Ezekiel 18

For both this man hath sinned and his parents, but his blindness proceedeth not from that. And this He said, not signifying that though this man indeed was not in such case, yet that others had been made blind from such a cause, the sins of their parents, since it cannot be that when one sinneth another should be punished. For if we allow this, we must also allow that he sinned before his birth. As therefore when He declared, "neither hath this man sinned," He said not that it is possible to sin from one's very birth, and be punished for it; so when He said, "nor his parents," He said not that one may be punished for his parents' sake. This supposition He removeth by the mouth of Ezekiel; "As I live saith the Lord, this proverb shall not be, that is used, The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children's teeth are set on edge." And Moses saith, "The father shall not die for the child, neither shall the child die for the father."

WHAT DOES IT MEAN THAT GOD, WHO IS PROCLAIMED AS JUST, HAS PROMISED TO REPAY THE SINS OF THE FATHERS UPON THE CHILDREN TO THE THIRD AND FOURTH GENERATION? — Anyone who doubts that God does nothing and says nothing unjust is out of his mind. Therefore, if the words of the Lord are not suppressed, but everything that relates to this same question is set forth, what seems obscure will come to light, and what is thought hardly just will be recognized as devout. For whoever suppresses the words of a question is either ignorant or shifty, preferring accusation to teaching. Further, the Lord indeed promised that He would repay the sins of the fathers upon the children, but upon those who hate Him, that is, those who, involved in their fathers’ evils, have served idols just as their fathers did. For he is an enemy of God who transfers the honor of His name to a creature. Just as the sons of the righteous, being themselves righteous, dignify the line of righteousness in themselves, while both the righteousness of the fathers and their own are exalted; so also the sons of the utterly wicked, being themselves wicked, increase hatred, because they are children of the evil and have copied their wickedness to the ruin of many. God therefore appears to speak with terror; but it is true, and it has its basis. For who does not detest both an evil man and the son of an evil man in a double way, just as he judges both a good man and the son of a good man deserving of double honor? He therefore promised to repay to the third and fourth generation so that, if after an evil father the son does not follow his father’s treachery, but the grandson becomes an imitator of his grandfather’s evils, he may know that he will not be exempt from the severity of judgment; or if the grandson, not following his grandfather but his father’s footsteps, loves the Covenant of God, the great‑grandson may not be ignorant that the sentence reaches to him, if he rivals the disloyalty of his great‑grandfather. By this revealing of the Law God wished to deter wicked fathers, so that, recognizing how much evil the pursuit of idolatry produces, they might be recalled to reverence for the Creator by affection for their children; or so that the children, fearing lest they experience their fathers’ sins, might obey the Law of God. But those who add to their wickedness began to interpret this differently, saying, “Our fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the teeth of the children are set on edge,” so that, feeling secure about exemption, because the sins would be repaid to their children, they would have no devotion either in spirit or in flesh. Therefore it is said to them, “The son shall not die for the father, nor the father for the son; but the soul that sins, it shall die” (Ezek. 18:2, 4). In order that they might learn that it would not be without penalty for them, but that the sins of the fathers are repaid to the children in this way: since they have followed the wickedness of their parents and have repeated the evils which should have been blotted out, they are punished more bitterly. After God showed what evil idolatry produces, He immediately added what good follows for those who love Him, saying, “And showing mercy to thousands upon thousands of those who love Me and keep My commandments” (Exod. 20:6): so that the good of a father is repaid not only up to the great‑grandson, but up to thousands upon thousands. Suppose, for instance, that someone from the seed of David loves God, knowing for certain that David lived a thousand years earlier: to this man the mercy of God is added, so that in time of need, with two reasons to support him, he may merit to receive mercy, because he himself is a worshiper of God, and because he is of the seed of one who loved God. And in this the mercy of God is praiseworthy, that He repays to those who hate Him only up to the third and fourth generation, and not to thousands upon thousands: so that, if evil is drawn out into a fifth generation, from there it again begins to have its starting‑point, so that from that point it is counted up to a third and fourth generation. But someone will say: It seems more just that more should be repaid to the originator than to the imitator. Vengeance is rightly given to the originator; but what is said about more being repaid to the sons is a punishment upon the fathers. And if you seek the reason, by the coming of the Law sinners become more guilty, like Lamech and those after Lamech. Yet it seems to some that the sins of the fathers were repaid to the children in this way: when they were led into captivity because of their fathers and remained there up to the fourth generation. If this is true, He repaid the sins of the fathers not only to those who hated Him, but also to those who loved His name: for Daniel was taken away, and the three youths, and Baruch, and Ezekiel, and Ezra was born there. It clearly appears, then, that what we said above fits the question that has been proposed.

It was this new covenant that was prophesied about when it was said by Ezekiel that the children should not bear the iniquity of the parents, and that it should no longer be a proverb in Israel, "The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children's teeth are set on edge." Here lies the necessity that each person should be born again, that he might be freed from the sin in which he was born. For the sins committed afterwards can be cured by penitence, as we see is the case after baptism.

For the last and supposedly strongest argument for your case, you refer to the prophetic testimony of Ezekiel, where we read that there will no longer be a proverb in which they say the parents have eaten sour grapes and the teeth of the children are on edge; the child will not die in the sin of his parent or the parent in the sin of his child, but the soul that sins shall die. You do not understand that this is the promise of the New Testament and of the other world. For the grace of the Redeemer ensured that he cancelled the paternal decree, so that each person should account for himself.

And the word of the Lord came to me, saying: What is it that you turn a parable into this proverb among you in the land of Israel, saying: The fathers have eaten a sour grape, and the teeth of the sons have been set on edge? (LXX: "And the word of the Lord came to me, saying: ÷ Son of man, ⁚ what is the parable among the sons of Israel, of those who say: The fathers have eaten a sour grape, and the teeth of the sons have been set on edge?") What the Seventy said, Son of man, is not found in the Hebrew. Now divine Scripture warns that what was said in Exodus, I am the Lord your God; a jealous God, who render the sins of the fathers upon the sons to the third and fourth generation for those who hate me, and show mercy to thousands for those who love me and keep my precepts, and again, The Lord descended in a cloud and stood beside Moses, and Moses called on the name of the Lord, and the Lord passed before his face, and he called on him, saying: Lord God, compassionate and merciful, patient and of much mercy and true, and keeping righteousness and mercy to thousands, taking away iniquities and injustices and sins, and he will not cleanse the guilty, rendering the iniquities of the fathers upon the sons and upon the sons of the sons to the third and fourth generation, ought to be taken thus, as a parable and a proverb, so that it sounds one thing in the words and holds another in the sense; which we also said above on the parable of the two eagles. Hence the Lord in Psalm 77 (78): I will open, he says, my mouth in parables, I will utter propositions from the beginning; and in the Gospel he sets forth the parable of the sowing, and of the darnel, and of the mustard seed, which, though it is the least of all seeds, rises up into a great tree, in such a way that he presents one thing in the words and holds another in the sense; and we, up to the present day, think that the two testimonies of Exodus which we set down above are not a parable, but set out a simple statement. And although we would not dare to say anything, nor would the earthen vessel speak against the potter, 'why have you made me thus or thus', yet we suffered a hidden stumbling block, because it seemed an injustice on God's part that one should sin and another pay for the sins. For if he renders the sins of the fathers upon the sons to the third and fourth generation, it seems unjust that one should sin and another be punished; but from what follows, for those who hate me, the stumbling block of the threat, or of the precept, is resolved: for they are not punished to the third and fourth generation because their fathers transgressed, since it is rather the fathers, who were the sinners, who ought to have been punished, but because they proved to be imitators of their fathers and hated God, by an inherited evil, the impiety growing from the root into the branches as well. At this place the heretics who do not receive the Old Testament are accustomed to say against the Creator: How good and righteous is the God of the Law and the Prophets, who, resting and silent at the sins of the fathers, repays those who have not sinned; nay rather, how great is the cruelty in him, that he should extend his wrath even to the third and fourth generation! To them we shall reply that even in this the clemency of God the Creator is shown: for it is not a mark of ferocity and severity to hold back wrath until the third and fourth generation, but a sign of mercy to defer the punishment of sin; for when he says, The Lord God, compassionate and merciful, patient and of much compassion, and adds, rendering the iniquities of the fathers upon the sons and the sons of the sons, he indicates this: that he is of such great mercy that he does not punish at once but defers the sentence of punishment. But if the vengeance on sinners is deferred to the third and fourth generation, what more will he do with the righteous and the holy? There follows: And keeping righteousness and mercy to many thousands for those who keep his commandments and do his precepts. It is written in Proverbs: As a sour grape is harmful to the teeth and smoke to the eyes, so is iniquity to those who practice it; from which it is clear that it is not the teeth of others that ache and are set on edge, but the teeth of those who have eaten the sour grape. And this is the sense of this passage: just as, if anyone should wish to say, The fathers have eaten a sour grape, and the teeth of the sons have been set on edge, it is ridiculous and has no logical consequence, so it is unjust and perverse that the fathers should sin and the sons and grandsons be tormented. There are those who expound what is written in Exodus, rendering the iniquities of the fathers upon the sons to the third and fourth generation, in such a way as to refer the statement to the human soul, saying that the father in us is the light prick of the senses and the incitements of the vices; the son, if the thought has conceived the sin; the grandson, if you carry out in deed what you have thought and conceived; and the great-grandson, that is, the fourth generation, if you not only do what is evil and wicked but glory in your crimes, according to what is written: The impious man, when he has come into the depth of evils, despises. God therefore by no means punishes the first and second goads of thoughts, which the Greeks call προπαθείας [pre-passions, the first movements of the mind], without which no human being can exist, but only if someone has resolved to do what he has thought, or has been unwilling to correct by repentance the very things he has done; whence it is written: No human being is without sin, not even if his life be of a single day. But the years of his life are numbered; and in another place: Who will boast that he has a chaste heart?; and again: The stars too are not clean in his sight, and against his angels he has devised something perverse. But if that sublime nature is not free of sin, what is to be said of human beings who, surrounded by fragile flesh, must say with the Apostle: Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from the body of this death?, and that word, that when we have done all things we must say, We are unprofitable servants; we have done what we ought to have done, and: Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labor in vain. Unless the Lord guards the city, he who guards it has kept watch in vain? Now in proof of this point, that the first impulse of thoughts, or rather the slight prompting of the mind, is by no means punished by God, but only if you complete in deed what you have conceived in the mind, that passage of Genesis must be brought forward: Ham sinned in mocking his father's nakedness, and the sentence was received not by him who laughed but by his son Canaan: Cursed, he says, be Canaan; a servant he shall be to his brothers. For what righteousness is there in this, that the father should have sinned and the sentence be pronounced against the son? Likewise what the Apostle sets down in the opposite direction, that the woman is saved if her son remains in faith and holiness and chastity, would seem not to have the righteousness of a sentence, namely that if the sons and grandsons are good, the parents are saved; for how many parents are holy and have wicked sons, and, on the contrary, how many are sinners and beget holy sons? Therefore all that we said above is to be taken according to this sense: that the sins of parents and begetters are punished in the branches, not in the root. Let it suffice for the present to have said this about the proverb, or the parable: that the Law and the Prophets, that is, Exodus and Ezekiel, or rather God himself, who spoke both here and there, should by no means seem to disagree in their statements, or to correct here what he had said badly there. But if anyone can find either a better sense or another one, which removes the stumbling block of testimonies contrary to one another, it is rather his opinion that is to be accepted.

As I live, says the Lord, if this parable shall be any longer to you as a proverb in Israel. Behold, all souls are mine; as the soul of the father, so also the soul of the son is mine: the soul that sins, it shall die. (LXX: "As I live, says the Lord Adonai, if it shall be any longer that this parable is spoken in Israel; for all souls are mine; as the soul of the father, so the soul of the son is mine: the soul that sins, it shall die.") What As I live, says the Lord means, and parable or proverb, we have said more fully above; it will by no means be spoken in Israel, but among those who do not have the knowledge of God and cannot discern the truth.

But if they wish to say that after the return from Babylon these nations were subjected to the people of Israel, first we shall demand the authority of the Scriptures by which they may prove that this happened; then, when they are quite unable to demonstrate it, we shall grant it to them out of superfluity and say: Suppose that what you say happened; what justice of God would it be that the grandfathers blasphemed and the forefathers reproached, and afterwards it was repaid to the grandsons? Especially since that sentence by which it was formerly said in the law that the sins of the fathers are repaid upon the sons in the third and the fourth generation has been loosed through Ezekiel: As I live, says the Lord; this parable shall no longer be spoken, but the soul that sins, it shall die. And at the same time notice that what was said is a parable, and does not mean what they bring forward on the surface of the letter.

The soul dies to the Lord, not through natural infirmity but through the sickness caused by guilt. This type of death is not the release from this life but is the fall resulting from sin.

There are three kinds of death. One is the death due to sin, concerning which it was written, the soul that sins shall itself die." Another death is the mystical, when someone dies to sin and lives to God; concerning this the apostle likewise says, or we were buried with him by means of baptism into death. The third is the death by which we complete our lifespan with its functions—I mean the separation of the soul and body. Thus we perceive that the one death is an evil, if we die on account of sins, but the other, in which the deceased has been justified of sin, is a good, while the third stands in between, for it seems good to the just and fearful to most people; although it gives release to all, it gives pleasure to few.

The spiritual penalty always pertained only to the sinner.

This whole passage is so constructed as to show that bad children are not given relief because of good parents or good children oppressed because of bad parents. So having first established this absolutely true and rock-firm principle on our own account, we go on now to examine what our obligations are in our relations with others; and here we must be very careful to distinguish between the effect of salvation, which we must seek for ourselves, and the consideration that we must show to our neighbors. If you are good, you are good with your own goodness, not with someone else's. And yet through that goodness of yours with which you are good you also rejoice over another's goodness together with him, not by exchanging goodnesses but by exchanging love.

Show me a body that has never been sick or one that is sure of enjoying good health forever after sickness, and I will show you a soul that has never sinned.

The soul therefore that has not sinned shall live. Neither the virtues nor the vices of parents are imputed to their children. God takes account of us only from the time when we are born anew in Christ.

All, he says, souls are mine, according to creation, not according to merit, as Moses was called a man of God, of whom it is written, A prayer of Moses, the man of God, and Elijah, who said to the captain of fifty soldiers, And if I am a man of God, let fire come down upon you and upon the fifty men; but the man of sin and son of iniquity is not called a man of God, just as those are called servants and attendants of God of whom it cannot be said, Everyone who commits sin is the servant of sin, and again, For by whom anyone is overcome, to him he is also a servant. Just as the sins of the sons do not harm the fathers, so the sins of the fathers do not overflow onto the sons, but the soul that sins, it shall die: not by the abolition of its substance, but out of the fellowship of him who says, I am the life, and who says elsewhere, Everyone who lives and believes in me shall not die for ever, and, Amen, amen I say to you, whoever keeps my word shall not see death for ever; for our life indeed is hidden with Christ in God, the life by which we shall live when Christ, our life, appears in glory, and that which is written will be fulfilled: Amen, amen I say to you, he who hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but passes from death to life. But what is said by Balaam, Let my soul die the death of the righteous, has this sense: that he desires to die to the world and to sin, and to live with the souls of the righteous, whose life is Christ, and who can sing, I will please the Lord in the land of the living; he is not indeed the God of the dead, but of the living; and if Balaam, translated into our language, means 'a vain people', which is most true, it is clear that the formerly vain people of the nations desired to have fellowship with the souls of the righteous Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, who are called εὐθεῖς, that is, 'upright' and 'righteous'; whence also the book of Genesis received its name from their designation.

I know also another kind of death, in which a man dies for God; of it it is said: "The soul that sins shall itself die."

·i· If, he says, a man is righteous and does judgment. It is written in Proverbs: The thoughts of the righteous are judgments. He who possesses this virtue, so as to do nothing without reason and judgment, can say that prophetic word, The judgments of the Lord are true, justified in themselves; and when he has judged all things rightly, so as not to accept the person of the poor in judgment, he will fulfill the precept of the Lord, As the lesser, so also shall you judge the greater, saying boldly, My soul has longed to desire your judgments at all times, and again, I have chosen the way of truth, I have not forgotten your judgments, and in the same psalm, I have known that your judgments are righteousness; and he will advance to such great blessedness that he understands the judgments of the Lord, which are a great deep, and says with the Apostle, O the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How inscrutable are his judgments, and his ways unsearchable!, and recalls in prayer, For your judgments are delightful. ·ii· After judgment follows 'righteousness', and he who has it will clearly possess Christ, who, according to the Apostle, was made for us righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that he does true righteousness and does not regard persons in judgment, but knows that, in his judgment of others, he must be judged on his own righteousness.

And a man, if he is righteous and does judgment and righteousness, does not eat on the mountains and does not lift up his eyes to the idols of the house of Israel, and does not violate his neighbor's wife, and does not approach a menstruous woman, and does not grieve a man, returns the pledge to the debtor, seizes nothing by force, gives his bread to the hungry, and covers the naked with a garment, and does not lend at usury, and does not take more, turns his hand away from iniquity, does true judgment between man and man, walks in my precepts, and keeps my judgments so as to do truth: this man is righteous and shall live with life, says the Lord God. (LXX: "But a man who is righteous, who does judgment and righteousness, does not eat upon the mountains and does not lift up his eyes to the thoughts of the house of Israel, and does not defile his neighbor's wife, and does not approach a woman flowing with blood, and does not oppress a man, returns the pledge owed, and does not seize plunder, gives his bread to the hungry, and covers the naked with a garment, and does not give his money at usury, and does not take more, turns his hand away from iniquity, will do righteous judgment between a man and his neighbor, and walks in my precepts, keeps my justifications so as to do them: this man is righteous, he shall live with life, says Adonai the Lord.") 'Do you wish', he says, 'to know that what was said, I will render the sins of the fathers to the third and fourth generation, does not mean what most people suppose, and is not like this saying, The fathers have eaten a sour grape, and the teeth of the sons have been set on edge? Hear what I am about to add: if a father is righteous, who has done these things and has not done those, and has a very wicked son who, abandoning his father's virtues, gives himself over to crimes, will not the one live with life because he is righteous, and the other die by death because he has committed all the things by avoiding which his father was made righteous?' Let us look at the catalogue of the father's virtues, which seem to me to be divided into seventeen parts; of which the first is: to have done judgment; the second, similar to this: to have joined righteousness to judgment; the third: not to have eaten on the mountains; the fourth: not to have lifted the eyes to the idols — or, as the Seventy translated, the thoughts — of the house of Israel; the fifth: not to have violated his neighbor's wife; the sixth: to have avoided the embraces of a menstruous wife; the seventh: not to have grieved a man — or, as the Seventy rendered it, oppressed through power —; the eighth: to have returned the pledge to the debtor; the ninth: to have seized nothing by force — or, according to the Seventy, not to have seized plunder —; the tenth: to have given his bread to the hungry; the eleventh: to have covered the naked with a garment; the twelfth: not to have given money at usury; the thirteenth: to have taken nothing more from what you have given; the fourteenth: to have turned his hand away from iniquity; the fifteenth, which seems similar to the first but is different in part: to have done true judgment between man and man — or, his neighbor —; the sixteenth: to have walked in the precepts of the Lord; the seventeenth: to have kept his judgments and justifications. What each of these means we shall say in what follows.

·iii· The third is: He does not eat on the mountains, which the Jews think pertains to the sin of idolatry; for we read frequently in the books of Kings and of Chronicles: Nevertheless he did not depart from the high places; the people still sacrificed and burned incense on the heights, Scripture signifying this: that on mountains and in groves they sacrificed victims to idols and kindled incense. We, however, say that he eats on the mountains who says with the Pharisee: I give you thanks, God, that I am not like this tax collector. I fast twice in the sabbath, I give tithes of all my substance, and so on; but on the contrary the tax collector, hearing him who had said, Learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart, struck his breast with his hand, that is, the treasury of the worst thoughts, and did not dare to raise his eyes to heaven. But that too which is said elsewhere, Do not seek things greater than you, and do not search out things stronger than you, convicts all heretics of eating on the mountains of pride, and of despising the simplicity of the Church, and of not knowing that it is written of them: God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble. ·iiii· In the fourth place is set: And does not lift up his eyes to the idols of the house of Israel, for which the Seventy translated 'thoughts'. Now idols, that is, images which they have fashioned from their own heart, all heretics make, and to them they lift up the eyes of the heart, since they have supposed their falsehood and lie to be the truth. And those are called images of the house of Israel which are found in the Church and, by occasion of knowledge falsely so called, seduce all the simple, as they bring the dogmas of the philosophers into the house of Israel, that is, of those who behold God with the mind. ·v· In the fifth place is set: And does not violate his neighbor's wife (or defile), which plainly forbids adultery; but from the fact that it says 'his neighbor's', unless every human being is understood as a neighbor, the precept would seem to be that we abstain from the wives of friends, but freely pollute the spouses of enemies and strangers. Every human being, therefore, is to be taken as the neighbor of every human being, according to the Gospel parable set forth by the Savior about a certain man who, going down to Jericho, was wounded by robbers, when the Pharisee asks, 'who was his neighbor?', teaching that he is the neighbor who has done good. According to the mystical understanding, the wife of the holy man can be understood as wisdom, as Solomon says: Love her and she will embrace you, cherish her and she will guard you; and he desires to defile her who finds fault with the good words of others and, kindled by the torches of envy, violates holy things, corrupts chaste things, defiles pure things. ·vi· The sixth is: And does not approach a menstruous woman. Each month the heavy and sluggish bodies of women are relieved by the outflow of unclean blood, and if at that time a man has intercourse with a woman, the fetuses conceived are said to contract a defect of the seed, so that lepers and elephantiacs are born from this conception, and corrupted gore makes bodies, foul in either sex, degenerate through the smallness or the enormity of their limbs. Men are therefore commanded, not only with respect to other men's women but also with their own, to whom they are seen to be joined by law, Scripture saying, Increase and multiply and fill the earth, to know fixed times for intercourse, when they must come together and when they must abstain from their wives; which indeed both the Apostle and Ecclesiastes express: A time to embrace and a time to be far from embraces. Let the wife therefore beware lest, overcome by the desire for intercourse, she conceal it from her husband, and the husband lest he do violence to his wife, thinking that the pleasure of marriage ought to be subject to him at every time; whence Paul too: That each one, he says, may know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and chastity. It is finely said in the little maxims of Sextus the Pythagorean: An adulterer is the too ardent lover of his own wife; a book which a certain man, translating it into the Latin language, wished to adorn with the name of the martyr Sixtus, not considering that in the whole volume, which he pointlessly divided into two parts, the name of Christ and of the apostles is entirely passed over in silence; nor is it surprising if he turned a pagan philosopher into a martyr and bishop of the city of Rome, since he also changed the first book of Eusebius of Caesarea in defense of Origen to the name of the martyr Pamphilus, so that with such a eulogist he might more easily commend the most impious books Περὶ Ἀρχῶν [On First Principles] to Roman ears.

·vii· There follows in the seventh place: And does not grieve a man (or, as the Seventy translated, does not oppress through power). I do not know who is free of this vice and sin; for the Egyptians too oppressed the Hebrews through power, whence Habakkuk also complains that the impious oppresses the righteous. And would that this were said only of those who are outside, and not of those who are within! For the princes of the churches too are accustomed to oppress the people through pride, of whom it is written: They have made you prince: do not be lifted up; be among them as one of them, and the Savior commanded: Whoever wishes to be first among you, let him be the least of all. But what is said according to the Hebrew, And does not grieve a man, agrees with the apostolic testimony, Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, who dwells in you; and in the Gospel according to the Hebrews, which the Nazarenes are accustomed to read, it is placed among the greatest crimes: he who has grieved his brother's spirit. But if the sadness of another kills the one who causes the grief, what must be said of iniquity and a tyrannical mind, when that saying fits, Why do earth and ashes glory?, so that a man, forgetful of his condition, how he is full of phlegm, bile and dung, and shortly to be ploughed through by worms, sets his mouth in heaven, and his tongue passes through even to the earth, and he says with the true Nebuchadnezzar, I will ascend into heaven, above the stars of heaven I will set my throne and I will be like the Most High? ·viii· The eighth is: If he returns the pledge to the debtor; not to every debtor, otherwise for many the occasion of receiving back their pledges would become a means to riches, but to that debtor of whom it is written in the Law that he is poor and has put up his own garment, and ought to receive back his covering before sunset, lest, tormented by cold, he cry out to the Lord, who is the avenger of his injury. But if, according to what follows, we ought to give bread to the hungry and cover the naked with a garment, how much more to return what is his own, provided the debtor's poverty is beyond doubt? We can also return the pledge to the debtor when, to one to whom we are joined in love and who owes us mutual charity, we return his pledge, retaining with us nothing further of his debt. ·viiii· The ninth place is held by: Seizes nothing by force (or, according to the Seventy, does not seize plunder). The Apostle too speaks of plunderers, that among the other sinners one must not even eat with such men; and every plunder is mixed with violence, for unless force has been applied, plunder does not succeed. But there is also a holy violence and a desirable plunder, of which the Gospel writes: From the days of John the Baptist the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and the violent tear it away; of which Jude the brother of James also speaks: And some indeed seize from the fire; but have mercy on others who are judged. On the contrary, the adverse powers hasten to seize their prey to the destruction of those whom they seize, which Jacob too signifies when he says: An evil beast has devoured him, an evil beast has seized Joseph. Hence also the sheep of the Lord which follow him are not seized from his hands, and he himself says: What the Father has given me is greater than all, and no one can seize it from the hand of the Father; from which is seen the one power, might and substance of the Father and the Son: for if no one can seize from the Son's hand what the Father has given, and these same things are in the Father's hand and are not seized from him, it is clearly proved that all things are common to the Father and the Son, and that the Father holds in the Son's hand, just as the things that are the Son's are held in the Father's hand. ·x· The tenth is: Gives his bread to the hungry; by which we are taught that alms are to be given not to the sated but to the hungry, and that bread is to be given not to those who belch with fullness but to those who are tormented by emptiness. In bread, moreover, every food is contained, and 'his' is said significantly, lest we turn into an act of mercy bread acquired from plunder and usury and the misfortune of others: for the redemption indeed of a man's soul is his own riches; which we see many doing who oppress their clients and the poor and the farmers through power, or commit thefts against them, to say nothing of the violence of soldiers and judges, so that out of much they bestow a little on the poor and glory in their crimes; and the deacon reads out publicly in the churches the names of the offerers, 'She offers so much, he has promised so much'; and they are pleased with themselves at the applause of the people, while their conscience torments them; and we give the wretches occasion to rejoice over what they bestow and not to mourn over what they have seized. But it is better for us to understand that the bread of righteousness is he who said, I am the bread who came down from heaven, and whom we pray in prayer to be granted to us: Our substantial bread (or that is to come) give us, so that him whom we shall afterwards receive always, we may deserve to receive daily in the present age. This bread the righteous man gives to the hungry, of whom it is written, Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled, because he who is righteous makes the common bread of all his own, the bread which had failed in Judea, as the prophet says: I will take away from them the strength (or the staff) of bread. What we are saying, provided that we are Christ's, or rather what the prophet records, is the bread of believers and of the hungry, which is by no means to be given to those who have eaten and drunk and been sated and, grown fat, have kicked, of whom it is said, Woe to you who are sated now, for you will hunger, lest they vomit it up, as Solomon says: For he will vomit it up and will defile your good words; which the Savior says in other words: Do not give what is holy to dogs, nor cast your pearls before swine. ·xi· The eleventh place is held by: And has covered the naked with a garment, a saying which, according to the explanation of the preceding little verse, must be expounded in two ways: that we both give covering to the naked, as the Savior says, I was naked, and you covered me, and give to those who are naked of faith and virtues the garment of Christ, of whom it is written, For as many of you as were baptized in Christ have put on Christ. Naked of this garment was he who, not having a wedding garment, was thrown out of the banquet. Of this nakedness the Lord also speaks to Jerusalem: You moreover were naked and full of confusion.

·xii· The twelfth number is held by: And does not lend at usury (or, as the Seventy translated, does not give his money at usury). In the Hebrew usury on all kinds of goods is forbidden, in the Seventy only on money, according to what is also written in Psalm 14 (15), Who has not given his money at usury, and as it is said, To your brother you shall not lend at interest, but to a foreigner you shall lend at interest. But see the progress: at the beginning of the Law interest is removed only from brothers; in the prophet usury is forbidden from all, as Ezekiel says, He has not given his money at usury; and further, in the Gospel there is an increase of virtue, as the Lord commands, 'Lend to those from whom you do not hope to receive back'. ·xiii· There follows in the thirteenth place: And does not take more. Some think that usury applies only to money; foreseeing this, divine Scripture removes the surplus on everything, so that you may not receive back more than you gave. In the country it is customary for 'usury', or, as the divine word calls it, 'abundance', to be exacted on grain and millet, wine and oil, and other kinds of goods; for example, that in winter we give ten modii and at harvest receive back fifteen, that is, more by half. He who thinks himself most just will take a fourth part more; and they are accustomed to argue and say: 'I gave one modius, which, when sown, made ten modii. Is it not just that I should receive half a modius more of what is mine, when he, by my generosity, has nine and a half from what is mine?' Do not err, says the Apostle: God is not mocked. For let the merciful moneylender answer us briefly whether he gave to one who had or to one who did not have. If to one who had, he certainly ought not to have given; but he gave as if to one who did not have: why then does he exact more as if from one who has? Others, in return for money lent at interest, are accustomed to accept little gifts of various kinds, and do not understand that whatever it is is called 'usury' and 'surplus' if they have received more than what they gave. ·xiiii· The fourteenth step: From iniquity, he says, he turns away his hand, so that he flees iniquity in every work. For iniquity is committed not only with the hand but with the other members too, as Solomon says, Remove iniquitous lips far from you, and in the Psalms, They have spoken iniquity on high; the foot too runs to iniquity, and the eye, if it covets another man's wife; nor would he be an imitator of him of whom it is said, He did no iniquity and no deceit was found in his mouth. Hence also we are commanded to make friends for ourselves from the unrighteous mammon, who may receive us into the eternal tabernacles. ·xv· The fifteenth is: Does true judgment between man and man (or his neighbor), which seems to mean the same as the first, where it is written, If he is righteous and does judgment; but it adds the 'truth' of the judgment which he does between man and man, or his neighbor: it is seen to have an ἐπίτασιν [intensification] of the virtues. Hence also at the opening of Proverbs, after many precepts, the 'correction' of judgment is added: To know, it says, wisdom and discipline, and to understand the words of prudence, to receive the subtleties of words, and to know true righteousness, and after all things to correct judgment. For this reason the Apostle too rebukes those who are established in the Church, because they have lawsuits among themselves, and the least and despised one is chosen, who according to the Gospel is first, to judge between man and man, he who has put away the things of a child and has attained to the perfect man; and yet he needs a greater discernment to be able to attain to the 'truth' of judgment.

·xvi· There follows in the sixteenth place: Walks in my precepts, ·xvii· and in the seventeenth: Judgments (or my justifications) he keeps, so as to do them, and keeps them once done; each of which has a manifold understanding, if we wish to go over all the commandments of the Law, in which there are said to be precepts of the Lord and in which justifications. Psalm 118 (119) is full of precepts and justifications, and in part Psalm 18 (19), in which it is written, The righteousnesses of the Lord are right, gladdening hearts and the precept of the Lord is bright, enlightening the eyes; in this the question is raised how God said in this same prophet, I gave them justifications not good, in which they should not live in them; and the answer is easy, and fuller in what follows: that the Jews, following the killing letter, do not live, and the Christians, understanding the life-giving spirit, do live. It would be long, if we wished to prove by testimonies where there are said to be precepts of the Lord and where justifications, and in what differences or obscurities they are each wrapped. Hence too in the present place it is added: This man is righteous, he shall live with life, says the Lord God; he who has done these things and has not done those will by no means be punished for the offenses of his father, but will live by his own virtues.

Therefore, dearly beloved, let us shed our tears every day and ask this teacher of virtues to teach us to be devout to these profitable wounds. May he show us how to expose our breast in this warfare and sustain every onset of injury. It is not hard to enter a fight where you see that a victory has already been won. That which is taught by example quickly lodges in our minds.

But if he begets a son who is a robber, shedding blood, and does one of these things (or, as the Seventy translated, and does sins, does not walk in the way of his righteous father), and who does not do all these things, but eats on the mountains, and pollutes his neighbor's wife, grieves the needy and the poor (or oppresses), seizes plunder, does not return the pledge, and lifts up his eyes to idols, commits abomination, gives at usury and takes more: shall he live? He shall not live; since he has done all these detestable things, he shall die by death, his blood shall be upon him. For 'robber' in the Hebrew is written 'pharis', which the second edition of Aquila translated 'sinner', Symmachus 'transgressor', the Seventy and Theodotion 'pestilent'. Just as a pestilence creates diseases and is wont to lay waste far and wide the regions on which it has settled, so the pestilent man ravages everything.

And let us speak first according to the history, so that you may know that the iniquities of the fathers do not overflow onto the sons. If the righteous man does what the preceding discourse wove together in order, he shall live with life; but if he begets a son who departs from the service of the Lord and exchanges his father's virtues for vices, so that he does what the father did not do and does not do what the father wrought, will he be able to live? Certainly he will not live, but will be guilty of his own blood. Further, according to the spiritual understanding, if a righteous man of the Church has preached the evangelical faith, and his son and disciple has been deceived by heretical error, the son will be called pestilent, of whom it is written also in Psalm 1, And has not sat in the chair of pestilence, and in Proverbs, The bold and insolent and proud man is called pestilent. He has shed the blood of the deceived and doubles all sins upon himself, eating on the mountains of pride and polluting his neighbor's church, grieving the needy and the poor in the knowledge of the Scriptures, oppressing and supplanting them, seizing as plunder those whom he has seduced from the Church, not returning the pledge which he had received from his teacher so as to fulfill what is written, Freely you have received, freely give, and lifting up his eyes to the idols and images which he has fashioned from his own heart, and committing all abominations, and giving money at usury, so as to increase the teacher's error by the diligence of the disciples, and demanding back from those to whom he gave more than he had given: certainly he will not be able to live, but will die in his own blood.

But if he begets a son who, seeing all the sins of his father which he did, fears and does not do likewise, does not eat upon the mountains and does not lift up his eyes to the idols of the house of Israel, and does not violate his neighbor's wife, and does not grieve a man, does not retain the pledge, and does not seize plunder, gives his bread to the hungry, and covers the naked with a garment, turns his hand away from injury to the poor, does not take usury and surplus, does my judgments, walks in my precepts: this man shall not die in the iniquity of his father, but shall live with life. His father, because he practiced calumny and did violence to his brother, and wrought evil in the midst of his people, has died in his iniquity. 'And do not wonder', he says, 'if the son of a righteous man, turning aside to vices and sins, dies by death, since, on the contrary, the son of a sinner and impious man, if he sees the perversity of his father's ways and turns himself so as not to do evil things and to do good things, is not held guilty of his father's crimes'. This can be taken also of us, to whom it is said in the Psalms, Hear, daughter, and see, and incline your ear, and forget your people and the father's house; and the king will desire your beauty, and who have been born of the stock of the nations: that we should leave behind the crimes of our parents and do judgment and righteousness and live in it. He therefore repeats what we have treated more broadly above, and so we run through everything briefly, wishing to pass on to the things that are more obscure and new.

And you say: Why has the son not borne the iniquity of the father? Clearly because the son has wrought judgment and righteousness, has kept all my precepts, and has done them: he shall live with life. The soul that sins, it shall die: the son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, and the father the iniquity of the son; the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the impiety of the impious shall be upon him. He solves the question which the hearer could raise as an objection: 'You are accustomed', he says, 'to say: Why has the righteous son not borne the iniquity of the father?'; to which he himself replied: 'Clearly because the son has done well and has not committed his father's offenses'. And it is just that, as the sinner dies in his crime, so the righteous man should live in his virtues; and that the soul that sins should die, and he who keeps the precepts of God should live.

Behold how God advises and arouses you so that you may be converted from your sins and be saved, though late. Behold how he urges one liable to death to live; how gently, how kindly he calls, not refusing his fatherly devotion even to sinners. He continues to call children those who have lost God their Father by their sins.

There are people who, as soon as they begin to think about the evil things they have done, assume that they can not be pardoned; and on the assumption that they can not be pardoned, they give their souls over to destruction from that moment.… They perish from despair, whether before they come to believe at all or whether they are already Christians and have fallen by evil living into various sins and vicious forms of behavior.

Since no one makes a fool of the Lord, he deceives himself if having led a wicked life for a long time he arises to seek life when he is already half-dead. He should listen to the prophet say, "If the sinner turns away from his sins"—if he turns away, he says, not if he only talks about it—"he shall live because of the virtue he has practiced." Surely you have noticed that healing medicine of this kind must be asked with the lips, but it must be brought to completion by deeds. That gift of repentance that is received at the end of one's life should be believed to be profitable if it is accepted with a sublime intention, much crying and groaning, and is further enhanced by more abundant almsgiving. However, there must be as much piety on the part of sinners in healing the wounds as the intention of the mind was quick and active in doing evil.

A person who is always uncertain of his life is also swift to apply the remedy of his salvation. The same one who gave us assurance by the words, "On whatever day the sinner is converted, all his iniquities will be forgiven," also wanted to make us careful when he said, "Delay not to be converted to the Lord, and defer it not from day to day."

The person who believes that even if he does penance for his sins the divine mercy will not forgive him wrongly despairs, while one who defers the remedy of repentance to a much later day is presumptuous. Just as it is said to those who despair, "On whatever day the sinner is converted, all his iniquities will be forgotten," so it is said to the presumptuous, "Delay not to be converted to the Lord."

Once the mind is lent brightness at the very beginning of good works and begins to recognize the truth, you are not to imagine that after sinning a delay ensues by reason of which it is enabled to be heard.

Sin is a terrible thing, and the most grievous disease of the soul is iniquity, which corrodes the fiber of the soul and makes it liable to eternal fire. It is an evil freely chosen, the product of the will.

But if the impious man repents of all his sins which he has wrought, and keeps all my precepts, and does judgment and righteousness, he shall live with life and shall not die. Of all his iniquities which he has wrought I will not be mindful. 'To such a degree', he says, 'do the sins of the fathers not overflow onto the sons, nor does a criminal father weigh down a righteous son, nor are some punished for the crimes of others, that one and the same man who was formerly impious and a sinner, if afterwards he repents and, turned to better things, blots out his former sins, is not judged by the oldness of his sin, but is received into my flock by the renewal of virtue'. And at the same time it must be considered what kind of impious man and sinner he receives as a penitent: 'If from all his sins', he says, 'which he has wrought he turns himself away, and keeps all the precepts of the Lord, so, namely, that he abandons all crimes and follows all virtues; if he does all good things and forsakes all evil things, I too will forget all his iniquities which he has wrought'.

Do not doubt the mercy of God. Only perform in your heart your pact with God not to practice the worship of demons any more, or to worship anything except the God of heaven, or to commit homicide, or to be involved in adultery or fornication or theft or to swear falsely. And when you have promised God this with your whole heart and have not committed these sins again, hope confidently for pardon from God.… True repentance consists of a person not doing again the evils that he did but asking pardon for past sins and watching in the future not to fall into them again.

Repentance, then, means life, since it is preferred to death. You must, as a sinner like myself—yes, and a lesser one than I, for I recognize my eminence in evil—lay hold on it and grip it fast, as one who is shipwrecked holds to a plank of salvation. It will buoy you up when you are plunged into a sea of sin and bear you safely to the haven of divine mercy.

I will not allow those punishments that the parents avoided to be repeated by their children, since I am the Lord of both of them and have the same care for all of them. For all souls are mine, and the soul that sins pays the penalty. Thus God teaches us forms of justice, and the way people can delight in life and be released by prayer and become free.

In his righteousness which he has wrought he shall live. 'He shall live not so much by my righteousness as by his own, although it belongs to my righteousness to render good things to the good and evil things to the evil'.

You have wished to die by sinning; he wishes you to live by being converted. O foolish, irreverent and ungrateful sinner, you do not yield in this respect to God, who wishes to have mercy on you, who prefers to save you because of his own goodness than to destroy you because of your sins.

Dearly beloved, if you are good, you must put up with the bad; if you are bad, you must imitate the good. The fact is, on this threshing floor grains can degenerate into chaff, and again grains can be resurrected from chaff. This sort of thing happens every day, my dear brothers and sisters; this life is full of both painful and pleasant surprises. Every day people who seemed to be good fall away and perish; and again, ones who seemed to be bad are converted and live. "God," you see, "does not desire the death of the wicked but only that they may turn back and live."

One person prays to the Lord almost all his life, another is converted in middle age, another is saved at his life's end.… God with merciful patience awaits the hour of our conversion at any time, and so he bears with the guilty and awaits sinners with the words, "It is not my will that a sinner should die, but that he be converted and live." The only requirement is that in this life we confess all our sinning, for here we fail through human frailty.

He takes delight in the conversion of sinners, for he desires the conversion that follows their sins. Surely, he himself is the only sinless one.

See, then, how God instructs and incites you, so that you may be converted from your sins, late though it is, and come to salvation. See how he exhorts you, doomed to death as you are, so that you may live; and with what sweetness and gentle compassion he cajoles you, so that he does not deny a father's love even to the sinner.

Is the death of the impious man of my will, says the Lord God, and not that he should turn from his ways and live? Therefore it is of the Lord's will that all be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth; and wherever the sentence of God seems severe and ferocious, he condemns not men but sins.

For if it had not been His will that they should hear and be saved, He ought to have been silent, not to have spoken in parables; but now by this very thing He stirs them up, even by speaking under a veil. "For God willeth not the death of the sinner, but that he should turn unto Him and live."

I mean, surely I seek nothing else than a mere end of their wickedness and a stop to their evil? Surely I look for no accounting of past deeds if I see them willing to change? Do I not cry aloud each day, "Surely I have no real wish for the death of the sinner as for his conversion and life"? Do I not take every means to snatch from destruction those ensnared in deceit? Surely, after all, if I see them changing I will not hesitate?… Surely I do not bring you from nonbeing for the purpose of destroying you? It is not in vain that I prepared the kingdom and the countless good things beyond description, was it? Did I not also make the threat of hell for the purpose of encouraging everyone by this means also to hasten toward the kingdom?

A petition for pardon is a full confession; because one who begs for pardon fully admits his guilt. So, too, penitence is demonstrated as acceptable to God, who desires it rather than the death of a sinner.

But behold, while we search out the secrets of the heavenly citizens, we have digressed far from the order of our exposition. Let us therefore sigh toward those of whom we speak, but let us return to ourselves. For we ought to remember that we are flesh. Let us be silent meanwhile about the secrets of heaven, but before the eyes of our Creator let us wipe away the stains of our dust with the hand of repentance. Behold, divine mercy itself promises, saying: There shall be joy in heaven over one sinner doing penance; and yet through the prophet the Lord says: In whatever day the just man shall sin, all his righteousnesses shall be in oblivion before me. Let us consider, if we can, the dispensation of heavenly loving-kindness. To those who stand, if they should fall, he threatens punishment; but to the fallen, that they might desire to rise, he promises mercy. He terrifies those, lest they presume upon their good works; he comforts these, lest they despair in their evils. You are just—fear wrath, lest you fall; you are a sinner—trust in mercy, that you may rise.

But if the righteous man turns himself away from his righteousness, and does iniquity according to all the abominations which the impious man is accustomed to work, shall he live? All his righteousnesses which he had done shall not be remembered; in the transgression by which he transgressed and in his sin which he sinned, in it he shall die. Just as old offenses do not weigh down the righteous man who was formerly a sinner, so former righteousnesses do not help the sinner who was formerly righteous; each one is judged in that in which he is found.

O such strictness toward the righteous! O such abundant forgiveness toward the sinner! He finds so many different means, without himself changing, to keep the righteous in check and forgive the sinner, by usefully dividing his rich goodness. And listen how. If he frightens the sinner who persists in sins, he brings him to desperation and to the exhaustion of hope. If he blesses the righteous, he weakens the intensity of his virtue and makes him neglect his zeal, since he considers himself already blessed. For this reason he is merciful to the sinner and frightens the righteous.

Remark all the sins which God threatens, thou wilt at once see that they are present sins. But if his past righteousness shall not profit the righteous in the time of his iniquity, neither shall his wickedness which he hath forsaken hurt the wicked man in the time of his righteousness; for it is written, Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the Lord, and he shall obtain mercy.

And you have said: The way of the Lord is not equitable. Hear, house of Israel: Is my way not equitable, and are not rather your ways crooked? He gives the reasons why the sentence of the Lord is just: 'Do you think me unjust', he says, 'in rendering the sins of the fathers to the sons, so that while some eat the sour grape, the teeth of others are set on edge? Behold, each one dies in his own sin and is given life in his own righteousness; in both cases, not the things past but the things present. Rather it is your sentence that is unjust, you who think that the parable is not a parable, but take it as though it were the truth of history, that the crimes of some are punished in others'.

When we have made the Lord's yoke heavy and hard to us, we at once complain in a blasphemous spirit of the hardness and roughness of the yoke itself or of Christ who lays it on us.

ON THE PERSON WHO HAS RECEIVED FAITH IN CHRIST. — It is written: “The righteousness of the righteous shall not benefit him on the day that he goes astray; and the wickedness of the wicked shall not harm him when he turns back” (Ezek. 18:26–27). And the Lord in the Gospel says: “He who does not believe is already judged” (Jn. 3:18); by this indicating that the one who believes is not subject to judgment for the reception of a sentence, but will be found worthy of praise by the merit of faith. Therefore, the knowledge of God has this privilege, that it obtains the remission of sins. For the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God is deemed worthy to be freed from all sins. Long wandering in error, tossed by the waves of ignorance in various ways, he has at last been enlightened and has received the flashing light of truth, in which, after great storms, he rests in safety. It is fitting that after this knowledge he restrain himself from those things which he used to do long before when he was set in ignorance. For what does knowledge profit if the former way of life remains? One is seen to have known God if he changes his life and corrects his conduct. For once God is known, he must be feared, because he is proclaimed as the one who will judge: so that the faithful may receive the fruit of their righteousness, and the wicked, that is, the unbelieving, may pay the due penalties for their faithlessness. It is fitting that the righteous rejoice in the future, where Christ will reign with his own: so that righteous as in this world, where the Devil is prince, they are exposed to reproach and injuries, so in the kingdom of Christ they may appear glorious for the sake of him for whom they were judged shameful by worldly people. But the unrighteous, who seem to flourish falsely, resisting the truth by lies, are to be afflicted in punishment; so that those who appeared glorious by hoax may appear exceedingly despised and humbled by the reality. Then the righteous will rejoice that they have believed, when they see the faithless tormented; and the faithless will not even regret that they did not believe except when they see the glory of those whom they considered foolish and shameful because they believed, and their own punishment. Therefore, from the fact that someone professes to be a Christian, he must strive not to sin and arm himself against vices; and because it is impossible always to win, if he is overcome he should grieve lest he be overcome again; for the one who is grieved that he has been beaten restores himself. Whoever, then, resists has a basis on which he can excuse himself if he has been overcome. He shows that he had the desire to win, though he was by no means able. From this there is hope that he can repair himself, so that by constant reflection he may be found more skillful and stronger in the contest. But the one who rises for the purpose of sinning, having become inexcusable, bears a very serious charge. It is worse to live under the profession of God and yet have the will to sin than for someone to be ignorant of God and live shamefully and in defilement. For such a person does not know whom he ought to fear; the other one, knowing, despises. Believers therefore receive remission of sins; yet they will not be glorious unless, after receiving faith, they live in the fear of God, so that, having struggled against the enemies of the Christian name, they may win victory and therefore deserve the reward by conquering more than they are conquered. But the one who understands God and does not approach his faith so as to live as a Christian, but instead wants to receive faith at the end so that he may die a Christian, either is ashamed to live as a Christian, or devotes himself to sins which he thinks can be forgiven him when he has believed, this person, I think, does not have a good case. For he does not want to become or live as a Christian as long as he is in the world, but wants to sin; or he is ashamed to become a Christian. What sort of God does he hope for, from whom, while he is ashamed to serve as a soldier, he wants to receive wages? Such a man is a mocker. Knowing he no longer has time to sin, with death at hand, then he wants to become a Christian; so that, because he can no longer sin, he may say that he believes in Christ, who hates sinning, not that he no longer wishes to sin, but that he cannot, because death has come first. To such people it ought to be read that “God is not mocked” (Gal. 6:7). Indeed, such persons are even accustomed to give such instructions that faith should be given only to those already failing and out of their senses, merely still breathing, fearing that they might recover and be ashamed because they have become Christians. For them the words of the Gospel must be recited: “Whoever,” says the Lord, “is ashamed of me and of my words in this generation, the Son of Man will be ashamed of him when he comes in the kingdom of his Father” (Matt. 10:33). But perhaps they say: knowing that the human race is frail, therefore we want to receive faith at the end of life, so that we may no longer sin. Yet faith must be received in such a way that one knows what he is receiving. Then it will bring its benefit, if he both knows it and professes it. “For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation” (Rom. 10:10). And therefore, one who by then no longer knows where he is, how can he be said to receive? He has received who professes that he has received, knowing that he has received. If they believe that remission of sins is given to those who believe, they ought to know that this one believes whose heart bears witness that he believes. For God, who promised, is the inspector of the heart: he accepts the one whom he sees believing in his heart. Therefore, whose heart does not regard the words of faith, how will he have its benefit? So the person who does not lightly become a Christian upon receiving faith can be seen to act rightly, in that he is observed to strive not to sin easily. But the one who rushes to sin does not want to receive faith, specifically so that he may not be compelled to live well, which he appears unwilling to do; but he wants to obtain faith at death, hoping for exemption and remission of past evils, so that he may be secure both regarding the past and the future, since as a dying man he can no longer sin. But this is done neither with good counsel nor with a clean conscience, that he should want to receive faith then, when he can no longer sin, rather than when he does not want to sin. To such people the saying applies: “Let us do evil that good may come”—that is, let us sin now, and at the last let us believe, and it will be forgiven us. And so it is added: “Their condemnation is just” (Rom. 3:8). For it is not fitting that forgiveness of sins be granted to those who, already knowing God, who wills that no one should sin and hates sinners, are eager to sin, refusing to consider that the gift of God benefits those who, ignorant of God, sin in such a way that they do not know God will judge. But the one who has heard and reflected within himself, and has the intention of sinning, not because he is overcome by some compelling cause, but because he wishes to sin, is hardly to be forgiven. For there are two causes which bring about the remission of sins: one is the gift, the other is repentance, so that whoever has sinned after receiving the gift should be restored through repentance. For since he did not remain in the grace received so as to persevere in freedom, but again subjected himself to sin, he obtains the blotting out of sin by weeping and groaning; for he sinned knowingly and deliberately: not that anyone is ignorant of sin itself, but the one who does not know that God will judge thinks that what he does in sin will be without punishment. Therefore, if a Gentile begins to grow weak and, in the very despair of life, considers within himself the faith and hope that have been promised, he has a complete case for his sins to be forgiven when he believes, and for him not to be held in the underworld, bearing with him the sign of death overcome and despoiled, even though he does not possess dignity or reward. For there ought to be some difference between the one who, stirred by love of his Lord, did not fear to fight against His enemies, arming himself with self‑control and with the observance of all virtues, so that he might resist evil, always anxious as to how he may defend the dominion of his Lord; and the one who, having made common cause with the enemies of his Lord and standing by their side, at the end of life returned to his Lord, not in order to claim the kingdom of his Lord, but so that it might benefit himself alone to be a citizen before being a soldier. For he who wishes to live as a Christian so as to be rewarded after death knows that “the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the future glory that shall be revealed in us” (Rom. 8:18). And therefore, having taken up the armor of faith, he does not hesitate to engage with principalities and powers, so that, being a victor in this world, he may be crowned after this world. For it is fitting that the one who, among the faithless and rebels, bears witness to the kingdom of his Lord in the present should receive a reward for this in the future: so that the enemies of God, seeing the witness of Christ appear exalted in the kingdom of God because of the truth of his confession, may grieve in confusion that they judged false what has been shown to be true; and also that those who believed late, confessing God not in life but in death, when they see how great is the glory of those who, fighting under the armor of Christ, have waged the battles of their Emperor devoutly and faithfully, may regret not that they lived as Christians, but that they were Christians only in death. For one who had no intention of living as a Christian can seem hardly suitable to die as a Christian: perhaps already on the point of death he wished to be called a Christian precisely because the time for sinning was now past. “Lest,” he says, “what is believed should prove true, I wish to become a Christian, losing nothing if what is believed is false”; and because at death it is not the will to sin, but the act of sinning, that ceases, he tests whether faith may be able to profit after death, whereas its usefulness would certainly have been this: that vices and sins should be corrected here, where they had been committed. For a person then shows that he has condemned his past deeds when, following the rule of faith, he appears to change his conduct and his life. For if before he sinned on this account, that he did not know God, when he comes to know Him, he ought no longer to sin, lest it be pointless that he has come to know Him. For a person ought to be made perfect by the knowledge of God. Indeed, before his profession, a Christian ought to understand that he must prove himself more by his works than by his name. For this reason the commandments were given, superior to all other laws and belonging to holiness, so that from these the worship of God might be seen: otherwise they will hear, “Why do you call me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ and not do what I say?” (Luke 6:46). By which He then indicated that it is beneficial to call the Lord “Lord” if His commandments are kept: for he seems a mocker who calls him Lord whose precepts he despises. To such a person the words of the Law must be recited, which say that God is not mocked. Therefore he will be condemned by his own words, because he calls Him Lord whom he shows by his deeds that he is in no way afraid of.

"When the wicked turn away from the wickedness they have committed and do what is lawful and right, they shall save their life. Because they considered and turned away from all the transgressions that they had committed, they shall surely live. They shall not die." Each statement is true because each is divine, whether it is that the just person when he will have turned away from his righteousness, all his righteous deeds will be consigned to oblivion, or whether it is that the wicked person, when he will have been converted from wickedness to righteousness, will be saved, and all his wicked deeds will not be remembered.

For when the righteous man turns himself away from his righteousness and does iniquity, he shall die in them: in the iniquity which he has wrought he shall die. This can be understood thus: the people of Israel, formerly righteous, turned itself away from its righteousness, because it abandoned the author of righteousness, and did iniquity by denying the Son of God; in the sin and crime which it wrought it will die, not in many but in one, killing the heir so that it lost the inheritance.

And when the impious man turns himself away from his impiety which he has wrought, and does judgment and righteousness, he has given life to his own soul; for, considering, he has turned himself away from all his iniquities which he has wrought; he shall live with life, and shall not die. 'On the contrary', he says, 'the people of the nations, not having the knowledge of God, and impious, if it turns itself away from its impiety which it formerly wrought in idolatry, and does the things which were commanded to Israel in the Law, has itself, formerly dead, given life to its own soul; and seeing that it had perished in the iniquities which it wrought, it will believe in him who says, 'I am the way and the life and the truth'; it shall live with life, and shall not die'.

God's justice promises scourges to those without hope but mercy to those who hope in him.

You see my just sentence and you dare to accuse me of injustice? You yourselves needed to be accused; you actually prefer injustice in the face of such an obvious example of justice by your own judge.

And the sons of Israel say: The way of the Lord is not equitable. Are my ways not equitable, house of Israel, and are not rather your ways crooked? To this day Israel blasphemes God: why has he abandoned his people and taken up the multitude of the nations? The Lord rebukes them because their ways are crooked, while the sentence of the Lord is just: having despised or destroyed the former tenants, he sends other farmers into his vineyard; understanding which, in the parable of the Gospel, the Jews said: This shall not be.

The ministers of the grace of God have, by the Holy Spirit, spoken of repentance; and the Lord of all things has himself declared with an oath regarding it, "As I live, says the Lord, I desire not the death of the sinner, but rather his repentance;" [Ezekiel 33:11] adding, moreover, this gracious declaration, "Repent, O house of Israel, of your iniquity." [Ezekiel 18:30] Say to the children of my people, Though your sins reach from earth to heaven, and though they be redder than scarlet, and blacker than sack-cloth, yet if you turn to me with your whole heart, and say, Father! I will listen to you, as to a holy people. [2 Chronicles 7:14] And in another place He speaks thus: "Wash you and become clean; put away the wickedness of your souls from before my eyes; cease from your evil ways, and learn to do well; seek out judgment, deliver the oppressed, judge the fatherless, and see that justice is done to the widow; and come, and let us reason together. He declares, Though your sins be like crimson, I will make them white as snow; though they be like scarlet, I will whiten them like wool. And if you be willing and obey me, you shall eat the good of the land; but if you refuse, and will not hearken unto me, the sword shall devour you, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken these things." [Isaiah 1:16-20] Desiring, therefore, that all His beloved should be partakers of repentance, He has, by His almighty will, established [these declarations].

These words show us that the mind must not fail to believe in the promised blessings and give way to despair; and the soul once marked out for perdition must not refuse to apply remedies on the ground that its wounds are past curing.

Therefore I will judge each one of you according to his ways, house of Israel, says the Lord God. Whether those who are judged are from the multitude of the Gentiles or from the people of Israel, there is no respect of persons with God, but each one will be crowned by his own faith, and condemned by impiety and unbelief.

Turn, and repent of all your iniquities, and iniquity shall not be a ruin to you. Cast away from you all your transgressions by which you have transgressed. This word is properly directed to Israel, that they should repent and abandon their iniquities, or transgressions, by which they transgressed against God. But it can also be understood of both peoples, so that both Israel and the crowd of the nations, abandoning their vices, may turn to him who is able to heal their bruises.

"Make for yourselves a new heart and a new spirit" that you may become a subject of joy for the citizens of heaven. For if there is joy "over one sinner who repents," according to the Gospel, how much more will the salvation of so many souls gladden the blessed saints? You have entered on a good and glorious course: run the holy race in good earnest.

'And make for yourselves a new heart and a new spirit, so that, abandoning the oldness of the letter, you may live in the newness of the spirit'. The new heart of Israel is to believe in him whom it had formerly denied; the new heart of the nations is to abandon idols and, having despised the cult of the dead, to believe in him who is the God of the living.

And why will you die, house of Israel? It is better, as we said above, to take this exhortation, in which it is written, Turn, and repent, as addressed to the person of the Jews, whom he does not wish to die and to whom he is now speaking: 'Why will you die, house of Israel, you who have as fathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob — of whom it is written, The God of the living and not of the dead —? Why will you die by your own fault, you who ought to live by the merit of your fathers and by my mercy?'

Why are you dying? Do not go into the trap. These are the reminders given to the believers, that by walking in them and striving in the commandments they will do the works worthy of eternal life.

Remember the compassion of God, how he heals with olive oil and wine. Do not despair of salvation. Recall the memory of what has been written, how he that falls rises again, and he that is turned away turns again, he that has been smitten is healed, he that is caught by wild beasts escapes and he that confesses is not rejected. The Lord does not want the death of the sinner, but that he return and live. Do not be contemptuous like one who has fallen into the depths of sins.

As we shudder at the wounds of our sins as at deadly poisons, let us apply ourselves to almsgiving, prayer and fasting. Above all, by a charity that loves not only friends but even enemies, let us have recourse to the mercy of that heavenly physician to recover the health of our souls as if by spiritual remedies. For he said, "I take no pleasure in the death of the sinner but rather in the wicked person's conversion, that he may live."

The prayer that frees us from faults wins the heart of the judge and wipes away sins; mercy cannot be withheld from the one who asks for it, as humility fires us to pray unceasingly for forgiveness. All this is achieved by the devoted Lord, for he does not wish to condemn those whom he forewarns.

God knows everything beforehand. But there is that which he wills, and there is that which he does not. He willed to bring the flood, but it was not his will that by means of the flood humans and animals alike would be exterminated. He was brought to do what he did not will by the unworthy, arrogant couplings of the race.

For I do not want the death of the dying sinner, says the Lord God; return and live. 'I do not want you to die', he says, 'whom I begot in salvation: for sons indeed I have begotten and exalted, but they have despised me; return therefore and live'. Return is not said except to those who were formerly with God and afterwards deserted his company. And live through repentance, you who are dead through sin. Therefore Israel, because it does not return to its former state, must be believed to be dead.