Ezekiel 16

And the word of the Lord came to me, saying: Son of man, make known to Jerusalem her abominations, and you shall say: Thus says the Lord God to Jerusalem. (LXX: "And the word of the Lord came to me, saying: Son of man, bear witness to Jerusalem of her iniquities, and you shall say to her: Thus says Adonai the Lord.") Where the compass of the individual prophecies was brief, we set down whole passages, adding at once beneath them what seemed right to us; here, however, because a long discourse is directed to Jerusalem by one who bears witness to her and teaches her the sins she has committed, and the prophecy extends to nearly two hundred lines, namely up to that place in which it is written: When I have been appeased toward you in all that you have done, says the Lord God, we must set out the whole prophecy in parts, and fit the due explanations to the parts we have set out. Under the person of a harlot woman, who was first joined in union with a husband, there is woven together the birth and upbringing and youth and marriage and adultery and divorce and recall again of Jerusalem, so that both the clemency and the judgment of the husband and the crimes of the adulteress and harlot may be recognized, when after all the punishments he raises up for her an everlasting covenant, that she may remember her iniquity and be confounded, and it may no longer be hers to open her mouth because of her confusion, when he has been appeased toward her in all that she had done; and it greatly profits sinners to know what they have done: whence the penitent too says: For I know my iniquity, and my sin is ever against me. Now Jerusalem can be understood in four ways: either this one which was set on fire by the Babylonian and the Roman flame, or the heavenly one of the firstborn, or the Church, which means 'vision of peace', or the souls of individuals who by faith behold God. And what many think should be interpreted of the heavenly Jerusalem the Church does not accept, lest we be compelled to take all that is woven together in the present prophecy as referring to the fall and torments of the heavenly powers, and to their restoration to their former state.

And again, Ezekiel makes this an accusation against them, that they did not grieve for the afflicted. What sayest thou, O Prophet? God punisheth, and shall I grieve for those that He is punishing? Yea verily: for God Himself that punisheth wisheth this: since neither does He Himself wish to punish, nay, even Himself grieves when punishing. Then be not thou glad at it. You will say, "If they are justly punished, we ought not to grieve." Why, the thing we ought to grieve for is this—that they were found worthy of punishment. Say, when thou seest thy son undergoing cautery or the knife, dost thou not grieve? and sayest thou not to thyself, "What is this? It is for health this cutting, to quicken his recovery; it is for his deliverance, this burning?" but for all that, when thou hearest him crying out, and not able to [bear it], the hope of health being restored is not enough to carry off the shock to nature. So also in the case of these, though it be in order to their health that they are punished, nevertheless let us show a brotherly feeling, a fatherly disposition. They are cuttings and cauteries, the punishments sent by God: but it is for this we ought to weep, that they were sick, that they needed such a mode of cure.

Why is it that I admire Ezekiel? Because the order was given him to make known to Jerusalem its abominations, and he did not place before his eyes any danger that would result from his preaching, but in order to keep only the precepts of God, he spoke whatever he was told. Let us realize that there was a mystery, that there was the revelation of a mysterious kind on the subject of Jerusalem and all that is said against it. Nevertheless, he prophesied, and accused it of fornication.

Your root and your generation from the land of Canaan, your father an Amorite and your mother a Hittite. Great is the faith, great the boldness of the prophets, that one man should charge a whole city with ignoble birth; admirable is Daniel who, to an elder who was sinning and joining murder to adultery, dared as a boy to say: Seed of Canaan and not of Judah, beauty has deceived you; great too is Isaiah, who cries out to the princes and to the people of the Jews: Hear the word of the Lord, princes of Sodom; give ear to the words of the Lord, people of Gomorrah; but no less is Ezekiel, who speaks confidently to the whole city: Your root and your generation from the land of Canaan, your father an Amorite and your mother a Hittite. Although Stephen too, the first martyr of the Gospel, spoke thus to the raging people: Stiff of neck, and uncircumcised in heart, you have always resisted the Holy Spirit, and although we can take the root of Jerusalem and her generation, the land of Canaan, in the sense that the people was called in Egypt and dwelt there a long time — for Ham, the father of Canaan, was the founder of the Egyptian nation —, yet, according to the likeness of their crimes, let us say that the root of Jerusalem is the land of Egypt; whence also her father is called 'amorrhaeus' [Amorite], which means διαδούμενος, that is, 'celebrated by much talk', and her mother 'chethaea' [Hittite], that is, ἐξιστῶσα, 'she who' either 'is herself mad' or 'drives others into madness': Everyone, indeed, who commits sin is born of the devil, whence also in the whole world the name of this ancient father is notorious, and it turns many into madness. And Jerusalem is commanded, whether according to the letter or according to the spirit, to leave her ancient father, and it is said to her: Hear, daughter, and see, and incline your ear, and forget your people and your father's house; and the king will desire your beauty, and it is promised her, if after sin she is willing to return to her true father: I will restore you as you were when you were born. Such is the nobility of the city of Jerusalem, which, descending from the stock of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, had God as her father, and yet, because she sinned and left her true parent, deserves to hear: Your root and your generation from the land of Canaan, your father an Amorite and your mother a Hittite! If she heard this, what will become of us, who, called out of the filth of the nations, lost every stain in the washing of the Savior, if we defile the garment of Christ and do not have the wedding garment at the banquet? Surely this: that, with hands and feet bound, we be handed over to everlasting fires, in which there is weeping of eyes and gnashing of teeth.

If we are on the alert, these evils that came into life as a result of the sins of our forebears will in no way be able to harm us, because in fact they go no further than the level of terminology. It was the first formed human being who through the fall brought on the punishment of death and was responsible for spending his life in pain and distress, and it was he who was the cause of servitude. But Christ the Lord came and permitted all these evils to occur only at the level of terminology, provided we are of the right mind. You see, death is now not death but only carries the name of death—or, rather, even the very name has been abolished.

Which of the cities in the world were so elevated and so deep in knowledge as the city of God?

If so many things are said in Jerusalem about which such great and wonderful things are written that have been promised to her, what future is there for unhappy me, if I sin? Who will I have for a father, who will I have for a mother?

And when you were born, on the day of your birth, your navel was not cut, and you were not washed in water for salvation, nor salted with salt, nor wrapped in swaddling cloths. No eye spared you, to do for you one of these things, having pity on you, but you were cast out upon the face of the earth in the abjection of your soul on the day on which you were born. (LXX: "And your generation: on the day on which you were born, they did not bind your breasts, and you were not washed in water for salvation, nor salted with salt, and you were not wrapped in swaddling cloths. Nor did your eye spare you, that I should do for you one of all these things, and that it should suffer anything over you, and you were cast out upon the face of the field for the depravity of your soul on the day on which you were born.") Let us discuss each point in the order of the reading. When Jerusalem was born of an Amorite father and a Hittite mother and poured forth from the womb, her navel was not cut, the navel by which fetuses are nourished in the belly, like trees and shrubs which are nourished through their roots by the hidden moisture of the earth — and just as the seed-bed of men is signified in the loins, so the genitals of women, by a decent expression, according to the custom of the Scriptures, are called the navel, on the testimony of Job who, under the figure of the dragon, speaks of the devil: His strength is in his loins, and his might in the navel of his belly; for this dragon, the ancient serpent who is called the devil and Satan and deceived the whole world, has his strength against men in the loins, against women in the navel —, and this signifies of Jerusalem that she did not at once receive the Law, nor were the beginnings of her shameful birth cut away from her, but she first lived a Gentile life; for which the Seventy translated: On the day on which you were born, they did not bind your breasts, since Holy Scripture has this custom, that for the heart it names the little breast, or the breast, and the breasts, as it sees fit for each place — the priests, in whom there ought to be doctrine, and from whose mouth they seek the Law, receive the little breast; John reclines upon the breast of the Lord, to draw the streams of wisdom from the richest fountain; the virgin's two breasts in the Song of Songs are like two fawns, twins of a gazelle, which feed among the lilies, until the day breathes and the shadows are removed; a careful mother, as soon as her baby girl is born, binds her breasts, so that they may refrain from tender swelling and keep their virginal beauty, but when she has come to the age of puberty, it is said of her: Will a bride forget her adornment, or a virgin her breast-band? —. There follows: And you were not washed in water for salvation; the bloody bodies of infants are usually washed as soon as they are sent forth from the womb; so too the spiritual birth needs the saving washing: For no one is clean from filth, not even if his life has been of one day, and in the Psalms we read: In iniquities I was conceived, and in sins my mother conceived me; the second birth undoes the first birth, for it is written: Unless one is reborn of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God; and there are many washings which the pagans, in their mysteries, and the heretics promise, who all wash but do not wash for salvation; therefore it is added: And you were not washed in water for salvation, which indeed can be understood not only of heretics but also of churchmen who do not receive saving baptism with full faith, of whom it must be said that they received the water but did not receive the Spirit — just as that Simon the magician, who wished to buy the grace of God with money, was indeed baptized in water but was by no means baptized for salvation —. Thirdly it is said: Nor salted with salt; the tender bodies of infants, while they still keep the warmth of the womb and with their first wail bear witness to the beginnings of a toilsome life, are usually touched with salt by the midwives, so that they may be drier and be firmed; but Jerusalem, born of evil parents, obtained no savor, no care; to those, however, who are reborn in Christ it is said: You are the salt of the earth, and they are commanded by the Apostle: Let your speech always be seasoned with salt in grace — whence also in common speech the wise are called 'salty' and the foolish 'unsalted', and in Leviticus it is enacted by law: Every sacrifice of yours shall be salted with salt, the salt of the covenant of the Lord shall not cease from your sacrifices: in all your gifts you shall offer salt; he who has been seasoned with this salt and by its admixture has dried up all stench and harmful moisture will no longer say: My scars have putrefied and become corrupt before the face of my foolishness. I know that I have read in a certain volume about the Lord Savior that he himself is the heavenly salt, and has seasoned with his savor not only earthly and infernal things but heavenly ones too, and that what is written is fulfilled: Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men of good will —. Fourth is: Nor wrapped in swaddling cloths; the Savior too was wrapped in the swaddling cloths of infancy, and everyone who is born needs the protection of God through the wrappings of swaddling cloths. It is natural, where at least the care of the parents is not lacking, for newborn infants first to have the navel cut, then to be washed with water to wash off the blood, thirdly for the moisture of the little bodies to be dried by the application of salt, fourthly for the tender bodies of infants to be wrapped in swaddling cloths, for a twofold reason: both so that the body may be dried by the salt, the body being kept and held tight by the cloths so that it does not run off, and so that the most tender limbs may not easily become misshapen — whence also the bodies of the barbarians are straighter than Roman bodies: for up to the second and third year they are always wrapped in swaddling cloths —; but not so Jerusalem, whose navel was not cut off, nor were her breasts bound, nor was she washed with water for salvation, nor salted with salt, nor wrapped and bound in the swaddling cloths of infancy.

Not everyone is washed for salvation. We who have received the grace of baptism in the name of Christ are washed, but I do not know who is washed for salvation.

It is quite difficult that he who is washed should be washed in order to be saved. Listen, catechumens, listen, and from what is said, prepare yourselves, while you are catechumens, while you are not yet baptized, and come to the bath and be baptized for salvation. Do not be so baptized that you are washed but not for salvation.

It is a great work to be rubbed with salt. If we are seasoned with salt, we are full of grace.

The soul that is reborn is barely out of the bath before being enveloped with towels.

To take an example from human relationships, if the Holy Spirit gives, then I travel on to Jesus Christ and God the Father.

But why she deserved none of these things, the following Scripture testifies: No eye spared you, to do for you one of these things, having pity on you, for which the Seventy put: Your eye did not spare you, that I should do for you one of all these things, and the twofold edition must have a twofold understanding; the former signifies this: No eye spared you, to do for you one of these things, having pity on you, and the sense is: 'No one had pity on you, since God was offended; no one's heart was moved over you, so as to do for you at least one of the four things above, since you did not deserve to receive them all together'; in the other it is said: Your eye did not spare you, that I should do for you one of all these things, and it has this sense: 'You acted so, and were so born in sins, and in sins your mother conceived you, that not even you yourself had pity on yourself. And since you behaved so as to be cruel against yourself through evil works, what could I do for you, who did not deserve to receive even one of the things above? Since, then, none of these things which are usually done for infants was done in you, and this not without cause nor without judgment but through your own fault and sin, since not even you yourself had pity on yourself, therefore: You were cast out on the face of the earth (or of the field), and cast out because of the depravity of your soul on the day on which you were born' — let us pray that we be not cast out through depravity of soul onto the face of the field, in which wide and spacious is the way that leads to death, in which the cavalry of the Chaldeans runs riot —. And at the same time it must be considered that no one, on the day on which he is born, can commit anything depraved, except at the time of the washing, when a wise generation is taken up by the faith of the believer.

Israel is the pauper bride, the waif whom Her lover found abandoned by the wayside, and clothed and adorned and made lovely and yet she betrayed Him.

But passing by you I saw you trampled in your blood, and I said to you, when you were in your blood: Live. I said, I say, to you: In your blood live. I made you multiplied like the sprout of the field, and you went in and came to womanly finery, your breasts swelled and your hair sprouted; and you were naked and full of confusion. (LXX: "And I passed by you and saw you mixed in your blood, and I said to you: From your blood, life; be multiplied. Like the growth of the field I made you, and you were multiplied and were magnified; and you entered into the cities of cities, your breasts were raised and your hair sprang up; but you were naked, full of disgrace.") 'After you were cast out on the face of the field, or upon the face of the earth, because of the depravity of your soul, you no longer deserved my help. Nevertheless: Passing by you I saw you trampled (or mixed) in your blood, that is, guilty of deadly crimes, and I summoned you, granting repentance, and I said to you: Although you are in blood, yet live, converted.

But see the mercy of God, see his extraordinary goodness. Even though Jerusalem was thrown into the open field, he does not look down on it as thrown out forever, he does not leave it in a state of perversion as entirely forgotten, as not in the end to lift up the fallen. You were thrown out, but I still return to you; my visit is not lacking after your ruin."

And so great was the abundance of all things in you, that you had the likeness of a most fertile field — and the blessing of Jacob with which his father blessed him, saying: Behold, the smell of my son is as the smell of a full field which the Lord has blessed —, and that you entered the inner chambers of the Lord — and said with the bride: The king has brought me into his chamber —, and came to womanly finery'; for which the Seventy translated: And you entered into the cities of cities, so that, just as one speaks of the Song of 'Songs' and of an age of 'ages', so cities are called cities of 'cities', of which it is said in the Gospel: 'Have authority over ten (or over five) cities, so that you are called not only a city but a metropolis city', according to what is written in Isaiah: Faithful Zion, mother of cities; moreover, what Symmachus translated: And you came to the adornment of women, or Theodotion: And you entered to the adornment of adornments, for which we, following the Hebrew sense, said: And you came to womanly finery, shows the time of puberty, when girls are called 'marriageable' and can be joined in the embraces of husbands. Then there follows: Your breasts swelled and your hair sprouted: the maturity of young girls is decently indicated, when the breasts swell, or are raised, and the hair sprouts. And although she was ready for marriage and had beauty of body, she did not have the covering of garments nor was she protected by the help of God; if anyone does not have the garment of Christ, he is naked; if anyone is not clothed with the bowels of mercy, of goodness, of humility, of modesty, of meekness, of patience, he lies upon the face of the earth, and his beauty is disfigured by confusion and nakedness.

And I passed by you and saw you; and behold, your time, the time of lovers. And I spread my cloak over you, and covered your disgrace. (LXX: "And I passed by you and saw you; and behold, your time, the time of those turning aside. And I spread my wings over you, and covered your disgrace.") What great clemency! It had not been enough to have seen her once trampled in blood and to have called her to repentance, but when she sins again he visits her and, because she was naked and full of confusion, he comes again and visits; and behold, her time, the time 'of lovers' — or according to the Seventy 'of those turning aside', and according to the second translation of Aquila, συναλλαγῆς, namely 'of betrothal' and 'of the time of the nuptials', but according to the first edition of the same and Theodotion μαστῶν, which means 'of breasts', for which Symmachus rendered ἀγαπῆς, which signifies 'love' —; that, then, was the time when women can be joined and sustain marital intercourse. Nevertheless the merciful God spread his wings, took them up, and carried them on his shoulders — according to what is written in the Gospel: How often I wished to gather your children as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you would not —, or he spread a 'cloak' in place of 'wings' — for this is what πτερυγίῳ [wing; also the skirt of a garment] means, with which Ruth too was covered as she slept at the feet of Boaz; and on the border, that is, the πτερυγίῳ, of our garment we are commanded to fasten ὑακίνθινας [hyacinth-blue] fringes —; and he did these things to cover the disgrace of Jerusalem — indicating by this name the genital body of women; for indeed, according to the Apostle, we surround the uncomely parts of our body with greater honor, whence also the psalmist sings: Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered; and because Ham did not cover these in his father, he is marked with an everlasting curse —. What we have said of Jerusalem, let us refer to our soul, which, as long as it is set in infancy, is without sin; but when the time of its age has come, there are many lovers — of demons and of heretics and of perverse dogmas — who desire to turn aside to it; they are repelled by the protection of the Lord, so that it may receive not the satellites of the devil but the ministers of the Savior. For 'of those turning aside', 'love' and 'of breasts', the Hebrew has 'dodim', which, according to the peculiar character of their language, signifies all the things translated above. The time 'of love' and 'of breasts', or 'of the lovers of God', can be understood as Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, when the Lord promised them that his people would be freed after the Egyptian servitude.

And I swore to you, and entered into a pact with you, says the Lord God. (LXX: "And I swore to you, and entered into a covenant with you, says Adonai the Lord.") 'Because I spread my cloak, or my wings, over you and covered your confusion, therefore I swore to you and entered into a pact, or covenant, with you, so that you might be joined to me rather than to the others who wished to turn aside to you' — according to that: The Lord has sworn and will not repent: You are a priest forever, according to the order of Melchizedek; for an oath is the end of every dispute, and: As I live, says the Lord, 'I would rather have the repentance of the sinner than his death' —. At the time of the nuptials, then, Israel received the oath of God in place of every dowry gift — and because David had said of himself: Remember, O Lord, David and all his meekness, who swore to the Lord, vowed a vow to the God of Jacob, the Lord himself also swears to him, as Scripture says: The Lord has sworn truth to David, and will not frustrate him.

And you became mine. And I washed you with water, and cleansed your blood from you, and anointed you with oil. 'Because I spread my wings and covered your disgrace and swore to you and entered into a pact with you, therefore you have become my possession, so that you, who were another's when you were seen unclean, began to be mine when I confirmed my pact with you by an oath', or, according to the custom of the prophets: 'You became mine', he says, 'stands for: you were joined to me in marriage; and I washed you', he says, 'with the water of saving baptism': Unless, indeed, one is reborn of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God; and elsewhere we read: He will baptize you in the Holy Spirit and fire, of which baptism Isaiah too speaks, saying: The Lord will wash away the filth of the sons and daughters of Zion, and will cleanse the blood from their midst, by a spirit of judgment and a spirit of burning. And when he has washed, and cleansed her of the blood — the blood from which, by the touch of his fringe, he also healed the αἱμορροοῦσαν [woman with a flow of blood] who for twelve years had been running with gore —, it is not enough to wash with water and cleanse from blood, unless he also anoints with oil, according to which the Samaritan, which means 'guardian', first soothed the wounds of the half-dead man by pouring in oil, then checked them with the sharpness of wine; but our Lord was anointed with another oil, which would not soothe the pain of wounds but grant gladness, as the Holy Spirit says to him: Therefore God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of exultation above your fellows. The opposing powers too have the smoothness of a counterfeit oil, promising sweet things through the heretics: things which are turned into bitterness, and which the prophet detests, recalling: But let not the oil of the sinner fatten my head. But if from anointing the anointed one, that is, Christ, is so named, see how far Jerusalem had advanced, that she too, anointed with spiritual oil, received the name of Christ, according to what we read in the Psalms of Abraham: Do not touch my christs, and do no evil among my prophets.

But from hence infer not thy punishment only, but also the boundless longsuffering of God. How often at least have we put our hands to the same evil deeds, and yet He suffers long! But let us not be sanguine, but fear; since Pharaoh too, had he been taught by the first plague, would not have experienced the later ones; he would not afterwards have been drowned, his host and all together.

When we are of a greater age and can therefore sin, angels look for a chance to influence us, and that is as true of the angels of God as it is of the angels of Satan.

Let us pray that the mercy of God will come on us and wash away the blood from our souls.

"Untie the donkey and bring it to me."He began with a manger and finished with a donkey, in Bethlehem with a manger, in Jerusalem with a donkey. This is like, "Rejoice, daughter of Zion, for behold, your king is coming to you, just and lowly and seated on a donkey." But the daughter of Zion saw him and was troubled. She looked at him and became sad. He the merciful One, and the Son of the merciful One, had spread his benevolence over her like a father, but she conducted herself as perversely toward him as she had done toward the One who had sent him. Not being able to abuse the Father, she displayed her hatred against his Only Begotten. The daughter of Zion repaid him with evil for the immensity of his grace. The Father had washed her from her blood, but she defiled his Son with her spitting. The Father had clothed her with fine linen and purple, but she clothed him with garments of mockery. He had placed a crown of glory on her head, but she plaited a crown of thorns for him. He had nourished her with choicest food and honey, but she gave him gall. He had given her pure wine, but she offered him vinegar and soaked it with blood. The One who had introduced her into cities, she drove out into the desert. The One who had put shoes on her feet, she made hasten barefoot toward Golgotha. The One who had girded her loins with sapphire, she pierced in the side with a lance. When she had outraged the servants of God and killed the prophets, she was led into captivity to Babylon, and when the time of her punishment was completed, her return from captivity took place.

And I clothed you in parti-colored garments. (LXX: "And I dressed you in varied garments.") In the ceremonies of the Law, so that, occupied in the study of them, you would forsake idols. These are the varied garments with which Joseph was clothed, and his brothers could not sell him until they had first stripped him of the variety of his tunic; and of the bride it is said in Psalm 44 (45): The queen stood at your right hand in gilded clothing, surrounded with variety; this is the garment of which the Apostle too speaks: Having put on the new man, who is renewed in knowledge according to the image of the Creator. Do we want to know what the varied garments are? Let the same Apostle teach us, writing to believers: Put on therefore the bowels of mercy, of goodness, of humility, of meekness, of patience — what is more beautiful than this variety? —, of which Job too spoke: Who gave women the wisdom of weaving or the skill of variety?, and the high priest, once a year, when he burned incense for the people and entered the Holy of Holies, used varied vestments. Certainly, if riches, and not holiness and diversity of virtues, made the variety of garments, Pharaoh and Nebuchadnezzar would be written to have had these garments, and not Joseph, who under a sojourning and shepherd father could not have parti-colored and royal garments.

And I shod you with violet. (LXX: "And I shod you with hyacinth.") Aquila and Symmachus translated 'violet', the Seventy and Theodotion 'hyacinthine', for which in the Hebrew is written 'thas'. And beautifully, because the discourse is directed to Jerusalem and, under the person of a woman, all her adornment is set out, ὑακίνθινα [hyacinth-colored] or ἰάνθινα [violet] shoes are spoken of, which do not suit the person of men — indeed, those who are to keep the Passover are commanded, without any variety of color, to have their loins girded and their feet shod; these are the shoes of which the Apostle writes: Feet shod in the preparation of the Gospel of peace; Philo, the most eloquent man among the Jews, compares the ὑάκινθον [hyacinth] in the vestments of the high priest to the air, by which he thinks the higher and heavenly things are signified —. Nor is Jerusalem shod with hyacinthine shoes until she has been washed with water — whence also the apostles, whom the Lord had earlier commanded to shake off the dust of their feet, have their feet washed by the Savior; and the bride says in the Song of Songs: I have washed my feet, how shall I defile them?; and the divine word testifies to Moses and Joshua that they should loose the latchet of their shoe, because the place in which they stand is holy —; but when the feet have been washed and purged of all filth, they are shod with ὑακίνθινις or ἰάνθινις — both of which are of an ἀέριον [air-like] and κυανέου [dark blue] color — so that they may be caught up to meet the Lord in the air, and hasten to the heavenly kingdoms.

And I girded you with fine linen. Jerusalem is not only clothed in parti-colored garments and shod with ὑακίνθινις, but is also girded with fine linen, from which the finest threads are woven in the vestment of the high priest; and the wife in Proverbs, who wove two cloaks for her husband, of the present age and of the future, is said to have made garments for herself of fine linen and purple. With this fine linen the reins are girded whenever the rich incitements of lust are to be thinned, and nothing of gross moisture is left in them, and we fulfill the precept of the Apostle, who says: Stand therefore with your loins girded in truth — as though he said in other words 'with fine linen' —. And the Lord says to the apostles: Let your loins be girded, and lamps in your hands: for unless we bind up the flowing humors of the loins, we cannot have lamps in our hands; whence God also says to Job: Gird up your loins like a man. And those who are to eat the lamb, with feet shod, holding a staff, standing in the truth of the Gospel and prepared for the blood of Christ, are said to have their loins girded; with this belt, which mortifies the loins, Elijah too and John the Baptist are girded; of these the penitent too groans tearfully, saying: For my loins are filled with illusions.

And I clothed you with fine stuffs. (LXX: "And I surrounded you with trichaptum.") For which Aquila put 'flowery' or 'palpable', Symmachus 'garment', Theodotion the Hebrew word itself, 'messe'; and when I was diligently inquiring what the word 'trichaptum', which the Seventy translated, meant, and could find from none of the Greeks either the usage or the ἐτυμολογίαν [etymology] of the word, at last I learned that it was coined by the Seventy — for new names must be fixed to new things —, because the garment was of such fineness that it was believed to have the thinness of hairs and of the hair of the head; whence I too, wishing to express the thinness of the garment, translated 'subtilibus' [fine stuffs] for 'trichapto', because it was woven with fine warp and weft. And fittingly, to those whom he had rebuked, saying: The heart of this people has grown fat, and Jacob ate and drank and was filled and grew fat, and the beloved kicked and forsook God his maker, fineness of garments is now granted; for in the book of Wisdom too, which by some is ascribed to Solomon, the spirit of wisdom is called only-begotten and manifold, fine and mobile; and the manna, of which it is written: Man ate the bread of angels, is said to have been very fine, in the likeness of hoarfrost and of coriander seed. We can, according to the interpretation of the second edition of Aquila, who translated 'flowery', understand the 'garment' through a μεταφορὰν [metaphor] as the fertility of the land of Judea, or as the beauty of divine worship.

It is true that a festival such as the birthday of Peter should be seasoned with more gladness than usual; still our merriment must not forget the limit set by Scripture, and we must not stray too far from the boundary of our wrestling ground. Your presents, indeed, remind me of the sacred volume, for in it Ezekiel decks Jerusalem with bracelets.

And I adorned you with adornment. Here he sets down the adornments in general, which in what follows he enumerates one by one: bracelets and torque, earrings and crown, and the rest, which adornments he bestowed on Jerusalem, and in Isaiah it is said that by her own fault she lost them all: for it is written: Because the daughters of Jerusalem were lifted up (that is, were proud) and walked with lofty neck, and the rest: instead of a girdle they were girded with ropes, and instead of the adornment of the head disfigured with baldness, and instead of beautiful and soft clothes surrounded with the roughness of sackcloth.

And I put bracelets on your hands. (LXX: "And I surrounded your hands with bracelets.") When God gives us good works, he puts bracelets around our hands. Whence also he says that he was likened in the hands of the prophets, and we frequently read that the word came in the hand of Haggai or Jeremiah and the others; in Job too the lip of the dragon is pierced with a bracelet, and all his venomous hissings, which are understood in perverse dogmas, are pierced by the ring of good works.

And a torque around your neck. For 'torque', which we translated following the second edition of Aquila and Symmachus, the Seventy and Theodotion translated κάθεμα [pendant] — which is written not only here but also in Isaiah: The Lord will take away the glory of their garment, and the little lamprey-chains and the clusters and the rings, and the κάθεμα —; and I think that by κάθεμα they meant a necklace of various gems descending onto the breast of women, which itself too is a most beautiful adornment of women.

The priests are anointed with holy oil and are clothed with embroidered cloth and with silk. It means riches, which the people gained as a result of his providence, as much in spirit as in body.

And I gave an earring over the mouth (or your nostrils). The Hebrew word 'nezem', except for Symmachus, who translated ἐπιρρίνιον [nose-ring], all translated 'earring', not that earrings are put in the nostrils — they are called 'inaures' [earrings] from the fact that they hang from the ears [aures] —, but that a ring, made in the likeness of earrings, is called by the same word; and to this day, among the other adornments of women, golden rings are wont to hang from the forehead over the mouth and to overhang the nostrils. These we receive according to mystical understanding when with the Apostle we can say: We are the good odor of Christ in those who are being saved, and in those who perish: to some an odor of death unto death, to others an odor of life unto life; when we live and it can be said of us: The dead shall not praise you, O Lord, but we the living, then God smells the odor of our sacrifice of good fragrance, and we have the golden ring of divine senses and dogmas in our nostrils; but when we are dead and wallow in the mire and in the filth of lusts, we have in our nostrils that earring of which Solomon wrote: As golden earrings in the nostrils of a swine, so is beauty to an ill-mannered woman.

And rings for your ears. (LXX: "And little wheels upon your ears.") He who stops his ears so as not to hear the judgment of blood, and hedges them with thorns so as not to become a partaker with the envious and the detractors — of whom it is written: Do not mingle with detractors; for their destruction will come suddenly, and who knows the ruin of both? —, namely both of him who detracts and of him who gladly listens, this man has rings and little wheels in his ears — not the wheels which follow the Cherubim: for that belongs to the evangelical powers, but little wheels, in the diminutive —, which befit human frailty. Therefore it is also said to God: The voice of your thunder in the wheel: for in those who pass over earthly things and touch the earth with scarcely the slightest footprints — of whom it is written: Holy stones are rolled upon the earth —, the voice of the Lord's thunder and of lofty dogmas resounds; but those who are led by human errors and have no solid footing but are carried about by every wind of doctrine and, cast out of the paradise of firmness, dwell in the region of Naid [Nod], which means 'fluctuation', deserve to bear the sentence of a lying tongue, which sets on fire the wheel of our birth.

And a crown of beauty on your head. (LXX: "And a crown of boasting upon your head.") We translated 'beauty' following Symmachus, for the elegance of the sense; otherwise both in the Hebrew, 'thopherth', and in the other translators, καύχησις, it is called 'boasting'. The other adornments belong to individual members; the adornment of the head is the dignity of the whole body; and he calls crown the diadem of women, by which the abundance of the hair is bound and adorned. Do we want to know what the crown of beauty on the head of Jerusalem is? Let us unroll Exodus, in which it is written: And he made a plate of gold, and wrote on it letters formed with the seal of the sanctification of the Lord, and put it upon the head of Aaron; 'the sign of the Lord's holiness' is the name of almighty God, which is written with four Hebrew letters and among them is called 'ineffable', since his name cannot be spoken — whose majesty even paganism is not ignorant of, and the altar of the Athenians bears witness, 'To the Unknown God', whence also the Apostle: What you, he says, worship as unknown, this we proclaim to you —. This I think is the crown of which he also speaks thus in the Psalms: The light of your countenance is sealed upon us, O Lord, and the Apostle says: I have finished the course, I have kept the faith; for the rest there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the righteous judge will render to me, and in another place to believers: My joy and my crown: for the glory of fathers is their sons; and in Solomon it is written: Old age is a crown of glory, namely of those who have destroyed the things that belong to little ones and, after the age of the perfect man, have come to old age and to the name of fathers, to whom John writes after the children and the young men, who can say: When I was a little one, I spoke as a little one, I understood as a little one, I thought as a little one; when I became a man, I destroyed the things that belong to a little one.

Almighty God, grant to us to be worthy of the crown and glory on our head.

We are not only anointed with this oil, but we also live.

And you were adorned with gold and silver. We have often said that gold pertains to the mind, silver to speech. And may the Lord grant us that we may deserve to receive the divine sense and wisdom, and to bring forth with grace of eloquence what we conceive in the mind, and by no means to make idols of these, as the heretics do, of whom it is written: I gave them silver and gold; but they made Baal of the silver and gold. And this, according to the spiritual understanding, is the more fitting for the adornment of women; otherwise silver, the cheaper material, is the adornment of country women and of poor women and maidservants, which does not befit Jerusalem, who is said to have advanced to be queen.

And you were clothed with fine linen and many-threaded stuff and many colors. (LXX: "And your cloaks of fine linen and trichapta and variegated things.") The Hebrew word 'mesi' Theodotion here too set down as it stands, as above, Aquila ἄνθινον [flowered], Symmachus 'polymitum' [many-threaded], and we, what above we called 'subtile' [fine], here, following Symmachus, called 'polymitum'; the Seventy translated 'trichapta', keeping their former interpretation, so as to show garments fine like hairs. Now the whole adornment of women is described: that she is washed, that she is cleansed, that she is anointed with oil, and is clothed in parti-colored garments, is shod with ὑακίνθινις, is girded with fine linen, is clothed with trichapta or fine stuffs, receives bracelets, and the golden torque, rings hanging over the mouth, and little wheels in the ears, a diadem on the head, is decorated with gold and silver — although silver is the cheaper material —, and after all this there is added: You were clothed with fine linen and many-threaded stuff and variegated colors — or, as the Seventy translated, 'with cloak and mantles', for this is what περιβόλαια signifies —, so that she was not only adorned in the care of her body and had all the necklaces of women, but the husband's diligence was also solicitous for her bedding and her couch, so that, when he had completed these things, he might come to the delights of foods, and would not allow anything to be lacking to her even in these. All of which, following the explanation above, we have fitted to the spiritual understanding: that she is covered with fine linen and fine stuffs, so that the delicate limbs of the wife may not be weighed down by the heavy burden of mantles, but may display usefulness and beauty alike.

Fine flour and honey and oil you ate, and you became beautiful greatly, exceedingly. After the clothing he takes care of food, that Jerusalem may eat fine flour and honey and oil, either separately, as many reckon, or, by a mixture of the three, a sweeter bread, the bread which came down from heaven; and under three names, as some think, it indicates the mystery of the Trinity, not that there is one substance and another, but that by the diverse names of fine flour and honey and oil the one sweetness of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit is shown. And this is to be noted, that in many sacrifices fine flour is offered, the marrow of the wheat and the purest, of which it is written: And he satisfied them with the fat of wheat, not of barley nor of meal, which is offered only when a husband is moved by a spirit of jealousy. In the volume of Judges we read of 'Debboram' [Deborah], which means 'bee', whose prophecy is the sweetest honey, and this is referred to the Holy Spirit, who among the Hebrews is called by a feminine name: in the Gospel of the Hebrews too, which the Nazarenes read, the Savior is introduced speaking: Just now my mother, the Holy Spirit, took hold of me; moreover the fine flour, which is made from wheat, is referred to the Lord, who says of himself: Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit; and the oil, which sustains and refreshes the limbs of the weary, and is the nourishment of light, and with which the light of the lamp is kindled continually in the tabernacle of God, is said to befit the Father; and all these grant one grace to believers, as the Apostle says: There are divisions of graces, but one Spirit; and divisions of ministries, but one Lord; and divisions of operations, but one and the same God. He who has eaten such food, and has been fed and nourished with this sweetest and most delightful bread and the splendor of shining oil, will be turned into beauty and become most beautiful: not once, but repeated: 'exceedingly, exceedingly'; for the doubled adverb gives the speech this weight, that nothing further could be added to the greatness of the beauty.

And you advanced to a kingdom. — This is not found in the Seventy, who perhaps, translating the Scriptures at Alexandria from the Hebrew truth into the Greek language, feared to publish it, lest they seem to offend the king of Egypt by recording that a kingdom was owed to Jerusalem by God; although the learned prove that only the five books of Moses were translated by them. — After manifold adornment, then, after the crown, after the abundance of gold and silver, after the most beautiful garments and mantles, after incredible beauty, she advances to be queen, because she is the city of the great king, of whom it is written: O God, give your judgment to the king, and your righteousness to the king's son; and in the Revelation of John Jerusalem is described as a bride adorned and arrayed for her husband; in the Psalms also it is said of her: The queen stood at your right hand in gilded clothing, surrounded with variety. But all that we say of Jerusalem, lest we dwell on each detail and the size of the books bring weariness to the readers, let us refer to the Church; for if Jerusalem, according to the Apostle, is our mother, and our mother is the Church, consequently Jerusalem is the Church, the mother of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven.

But since often, when preaching is abundantly poured forth in fitting ways, the mind of the speaker is elevated in itself by a hidden delight in self-display, great care is needed that he may gnaw himself with the laceration of fear, lest he who recalls the diseases of others to health by remedies should himself swell through neglect of his own health; lest in helping others he desert himself, lest in lifting up others he fall. For to some the greatness of their virtue has often been the occasion of their perdition; causing them, while inordinately secure in confidence of strength, to die unexpectedly through negligence. For virtue strives with vices; the mind flatters itself with a certain delight in it; and it comes to pass that the soul of a well-doer casts aside the fear of its circumspection, and rests secure in self-confidence; and to it, now torpid, the cunning seducer enumerates all things that it has done well, and exalts it in swelling thoughts as though superexcellent beyond all beside.

Hence under the figure of Jerusalem the soul that is proud in virtue is reproved, when it is said, "Thou wert perfect in my comeliness which I had put upon thee, saith the Lord, and having confidence in thy beauty thou hast committed fornication in thy renown." For the mind is lifted up by confidence in its beauty, when, glad for the merits of its virtues, it glories within itself in security. But through this same confidence it is led to fornication; because, when the soul is deceived by its own thoughts, malignant spirits, which take possession of it, defile it through the seduction of innumerable vices. But it is to be noted that it is said, "Thou hast committed fornication in thy renown": for when the soul leaves off regard for the supernal ruler, it forthwith seeks its own praise, and begins to arrogate to itself all the good which it has received for shewing forth the praise of the giver; it desires to spread abroad the glory of its own reputation, and busies itself to become known as one to be admired of all.

In Ezekiel, God speaks to Jerusalem: "You were perfect through my beauty." And this is the meaning of the text: "You were not perfect through your own works or through your own knowledge and the boasting of your heart but through my beauty, which I had put on you freely through my mercy."

And your name went forth among the nations because of your fairness; for you were perfect in my beauty, which I set upon you, says the Lord God. (LXX: "And your name went out among the nations in your fairness; which was made complete in loveliness, which I set upon you, says the Lord God.") Symmachus translated this passage more clearly: And your name went forth among the nations; which was perfect because of my dignity, which I had set upon you, says the Lord God. And the sense is: 'By my benefits and my incredible bounty you came to the title of queen, so that the talk of all the nations spoke of you, and you were perfect, not by your own merits and virtues but by my liberality': Unless, indeed, the Lord builds the house, they have labored in vain who build it. Unless the Lord guards the city, he has watched in vain who guards it; for he who plants and he who waters is nothing, unless the Lord gives the increase, because: It is not of him who wills nor of him who runs, but of God who has mercy, so that, when we have done all things, we may say: We are unprofitable servants; we have done what we ought to do; not that the free choice of man is taken away by the beneficence of God, but that this very freedom ought to have the Lord as its helper.

And having confidence in your loveliness you fornicated in your name, and you laid out your fornication to everyone passing by, to become his. Great is the peril of trusting not in the clemency of God but in one's own beauty; and the more exalted anyone has been, the more he ought to fear lest he fall and fornicate in his own name. For the adverse powers despise ordinary foods and desire foreign nourishment; whence it is said of the devil: His foods are choice; he does not want to deceive just anyone: it is King Saul, who was chosen by the Lord, and Judas the apostle that he hastens to trip up. Let us not, therefore, trust in our own loveliness, nor think the liberality of God to be our own virtue, but rather let us hear: Do not boast about tomorrow, for you do not know what the coming day may bring forth, and in another place: Brothers, if a man is overtaken in any sin, you who are spiritual, perfect such a one in a spirit of meekness, considering yourself, lest you too be tempted; and let us not lay out, or pour out, our fornication to everyone passing by, so as to become not God's, in whom we believe, but his by whom we are defiled: he who receives all vices, and takes into his bosom the passing spirit of diverse sins, and spreads his feet for everyone passing by, he pours out his fornication, and begins to endure the dominion of him whose host he has become.

And taking some of your garments you made for yourself high places sewn together here and there; and you fornicated upon them, as has not been done nor will be. (LXX: "And you took some of your garments and made yourself idols sewn together; and you fornicated upon them, and you will not enter nor shall it be.") Symmachus translated this passage thus: And when you had taken some of your clothes, you made yourself many-colored high places; and you fornicated in them, things not done nor to be. For 'sewn together' and 'variegated' and 'high places' or 'idols', Aquila and Theodotion translated ἐμβολίσματα, which signifies 'diverse rags sewn together here and there' and 'an idol made like a plaster', as it were 'a πολύρραφον [much-stitched] garment'. 'I clothed you', he says, 'in variegated garments, and you were dressed in fine linen and many-threaded stuff and the variety of many forms; but you took your garments, with which you were gifted by my bounty, and made for yourself idols, or high places, which in Hebrew are called 'bamoth', a thing which never was done before nor will be done, that what you had received for adornment you should turn to the injury of the giver'. This can be understood of Jerusalem according to the letter thus: that she assigned all the precepts of the Law and her riches and the abundance of all things to idols, which no other nation has done or will do; for all the nations which from the beginning served idols are not guilty of so great a crime. But our Jerusalem, which means 'vision of peace', is torn by the heretics, when, plucking one testimony of the Scriptures or another from their proper places, they try to sew them onto places to which they cannot be fitted; to whom, as we read, it was also said above in this same prophet: Woe to those who sew pillows under every elbow of the hand, and make a covering over the head of every age, and the Lord, forbidding this to be done, says in the Gospel: No one puts a patch of rough cloth on an old garment; otherwise it takes away from its fullness, and a worse tear is made. Nor do they put new wine into old wineskins; such are the Nazarenes, who try to fit the observance of the old Law to the grace of the Gospel, and all the heretics who strive to sew a testimony that fits one sense in its own place onto another, whereas the Lord's tunic, woven from the top throughout, cannot be torn, but, woven by the Holy Spirit, admits no tearing. But what is said according to the Seventy: And you will not enter nor will it be, signifies this: 'When you have made for yourself idols of perverse dogmas which you take for high places, and have fornicated upon them, believing in the things which you yourself have fashioned, you will not be able to enter the temple of God, and your images will have no substance nor will they exist forever', as the Apostle says: We know, indeed, that an idol is nothing in the world.

And you took the vessels of your beauty, from my gold and from my silver which I gave you, and you made yourself male images, and you fornicated with them. According to the letter, the Lord commanded in the Law that there be made censers, bowls, a lampstand, the ark of the Covenant: all either of gold or gilded, and others of silver, all of which Jerusalem melted down and turned into idols of Bel or Baal, Chemosh, Ashtaroth and Milcom. According to the spiritual understanding, we make idols of the gold and silver of the holy Scriptures when we corrupt the grace of sense and eloquence by heretical depravity, and set our mouth in heaven, and our tongue passes through the earth; and male images is the name given to those in which every heresy fornicates, from the fact that each one thinks that what he worships and holds, which he has fashioned, is most robust and cannot be overthrown by any assault; these are the images which we have fashioned from our own heart and which are to be destroyed in the heavenly Jerusalem, of which the prophet foretells: O Lord, in your city you will scatter their image; for whoever is a man and has lost the name of God, it is said of him: Nevertheless man walks in an image; nevertheless he is disquieted in vain; but let us have one husband and venerate one image, which is the image of the invisible and almighty God.

The golden and silver vase, the censers, the cups and the rest of that kind we have in the holy Scriptures. But when we turn the meaning of Scripture into another that is contrary to the truth, we kindle the divine words and turn the things of God into other images.

And you took your many-colored garments, and covered them. 'The male images' is understood, so that she turned all the finery she had received for use into blasphemy. And we do this whenever we surround heretical depravity with prudence, temperance, fortitude, righteousness and all the virtues and, under their pretext, deceive all the simple, so that, seeing the honey of the virtues, they do not beware of the poisons of the vices.

And my oil and my perfume you set before them. And my bread (or, as the Seventy translated, my loaves which I gave you), fine flour, honey and oil with which I nourished you, you set in their sight for an odor of sweetness. The oil of which we spoke above, and the perfume or incense of which the psalmist cries out: Let my prayer be directed as incense in your sight, and the loaves of proposition which we are commanded to offer to God, the fine flour too, the purest sense of the Scriptures, and the honey which Jonathan tasted, and his eyes were opened and he was strengthened, wretched Jerusalem set in the sight of the idols — or before the male images —, that they might be for an odor of sweetness to them, things which by their nature are sweet and most delightful but, when they are offered to idols and false doctrines, are turned into bitterness.

These various clothes and beautiful garments that God has bestowed on us, if we cut them up and rip them and surround them with false teaching to deceive human beings, there is no doubt that we are covering idols with different clothing.

To me who preaches the gospel in the church, the devil always stretches out a noose, in order to confuse the whole church with my conduct.

We do not imitate anyone, but if we want to imitate anyone, we should imitate Jesus Christ.

Incense and oil are the prayer that is offered to God with understanding and in which God delights.

Whoever is born in the teaching of heretics and has taken these principles for his own faith is a child of Jerusalem the fornicator and sinner.

By the name of such adulterers we are to understand every kind of carnal and lustful concupiscence. Indeed, since the Scriptures so constantly give to idolatry the name of fornication, and since the apostle Paul calls avarice idolatry, who can doubt that every evil concupiscence may be rightly called fornication?

When the soul disregards the higher law by which it is governed and prostitutes itself as though for a price, then it corrupts itself.

And it came to pass, says the Lord God. And you took your sons and your daughters whom you bore to me, and you sacrificed them to them to be devoured — is your fornication a small thing, that you sacrificed my sons? —, you gave them up, consecrating them to them. And after all your abominations and fornications, you did not remember the days of your youth, when you were naked and full of shame, trampled in your blood. (LXX: "And it came to pass, says Adonai the Lord. And you took your sons and your daughters whom you bore, and you sacrificed them to them for consumption, as though you had committed little fornication, and you killed your sons and gave them up when you offered them to them. This over and above all your fornication and your abominations; and you did not remember the day of your infancy, when you were naked and disgraced, you lived mingled in your blood.") That Jerusalem sacrificed her sons and daughters to idols — the sons and daughters of whom it is written: Sons I have begotten and exalted, but they have despised me — holy Scripture records: They sacrificed their sons and their daughters to demons, and again: They poured out innocent blood, the blood of their sons and of their daughters, whom they sacrificed to the carved images of Canaan. Now according to the Hebrew he calls them 'his own' — for he himself had said of them: Israel is my firstborn son — or, according to the Seventy, 'yours', those whom you begot of fornication. And in that place where we have put: And you gave them up, consecrating them to them, for which the Seventy translated: And you gave them up for appeasing (or for expiating), Aquila, Symmachus and Theodotion put: You carried them across and led them through, by which the heathens, through fire, either carry their sons across while they are little or compel them, when grown, to pass through. 'Although you have done these things so, you did not remember your infancy, when I took you up, spattered with blood, and washed you, and — after the many things which the prophetic discourse has related — joined you to myself'. Our Jerusalem too, if she has been tripped up by heretical deceit, takes her sons who are stronger in faith and her daughters who do not have such great strength of faith — or certainly the sons who know every mystical thing, the daughters who follow the simple history — and hands them over to demons to be devoured, and while she kills them she believes that she is giving life and appeasing the images, which are glutted with their slaughter. And what is said according to the Seventy: This is over and above all your fornication and your abominations, signifies that the teaching of the heretics is worse than all sins and fornications, for it makes the sons of God sons of demons, nay rather it kills those whom she had either begotten for God with much labor or had made her own sons, those whom she begot in fornication.

To our Jerusalem too, whether the Church or the souls of believers, if they have been negligent and have lain open to all vices, a twofold word of cursing is addressed, so that they hear: Woe, woe to you, says the Lord God, according to what is written in the Revelation of John: Woe upon all the inhabitants of the earth. For if a holy man says: I am a stranger and a sojourner, as all my fathers were, why should not the sinner be said to be an inhabitant of the earth?

And it happened after all your wickedness, woe, woe to you, says the Lord God, and you built yourself a brothel, and you made yourself a place of prostitution in all the streets; at every head of the way you built the sign of your prostitution, and you made your beauty abominable, and you parted your feet to every passer-by, and you multiplied your fornications. And you committed fornication with the sons of Egypt, your neighbors, of great flesh, and you multiplied your fornication to provoke me. (LXX: "And it came to pass after all your wickednesses, ※ woe, woe to you, ⁚ says Adonai the Lord, and you built yourself a dwelling of fornication, and you made yourself prostitution in every street, and at the beginning of every way you built your fornications, and you corrupted your beauty, and you spread your legs to every passer-by, and you multiplied your fornication. And you committed fornication with the sons of Egypt, your neighbors, who are of great flesh, and you committed fornication manifoldly to provoke me to anger.") This, which is said a second time: Woe, woe to you, the common edition does not have, but it was added from the translation of Theodotion; and again, where we said: And you built yourself a brothel, for which the Seventy translated: And you built yourself a dwelling of fornication, Symmachus and Theodotion translated πορνεῖον [brothel], while Aquila, wishing to express the ἐτυμολογίαν [etymology] of the Hebrew word 'gob', put βόθυνον, which we could call 'a pit', to signify a den of vice and a dug-out, dark cave in which the lust of prostitutes has its haunt; and what follows: And you made yourself a place of prostitution in all the streets, for which the Seventy said ἔκθεμα [a thing set out for show], has in the Hebrew 'rama', and Aquila as well as Symmachus and Theodotion translated it 'high place' or 'lofty'; and then in what follows it is also written: At every head of the way you built the sign of your prostitution — for 'sign' and 'fornication' the Hebrew again has 'rama', which we have translated either 'place of prostitution' or 'sign', since among the Hebrews it is a single word —, and this is set up, or is made rather high, so that the place of fornication may be seen from afar by those who wish to fornicate and there may be no need to search for it.

For what saith He? "An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign." Now what He saith is to this effect: What marvel if ye behave so to me who have been hitherto unknown to you when even to the Father, of whom ye have had so much experience, ye have done the very same? forsaking Him, ye have run unto the devils, drawing to yourselves wicked lovers. With this Ezekiel too was continually upbraiding them.

Their bodies are corrupted, and the soul is wounded.

Now he builds himself a brothel who sins with complete brazenness of brow, according to what is written: The sinner, when he has come into the depth of impiety, despises. And he raises a very high place in all the streets: For wide and spacious is the way that leads to death.

What we have said once, and again and again, let it suffice to have said for good: that under the person of a woman who commits fornication after her husband's many benefits, the fornication of Jerusalem is described: how she withdrew from God and was joined to idols and was not content with hidden fornication, but built herself a brothel and in every way set up a sign for passers-by — that they might come to the harlot and sate their lust, not so much their own as hers who spread her legs to every passer-by —, and disfigured the greatness of her beauty by the greatness of her fornication; and among other things she prostrated herself to the Egyptians too, her neighbors, out of love for great flesh, and, to display every kind of foulness, was disfigured by a manifold kind of filth.

What then has persuaded you to contradict each other and to procure to yourselves so great a disgrace? You cannot give any good account of it; this supposition only remains, that all you do is but outward profession and pretense.… And you make nothing of accusing the Fathers, and you complain outright of the expressions as being unscriptural; and, as it is written, "opened your legs to every one that passed by;" so as to change as often as they wish, in whose pay and keep you are. Yet, though a person uses terms not in Scripture, it makes no difference, so that his meaning is religious. But the heretic, though he uses scriptural terms, because he is equally dangerous and depraved, will be asked in the words of the Spirit, "Why do you preach my laws and take my covenant in your mouth?"

She will sit by the waters of loneliness, her pitcher laid aside, and open her legs to every one who passes by and be polluted to the crown of her head. It would have been better for her to have submitted to the yoke of marriage, to have walked in level places, than to aspire to loftier heights and fall into the depths of hell.

A noble alternative only to be embraced in preference to Satan! In the old days even Jerusalem went whoring and opened her legs to everyone that passed by. It was in Egypt that she was first deflowered and there that her teats were bruised.

Our Zion, in which at times there are Philistines and Tyre and Ethiopia; that watchtower, that meretrix, that harlot, that Rahab, that Babylon, that one who, according to Ezekiel, has prostituted herself to everyone on the crossroads; that meretrix, if she wills it, suddenly becomes a virgin. A virgin she becomes, conceives the Son of God and brings him forth. "From your fear, O Lord, we conceived and suffered the pangs of childbirth, bringing forth the spirit of your salvation on the earth." Understand, therefore, that [Jerusalem], who was a prostitute, conceives of God and is in labor and brings forth the Savior.

And he builds at every head of the way, so as to leave no kind of sin untried, but, imitating the harlot of Proverbs, openly in the streets and at the corners of the streets he invites the foolish young men passing by to his embraces, and defiles the beauty of the soul which he received as a gift from God the creator.

And all his ways are full of foulness, and to all the thoughts that supply the incitements of vices he opens his heart and spreads his legs, and he commits fornication with the Egyptians his neighbors, whose examples he follows, namely the heathens, who glory in their foulnesses, and he is so wicked as to surpass even them in foulness. And all this he does to provoke God to anger. Now the Egyptians are said to be of great flesh, either because of the greatness of their foulness or because of the deformity of their sins: hence the holy man is said to be of little flesh, which in him decreases daily and is thinned away by the virtues, so that it is no longer called flesh but spirit; and he says in the psalm: My soul has thirsted for you, O God, how manifoldly my flesh for you (or, as some copies have, how my flesh has been consumed), in a desert land, pathless and waterless, so in the holy place I have appeared to you; for this reason the Corinthian fornicator too is handed over: For the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved; of this flesh it is written: All flesh is grass, and all its glory like the flower of grass; the grass has withered and the flower has fallen; but the word of the Lord abides forever, of which the Apostle also spoke: Flesh and blood shall not possess the kingdom of God, and in Genesis God says: My spirit shall not remain in these men, because they are flesh, and to believers it is said: Those who are in the flesh cannot appease God. But you are not in the flesh but in the spirit; but the flesh of the saints is another, of which it is written: All flesh shall see the salvation of God.

Possessing these things, she is of great beauty, but she is corrupted by the divisions of heretics and foreign religious systems.

Now no one doubts that Palestine is a neighbor of Egypt, since the Lord says to Abraham: I will give you all the land, from the river of Egypt to the great river Euphrates, so that on one side it has the Egyptians, on the other the Assyrians, with whom too she is said further on to have committed fornication; and the fornication of Jerusalem with the Egyptians is the imitation of their idolatry.

You see that she is handed over to the souls of strangers, she who is unworthy to practice the law and the words of God.

If we have promised God purity, may we never be found in fornication, of which there are several forms. It is said that they prostituted themselves in a number of ways. My brothers, may no one ever catch us in deeds of this kind. May no one ever find us fallen below every other person.

Behold, I will stretch out my hand over you, and I will take away your justification, and I will give you up in the souls of those who hate you, of the Palestinian daughters, who blush at your wicked way. (LXX: "But if I stretch out my hand over you, and I will take away your ordinances, and I will give you into the souls of those who hate you, of the daughters of the foreigners, who made you turn aside from your way." And what follows: Ἠσέβησας, that is: You acted impiously, is fitted according to the Seventy to the following section, according to the others it is the end of the preceding one.) Now the Lord stretches out his hand over Jerusalem, to correct her in her sinning and to take away her ordinances, which, as long as she kept the precepts of God, were called the ordinances of the Lord, but when she worshiped idols and exchanged religion for impiety, are called her ordinances — which is to be understood not only of the law and the ceremonies, but also of the sabbaths and the feast days and the new moons: for when he gives the law he says: My sabbaths and: My feast days, but when they withdrew from God, it is said to them: Your new moons and sabbaths and the great day I will not receive; your fasting and rest and your solemnities my soul has hated; which is written of the people as well: for those who were formerly called the people of God, after they withdrew from the Lord, it is said of them to Moses: Your people have sinned, whom you led out of the land of Egypt —. What is here called the stretching out of the hand is elsewhere called lifting up or visitation: for when God does not rebuke the sinner, he draws back his hand, but if he sins and begins to sicken in the law of God, a visitation is sent to him, according to what is sung in the Psalms: If his sons forsake my law and do not walk in my judgments, I will visit their iniquities with the rod, and in this prophet it is written: The land, if it sins against me so as to commit an offense, I will stretch out my hand over it, and I will break the staff of its bread, and the rest; in which we ask what difference there is between the stretching out of the hand and the sending of it: for the devil says to the Lord: Send your hand, and touch all that he has; unless he blesses you to your face, and it seems to me that the hand is sent for the testing of those to whom it is sent, but stretched out for the punishment of those who deserve torments; and not only the stretching out and the sending, but also the spreading out of the hand of God is spoken of, as Isaiah proclaims in the person of the Lord: All day long I have spread out my hands to a people unbelieving and contradicting; the saints too are related to lift up their hands, as Scripture says: The lifting up of my hands an evening sacrifice. Now since the ordinances of God have been taken away from the people of the Jews, let us ask them what observance of the law they have: victims they cannot offer, since the temple has been taken away and overthrown, nor can the stoning of adulteresses and of the other crimes, granted by the law, be carried out, nor the rest of the land in the year of remission, and the other things of this kind; and she is given into the souls of those who hate her, of the Palestinian daughters, when she is handed over to the Palestinians, whom the Seventy indiscriminately call 'foreigners', by which we may understand the cities or towns of Palestine. Our Jerusalem too, if we pass over the ceremonies of God, and his hand has been stretched out over us, and, the observance of the whole law having been taken away, she will be handed over to the daughters of Palestine and not to the sons; for we are not handed over first to the heavier punishments but, according to the quality of our sins, to the lesser ones, so that, chastised in the smaller, we may escape the greater torments of tortures. 'Philistim', that is 'Palaestini' [Palestinians], with the first part of the letters changed, means 'falling by the cup — or by the making —', by which it is signified that we are to be handed over to the adverse powers, which have drunk from the cup of Babylon and have fallen, and whose works are perverse; and so great will be the chastisement and disgrace of wretched Jerusalem that even the adverse powers themselves blush at the greatness of our sins. What we have translated, following Symmachus, 'wicked', Theodotion put as the Hebrew word itself, 'zemma'. And since the ceremonies of God have been taken away from the people of the Jews, the giving of the law passes over to us together with the priesthood, as Scripture says: Appoint, O Lord, a lawgiver over them, and in another place: Set me a law, O Lord, in your way.

And you committed fornication with the sons of the Assyrians, because you had not yet been filled; and after you committed fornication, not even so were you satisfied. And you multiplied your fornication in the land of Canaan with the Chaldeans, and not even so were you satisfied. (LXX: "And you acted impiously, and you committed fornication with the sons of Assyria, and not even so were you satisfied; and you committed fornication, and you were not filled. And you multiplied your covenants toward the land of Canaan of the Chaldeans, and not even in these were you filled.") Above it was written that Jerusalem committed fornication with the sons of Egypt her neighbors, who are of great flesh; here the other neighborhood, that of the Assyrians, is indicated; and therefore they are handed over to both nations: because they venerated the images of both, and, entering Chaldea, which is the land of Canaan, they took on in exchange the errors of those to whose rule they were subject. According to tropology we often pass from some sins to others; and when we have not done penance for our former crimes, we add offense to offenses and are sated by no error, but as with a long rope and the strap of a heifer's yoke we drag along our sins and our covenant, or we multiply fornication in the land of 'Chanaan' [Canaan], which means 'as it were a tossing', with the Chaldeans, who themselves also sound to us 'as it were demons'; and we always have our footprints in the sand and can never say: He has set my feet upon a rock; and we are subjected to the depravities of the heretics, who have the likeness of demons, or to the demons themselves, of whom Paul writes: Our fight is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers of these darknesses, against the spiritual things of wickedness in the heavenly places.

When God makes covenants with us and we consent to them, we are blessed. But when we prostitute ourselves to the spirits of evil, then we turn the covenants of God into the land of Canaan, and we make a pact with her.

In what shall I cleanse your heart, says the Lord God, when you do all these works of a harlot and wanton woman? For you have built your brothel at the head of every way, and you have made your high place in every street; nor have you become like a harlot who increases her price by disdain. (LXX: "What shall I do to your heart, says Adonai the Lord, when you have done all these works of a fornicating and shameless woman? ÷ and you committed fornication threefold in your daughters ⁚ when you built your brothel at the beginning of every way, and made your base in every street; and you were not like a harlot gathering wages.") And what the Seventy said: And you committed fornication threefold in your daughters, is not found in the Hebrew, nor did any of the other translators put it. Now God says all these things to Jerusalem Ἐπαπορητικῶς [as one at a loss], because he cannot find the remedy by which he might heal her, sick and half dead, according to what Isaiah writes: What is there that I ought to have done further for my vineyard, and have not done for it?, and Hosea: What shall I do to you, Ephraim? What shall I do to you, Judah? Your mercy is like a morning cloud, and like the dew passing away early.

And this which, as we said above, is not found in the Hebrew: You committed fornication threefold in your daughters, is said either to Jerusalem according to the letter: that she committed fornication in every way in her towns and villages, and no corner or street remained where she did not set up the signs of idolatry; or to the Church and to the believers who were deceived: who did not heed that word of the Apostle: May the God of peace himself sanctify you in all things, and may your spirit and soul and body be kept whole without complaint at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but committed fornication in every way, both in body and in spirit and in soul. We read in Proverbs: But you, describe them threefold, that you may answer words of truth which are proposed to you, and we are commanded to understand the utterances of truth, that is, the holy Scriptures, threefold: first, according to the letter; second, in a middle way, through tropology; third, more loftily, so that we may know all mystical things. According to the letter is this: Neither let us commit fornication, as some of them committed fornication, and twenty-three thousand fell in one day, and: Do not murmur, as some of them murmured, and perished by the destroyer; in the middle way and according to tropology, when we withdraw from the letter and climb a little to higher things, as the Apostle says: It is written: You shall not muzzle the mouth of the ox that treads out the grain, and immediately there follows: Is it for oxen that God cares? Or did he speak surely for our sake?; but the last, that is, the third, sublime and sacred understanding, according to that word of the same Apostle: For this reason a man shall leave father and mother and shall cleave to his wife. This mystery is great; but I speak in Christ and in the Church. Now the daughters of the fornicating Church are the souls of those who first believed and afterwards were deceived into heresy, whose guilt is referred back to the mother.

As the law is not made for the just but for the lawless and those who are not subjected to God, so the teaching that warns us away from fornication does not become chaste but is for the lawless and the fornicators and the disobedient.

If you understand fornication of the flesh and the soul and the spirit, and if you see someone fornicating in them, you will also see Jerusalem fornicating herself three times.

There is no doubt that the word of the orator provokes the hero to worse things when a heretic builds up his hero in the perversions of heresy by what he says.

Those who have not completely gone away from religion but are conquered by sin and who want their sin to be hidden behave exactly like a prostitute who has been insulted.

'For your idolatry was committed not in secret but with full license, so that at all the beginnings of the ways and at the crossroads you set up altars, and made your base, or your high place, of which we spoke above, in every street; nor did you imitate the cunning harlots, who are accustomed to increase the price of lust by difficulty and thereby provoke their lovers the more to madness — according to the Seventy: You were not like a harlot gathering wages —, but you gave what you ought to have received, so that not even in this, that you committed fornication and followed demons, were you protected by their help, but, oppressed by various captivities, you felt your calamities'. Which indeed can also be referred to every Christian soul that, having deserted the worship of God, has given itself up to vices and luxury and, having followed the worldly life, has not fared happily even in it, but has both lost the riches of religion and not received the riches of the world, nor was there any difficulty in debauching her, but she thrust herself upon your lovers. There is also another, spiritual fornication, when, deserting the Church, we are joined to heretics and build our brothel at the head of every way, the ways of which the divine word commands: Stand in the ways and seek the everlasting paths of the Lord, and see which is the good way, and walk in it, namely the books of Moses, of Joshua, of Judges and of Kings, and Isaiah and Jeremiah and the other prophets. He builds his brothel at all the beginnings of the ways who, for the perversity of his doctrine, wickedly abuses the testimonies of the Scriptures and says: 'Thus says Isaiah': 'Thus said Hosea': 'Thus spoke Moses' and: 'Thus Daniel'; and fittingly he places his brothel not in the middle of the ways nor at the ends of the ways, but at the beginning: for if he had come to the knowledge and the depths of the divine books, he could not go astray. His high place too, or base, he makes in every street, giving himself up to the wantonness and vices of heathens and impious men, even among the heretics themselves, when she has been defiled by them, having no favor but lying open to contempt, because she easily lost her former chastity of faith.

Ecclesiastics who are leaders in the church build the house of God, the church, in their own way of life as well as those of their faithful, and their work is the building of God.

These Gentile peoples through their desire of worldly eloquence, through the brothels of the schools, through senseless disputation at the meeting places of the philosophical sects, dissipated the property of God the Father. By their conjectures they exhausted everything there was in the line of speech, knowledge, reason and judgment. But, even after that, these poor wretches still suffered the greatest need and most intense hunger to know the truth. Philosophy enjoined the task of seeking God, but of that truth to be learned it gathered no fruit.

But as an adulterous woman who brings in strangers over her husband. To all harlots wages are given, but you have given wages to all your lovers, and you made gifts to them that they might come in to you from every side to commit fornication with you. And it has happened in you contrary to the custom of women in your fornications, and after you there will be no fornication; for in that you gave wages and did not receive wages, the contrary has happened in you. (LXX: "An adulterous woman ÷ like you ⁚ receiving wages from her husband. To all who committed fornication with her she gave wages, and you gave wages to all your lovers, and you loaded them that they might come to you round about in your fornication. And there happened in you a perverse thing against women in your fornication, and after you they have not committed fornication; in that you gave wages and wages were not given to you, there also happened in you a perverse thing.") This which is written in the Seventy: Like you, is not found in the Hebrew; and it disturbs the order of the reading, and raises no small question: what woman, and like whom she is, since Jerusalem herself is said to be the adulterous woman. Jerusalem, then, took the abundance of all things with which she had been endowed by her husband's liberality, and gave it to strangers, namely to demons and idols, according to what is written in Hosea: And this I did not know, that I gave her wheat and wine and oil, and multiplied silver for her; but she made silver and golden Baalim, whence, angered, he at once adds: Therefore I will turn back, and take away my wheat in its season and my wine in its season; and I will take away my garments and my linens, so that I may no longer cover her disgrace; and now I will uncover her disgrace in the sight of her lovers, and no one shall rescue her from my hand.

Whatever we have said of Jerusalem, refer also to the Church and to the souls of believers, who give their marriage gifts — namely gold in understanding and silver in speech and the garments by which our foulness and disgrace are veiled — to their lovers, either to the contrary powers or to the teachers of perverse doctrines, when they assert that luxury does no harm, and that indiscriminate lust, according to the genitals of the body, demands intercourse by natural law, that all foods are to be used without distinction, since they were made for this, to be eaten, that prudence is necessary only in so far as it profits oneself, and that righteousness has no place, for if it prevailed one would have to beg, and other things of this kind; receiving which, wretched Jerusalem, in whom there ought to have been a vision of peace, turned the sharpness of her intellect and the charm of her eloquence to foulness; and for her lovers she went forth against her husband adorned with those ornaments with which she had been adorned by her husband, to the abuse of the good. And what follows: And you made gifts to them that they might come in to you from every side to commit fornication with you, signifies every kind of sin, so that she is not content with one offense, but endures a hunger for sinning and, against the laws of nature, defiled in all her members, is polluted even to the crown of her head.

Your cruelty is a false faith. An heretical congregation is an adulteress woman; for the Catholic hath never from the beginning left the couch and the chamber of her Spouse, nor gone after other and strange lovers. Ye have painted a divorced form in new colours, ye have withdrawn your couch from the old wedlock, ye have left the body of a mother, the wife of One Husband, decking yourselves out with new arts of pleasing, new allurements of corruption.

And whereas all fornicating women are accustomed to receive wages from their lovers, Jerusalem did the contrary, giving rather than receiving; and to show the lavishness of her wages: She loaded them, he says, that they might come to her round about, lest there be any neighbor who was not mingled in her disgrace.

The husband of the soul is the word of God, a spouse truly loving, who has given her chastity, justice and all the other gifts.

And indeed Jerusalem surpassed the other harlots in this too, that she not only gave her own things, which she had acquired by labor in the practice of foulness, but also bestowed her marriage gifts on her lovers and debauchers. And so great was the adulteress's exposure to every magnitude of foulness that she is ranked above not only present but also future harlots; hence we too translated according to Symmachus: 'And after you there will be no fornication; for in comparison with you every fornication from now on will be reckoned lighter'.

Therefore, harlot, hear the word of the Lord. Thus says the Lord God: Because your bronze has been poured out, and your disgrace has been uncovered in your fornication over your lovers, and over the idols of your abominations in the blood of your sons whom you gave to them, behold, I will gather all your lovers with whom you mingled, and all whom you loved, together with all whom you hated; and I will gather them against you from every side, and I will lay bare your disgrace before them, and they will see all your foulness. And I will judge you with the judgments of adulteresses and of those who shed blood, and I will give you into the blood of fury and jealousy. And I will give you into their hands, and they will destroy your brothel, and they will demolish your place of prostitution, and they will strip you of your garments, and they will take away the vessels of your beauty; and they will leave you naked, and full of disgrace. And they will bring a multitude upon you, and they will stone you with stones, and they will cut you down with their swords. And they will burn your houses with fire, and they will execute judgments upon you in the eyes of very many women; and you will cease to commit fornication, and you will no longer give wages. And my indignation will rest in you, and my jealousy will be taken away from you; and I will be quiet, and will be angry no more. Because you did not remember the days of your youth, and provoked me in all these things, therefore I too have given your ways upon your head, says the Lord God, and I have not done according to your crimes in all your abominations. (LXX: "Therefore, harlot, hear the word of the Lord. Thus says the Lord God: Because you poured out your bronze, and your disgrace will be uncovered in your fornication to all your lovers, and into all the thoughts of your iniquities and in the blood of your sons whom you gave to them, therefore behold, I will gather against you all your lovers with whom you mingled, and all whom you loved together with all whom you hated; and I will gather them against you round about, and I will uncover your wickednesses to them, and all will see your disgrace. And I will take vengeance on you with the vengeance of adulteresses and of those who shed blood, and I will set you in the blood of fury and jealousy. And I will deliver you into their hands, and they will dig under your brothel, and they will destroy your base, and they will strip you of your garments, and they will take away the vessels of your glorying; and they will leave you naked, and full of disgrace. And they will bring a multitude upon you, and they will stone you with stones and cut you down with their swords. And they will set fire to your houses, and they will execute vengeances upon you before very many women; and I will turn you away from fornication, and you will no longer give wages. And I will send my fury upon you, and my jealousy will be taken away from you; and I will rest, and I will no longer be anxious. Because you did not remember the day of your infancy, and you grieved me in all these things, I too, behold, will give your ways upon your head, says Adonai the Lord, and thus you have done iniquity above all your iniquities.") Let us first lay the foundations of the history. 'Because you have done these things and those which the preceding discourse has set out, therefore hear, harlot, what you have done and what you are going to suffer: You poured out your bronze, which you had received from me, and gave to your lovers the wages which you ought to have received, and you killed your sons, so that, in offering them to idols, you have proved to be not only an adulteress but also a parricide. Therefore I will gather against you all your lovers with whom you committed fornication, both those whom you loved and those whom you hated, and I will strip you by the law of adulteresses, so that all may see your foulness and the genitals for whose sake they were formerly carried away by the madness of love'. Now all these things, through the μεταφορὰν [metaphor] of an adulterous and murderous woman who not only committed fornication against her husband but also killed her sons, are said to Jerusalem: both that all the nations are to be gathered against her, whose idols she worshiped and into whose worship she turned all the gifts of God, and that the temple of Baal is to be destroyed, and the altars of the whole city overthrown by fire, and nothing is to remain in her; and that, just as all are accustomed to throw stones at an adulteress and to slaughter a harlot, so that she is killed by the wounds of each one, in such a way that all women see the punishment of the fornicatress, so Jerusalem is to be abandoned in the sight of the other cities round about and of all the nations; and that this is done so that she may cease to commit fornication and may no longer give wages to her lovers, and so that the indignation of God may rest and he may not be angry with her whom he has ceased to love; from which we perceive that it is a great mark of displeasure to be in no way an object of God's care, but for a man to be left to his crimes and sins. My jealousy, he says, will be taken away from you; and I will be quiet, and will be angry no more, as with one estranged, who has withdrawn from me and whom I have handed over to everlasting nakedness — but if Jerusalem suffered this because she committed fornication with idols, what do we think she will suffer when she has slaughtered the Son of God? —.

According to tropology, every soul has received spiritual money from God, according to that passage of the Gospel which is told in the parables of the five, the two and the one talents, and of the ten servants receiving a mina each, who, when they have acted negligently, will become debtors of fifty denarii and of five hundred; and for this reason, in the presence of the lovers, whom we understand to be the demons and the contrary powers, the disgrace of Jerusalem is uncovered, either on the day of judgment or in the time of penance, when they are rebuked; and at first, indeed, God almighty alone discerns hidden things, as the word of the Gospel says: And the Father who sees in secret, and in another place: God searching hearts and reins, and in the volume of Kings: You alone know the hearts of all men; but when there has been fulfilled: There is nothing hidden that will not be made manifest and covered that will not be revealed, and in another place: Do not judge before the time, until the Lord comes, who will both bring to light the hidden things of darkness and make manifest the counsels of hearts, and then each one will have praise from God, and when the time of rebuke has come, then that word of Hosea is fulfilled: Now their thoughts have surrounded them, and in another place: Their thoughts among themselves accusing or else defending, on the day when God judges the secrets of men, and again: Behold the man, and his works before his face. And those who formerly committed fornication with her will see all her foulness, and God will give her into the blood of fury and jealousy; for the fury of a husband against an adulterous wife is full, and can be redeemed by no price. The blood of the sons, moreover, can be understood thus, that we call the sons of Jerusalem λογισμούς καλούς, that is, 'good thoughts', which have been implanted in men by God, and which the adulteress killed when she turned aside to evil works. It also profits Jerusalem that her brothel should be dug under and every seedbed of fornication destroyed: for when this has been done, she will no longer give wages, and the indignation of God will rest, and he will in no way be jealous over her, being secure about her chastity; that is, according to those who take what is said in a good sense. Others, however, as we said above, refer it to the contrary sense, so that it belongs to God's great anger not to be angry with them, once he has despised the fornicatress and despaired of her salvation; but if the heretics who do not receive the Old Testament should, according to the edition of the Seventy, find fault in this place with what is said: And you grieved me in all these things, on the ground that God not only admits anger but is also subject to grief and sadness, let us ask them how they accept this, which is certainly a command of the good God: Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, in whom you were sealed in the day of redemption; for whatever they say in defense of that testimony, we shall apply in satisfaction of the present passage.

Mighty is the wrath of the Lord when he is not angry with us here, for, then, he reserves us like a calf for slaughter. In fact, he says to Jerusalem, "Many are your sins and many your iniquities, but I will not be vexed with you." In other words, when you were only an adulteress, I loved you with a jealous love; but when you had many lovers, I despised you, and I will not be vexed with you. In this same way, a man is jealous of his wife when he loves her; but if he is not jealous, he hates her and does not imitate the words of him who says, "I will punish their crime with a rod" but, "I will not punish your daughters for their harlotry."

It is when God shows no anger to sinners that his anger is great. So in the case of Ezekiel he said to Jerusalem, "Now I shall not be angry with you, my jealousy has left you." … So that I may not go too far and overrun the length of a letter by piling up instances from the Old Testament, I shall tell you a brief story that happened in the days of my childhood. When the blessed Antony was summoned by Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria, to the city of Alexandria to confute heretics, and Didymus, a most learned and blessed man, had a meeting with him, they had a discussion about the holy Scriptures. Antony admired the other's brain and praised his mental sharpness. Then he asked, "I imagine that your blindness does not depress you?" Didymus in his shame said nothing. But when Antony asked a second and third time, he finally succeeded in eliciting from Didymus a simple expression of grief. Antony said to him, "I am surprised at a wise man grieving at the loss of what ants, flies and gnats have rather than rejoicing at having what only the saints and apostles have deserved to get." From this you can realize that it is much better to see with the spirit than with the flesh and to possess the eyes that the mote of sin cannot enter.

Like a skillful physician, who has tried all saving cures and sees there is no remedy left which can be applied to their disease, the Lord is, as it were, overcome by their iniquities and is obliged to desist from his kindly chastisement. And so he denounces them saying: "I will no longer be angry with you, and my jealousy has departed from you."

But if, chastised, you do not come to your senses, if, rebuked, you are not amended, if, scourged, you despise it, know that, if you have so far advanced in sinning, his jealousy will depart from you, and that will be said to you which through the prophet Ezekiel is said to Jerusalem: "therefore my jealousy shall depart from you, and I will be angry over you no more".

'And all these things', he says, 'you have done, forgetful of former benefits, and you have provoked me to anger, or grieved me, whom you ought to have provoked to joy by good works. Therefore I too have rendered your works upon your head. And although I overthrew you, O adulteress, yet I will exercise less of my anger on you than you deserved'; so that in this too the divine clemency may be shown, that the sins are greater than the punishments.

Behold, everyone who speaks a common proverb will take it up against you, saying: As the mother, so also her daughter. You are the daughter of your mother, who cast off her husband and her sons; and you are the sister of your sisters, who cast off their husbands and their sons. (LXX: "These are all the things which they said against you in a parable, saying: As the mother, also the daughter. You are the daughter of your mother, who leaves her husband and her sons, and sisters of your sisters, who left their husbands and their sons.") After the κατάλογον [catalogue] of the vices and of the chastisement of Jerusalem, by which she is drawn back to salvation, there is also applied a proverb worn by the common speech of the people, or, as the Seventy translated, a 'parable': Such as the mother, such also the daughter.

Now the mother of Jerusalem, as is written both above and in what follows, is called 'chethaea' [Hittite], and it means 'raving' or 'turning into madness', by which are shown the incitements of this world, which lead the captive soul to destruction and separate her from her husband — there is no doubt that by him the word of God and doctrine are meant —; and she is the sister of her sisters, who, as we shall read a little later, are called Sodom and Samaria, of whom the one signifies the life and luxury of the Gentiles, the other the snares of the heretics. Furthermore, what is read in the Seventy: Sisters of your sisters, who repulsed their husbands and their sons, makes no sense — for what other sisters did Sodom and Samaria have, who are the sisters of Jerusalem? And this too must be asked, what husbands Sodom and Samaria sent away and what sons they cast off —, unless perhaps we can say this: that the feet of those who go astray always waver, and theirs are not the solid footsteps that properly belong to the truth, but they run hither and thither and are carried about by every wind of doctrine, while they pass from falsehood to another falsehood and, when they have realized that they toiled in vain over the first, cross over to the second and the third.

Your mother a Hittite, and your father an Amorite. And your greater sister is Samaria, she — and her daughters — who dwells at your left hand; but your sister lesser than you, who dwells at your right hand, is Sodom and her daughters. But you have not walked in their ways, nor done a little less according to their crimes; you have done things almost more wicked than they in all your ways. (LXX: "Your mother a Hittite, and your father an Amorite. Your elder sister is Samaria, she — and her daughters — who dwells on your left; and your sister younger than you, who dwells on your right, is Sodom and her daughters. And not even so did you walk in their ways, nor did you act a little less according to her iniquities; and you surpassed them in all your ways.") Above he had said: Your father an Amorite and your mother a Hittite; here, with the order and the number changed: Your mother a Hittite and your father an Amorite. For when crimes have advanced, they are split into parts, and, unity forsaken, they advance into a crowd and a multitude, which cannot climb to the mountains with Jesus.

The heretics who nevertheless accept the Old Testament are accustomed to understand three natures from this passage: spiritual, animal and earthly, and they refer the spiritual to Jerusalem, the animal to Samaria, the earthly to Sodom; let us briefly ask them how three natures, spiritual, animal and earthly, which are certainly different from one another, are said to have one mother and one father — which does not agree with their fiction —, and how the animal and the earthly nature, according to this same prophet, are restored to their ancient state, that is, to the spiritual — which is itself also contrary to their reasonings —. Now that Samaria is to be understood of the heresies is proved both in the prophet Hosea and in many other places, and especially by that testimony: Woe to those who despise Zion and who trust in the mountain of Samaria; they have gathered as a vintage the chiefs of the nations; for all heretics despise 'Sion' [Zion], which means 'watchtower' and is referred to the Church, and they trust in the mountain of Samaria, namely in the pride of perverse doctrines which they think sublime, and through these frauds of preaching they gather as a vintage and lay waste the chiefs of the nations, so that, by the marvel of their doctrines, they draw all the powerful among the Gentiles into heretical error.

Where there are sins, where there are multitudes of people, there are schisms, there are heresies, there are dissensions. But where there is virtue, there is unity, union, from which the single heart and spirit of all believers were made.

To put it more clearly, the origin of all evils is the multitude, but the origin of good things is to retire from the crowd and to confine oneself to the solitary life.

As the Father and Son are one, so those who have one Spirit are brought together in unity.

Now that Samaria and Sodom are the sisters of Jerusalem, of whom one is on the left and the other on the right, you will confirm even according to the bodily understanding, if you look toward the east from the temple of Jerusalem; and Samaria is called greater because she sinned first and was led into captivity by the Assyrians, and Sodom lesser and younger, which is referred to the crowd of the Gentiles; otherwise, at that time Sodom did not exist, for before we read of Jerusalem in the Scriptures, it had been destroyed by divine fire together with Gomorrah, Admah and Zeboiim.

Virtue makes me to have Christ as my brother, so that I may be both good and well-mannered.

What are these two sisters of Jerusalem the sinner? Schism and division of the people created Samaria.

This is to despise Zion and to trust in the mountain of Samaria. For if we ecclesiastics sin, heretics are certainly not strangers to us in the perversion of their teaching.

And Jerusalem, in the middle between the two sisters, which by another name is called Judah, was led by the Chaldeans into Babylon, and Jerusalem sinned far more wickedly than Samaria and Sodom, worshiping in the temple the idol of Jealousy and afterwards killing the Son of God. Furthermore, according to tropology, Samaria and Sodom, that is, the heretics and the heathens, often commit lighter things than those who are reckoned to be Jerusalem, that is, the churchmen; hence it is said to the Corinthians, who believed indeed in Christ but were weighed down by evil works: Fornication is actually heard of among you; and such fornication as is not even among the Gentiles, so that someone has his father's wife, and the rest.

As I live, says the Lord God, Sodom your sister, she and her daughters, has not done as you and your daughters have done. Behold, this was the iniquity of Sodom your sister: pride, fullness of bread and abundance, and the idleness of her and of her daughters, and they did not stretch out a hand to the needy and the poor; and they were lifted up and committed abominations before me, and I took them away as you saw. And Samaria did not commit half of your sins; but you have surpassed her by your crimes, and you have justified your sisters in all your abominations which you have wrought. (LXX: "As I live, says Adonai the Lord, if Sodom your sister has done, she and her daughters, as you and your daughters have done. Nevertheless the iniquity of Sodom your sister was pride in fullness of breads and in abundance. She abounded in delights, she and her daughters ÷ this she had, she and her daughters ⁚ and she did not take hold of the hand of the poor and needy; and they gloried magnificently and committed iniquities in my sight, and I took them away as you saw. And Samaria did not commit half of your sins; and you multiplied your iniquities beyond them, and you justified your sisters in all your iniquities which you have wrought.") What the Seventy put: This she had, she and her daughters, is not found in the Hebrew. In the Old Testament the oath of God is: As I live, says the Lord God, but in the New: Amen, amen I say to you; but if this is common with others: The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob; he is not the God of the dead, but of the living, and in another place: I will please the Lord in the land of the living, we ask by what reason God claims a common word as properly his own; but just as a good tree is spoken of, and a good man, and a good shepherd, and a good servant — yet no one is absolutely good but the one God —, so, although the angels and the other powers, and also the patriarchs and prophets and apostles, are living, in comparison with God almighty they are called dead: Who is the man who shall live and not see death?; hence the apostle Paul too says of God: Who alone, he says, has immortality, and dwells in light inaccessible, and of the fountain of the living: Our life, he says, is hidden with Christ in God.

The soul … that devotes herself to the recollection of profitable things finds rest in her freedom; her cares are small, and she repents of nothing. She takes forethought for virtue, she bridles the passions, she keeps guard upon excellence, and thus she enjoys growth [that is unhindered], joy free of solicitude, a good life and a perilless haven.

He therefore who swears and says: As I live, says the Lord, in describing the crimes of Sodom and her daughters, set first pride, which is properly the devil's, and the first sin; hence the same Apostle: Lest, puffed up, he says, with pride, he fall into the judgment of the devil, on account of which he fell from heaven: For he had said: I will make strength and wisdom of understanding, I will take away the boundaries of the nations and lay waste their strength and shake the inhabited cities, and I will seize the whole world with my hand like a nest, and like broken eggs I will carry it off, and: God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble; we read also in another place: Why is earth and ashes proud?; and the Gospel relates the pride of the Pharisee overcome by the humility of the publican; whose seedbed is fullness of bread and abundance of all things and idleness, or, as the Seventy translated, an opulence of delights and luxury; that rich man in the Gospel, clothed in purple, is related to have had no other crime except that, abounding in wealth and riches, he had broken out into such pride that he did not stretch out his hand to the needy and poor Lazarus, and so forgot his own condition that he did not give to the wretched man even what was to be thrown away; for which reason it is also written in another place: Everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted. Pride, fullness, abundance of all things, idleness and delights: this is the sin of Sodom, and on account of it there follows forgetfulness of God, which thinks present goods everlasting and that it will never lack necessities; for which reason it is also commanded in the law: Take heed lest, eating and drinking and being filled, having built very fine houses, and having sheep and oxen, silver and gold, you forget the Lord your God, and in another place it is written of Israel: He ate and drank, and was filled and grew fat, and the beloved kicked; knowing which, Solomon too, the wisest of all, prays in Proverbs: Grant me what is necessary and what suffices, lest, being filled, I become a liar and say: Who will see me? or, being made poor, I steal and forswear the name of God.

Furthermore, as to the fact that for 'delights' the Hebrew contains 'idleness', it should be known that it belongs to this sense: every soul of the idle man is in desires; that is, something must always be being done, lest the field of our breast, when the hand ceases, be overrun by the brambles of evil thoughts.

But for all this, some are of so senseless a disposition, as even after these words to say, "Nay, far be it from me to weep at any time, but may God grant me to laugh and to play all my days." And what can be more childish than this mind? For it is not God that grants to play, but the devil. At least hear, what was the portion of them that played. "The people," it is said, "sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play." Such were they at Sodom, such were they at the time of the deluge. For touching them of Sodom likewise it is said, that "in pride, and in plenty, and in fullness of bread, they waxed wanton." And they who were in Noah's time, seeing the ark a preparing for so many years, lived on in senseless mirth, foreseeing nought of what was coming. For this cause also the flood came and swept them all away, and wrought in that instant the common shipwreck of the world. Ask not then of God these things, which thou receivest of the devil. For it is God's part to give a contrite and humbled heart, sober, self-possessed, and awestruck, full of repentance and compunction. These are His gifts, forasmuch as it is also of these things that we are most in need.

To know that sins are unequal you only have to look at the teaching of the Scriptures, which will leave you in no doubt.

What then is the sin most great of all sins? It is the one for which the devil fell.… Pride is greater than all sins, and the principal sin of the devil.… Often the reason for pride is for him who disregards having an ecclesiastical dignity.

Often having a fullness and an abundance of bread is the cause of arrogance. But often the sin of pride also arises over spiritual gifts, and discernment is needed to distinguish the one from the other.

And again, through meat and luxuries the Sodomites also were polluted with an unclean matter, and pleasures and the love of the belly brought them unto that limitless wickedness, even as the prophet of God maketh known concerning them, "This was the iniquity of thy luxurious sister Sodom, who was satisfied with bread, and dwelt at ease;" for by reason of being filled with bread, and delicacies they polluted themselves with unnatural lust. Let these things and others which are like unto them be in thy remembrance, O thou that wishest to travel in the path of heaven, and cut off and cast away from thee the fettering weight of the belly, which sinketh the soul into the depths of wickedness like a millstone in the sea.

And what follows: And you have justified your sisters in all your abominations which you have wrought, does not declare Sodom and Samaria simply righteous, but by comparison with those who are worse, just as the publican too, of whom we spoke above, is called righteous not absolutely but by comparison with one worse. And yet, though Sodom and Samaria are such, they have not sinned even half, in comparison with Jerusalem: The servant, for, who knows the will of his master and does not do it will be beaten with many stripes, and: The mighty will mightily suffer torments.

My Lord Jesus Christ is justified according to the dispensation of the flesh that he purified for our salvation, by Abraham, by Isaac, by Jacob and by the rest of the prophets.

Before Christ it was not possible for the light of the righteous to shine.

It is one thing to have an action set forth as praiseworthy in itself and another to have it extolled in comparison with something worse than itself. We rejoice in one way when a sick person is cured and in another when he improves a little. Even in the sacred Scriptures, Sodom is spoken of as justified in comparison with the crimes of the people of Israel.

Therefore you too, bear your shame, you who have surpassed your sisters by your sins, acting more wickedly than they; for they have been justified by you. (LXX: "And you, endure your torment, in that you corrupted your sisters in your sins, by which you acted iniquitously beyond them, and you justified them beyond yourself.") The second plank after shipwreck is, when you have sinned, to blush, and not to fall under that reproach which is spoken against Jerusalem: The face of a harlot has become yours; you do not know how to blush. Now he bears his torment who is tortured by his own conscience, and in this world endures torture of his own will, so that he may not endure eternal torments; and we corrupt our brothers or sisters by our sins when through our sins they are provoked to greater crimes — let what I say be made clearer thus: imagine someone set on the summit of the priesthood not living well and disfiguring his dignity by his works: is not the lay brother corrupted by the imitation of his vices? —; for he too who has scandalized one of the least is cast headlong into the deep with a millstone tied to his neck. The sisters of Jerusalem too, Sodom and Samaria, are justified, not because they are righteous in themselves, but, as we said, in comparison with one who is worse.

Therefore you too, be ashamed and bear your disgrace, you who have justified your sisters. (LXX: "And you, be ashamed and take up your disgrace, because you have justified your sisters.") Shame is followed by disgrace, disgrace by chastisement, chastisement by consolation, consolation by salvation, according to that word of the Apostle: Tribulation works patience, patience proof, proof hope. And hope does not put to shame — no doubt with respect to the future, since in the present it has blotted out its sins through shame —; something of the same kind is sounded by that word of the Gospel too: There is a shame that leads to death, and there is a shame that leads to life; the Holy Spirit too exhorts sinners in the Psalms: Let all my enemies be put to shame and be afraid; let them be turned back, and be put to shame very swiftly; it is written also in another place: Tell your sins first, that you may be justified, and again: The righteous man is his own accuser at the beginning of his speech. It is no wonder, then, if Jerusalem is called to shame and disgrace, she who sinned to such a degree that she justified her sisters, and to whom it is said thereafter: Both you and your daughters, return to your ancient state.

O you who are subject to pain, do not go into exile with mourning.

It is an infamy to be separated from the people of God and from the church; it is a dishonor in the church to leave the bench of presbyters, to be expelled from the rank of the diaconate.

If we justify providence, we cleanse our disgrace; but if we do not receive the judgments of God, we will multiply our disgrace.

The more we come very near to God the more we come near the beatitude; and when we have sinned, we shall be far from it and very near terrible and very great punishments.

The person who is "very small" deserves mercy more quickly.

And I will turn them, restoring them, with the turning of Sodom with her daughters, and with the turning of Samaria and of her daughters; and I will turn your return in the midst of them, that you may bear your disgrace, and you will be ashamed in all that you have done, consoling them. (LXX: "And I will turn their turnings with the turning of Sodom and of her daughters, and I will turn the turning of Samaria and of her daughters; and I will turn your turning in the midst of them, that you may bear your torment, and have disgrace from all that you have done to provoke me to anger.") Great is the progress of Jerusalem, that, after the shame and disgrace brought upon her by the judgment of God, which she willingly accepted and bore, saying: I will bear the wrath of the Lord, because I have sinned against him, restoration to her ancient state should be promised her. But yet, since by comparison with her crimes Sodom and Samaria were justified, of whom one is on the right and the other on the left, first the 'turning', or 'captivity', of Sodom is restored, as Aquila translated, second the 'captivity' of Samaria, as the same Aquila and Symmachus translated, and last of all Jerusalem is restored, which had been weighed down by greater iniquity and had shown her sinful sisters to be righteous in comparison with herself. For who doubts that among three sinners, nay rather impious men — the Gentile, the heretic, the churchman — he is worthy of much greater punishments who has been of greater dignity? : For the mighty, as we said, will mightily suffer torments; but he who has been least is worthy of mercy, and: The servant who knows the will of his master and does not do it will be beaten with many stripes. Hence Peter too: It is time, he says, for judgment to begin from the house of the Lord; and in this same prophet it is commanded to those who hold axes: Begin from my holy ones, so that Jerusalem last of all, after her sisters have first been turned back and restored to their former state, may bear her disgrace and be ashamed and blush over the things in which she had sinned and in all things console her sisters, while she endures heavier things; or certainly she is ashamed and blushes for this reason, that she provoked God to anger. From which it is plain that anger is not natural to God, but that God, most clement and most gentle, is provoked to anger by our vices, as the Apostle says: Or do you despise the riches of his goodness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that the goodness of God calls you to penance? But according to your hardness and impenitent heart you treasure up wrath for yourself, which the Lord does not have by nature; whence it is also written in another place: You sent forth your wrath, and it devoured them like stubble — for what is joined and united in one body cannot be sent, but only what is outside the body, for example a lance, a javelin, an arrow, a sword —; we read in the Gospel that it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom on the day of judgment than for the land that has not received the apostles.

Anger is something other than God himself, so that it is never part of him, nor does he share in it in any way.

Consider and observe, my hearer, that if God had given a hope to Sodom and to its fellows, he would not have overthrown them with fire and brimstone, the sign of the last day of the world, but would have delivered them over to one of the kingdoms to be chastised.

It is plain that the just and good God of the law and the gospels is one and the same and that he does good with justice and punishes in kindness, since neither goodness without justice nor justice without goodness can describe the dignity of the divine nature.

And your sister Sodom and her daughters will return to their antiquity, and Samaria and her daughters will return to their antiquity, and you and your daughters, return to your antiquity. (LXX: "And your sister Sodom and her daughters will be restored as they had been from the beginning, and Samaria and her daughters will be restored as they were from the beginning, and you and your daughters will be restored as you were from the start.") The Jews, among the other fables and endless genealogies and ravings which they invent, dream this too: that at the coming of their Christ, whom we know to be Antichrist, and in the kingdom of a thousand years, Sodom is to be restored to its ancient state, so that it will be like the paradise of God and like the land of Egypt, and that Samaria will receive its former happiness, so that they will return from the Assyrians to the land of Judea — for we read that the ten tribes were taken captive by Pul and Shalmaneser and Tiglath-pileser, kings of the Assyrians, and are captives there to this day —; that Jerusalem too is then to be built, and all her daughters, namely the cities and villages and fortresses that are to be under her power, will flourish as they flourished before, and Jerusalem herself is to be built of gold and silver and precious stones, of which Isaiah too is said to prophesy: I will establish your judges as before and your counselors as from the beginning, and after this you shall be called the city of righteousness, the faithful mother of cities, Zion, and our Revelation to speak, and David to sing: Deal kindly, O Lord, in your good will with Zion, and let the walls of Jerusalem be built, and in another place: The cities of Judea shall be built, and they shall dwell and abide there, and their seed shall be directed forever. But we, leaving the perfect knowledge of these things to the judgment of God, nay rather clearly confessing that after the second coming of the Lord Savior there will be nothing lowly, nothing earthly, but the heavenly kingdoms which are first promised in the Gospel, say this: that in the state of the Church all things have been fulfilled and are fulfilled daily. Sodom returns to its ancient state when the soul, formerly Gentile and impious, restored to its own nature, understands the Creator. Samaria receives her ancient blessedness, the error of the heretics despised, and joined to Christian doctrine and faith. And when they have returned, Jerusalem too, 'vision of peace', which is interpreted as the Church, will return to her former state — of which it is written: His place has been made in peace, and: Jerusalem, which is built as a city whose sharing thereof is in the selfsame, and in the Apostle: But the Jerusalem which is above is free, which is our mother, and in the same: You have come to Mount Zion and the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and thousands of angels in throngs —, and she will return with her daughters, who are scattered over the whole world; of which we have treated more fully in the explanations of Isaiah.

But Sodom your sister was not heard in your mouth in the day of your pride, before your wickedness was uncovered, as at this time, to the reproach of the daughters of Syria, and of all the Palestinian daughters round about you, who surround you on every side. Your crime and your disgrace you have borne, says the Lord God. (LXX: "If Sodom your sister had not been for hearing in your mouth in the days of your pride, before your wickednesses were uncovered, as now is the case with the daughters of Syria, and if this had not been, what would have been done to you, and to all round about you, the daughters of the foreigners who surround you on every side? Your impieties and your iniquities, you, bear them.") Symmachus translated this passage thus: Because Sodom your sister was not in hearing through your mouth in the day of your pride, before your disgrace was uncovered, as in the time of the reproach of the daughters of Syria, and of all the Palestinian daughters who are round about you, who surround you on every side. Your crime and your wickedness you will bear; Theodotion in this way: And Sodom your sister was not in the hearing of your mouth in the day of your pride, before your wickedness was uncovered, as the time of the reproach of the daughters of Syria, and of all the daughters of the foreigners round about her, who abhor you on every side. Your fornication and your abominations you have borne, says Adonai the Lord; our translation agrees with the edition of Aquila. All these I have set down so that from the comparison of them all we may be able to find a trace of some sense; and meanwhile, without prejudice to others, the order of the reading seems to us to be rendered thus: 'In the days of your pride, when you were sinning, you did not remember the overthrow of Sodom your sister, before your wickedness lay open, which at this time has been uncovered to such a degree that you became a reproach to all the cities of Syria and Palestine which are round about you; since, therefore, you surpassed your sister in crime, and were not frightened by her example so as not to suffer like things and to hold back your foot, but now your disgrace has been uncovered, hear the sentence of God: either 'bear' — according to the Seventy —, or 'you have borne' — according to Aquila and Theodotion, or 'you are going to bear' — according to Symmachus — your crime and disgrace, so that, after you have endured the punishment for sacrilege, you may obtain pardon, not from your covenant but from my clemency'.

'Syria' in the Hebrew tongue is called 'aram', which means 'loftiness'; and according to the explanation of that passage of the prophet Isaiah in which Aram and Ephraim conspire against Judah and Jerusalem, the subtle wisdom of the heathens, which promises itself the loftiness of knowledge, in all the wickedness of the heretics, attacks Judah, in which is the true confession, and cannot prevail; here too the same arrogance of Syria, that is, of the philosophers, together with the daughters of the foreigners, in whom is shown the manifold error of the diverse doctrines among the nations, mocks Jerusalem and holds in reproach her by whose vices it has been surpassed.

For thus says the Lord God: And I will do to you as you despised the oath, so as to make void the covenant. And I will remember my covenant with you in the days of your youth, and I will raise up for you an everlasting covenant. And you will remember your ways, and you will be ashamed when you receive your sisters with you, the greater with your lesser ones; and I will give them to you as daughters, but not by your covenant. And I will raise up for you my covenant with you, and you will know that I am the Lord, that you may remember and be ashamed, and that it may no longer be yours to open your mouth because of your shame, when I have been appeased toward you in all that you have done, says the Lord God. (LXX: "Thus says Adonai the Lord: And I will do in you as you have done, as you despised these things, so as to transgress my testament. And I will remember my testament which I made with you in the days of your youth, and I will raise up for you an everlasting testament. And you will remember your way, and you will be despised when you receive your sisters greater than you together with your younger ones; and I will give them to you for proving, and not by your testament. And I will raise up my testament with you, and you will know that I am the Lord, and you may remember and be ashamed, and it may no longer be yours to open your mouth before the face of your disgrace, when I have been propitiated toward you according to all that you have done, says the Lord God.") 'For this reason I said to you: Your crime and your disgrace, you, bear them (or you have borne or you are going to bear), : that you may receive what you deserve, because you despised my oath and made void my covenant. But when there has been fulfilled: I will kill and I will make alive, I will strike and I will heal, then I will remember my covenant which I once had with you. And I will raise up for you a covenant, by no means that of the law, which has passed away, but the everlasting covenant of the Gospel, so that, when you have remembered your ways and received your sisters, greater or lesser, Samaria and Sodom and their companions, I may grant them to you as daughters — or for proving: For there must also be heresies, so that those who are approved may be made manifest to each —, not from your merit, but from my mercy; and then you may know that I am the Lord, and remember my benefits and be ashamed, and say with the Apostle: I who am not worthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the Church of God'.

After receiving the price of my sins and being re-established, and the covenant made with me, then do I understand my evil deeds, and I am confounded, and within I punish myself.

Let us pray with all our heart that God would grant us to fight for truth to the very end of our mind and body.

And that it may no longer be yours to open your mouth because of your shame: for it belongs to the saints to open the mouth — according to the Apostle, who says: My mouth is open to you, O Corinthians —, and to the Lord Savior — who, opening his mouth, taught them, and who says in the psalm too: I will open my mouth in parables —; but to the sinner it is said: You have sinned, be still, and: Why do you take up my testament through your mouth?, and: Praise is not seemly in the mouth of a sinner; and the holy man deserves to hear: Open your mouth and I will fill it. From this we understand that even when, through the mercy of the Lord, we have received back our former glory, nay rather have received the everlasting covenant of the Gospel, after the Lord has been appeased toward us in all that we have done, we keep the memory of past sin and always close our mouth, because we have been saved not by our works but by the grace of God.