Cornelius a Lapide
Table of Contents
Synopsis of the Chapter
God ordains that priests abstain from funerals and mourning, and indeed that the high priest should mourn neither father nor mother; second, that the high priest should not take a wife unless she is a virgin and noble, verse 13; third, that priests be free from blemishes, that is, bodily defects, verse 17.
Vulgate Text: Leviticus 21:1-24
1. The Lord also said to Moses: Speak to the priests, the sons of Aaron, and you shall say to them: Let not a priest be defiled at the deaths of his citizens, 2. except only for blood relatives and near kin, that is, for his father and mother, and son and daughter, and brother, 3. and a virgin sister who has not been married to a man, 4. but he shall not be defiled even for a prince of his people. 5. They shall not shave their head, nor their beard, nor make incisions in their flesh. 6. They shall be holy to their God, and shall not defile His name: for they offer the incense of the Lord, and the bread of their God, and therefore they shall be holy. 7. They shall not take as wife a harlot or a vile prostitute, nor one who has been divorced by her husband, because they are consecrated to their God, 8. and they offer the bread of proposition. Let them therefore be holy, because I also am holy, the Lord, who sanctifies them. 9. If the daughter of a priest is caught in fornication, and has violated the name of her father, she shall be burned with fire. 10. The high priest, that is, the chief priest among his brothers, on whose head the oil of anointing has been poured, and whose hands have been consecrated in the priesthood, and who is clothed with the holy vestments, shall not uncover his head, nor rend his garments; 11. and he shall by no means enter where any dead person is, nor be defiled even for his father or mother. 12. Nor shall he go out of the holy places, lest he pollute the Sanctuary of the Lord, because the oil of the holy anointing of his God is upon him. I am the Lord. 13. He shall take a virgin for his wife; 14. but a widow, and a divorced woman, and a defiled woman, and a harlot he shall not take, but a maiden of his own people; 15. lest he mingle the stock of his family with the common people of his nation, because I am the Lord who sanctifies him. 16. And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: 17. Speak to Aaron: A man of your seed throughout their families who has a blemish shall not offer bread to his God, 18. nor approach to His ministry: if he is blind, if lame, if he has a small or large or crooked nose, 19. if he has a broken foot or hand, 20. if he is humpbacked, if bleary-eyed, if he has a white spot in his eye, if he has a persistent scab, or scurvy in his body, or is ruptured. 21. Every man who has a blemish, of the seed of Aaron the priest, shall not approach to offer victims to the Lord, nor bread to his God; 22. he shall nevertheless eat of the bread that is offered in the Sanctuary, 23. provided only that he does not enter within the veil, nor approach the altar, because he has a blemish, and he must not defile My Sanctuary. I am the Lord who sanctifies them. 24. Moses therefore spoke to Aaron, and to his sons, and to all Israel, all the things that had been commanded him.
Verse 1: Speak to the Priests
Speak to the priests, the sons of Aaron — speak to the lesser priests: for the high priest could mourn no one at all, not even his father, as is said in verse 10, which however is here permitted to the lesser priests.
Let not a priest be defiled at the deaths of his citizens — as if to say: Let the priest beware lest he contract legal uncleanness by touching a corpse, or by attending to a funeral, or by following it, or by mourning, or by entering the house of the dead.
At the deaths. — In Hebrew, over a soul, that is, over a corpse; the Chaldean, over a dead person: for here "soul" by antiphrasis is applied to a lifeless body. Saint Augustine gives another reason for this nomenclature, Question LXXVIII: "The name of the ruling soul," he says, "has been given even to the body bereft of its soul, because it is to be restored to it in the resurrection; just as a building which is called a church, even when the church — that is, the people — have gone out of it, is nonetheless called a church," by metonymy.
The priest is here forbidden to mourn his citizens; therefore much more was it not permitted for him to mourn foreigners and strangers. The reason for this law is, first, because it was the duty of priests to handle divine things and to carry out the ministries of the sanctuary, and therefore it was fitting that they should be as far removed as possible from all association with funerals and the dead, from impurity and irregularity: for their ancient holiness and purity was bodily; now among bodies the most impure are corpses, inasmuch as they go into putrefaction and become the food of worms, toads, and serpents: therefore the priests of old had to be kept at the greatest distance from them. Second, because the priest was to be for the people an example of heavenly life, and was to demonstrate in practice faith and hope in the resurrection, by not mourning the dead. Third, because the priest was a type of Christ, who destroyed death by His own sacrifice: therefore the priest was to foreshadow through his sacrifices the single offering of Christ. So Cyril, book XII On Adoration, page 248.
Verse 2: Except Only for Blood Relatives
Except only for blood relatives. — Excepted here from the law just laid down are the father, mother, son, daughter, brother, and sister, if she is a virgin: these deceased therefore the priest could mourn, but not his wife, grandson, or granddaughter, because those are not excepted here.
You will say: In chapter X, verse 6, Ithamar and Eleazar the priests are forbidden to mourn Nadab and Abihu their brothers, already dead. I respond: That prohibition was a special one made to them, because they had then been recently consecrated as priests; hence God did not want them to mourn their brothers, who had been justly and deservedly killed by Him; otherwise according to this law they could have mourned.
Verse 4: Not Even for a Prince
But he shall not be defiled even for a prince of his people. — Vatablus and others translate from the Hebrew: Let not the prince be defiled among his people, so as to profane himself. But the matter here is not about the defilement of a prince, but of priests. Therefore our Translator more correctly translates, for a prince: for in the Hebrew the preposition beth, meaning "in" or "for," is rightly understood, as it often is, especially because here another preposition immediately follows.
Tropologically, corpses are sins; the touching of corpses is the sharing of sins: therefore the priest must beware lest he become a partaker of the crimes of his citizens, and lead a worldly life; indeed he cannot even consent to a prince who sins: but he is only defiled in his father and mother, that is, by the offense of our first parents, Adam and Eve, and in son and daughter, brother and sister, because after original sin we all offend in many things: and in these things it is necessary that even the just receive pardon, without which neither they, nor those who succeed them in religion, as sons, nor those who walk with them as brothers in the way of holiness, can live. On the contrary, concerning the high priest, that is, Christ, it is said that He is defiled in no one at all, not even in father and mother, because Christ felt no contagion of a corrupted origin nor any other stain. So Radulphus.
Verse 5: They Shall Not Shave Their Head
They shall not shave their head, nor their beard, nor make incisions in their flesh. — The Gentiles did these things in mourning, and therefore they were forbidden to the Jews, even to laypeople, as I said at chapter XIX, verse 27; here however the same things are particularly forbidden to priests, because these things are more unbecoming to them.
Tropologically, priests should not shave their head, but only trim it, because thoughts of the flesh about the life of their subjects and relatives (which are signified by hair), they should neither root out entirely from themselves, nor again allow to grow so much that they close the eyes of the mind; so that they should bear the beard, that is, the appearance of virtue, in their countenance; in the same way they shall not make incisions in the flesh, lest they themselves seem to empty the faith of the resurrection, if they do not strive to moderate their mourning for their dead, says Radulphus.
What then should the faithful do at the funerals of their loved ones? Strong women and heroines will teach you. Hear Saint Ambrose, book I of the Offices, chapter LI: "What shall I say of the mother of the Maccabees? She watched joyfully as the funerals of her sons became so many trophies, and was delighted by the voices of the dying as by the songs of psalm-singers, seeing in her sons the most beautiful harp of her womb, and a harmony of piety sweeter than any measure of the lyre." The same can be said of Saint Felicity, who watched the martyrdom of her seven sons, of whom Saint Gregory speaks in homily 3 on the Gospel; and of Saint Symphorosa, likewise the mother of seven Martyr sons, of whom we read in the Life of Saint Getulius the Martyr, her husband; likewise of Saint Melania the younger, of whom Saint Jerome writes in his letter to Paula on the death of Blesilla: "Follow the examples before you," he says. "Saint Melania, the true nobility of our time among Christians, with whom may the Lord grant you and me to have a part in His day, while her husband's body was still warm and not yet buried, lost two sons at once. I am about to say something incredible, but, with Christ as witness, not false. Who would not have thought that she would, in frenzied fashion, with hair disheveled and garment torn, tear at her lacerated breast? Not a drop of tears flowed; she stood immovable, and prostrate at the feet of Christ, as if she held Him Himself, she smiled. More freely, she said, shall I serve You, Lord, because You have freed me from so great a burden. But perhaps she is surpassed in other cases? Nay rather, with what spirit she despised them she proved afterwards in the case of her one remaining son, to whom, having granted all the possessions she had, as winter was already coming on, she sailed to Jerusalem."
Do you want examples from the Gentiles? Hear Saint Jerome, letter 3 to Heliodorus in the epitaph of Nepotian: "Where," he says, "is the ever-praised saying of Anaxagoras and Telamon: 'I knew that I had begotten a mortal';" so they had responded when the death of their son was announced. "Cicero, Plato, Diogenes, Clitomachus, Carneades, Possidonius, put forward innumerable men, and especially Pericles and Xenophon the Socratic, of whom the former, having lost two sons, gave a public oration wearing a garland; the latter, when while sacrificing he heard that his son had been killed in battle, is said to have laid down his garland, and to have replaced it on his head after he learned that his son had fallen fighting bravely in the battle line. Pulvillus, while dedicating the Capitol, when told that his son had suddenly died, ordered that he be buried in his absence. Lucius Paulus entered the city in triumph during the seven days between the funerals of his two sons. I pass over the Maximi, the Catos, the Galli, the Pisos, the Bruti, the Scaevolae, the Metelli, the Scauri, the Martii, the Crassi, the Marcelli, and the Aufidii, whose virtue in mourning was no less than in wars, and whose bereavements Cicero recounted in his book On Consolation, lest I should seem to have sought examples from others rather than from our own. Although these things have been said briefly for our chastisement, if faith does not perform what unbelief has demonstrated."
Verse 6: They Shall Be Holy to Their God
They shall be holy to their God — that is, removed from all defilement, uncleanness, and from the shameful and profane rites and ceremonies which the Gentiles employ at funerals.
And they shall not defile His name — as if to say: Therefore they shall not defile the name, the reputation, and the priestly dignity; and consequently not even the reputation of God, whose ministers and priests they are.
They offer the incense (in Hebrew it is "fire-offerings," which the Septuagint translates as "sacrifices," but our Translator as "incense," which is burned with fire) and the bread (of proposition) of their God, and therefore they shall be holy. — In Hebrew, "therefore they shall be holiness," as if to say: Therefore they shall be most holy and most pure, so that they may seem to be holiness itself.
Tropologically, incense is prayer; the bread of God is the Saints, who feed God with faith and good works, and transfer themselves into the Body of Christ: these the priests offer to God, because by their teaching they bring them to belief. It is just therefore that they themselves should be holy who invite others to holiness. So Radulphus.
Verse 7: A Harlot and a Vile Prostitute
They shall not take as wife a harlot and a vile prostitute (the priests). — "Prostitute" both here and in Deuteronomy XXIII, 18, and Joel III, 3, is a harlot, who has prostituted her body and her chastity. The Septuagint translates it as bebēlōmenēn, "profaned," that is, violated and defiled: for this is what the Hebrew chalala signifies. So in Plautus and other Latin writers, prostibulum signifies not only the place of shame, namely a brothel, but also the harlot herself, most vile and abject.
Tropologically, a wife is a way of life; he takes one of his own kind who looks to God the Creator and the holy Fathers, and lives according to their pattern: but he takes a harlot, a vile prostitute, and a divorced woman, who conforms himself to the lovers of this world. So Radulphus.
Verse 8: Let Them Be Holy
Let them therefore be holy, because I also am holy, the Lord, who sanctifies them — who communicates My holiness to you, by designating and consecrating you as My priests. Second, "I sanctify," that is, I command you to be holy.
Verse 9: The Daughter of a Priest
If the daughter of a priest is caught in fornication, and has violated the name of her father, she shall be burned with fire. — On account of the dignity of the priestly father, the simple fornication of his daughter is punished with death by fire; but the fornication of other women is not punished: for it is gathered from Exodus XXII, 16, that daughters of citizens who fornicated were not punished, unless they had afterwards sold themselves as virgins, and by this means deceived a bridegroom; for then, when the matter was discovered, they were stoned, just as adulteresses, as is clear from Deuteronomy XXII, 20. This distinction is what the words of this law signify, when they give the reason, namely that "she has violated the name of her father," as if to say: Because by her fornication she has branded a grave mark and disgrace upon her priestly father, therefore she shall be burned. So also the pagan Romans buried alive Vestal virgins caught in fornication: but adulterous women, although they punished them with some condemnation, they nonetheless did not punish with death. "To such a degree did they think that divine sanctuaries had to be avenged more seriously than human bedchambers," says Saint Augustine, book III of The City of God, chapter V.
Verse 10: The High Priest Shall Not Uncover His Head
The high priest, on whose head the oil of anointing has been poured, shall not uncover his head. — The Septuagint: "he shall not remove the mitre from his head," that is, he shall not bare his head of his mitre, namely in order to mourn the dead, so that by this he might allegorically signify the untroubled, immovable, and eternal priesthood of Christ, which will never be taken away, says Cyril, book XII On Adoration, page 249.
Note: Only the high priest was anointed on the head, and therefore he mourned no dead persons, not even his parents. The lesser priests were anointed only on the thumbs of their hands and feet, and upon their ears, and their garments were sprinkled with the blood of a sacrificed ram, mixed with the oil of sacred anointing; and therefore they could mourn the designated blood relatives of verse 2, but not others. Kings, however, were anointed neither on the head, nor on the hands, nor on the garments with sacred oil, but only with simple and common oil; and therefore they could mourn all the dead whom they wished.
Verse 11: He Shall Not Enter Where Any Dead Person Is
He shall not enter where any dead person is. — "To any... not," that is, to none, as if to say: He shall not enter the house in which there is any corpse, abandoning it, so as to mourn indecently over the dead. So Vatablus.
Again, "lest he pollute," because if he, being polluted by a dead person, were to return to the sanctuary, he would pollute it.
Abulensis notes here that during the Hebrews' wandering in the desert for 40 years, no sacrifices were offered except on Mount Sinai, and therefore they were not afterwards bound in the desert by any ceremonial precepts, but only by moral and judicial ones. The reason is that ceremonial precepts were established only in relation to sacrifices; therefore when sacrifices ceased, the other ceremonial laws also ceased. Except those which God specifically exempted in Numbers 5:2, namely the leper, the one with a seminal discharge, and the one unclean from a dead person: for these were unclean and had to be separated according to the rite and ceremony prescribed in chapter 13. Therefore, in order for these to be purified, the ashes of the red heifer were needed, about which see Numbers 19; it is therefore necessary to say that this heifer was burned in the desert, for those polluted by a dead person were purified by these ashes. From this it follows that priests even in the desert were obliged to observe the law prescribed here, namely that they should not mourn the dead. In a similar manner, the Hebrews did not observe the feasts in the desert, except the Sabbath; for one who violated the Sabbath was stoned in the desert, Numbers chapter 15, verse 35.
Also he shall not be defiled for his father or his mother — that is, if the father or mother should die, the high priest shall not mourn for them with outward rite and sign, nor shall he accompany their funeral procession. "For the law demands," says Philo, in Book II of On the Monarchy, "in this man a nature superior to that of ordinary men, since he is familiar with God above all others, situated on a certain boundary between the divine and human natures, so that through this mediator God may be propitious to men." The Gentiles imitated this. Whence among the Romans the Flamen Dialis was not permitted to enter a place where there was a funeral pyre or to touch a dead body, as attested by Aulus Gellius, Book X, chapter 15; indeed "not even to hear funeral flutes," as Festus attests. Moreover, the Flaminica was not permitted to have sandals or shoes made from animals that had died of natural causes, as Servius attests in his commentary on Aeneid IV: "Because," he says, "all things that have died by their own death are accursed." Hence also, whenever the high priest delivered a funeral oration, a veil was spread before the dead body, which would keep his eyes from the funeral. Hear Seneca, Consolation to Marcia, chapter 15: "Tiberius Caesar lost both the son he had begotten and the one he had adopted; yet he himself praised his son from the rostra, and stood in the sight of the body that had been placed there, with only a curtain interposed, which kept the eyes of the pontiff from the funeral."
Augustus Caesar did the same at the funeral of Agrippa, as Dio attests, Book 54; for the Caesars themselves were also pontiffs up until the Emperor Constantine, who, having become a Christian, renounced this pagan pontificate. The same Dio, speaking of Tiberius at the funeral of Augustus: "Tiberius," he says, "was granted immunity for having touched the corpse (for this was forbidden) and for having accompanied the funeral procession."
Allegorically St. Bernard, Sermon 1 On the Circumcision, at the beginning: "Christ," he says, "is the high priest, of whom it was prophesied rather than commanded that He should not be defiled for His father or for His mother; for His Father is from eternity, but He is God, upon whom no sin can fall; and He has a mother, but she is a virgin, nor could incorruption give birth to corruption."
Verse 12: Nor Shall He Go Out of the Holy Places
Nor shall he go out of the holy places — that is, out of the sanctuary, if, while he is stationed there, it should happen that even his father or mother should die. For the high priest, when at home, was not required to go to the sanctuary if one of his family members died; but if he was in the sanctuary, he was not permitted on account of the death of his father or mother to leave it and its sacred duties, and go out to the funeral. The reason follows:
Lest he pollute the Sanctuary of the Lord — that is, lest he bring injury and disgrace upon the sanctuary, by leaving it for the sake of a funeral.
Verse 13: He Shall Take a Virgin as Wife
He (the high priest) shall take a virgin as wife. — God commanded this on account of the honor and dignity of the supreme priesthood: and this firstly, because it would not have been fitting for the supreme pontiff to marry one who had been violated and known by another; secondly, "so that the sacred seed might be received in the untouched and pure womb of a virgin, and the birth of this child not be mixed in any way with other families," says Philo, Book II of On the Monarchy; thirdly, so that by forming an association with minds not yet corrupted, the pontiffs might more easily mold them to their own ways. For the minds of virgins are compliant and flexible toward virtue, and most ready for training.
Tropologically St. Cyril, Book XII of On Adoration: "It was signified," he says, "by this marriage of the high priest with a virgin, that Christ would dwell spiritually not with impious and corrupt souls, but with the most chaste and purest ones, as with virgins, and would make them fruitful and call them joined to Him by kinship."
Allegorically: Christ, says Radulphus, betrothed to Himself not the corrupt Synagogue, which He had repudiated, but the Church from among the Gentiles; whom, although she was a harlot, He loved, and in order to join her worthily to Himself, He made her a virgin — noble now in character, and later in dwelling places.
Verse 14: A Defiled Woman
A defiled woman. — The Chaldean has: profaned, that is, violated and polluted. So the Septuagint; for it was clearly fitting that the wife of the high priest be pure. Thus Julius Caesar dismissed his wife Pompeia, whom rumor reported to have been corrupted by Clodius; on which account, when the case was brought against Clodius, he himself, summoned as a witness, said nothing unfavorable about her; and to the prosecutor who asked: Why then did you dismiss her? he replied: "Because Caesar's wife must be free from all unfavorable suspicion, and she must be entirely pure." The same was to be said here of the high priest. Tertullian, in his book On Monogamy, adds here: "My priests shall not marry again;" as if second marriages were here forbidden to them, and they were required to be monogamous. Perhaps the version of Theodotion or Symmachus had something of the sort, as Pamelius suspects. For neither the Septuagint nor the Hebrew text has this: although here the reliability of Tertullian wavers; for he wrote this book while in heresy: for he contends in this book that second marriages are unlawful for Christians, which is a well-established error.
Verse 15: Lest He Mingle the Stock of His Lineage
But a young woman of his own people. — Philo adds that the high priest could not take a wife except of priestly lineage; but this is not clear from the divine law; indeed, the histories rather suggest the contrary: for from these it is established that high priests were accustomed to marry the daughters of princes and kings, who were not of the tribe of Levi but of Judah. Thus Jehoiada married Jehosheba, daughter of King Joram of Judah, as Josephus attests, Book IX of Antiquities, chapter 7.
Lest he mingle the stock of his lineage with the common people of his nation — that is, let him not take a wife from the common people, but a noble one. The Septuagint translates: He shall not profane his seed among his people, and this firstly, on account of the dignity of the priesthood; secondly, so that the high priest may more freely and effectively teach the kings and princes to whom he is joined by kinship the worship of God and true religion.
I am the Lord who sanctify him — who command him to be holy, and to abstain from the contamination of a common and plebeian wife; so "I sanctify" is understood in verse 8 and 23, and in the preceding chapter, verse 8.
Verse 17: A Man Who Has a Blemish
A man of your seed who has a blemish (such a deformity as those which follow), shall not offer the bread (of proposition, which even the lesser priests offer fresh each Sabbath, removing the previous ones) to his God, nor shall he approach His ministry. — These words are not in the Hebrew, but are understood: for those having a blemish were excluded both from the altar of holocausts, the altar of incense, and the lampstand, as well as from the table of the showbread.
Verse 18: The Blemishes That Make One Irregular
If he is blind (behold, these are the blemishes that make one irregular, so that having any one of them, he cannot be an Aaronic priest), if lame, if with a small, or large, or crooked nose — For "if small" the Hebrew is charum, which the Hebrews translate as "flat-nosed," although if you look at the origin and root, it properly signifies not a nose or flat-nosedness, but something cut off. Likewise for a large or crooked nose, the Hebrew is sarua, which properly signifies something overgrown, such as a large or twisted nose, to which accordingly the Hebrews applied this name. The Hebrews, besides these blemishes, assign another hundred and forty which make a man unfit for the priesthood: see the Book of Precepts, negative precept 308.
Verses 19-21: Broken Foot, Broken Hand, and Other Defects
If with a broken foot, if with a broken hand, if hunchbacked (gibbous), if blear-eyed (so also the Septuagint and the Chaldean. In Hebrew it is dac, that is, one who has thin or tender eyes, as the blear-eyed have), if having a white spot in the eye, if with chronic scabies, if with impetigo on the body (impetigo is a kind of dry scabies, creeping through the skin with itching), or if ruptured.
Anyone who has a blemish (any of those just mentioned), shall not approach to offer sacrifices to the Lord, nor bread to his God. — He repeats what has gone before; therefore "bread" here means the same as sacrifices and offerings, which are as it were the bread, that is, the food of God. So the Chaldean and the Septuagint. Whence it follows: "Yet he shall eat of the bread that is offered in the sanctuary," that is, he shall eat of the meats and sacrifices offered to God. So Abulensis and others. And therefore by a similar usage from Hebrew phraseology, rightly the flesh of Christ in the Eucharist, offered to God, is called bread by St. John, chapter 6, and by St. Paul, 1 Corinthians 11, especially because it lies hidden under the species of bread; but not conversely — that the bread itself is rightly called the body and flesh, so that you would say of the bread: "This is My body," that is, this bread is My body. So also bread is taken for sacrifices in the next chapter, last verse.
Verse 22: He Shall Eat of the Most Holy Offerings
The Hebrew is: he shall eat of the most holy and the holy offerings. The most holy offerings were called the portions of sacrifices, the sacred bread, the grain offerings, which the priests alone ate in the holy place; but the holy offerings were called the tithes and first fruits, of which others besides the priests could also eat.
Verse 23: He Shall Not Enter Within the Veil
Provided only that he not enter within the veil (within the tabernacle or the holy place) (to burn incense, light the lamps, and place the showbread on the table), nor approach the altar — of holocausts, to offer sacrifices.
I am the Lord who sanctify them — who command them to be holy and pure from all indecency and blemish. All these things, says Philo, are to be referred figuratively to the perfection of the soul; for if the mortal body of the priest must be inspected, lest it be tainted by any defect, how much more the immortal soul formed in the image of God? So he says in Book II of On the Monarchy.
Tropological Sense of the Blemishes
Tropologically, St. Gregory, Part I of the Pastoral Rule, last chapter, and from him Radulphus: "The blind man is he who, pressed by the darkness of the present life, does not know where to direct the step of his action; the lame man is he who sees indeed, but through the weakness of his mind cannot perfectly accomplish what he sees; the small-nosed man is he who has little discernment." Whence in Canticles 7 it is said: "Your nose is like the tower which is in Lebanon;" because Holy Church, from what sources temptations may arise, perceives through discernment, and detects from on high the coming wars of vices; the large and crooked nose is immoderate subtlety of discernment, which, when it has grown beyond what is fitting, confuses the very rectitude of its action. He is one with a broken foot or hand, who is devoid of good works and idle; or, as St. Cyril, Book XII of On Adoration, he who does not walk uprightly toward virtuous actions, but does the work of God imperfectly and negligently: "The hunchback is he whom earthly solicitude weighs down, so that he never looks upward; the blear-eyed man is he whose sense and mind nature has sharpened, but the wickedness of his way of life confuses; the one who has a white spot is he who, attributing to himself the brightness of justice or wisdom, excludes himself through arrogance from the light of supernatural knowledge; the one who has chronic scabies is he whom the wantonness of the flesh dominates; the one with impetigo, whom avarice dominates; the ruptured man is he who carries the weight of shameful conduct in hidden places, that is, in his mind." So also Theodoret, Question 30, and Cyril above.
Now, if God required such great purity from the Jews who sacrificed animals, how much does He require from priests and Christians who offer and consume the Body of the Lord? John Moschus narrates in the Spiritual Meadow, chapter 101, that a Bishop of Rumelia, celebrating before Pope Agapitus, paused because he did not see, as was customary, the Holy Spirit visibly descending upon the host. When asked by Agapitus the cause of the delay, he replied: Remove the deacon who holds the fan from the altar. When he was removed, the usual signs appeared, and he completed the sacrifice. Behold, the wickedness of the deacon delayed the sacrifice of so holy a Bishop. The same thing happened to St. John Chrysostom, on account of a deacon casting his eyes upon a woman, as Metaphrastes narrates in the Life of St. Chrysostom. Let Christians therefore flee this rupture.
Palladius narrates in the Lausiac History, chapter 20, that a certain priest who celebrated Mass while in a state of fornication was struck by God with a cancer, which had so eaten away his head that the very bone appeared entirely at the crown; blessed Macarius cured him by the laying on of hands, after he had first promised that he would sin no more, nor minister at the altar, but would embrace the lay state.
On the contrary, to the pure and holy, Christ and the angels assist and minister at the sacrifice, and indeed from time to time even carry the sacred host.
Thus to St. Catherine of Siena, a most holy virgin, who desired Communion but was unable to receive it because of the murmurings of certain people, Christ Himself brought a particle of the consecrated host from the altar, as Raymond of Capua attests, from whose hands the sacred host was taken, Book II of her Life, chapter 32.
Thus St. Stanislaus Kostka, a novice of our Order, most joyfully received the Eucharist from the hands of two angels who entered his room, led by St. Barbara (which he had most ardently desired during a dangerous illness), as our Sacchinus reports in his Life, and Father Ribadeneira, Book III of the Life of Francis Borgia, chapter 6.
Blessed Macarius narrated to Palladius, as he himself says in the Lausiac History, chapter 20, "that he had observed at the time of communion that he himself had never given the oblation to Marcus the ascetic, but that an angel had given it to him from the altar; and that he had only seen the finger of the hand of the one who was giving it."
St. Onuphrius in the desert received the Eucharist every week from the hands of angels, and thereby became so heavenly and angelic, as is evident from his Life. I shall adduce more in Numbers 4, at the end.
Palladius narrates in the Lausiac History, chapter 20, that a certain celebrating priest was accustomed to seeing an angel assisting at the right side of the altar.