Hosea 10

In Scripture there is first a fixing of the roots of virtue, as in the Patriarchs. But later, in the establishment of commands and sacrifices, there is a production of green foliage. Hence, in Hosea, "Israel is a luxuriant vine." And because foliage is not to last forever, but is to be followed by flowers, there followed prophecy with both fragrance and beauty.

Israel is a leafy vine, its fruit was made equal to it; according to the multitude of its fruit it multiplied altars, according to the richness of its land it abounded in images. LXX: Israel is a leafy vine, abundant fruit in it; according to the multitude of its fruits it multiplied altars, according to the good things of their land they will build monuments. For leafy vine, Aquila translated ἕνυδρον, which we can call watery, or ἔξίτηλον, because it loses the flavor of wine. Symmachus has ὑλομανοῦσαν, one that has grown entirely into leaves. Vines that have not been pruned by the vinedresser run riot into shoots and leaves, and the moisture that they ought to have changed into wine they squander on the empty ambition of foliage and leaves; a vine of this kind is ruinous to farmers. Such was Israel, growing in the multitude of its peoples, and not rendering fruit to God the farmer. Let us also put it another way: the leafy vine, or according to the Seventy εὐκληματοῦσα, that is, having good layers and fruitful shoots, bore many clusters, and the fruitfulness of the grapes equaled the size of the branches; but she who before was such, before she offended God, afterwards turned the abundance of fruits into a multitude of offense, so that the more peoples she had, the more altars she built, and surpassed the abundance of the land by the number of idols. For images, the Seventy rendered στήλας, which we call statues or monuments, which properly belong to demons or to dead men. So also the heretics, while they were planted in the Church and growing in the house of God, were called the vineyard of Sorek and bore most abundant fruits; but afterwards, the more numerous they became, the more altars they multiplied for themselves, so that instead of the one altar that is true they built many altars for their error, and according to the richness of their land they abounded in images. The land of the heretics is fruitful: receiving from God keenness of understanding and of talent, so that they might turn the goods of nature to the worship of God, they made idols for themselves out of them. For no one can build a heresy unless he is of ardent talent and has gifts of nature which were created by God the artificer. Such was Valentinus, such was Marcion, whom we read to have been most learned. Such was Bardesanes, whose talent even the philosophers admire. These, then, turned the good things of their land into monuments of the dead, because all their doctrine refers not to the living but to the dead, both to those whom they worship and to those whom they deceive.

Their heart is divided; now they will perish, he himself will break their images, he will lay waste their altars. LXX: They have divided their hearts; now they will perish; he himself will dig under their altars; their monuments will be afflicted. The Hebrews hand down a tale of this kind, confirming their surmise by the authority of the Scriptures: as long as both the kings and the people alike worshiped the golden calves and were in agreement in impiety, captivity did not come. The last king of the ten tribes was Hoshea, of whom it is written that he did indeed do evil in the sight of the Lord, but not like the kings of Israel who were before him; in whose ninth year Shalmaneser, king of the Assyrians, took the people of Israel, and led them away to the Assyrians, and made them dwell by the river Gozan in the cities of the Medes. It is asked, therefore, why they were not taken captive under the worst kings, but under one who had begun in some part to turn to better things? To this they adduce the following: at first the people excused itself and said: We obey the commands of kings, and we cannot resist their tyranny; we worship the calves that we are compelled to adore. But in the days of Hoshea it was ordered by that same king that the calves should not be worshiped with such zeal, but that whoever wished should go to Jerusalem and sacrifice to God in the temple; this decision, they say, the people opposed. And this is what he now says: their heart is divided, that is, the heart of the king and of the people, and with no excuse remaining, now they will perish and be handed over to eternal captivity; for as soon as the people separated from the king, destruction came. And what follows: he himself will break their images, he says of God: and he will lay waste their altars; not that God himself did this with his own hand, but that his will was fulfilled through enemies. That the hearts of the heretics are divided among themselves, and that they fight with contrary opinions, even they themselves do not deny, since they hold different views. Hence they will be destroyed, and the Lord will break, or dig under, their images or altars, which they have fashioned from their own heart; and he will lay waste the monuments by which each of them is called by his own name; and they have called their names upon their lands, so that they are said to belong in no way to the Church of Christ, but to this man or that.

For now they will say: We have no king; for we do not fear the Lord, and what will a king do for us? Speak words of a useless vision, and you will strike a covenant, and judgment will spring up like bitterness over the furrows of the field. LXX: Therefore now they will say: We have no king, because we did not fear the Lord, but what will a king do for us? Speaking words, lying pretexts; he will draw up a testament, judgment will spring up like grass upon the wilderness of the field. After God has broken the images of Israel, and laid waste their altars or statues, and the final captivity has come, they will say: We have no king. And lest they think that the sentence is put off for a long time, he added: Now they will say, when they are laid waste, when they perceive that Hoshea, their last king, has been taken from them; but the king has been taken from us for this reason, because we did not fear the Lord, the true king; for what could a man as king profit us?

The disciples of contrary dogmas too, when their lies have been crushed and their altars and groves overthrown, will say too late: We do not have the kings who formerly ruled over us, by whose deceptions we did not fear the Lord; for what did it profit us to follow those whose help we do not feel in our need? They will say these things seeking some excuse, so that they may seem to have erred not through themselves but through very bad teachers. Hence also the LXX translated their words as false excuses, which the prophet shuns, saying: Do not incline my heart to words of malice, to make excuses in sins. We gladly applaud our own vices, and, overcome by pleasures, we plead the weakness of the flesh or the harsh commands of our elders; hence the words and visions of the heretics will be useless. And they will strike a covenant, not at all with God, but with bitterness, which, when the day of judgment has come, will spring up over the furrows of their field; so that those who sowed in joy may reap in tears; those who laughed may weep; those who had consolation may mourn.

Say what you will, sigh after your old errors, promise yourselves prosperity, which will be turned into its opposite; you will strike a covenant, not at all with God, but with a lie. And after the covenant, which the Seventy translated testament, there will spring up for you not a fruitful crop of grain, not even barley, the food of beasts of burden, not various pulses, not vines that sweat out their fruit into must; the trees will not put forth fruits that change the moisture of the earth into various flavors; but bitterness will spring up for you, or rather the judgment of bitterness, or ἄγρωστις, which in Latin we render as grass. For it is a kind of plant like a reed, which at each of its joints sends a shoot upward and a root downward, and these shoots and twigs in turn are the seedbeds of another plant, and so in a short time, unless it is dug out to its deepest roots, it makes whole fields like thickets of briars. Indeed, even if some dry part of it, provided it has a joint, falls upon cultivated ground, it fills everything with grass. We have said these things according to the LXX translators; but in the Hebrew ros is written, which is translated as bitterness, that is, the judgment of bitterness, of which the Lord also speaks in the Gospel: For judgment I came into this world; and of others it is written that they will receive greater judgment.

The inhabitants of Samaria worshiped the cows of Beth-aven, for its people mourned over it; and its temple-keepers exulted over it in its glory, because it departed from it. For indeed it too was carried into Assyria, a gift to the avenging king; shame will seize Ephraim; Israel will be put to shame in his own will. LXX: With the calf of the house of ὢν those who dwell in Samaria will sojourn, for its people mourned over it. And as they provoked him, they will rejoice over its glory, because it was carried away from it; and binding it for the Assyrians, they bore gifts to King Jareb in the house. Ephraim will receive shame, Israel will be put to shame in his own counsel. What Beth-aven is, for which the LXX translated house of ὢν, and who King Jareb is, which is interpreted avenger, we have discussed more fully above. In Beth-aven, then, that is, Bethel, the inhabitants of Samaria worshiped the golden cows; and he called them in mockery not calves of the male sex but cows, that is, females, so that, plainly, Israel worshiped not only calf gods but cow goddesses. And to show that by the cows of Beth-aven the one calf in Bethel is to be understood, he did not add, the people mourned over them, but over it, that is, over the golden calf. But if the people mourned, why did its temple-keepers exult over it? The Hebrews relate that the golden calves were taken away by the priests by theft, and that bronze gilded ones were put back in their place. When, therefore, the people mourned in the time of need and distress that the golden calves too, among the other gifts, had been sent by the king of Israel to the Assyrian kings, and above all to King Sennacherib, the temple-keepers exulted, because their fraud could in no way be proved or detected. And this is what he says: its temple-keepers, that is, the calf's, exulted over it in the glory of the people, that is, in the calf, which they held as their glory; because it had departed from it, that is, from the people, and had been carried over to the Assyrians.

According to the spiritual understanding we must labor at how we may fit everything to the heretics. The cows of Beth-aven, or of the house of ὢν, which is interpreted toil, were worshiped by the heretics, who boasted that they dwelt in the keeping of the commandments of God, that is, in Samaria; and on the day of judgment, when judgment will spring up like bitterness upon the furrows of the field, the people will mourn over it, that is, over the calf, and over the perverse dogma which it thought to be God. But of the temple-keepers too he did not say, will exult, but, exulted, referring it to past time, over their glory, with which they had once fabricated their glorious things, because the people had departed from God, or because the very glory of God had departed from the people, by whom it had been abandoned.

And the expression, "They opened their mouth upon me like a roaring lion," designates him who was then king of the Jews, and was called Herod, a successor of the Herod who, when Christ was born, slew all the infants in Bethlehem born about the same time, because he imagined that amongst them He would assuredly be of whom the Magi from Arabia had spoken; for he was ignorant of the will of Him that is stronger than all, how He had commanded Joseph and Mary to take the Child and depart into Egypt, and there to remain until a revelation should again be made to them to return into their own country. And there they did remain until Herod, who slew the infants in Bethlehem, was dead, and Archelaus had succeeded him. And he died before Christ came to the dispensation on the cross which was given Him by His Father. And when Herod succeeded Archelaus, having received the authority which had been allotted to him, Pilate sent to him by way of compliment Jesus bound; and God foreknowing that this would happen, had thus spoken: "And they brought Him to the Assyrian, a present to the king."

The Lord himself comes to a trial with "the elders and rulers of the people," as Isaiah predicted. And then he fulfilled all that had been written of his passion. At that time "the heathen raged, and the people imagined vain things; the kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers gathered themselves together against the Lord and against his Christ." The heathen were Pilate and the Romans; the people were the tribes of Israel; the kings were represented in Herod and the rulers in the chief priests. When, indeed, he was sent to Herod gratuitously by Pilate, the words of Hosea were accomplished, for he had prophesied of Christ, "And they shall carry him bound as a present to the king."

And that we may know, they say, that this is what is meant, the following verse shows it clearly: For indeed it was carried into Assyria, a gift to the avenging king. And at once there follows: Shame will seize Ephraim, and Israel will be put to shame in his own will, or in his own counsel. For the fraud of the gilded calves, once detected, is reported to the king of Israel by letter, and the very thing by which they had thought to please is that by which they are put to shame most of all; and they offend those to whom they had sent the gifts, who think that this was accomplished not by the theft of the priests but by the fraud and counsel of the kings. We read in the book of Kings that Menahem, king of Israel, sent to Pul, king of the Assyrians, a thousand talents of silver, that his hand might be with him, that is, that he might give him help; and some think that among these the golden calves too were carried off. For Jareb in the present place Symmachus translated ὑπερμαχητῆ, that is, to the protector and defender.

And whatever the heretics say and compose in fine language, they send as gifts to their king, the devil, referring everything to him; whence shame will seize them for ever, and they will be put to shame in their own wills. A certain man has left it written in his commentaries, both above and in the present place, that King Jareb, that is, the avenger, is to be understood as Christ. This displeases us altogether. For it is impious that what according to the history will be understood of the Assyrian king should according to tropology be referred to Christ.

But the Samaria of spiritual wickedness too, which had divided itself from the people of God, made its king pass swiftly away, namely the speech of the heretics and their doctrine, like foam, or brushwood, upon the face of the water: the one, even while it is seen, suddenly dissolves; the other is easy to lift from the surface of the waters and cast into the fire. Such are the heretics, swelling with foaming words and mixing precepts destined for burning into the baptism of Christ and into his words.

Samaria has made her king pass away like foam upon the face of the water, and the high places of the idol, the sin of Israel, will be destroyed. The bur and the thistle will come up upon their altars; and they will say to the mountains: Cover us; and to the hills: Fall upon us. LXX: Samaria has cast out her king like brushwood upon the face of the water, and the altars of ὦν, the sins of Israel, will be taken away. Thorns and thistles will come up upon their altars; and they will say to the mountains: Cover us; and to the hills: Fall upon us. For foam, which the LXX and Theodotion translated φρύγανον, that is, brushwood, dry grasses and withered twigs, which are got ready for the furnace and for burning, Symmachus put ἐπίζεμα, wishing to indicate the upper waters of a boiling pot, rising into foam and bubbles, which the Greeks call πομφόλυγας. As, then, the foam that is upon the water quickly dissolves, so the kingdom of the ten tribes will swiftly be ended; and the high places will perish, that is, bamoth, of which it is written: But still the people were sacrificing and burning incense on the high places. Now these high places are those of ὦν, or auen, that is, of the idol, which is interpreted useless; and this idol and useless thing is the sin of Israel.

But once the idol and its high places have been scattered: The bur and the thistle will come up upon their altars. A sign of utter desolation, so that not even walls and the last traces of buildings are left. At that time they will say to the mountains: Cover us; and to the hills: Fall upon us. This the Lord says is to be fulfilled in the last time of the Jewish captivity. Whatever, then, is now said against the ten tribes, or against all Israel, let us know that it can also be transferred τυπικώς (typologically) to the whole people, so that when the Romans had taken Jerusalem and overthrown the temple, or when the day of judgment comes, as others suppose, they say, fearing with great horror, to the mountains: Cover us; and to the hills: Fall upon us, preferring to die rather than to see the things that bring death.

All these will pass away, and the grand words on which they labored, which is what ὦν is interpreted, will at once be scattered, the words in which Israel sinned; and so great will be the desolation of that most wicked doctrine that thorns and thistles will come up upon their altars. That thorns and thistles spring up where there is no cultivation of the fields is plain to all. These are the thorns that choke the seed and do not let it grow, which spring up in the hand of the drunkard, and which Israel produced instead of the grape. For the Lord waited for it to produce grapes, and it produced thorns, or the wild vine, which has the likeness of the grape and twists the mouths of those who eat it with its bitter taste. Therefore, when the time of judgment comes and all things have been overthrown, they will say to the mountains, which they formerly thought lofty, and to their former teachers: Cover us; and to the hills: Fall upon us. But because with the mountains he put cover, and with the hills: fall, something more sacred must be explained. To the mountains, that is, to the saints, who have a true and not a feigned height, they will say: Cover us. For blessed are those whose iniquities are covered. And to the hills, which have no natural height, which they once thought had something of loftiness, they will speak: Fall upon us; for the mountains will cover, and the hills will fall; and these things will happen out of fear and incredible dread, through which both mountains and hills will be humbled.

And as they led him away, they laid hold upon one Simon, a Cyrenian, coming out of the country, and on him they laid the cross, that he might bear it after Jesus. And there followed him a great company of people, and of women, which also bewailed and lamented him. But Jesus turning unto them said, Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for me, but weep for yourselves, and for your children. For, behold, the days are coming, in the which they shall say, Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never bare, and the paps which never gave suck. Then shall they begin to say to the mountains, Fall on us; and to the hills, Cover us. [Hosea 10:8] For if they do these things in a green tree, what shall be done in the dry? And there were also two other, malefactors, led with him to be put to death. And when they were come to the place, which is called Calvary, there they crucified him, and the malefactors, one on the right hand, and the other on the left.

The Seventy interpreted Gibeah as hills. From the days of the hills, then, Israel has sinned, when it abandoned the mountains of the Church and went down to the hills, or heretical slopes, thinking itself more learned than the Church is and to have found something more sublime: there they stood, that is, they persisted in error. And what follows, The battle will not overtake them on the hill, some have interpreted thus: because they have begotten sons of iniquity, and, withdrawing from the Church, have begun to be on the hills, when persecution comes the battle will not overtake them, since the devil is unwilling to attack his own. Others thus: Since from the days of the hills Israel has sinned, and stood there and could walk no further, must it not be overtaken by battle on the hills? Ought not churchmen to fight against it, to destroy them over the sons of iniquity? If they are overtaken and overcome, they will no longer be able to beget.

From the days of Gibeah Israel has sinned; there they stood. The battle against the sons of iniquity will not overtake them in Gibeah. According to my desire I will chastise them; peoples will be gathered against them when they are chastised for their two iniquities. LXX: Since the hills have been, Israel has sinned; there they stood. War did not overtake them on the hill against the sons of iniquity; he came to chastise them, and peoples will be gathered against them when they have been chastised in their two iniquities. From the day on which Benjamin shamefully and cruelly killed the Levite's wife in the city of Gibeah, all Israel has sinned against me; not because it avenged the wrong and punished the crime with blood, but because it leapt to battle out of a husband's grief and would not avenge the sacrilege against its own God, in that it disregarded the ephod and teraphim in the house of Micah, which were worshiped as idols. Here, then, Israel stood; there it checked its step, so as to walk no further in the ways of the Lord. Therefore the battle, or captivity, will not overtake them on account of Gibeah, as they themselves suppose; for there they did well to pursue the sons of iniquity; but I will chastise them, he says, and instruct them with the whole will of my mind, and I will gather against them a multitude of peoples, because they committed two iniquities, avenging a man and neglecting the wrong done to their God. Or two iniquities, because they sinned first in the idols of Micah, second in the calves of Jeroboam. Or at least we can call the two calves of Samaria, in Dan and Bethel, the two iniquities, of which Jeremiah too speaks: My people have done two most evil things; they have forsaken the fountain of living water, and dug for themselves broken cisterns, which cannot hold water. These two iniquities broke out against two commandments of the Decalogue, in which it is said: I am the Lord your God; you shall have no other gods besides me.

And at the same time the Lord promises that he will chastise and instruct them, so that, when the teachers have been overcome, their own disciples, whom they had deceived before, may be gathered against them and see the chastisement on account of the two iniquities: because they both abandoned the Church, the fountain of the Lord, and dug for themselves broken cisterns, namely the caves of the heretics, which cannot hold the waters, that is, the doctrine of the Savior and the mystery of baptism.

Ephraim is a heifer trained to love threshing, and I passed over the beauty of her neck; and I will mount upon Ephraim; Judah will plow, Jacob will break up the furrows for himself. LXX: Ephraim is a heifer — or a cow; for what in Hebrew is called egla, that is, μόσχος (calf) and δάμαλις (heifer), signifies both —; Ephraim, then, is a heifer taught to love contention; but I will come upon the beauty of her neck; I will lay upon Ephraim and I will keep silent about Judah; Jacob will be strengthened for himself. This passage, or rather everything that follows this section, is wrapped in great obscurities. Hence let both we who try to explain it and the prudent reader with us pay attention, so that, if not the truth, which is most difficult, we may at least be able to track down a conjecture of what is probable. The divine word has this custom, to express the truth of the history through tropology and metaphor. Ephraim, then, is like a cow or a heifer which from her youth has learned to tread the threshing floor and to drag iron wheels over the heaps of grain, so that the chaff may be separated from the wheat; and she has not only learned it, but through excessive habit has begun to love what she was taught. And I, he says, passed over the beauty of her neck. The Hebrew word abarthi, that is, I passed over, especially when it is said by God, always signifies blows and adversities. Indeed the destroyer too is recorded to have passed through in Egypt. Because, then, Ephraim, the cow or heifer, loves to tread the threshing floor, I, he says, passed over the beauty of her neck, and, laying a yoke on it, I tamed the swelling muscles of her neck. Why should I mention the yoke of the law? I myself mounted upon her, and while I was laboring thus, Judah, that is, the two tribes, began to cleave the fields with the plowshare and to turn the earth back into furrows. And while Ephraim bore the yoke and Judah plowed, Jacob broke up the furrows for himself. Here by Jacob, as distinct from Israel and Judah, let us understand the twelve tribes, in that they began to break the clods with hoes and to crumble the earth, so that, softened, it may receive the seed, and after a little while a fruitful crop may sprout. For threshing, or threshing floor, the Seventy translated contention, and the sense is: Because Ephraim will not receive the yoke of the law, I will pass over and mount upon the beauty of her neck, so that the contentious and wanton cow may learn to labor, which she does not want. But Judah will plow of his own accord, because he has the temple; and he abides in the law, so that all the twelve tribes vie with one another in preparing the fields for sowing. And what follows according to the same Seventy, I will lay upon Ephraim and I will keep silent about Judah; Jacob will be strengthened for himself, can have this sense: On Ephraim, who is contentious and will not bear the burdens of the law, I will lay captivity. Judah, however, I will leave for a little while and say nothing about him; but whoever, whether of Ephraim or of Judah, keeps my precepts will be strengthened for himself and will be called Jacob. According to ἀναγωγήν (anagogy) this can be said: that Ephraim, who was instructed in the law of God so as to tread the threshing floor of the Scriptures and to meditate on it day and night, began to love contention, to throw off the yoke of the law, and to contend against the churchmen to the subversion of the hearers. Hence the Lord will either press down with the yoke the neck that is lifted up and promises itself lofty things, or, passing over, will himself trample it with his feet and mount upon him, so that he may know that he has a Lord. But Judah, that is, the churchman, will plow, persevering in the work he has begun. Or: I will keep silent, he says, about Judah. It is not, after all, the healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick. But Jacob, which is interpreted supplanter, who daily supplants vices and sins, and receives his brother's birthright, and is heir of his father's possession, and sleeps in Bethel, which is interpreted house of God, will break up the furrows and the clods, so that the earth may receive the scattered seed in its soft bosom, and may yield a hundred measures of barley, or, as it is in the Hebrew, a hundredfold. For it is not to be believed that the patriarch Isaac devoted himself to barley and not to wheat. To this day the churchman Jacob breaks into pieces the clods of the history and the hardness of the letter, and divides them spiritually, so that they can yield spiritual fruits. This indeed we read that the Lord too did, breaking into pieces the five loaves of the law, which the people could not eat whole, so as to give them through the hands of the apostles to believers to eat. And what he says according to the Seventy, Jacob will be strengthened for himself, shows that everyone who labors labors for himself, so as to gain everlasting fruits.

Be careful, therefore, O bishop, to study the Word, that you may be able to explain everything exactly and that you may copiously nourish your people with much doctrine and enlighten them with the light of the law. For God says, "Enlighten yourselves with the light of knowledge, while we have yet opportunity."

So that we may know clearly what is meant by not having a share in the works which do not bear fruit, let us first inquire as to what sort of actions merit the attribute unfruitful—whether those only that are forbidden or such also are commendable but are not performed in good dispositions. In the Old Testament, the prophet, comparing the saints with the tree, says, "which shall bring forth its fruit in due season." Solomon declares, "The work of the just is unto life, but the fruit of the wicked is sin"; and Hosea, "Sow for yourselves in justice, reap the fruit of life."

I do not say, however, that knowledge of letters is to be despised or neglected, which adorns the soul and instructs it, and makes it able to instruct others also. But those two things ought and are expedient to come first, in which the preceding argument declared the sum of salvation to consist. And see whether he was not contemplating and teaching this order who said: Sow for yourselves unto justice, reap the hope of life; and then at last, he says, illuminate for yourselves the light of knowledge. He placed knowledge last, as a painting, which cannot stand upon an empty surface; and therefore he set those two things before it and placed them beneath it, as if he were laying something solid beneath a painting. I shall now attend to knowledge in safety, if first through the benefit of hope I shall have received security of life. You therefore have sown for yourself unto justice, if from true knowledge of yourself you have been awakened to fear God, have humbled yourself, have poured forth tears, have lavished alms, and have given yourself over to other works of piety, if you have afflicted your body with fasts and vigils, if you have wearied your breast with beatings and heaven with cries. For this indeed is to sow unto justice.

Sow for yourselves in righteousness and reap in the mouth of mercy. Renew for yourselves the fallow ground; but it is the time of seeking the Lord, when he comes who will teach you righteousness. LXX: Sow for yourselves in righteousness, gather for yourselves the vintage of the fruit of life; light for yourselves the light of knowledge, for it is time; seek the Lord, until the fruits of righteousness come to you. He keeps up the metaphor taken from farmers, once he has begun it. He had said that Ephraim, a trained heifer, loves and cherishes the threshing of the threshing floor, and that he had mounted upon her neck, and that Judah had plowed, and that Jacob had broken up the furrows, or the clods. Now he commands them to sow for themselves through repentance, and to sow in righteousness, that is, in the law, and to reap in mercy, that is, in the grace of the Gospel; for there it is: An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth; here we read: Whoever strikes you on the right cheek, offer him the other as well. And when you have sown in righteousness and reaped in mercy, renew for yourselves the fertile fallow lands. And he gives the reasons why they should sow, why reap, why renew the fertile fallow lands. It is the time, he says, of seeking the Lord, when he comes, Christ and Savior, who will teach you righteousness, which you now hope for in the law: For Christ is the end of the law unto righteousness for everyone who does good. Where we said, reap in the mouth of mercy, the Seventy translated, gather for yourselves the vintage of the fruit of life; and reaping suits seed better than the vintage does; but the fruit of life is he who is also the tree of life. And where we put, renew for yourselves the fallow ground, they rendered, light for yourselves the light of knowledge, so that from the works and commandments of the law we may deserve to have knowledge, according to what we read in a certain book: You have desired wisdom; keep the commandments, and the Lord will give it to you. For whoever turns the commandments into works sows in righteousness and will reap from it the fruits of life. Whence we read elsewhere too: The commandment of the Lord is bright, enlightening the eyes. And Isaiah says to the Lord: Your precepts are a light upon the earth. And in another place: From your commandments I have gained understanding. Those too who have been separated from the Church and take to themselves the false name of Christians are commanded to repent and to receive both testaments: to sow righteousness in the Old, to reap mercy in the New; and to light for themselves the light of knowledge, or to renew for themselves the fallow lands, and to seek the Lord, who can teach them true righteousness, and to destroy the false teachers, from whom they learn not righteousness but iniquity.

Therefore, if you are concerned to attain to the light of spiritual knowledge not by the vice of empty boastfulness but by the grace of correction, you are first inflamed with desire for that blessedness about which it is said, "Blessed are the pure of heart, for they shall see God." [Thus] you may also attain to that about which the angel said to Daniel: "Those who are learned shall shine like the splendor of the firmament, and those who instruct many in righteousness like the stars forever." And in another prophet: "Enlighten yourselves with the light of knowledge while there is time."

But behold also how holy and how wonderful is the very order of the things. Not first the "breastpiece" and afterward the "ephod", because wisdom is not before works, but works ought first to be had and afterward wisdom is to be sought. Then, next, not "manifestation" before the "rational", because we ought not to teach others before we ourselves are instructed and rational. But above these is added "truth", because "truth" is the highest wisdom. Finally the prophet too keeps this same order, when he says: "Sow for yourselves unto righteousness, and reap the fruit of life, kindle for yourselves the light of knowledge." You see how he does not say first: "Kindle for yourselves the light of knowledge", but first: "Sow for yourselves unto righteousness", and it does not suffice to sow, but "reap," he says, "the fruit of life", so that after these things you may be able to fulfill what follows: "Kindle for yourselves the light of knowledge."

It is the bishop's duty not to be silent in the case of offenders but to admonish them, to exhort them, to wrestle them down, to afflict them with fastings, that so he may strike a pious dread into the rest. For he is called to bring up the children of Israel in piety. For the bishop must be one who discourages sin by exhortations, who sets a pattern of righteousness, who proclaims those good things that are prepared by God, and who declares that wrath which will come at the day of judgment, lest he neglect the field of God and increase its condemnation. To avoid this carelessness, hear that which is said by Hosea: "Why have you held your peace at impiety? You have reaped the fruit of lies."

"They ate the fruit of deception," namely, they had a useless and senseless hope. For the true fruit is the one that can save and help, the love toward God and the glory of righteousness. On the contrary, the false fruit would reasonably be considered impiety, for in the end it altogether descends to what is abominable.

You have ploughed impiety, you have reaped iniquity; you have eaten the fruit of lying. LXX: Why do you keep silent about impieties, and you have gathered the vintage of his iniquities; you have eaten lying fruit. I am compelled against my will to discuss rather often the peculiarities of the Hebrew language; for we do not, after the manner of the rhetoricians, repeat maxims, build up words, and rouse our hearers or readers by declamations to our own praises. But what is obscure, above all in a foreign tongue, we strive to explain to men. Above, where we translated: Judah shall plough, in the Hebrew is read ieros, with iod as the first letter; the Seventy, thinking it uau, translated: and shall I keep silent? Now too in the Hebrew is written arasthem, which we have rendered you have ploughed, for which the Seventy translated: why do you keep silent; by the same error as above, rendering silence for ploughing. And this is the sense of what is said: Over the neck of the heifer Ephraim, contentious and loving to thresh, I passed; and I went up, so that, while Judah ploughed and broke up the furrows, Jacob might tread the threshing floor and bear the heat of the sun. And I admonished them to sow in righteousness and to reap in mercy, and to make for themselves fallow ground; and to know that that is the time for seeking the Lord in which he will come who will teach us righteousness. While I commanded this and willed to receive from the glad fallow lands the fruits of righteousness and mercy, they ploughed impiety, because they acted impiously against the Lord, forsaking the Creator and worshipping idols; and they reaped iniquity, receiving from evil seed evil fruits, from which they made not only bread baked under the ashes, but deceitful and lying bread, which would deceive the one who eats it with an empty hope. Of this kind are the heretics, who plough with composed speech and protect or keep silent about impiety, lest it seem to be impiety, but be believed to be piety. Hence, because they said in their heart: There is no God, they are corrupt and have become abominable, they also reaped, or gathered the vintage of, iniquities. For as avarice is the root of all evils, so the root of all sins and crimes is impiety, and whoever has ploughed, or sown, it will reap iniquities. Those therefore who have ploughed impiety and reaped iniquities have eaten the fruit of lying, preaching to the deceived peoples all things that are false, so that they do not seek the true bread which came down from heaven, but the bread of lying, which chokes and kills those who devour it.

Because you have trusted in your ways, in the multitude of your mighty men,

a tumult will rise up among your people, and all your fortresses will be laid waste; as Salmana was laid waste by the house of him who judged Baal in the day of battle, the mother dashed down upon the sons, so has Bethel done to you from the face of the malice of your wickednesses. LXX: Because you have hoped in your chariots, in the multitude of your strength, destruction will rise up among your people, and all your walled places will depart; as the princes of Salmana from the house of Jerubbaal in the days of war dashed the mother down upon the sons, so will I do to you, house of Israel, from the face of your wickednesses. Therefore you have eaten the fruit of lying, and in all that you set before yourselves an empty hope has deceived you; because you have trusted, O Ephraim, in the ways of your idolatry; for these are your ways; and in the multitude of your mighty men, having your hope not in God but in the strength of an army.

We have escaped, after a fashion, from the rugged places; now, spreading our sails for the deep, let us cross the sea of allegory. Because you have trusted, O Ephraim, in the ways, or in the chariots, of yours, of which it is written: Some in chariots and some in horses; but we will be magnified in the name of the Lord our God; and you have trusted in the multitude of your mighty men, whom you have strengthened for yourself by false knowledge; therefore a tumult and noise will rise up among your people. For whatever the heretics say has no voice that unfolds meanings, but only tumult, clamor and noise. And all your fortresses, or the things that are walled, will be laid waste —, for they have been fortified and built not with the testimonies of the Scriptures, but with the art of dialectic and the arguments of the philosophers —; as Salmana was once laid waste by Gideon, the mother being killed upon her sons. This history the eighty-second (83rd) psalm also recalls, where it records that among the other leaders of Midian there was also Salmana, saying: Do to them, O Lord, — no doubt meaning those who have entered into a pact or covenant against God —, as to Midian and to Sisera. And after the rest: Make, he says, their princes like Oreb and Zeeb, and Zebah and Salmana, all their princes who said: Let us possess the sanctuary of God by inheritance. For in this psalm too the leaders of the heretics are described, who have tried to claim the altar of God for themselves.

And so a tumult will rise up among your people, which in Hebrew is called Saon, that is, the noise and roaring of a howling army; and at their shouting all your fortresses will be laid waste; and the places you thought fortified and safe will lie open to the enemy and will be laid waste just as Salmana, the prince of the Midianites, was laid waste and crushed, who was killed by the house of Jerubbaal. There is no doubt that he means Gideon, who, from the fact that he destroyed the temple of Baal and cut down the grove, and Baal could not avenge himself, obtained the surname Jerubbaal, that is, let Baal avenge himself; so that, as Salmana killed the sons in front of their mothers, the mothers themselves also being killed afterwards, so too your sons, O Ephraim, may be killed in your presence, you who are yourself also to be slaughtered. We ask where it is written that Salmana killed the mother upon her sons; we read in the book of Judges, where Gideon speaks to the prince of Midian: As your sword has made many mothers childless, so your mother will be without sons among women.

As, therefore, Salmana was laid waste by Jerubbaal, whom some wrongly think to be Jeroboam son of Nebat, who ruled over the ten tribes, and was laid waste, as is contained in the Hebrew, by Arbel, which signifies the very same thing as Jerubbaal, but in a shorter and more eloquent expression; so has Bethel done to you, O Israel, from the face of your wickednesses, Bethel, where you set up the golden calf and worshipped the gods of Egypt. For Bethel, which is interpreted house of God, the LXX translated house of Israel, which is not found at all in the Hebrew.

And what follows, So has Bethel done to you from the face of the malice of your wickednesses, is properly fitted to the leaders of the heretics: that Bethel has done this to them, the one they themselves call Bethel, that is, the house of God, and a false Church; so that the sense is: So will your Church do to you, which you call the house of God; but from the time it is held by you, it must be called Beth-aven, that is, house of the idol, because of the multitude of your wickednesses.

As the morning passes, the king of Israel has passed away; because Israel was a child, and I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son; they called them, so they went away from their face. They sacrificed to the Baalim and offered sacrifice to images. LXX: In the morning they were cast away, the king of Israel was cast away; because Israel was a little child, and I loved him, and out of Egypt I called his sons. As I called them, so they themselves went away from my face. They sacrificed to the Baalim and burned incense to carved images. He sets out the same sense under different figures. He who had said above: Samaria has made her king pass away like foam upon the face of the water, because foam and bubbles floating on the surface of the waters are quickly dissolved, now puts the same thing under another likeness. For as the rising of the dawn, the first light and the beginning of the day, which is called morning, passes quickly between the nearness of night and of the sun, so that the night ends and the day grows bright, so the king of Israel, that is, of the ten tribes, will swiftly pass away.

And we understand that the heretics pass away like the first light of dawn, and their king, the devil, or the heresiarch; whom in their infancy, — when they believed in the Church, and were little ones, and were reckoned under the name of Christ —, God loved; and he called them out of the tribulation and darkness of Egypt. And he called them through the apostles and the teachers of the Church. And when they had been called, he says, by my leaders, they withdrew from their face and worshipped Baal-peor, that is, they served their own vices and lust, and afterwards they sacrificed to the Baalim and to images which they had fashioned for themselves. For each of the heretics has his own gods, and whatever they have feigned they set up as a carved and a molten image.