Cornelius a Lapide

Ecclesiasticus XVII

Table of Contents

Verse 1: God created man from the earth

1. God created man from the earth, and made him according to His own image. 2. And again

He turned him back into it, and clothed him with strength according to Himself. 3. He gave him a number of days and a time, and gave him power over the things that are upon the earth. 4. He put the fear of him upon all flesh, and he had dominion over beasts and birds. 5. He created from him a helper like himself: counsel, and a tongue, and eyes, and ears, and a heart He gave them for thinking; and He filled them with the discipline of understanding. 6. He created for them the knowledge of the spirit, He filled their heart with sense, and He showed them good and evil. 7. He set His eye upon their hearts, to show them the greatness of His works, 8. that they might praise the name of His sanctification; and glory in His wonders, that they might declare the greatness of His works. 9. He added to them discipline, and gave them the law of life as an inheritance. 10. He established an eternal covenant with them, and showed them His justice and judgments. 11. And their eye saw the greatness of His glory, and their ears heard the honor of His voice, and He said to them: Beware of all that is unjust. 12. And He commanded each of them concerning his neighbor. 13. Their ways are always before Him; they are not hidden from His eyes. 14. Over every nation He set a ruler, 15. and the portion of God — Israel — was made manifest. 16. And all their works are as the sun in the sight of God, and His eyes without ceasing look upon their ways. 17. Their covenants are not hidden by their iniquity, and all their iniquities are in the sight of God. 18. The alms of a man are as a seal with Him, and He will preserve the grace of a man as the apple of the eye; 19. and afterwards He shall rise up and render them their recompense, to each one upon their own head, and He shall turn them into the inner parts of the earth. 20. But to the penitent He gave a way of justice, and He strengthened those who were failing in endurance, and He destined for them the lot of truth. 21. Turn to the Lord and forsake your sins: 22. pray before the face of the Lord, and lessen your stumbling blocks. 23. Return to the Lord and turn away from your injustice, and greatly hate abomination: 24. and know the justices and judgments of God, and stand in the lot of the proposition and prayer of the Most High God. 25. Go into the parts of the holy world, with the living and those who give praise to God. 26. Do not tarry in the error of the ungodly; confess before death. From the dead, as from nothing, confession perishes. 27. You shall confess while living; living and in health you shall confess, and you shall praise God, and you shall glory in His mercies. 28. How great is the mercy of the Lord, and His propitiation toward those who turn to Him! 29. For not all things can be in men, since the son of man is not immortal, and they have taken pleasure in the vanity of malice. 30. What is brighter than the sun? Yet even this shall fail. Or what is more wicked than what flesh and blood has devised? And this shall be reproved. 31. He Himself beholds the power of the height of heaven, and all men are earth and ashes.

First Part of the Chapter

Synopsis of the Chapter

He continues the narration of the works and mighty deeds of God, in order to impel the reader to obedience and veneration of God, and on both topics this chapter is, as it were, a continuous sermon. Therefore first, from Genesis he narrates the creation of man in the image of God, and the gifts especially of wisdom and divine law bestowed upon him, the covenant entered into by God with him, and God's gaze upon all the works and sins of men; and from all these things, at verse 21, he concludes and urges man to turn through repentance, amendment of life, and all holiness to his so munificent Creator, and to serve his God with all reverence and devotion.

Vulgate Text: Ecclesiasticus 17:1-31

1. God created man out of the earth, and made him according to His own image. 2. And again He turned him back into it, and according to Himself He clothed him with strength. 3. He gave him the number of days and a time, and gave him power over the things that are upon the earth. 4. He put the fear of him upon all flesh, and he had dominion over beasts and birds. 5. He created out of him a helper like himself: counsel, and a tongue, and eyes, and ears, and a heart He gave them for thinking; and with the discipline of understanding He filled them. 6. He created for them the knowledge of the spirit, He filled their heart with sense, and showed them good and evil. 7. He set His eye upon their hearts, to show them the greatness of His works, 8. that they might praise the name of sanctification; and glory in His wonders, that they might declare the greatness of His works. 9. He added to them discipline, and the law of life He gave them as an inheritance. 10. He established an everlasting covenant with them, and showed them His justice and judgments. 11. And their eyes saw the greatness of His honor, and their ears heard the honor of His voice, and He said to them: Beware of all iniquity. 12. And He commanded them, each one concerning his neighbor. 13. Their ways are always before Him, they are not hidden from His eyes. 14. Over every nation He set a ruler, 15. and the portion of God, Israel, was made manifest. 16. And all their works are as the sun in the sight of God, and His eyes are continually looking upon their ways. 17. Their covenants are not hidden by their iniquity, and all their iniquities are in the sight of God. 18. The alms of a man is as a seal with Him, and He will preserve the grace of a man as the pupil of the eye; 19. and afterwards He will rise up and render to them their recompense, to each one upon their own head, and will turn them into the interior parts of the earth. 20. But to the penitent He gave the way of justice, and He strengthened those who were failing in endurance, and destined for them the lot of truth. 21. Turn to the Lord, and forsake your sins: 22. pray before the face of the Lord, and lessen your offenses. 23. Return to the Lord, and turn away from your injustice, and greatly hate abomination: 24. and know the justices and judgments of God, and stand in the lot of the proposition, and of the prayer of the most high God. 25. Go into the parts of the holy age, with the living and those who give praise to God. 26. Do not tarry in the error of the ungodly, confess before death. From the dead, as if nothing, confession perishes. 27. You shall confess while living, living and healthy you shall confess, and you shall praise God, and shall glory in His mercies. 28. How great is the mercy of the Lord, and His forgiveness to those who turn to Him! 29. For not all things can be in men, because the son of man is not immortal, and they have taken pleasure in the vanity of malice. 30. What is brighter than the sun? yet it shall fail. Or what is more wicked than what flesh and blood has devised? and this shall be reproved. 31. He beholds the power of the height of heaven, and all men are earth and ashes.

Verse 2: He turned him back into it and clothed him with virtue

2. AND AGAIN HE TURNED HIM BACK INTO IT, AND ACCORDING TO HIMSELF HE CLOTHED HIM WITH VIRTUE. — The Syriac reads: God clothed him.

The concise Greek text combines these two verses into one; for they only have: The Lord created man from the earth, and will again reduce him to the same. So also the Syriac: God created Adam from the earth, and by turning will turn him to the midst of it, that is, into it. It is a Hebraism and Syriacism, by which the middle of a thing is called the thing itself. The rest, however, namely that God created man in His likeness, and clothed him with virtue, they postpone and refer to the following verses, both the Greek and the Syriac.

Verse 3: He gave him the number of days and a time

3. HE GAVE (the Syriac reads: assigned) HIM THE NUMBER OF DAYS AND A TIME. — The Tigurina: He assigned numbered days

and a fixed time for men, because Adam and his posterity would have lived in paradise a long age unknown to us, but defined by God; after sin, however, this age was shortened, namely to 900 years before the flood, after the flood to 400, then to 200, and finally to 100, 80, and 70, in which it has persevered up to these times, according to Psalm LXXXIX, 10: "The days of our years are seventy years; but if in the powerful, eighty years; and what is more of them is labor and sorrow." Again, for each individual man God has defined the number of years and days of life; but He willed this to be unknown to each, so that one may always lead an honest, pious, and holy life in the fear of God and death, according to Job XIV, 5: "Man's days are short, the number of his months is with You; You have appointed his limits which cannot be passed."

AND HE GAVE HIM POWER OVER THE THINGS THAT ARE UPON THE EARTH. — The Syriac reads: He set them over all things by His wisdom, as if to say: God communicated His own dominion to man, so that, just as God rules over heaven and earth, so man might rule over animals, beasts, birds, fish, and the whole earth, as God's vicar, and viceroy, indeed vice-God. Whence explaining he adds: "He put the fear of him upon all flesh." Eminently St. Ambrose, Book VI, Epistle 38: "Man came forth, he says, last of all creatures, pleasing in appearance, sublime in mind, so that he might be a wonder to every creature, in whom, in the likeness of the eternal God, the νοῦς (that is, mind, soul) would be eternal, clothed in human form. Hence the νοῦς is the vigor of the soul, claiming for itself the principality of the soul as its ruler, which, even though other animals do not see it, they nevertheless dread; just as we fear God, whom, because we do not see Him, we fear, and fear Him the more because we do not see Him."

Verse 4: He put the fear of him upon all flesh

4. HE PUT THE FEAR OF HIM UPON ALL FLESH, AND HE HAD DOMINION OVER BEASTS AND BIRDS. — The Tigurina: He imposed the terror of man upon every animal, so that he might have dominion over beasts and birds; the Syriac: and He cast the fear of them upon all flesh, animal, and bird, as if to say: Because God gave man dominion over animals, wild beasts, and birds, so in turn He cast upon animals, wild beasts, and birds the reverence and fear of man, so that they might fear man as their lord and obey him. Through sin this fear of animals was diminished, as was man's dominion over them. For when man was disobedient to God, by God's just judgment and vengeance, he likewise felt disobedience from animals, and even from his own limbs and his own appetites. Yet it did not entirely perish: for domestic animals obey man willingly, and man forces wild beasts to obey him, and captures them by hunting. Again, in certain Saints it remained full and entire, those who approached the original innocence, such as St. Paul, St. Anthony, St. Francis, and the like. Whence just as before the sin this dominion was given to man by God, Genesis I, 26, so after the sin it was restored and confirmed to him —

Genesis IX, verse 2. For he looks back to both passages, indeed Sirach here cites both. See what was said there.

Wherefore even now lions fear man, and, if they think they are being watched by men, they throw themselves into flight; indeed over time they are tamed, according to the saying: "Long experience has taught lions to obey man." Whence we also read that certain Emperors triumphed in a triumphal chariot drawn by lions. That fish fear and flee from the shadows of men, St. Basil teaches, Homily 10 on the Hexaemeron. That elephants are tamed and serve man in battles and for riding, experience teaches; whence Martial: "And because, commanded, the beast performs graceful dances, it denies nothing to its dark-skinned master."

For Ethiopians generally preside over elephants, and guide and lead them wherever they wish. Finally, horses, deer, oxen, and other animals fear the voice of man; and if they are domestic, they obey him; if wild, they are terrified and flee. The whale also is subject to man; although Theodoret denies this, Question 20 on Genesis. Hear St. Basil, Homily 10 on the Hexaemeron: "The whale, so monstrous and fierce, with scarcely any effort is led captive by a hook that clings most tenaciously, conquered and subdued by the ingenuity and industry of man, and made the prey of a fisherman, a monstrous creature overcome by a feeble little device."

Finally, St. Gregory, Book XXI, Moralia XI, from the fact that it says: He gave them (namely to animals, not to men) fear, concludes that a man, though set over others, ought to be to a subject man not a source of terror, but of love. "For man, he says, was set by nature over animals, not over men, and therefore it was said that he should be feared by animals, not by men; for it is against nature to be proud and to wish to be feared by one's equals." Therefore the voice of a tyrant is: "Let them hate, so long as they fear."

Verse 5: He created from him a helper like himself

5. HE CREATED OUT OF HIM A HELPER LIKE HIMSELF — that is, as the Tigurina has it, He formed from him a helper like himself, namely Eve, who as a wife would assist him both in begetting children and in governing the household and managing domestic affairs. Whence among the Romans there was an ancient law of Romulus, as Dionysius of Halicarnassus testifies, Book II of Roman Antiquities, decreeing thus: "A woman lawfully joined to a husband shall be a partner of his fortunes and sacred rites; and as he is master of the house, so she is mistress." So also the Greeks and others called wives "mistresses." See Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics VIII, chapter X, and Tiraquellus on the Marriage Law, Book V, numbers 11 and following. Whence St. Ambrose, Book V of the Hexaemeron, chapter VII: "You are not, he says, a lord, but a husband; you did not obtain a slave, but a wife; God wished you to be a governor of the weaker sex, not a tyrant. Repay her devotion in kind, repay her love with gratitude. The viper (when the male approaches the female) pours out its venom: can you not lay aside the hardness of your mind?" Hence one may observe and laugh at the fables of Plato in the Symposium, when he says: "At that time there were three kinds of human beings, because the male —

sex, at the very beginning of things, was the offspring of the sun; the female sex, of the earth; and the one sharing in both sexes, of the moon: for the moon shares in both. They were circular both in shape and in movement, because they were similar to their parents; and therefore they had the greatest powers both of body and soul. And so they attempted to make war on the gods, and to ascend to heaven," and the rest, from which, weaving fables upon fables, he strings together a chain of nonsense."

After these words the Complutensians add: and the sixth gift, the mind, He bestowed upon them, dividing it, and the seventh, speech (which is) the interpretation of his operations, as if he were here counting seven gifts bestowed upon man by God. The first is that He created him in His image; the second, that He clothed him with virtue; the third, that He gave him the number of days; the fourth, that He gave him power and dominion over all earthly things; the fifth, that He instilled in animals the fear of him; the sixth, that He gave him the mind; the seventh, that He gave him speech. But the Tigurina postpones these words and attaches them to the following verse; for thus it reads: judgment, tongue, eyes, ears, and heart He gave them for thinking, and in sixth place also He bestowed the mind, imparting it, and in seventh place speech for explaining His works, as if to say: God gave man seven gifts: first, reason or judgment; second, the tongue; third, eyes; fourth, ears; fifth, the heart; sixth, the mind; seventh, speech. But these words are found neither in the Greek codices corrected at Rome and others, nor in the Syriac, nor in other Latin texts; whence they appear to have been inserted by someone for the sake of explanation: for speech explains the tongue, and mind explains the heart. Add that more gifts bestowed upon man are enumerated here than seven, as I will soon show.

COUNSEL, AND A TONGUE, AND EYES, AND EARS, AND A HEART HE GAVE THEM FOR THINKING, AND WITH THE DISCIPLINE OF UNDERSTANDING HE FILLED THEM. — Counsel, that is, the power and faculty of deliberating, considering, and choosing. Whence the Tigurina translates: He gave him judgment; for this power is inherent in the mind and reason of man, which other animals lack. Second, He gave him a tongue, so that what the mind has deliberated through counsel, the tongue might receive, utter, communicate to others, and explain, and this with a distinct and articulate voice; wherefore just as mind and counsel, or the judgment of reason, were given to man alone, so also the tongue and articulate speech were given to him alone: for brute animals, because they lack mind, therefore also lack a tongue and articulate voice by which to express their mental images; for they have no reasonings, no discourses, no deliberations to pronounce; but only conceptions of the imagination and feelings of the sensitive appetite, which they sufficiently express with inarticulate voice by roaring, neighing, lowing, barking. Speech therefore in man is the act and effect of reason and counsel, and therefore is its indicator and interpreter.

He adds eyes and ears, because these are the senses of counsel and learning. Whence just as man alone has distinct concepts in his mind, and articulate sounds on his tongue: so he alone perceives and receives them in his ears, and through them perceives all knowledge. I say the same of the eyes: for through them we read articulate sounds recorded in writing, by which all knowledge written in books and documents is read.

Finally, He gave to man alone a heart, that is, an intellect and ingenuity for devising all arts and disciplines. Whence the Syriac translates: He created for them a tongue, eyes and ears, and a heart for understanding. And for this reason He filled them with the discipline of understanding, that is, as others translate, the knowledge of intelligence, by which one understands any things whatsoever and comprehends them with the intellect. Add that God infused into Adam at creation the knowledge of all natural things: for from this knowledge Adam gave to all birds and animals fitting names, which would express the nature of each, as I said on Genesis II, verses 19 and 21.

Moreover, a wonderful artistry, as well as a benefit of God, shines forth in these members: for the tongue, first, discerns flavors of every kind, and from them recognizes and rejects harmful foods, but separates and accepts beneficial and useful ones; second, the tongue heals wounds, as we see dogs heal their own and men's wounds by licking; third, the tongue produces not only an indistinct voice in brutes, but also an articulate one in men. Whence Cicero, Book II On the Nature of the Gods, calls the tongue the plectrum of the mouth, and the teeth the strings. And St. Ambrose, Book VI of the Hexaemeron, chapter IX: "The tongue, he says, is a most precious instrument not only in speaking, but also in eating: for it is like the plectrum of one speaking and a certain hand of one eating, which pushes and conveys food slipping down to the teeth." Moreover, in man the tongue is soft and flexible, and therefore can produce infinite varieties of sounds, tones, and melodies. Whence St. Ambrose adds: "We men alone express with our mouth what we feel in our heart; and thus the silent thoughts of the mind are signified by the speech of the mouth. What then is the mouth of man, but a kind of gateway of speech, a fountain of debate, a hall of words, a storehouse of the will? We have completed, as it were, a certain palace of the human heart, in which although there is a certain measure of the part, yet there is the form of the whole." And Cicero in the cited passage: "With this, he says, we exhort, with this we persuade, with this we console the afflicted, with this we lead away the terrified from fear, with this we restrain the exulting, with this we curb desires and angers: this has bound us with the fellowship of law, legislation, and cities; this has separated us from a savage and brutal life." The eyes are to man what the sun and moon are to the sky, what springs are to the earth. Whence the Hebrew word עין (ain) signifies both eye and fountain; for what the spring is in the earth, the eye is in man, so that like a fountain it may pour forth continual showers of tears to God. Moreover, God, as Cicero says in the cited passage, "made the eyes smooth and mobile, so that they might turn aside if anything harmful approached, and easily direct their gaze wherever they wished," and He placed them inward, so that they might be covered by the brow and eyebrows, lest they be injured by dust or any other thing. Whence St. Ambrose,

in the cited passage: "Among these, he says, the orbs of the eyes are in the middle, both safe for caution and free for gazing and beautiful for grace, shining as it were like crystal; in the middle of which are the pupils, which perform the function of seeing, etc. Whence the Prophet, seeking sure help, says in Psalm XVI: Guard me, O Lord, as the pupil of the eye, so that divine protection might be for him as careful and faithful a guard as He deigned to fortify the pupil of the eye with a most secure rampart of nature."

Wherefore Varro, as cited by Lactantius, On the Workmanship of God, chapter X, holds that the eyes are called as it were "hidden" (occulti), because God concealed them with so many coverings. The ears perceive all the forms of sounds, even articulate ones, and their meanings and significations. Whence in man hearing is the sense of learning. The voice progresses through the ears by winding passages to the sense of hearing, "so that at their extremities, says St. Ambrose in the same place, being reflected back, it may enter the interior windings without offense. For if it were not so, who would not be stunned at every stronger sound of voice? etc. The winding of the inner ears provides a certain rhythm and discipline of modulation: for through the windings of the ears a certain rhythm is produced, and the sound of the entering voice is expressed in certain measures." On this and the other members of man, and their wonderful structure, functions, and uses, see there St. Ambrose, St. Basil, Cicero, as well as Galen and Aristotle, On the Parts of Animals; Pliny, Book XI, chapter XXXVII; Lactantius, On the Workmanship of God, chapter VIII and following, and others.

Note: Sirach here assigns fourteen gifts bestowed by God upon man, so that from each he may draw out a particular obligation, which may spur man to the worship and obedience of God.

The first, verse 1, is that God created man from the earth; therefore man as a creature owes everything that he is to his Creator: let him therefore devote and offer it to Him. Again, mindful of his origin and base material, let him profoundly humble himself beneath God. For why is earth and ashes proud? Why is nothing proud? For man was created from nothing, and of himself is nothing, and would return to nothing at any moment if God were to withdraw His hand from him.

The second is that God created man in His own image and likeness. Let him therefore continually contemplate this image, and see whose image it is, and consequently always look to God as his exemplar, and strive to make himself and his ways like Him, so that he may fully reflect His holiness, and God may shine forth in his soul as in a living image. "God has entrusted our soul to us; let us preserve the deposit as we received it," says St. Anthony as recorded by St. Athanasius.

The third, verse 2, is that God will again turn man back to the earth from which he was taken; therefore let man despise earthly things as transitory, and prepare himself for death, which will soon come, by living soberly, piously, and justly.

The fourth is that God bestowed upon man His own virtue and strength; let man therefore use the strength of his body for agriculture, mechanical arts, and other honest labors, and the strength of his soul for resisting the world, the flesh, and the devil.

The fifth, verse 3, is that He assigned him the number of years and days of life, and that it is short and small: therefore let man rightly spend each year, day, hour, indeed each moment, and acquire the merits of good works, because from them he must live for all eternity, especially since this number is unknown to man. Let him therefore say to himself daily: Perhaps today I shall die; let me therefore live holily and fervently as though I were to die today. "Why do we not willingly leave behind, for the sake of gaining the heavenly kingdom, what must be lost at the end of this life? Let Christians have no care for those things which they cannot take with them," says St. Anthony.

The sixth, verse 3, is that He gave him dominion over animals and the whole earth; let him therefore use it according to the will of God, who bestowed this dominion upon him, and who will demand from him an exact account of its administration.

The seventh, verse 4, is that He instilled in animals and birds reverence and obedience toward man; let man therefore render the same to God, his Lord.

The eighth, verse 5, is that He gave Adam a companion, namely his wife Eve, joining them in marriage. Let man therefore, who is his own master, enter into marriage with whomever he wishes, and observe it holily and inviolably as God established and sanctioned it, and not turn aside to prostitutes and other vagrant and unnatural lusts.

The ninth, verse 5, is that He gave man counsel, tongue, eyes, ears, and heart; let him therefore use counsel, to prudently choose what deliberation recommends and right reason and faith advise; let him use the tongue, for the praise of God; the eyes, to see creatures and in them to behold and celebrate the Creator; the ears, to hear the words of God and the Saints; the heart, to love God, and to render it whole and pure to its Maker.

The tenth, verse 6, is that He gave man faith and knowledge; let him therefore believe in God by faith, and by knowledge contemplate His works, so that from them he may recognize, praise, celebrate, and glorify the Craftsman. Whence St. Ambrose, On the Instruction of Virgins, chapter XI: "Why, he says, do we labor rather for the world, and defraud our soul of the dispensation of so great goodness, we who ought to serve no one else but this Lord?"

The eleventh, verse 9, is that He gave them the law of life; let him therefore obey the law in all things, so that he may obtain both the present and eternal life.

The twelfth, verse 10, is that He entered into a covenant with them to give them His inheritance and the heavenly kingdom, if they would fulfill His will; let them therefore conform themselves above all things to the will of God, so that they may obtain His inheritance and kingdom.

The thirteenth, verse 14, is that over every nation He set —

rulers, both angels and men; let them therefore follow their governance and direction, so that they may deserve to be honored, not chastised, by them. Again, that God Himself governs the faithful and Saints personally and through His grace. Let them therefore allow themselves to be possessed and governed by God; indeed, let them assiduously pray and seek this, saying with the Psalmist: "I have become as a beast of burden before You." Brilliantly St. Gregory Nazianzen, Oration 42, describes man with these epithets, as with praises: "The Word, the craftsman, he says, fashions man as a kind of second world, great within small; He places upon the earth another angel, a composite worshiper, a spectator of visible nature, an initiate of the intelligible, a king of things that are on earth; yet subject to those above, earthly and heavenly, temporal and immortal, visible and intelligible, midway between greatness and lowliness, at once spirit and flesh, etc., a living being that, by the inclination and tendency of its soul toward God, attains divinity."

Verse 6: He created for them the knowledge of the spirit

6. HE CREATED FOR THEM THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE SPIRIT, HE FILLED THEIR HEART WITH SENSE, AND SHOWED THEM EVIL AND GOOD. — You may ask: what is this knowledge of the spirit given to man by God? First, Lyranus takes "knowledge" in the proper sense as the cognition of conclusions that are demonstrated from their principles; by "spirit" he understands the intellect, which is the habit of principles by which the very principles of the sciences are known; therefore the knowledge of the spirit is knowledge, or demonstration, which is drawn from its principles known through the intellect, and is clearly known.

Second, Palacius understands by "the discipline of understanding" which preceded, natural knowledge; by "the knowledge of the spirit," all theology, as if to say: God bestowed upon Adam faith in the principles of Theology, and from them the knowledge of conclusions: for this is the knowledge of the spirit; therefore Adam was the most learned philosopher, and the most complete theologian. Again, He gave him sense, that is, sharpness and depth of mind, by which he understood most profoundly all that had been infused into him. Finally, He showed them good and evil, that is, He showed them the splendor of good, and the ugliness of evil. Not as we, who hear of good and evil, but are ignorant of the beauty of the former and the horror of the latter; but Adam and Eve, knowing the weights of both, sinned. O enormous misery! So says Palacius. See St. Thomas and the Scholastics, Part I, Question XCIV, articles 3 and following, where they teach how great and how excellent was the knowledge of Adam infused by God.

Third, Jansenius understands by "spirit" the mind, as if to say: He gave man the knowledge of the mind, because through the infused natural light He gave him the knowledge of prudently arranging temporal things, and through the natural law impressed upon their mind, the knowledge of what was evil and what was good.

Fourth, properly and genuinely the knowledge of the spirit is the knowledge of spiritual things, namely the knowledge of God, of angels, of virtues, of grace, of glory. Such knowledge is faith, wisdom, theology, and especially the sa-

sacred and faithful ethics, which teaches the spirit of man, and directs it to the worship of God and to heavenly blessedness. For this is the knowledge of the spirit, that is, spiritual knowledge, which he distinguishes from the discipline of the intellect, that is, of natural intelligence. Whence he also adds: "And with sense," that is, with prudence by which they may be wise and, as it were, perceive spiritual things; "He filled their heart, and showed them evil and good:" evil things, both of guilt and of punishment and of hell; good things, both of virtue and holiness and of glory and happiness, as if to say: He showed them how great are the evils awaiting those who act wickedly, and how great the goods awaiting those who live well. And in this sense Christ and Paul take the word "spirit" for faith, grace, and other spiritual things, as in John VI, 64: "It is the Spirit who gives life, the flesh profits nothing." Galatians V, 22: "The fruit of the Spirit is charity, joy, peace," etc. And verse 16: "Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the desires of the flesh." Romans VIII, 6: "The prudence of the flesh is death, but the prudence of the spirit is life and peace."

This knowledge is called the knowledge of the spirit for four reasons, according to the four kinds of causes: first, from the matter and material cause, because its object and matter are spiritual things; second, from the efficient cause, because the Holy Spirit produces and inspires it; third, from the formal cause, because it is in itself spiritual and divine, and makes the mind of man spiritual and divine; fourth, from the final cause, because it tends to a spiritual end, namely to the attainment of virtues, grace, and glory, and to the very vision of God as its end and eternal blessedness. Moreover, God gives this knowledge of the spirit in an inchoate way to all the faithful, but perfectly only to the just and holy, who by praying and cooperating with Him seek it with all their strength. Hence he says: "He created for them the knowledge of the spirit;" He created, that is, by creating He bestowed it upon them. Again, He did not draw it out naturally, as if generating it, from the potency of the subject, namely the mind, but supernaturally inspired it, as if by creating.

Moreover, the concise Greek text has only this: He filled them with the knowledge of understanding, and showed them good and evil; the Tigurina: He filled them with ingenious knowledge, and showed them both good and evil at once; the Syriac: with wisdom and counsel He filled their heart, and taught them good and evil.

Verses 7 and 8: He set His eye upon their hearts

7 and 8. HE SET HIS EYE UPON THEIR HEARTS, TO SHOW THEM THE GREATNESS OF HIS WORKS, THAT THEY MIGHT PRAISE THE NAME OF SANCTIFICATION, AND GLORY IN HIS WONDERS, THAT THEY MIGHT DECLARE THE GREATNESS OF HIS WORKS. — Rabanus, Lyranus, and others read: He set their eye, which Lyranus explains thus: He gave the human intellect the power of reflecting upon itself, in order to show them the greatness of His works. For by the fact that the intellectual soul is self-reflective, it greatly advances in knowledge. But the correct reading, with the Roman, Greek, and Syriac texts, is: He set His eye. By "eye" he means both the care and providence of God, as I showed on Jeremiah I, 11; and also His illumination: for the eye is the symbol of both. For the eye of God, because it is most bright —

and most resplendent, illuminates all things, declares them, and makes them conspicuous and transparent, according to Proverbs XXII, verse 12: "The eyes of the Lord guard knowledge." And Sirach XI, 13: "The eye of God looked upon him." Sirach XXXIV, verse 19: "The eyes of the Lord are upon those who fear Him, etc., exalting the soul and illuminating the eyes." Psalm LXVI, 2: "May the Lord have mercy on us and bless us, may He cause His face to shine upon us." Psalm CXVIII, 135: "Make Your face shine upon Your servant." Psalm XXXII: "I will fix My eyes upon you." Hence the seven eyes are the seven Angels who direct and govern the world, Apocalypse V, 6, and Zechariah XI, 10. So Job chapter XXIX says: "I was an eye to the blind, and a foot to the lame." And Solomon, Proverbs XXIII: "Your eyes guard my ways."

The meaning is, as if to say: God with His knowledge and grace, as with a most brilliant eye, illuminated the hearts of men, so that through it He might show the great works which He did, both in the creation and governance of the world, and in His singular providence which He showed to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Noah, Moses, and the other Patriarchs and Prophets; and in the protection or punishment of His people: for example, His wonderful power, by which through so many plagues and portents He led the Israelites out of Egypt with dry foot through the Red Sea, and there for forty years guided them by a pillar of fire by night and of cloud by day, and fed them with manna, heavenly food, etc. Moreover, He showed these things to men for this purpose, that the faithful might praise from them the name of sanctification, that is, the most sacred name of God; and might glory before faithful Jews and before unfaithful Gentiles in these wondrous prodigies and deeds of their God, so that they might declare His mighty works to them, and thus invite and attract them to the fear, love, and worship of God.

Whence the Tigurina translates: He added His eye to their hearts, to teach them the magnificence of His works; He gave them to glory in His miracles perpetually, that they might prudently declare His works, and the elect might praise His holy name; the Syriac: He assigned him a heart for understanding, to show him the excellence of His works, that he might understand His wonders, and that they might be declaring in the world the fear of Him, and glorifying the name of His holiness.

He alludes to boys and servants who continually gaze upon the eye of their teacher and master, and are taught and directed by it; for wherever they see the eye of the teacher and master turning, they themselves turn their own eyes to the same place, read it, learn, act, and carry it out. Wherefore the eye of the teacher governs the boy, the eye of the master fattens the horse. For in the eyes of the teacher they seem to themselves to see and read his nod, mind, teaching, will, command, anger, favor, and vengeance. The eye of the teacher therefore teaches them what he thinks and wills.

Allegorically, Palacius (although he himself thinks this is the literal sense) understands by "great works" the Incarnation of the Word, namely Jesus Christ; for the great works shown to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Noah, Moses, etc., were figures representing the great works of Christ. God, he says, in order to show His love toward men, determined to show them the great works of His works. And because among the great works of all works, the greatest is the work of the Incarnation of the Word, therefore from this it seems to be proved that Adam knew of the Incarnation of the Son of God. For this reason he said: "A man shall leave his father, and shall cleave to his wife;" for from there the Son of God was to take flesh, namely from the fathers who were to be born from Eve. Moreover, as to what he says: "That they might praise the name of sanctification," the Hebrews refer this to the tetragrammaton name of God, which God revealed to Adam. So says Reuchlin. But it would be better to say that the Son of God revealed His name Jesus, in which we are sanctified. For if God revealed the Incarnation, was it not easy and consequent to reveal the name of the Incarnate One? He adds: "And to glory in His wonders." Indeed, if God revealed His Incarnation to men, men have something in which they can truly glory. For what is more glorious than to have such a brother? If it is glorious to bear His stigmata in one's body, is it not glorious to be His brother? But because it is written: "Let him who glories, glory in the Lord;" therefore he adds: "That they might declare His great works," that is, let men glory in God made man; but let them cast that glory back upon God, the worker of such great things. And thus far concerning the institution of man in the law of nature. So says Palacius.

Verses 9 and 10: He added to them discipline

9 and 10. HE ADDED TO THEM DISCIPLINE, AND THE LAW OF LIFE HE GAVE AS AN INHERITANCE TO (as though He conferred an inheritance, or rather made them to inherit) THEM; HE ESTABLISHED AN EVERLASTING COVENANT WITH THEM, AND SHOWED THEM HIS JUSTICE AND HIS JUDGMENTS. — This is the eleventh benefit of God to men, namely, that through Moses He gave Israel, and through him the other nations, the law, which he calls discipline, in Greek ἐπιστήμην, that is, knowledge, both because the law teaches men as disciples how they ought to live honestly; and because it restrains, shapes, and composes their morals and passions with the discipline of right reason; and because, like a disciplinary rod, it punishes the vices of men and threatens them with deserved punishments, and restrains them from sins by fear of the same. For the law is discipline for man, just as a bridle is discipline for a horse, teaching him in which direction he ought to go.

Second, it is called the law of life because it provides a happy and long-lived present life (for this was promised by God to the Jews who kept the law), and a blessed and eternal future life.

"Covenant" signifies the pact and alliance that God made through Moses with the Hebrews about giving them the promised land, if they would worship Him and keep His law. Wherefore in the covenant is comprehended the worship of God and the cult prescribed by Him through the ceremonial laws concerning sacrifices, purifications, offerings, tithes, first fruits, vows, etc.; just as by "judgments" are understood the judicial laws, which prescribed what was right and lawful with respect to one's neighbor; and just as by "law and discipline" is understood the natural law,

Verse 12: He commanded each of them concerning his neighbor

12. AND HE SAID TO THEM: BEWARE OF ALL INJUSTICE (Greek adikou, that is, of the unjust), AND HE COMMANDED THEM, EACH ONE CONCERNING HIS NEIGHBOR. — For this is the sum and compendium of the second table of the Decalogue, which God proclaimed through an Angel from Sinai, namely to do nothing unjust to one's neighbor, but to render to him his right, that is, what is due both in justice and in charity. For the second table of the Decalogue, containing seven precepts, entirely concerns one's neighbor, and forbids that any injustice be inflicted upon him in his goods, reputation, wife, or life, but that all his rights be preserved whole and inviolate. He omits the precepts of the first table concerning the worship of God, because those are known to all, and because he sufficiently indicated them in verse 10, saying: "He established an eternal covenant with them" — namely about nothing other than His own worship, as I said a little before. Finally, the precepts of the first table are tacitly included in the second, because love of neighbor, prescribed in the second, flows from the love of God, which is prescribed in the first, and presupposes it. Hence the Apostle says the whole law is contained in love of neighbor, Romans XIII, 9. See what was said there. Wherefore Vatablus clearly translates: from all injustice, he says, abstain, and concerning your neighbor he gave commandments to each; the Syriac: and he said to them: Beware, and do not lie (deceive, defraud), and he commanded each man concerning his neighbor.

Verse 13: Their ways are before Him always

13. THEIR WAYS ARE BEFORE HIM ALWAYS, THEY ARE NOT HIDDEN FROM HIS EYES. — The Syriac: their ways before him are manifest, and they do not pass from the sight of his face, that is, God gave the Hebrews the law, not withdrawing Himself from care of them, as though not caring whether they keep the law or not; but He continually attends, watches, and inspects whether they obey Him, so as to reward those who observe and punish those who do not: for this is the duty of a perfect lawgiver. The remaining nations to whom He did not give the law, God does not so much care how they live. Hence concerning them He adds: "Over each nation He placed a ruler, and the portion of God is Israel." Hence also He passionately taunts His own people who violate His law, Jeremiah VII, 11, saying: "I, I am He; I have seen, says the Lord."

In a second sense, however, you may take this statement as referring to all men. Hence the Tigurina translates: the practices of men are always open to Him, nor have they escaped His eyes. For just as God has a general providence over all men, so also a general inspection; but a special one over Israel, that is, the faithful people. He alludes to Proverbs XVI, 2: "All the ways of a man are open (some translate, are like glass, that is, they shine through like glass) to His eyes;" about which more was said there.

Verses 14 and 15: Over every nation He set a ruler

14 and 15. Over each nation He placed a ruler, AND (but) THE PORTION OF GOD, ISRAEL, WAS MADE MANIFEST — that is, other nations have men as rulers, but Israel has God as king; God placed over other nations kings and princes, who govern them by their own laws; but "Israel," that is, the Hebrew people, "became the portion," that is, the inheritance, "of God manifest," because God wished to govern Israel Himself, and to give him the law Himself. Therefore Israel is

the kingdom, republic, and peculiar people of God. Hence God dwelt with him, residing in the propitiatory above the ark, and thence giving oracles, and He walked among them, so that they rightly ought to have been ashamed to sin in the presence of God.

He adds the word manifest, meaning: It is manifest not to Israel alone, but to the whole world, that Israel is the people, portion, and kingdom of God, because all see him governed, loved, and protected by God, adorned with constant benefits, and indeed with oracles and miracles; all see that God separated Israel from the other nations through law and religion and His own worship, and chose and bound him to Himself. Therefore there is no reason why, with Jansenius and against the testimony of all manuscripts, we should refer the word manifest to the following verse, in this way: "Manifest are all their works like the sun in the sight of God."

In a second interpretation, Rabanus, Lyranus, and the Gloss rightly (though Jansenius denies it) understand by rulers the Angels, meaning: God placed Angels over the other nations to govern them; but He reserved Israel to be governed by Himself, according to Deuteronomy XXXII, verse 8, following the Septuagint: He set the boundaries of the nations according to the number of the Angels of God. Hence also in Daniel X, verse 21, the prince of the Persians and the prince of the Greeks are said to struggle against each other.

You will say: God also governs Israel through an Angel placed over him, namely Saint Michael; for he was formerly placed over the Synagogue, as he now is over the Church, Daniel X, 21. I respond: Saint Michael governed the Synagogue, and now governs the Church, as the peculiar property or kingdom proper and peculiar to God; for the faithful people, such as the Hebrews were, bound to God by faith, law, and religion, is the proper republic of God. Therefore Saint Michael governs this people as the vicar of God, in God's own and primary kingdom, which is the Church; but the other Angels govern their nations, which are unfaithful, as God's spurious and rebellious kingdom, since they shrink from His law, faith, and worship. So the king of Spain properly governs Spain through himself and his own presence, subordinating to himself prefects, governors, etc. But he governs the Indies and other kingdoms through viceroys. So the Pope governs Rome as the proper Bishop of that city; but he governs other cities and provinces as the Pontiff of the whole Church, through their proper Bishops, whom he places over them; and he governs the infidels through Apostolic men, who preach the Gospel and draw them to the Church. Furthermore, God often governs the Church immediately by Himself, as in every Sacrament: for whenever any Sacrament is conferred, God immediately infuses grace into the recipient, for an Angel cannot infuse grace.

Again, whenever the dead are raised, or miracles are performed, God works them by Himself; for an Angel cannot work them. For a miracle is and is called a work which exceeds the entire power of natural agents, including Angels, and therefore requires divine power; and consequently it is a supernatural work, proper to God.

This is what Moses says, Deuteronomy VII, 6: "The Lord your God has chosen you, that you may be His own special people, out of all the peoples that are upon the earth." And chapter XXXII, 9: "The portion of the Lord is His people, Jacob the lot of His inheritance." And Exodus XIX, 5: "You shall be My own possession out of all peoples; for the whole earth is Mine. And you shall be to Me a priestly kingdom and a holy nation," so that I, the Holy One, may be, as it were, your proper king. Wherefore when the Hebrews asked for a king, Samuel heard from God, I Kings VIII, verse 7: "They have not rejected you, He said, but Me, that I should not reign over them." Hence Josephus, Book II Against Apion, after teaching that nations are governed either by monarchy, aristocracy, or democracy, adds that Israel was governed by a theocracy, that is, by God: "Our lawgiver, he says, aiming at none of these forms of government, established a theocracy, assigning sovereignty and authority especially to the one God."

Moreover, the Complutensian and Tigurina editions add some things which the Latin Vulgate lacks; for they read: every man from his youth is inclined to evil, nor could their heart be changed from stony to one of flesh; for in distributing the nations of the whole earth, he appointed a leader for each nation, and chose Israel specially for Himself, whom like a firstborn he educates with discipline, and bestowing the light of charity does not abandon; but the Syriac, agreeing with the Latin, translates succinctly: over all peoples he appointed rulers, and the portion of the Lord is Israel; a portion, that is, a hereditary share, or inheritance.

Tropologically, Rabanus says: "The portion of God, Israel, was made manifest, that is, the proven congregation of the Saints, whose teachings shine like the sun in the sight of God, and whose actions are pleasing to God. For the eyes of the Lord are upon the just, and His ears are open to their prayers: because their eyes are directed toward the Lord, and the love of their heart yearns for Him. In their person the Prophet speaks, saying: My eyes are always upon the Lord, for He will pluck my feet from the snare." These are Israel, because they have dominion over vices, passions, themselves, and thereby over God. For just as Jacob, that is, the supplanter — namely of Esau his brother, that is, of his own flesh — was afterward called Israel, that is, one who prevails with God, because in wrestling he prevailed over the angel of God, Genesis XXXII, 28: so likewise the Saints, after victory and dominion over the passions, as it were prevail with God Himself, so as to obtain from Him whatever they wish.

Verse 16: All their works are as the sun in the sight of God

16. AND ALL THEIR WORKS ARE AS THE SUN IN THE SIGHT OF GOD; AND HIS EYES WITHOUT CEASING LOOK UPON THEIR WAYS. — He repeats what he said in verse 13, meaning: All the works of Israel, that is, of individual Israelites, both the good works by which they keep the law of God, of which he will speak in verse 18, and the evil works by which they violate it, of which he will speak in the following verse, are clear and manifest in the sight of God, just as the sun is clear and manifest to the whole world, and this not of themselves, as if this clarity were intrinsic and natural to them; but from God, because they are illuminated by the brightness of God, and by His most luminous eyes, which

continually illumine and inspect all their ways, that is, their actions: just as the earth and the air are bright, not from within themselves, but because they are illuminated from without by the sun. Hence it should rather be said that God is the sun who illumines and beholds all things, than that the works of men are bright like the sun, as we shall hear in chapter XXIII, verse 28. So Lyranus and Jansenius apply these words to Israel alone.

In a second sense, this statement can be taken as referring to the Gentiles, meaning: Granted that the portion of God is Israel, whom He inspects, governs, and cares for with special providence, yet with the eye of common providence He looks upon all nations, and beholds both their evil deeds and their good deeds, so as to punish the former and reward the latter. Hence the Tigurina translates: therefore all the deeds of those (nations) are as the sun openly before Him, and He watches their practices with unceasing eyes; the Syriac translates as our text: all their works appear like the sun in His sight, and all their counsels are manifest to Him.

In a third interpretation, some take these words as referring to the good works of Israel and explain: Because God chose Israel for Himself as His portion, lot, and inheritance, therefore He sees their works — insofar as they are Israel's, that is, insofar as he is faithful and pious — as gladly as we see the sun: their sight is most pleasing to Him. So of Solomon it is said in Psalm LXXXVIII, 37: "His throne shall be as the sun in My sight," so that shining before Me forever it may delight My eyes. And below in chapter L, 7, of Simon: "As the sun shining, so did he shine in the house of God." And chapter XXVI, 11: "As the sun rising in the heights of God upon the world, so is the beauty of a good woman an ornament of her house."

Verse 17: Their covenants are not hidden by their iniquity

17. The covenants are not hidden through (but the Complutensian and many read on account of instead of through; others, because of) their iniquity, and all their iniquities are in the sight of God. — So the Roman edition, Rabanus, and others, meaning: The covenants, that is, the pacts made by God with Israel, are not annulled through the iniquity of the Israelites, even though all their iniquities are in the sight of God, so that He may chastise and punish each one in due time. This is what Paul says in Romans III, 3: "Has the unfaithfulness of men made the faithfulness of God void? By no means. For God is true, but every man is a liar."

In a second sense, the covenants, that is, the ordinances and laws of God, are not hidden and abolished through the sins by which men have violated them, because God's unshaken ordinance and the obligation of His laws always remain and keep watch, according to which the punishment decreed by the laws awaits sinners: for God always has them and their sins before His eyes, so as to judge and avenge them in due time.

In a third interpretation, Palacius, reading on account of instead of through, explains thus: The pacts which the impious make concerning iniquity are not hidden — for example, conspiracies to rebel against a king or God. Therefore even though they ratify alliances over the most secret iniquity, those alliances are nevertheless as clear as the sun to God. But this interpretation, like its reading, is more strained and far-fetched.

The concise Greek text has only this: their injustices are not hidden from him, and all their sins are before the Lord; the Syriac: their transgressions are not hidden from his sight, and the sins of all men are written in his sight — namely, they are written in the mind and memory of God, for the purpose of judging and punishing them. The Complutensian and Tigurina add more: the unjust deeds of those (nations) do not escape him, but all their sins are fully known to him. But since he is benign, and knows his own creation (Greek plasma, that is, his handiwork), he neither casts away men nor abandons them, being one who spares them.

Verse 18: The alms of a man is as a seal with Him

18. THE ALMS OF A MAN IS AS A SEAL WITH HIM, AND HE WILL PRESERVE THE GRACE OF A MAN AS THE APPLE OF HIS EYE. — He said that evil works are in the sight of God; now he says the same of good works, among which the chief is almsgiving. Lyranus and others read purse instead of seal, as if to say: Almsgiving is to the almsgiver like a purse, that is, a pouch. For just as a man puts his provisions in a pouch, to which he has recourse in time of need, so almsgiving comes to a man's aid at death. Hence Saint Augustine says: "Mercy alone is the companion of the dead;" so that Christ may allude to this in Luke XII, saying: "Make for yourselves purses that do not grow old, a treasure that does not fail in heaven."

But the correct reading is seal rather than purse. So the Roman edition, Rabanus, and others: for this is what the Greek sphragis means. Yet the sense comes to the same thing, whether you read purse or seal. For he alludes to the money bags or purses of the ancients, which were secured and sealed with a seal, lest anyone dare to open them, and so that if they were lost, it could be known from the seal who had lost them. This is clear from Saint Augustine, Sermon 19 On the Words of the Apostle, where he relates that the finder of a lost purse asked the man who claimed to have lost it for the marks and seals of the purse: "He asked for the marks, he says, inquired about the quality of the purse, the seal, and even the number of coins." And Saint Jerome, Letter 47 On Avoiding Suspicious Companionship: "She grieves, he says, that a young man has been preferred to her, etc., who seals the purse, manages the weaving room, distributes the tasks, governs the household, and buys whatever is necessary from the market." So that Christ seems to have alluded to this in Luke XII, 33, when He says: "Make for yourselves purses that do not grow old."

On which words Blessed Chrysologus says in Sermon 25: "Why is a purse prepared? What need of locks where innocence is the guardian? What need of a seal where there is no suspicion of fraud?" Almsgiving, therefore, is here said to have in place of its reward a seal, that is, a purse filled with coins and therefore carefully sealed, secured with its locks and seals, meaning: Almsgiving gives secure and stable riches, which neither moth corrodes nor thieves steal, as Christ says. But since the true reading is seal, let us here pile up other meanings of it.

First, Rabanus and Jansenius explain thus: Just as we are accustomed to seal precious and dear things with a seal and signet, so God seals each person's alms in His mind, meaning: The alms of the pious remain in the mind and memory of God, as if sealed by His seal, so that they may be faithfully preserved there, and in due time He may give them their just reward. For many say they give alms and complain that they do not immediately receive their reward. To these Sirach responds that God holds them sealed with Himself, so as to recompense them at the fitting time: let them therefore wait for that time with faith and patience. Note the metonymy: almsgiving is called a seal, that is, a thing sealed and stamped (as the Syriac translates) in the mind of God.

In a similar way God says, Deuteronomy XXXII, 34: "Are not these things stored up with Me, and sealed in My treasuries?" And Paul, concerning the elect sealed by God's foreknowledge and predestination: "The firm foundation of God stands, he says, having this seal: The Lord knows who are His, and let everyone who names the name of the Lord depart from iniquity," II Timothy II, 19.

Second, more genuinely and powerfully, meaning: Almsgiving itself is like a seal, that is, a signet ring of God, on which the image of the almsgiver is engraved. For just as a signet ring is most dear to a man, which he always has in his hand and before his eyes: so too is almsgiving before God, namely, precious and most dear to Him, always striking His eyes. Hence some translate: mercy is like the sign of a ring before Him. In a similar way God says to Zerubbabel: "I will make you like a seal," Haggai II, 24. See what I said there at length on this matter.

Some add that the one who gives alms receives, as it were, a seal from God, so that he may write whatever he wishes, whatever he desires, and stamp and seal his petition with the seal of God, which when presented before the tribunal of God, he will undoubtedly obtain his request and receive what he wished for, having his prayer granted. By this phrase and figure it is signified that the almsgiver obtains from God everything he asks. But that this seal is with God, not with the almsgiver, is clear from what has been said.

Hence Sirach explains this seal by a comparison with the pupil of the eye, when he adds: "And He will preserve the grace of a man as the apple of the eye" — not almsgiving, but God Himself, says Jansenius, meaning: God in His memory, as in the book of His accounts, exactly and carefully records and preserves the grace, that is, the mercy and kindness shown to another, as the apple of the eye, that is, with the care and solicitude with which a man preserves the pupil of his own eye; indeed, with the same care with which God preserves the pupil of His own eye, that is, the gaze of His mind, according to that saying about the pious and merciful: "He who touches you, touches the apple of My eye," Zechariah II, 8. Or rather, you may take the grace of a man as that by which the almsgiver is pleasing and gracious in the eyes of God, as well as of men; for this is what the Greek charis means, and the Hebrew chen. Hence that common expression in Scripture: "You have found grace in My eyes," meaning: Just as the pupil is precious to a man, and a signet ring is precious to a prince, so is almsgiving precious to God.

Again, just as a signet ring preserves the memory and favor of the beloved in the mind of the friend who wears the ring (for in ancient times they used to engrave the likeness of one they loved greatly on the face of the ring, so that the lover would always have the beloved before his eyes, and as it were present): so almsgiving perpetually preserves the memory and favor of the almsgiver in the eyes and mind of God; for the almsgiver is seen depicted and expressed in his almsgiving as in his own likeness, fashioned by himself. Almsgiving therefore causes the favor of the almsgiver to be preserved always before God, living and dear, like the pupil of the eye. Therefore, refer the word will preserve rather to almsgiving than to God. For he wishes to teach that all our works, both evil and good, such as almsgiving, are conspicuous to God and strike His eyes.

Hence the Tigurina translates: the kindness (Vatablus: compassion; for this is what the Hebrew chesed means) of a man is like a seal before Him (God), and He preserves the benefit of each one like the pupil. Vatablus translates grace as love; for the Hebrew chen also signifies this, meaning: Almsgiving preserves the favor, grace, and love of the almsgiver before God, and renders him pleasing and dear like the pupil of the eye, because it causes God to love him and to favor him in all things. The Complutensian and Tigurina add: granting or bestowing repentance on his sons and daughters, meaning: Almsgiving by its grace before God obtains for the almsgiver repentance of sins, and not only for himself, but also for his sons and daughters. Hence Daniel to Nebuchadnezzar, chapter IV, 24: "Redeem your sins, he says, with alms, and your iniquities with mercy to the poor." The Syriac translates: the justification (or victory) of all men is sealed and placed with him, and the grace of all men is guarded before him like the pupil of the eye. Justification or justice is the name given to almsgiving, on account of the analogies which I reviewed at Daniel IV, 24; which translation more favors the former exposition of Jansenius.

Moreover, Palacius explains these words differently. Hear him: "Almsgiving, he says, is like a purse of money with him; second, and He will preserve the grace of a man as the apple of the eye; third, and afterward He will rise; fourth, He will give them their recompense, to each one upon their head; fifth, He will turn to the lower parts of the earth." The first praise of almsgiving, then, which the Author treats as a work by which God is greatly honored, is that it is like a purse, namely of money, meaning: He who carries a purse of money with him buys what he wants; so he who gives alms, although he casts away his money, nevertheless carries it with him, with which he procures God's favor against evils, an abundance of good things on earth, and finally happiness for himself in heaven. In the Greek, instead of purse we have seal, and the meaning is: Just as Abraham received circumcision as a seal, by which God testified that he was just, so the one who gives alms is furnished with the seal of God, by which he is shown to be just; for he who gives food to the hungry, drink to the thirsty, etc., is just

is held to be so on the day of judgment. And just as no one rashly dares to violate a letter secured with a seal, so neither do demons easily harm the one who gives alms out of mercy, since on the evil day the Lord will deliver him. The second praise of almsgiving is that it diligently and carefully preserves grace — a most illustrious praise indeed. For since the grace of our soul is so exposed to the envy of demons, the frailty of the flesh, the cupidity and assaults of the world, it is almsgiving that preserves and defends grace against so many phalanxes of raging enemies, that is, it earnestly prays to God in heaven to defend it, according to that saying: "The Lord will preserve him and give him life," etc. So says Palacius.

Note that the grace of God is rightly compared to the pupil of the eye: first, because just as in the pupil the image of a little man appears, whence in Hebrew the pupil is called ischon, as if to say "little man" — so in grace the image of God appears; for grace is the supreme participation in the divinity, according to II Peter I, 4: "That you may become partakers of the divine nature." Second, just as the pupil is the grace, beauty, and charm of the face, so grace is the beauty, charm, and dignity of the soul; remove the pupil and you gouge out a man's eyes; remove grace and you blind, nay, you kill the soul; take away the sun from the sky by day, take away the stars by night, and the sky will be nothing but darkness and gloom; take away grace and you take away the sun and stars of the mind, and with them removed, nothing remains but night and gloom. Hence, third, just as the pupil should be the utmost concern of a man, so also grace should be the utmost concern of the faithful, to preserve, increase, and perfect it. See therefore how great is the dignity of almsgiving, which preserves this pupil of the soul — grace, I say. Hence Saint Chrysostom, in his Homily on Almsgiving and Contributions to the Saints, equates the grace of almsgiving with the grace of miracles, by which the dead are raised, lepers are cleansed, and demons are put to flight. And he adds: "God established almsgiving not solely so that the needy might be fed, but also so that benefits might accrue to the givers, and indeed more for the sake of the givers than of the receivers. And therefore true almsgiving is to give in such a way that you rejoice in giving, and consider yourself to be receiving rather than giving." Finally, almsgiving finds grace even among enemies, and makes friends not only of friends but of enemies; indeed it bestows the grace that demons, our sworn enemies, cannot harm us. Hear Saint Chrysostom, Homily 33 to the People: "Here too, he says, are the camps of the poor, and a battle in which the poor fight for you; for when they have received their pay, they pray and make God propitious to you; and making Him propitious, they repel the ambushes of demons for us barbarians, and do not allow the evil one to be grievously hostile or to attack continually, but they break his power. Therefore, looking upon those soldiers, who daily fight against the devil with prayers and supplications on your behalf, exact from yourself that tribute — their sustenance."

Cyril represents this maxim and this riddle with a beautiful fable of the silkworm and the man, in Book III of the Moral Apologues, chapter XX. For the silkworm, wrapping and hiding itself in its silk which it provides to man, signifies that the benefactor ought to show the benefit but hide himself. "Wherefore the generous man, he says, hides his face, flees praise, and seeks no outward reward. The gem-producing nature is never in plain sight, nor does the most generous vein of gold display itself openly. For nature and virtue do not give for show, because they desire neither the thing nor the praise for the gifts they have virtually poured forth externally. Having heard these words, he bid farewell and fell silent."

Verse 19: He shall rise up and render them their recompense

19. And afterward He will rise (He will rise up for judgment — not almsgiving, but God, whose it is to judge and to recompense each one according to his merits), AND HE WILL GIVE THEM THEIR RECOMPENSE, TO EACH ONE UPON THEIR OWN HEAD, AND HE WILL TURN THEM TO THE INTERIOR (some read, lower) PARTS OF THE EARTH.

First, Jansenius, Lyranus, and Palacius refer these words to almsgiving and almsgivers, meaning: Almsgiving, sealed and guarded, is preserved with God until the day of judgment; for then He will rise, that is, God will rise up for judgment, and will recompense each person according to their merits, and will turn to the lower parts of the earth, that is, to the dead — in Sirach's time those dwelling in the underworld, that is, the limbo of the fathers: both because He will cause the power of almsgiving to reach them, since on account of it He will raise them to glory; and because He will cause the soul of the almsgiver, if sent to purgatory for expiation, to be freed from there, or at least to have its punishment mitigated. So say Lyranus, Palacius, and Jansenius, who from this passage prove Purgatory against the heretics.

Erroneously, Praepositivus, whom Hugo cites and refutes here, and certain others concluded from this passage and similar ones that almsgiving also benefits the souls of the damned in hell, in that their punishment is mitigated for a time through alms. They cite in their favor Saint Augustine, Enchiridion chapter CX, where he says: "For those whom they benefit (alms and suffrages) either benefit to the extent that there is full remission, or at least that the condemnation itself is made more tolerable." But Saint Augustine is speaking of condemnation to purgatory, not to hell: for both groups are condemned to the same fire, but there the fire is temporary, here eternal. That this is so is clear from what Saint Augustine immediately says beforehand: "When therefore sacrifices, whether of the altar or of any alms, are offered for all the baptized dead, for the very good they are acts of thanksgiving; for those not very bad they are propitiations; for the very bad, even if they are no help to the dead, they are still consolations of a sort for the living." They also cite in their favor Saint Chrysostom, Homily 3 on the Epistle to the Philippians, Innocent III, chapter Cum Martha, and others. But to all of these and to everything, Bellarmine responds admirably, Book II On Purgatory, chapter XVIII.

Moreover, how great this recompense is, Christ teaches,

who for a cup of cold water promises the kingdom of heaven, Matthew X, 42. Hence Saint Chrysostom, Homily 5 On Penance: "A merchant, he says, has no other intention than to buy cheap and sell dear, etc. Such then are the markets God has proposed to us: justice is bought for a small price, merely for a piece of bread, for a cup of cold water." And the Angel to Tobias, chapter XII, 9: "Those who give, he says, alms and do justice will be filled with life."

Second, more aptly you may refer these words to the iniquities and the wicked, of whom he treated in verses 16 and 17, meaning: The iniquities and the wicked are in the eyes of God, and are kept in the mind and memory of God until the day of judgment, both particular and universal; for then God as avenger will rise up for judgment, and will judge the impious, the merciless, and the impenitent who persist and die in their iniquity, and will give them the punishments they deserve upon their own head, because He will turn (some read, crush) and send them into hell. For it is clear from the following antithesis that the wicked and impenitent are being discussed here. For opposing the penitent to these in the following verse, he adds: "But to the penitent He gave the way of justice," etc. The same is sufficiently indicated by the phrase He will recompense each one upon their head. For God is said to recompense the impious upon their head, but the pious into their bosom. Hence the Syriac clearly translates: and after these things He will be revealed and will recompense them, and will put their sins upon their head. Finally, if you wish to take this statement in the broadest sense, you can refer it both to the pious and the impious, and thus join together both interpretations already given, and embrace them as one. Hence the Tigurina translates: at last He rises, and gives each one his price, and turns upon each one's own head his own recompense.

Verse 20: To the penitent He gave the way of justice

20. BUT TO THE PENITENT HE GAVE THE WAY OF JUSTICE, AND HE STRENGTHENED THE FAINTING TO ENDURE (that is, for enduring, that they might endure temptation), AND HE APPOINTED FOR THEM THE LOT OF TRUTH. — The word but to the penitent indicates that there is an antithesis here, and therefore the preceding passage is to be understood of the wicked and impenitent, as I already said; perhaps he also looks back to what the Greek of the Complutensian adds at the end of verse 18: "Granting to his sons (the almsgiver's) and daughters a place for repentance." He said in verses 16 and 17 that God beholds all the iniquities of all men, so as to judge and avenge them; now, lest anyone on that account despair of pardon for his sins, he adds the remedy, namely penance, meaning: If you have sinned and shipwrecked your innocence and justice, after the shipwreck there remains a plank by which you may save yourself, namely penance, which God suggests and offers to you; for to the penitent He gave the way of justice, that is, to justice, namely the way by which they may return to justice; this way is penance. Hence the Greek has: yet to the penitent He grants a return, namely to Himself and to justice; the Tigurina: yet He grants a way back to those who come to their senses; the Syriac: but to the penitent He will give repentance. Nor is this all, but in addition He strengthened the fainting, meaning: God strengthens and fortifies the faint-hearted, who otherwise, left to themselves, would lose heart and give way through human weakness in

temptation and tribulation, and would slip into consent to temptation, impatience, despair, and other sins; He strengthens, I say, "the fainting to endure," that is, for enduring; for by the power of His grace He causes them to bravely tolerate and endure every tribulation. Moreover, He strengthens them both through the reading of Sacred Scripture and pious books, through preachers and consolers, through the examples of the Saints, and especially through the interior grace and strength that He inspires in the mind. Hence the Greek word is parakalesen, which you may translate: first, he exhorted; second, he consoled; third, he called, he asked. Hence some here read conrogavit, or rather corrogavit, and Jansenius thinks our translator rendered it this way, and so reads Saint Ambrose, or rather Victor, Bishop of Cartenna, in his Book on Penance, chapter 1 (extant in volume V of Saint Ambrose, Roman edition, p. 405), where among other things he says: "For a cautious confession of error has a part of justice (for instead of way he reads part); that you may milk mercy, first exercise censure upon yourself." Fourth, he aroused, animated, strengthened, as our translator renders it. Hence the same Victor in the same place defines penance thus: "Penance is the condemnation of one's former life, and a promised correction for the future, and the manner of living is, as it were, led into another life, while the pious mind does not look back at the things that are behind."

The full Greek reads: parakalesen ekleipontas hypomonen, where some preposition must necessarily be understood. The Tigurina adds pros, that is toward; hence it translates: he exhorts the wavering to patience. Others understand kata, that is according to or in accordance with; hence they translate: he encourages the fainting according to patience, that is, those lacking or deprived of patience. The Complutensian: he strengthened the fainting in expectation; the Roman: the fainting in endurance; the Syriac goes in another direction, for it reads: and he will destroy all who offend the just.

AND HE APPOINTED FOR THEM THE LOT OF TRUTH — namely, the lot due to penance and justice, that is, eternal life. For truth in Scripture often signifies justice and every duty of virtue, that is, what one ought to do in order to live worthily according to one's rank and state. So of the devil it is said in John VIII, 44: "He did not stand in the truth," that is, he did not persevere in his angelic state, he did not do what an Angel ought to do, he abandoned his angelic office. The sense therefore is: The wicked of whom I treated in verses 16 and 17, await from God — who continually beholds their iniquities with stern eyes — the lot due to iniquity, namely hell, as he said in verse 19; but the penitent, if they sincerely turn from their iniquity, await from God the lot of truth and justice, namely heavenly happiness: for God has destined this for them from eternity, Matthew XXV.

He indicates that there are two lots for men: one of earthly happiness, which is granted to the wicked, and this is the lot of vanity, dream, falsehood, and darkness; the other of eternal happiness, and this is the lot of truth. If you understand this, it is enough, says Palacius.

SECOND PART OF THE CHAPTER, IN WHICH HE EXHORTS TO PENANCE, THAT THROUGH IT THEY MAY RETURN TO GOD.

Verses 21 and 22: Turn to the Lord and forsake your sins

21 and 22. Return (Greek epistrephe, that is, come back, return) TO THE LORD, AND FORSAKE YOUR SINS: PRAY BEFORE THE FACE OF THE LORD, AND LESSEN YOUR OFFENSES. — The Tigurina has offenses; the Syriac: return to the Lord, and turn back from perishing, turn back from sinning, and do not provoke His wrath. For what profit is there to God in all those who perish in the world, instead of those who live and give Him thanksgiving? The Complutensian adds oun, that is therefore. For this second part of the chapter about penance is inferred from the first, namely from what was said about the benefits God has bestowed on man, and about His inspection, judgment, and recompense, by which He repays both good and evil according to their merits, as if to say: Since, O man, you are bound to God by so many titles and debts, and He attentively inspects each of your actions, and especially all your iniquities, so as to punish them most severely in hell; it follows that if you are wise, if you wish to take care of your soul, your salvation, and your eternity, you should turn to the Lord. "Turn back, says Hugo, and return like a handmaid to her mistress, according to Genesis XVI: Return, Hagar, to your mistress, and humble yourself under her hand. Return, prodigal son, to your father, and say: I will arise and go to my father, and I will say to him: I have sinned. Return, adulterous harlot, to your spouse, according to Jeremiah III: You have played the harlot with many lovers, yet return. Return, sick man, to the physician, according to Hosea VI: Come, and let us return to the Lord, for He has torn us and He will heal us."

Note first: Sirach requires two things for conversion and justification: first, that the sinner turn to the Lord with his whole heart; second, that he forsake his sins. For the sinner, while he sins, leaves the unchangeable good and turns to a changeable good. Therefore, in order to be converted and return to his former state of justice, he must leave the changeable good, return to the unchangeable, and turn from creatures to the Creator. For just as light excludes darkness, and darkness excludes light, so in turn the love of the Creator excludes the disordered love of the creature, and vice versa.

He adds a third requirement, that one pray "before the face of God," namely that the penitent prostrate himself before God and humbly ask for pardon. He adds a fourth, that one lessen offenses — namely, both the sins and transgressions that offend God, the occasions of sinning and offending God, suspicious associations, and whatever gives neighbors an occasion of stumbling and scandal. For all these things are signified by the Greek proskomma; and whoever seriously wishes to turn to God must, insofar as he can, diminish and remove them. So Manasseh, when repentant, removed the offenses, namely the idols he had previously erected, II Chronicles XXXIII, verse 15.

Note second: pray before the face of the Lord, that is, before the sight of the Lord, or before the person of the Lord, namely before the Lord. For the Hebrew panim and the Greek prosopon signify both face and person, which is distinguished and recognized from the face as distinct from others. Note here that panim is plural in Hebrew and lacks a singular form, so as to signify that there are several, namely three, persons in God. Hence at Exodus XXXIII, 20, on the words: "You cannot see My face," the Cabalists note that the Hebrew panai, that is my face, is triliteral, and represents the three persons of the Most Holy Trinity: indeed, the three letters of which panai is composed are signs of the three hypostases. For the first letter is pe, which signifies the mouth, from which the word proceeds, and which therefore fittingly represents God the Father. The second is nun, which expressly signifies the Son, from the root nin, from which the Arabs and the Spaniards call infants and little children niños. The third is yod, that is Hand, which in Scripture signifies the Holy Spirit, as when David says in Psalm CX [CXXXIX], verse 10: "Where shall I go from Your spirit?" and immediately adds: "There Your hand will lead me." All these things were noted by Raphael Aquilinus, treatise 1, whom Anton. Ricciardus cites in his Symbolic Commentary. So the ancient Hebrews and Latins used to say that there are three faces, three appearances, three forms in God, that is, three persons. Hear Tertullian against Praxeas: "They are three, not in state but in degree; not in substance but in form; not in power but in species; but of one state, one substance, one power: because there is one God from whom those degrees, and form, and species are assigned in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit." By degrees he meant origins and processions, as Pamelius rightly noted. Hence also the Septuagint translates face as prosopon, that is person. For the ancient philosophers were ignorant of the distinction between nature and person: hence when Aristotle says that actions belong to supposita, by supposita he did not mean persons but substances, as Suarez rightly noted in his Metaphysics.

Wherefore Martial the poet mocking the Most Holy Trinity which Christians worship, because he could not grasp the Trinity of persons in one and the same essence, said: "Hermes, all things alone, and thrice one;" to whom Athenagoras, almost a contemporary of Saint Dionysius the Areopagite, responding in his Apology for the Christians, says "that God is one in act, but three in power," that is, one in essence, but three in persons. For the name hypostasis was not yet used for person, but from its etymology signified substance. For the first one who distinguished hypostasis from ousia, and called the persons hypostases, and the ousia

their essence, was Hosius, Bishop of Cordoba, in order to refute Sabellius who said that in God there is one hypostasis and one person, just as there is one nature, as Socrates reports in Book III, chapters IV and V.

Therefore the face of God which we worship and to which we pray signifies, first, the essence of God; second, the presence of God, for the face is the indicator of presence; third, the person of God, for a person is recognized and identified by the face; fourth, benevolence, for this is discerned in a kind face. Hence God is said to turn away His face from one with whom He is angry, but to show His face to one whom He graciously regards, according to Psalm LXXIX: "Show Your face, and we shall be saved;" for which Saint Augustine reads: illuminate Your face, that is, show us a bright, cheerful, and kind face.

Hence also Saint Gregory, expounding that passage in Job I: Unless he has blessed You to Your face: "We, he says, look upon what we love; but what we wish to shun, we turn our face away from. What then is the face of God, if not the regard of His grace? He says therefore: Stretch out Your hand a little, and touch all that he possesses, unless he has blessed You to Your face. As if he were saying openly: Take away what You have given. For if he has lost what he received, he does not seek the regard of Your grace once temporal things are taken away. For if he does not have the things in which he takes pleasure, he scorns Your favor, even by cursing." Hence Sirach commands us to pray before the face of God, so that by praying we may win it over to ourselves, and from angry, stern, and threatening, make it propitious, serene, benevolent, and beneficent toward us.

Verse 23: Return to the Lord and turn away from injustice

23. RETURN TO THE LORD, AND TURN AWAY FROM INJUSTICE, AND HATE ABOMINATION EXCEEDINGLY — namely, sin, which God loathes and abhors. He repeats and emphasizes in other words what he said in the preceding verse. "Exceedingly" means greatly: for this is what the Hebrew meod means; but he says exceedingly rather than greatly, because an enormous and almost immeasurable hatred of sin is required: for sin is an immeasurable evil, and therefore must be immeasurably abhorred; wherefore however great the hatred of sin may be, it cannot be too much: indeed, God pursues and execrates sin with a positively infinite hatred. Therefore, just as God must be loved above every lovable good, so sin must be execrated above every hateful evil that can be hated by man or Angel.

The Complutensian and Tigurina insert some words about light and darkness. For they read: strive toward the Most High (for He will lead you from darkness to the light of safety), and depart from injustice; and pursue with the greatest hatred what is abominable; the Syriac again goes in a different direction: how many, he says, are the mercies of God! who spares those who return to him, because there is nothing of this kind in man: nor is his counsel like the counsels of the children of the flesh.

Verse 24: Know the justices and judgments of God

24. AND KNOW THE JUDGMENTS AND ORDINANCES (that is, the commandments which prescribe what is just, according to which one must judge) OF GOD, AND STAND IN THE LOT OF THE PROPOSITION AND PRAYER OF THE MOST HIGH GOD. — This statement and the following are now absent from the Greek, and consequently from the Syriac and Arabic; the Tigurina, however, expresses them thus: see to it that you know the justice and the laws of God, persist in the prescribed lot and in the invocation of the Most High, meaning: It is not enough to hate abomination, that is, execrable sin; but in addition one must know — namely, in a practical sense, that is, love and do — the works of justice prescribed by the law, according to Psalm XXXIII: "Turn from evil, and do good."

For these are the two integral parts of the true justice of the Saints.

Note: The word stand signifies, first, struggle and combat against enemies; second, constancy and perseverance therein, meaning: You wrestle with the world, the flesh, and the devil, who strive to divert you from the purpose of virtue; but stand, that is, generously resist their temptations, do not yield, nor fall, nor turn your back: for thus you will certainly conquer. For soldiers in camp, although they stand and resist, are often overcome and killed by a more powerful enemy; but the soldier of God and champion of virtue, if he stands unmoved in it, conquers: for no one can take virtue from us against our will, but only our own free will. For stand is a military term; those about to fight must stand firm: hence those who did so were formerly rewarded with torques and necklaces, as Vegetius testifies, Book II, chapter VII, and Vopiscus in the Life of Probus. Moreover, Roman soldiers bound themselves by a sacramentum, that is, a military oath, never to withdraw from obedience to the Consuls, never to desert their post, as Alexander ab Alexandro testifies, Book I of Genial Days, chapter XX. So the soldiers of Catiline fell on the very spot where they stood, as Sallust reports. Wherefore, alluding to this, Saint Paul in Ephesians VI, 12, after describing the struggle of the faithful against demons, and arming them with spiritual armor from head to foot, adds: "Therefore take up the armor of God, that you may be able to resist in the evil day." And then: "Stand therefore, having girded your loins, and having shod your feet with the preparation of the Gospel of peace," where I noted many things on this subject. Following these leaders, Saint Cyprian, Book I, Letter 5, says: "We exhort you, he says, by our common faith, by the true and sincere charity of our heart toward you, that you hold fast to your glory with strong and persevering virtue. We are still in the world, still placed in the battle line, we fight daily for our life."

The same author, praising the constancy of the Martyrs in their torments, in his Exhortation to Martyrdom says: "They stood, he says, tortured yet stronger than their torturers, and their beaten and torn limbs overcame the beating and tearing claws. Repeated blows from long-raging cruelty could not conquer their unconquerable faith, even though, with the framework of their bodies broken apart, what was being tortured in the servants of God was no longer limbs but wounds."

You will ask: what is this lot of the proposition in which he commands us to stand? I respond, first: it is the lot of the judgments, that is, of the commandments of God, proposed by Him to each person, so that through their observance one may be saved and blessed, meaning: Know the ordinances and judgments of God, and stand in the lot of the proposition and prayer of the Most High God.

you should continually set forth, offer, dedicate, and consecrate, and, so that you may be able to do this, you should frequently offer Him the incense of prayer, that is, of thanksgiving, praise, and invocation. Whence St. Paul, Ephesians chapter 6, verse 14, after saying: "Stand therefore, having girded your loins," adds in verse 18: "Praying with all prayer and supplication (that God may strengthen you by His grace to stand) at all times in the spirit, and watching thereunto with all perseverance." For, as St. Chrysostom says in Book I of On Praying to God: "Neither temperance alone can save a man, nor care for the poor, nor kindness, etc. But all these must converge together in our souls: moreover, prayer is laid as the root and foundation beneath all things." To this lot of proposition St. Paul alludes, when he often says that we are called according to a purpose, that is, according to God's will and good pleasure: "As He chose us, he says, in Him (Christ) before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless in His sight in love, etc., according to the purpose of His will, etc., which He purposed in Him, in the dispensation of the fullness of times, to restore all things in Christ," Ephesians 1:4 and following.

Finally, by "lot" understand any state of life whatsoever, which you have voluntarily chosen, even if rashly and imprudently — for example, marriage with a difficult wife, a laborious office, or a mechanical trade to which you have bound yourself. For if this is immovable, or difficult to change, you must embrace it and persevere in it. Therefore you should persuade yourself that it is now set before you by God as immovable, and that God, if you invoke Him, will give you the grace to endure it, and to live in it honestly and justly, according to that saying of the Apostle in 1 Corinthians chapter 7, verse 20: "Let each one remain in the vocation in which he was called. Were you called as a slave? Let it not trouble you." To this end applies the Arabic proverb, Century 1, number 96: "When what you wish does not happen to you, wish for what does happen." And that saying of Terence cited by St. Augustine: "When you cannot do what you wish, wish for what you can." For, as Seneca says in his Proverbs: "You cannot stray from your fortune — it besieges you; you will find fortune sooner than you will keep it. Bear, do not blame, what cannot be changed. Thus you will be the maker and guardian of your own fortune."

And in this matter consists the happiness of this life, namely that each person live content with his lot; for whoever is not content with it, even if he be rich, wise, and fortunate, is in reality miserable. For, as Seneca says: "He is not happy who does not consider himself most happy." And Aristotle in Book VII of the Eudemian Ethics cites and praises the old saying: "Friendship belongs to the steadfast, happiness to the temperate," that is, to those who are content with their lot. Therefore whoever makes the best of his fortune, even if he be poor, sick, or afflicted, is happy: just as the Martyrs were happy in their torments, because they rejoiced to endure them for God. And Euripides says: "You have obtained Sparta — adorn it." And Plato in the Gorgias: "It is necessary for me, according to the old say-

Second, Rabanus understands the lot of holiness set before us by God, so that through it we may become His friends and children: "He exhorts, he says, that after the fall of sin one should turn again to his Maker, and abandon the error by which he deceived himself through self-delusion; that he should beseech the Lord continually for his offenses, and with his whole mind's intent flee to divine compassion; that he should despise idolatry and the deceit of diabolical servitude, and learn the most upright standard of God's commandments, so that he may remain in the lot of holiness for which he was chosen, and persevere in the praises of the Most High." Of this lot Paul says in Ephesians 1:11: "In whom we also were called by lot;" and Colossians 1:12: "He made us worthy for a share in the lot of the Saints;" and St. Peter, 2nd Epistle, chapter 1, verse 1: "Those who have obtained an equal faith with us in justice." Opposed to this is the lot of the wicked, or the lot of the devil, about which it was said above in chapter 6, verse 4: "He will lead them into the lot of the wicked;" and chapter 25, verse 26: "Let the lot of sinners fall upon her." And St. Peter to Simon Magus in Acts chapter 8, verse 21: "You have neither part nor lot in this matter." Hence anagogically, by the lot of proposition you may understand the lot of predestination, which is the lot of glory and eternal happiness, of which the Angel said to Daniel in chapter 12, verse 13: "But you, he says, go to the appointed end; and you shall rest, and shall stand in your lot at the end of days." Whence Sirach also adds: "Go into the parts of the holy age," etc.

Third, Lyranus says: "Stand in the lot of proposition," that is, he says, stand in your good resolution.

Fourth, more properly and genuinely: "Stand in the lot of proposition," that is, persevere constantly and bravely against all the suggestions and temptations of the world, the flesh, and the devil in the lot set before you, that is, in your vocation — both of the new and holy life to which you have been converted from sins to the Lord, about which the preceding discourse treated; and of whatever definite honorable and holy state, such as the priesthood, religious life, office of authority, or any other, which God has set before you and to which He has called you, and which from His purpose and calling you have proposed to yourself and chosen. For this is the proposition of the Most High. Likewise stand and persist in the prayer of the Most High, that is, so that you may frequently pray to God for the help of grace, by which you may live worthily in your lot and vocation set before you.

He alludes to the tabernacle and temple of the Jews: for in it there were the loaves of proposition, so called because they were continually set forth and offered to the Lord; and the altar of incense, which signified prayer — for incense is the symbol of prayer. As if to say: Just as those loaves remained continually throughout the entire week in their proposition, that is, they remained on the table set before the Lord dwelling in the Holy of Holies, and incense was offered to Him on the altar: so likewise you, throughout your entire life, remain in your vocation set before you by God, so that in return you may offer Him yourself and all your actions

know the judgments, that is, the precepts of God, and persist in the lot set before you by God.

ing, to make the best of what is at hand, and to accept what is given to you by fate." And Pindar in the Isthmian Odes, Hymn 3: "The age, turning through the days, bends now this way, now that. But the gods (and godlike men, that is, the wise) are beyond the reach of weapons." The same author in the Pythian Odes, Hymn 7: "They say that a man's happiness flourishes steadily if he bears both this and that," that is, if he bears both prosperity and adversity. Homer gives the reason, Odyssey X:

For two jars of Jupiter stand on the threshold.

As if to say: God measures out to each person his own prosperity and adversity; therefore let each one accept both with equanimity from his God. For "where there is honey, there is gall; where there is abundance, there is a tumor." The Romans worshipped two goddesses, Angeronia and Volupia: one named from anxieties, the other from pleasure. The statue of Angeronia was at the entrance of Volupia's temple, to signify that pain is the companion of pleasure, and pleasure of pain; she had her mouth bound and sealed, to indicate that those who bear pains and anxieties silently and conceal them through the benefit of patience, attain the greatest pleasure. So Macrobius, Book I of the Commentary on the Dream of Scipio. Therefore, if anyone wishes to be happy, he must be content with his lot — not only of wealth, condition, and status, of labors and sufferings, but also of wisdom, virtue, and grace, which God has measured out to him. For this is the happiness of the Angels and the Blessed, in which each one lives content with his lot of grace and glory. For an Angel does not wish to be an Archangel; nor does an Archangel wish to be a Principality, nor a Principality to be among the Cherubim or Seraphim; but each one lives content with his choir, rank, and place in which he has been placed by God. It befits us to imitate them.

For there are some who, when they see someone wiser or holier than themselves, torment themselves because they cannot be his equal. And this vice is implanted in human nature, that we generally admire another's lot more, despise and disdain our own, desire what is untried, and condemn what is experienced, according to the saying:

The lazy ox wishes for a saddle, the horse wishes to plow.

These are foolish and unhappy people: for not everyone can be a Paul the Apostle, an Augustine, or an Athanasius. It suffices that each person cooperate with the grace given to him by God according to his own measure, and increase it as much as he can; but he foolishly aspires to the grace of the Blessed Virgin or St. Paul, because that grace, by God's gift, far surpasses and transcends all the measures of graces which God bestows on all the Saints: hence it is impossible for man to attain it. So in the body, the foot does not wish to be the hand or the eye, but is content with its own lot, place, and rank — the Apostle uses this example in 1 Corinthians 12:14. The same Apostle, in 1 Timothy chapter 6, verse 6: "Godliness with contentment, he says, is great gain" — in Greek autarkeia, that is, with a mind sufficient to itself and content with its own things. See what was said in both places. Therefore let each one say to God with the Psalmist: "In Your hands are my lots," Psalm 30,

verse 16. You, O Lord, are the commander of this great court of the world, You are the absolute master of all; it is Yours to determine whatever You please concerning us, Your creatures — indeed, whatever the most wise order of Your providence has decreed. To that order, therefore, I resign myself entirely; in whatever station You place me as Your soldier, I will willingly and vigorously discharge it, I will rest in it, and I will say: "In peace, in the selfsame, I will sleep and rest." This is holiness, this is truth, this is true happiness. Thus St. Jerome, in Epistle 25, consoles St. Paula mourning the death of her daughter Blesilla: "He who says he believes in Christ, he says, should rejoice in all the judgments of Christ. I am well — I give thanks to the Creator; I am sick — and in this too I praise the will of the Lord."

There is a delightful fable on this subject about the peacock in Phaedrus, Book III, Fable 15. For the peacock complained to Juno that he was surpassed in song by the nightingale, and demanded that song for himself as being more worthy. Juno replied that each creature had been given its own gifts by God: to the peacock beauty and the train of his tail, to the nightingale a voice, etc., and that each should be content with his own gift and lot. But hear Phaedrus:

The peacock came to Juno, indignant That the nightingale's song had not been given to him: That bird was admirable to all other birds, While he was mocked as soon as he uttered a sound. Then the goddess spoke to console him: But you surpass in beauty, you surpass in size. The brilliance of emerald gleams upon your neck, And you spread a jeweled tail with painted plumes. To what end, he said, this mute beauty, if I am defeated in sound? By the decree of fate, roles have been assigned to you: To you beauty, strength to the eagle, song to the nightingale, Augury to the raven, ill omens to the crow, And all are content with their own voices.

The moral: Do not seek what has not been given to you, Lest disappointed hope fall back into complaint.

Plato himself saw the same thing, as it were through a shadow. According to Plutarch's testimony, in the book On Tranquility of Mind, he illustrates it with the example of dice: "In which, though the best throw is most desirable for the player, yet however it may turn out, one must take care to make the best possible use of what chance has brought." And Terence in the Adelphi, using a similar example, says:

Such is the life of men, as when you play at dice. If what is most needed does not fall in the throw, What has fallen by chance, you must correct by skill.

Someone asked St. Anthony: "What should I do to become pleasing to God?" To whom Anthony prescribed three things: first, "Always keep God before your eyes;" second, "Whatever work you undertake, confirm it by the testimony of Sacred Scripture;" third, "In whatever place you have settled, do not quickly move from there, but remain in it. Keep these three things, and you shall live." So the Apophthegms of the Holy Fathers. St. Ephrem, in Exhortation 4: "In what voca-

tion you have been called to work, he says, secure your anchors and ropes, lest your ship be gradually driven out to the open sea; and then experience will teach you what peace you enjoyed while stationed in port." I shall say more on this subject at Proverbs 27:8.

Verse 25: Go into the parts of the holy world

"Part" in Scripture is called each person's lot, according to that saying of Isaiah 57:6: "Your part, this is your lot." And so in substance it is the same to say: "Stand in the lot of proposition and prayer of the Most High," as: "Go into the parts of the holy age." He calls the holy age the blessed age and the blessed eternity which the Saints enjoy in heaven, of which the Wise Man says in chapter 5, verse 5: "And among the saints is their lot." And Daniel chapter 7, verse 27: "The kingdom, and the power, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High: His kingdom is an everlasting kingdom." And in Isaiah 9:6, Christ is called "the Father of the age to come;" and chapter 26, verse 4: "You have hoped in the Lord for ages eternal."

Esdras (to whom Sirach here alludes) describes at length this holy age of the sealed and elect of God, in Book IV, chapter 2, verse 34: "Wait for your shepherd, he says, he will give you the rest of eternity: for he who will come at the end of the age is near. Be ready for the rewards of the kingdom, because perpetual light will shine upon you for the eternity of time. Flee the shadow of this age; receive the gladness of your glory, etc., giving thanks to Him who has called you to the heavenly kingdoms. Arise and stand, and see the number of those sealed at the banquet of the Lord," etc. St. John follows Esdras in Apocalypse 4:8, and chapter 5:9, and chapter 7:10. So Rabanus, Lyranus, Hugo, Jansenius, Palacius, and others. Hear Rabanus: "The holy age, he says, is the rest of eternal life, which elsewhere is called the eternal age and the age of ages, or ages of ages. It is therefore necessary for each person, that while he lives and is strong, he prepare for himself a place of eternal blessedness by believing rightly and working well, because after the end of this life there is no time for working. Whence Christ admonished His own: Walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake you," John 12:35; and Paul: "Therefore, while we have time, let us do good to all," Galatians 6:10.

Tropologically, our Jacobus Alvarez de Paz, in On the Spiritual Life, Book V, Part II, chapter 23, says: To go into the parts of the holy age is nothing other than to learn the virtues of the Saints who preceded us; and to dwell with the living who confess God is to pursue the virtues of the Saints of the present, so that thus we may offer to Christ our Bridegroom fruits both new and old, that is, the virtues of past and present Saints. So St. Anthony, as St. Athanasius attests, strove to imitate the virtues of each individual Saint. In like manner, let a Franciscan set before himself as a model of life St. Francis, St. Anthony of Padua, and St. Bernardine; a Dominican, St. Dominic, St. Thomas Aquinas, and St. Hyacinth; the Society of Jesus, St. Ignatius, St. Xavier, Blessed Francis de Borgia, Blessed Aloysius, etc. Thus each will go into the parts of his own holy age.

In place of this verse, the Complutensian edition and the other Greek texts have: Who will sing praise to the Most High in the underworld, in place of the living and those who give confession, that is, as others translate, in place of the living and those giving thanks; the Tigurine version: Who among the dead will praise the Most High, just as the living who are devoted to thanksgiving? As if to say: Those in the underworld do not praise God, but those above, namely those living on earth. Therefore, while you live, praise God; for you will not be able to praise Him in the underworld. Understand this in the way I shall explain in the following verse. Therefore, he goes into the parts of the holy age who perpetually praises God with the Angels and Saints, who walks with God as Noah and Enoch did; such a one becomes divine, and as it were a certain earthly god. Whence St. Augustine, in Tractate 2 on the First Epistle of St. John: "Each person, he says, is such as his love is. Do you love the earth? You will be earth. Do you love God — what shall I say? You will be God." Indeed even Aristotle, in Book I of the Politics: "A solitary man, he says, is either a god or a beast." A god, namely, if he constantly dwells with God, and pours his whole heart, mind, and love into Him, so that he may say with St. Paul: "It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me," Galatians 2:20. This is what ascetics do, whose entire conversation is in heaven with God and the Angels, who therefore dwell on earth only in body, but in spirit transcend all earthly things, as if they alone dwelt in the world with God alone; which the Italians express as: Dio et io, Dio amor mio — God and I, God my love.

The sense therefore is, as if to say: You who have now turned from sin, and from the vanity and cupidity of this age, to God — having left that behind, go to the holy age; namely, strive daily through good works, advance and proceed toward heaven, so that among the portions of the Blessed, that is, their lots, one part of the holy age — that is, one lot of blessed eternity and future glory — may fall to you. Live for holy eternity, and indeed begin it here through confession of God, that is, praise, so that you may continually praise God both in heart and in word and in deed with the just who still live and give praise to God; converse with the Angels, rejoice with the Blessed: for the life of the heavenly citizens and the Blessed is nothing other than continual praise of God, a perpetual Alleluia. Whence Psalm 141:6, and Psalm 41:5 and 6, heaven is called the land of the living, the place of the wondrous tabernacle, the house of God, where there is the voice of exultation and confession, and the sound of feasting. See what was said at Apocalypse 4:8, and chapter 5:9, and chapter 7:10. So Rabanus, Lyranus, Hugo, Jansenius, Palacius, and others.

Wherefore St. Augustine explains this passage about the confession of sins, in On the Words of the Lord according to Matthew, Sermon 8: "We confess, he says, either by praising God or by accusing ourselves. Both kinds of confession are devout — whether you reproach yourself who are not without sin, or whether you praise Him who cannot have sin. But if we think rightly, your self-reproach is His praise. For why do you now confess in the accusation of yourself? Why do you confess, unless because from a dead man you have been made alive? For Scripture says: From the dead, as if he did not exist, confession perishes. If confession perishes in the dead, he who confesses is alive: and if he confesses sin, he has surely come back to life from death. The confessor of sin has risen from the dead — who raised him?" Surely no one but God. And further on: "Whether therefore we accuse ourselves, or praise God, we proclaim Him as one who is without sin. And when we accuse ourselves, we give glory to Him through whom we have risen." Likewise St. Ambrose (or rather Victor, Bishop of Cartenna), in the book On Penance, chapter 28, volume V, page 421: "But since, he says, the final exit comes unforeseen to us, and the course of our life is uncertain due to our ignorance of death, how can anyone suppose that time will remain for confessing, when he is ignorant of the time of his own time? — when surely he hears Scripture saying: While living and healthy you shall confess, and you shall praise God, and go into the part of the holy age with the living and those who give confession," etc. In a similar way, this passage is explained regarding the confession of sins in the section On Penance, distinction 1, chapter 34, Convertimini, where from this text it is proved that without confession no one can rise to the life of grace, but all who refuse to confess remain in the death of sin: and that if they begin to open their mouth for confession, already by God's gift they partake of some beginning of life, as St. Augustine taught shortly before.

Verse 26: Do not tarry in the error of the ungodly

As if to say: Do not linger in the error by which the wicked, while they live, indulging their pleasures and lusts, persuade themselves that in death and in mortal sickness, or after death, they will turn to God and praise Him, since the soul released from the body will no longer be able to desire anything earthly; but rather "before death, confess." He adds the reason: "From the dead, as if nothing, confession perishes," as if to say: From the dead, as one who is nothing, that is, who does not exist, who is not in the nature of things, confession perishes — that is, the useful and meritorious praise of God, which would lead him into the parts of the holy age, so that he might merit to advance there, and glorify God forever by rejoicing with the Angels and the Blessed, as was said above; for there is no merit after this life. Indeed, no one will then praise God who did not praise Him in this life: for all the wicked who did not praise God in this life, but blasphemed Him either by word or by their manner of living, will blaspheme Him far more in Gehenna, tormented by Him. Hear Rabanus: "To linger in the error of the wicked is the certain ruin of men, because after the end of the present life all the pomp of human glory will be reckoned as nothing; but he who spends the span of the present life in divine praise, and always presses on in this work for as long as he lives, will afterward be happily rewarded and will exult in eternal blessedness. Whence Ecclesiastes, instructing us in his customary manner in chapter 9, that we should not waste the leisure of the time granted to us, but turn it to our advantage, says thus: There is no one who lives forever and has confidence of this thing. Whatever your hand is able to do, work at it earnestly: for neither work, nor reason, nor wisdom, nor knowledge will be in the underworld, where you hasten."

He alludes to Baruch chapter 2, verse 17: "See, for the dead who are in the underworld will not give honor and justification to God, but the soul that is sorrowful," etc. See what was said there: where I explained at length this and similar passages from Isaiah chapter 38, verse 19, and Psalm 113, verse 26.

From this it is clear that "confession" here properly signifies praise and thanksgiving. For the Hebrew word הודה hoda, that is, "to confess," means to praise, because the acknowledgment and confession of the supreme majesty of God, and conversely of our own lowly baseness, is the highest praise of God. Hence the sacrifice of תודה thoda, that is, of confession, was that which was offered in praise and thanksgiving to God. Yet this confession and praise of God involves and presupposes the confession of sins, especially because Sirach is speaking about sins and about a sinner who has turned to God through penance and confession, and who therefore, for this benefit of the remission of sins and reconciliation, confesses and praises God. For the confession of sins was prescribed even under the old law for penitents, and not only to be made to God, but also to the priest, as I have shown at Leviticus 5:5, and elsewhere.

Wherefore St. Jerome, in Epistle 30 to Oceanus, praises Fabiola because she publicly confessed and bewailed the sin of having repudiated her first husband and taken a second: "Who would have believed, he says, etc., that she would put on sackcloth, that she would publicly confess her error, and while all Rome watched, before the day of Easter in the basilica of the Lateran, would stand in the order of penitents, with the bishop, priests, and all the people weeping with her, and with disheveled hair, pallid face, unwashed hands, would bow her soiled neck?" And further on: "O happy penance, which drew to itself the eyes of God, which changed the furious sentence of God by confessing its error! We read that Manasseh did the same in the Chronicles, and Nineveh in the Prophet, and the Publican also in the Gospel: of whom the first merited to receive not only pardon but also the kingdom of heaven; the second broke the impending wrath of God; the third, beating his breast with his fists, did not raise his eyes to heaven, and the Publican departed far more justified by his confession of vices than the Pharisee

by his proud boasting of virtues." And after a few intervening words: "She was not ashamed of the Lord on earth, and He will not put her to shame in heaven. She opened her wound to all, and weeping Rome beheld the discolored scar on her body. Her garments were torn apart, her head bare, her mouth closed. She did not enter the Church of the Lord, but sat apart outside the camp with Miriam, the sister of Moses, so that he whom the priest had cast out, He Himself might recall. She descended from the throne of her luxuries, took a millstone, ground flour, and with bare feet crossed streams of tears. She sat upon coals of fire: these were her aid. She struck the face by which she had pleased her second husband; she hated jewels, could not bear to look at fine linen, and fled from ornaments; she grieved as though she had committed adultery, and with many costly remedies she desired to heal a single wound."

Mystically, "from the dead," that is, from one who remains in sins, who is nothing, that is, of no profit or value before God, "confession perishes," because one who clings to his sins neither wants to confess nor is able to. So St. Augustine, in his commentary on Psalm 68, discourse 1, at the end, explaining that verse 46: "Let not the deep swallow me up, nor the pit close its mouth upon me: Great, he says, is the pit of the depth of human iniquity, etc. When the sinner has come into the depths of evils, he will despise; the pit has closed its mouth upon him. Why did it close its mouth? Because it closed his mouth. For he has lost confession; he is truly dead, and there is fulfilled in him what is said elsewhere: From the dead, as that which is not, confession perishes. This is a thing to be greatly feared, brothers. If you see a man who has committed iniquity, he has been plunged into the pit. But when you tell him of his iniquity, and he says: Truly I have sinned, I confess — the pit has not closed its mouth upon him. But when you see him say: What evil have I done? — he has become the defender of his sin; the pit has closed its mouth upon him, and he has no way to be pulled out. Once confession is lost, there will be no place for mercy. You have become the defender of your sin — how will God be your liberator? Therefore, that He may be your liberator, you must be your own accuser."

Note: The words "before death confess" are no longer in the Greek, nor in some Latin manuscripts; but they are sufficiently understood from the following words: "From the dead, as if nothing, confession perishes." In place of this, the Greek more clearly has: from the dead, as from one not existing, that is, who is not, who does not exist, confession perishes. Hence, explaining further, he adds: "The living and the healthy shall praise the Lord." Whence the Tigurine version clearly translates: Do not cling to the error of the wicked. See to it that you proclaim the Lord before death. From the dead, no differently than if he had ceased to exist, praise fails: but the living and the sound of heart will praise the Lord, and will glory in His mercy. See Francisco Lucas in his Notes here.

Verse 27: You shall confess while living

by which He pardons you as a penitent. The Complutensian edition and the Tigurine version read "sound of heart" instead of simply "sound" — that is, one who, tearing his heart away from sins and lusts, has a sound heart, because it has been healed through God's grace, charity, and virtues. For such a one is fit, capable, and disposed for praising God, but not the one who is sound in body yet sick, indeed insane, in heart and mind, because he serves his lusts. But our Vulgate and others read simply "sound," as if to say: While you live and are strong both in body and in mind, confess, because when sickness presses upon you, such true confession is rare, and when death is imminent, it is most rare; for the sick person deserves to forget himself as he dies, who while living forgot God, as Palacius says following St. Augustine. He alludes to — indeed he cites — the words of King Hezekiah when sick and praying to God for health, in Isaiah 38:19. Hear the counsel of St. Basil, Oration 4, On Penance: "What are you doing, O man? he says. When you have great strength for action, you spend your youth in sins; but when the instruments have been broken by labor, then you bring them to God, when they are of no use, but necessarily totter and are numb from the decay of long time." And St. Ambrose: "What praise can there be, he says, if one turns a body worn out by pleasures, and now cold with the frost of old age, to late duties of devotion, having already laid aside the vigor of one's prime?" Indeed even Seneca, in the book On the Brevity of Life: "Are you not ashamed, he says, to reserve for yourself the remnants of life, and to designate for a good mind only that time which cannot be applied to any purpose? How late it is to begin to live when one must cease dying!" Finally St. Augustine, in his Book 50, Homily 41: "One who does penance at the very end, he says, and is reconciled — if he departs from here secure, I am not secure." And further on, meeting a tacit objection: "I ought, he says, to explain more fully, lest anyone think I have been misunderstood. Am I saying he will be damned? I do not say so. But do I also say he will be freed? No. But what do you say to me? I do not know, I do not presume, I do not promise, I do not know. Do you wish to free yourself from doubt? Do you wish to escape what is uncertain? Do penance while you are healthy, when you were able to sin, etc. But if you wish to do penance only when you can no longer sin, your sins have left you, not you them, etc. But how do you know, you say, that perhaps God will not pardon me? You speak truly. How do I know? I do not know; I know the one thing, the other I do not know. For I give you penance precisely because I do not know; for if I knew it would profit you nothing, I would not give it; likewise if I knew it would profit you, I would not admonish you, I would not frighten you. There are two possibilities: either you are pardoned, or you are not pardoned; which of these will be your future, I do not know. Therefore hold fast to what is certain, let go of what is uncertain."

Tropologically, "sound of heart," that is, one who has driven out the diseases of vice from his heart and has acquired virtues, so that he may progress in them, and especially in humility, and not be ashamed to lay open his faults and sins before the brethren. For in this way too he praises God, and because he

while He permitted countless others of times past to die in their crimes and be damned, has pardoned so many and such great sins, as is clear from what has been said.

bears himself as wretched, he proclaims God as praiseworthy, and therefore he will glory in His mercies, which he will receive on account of his humble confession of faults. Wherefore St. Dorotheus, in Instruction 7, assigns this above all as the way to God: that a man should always accuse himself in all things. And Abbot Pastor used to say that all virtues had migrated to the house of one thing: which is that a man accuse himself.

Verse 28: How great is the mercy of the Lord

The Complutensian edition adds osios, that is, "in a holy manner"; the Syriac: How many are the mercies of God, who spares those who return to Him! because there is nothing of this kind in man, nor is his counsel like the counsels of the children of flesh. The Tigurine version: How immense is the mercy of our God, and how ready His appeasability toward those who turn to Him in holiness! Palacius thinks this is a mimesis: for Sirach is imitating the words of one who confesses, indeed prescribing the manner of confessing, that is, of praising, namely that one who has obtained remission from God, marveling at so great a benefit of God, should exclaim and say: "How great is the mercy," etc.

Better is Jansenius's view that these are the words of Sirach himself, spoken by him to invite sinners to penance through the commendation of God's mercy, which is so great that it cannot be expressed in words or conceived by the mind; for it is immense, incomprehensible, and infinite. Do you wish to know how great the mercy of God is toward the sinner whom He receives into grace? Measure first how great are the torments of hell; for the measure of these is the measure of God's mercy, since it delivers the guilty sinner from them. Measure second the baseness and miseries of sinful man; for God's mercy swallows all of these, just as the sea swallows drops of rain. Hence the abyss of our misery calls upon the abyss of divine mercy. Measure third the multitude and enormity of all sins; for God's mercy immeasurably transcends all of these, especially because it not only pardons and abolishes all of them, however many and grave, with respect to guilt and offense, but also substitutes and puts in their place God's grace, friendship, divine sonship, inheritance, and eternal glory. Add that the same mercy always abolishes for the penitent a portion of the punishment, and sometimes the entire punishment, as happened to St. Mary Magdalene, says Lyranus. Truly therefore "mercy triumphs over judgment," James 2:13. Great and incomprehensible are the works of the Lord, but "His mercies are above all His works," Psalm 144:9.

Therefore let the penitent reconciled to God say with St. Mary Magdalene, with St. Pelagia, with St. Mary of Egypt, and others like them: "I will sing of the mercies of the Lord forever. My God, my mercy. Unless the Lord had helped me, my soul would almost have dwelt in hell," Psalm 93:17. "For as the heaven is high above the earth, He has strengthened His mercy toward those who fear Him. As far as the east is from the west, He has removed our iniquities from us," Psalm 102:11.

Elegantly St. Chrysostom, in Homily 2 on Psalm 50, at verse 1: "Have mercy on me, O God, according to Your great mercy," magnifying that mercy, exclaims: "O great mercy of the Lord! When the whole world was locked in sins, the Creator of all things came and annulled the beginnings of sinners, so that no one afterward should despair of his salvation. If you are wicked, think of the publican; if you are unclean, consider the harlot; if you are a murderer, look at the thief; if you are unjust, think of the blasphemer. Consider the Apostle Paul, first a persecutor, afterward a preacher; first a transgressor, afterward a steward; before this, tares, after this, wheat; before, a wolf, afterward, a shepherd; before, lead, afterward, gold; before, a pirate, afterward, a helmsman." And further on: "For what is sin compared to God's mercy? A spider's web, which when the wind blows is nowhere to be seen."

Verse 29: Not all things can be in men

The Tigurine version: and we delight in the vanity of vices. Here he gives the cause of that great mercy of God, namely the great misery of men, so that through it he may again attract men to the easy confession of sins and to hope of obtaining pardon from God's mercy, as if to say: Do not marvel that God's mercy is so great, because God knows that men are very fragile and prone to fall; therefore He easily has mercy on them when they repent after falling into sins, according to that saying of Psalm 102:13: "As a father has mercy on his children, so the Lord has had mercy on those who fear Him: for He Himself knows our frame."

FOR NOT ALL THINGS CAN BE IN MEN — as if to say: Perfect completeness does not belong to men, because they are wretched, weak, and infirm; therefore not all things that by right ought to be in them, and that are desired of them, can be in them: because he who is born of mortal man is not immortal, immutable, or free from corruption, says Jansenius; but by the very fact that he is born of man, he brings death with him, and with death instability, the fragility of this life, deficiency, corruption, and a proneness to vices; and therefore he sins frequently, and delights in evil vanity, and forbidden concupiscence pleases him. "For the inclination and thought of the human heart are prone to evil from its youth," Genesis 8, verse 21. So Rabanus, Lyranus, and Jansenius.

Verse 30: What is brighter than the sun?

The word "or" is used in place of "and"; similar examples of this usage are found in Deuteronomy 27:16, Proverbs 20:20, as explained at Matthew 15:4, and elsewhere. Again, the word "and" is used for "so" or "thus." For it is a mark of comparison; for he compares the defect of the flesh with the defect of the sun. Whence the Greek text has: What is more splendid than the light of the sun? Yet it shall fail; and (that is, so, likewise) flesh and blood shall devise evil. With this reading our Latin Jansenius thinks should be accommodated, and thus read: "Or what more wicked thing has flesh and blood devised," as some codices have, and he gives this meaning, both varied and manifold: "Since the most brilliant of all, the sun, is not without defect, what will flesh and blood, that is, man inherently quite fragile, devise more wickedly, than namely to refuse to acknowledge his own defect, his own fragility and frequent falls, but proudly exalt himself as if superior to the sun? If indeed he does this, this very thing will be severely reproved and punished." But these meanings, as they are uncertain and doubtful, supply much that is not found in the text. Again, the Greek codices vary remarkably here, so that we cannot rely on or trust them.

Therefore we must stand by the Latin Vulgate version as corrected by the Romans, which is clear and complete, and reads thus: "What is brighter than the sun? yet even this will fail; or what is more wicked than what flesh and blood has devised?" It proves what was said in the preceding verse: "For not all things can be in men, because the son of man is not immortal, and they delighted in the vanity of malice;" these, I say, two defects of man — namely the natural one through death, and the moral one through malice — it proves from a similar defect of the sun, as if to say: If the sun, which is most brilliant, fails — in Greek ekleipei, that is, suffers eclipse and failure — both when the moon or clouds interpose themselves between it and the earth, and when the sun migrates to the Antipodes, and so the lower part of the earth interposes itself between it and us; again the sun failed at the Passion of Christ, and will fail at the end of the world: what wonder then if man fails, and suffers the darkness of sin, and thence of death? man, I say, who consists of flesh and blood: for what is more wicked than what flesh and blood has devised? The meaning is: What is more wicked than the sinner, who follows the inventions and suggestions of his concupiscence and vicious nature? For man the sinner is the worst of all animals, as Aristotle says, in book 1 of the Politics. As if to say: Therefore man is far from perfection and stability. For if the sun fails, what wonder that man fails, and that wickedly into carnal sins, to which he is most inclined, since he appears sewn together and compacted from the very wickedness of flesh and blood.

Hence the Tigurina version renders it: what is more splendid than the light of the sun? yet even this fails: not only does flesh and blood thinking evil fall into sin; the Syriac says: when the sun passes from the day, even it has darkness: so also man has subjugated his concupiscence, whatever flesh and blood is.

But why does the sun fail? I answer, because it is a creature, whose nature it is to be able to fail. St. Chrysostom adds, in homily 6 on Genesis, that from its failure it may be clear that the sun is not God, as the Persians and other nations thought, deceived by such great splendor of the sun: "Let not the spectacle deceive you," says Chrysostom, "lest the honor of the Creator be given to the creature," lest so great a light be thought to be the Deity. For where there is a defect, there cannot be Divinity and Deity.

Jansenius objects: The devil is more wicked than flesh and blood; therefore it is not rightly or truly said: "What is more wicked than what flesh and blood has devised?" for more wicked is what the devil has devised. I answer, "What is more wicked?" — understand, on earth among men, who dwell under the sun in this elemental world; but the devil was an inhabitant of heaven, and is now of hell. Add that by flesh and blood here is understood concupiscence, which is as much in the devil as in man: and nothing is more wicked than concupiscence.

For which note: Flesh and blood in Scripture sometimes signifies a man endowed with flesh, sometimes one given over to the lusts of the flesh, sometimes the corruption of the flesh, sometimes concupiscence, whether it resides in the flesh or in the mind, such as the concupiscence of anger, vengeance, malice, pride, blasphemy, etc. Hence the Apostle reckons these among the works of the flesh, Galatians 5:19. The chief reason is that the flesh in man is the workshop, indeed the pottery of the soul; and just as the soul rubs off and communicates its passions to the flesh, so in turn the flesh rubs off and communicates its affections to the soul. Hence in anger, which is in the mind, the blood and bile boil in the flesh; the same is true of the other passions. He alludes to Genesis 6:5: "Every thought of the heart was intent on evil." Since therefore man always carries with him this bilge of flesh and concupiscence, and, as it were, a sewer of stinking sins, what wonder if he sometimes sins?

Sirach says this, both to humble man, and to keep him in holy fear, and to admonish him to constantly fight against flesh and blood, and to immediately crush its impulses; and also to raise him to the hope of divine mercy: for this mercy, conscious of this human weakness and misery, is inclined to have pity on him and to help him; indeed for this reason the Word was made flesh, that through experience He might learn to have compassion on our infirmities, Hebrews 4:15; and chapter 2:14: "Because the children shared in flesh and blood, He Himself likewise partook of the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death." So expressly does Sirach explain himself in the following chapter, verses 7, 8, 9, 10.

He alludes to Job chapter 25:5: "Behold, even the moon does not shine, and the stars are not clean in His sight. How much more is man, who is rottenness, and the son of man, who is a worm," not clean from sin in the sight of God? And chapter 15, verse 15: "Behold, among His saints no one is unchangeable, and the heavens are not clean in His sight. How much more abominable and useless is man, who drinks iniquity like water?"

Finally, from the fact that it is said here, the sun will fail, as also in Isaiah chapter 34:4, and chapter 65:17, and Revelation 21:1, St. Chrysostom, Theodoret, Oecumenius, and others think that at the end of the world the sun, moon, stars, heavens, and all elements will be substantially annihilated or destroyed, and another sun, heavens, and earth are to be created: on which matter I have said more at Isaiah 34, and 2 Peter 3:10.

AND THIS WILL BE REPROVED. — So the Roman edition: in the judgment, namely, he will be condemned and punished by God, lest man think that on account of following his natural concupiscence, he will escape His judgment and vengeance through the propitious mercy of God. Because, as was said to Cain, Genesis 4:7: "Its desire will be under you:" therefore if you do not restrain it when it sprouts evil, you will be punished.

Verse 31: He beholds the power of the height of heaven

31. HE BEHOLDS THE POWER OF THE HEIGHT OF HEAVEN: AND ALL MEN ARE EARTH AND ASHES. — The Tigurina version: he surveys the mass of the lofty heaven, but all men are earth and dust. "He," namely the sun, which preceded. Power, in Greek dynamin, which signifies force and might, and thence a powerful army; hence when God in Hebrew is called Adonai sabaoth, that is, Lord of hosts, the Septuagint translates Kyrios dynameōn, that is, Lord of powers. The meaning therefore is, as if to say: "The power," that is, the army of the most high heaven, namely the planets and stars, of which the sun is, as it were, the leader — the sun itself, as an emperor, beholds and surveys them: but man is a little worm of the earth, compacted from the dust of the earth, and again to return to the dust of the earth. And yet the sun, so illustrious, fails and suffers eclipses: it is no wonder therefore that men, so wretched and fragile, fail, fall, and sin. Earth signifies the origin of man, because Adam was formed from the earth; ashes, his end and destruction, because in dying he turns to ashes. Jansenius gives the reason: For since the soul in man is like a fire continuously moving and moved, the body deprived of the soul is like a coal that dissolves into ashes.

Second, Lyranus, Dionysius, and Palacius refer the word "He" to God, about whom verse 28 speaks, as if to say: God is so great that the entire power from heaven to earth is intimately beheld by Him: meanwhile He sees that the strength and vigor of man is earth and ashes. Will He not therefore have pity on him? God sees the forces of the angels, of the heavens, of the elements, and of all other things. He sees therefore the forces of man — that from the body they are earth; from the soul, ashes: He therefore has pity on so weak a thing. So also Rabanus: "By the name of heaven he designates the heavenly creature; by that of man, the earthly: and he wants to show this, that the heavenly and earthly creature is equally His handiwork. But mystically, God beholds the power of the height of heaven, when He counts by testing the perfection of the saints. But He nonetheless knows the fragility of man, when in reproving He looks down upon the life of sinners; whose works are compared to dust and ashes, because by the examination of the coming judgment they will be entirely scattered and reduced to nothing."

Third, the Syriac translates: God judges the powers of the heavens, also the sons of men who are dust and ashes, as if to say: God judged and condemned the angels when they became demons: how much more will He judge men who are vile and wretched? For the Greek episkeptetai means the same as "inspects," "visits," "judges." With a similar argument the Apostle concludes, saying, 1 Corinthians 6:3: "Do you not know that we shall judge angels? how much more secular matters?"

Moreover, all these things depend on verse 28, where he commended the mercy of God, as if to say: All creatures, and therefore the sun itself, suffer a failure of light, and therefore, in order to restore and preserve it, the sun needs the mercy, help, and influence of God: much more therefore does sinful man suffer the same, who came forth from the marsh of the earth like a little frog, and through death will return to dark and black ashes; and therefore he much more needs the mercy of God, both so that from the darkness of sin he may return to the light of grace, and so that from the darkness of death he may revive to the light of life and eternal glory: for sin is the supreme defect, the supreme eclipse of the human soul, which no one can remove and illuminate except the eternal sun of justice, Christ the Lord. Again these things depend on verse 26: "From the dead, as if nothing, confession perishes. You will confess while living," as if to say: Just as the sun while it shines and flourishes, by its light confesses, that is, praises and glorifies, God its Author; but when it fails, sets, and, as it were, dies, its confession, praise, and glorification of God fails and is darkened along with its light: so similarly man living, both in body and in soul through the grace and spirit of God, praises God the Author of both lives, namely natural and spiritual. But when he dies, either naturally through death, or morally through sin, with life ceases that part of him — the body's praise and glorification of God. For man is most prone to sin, because he himself is nothing other than flesh and blood.