Cornelius a Lapide
Table of Contents
Synopsis of the Chapter
First, there is a canticle of the Blessed, in which they give thanks to God for their happy lot. Second, at verse 10, the Prophet prays to God that He may justly punish the wicked who afflict the pious. Third, at verse 19, he predicts the resurrection of the dead, from which we may expect salvation and consolation.
Vulgate Text: Isaiah 26:1-21
1. In that day this canticle shall be sung in the land of Judah: The city of our strength is Sion; the Savior shall be set therein as a wall and bulwark. 2. Open the gates, and let the just nation enter, that keeps the truth. 3. The old error has departed: You will keep peace; peace, because we have hoped in You. 4. You have hoped in the Lord for ages eternal, in the Lord God, mighty forever. 5. For He shall bring down those who dwell on high; the high city He shall lay low. He shall bring it down even to the ground; He shall pull it down even to the dust. 6. The foot shall tread it down, the feet of the poor, the steps of the needy. 7. The way of the just is straight; the path of the just is straight to walk in. 8. And in the way of Your judgments, O Lord, we have endured You; Your name and Your memorial are the desire of the soul. 9. My soul has desired You in the night; yes, with my spirit within me in the morning I will watch to You. When You shall execute Your judgments on the earth, the inhabitants of the world shall learn justice. 10. Let us have pity on the wicked, and he will not learn justice; in the land of the saints he has done wicked things, and he shall not see the glory of the Lord. 11. Lord, let Your hand be exalted, and let them not see; let the envious people see and be confounded, and let fire devour Your enemies. 12. Lord, You will give us peace: for You have wrought all our works for us. 13. O Lord our God, other lords besides You have had dominion over us; only in You let us remember Your name. 14. Let not the dead live, let not the giants rise again: therefore You have visited and crushed them, and have destroyed all their memory. 15. You have been gracious to the nation, O Lord, You have been gracious to the nation: are You glorified? You have removed far all the ends of the earth. 16. Lord, in the tribulation of murmuring, Your teaching was for them. 17. As a woman with child, when she draws near the time of her delivery, is in pain and cries out in her pangs: so have we become before Your face, O Lord. 18. We have conceived and been as it were in labor and have brought forth wind; we have not wrought salvation on the earth, therefore the inhabitants of the earth have not fallen. 19. Your dead shall live, my slain shall rise again. Awake and give praise, you that dwell in the dust: for your dew is a dew of light, and the land of the giants You shall pull down into ruin. 20. Go, my people, enter into your chambers, shut your doors upon you, hide yourself a little for a moment, until the indignation passes. 21. For behold, the Lord shall come out of His place, to visit the iniquity of the inhabitants of the earth against him: and the earth shall disclose her blood, and shall cover her slain no more.
Verse 1: The City of Our Strength Is Sion
1. THIS CANTICLE SHALL BE SUNG (by the Blessed) IN THE LAND OF JUDAH — that is, in Sion, that is, in the heavenly Church, of which he has been treating from chapter 24 onward. Judah means confession, that is praise: therefore the heavenly Church is the land of confession, of perpetual praise of God.
Second, St. Cyril applies these words also to the Church Militant, which is the way and the beginning of the heavenly and triumphant Church.
THE CITY OF OUR STRENGTH IS SION; THE SAVIOR SHALL BE SET THEREIN AS A WALL AND BULWARK. — The Septuagint has perigitages, that is, a surrounding wall; as if to say: Jesus, that is, the Savior, shall be a wall surrounding, protecting and defending the Saints like a most powerful fortress.
Thus Alcidamas said that Philosophy is the rampart and fence of the laws, as if in it lies the summit and strength of the laws; which Aristotle, citing it, judges most wisely said.
Second, the word Savior can be referred to what follows, with the Hebrews, and this is more fitting and harmonious, as if to say: The city of our blessed Sion is all strength and salvation; and its wall and bulwark, that is, the Lord Jesus the Savior, is our protection.
Thus literally the Savior was a wall and bulwark to Clovis, king of the Franks, while still a pagan. For when he was losing in war against the Alemanni, he invoked the God of his wife Clotilde, namely the Lord Jesus, and immediately gained the victory and afterward was baptized.
Morally, Jesus, that is, the Savior, is our strength, wall, and bulwark: for first, He heals us from every infirmity and vice; and so He incites and inflames our zeal toward all virtue and perfection.
Second, He directs our right intention toward God and toward salvation.
Third, it is an incitement to humility and hope: because while we both hope for and seek salvation from Jesus, we both confess and accuse our miseries, and fix our hope entirely upon Him.
Fourth, it is a stimulus to devotion, so that, just as He Himself handed over His entire self to me for my benefit and salvation, so I too may be entirely His and may devote myself wholly to Him and His service.
Fifth, it teaches gratitude, which we owe Him for so great a benefit of salvation, especially if we consider at what price our salvation cost Him: since He purchased it with His precious blood and His most cruel death on the cross.
Sixth, it calls us to obedience; because Paul affirms in Philippians 2 that He merited this so great name for Himself through obedience, since indeed "He became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross."
Seventh, He invites us to take refuge in every necessity in the invocation of this most holy name, as at a sacred anchor. Hear St. Bernard, Sermon 15 on the Canticle: "Is there anyone among you, to whom if this name of Jesus comes to mind, it does not fill his heart with devotion?"
Eighth and finally, this most sacred name of Jesus teaches all Christian perfection entirely. St. Paul, in 1 Corinthians 1, urges unity and perfection by the name of Christ: "I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all say the same thing, and that there be no schisms among you."
Finally St. Jerome: "The Savior," he says, "is a wall of good works, and a bulwark of faith. For it is not enough to have the wall of faith, unless faith is fortified by good works."
Verse 2: Open the Gates
2. OPEN THE GATES, AND LET THE JUST NATION ENTER. — St. Jerome notes that here the speakers change: for it is like a dialogue. He himself thinks this is the voice of Christ saying to the Angels: Open the gates of heaven to the just.
Second, Sanchez probably judges these to be the words of the Blessed, who, hearing from the Judge: "Come, blessed of my Father, possess the kingdom prepared for you," say to one another: Open the gates, enter, possess the kingdom!
Third, Cyril thinks these are the words of God to the Apostles, as if to say: You, O Apostles, and their imitators! Open to the Gentiles the entrance into the Church by preaching, baptism, and the other sacraments.
Verse 3: The Old Error Has Departed
3. THE OLD ERROR HAS DEPARTED. — In Hebrew it is ietser samuch: which first, Symmachus and Aquila translate as our thought has been established, or our purpose has been supported.
Second, Pagninus translates, the desire has been joined, as if to say: Now we enjoy our wishes; whatever we desired, we possess. For we are joined to God, whom we desired.
Third and best, our Translator renders ietser as figment, error, as if to say: Now the old error of the pleasure-seekers and the damned is clear, by which they thought that there was no future life, no judgment, no punishment; now all this is manifest, and the truth is plain.
Verse 4: You Have Hoped in the Lord
4. YOU HAVE HOPED IN THE LORD FOR AGES ETERNAL. — For sperastis (you have hoped) the Hebrew has "hope" (imperative), so that it is the voice and mutual exhortation of the Blessed, as if to say: Hope in the Lord, for He is the rock of ages, constant and immovable, who never fails those who trust in Him.
Others think these are the words of Isaiah to men devoted to the vain riches and pomp of the world, as if to say: Do not, O worldly ones, O men of the earth, trust in these fleeting and fragile goods: trust in the Lord, the rock of ages!
IN THE LORD GOD, MIGHTY FOREVER. — In Hebrew, because in the Lord God there is tsur olamim, that is, the rock of the ages, that is, constancy and firmness that lasts forever. He is the rock on which whoever builds his house, neither winds nor floods shall overthrow it.
Verse 5: He Shall Bring Down Those Who Dwell on High
5. FOR HE SHALL BRING DOWN THOSE WHO DWELL ON HIGH. — He shows that God is mighty forever, and that therefore one must hope in Him, from the fact that He casts down the proud from their heights and exalts the humble.
Verse 6: The Foot Shall Tread It Down
6. THE FOOT SHALL TREAD IT DOWN, THE FEET (I say) OF THE POOR. — He calls the poor and needy the Apostles and other faithful, who followed the poverty and humility of Christ: these with their feet, that is, by their preaching and the example of their lives, trod down and destroyed the lofty city of pagan pride and worldly glory.
Second, the same St. Jerome, Origen, St. Chrysostom, Eusebius, and from them Leo Castro, take these things as referring to the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus and the Romans.
Third, some with St. Cyril refer these things to the Church Militant and Roman. Whence Galatinus, Book IV, chapter 26: The lofty city, he says, that is brought down, is Rome, which was brought low by the Goths, Vandals, and other barbarians.
Verse 7: The Way of the Just Is Straight
7. THE WAY OF THE JUST IS STRAIGHT. — He shows here that the way which led the just to heaven and to such great glory, when the wicked had been destroyed, was a straight way, that is, a way of justice and uprightness.
Second, "the way of the just is straight," that is, level, smooth, direct, without any fall or stumble at all, nor even a trip. For this is what the Hebrew mishor signifies: a level, smooth, even path. As if to say: Although the way of virtue seems narrow and rough, yet in reality it is straight and smooth, because God smooths and levels it with His grace.
Verse 8: Your Name and Your Memorial
8. YOUR NAME AND YOUR MEMORIAL ARE THE DESIRE OF THE SOUL, as if to say: We have desired and continually desire that Your name and Your memory, O Lord, be always in our heart, on our lips, in our works; for nothing is sweeter, nothing more delightful, than to think of You, to speak of You, to work for You.
So did the soul of St. Julian desire, so did it melt at the name of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, that wherever he found it written in books, he would kiss it with the greatest reverence and devotion.
And St. Bernard: "Jesus," he says, "is honey in the mouth, melody in the ear, jubilation in the heart." For when you think of and name Jesus, you think of and name the Savior: what is sweeter, what more consoling, than to think and say that I have a Savior?
Verse 9: My Soul Has Desired You in the Night
9. MY SOUL HAS DESIRED YOU IN THE NIGHT. — Here the canticle of the Blessed seems to end; now, admonished and stirred by it, Isaiah, seeing what outcomes the just and the unjust will have, prays to God for the conversion or punishment of the wicked.
Otherwise Sanchez: At night, he says, that is, from tribulation and the cross, through which You lead us to glory, I will sigh for You.
Otherwise also Theodoret: At night, he says, that is, before the incarnation of Christ; and in the morning, that is, in the incarnation and after it, I will seek You.
WHEN YOU SHALL EXECUTE YOUR JUDGMENTS ON THE EARTH, THE INHABITANTS OF THE WORLD SHALL LEARN JUSTICE — as if to say: Out of the zeal with which I desire You and Your glory, I desire also Your judgments upon the wicked: for when You punish the wicked, others learn to fear You and to practice justice.
Second, St. Jerome refers these things to the day of judgment, as if to say: When You shall have rendered to each one on the day of judgment what he deserves, then all the inhabitants of the world shall learn justice by experience.
Verse 10: Let Us Have Pity on the Wicked
10. LET US HAVE PITY ON THE WICKED, AND HE WILL NOT LEARN JUSTICE — as if to say: I justly desire Your judgment in the punishment of the wicked. For if You have pity on them and bear with them, they will not amend, but will abuse Your mercy to sin more boldly.
Hear St. Bernard, Sermon 42 on the Canticle: "God is most angry when He is not angry: Let us have pity, he says, on the wicked, and he will not learn justice."
IN THE LAND OF THE SAINTS HE HAS DONE WICKED THINGS, AND HE SHALL NOT SEE THE GLORY OF THE LORD. — First, Forerius: "The land," he says, "of the saints" is the Church, in which the wicked sin, polluting by their crimes the holy places and the society of the saints.
Second, Adamus: The whole earth, he says, is called the land of the saints; because in it there are many saints, and all should be saints: for to this end God created the earth and placed man upon it.
Third, Sanchez: To be, he says, in the land of the saints, is to suffer hard things, to be exercised by hardships, and to be soothed by no delights of the flesh.
Fourth, Vatablus says that for "land of the saints," in Hebrew it is the land nechochot, that is, of straightnesses, that is, straight and smooth ways: as if to say: Even when the way of justice and virtue lies open and straight before the wicked, yet they refuse to walk in it.
Fifth and most fittingly, there is here an amplification: for he increases and exaggerates the sin of the wicked man, that he perpetrated it in the land of the saints, that is, in the very presence and sight of the saints, and thereby defiled and profaned their sanctity.
Tropologically, let those apply these words to themselves who live dissolutely or irreligiously in a holy community or Religious order. For the heavier condemnation awaits those who sin in the land of the saints.
The same, Sermon 23 on the Canticle: "Let them fear," he says, "the clergy, let the ministers of the Church fear, who in the lands of the saints which they administer live wickedly and perversely."
Verse 11: Let Your Hand Be Exalted
11. LORD, LET YOUR HAND BE EXALTED, AND LET THEM NOT SEE; AND LET THEM BE CONFOUNDED. — St. Jerome thinks there is here a dialogue between God and Isaiah, or between Isaiah and the people.
Second, Sanchez considers it to be bitter irony, as when we say: "Feed the wolf cubs, and the dogs that will tear you apart," as if to say: Lift up, O Lord, Your hand to strike, and let the wicked not see it, that they may be struck suddenly and unexpectedly.
Third, others say: Strike the wicked with Your hand, and punish them with blindness, so that they may not see Your justice in this life, that they might at least believe and repent.
Fourth and genuinely, Forerius: The Prophet had said: "In the land of the saints he has done wicked things, and he shall not see the glory of the Lord." Now he adds: Lord, show Your hand, that is Your power, and let the wicked see and be confounded, that is, let them see Your power and be put to shame.
AND LET FIRE DEVOUR YOUR ENEMIES. — First, St. Jerome: "Fire," he says, of late repentance shall torment their hearts, because they have lost so great glory.
Second, "fire," namely of tribulation, shall devour your enemies, even to consumption and ashes, so that it may instruct them, consume them, and convert them to You.
Third and most plainly, Theodoret takes the fire as the fire of Gehenna.
Verse 12: Lord, You Will Give Us Peace
12. LORD, YOU WILL GIVE US PEACE: FOR YOU HAVE WROUGHT ALL OUR WORKS FOR US. — From the wickedness and punishment of the ungodly, he here turns to the happiness of the just.
First, Sanchez explains these words, as if to say: Afflict, O Lord, the wicked who vex and trouble us, so that they may change their life and become peaceful, and thus You may give us peace.
Second, St. Jerome, as if to say: Give us peace in heaven: for whatever You promised through the Prophets, You have fulfilled and wrought in this life through Christ.
Third, the Septuagint translates: give us peace, for you have rendered all things to us, as if they say, as St. Jerome explains: Give us peace, because all things that we have, we have received from You.
Fourth and genuinely, this is the voice of the Church and of the Saints, whose works are twofold: namely first, passive, which we suffer by God's working in us through grace; and second, active, which we do cooperating with God's grace. As if to say: Lord, You will give us peace, because all our good works are Yours rather than ours, since You inspired them, You sustained them, You brought them to completion.
Verse 13: Other Lords Besides You
13. OTHER LORDS BESIDES YOU HAVE HAD DOMINION OVER US; ONLY IN YOU LET US REMEMBER YOUR NAME. — These lords are, first, idols; second, kings and tyrants; third, the devil; fourth, our passions and vices.
Second, Sanchez, as if to say: While we are harassed by the wicked, You alone, O Lord, do not possess us: for "besides You," that is, in addition to You and contrary to Your will, other lords have dominion over us.
Mystically, as if to say: Foreign lords, namely the world, the flesh, the devil, and sin, "besides You," that is, against You (for they are Your enemies), have had dominion over us: but now, O Lord, in You alone, that is, in Your grace and strength, let us remember and invoke Your name, rejecting all other lords.
Verse 14: Let Not the Dead Live
14. LET NOT THE DEAD LIVE, LET NOT THE GIANTS RISE AGAIN. — He explains which lords had possessed them, namely "giants," that is, powerful tyrants, enemies of the people of God.
Second, others explain generally: "The dying," namely the wicked in their sins, "let them not live," but let them die with eternal death and torment; "and let not the giants," that is, the powerful and violent tyrants, "rise again" to power.
Third, Symmachus translates: the dead shall not give life, the giants shall not raise up, as if to say: I have prayed that foreign lords may not possess us; indeed, says he, they shall not, because the dead, that is, their idols, which are dead and lifeless, shall not give life, and the giants shall not rise from the dead to oppress us again.
THEREFORE (namely so that the dying might not live and the giants might not rise again) YOU HAVE VISITED AND CRUSHED THEM, AND HAVE DESTROYED ALL THEIR MEMORY — meaning: Therefore You have visited these tyrants and idols with Your vengeance, You have crushed them, and You have obliterated their very memory from the earth.
Verse 15: You Have Been Gracious to the Nation
15. YOU HAVE BEEN GRACIOUS TO THE NATION. — He proves from the outcome what he said at verse 10 and following, namely that affliction is useful to the just, for by it God purifies and multiplies them.
YOU HAVE REMOVED FAR ALL THE ENDS OF THE EARTH — as if to say, according to St. Jerome: From this indulgence of Yours, ungrateful peoples have withdrawn far from You, to the ends of the earth.
Second, and better, as if to say: You permitted the Jews to live in peace and to roam without fear throughout all the borders of their land, namely the Promised Land.
Third, Vatablus and Leo Castro: "You have removed far the borders," that is, You have extended their boundaries and estates: did they therefore glorify You? No, they abused Your benefits.
Verse 16: In the Tribulation of Murmuring
16. IN THE TRIBULATION OF MURMURING YOUR TEACHING WAS FOR THEM. — as if to say: The wicked, while they are afflicted, accept and practice Your teaching, but they murmur and grumble at the tribulation, and as soon as it ceases, they return to their former ways.
Others take it as contrition and indignation, by which the sinner, taught by tribulation, reproaches himself. Whence the Chaldean translates murmur as prayer.
Verse 17: So Have We Become Before Your Face
17. SO HAVE WE BECOME BEFORE YOUR FACE. — It is the voice of the people worn down and penitent from scourges, as if to say: Just as a woman from the pains of childbirth cries out and is in anguish, so we from the anguish of our tribulations have cried out to You, O Lord.
Moreover, by these words Isaiah describes what the fear of God produces in the womb of our soul, namely the conception and birth of grace, which he calls the spirit of salvation.
Verse 18: We Have Not Wrought Salvation
18. WE HAVE NOT WROUGHT SALVATION ON THE EARTH, THEREFORE THE INHABITANTS OF THE EARTH HAVE NOT FALLEN. — It is the voice of Isaiah, the Prophets, and the Apostles, as if to say: We have labored and preached, but we have brought forth only wind, that is, we have accomplished little or nothing; the enemies of God have not fallen, the wicked have not been converted.
Second, fittingly St. Jerome, St. Thomas, Hugo, and Sanchez, as if the Jews say: Therefore the inhabitants of the land, namely our land and neighboring nations, have not fallen, that is, have not been converted and have not acknowledged the true God.
Third, Vatablus translates and explains differently, as if to say: Salvation has not been wrought on the earth, that is, tribulation has not ceased, and therefore the inhabitants of the earth have not fallen, that is, have not rested from their labors.
Verse 19: Your Dead Shall Live
19. YOUR DEAD SHALL LIVE (O Lord! there is here a remarkable change of person; for this is the voice of Isaiah to God: "Your dead shall live," as if to say: Those who died for You and in You, O Lord, shall live again), MY SLAIN SHALL RISE AGAIN — meaning: My slain, that is, the faithful and the martyrs who were slain for Your name, shall rise again in glory.
AWAKE AND GIVE PRAISE, YOU THAT DWELL IN THE DUST — meaning: Arise from the dust of death and the grave, O you saints, and praise God who has raised you!
Thus we read in the Life of St. Leocadia, December 9, who was a noble virgin and martyr at Toledo in Spain, under the Emperor Diocletian and the prefect Dacian: after many centuries her tomb was opened, and she was found as if alive, and when St. Ildephonsus placed his hands upon her, she seemed to move. So the dead shall awake and give praise.
FOR YOUR DEW IS A DEW OF LIGHT. — Our Jerome Prado, on Ezekiel chapter 26:20, thinks this is the praise and canticle of those who rise again, as if to say: Your dew, O Lord, is a dew of light, that is, a lifegiving and illuminating dew, which shall quicken our dead bodies and restore them to life and glory.
Our Translator renders it "dew of light," that is, the dew before dawn and herald of the light: for this is what makes herbs fruitful. Again, "dew of light," that is, dew that produces light, life, and glory in the bodies of the risen dead.
Tropologically, Procopius: Light, he says, or life, is the remission of sins, which Christ, who is the dew of the Father, distills into souls dead from sin, and vivifies them.
Symbolically, the dew and manna of light, that is, of the truth of the Gospel, is the Eucharist; for the manna and dew of the Jews was of the night, but the manna and dew of Christians is of the light and of the day, that is, of Christ.
Furthermore, Arias Montanus refers these words to the plastic art or pottery, in which dry clay is moistened by the potter and sprinkled with water, so that it can be molded anew: so God will sprinkle the dry dust of the dead with the dew of His power, and mold them into new and glorious bodies.
AND THE LAND OF THE GIANTS YOU SHALL PULL DOWN INTO RUIN — that is, this land which is the seat of the proud and the violent and all the wicked, You will destroy and cast into the pit of hell.
Verse 20: Go, My People, Enter Your Chambers
20. GO, MY PEOPLE, ENTER INTO YOUR CHAMBERS. — It is the voice of God to the Saints who die in the Lord, as if to say: Go for a little while, O Saints, into your chambers, that is, your sepulchres, sleep there and rest; because soon, namely on the day of judgment, I will raise you up. For death is not burdensome to the Saints, but is like entering a quiet chamber to rest.
SHUT YOUR DOORS UPON YOU — close your eyes, close your senses; take care that your tomb is sealed shut, so that you may rest there silently without interruption until the resurrection.
Morally, St. Gregory, Book IV, Morals 24: "We enter our chambers," he says, "when we enter the secrets of our mind. And we close the doors when we restrain unquiet thoughts from entering the sanctuary of the heart, and shut ourselves in with God alone in prayer and contemplation."
UNTIL THE INDIGNATION PASSES — both that by which God willed and determined to punish sin and our individual sins by the common death and corruption of the body, and that by which He punishes the wicked in the tribulations and calamities of this world. When all this passes at the general resurrection, the Saints shall come forth from their chambers in glory.
Verse 21: The Lord Shall Come Out
21. FOR BEHOLD, THE LORD SHALL COME OUT — from heaven, He shall descend with all the Angels to judge the world, and then the earth shall give back the blood of the Saints and the just which it had drunk and hidden, and shall no longer cover its slain, but shall disclose them for vindication.
God says the same thing to so many hundreds of thousands of Martyrs, who were variously killed at Rome by the pagan Emperors and buried there. Indeed, Rome is a city of Martyrs: for everywhere, both within and outside the walls, there are subterranean crypts and cemeteries of Martyrs. The Teacher of the Gentiles was beheaded by the Neronian sword, and three most limpid fountains, which sprang forth from the triple and mighty leap of his head — that most eloquent head, say I, whose tongue was the pen of the Holy Spirit — testify today to the glory of the Apostle and to the cruelty of Nero.
Rightly therefore You say to them: "Go, my people, enter into your chambers, shut your doors upon you, hide yourself a little for a moment," until the dew of light descends upon those who dwell in the dust, until the indignation passes, until the Lord comes forth from His place to visit the wickedness of the inhabitants of the earth.
Thus our Jerome Prado in fact concluded his Commentary on Ezekiel chapter 26 together with his life with this saying of Isaiah: "Go then, my people, enter into your chambers, shut your doors upon you, hide yourself a little for a moment, until the indignation passes."