Jeremiah 14

The word of the Lord which came to Jeremiah concerning the words of the drought. All things are in accord with the wrath of God; hence the sun also sets at noon upon sinners, and the moon and the other stars do not give their light, and we must suppose that in the time of the siege there were no rains, so that the besieged endured a dearth of water. For the city uses a single spring, that of Siloam, and this not a perennial one, and to the present day a dearth of rains causes a lack not only of crops but also of water to drink.

It will serve us to remember that what is called the Word came to certain persons, as "the word of the Lord which came to Hosea, the son of Beeri," and "the word which came to Isaiah, the son of Amoz, concerning Judah and concerning Jerusalem," and "the word that came to Jeremiah concerning the drought." We must inquire how this Word came to Hosea, and how it came also to Isaiah the son of Amoz, and again to Jeremiah concerning the drought. The comparison may enable us to find out how the Word was with God. We will generalize by simply looking at what the prophets said, as if that were the Word of the Lord or the Word that came to them. May it not be … that … the Son, the Word, of whom we are now theologizing, came to Hosea, sent to him by the Father, historically, that is to say, to the son of Beeri, the prophet Hosea.… Similarly the Word comes also to Isaiah, teaching the things that are coming on Judea and Jerusalem in the last days. So also it comes to Jeremiah lifted up by a divine elation.… Thus to find out what is meant by the phrase "the Word was with God," we have adduced the words used about the prophets, how he came to Hosea, to Isaiah, to Jeremiah.… We have to add that in his coming to the prophets he illuminates the prophets with the light of knowledge, causing them to see things that had been before them but that they had not understood until then.

Judea has mourned — or Judah — and its gates have fallen — or have been made empty — and have been darkened — or have been made dark — upon the earth, and the cry of Jerusalem has gone up. Its elders sent their lesser ones — or younger ones — to the water; they came to draw — or to the wells — and did not find water; they brought back their vessels empty. They were confounded and afflicted — or they blushed — and covered their heads; because of the desolation of the land — or and the works of the land, because they have failed —, because no rain came — or there was no rain — upon the land, the farmers were confounded, they covered their heads. In the time of drought, when the multitude suffers a famine of hearing and learning the word of God, Judea mourns, 'boasting' that it formerly had the worship of God and the 'confession' of the true faith; and its gates are either emptied or fall, which we ought to refer to the senses, through which instruction is conceived by the soul. Then all things are darkened and wrapped in darkness, and in Jerusalem it is by no means reason and the word of teaching that reign, but clamor and confusion.

The elders also, who ought themselves to go to draw the waters, send the younger ones, in whom there are no gray hairs of wisdom, and therefore they come to the wells and do not find the waters which, as the history relates, the patriarchs found. They bring back their vessels empty, the younger ones, that is, not because there were no waters, but because they could not find them. They were confounded and afflicted — or they blushed — and covered their heads — because they could not say with the Apostle: 'But we all, with unveiled face, behold the glory of the Lord' — because of the desolation of the land or and the works of the land have failed, through which we advance to the knowledge of God. And the cause is plain: because no rain came upon the land. For the clouds were commanded not to rain a shower upon it. The farmers also, one of whom says: You are God's husbandry, God's building and: We are God's fellow workers, cover their head and are confounded, understanding that without the grace and help of God they strive in vain.

For the hind also — or the hinds — gave birth in the field — or they gave birth — and forsook — or they forsook —, because there was no grass. And the wild asses stood on the crags, they drew in the wind like dragons; their eyes failed, because there was no grass or hay. Great is the barrenness when even the hinds give birth in the field and forsake their young because there is no grass or hay, so that they, which by the scent of their nostrils draw serpents out of their holes and kill venomous creatures, do not enjoy the food of grace; and when the wild asses also, of which it is written: Who has sent out the wild ass free into the wilderness?, leaving the plains and the open country, stand on the crags and cannot run, and draw in the wind after the likeness of dragons, and their eyes fail and cannot see the clear light, since rational food has been withdrawn. This drought often happens in the churches, when both stags and wild asses are found among the peoples and waste away through a dearth of teachers: there are those who could learn, and there are none who could teach.

If our iniquities have answered — or have withstood — us, O Lord, act for your name's sake, for many are our turnings away — or our sins —. Against you we have sinned, O expectation of Israel, his Savior in the time of tribulation. If we are in doubt why the rains do not come down upon the land, why all things wither with dryness, let us hear: our iniquities have withstood us; 'therefore, O Lord, not according to our works but according to your holy name, overcome our many turnings away. For against you we have sinned, whom the secrets of the heart do not deceive, and we wait for you, who are the true hope and expectation of Israel and save him in the time of tribulation, according to that which is written: To the Lord I cried when I was in tribulation, and he heard me'. Let us too say, in the time of drought and dearth of waters: 'Against you we have sinned and have done evil before you; we wait for your coming, you who save Israel not by its own merit but by your clemency.'

Why will you be like a settler in the land and like a traveler turning aside to lodge? Why will you be like a wandering man or a mighty one who cannot save? LXX: why have you become like a stranger in the land and like a native turning aside to lodge? Will you be like a man asleep and like a man who cannot save? The Jews understand this passage thus: 'Why do you separate yourself from your people and, like a traveler, for the refreshment of a single hour not care what lodging you use, but, being about to pass on to other places, not save your people and forsake the temple once renowned?' Our people, however, think that it is said of the future dispensation of Christ: that he was to be a pilgrim in the land and to use the hospitality of the earth for a short time, and, like a man passing through and strong, having left Israel, to make for the multitude of the Gentiles, so as to pass from place to place, from people to people, from the temple to the Church.

But what is said according to the Seventy: Will you be like a man asleep and like a man who cannot save? sets down a likeness, not the truth of the matter, according to that which is written: Arise, why do you sleep, O Lord?, not that the Lord sleeps, of whom it is said: He who keeps Israel will not slumber nor sleep, but that he seems to sleep to those whom he forsakes. Finally, in what follows too, it is not written: 'a man asleep', who cannot save, but: 'like a man'; in both, anthrōpopathōs [in human terms].

But you are in us, O Lord, and your name has been invoked upon us; do not forsake us or do not forget us! 'You who among the Jews will be like a stranger and a traveler and a wandering man, forsaking your ancient dwelling, dwell in us, and your name has been invoked upon us, so that we are called Christians; therefore do not forsake us nor forget us, to whom the mouths of all the prophets have sung of your future coming'.

Again, the Scriptures speak of God as asleep when the psalmist says, "Arise! Why do you sleep, O Lord?" He does not say this to make us suspect that God sleeps. This would be the utmost madness. By the word sleep the psalm shows God's patience and forbearance toward us. Another prophet has said, "You will not be like a person who sleeps, will you?" Do you not see that we need much help from our understanding and reason when we are searching into the treasure house of the divine Scriptures? If we listen to the words only, if we do not think but take the words as they come, not only will those absurdities follow, but many a conflict will be seen in what has been said.

Hence it is that they are always writing, and always altering their own previous statements, and thus they shew an uncertain faith, or rather a manifest unbelief and perverseness. And this, it appears to me, must needs be the case with them; for since, having fallen away from the truth, and desiring to overthrow that sound confession of faith which was drawn up at Nicaea, they have, in the language of Scripture, `loved to wander, and have not refrained their feet;' therefore, like Jerusalem of old, they labour and toil in their changes, sometimes writing one thing, and sometimes another, but only for the sake of gaining time, and that they may continue enemies of Christ, and deceivers of mankind.

Thus says the Lord to this people: because it has loved — or they have loved — to move its feet and has not rested — or they have not spared — and it has not pleased the Lord — or and God was not well pleased in them —, now he will remember their iniquities and will visit their sins. When the people says: 'Why have you become like a stranger and a traveler and a wanderer, so as to forsake your dwelling?', the Lord answers the people that was once his own: 'Do you wish to know the reason? Listen to what is said: because the people has loved to move its feet and has not withdrawn them from the fetter of sins, or has not rested and could not stand, therefore I too have forsaken it, and I have no good pleasure in it'. He, then, who long delayed and through patience was unwilling to punish sinners, since they persisted in wickedness, will remember their iniquities and will visit the sins of those who are, as it were, sick and do not perceive God, so that they may cease to sin any more. But it should be noted in the holy Scriptures that it is always the feet of sinners that are moved, while to the saints it is said, with Moses: But you, stand here with me, and elsewhere it is written: Praise the Lord, you servants, who stand in the house of the Lord, in the courts of the house of our God!

In the Gospel, the Savior commends the unjust steward because, although he defrauded his master, he acted wisely for his own interests. The heretics in this instance pursued the same course. When they saw how great a matter a little fire had kindled, and that the flames applied by them to the foundations had by this time reached the housetops and that the deception practiced on many could no longer be hid, they asked for and obtained letters of commendation from the church, so that it might appear that until the day of their departure they had continued in full communion with it. Shortly afterward the distinguished Anastasius succeeded to the pontificate. But he was soon taken away, for it was not fitting that the head of the world should be struck off during the episcopate of one so great. He was removed, no doubt, that he might not seek to turn away by his prayers the sentence of God passed once for all. For the words of the Lord to Jeremiah concerning Israel applied equally to Rome: "Pray not for this people for their good. When they fast, I will not hear their cry. When they offer burnt offering and oblation, I will not accept them. But I will consume them by the sword and by the famine and by the pestilence."

And the Lord said to me: Do not pray for this people for good! When they fast, I will not hear their prayers, and if they offer burnt offerings and victims, I will not accept them, for by the sword and by famine and by pestilence I will consume them. It is foolish to pray for one who has sinned unto death, as John says: There is a sin unto death; I do not say that one should pray for that. All iniquity is sin, and there is a sin not unto death. Fasts and prayers and victims and burnt offerings profit only when we withdraw from vices and weep for our former sins; but if, persisting in our crimes, we think that we can buy the ears of God with vows and sacrifices, we greatly err, judging God to be unjust. For he who has once been destined for the sword and famine and pestilence cannot be rescued by any prayers. Hence the prophet too is told not to ask in vain for what he cannot obtain.

Although God is by nature good, yet he is also just, and as the case requires. He knows how to heal but also how to strike. He brings peace, but he brings about evil. He desires repentance, yet he commands Jeremiah not to intercede for the sinful people, since, he says, even if they fast, I will not hear their prayer.

You see, then, that fasting is certainly not considered by the Lord as a thing that is good in its own nature, because it becomes good and well-pleasing to God not by itself but by other works. Again, from the surrounding circumstances it may be regarded as not merely empty but hateful, as the Lord says: "When they fast, I will not hear their prayers."

And I said: Ah, ah, ah, Lord God — or you who are, Lord God —, the prophets say to them: You shall not see the sword, and famine shall not be among you, but he will give you true peace in this place. And the Lord said to me: The prophets prophesy falsely in my name. I did not send them, and I did not command them, nor did I speak to them; a lying vision and deceitful divination and the seduction of their own heart they prophesy to you. Let the teachers hear this who promise prosperity to those who sin and persist in their vices, who say to the rich: 'You shall not see the sword of God's torments, and famine shall not be among you. For you will be filled with the words of God, and the Lord will give you most true peace in the place of the Church, or of Jerusalem'. But that, according to the Hebrew, he said three times: Ah, ah, ah, answers to what came before, where the Lord had threatened, saying: by the sword and by famine and by pestilence I will consume them.

Since, then, the prophets, nay rather the false prophets, promised false things, the Lord therefore spoke through Jeremiah: 'Do not listen to the words of the false prophets, who were not sent by me but came of their own will! Hence they are by no means to be called prophets but diviners, they who speak seduction to the people'. For it is much better to amend sins through fear of punishments than, through hope of prosperity, to fall under the divine sentence.

Therefore thus says the Lord concerning the prophets who prophesy in my name, whom I did not send, saying: Sword and famine shall not be in this land: by sword and famine those prophets shall be consumed. And the peoples to whom they have prophesied shall be cast out in the streets of Jerusalem because of famine and sword, and there shall be none to bury them, they and their wives, their sons and their daughters, and I will pour out upon them their own evil or their own evils. Let the false prophets beware, who by promising prosperity trip up the people of God, lest they themselves perish and the deceived people be destroyed by a like ruin, and they lie in the streets of Jerusalem and, trampling on the precepts of the Lord, perish by famine and sword, and there be none to bury them nor to cover their disgrace with the dust of repentance. For the prophets themselves and the people, and their wives, and sons and daughters, and their whole generation will be on the dunghill without any undertaker. How many lie in the streets of Jerusalem! How many do we see unburied receiving their own evils, which they suffer as the Lord pours them out!

And you shall say this word to them: Let my eyes shed a tear — or let your eyes shed tears — through night and day, and let them not be silent — or let them not cease —, for the virgin daughter of my people has been crushed with a great crushing, with a most grievous blow, exceedingly. This passage is understood in two ways: either that God himself laments his people and his eyes do not cease to weep, or at any rate that he commands that the eyes of the peoples should flow with tears; and that what must be lamented is no light thing, since the virgin daughter of his people has been struck with the greatest crushing and an intolerable blow. Others think that these things are said in the person of the prophet.

If I go out into the fields, behold, those slain by the sword, and if I enter the city, behold, those wasted with famine — or the pain of famine —! The prophet also and the priest have gone off into a land which they did not know. A just cause for lamenting, that the virgin has been crushed, the daughter struck and the people destroyed. 'For if,' he says, 'I wish to go outside, I shall see the slain; if to enter the city, I shall behold those wasted and scarcely clinging to their bones through the necessity of famine'. And what wonder is it to say this of the common people and the ignoble crowd, when the prophets also and the priests, who prophesied prosperity to others and who ought to have opened the commandments of the law, themselves went into a land which they did not know and endured the evil of captivity? Let our prophets and priests hear this: that because of their negligence there is no security either within or without, since they both scandalize those who are without and allow those who are within to perish by famine, and those who were the authors of sinning become companions in the torments.

And blessed Daniel the prophet, the divine Ezekiel (who was both prophet and priest) and many other priests in addition to them shared in these misfortunes. For God provided for those profane exiles and sent along also prophets that could be pedagogues and teachers so that the exiles might not incline entirely to godlessness.

Have you utterly cast off Judah, or has your soul abhorred Zion? Why then have you struck us, so that there is no healing? We waited for peace, and there is no good, and for a time of healing, and behold, turmoil! The prophet marvels that the Lord has so suddenly cast off Judah and Jerusalem, that is, the kingdom of the two tribes, in which were the religion of God and the ceremonies of the temple, and has struck them with so great a blow that no medicine can be applied. 'We waited', he says, 'for peace and for a time of healing, and there is no good at all, but, on the contrary, turmoil, so that where formerly there had been the worship of God and tranquility, there all things were filled with seditions and the roar of the enemy'. If ever, therefore, our Zion too and our Judah is cast off and the soul of God abhors it, let us by no means marvel, but rather let us say what follows:

We have acknowledged, O Lord, our impieties, the iniquity of our fathers, because we have sinned against you. 'Both we', he says, 'and our fathers, with the same madness, neglected the precepts of God, and the measure of our forefathers has been filled up in us, so that whatever had been lacking in them was completed by our heap'. Hence it is also said of Judas: Let the iniquity of his fathers return to remembrance in the sight of the Lord, and let not the sin of his mother be blotted out! Let it be over against the Lord always, and let the memory of them perish from the earth!

Do not give us over to reproach for your name's sake, nor bring upon us the dishonor of the throne of your glory! Remember, do not make void your covenant with us! Let us consider the throne of God's glory to be not only the temple of Judea, which has often been destroyed, but every saint, in whom, according to that which is written: You have dashed his throne to the ground, it is dashed down and destroyed when he has offended God by a multitude of sins; but nevertheless he who has perished by his own fault is upheld by the clemency of the Lord, which is exchanged for the severity of the sentence if the Lord makes void his pact, by which he has promised that we shall be saved.

Are there among the graven images of the nations any that rain, or can the heavens give showers? Are you not the Lord God, whom we have awaited? For you have made all these things. After many and varied discourses he returns to the title of the prophecy, in which it is written: the word of the Lord which came to Jeremiah concerning the words of the drought. So what he says is this: 'Since the images of demons cannot rain, nor can the heavens of themselves give their shower, therefore you, O Lord our God, whom we have always awaited, to whom we have turned our hopes and vows, you give your rain! For all things are yours, and whatever is good cannot be given without you, whose it is'. Let us say this also against the heretics, who cannot bestow the rain of doctrines, and who, though they promise that they are heavens and boast that it is written of them: The heavens declare the glory of God, nevertheless cannot give the showers of doctrine. For it is God alone who instructs his people and bestows the diversities of grace on those who await him.

What a state the person is in who has deserted the easy yoke and the light burden of Christ to subject himself once again to the yoke of demons and to bear the burden of the heaviest sin! How can this be after we have known that the heart of those who worship idols is ashes and their life more worthless than clay, and after we have said, "Our ancestors possessed false idols, and none of them can bring rain"?