, I
say, is said to be born of His mother, who shaped to Himself a body out of her,
in which He might be born; not as though before He was born, His mother might,
as far as pertained to Him, not have been in being. In like manner, yea in a
manner yet more incomprehensible and sublime, the Son of God was born, by
taking on Him perfect manhood of his Mother. He [p. 37] who by his singular
almighty power is the cause of their being born to all things that are born.
17.
So all the generations from Abraham to David are fourteen generations; and from
David until the carrying away into Babylon are fourteen generations; and from
the carrying away into Babylon unto Christ are fourteen generations.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Having enumerated the generations from Abraham to Christ, he divides them into
three divisions of fourteen generations, because three times at the end of
fourteen generations the state of the people of the Jews was changed. From
Abraham to David they were under Judges; from David to the carrying away into
Babylon under Kings; from the carrying away to Christ under the High Priests.
What he would shew then is this: like as
ever at the end of fourteen generations the state of men has changed, so there
being fourteen generations completed from the carrying away to Christ, it must
needs be that the state of men be changed by Christ. And so since Christ all
the Gentiles have been made under one Christ Judge, King, and Priest. And for
that Judges, Kings, and Priests prefigured Christ’s dignity, their beginnings
were always in a type of Christ; the first of the Judges was Joshua the son of
Nave; the first of the Kings, David; the first of the Priests, Jesus son of
Josedech. That this was typical of Christ none doubts.
Chrys.:
Or he divided the whole genealogy into three parts to shew that not even by the
change of their government were they made better, but under Judges, Kings, High
Priests, and Priests, held the same evil course. For which cause also he
mentions the captivity in Babylon, shewing that neither by this were they
corrected. But the going down into Egypt is not mentioned, because they were
not still in terror of the Egyptians as they were of the Assyrians or
Parthians; and because that was a remote, but this a recent event; and because
they had not been carried thither for sin as they had to Babylon.
Ambrose,
in Luc., c. 3: Let us not think this is to be overlooked, that though there
were seventeen Kings of Judaea between David and Jeconiah, Matthew only
recounts fourteen. We must observe that there [p. 38] might be many more
successions to the throne than generations of men; for some may live longer and
beget children later; or might be altogether without seed; thence the number of
Kings and of generations would not coincide.
Gloss:
Or we may say that there are three Kings overlooked, as was said above.
Ambrose:
Again, from Jeconiah to Joseph are computed twelve generations; yet he
afterwards calls these also fourteen. But if you look attentively, you will be
able to discover the method by which fourteen are reckoned here. Twelve are
reckoned including Joseph, and Christ is the thirteenth; and history declares
that there were two Joakims, that is two Jeconiahs, father and son. The
Evangelist has not passed over either of these, but has named them both. Thus,
adding the younger Jeconiah, fourteen generations are computed.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Or, the same Jeconiah is counted twice in the Gospel, once before the carrying
away, and again after the carrying away. For this Jeconiah being one person had
two different conditions; before the carrying away he was King, as being made
King by the people of God; but he became a private man at the carrying away;
hence he is reckoned once among the Kings before the carrying away; and after
the carrying away once among private men.
Aug.,
de Cons. Evan, ii, 4: Or, one of Christ’s forefathers is counted twice, because
in him, Jeconiah to wit, there was made a passing off to strange nations since
he was carried to Babylon. Wherever a series turns out of the right line to go
in any other direction there is an angle made, and that part that is in the angle
is reckoned twice. Thus here is a figure of Christ, who passes from the
circumcision to the uncircumcision, and is made a cornerstone.
Remig.:
He made fourteen generations, because the ten denotes the Decalogue, and the
four the four books of the Gospel; whence this shews the agreement of the Law
and the Gospel. And he put the fourteen three times over, that he might shew
that the perfection of law, prophecy, and grace, consists in the faith of the
Holy Trinity.
Gloss:
Or in this number is signified the sevenfold grace of the Holy Spirit. The
number is made up of seven, doubled, to shew that the grace of the Holy Spirit
is needed both for soul and body to salvation.
Also the genealogy is divided into three
portions of fourteen thus. The first from Abraham [p. 39] to David, so as that
David is included in it; the second from David to the carrying away, in which
David is not included, but the carrying away is included; the third is from the
carrying away to Christ, in which if we say that Jeconiah is included, then the
carrying away is included. In the first are denoted the men before the Law, in
which you will find some of the men of the Law of nature, such as Abraham,
Isaac, and Jacob, all as far as Solomon.
In the second are denoted the men under the
Law; for all who are included in it were under the Law.
In the third are found the men of grace;
for it is finished in Christ, who was the giver of grace; and because in it was
the deliverance from Babylon, signifying the deliverance from captivity that
was made by Christ.
Aug.:
After having divided the whole into three periods of fourteen generations, he
does not sum them all up and say, The sum of the whole is forty and two;
because one of those fathers, that is Jeconiah, is reckoned twice; so that they
do not amount to forty-two, as three times fourteen does, but because one is
reckoned twice over, there are only forty-one generations.
Matthew therefore, whose purpose was to
draw out Christ’s kingly character, counts forty successions in the genealogy
exclusive of Christ. This number denotes the time for which we must be governed
by Christ in this world, according to that painful discipline which is
signified by the iron rod of which it is written in the Psalms, “Thou shalt
rule them with a rod of iron.”
That this number should denote this our
temporal life, a reason offers at hand, in this, that the seasons of the year
are four, and that the world itself is bounded by four sides, the east, the
west, the north, and the south. But forty contains ten four times. Moreover,
ten itself is made up by a number proceeding from one to four.
Gloss:
Or, the ten refers to the decalogue, the four to this life present, which
passes through four seasons; or by the ten is meant the Old Testament, by the
four the New.
Remig.:
But if any, maintaining that it is not the same Jeconiah, but two different
persons, make the number forty and two, we then shall say that the Holy Church
is signified; for this number is the product of seven, and six; (for six times
seven make forty-two;) the six denotes labour, and the seven rest.
[p. 40]
18.
Now the birth of Jesus Christ was on this wise: When as His mother Mary was
espoused to Joseph, before they came together, she was found with child of the
Holy Ghost.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Having said above, “And Jacob begat Joseph,” to whom Mary being espoused bare
Jesus; that none who heard should suppose that His birth was as that of any of
the forementioned fathers, he cuts off the thread of his narrative, saying,
“But Christ’s generation was thus.” As though he were to say, The generation of
all these fathers was as I have related it; but Christ’s was not so, but as
follows, “His mother Mary being espoused.”
Chrys.:
He announces that he is to relate the manner of the generation, shewing therein
that he is about to speak some new thing; that you may not suppose when you
hear mention of Mary’s husband, that Christ was born by the law of nature.
Remig.:
Yet it might be referred to the foregoing in this way, The generation of Christ
was, as I have related, thus, “Abraham begat Isaac.”
Jerome:
But why is He conceived not of a Virgin merely, but of a Virgin espoused?
First, that by the descent of Joseph, Mary’s family might be made known;
secondly, that she might not be stoned by the Jews as an adulteress; thirdly,
that in her flight into Egypt she might have the comfort of a husband.
The Martyr Ignatius [margin note: vid. Ign.
ad Eph. 19] adds yet a fourth reason, namely, that His birth might be hid from
the Devil, looking for Him to be born of a wife and not of a virgin.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Therefore both espoused and yet remaining at home; for as in her who should
conceive in the house of her husband, is understood natural conception; so in
her who conceives before she be taken to her husband, there is suspicion of
infidelity.
Jerome,
Hieron. cont. Helvid. in princ.: It is to be known, that Helvidius, a certain
turbulent man, having got matter of disputation, takes in hand to blaspheme
against the Mother of God. His first proposition was, Matthew begins thus,
“When she was espoused.” Behold, he says, you have her espoused, but as ye say,
not yet committed; but surely not espoused for any other reason than as being
to be married.
Origen:
She was indeed espoused to Joseph, but not united in wedlock; that is to say,
His mother immaculate, His mother incorrupt, [p. 41] His mother pure. His
mother! Whose mother? The mother of God, of the Only-begotten, of the Lord, of
the King, of the Maker of all things, and the Redeemer of all.
Cyril,
Epist. ad Monach. Egypt. (Ep. p. 7): What will any one see in the Blessed
Virgin more than in other mothers, if she be not the mother of God, but of
Christ, or the Lord, as Nestorius says? For it would not be absurd should any
one please to name the mother of any anointed person, the mother of Christ. Yet
she alone and more than they is called the Holy Virgin, and the mother of
Christ. For she bare not a simple man as ye say, but rather the Word incarnate,
and made man of God the Father.
But perhaps you say, Tell me, do you think
the Virgin was made the mother of His divinity? To this also we say, that the
Word was born of the very substance of God Himself, and without beginning of
time always coexisted with the Father.
But in these last times when He was made
flesh, that is united to flesh, having a rational soul, He is said to be born
of a woman after the flesh. Yet is this sacrament in a manner brought out like
to birth among us; for the mothers of earthly children impart to their nature
that flesh that is to be perfected by degrees in the human form; but God sends
the life into the animal. But though these are mothers only of the earthly
bodies, yet when they bear children, they are said to bear the whole animal,
and not a part of it only.
Such do we see to have been done in the
birth of Emmanuel; the Word of God was born of the substance of His Father; but
because He took on Him flesh, making it His own, it is necessary to confess
that He was born of a woman according to the flesh. Where seeing He is truly
God, how shall any one doubt to call the Holy Virgin the Mother of God?
Chrysologus,
Serm. 148: If you are not confounded when you hear of the birth of God, let not
His conception disturb you, seeing the pure virginity of the mother removes all
that might shock human reverence. And what offence against our awe and
reverence is there, when the Deity entered into union with purity that was
always dear to Him, where an Angel is mediator, faith is bridesmaid, where
chastity is the giving away, virtue the gift, conscience the judge, God the cause;
where the conception is inviolateness, the birth virginity, and the mother a
virgin. [ed. note: The allusions here made may be illustrated by a passage in
the Ad Uxor. ii. 1, of Tertullian, who, with reference to the civil usages,
speaks of “the [cont. p. 42] happiness of that Marriage, which the Church
“brings about, (conciliat,)” the “Oblation” confirms, the Blessing “seals,” the
Angles “witness,” and the Father “ratifies,” In Chrysologus the Angel brings about, (interpres ost,) virtue
is the oblation or bride’s gift, and a pure conscience is the witness.]
Cyril,
Epist. ad Joan. Antioch. (Ep. p. 107): But if [p. 42] we were to say that the
holy Body of Christ came down from heaven, and was not made of His mother, as
Valentinus does, in what sense could Mary be the Mother of God?
Gloss:
The name of His Mother is added, “Mary.”
Bede,
in Luc., c. 3: Mary in interpreted, ‘Star of the Sea,’ after the Hebrew;
‘Mistress,’ after the Syriac; as she bare into the world the Light of
salvation, and the Lord. [ed. note, r: their rebellion. S. Ambrose interprets it “God from my
race,” and “the bitterness of the sea.” de Instit. Virg. 33. It is not
necessary to give the origin of these various interpretations.]
Gloss:
And to whom she was betrothed is shewn, Joseph.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Mary was therefore betrothed to a carpenter, because Christ the Spouse of the
Church was to work the salvation of all men through the wood of the Cross.
Chrys.:
What follows, “Before they came together,” does not mean before she was brought
to the bridegroom’s house, for she was already within. For it was a frequent
custom among the ancients to have their betrothed wives home to their house
before marriage; as we see done now also, and as the sons-in-law of Lot were
with him in the house.
Gloss:
But the words denote carnal knowledge.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
That He should not be born of passion, of flesh and blood, who was therefore
born that He might take away all passion of flesh and blood.
Aug.,
de Nupt. et Concup., i, 12: There was no carnal knowledge in this wedlock,
because in sinful flesh this could not be without carnal desire which came of
sin, and which He would be without, who was to be without sin; and that hence
He might teach us that all flesh which is born of sexual union is sinful flesh,
seeing that Flesh alone was without sin, which was not so born.
Pseudo-Aug.,
in App. 122 et. al.: Christ was also born of a pure virgin, because it was not
holy that virtue should be born of pleasure, chastity of self-indulgence,
incorruption of corruption. Nor could He come from heaven but after some new
manner, who came to destroy the ancient empire of death. Therefore she received
the crown of virginity who bare the King of chastity. Farther, our Lord sought
out for Himself a virgin abode, wherein to be received, that He might shew us
that God ought to be borne in a chaste body.
Therefore He that wrote on tables of stone
without an iron pen, the same wrought in Mary by the Holy [p. 43] Spirit; “She
was found with child of the Holy Ghost.”
Jerome:
And found by none other than by Joseph, who knew all, as being her espoused
husband.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
For, as a not incredible account relates, Joseph was absent when the things
were done which Luke writes. For it is not easy to suppose that the Angel came
to Mary and said those words, and Mary made her answer when Joseph was present.
And even if we suppose thus much to have been possible, yet it could not be
that she should have gone into the hill country, and abode there three months
when Joseph was present, because he must needs have enquired the causes of her
departure and long stay. And so when after so many months he returned from
abroad, he found her manifestly with child.
Chrys.:
He says exactly “was found,” for so we use to say of things not thought of. And
that you should not molest the Evangelist by asking in what way was this birth
of a virgin, he clears himself shortly, saying, “Of the Holy Ghost.” As much as
to say, it was the Holy Ghost that wrought this miracle. For neither Gabriel
nor Matthew could say any futher.
Gloss.,
ap Anselm: Therefore the words, “Is of the Holy Ghost,” were set down by the
Evangelist, to the end, that when it was said that she was with child, all
wrong suspicion should be removed from the minds of the hearers.
Pseudo-Aug.
, Serm. 236 in App.: But not, as some impiously think, are we to suppose, that
the Holy Spirit was as seed, but we say that He wrought with the power and
might of a Creator. [ed. note: And thus S. Hilary speaks of the sementiva ineuntis Spiritus
“efficacia.” de Trin. ii, 26]
Ambrose,
De Spir. Sanct., ii, 5: That which is of any thing is either of the substance
or the power of that thing; of the substance, as the Son who is of the Father;
of the power, as all things are of God, even as Mary was with Child of the Holy
Spirit.
Aug.,
Enchir. c. 40: Furthermore, this manner in which Christ was born of the Holy
Spirit suggests to us the grace of God, by which man without any previous
merits, in the very beginning of his nature, was united with the Word of God
into so great unity of person, that he was also made son of God. [margin note: Aug., Enchir. c. 38]
But inasmuch as the whole Trinity wrought
to make this creature which was conceived of the Virgin, though pertaining only
to the person of the Son, (for the works of the Trinity are indivisible,) why
is [p. 44] the Holy Spirit only named in this work? Must we always, when one of
the Three is named in any work, understand that the whole Trinity worked in
that?
Jerome,
Hieron. Cont. Helvid. in princip.: But says Helvidius; Neither would the
Evangelist have said, “Before they came together,” if they were not to come
together afterwards; as none would say, Before dinner, where there was to be no
dinner. As if one should say, Before I dined in harbour, I set sail for Africa,
would this have no meaning in it, unless he were at some times or other to dine
in the harbour?
Surely we must either understand it thus, -
that “before,” though it often implies something to follow, yet often is said
of things that follow only in thought; and it is not necessary that the things
so thought of should take place, for that something else has happened to
prevent them from taking place.
Jerome:
Therefore it by no means follows that they did come together afterwards;
Scripture however shews not what did happen.
Remig.:
Or the word “come together” may not mean carnal knowledge, but may refer to the
time of the nuptials, when she who was betrothed begins to be wife. Thus,
“before they came together,” may mean before they solemnly celebrated the
nuptial rites.
Aug.,
de Cons. Evan., ii, 5: How this was done Matthew omits to write, but Luke
relates after the conception of John, “In the sixth month the Angel was sent;”
and again, “The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee.” This is what Matthew relates
in these words, “She was found with child of the Holy Ghost.” And it is no
contradiction that Luke has described what Matthew omits; or again that Matthew
relates what Luke has omitted; that namely which follows, from “Now Joseph her
husband being a just man,” to that place where it is said of the Magi, that
“They returned into their own country another way.”
If one desired to digest into one narrative
the two accounts of Christ’s birth, he would arrange thus; beginning with
Matthew’s words, “Now the birth of Christ was on this wise;” then taking up
with Luke, from “There was in the days of Herod,” [Luke 1:5] to, “Mary abode
with her three months,” and “returned to her house;” then taking up again
Matthew, add, “She was found with child of the Holy Ghost.” [Matt 1:10]
[p. 45]
19.
Then Joseph her husband, being a just man, and not willing to make her a public
example, was minded to put her away privily.
Chrys.:
The Evangelist having said that she was found with child of the Holy Ghost, and
without knowledge of man, that you should not herein suspect Christ’s disciple
of inventing wonders in honour of his Master, brings forward Joseph confirming
the history by his own share in it; “Now Joseph her husband, being a just man.”
Pseudo-Aug.,
Serm. in App. s. 195: Joseph, understanding that Mary was with child, is
perplexed that it should be thus with her whom he had received from the temple
of the Lord, and had not yet known, and resolved within himself, saying, What
shall I do? Shall I proclaim it, or shall I overlook it? If I proclaim it, I am
indeed not consenting to the adultery; but I am running into the guilt of
cruelty, for by Moses’ law she must be stoned. If I overlook it, I am
consenting to the crime, and take my portion with the adulterers. Since then it
is an evil to overlook the things, and worse to proclaim the adultery, I will
put her away from being my wife.
Ambrose,
in Luc., ii, 5: St. Matthew has beautifully taught how a righteous man ought to
act, who has detected his wife’s disgrace; so as at once to keep himself
guiltless of her blood, and yet pure from her defilements; therefore it is he
says, “Being a just man.” Thus is preserved throughout in Joseph the gracious
character of a righteous man, that his testimony may be the more approved; for,
the tongue of the just speaketh the judgment of truth.
Jerome:
But how is Joseph thus called, “just,” when he is ready to hide his wife’s sin?
For the Law enacts, that not only the doers of evil, but they who are privy to
any evil done, shall be held to be guilty.
Chrys.:
But it should be known, that “just” here is used to denote one who is in all
things virtuous. For there is a particular justice, namely, the being free from
covetousness; and another universal virtue, in which sense Scripture generally
uses the word justice. Therefore being “just,” that is, kind, merciful, he “was
minded to put away privily” her who according to the Law was liable not only to
dismissal, but to death. But Joseph remitted both, as though living above the
Law. For as the sun lightens up the world, [p. 46] before he shews his rays, so
Christ before He was born caused many wonders to be seen.
Aug.:
Otherwise; if you alone have knowledge of a sin that any has committed against
you, and desire to accuse him thereof before men, you do not herein correct,
but rather betray him. But Joseph, “being a just man,” with great mercy spared
his wife, in this great crime of which he suspected her. The seeming certainty
of her unchastity tormented him, and yet because he alone knew of it, he was
willing not to publish it, but to send her away privily; seeking rather the
benefit than the punishment of the sinner.
Jerome:
Or this may be considered a testimony to Mary, that Joseph, confident in her
purity, and wondering at what had happened, covered in silence that mystery
which he could not explain.
Rabanus:
He beheld her to be with child, whom he knew to be chaste; and because he had
read, “There shall come a Rod out of the stem of Jesse,” of which he knew that
Mary was come [ed. note: Jerome
in loc. Ambros. de Spir. S. ii. 5. and Pseudo-Augustine (t. vi. p. 570.) so apply these words,
considering Christ the ‘Branch’ or flower (flos) which is spoken of in the
clause following. Cyril Alex.
et Theod. in loc. explain it of Christ.], and had also read, “Behold, a virgin
shall conceive,” he did not doubt that this prophecy should be fulfilled in
her.
Origen:
But if he had no suspicion of her, how could he be a just man, and yet seek to
put her away, being immaculate? He sought to put her away, because he saw in
her a great sacrament, to approach which he thought himself unworthy.
Gloss,
ap Anselm: Or, in seeking to put her away, he was just; in that he sought it
privily, is shewn his mercy, defending her from disgrace; “Being a just man, he
was minded to put her away;” and being unwilling to expose her in public, and
so to disgrace her, he sought to do it privily.
Ambrose,
in Luc., ii, 1: But as no one puts away what he has not received; in that he
was minded to put her away, he admits to have received her.
Gloss,
part ap. Anselm, part in Ordinaria: Or, being unwilling to bring her home to
his house to live with him for ever, “he was minded to put her away privily;”
that is, to change the time of their marriage. For that is true virtue, when
neither mercy is observed without justice, nor justice without mercy; both
which vanish when severed one from the other.
Or he was just because of his faith, in
that [p. 47] he believed that Christ should be born of a virgin; wherefore he
wished to humble himself before so great a favour.
20.
But while he thought on these things, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared
unto him in a dream, saying, Joseph, thou son of David, fear not to take unto
thee Mary thy wife: for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost.
Remig.:
Because Joseph was minded, as has been said, to put Mary away privily, which if
he had done, there would have been few who would not rather have thought her a
harlot than a virgin, therefore this purpose of Joseph was changed by Divine
revelation, whence it is said, “While he thought on these things.”
Gloss.,
ap Anselm: In this is to be noted the wise soul that desires to undertake
nothing rashly.
Chrys.:
Also observe the mercifulness of Joseph, that he imparted his suspicions to
none, not even to her whom he suspected, but kept them within himself.
Pseudo-Aug.,
Serm. in App. 195: Yet though Joseph think on these things, let not Mary the daughter of David be troubled; as
the word of the Prophet brought pardon to David, so the Angel of the Saviour
delivers Mary. Behold, again appears Gabriel the bridesman of this Virgin; as
it follows, “Behold the Angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph.”
Ambrose:
In this word “appeared” is conveyed the power of Him that did appear, allowing
Himself to be seen where and how He pleases.
Raban.:
How the Angel appeared to Joseph is declared in the words, “In his sleep;” that
is, as Jacob saw the ladder offered by a kind of imagining to the eyes of his
heart.
Chrys.:
He did not appear so openly to Joseph as to the Shepherds, because he was
faithful; the shepherds needed it, because they were ignorant. The Virgin also
needed it, as she had first to be instructed in these mighty wonders. In like
manner Zacharias needed the wonderful vision before the conception of his son.
Gloss.,
part Int., part Anselm: The Angel appearing calls him by name, and adds his
descent, in order to banish fear, “Joseph, son of David;” Joseph, as though he
were known to him by name and his familiar friend.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
By addressing him as son of David, he sought to recall to his memory the
promise of God to David, that of [p. 48] his seed should Christ be born.
Chrys.:
But by saying, “Be not afraid,” he shews him to be in fear that he had offended
God, by having an adulteress; for only as such would he have ever thought of
putting her away.
Chrysologus:
As her betrothed husband also he is admonished not to be afraid; for the mind
that compassionates has most fear; as though he were to say, Here is no cause
of death, but of life; she that brings forth life, does not deserve death.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Also by the words, “Fear not,” he desired to shew that he knew the heart; that
by this he might have the more faith in those good things to come, which he was
about to speak concerning Christ.
Ambrose,
in Luc., ii, 5: Be not troubled that he calls her his wife; for she is not
herein robbed of her virginity, but her wedlock is witnessed to, and the
celebration of her marriage is declared.
Jerome:
But we are not to think that she ceased to be betrothed, because she is here called
wife, since we know that this is the Scripture manner to call the man and
woman, when espoused, husband and wife; and this is confirmed by that text in
Deuteronomy, “If one finds a virgin that is betrothed to a man in the field,
and offer violence to her, and lie with her, he shall die, because he hath
humbled his neighbour’s wife.” [Deut 22:25]
Chrys.:
He says, “Fear not to take unto thee;” that is, to keep at home; for in thought
she was already dismissed.
Raban.:
Or, “to take her,” that is, in marriage union and continual converse.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
There were three reasons why the Angel appeared to Joseph with this message.
First, that a just man might not be led into an unjust action, with just
intentions. Secondly, for the honour of the mother herself, for had she been
put away, she could not have been free from evil suspicion among the
unbelievers. Thirdly, that Joseph, understanding the holy conception, might
keep himself from her with more care than before.
He did not appear to Joseph before the conception,
that he should not think those things that Zacharias thought, nor suffer what
he suffered in falling into the sin of unbelief concerning the conception of
his wife in her old age. For it was yet more incredible that a virgin should
conceive, than that a woman past the age should conceive.
Chrys.:
Or, The Angel appeared to Joseph when he was in this perplexity, that his
wisdom might be apparent to Joseph, and that this [p. 49] might be a proof to
him of those things that he spoke. For when he heard out of the mouth of the
Angel those very things that he thought within himself, this was an undoubted
proof, that he was a messenger from God, who alone knows the secrets of the
heart.
Also the account of the Evangelist is
beyond suspicion, as he describes Joseph feeling all that a husband was likely
to feel. The Virgin also by this was more removed from suspicion, in that her
husband had felt jealousy, yet took her home, and kept her with him after her
conception. She had not told Joseph the things that the Angel had said to her,
because she did not suppose that she should be believed by her husband,
especially as he had begun to have suspicions concerning her.
But to the Virgin the Angel announced her
conception before it took place, lest if he should defer it till afterwards she
should be in straits. And it behoved that Mother who was to receive the Maker
of all things to be kept free from all trouble. Not only does the Angel
vindicate the Virgin from all impurity, but shews that the conception was supernatural,
not removing his fears only, but adding matter of joy; saying, “That which is
born in her is of the Holy Spirit.”
Gloss.
ord: To be “born in her,” and “born of her,” are two different things; to be
born of her is to come into the world; to be born in her, is the same as to be
conceived. Or the word, “born,” is used according to the foreknowledge of the
Angel which he has of God, to whom the future is as the past.
Pseudo-Aug.,
Hil. Quaest. N. et V. Test.
q. 52: But if Christ was born by the agency of the Holy Ghost, how is that
said, “Wisdom hath built herself an house?” [Prov 9:1]
That house may be taken in two meanings.
First, the house of Christ is the Church, which He built with His own blood;
and secondly, His body may be called His house, as it is called His temple. But
the work of the Holy Spirit, is also the work of the Son of God, because of the
unity of their nature and their will; for whether it be the Father, or the Son,
or the Holy Spirit, that doeth it, it is the Trinity that works, and what the
Three do, is of One God.
Aug.,
Enchir., 38: But shall we therefore say that the Holy Spirit is the Father of
the man Christ, that as God the Father begot the Word, so the Holy Spirit begot
the man? This is such an absurdity, that the ears of the faithful cannot bear
it. [p. 50]
How then do we say that Christ was born by
the Holy Spirit, if the Holy Spirit did not beget Him? Did He create Him? For
so far as He is man He was created, as the Apostle speaks; “He was made of the
seed of David according to the flesh.” [Rom 1:3] For though God made the world,
yet is it not right to say that it is the Son of God, or born by Him, but that
it was made, or created, or formed by Him. But seeing that we confess Christ to
have been born by the Holy Spirit, and of the Virgin Mary, how is He not the
Son of the Holy Spirit, and is the Son of the Virgin? It does not follow, that
whatever is born by any thing, is therefore to be called the son of that thing;
for, not to say that of man is born in one sense a son, in another a hair, or
vermin, or a worm, none of which are his son, certainly those that are born of
water and the Spirit none would call sons of water; but sons of God their
Father, and their Mother the Church. Thus Christ was born of the Holy Spirit,
and yet is the Son of God the Father, not of the Holy Spirit.
21.
And she shall bring forth a Son, and thou shalt call His name Jesus: for He
shall save His people from their sins.
Chrys.:
What the Angel thus told Joseph, was beyond human thought, and the law of
nature, therefore he confirms his speech not only be revealing to him what was
past, but also what was to come; “She shall bring forth a Son.”
Gloss.,
ap Anselm: That Joseph should not suppose that he was no longer needed in this
wedlock, seeing the conception had taken place without his intervention, the
Angel declares to him, that though there had been no need of him in the
conception, yet there was need of his guardianship; for the Virgin should bear
a Son, and then he would be necessary both to the Mother and her Son; to the
Mother to screen her from disgrace, to the Son to bring Him up and to
circumcise Him. The circumcision is meant when he says, “And thou shalt call
His name Jesus;” for it was usual to give the name in circumcision.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
He said not, “Shall bear thee a Son,” as to Zacharias, “Behold, Elisabeth thy
wife shall bear thee a son.” For the woman who conceives of her husband, [p.
51] bears the son to her husband, because he is more of him than of herself;
but she who had not conceived of man, did not bear the Son to her husband, but
to herself.
Chrys.:
Or, he left it unappropriated, to shew that she bare Him to the whole world.
Raban.:
“Thou shalt call His name,” he says, and not, “shalt give Him a name,” for His
name had been given from all eternity.
Chrys.:
This further shews that this birth should be wonderful, because it is God that
sends down His name from above by His Angel; and that not any name, but one
which is a treasure of infinite good. Therefore also the Angel interprets it,
suggesting good hope, and by this induces him to believe what was spoken. For
we lean more easily to prosperous things, and yield our belief more readily to
good fortune.
Jerome:
Jesus is a Hebrew word, meaning Saviour. He points to the etymology of the
name, saying, “For He shall save His people from this sins.”
Remig.:
He shews the same man to be the Saviour of the whole world, and the Author of
our salvation. He saves indeed not the unbelieving, but His people; that is, He
saves those that believe on Him, not so much from visible as from invisible
enemies; that is, from their sins, not by fighting with arms, but by remitting
their sins.
Chrysologus:
Let them approach to hear this, who ask, Who is He that Mary bare? “He shall
save His people;” not any other man’s people; from what? “from their sins.”
That it is God that forgives sins, if you do not believe the Christians so
affirming, believe the infidels, or the Jews who say, “None can forgive sins
but God only.” [Luke 5:1]
22.
Now all this was done, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord
by the prophet, saying,
23.
Behold, a Virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a Son, and they
shall call His Name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us.
Remig.:
It is the custom of the Evangelist to confirm what he says out of the Old
Testament, for the sake of those Jews who believed on Christ, that they might
recognize as fulfilled in the grace of the Gospel, the things that were
foretold in the Old Testament; therefore he adds, “Now all this was done.” [p.
52]
Here we must enquire why he should say “all
this was done,” when above he has only related the conception. It should be
known that he says this to shew, that in the presence of God “all this was
done” before it was done among men. Or he says, “all” this was done, because he
is relating past events; for when he wrote, it was all done.
Gloss.,
ap Anselm: Or, he says, “all this was done,” meaning, the Virgin was betrothed,
she was kept chaste, she was found with child, the revelation was made by the
Angel, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken. For that the Virgin should
conceive and should bring forth would never have been fulfilled, had she not
been espoused that she should not be stoned; and had not her secret been
disclosed by the Angel, and so Joseph taken her unto him, that she was not
dismissed to disgrace and to perish by stoning. So had she perished before the
birth, that prophecy would have been made void which says, “She shall bring
forth a Son.” [Isa 7:14]
Gloss:
Or it may be said, that the word “that” does not here denote the cause; for the
prophecy was not fulfilled merely because it was to be fulfilled. But it is put
consecutively, as in Genesis, “He hung the other on the gallows, that the truth
of the interpreter might be proved;” [Gen 40:22] since by the weighing of one,
truth is established. So also in this place we must understand it as if it
were, that which was foretold being done, the prophecy was accomplished.
Chrys.:
Otherwise; the Angel seeing the depths of the Divine mercy, the laws of nature
broken through and reconciliation made, He who was above all made lower than
all; all these wonders, all this he comprises in that one saying, “Now all this
hath happened;” as though he had said, Do not suppose that this is newly
devised of God, it was determined of old. And he rightly cites the Prophet not
to the Virgin, who as a maiden was untaught in such things, but to Joseph, as
to one much versed in the Prophets.
And at first he had spoken of Mary as “thy
wife,” but now in the words of the Prophet he brings in the word, “Virgin,”
that he might hear this from the Prophet, as a thing long before determined.
Therefore to confirm what he had said, he introduces Isaiah, or rather God; for
he does not say, Which was spoken by Isaiah, but, “Which was spoken of the Lord
by the Prophet.”
Jerome,
in Isa 7:14; Since it is introduced in the Prophet by the words, [p. 53] “The
Lord Himself shall give you a sign,” it ought to be something new and
wonderful. But if it be, as the Jews will have it, a young woman, or a girl
shall bring forth, and not a virgin, what wonder is this, since these are words
signifying age and not purity?
Indeed the Hebrew word signifying “Virgin”
(Bethula) is not used in this place, but instead the word, ‘Halma,’ [ed. note,
a: עןלמה, &c.] which except the LXX all render
‘girl.’ But the word, ‘Halma,’ has a twofold meaning; it signifies both ‘girl,’
and ‘hidden;’ therefore ‘Halma’ denotes not only ‘maiden’ or ‘virgin,’ but
‘hidden,’ ‘secret;’ that is, one never exposed to the gaze of men, but kept
under close custody by her parents.
In the Punic tongue also, which is said to
be derived from Hebrew sources, a virgin is properly called ‘Halma.’ In our
tongue also ‘Halma’ means holy; and the Hebrews use words of nearly all
languages; and as far as my memory will serve me, I do not think I ever met
with Halma used of a married woman, but of her that is a virgin, and such that
she be not merely a virgin, but in the age of youth; for it is possible for an
old woman to be a maid. But this was a virgin in years of youth, or at least a
virgin, and not a child too young for marriage.
For that which Matthew the Evangelist says,
“Shall have in her womb,” the Prophet who is foretelling something future,
writes, “shall receive.” The Evangelist, not foretelling the future but
describing the past, changes “shall receive,” into “shall have;” but he who
has, cannot after receive that he has. He says, “Lo, a Virgin shall have in her
womb, and shall bear a Son.”
Leo,
Serm. 23, 1: The conception was by the Holy Spirit within the womb of the
Virgin; who, as she conceived in perfect chastity, in like manner brought forth
her Son.
Pseudo-Aug.,
in App. s. 123: He, who by a touch could heal the severed limbs of others, how
much more could He, in His own birth, preserve whole that which He found whole?
In this parturition, soundness of the Mother’s body was rather strengthened
than weakened, and her virginity rather confirmed than lost.
Theodotus,
Hom. 1 and 2. in Conc. Eph. ap. Hard. t. i. pp. 1643, 1655: Inasmuch as
Photinus affirms that He that was now born was mere man, not allowing the
divine birth, and maintains that He who now issued from the womb was the man
separate from the God; let him shew how it was possible that human nature, born
of the Virgin’s womb, should have preserved the [p. 54] virginity of that womb
uncorrupted; for the mother of no man ever yet remained a virgin.
But forasmuch as it was God the Word who
was now born in the flesh, He shewed Himself to be the Word, in that He
preserved His mother’s virginity. For as our word when it is begot does not
destroy the mind, so neither does God the Word in choosing His birth destroy
the virginity.
Chrys.:
As it is the manner of Scripture to convey a knowledge of events under the form
of a name, so here, “They shall call His name Emmanuel,” means nothing else
than, They shall see God among men. Whence he says not, ‘Thou shalt call,’ but
“They shall call.”
Raban.:
First, Angels hymning, secondly, Apostles preaching, then Holy Martyrs, and
lastly, all believers.
Jerome,
in Isa 7:14; The LXX and three others translate, ‘Thou shalt call,’ instead of
which we have here, “They shall call,” which is not so in the Hebrew; for the
word, ‘Charathi,’ [ed. note: קראת] which all render “Thou shalt call,” may
mean, ‘And she shall call,’ that is, The Virgin that shall conceive and shall
bear Christ, shall call His name Emmanuel, which is interpreted, ‘God with us.’
Remig.:
It is a question who interpreted this name? The Prophet, or the Evangelist, or
some translator? It should be known then, that the Prophet did not interpret
it; and what need had the Holy Evangelist to do so, seeing he wrote in the
Hebrew tongue? Perhaps that was a difficult and rare word in Hebrew, and
therefore needed interpretation. It is more probable that some translator
interpreted it, that the Latins might not be perplexed by an unintelligible
word.
In this name are conveyed at once the two
substances, the Divinity and Humanity in the one Person of the Lord Jesus
Christ. He who before all time was begot in an unspeakable manner by God the
Father, the same in the end of time was made “Emmanuel,” that is, “God with
us,” of a Virgin Mother. This “God with us” may be understood in this way. He
was made with us, passible, mortal, and in all things like unto us without sin;
or because our frail substance which He took on Him, He joined in one Person to
His Divine substance.
Jerome:
It should be known, that the Hebrews believe this prophecy to refer to Ezekias,
the son of Ahaz, because in his reign Samaria was taken; but this cannot be
established. Ahaz [p. 55] son of Jotham reigned over Judaea and Jerusalem
sixteen years, and was succeeded by his son Ezekias, who was twenty-three years
old, and reigned over Judaea and Jerusalem twenty-nine years; how then can a
prophecy prophesied in the first year of Ahaz refer to the conception and birth
of Ezekias, when he was already nine years of age? Unless perhaps the sixth
year of the reign of Ezekias, in which Samaria was taken, they think is here
called his infancy, that is, the infancy of his reign, not of his age; which
even a fool must see to be hard and forced.
A certain one of our interpreters contends,
that the Prophet Isaiah had two sons, Jashub and Emmanuel; and that Emmanuel
was born of his wife the Prophetess as a type of the Lord and Saviour. But this
is a fabulous tale.
Petrus
Alfonsus, Dial. tit. 7: For we know not that any man of that day was
called Emmanuel. But the Hebrew objects, How can it be that this was said on
account of Christ and Mary, when many centuries intervened between Ahaz and
Mary? But though the Prophet was speaking to Ahaz, the prophecy was yet not
spoken to him only or of his time only; for it is introduced, “Hear, O house of
David;” [Isa 7:13] not, ‘Hear, O Ahaz.’
Again, “The Lord Himself shall give you a
sign;” meaning He, and none other; from which we may understand that the Lord
Himself should be the sign. And that he says “to you,” (plur.) and not ‘to
thee,’ shews that this was not spoken to Ahaz, or on his account only.
Jerome:
What is spoken to Ahaz then is to be thus understood. This Child, that shall be
born of a Virgin of the house of David, shall now be called Emmanuel, that is,
God with us, because the events (perhaps delivery from the two hostile kings)
will make it appear that you have God present with you. But after He shall be
called Jesus, that is, Saviour, because He shall save the whole human race.
Wonder not, therefore, O house of David, at the newness of this thing, that a
Virgin should bring forth a God, seeing He has so great might that though yet
to be born after a long while, He delivers you now when you call upon Him.
Aug.,
Cont. Faust., 12, 45, and 13, 7: Who so mad as to say with Manichaeus, that it
is a weak faith not to believe i Christ without a witness; whereas the Apostle
says, “How shall they believe on Him of whom they have not heard? Or how shall
they hear without a preacher?” [Rom 10:14]
That those things which were preached by
the Apostle might [p. 56] not be contemned, nor thought to be fables, they are
proved to have been foretold by the Prophets. For though attested by miracles,
yet there would not have been wanting men to ascribe them all to magical power,
had not such suggestions been overcome by the additional testimony of prophecy.
For none could suppose that long before He
was born, He had raised up by magic prophets to prophesy of Him. For if we say
to a Gentile, Believe on Christ that He is God, and he should answer, Whence is
it that I should believe on Him? we might allege the authority of the Prophets.
Should he refuse assent to this, we establish their credit from their having
foretold things to come, and those things having truly come to pass. I suppose
he could not but know how great persecutions the Christian religion has
formerly suffered from the Kings of this world; let him now behold those very
Kings submitting to the kingdom of Christ, and all nations serving the same;
all which things the Prophets foretold. He then hearing these things out of the
Scriptures of the Prophets, and beholding them accomplished throughout the
whole earth, would be moved to faith.
Gloss,
in Anselm: This error then is barred by the Evangelist saying, “That it might
be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the Prophet.”
Now one kind of prophecy is by the
preordination of God, and must needs be fulfilled, and that without any free
choice on our part. Such is that of which we now speak; wherefore he says,
“Lo,” to shew the certainty of prophecy.
There is another kind of prophecy which is
by the foreknowledge of God, and with this our free will is mixed up; wherein
by grace working with us we obtain reward, or if justly deserted by it,
torment.
Another is not of foreknowledge, but is a
kind of threat made after the manner of men; as that, “Yet forty days, and
Nineveh shall be overthrown;” [Jonah 3] understanding, unless the Ninevites
amend themselves.
24.
Then Joseph being raised from sleep did as the angel of the Lord had bidden
him, and took unto him his wife:
25.
And knew her not till she had brought forth her first-born Son: and he called
his name, Jesus.
[p. 57]
Remig.:
Life returned by the same entrance through which death had entered in. By
Adam’s disobedience we were ruined, by Joseph’s obedience we all begin to be
recalled to our former condition; for in these words is commended to us the
great virtue of obedience, when it is said, “And Joseph rising from sleep, did
as the Angel of the Lord had commanded him.”
Gloss.
ord. et ap. Anselm ex Beda cit.: He not only did what the Angel commanded, but
as he commanded it. Let each one who is warned of God, in like manner, break
off all delays, rise from sleep, and do that which is commanded him.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
“Took unto him” not took home to him; for he had not sent her away; he had put
her away in thought only, and now took her again in thought.
Remig.:
Or, Took her so far, as that the nuptial rites being complete, she was called
his wife; but not so far as to lie with her, as it follows, “And knew her not.”
Jerome,
Cont. Helvid. c. 5: Helvidius is at much superfluous trouble to make this word
“know” refer to carnal knowledge rather than to acquaintance, as though any had
ever denied that; or as if the follies to which he replies had ever occurred to
any person of common understanding. He then goes on to say, that the adverb,
‘until,’ denotes a fixed time when that should take place, which had not taken
place before; so that here from the words, “He knew her not until she had
brought forth her first-born Son,” it is clear, he says, that after that he did
know her. And in proof of this he heaps together many instances from Scripture.
To all this we answer, that the word
‘until’ is to be understood in two senses in Scripture. And concerning the
expression, “knew her not,” he has himself shewn, that it must be referred to
carnal knowledge, none doubting that it is often used of acquaintance, as in
that, “The child Jesus tarried behind in Jerusalem, and His parents knew not of
it.” [Luke 2:43]
In like manner, ‘until’ often denotes in
Scripture, as he has shewn, a fixed period, but often also an infinite time, as
in that, “Even to your old age I am He.” [Isa 46:4] Will God then cease to be
when they are grown old? Also the Saviour in the Gospel, “Lo, I am with you
always, even to the end of this world.” [Matt 28:20] Will He then leave His
disciples at the end of the world? Again, the Apostle says, “He must reign till
He has put His enemies under His feet.” [1 Cor 15:25]
Be it understood then, that which if it had
not been written might have been [p. 58] doubted, is expressly declared to us;
other things are left to our own understanding.
[ed. note: In other words, “till,” need not
imply a termination at a certain point of time, but may be giving us
information up to a point from which onwards there is already no doubt.
Supposing an Evangelist thought the very notion shocking that Joseph should
have considered the Blessed Virgin as his wife after he was a witness of her
bearing God the Son, he would only say that the vision had its effect upon him
up to that time when it was no longer necessary. Just as if, in speaking of a
man like Augustine, one said,
that, in consequence of some awful occurrence, he was in the habit of saying
prayers till the time of his conversion, no one would suppose that he left them
off on being converted.]
So here the Evangelist informs us, in that
wherein there might have been room for error, that she was not known by her
husband until the birth of her Son, that we might thence infer that much less
was she known afterwards.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
As one might say, ‘He told it not so long as he lived;’ would this imply that
he told it after his death? Impossible. So it were credible that Joseph might
have known her before the birth, while he was yet ignorant of the great mystery;
but after that he understood how she had been made a temple of the
Only-begotten of God, how could he occupy that? The followers of Eunomius
think, as they have dared to assert this, that Joseph also dared to do it, just
as the insane think all men equally mad with themselves.
Jerome,
cont. Hevlid. 8: Lastly, I would ask, Why then did Joseph abstain at all up to
the day of birth? He will surely answer, Because of the Angel’s words, “That
which is born in her, &c.” He then who gave so much heed to a vision as not
to dare to touch his wife, would he, after he had heard the shepherds, seen the
Magi, and known so many miracles, dare to approach the temple of God, the seat
of the Holy Ghost, the Mother of his Lord?
Pseudo-Chrys.:
It may be said, that “know” here signifies simply, to understand; that whereas
before he had not understood how great her dignity, after the birth he then
“knew” that she had been made more honourable and worthy than the whole world,
who had carried in her womb Him whom the whole world could not contain.
Gloss:
Otherwise; On account of the glorification of the most holy Mary, she could not
be known by Joseph until the birth; for she who had the Lord of glory in her
womb, how should she be known? If the face of Moses talking with God was made
glorious, so that the children of Israel could not look thereon, how much [p.
59] more could not Mary be known, or even looked upon, who bare the Lord of
glory in her womb? After the birth she was known of Joseph to the beholding of
her face, but not to be approached carnally.
Jerome:
From the words, “her first-born Son,” some most erroneously suspect that Mary
had other sons, saying that first-born can only be said of one that has
brethren. But this is the manner of Scripture, to call the first-born not only
one who is followed by brethren, but the first-birth of the mother.
Jerome,
Cont. Helvid. 10: For if he only was first-born who was followed by other
brethren, then no first-birth could be due to the Priests, till such time as
the second birth took place.
Gloss.
ord.: Or; He is “first-born” among the elect by grace; but by nature the
Only-begotten of God the Father, the only Son of Mary. “And called His name
Jesus,” on the eighth day on which the circumcision took place, and the Name
was given.
Remig.:
It is clear that this Name was well known to the Holy Fathers and the Prophets
of God, but to him above all, who spake, “My soul fainted for Thy salvation;”
[Ps 119:81] and, “My soul hath rejoiced in Thy salvation.” [Ps 13:5] Also to
him who spake, “I will joy in God my Saviour.” [Heb 3:18]
Gospel of Matthew, Chapter 2
[p. 60]
1.
Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judaea in the days of Herod the king,
behold, there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem,
2.
Saying, Where is He that is born King of the Jews? for we have seen His star in
the east, and are come to worship Him.
Aug.:
After the miraculous Virgin-birth, a God-man having by Divine power proceeded
from a virgin womb; in the obscure shelter of such a cradle, a narrow stall,
wherein lay Infinite Majesty in a body more narrow, a God was suckled and
suffered the wrapping of vile rags - amidst all this, on a sudden a new star
shone in the sky upon the earth, and driving away the darkness of the world,
changed night into day; that the day-star should not be hidden by the night.
Hence it is that the Evangelist says, “Now
when Jesus was born in Bethlehem.”
Remig.:
In the beginning of this passage of the Gospel he puts three several things;
the person, “When Jesus was born,” the place, “in Bethlehem of Judaea,” and the
time, “in the days of Herod the king.” These three circumstances verify his
words.
Jerome:
We think the Evangelist first wrote, as we read in the Hebrew, ‘Judah,’ not
‘Judaea.’ For in what other country is there a Bethlehem, that this needs to be
distinguished as in ‘Judaea?’ But ‘Judah’ is written, because there is another
Bethlehem in Galilee.
Gloss.
ord.: There are two Bethlehems; [Josh 19:15] one in the tribe of Zabulon, the
other in the tribe of Judah, which was before called Ephrata.
Aug.,
de Cons. Evan., 2, 15: Concerning the place, Bethlehem, Matthew and Luke agree;
but the cause and manner of their being there, Luke relates, Matthew omits.
Luke again omits the account of the Magi, which Matthew gives. [p. 61]
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Let us see to what serves this designation of time, “In the days of Herod the
king.” It shews the fulfilment of Daniel’s prophecy, wherein he spake that
Christ should be born after seventy weeks of years. For from the time of the
prophecy to the reign of Herod, the years of seventy weeks were accomplished.
Or again, as long as Judaea was ruled by
Jewish princes, though sinners, so long prophets were sent for its amendment;
but now, whereas God’s law was held under the power of an unrighteous king, and
the righteousness of God enslaved by the Roman rule, Christ is born; the most
desperate sickness required the better physician.
Rabanus:
Otherwise, he mentions the foreign king to shew the fulfilment of the prophecy.
“The Sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a Lawgiver from between his feet,
until Shiloh come.” [Gen 49:10]
Ambrose,
in Luc., iii, 41: It is said, that some Idumaean robbers coming to Ascalon,
brought with them among other prisoners Antipater. [ed. note: The same account
of Herod’s parentage is given by Africanus, Euseb. Hist. i. 7. but Josephus says (Antiq. xiv. 1. n. 3.
de Bell. Jud. i. 6. n. 2.) that Herod was an Idumaean, of noble birth, and that
his father Antipas was governor of Idumaea under Alexander Jannaeus.] He was
instructed in the law and customs of the Jews, and acquired the friendship of
Hyrcanus, king of Judaea, who sent him as his deputy to Pompey. He succeeded so
well in the object of his mission, that he laid claim to a share of the throne.
He was put to death, but his son Herod was under Antony appointed king of
Judaea, by a decree of the Senate; so it is clear that Herod sought the throne
of Judaea without any connection or claim of birth.
Chrys.:
“Herod the king,” mentioning his dignity, because there was another Herod who
put John to death.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
“When He was born . . . behold wise men,” that is, immediately on His birth,
shewing that a great God existed in a little one of man.
Rabanus:
The Magi are men who enquire into the nature of things philosophically, but
common speech uses Magi for wizards. In their own country, however, they are
held in other repute, being the philosophers of the Chaldaeans, in whose lore
kings and princes of that nation are taught, and by which themselves knew the
birth of the Lord.
Aug.,
Serm. 202: What were these Magi but the first [p. 62] fruits of the Gentiles?
Israelitish shepherds, gentile Magians, one from far, the other from near,
hastened to the one Corner-stone.
Aug.,
Serm. 200: Jesus then was manifested neither to the learned nor the righteous;
for ignorance belonged to the shepherds, impiety to the idolatrous Magi. Yet
does that Corner-stone attract them both to Itself, seeing He came to choose
the foolish things of this world to confound the wise, and not to call the
righteous, but sinners; that nothing great should exalt himself, none weak
should despair.
Gloss:
These Magi were kings, and though their gifts were three, it is not to be
thence inferred that themselves were only three in number, but in them was
prefigured the coming to the faith of the nations sprung from the three sons of
Noah.
Or, the princes were only three, but each
brought a large company with him. They came not after a year’s end, for He
would then have been found in Egypt, not in the manger, but on the thirteenth
day. To shew whence they came it is said, “from the East.”
Remig.:
It should be known that opinions vary respecting the Magi. Some say they were
Chaldaeans, who are known to have worshipped a star as God; thus their
fictitious Deity shewed them the way to the true God. Others think that they
were Persians; others again, that they came from the utmost ends of the earth.
Another and more probable opinion is, that they were descendants of Balaam, who
having his prophecy, “There shall rise a Star out of Jacob,” [Num 24:17] as
soon as they saw the star, would know that a King was born.
Jerome:
They knew that such a star would rise by the prophecy of Balaam, whose
successors they were. But whether they were Chaldaeans, or Persians, or came
from the utmost ends of the earth, how in so short a space of time could they
arrive at Jerusalem?
Remig.:
Some used to answer, ‘No marvel if that boy who was then born could draw them
so speedily, though it were from the ends of the earth.’
Gloss:
Or, they had dromedaries and Arabian horses, whose great swiftness brought them
to Bethlehem in thirteen days.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Or, they had set out two years before the Saviour’s birth, and though they
travelled all that time, neither meat nor drink failed in their scrips.
Remig.:
Or, if they were the descendants of Balaam, their kings are not far distant
from the land of promise, and [p. 63] might easily come to Jerusalem in that so
short time.
But why does he write “From the East?”
Because surely they came from a country eastward of Judaea. But there is also
great beauty in this, They “came out of the East,” seeing all who come to the
Lord, come from Him and through Him; as it is said in Zechariah, “Behold the
Man whose name is the East.” [Zech 6:12]
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Or, whence the day springs, thence came the first-fruits of the faith; for
faith is the light of the soul. Therefore they came from the East, but to
Jerusalem.
Remig.:
Yet was not the Lord born there; thus they knew the time but not the place of
His birth. Jerusalem being the royal city, they believed that such a child
could not be born in any other.
Or it was to fulfil that Scripture, “The
Law shall go out of Sion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.” [Isa 2:3]
And there Christ was first preached.
Or it was to condemn the backwardness of
the Jews.
Pseudo-Aug.,
Append. Serm. 132: Many kings of Judaea had been born and died before, yet had
Magi ever sought out any of them for adoration? No, for they had not been
taught that any of these spoke from heaven. To no ordinary King of Judaea had
these men, aliens from the land of Judaea, ever thought such honour due. But
they had been taught that this Child was one, in worshipping whom they would
certainly secure that salvation which is of God. Neither His age was such as attracts
men’s flattery; His limbs not robed in purple, His brow not crowned with a
diamond, no pompous train, no awful army, no glorious fame of battles,
attracted these men to Him from the remotest countries, with such earnestness
of supplication. There lay in a manger a Boy, newly born, of infantine size, of
pitiable poverty. But in that small Infant lay hid something great, which these
men, the first-fruits of the Gentiles, had learned not of earth but of heaven;
as it follows, “We have seen His star in the east.” They announce the vision
and ask, they believe and enquire, as signifying those who walk by faith and
desire sight.
Greg.,
M. in Evan., i. 10. n. 4: It should be known that the Priscillianists, heretics
who believe every man to be born under the aspect of some planet. cite this
text in support of their error; the new star which appeared at the Lord’s birth
they consider to have been his fate.
Aug.,
contr. Faust, ii, 1: And, according to Faustus this [p. 64] introduction of the
account of the star would lead us rather to call this part of the history, ‘The
Nativity,’ than ‘The Gospel.’
Gregory:
But far be it from the hearts of the faithful to call any thing, ‘fate.’
Aug.,
City of God, book v, ch. 1: For by the word, ‘fate,’ in common acceptation, is meant
the disposition of the stars at the moment of a person’s birth or conception;
to which some assign a power independent of the will of God. These must be kept
at a distance from the ears of all who desire to be worshippers of Gods of any
sort. But others think the stars have this virtue committed to them by the
great God; wherein they greatly wrong the skies, in that they impute to their
splendent host the decreeing of crimes, such as should any earthly people
decree, their city should in the judgment of mankind deserve to be utterly
destroyed.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
If then any should become an adulterer or homicide through means of the
planets, how great is the evil and wickedness of those stars, or rather of Him
who made them? For as God knows things to come, and what evils are to spring
from those stars; if He would not hinder it, He is not good; if He would but
could not, He is weak.
Again, if it be of the star that we are
either good or bad, we have neither merit nor demerit, as being involuntary
agents; and why should I be punished for sin which I have done not wilfully,
but by necessity? The very commands of God against sin, and exhortations to
righteousness, overthrow such folly. For where a man has not power to do, or
where he has not power to forbear, who would command him either to do or to
forbear?
Gregory
Nyss.: How vain moreover is prayer for those who live by fate; Divine
Providence is banished from the world together with piety, and man is made the
mere instrument of the sidereal motions. For these they say move to action, not
only the bodily members, but the thoughts of the mind. In a word, they who
teach this, take away all that is in us, and the very nature of a contingency;
which is nothing less than to overturn all things. For where will there be free
will? but that which is in us must be free.
Augustine,
City of God, Book 5, ch. 6: It cannot be said to be utterly absurd to suppose
that sidereal afflatus should influence the state of the body, when we see that
it is by the approach and departure of the sun that the seasons of the year are
[p. 65] varied, and that many things, as shells and the wonderful tides of the
Ocean, increase or decrease as the moon waxes or wanes. But not so, to say that
the dispositions of the mind are subject to sidereal impulse. Do they say that
the stars rather foreshew than effect these results? how then do they explain,
that in the life of twins, in their actions, their successes, professions,
honours, and all other circumstances of life, there will often be so great
diversity, that men of different countries are often more alike in their lives
than twins, between whose birth there was only a moment’s, and between whose
conception in the womb there was not a moment’s, interval.
And the small interval between their births
is not enough to account for the great difference between their fates. Some
give the name of fate not only to the constitution of the stars, but to all
series of causes, at the same time subjecting all to the will and power of God.
This sort of subjection of human affairs
and fate is a confusion of language which should be corrected, for fate is
strictly the constitution of the stars. The will of God we do not call ‘fate,’
unless indeed we will derive the word from ‘speaking;’ as in the Psalms, “God hath
spoken once, twice have I heard the same.” [Ps 62:11] There is then no need of
much contention about what is merely a verbal controversy.
Aug.,
cont. Faust. ii, 5: But if we will not subject the nativity of any man to the
influence of the stars, in order that we may vindicate the freedom of the will
from any chain of necessity; how much less must we suppose sidereal influences
to have ruled at His temporal birth, who is eternal Creator and Lord of the
universe? The star which the Magi saw, at Christ’s birth according to the
flesh, did not rule His fate, but ministered as a testimony to Him. Further,
this was not of the number of those stars, which from the beginning of the
creation observe their paths of motion according to the law of their Maker; but
a star that first appeared at the birth, ministering to the Magi who sought
Christ, by going before them till it brought them to the place where the infant
God the Word was.
According to some astrologers such is the
connexion of human fate with the stars, that on the birth of some men stars
have been known to leave their courses, and go directly to the new-born. The
fortune indeed of him [p. 66] that is born they suppose to be bound up with the
course of the stars, not that the course of the stars is changed after the day
of any man’s birth.
If then this star were of the number of
those that fulfil their courses in the heavens, how could it determine what
Christ should do, when it was commanded at His birth only to leave its own
course? If, as is more probable, it was first created at His birth, Christ was
not therefore born because it arose, but the reverse; so that if we must have
fate connected with the stars, this star did not rule Christ’s fate, but Christ
the stars.
Chrys.:
The object of astrology is not to learn from the stars the fact of one’s birth;
but from the hour of their nativity to forecast the fate of those that are
born. But these men knew not the time of the nativity to have forecast the
future from it, but the converse.
Gloss.
interlin.: ‘His star,’ i.e. the star He created for a witness of Himself.
Gloss.
ord.: To the Shepherds, Angels, and the Magians, a star points out Christ; to
both speaks the tongue of Heaven, since the tongue of the Prophets was mute.
The Angels dwell in the heavens, the stars adorn it, to both therefore “the
heavens declare the glory of God.”
Greg.,
Hom. in Ev. Lib. i. Hom. 10: To the Jews who used their reason, a rational
creature, i.e. an Angel, ought to preach. But the Gentiles who knew not to use
their reason are brought to the knowledge of the Lord, not by words, but by
signs; to the one prophecy, as to the faithful; to the other signs, as to the
unbelievers. One and the same Christ is preached, when of perfect age, by
Apostles; when an infant, and not yet able to speak, is announced by a star to
the Gentiles; for so the order of reason required; speaking preachers
proclaimed a speaking Lord, mute signs proclaimed a mute infant.
Leo,
Serm. 33, 2: Christ Himself, the expectation of the nations, that innumerable
posterity once promised to the most blessed patriarch Abraham, but to be born
not after the flesh, but by the Spirit, therefore likened to the stars for
multitude, that from the father of all nations, not an earthly but an heavenly
progeny might be looked for.
Thus the heirs of that promised posterity,
marked out in the stars, are roused to the faith by the rise of a new star, and
where the heavens had been at first called in to witness, the aid of Heaven is
continued. [p. 67]
Chrys.:
This was manifestly not one of the common stars of Heaven. First, because none
of the stars moves in this way, from east to south, and such is the situation
of Palestine with respect to Persia. Secondly, from the time of its appearance,
not in the night only, but during the day. Thirdly, from its being visible and
then again invisible; when they entered Jerusalem it hid itself, and then
appeared again when they left Herod. Further, it had no stated motion, but when
the Magi were to go on, it went before them; when to stop, it stopped like the
pillar of cloud in the desert. Fourthly, it signified the Virgin’s delivery,
not by being fixed aloft, but by descending to earth, shewing herein like an
invisible virtue formed into the visible appearance of a star.
Remig.:
Some affirm this star to have been the Holy Spirit; He who descended on the
baptized Lord as a dove, appearing to the Magi as a star. Others say it was an
Angel, the same who appeared to the shepherds.
Gloss.
ord: “In the east.” It seems doubtful whether this refers to the place of the
star, or of those that saw it; it might have risen in the east, and gone before
them to Jerusalem.
Aug.,
Serm. 374: Will you ask, from whom had they learned that such an appearance as
a star was to signify the birth of Christ? I answer from Angels, by the warning
of some revelation. Do you ask, was it from good or ill Angels? Truly even
wicked spirits, namely the daemons, confessed Christ to be the Son of God. But
why should they not have heard it from good Angels, since in this their
adoration of Christ their salvation was sought, not their wickedness condemned?
The Angels might say to them, ‘The Star which ye have seen is the Christ. Go
ye, worship Him, where He is now born, and see how great is He that is born.’
Leo,
Sermon 34, 3: Besides that star thus seen with the bodily eye, a yet brighter
ray of truth pierced their hearts; they were enlightened by the illumination of
the true faith.
Pseudo-Aug.,
Hil. Quaest. V. and N. Test.
q. 63: They might think that a king of Judaea was born, since the birth of
temporal princes is sometimes attended by a star. These Chaldean Magi inspected
the stars, not with malevolence, but with the true desire of knowledge;
following, it may be supposed, the tradition from Balaam; so that [p. 68] when
they saw this new and singular star, they understood it to be that of which
Balaam had prophesied, as marking the birth of a King of Judaea.
Leo:
What they knew and believed might have been sufficient for themselves, that
they needed not to seek to see with the bodily eye, what they saw so clearly
with the spiritual. But their earnestness and perseverance to see the Babe was
for our profit. It profited us that Thomas, after the Lord’s resurrection,
touched and felt the marks of his wounds, and so for our profit the Magians’ eyes
looked on the Lord in His cradle.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Were they then ignorant that Herod reigned in Jerusalem? Or that it is a
capital treason to proclaim another King while one yet lives? But while they
thought on the King to come, they feared not the king that was; while as yet
they had not seen Christ, they were ready to die for Him. O blessed Magi! who
before the face of a most cruel king, and before having beheld Christ, were
made His confessors.
3.
When Herod the king had heard these things, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem
with him.
4.
And when he had gathered all the Chief Priests and Scribes of the people
together, he demanded of them where Christ should be born.
5.
And they said unto him, “In Bethlehem of Judaea: for thus it is written by the
prophet,
6.
‘And thou Bethlehem, in the land of Juda, art not the least among the princes
of Juda: for out of thee shall come a Governor, that shall rule my people
Israel.’ “
Aug.:
As the Magi seek a Redeemer, so Herod fears a successor.
Gloss.
ord.: “The King,” he is called, though in comparison with him whom they are
seeking he is an alien and a foreigner.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Herod “was troubled” when he heard that a King was born of Jewish lineage,
lest, himself being an Idumaean, the kingdom should return again to native
princes, and himself be expelled, and his seed after [p. 69] him.
Great station is ever obnoxious to great
fears; as the boughs of trees planted in high ground move when never so little
wind blows, so high men are troubled with little rumours; while the lowly, like
trees in the valley, remain at peace.
Aug.,
Serm. 200, 2: If His birth as an infant makes proud kings tremble, what will
His tribunal as a Judge do? Let princes fear Him sitting at the right hand of
His Father, whom this impious king feared while He hanged yet on His mother’s
breast.
Leo:
Thou art troubled, Herod, without cause. Thy nature cannot contain Christ, nor
is the Lord of the world content with the narrow bounds of thy dominion. He,
whom thou wouldest not should reign in Judaea, reigns every where.
Gloss.
ord.: Perhaps he was troubled not on his own account, but for fear of the
displeasure of the Romans. They would not allow the title of King or of God to
any without their permission.
Greg.,
Hom. in Evan., 1, 10: At the birth of a King of Heaven, a king of earth is
troubled; surely, earthly greatness is confounded, when heavenly greatness
shews itself.
Leo,
Serm. 36, 2: Herod represents the Devil; who as he then instigated him, so now
he unweariedly imitates him. For he is grieved by the calling of the Gentiles,
and by the daily ruin of his power.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Both have their own causes of jealousy, both fear a successor in their kingdom;
Herod an earthly successor, the Devil a spiritual. Even Jerusalem is troubled,
which should have rejoiced at that news, when a Jewish King was said to be
risen up. But they were troubled, for the wicked cannot rejoice at the coming
of the good. Or perhaps it was in fear that Herod should wreak his wrath
against a Jewish King on his race.
Gloss.
ord.: “Jerusalem was troubled with him,” as willing to favour him whom it
feared; the vulgar always pay undue honour to one who tyrannizes over it.
Observe the diligence of his enquiry. If he should find him, he would do to him
as he shewed afterwards his disposition; if he should not, he would at least be
excused to the Romans.
Remig.:
They are called Scribes, not from the employment of writing, but from the
interpretation of the Scriptures, for they were doctors of the law. Observe, he
does not enquire where Christ is born, but where He should be born; the subtle
purpose of this was to see if they would shew pleasure at [p. 70] the birth of
their King. He calls Him Christ, because he knew that the King of the Jews was
anointed.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Why does Herod make this enquiry, seeing he believed not the Scriptures? Or if
he did believe, how could he hope to be able to kill Him whom the Scriptures
declared should be King? The Devil instigated Herod; who believed that
Scripture lies not. Such is the faith of devils, who are not permitted to have
perfect belief, even of that which they do believe. That they do believe, it is
the force of truth constrains them; that they do not believe, it is that they
are blinded by the enemy. If they had perfect faith, they would live as about
to depart from this world soon, not as to possess it for ever.
Leo,
Serm. 31, 2: The Magi, judging as men, sought in the royal city for Him, whom
they had been told was born a King. But He who took the form of a servant, and
came not to judge but to be judged, chose Bethlehem for His birth, Jerusalem
for His death.
Theodotus,
Serm. 1, ap. Conc. Eph.: Had He chosen the mighty city of Rome, it might have
been thought that this change of the world had been wrought by the might of her
citizens; had He been the son of the emperor, his power might have aided Him.
But what was His choice? All that was mean, all that was in low esteem, that in
this transformation of the world, divinity might at once be recognized.
Therefore He chose a poor woman for His mother, a poor country for His native
country; He has no money, and this stable is His cradle.
Gregory,
Hom. in Evan., 8, 1: Rightly is He born in Bethlehem, which signifies the house
of bread, who said, “I am the living bread, who came down from heaven.”
Pseudo-Chrys.:
When they should have kept secret the mystery of the King appointed of God,
especially before a foreign king, straightway they became not preachers of the
word of God, but revealers of His mystery. And they not only display the
mystery, but cite the passage of the prophet, viz. Micah.
Gloss.
ord.: He quotes this prophecy as they quote who give the sense and not the
words.
Jerome,
Epist. 57: The Jews are here blamed for ignorance; for whereas the prophecy
says, “Thou Bethlehem Ephrata;” they said, ‘Bethlehem in the land of Judah.’
Pseudo-Chrys.:
By cutting short the prophecy, they became the cause of the murder of [p. 71]
the Innocents. For the prophecy proceeds, “From thee shall go forth a King who
shall feed My people Israel, and His day shall be from everlasting.” Had they
cited the whole prophecy, Herod would not have raged so madly, considering that
it could not be an earthly King whose days were spoken of as “from
everlasting.”
Jerome,
in Mich. v. 2: The following is the sense of the prophecy. Thou, Bethlehem, of
the land of Judah, or Ephrata, (which is added to distinguish it from another
Bethlehem in Galilee,) though thou art a small village among the thousand
cities of Judah, yet out of thee shall be born Christ, who shall be the Ruler
of Israel, who according to the flesh is of the seed of David, but was born of
Me before the worlds; and therefore it is written, “His goings forth are of
old. In the beginning was the Word.”
Gloss:
This latter half of the prophecy the Jews dropped; and other parts they
altered, either through ignorance, (as was said above,) or for perspicuity,
that Herod who was a foreigner might better understand the prophecy; thus for
“Ephrata,” they said, “land of Judah;” and for “little among the thousands of
Judah,” which expresses its smallness contrasted with the multitude of the
people, they said, “not the least among the princes,” willing to shew the high
dignity that would come from the birth of the Prince. As if they had said,
“Thou art great among cities from which princes have come.”
Remig.:
Or the sense is; though little among cities that have dominion, yet art thou
not the least, for “out of thee shall come the Ruler, who shall rule My people
Israel;” this Ruler is Christ, who rules and guides His faithful people.
Chrys.:
Observe the exactness of the prophecy; it is not He shall be in Bethlehem, but
shall come out of Bethlehem; shewing that He should be only born there. What
reason is there for applying this to Zorobabel, as some do? For his goings
forth were not from everlasting; nor did he go forth from Bethlehem, but was
born in Babylonia. The expression, “art not the least,” is a further proof, for
none but Christ could make the town where He was born illustrious.
And after that birth, there came men from
the utmost ends of the earth to see the stable and manger. He calls Him not
‘the Son of God,’ but “the Ruler who shall govern My people Israel;” [p. 72]
for thus He ought to condescend at the first, that they should not be
scandalized, but should preach such things as more pertained to salvation, that
they might be gained.
“Who shall rule My people Israel,” is said
mystically, for those of the Jews who believed; for if Christ ruled not all the
Jews, theirs is the blame. Meanwhile he is silent respecting the Gentiles, that
the Jews might not be scandalized. Mark this wonderful ordinance; Jews and Magi
mutually instruct each other; the Jews learn of the Magi that a star had
proclaimed Christ in the east, the Magi from the Jews that the Prophets had
spoken of Him of old. Thus confirmed by a twofold testimony, they would look
with more ardent faith for One whom the brightness of the star and the voice of
the Prophets equally proclaimed.
Aug.,
Serm. 374. 2, 373. 4: The star that guided the Magi to the spot where was the
Infant God with His Virgin Mother, might have conducted them straight to the
town; but it vanished, and shewed not itself again to them till the Jews
themselves had told them “the place where Christ should be born;” Bethlehem of
Judaea.
Like in this to those who built the ark for
Noah, providing others with a refuge, themselves perished in the flood; or like
to the stones by the road that shew the miles, but themselves are not able to
move.
The enquirers heard and departed; the
teachers spake and remained still. Even now the Jews shew us something similar;
for some Pagans, when clear passages of Scripture are shewn them, which
prophesy of Christ, suspecting them to be forged by the Christians, have
recourse to Jewish copies. Thus they leave the Jews to read unprofitably, and
go on themselves to believe faithfully.
7.
Then Herod, when he had privily called the wise men, enquired of them
diligently what time the star appeared.
8.
And he sent them to Bethlehem, and said, “Go and search diligently for the
young Child; and when ye have found Him, bring me word again, that I may come
and worship Him also.”
9.
Whey they had heard the king, they departed.
[p. 73]
Pseudo-Chrys.:
As soon as Herod had heard the answer, though doubly authenticated, both by the
authority of the Priests, and the passage from the Prophets, he yet turned not
to worship the King that was to be born, but sought how he might put Him to
death by subtilty. He saw that the Magi were neither to be won by flattery, nor
awed by threats, nor bribed by gifts, to consent to this murder; he sought
therefore to deceive them; “he privily called the wise men;” that the Jews,
whom he suspected, might not know of it. For he thought they would incline the
rather to a King of their own nation.
Remig.:
“Diligently enquired;” craftily, for he feared they would not return to him,
and then he should know how he should do to put the young Child to death.
Pseudo-Aug.,
Serm. in App. 131, 3: The star had been seen, and with great wonder, nearly two
years before. We are to understand that it was signified to them whose the star
was, which was visible all that time till He, whom it signified, was born. Then
as soon as Christ was made known to them they set out, and came and worshipped
Him in thirteen days from the east. [ed. note: This is written upon the notion
that the Magi presented themselves to Christ twelve days after His birth,
according to the Latin date for celebrating the event. It seems really to have
taken place after the Purification, on the return of St. Mary to Bethlehem.
However, Aug. (Cons. Evan.,
ii. 11) places it before the Purification.]
Chrys.:
Or, the star appeared to them long time before, because the journey would take
up some time, and they were to stand before Him immediately on His birth, that
seeing Him in swaddling clothes, He might seem the more wonderful.
Gloss:
According to others, the star was first seen on the day of the nativity, and
having accomplished its end, ceased to be. Thus Fulgentius [margin note: Serm.
de Epiph.] says, “The Boy at His birth created a new star.” Though they now
knew both time and place, he still would not have them ignorant of the person
of the Child, “Go,” he says, “and enquire diligently of the young Child;” a
commission they would have executed even if he had not commanded it.
Chrys.:
“Concerning the young Child,” he says, not ‘of the King;’ he envies Him the
regal title.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
To induce them to do this, he put on the colour of devotion, beneath which he
whetted the sword, hiding the malice of his heart under colour of [p. 74]
humility. Such is the manner of the malicious, when they would hurt any one in
secret, they feign meekness and affection.
Greg.,
Hom. in Ev. i. 10. 3: He feigns a wish of worshipping Him only that he may
discover Him, and put him to death.
Remig.:
The Magi obeyed the King so far as to seek the Lord, but not to return to
Herod. Like in this to good hearers; the good they hear from wicked preachers,
that they do; but do not imitate their evil lives.
9.
And, lo, the star, which they saw in the east, went before them, till it came
and stood over where the young Child was.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
This passage shews, that when the star had brought the Magi nearly to
Jerusalem, it was hidden from them, and so they were compelled to ask in Jerusalem,
“where Christ should be born?” and thus to manifest Him to them; on two
accounts, first, to put to confusion the Jews, inasmuch as the Gentiles
instructed only by sight of a star sought Christ through strange lands, while
the Jews who had read the Prophets from their youth did not receive Him, though
born in their country.
Secondly, that the Priests, when asked
where Christ should be born, might answer to their now condemnation, and while
they instructed Herod, they were themselves ignorant of Him.
“The star went before them,” to shew them
the greatness of the King.
Aug.:
To perform its due service to the Lord, it advanced slowly, leading them to the
spot. It was ministering to Him, and not ruling His fate; its light shewed the
suppliants and filled the inn, shed over the walls and roof that covered the
birth; and thus it disappeared.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
What wonder that a divine star should minister to the Sun of righteousness
about to rise. It stood over the Child’s head, as it were, saying, ‘This is He;’
proving by its place what it had no voice to utter.
Gloss.
Anselm: It is evident that the star must have been in the air, and close above
the house where the Child was, else it would not have pointed out the exact
house.
Ambrose,
in Luc. 2, 45: The star is the way, and the way is Christ; and according to the
mystery of the incarnation, Christ is a [p. 75] star. He is a blazing and a
morning-star. Thus where Herod is, the star is not seen; where Christ is, there
it is again seen, and points out the way.
Remig.:
Or, the star figures the grace of God, and Herod the Devil. He, who by sin puts
himself in the Devil’s power, loses that grace; but if he return by repentance,
he soon finds that grace again which leaves him not till it have brought him to
the young Child’s house, i.e. the Church.
Gloss.
ord.: Or, the star is the illumination of faith, which leads him to the nearest
aid; while they turn aside to the Jews, the Magi lose it; so those who seek
counsel of the bad, lose the true light.
10.
When they saw the star, they rejoiced with exceeding great joy.
11.
And when they were come into the house, they saw the young Child with Mary His
mother, and fell down, and worshipped Him: and when they had opened their
treasures, they presented unto Him gifts; gold, and frankincense, and myrrh.
Gloss:
This service of the star is followed by the rejoicing of the Magi.
Remig.:
And it was not enough to say, “They rejoiced,” but “they rejoiced with
exceeding great joy.”
Pseudo-Chrys.:
They rejoiced, because their hopes were not falsified but confirmed, and
because the toil of so great travel had not been undertaken in vain.
Gloss.
ord.: He rejoices indeed who rejoices on God’s account, who is the true joy.
“With great joy,” he says, for they had great cause.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
By the mystery of this star they understood that the dignity of the King then
born exceeded the measure of all worldly kings.
Remig.:
He adds, “greatly,” shewing that men rejoice more over what they have lost than
over what they possess.
Leo,
Serm. in Epiph., 4. 3: Though in stature a babe, needing the aid of others,
unable to speak, and different in nothing from other infants, yet such faithful
witnesses, shewing the unseen Divine Majesty which was in Him, ought to have
proved most certainly that was the Eternal Essence of the Son of [p. 76] God
that had taken upon Him the true human nature.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
“Mary His mother,” not crowned with a diadem or laying on a golden couch; but
with barely one garment, not for ornament but for covering, and that such as
the wife of a carpenter when abroad might have. Had they therefore come to seek
an earthly king, they would have been more confounded than rejoiced, deeming
their pains thrown away.
But now they looked for a heavenly King; so
that though they saw nought of regal state, that star’s witness sufficed them,
and their eyes rejoiced to behold a despised Boy, the Spirit shewing Him to
their hearts in all His wonderful power, they fell down and worshipped, seeing
the man, they acknowledged the God.
Rabanus:
Joseph was absent by Divine command, that no wrong suspicions might occur to
the Gentiles.
Gloss,
Anselm: in these offerings we observe their national customs, gold,
frankincense, and various spices abounding among the Arabians; yet they
intended thereby to signify something in mystery.
Greg.,
Hom. in Evan., 1, 106: Gold, as to a King; frankincense, as sacrifice to God;
myrrh, as embalming the body of the dead.
Aug.:
Gold, as paid to a mighty King; frankincense, as offered to God; myrrh, as to
one who is to die for the sins of all.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
And though it were not then understood what these several gifts mystically
signified, that is no difficulty; the same grace that instigated them to the
deed, ordained the whole.
Remig.:
And it is to be known that each did not offer a different gift, but each one
the three kings, each one thus proclaiming the King, the God, and the man.
Chrys.:
Let Marcion and Paul of Samosata then blush, who will not see what the Magi
saw, those progenitors of the Church adoring God in the flesh. That He was
truly in the flesh, the swaddling clothes and the stall prove; yet that they
worshipped Him not as mere man, but as God, the gifts prove which it was
becoming to offer to a God. Let the Jews also be ashamed, seeing the Magi coming
before them, and themselves not even earnest to tread in their path.
Greg.:
Something further may yet be meant here. Wisdom is typified by gold; as Solomon
saith in the Proverbs, “A treasure to be desired is in the mouth of the wise.”
By frankincense, which is burnt before God,
the power of prayer [p. 77] is intended, as in the Psalms, “Let my speech come
before thee as incense.” [Ps 141:2] In myrrh is figured mortification of the
flesh. To a king at his birth we offer gold, if we shine in his sight with the
light of wisdom; we offer frankincense, if we have power before God by the
sweet savour of our prayers; we offer myrrh, when we mortify by abstinence the
lusts of the flesh.
Gloss,
Anselm: The three men who offer, signify the nations who come from the three
quarters of the earth. They open their treasures, i.e. manifest the faith of
their hearts by confession. Rightly “in the house,” teaching that we should not
vaingloriously display the treasure of a good conscience. They bring “three”
gifts, i.e. the faith in the Holy Trinity. Or opening the stores of Scripture,
they offer its threefold sense, historical, moral and allegorical; or Logic,
Physic, and Ethics, making them all serve the faith.
12.
And being warned of God in a dream that they should not return to Herod, they
departed into their own country another way.
Aug.:
The wicked Herod, now made cruel by fear, will needs do a deed of horror. But
how could he ensnare him who had come to cut off all fraud? His fraud is
escaped as it follows, “And being warned.”
Jerome:
They had offered gifts to the Lord, and receive a warning corresponding to it.
This warning (in the Greek ‘having received a response’) is given not by an
Angel, but by the Lord Himself, to shew the high privilege granted to the merit
of Joseph.
Gloss.
ord.: This warning is given by the Lord Himself; it is none other that now
teaches these Magi the way they should return, but He who said, “I am the way.”
[John 14:6] Not that the Infant actually speaks to them, that His divinity may
not be revealed before the time, and His human nature may be thought real. But
he says, “having received an answer,” for as Moses prayed silently, so they
with pious spirit had asked what the Divine will bade. “By another way,” for
they were not to be mixed up with the unbelieving Jews.
Chrys.,
Hom. 8: See the faith of the Magi; they were not offended, nor said within
themselves, What need now of flight? or [p. 78] of secret return, if this Boy
be really some great one? Such is true faith; it asks not the reason of any
command, but obeys.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Had the Magi sought Christ as an earthly King, they would have remained with
Him when they had found Him; but they only worship, and go their way. After
their return, they continued in the worship of God more steadfast than before,
and taught many by their preaching. And when afterwards Thomas reached their
country, they joined themselves to him, and were baptized, and did according to
his preaching. [ed. note: S. Thomas is said to have preached to the Parthians, Persians,
or Indians. Euseb. Hist. iii.
1. Clem. Recogn. ix. 29. Greg.
Naz. Or. 25. p. 438. The Margi are mentioned, Pseudo-Hippol. de Duod. Apost. (ed. Fabr. Append. p. 30)
Combefis conjecturing Mardi.]
Greg.,
Hom. in Ev. i. 10. 7: We may learn much from this return of the Magi another
way. Our country is Paradise, to which, after we have come to the knowledge of
Christ we are forbidden to return the way we came. We have left this country by
pride, disobedience, following things of sight, tasting, forbidden food; and we
must return to it by repentance, obedience, by contemning things of sight, and
overcoming carnal appetite.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
It was impossible that they, who left Herod to go to Christ, should return to
Herod. They who have by sin left Christ and passed to the devil, often return
to Christ; for the innocent, who knows not what is evil, is easily deceived,
but having once tasted the evil he has taken up, and remembering the good he
has left, he returns in penitence to God. He who has forsaken the devil and
come to Christ, hardly returns to the devil; for rejoicing in the good he has
found, and remembering the evil he has escaped, with difficulty returns to that
evil.
13.
And when they were departed, behold, the angel of the Lord appeareth to Joseph
in a dream, saying, “Arise, and take the young Child and His mother, and flee
into Egypt, and be thou there until I bring thee word; for Herod will seek the
young Child to destroy Him. [p. 79]
14.
When he arose, he took the young Child and His mother by night, and departed
into Egypt:
15.
And was there until the death of Herod: that it might be fulfilled which was
spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying, “Out of Egypt have I called my Son.”
Rabanus:
Here Matthew omits the day of purification when the first-born must be
presented in the Temple with the lamb, or a pair of turtle doves, or pigeons.
Their fear of Herod did not make them bold to transgress the Law, that they
should not present the Child in the temple. As soon then as the rumour
concerning the Child begins to be spread abroad, the Angel is sent to bid
Joseph carry Him into Egypt.
Remig.:
by this that the Angel appears always to Joseph in sleep, is mystically
signified that they who rest from mundane cares and secular pursuits, deserve
angelic visitations.
Hilary:
The first time when he would teach Joseph that she was lawfully espoused, the
Angel called the Virgin his espoused “wife;” but after the birth she is only
spoken of as the Mother of Jesus. As wedlock was rightfully imputed to her in her
virginity, so virginity is esteemed venerable in her as the mother of Jesus.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
He says not, ‘the Mother and her young Child,’ but, “the young Child and His
mother;” for the Child was not born for the mother, but the mother prepared for
the Child. How is this that the Son of God flies from the face of man? or who
shall deliver from the enemy’s hand, if He Himself fears His enemies?
First; He ought to observe, even in this,
the law of that human nature which He took on Him; and human nature and infancy
must flee before threatening power.
Next, that Christians when persecution
makes it necessary should not be ashamed to fly. But why into Egypt? The Lord,
“who keepeth not His anger for ever,” remembered the woes He had brought upon
Egypt, and therefore sent His Son thither, and gives it this sign of great
reconciliation, that with this one remedy He might heal the ten plagues of
Egypt, and the nation that had been the persecutor of this first-born people,
might be the guardian of His first-born Son. As formerly [p. 80] they had
cruelly tyrannized, now they might devoutly serve; nor go to the Red Sea to be
drowned, but be called to the waters of baptism to receive life.
Aug.:
Hear the sacrament of a great mystery. Moses before had shut up the light of
day from the traitors the Egyptians; Christ by going down thither brought back
light to them that sat in darkness. He fled that he might enlighten them, not
that he might escape his foes.
Aug.,
Serm. 218, App.: The miserable tyrant supposed that by the Saviour’s coming he
should be thrust from his royal throne. But it was not so; Christ came not to
hurt others’ dignity, but to bestow His own on others.
Hilary:
Egypt full of idols; for after this enquiry for Him among the Jews, Christ
leaving Judaea goes to be cherished among nations given to the vainest
superstitions.
Jerome:
When he takes the Child and His mother to go into Egypt, it is in the night and
darkness, when to return into Judaea, the Gospel speaks of no light, no
darkness.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
The straitness of every persecution may be called night - the relief from it in
like manner, day.
Rabanus:
For when the true light withdraws, they who hate the light are in darkness,
when it returns they are again enlightened.
Chrys.:
See how immediately on His birth the tyrant is furious against Him, and the
mother with her Child is driven into foreign lands. So should you in the
beginning of your spiritual career seem to have tribulation, you need not to be
discouraged, but bear all things manfully, having this example.
Bede,
Hom. in Nat. Innocent: The flight into Egypt signifies that the elect are often
by the wickedness of the bad driven from their homes, or sentenced to
banishment. Thus He, who, we shall see below, gave the command to His own,
“When they shall persecute you in one city, flee ye to another,” first
practised what He enjoined, as a man flying before the face of man on earth. He
whom but a little before a star had proclaimed to the Magi to be worshipped as
from heaven.
Remig.:
Isaiah had foretold this flight into Egypt. “Lo! the Lord shall ascend on a
light cloud, and shall come into Egypt, and shall scatter the idols of Egypt.”
[Isa 19:1] It is the practice of this Evangelist to confirm all he says; and
that because he is writing to the Jews, therefore he adds, “that it might be
fulfilled, &c.”
Jerome,
Epist., 57. 7: This is not in the LXX; but in Osee according to the genuine [p.
81] Hebrew text we read; “Israel is my child, and I have loved him,” and “from
Egypt have I called my Son;” where the LXX render, “Israel is my child, and I
have loved him, and called my sons out of Egypt.”
Jerome,
in Osee, 11, 2: The Evangelist cites this text because it refers to Christ
typically. For it is to be observed, that in this Prophet and in others, the
coming of Christ and the call of the Gentiles are foreshewn in such a manner,
that the thread of history is never broken.
Chrys.:
It is a law of prophecy, that in a thousand places many things are said of some
and fulfilled of others. As it is said of Simeon and Levi, “I will divide them
in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel;” [Gen 49:7] which was fulfilled not in
themselves, but in their descendants. So here Christ is by nature the Son of
God, and so the prophecy is fulfilled in Him.
Jerome:
Let those who deny the authenticity of the Hebrew copies, shew us this passage
in the LXX, and when they have failed to find it, we will shew it them in the
Hebrew. We may also explain it in another way, by considering it as quoted from
Numbers, “God brought him out of Egypt; his glory is as it were that of a
unicorn.” [Num 23:22]
Remig.:
In Joseph is figured the order of preachers, in Mary Holy Scripture; by the
Child the knowledge of the Saviour; by the cruelty of Herod the persecution
which the Church suffered in Jerusalem; by Joseph’s flight into Egypt the
passing of the preachers to the unbelieving Gentiles, (for Egypt signifies
darkness;) by the time that he abode in Egypt the space of time between the
ascension of the Lord and the coming of Anti-Christ; by Herod’s death the
extinction of jealousy in the hearts of the Jews.
16.
Then Herod, when he saw that he was mocked of the wise men, was exceeding
wroth, and sent forth, and slew all the children that were in Bethlehem, and in
all the coasts thereof, from two years old and under, according to the time
which he had diligently enquired of the wise men.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
When the infant Jesus had subdued the Magi, not by the might of His flesh, but
the grace of His [p. 82] Spirit, Herod “was exceeding wrath,” that they whom he,
sitting on his throne, had no power to move, were obedient to an Infant lying
in a manger. Then by their contempt of him the Magi gave further cause of
wrath. For when kings’ wrath is stirred by fear for their crowns, it is a great
and inextinguishable wrath.
But what did he? “He sent and slew all the
children.” As a wounded beast rends whatsoever meeteth it as if the cause of
its smart, so he mocked by the Magi spent his fury on children. He said to
himself in his fury, ‘Surely the Magi have found the Child whom they said
should be King;’ for a king in fear for his crown fears all things, suspects
all. Then he sent and slew all those infants, that he might secure one among so
many.
Aug.:
And while he thus persecutes Christ, he furnished an army (or martyrs) clothed
in white robes of the same age as the Lord.
Aug.,
Serm. 220. App.: Behold how this unrighteous enemy never could have so much
profited these infants by his love, as he did by his hate; for as much as
iniquity abounded against them, so much did the grace of blessing abound on
them.
Aug.,
Serm. 373, 3: O blessed infants! He only will doubt of your crown in this your
passion for Christ, who doubts that the baptism of Christ has a benefit for
infants. He who at His birth had Angels to proclaim Him, the heavens to
testify, and Magi to worship Him, could surely have prevented that these should
not have died for Him, had He not known that they died not in that death, but
rather lived in higher bliss. Far be the thought, that Christ who came to set
men free, did nothing to reward those who died in His behalf, when hanging on
the cross He prayed for those who put Him to death.
Rabanus:
He is not satisfied with the massacre at Bethlehem, but extends it to the
adjacent villages; sparing no age from the child of one night old, to that of
two years.
Aug.,
Serm. 132, App.: The Magi had seen this unknown star in the heavens, not a few
days, but two years before, as they had informed Herod when he enquired. This
caused him to fix “two years old and under;” as it follows, “according to the
time he had enquired of the Magi.”
Gloss.
ord.: Or because he feared that the Child to whom even stars ministered, might
transform His appearance to greater or under that of His own age, or might
conceal all those of that age: hence it [p. 83] seems to be that he slew all
from one day to two years old.
Aug.,
de Cons. Evan., 2, 11: Or, disturbed by pressure of still more imminent
dangers, Herod’s thoughts are drawn to other thoughts than the slaughter of children, he might
suppose that the Magi, unable to find Him whom they had supposed born, were
ashamed to return to him. So the days of purification being accomplished, they
might go up in safety to Jerusalem. And who does not see the one day they may
have escaped the attention of a King occupied with so many cares, and that
afterwards when the things done in the Temple came to be spread abroad, then
Herod discovered that he had been deceived by the Magi, and then sent and slew
the children.
Bede,
Hom. in Nat. Innocent: In this death of the children the precious death of all
Christ’s martyrs is figured; that they were infants signifies, that by the
merit of humility alone can we come to the glory of martyrdom; that they were
slain in Bethlehem and the coasts thereof, that the persecution shall be both
in Jerusalem whence the Church originated, and throughout the world; in those
of two years old are figured the perfect in doctrine and works; those under
that age the neophytes; that they were slain while Christ escaped, signifies
that the bodies of the martyrs may be destroyed by the wicked, but that Christ
cannot be taken from them.
17.
Then was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremy the prophet, saying,
18.
In Rama was there a voice heard, lamentation, and weeping, and great mourning,
Rachel weeping for her children, and would not be comforted, because they are
not.
Chrys.,
Hom. ix: The Evangelist by this history of so bloody a massacre, having filled
the reader with horror, now again sooths his feelings, shewing that these
things were not done because God could not hinder, or knew not of them; but as
the Prophet had foretold.
Jerome,
In Hierem, 31, 15: This passage of Jeremiah has been quoted by Matthew neither
according to the Hebrew nor the LXX version. This shews that the [p. 84]
Evangelists and Apostles did not follow any one’s translation, but according to
the Hebrew manner expressed in their own words what they had read in Hebrew.
By Ramah we need not suppose that the town
of that name near Gibeah is meant; but take it as signifying ‘high.’ A voice
was heard ‘aloft,’ that is, spread far and wide.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Or, it was heard on high, because uttered for the death of the innocent,
according to that, “The voice of the poor entereth into the heavens.” The ‘weeping’
means the cries of the children; ‘lamentation,’ refers to the mothers. In the
infants themselves their death ends their cries, in the mothers it is
continually renewed by the remembrance of their loss.
Jerome:
Rachel’s son was Benjamin, in which tribe Bethlehem is not situated. How then
does Rachel weep for the children of Judah as if they were her own? We answer
briefly. She was buried near Bethlehem in Ephrata, and was regarded as the
mother, because her body was there entertained. Or, as the two tribes of Judah
and Benjamin were contiguous, and Herod’s command extended to the coasts of
Bethlehem as well as to the town itself, we may suppose that many were slain in
Benjamin.
Pseudo-Aug.,
Hil. Quaest. N. and N. Test.
9. 62: Or, The sons of Benjamin, who were akin to Rachel, were formerly cut off
by the other tribes, and so extinct both then and ever after. Then therefore
Rachel began to mourn her sons, when she saw those of her sister cut off in
such a cause, that they should be heirs of eternal life; for he who has experienced
any misfortune, is made more sensible of his losses by the good fortune of a
neighbour.
Remig.:
The sacred Evangelist adds, to shew the greatness of the mourning, that even
the dead Rachel was roused to mourn her sons; and “would not be comforted because
they were not.”
Jerome:
This may be understood in two ways; either she thought them dead for all
eternity, so that no consolation could comfort her; or, she desired not to
receive any comfort for those who she knew had gone into life eternal.
Hilary:
It could not be that they “were not” who seemed now dead, but by glorious
martyrdom they were advanced to eternal life; and consolation is for those who
have suffered loss, not for those who have reaped a gain. Rachel affords a type
of the Church long barren now at length fruitful. [p. 85] She is heard weeping
for her children, not because she mourned them dead, but because they were slaughtered by those whom she would
have retained as her first-born sons.
Rabanus:
Or, The Church weeps the removal of the saints from this earth, but wishes not
to be comforted as though they should return again to the struggles of life,
for they are not to be recalled into life.
Gloss.
ord.: She “will not be comforted” in this present life, for that they are not,
but transfers all her hope and comfort to the life to come.
Rabanus:
Rachel is well set for a type of the Church, as the word signifies ‘a sheep’ or
‘seeing;’ [margin note: see Ch. 1, note i, p. 19] her whole thought being to
fix her eye in contemplation of God; and she is the hundredth sheep that the
shepherd layeth on his shoulder.
19.
But when Herod was dead, behold, an Angel of the Lord appeareth in a dream to
Joseph in Egypt,
20.
Saying, “Arise, and take the young Child and His mother, and go into the land
of Israel; for they are dead which sought the young Child’s life.
Euseb.,
Eccles. Hist., 1, 8: For the sacrilege which Herod had committed against the
Saviour, and his wicked slaughter
of the infants of the same age, the Divine vengeance hastened his end; and his
body, as Josephus relates, was attacked by a strange disease; so that the
prophets declared that they were not human ailments, but visitations of Divine
vengeance. Filled with mad fury, he gives command to seize and imprison the
heads and nobles out of all parts of Judaea; ordering that as soon as ever he
should breathe his last, they should be all put to death, that so Judaea,
though unwillingly, might mourn at his decease.
Just before he died he murdered his son,
Antipater,(besides two boys put to death before, Alexander and Aristobulus.)
Such was the end of Herod, noticed in those words of the Evangelist, “when
Herod was dead,” and such the punishment inflicted.
Jerome:
Many here err from ignorance of history, supposing the Herod who mocked our [p.
86] Lord on the day of His passion, and the Herod whose death is here related,
were the same. But the Herod who was then made friends with Pilate was son of
this Herod and brother to Archelaus; for Archelaus was banished to Lyons in
Gaul, and his father Herod made king in his room, as we read in Josephus.
Pseudo-Dionysius,
Dion. De Cael. Hierarch. 4: See how Jesus Himself, though far above all
celestial beings, and coming unchanged to our nature, shunned not that
ordinance of humanity which He had taken on Him, but was obedient to the
dispositions of His Father made known by Angels. For even by Angels is declared
to Joseph the retreat of the Son into Egypt, so ordained of the Father, and His
return again to Judaea.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
See how Joseph was set for ministering to Mary; when she went into Egypt and
returned, who would have fulfilled to her this so needful ministry, had she not
been betrothed? For to outward view, Mary nourished and Joseph defended the
Child; but in truth the Child supported His mother and protected Joseph.
“Return into the land of Israel;” for He
went down into Egypt as a physician, not to abide there, but to succour it sick
with error. But the reason of the return is given in the words, “They are dead,
&c.”
Jerome:
From this we see that not Herod only, but also the Priests and Scribes had
sought the Lord’s death at that time.
Remig.:
But if they were many who sought his destruction, how came they all to have
died in so short a time? As we have related above, all the great men among the
Jews were slain at Herod’s death.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
And that is said to have been done by the counsel of God for their conspiring
with Herod against the Lord; as it is said, “Herod was troubled, and all
Jerusalem with him.”
Remig.:
Or the Evangelist uses a figure of speech, by which the plural is used for the
singular. These words, “the Child’s life,” overthrow those heretics [margin
note: or “soul,” i.e. the Apollinarians] who taught that Christ did not take a
soul, but had His Divinity in place of a soul.
Bede,
Hom. in Nat. Innocent: This slaughter
of the infants for the Lord’s sake, the death of Herod soon after, and Joseph’s
return with the Lord and his mother to the land of Israel, is a figure shewing
that all the persecutions moved against the Church will be avenged by the death
of the persecutor, peace restored to the Church, [p. 87] and the saints who had
concealed themselves return to their own places. Or the return of Jesus to the
land of Israel on the death of Herod shews, that, at the preaching of Enoch and
Elijah [see note, c, below], the Jews, when the fire of modern jealousy shall
be extinguished, shall receive the true faith.
[ed. note, c: That Enoch and especially
Elias will come at the end of the world and by their preaching convert the Jews
is affirmed by Tertullian, (de Anima 35. de Resur. c. 22) Origen, (in Joann, i. tom. 5. in
Matt. tom. 13) Hilary, (in
Matt. xx. 10. xxvi. 5) Chrysostom,
(in Matt. xvii. 10) Augustine,
(City of God 20, 29. Op. Imp. contra Julian. vi. 30) Pope Gregory, (in Job. lib. xiv. 23. in
Joann. Hom. vii. 1) and Damascene, (de Fid. Orth. iv. 26 fin]
21.
And he arose, and took the young Child and His mother, and came into the land
of Israel.
22.
But when he heard that Archelaus did reign in Judaea in the room of his father
Herod, he was afraid to go thither: notwithstanding, being warned of God in a
dream, he turned aside into the parts of Galilee:
23.
And he came and dwelt in a city called Nazareth: that it might be fulfilled
which was spoken by the prophets, “He shall be called a Nazarene.
Gloss:
Joseph was not disobedient to the angelic warning, but “he arose, and took the
young Child and his mother, and came into the land of Israel.”
The Angel had not fixed the particular
place, so that while Joseph hesitates, the Angel returns, and by the often
visiting him confirms his obedience.
Josephus: Herod had nine wives, by seven of
whom he had a numerous issue. By Josida, his first born Antipater - by
Mariamine, Alexander and Aristobulus - by Mathuca, a Samaritan woman, Archelaus
- by Cleopatra of Jerusalem,
Herod, who was afterwards tetrarch, and Philip. The three first were put to
death by Herod; and after his death, Archelaus seized the throne by occasion of
his father’s will, and the question of the succession was carried before Augustus Caesar. After some delay,
he made a distribution of the whole of Herod’s dominions in accordance with the
Senate’s advice. [p. 88] To Archelaus he assigned one half, consisting of
Idumaea and Judaea, with the title of tetrarch, and a promise of that of king
if he shewed himself deserving of it. The rest he divided into two
tetrarchates, giving Galilee to Herod the tetrarch, Ituraea and Trachonitis to
Philip. Thus Archelaus was after his father’s death a duarch, which kind of
sovereignty is here called a kingdom.
Aug.,
De Con. Evan. ii. 10: Here is may be asked, How then could his parents go up
every year of Christ’s childhood to Jerusalem, as Luke relates, if fear of
Archelaus now prevented them from approaching it? This difficulty is easily
solved. At the festival they might escape notice in the crowd, and by returning
soon, where in ordinary times they might be afraid to live. So they neither
became irreligious by neglecting the festival, nor notorious by dwelling
continually in Jerusalem.
Or it is open to us to understand Luke when
he says, they “went up every year,” as speaking of a time when they had nothing
to fear from Archelaus, who, as Josephus relates, reigned only nine years.
There is yet a difficulty in what follows;
“Being warned in a dream, he turned aside into the parts of Galilee.” If Joseph
was afraid to go into Judaea because one of Herod’s sons, Archelaus, reigned
there, how could he go into Galilee, where another of his sons Herod was
tetrarch, as Luke tells us? As if the times of which Luke is speaking were
times in which there was any longer need to fear for the Child, when even in
Judaea things were so changed, that Archelaus no longer ruled there, but Pilate
was governor.
Gloss.
ord.: But then we might ask, why was he not afraid to go into Galilee, seeing
Archelaus ruled there also? He could be better concealed in Nazareth than in
Jerusalem, which was the capital of the kingdom, and where Archelaus was
constantly resident.
Chrys.:
And when he had once left the country of His birth, all the occurrences passed
out of mind; the rage of persecution had been spent in Bethlehem and its
neighbourhood. By choosing Nazareth therefore, Joseph both avoided danger, and
returned to his country.
Aug.,
de Con. Evan., ii, 9: This may perhaps occur to some, that Matthew says His
parents went with the Child Jesus to Galilee because they feared Archelaus,
when it should seem most probable that they chose Galilee because Nazareth was
[p. 89] their own city, as Luke has not forgot to mention. We must understand,
that when the Angel in the vision in Egypt said to Joseph, “Go into the land of
Israel,” Joseph understood the command to be that he should go straight into
Judaea, that being properly “the land of Israel.” But finding Archelaus ruling there,
he would not court the danger, as “the land of Israel” might be interpreted to
extend to Galilee, which was inhabited by children of Israel.
Or we may suppose His parents supposed that
Christ should dwell no where but in Jerusalem, where was the temple of the
Lord, and would have gone thither had not the fear of Archelaus hindered them.
And they had not been commanded from God to dwell positively in Judaea, or
Jerusalem, so as that they should have despised the fear of Archelaus, but only
in the land of Israel generally, which they might understand of Galilee.
Hilary:
But the figurative intepretation holds good any way. Joseph represents the
Apostles, to whom Christ is entrusted to be borne about. These, as though Herod
were dead, that is, his people being destroyed in the Lord’s passion, are
commanded to preach the Gospel to the Jews; they are sent to the lost sheep of
the house of Israel. But finding the seed of their hereditary unbelief still
abiding, they fear and withdraw; admonished by a vision, to wit, seeing the
Holy Ghost poured upon the Gentiles, they carry Christ to them.
Rabanus:
Or, we may apply it to the last times of the Jewish Church, when many Jews
having turned to the preaching of Enoch and Elijah, the rest filled with the
spirit of Antichrist shall fight against the faith. So that part of Judaea
where Archelaus rules, signifies the followers of Antichrist; Nazareth of
Galilee, whither Christ is conveyed, that part of the nation that shall embrace
the faith. Galilee means, ‘removal;’ Nazareth, ‘the flower of virtues;’ for the
Church the more zealously she removes from the earthly to the heavenly, the
more she abounds in the flower and fruit of virtues.
Gloss:
To this he adds the Prophet’s testimony, saying, “That is might be fulfilled
which was spoken by the Prophets, &c.”
Jerome:
Had he meant to quote a particular text, he would not have written ‘Prophets,’
but ‘the Prophet.’ By thus using the plural he evidently [p. 90] does not take
the words of any one passage in Scripture, but the sense of the whole. Nazarene
is interpreted, ‘Holy,’ [ed. note, d: נדר] and that the Lord would be Holy, all Scripture testifies.
Otherwise we may explain that it is found
in Isaiah rendered to the strict letter of the Hebrew. [margin note: c. 11. 1]
“There shall come a Rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a Nazarene shall grow out
of His roots.” [ed. note, e: As if נצר]
Pseudo-Chrys.:
They might have read this in some Prophets who are not in our canon, as Nathan
or Esdras. That there was some prophecy to this purport is clear from what
Philip says to Nathanael. “Him of whom Moses in the Law and the Prophets did
write, Jesus of Nazareth.” [John 1:15] Hence the Christians were at first
called Nazarenes, at Antioch their name was changed to that of ‘Christians.’
Aug.,
de Con. Evan., ii, 5: The whole of this history, from the account of the Magi
inclusively, Luke omits. Let it be here noticed once for all, that each of the
Evangelists writes as if he were giving a full and complete history, which
omits nothing; where he really passes over any thing, he continues his thread
of history as if he had told all. Yet by a diligent comparison of their several
narratives, we can be at no loss to know where to insert any particular that is
mentioned by one and not by the other.
Gospel of Matthew, Chapter 3
[p. 91]
1.
In those days came John the Baptist, preaching in the wilderness of Judaea,
2.
And saying, “Repent ye: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”
3.
For this is he that was spoken of by the Prophet Esaias, saying, “The voice of
one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make His paths
straight.”
Pseudo-Chrys.:
The Sun as he approaches the horizon, and before he is yet visible, sends out
his rays and makes the eastern sky to glow with light, that Aurora going before
may herald the coming day. Thus the Lord at His birth in this earth, and before
He shews Himself, enlightens John by the rays of His Spirit’s teaching, that he
might go before and announce the Saviour that was to come. Therefore after
having related the birth of Christ, before proceeding to His teaching and
baptism, (wherein he received such testimony,) he first premises somewhat of
the Baptist and forerunner of the Lord.
“In those days, &c.”
Remig.:
In these words we have not only time, place, and person, respecting St. John,
but also his office and employment. First the time, generally; “In those days.”
Aug.,
de Cons. Evan., ii, 6: Luke describes the time by the reigning sovereigns.
[Luke 3:1] But Matthew must be understood to speak of a wider space of time by
the phrase ‘those days,’ than the fifteenth year of Tiberius. Having related
Christ’s return from Egypt, which must be placed in early boyhood or even
infancy, to make it agree with what Luke has told of His being in the [p. 92]
temple at twelve years old, he adds directly, “In those days,” not intending
thereby only the days of His childhood, but all the days from His birth to the
preaching of John.
Remig.:
The man is mentioned in the words “came John,” that is, shewed himself, having abode
so long in obscurity.
Chrys.:
But why must John thus go before Christ with a witness of deeds preaching Him?
First; that we might hence learn Christ’s dignity, that He also, as the Father
has, has prophets, in the words of Zacharias, “And thou, Child, shalt be called
the Prophet of the Highest.” [Luke 1:76]
Secondly; That the Jews might have no cause
for offence; as He declared, “John came neither eating nor drinking, and they
say, He hath a devil. The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say,
Behold a gluttonous man.” [Luke 7:33-34]
It needeth moreover that the things
concerning Christ should be told by some other first, and not by Himself; or
what would the Jews have said, who after the witness of John made complaint,
“Thou bearest witness of thyself, thy witness is not true.” [John 8:!3]
Remig.,
ap. Anselm: His office; “the Baptist;” in this he prepared the way of the Lord,
for had not men been used to be baptized, they would have shunned Christ’s
baptism.
His employment; “Preaching.”
Rabanus:
For because Christ was to preach, as soon as it seemed the fit time, that is,
about thirty years of age, he began by his preaching to make ready the way for
the Lord.
Remig.:
The place; “the desert of Judaea.”
Maximus, Hom. in Joan. Bap. nat. 1: Where neither
a noisy mob would interrupt his preaching, and whither no unbelieving hearer
would retire; but those only would hear, who sought to his preaching from
motives of divine worship.
Jerome,
in Isa 40. 3: consider how the salvation of God, and the glory of the Lord, is
preached not in Jerusalem, but in the solitude of the Church, in the wilderness
to multitudes.
Hilary:
Or, he came to Judaea, desert by the absence of God, not of population, that
the place of preaching might witness the few to whom the preaching was sent.
Gloss.
ap. Anselm: The desert typically means a life removed from the temptations of
the world, such as befits the penitent.
Aug.
Serm.: Unless one repent him of his former life, he cannot begin a new life.
Hilary:
He therefore preaches repentance when the Kingdom of Heaven approaches; by
which [p. 93] we return from error, we escape from sin, and after shame for our
faults, we make profession of forsaking them.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
In the very commencement he shews himself the messenger of a merciful Prince;
he comes not with threats to the offender, but with offers of mercy. It is a
custom with kings to proclaim a general pardon on the birth of a son, but first
they send throughout their kingdom officers to exact severe fines. But God
willing at the birth of His Son to give pardon of sins, first sends His officer
proclaiming, “Repent ye.” O exaction which leaves none poor, but makes many
rich! For even when we pay our just debt of righteousness we do God no service,
but only gain our own salvation. Repentance cleanses the heart, enlightens the
sense, and prepares the human soul for the reception of Christ, as he
immediately adds, “For the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand.”
Jerome:
John Baptist is the first to preach the Kingdom of Heaven, that the forerunner
of the Lord may have this honourable privilege.
Chrys.:
And he preaches what the Jews had never heard, not even from the Prophets,
Heaven, namely, and the Kingdom that is there, and of the kingdoms of the earth
he says nothing. Thus by the novelty of those things of which he speaks, he
gains their attention to Him whom he preaches.
Remig.:
“The Kingdom of Heaven” has a fourfold meaning. It is said, of Christ, as “The
Kingdom of God is within you.” [Luke 17:21] Of Holy Scripture, as, “The Kingdom
of God shall be taken from you, and shall be given to a nation bringing forth
the fruits thereof.” [Matt 21:43] Of the Holy Church, as, “The Kingdom of
Heaven is like unto ten virgins.” [Matt 25:1] Of the abode above, as, “Many
shall come from the East and the West, and shall sit down in the Kingdom of
Heaven.” [Matt 8:11] And all these significations may be here understood.
Gloss.
ord.: “The Kingdom of Heaven” shall come nigh you; for if it approached not,
none would be able to gain it; for weak and blind they had not the way, which
was Christ.
Aug.,
de Cons. Evan., ii, 12: The other Evangelists omit these words of John. What
follows, “This is He, &c.” it is not clear whether the Evangelist speaks
them in his own person, or whether they are part of John’s preaching, and the
whole from “Repent ye,” to “Esaias the prophet,” is to be assigned to John. It
is of no importance [p. 94] that he says, “This is he,” and not, “I am he;” for
Matthew speaking of himself says, “He found a man sitting at the toll-office;”
[Matt 9:9] not “He found me.” Though when asked what he said of himself, he
answered, as is related by John the Evangelist, “I am the voice of one crying
in the wilderness.”
Greg.,
Hom. in Ev., i. 7: It is well known that the Only-begotten Son is called the Word
of the Father; as in John, “In the beginning was the Word.” [John 1:1] But it
is by our own speech that we are known; the voice sounds that the words may be
heard. Thus John the forerunner of the Lord’s coming is called, “The voice,”
because by his ministry the voice of the Father is heard by men.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
The voice is a confused sound, discovering no secret of the heart, only
signifying that he who utters it desires to say somewhat; it is the word that
is the speech that openeth the mystery of the heart. Voice is common to men and
other animals, word peculiar to man. John then is called the voice and not the
word, because God did not discover His counsels through him, but only signified
that He was about to do something among men; but afterwards by His Son he fully
opened the mystery of his will.
Rabanus:
He is rightly called, “The voice of one crying,” on account of the loud sound
of his preaching. Three things cause a man to speak loud; when the person he
speaks to is at a distance, or is deaf, or if the speaker be angry; and all
these three were then found in the human race.
Gloss:
John then is, as it were, the voice of the word crying. The word is heard by
the voice, that is, Christ by John.
Bede,
Gloss. ord. in cap. iv. 1: In
like manner has He cried from the beginning through the voice of all who have
spoken aught by inspiration.
And yet is John only called, “The voice;” because the Word which others shewed
after off, he declares as nigh.
Greg.,
Hom. in Ev., i. 7. 2: “Crying in the desert,” because he shews to deserted and
forlorn Judaea the approaching consolation of her Redeemer.
Remig.:
Though as far as historical fact is concerned, he chose the desert, to be
removed from the crowds of people. What the purport of his cry was is
insinuated, when he adds, “Make ready the way of the Lord.”
Pseudo-Chrys.:
As a great King going on a progress is preceded by couriers to cleanse what is
foul, repair what is broken down; so John preceded the Lord to cleanse the
human heart from the filth [p. 95] of sin, by the besom of repentance, and to
gather by an ordinance of spiritual precepts those things which had been
scattered abroad.
Greg.,
Hom. in Ev. i. 20. 3: Every one who preacheth right faith and good works,
prepares the Lord’s way to the hearts of the hearers, and makes His paths
straight, in cleansing the thoughts by the word of good preaching.
Gloss.
interlin.: Or, faith is the way by which the word reaches the heart; when the
life is amended the paths are made straight.
4.
And the same John had his raiment of camel’s hair, and a leathern girdle about
his loins; and his meat was locusts and wild honey.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Having said that he is the voice of one crying in the desert, the Evangelist
well adds, “John had his clothing of camel’s hair;” thus shewing what his life
was; for he indeed testified of Christ, but his life testified of himself. No
one is fit to be another’s witness till he has first been his own.
Hilary:
For the preaching of John no place more suitable, no clothing more useful, no
food more fitted.
Jerome:
His raiment of camel’s hair, not of wool - the one the mark of austerity in
dress, the other of a delicate luxury.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
It becomes the servants of God to use a dress not for elegant appearance, or
for cherishing of the body, but for a covering of the nakedness. Thus John
wears a garment not soft and delicate, but hairy, heavy, rough, rather wounding
the skin than cherishing it, that even the very clothing of his body told of
the virtue of his mind. It was the custom of the Jews to wear girdles of wool;
so he desiring something less indulgent wore one of skin.
Jerome:
Food moreover suited to a dweller in the desert, no choice viands, but such as
satisfied the necessities of the body.
Rabanus:
Content with poor fare; to wit, small insects and honey gathered from the
trunks of trees. In the sayings of Arnulphus [ed. note: Arnulphus, who visited
Palestine 705; his travels to the Holy Land written from his mouth by
Adamannus, Abbot of Lindisferne, are still extant.], Bishop of Gaul, we find
that there was a very small kind of locust in the deserts of Judaea, with
bodies about the thickness of a finger and short; they are easily taken among
the grass, and when cooked in oil form a poor [p. 96] kind of food.
He also relates, that in the same desert
there is a kind of tree, with a large round leaf, of the colour of milk and
taste of honey, so friable as to rub to powder in the hand, and this is what is
intended by wild honey.
Remig.:
In this clothing and this poor food, he shews that he sorrows for the sins of
the whole human race.
Rabanus:
His dress and diet express the quality of his inward conversation. His garment
was of an austere quality, because he rebuked the sinner’s life.
Jerome:
His girdle of skin, which Elias also bare, is the mark of mortification.
Rabanus:
He ate locusts and honey, because his preaching was sweet tot he multitude, but
was of short continuance; and honey has sweetness, locusts a swift flight but
soon fall to the ground.
Remig.:
In John (which name is interpreted ‘the grace of God,’) is figured Christ who
brought grace into the world; in his clothing, the Gentile Church.
Hilary:
The preacher of Christ is clad in the skins of unclean beasts, to which the
Gentiles are compared, and so by the Prophets’ dress is sanctified whatever in
them was useless or unclean. The girdle is a thing of much efficacy to every
good work, that we may be girt for every ministry of Christ. For his food are
chosen locusts, which fly the face of man, and escape from every approach, signifying
ourselves who were borne away from every word or speech of good by a
spontaneous motion of the body, weak in will, barren in works, fretful in
speech, foreign in abode, are now become the food of the Saints, chosen to fill
the Prophets’ desire, furnishing our most sweet food not from the hives of the
law, but from the trunks of wild trees.
5.
Then went out to him Jerusalem, and all Judaea, and all the region round about
Jordan,
6.
And were baptized of him in Jordan, confessing their sins.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Having described the preaching of John, he goes on to say, “There went out to
him,” for his severe life preached yet more loudly in the desert than the voice
of his crying.
Chrys.:
For it was wonderful to see such [p. 97] fortitude in a human body; this it was
that chiefly attracted the Jews, seeing in him the great Elias. It also
contributed to fill them with wonder that the grace of Prophecy had long failed
among them, and now seemed to have at length revived.
Also the manner of his preaching being other
than that of the old prophets had must effect; for now they heard not such
things as they were wont to hear, such as wars, and conquests of the king of
Babylon, or of Persia; but of Heaven and the Kingdom there, and the punishment
of hell.
Gloss.
interlin.: This baptism was only a forerunning of that to come, and did not
forgive sins. [ed. note: Tertullian (de Bapt. 10. 11) S. Jerome (adv. Lucifer. 7) S. Gregory (Hom. in Evang. vii. 3)
Theophylact in Marc. ch. i. S. Augustine
(de Bapt. e Donat. v. 10) considered that S. John’s baptism gave a sort of
suspensive or implicit remission, to be realized in the Atonement; and S. Cyril. Hieros. Cat. iii. 7-9. S. Greg. Nyss. in laud. Bas. t. 3. p.
482. vid. Dr. Pusey on Baptism, Ed. 2. pp. 242-271]
Remig.:
The baptism of John bare a figure of the catechumens. As children are only
catechized that they may become meet for the sacrament of Baptism; so John
baptized, that they who were thus baptized might afterwards by a holy life
become worthy of coming to Christ’s baptism. He baptized in Jordan, that the
door of the Kingdom of Heaven might be there opened, where an entrance had been
given to the children of Israel into the earthly kingdom of promise.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Compared with the holiness of John, who is there that can think himself
righteous? As a white garment if placed near snow would seem foul by the
contrast; so compared with John every man would seem impure; therefore they
confessed their sins. Confession of sin is the testimony of a conscience
fearing God. And perfect fear takes away all shame. But there is seen the shame
of confession where there is no fear of the judgment to come. But as shame
itself is a heavy punishment, God therefore bids us confess our sins that we
may suffer this shame as punishment; for that itself is a part of the judgment.
Rabanus:
Rightly are they who are to be baptized said to go out to the Prophet; for
unless one depart from sin, and renounce the pomp of the Devil, and the
temptations of the world, he cannot receive a healing baptism.
Rightly also in Jordan, which means their
[p. 98] descent, because they descended from the pride of life to the humility
of an honest confession. Thus early was an example given to them that are to be
baptized of confessing their sins and professing amendment.
7.
But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees come to his baptism, he
said unto them, “O generation of vipers, who hath warned you to flee from the
wrath to come?
8.
Bring forth therefore fruits meet for repentance:
9.
And think not to say within yourselves, ‘We have Abraham to our father:’ for I
say unto you, that God is able of these stones to raise up children unto
Abraham.
10.
And now also the axe is laid unto the root of the trees: therefore every tree
which bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire.”
Greg.,
De Cur. Past., iii, prologue: The words of the teachers should be fitted to the
quality of the hearers, that in each particular it should agree with itself and
yet never depart from the fortress of general edification.
Gloss:
It was necessary that after the teaching which he used to the common people,
the Evangelist should give an example of the doctrine he delivered to the more
advanced; therefore he says, “Seeing many of the Pharisees, &c.”
Isid. Hisp. Orig. 8. 4: The Pharisees and
Sadducees opposed to one another; Pharisee in the Hebrew signifies, ‘divided;’
because choosing the justification of traditions and observances they were ‘divided’
or ‘separated’ from the people by this righteousness.
Sadducee in the Hebrew means ‘just;’ for
these laid claim to be what they were not, denied the resurrection of the body,
and taught that the soul perished with the body; they only received the
Pentateuch, and rejected the Prophets.
Gloss:
When John saw those who seemed to be of great consideration among the Jews come
to his baptism, he said [p. 99] to them, “O generation of vipers, &c.”
Remig.:
The manner of Scripture is to give names from the imitation of deeds, according
to that of Ezekiel, “Thy father was an Amorite;” [Ezek 16:3] so these from
following vipers are called “generation of vipers.”
Pseudo-Chrys.:
As a skilful physician from the colour of the skin infers the sick man’s
disease, so John understood the evil thoughts of the Pharisees who came to him.
They thought perhaps, We go, and confess our sins; he imposes no burden on us,
we will be baptized, and get indulgence for sin. Fools! if ye have eaten of
impurity, must ye not needs take physic? So after confession and baptism, a man
needs much diligence to heal the wound of sin; therefore he says, “Generation
of vipers.”
It is the nature of the viper as soon as it
has bit a man to fly to the water, which, if it cannot find it, straightway
dies; so this “progeny of vipers,” after having committed deadly sin, ran to
baptism, that, like vipers, they might escape death by means of water.
Moreover it is the nature of vipers to
burst the insides of their mothers, and so to be born. The Jews then are
therefore called “progeny of vipers,” because by continual persecution of the
prophets they had corrupted their mother the Synagogue. Also vipers have a
beautiful and speckled outside, but are filled with poison within. So these men’s
countenances wore a holy appearance.
Remig.:
When then he asks, “who will shew you to flee from the wrath to come,” - ‘except
God’ must be understood.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Or “who hath shewed you?” Was it Esaias? Surely no; had he taught you, you
would not put your trust in water only, but also in good works; he thus speaks,
“Wash you, and be clean; put your wickedness away from your souls, learn to do
well.” [Isa 1:16]
Was it then David? who says, “Thou shalt
wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow;” [Ps 51:7] surely not, for he adds
immediately, “The sacrifice of God is a broken spirit.” If then ye had been the
disciple of David, ye would have come to baptism with mournings.
Remig.:
But if we read, “shall shew,” in the future, this is the meaning, ‘What
teacher, what preacher, shall be able to give you such counsel, as that ye may
escape the wrath of everlasting damnation?’
Aug.,
City of God, book 9, ch. 5: God is described in Scripture, from some likeness
of effects, not from being subject to such weakness, as being angry, and yet is
He never moved by any passion. [p. 100] The word, ‘wrath,’ is applied to the
effects of his vengeance, not that god suffers any disturbing affection.
Gloss:
If they ye would escape this wrath, “Bring forth fruits meet for repentance.”
Greg.,
Hom. in Ev. 20. 8: Observe, he says not merely “fruits of repentance,” but
“fruits meet for repentance.” For he who has never fallen into things unlawful,
is of right allowed the use of all thing lawful; but if any hath fallen into
sin, he ought so far to put away from him even things lawful, as far as he is
conscious of having used unlawful things. It is left then to such man’s
conscience to seek so much the greater gains of good works by repentance, the
greater loss he has brought on himself by sin.
The Jews who gloried in their race, would
not own themselves sinners because they were Abraham’s seed. “Say not among
yourselves we are Abraham’s seed.”
Chrys.,
Hom. 11: He does not forbid them to “say” they are his, but to trust in that,
neglecting virtues of the soul.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
What avails noble birth to him whose life is disgraceful? Or, on the other
hand, what hurt is a low origin to him who has the lustre of virtue? It is
fitter that the parents of such a son should rejoice over him, than he over his
parents. So do not you pride yourselves on having Abraham for your father,
rather blush that you inherit his blood, but not his holiness. He who has no
resemblance to his father is possibly the offspring of adultery. These words
then only exclude boasting on account of birth.
Rabanus:
Because as a preacher of truth he wished to stir them up, to “bring forth fruit
meet for repentance,” he invites them to humility, without which no one can
repent.
Remig.:
There is a tradition, that John preached at that place of the Jordan, where the
twelve stones taken from the bed of the river had been set up by command of
God. He might then be pointing to these, when he said, “Of these stones.”
Jerome:
He intimates God’s great power, who, as he made all things out of nothing, can
make men out of the hardest stone.
Gloss.
ord.: It is faith’s first lesson to believe that God is able to do whatever He
will.
Chrys.:
That men should be made out of stones, is like Isaac coming from Sarah’s womb;
“Look into the rock,” says Isaiah, “whence ye were hewn.” Reminding them thus
of this prophecy, he shews that it is possible that the like might even how
happen.
Rabanus:
[p. 101] Otherwise; the Gentiles may be meant who worshipped stones.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Stone is hard to work, but when wrought to some shape, it loses it not; so the
Gentiles were hardly brought to the faith, but once brought they abide in it
for ever.
Jerome:
“These stones” signify the Gentiles because of their hardness of heart. See
Ezekiel, “I will take away from you the heart of stone, and give you the heart
of flesh.” Stone is emblematic of hardness, flesh of softness.
Rabanus:
Of stones there were sons raised up to Abraham; forasmuch as the Gentiles by
believing in Christ, who is Abraham’s seed, because his sons to whose seed they
were united.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
The axe is that most sharp fury of the consummation of all things, that is to
hew down the whole world. But if it be already laid, how hath it not yet cut
down? Because these trees have reason and free power to do good, or leave
undone; so that when they see the axe laid to their root, they may fear and
bring forth fruit.
This denunciation of wrath then, which is
meant by the laying of the axe to the root, though it have no effect on the
bad, yet will sever the good from the bad.
Jerome:
Or, the preaching of the Gospel is meant, as the Prophet Jeremiah also compares
the Word of the Lord to an axe cleaving the rock. [Jer 23:29]
Greg.,
Hom. in Ev., 20. 9: Or, the axe signifies the Redeemer, who as an axe of halt
and blade, so consisting of the Divine and human nature, is held by His human,
but cuts by His Divine nature. And though this axe be laid at the root of the
tree waiting in patience, it is yet seen what it will do; for each obstinate
sinner who here neglects the fruit of good works, finds the fire of hell ready
for him. Observe, the axe is laid to the root, not to the branches; for that
when the children of wickedness are removed, the branches only of the
unfruitful tree are cut away. But when the whole offspring with their parent is
carried off, the unfruitful tree is cut down by the root, that there remain not
whence the evil shoots should spring up again.
Chrys.:
By saying, “Every,” he cuts off all privilege of nobility: as much as to say,
Though thou be the son of Abraham, if thou abide fruitless thou shalt suffer
the punishment.
Rabanus:
There are four sorts of tree; the first totally withered, to which the Pagans
may be likened; [p. 102] the second, green but unfruitful, as the hypocrites;
the third, green and fruitful, but poisonous, such are heretics; the fourth,
green and bringing forth good fruit, to which are like the good Catholics.
Greg.:
“Therefore every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit shall be cut down, and
cast into the fire,” because he who here neglects to bring forth the fruit of
good works finds a fire in hell prepared for him.
11.
“I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance: but He that cometh after me
is mightier than I, Whose shoes I am not worthy to bear: He shall baptize you
with the Holy Ghost, and with fire:
12.
Whose fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly purge His floor, and gather
His wheat into the garner; but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable
fire.”
Gloss.
non occ.: As in the preceding words John had explained more at length what he
had shortly preached in the words, “Repent ye,” so now follows a more full
enlargement of the words, “The kingdom of heaven is at hand.”
Greg.,
Hom. in Ev., 7. 3: John baptizes not with the Spirit but with water, because he
had no power to forgive sins; he washes the body with water, but not at the
same time the soul with pardon of sin.
Chrys.,
Hom. 10, 1: For while as yet the sacrifice had not been offered, nor remission
of sin sent, nor the Spirit had descended on the water, how could sin be
forgiven? But since the Jews never perceived their own sin, and this was the
cause of all their evils, John came to bring them to a sense of them by calling
them to repentance.
Greg.:
Why then does he baptize who could not remit sin, but that he may preserve in
all things the office of forerunner? As his birth had preceded Christ’s birth,
so his baptism should precede the Lord’s baptism.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Or, John was sent to baptize, that to such as came to his baptism he might
announce the presence among them of the Lord in the flesh, as himself testifies
in another place, “That He might be manifested to Israel, therefore am I come
to baptise with water.” [John 1:31]
Aug.,
in Joann. Tract. v. 5: Or, he baptizes, because it behoved Christ [p. 103] to
be baptized. But if indeed John was sent only to baptize Christ, why was not He
alone baptized by John? Because had the Lord alone been baptized by John, there
would not have lacked who should insist that John’s baptism was greater than
Christ’s, inasmuch as Christ alone had the merit to be baptized by it.
Rabanus:
Or, by this sign of baptism he separates the penitent from the impenitent, and
directs them to the baptism of Christ.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Because then he baptized on account of Christ, therefore to them who came to
him for baptism he preached that Christ should come, signifying the eminence of
His power in the words, “He who cometh after me is mightier than I.”
Remig.:
There are five points in which Christ comes after John, His birth, preaching,
baptism, death, and descent into hell. A beautiful expression is that, “mightier
than I,” because he is mere man, the other is God and man.
Rabanus:
As though he had said, I indeed am mighty to invite to repentance, He to
forgive sins; I to preach the kingdom of heaven, He to bestow it; I to baptize
with water, He with the Spirit.
Chrys.:
When you hear “for He is mightier than I,” do not suppose this to be said by
way of comparison, for I am not worthy to be numbered among his servants, that
I might undertake the lowest office.
Hilary:
Leaving to the Apostles the glory of bearing about the Gospel, to whose
beautiful feet was due the carrying the tidings of God’s peace.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Or, by the feet of Christ we may understand Christians, especially the
Apostles, and other preachers, among whom was John Baptist; and the shoes are
the infirmities with which he loads the preachers. These shoes all Christ’s
preachers wear; and John also wore them; but declares himself unworthy, that he
might shew the grace of Christ, and be greater than his deserts.
Jerome:
In the other Gospels it is, “whose shoe latchet I am not worthy to loose.” Here
his humility, there his ministry is intended; Christ is the Bridegroom, and
John is not worthy to loose the Bridegroom’s shoe, that his house be not called
according to the Law of Moses and the example of Ruth, “The house of him that
hath his shoe loosed.” [Deut 25:10]
Pseudo-Chrys.:
But since no one can give a benefit more worthy than he himself is, nor to make
another what himself is not, he adds, “He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost
and with fire.” [p. 104]
John who is carnal cannot give spiritual
baptism; he baptizes with water, which is matter; so that he baptizes matter
with matter. Christ is Spirit, because He is God; the Holy Ghost is Spirit, the
soul is spirit; so that Spirit with Spirit baptizes our spirit. The baptism of
the Spirit profits as the Spirit enters and embraces the mind, and surrounds it
as it were with an impregnable wall, not suffering fleshly lusts to prevail
against it. It does not indeed prevail that the flesh should not lust, but
holds the will that it should not consent with it.
And as Christ is Judge, He baptizes in
fire, i.e. temptation; mere man cannot baptize in fire. He alone is free to
tempt, who is strong to reward. This baptism of tribulation burns up the flesh
that it does not generate lust, for the flesh does not fear spiritual
punishment, but only such as is carnal. The Lord therefore sends carnal
tribulation on his servants, that the flesh fearing its own pains, may not lust
after evil. See then how the Spirit drives away lust, and suffers it not to
prevail, and the fire burns up its very roots.
Jerome:
Either the Holy Ghost Himself is a fire, as we learn from the Acts, when there
sat as it were fire on the tongues of the believers; and thus the word of the
Lord was fulfilled who said, “I am come to send fire on the earth, I will that
it burn.” [Luke 12:49]
Or, we are baptized now with the Spirit,
hereafter with fire; as the Apostle speaks, “Fire shall try every man’s work,
of what sort it is.” [1 Cor 3:13] [ed. note, e: The fire here spoken of is
interpreted by S. Austin, (Enchir. 68) and Pope Gregory, (Dial. iv. 40) of the “troubles of this life;” by
S. Ambrose, (in Ps. 118, 20.
n. 15. apparently, Hil. in
Ps. 118, 3. n. 12) of the “severity of the divine judgment;” by S. Chrysostom, and Theophylact, (in
loc.) and Pseudo-Athanasius,
(Quaest. in Ep. Paul. 98. t. 2. p. 328. Ed. Ben.) of “hell-fire;” by
Ambrosiaster, (in loc.) S. Jerome,
perhaps, (in Isa. 1. fin.) and also by S. Austin and Pope Gregory, of a “purgatorial fire.”]
Chrys.:
He does not say, shall give you the Holy Ghost, but “shall baptize you in the
Holy Ghost,” shewing in metaphor the abundance of the grace.
This further shews, that even under the
faith there is need of the will alone for justification, not of labours and
toilings; and even as easy a thing as it is to be baptized, even so easy a
thing it is to be changed and made better. [ed. note, f: This sentence is not
here found in the original.]
By fire he signifies the strength of grace
which cannot be overcome, and that it may be understood that He makes His own
people at once [p. 105] like to the great and old prophets, most of the
prophetic visions were by fire.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
It is plain then that the baptism [ed. note: Two sentences about rebaptizing,
wanting in some copies of the original, are omitted by Aquinas. This comment on
St. Matthew has apparently passed successively through the hands of opposite
controversialists upon the Arian question. It may be observed that the
Eunomians rebaptized, and that the second General Council rejects their
baptism.] of Christ does not undo the baptism of John, but includes it in
itself; he who is baptized in Christ’s name hath both baptisms, that of water
and that of the Spirit. for Christ is Spirit, and hath taken to Him the body
that He might give both bodily and spiritual baptism.
John’s baptism does not include in it the
baptism of Christ, because the less cannot include the greater. Thus the
Apostle having found certain Ephesians baptized with John’s baptism, baptized
them again in the name of Christ, because they had not been baptized in the
Spirit: thus Christ baptized a second time those who had been baptized by John,
as John himself declared he should, “I baptize you with water; but He shall
baptize you with the Spirit.”
And yet they were not baptized twice but
once; for as the baptism of Christ was more than that of John, it was a new one
given, not the same repeated.
Hilary:
He marks the time of our salvation and judgment in the Lord; those who are
baptized in the Holy Ghost it remains that they be consummated by the fire of
judgment.
Rabanus:
By the fan is signified the separation of a just trial; that it is in the Lord’s
hand, means, ‘in His power,’ as it is written, “The Father hath committed all
judgment to the Son.”
Pseudo-Chrys.:
“The floor,” is the Church, “the barn,” is the kingdom of heaven, “the field,”
is the world. The Lord sends forth His Apostles and other teachers, as reapers
to reap all nations of the earth, and gather them into the floor of the Church.
Here were must be threshed and winnowed, for all men are delighted in carnal
things as grain delights in the husk. But whoever is faithful and has the
marrow of a good heart, as soon as he has a light tribulation, neglecting
carnal things runs to the Lord; but if his faith be feeble, hardly with heavy
sorrow; and he who is altogether void of faith, however he may be troubled,
passes not over to God.
The wheat when first thrashed lies in one
heap with chaff and straw, and is after winnowed to separate it; so the [p.
106] faithful are mixed up in one Church with the unfaithful; but persecution
comes as a wind, that, tossed by Christ’s fan, they whose hearts were separate
before, may be also now separated in place. He shall not merely cleanse, but “thoroughly
cleanse;” therefore the Church must needs be tried in many ways till this be
accomplished.
And first the Jews winnowed it, then the
Gentiles, now the heretics, and after a time shall Antichrist thoroughly winnow
it. For as when the blast is gentle, only the lighter chaff is carried off, but
the heavier remains; so a slight wind of temptation carries off the worst
characters only; but should a greater storm arise, even those who seem
steadfast will depart. There is need then of heavier persecution that the
Church should be cleansed.
Remig.:
This His floor, to wit, the Church, the Lord cleanses in this life, both when
by the sentence of the Priests the bad are put out of the Church, and when they
are cut off by death.
Rabanus:
The cleansing of the floor will then be finally accomplished, when the Son of
Man shall send His Angels, and shall gather all offences out of His kingdom.
Greg.,
Mor. 34. 5: After the threshing is finished in this life, in which the grain
now groans under the burden of the chaff, the fan of the last judgment shall so
separate between them, that neither shall any chaff pass into the granary, nor
shall the grain fall into the fire which consumes the chaff.
Hilary:
The wheat, i.e. the full and perfect fruit of the believer, he declares, shall
be laid up in heavenly barns; by the chaff he means the emptiness of the
unfruitful.
Rabanus:
There is this difference between the chaff and the tares, in that the chaff is
produced of the same seed as the wheat, but the tares from one of another kind.
The chaff therefore are those who enjoy the sacraments of the faith, but are
not solid; the tares are those who in profession as well as in works are
separated from the lot of the good.
Remig.:
The unquenchable fire is the punishment of eternal damnation; either because it
never totally destroys or consumes those it has once seized on, but torments
them eternally; or to distinguish it from purgatorial fire which is kindled for
a time and again extinguished.
Aug.,
de Cons. Evan., ii. 12: If any asks which were the actual words spoken by John,
whether those reported by Matthew, or by Luke, or by [p. 107] Mark, it may be
shewn, that there is no difficulty here to him who rightly understands that the
sense is essential to our knowledge of the truth, but the words indifferent.
And it is clear we ought not to deem any testimony false, because the same fact
is related by several persons who were present in different words and different
ways.
Whoever thinks that the Evangelists might
have been so inspired by the Holy Ghost that they should have differed among
themselves neither in the choice, nor the number, nor the order of their words,
he does not see that by how much the authority of the Evangelists is
preeminent, so much the more is to be by them established the veracity of other
men in the same circumstances. But the discrepancy may seem to be in the thing,
and not only in words, between, “I am not worthy to bear His shoes,” and “to
loose His shoe-latchet.” Which of these two expressions did John use? He who
has reported the very words will seem to have spoken truth; he who has given
other words, though he have not hid, or been forgetful, yet had he said one
thing for another.
But the Evangelists should be clear of
every kind of falseness, not only that of lying, but also that of
forgetfulness. If then this discrepancy be important, we may suppose John to
have used both expressions, either at different times, or both at the same
time. But if he only meant to express the Lord’s greatness and his own humility,
whether he used one or the other the sense is preserved, though any one should
in his own words repeat the same profession of humility using the figure of the
shoes; their will and intention does not differ.
This then is a useful rule and one to be
remembered, that it is no lie, when one fairly represents his meaning whose
speech one is recounting, though one uses other words; if only one shews our
meaning to be the same with his. Thus understood it is a wholesome direction
that we are to enquire only after the meaning of the speaker.
13.
Then cometh Jesus from Galilee to Jordan unto John, to be baptized of him.
14.
But John forbad Him, saying, “I have need to be baptized of Thee, and comest
Thou to me?” [p. 108]
15.
And Jesus answering said unto him, “Suffer it to be so now: for thus it
becometh us to fulfil all righteousness.” Then he suffered Him.
Gloss.,
non occ.: Christ having been proclaimed to the world by the preaching of His
forerunner, now after long obscurity will manifest Himself to men.
Remig.:
In this verse is contained person, place, time, and office. Time, in the word,
“Then.”
Rabanus:
That is, when He was thirty years old, shewing that none should be ordained
priest, or even to preach till He be of full age. Joseph at thirty years was made
governor of Egypt; David began to reign, and Ezekiel his prophesying at the
same age.
Chrys.,
Hom. 10, 1: Because after his baptism Christ was to put an end to the Law, He
therefore came to be baptized at this age, that having so kept the Law, it
might not be said that He cancelled it, because He could not observe it.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
“Then,” that is when John preached, that He might confirm his preaching, and
Himself receive his witness. But as when the morning-star has risen, the sun
does not wait for that star to set, but rising as it goes forward, gradually
obscures its brightness; so Christ waited not for John to finish his course,
but appeared while he yet taught.
Remig.:
The Persons are described in the words, “came Jesus to John;” that is, God to man,
the Lord to His servant, the King to His soldier, the Light to the lamp. The
Place, “from Galilee to Jordan.” Galilee means ‘transmigration.’ Whoso then
will be baptized, must pass from vice to virtue, and humble himself in coming
to baptism, for Jordan means, ‘descent.’
Ambrose,
Ambrosiaster. Serm. x. 5: Scripture tells of many wonders wrought at various
times in this river; as that, among others, in the Psalms, “Jordan was driven
backwards;” [Ps 114:3] before the water was driven back, now sins are turned
back in its current; as Elijah divided the waters of old, so Christ the Lord
wrought in the same Jordan the separation of sin.
Remig.:
The office to be performed; “that He might be baptized of him;” not baptism to
the remission of sins, but to leave the water sanctified for those after to be
baptized.
Aug.,
non occ., cf. Ambrosiaster, Serm. 12. 4: The Saviour willed to be baptized not
that He might [p. 109] Himself be cleansed, but to cleanse the water for us.
[ed. note: This is the doctrine of S. Austin, in Joan. iv. 14. Op. Imp. contr.
Julian iv. 63. Ambros. in Luke ii, 83, &c. &c. vid. Pusey on Baptism,
p. 279. ed. 2]
From the time that Himself was dipped in
the water, from that time has He washed away all our sins in water. And let
none wonder that water, itself corporeal substance, is said to be effectual to
the purification of the soul; it is so effectual, reaching to and searching out
the hidden recesses of the conscience. Subtle and penetrating in its own
nature, made yet more so by Christ’s blessing, it touches the hidden springs of
life, the secret places of the soul, by virtue of its all-pervading dew. The
course of blessing is even yet more penetrating than the flow of waters. Thus
the blessing which like a spiritual river flows on from the Saviour’s baptism,
hath filled the basins of all pools, and the courses of all fountains.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
He comes to baptism, that He who has taken upon Him human nature, may be found
to have fulfilled the whole mystery of that nature; not that He is Himself a
sinner, but He has taken on Him a nature that is sinful. And therefore though
He needed not baptism Himself, yet the carnal nature in others needed it.
Ambrose,
Ambrosiaster, Serm. 12. 1: Also like a wise master inculcating His doctrines as
much by His own practice, as by word of mouth, He did that which He commanded
all His disciples to do.
Aug.,
in Joann. Tract. v. 2: He deigned to be baptized of John that the servants
might see with what readiness they ought to run to the baptism of the Lord,
when He did not refuse to be baptized of His servant.
Jerome:
Also that by being Himself baptized, He might sanction the baptism of John.
Chrys.,
Hom. 12: But since John’s baptism was to repentance, and therefore shewed the
presence of sin, that none might suppose Christ’s coming to the Jordan to have
been on this account, John cried to Him, “I have need to be baptized of Thee,
and comest Thou to me?”
As if he had said,
Pseudo-Chrys.:
That Thou shouldest baptize me there is good cause, that I may be made
righteous and worthy of heaven; but that I should baptize Thee, what cause is
there? Every good gift comes down from heaven upon earth, not ascends from
earth to heaven.
Hilary:
John reject Him from baptism as God; He teaches him, [p. 110] that it ought to
be performed on Him as man.
Jerome:
Beautifully said is that “now,” to shew that as Christ was baptized with water
by John, so John must be baptized by Christ with the Spirit.
Or, suffer now that I who have taken the
form of a servant should fulfil all that low estate; otherwise know that in the
day of judgment thou must be baptized with my baptism.
Or, the Lord says, ‘Suffer this now; I have
also another baptism wherewithal I must be baptized; thou baptizest Me with
water, that I may baptize thee for Me with thy own blood.’
Pseudo-Chrys.:
In this he shews that Christ after this baptized John; which is expressly told
in some apocryphal books. [ed. note: Apocryphis ap. Aquin. in secretioribus
libris, in the present text of Pseudo-Chrysost.
The same opinion is imputed to S. Gregory
Naz. S. Austin, &c. but apparently without reason, vid. Tillemont Memoirs
St. Joan. B. note 7. It was an objection familiar with the heretics whether the
Apostles were baptized, vid. Tertull. in Bapt. 12]
Suffer now that I fulfil the righteousness
of baptism in deed, and not only in word; first submitting to it, and then
preaching it; for “so it becometh us to fulfil all righteousness.” Not that by
being baptized He fulfils all righteousness, but “so,” in the same manner, that
is, as He first fulfilled the righteousness of baptism by His deeds, and after
preached it, so He might all other righteousness, according to that of the
Acts, “All things that Jesus began both to do and to teach.” [Acts 1:1]
Or thus, “all righteousness,” according to
the ordinance of human nature; as He had before fulfilled the righteousness of
birth, growth, and the like.
Hilary:
For by Him must all righteousness have been fulfilled, by whom alone the Law
could be fulfilled.
Jerome:
“Righteousness;” but he adds neither ‘of the Law;’ nor ‘of nature,’ that we may
understand it of both.
Remig.:
Or thus; “It becometh us to fulfil all righteousness,” that is, to give an
example of perfect justification in baptism, without which the gate of the
kingdom of heaven is not opened. Hence let the proud take an example of
humility, and not scorn to be baptized by My humble members when they see Me
baptized by John My servant. That is true humility which obedience accompanies;
as it continues, “then he suffered Him,” that is, at last consented to baptize
Him.
16.
And Jesus, when He was baptized, went up straightway out of the water: and, lo,
the heavens were opened unto Him, and He saw the Spirit of God descending like
a dove, and lighting upon Him.
Ambrose,
Ambrosiaster, Serm. 12. 4: For, as we have said, when the Saviour was washed,
then the water was cleansed for our baptism, that a laver might be ministered
to the people who were to come. Moreover, it behoved that in Christ’s baptism
should be signified those things which the faithful obtain by baptism.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
This action of Christ’s has a figurative meaning pertaining to all who were
after Him to be baptized; and therefore he says, “straightway He ascended,” and
not simply “He ascended,” for all who are worthily baptized in Christ,
straightway ascend from the water; that is, make progress in virtues, and are
carried on towards a heavenly dignity. They who had gone down to the water
carnal and sinful sons of Adam, straightway ascend from the water spiritual
sons of God. But if some by their own faults make no progress after baptism,
what is that to the baptism?
Rabanus:
As by the immersion of His body He dedicated the laver of baptism, He has shewn
that to us also, after baptism received, the entrance to heaven is open and the
Holy Spirit is given, as it follows, “and the heavens were opened.”
Jerome:
Not by an actual cleaving of the visible element, but to the spiritual eye, as
Ezekiel also in the beginning of his book relates that he saw them.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
For had the actual creation of the heavens been opened, he would not have said,
“were opened to Him,” for a physical opening would have been open to all.
But some one will say, What, are the
heavens then closed to the eye of the Son of God, who even when on earth is
present in heaven? But it must be known, that as He was baptized according to
the ordinance of humanity that He had taken on Him, so the heavens were opened
to His sight as to His human nature, though as to His divine He was in heaven.
Remig.:
But was this then the first time that the heavens were opened to Him according
to His human nature? The faith of the Church both believes and holds that the
heavens were no less open to him before than after. [p. 112] It is therefore
said here, that the heavens were opened, because to all them who are born again
the door of the kingdom of heaven is opened.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Perhaps there were before some unseen obstacles which hindered the souls of the
dead from entering the skies. I suppose that since Adam’s sin no soul had
mounted the skies, but the heavens were continually closed. When, lo! on Christ’s
baptism they were again opened; after He had overcome by the Cross the great
tyrant death, henceforward the heaven, never more to be closed, needed not
gates, so that the Angels say not, ‘Open ye gates,’ for they were open, but
“take away the gates.” [Ps 24:7]
Or the heavens are opened to the baptized,
and they see those things which are in heaven, not by seeing them with the
bodily eye, but by believing with the spiritual eye of faith.
Or thus; The heavens are the divine
Scriptures, which all read but all do not understand, except they who have been
so baptized as to receive the Holy Spirit. Thus the Scriptures of the Prophets
were at the first sealed to the Apostles, but after they had received the Holy
Spirit, all Scripture was opened to them.
However, in whatever way we interpret, the
heavens were opened to Him, that is to all, on His account; as if the Emperor
were to say to any one preferring a petition for another, This boon I grant not
to him but to you; that is, to him, for your sake.
Gloss.
non occ.: Or, so bright a glory shone round about Christ, that the blue concave
seemed to be actually cloven.
Chrys.:
But though you see it not, be not therefore unbelieving, for in the beginnings
of spiritual matters sensible visions are always offered, for their sakes who
can form no idea of things that have no body; which if they occur not in later
times, yet faith may be established by those wonders once wrought.
Remig.:
As to all those who by baptism are born again, the door of the kingdom of
heaven is opened, so all in baptism receive the gifts of the Holy Spirit.
Aug.,
App. Serm. 135. 1: Chris after He had been once born among men, is born a
second time in the sacraments, that as we adore Him then born of a pure mother,
so we may now receive Him immersed in pure water. His mother brought forth her
Son, and is yet virgin; the wave washed Christ, and is holy. Lastly, that Holy
Spirit which was present to Him in the [p. 113] womb, now shone round Him in
the water, He who then made Mary pure, now sanctifies the waters.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
The Holy Ghost took the likeness of a dove, as being more than other animals
susceptible of love. All other forms of righteousness which the servants of God
have in truth and verity, the servants of the Devil have in spurious imitation;
the love of the Holy Spirit alone an unclean spirit cannot imitate. And the
Holy Ghost has therefore reserved to Himself this special manifestation of
love, because by no testimony is it so clearly seen where He dwells as by the
grace of love.
Rabanus,
ap. Anselm: Seven excellencies in the baptized are figured by the dove. The
dove has her abode near the rivers, that when the hawk is seen, she may dive
under water and escape; she chooses the better grains of corn; she feeds the
young of other birds; she does not tear with her beak; she lacks a gall; she
has her rest in the caverns of the rocks; for her song she has a plaint.
Thus the saints dwell beside the streams of
Divine Scripture, that they may escape the assaults of the Devil; they choose
wholesome doctrine, and not heretical for their food; they nourish by teaching
and example, men who have been the children of the Devil, i.e. the imitators;
they do not pervert good doctrine by tearing it to pieces as the heretics do;
they are without hate irreconcileable; they build their nest in the wounds of
Christ’s death, which is to them a firm rock, that is their refuge and hope; as
others delight in song, so do they in groaning for their sin.
Chrys.:
It is moreover an allusion to ancient history; for in the deluge this creature
appeared bearing an olive branch, and tidings of rest to the world. All which
things were a type of things to come. For now also a dove appears pointing out
to us our liberator, and for an olive branch bringing the adoption of the human
race.
Aug.,
de Trin., ii, 5: It is easy to understand how the Holy Ghost should be said to
be sent, when as it were a dove in visible shape descended on the Lord; that
is, there was created a certain appearance for the time in which the Holy
Spirit might be visibly shewn. And this operation thus made visible and offered
to mortal view, is called the mission of the Holy Spirit, not that His
invisible substance was seen, but that the hearts of men might be roused by the
external appearance to contemplate [p. 114] the unseen eternity.
Yet this creature in the shape of which the
Spirit appeared, was not taken into unity of person, as was that human shape
taken of the Virgin. For neither did the Spirit bless the dove, nor unite it
with Himself for all eternity, in unity of person. Further, though that dove is
called the Spirit, so far as to shew that in this dove was a manifestation of
the Spirit, yet can we not say of the Holy Spirit that He is God and dove, as
we say of the Son that He is God and man; and yet it is not as we say of the
Son that He is “the Lamb of God,” as not only has John Baptist declared, but as
John the Evangelist saw the vision of the Lamb slain in the Apocalypse. For
this was a prophetic vision, not put before the bodily eyes in bodily shape,
but seen in the Spirit in spiritual images.
But concerning this dove none ever doubted
that is was seen with the bodily eye; not that we say the Spirit is a dove as
we say Christ is a Rock; (for “that Rock was Christ.) [1 Cor 10:4] For that
Rock already existed as a creature, and from the resemblance of its operation
was called by the name of Christ, (whom it figured;) not so this dove, which
was created at the moment for this single purpose.
It seems to me to be more like the flame
which appeared to Moses in the bush, or that which the people followed in the
wilderness, or to the thunderings and lightnings which were when the Law was
given from the mount. For all these were visible objects intended to signify
something, and then to pass away. For that such forms have been from time to
time seen, the Holy Spirit is said to have been sent; but these bodily forms
appeared for the time to shew what was required, and then ceased to be.
Jerome:
It sat on the head of Jesus, that none might suppose the voice of the Father
spoken to John, and not to the Lord.
17.
And lo a voice from heaven, saying, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well
pleased.”
Aug.,
non occ.: Not as before by Moses and the Prophets, neither in type or figure
did the Father teach that the Son should come, but openly shewed Him to be
already come, “This is my Son.”
Hilary:
Or, that from these things thus fulfilled upon Christ, we might learn that
after the washing of water [p. 115] the Holy Spirit also descends on us from
the heavenly gates, on us also is shed an unction of heavenly glory, and an
adoption to be the sons of God, pronounced by the Father’s voice.
Jerome:
The mystery of the Trinity is shewn in this baptism. the Lord is baptized; the
Spirit descends in the shape of a dove; the voice of the Father is heard giving
testimony to the Son.
Ambrose,
Ambrosiaster, Serm. 10. 1: And no wonder that the mystery of the Trinity is not
wanting to the Lord’s laver, when even our laver contains the sacrament of the
Trinity. The Lord willed to shew in His own case what He was after to ordain
for men.
Pseudo-Aug.,
Fulgent. de Fide ad Petrum. c. 9: Though Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are one
nature, yet do thou hold most firmly that They be Three Persons; that it is the
Father alone who said, “this is my beloved Son;” the Son alone over whom that
voice of the Father was heard; and the Holy Ghost alone who in the likeness of
a dove descended on Christ at His baptism.
Aug.,
de Trin. 4. 21: Here are deeds of the whole Trinity. In their own substance
indeed Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are One without interval of either place or
time; but in my mouth they are three separate words, and cannot be pronounced
at the same time, and in written letters they fill each their several places.
By this comparison may be understood how the Trinity in Itself indivisible may
be manifested dividedly in the likeness of a visible creation. That the voice
is that of the Father only is manifest from the words, “This is my Son.”
Hilary,
de Trin. iii. 11: He witnesses that He is His Son not in name merely, but in
very kindred. Sons of God are we many of us; but not as He is a Son, a proper
and true Son, in verity, not in estimation, by birth, not adoption.
Aug.,
in Joann. tr. 14. 11: The Father loves the Son, but as a father should, not as
a master may love a servant; and that as an own Son, not an adopted; therefore
He adds, “in whom I am well-pleased.”
Remig.:
Or if it be referred to the human nature of Christ, the sense is, I am pleased
in Him, whom alone I have found without sin. Or according to another reading,
“It hath pleased me” to appoint Him, by whom to perform those things I would
perform, i.e. the redemption of the human race.
Aug.,
de Cons. Evan., ii, 14: These words Mark and Luke give in the same way; in the
words of the voice that came from Heaven, their expression varies though the
sense is the [p. 116] same. For both the words as Matthew gives them, “This is
my beloved Son,” and as the other two, “Thou art my beloved Son,” express the
same sense in the speaker; (and the heavenly voice, no doubt, uttered one of
these,) but one shews an intention of addressing the testimony thus borne to
the Son to those who stood by; the other of addressing it to Himself, as if
speaking to Christ He had said, “This is my Son.” Not that Christ was taught
what He knew before, but they who stood by heard it, for whose sake the voice
came.
Again, when one says, “in whom I am
well-pleased;” another, “in thee it hath pleased me,” if you ask which of these
was actually pronounced by that voice; take which you will, only remembering
that those who have not related the same words as were spoken have related the
same sense. That God is well-pleased with His Son is signified in the first;
that the Father is by the Son pleased with men is conveyed in the second form,
“in thee it hath well-pleased me.”
Or you may understand this to have been the
one meaning of all the Evangelists, In Thee have I put My good pleasure, i.e.
to fulfil all My purpose.
Gospel of Matthew, Chapter 4
[p. 117]
1.
Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the
Devil.
2.
And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, He was afterward hungry.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
The Lord being baptized by John with water, is led by the Spirit into the
wilderness to be baptized by the fire of temptation. ‘Then,’ i.e. when the
voice of the Father had been given from heaven.
Chrys.,
Hom. 13: Whoever thou art then that after thy baptism sufferest grievous
trials, be not troubled thereat; for this thou receivedst arms, to fight, not
to sit idle. God does not hold all trial from us; first, that we may feel that
we are become stronger; secondly, that we may not be puffed up by the greatness
of the gifts we have received; thirdly, that the Devil may have experience that
we have entirely renounced him; fourthly, that by it we may be made stronger;
fifthly, that we may receive a sign of the treasure entrusted to us; for the
Devil would not come upon us to tempt us, did he not see us advanced to greater
honours.
Hilary:
The Devil’s snares are chiefly spread for the sanctified, because a victory
over the saints is more desired than over others.
Greg.,
Hom. in Ev., 16, 1: Some doubt what Spirit it was that led Jesus into the
desert, for that it is said after, “The Devil took him into the holy city.” But
true and without question agreeable to the context is the received opinion,
that it was the Holy Spirit; that His own Spirit should lead Him thither where
the evil spirit should find Him and try Him.
Aug.,
de Trin., 4, 13: Why did He offer Himself to temptation? That He might be our
mediator in vanquishing temptation not by aid only, but by example.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
He was led by the Holy Spirit, not as an [p. 118] inferior at the bidding of a
greater. For we say, “led,” not only of him who is constrained by a stronger
than he, but also of him who is induced by reasonable persuasion; as Andrew
“found his brother Simon, and brought him to Jesus.”
Jerome:
“Led,” not against His will, or as a prisoner, but as by a desire for the
conflict.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
The Devil comes against men to tempt them, but since He could not come against
Christ, therefore Christ came against the Devil.
Greg.:
We should know that there are three modes of temptation; suggestion, delight,
and consent; and we when we are tempted commonly fall into delight or consent,
because being born of the sin of the flesh, we bear with us whence we afford
strength for the contest; but God who incarnate in the Virgin’s womb came into
the world without sin, carried within Him nothing of a contrary nature. He
could then be tempted by suggestion; but the delight of sin never gnawed His
soul, and therefore all that temptation of the Devil was without not within
Him.
Chrys.:
The Devil is wont to be most urgent with temptation, when he sees us solitary;
thus it was in the beginning he tempted the woman when he found her without the
man, and now too the occasion is offered to the Devil, by the Saviour’s being
led into the desert.
Gloss.
ap. Anselm: This desert is that between Jerusalem and Jericho, where the
robbers used to resort. It is called Hammaim, i.e. ‘of blood,’ from the
bloodshed which these robbers caused there; hence the man was said (in the
parable) to have fallen among robbers as he went down from Jerusalem to
Jericho, being a figure of Adam, who was overcome by daemons. It was therefore
fit that the place where Christ overcame the Devil, should be the same in which
the Devil in the parable overcomes man.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Not Christ only is led into the desert by the Spirit, but also all the sons of
God who have the Holy Spirit. For they are not content to sit idle, but the
Holy Spirit stirs them to take up some great work, i.e. to go out into the
desert where they shall meet with the Devil; for there is no righteousness
wherewith the Devil is pleased.
For all good is without the flesh and the
world, because it is not according to the will of the flesh and the world. To
such a desert then all [p. 119] the sons of God go out that they may be
tempted.
For example, if you are unmarried, the Holy
Spirit has by that led you into the desert, that is, beyond the limits of the
flesh and the world, that you may be tempted by lust. But he who is married is
unmoved by such temptation. Let us learn that the sons of God are not tempted
but when they have gone forth into the desert, but the children of the Devil
whose life is in the flesh and the world are then overcome and obey; the good
man, having a wife is content; the bad, though he have a wife is not therewith
content, and so in all other things.
The children of the Devil go not out to the
Devil that they may be tempted. For what need that he should seek the strife
who desires not victory? But the sons of God having more confidence and
desirous of victory, go forth against him beyond the boundaries of the flesh.
For this cause then Christ also went out to the Devil, that He might be tempted
of him.
Chrys.:
But that you may learn how great a good is fasting, and what a mighty shield
against the Devil, and that after baptism you ought to give attention to
fasting and not to lusts, therefore Christ fasted, not Himself needing it, but
teaching us by His example.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
And to fix the measure of our quadragesimal fast, be fasted forty days and
forty nights.
Chrys.:
But He exceeded not the measure of Moses and Elias, lest it should bring into
doubt the reality of His assumption of the flesh.
Greg.,
Hom. in Ev., 16, 5: The Creator of all things took no food whatever during
forty days. We also, at the season of Lent as much as in us lies afflict our
flesh by abstinence. The number forty is preserved, because the virtue of the
decalogue is fulfilled in the books of the holy Gospel; and ten taken four
times amounts to forty.
Or, because in this mortal body we consist
of four elements by the delights of which we go against the Lord’s precepts
received by the decalogue. And as we transgress the decalogue through the lusts
of this flesh, it is fitting that we afflict the flesh forty-fold.
Or, as by the Law we offer the tenth of our
goods, so we strive to offer the tenth of our time. And from the first Sunday
of Lent to the rejoicing of the paschal festival is a space of six weeks, or
forty-two days, subtracting from which the six Sundays which are not kept there
remain thirty-six. Now as the year [p. 120] consists of three hundred and
sixty-five, by the affliction of these thirty-six we give the tenth of our year
to God.
Aug.,
Lib. 83. Quest. q. 81: Otherwise; The sum of all wisdom is to be acquainted
with the Creator and the creature. The Creator is the Trinity, Father, Son, and
Holy Ghost; the creature is partly invisible, - as the soul to which we assign
a threefold nature, (as in the command to love God with the whole heart, mind,
and soul,) - partly visible as the body, which we divide into four elements;
the hot, the cold, the liquid, the solid. The number ten then, which stands for
the whole law of life, taken four times, that is, multiplied by that number which
we assign for the body, because by the body the law is obeyed or disobeyed,
makes the number forty. All the aliquot parts in this number, viz. 1, 2, 4, 5,
8, 10, 20, taken together make up the number 50. Hence the time of our sorrow
and affliction is fixed at forty days; the state of blessed joy which shall be
hereafter is figured in the quinquagesimal festival, i.e. the fifty days from
Easter to Pentecost.
Aug.,
Serm. 210, 2: Not however because Christ fasted immediately after having
received baptism, are we to suppose that He established a rule to be observed,
that we should fast immediately after His baptism. But when the conflict with
the tempter is sore, then we ought to fast, that the body may fulfil its
warfare by chastisement, and the soul obtain victory by humiliation.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
The Lord knew the thoughts of the Devil, that he sought to tempt Him; he had
heard that Christ had been born into this world with the preaching of Angels,
the witness of shepherds, the inquiry of the Magi, and the testimony of John.
Thus the Lord proceeded against him, not as God, but as man, or rather both as
God and man. For in forty days of fasting not to have been “an hungred” was not
as man; to be ever “an hungred” was not as God. He was “an hungred” then that
the God might not be certainly manifested, and so the hopes of the Devil in
tempting Him be extinguished, and His own victory hindered.
Hilary:
He was “an hungred,” not during the forty days, but after them. Therefore when
the Lord hungred, it was not that the effects of abstinence then first came
upon Him, but that His humanity was left to its own strength. For the Devil was
to be overcome, not by the God, but by the flesh. By this [p. 121] was figured,
that after those forty days which He was to tarry on earth after His passion
were accomplished, He should hunger for the salvation of man, at which time He
carried back again to God His Father the expected gift, the humanity which He
had taken on Him.
3.
And when the Tempter came to Him, he said, “If Thou be the Son of God, command
that these stones be made bread.”
4.
But He answered and said, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone,
but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.’ “
Pseudo-Chrys.:
The Devil who had begun to despair when he saw that Christ fasted forty days,
now again began to hope when he saw that “he was an hungred;” and “then the
tempter came to him.” If then you shall have fasted and after been tempted, say
not, I have lost the fruit of my fast; for though it have not availed to hinder
temptation, it will avail to hinder you from being overcome by temptation.
Greg.:
If we observe the successive steps of the temptation, we shall be able to
estimate by how much we are freed from temptation. The old enemy tempted the
first man through his belly, when he persuaded him to eat of the forbidden
fruit; through ambition when he said, “Ye shall be as gods;” through
covetousness when he said, “Knowing good and evil;” for there is a covetousness
not only of money, but of greatness, when a high estate above our measure is
sought.
By the same method in which he had overcome
the first Adam, in that same was he overcome when he tempted the second Adam.
He tempted through the belly when he said, “Command that these stones become
loaves;” through ambition when he said, “If thou be the Son of God, cast
thyself down from hence;” through covetousness of lofty condition in the words,
“All these things will I give thee.”
Ambrose,
Ambros. in Luc., c. 4. 3: He begins with that which had once been the means of
his victory, the palate; “If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones
become loaves.” What means such a beginning as this, but that he knew that the
Son of God was to come, yet believed not that He was come on account of His
fleshly [p. 122] infirmity. His speech is in part that of an enquirer, in part
that of a tempter; he professes to believe Him God, he strives to deceive Him
as man.
Hilary:
And therefore in the temptation he makes a proposal of such a double kind by
which His divinity would be made known by the miracle of the transformation,
the weakness of the man deceived by the delight of food.
Jerome:
But thou art caught, O Enemy,
in a dilemma. If these stones can be made bread at His word, your temptation is
vain against one so mighty. If He cannot make them bread, your suspicions that
this is the Son of God must be vain.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
But as the Devil blinds all men, so is he now invisibly made blind by Christ.
He found Him “an hungred” at the end of forty days, and knew not that He had
continued through those forty without being hungry. When he suspected Him not
to be the Son of God, he considered not that the mighty Champion can descend to
things that be weak, but the weak cannot ascend to things that are high.
We may more readily infer from His not
being “an hungred” for so many days that He is God, than from His being “an
hungred” after that time that He is man. But it may be said, Moses and Elias
fasted forty days, and were men. But they hungred and endured, He for the space
of forty days hungred not, but afterwards. To be hungry and yet refuse food is
within the endurance of man; not be hungry belongs to the Divine nature only.
Jerome:
Christ’s purpose was to vanquish by humility;
Leo,
Serm. 39, 3: hence he opposed the adversary rather by testimonies out of the
Law, than by miraculous powers; thus at the same time giving more honour to
man, and more disgrace to the adversary, when the enemy of the human race thus
seemed to be overcome by man rather than by God.
Greg.:
So the Lord when tempted by the Devil answered only with precepts of Holy Writ,
and He who could have drowned His tempter in the abyss, displayed not the might
of His power; giving us an example, that when we suffer any thing at the hands
of evil men, we should be stirred up to learning rather than to revenge.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
He said not, ‘I live not,’ but, “Man doth not live by bread alone,” that the
Devil might still ask, “If thou be the Son of God.” If He be God, it is as
though He shunned [p. 123] to display what He had power to do; if man, it is a
crafty will that His want of power should not be detected.
Rabanus:
This verse is quoted from Deuteronomy. [margin note: c. 8. 3] Whoso then feeds
not on the Word of God, he lives not; as the body of man cannot live without
earthly food, so cannot his soul without God’s word. This word is said to
proceed out of the mouth of God, where he reveals His will by Scripture
testimonies.
5.
Then the Devil taketh Him up into the holy city, and setteth Him on a pinnacle
of the temple,
6.
And saith unto Him, “If Thou be the Son of God, cast Thyself down; for it is
written, ‘He shall give His Angels charge concerning Thee:’ and in their hands
they shall bear Thee up, lest at any time Thou dash Thy foot against a stone.”
7.
Jesus said unto Him, “It is written again, ‘Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy
God.’ “
Pseudo-Chrys.:
From this first answer of Christ, the Devil could learn nothing certain whether
He were God or man; he therefore betook him to another temptation, saying within
himself; This man who is not sensible of the appetite of hunger, if not the Son
of God, is yet a holy man; and such do attain strength not to be overcome by
hunger; but when they have subdued every necessity of the flesh, they often
fall by desire of empty glory. Therefore he began to tempt Him by this empty
glory.
Jerome:
“Took him,” not because the Lord was weak, but the enemy proud; he imputed to a
necessity what the Saviour did willingly.
Rabanus:
Jerusalem was called the Holy City, for in it was the Temple of God, the Holy
of holies, and the worship of the one God according to the law of Moses.
Remig.:
This shews that the Devil lies in wait for Christ’s faithful people even in the
sacred places.
Gregory:
Behold when it is said that this God was taken by the Devil into the holy city,
pious ears tremble to hear, and yet the Devil is head and chief among the
wicked; what wonder that He suffered Himself to be led up a mountain by the
wicked one himself, who suffered Himself to be crucified by his members. [p.
124]
Gloss.
ord.: The Devil places us on high places by exalting with pride, that he may
dash us to the ground again.
Remig.:
The “pinnacle” is the seat of the doctors; for the temple had not a pointed
roof like our houses, but was flat on the top after the manner of the country
of Palestine, and in the temple were three stories. It should be known that
“the pinnacle” was on the floor, and in each story was one pinnacle. Whether
then he placed Him on the pinnacle in the first story, or that in the second,
or the third, he placed Him whence a fall was possible.
Gloss.
ord.: Observe here that all these things were done with bodily sense, and by
careful comparison of the context it seems probable that the Devil appeared in
human form.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Perhaps you may say, How could he in the sight of all place Him bodily upon the
temple? Perhaps the Devil so took Him as though He were visible to all, while
He, without the Devil being aware of it, made Himself invisible.
Gloss,
ap. Anselm: He set Him on a pinnacle of the temple when he would tempt Him
through ambition, because in this seat of the doctors he had before taken many
through the same temptation, and therefore thought that when set in the same
seat, He might in like manner be puffed up with vain pride.
Jerome:
In the several temptations the single aim of the Devil is to find if He be the
Son of God, but he is so answered as at last to depart in doubt; He says, “Cast
thyself,” because the voice of the Devil, which is always called men downwards,
has power to persuade them, but may not compel them to fall.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
How does he expect to discover by this proposition whether He be the Son of God
or not? For to fly through the air is not proper to the Divine nature, for it
is not useful to any. If then any were to attempt to fly when challenged to it,
he would be acting from ostentation, and would belong rather to the Devil than
to God. If it is enough to a wise man to be what he is, and he has no wish to
seem what he is not, how much more should the Son of God hold it not necessary
to shew what He is; He of whom none can know so much as He is in Himself?
Ambrose:
But as Satan transfigures himself into an Angel of light, and spreads a snare
for the faithful, even from the divine Scriptures, so now he uses its texts,
not to instruct [p. 125] but to deceive.
Jerome:
This verse we read in the ninetieth Psalm, [Ps 91:11] but that is a prophecy
not of Christ, but of some holy man, so the Devil interprets Scripture amiss.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
For the Son of God in truth is not borne of Angels, but Himself bears them, or
if He be borne in their arms, it is not from weakness, lest He dash His foot
against a stone, but for the honour. O thou Devil, thou hast read that the Son
of God is borne in Angels’ arms, hast thou not also read that He shall tread
upon the asp and basilisk? But the one text he brings forward as proud, the
other he omits as crafty.
Chrys.:
Observe that Scripture is brought forward by the Lord only with an apt meaning,
but by the Devil irreverently; for that where it is written, “He shall give his
Angels charge over thee,” is not an exhortation to cast Himself headlong.
Gloss.
ap. Anselm: We must explain thus; Scripture says of any good man, that He has
given it in charge to His Angels, that is to His ministering spirits, to bear
him in their hands, i.e. by their aid to guard him that he dash not his foot
against a stone, i.e. keep his heart that it stumble not at the old law written
in tables of stone.
Or by the stone may be understood every
occasion of sin and error.
Rabanus:
It should be noted, that though our Saviour suffered Himself to be placed by
the Devil on a pinnacle of the temple, yet refused to come down also at his
command, giving us an example, that whosoever bids us ascend the strait way of
truth we should obey. But if he would again cast us down from the height of
truth and virtue to the depth of error we should not hearken to him.
Jerome:
The false Scripture darts of the Devil He brands with the true shield of
Scripture.
Hilary:
Thus beating down the efforts of the Devil, He professes Himself both God and
Lord.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Yet He says not, Thou shalt not tempt me thy Lord God; but, “Thou shalt not
tempt the Lord thy God;” which every man of God when tempted by the Devil might
say; for whoso tempts a man of God, tempts God.
Rabanus:
Otherwise, it was a suggestion to Him, as man, that He should seek by requiring
some miracle to know the greatness of God’s power.
Aug.,
contr. Faust., 22, 36: It is a part of sound doctrine, that when man has any
other means, he should not tempt the Lord his God.
Theod. non occ.: And it is to tempt [p.
126] God, in any thing to expose one’s self to danger without cause.
Jerome:
It should be noted, that the required texts are taken from the book of
Deuteronomy only, that He might shew the sacraments of the second Law.
8.
Again, the Devil taketh Him up into an exceeding high mountain, and sheweth Him
all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them;
9.
And saith unto Him, “All these things will I give Thee, if Thee wilt fall down
and worship me.”
10.
Then saith Jesus unto him, “Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, ‘Thou
shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt thou serve.’ “
11.
Then the Devil leaveth Him, and, behold Angels came and ministered unto Him.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
The Devil, left in uncertainty by this second reply, passes to a third
temptation. Christ had broken the nets of appetite, had passed over those of
ambition, he now spreads for Him those of covetousness; “He taketh him up into
a very high mountain,” such as in going round about the earth he had noticed
rising above the rest. The higher the mountain, the wider the view from it.
He shews Him not so as that they truly saw
the very kingdoms, cities, nations, their silver and their gold; but the
quarters of the earth where each kingdom and city lay. As suppose from some
high ground I were to point out to you, see there lies Rome, there Alexandria;
you are not supposed to see the towns themselves, but the quarter in which they
lie. Thus the Devil might point out the several quarters with his finger, and
recount in words the greatness of each kingdom and its condition; for that is
said to be shewn which is in any way presented to the understanding.
Origen,
in Luc., Hom. 30: We are not to suppose that when he shewed him the kingdoms of
the world, he presented before Him the kingdom of Persia, for instance, or
India; but he shewed his own kingdom, how he reigns in the world, that is, how
some are governed by fornication, some by avarice.
Remig.:
By “their glory,” [p. 127] is meant, their gold and silver, precious stones and
temporal goods.
Rabanus:
The Devil shews all this to the Lord, not as though he had power to extend his
vision or shew Him any thing unknown. But setting forth in speech as excellent
and pleasant, that vain worldly pomp wherein himself delighted, he thought by
suggestion of it, to create in Christ a love of it.
Gloss.
ord.: He saw not, as we see, with the eye of lust, but as a physician looks on
disease without receiving any hurt.
Jerome:
An arrogant and vain vaunt; for he hath not the power to bestow all kingdoms,
since many of the saints have, we know, been make kings of God.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
But such things as are gotten by iniquity in this world, as riches, for
instance, gained by fraud or perjury, these the Devil bestows. The Devil
therefore cannot give riches to whom he will, but to those only who are willing
to receive them of him.
Remig.:
Wonderful infatuation in the Devil! To promise earthly kingdoms to Him who
gives heavenly kingdoms to His faithful people, and the glory of earth to Him
who is Lord of the glory of heaven!
Ambrose,
in Luc., c. iv, 11: Ambition has its dangers at home; that it may govern, it is
first others’ slave; it bows in flattery that it may rule in honour; and while
it would be exalted, it is made to stoop.
Gloss.
non occ.: See the Devil’s pride as of old. In the beginning he sought to make
himself equal with God, now he seeks to usurp the honours due to God, saying,
“If thou wilt fall down and worship me.” Who then worships the Devil must first
fall down.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
With these words He puts an end to the temptations of the Devil, that they
should proceed not further.
Jerome:
The Devil and Peter are not, as many suppose, condemned to the same sentence.
To Peter it is said, “Get thee behind me, Satan;” i.e. follow thou behind Me
who art contrary to My will. But here it is, “Go, Satan,” and is not added, ‘behind
Me,’ that we may understand “into the fire prepared for thee and thy angels.”
Remig.:
Other copies read, “Get thee behind me;” i.e. remember thee in what glory thou
wast created, and into what misery thou hast fallen.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Observe how Christ when Himself suffered wrong at the hands of the Devil, being
tempted of him, saying, “If thou be the Son of God, cast [p. 128] thyself
down,” yet was not moved to chide the Devil. But now when the Devil usurps the
honour of God, he is wroth, and drives him away, saying, “Go thy way, Satan;”
that we may learn by His example to bear injuries to ourselves with
magnanimity, but wrongs to God, to endure not so much as to hear; for to be
patient under our own wrongs is praiseworthy, to dissemble when God is wronged
is impiety.
Jerome:
When the Devil says to the Saviour, “If thou wilt fall down and worship me,” he
is answered by the contrary declaration, that it more becomes him to worship
Jesus as his Lord and God.
Aug.,
cont. Serm. Arian, 29: The one Lord our God is the Holy Trinity, to which alone
we justly owe the service of piety.
Aug.,
City of God, book 10, ch. 1: By service is to be understood the honour due to
God; as our version renders the Greek words, ‘latria,’ wherever it occurs in
Scripture, by ‘service’ (servitus), but that service which is due to men (as
where the Apostle bids slaves be subject to their master) is in Greek called ‘dulia;’
while ‘latria,’ always, or so often that we say always, is used of that worship
which belongs to God.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
The Devil, we may fairly suppose, did not depart in obedience to the command,
but the Divine nature of Christ, and the Holy Spirit which was in Him drove him
thence, and “then the Devil left him.” Which also serves for our consolation,
to see that the Devil does not tempt the men of God so long as he wills, but so
long as Christ suffers. And though He may suffer him to tempt for a short time,
yet in the end He drives him away because of the weakness of our nature.
Aug.,
City of God, book 9, ch. 21: After the temptation the Holy Angels, to be
dreaded of all unclean spirits, ministered to the Lord, by which it was made
yet more manifest to the daemons how great was His power.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
He says not ‘Angels descended from heaven,’ that it may be known that they were
ever on the earth to minister to Him, but had now by the Lord’s command
departed from Him, to give opportunity for the Devil to approach, who perhaps
when he saw Him surrounded by Angels would not have come near Him.
But in what matters they ministered to Him,
we cannot know, whether in the healing diseases, or purifying souls, or casting
out daemons; for all these things He does by the ministration of Angels, so
that what they do, Himself [p. 129] appears to do. However it is manifest, that
they did not now minister to Him because His weakness needed it, but for the
honour of His power; for it is not said that they ‘succoured Him,’ but that
they “ministered to Him.”
Gregory,
non occ. vid. in Ezek. i. 8. n. 24. in 1 Reg. i. I. n. 1. 2: In these things is
shewn the twofold nature in one person; it is the man whom the Devil tempts;
the same is God to whom Angels minister.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Now let us shortly review what is signified by Christ’s temptations. The
fasting is abstinence from things evil, hunger is the desire of evil, bread is
the gratification of the desire. He who indulges himself in any evil thing,
turns stones into bread. Let him answer to the Devil’s persuasions that man
does not live by the indulgence of desire alone, but by keeping the commands of
God. When any is puffed up as though he were holy he is led to the temple, and
when he esteems himself to have reached the summit of holiness he is set on a
pinnacle of the temple. And this temptation follows the first, because victory
over temptation begets conceit.
But observe that Christ had voluntarily
undertaken the fasting; but was led to the temple by the Devil; therefore do
you voluntarily use praiseworthy abstinence, but suffer yourself not to be
exalted to the summit of sanctity; fly high-mindedness, and you will not suffer
a fall.
The ascent of the mountain is the going forward
to great riches, and the glory of this world which springs from pride of heart.
When you desire to become rich, that is, to ascend the mountain, you begin to
think of the ways of gaining wealth and honours, then the prince of this world
is shewing you the glory of his kingdom.
In the third place He provides you reasons,
that if you seek to obtain all these things, you should serve him, and neglect
the righteousness of God.
Hilary:
When we have overcome the Devil and bruised his head, we see that Angels’
ministry and the offices of heavenly virtues will not be wanting in us.
Aug.,
de Cons. Evan., ii, 16: Luke has not given the temptations in the same order as
Matthew; so that we do not know whether the pinnacle of the temple, or the
ascent of the mountain, was first in the action; but it is of no importance, so
long as it is only clear that all of them were truly done.
Gloss.
ap. Anselm: Though Luke’s order seems the more historical; Matthew relates the
temptations as they were done to Adam.
12.
Now when Jesus had heard that John was cast into prison, He departed into
Galilee;
13.
And leaving Nazareth, He came and dwelt in Capernaum, which is upon the sea
coast, in the borders of Zabulon and Nephthalim:
14.
That is might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaeas the prophet, saying,
15.
“The land of Zabulon, and the land of Naphthalim, by the way of the sea, beyond
Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles;
16.
The people which sat in darkness saw great light; and to them which sat in the
region and shadow of death light is sprung up.
Rabanus:
Matthew having related the forty days’ fast, the temptation of Christ, and the
ministry of Angels, proceeds, “Jesus having heard that John was cast into
prison.”
Pseudo-Chrys.:
By God without doubt, for none can effect any thing against a holy man, unless
God deliver him up. “He withdrew into Galilee,” that is, out of Judaea; both
that He might reserve His passion to the fit time, and that He might set us an
example of flying from danger.
Chrys.:
It is not blameworthy not to throw one’s self into peril, but when one has
fallen into it, not to endure manfully. He departed from Judaea both to soften
Jewish animosity, and to fulfil a prophecy, seeking moreover to fish for those
masters of the world who dwelt in Galilee.
Note also how when He would depart to the
Gentiles, He received good cause from the Jews; His forerunner was thrown into
prison, which compelled Jesus to pass into Galilee of the Gentiles.
Gloss.
ap. Anselm: He came as Luke writes to Nazareth, where He had been brought up,
and there entering into the synagogue, He read and spoke many things, for which
they sought to throw Him down from the rock, and thence He went to Capernaum;
for which Matthew has only, “And leaving the town of Nazareth, He came and dwelt
at Capernaum.”
Gloss.
ord.: Nazareth is a village in Galilee near Mount Tabor; Capernaum a town in
Galilee of the Gentiles near the Lake of Gennesaret; and [p. 131] this is the
meaning of the word, “on the sea coast.”
He adds further “in the borders of Zabulon
and Naphtali,” where was the first captivity of the Jews by the Assyrians. Thus
where the Law was first forgotten, there the Gospel was first preached; and
from a place as it were between the two it was spread both to Jews and
Gentiles.
Remig.:
He left one, viz. Nazareth, that He might enlighten more by His preaching and
miracles. Thus leaving an example to all preachers that they should preach at a
time and in places where they may do good, to as many as possible. In the
prophecy, the words are these - “At that first time the land of Zabulon and the
land of Naphtali was lightened, and at the last time was increased the way of
the sea beyond Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles.” [Isa 9:1]
Jerome,
Hieron. in Esai. c. 9. 1: They are said at the first time to be lightened from
the burden of sin, because in the country of these two tribes, the Saviour
first preached the Gospel; “at the last time” their faith “was increased,” most
of the Jews remaining in error.
By the sea here is meant the Lake of
Gennesaret, a lake formed by the waters of the Jordan, on its shores are the
towns of Capernaum, Tiberias, Bethsaida, and Corozaim, in which district
principally Christ preached.
Or, according to the interpretation of
those Hebrews who believe in Christ, the two tribes Zabulon and Naphtali were
taken captive by the Assyrians, and Galilee was left desert; and the prophet
therefore says that it was lightened, because it had before suffered the sins
of the people; but afterwards the remaining tribes who dwelt beyond Jordan and
in Samaria were led into captivity; and Scripture here means that the region
which had been the first to suffer captivity, now was the first to see the
light of Christ’s preaching.
The Nazarenes again interpret that this was
the first part of the country that, on the coming of Christ, was freed from the
errors of the Pharisees, and after by the Gospel of the Apostle Paul, the
preaching was increased or multiplied throughout all the countries of the
Gentiles.
Gloss.
ap. Anselm: But Matthew here so quotes the passage as to make them all
nominative cases referring to one verb. The land of Zabulon, and the land of
Naphtali, which is the way of the sea, and which is beyond Jordan, viz. the
people of Galilee of the Gentiles, the people which walked in darkness. [p.
132]
Gloss.
ord.: Note that there are two Galilees; one of the Jews, the other of the
Gentiles. This division of Galilee had existed from Solomon’s time, who gave
twenty cities in Galilee to Hyram, King of Tyre; this part was afterwards
called Galilee of the Gentiles; the remained, of the Jews.
Jerome,
Hieron.: Or we must read, “beyond Jordan, of Galilee of the Gentiles;” so, I
mean, that the people who either sat, or walked in darkness, have seen light,
and that not a faint light, as the light of the Prophets, but a great light, as
of Him who in the Gospel speaks thus, “I am the light of the world.”
Between death and the shadow of death I
suppose this difference; death is said of such as have gone down to the grave
with the works of death; the shadow of such as live in sin, and have not yet
departed from this world; these may, if they will, yet turn to repentance.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Otherwise, the Gentiles who worshipped idols, and daemons, were they who sat in
the region of the shadow of death; the Jews, who did the works of the Law, were
in darkness, because the righteousness of God was not yet manifested to them.
Chrys.:
But that you may learn that he speaks not of natural day and night, he calls
the light, “a great light,” which is in other places called “the true light;”
and he adds, “the shadow of death,” to explain what he means by darkness. The
words “arose,” and “shined,” shew, that they found it not of their own seeking,
but God Himself appeared to them, they did not first run to the light; for men
were in the greatest miseries before Christ’s coming; they did not walk but
safe in darkness; which was a sign that they hoped for deliverance; for as not
knowing what way they should go, shut in by darkness they sat down, having now
no power to stand. By darkness he means here, error and ungodliness.
Rabanus,
ap. Anselm: In allegory, John and the rest of the Prophets were the voice going
before the Word. When prophecy ceased and was fettered, then came the Word,
fulfilling what the Prophet had spoken of it, “He departed into Galilee,” i.e.
from figure to verity.
Or, into the Church, which is a passing
from vice to virtue. Nazareth is interpreted ‘a flower,’ Capernaum, ‘the
beautiful village;’ He left therefore the flower of figure, (in which was
mystically intended the fruit of the Gospel,) and came [p. 133] into the
Church, which was beautiful with Christ’s virtues.
It is “by the sea-coast,” because placed
near the waves of this world, it is daily beaten by the storms of persecution.
It is situated between Zabulon and
Naphtali, i.e. common to Jews and Gentiles. Zabulon is interpreted, ‘the abode
of strength;’ because the Apostles, who were chosen from Judaea, were strong.
Nephtali, ‘extension,’ because the Church of the Gentiles was extended through
the world.
Aug.,
de Cons. Evan., ii, 17: John relates in his Gospel the calling of Peter,
Andrew, and Nathanael, and the miracle of Cana, before Jesus’ departure into
Galilee; all these things the other Evangelists have omitted, carrying on the
thread of their narrative with Jesus’ return into Galilee. We must understand
then that some days intervened, during which the things took place concerning
the calling of the disciples which John relates.
Remig.:
But this should be considered with more care, viz. that John says that the Lord
went into Galilee, before John the Baptist was thrown into prison. According to
John’s Gospel after the water turned into wine, and his going down to
Capernaum, and after his going up to Jerusalem, he returned to Judaea and
baptized, and John was not yet cast into prison. But here it is after John’s
imprisonment that He retires into Galilee, and with this Mark agrees. But we
need not suppose any contradiction here. John speaks of the Lord’s first coming
into Galilee, which was before the imprisonment of John. He speaks in another
place of His second coming into Galilee [John 4:3], and the other Evangelists
mention only this second coming into Galilee which was after John’s
imprisonment.
Euseb.,
H. E. iii. 24: It is related that John preached the Gospel almost up to the
close of his life without setting forth any thing in writing, and at length
came to write for this reason.
The three first written Gospels having come
to his knowledge, he confirmed the truth of their history by his own testimony;
but there was yet some things wanting, especially an account of what the Lord
had done at the first beginning of His preaching. And it is true that the other
three Gospels seem to contain only those things which were done in that year in
which John the Baptist was put into prison, or executed. For Matthew, after the
[p. 134] temptation, proceeds immediately, “Hearing that John was delivered
up;” and Mark in like manner. Luke again, even before relating one of Christ’s
actions, tells that “Herod had shut up John in prison.” The Apostle John then
was requested to put into writing what the preceding Evangelists had left out
before the imprisonment of John; hence he says in his Gospel, “this beginning
of miracles did Jesus.”
17.
From that time Jesus began to preach, and to say, “Repent: for the kingdom of
Heaven is at hand.”
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Christ’s Gospel should be preached by him who can control his appetites, who
contemns the goods of this life, and desires not empty honours. “From this time
began Jesus to preach,” that is, after having been tempted, He had overcome
hunger in the desert, despised covetousness on the mountain, rejected ambitious
desires in the temple.
Or from the time that John was delivered
up; for had He begun to preach while John was yet preaching, He would have made
John be lightly accounted of, and John’s preaching would have been though
superfluous by the side of Christ’s teaching; as when the sun rises at the same
time with the morning star, the star’s brightness is hid.
Chrys.:
For another cause also He did not preach till John was in prison, that the
multitude might not be split into two parties; or as John did no miracle, all
men would have been drawn to Christ by His miracles.
Rabanus:
In this He further teaches that none should despise the words of a person
inferior to Him; as also the Apostle, “If any thing be revealed to him that
sits, let the first hold his peace.” [1 Cor 14:30]
Pseudo-Chrys.:
He did wisely in making now the beginning of His preaching, that He should not
trample upon John’s teaching, but that He might the rather confirm it and
demonstrate him to have been a true witness.
Jerome:
Shewing also thereby that He was Son of that same God whose prophet John was;
and therefore He says, “Repent ye.”
Pseudo-Chrys.:
He does not straightway preach righteousness which all knew, but repentance,
which all needed. Who then dared to say, ‘I desire to be good, but am not
able?” [p. 135]
For repentance corrects the will; and if ye
will not repent through fear of evil, at least ye may for the pleasure of good
things; hence He says, “the kingdom of heaven is at hand;” that is, the
blessings of the heavenly kingdom. As if He has said, Prepare yourselves by
repentance, for the time of eternal reward is at hand.
Remig.:
And note, He does not say the kingdom of the Canaanite, or the Jebusite, is at
hand; the “the kingdom of heaven.” The law promised worldly goods, but the Lord
heavenly kingdoms.
Chrys.:
Also observe how that in this His first address He says nothing of Himself
openly; and that very suitably to the case, for they had yet no right opinion
concerning Him. In this commencement moreover He speaks nothing severe, nothing
burdensome, as John had concerning the axe laid to the root of the condemned
tree, and the lie; but he puts first things merciful, preaching the glad
tidings of the kingdom of heaven.
Jerome:
Mystically interpreted, Christ begins to preach as soon as John was delivered
to prison, because when the Law ceased, the Gospel commenced.
18.
And Jesus, walking by the sea of Galilee, saw two brethren, Simon called Peter,
and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea: for they were fishers.
19.
And He saith unto them, “Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men.”
20.
And they straightway left their nets, and followed Him.
21.
And going on from thence, he saw other two brethren, James the son of Zebedee, and John his brother, in a ship with Zebedee their father, mending their nets; and He called them.
22.
And they immediately left the ship and their father, and followed Him.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Before He spoke or did any thing, Christ called Apostles, that neither word nor
deed of His should be [p. 136] hid from their knowledge, so that they may
afterwards say with confidence, “What we have seen and heard, that we cannot
but speak.” [Acts 4:20]
Rabanus:
The sea of Galilee, the lake of Gennesaret, the sea of Tiberias, and the salt
lake, are one and the same.
Gloss.
ord.: He rightly goes on fishing places, when about to fish for fishermen.
Remig.:
“Saw,” that is, not so much with the bodily eye, as spiritually viewing their
hearts.
Chrys.:
He calls them while actually working at their employment, to shew that to
follow Him ought to be preferred to all occupations. They were just then
“casting a net into the sea,” which agreed with their future office.
Aug.,
Serm. 197, 2: He chose not kings, senators, philosophers, or orators, but he
chose common, poor, and untaught fishermen.
Aug.,
Tract. in Joann. 8, 7: Had one learned been chosen, he might have attributed
the choice to the merit of his learning. But our Lord Jesus Christ, willing to
bow the necks of the proud, sought not to gain fishermen by orators, but gained
an Emperor by a fisherman. Great was Cyprian
the pleader, but Peter the fisherman was before him.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
The operations of their secular craft were a prophecy of their future dignity.
As he who casts his net into the water knows not what fishes he shall take, so
the teacher casts the net of the divine word upon the people, not knowing who
among them will come to God. Those whom God shall stir abide in his doctrine.
Remig.:
Of these fishermen the Lord speaks by Jeremiah. “I will send my fishers among
you, and they shall catch you.” [Jer 16:16]
Gloss.
interlin.: “Follow me,” not so much with your feet as in your hearts and your
life.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
“Fishers of men,” that is, teachers, that with the net of God’s word you may
catch men out of this world of storm and danger, in which men do not walk but
are rather borne along, the Devil by pleasure drawing them into sin where men
devour one another as the stronger fishes do the weaker, withdrawn from hence
they may live upon the land, being made members of Christ’s body.
Greg.,
Hom. in Evan., v. 1: Peter and Andrew had seen Christ work no miracle, had
heard from him no word of the promise of the eternal reward, yet at this single
bidding of the Lord they forgot all that they had seemed to possess, and
“straightway left their nets, and followed Him.” In which deed we ought rather
to consider their wills than [p. 137] the amount of their property. He leaves
much who keeps nothing for himself, he parts with much, who with his
possessions renounces his lusts.
Those who followed Christ gave up enough to
be coveted by those who did not follow. Our outward goods, however small, are
enough for the Lord; He does not weight the sacrifice by how much is offered,
but out of how much it is offered. The kingdom of God is not to be valued at a
certain price, but whatever a man has, much or little, is equally available.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
These disciples did not follow Christ from desire of the honour of a doctor,
but because they coveted the labour itself; they knew how precious is the soul
of man, how pleasant to God is his salvation, and how great its reward.
Chrys.:
To so great a promise they trusted, and believed that they should catch others
by those same words by which themselves had been caught.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
These were their desires, for which they “left all and followed;” teaching us
thereby that none can possess earthly things and perfectly attain to heavenly
things.
Gloss.
ap. Anselm: These last disciples were an example to such as leave their
property for the love of Christ; now follows an example of others who postponed
earthly affection to God. Observe how He calls them two and two, and He
afterwards sent them two and two to preach.
Greg.,
Hom. in Ex., 17, 1: Hereby we are also silently admonished, that he who wants
affection towards others, ought not to take on him the office of preaching. The
precepts of charity are two, and between less than two there can be no love.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Rightly did He thus build the foundations of the brotherhood of the Church on
love, that from such roots a copious sap of love might flow to the branches;
and that too on natural or human love, that nature as well as grace might bind
their love more firmly. They were moreover “brothers;” and so did God in the
Old Testament lay the foundations of His building on Moses and Aaron, brothers.
But as the grace of the New Testament is
more abundant than that of the Old, therefore the first people were built upon
one pair of brethren, but the new people upon two.
They were “washing their nets,” a proof of
the extremest indigence; they repaired the old because they had not whence they
should buy new. And [p. 138] what shews their great filial piety, in this their
great poverty they deserted not their father, but carried him with them in
their vessel, not that he might aid in their labour, but have the enjoyment of
his sons’ presence.
Chrys.:
It is no small sign of goodness, to bear poverty easily, to live by honest
labour, to be bound together by virtue of affection, to keep their poor father
with them, and to toil in his service.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
We may not dare to consider the former disciples as more quick to preach,
because they were “casting their nets;” and these latter as less active,
because they were yet making ready only; for it is Christ alone that may know
their differences.
But, perhaps we may say that the first were
“casting their nets,” because Peter preached the Gospel, but committed it not
to paper - the others were making ready their nets, because John composed a
Gospel.
He “called them” together, for by their
abode they were fellow-townsmen, in affection attached, in profession agreed,
and united by brotherly tenderness. He called them then at once, that united by
so many common blessings they might not be separated by a separate call.
Chrys.:
He made no promise to them when He called them, as He had to the former, for
the obedience of the first had made the way plain for them. Besides, they had
heard many things concerning Him, as being friends and townsmen of the others.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
There are three things which we must leave who would come to Christ; carnal
actions, which are signified in the fishing nets; worldly substance, in the
ship; parents, which are signified in their father. They left their own vessel,
that they might become governors of the vessel of the Church; they left their
nets, as having no longer to draw out fishes on to the earthly shore, but men
to the heavenly; they left their father, that they might become the spiritual
fathers of all.
Hilary:
By this that they left their occupation and their father’s house we are taught,
that when we would follow Christ we should not be holden of the cares of
secular life, or of the society of the paternal mansion.
Remig.:
Mystically, by the sea is figured this world, because of its bitterness and its
tossing waves. Galilee is interpreted, ‘rolling,’ or ‘a wheel,’ and shews the
changeableness of the world. [p. 139] Jesus “walked by the sea” when He came to
us by incarnation, for He took on Him of the Virgin not the flesh of sin, but
the likeness of the flesh of sin.
By the two brothers, two people are
signified born of one God their Father; He “saw” them when He looked on them in
His mercy. In Peter, (which is interpreted ‘owning,’) who is called Simon,
(i.e. obedient,) is signified the Jewish nation, who acknowledged God in the
Law, and obeyed His commandments; Andrew, which is interpreted ‘manly’ or ‘graceful,’
signifies the Gentiles, who after they had come to the knowledge of God,
manfully abode in the faith. He called us His people when He sent the preachers
into the world, saying, “Follow me;” that is, leave the deceiver, follow your
Creator. Of both people there were made fishers of men, that is, preachers.
Leaving their ships, that is, carnal desires, and their nets, that is, love of
the world, they followed Christ. By James is understood the Jewish nation,
which through their knowledge of God overthrew the Devil; by John the Gentile
world, which was saved of grace alone. Zebedee whom they leave, (the name is interpreted flying or
falling,) signifies the world which passes away, and the Devil who fell from
Heaven. By Peter and Andrew casting their net into the sea, are meant those who
in their early youth are called by the Lord, while from the vessel of their
body they cast the nets of carnal concupiscence into the sea of this world. By
James and John mending their nets are signified those who after sin before
adversity come to Christ recovering what they had lost.
Rabanus:
The two vessels signify the two Churches; the one was called out of the
circumcision, the other out of the uncircumcision. Any one who believes becomes
Simon, i.e. obedient to God; Peter by acknowledging his sin, Andrew by enduring
labours manfully, James by overcoming vices,
Gloss.
ap. Anselm: and John that he may ascribe the whole to God’s grace. The calling
of four only is mentioned, as those preachers by whom God will call the four
quarters of the world.
Hilary:
Or, the number that was to be of the Evangelists is figured.
Remig.:
Also, the four principal virtues are here designed; Prudence, in Peter, from
his [p. 140] confession of God; Justice, we may refer to Andrew for his manful
deeds; Fortitude, to James, for his overthrow of the Devil; Temperance, to
John, for the working in him of divine grace.
Aug.,
de Cons. Evan., ii, 17: It might move enquiry, why John relates that near
Jordan, not in Galilee, Andrew followed the Lord with another whose name he
does not mention; and again, that Peter received that name from the Lord.
Whereas the other three Evangelists write that they were called from their
fishing, sufficiently agreeing with one another, especially Matthew and Mark;
Luke not naming Andrew, who is however understood to have been in the same
vessel with him.
There is a further seeming discrepancy,
that in Luke it is to Peter only that it is said, “Henceforth thou shalt catch
men;” Matthew and Mark write that is was said to both. As to the different
account in John, it should be carefully considered, and it will be found that
it is a different time, place, and calling that is there spoken of. For Peter
and Andrew had not so seen Jesus at the Jordan that they adhered inseparably
ever after, but so as only to have known who He was, and wondering at Him to
have gone their way. Perhaps he is returning back to something he had omitted,
for he proceeds without marking any difference of time, “As he walked by the
sea of Galilee.”
It may be further asked, how Matthew and
Mark relate that He called them separately two and two, when Luke relates that
James and John being partners of Peter were called as it were to aid him, and
bringing their barks to land followed Christ. We may then understand that the
narrative of Luke relates to a prior time, after which they returned to their
fishing as usual. For it had not been said to Peter that he should no more
catch fish, as he did do so again after the resurrection, but that he “should
catch men.” Again, at a time after this happened that call of which Matthew and
Mark speak; for they draw their ships to land to follow Him, not as careful to
return again, but only anxious to follow Him when He bids them.
23.
And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching
the Gospel of [p. 141] the kingdom, and healing all manner of sickness and all
manner of disease among the people.
24.
And His fame went throughout all Syria: and they brought unto Him all sick
people that were taken with divers diseases and torments, and those which were
possessed with devils, and those which were lunatic, and those that had the
palsy; and He healed them.
25.
And there followed Him great multitudes of people from Galilee, and from Decapolis,
and from Jerusalem, and from Judaea, and from beyond Jordan.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Kings, when about to go to war with their enemies, first gather an army, and so
go out to battle; thus the Lord when about to war against the Devil, first
collected Apostles, and then began to preach the Gospel.
Remig.:
An example of life for doctors; that they should not be inactive, they are
instructed in these words, “And Jesus went about.”
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Because they being weak could not come to their physician, He as a zealous
Physician went about to visit those who had any grievous sickness. The Lord
went round the several regions, and after His example the pastors of each
region ought to go round to study the several dispositions of their people,
that for the remedy of each disease some medicine may be found in the Church.
Remig.:
That they should not be acceptors of persons the preachers are instructed in
what follows, “the whole of Galilee.” That they should not go about empty, by
the word, “teaching.” That they should seek to benefit not few but many, in
what follows, “in their synagogues.”
Chrys.:
[ed. note: A passage is here inserted in Nicolai’s edition which is not in the
original. It is of no doctrinal importance.] By which too He shewed the Jews
that He came not as an enemy of God, or a seducer of souls, but as consenting
with his Father.
Remig.:
That they should not preach error nor fable, but sound doctrine, is inculcated
in the words, “preaching the Gospel of the kingdom.” ‘Teaching’ and ‘preaching’
[p. 142] differ; teaching refers to things present, preaching to things to
come; He taught present commandments and preached future promises.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Or, He taught natural righteousness, those things which natural reason teaches,
as chastity, humility, and the like, which all men of themselves see to be
goods. Such things are necessary to be taught not so much for the sake of
making them known as for stirring the heart.
For beneath the prevalence of carnal
delights the knowledge of natural righteousness sleeps forgotten. When then a
teacher begins to denounce carnal sins, his teaching does not bring up a new
knowledge, but recalls to memory one that had been forgotten. But He preached
the Gospel, in telling of good things which the ancients had manifestly not heard
of, as the happiness of heaven, the resurrection of the dead, and the like.
Or, He taught by interpreting the
prophecies concerning Himself; He preached by declaring the benefits that were
to come from Himself.
Remig.:
That the teacher should study to commend his teaching by his own virtuous
conduct is conveyed in those words, “healing every sort of disease and malady
among the people;” maladies of the body, diseases of the soul.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
Or, by disease we may understand any passion of the mind, as avarice, lust, and
such like, by malady unbelief, that is, weakness of faith.
Or, the diseases are the more grievous
pains of the body, the maladies the slighter. As He cured the bodily pains by
virtue of His divine power, so He cured the spiritual by the word of His mercy.
He first teaches, and then performs the
cures, for two reasons. First, that what is needed most may come first; for it
is the word of holy instruction, and not miracles, that edify the soul.
Secondly, because teaching is commended by miracles, not the converse.
Chrys.:
We must consider that when some great change is being wrought, as the
introduction of a new polity, God is wont to work miracles, giving pledges of
His power to those who are to receive His laws.
Thus when He would make man, He first
created a world, and then at length gave man in paradise a law. When He would
dispense a law to the holy Noah, he shewed truly great wonders; and again when
He was about to ordain the Law for the Jews, He first shewed great prodigies,
and then at [p. 143] length gave them the commandments. So now when about to
introduce a sublime discipline of life, He first provided a sanction to His
instructions by mighty signs, because the eternal kingdom He preached was not
seen, by the things which did appear, He made sure that which as yet did not
appear.
Gloss.
ap. Anselm: Because preachers should have good testimony from those who are
without, lest if their life is open to censure, their preaching be contemned,
he adds, “And the fame of him went abroad through all Syria.”
Rabanus:
Syria here is all the region from Euphrates to the Great sea, from Cappodocia
to Egypt, in which is the country of Palestine, inhabited by Jews.
Chrys.:
Observe the reserve of the Evangelist; he does not give an account of any one
of the various cases of healing, but passes in one brief phrase an abundance of
miracles, “they brought to him all their sick.”
Remig.:
By these he would have us understand various but slighter diseases; but when he
says, “seized with divers sicknesses and torments,” he would have those
understood, of whom it is subjoined, “and who had daemons.”
Gloss:
‘Sickness’ means a lasting ailment; ‘torment’ is an acute pain, as pleurisy,
and such like; they “who had daemons” are they who were tormented by the daemons.
Remig.:
‘Lunatics’ are so called from the moon; for as it waxes in its monthly seasons
they are tormented.
Jerome:
Not really smitten by the moon, but who were believed to be so through the
subtlety of the daemons, who by observing the seasons of the moon, sought to
bring an evil report against the creature, that is might redound to the
blasphemy of the Creator.
Aug.,
City of God, book 21, ch. 6: Daemons are enticed to take up their abode in many
creatures, (created not by themselves but God,) by delights adapted to their
various natures; not that they are animals, drawn by meats; but spirits
attracted by signs which agree with each one’s taste.
Rabanus:
Paralytics are those whose bodies have their nerves slackened or resolved from
a Greek word, signifying this.
Pseudo-Chrys.:
In some places it is, “He cured many;” but here, “He cured them,” meaning, ‘all;’
as a new physician first entering a town cures all who come to him to beget a
good opinion concerning himself.
Chrys.:
He requires no direct profession of faith from them, both because He had not
yet given them any proofs of His miraculous [p. 144] power, and because in
bringing their sick from far they had shewn no small faith.
Rabanus:
The crowds that followed Him consisted of four sorts of men. Some followed for
the heavenly teaching as disciples, some for the curing of their diseases, some
from the reports concerning Him alone, and curiosity to find whether they were
true; others from envy, wishing to catch Him in some matter that they might
accuse Him.
Mystically, Syria is interpreted ‘lofty,’
Galilee, ‘turning:’ or ‘a wheel;’ that is, the Devil and the world; the Devil
is both proud and always turned round to the bottom; the world in which the
fame of Christ went abroad through preaching: the daemoniacs are the idolaters;
the lunatics, the unstable; the paralytics, the slow and careless.
Gloss.
ap. Anselm: The crowds that follow the Lord, are they of the Church, which is
spiritually designated by Galilee, passing to virtuousness; Decapolis is he who
keeps the Ten Commandments; Jerusalem and Judaea, he who is enlightened by the
vision of peace and confession; and beyond Jordan, he who having passed the
waters of Baptism enters the land of promise.
Remig.:
Or, they follow the Lord “from Galilee,” that is, from the unstable world; from
Decapolis, (the country of ten towns,) signifying those who break the Ten
Commandments; “and from Jerusalem,” because before it was preserved unhurt in
peace; “and from Jordan,” that is, from the confession of the Devil; “and from
beyond Jordan,” they who were first planted in paganism, but passing the water
of Baptism came to Christ.