Isaiah 26

Hence, if they find anyone outside, they beat, wound and rob him by not believing in the true flesh of Christ that was nailed to the cross, from whom true blood flowed when pierced by a lance, and by not believing in the true God who bore a true soul and laid it down freely and raised it up freely. Isaiah prophesied about this city and, indeed, demonstrated with his finger, when he said, "Behold, our Savior is a strong city, fortified with walls and bulwarks."

For this reason, it seems to me that the wall represents the people who are acquainted with the one omnipotent God, having been brought near to the Word of the Father, about whom Isaiah prophesied, saying, "The Savior is our strong city. A wall and a bulwark is established in him." This indicates that Christ was shown to be equipped with a true soul and true flesh for the redemption of the world. But those who have already attained greater perfection, who are prepared to have their blood shed for the sake of his name, who by their own example offer unbelievers access to salvation, are compared with gates. For although the Word of God clothed himself with the nature of every human person for the liberation of the human race, it is nevertheless true that anyone becomes the wall or the gate of the prophesied city, that is of Christ, who, bearing God's image and holding fast to the true faith, merits with his holy works to contain the Word himself, as he promised through the prophet: "I will dwell within them, and I will be their God."

This is the wall of which the prophet says: “Our strong city is Zion; the Savior shall be set within it as a wall and fortification” (Isa. 26:1). By this wall, therefore, Christ is signified together with all his members, so that its foundation represents him, while the rest of its structure represents his members.

In that day this song will be sung in the land of Judah: The city of our strength, the Savior, a wall and an outer wall will be set in it. LXX: In that day they will sing this song in the land of Judea: Behold a strong city, and our salvation will set a wall and a surrounding wall. When Moab has been brought low and pulled down to the ground, even to the dust, and all enemies laid beneath the feet of Christ, then this song will be sung in the land of Judah, or Judea, each of which means confession: so that, as we have understood Zion and Jerusalem as the heavenly city, so we may also understand the region of this city as the heavenly confession. Indeed, the saints, unwilling to sing the song of Judea in a foreign land, say: How shall we sing a song to the Lord in a foreign land? (Ps 136 [137]:4). I think that this is the song which in another place too the saints are commanded: Sing to the Lord a new song (Ps 95 [96]:1). And this song will be what follows: The city of our strength, the Savior (Matt 5). Which is this city? The one which, set on a mountain, cannot be hid. Of which it is written also in another place: The rush of the river makes glad the city of God (Ps 45 [46]:4); and again: Glorious things are spoken of you, city of God (Ps 86 [87]:2). The founder of this city is he of whom the Father speaks: he has built my city; nay rather, the city of our strength is the Savior, that is, Jesus. And a wall and an outer wall will be set in it: the wall of good works, and the outer wall of right faith, so that it may be enclosed by a double fortification. For it is not enough to have the wall of faith, unless faith itself is confirmed by good works. This wall and this outer wall, or surrounding wall, is built of living stones, which, according to the prophet, are rolled upon the earth. For what we have rendered, outer wall, Symmachus translated bulwark: so that the walls themselves are girded with fortifications, and with rampart and ditch and other walls, which in the building of camps they are accustomed to call breastworks.

597. In that day. In this part, he gives thanks for the justification of the people, and it is divided into two parts:

in the first, he foretells the state of the just;

in the second, he shows the fruit of justice: the old error (Isa 26:3).

Concerning the first, he does two things.

For first, he foretells the confidence of the just: in that day, after the return from captivity and the affliction of the Moabites by the Maccabees, or after the coming of Christ; O Zion, the savior, Christ, or Judas Maccabeus, is a city of strength; therein, namely, in protection, a wall and a bulwark shall be set, these only literally in the time of the Maccabees; or a wall, Christ, a bulwark, the prophets. Or otherwise: Zion is the city, the savior, God, or Christ, or Judas Maccabeus, a wall, that is, defending like a wall: the name of the Lord is a strong tower (Prov 18:10); I will be to them, says the Lord, a wall of fire round about (Zech 2:5).

609. Note on the words, the city of our strength (Isa 26:1), that Christ is the city of our strength, because he strengthens us:

first, in faith: other foundation no man can lay, but that which is laid: which is Christ Jesus (1 Cor 3:11);

second, in hope: we may have the strongest comfort, we who have fled for refuge to hold fast the hope set before us (Heb 6:18);

third, in charity: being rooted and founded in charity (Eph 3:17); I am come to cast fire on the earth (Luke 12:49);

fourth, in work: it is God who works in you, both to will and to accomplish, according to his good will (Phil 2:13);

fifth, in temptation: God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able (1 Cor 10:13);

sixth, in accusation: we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ (1 John 2:1);

seventh, in reward: I will make him a pillar in the temple of my God (Rev 3:12).

When Hezekiah, the king of Judah and son of Ahaz, was gravely ill and had learned of his coming death by the prophecy of Isaiah, he turned his face to the wall and wept bitterly. Immediately the Lord in his mercy not only averted the destruction of imminent death but also added fifteen years to the man's life. Then, at last, Hezekiah sang this song. Hezekiah, a holy man who reigned at that time over all of Israel, displayed the Lord's form: clearly he had every movement of body, soul and mind in subjection to himself, and he accepted the consequences of his infirmity and weakness. He knew without doubt through the prophetic message that the end of his life was approaching. For the longer we seem to live, the more indubitably is our future death foreknown to us. And if we turn our face to the wall when struck by the fear of death, that is, if we direct the vision of our hearts to the Savior, who is here represented by the wall because he is elsewhere called "a wall," we will be saved, inasmuch as he saves the faithful who dwell within him from a great many attacks. "In the city of our strength," says Isaiah, "is the Savior established as a wall and a fortress." Behold, the Savior is said to be a wall.

Open the gates, and let the righteous nation enter, keeping the truth. The old error has gone; you will keep peace: peace, because we have hoped in you. You have hoped in the Lord for everlasting ages. LXX: Open the gates, let the people enter which keeps righteousness, and keeps the truth, laying hold of the truth, and keeping peace: peace, because they have hoped in you, O Lord, for ever. This whole song, which the saints are to sing in the land of confession and praise, suddenly changes persons, and is woven as if by question and answer. The people of God had said: The city of our strength, the Savior, a wall and an outer wall will be set in it. The Lord answered, or rather commanded, not those who had said this, but the angels who presided over the gates of the Lord's city, that they should open the gates, and let the righteous nation enter through them, keeping the truth, or, as is said in the Hebrew, EMMUNIM (אמונים), which in our language is rendered faiths, in the plural number, not the singular. Which are the gates that are opened by the angels, so that there may enter, not the people of the Jews, which has been cast off, but the righteous nation, which from faith has received the name of the faithful? Surely those of which the holy man speaks: Open to me the gates of righteousness; having entered them, I will confess to the Lord (Ps 117 [118]:19). But no one will be able to enter these gates except one who has been freed from the gates of death, as the Psalmist said: You who lift me up from the gates of death, that I may declare all your praises in the gates of the daughter of Zion (Ps 9:15). For when we have been snatched from the gates of death, then we shall be able to sing all the praises of the Lord in the gates of the daughter of Zion. And as I consider the gates of death to be sins, of which it is said to Peter: The gates of hell shall not prevail against you (Matt 16:18), so I consider the gates of righteousness to be all the works of the virtues; and he who has entered them will find one gate, of which it is said: This is the gate of the Lord, the righteous shall enter by it (Ps 117 [118]:20). And as through many pearls one comes to the one pearl, so through many ways and gates we come to him who says that he is the way and the gate, through which we enter to the Father.

After the words of the people and the answer of the Lord, and again the voice of the people, the Prophet speaks to the believers: You have hoped, or hope in the Lord, for everlasting ages, and the rest that follows. According to the Seventy, he enters the gates of the Lord who keeps righteousness in good works, and keeps or embraces the truth in the truth of faith, so that through good works and faith he may come to the peace which surpasses all understanding, and may merit to receive that peace; because he has believed in God, who is the eternal rewarder of good works (Phil 4). Hence also in another place it is written: You have desired wisdom: keep the commandments, and the Lord will grant it to you (Sir 1:33).

598. Second, the Lord foretells their justice, saying to the angels: open the gates, of heaven or of virtue, closed by sins; or, literally: it is not necessary for you to close the gates because of the unfaithful, for they are all just: this is the gate of the Lord, the just shall enter into it (Ps 117[118]:20).

610. Note also on the words, open the gates (Isa 26:2), that we ought to open the gates through meditation,

first, on the misery of hell, below: I shall go to the gates of hell (Isa 38:10);

second, on the just life: let her works praise her in the gates (Prov 31:31);

third, on the glory of heaven: he has strengthened the bolts of your gates (Ps 147:13).

After the word of God, the people answered in Hebrew JESER SAMUCH (יצרסמך), which Aquila and Symmachus translated alike, πλᾶσμα ἐπηρεισμένον, that is, our error has been taken away, or our thought has been made firm, which before wavered between you and the idols, so that we are by no means carried about by every wind of doctrine, but believe with our whole mind in you, the Lord Savior. For this, so that the sense might be made plainer, we translated, the old error has gone. And because our thought has been made firm, therefore you will keep for us the peace which you promised to the Apostles, saying: My peace I give you, my peace I leave you (John 14:27); and not once only but a second time, so that the recompense which is promised with a double word may be secure, according to what the Apostle too said: Rejoice, again I say rejoice (Phil 4:4). And this he obtains of whom it is said in Leviticus: Man, man, of the children of Israel (Lev 17); and in the book of Numbers: Man, man, whose wife has defiled his bed (Num 5:12): so that the double man and the double husband may obtain a double peace. And we merit peace, they say, because we trust in you with our whole mind.

599. The old error. Here he sets out the fruit of justice, namely, peace; for which is first set out the petition of the people, which contains three things.

For the suitableness of the petitioners is set out: the old error, namely, of idolatry: the old things are passed away (2 Cor 5:17); the benefit of peace is asked for: you will keep peace, of body and soul, below: my people shall sit in the beauty of peace (Isa 32:18); their meriting of peace is alleged: because we have hoped in you: who has hoped in the Lord, and has been confounded? (Sir 2:11).

611. Note also on the word, peace (Isa 26:2), that there are three things that make peace in the present life:

first, contempt for temporal riches, below: but the wicked are like the raging sea, which cannot rest (Isa 57:20);

second, subjugation of carnal concupiscence. Living at peace in their houses (Sir 44:6);

third, contemplation of divine wisdom: his place is in peace: and his abode in Zion (Ps 75:3[76:2]).

In the Lord God, the strong one, for ever: for he will bow down those who dwell on high; he will bring low the lofty city, he will bring it low even to the ground; he will pull it down even to the dust. The foot will trample it, the feet of the poor, the steps of the needy. LXX: O great eternal God, who have brought low and pulled down those who dwell on high, you will destroy strong cities, and will bring them down even to the pavement, and the feet of the meek and the lowly will trample them. These things too the Prophet speaks, who answered from that place where he had said above, Hope in the Lord for everlasting ages; and he joins to it what we have now set forth: In the Lord God, the strong one, for ever, and the rest. For the Lord God, the strong one, the Hebrew has three names, IA (יה) and ADONAI (יהוה) and SUR (צור), of which one signifies invisible, another ineffable, another mighty; the first of them is placed as the last syllable in ALLELUIA (הללו יה). And let the diligent reader observe this, that we sometimes divide the text in setting out a testimony, because the edition of the Seventy produces one sense, and the translation rendered word for word from the Hebrew another. The Prophet says, then: Hope in the Lord for everlasting ages: in the Lord God, the strong one, for ever, whose help is everlasting.

600. Second, the response of the prophet is set out, who is the mediator between the people and God: you have hoped. And this is divided into three parts:

in the first, the promise of peace is set out;

in the second, the procurement of peace: the way of the just (Isa 26:7);

in the third, the announcement of the procured peace: the inhabitants of the world shall learn justice (Isa 26:9).

601. Concerning the first, he does three things.

First, he concedes their merit: you have hoped in the Lord for eternal ages, that is, forever: in him has my heart confided, and I have been helped (Ps 27[28]:7).

Second, he adds counsel: in the Lord God, that is, hope in the Lord God: he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved (Matt 10:22).

For he will bow down those who dwell on high, because everyone who exalts himself will be humbled; those who boasted that they had Abraham as their father, and said in insult of the Lord: We were not born of fornication (John 8:41). He will bring low the lofty city: as the Jews think, Rome; as we prove to be more correct, Jerusalem, which killed the Prophets and stoned those who were sent to it, and at the last killed the son of the householder, so that, the heir being slain, the inheritance might perish (Luke 13). Nor is it called a city, which in Hebrew is said IR (עיר), but CARIA (כריה), which Aquila translated πολίχνην, which we can call either little city or hamlet or small town; and Jerusalem is frequently called by this name in the Scriptures. And he did well to set down a double humbling, He will bring low, he will bring it low: first under the Babylonians, when the temple was destroyed; the second time under Titus and Vespasian, whose ruin remains until the end.

And because it is said in the words of the Savior, Everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted (Luke 14:11), we can refer this not only to men but also to the adverse powers. According to the Seventy, the Prophet sings praises to God because he brings low all the proud, and razes the fortifications of all cities to the ground, and the feet of the saints, the meek and the lowly trample them.

Third, he promises the benefit of peace for the destruction of enemies: for he shall bring down them that dwell on high, the high city he shall lay low. He shall bring it down even to the ground, he shall pull it down even to the dust. The Jews say this refers to the Romans, but it can refer to any of their enemies, or, mystically, to the Jews themselves, above: the bulwarks of your high walls shall fall (Isa 25:12).

The foot will trample it, and he repeats and joins the feet of the poor, without doubt of Christ, of whom we have said above too: He has become strength to the poor, strength to the needy in his tribulation. The steps of the needy, namely of the Apostles, who, imitating the poverty of the Lord, obtained also the privilege of his power; who, not being received, shook off upon it the dust of their feet.

And he adds the condition of those who destroy them: the foot shall tread it down, the feet of the poor, the Jews, who have little; the needy, who need to have many things. Or, if taken mystically, he sets out the Jews' meriting of destruction on account of the poor Christ, of whom it says in Psalm 69:6[70:5]: but I am needy and poor, and also: but I am poor and sorrowful (Ps 68:30[69:29]); the needy, the disciples.

The path of the righteous is straight, straight is the track of the righteous for walking; and in the path of your judgments, O Lord, we have waited for you; your name and your memorial are in the desire of the soul: my soul has desired you in the night. LXX: The way of the righteous is straight, the way of the righteous has been made straight, and prepared. For the way of the Lord is judgment; we have hoped in your name, and in the remembrance which our soul desires. The Prophet is still speaking of Christ, of whom he had said above: The foot will trample it, the feet of the poor. The path of this righteous one, then, is straight, or, to coin a new word, straightnesses, which the Greeks call εὐθύτητας, and which we can call more in the Latin manner equities; and in Hebrew they are called MESSARIM (משרים). In the one path of Christ, then, all righteousnesses are found; and for that reason he trod and wore it with his own foot, so that whoever wishes to walk along it may walk with an unstumbling course.

602. The way of the just. Here is set out, as it were, a dispute of the prophet with the Lord, to obtain the petition of the people.

And first, he urges him by arguments to punish their enemies;

second, he urges him from experience: you have indulged (Isa 26:15).

Concerning the first, he does two things:

first, he urges him to punish them;

second, to detain them in punishment: let not the dead live (Isa 26:14).

Concerning the first, he does three things:

first, he urges him to justice;

second, he excludes mercy: let us have pity (Isa 26:10);

third, he determines the punishment: and he shall not see the glory of the Lord (Isa 26:10).

603. Now he provokes him to justice by setting out three things.

First, the rightness of justice: the way of the just, that is, of justice: the Lord conducted the just through the right ways (Wis 10:10).

612. Note also on the words, the way of the just (Isa 26:7), that the way of justice is right:

first, because of the shortness of its course: we have walked through hard ways (Wis 5:7);

second, because of the evenness of its site, whose mean does not vary: knowing that he came from God and goes to God (John 13:3);

third, because of its beauty: the Lord bless you, the beauty of justice, the holy mountain (Jer 31:23).

In this path of the Lord's judgments the saints have waited for him, and have hoped in him, because hope does not confound. And they have had his name and memorial in the desire of their soul, saying: My soul has longed to desire your judgments at all times (Ps 118 [119]:20); and again: My soul desires, and has fainted for your salvation (ibid. 81). And he who has the name of the Lord in his desire desires nothing else. And this must be noted, that the desire for the Lord is not in the flesh but in the soul, according to what we read in another psalm: My soul has thirsted for God, the strong, the living (Ps 41 [42]:2). For the flesh lusts against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh (Gal 5). For these are opposed to one another, so that we do not do the things we wish.

Second, the expectation of the afflicted, setting out three things:

the expectation itself, in the way, that is, through the punishment, of your judgments, by which you vindicate and liberate us: your justifications I will never forget: for by them you have given me life (Ps 118[119]:93);

the desire of those in expectation: your name: this is the name that they shall call him, the Lord our just one (Jer 33:16).

For this reason, as I have already said, you ought to read and listen to the sacred lessons with such eagerness that you may be able to speak about them and teach them to others in your own homes and elsewhere, wherever you are. As you, like clean animals, ruminate the Word of God by continuous reflection, you may be able to procure useful favor for yourselves, that is, their spiritual meaning, and with God's help give it to others. Then will be fulfilled in you what is written: "Your cup overflows!" Moreover, you will fulfill what the blessed apostle encourages and advises when he says, "The fact is that whether you eat or drink—whatever you do—you should do all for the glory of God." If infirmity does not prevent it, fast daily. Hasten to the vigils with cheerful and fervent devotion because of what is written: "O God, my soul yearns for you in the night"; and again: "To you I pray, O Lord; at dawn you hear my voice"; and still further: "At midnight I rise to give thanks to your name, O Lord." To this our Lord and Savior also exhorts and encourages us when he says in the Gospel: "Be on guard, and pray that you may not undergo the test." May he himself deign to grant this, to whom are honor and might together with the Father and the Holy Spirit, world without end.

For "night" is this present life, and as long as we are in it, we are covered with a mist of uncertain imaginations as far as the sight of inward objects is concerned. For the prophet was sensible that he was held by a certain mist in his sight of the Lord, when he says, "My soul longed for you in the night." As if he were to say, I long to behold you in the obscurity of this present life, but I am still surrounded by the mist of infirmity.

Anyone who has been able to reach out for the truth has been on fire with this love. For this reason David said, "My soul has thirsted for the living God; when shall I come and appear before the face of God?" And he counseled us, saying, "Seek his face continually." And for this reason the prophet said, "My soul has desired you in the night, and with my spirit within my breast I will watch for you in the morning." And again the church says to the Lord in the Song of Songs, "I have been wounded with love."It is right that the soul, after bearing in its heart a wound of love brought on by its burning desire, should reach out for healing at the sight of the doctor. And so, again, it says, "My soul melted when he spoke." The heart of a person who does not seek the face of his Creator is hardened by his wickedness, because in itself it remains cold. But if it now begins to burn with the desire of following him whom it loves, it runs since the fire of love has melted it. Its desire makes it anxious. Everything that used to please it in the world seems worthless; it finds nothing agreeable outside of its Creator; things that once delighted the heart afterwards become grievously oppressive. Nothing brings it consolation in its sadness as long as the one it desires is not beheld. The heart sorrows. Light itself is loathsome. Scorching fire burns away the rust of sin in the heart. The soul is inflamed as if it were gold, for gold loses its beauty through use, but fire restores its brightness.

And what follows, In the night, according to the Seventy is joined to the following passage, according to the Hebrew to the former one. And he can say, My soul has desired you in the night, who says confidently with the Psalmist: Every night I will wash my bed, I will water my couch with tears (Ps 6:7). Night and darkness can also be taken for tribulation and distress. Hence in another psalm too the Prophet sings of the security of the righteous: The sun will not burn you by day, nor the moon by night (Ps 120 [121]:6), that is, neither in prosperity nor in adversity will you ever be moved from your place.

But also with my spirit within my breast, from the morning I will watch for you. LXX: From the night my spirit rises early to you, O God: for your judgments are a light upon the earth. We wish both to follow the Hebrew and not to pass over the common edition entirely, and by this necessity of things we are compelled to seek different understandings in a different order and wording. So what is said, from the night, is, according to the Seventy, as we said, the beginning of this passage; according to the Hebrew, the end of the preceding one; although even according to the Seventy it can be taken at the end of the preceding testimony, so that the sense is: My soul desires you in the night; and afterwards it begins: in the morning my spirit rises to you, O God. And it rises in the morning for this reason, because your precepts are a light upon the earth. For, keeping your commandments, and illumined by the light of those of which it is said, The precept of the Lord is bright, enlightening the eyes (Ps 18 [19]:9), I cannot sleep, but desiring you at all times, I rise to you with my spirit. And this must be observed, that while still placed in the night we desire the Lord with the soul; but after our spirit within our breast has moved itself toward God with the whole mind, let us watch for him in the morning: and, to speak more plainly, night and desire are joined to the soul, but morning and watching to the spirit. Further, he watches for God with the spirit within his breast who can say: Out of the depths I have cried to you, O Lord (Ps 129 [130]:1).

When you have done your judgments on the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness. Let us have mercy on the impious, and he will not learn righteousness; in the land of the saints he has done wickedly, and he will not see the glory of the Lord. LXX: Learn righteousness, you who dwell upon the earth. For the impious has ceased, and he will not learn righteousness upon the earth; he will not do truth; let the impious be taken away, that he may not see the glory of the Lord. Let us speak first according to the Hebrew, and when we have chosen to express the sense of the Prophet, then let us pass to the Seventy translators. As long as you do not exercise your judgments upon the earth, and neither repay good to the good nor evil to the evil, your righteousness, O Lord God, is unknown on the earth. But when on the day of judgment you have rendered to each what he deserves, according to the quality of his works, then your righteousness will be known in the world, which before seemed unjust among the unbelieving, so that one of the saints too said: But my feet were almost moved, my steps had well-nigh slipped: for I was zealous over the wicked, seeing the peace of sinners (Ps 72 [73]:2).

According to the Seventy, the inhabitants of the earth are commanded to learn righteousness. For every man seems righteous to himself; but God knows the hearts of all, who will render to each according to his works (Prov 21). And in another place of the same book it is said: There are ways of a man which seem straight; but their ends look into the depth of hell (Prov 14:12). Hence we ought to learn righteousness, and not trust in our own judgment. For there is a righteous man who perishes in his righteousness (Eccl 7); not because he is righteous, but because he seems to himself to be righteous. But if Christ has been made for us by God wisdom and righteousness, sanctification and redemption (1 Cor 1), those who are commanded to know righteousness are commanded this: to learn and know Christ. And I command you, he says, to learn righteousness for this reason, because the impious has been taken away, and his kingdom destroyed, who, as long as he reigned on the earth, could neither know righteousness nor do truth; of which it is written elsewhere that grace and truth came through Jesus Christ (John 1:17). And because the impious does not do truth on the earth, he will be taken away: for he does not deserve to see the Lord reigning.

But, as I said, at the crowing of the cock their President comes, and gently touching the sleeper with his foot, rouses them all. For there are none sleeping naked. Then as soon as they have arisen they stand up, and sing the prophetic hymns with much harmony, and well composed tunes. And neither harp nor pipe nor other musical instrument utters such sweet melodies, as you hear from the singing of these saints in their deep and quiet solitudes. And the songs themselves too are suitable, and full of the love of God. "In the night," they say, "lift up your hands unto God. With my soul have I desired Thee in the night, yea with my spirit within me will I seek Thee early."

And now, beloved, I ought to say a word about the antiquity of the tradition and the utility of vigils. It is easier to begin a work if we keep before our eyes how useful it is. The devotion to vigils is very old. It has been a household tradition among the saints. It was the prophet Isaiah who cried out to the Lord: "My soul has yearned for you in the night. Indeed, my spirit within me seeks you early in the morning."

The constancy of the desire, for day and night, that is, at all times, or in prosperity and adversity, my soul has desired you: in my bed I sought him whom my soul loves (Song 3:1); O God, my God, to you do I watch at break of day (Ps 62:2[63:1]).

Third, he sets out the usefulness of justice: when you shall do your judgments on the earth, the inhabitants of the world shall learn justice: the Lord shall be known when he executes judgments (Ps 9:17[16]).

When, by such faith and knowledge, the Lord's people have embraced this true life, they surely receive the joy of heaven. The wicked, on the other hand, since they don't care about the Lord's life, are rightly deprived of its blessings. For, "let the wicked be taken away so that he shall not see the glory of the Lord." In the end they, like everyone else, shall hear the universal proclamation of the promise, "Awake, sleeper, and rise up from the dead." They shall rise and knock on the doors of heaven, saying, "Open to us." The Lord, however, will rebuke them for rejecting knowledge of him and will tell them, "I do not know you."

In the resurrection itself it is not easy to see God, except for those who are clean of heart; hence, "Blessed are the clean of heart, for they shall see God." From here on he begins to speak of that world where all who rise again will not see God, but only those who rise to eternal life. The unworthy will not see him, for of them it is said, "Let the wicked be taken away lest he behold the brightness of the Lord." But the worthy will see him, and of such the Lord spoke when, though present, he was not seen, saying, "He that loves me keeps my commandments, and he that loves me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him and will manifest myself to him."

In this human form the good will see him in whom they have believed; the wicked, him whom they have despised. But the wicked will not see him in the form of God in which he is equal to the Father, for as the prophet says, "The wicked shall be taken off that he may not see the glory of the Lord," and, on the other hand, "Blessed are the clean of heart, for they shall see God."

Then, therefore, we shall come and we shall enjoy the one thing; but the one thing will be all things to us. For what was it I said, my brothers, when I began to speak? What is that sufficiency which we shall possess when we shall have no need? What is the sufficiency which we shall possess? I had intended to say, "What will God give to us which he will not give to them?" "Let the wicked be taken away that he may not see the glory of God." Hence God will give his glory to us so that we may enjoy it; and the wicked will be taken away that he may not see the glory of God. God himself will be the entire sufficiency which we shall possess as our own. Greedy one, what did you seek to gain? What does anyone, for whom God is not enough, seek from God?

His coming means his return from the judgment to his kingdom. The Lord comes to us after the judgment, because he lifts us up from his human appearance in the contemplation of his divinity; his coming means that he leads us to the vision of his glory. We see in his divinity after the judgment the one we beheld in his humanity at the judgment. At the judgment he comes in the form of a servant and appears to everyone, since it is written, "They will look on him whom they pierced." When the condemned fall down to their punishment, the righteous are led to the brightness of his glory, as is written: "The wicked is taken away, so that he will [not] see the glory of the Lord."

To which the Lord answered: Let us have mercy on the impious; which all, except the Seventy, translated alike. And the sense is: rather let the impious obtain mercy, and learn my clemency, while he too is saved. And again, to the Lord as he speaks, the Prophet answered in the person of human impatience: And he will not learn righteousness. And the sense is: and how will he be able to know your righteousness, if he has experienced only clemency? And he gives the reasons why he wishes him to learn the righteousness of God: because he has acted wickedly in the land of the saints, and has fought continually against your saints, he ought to feel torments. And again the Lord, tempering the sentence, says: And let him not see, or he will not see the glory of the Lord. And the sense is: it is enough for him, in place of all punishment, that he will not see me reigning with my saints in my majesty. Some wish the impious one, that is, RESA (רשע), to be understood as the devil, of whom it is written in the ninth psalm: You have rebuked the nations, and the impious has perished; you have blotted out their name for ever and for ever and ever. The swords of the enemy have failed unto the end, and their cities you have destroyed (Ps 9:6). But let us take the impious generally either for the sinner or for one who does not have the worship of God.

O Lord, let your hand be exalted, and let them not see: let them see, and let the zeal of the people be confounded, and let fire devour your enemies. LXX: O Lord, your arm is lofty, and they did not know; but knowing they will be confounded: zeal will seize the untaught people, and now fire will eat the adversaries. What he had said above, and he will not see the glory of the Lord, can be understood thus: You ask, O Prophet, that I should not have mercy on the impious, lest, if I have had mercy on him, he who has acted wickedly in the land of the saints should begin not to know righteousness; I answer you: will he then not see the glory of the Lord? Will he then not behold my triumphs, he who rather ought to see me reigning, so that he may know how great a good he lacks? And this is to be read more pointedly, with the voice of one asking a question.

For our Lord Jesus Christ came, not only that we might behold His glory here, but also that which shall be. For therefore He saith, "I will that these also be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory." Now if the glory here was so bright and splendid, what can one say of that which shall be? for it shall appear not on this corruptible earth, nor while we are in perishable bodies, but in a creation which is imperishable, and waxes not old, and with such brightness as it is not possible even to represent in words. O blessed, thrice blessed, yea many times so, they who are deemed worthy to be beholders of that glory! It is concerning this that the prophet says, "Let the unrighteous be taken away, that he behold not the glory of the Lord." God grant that not one of us be taken away nor excluded ever from beholding it.

604. Let us have pity. Here he excludes mercy, and concerning this, he does two things.

First, the Lord proposes mercy interrogatively: let us have pity: the earth is full of the mercy of the Lord (Ps 32[33]:5).

Second, the prophet excludes it, because of its uselessness: but he will not learn: because sentence is not speedily pronounced against the evil, the children of men commit evils without any fear (Eccl 8:11); a horse not broken becomes stubborn, and a child left to himself will become headstrong (Sir 30:8); and because of the gravity of the sin, because it profanes a holy place: in the land of the saints he has done wicked things: O God, the heathens are come into your inheritance, they have defiled your holy temple (Ps 78[79]:1); what is the meaning that my beloved has wrought much wickedness in my house? (Jer 11:15).

605. And he shall not see. Here the dispute to determine the punishment is set out.

And first, the Lord asks: and he shall not see the glory of the Lord, as if to say, "should I give this punishment to him because he does not see?" Or forbearingly, "and this suffices for punishment."

Note that there are two kinds of zeal, one full of love, the other full of hatred. The former is indicated in the words, "The zeal of your house has devoured me"; the latter, in the words, "Zeal has taken hold of the senseless people, and now fire shall devour your opponents."

A fire went before the Lord's coming when the hearts of the unfaithful seethed at the preaching of the prophets so that they were fired with the heat of anger, and they debated the murder of those preachers. So this is the fire that shall go before him, but it devoured instead those who stirred it. As the prophet Isaiah said, "And now fire will devour your enemies." Next comes, "And shall burn his enemies round about." "Shall burn," as we have stated, refers to the indignation and sudden mental heat that the enemies of the holy church experienced at that time. "Round about" we must interpret as "on all sides," for as the preachers were few, a countless crowd of enemies hemmed them in.

I know the glittering sword, and the blade made drunk in heaven, bidden to slay, to bring to nothing, to make childless and to spare neither flesh nor marrow nor bones. I know him who, though free from passion, meets us like a bear robbed of her cubs, like a leopard in the way of the Assyrians, not only those of that day, but if anyone now is an Assyrian in wickedness. Nor is it possible to escape the might and speed of his wrath when he watches over our impieties, and his jealousy, which knows to devour his adversaries, pursues his enemies to the death. I know the emptying, the making void, the making waste, the melting of the heart and knocking of the knees together;7 such are the punishments of the ungodly.

To which the Prophet answered: O Lord, let your hand be exalted, and be stretched out to strike, so that the impious may not see you, and may not enjoy the light of your glory, not even for repentance. To whom the Lord answered: Let them rather see and be confounded, either the zeal of the people or those zealous for the people, and let fire devour and consume your adversaries, that is, those of the people of the saints. And it is the fire of repentance, which tortures their hearts because they have lost such a Lord. This can also be understood of the Jews, who did not know Christ, the arm of the Lord, and when they have seen and recognized him whom they had fastened to the gibbet, will be confounded. Then the untaught people, not knowing the law of God, will be roused by the goads of zeal, when it sees that the nations have succeeded to its place, and burns with the fire of regret, or with the pain of punishment, when it hears that which is written: Depart into the eternal fire, which has been prepared for the devil and his angels (Matt 25:41).

606. Second, the prophet responds: Lord, let your hand be exalted.

607. Third, the Lord determines the spiritual punishment: let the envious people see, and be confounded: every eye shall see him (Rev 1:7), in the glory of his humanity, not of his divinity; and the bodily punishment: let fire devour your enemies: they were cast alive into the pool of fire (Rev 19:20).

The time when our external enemy the devil will be under our feet is when the internal enemy, covetousness, has been healed, and we shall be living in peace. What sort of peace? The sort that "eye has not seen nor ear heard." What sort of peace? The sort that no imagination can conceive and no quarreling intrude on. What sort of peace? The sort about which the apostle said, "And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts." About this peace the prophet Isaiah says, "O Lord our God, give us peace, for you have given us everything you promised." You promised Christ; you have given him to us. You promised his cross and the shedding of his blood for the forgiveness of sins; you have given them to us. You promised his ascension and the sending of the Holy Spirit from heaven; you have given them to us. You promised us a church spread throughout the world; you have given it. You promised there would be heretics to try us and put us through our paces, and the church would triumph over their errors; you have given this. You promised the abolition of the idols of the heathen; you have given it.

What's the meaning of "Where, death, is your sting?" It means, "Where is sin?" You ask, and it is nowhere. "For the sting of death is sin." They are the apostle's words, not mine. That is when we will be able to say, "Where, death, is your sting?" Sin will be nowhere, neither to take you captive, nor to assault you nor to tickle your consciousness. That is when we will not say, "Forgive us our debts." But what will we say? "Lord our God, give us peace, for you have given us everything."

"A man's steps are directed by the Lord." Whoever walks a straight path composed of human steps does so not by the freedom of human judgment but by the governance of him to whom Isaiah said, "All of our works were accomplished by you." "What man can understand his way?" In this it becomes clear that whatever goodness anyone possesses from himself he does not have except through the grace of God, because no one is able to understand through the freedom of his own judgment either what kind of future he will have or the quality and duration of conquests to come.

All our merits are rooted in the merit of Christ, whether satisfactory for punishment or meritorious of eternal life, because we are worthy neither to be absolved from offense against the highest good, nor to gain the immensity of the eternal reward, which is God, except through the merit of the God-man, to whom we can and ought to say: All our works you have wrought in us, O Lord.

So they are truly wise who entrust themselves to the power and dispensation of the Godhead; him alone they seek, and the outcome is all that is good for them. This is the message of the prophet Isaiah: "Lord our God, give us your peace; for you have bestowed all things on us." Next comes: "And he gave ear to me." Note that this utterance to the Lord, so short but magnificent in its devotion, sought that he should deign to give ear; what is there that he has failed to give us when out of pity he has granted such a request? For his gaze on us spells deliverance and a bestowal of gifts so great that even the greedy suppliant ceases to beg for them.

"All have fallen." Anyone who refuses to seek out a strong foundation necessarily falls. "Together they became useless," namely, with regard to the work for which they were created. "There is none who does good." There was no one who would do good, because the Jews broke the commandments and the Gentiles spurned the law of nature. When anyone from either party did good, therefore, he knew that he was indebted to grace, not to nature, as the prophet said in reference to the Lord: "in the presence of whom no one is innocent." Isaiah also says in his canticle: "O Lord our God, you will give us peace, for you have accomplished all of our works in us."

And we have learned also to say in our prayers, "O Lord our God, grant us your peace, for you have given us everything," so that if anyone becomes partaker of the peace furnished by God, he will not be lacking any good thing.

Through all that we do, therefore, let us return with a careful mind to the fountain of true light. Let us give thanks to our Creator for the good things we receive, and let us humbly say to him with the prophet Isaiah: "All our works you have worked for us." For our good works are the works of him whose heart it did not suffice to raise us up unless he also bowed down himself for us. For if God, coeternal with the Father before the ages, had not become man in time, when would temporal man have tasted eternal things? Therefore the descent of truth became the ascent of our humility.

O Lord, you will give us peace: for you have wrought all our works for us. LXX: O Lord our God, give us peace: for you have rendered all things to us. It must be noted that after he has rendered to us our works, he is going to give peace, and how they set out the reasons why they ask for peace. For they say that for all the works which they have wrought upon the earth they have endured torments, and that it is just that after punishments and tortures they should obtain mercy. Or otherwise: Because the consummation of the world has come, and all that you spoke through the Prophets has been fulfilled in deed, and you have rendered all that you promised, grant us peace, which surpasses all understanding.

Whenever you see a man living in wickedness, and enjoying great prosperity, and suffering no calamity, on this account lament for him the more, because, being under the power of disease and grievous corruption, he increases his own weakness, becoming worse by luxury and indolence. For punishment is not in itself an evil, but the real evil is sin. The latter separates us from God; the former leads us to God, and mitigates His wrath. How is this shown? Hear the prophet saying, "O priests, comfort ye, comfort ye my people. Speak to the heart of Jerusalem, and say that she has received of the Lord's hand double for her sins." And again: "O Lord our God, give us peace, for thou hast repaid all to us."

But I say all this now, and select all the histories that contain trials and tribulations, and the wrath of kings, and their evil designs, in order that we may fear nothing, save only offending God. For then also was there a furnace burning; yet they derided it, but feared sin. For they knew that if they were consumed in the fire, they should suffer nothing that was to be dreaded; but that if they were guilty of impiety: they should undergo the extremes of misery. It is the greatest punishment to commit sin, though we may remain unpunished; as on the other hand, it is the greatest honour and repose to live virtuously, though we may be punished. For sins separate us from God; as He Himself speaks; "Have not your sins separated between you and Me?" But punishments lead us back to God. As one saith, "Give peace; for Thou hast recompensed us for all things." Suppose any one hath a wound; which is the most deserving of fear, gangrene, or the surgeon's knife? the steel, or the devouring progress of the ulcer? Sin is a gangrene, punishment is the surgeon's knife. As then, he who hath a gangrene, although he is not lanced, hath to sustain the malady, and is then in the worse condition, when he is not lanced; so also the sinner, though he be not punished, is the most wretched of men; and is then especially wretched, when he hath no punishment, and is suffering no distress.

608. Fourth, the prophet consents rejoicing, setting out two good consequences from these punishments: the peace of the people, therefore, Lord, this having been done, you will give us peace, and we hope for this from you: for all our works: it is God who works in you, both to will and to accomplish (Phil 2:13), you have wrought, the works, that is, the punishments, by which you have sufficiently cleansed us, below: she has received of the hand of the Lord double (Isa 40:2).

613. Note also on the word, peace (Isa 26:12), that there are three things that make peace in the future life:

first, the abundance of good things: he has placed peace in your borders (Ps 147:14);

second, freedom from evils, below: and my people shall sit in the tabernacles of confidence (Isa 32:18);

third, immobility: in peace in the self same I will sleep, and I will rest (Ps 4:9[8]).

For the Son of God indeed, being himself the Word, is Lord of all. But we once were subject from the first to the slavery of corruption and the curse of the law. Then by degrees fashioning for ourselves things that were not, we served, as says the blessed apostle, "them which by nature are no gods." Ignorant of the true God, we preferred things that were not to the truth. But afterwards, as the ancient people when oppressed in Egypt groaned, so when we too had the law "engrafted" in us, according to the unutterable sighings of the Spirit made our intercession, "O Lord our God, take possession of us"; then, as "he became a house of refuge" and a "God and defense," so also he became our Lord. Nor did he then begin to be, but we began to have him for our Lord.

Therefore Christ will hand the kingdom over to God and the Father when through him the Father will be known by sight, for his kingdom consists of those in whom he now reigns through faith. In fact, in one sense Christ's kingdom means his divine power according to which every created thing is subject to him; and in another sense his kingdom means the church in respect to the faith that it has in him. In accord with this meaning is the prayer of him who says, "Possess us," for it is not the case that [Christ] himself does not possess all things. This is also the meaning of the following statement: "When you were the slaves of sin, you were free from righteousness." Therefore he will destroy every dominion and every authority and power, so that he who sees the Father through the Son will neither require nor be pleased with repose in his own or the power of any created thing.

O Lord our God, lords have possessed us without you: only in you may we remember your name. LXX: Lord our God, possess us: O Lord, besides you we know no other, we call upon your name. For this reason we seek mercy and peace, which is to be granted after all things, because lords have possessed us without you, namely the idols, or the demons who sit by the idols; and we ask nothing else but that, after very many errors, we may be worthy to remember your name. According to the Seventy, those who said, Lord God, possess us, pray for this, that after peace has been restored to them they may become the possession of God. This indeed we read also of Wisdom, which according to the Hebrew speaks in Proverbs: God possessed me, the beginning of his ways (Prov 8:22), although some copies wrongly have creature for possession. Then it follows: But before all the hills he begot me. For how can begetting be fitted to a creature, when it rather suits possession? It is written in Deuteronomy: Is not he your father, who possessed you, and made you, and created you? (Deut 32:6). And this must be considered, that he did not say, the Lord, or God, possessed you, and made you, and created you; but father, so that the clemency of the name might soften the severity of the power. And what follows, O Lord, besides you we know no other, does not exclude the Son, but joins him to the Father; for he did not say "We know no other," but "Besides you we know no other." And since the Son says, I am in the Father and the Father in me, we do not know the Son outside the Father (John 14:10), because we know him in the Father. And indeed we name his name too, saying in the Lord's Prayer: Our Father, who art in heaven (Matt 6:9).

Second, the praise of God: O Lord our God, other lords besides you have had dominion over us, and therefore we could not give ourselves to praise of you; only in you, to whom alone we give ourselves, having no other god: servants have ruled over us (Lam 5:8).

For hence it is said by the prophet, "The dead shall not live; the giants shall not rise up again." For whom does he call "the dead" except sinners, and whom does he designate "giants" except those who over and above take pride in sin. Now the former do "not live," because by sinning they have forfeited the life of righteousness; these latter too "cannot rise up again" after death because after their transgression they are swollen with pride and do not have recourse to the remedies of penitence.

Let the dying not live; let the giants not rise again. Therefore you have visited and crushed them, and have destroyed all memory of them. LXX: For the dead will not see life, nor will physicians raise them up. Therefore you have brought on, and destroyed, and taken away every male of theirs. Symmachus, in his manner, more plainly: The dead will not give life; the giants will not raise up. Therefore you have visited and crushed them, and have utterly destroyed all memory of them. Let us speak first according to the Seventy. The question seems difficult, how the dead do not see life. It is solved thus: they do not see life so long as they are dead. As if we were to say, a blind man does not see the light so long as he is blind; but if he has recovered his health, he will look upon the light: so too he who is dead in iniquity and sins cannot live before he is given life by righteousness and the virtues, through him who says, I am the life (John 14). Hence God is also called the God of the living, not of the dead (Matt 22). For the soul that sins, it shall die (Ezek 18:4). We read in the Epistle written to the Hebrews: Not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works (Heb 6:1). But if sins are called dead works, why should not, on the contrary, the virtues be called living works? And what follows, Nor will physicians raise them up, its sense is plain: the fables of the poets are condemned, who boast that Virbius was raised up by Aesculapius. And this is to be said not only of the dead, but of every infirmity: that without the mercy of God the art of healing avails nothing. But how? Unless the Lord builds the house, they have labored in vain who build it: unless the Lord guards the city, he has watched in vain who guards it (Ps 126 [127]:1, 2). So unless the Lord has cured the sickness, the physicians labor in vain who desire to heal the sick. Unless the Lord has guarded health, they guard it in vain who even publish precepts for guarding health in their own books; and one must always learn, not only in the health of the body but also in that of the soul: Bless the Lord, O my soul, who heals all your sicknesses (Ps 102 [103]:1, 3). Further, those who persist dead in sin, and can recover the health of the soul by no art of medicine, will be utterly destroyed and taken away by the Lord, and whatever is strong in them, which is called the male, will be wholly removed. Hence Pharaoh too does not wish to kill the female sex, which is frail in itself and can easily perish, but every male, which, if it has grown up and come to manly age, is killed with difficulty (Exod 1). According to Symmachus, the dead will not give life, because, being dead in sin, they cannot give life to others, nor is praise seemly in the mouth of a sinner. And the giants, that is, RAPHAIM (רפאים), will not raise up others, they who themselves, according to the book of Genesis, are called the falling. And the Lord visits them, so that all memory both of the dead and of the giants may be blotted out. For he alone it is who raises the dead, of whom it is said: As the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so the Son also gives life to whom he will (John 5:21). We can call the dead the images of dead men, and the giants the demons who sit by their images. Nor should it trouble us why the Seventy translated male and the other translators memory, since among the Hebrews both are written with the same three letters, ZAI (ז), and CHAPH (כ), and RES (ר). But when we say memorial, it is read ZACHAR; when male, ZOCHOR. And they think that Saul was deceived by this ambiguity of the word when he fought against Amalek and killed every male of them (1 Sam 15). For when God commanded that he should blot out all memory of Amalek under heaven, he, for memory, led astray not so much by error as by the desire for plunder, interpreted males, not knowing that saying of the Apostle: Do not err, God is not mocked (Gal 6:7).

614. Let not the dead live. Here the prophet asks that God not free those punished from further punishment.

And first, he sets out the petition: let not the dead, sinners, live, in the life of glory, unless they repent; let not the giants, glorying in their own power, rise again, to glory: the wicked shall not rise again in judgment (Ps 1:5); the ancient giants did not obtain pardon for their sins (Sir 16:8[7]); or he asks that their fallen enemies not rise again further to power.

Second, he places the answer to the petition: therefore have you visited and destroyed them, and have destroyed all their memory: let their memory perish with a noise (Ps 9:7[6]); in the time of their visitation they shall fall (Jer 8:12).

You have been indulgent to the nation, O Lord, you have been indulgent to the nation. Have you been glorified? You have removed far all the ends of the earth. LXX: Add evils to them, O Lord, add evils to the glorious of the earth: you have made far off all the ends of the earth. The evils which the Seventy put twice are not found in the Hebrew; but because he had said above, Therefore you have brought on and destroyed, and taken away every male of theirs, following the same sense they added of their own, evils: so that those who are glorious on the earth may be crushed by double evils. Further, according to the Hebrews the sense is far otherwise, and in agreement with the earlier discussion. The Lord had said: Let us have mercy on the impious. The Prophet had answered: And where is your righteousness? especially since he has wrought such great evils against your saints. To which the Lord: And he will not see, he says, the glory of the Lord. Again the Prophet: Let your hand be exalted to strike, and let them not see your glory, which they do not deserve to behold. To which the Lord: Let them see rather and be confounded. Again the Prophet: O Lord, give us peace, and possess us, who remember your name. But let the impious and the proud not live, nor rise again in glory, but crush all memory of them. And he gives the reasons why he desires them to perish: You have been indulgent to the nation, O Lord, you have been indulgent to the nation; have you been glorified? And the sense is: You have often had mercy on the nations, that is, on the human race, and have exercised toward them an incredible clemency; have they known you? Have they glorified your name? Have they not, on the contrary, withdrawn far from you? For security breeds negligence, and negligence contempt.

615. You have indulged. Here he urges God to the work of justice from experience;

and first, from experience among the gentiles,

second, among to the Jews: as a woman with child (Isa 26:17).

Concerning the first, he does two things.

First, he demonstrates from the experience of the uselessness of mercy, both as to the remission of sins: you have indulged, and as to the multiplication of good things: you have removed all the ends of the land far off: they become great and enriched, and they are grown gross and fat: and have most wickedly transgressed my words (Jer 5:27–28); the prosperity of fools shall destroy them (Prov 1:32).

O Lord, in distress they have sought you; in the tribulation of murmuring your teaching was to them. LXX: O Lord, in tribulation I remembered you; in small tribulation your teaching was to us. Because, being indulgent, you have often been despised and not glorified, but on the contrary all have withdrawn from the knowledge of you, therefore, O Lord, strike them, so that in distress they may seek you, and in the tribulation of murmuring your teaching may be to them: when so great a weight of evils presses upon them that they do not even dare to cry out confidently, but swallow their pain in silence. According to the Seventy, the Prophet remembers the Lord in tribulation, according to what is said in the psalm: Out of tribulation I called upon the Lord, and he heard me in a broad place (Ps 117 [118]:5). And in another place: To the Lord I cried when I was troubled, and he heard me (Ps 119 [120]:1). Hence the Apostle says: We are troubled, but not distressed; we suffer persecution, but are not forsaken (2 Cor 4:8). And in another place: The sufferings of this time are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come, which will be revealed in us (Rom 8:18). But if a small tribulation teaches, and amends, and corrects, how much more a great one, when we are reminded of our condition and remember the power of God!

Second, the usefulness of avenging justice: Lord, they have sought after you in distress: in their affliction they will rise early to me (Hos 6:1); in the time of their affliction they will say: arise, and deliver us (Jer 2:27).

As a woman who has conceived, when she draws near to the birth, cries out in pain in her pangs: so have we become before your face, O Lord. We have conceived, and as it were travailed, and have brought forth spirit. LXX: And as a woman in travail, when she draws near to the birth, cries out in her pain: so have we become ÷ to your beloved ⁚ because of fear of you, O Lord; we have received in the womb, and have travailed, and have brought forth the spirit of your salvation, which we have made upon the earth. As a woman drawing near to the birth is compelled by pain to cry out, so we seek you in distress, and before the face of the dread of you we have conceived, and travailed, and brought forth, not children of the flesh, but of the spirit: so that we may believe in you with our whole mind, and learn through torments him whom we did not perceive through benefits. What the Seventy added, so have we become to your beloved, for which the others translated, so have we become before your face, O Lord, is to be marked beforehand with an obelus. But we can take the beloved of the Lord as Christ, for fear of whom we conceive, and travail, and bring forth, and make the spirit of salvation upon the earth. An apostolic man can say this too, when he instructs the peoples and imitates the apostle Paul: My little children, with whom I travail again until Christ be formed in you (Gal 4:19). Or is it to be doubted that the apostle Paul made the spirit of salvation upon the earth, who preached the Gospel from Jerusalem as far as Illyricum (Rom 15), and as a wise architect laid the foundation, besides which no one can lay another, which is Christ Jesus (1 Cor 3)? Whether, then, we read, because of fear of you, O Lord, we have received in the womb, or according to the Hebrew, before your face, O Lord, we have conceived, and have received in the womb, both pertain to this: that from the fear and remembrance of the Lord we conceive the word of God, and our heart is illumined as we say: The light of your countenance has been signed upon us, O Lord (Ps 4:7). And, show your face, and we shall be saved (Ps 79 [80]:4).

616. As a woman with child. Here he demonstrates the same thing from the experience among the Jews.

And first, he sets out the scourge of tribulation: as a woman with child: a woman, when she is in labor, has sorrow (John 16:21); there were pains as of a woman in labor (Ps 47:7[48:6]).

Second, the fruit of amendment: so are we become in your presence: now all chastisement for the present indeed seems not to bring with it joy, but sorrow: but afterwards it will yield to them that are exercised by it the most peaceable fruit of justice (Heb 12:11).

Nature provides woman with a womb in which a living person is brought to birth in the course of time. Such too is that characteristic of the soul which is ready to receive in its womblike recesses the seeds of our thoughts, to cherish them and to bring them forth as a woman gives birth to a child. This and no other is the meaning of the words of Isaiah: "We have conceived and brought forth the spirit of salvation."

Their cows did not miscarry, therefore, but gave birth, so that their labor would be increased and that they would beget everything they conceived without reverence for God. The righteous, however, take delight in an altogether different way. They glory not in the abundance of their wealth or the fruitfulness of their livestock but in the Lord, saying, "We were impregnated with reverence for you, and we brought forth the spirit of salvation."

Isaiah also, proclaiming the resurrection to the people, says that he is the announcer of the Lord's message, for we read thus: "For the mouth of the Lord has spoken, and they shall speak in that day." And what the mouth of the Lord declared that the people should say is set forth later on, where it is written: "Because of your fear, O Lord, we have been with child and have brought forth the Spirit of your salvation, which you have poured forth upon the earth. They that inhabit the earth shall fall; they shall rise that are in the graves. For the dew which is from you is health for them, but the land of the wicked shall perish. Go, O my people, and enter into your chambers; hide yourselves for a little until the Lord's wrath pass by."

Even now let us rejoice somehow or other in this hope derived from the promises of one most faithful, until that richest of all possible joys arises, when "we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is," and our joy nobody shall take from us. Of this hope, you see, we have also received already the acceptable and freely given pledge that is the Holy Spirit, who produces in our hearts the unutterable groanings of holy desire. "For we have conceived," as Isaiah says, "and have brought forth the spirit of salvation." And, "when a woman is in labor," the Lord says, "she has sorrow, because her day has come; but when she has brought forth, there is great joy, because a human being has been born into the world." This will be the joy that nobody will take away from us; on the day when we are brought forth into the eternal light from this conception of faith. So meanwhile let us fast and pray, while it is still the day of bringing forth.

"When a woman gives birth, she is sorrowful because her hour has come." He refers to holy church as a woman on account of her fruitfulness in good works and because she never ceases to beget spiritual children for God. He says also in another place about this, "The kingdom of heaven is like yeast which a woman took and hid in three measures of flour until the whole [mass] was leavened." A woman took some yeast when the church, by the Lord's generosity, secured the energy of love and faith from on high. She hid this "in three measures of flour until the whole [mass] was leavened" when she performed her ministry of imparting the word of life to parts of Asia [Minor], Europe and Africa, until all the bounds of the world were on fire with love for the heavenly kingdom. The one who said sadly to those who were departing from the purity of the faith, "My little children, for whom I am again in travail, until Christ be formed in you," was indicating that he was among this woman's members. They testified that they were among her members who were enkindled with heavenly desires, who cried out in praise of their Maker, "It is out of fear of you, Lord, that we have conceived and been in travail and given birth to the Spirit."

Therefore faith can neither be conceived nor augmented in the human heart unless it is infused and nourished by the Holy Spirit. For we are reborn from the same Spirit from which Christ was born. The Spirit by which Christ is formed according to faith in the heart of each believer, therefore, is also the Spirit by which he was formed bodily in the womb of the Virgin. For this reason, it is in the person of the believer that the prophet cries out to the Lord: "Out of reverence for you, Lord, we conceived in the womb and brought forth; we have brought the spirit of your salvation upon the earth."

Let us talk about how "mercy is put in the balance" as holy Isaiah declares, for goodness is not without discernment, as the first laborers in the vineyard fancied, because they could not perceive any distinction between those who were paid alike. And [let us talk about] how anger, which is called "the cup in the hand of the Lord" and "the cup of falling which is drained," is in proportion to transgressions, even though he abates to all somewhat of what is their due and dilutes with compassion the unmixed draught of his wrath. For he inclines from severity to indulgence toward those who accept chastisement with fear and who after a slight affliction conceived and are in pain with conversion and bring forth the perfect spirit of salvation. But nevertheless he reserves the dregs, the last drop of his anger, that he may pour it out entire upon those who, instead of being healed by his kindness, grow obdurate, like the hard-hearted Pharaoh, that bitter taskmaster, who is set forth as an example of the power of God over the ungodly.

We, however, who heard the Lord our Savior say that those in Judea should flee to the mountains also lift our own eyes to the mountains, concerning which it was written: "I raise my eyes to the mountains, whence comes my assistance." And in another place [it is written], "Its foundation is in the holy mountains," and "The Lord surrounds his people as the mountains surround them," and "The city set upon a mountain cannot be hidden." We must shed the skin of the letter and, ascending Mount Zion barefoot with Moses, say, "I will cross over and see this great vision." [This is] so that we can understand those souls to be pregnant who conceived the beginning of faith from the seed of doctrine and from talking with God, who say with Isaiah, "Out of reverence for you, Lord, we have conceived and given birth, bringing the spirit of your salvation upon the earth."

Salvations we have not wrought on the earth; therefore the inhabitants of the world have not fallen. LXX: We shall not fall, but the inhabitants of the earth will fall. A different translation must needs have a different sense too. According to the Hebrew this is said: Because we have done nothing worthy of your mercy, therefore the impious have not fallen, but to this day prevail and possess the earth. But the Seventy assert this: that while the saints make the spirit of salvation upon the earth, those who are inhabitants of the earth fall; although between world, which in Hebrew is called THEBEL (תבל) and in Greek οἰκουμένη, and earth there is much difference. Whoever, then, have given themselves to dwelling on the earth, and have been grounded with a fixed root in earthly works, will fall; and they will not fall who sit in the world and rest in the Church, which is the dwelling place of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

For they have crushed, or cut asunder, with iron carts the women with child of Gilead. These are the women with child of whom the Lord speaks in the Gospel: Woe to those who are with child, and to those who give suck in those days. The women with child are the souls of believers, who at the beginning of faith can say: From fear of you, Lord, we have conceived and been in labour; and if they have not been cut up and pierced with iron by the carts and the iron and toothed wheels, of which the psalmist says: The sons of men, their teeth are weapons and arrows, they can also say what follows: And we have brought forth; we have made the spirit of your salvation upon the earth. And consider at the same time that they cannot cut up men of mature age, but only those who are still in the womb, or who cannot take solid food and are still nourished with the milk of infancy.

That there are also some souls that conceive offspring, the prophet made clear when he said: "from fear of you, Lord, we conceived in the womb and travailed and gave birth to a spirit of salvation which you made upon the earth". For just as in those who are pregnant the seed is formed and shaped, so also in the soul that receives the word, the conception of the word is gradually formed and shaped within it. And this I think is what Paul says to the Galatians: "my children, whom I again bring forth in travail until Christ be formed in you", which is as though he were to say: until the word be formed and made manifest in you. In the epistle to Timothy he says likewise that a woman shall be saved "through the bearing of children, if she abide in faith and love and holiness with chastity". But who is this woman, if not the soul that conceives the word of God and of truth, and gives birth to good works like to Christ? But it is irrational to suppose that what he says was said of a bodily bearing: "the woman, being seduced, fell into transgression; but she shall be saved through the bearing of children, if she abide in faith and love and holiness with chastity". Therefore the souls that have newly received the word and, being still established as pregnant, have not yet borne fruit in it, having it intelligibly in the womb, cannot endure the discourse that stands "in the holy place" opposing the truth, nor stand firm so as not to be seduced by its persuasions.

The soul therefore conceives from this seed of the word and forms the conceived word within itself, until it brings forth the spirit of the fear of God. For thus through the prophet the souls of the saints say: "from your fear, O Lord, we have conceived in the womb and have been in labor and have brought forth; we have made the spirit of your salvation upon the earth". This is the childbearing of holy souls, this the conception, these are the holy nuptials which are fitting and suited to the great high priest Christ Jesus our Lord, "to whom be glory and dominion unto the ages of ages. Amen!".

617. We have not wrought justice. Here he announces the procured peace, and concerning this, he does three things.

First, the reason for the delay is shown: we have not wrought justice, so that he alludes to what is said in Deuteronomy 28:7: the Lord shall cause your enemies, that rise up against you, to fall down before your face.

About this dew the prophet Isaiah proclaimed: "Your dew is their salvation," or, according to the Hebrew text, "For your dew is the dew of light." Here is clearly taught that the dew of which he speaks is the light of wisdom and the healing of souls, which is the doctrine of wisdom and truth, without which the soul is sickly and blind.

The first part [of the verse] concerns the resurrection of the just, but the last few words may be taken to mean "the bodies of the wicked will fall into the ruin of damnation." In regard to the resurrection of the just, the attentive reader will notice some distinction. "The dead shall rise" refers to the first resurrection; "those in the graves" refers to the second; and in the following words we may not improperly find a reference to the saints whom the Lord will find alive on earth. As for the word "your dew is their health," we are not wrong in taking "health" to mean "immortality," that most perfect health which needs no daily medicine of ordinary food.

Isaiah the prophet says, "The dead men shall rise again, and those who are in the tombs shall awake." And the prophet Ezekiel, now before us, says most plainly, "Behold, I will open your graves and bring you up out of your graves." And Daniel says, "Many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall arise, some to everlasting life and some to everlasting shame."67And there are many Scriptures that testify of the resurrection of the dead. For there are many other sayings on this matter. But now, by way of remembrance only, we will make a passing mention of the raising of Lazarus on the fourth day and just allude, because of the shortness of the time, to the widow's son also who was raised. And merely for the sake of reminding you, let me mention the ruler of the synagogue's daughter, and the rending of the rocks, and how "there arose many bodies of the saints which slept," their graves having been opened. But especially be it remembered that "Christ has been raised from the dead."

Do not listen to those who say that this body is not raised up; for raised it is, as Isaiah witnesses, saying, "The dead shall arise, and they in the tombs shall be raised." Or, as Daniel says, "Many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall arise, some to everlasting life and some to everlasting shame." But while rising again is the common lot of all people, the manner of rising again is not alike for all. For while we all receive everlasting bodies, those bodies are not alike for all. That is to say, the righteous receive such bodies as may enable them to join with the band of angels throughout eternity, while sinners received bodies in which to undergo through the ages the torture of their sins.

Then, too, Isaiah himself has plainly declared that there shall be joy of this nature at the resurrection of the just, when he says: "The dead shall rise again; those, too, who are in the tombs shall arise, and those who are in the earth shall rejoice. For the dew from Thee is health to them."

Let your dead live, let my slain rise again: awake and give praise, you who dwell in the dust, for your dew is a dew of lights, and the land of the giants you will pull down to ruin. LXX: The dead will rise again, and they will rise again from the tombs, and those who are in the earth will rejoice. For your dew is their healing, but the land of the impious will fall. While the saints travail and bring forth the spirit, and the inhabitants of the earth fall, because they have not wrought salvations on the earth, those whom the Apostle calls the dead in Christ, and who have been slain for the name of the Lord, will rise again in glory (1 Thess 4). And because their death is sleep, they are said, not, as according to the Seventy, to rise again, but to awaken and to wake up. Hence Lazarus too, who was to be awakened, is called sleeping by the Lord (John 11). All the martyrs, then, and the holy men who shed their blood for Christ, and whose whole life was a martyrdom, will rise again and awaken, and will praise God their Creator, they who now dwell in the dust, of whom it is written in Daniel: Many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth will rise again, some to everlasting life, and some to reproach and everlasting confusion (Dan 12:2). And in John the Evangelist we read: The hour will come, and now is, when those who are in the tombs will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live, and those who have done good will come forth to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgment (John 5:28, 29). For the dew of the Lord, surpassing, as in the fables of the poets, all the Paeonian herbs, will give life to the bodies of the dead. And as, when seeds have been cast into the earth, the dew little by little makes the plants grow and come to the fruits of their kind, so the dew of the Lord, which is put for mercy, will be a dew of very many lights, which in Hebrew is called OROTH (אורות). But the land, that is, the bodies of the Raphaim, namely of the giants and the impious, the Lord will pull down into everlasting punishments. Indeed, for RAPHAIM (רפאים) the Seventy alone translated the impious. And because we read above, The dead will not see life, nor will physicians raise them up, for which Aquila and Symmachus translated Raphaim and giants, we ask what the cause of the error is, that for the Hebrew RAPHAIM some put giants, others physicians. If the Hebrew word RAPHAIM has VAU following its first letter RES, it is read ROPHAIM (רופאים) and signifies physicians; but if it is written without the letter VAU, it is read RAPHAIM, and is translated giants. And at the same time, because he had said above, The dead will not see life, so as to show more plainly that it was not said there of those dead by the law of nature and the separation of soul and body, but of those who are dead in sin, he now on the contrary says to God: Your dead will live, who have been slain for your sake; who are not called dead absolutely, as the Seventy translated, but, according to the Hebrew, where it is said JEJU METHECA (יהיו מתיך), your dead.

But the heavens too shall give their dew, the heavens of which it is written in Psalm 18 (19): The heavens tell the glory of God, and the firmament proclaims the works of his hands. Of these heavens it is said in the song of Deuteronomy: Rejoice, O heavens, with him, that is, with the Lord and Savior, whom he foreknew and predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son; it is he who speaks with Moses: Let my speech be awaited like the rain, and let my words come down like the dew. For those who were dead in sins shall rise again, and those who lay in whitewashed sepulchres, which are full of dead men's bones, shall be raised up, and those who dwell in the earth shall rejoice. And what the cause of the joy is, the following words show: For the dew which is from you is their healing.

Isaiah made it clear that Christ will raise up all people when he said, "The dead shall be raised up again; even those in the tombs shall be raised up. For the dew from you is healing for them." That was not all. After his cross, after his slaughter, his glory will shine forth more brightly; after his resurrection, he will advance the message of his gospel still more.

Sacred Scripture … testifies to the fact that there will be a resurrection of the body.… Isaiah also [testifies that] "the dead shall rise and those in their graves be awakened." And it is obvious that it is not the souls that are put in the tombs but the bodies.

To remove all doubt about the resurrection of the body, take a single illustration from the course of nature. The apostle reminds us, "What you yourself sow is not brought to life, unless it dies." Here you have a grain of wheat, dead and dry and sown in the earth. It is softened by the rain from heaven. Only when it decays does it spring to life and begin to grow. I take it that he who raises to life the grain of wheat for the sake of humankind will be able to raise to life the person himself who has been sown in the earth. He both can and wills to do this. What the rains do for the seed, the dew of the Spirit does for the body that is to be raised to life. Thus Isaiah cries to Christ, "Your dew is health for them," true health, since, once the bodies of the saints have been raised to life, they feel no pain, they fear no death. They will live with Christ in heaven, who lived on earth according to the words and ways of Christ. This is the eternal and blessed life in which you believe. This is the fruit of all our faith and holy works. This is the hope on account of which we are born, believe and are reborn. It was on account of this that the prophets, apostles and martyrs sustained such endless toil and accepted death with joy.

Of the fulfilled promise (both believed and seen) wherein the bodies of the saints rose again at the death of the Lord, the prophet Isaiah said, "The dead will rise again, and all who were in the graves will be raised up, and all who are on the earth shall rejoice, for the dew which is from you is their medicine." Matthew the Evangelist confirms this, saying, "The earth shook and rocks were split and graves were opened and many bodies of the sleeping saints were raised. And going forth from their graves after his resurrection, they came to the holy city and appeared to many."

Unquestionably, if the people were indulging in figurative murmurs that their bones were become dry and that their hope had perished—plaintive at the consequences of their dispersion—then God might fairly enough seem to have consoled their figurative despair with a figurative promise. Since, however, no injury had as yet alighted on the people from their dispersion, although the hope of the resurrection had very frequently failed among them, it is manifest that it was owing to the perishing condition of their bodies that their faith in the resurrection was shaken. God, therefore, was rebuilding the faith that the people were pulling down. But even if it were true that Israel was depressed at some shock in their existing circumstances, we must not on that account suppose that the purpose of revelation could have rested in a parable. Its aim must have been to testify a resurrection, in order to raise the nation's hope to even an eternal salvation and an indispensable restoration and thereby turn off their minds from brooding over their present affairs. This indeed is the aim of other prophets likewise. "You shall go forth," [says Malachi], "from your tombs, as young calves let loose from their bonds, and you shall tread down your enemies." And again [Isaiah says], "Your heart shall rejoice, and your bones shall spring up like the grass," because the grass also is renewed by the dissolution and corruption of the seed. In a word, if it is contended that the figure of the rising bones refers properly to the state of Israel, why is the same hope announced to all nations, instead of being limited to Israel only, of reinvesting those bony remains with bodily substance and vital breath and of raising up their dead out of the grave? For the language is universal: "The dead shall arise and come forth from their graves; for the dew which comes from you is medicine to their bones." In another passage it is written: "All flesh shall come to worship before me, says the Lord." When? When the fashion of this world shall begin to pass away. For he said before, "As the new heaven and the new earth, which I make, remain before me, says the Lord, so shall your seed remain." Then also shall be fulfilled what is written afterwards: "And they shall go forth" [namely, from their graves] "and shall see the carcasses of those who have transgressed: for their worm shall never die, nor shall their fire be quenched; and they shall be a spectacle to all flesh," even to that which, being raised again from the dead and brought out from the grave, shall adore the Lord for his great grace.

618. Second, the promise of restoration of the people through resurrection is set out, either bodily resurrection on the last day or resurrection from the misery of captivity. Hence resurrection is promised: your dead men shall live, the voice of the prophet to the Lord (Ezek 37); the thanksgiving of the resurrected is announced: awake, and give praise: many of those that sleep in the dust of the earth, shall awake (Dan 12:2); and the cause, or reason, of the resurrection is assigned: for your dew is the dew of the light, namely, of divine kindness (Hos 6:3).

619. Third, the destruction of their enemies is shown, and first, he sets out the destruction itself: the land of the giants, that is, of the proud and powerful, above: it shall be as a ruinous heap of stones (Isa 17:1).

Certainly there are two things that make us hope for the bliss of the just and the end of all suffering: death and the resurrection from the dead. In death is rest, as the prophet says, "My people, enter into your chambers, hide yourself a little until the indignation of the Lord pass away." But in the resurrection there is perfect happiness in the whole person, that is, in flesh and spirit. Consequently we are not to think that both of these are to be marked by the labor of fasting but rather by the rejoicing of refreshment.

All the generations from Adam to this day have passed away; but those who were made perfect in charity by the grace of God live among the saints; and they shall be made manifest at the judgment of the kingdom of Christ. For it is written, "Enter into your chamber a little while, until my wrath and anger pass, and I remember the good day and will raise you up out of your graves."

"The hour will come in which all who are in the tombs shall hear the voice of the Son of God and shall come forth." They shall hear with ears and come forth with feet. This Lazarus had already done. They shall, moreover, come forth from the tombs; that is, they who had been laid in the tombs, the dead, shall come and shall rise again from their graves. For the dew that God gives is healing to their bones. Then shall be fulfilled what God says by the prophet, "Go, my people, into your closets for a little while, until mine anger pass." The closets signify the graves, out of which is brought forth which had been laid therein. And they shall come out of the graves like young mules free from the halter. Their heart shall rejoice, and their bones shall rise like the sun; all flesh shall come into the presence of the Lord, and he shall command the fishes of the sea; and they shall give up the bones which they had eaten; and he shall bring joint to joint, and bone to bone;104 and they who slept in the dust of the earth shall arise, some to life eternal, others to shame and everlasting confusion.

"The hairs of your head are numbered." If the hairs, I suppose the teeth would be more easily numbered. But there is no object in numbering them if they are some day to perish. "The hour will come in which all who are in the tombs shall hear the voice of the Son of God and shall come forth." … Then shall be fulfilled what God says by the prophet, "Go, my people, into your closets for a little while, until my anger pass." The closets signify the graves, out of which is brought forth which had been laid therein. And they shall come out of the graves like young mules free from the halter.

But according to the anagogy, the people of God is commanded to enter into its chambers, or storerooms, for ταμεῖα means both: to shut, according to the precept of the Gospel, the door of its chamber (Matt 6), and to say with the Prophet: Set a guard, O Lord, on my mouth, and a fortified door to my lips (Ps 140 [141]:3); and to hide itself a little, however little, until the wrath of the Lord passes, so that it does nothing for the sake of glory, but enjoys the good of conscience and awaits God alone as judge. And the storerooms which are to be shut and hidden by those who have become rich in works and words are prudence, temperance, fortitude, justice, so that the left hand may not know what the right hand does, so that we may enjoy the riches of the Law and the Prophets and the Gospel. And that all the days of our life are short and very small, Jacob, exceeding a hundred years, says: Small and very evil are my days (Gen 47:9). And the wrath of the Lord that is to pass is that which those store up for themselves who are unwilling to do penance; after it has passed, the storerooms will by no means be shut any longer, but what is written will be fulfilled: Nothing is hidden that will not be revealed, and secret that will not be made manifest (Luke 8:17).

Go, my people, enter into your chambers, shut your doors upon you: hide yourself a little for a moment, until the indignation passes. For behold, the Lord will come forth from his place, to visit the iniquity of the inhabitant of the earth against him; and the earth will disclose its blood, and will no longer cover its slain. LXX: Go, my people, enter into your chambers, shut your door: hide yourself a little, however little, until the wrath of the Lord passes. For behold, the Lord from the holy place will bring wrath upon the inhabitants of the earth, and the earth will disclose its blood, and will no longer hide the slain. Above he had said of the saints, The dead will rise again, and those who are in the tombs will rise again; for the dew from you is their healing; and on the contrary of the impious, but the land of the impious will fall. Now he speaks to the saints: because resurrection has been promised to you, until the wrath of God rages against sinners and the impious, enter into your tombs and hide yourselves, for it is a short time until the indignation of God passes. For indeed the Lord comes forth from his place, because the Lord is merciful and compassionate, and the most clement father is compelled to strike his negligent children, and in a manner to be changed from his own judgment, so that he may visit and bring his wrath upon the inhabitants of the earth, of whom it is said in Hosea: Cursing and lying and adultery and theft have been poured out upon the inhabitants of the earth (Hos 4:2). And in the Apocalypse we read three times, Woe upon the inhabitants of the earth (Rev 8:13). But the righteous, although they are seen on the earth, yet their citizenship is in the heavens; they can say, I am a stranger on the earth, and a sojourner, as all my fathers were (Ps 38 [39]:13), and they enjoy the dwelling of the Most High, of whom the holy man speaks: He who dwells in the help of the Most High will abide in the protection of the God of heaven (Ps 90 [91]:1). Then the earth will disclose its blood, of which God speaks to Cain: The voice of your brother's blood cries to me from the earth, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand (Gen 4:10, 11). This can also be understood of the Martyrs, who shed their blood for Christ and cry out beneath the altar of God: How long, O Lord, do you not avenge our blood on those who dwell upon the earth? (Rev 6:10). Of them Moses too says in the Song: The blood of his sons will be vindicated and avenged, and he will repay vengeance to his enemies (Deut 32:43). This blood the earth which had received it will disclose, and it will by no means cover the slain of the Lord, but will bring them out into public view for the condemnation of those who killed the Martyrs. Let this be understood of the simple resurrection.

He builds, therefore, the ark and makes in it nests, that is, certain storerooms, in which animals of diverse kinds may be received. Of which the prophet also says: "Go, my people, enter into your storerooms, hide yourself for a little while, until the fury of my wrath passes by." This people, then, which is saved in the Church, is compared to all those, whether men or animals, which were saved in the ark.

When we read, "Go, my people, enter into your closets for a little while, until my anger passes away," we have in the closets graves, in which they will have to rest for a little while, who shall have at the end of the world departed this life in the last furious onset of the power of Antichrist. Why else did he use the expression closets in preference to some other receptacle, if it were not that the flesh is kept in these closets or cellars salted and reserved for use, to be drawn out thence on a suitable occasion? It is on a similar principle that embalmed corpses are set aside for burial in mausoleums and sepulchers, in order that they may be removed from there when the Master shall order it. Since, therefore, there is consistency in thus understanding the passage (for what refuge of little closets could possibly shelter us from the wrath of God?), it appears that by the very phrase which he uses, "until his anger passes away," which shall extinguish Antichrist, he in fact shows that after that indignation the flesh will come forth from the sepulcher, in which it had been deposited previous to the bursting out of the anger. Now out of the closets nothing else is brought than that which had been put into them, and after the extirpation of Antichrist shall be busily transacted the great process of the resurrection.

Second, the immunity of the people of God: go, my people; enter into your chambers, tombs, or literally, the fortifications in which they sometimes carefully kept themselves, below: in a moment of indignation have I hid my face a little while from you, but with everlasting kindness have I had mercy on you (Isa 54:8); and it was said to them that they should rest for a little time till the number of their brethren should be filled up (Rev 6:11).

And what follows, For behold, the Lord from the holy place will bring his wrath, signifies this: that the wrath of God begins from the saints, or that all his vengeance is just and holy, not coming down from disturbance of mind, as is usual among men, but from zeal to correct. And I consider the earth of the inhabitants to be that of which it is written: Let the earth hear the words of my mouth (Deut 32:1). And: Give ear, O earth (Isa 1:2). And again: Earth, earth, hear the word of the Lord (Jer 22:29). For as those who dwell on the earth, so those who are in the flesh cannot please God (Rom 8). And earth in this place signifies the soul that lives carnally. And it will disclose its blood, if it has caused anyone to stumble, and deserves to hear with Cain: The voice of your brother's blood cries to me from the earth, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother's blood (Gen 4:10, 11). All blood, then, will be required on the day of judgment, nor will the earth hide its blood; and the slain whom it has killed, whether willingly or through negligence, it will bring out into the open.

Third, he sets out the order of destruction, for it comes through judgment; hence he sets out the coming of the judge: for behold the Lord will come: behold the Lord will come forth (Mic 1:3), and all the angels with him; and the revealing of their crimes: and the earth shall disclose her blood: O earth, cover not you my blood, neither let my cry find a hiding place in you (Job 16:19).