for he too has his victims; Salmana, shadow of commotion. All these agree to the evils which the people of God conquer by good. Moreover Kishon, the torrent in which they were conquered, is explained, their hardness. Endor, where they perished, is explained, the Fountain of generation, but of the carnal generation namely, to which they were given up, and therefore perished, not heeding the regeneration which leadeth unto life, where they shall neither marry nor be given in marriage,' for they shall die no more. Rightly then it is said of these: " they became as the dung of the earth," in that nothing was produced of them but fruitfulness of the earth. As then all these were in figure conquered by the people of God, as figures, so he prays that those other enemies may be conquered in truth.
8. " All their princes, who said, Let us take to ourselves the sanctuary of God in possession " (ver. 12). This is that vain noise, with which, as said above, Thy enemies have made a murmuring. But what must be understood by " the sanctuary of God," except the temple of God? as saith the Apostle: " For the temple of God is holy,2 which temple ye are."3 For what else do the enemies aim at, but to take into possession, that is, to make subject to themselves the temple of God, that it may give in to their ungodly wills?
9. But what follows? "My God, make them like unto a wheel " (ver. 13). This is fitly taken as meaning that they should be constant in nothing that they think; but I think it may also be rightly explained, make them like unto a wheel, because a wheel is lifted up on the part of what is behind,4 is thrown down on the part of what is in front; and so it happens to all the enemies of the people of God. For this is not a wish, but a prophecy. He adds: " as the stubble in the face of the wind." By face he means presence; for what face hath the wind, which has no bodily features, being only a motion, in that it is a kind of wave of air? But it is put for temptation, by which light and vain hearts are hurried away.
10. This levity, by which consent is easily given to what is evil, is followed by severe torment; therefore he proceeds: — " Like as the fire that burneth up the wood, and as the flame that consumeth the mountains " (ver. 14): "so shalt Thou persecute them with Thy tempest, and in Thy anger shalt disturb them " (ver. 15). Wood, he saith, for its barrenness, mountains for their loftiness; for such are the enemies of God's people, barren of righteousness, full of pride. When he says, " fire " and " flame," he means to repeat under * Ex his qua retrd sunt extoltitur, ex his qua ante sunt dejicitur.
another term, the idea of God judging and punishing. But in saying, " with Thy tempest," he means, as he goes on to explain, " Thy anger: " and the former expression, " Thou shalt persecute," answers to, " Thou shalt disturb." We must take care, however, to understand, that the anger of God is free from any turbulent emotion; for His anger is an expression for His just method of taking vengeance: as the law might be said to be angry when its ministers are moved to punish by its sanction.
11. "Fill their faces with shame, and they shall seek Thy name, O Lord " (ver. 16). Good and desirable is this which he prophesieth for them: and he would not prophesy thus, unless there were even in that company of the enemies of God's people, some men of such kind that this would be granted to them before the last judgment: for now they are mixed together, and this is the body of the enemies, in respect of the envy whereby they rival the people of God. And now, where they can, they make a noise and lift up their head: but severally, not universally as they will do at the end of the world, when the last judgment is about to fall. But it is the same body, even in those who out of this number shall believe and pass into another body (for the faces of these are filled with shame, that they may seek the name of the Lord), as well as in those others who persevere unto the end in the same wickedness, who are made as stubble before the wind, and are consumed like a wood and barren mountains. To these he again returns, saying, " They shall blush and be vexed for ever and ever " (ver. 17). For those are not vexed for ever and ever who seek the name of the Lord, but having respect unto the shame of their sins, they are vexed for this purpose, that they may seek the name of the Lord, through which they may be no more vexed.
12. Again, he returns to these last, who in the same company of enemies are to be made ashamed for this purpose, that they may not be ashamed for ever: and for this purpose to be destroyed in as far as they are wicked, that being made good they may be found alive for ever. For having said of them, " Let them be ashamed and perish," he instantly adds, " and let them know that Thy name is the Lord, Thou art only the Most Highest in all the earth" (ver. 18). Coming to this knowledge, let them be so confounded as to please God: let them so perish, as that they may abide. " Let them know," he says, " that Thy name is the Lord: " as if whoever else are called lords are named so not truly but by falsehood, for they rule but as servants, and compared with the true Lord are not lords; as it is said, I Am that I Am: s as if those things 5 Exod. iii. 14.
[Psalm LXXXIV.
which are made are not, compared with Him by whom they are made. He adds, " Thou only art the Most Highest in all the earth: " or, as other copies have it, " over all the earth; " as it might be said, in all the heaven, or over all the heaven: but he used the latter word in preference, to depress the pride of earth. For earth ceaseth to be proud, that is, man ceaseth, to whom it was said, " Thou art dust; "' and " why is earth and ashes proud?"2 when he saith that the Lord is the Most Highest above all the earth, that is, that no man's thoughts avail against those " who are called according to His purpose," and of whom it is said, " If God is for us, who can be against us? " 3 PSALM LXXXIV.* i. This Psalm is entitled," For the winepresses." And, as you observed with me, my beloved (for I saw that you attended most closely), nothing is said in its text either of any press, or wine-basket, or vat, or of any of the instruments or the building of a winepress; nothing of this kind did we hear read; so that it is no easy question what is the meaning of this title inscribed upon it, " for the winepresses." For certainly, if after the title it mentioned anything about such things as I enumerated, carnal persons might have believed that it was a song concerning those visible winepresses; but as it has this title, yet says nothing afterwards of those winepresses which we know so well, I cannot doubt that there are other winepresses, which the Spirit of God intended us to look for and to understand here. Therefore, let us recall to mind what takes place in these visible winepresses, and see how this takes place spiritually in the Church. The grape hangs on the vines, and the olive on its trees. For it is for these two fruits that presses are usually made ready; and as long as they hang on their boughs, they seem to enjoy free air; and neither is the grape wine, nor the olive oil, before they are pressed. Thus it is with men whom God predestined before the world to be conformed to the image of His only-begotten Son,' who has been first and especially pressed in His Passion, as the great Cluster. Men of this kind, therefore, before they draw near to the service of God, enjoy in the world a kind of delicious liberty, like hanging grapes or olives: but as it is said, " My son, when thou drawest near to the service of God, stand in judgment and fear, and make thy soul ready for temptation: " 6 so each, as he draweth near to the service of God, findeth that he is come to the winepress; he shall undergo tribulation, shall be crushed, shall be pressed, not that he may perish in this -world, but that he may flow 1 Gen. iii. 19. 4 Lat LXXXIII.
6 Ecdus. ii. 1.
down into the storehouses of God. He hath the coverings of carnal desires stripped off from him, like grape-skins: for this hath taken place in him in carnal desires, of which the Apostle speaks, " Put ye off the old man, and put on the new man." ^ All this is not done but by pressure: therefore the Churches of God of this time are called winepresses.
2. But who are we who are placed in the winepresses? "Sons of Core." For this follows: " For the winepresses, to the sons of Core." The sons of Core has been explained, sons of the bald: as far as those could explain it to us, who know that language, according to their service due to God.8...
3. But being placed under pressure, we are crushed for this purpose, that for our love by which we were borne towards those worldly, secular, temporal, unstable, and perishable things, having suffered in them, in this life, torments, and tribulations of pressures, and abundance of temptations, we may begin to seek that rest which is not of this life, nor of this earth; and the Lord becomes, as is written, " a refuge for the poor man." 9 What is, " for the poor man "? For him who is, as it were, destitute, without aid, without help, without anything on which he may rest, in earth. For to such poor men, God is present. For though men abound in money on earth,...they are filled more with fear than with enjoyment. For what is so uncertain as a rolling thing? It is not unfitly that money itself is stamped round, because it remains not still. Such men, therefore, though they have something, are yet poor. But those who have none of this wealth, but only desire it, are counted also among rich men who will be rejected; for God takes account not of power, but of will. The poor then are destitute of all this world's substance, for even though it abounds around them, they know how fleeting it is; and crying unto God, having nothing in this world with which they may delight themselves, and be held down, placed in abundant pressures and temptations, as if in winepresses, they flow down, having become oil or wine. What are these latter but good desires? For God remains their only object of desire; now they love not earth. For they love Him who made heaven and earth; they love Him, and are not yet with Him. Their desire is delayed, in order that it may increase; it increases, in order that it may receive. For it is not any little thing that God will give to him who desires, nor does he need to be little exercised to be made fit to receive so great a good: not anything which He hath made will God give, but Himself who made all things. Exercise thysufrra. — C.]
Psalm LXXXIV.]
self to receive God: that which thou shalt have for ever, desire thou for a long time...4. Wherefore, most beloved, as each can, make vows, and perform to the Lord God ' what each can: let no one look back, no one delight himself with his former interests, no one turn away from that which is before to that which is behind: let him run until he arrive: for we run not with the feet but with the desire. But let no one in this life say that he hath arrived. For who can be so perfect as Paul? 2 Yet he saith, " Brethren, 1 count not myself to have attained."
5. If therefore thou feelest the passions of this world, even when thou art happy, thou understandest now that thou art in the winepress...If therefore the world smile upon thee with happiness, imagine thyself in the winepress, and say, " I found trouble and heaviness, and I did call upon the name of the Lord." 3 He said not, I found trouble, without meaning, of such a kind as was hidden: for some troubles are hidden from some in this world, who think they are happy while they are absent from God. " For as long as we are in the body," he saith, " we are absent from the Lord." 4 If thou wert absent from thy father, thou wouldest be unhappy: art thou absent from the Lord, and happy? There are then some who think it is well with them. But those who understand, that in whatever abundance of wealth and pleasures, though all things obey their beck, though nothing troublesome creep in, nothing adverse terrify, yet that they are in a bad case as long as they are absent from the Lord; with a most keen eye these have found trouble, and grief, and have called on the name of the Lord. Such is he who sings in this Psalm. Who is he? The Body of Christ. Who is that? You, if you will: all we, if we will: for Christ's Body is one...
" How lovely are Thy tabernacles, O Lord of Hosts " (ver. 1). He was in some tabernacles, that is, in winepresses: but he longed for other tabernacles, where is no pressure: in this he sighed for them, from these, he, as it were, flowed down into them by the channel of longing desire.
6. And what follows? " My soul longeth and faileth for the courts of the Lord " (ver. 2). It is not enough that it " longeth and faileth: " for what doth it fail? " For the courts of the Lord." The grape when pressed hath failed: but for what? So as to be changed into wine, and to flow into the vat, and into the rest of the storeroom, to be kept there in great quiet. Here it is longed for, there it is received: here are sighs, there joy: here prayers, there praises: here groans, there rejoicing. Those things which I 1 Ps. Ixxvi. II. 3 Ps. cxvi. 3, 4.
* Phil. iii. 13.
* 2 Cor. v. 6.
mentioned, let no one while here turn from ashamed: let no one be unwilling to suffer. There is danger, lest the grape, while it fears the winepress, should be devoured by birds or by wild beasts...
7. Thou hast heard a groan in the winepress, " My soul longeth and faileth for the courts of the Lord: " hear how it holdeth out, rejoicing in hope: " My heart and my flesh have rejoiced in the living God." Here they have rejoiced for that cause. Whence cometh rejoicing, but of hope? Wherefore have they rejoiced? " In the living God." What has rejoiced in thee? " My heart and my flesh." Why have they rejoiced?
" For," saith he, " the sparrow hath found her a house, and the turtle-dove a nest, where she may lay her young " (ver. 3). What is this? He had named two things, and he adds two figures of birds which answer to them: he had said that his heart rejoiced and his flesh, and to these two he made the sparrow and turtle-dove to correspond: the heart as the sparrow, the flesh as the dove. The sparrow hath found herself a home: my heart hath found itself a home. She tries her wings in the virtues of this life, in faith, and hope, and charity, by which she may fly unto her home: and when she shall have come thither, she shall remain; and now the complaining voice of the sparrow, which is here, shall no longer be there. For it is the very complaining sparrow of whom in another Psalm he saith, " Like a sparrow alone on the housetop." 5 From the housetop he flies home. Now let him be on the housetop, treading on his carnal house: he shall have a heavenly house, a perpetual home: that sparrow shall make an end of his complaints. But to the dove he hath given young, that is, to the flesh: " the dove hath found a nest, where she may lay her young." The sparrow a home, the dove a nest, and a nest too where she may lay her young. A home is chosen as for ever, a nest is framed for a time: with the heart we think upon God, as if the sparrow flew to her home: with the flesh we do good works. For ye see how many good works are done by the flesh of the saints; for by this we work the things we are commanded to work, by which we are helped in this life. " Break thy bread to the hungry, and bring the poor and roofless into thy house; and if thou see one naked, clothe him:"6 and other such things which are commanded us we work only through the flesh...We speak, brethren, what ye know: how many seem to do good works without the Church? ' how many even Pagans feed the hungry, clothe the naked, receive the 5 Ps. cii. 7. 6 Isa. Iviii. 7.
7 Ed. Ben. refers to P. Lombard, //. Sent. Dist. 41, where this passage is quoted on the question, " Are all the works of those who are without faith evil t " [See A. N. F. vol. ti. p. 517, note 4. — C.J [Psalm LXXXIV stranger, visit the sick, comfort the prisoner? how many do this? The dove seems, as it were, to bring forth young: but finds not herself a nest. How many works may heretics do not in the Church; they place not their young in a nest. They shall be trampled on and crushed: they shall not be kept, shall not be guarded...In that faith lay thy young: in that nest work thy works. For what the nests are, what that nest is, follows at once. Having said, And the dove hath found herself a nest, where she may lay her young; as if thou hadst asked, What nest? " Thy altars, O Lord of Hosts, my King and my God." What is, " My King and my God? " Thou who rulest me, who hast created me.
8..." Blessed are those who dwell in Thy house" (ver. 4)...If thou hast thy own house, thou art poor; if God's, thou art rich. In thy own house thou wilt fear robbers; of the house of God, He is Himself the wall. Therefore " blessed are those who dwell in Thy house." They possess the heavenly Jerusalem, without constraint, without pressure, without difference and division of boundaries; all have it, and each have all. Great are those riches. Brother crowdeth not brother: there is no want there. Next, what will they do there? For among men it is necessity which is the mother of all employments. I have already said, in brief, brethren, run in your mind through any occupations, and see if it is not necessity alone which produces them. Those very eminent arts which seem so powerful in giving help to others, the art of speaking in their defence or of medicine in healing, for these are the most excellent employments in this life; take away litigants, who is there for the advocate to help? take away wounds and diseases? what is there for the physician to cure? And all those employments of ours which are required and done for our daily life, arise from necessity. To plough, to sow, to clear fallow ground, to sail; what is it which produces all these works, but necessity and want? Take away hunger, thirst, nakedness; who has need of all these things?
...For instance, the injunction, " Break thy bread to the hungry." For whom could you break bread, if there were nobody hungry? "Take in the roofless poor into thy house." ' What stranger is there to take in, where all live in their own country? What sick person to visit, where they enjoy perpetual health? What litigants to reconcile, where there is everlasting peace? What dead to bury, where there is eternal life? None of those honourable actions which are common to all men will then be your employment, nor any of these good works; the young swallows will then fly out of their nest.
■ Isa. lviii. 7.
What then? You have said already what we shall have; " Those who dwell in Thy house are blessed." Say now what they shall do, for I see not then any need to induce me to action. Even what I am now saying and arguing springs from some need. Will there be any such argument there to teach the ignorant, or remind the forgetful? Or will the Gospel be read in that country where the Word of God Itself shall be contemplated?..."They shall be always praising Thee." This shall be our whole duty, an unceasing Hallelujah. Think not, my brethren, that there will be any weariness there: if ye are not able to endure long here in saying this, it is because 2 some want draws you away from that enjoyment. If what is not seen gives not so much joy here, if with so much eagerness under the pressure and weakness of the flesh we praise that which we believe, how shall we praise that which we see? " When death shall be swallowed up in victory, when this mortal shall have put on immortality," 3 no one will say, " I have been standing a long time; " no one will say, " I have fasted a long time," " I have watched a long time." For there shall be great endurance, and our immortal bodies shall be sustained in contemplation of God. And if the word which we now dispense to you keeps your weak flesh standing so long, what will be the effect of that joy? how will it change us? "For we shall be like Him, since we shall see Him as He is." * Being made like Him, when shall we ever faint? what shall draw us off? Brethren, we shall never be satiated with the praise of God, with the love of God. If love could fail, praise could fail. But if love be eternal, as there will there be beauty inexhaustible, fear not lest thou be not able to praise for ever Him whom thou shalt be able to love for ever. For this life let us sigh.
9. But how shall we come thither? " Happy is the man whose strength is in Thee " (ver. 5). He knew where he was, and that by reason of the frailty of his flesh he could not fly to that state of blessedness: he thought upon his own burden, as it is said elsewhere; " For the corruptible body weighs down the soul, and the earthly house depresses the understanding which has many thoughts." 5 The Spirit calls upward, the weight of the flesh calls back again downward: between the double effort to raise and to weigh down, a kind of struggle ensues: this struggle goes toward the pressure of the winepress. Hear how the Apostle describes this same struggle of the winepress, for he was himself afflicted there, there he was pressed..." Miserable man that I am: who shall deliver me from the body of this death? The grace of 2 Oxf. mss. " want keeps you not away."
5 Wisd. u. 15.
Psalm LXXXIV.]
God through Jesus Christ our Lord." '..."For I delight in the Law of God according to the inner man." But what shall I do? how shall I fly? how shall I arrive thither? " I see another law in my members," etc...And as in the words of the Apostle, that difficulty and that almost inextricable struggle is alleviated by the addition, "The grace of God through Jesus Christ our Lord; " so here, when he sighed in the ardent longing for the house of God, and those praises of God, and when a kind of despair arose at the feeling of the burden of the body and the weight of the flesh, again he awoke to hope, and said (ver. 5), "Blessed is the man whose taking up 2 is in Thee."
10. What then does God supply by His grace to him whom He taketh hold of to lead him on? He goes on to say: "He hath placed steps3 in his heart."...Where does it place steps? "In his heart, in the valley of weeping" (ver. 6). So here thou hast for a winepress the valley of weeping, the very pious tears in tribulation are the new wine of those that love...Thsy went forth " weeping," he says, " casting their seed." 4 Therefore, by the grace of God may upward steps be placed in thy heart. Rise by loving. Hence the Psalm " of degrees " is called..." He hath placed' steps of ascent to the place which He hath appointed " (ver. 7). Now we lament; whence proceed our lamentations, but from that place where the steps of our ascent are placed? Whence comes our lamentation, but from that cause wherefore the Apostle exclaimed that he was a wretched man, because he saw another law in his members, warring against the law in his mind? 5 And whence does this proceed? From the penalty of sin. And we thought that we could easily be righteous as it were by our own strength, before we received the command; " but when the command came, sin revived; but I died," 6 saith the Apostle. For a law was given to men, not such as could save them at once, but it was to show them in what severe sickness they were lying...But when sin was made manifest by the law given, sin was but increased, for it is both sin, and against the Law; " Sin," saith he, " taking occasion by the command, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence." 1 What does he mean by "taking occasion by the law"? Having received the command, men tried as by their own strength to obey it; conquered by lust, they became guilty of transgression of this very command also. But what saith the Apostle? " Where sin abounded, grace hath much more abounded; " 8 that is, the disease increased, the medicine became of more avail. Accordingly, 2 Sitsceptio.
3 Ascensus. 6 Rom. vii. 9.
my brethren, did those five porches of Solomon, in the middle of which the pool lay, heal the sick at all? The sick, says the Evangelist, lay in the five porches.9 In the Gospel we have and read it. Those five porches are the law in the five books of Moses. For this cause the sick were brought forth from their houses that they might lie in the porches. So the law brought the sick men forth, but did not heal them: but by the blessing of God the water was disturbed, as by an Angel descending into it. At the sight of the water troubled, the one person who was able, descended and was healed. That water surrounded by the five porches, was the people of the Jews shut up in their law. The Lord came and disturbed this people, so that He Himself was slain. For if the Lord had not troubled the Jews by coming down to them, would He have been crucified? So that the troubled water signified the Passion of the Lord, which arose from His troubling the Jewish people. The sick man who believeth in this Passion, like him who descended into the troubled water, is healed thereby. He whom the Law could not heal, that is, while he lay in the porches, is healed by grace, by faith in the Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ...