Cornelius a Lapide

Amos IX

Table of Contents

Synopsis of the Chapter

Amos sees God standing upon the altar, and commanding an angel to strike the capital and overturn it, on account of the avarice and wickedness of the people, whom He declares He will seek out and destroy, even if they should hide themselves in heaven, the abyss, or hell. Second, in verse 7, He compares the Israelites to the Ethiopians, Syrians, and Philistines, both in guilt and in the punishment of destruction and dispersion. Third, in verse 11, He promises to restore them through Christ, and to give abundance of grain and wine, so that the mountains shall drip with sweetness.

Vulgate Text: Amos 9:1-15

1. I saw the Lord standing upon the altar, and He said: Strike the capital, and let the lintels be shaken; for avarice is in the head of them all, and the last of them I will slay with the sword: there shall be no flight for them. They shall flee, and he that flees among them shall not be saved. 2. If they go down even to hell, thence shall My hand bring them out: and if they climb up to heaven, thence will I bring them down. 3. And if they hide themselves in the top of Carmel, I will search and take them away thence: and if they hide themselves from My eyes in the depth of the sea, there will I command the serpent, and it shall bite them. 4. And if they go into captivity before their enemies, there will I command the sword, and it shall kill them: and I will set My eyes upon them for evil, and not for good. 5. And the Lord God of hosts, who touches the earth, and it shall melt: and all that dwell therein shall mourn; and it shall rise up wholly like a river, and shall flow down like the river of Egypt. 6. He that builds His ascension in heaven, and has founded His bundle upon the earth: who calls the waters of the sea, and pours them out upon the face of the earth, the Lord is His name. 7. Are you not as the children of the Ethiopians to Me, O children of Israel, says the Lord? Did I not bring Israel up out of the land of Egypt: and the Philistines out of Cappadocia, and the Syrians out of Cyrene? 8. Behold, the eyes of the Lord God are upon the sinful kingdom, and I will destroy it from the face of the earth: nevertheless in destroying I will not utterly destroy the house of Jacob, says the Lord. 9. For behold, I will command, and I will sift the house of Israel among all nations, as grain is sifted in a sieve: and not a pebble shall fall upon the ground. 10. All the sinners of My people shall die by the sword, who say: The evil shall not approach, nor come upon us. 11. In that day I will raise up the tabernacle of David, that is fallen: and I will rebuild the breaches of its walls, and repair what was fallen down: and I will rebuild it as in the days of old. 12. That they may possess the remnant of Edom, and all the nations, because My name is invoked upon them, says the Lord who does these things. 13. Behold, the days come, says the Lord: and the ploughman shall overtake the reaper, and the treader of grapes him that sows seed: and the mountains shall drop sweetness, and every hill shall be tilled. 14. And I will bring back the captivity of My people Israel: and they shall build the desolate cities, and inhabit them: and they shall plant vineyards, and drink the wine of them: and shall make gardens, and eat the fruits of them. 15. And I will plant them upon their own land: and I will no more pluck them out of their land which I have given them, says the Lord your God.

(1) This is the third and final vision with which the book of the prophet Amos concludes. First, under the symbol of the striking of the pillars of the temple, it reports the decree concerning the ruin and destruction of the Israelites, in no way to be avoided, 1: first, on account of God's inescapable pursuit everywhere, which he proves by an enumeration of places to which one might flee, 2-4; second, on account of His supreme power over all things, 5, 6. Second, since the Israelites were exceedingly pleased with themselves, and endowed with great confidence and security, boasted that they were a people dear to God, first, lest they think themselves to be of any value before God; He declares He esteems them no more than the Ethiopians, Philistines, Syrians, to whom no eternal possession of the land was granted, 7; yet He adds the promise that if He has decreed to destroy sinners and the obstinate through the demand of justice, He will nevertheless save the just and penitent, 8. Third, He promises the future propagation of the Church through Christ: first, the raising up and restoration; second, the diffusion throughout all the earth, 12; third, the fruitfulness and abundance of spiritual gifts in this life and the next, 13-15.

Verse 1: 1. I SAW THE LORD STANDING UPON THE ALTAR.

1. I SAW THE LORD STANDING UPON THE ALTAR. — St. Jerome, Theodoret, Remigius, Hugo, Lyra, Arias, Vatablus, and Ribera hold that Amos here prophesies the destruction of the two tribes and of the temple of Jerusalem by the Chaldeans. They prove this because its restoration, which was accomplished through Ezra and Nehemiah, is promised in verse 11. The Chaldean supports this, who translates not word for word, but paraphrastically thus: I saw the glory of the Lord ascending from the Cherub, who remained upon the altar; unless the people of the house of Israel return to the law, the candlestick will be extinguished, King Josiah will be slain, and the house of God, that is, the temple, will be destroyed, and its courts will be scattered, and the vessels of the house of the sanctuary will go into captivity.

More probably, Ruffinus, Clarius, and a Castro hold that the Prophet here continues to prophesy against the ten tribes, and consequently here foretells the destruction of the altar and idolatrous temple which they had erected for themselves in Bethel. This is proved: first, because Amos was properly sent to the ten tribes in Bethel, as is clear from chapter 7:13; second, because in chapter 8 he acted against the ten tribes: therefore also in this chapter 9: for there is nothing to indicate that he is turning his discourse from the ten tribes to the two, but rather that he is continuing his discourse to the ten tribes, as is clear from verse 5, which is the same as verse 8 of chapter 8; third, because in verses 8 and 9, he says he is speaking of the house of Jacob and Israel: but thus after the schism of Jeroboam the ten tribes are called, not the two, especially since he adds: "I will shake the house of Israel among all nations." But this is true of the ten tribes, not of the two. For the ten, having been led into Assyria, Media, and Persia, were from there scattered among all nations, as Josephus attests: but the two, having been led into Babylon, remained there, and thence after seventy years under Cyrus were brought back to Judea. To the argument of the former opinion, I respond at verse 11.

You may ask, how did Amos see these things — with the eyes of the body, or of the mind? Albert, Arias, and Eusebius (Demonstration of the Gospel, book 1, chapter 18) hold that the vision was corporeal, and therefore hold that an angel in an assumed body actually shook the door-posts of the temple, and that the Prophet saw this with his bodily eyes.

It is more true that this vision was imaginary, not corporeal: both because such were commonly the visions of the Prophets; and because if this vision pertains to the temple of Jerusalem, as many hold, Amos could not have seen it with his bodily eyes, since he was far from it and was dwelling in Bethel; and because it is not probable that God here assumed a human body and was seen in it by Amos, especially since He did not do so for Isaiah in chapter 6:1, where He was seen by Isaiah with the eyes of the mind, not of the body, sitting on a lofty throne; nor for Ezekiel 1:26, where He was seen by Ezekiel likewise with the eyes of the mind sitting upon the Cherubic chariot. Certainly, if God had wished to be seen with bodily eyes, He would rather have granted this to Isaiah and Ezekiel, whose visions were most august, than to Amos the rustic prophet.

Upon the altar — either the altar of incense, which was in the Holy of Holies, where the seat and throne of God were, as Arias holds; or the altar of burnt offerings, which was in the court before the Holy Place, as Lyra and Vatablus hold. For the Samaritans, rivals of the Jews, erected a temple similar to the one in Jerusalem, and consequently a similar court, Holy Place, and Holy of Holies, and similar altars of incense and burnt offerings in Samaria, Dan, and Bethel. Moreover, that it is the altar of Bethel rather than of Dan or Samaria that is meant here, is clear from the fact that Amos was prophesying in Bethel, as a place most sacred to the Samaritans, both because Jacob the patriarch had sacrificed in the same place and had seen God leaning upon a ladder, and therefore had called the place Bethel, that is, the house of God; and because Jeroboam, the first king of Israel, the author of the schism and the new religion, had not only dedicated an altar to the golden calves in Bethel, but had himself with his own hand performed the office of priest at the same altar and offered incense to them, as is clear from 1 Kings 12:33; and because the rivals and followers of Jacob and Jeroboam, their descendants, the kings of Israel, sacrificing in Bethel, had established it as the common sanctuary of their kingdom, whence it was called by them "the sanctuary of the king, and the house of the kingdom," as I said at chapter 7:13. In Bethel, then, as in the public idol-shrine of Israel, God was seen by the Prophet standing as avenger upon the temple and altar, and commanding it to be demolished, together with the idolatry and the idolatrous kingdom of Israel. Hence He was fittingly seen here as standing, as though pressing upon the work, namely, the overthrow of the altar and temple.

AND HE SAID (the Lord, either to the prophet Amos, as St. Jerome and Remigius think, or rather to the angel assisting Him, as the minister of His will and work, as the same St. Jerome, Remigius, Ruffinus, Theodoret, and others hold. For through an angel God is accustomed to avenge and punish His enemies. To the angel, therefore, He said): STRIKE THE CAPITAL — namely, of the temple, so that by this symbolic and imaginary striking presented to the mind of Amos, you may represent and signify that the Assyrians will tear out and overthrow the temple from its capital and from its lowest foundations, together with its impious worship and its Israelite worshippers. So St. Jerome, Emmanuel, Mariana, and others already cited. Hence the Septuagint translates: Strike the mercy seat; the Antiochene Arabic: Strike the pavement; the Alexandrian Arabic: Strike the Rational of the high priest. In Hebrew it is: Strike הכפתור haccaphtor, which the Zurich version translates as threshold; Pagninus and Vatablus as lintel, namely of the gate of the temple. Properly caphtor signifies an apple (as the Syriac translates) and a small sphere: and because these were commonly carved on thresholds, hence it signifies a threshold. Our translator here renders it "capital" (cardinem), not threshold or lintel, because it is distinguished from them. For it follows: "And let the lintels be shaken," for these cannot be shaken unless the capital and threshold on which they rest above are shaken. The capital is therefore called caphtor, because it has the shape of a small sphere, and because it is covered by its pivot. For the root כפר caphar means to cover, wrap, conceal. God therefore commands the angel to strike both the threshold of the gate of the temple and the capital of the threshold in which the door turned, that is, was opened and closed, to signify that the gate of the temple, and the temple itself, and those entering it, were to be struck down and overthrown by the Assyrians.

For the capital is the base and support of the thing it sustains: hence the capital is called, as it were, the heart of the door, by which it moves, says Servius on that passage of the Aeneid, book 1: "The hinge creaked on its bronze doors." Hence the Romans worshipped the goddess Cardinia, who presided over hinges. So Seneca in the Hippolytus says to Jove: "You turn the heavens on their swift hinge." More truly, St. Anna, mother of Samuel, says in 1 Samuel 2:8: "The Lord's are the hinges of the earth." And the Wise Man, Proverbs 8:26: "He had not yet made the earth, and the rivers, and the hinges of the world." Moreover, in the hinge are noted the creaking and the horror of the temple being torn apart and falling, according to that passage of Statius, Thebaid 1: "The winds roaring crosswise clash and wrench the axle from its displaced hinge." And Virgil, Aeneid 6: "Then at last the sacred gates are thrown open, creaking on their dread-sounding hinge."

So Didymus, in the Catena of the Greeks on Job, chapter 9, and others, hold that in the Passion of Christ the earth was shaken by a universal earthquake and torn from its hinges. In like manner, many hold that the whole world on the day of judgment will be shaken and wrenched from its hinges, and that this is signified by those words of Christ, Matthew 24:29: "And the powers of the heavens shall be shaken." And Job 9:6: "Who shakes the earth from its place, and its pillars tremble." See what was said on Revelation, chapter 6, at the end.

AND LET THE LINTELS BE SHAKEN. — The Syriac has thresholds; in Hebrew ספים sippim, which David and from him Pagninus translate: And the door-posts shall tremble; the Zurich version: And let the door-posts be shaken, namely the lateral ones, which architects call antae. But the meaning comes to the same thing: for when the threshold and capital were shaken and wrenched by the angel, it was necessary that both the posts and the lintels, which rested upon the posts, be shaken and moved, indeed fall. For the ruin of the gate and the temple is signified here. Hence the Arabic translates: The outer gates shall be shaken. For the angel shook the hinges and the gate so violently that the entire wall, and consequently the entire temple resting upon it, appeared to collapse. Arias and Eusebius (Demonstration, book 1, chapter 18) hold that these things were actually carried out, and that this was a real earthquake, and that it is the one which Amos mentions in chapter 1:1, where from it he dates and marks the year of his prophecy. But from what has been said, it is clear that this shaking was different from that earthquake: for that one was real; but this was imaginary.

AVARICE (the Syriac has "deceit") IS IN THE HEAD OF THEM ALL. — He assigns avarice as the cause of the destruction of the temple, the city, and all of Israel. For "avarice" in Hebrew is בצעם betsaam, that is, their avarice. For the root בצע batsa properly means to injure and wound. For the Hebrews call usury and avarice a wound: because like a sword it wounds a man and sucks out his blood. In like manner, they call usury נשך nescech, that is, a bite, because it bites and injures one's neighbor: just as the Latins call interest (faenus) as though it were death (funus). Hence, second, the Septuagint, taking the Hebrew betsaam not as a noun but as a verb in the imperative mood, translate: Cut into the heads of all. Cut, that is, both with the hostile sword and with the fragments of posts and lintels flying apart from the angel's blow; hence others read: scatter, i.e., Scatter the flying fragments of the posts upon their heads, and with them cut them apart. Hence the Zurich version translates: Inflict a wound upon the heads of all; Arias takes it as a noun, but translates in the same way: Their cutting is upon the head of all; Third, Vatablus, taking betsaam as a past tense verb, translates: He has cut them to pieces (namely those who are) at the head of all, that is, who preside over all others. This pertains to the priests and magistrates: for God, or the angel in God's place, will cut these down: for God, or the angel, speaks of Himself in the third person. Hence Pagninus, reading botseam in the Benoni form instead of betsaam, translates in the first person: I will cut them to pieces, all of them at the head. This sense is subordinate to the former in this way, i.e., Because they by their avarice, that is, by their usury and frauds, wounded and cut down the poor, therefore they likewise will be wounded and cut down by their enemies. Hence some translate: Avarice shall fall back upon the heads of all, and will exact from them the punishments they deserve: which translation agrees well with the preceding and following words. Hence the Arabic translates: Strike the head of each one, and the rest of them shall be slain by the sword.

Moreover, avarice is said to be "in the head of all," because it dominates all, possesses all: for all direct their head, senses, and all their cares to enriching themselves by unjust gains, according to Jeremiah 6:13: "From the least of them even to the greatest of them, everyone is given to avarice." For the avaricious man is called, as it were, greedy (avidus), because he craves immense wealth. Hence Publius Nigidius, as quoted by Gellius, book 10, chapter 5: "The avaricious man, he says, is so called because he is greedy for money; but in this combination the letter E has been worn away." Likewise "he says that wealthy (locuples) means one who holds many places, that is, many possessions." So in Lamentations 1:5, it says: "Her enemies have become the head," that is, enemies have dominated Jerusalem. Avarice, therefore, is "in the head," not in the foot; because it occupies the head, that is, the imagination and the mind, and is so fixed there that it can scarcely be torn out; because it holds the citadel of the mind, and from there, like a queen, indeed like a goddess, over all thoughts, senses, faculties,

it commands limbs and actions as slaves, and compels them to serve it, to propagate its kingdom, to seize gains everywhere, to heap up wealth without limit. Hence, again, avarice is "in the head," that is, it is capital, and as it were the head of the avaricious man, dominating him in all things, just as the head dominates the whole body. Wherefore St. Paul calls avarice the slavery of idols, that is, idolatry, Ephesians 5:5. For the avaricious man carries in his mind an idol which he worships, namely money and Plutus. This idol is for him his divinity and god, to which he subjects himself and enslaves himself entirely. Thus we see that the avaricious dream of nothing, think of nothing, speak of nothing, deal with nothing except gains, except "give, give" (Proverbs 30:15). Is not avarice, then, in the head of the avaricious man? Second, Lyra says: Avarice is in the head, that is, in the kings, leaders, and priests of the people. For that these were addicted to avarice is clear both from the Prophets and from Christ, Matthew 15:5, and 23:14 and 23, who sharply denounces their avarice. Thus we also see that modern Jews of every kind are entirely intent on usury and gain. Moreover, that the avarice of the priests is properly rebuked here is clear from verse 1: "I saw the Lord standing upon the altar, and He said: Strike the capital."

He notes the source of all evil, namely avarice, and the frauds and deceits flowing from it. For, as the Apostle says, 1 Timothy 6:10: "The love of money is the root of all evils." Hence the Wise Man, Sirach 10:9: "Nothing, he says, is more wicked than the covetous man." Moreover, this avarice flowed from the highest to the lowest; just as the vices of princes and prelates flow down to their subjects. In like manner, Blessed Peter Damian, book 2, epistle 2, to the Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church, and St. Bernard, in his work On Consideration addressed to Pope Eugene, and in his Declamations, teach that all the evils of the Church arise from avarice, and that this is greatly fostered and increased by the greed of Churchmen and Prelates. And I saw this to be most clearly true when I was working in the provinces beyond the Alps. For what layman will believe a Pastor preaching from the Gospel that earthly goods are to be despised and heavenly ones sought, if he sees the same and other Prelates so eagerly desiring, so studiously hoarding and preserving earthly goods? With what face will a Prelate dare to exhort his flock to generosity and almsgiving, if he himself hoards his wealth avariciously and is harsh and merciless toward the poor? Who would not gape after riches, estates, and offices to amass, if he sees Churchmen wholly intent on accumulating benefices, pensions, revenues, houses, and estates?

You are a cleric — why do you seek your lot not in heaven, but on earth? With what mouth do you shamelessly and falsely say every day to God, who sees your avaricious heart gaping after earth: "The Lord is the portion of my inheritance and of my cup, You are He who will restore my inheritance to me"? Will not a layman rightly object to a Churchman: God willed to be the lot and inheritance of the Levites, but distributed the land among the laity, that is, among the other eleven tribes. The earth, therefore, is ours; you seek heaven and God: we must labor to acquire the wealth with which we feed ourselves, our wives, sons, daughters, menservants, and maidservants; you who are alone, whose lot is God, and that a sufficient and generous lot — why do you always desire more? Why do you study to enrich your nephews and relatives from the patrimony of Christ? Do you so take away the sacred things of the Church, and spend them on the laity who are your relatives, a carnal and unfaithful steward of the Lord? Is this not theft, indeed sacrilege? says St. Bernard.

St. Urban, Pope and Martyr, in the year of our Lord 233, who taught St. Cecilia and many others and encouraged them to martyrdom, formerly decreed that the goods of the Church should not be spent on the uses of laypeople, and this under severe penalty: "Because, he says, these goods are the offerings of the faithful, the price of sins, and the patrimony of the poor," as is found in chapter 17, Question 4, chapter Attendendum. Other Pontiffs decreed the same. Hence St. Jerome, writing to Pammachius: "It is part of sacrilege, he says, to give the property of the poor to those who are not poor." For the property of the poor is the property and goods of Christ crucified. Wherefore all the doctors hold that it is a mortal sin if any Churchman leaves the wealth that he received from his benefice to lay relatives and enriches them thereby. Why, then, says the wise Doctor, do you immoderately heap benefice upon benefice, pension upon pension, and so defraud the Church of its ministers, that it has few, and those unworthy? Why do you devour the patrimony of the poor to enrich your friends? Are you so mad that you would condemn your soul for the sake of friends, and consign it to the eternal fires of hell? Fool, this night the demons will demand your soul from you, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be? The friends you enriched will not free you from hell: rather, in return for your favors they will repay you with scorn and curses in hell, because through your wealth you were the cause of their luxury, their crimes, and thereby their damnation too. Wake up, Prelates! Open your eyes, Churchmen! Let not the foolish love of relatives make you mad, so that too late you groan forever, saying: Alas, how foolish I was, how senseless, who sold, killed, and destroyed my soul not for myself, but to enrich another! Woe is me! My nephews, my relatives have dragged me to the pit. "A brother does not redeem — shall a man redeem? He will not give to God a ransom for his soul." No one will deceive God with his petty excuses. The greater you are, the greater the scandal you give: the more powerful, the more powerful the torments you will suffer: because you took possession of the sanctuary of God as your inheritance; indeed, you caused the nations, caused laypeople to enter into the inheritance of God and to take possession of His sanctuary as their heritage: and therefore you turned both Catholics and heretics away from the faith and from salvation, and made them blaspheme the holy name of Christ and of His Christian Church.

Look down from on high upon Your spouse, O Christ! Cleanse this stain from her garment, indeed from Yours. If only You would wash it away even with my blood! How willingly would I die, that she might be restored to her heavenly brightness and beauty! Send from heaven an angel who may once more strike the hinges of the temple. Send a new Jeremiah who may once more thunder forth that word of chapter 6:12: "I will stretch out My hand against the inhabitants of the land, says the Lord. For from the least of them even to the greatest, all practice avarice: and from the prophet even to the priest, all practice deceit."

Morally, learn how great an evil avarice is, which, since it dominates all, wounds all, and often inflicts a lethal wound on both the soul of the avaricious man and the body of his neighbor. Sabellicus, book 7, Ennead 9, relates that the Caliph, the Mohammedan pontiff, rolling among heaps of gold, died of hunger. For when Hulagu, the brother of the Tartar king, had occupied Babylon and slaughtered all the people, the Caliph, who had amassed a great treasure, was captured, placed upon the heap of his gold, and kept there for many days, and was consumed by starvation — or rather by a precious hunger. So too Suetonius writes in his Life of Caligula, chapter 42, that Gaius Caligula, most greedy for money, used to roll among immense treasures of gold coins; but he did not enjoy them for long, and shortly afterward perished by a wretched death.

The symbol of avarice is the serpent called in Greek dipsa (the thirst-snake), because it excites an unquenchable thirst by its bite. The dipsa, says Lucian in his book On the Dipsa, is a serpent not very large, similar to a viper, with a violent bite and thick venom, which induces intolerable pains. For it sends forth unquenchable burning and putrefaction, and sets the whole body on fire. Moreover, those who have been bitten by it cry out just like those who have been thrown into a fire: the more they drink, the more they thirst; nor could you quench the thirst, even if you offered them the entire Nile or Danube to drink. So also Aelian, On Animals, book 6, chapter 2. The dipsa is avarice, which sets the avaricious on fire with an insatiable thirst for wealth, and with cares, pains, dangers, and slaughter. For: "The love of money grows as much as money itself grows."

"Avarice is much more violent when established amid the accumulation of great wealth, just as the force of flame is infinitely fiercer when it has burst forth from a greater conflagration," says Seneca, On Benefits, book 2, chapter 27. Such were the Ameanians, who, persuaded by an oracle, believed they would lose their homeland if they gave away even a small portion, as Plutarch says in his Greek Questions, chapter 14. And those of whom Arnobius writes, Against the Gentiles, book 2: "They practice, he says, greedy and most unjust usury, and increase themselves by the madness of calculating from the blood of the wretched: they constantly extend the boundaries of a thousand possessions, and though they make whole provinces into one estate, for a single tree, for a single furrow they wear out the courts with lawsuits: with friends and brothers they take up implacable feuds." Truly Cyprian writes, epistle 2: "Nor does the wretched miser understand, he says, that his punishments are but splendid, that he is held bound by gold, that he is possessed by his riches and wealth more than he possesses them. O detestable blindness of minds, and insane deep darkness of cupidity! When he could unburden and relieve himself of these weights, he continues all the more to brood over his increasing fortune, he continues to cling stubbornly to his heaps."

Wherefore all the Fathers keenly attack avarice and the avaricious, and especially St. Augustine, whose axioms on the subject are as follows. First: Avarice commands harder things than Christ. "What do you wish, he says, in Psalm 12, to be possessed by avarice? She commands hard things, I command easy ones: her burden is heavy, My burden is light. Avarice commands you to cross the sea, and you obey. She commands you to commit yourself to winds and storms. I command you to give to the poor at your door from what you have. You are lazy about doing a good work before you, and zealous about crossing the sea; because avarice commands her slaves; because God commands, you hate it." Second, on Psalm 30, discourse 3: "I say to the miser, why do you call upon God, that He might give you gain? You invoke gain, therefore, not God. You make God the minister of your gain. God has become cheap to you. If God came to you without gold and silver, you would not want Him. What then of the things God has made is enough for you, for whom God Himself is not enough?" Third, on Psalm 38: "See, O miser, lest while you collect, you be collected; lest when you wish to be the plunderer of the lesser, you become the prey of the greater. For you do not perceive that you are in the sea, nor discern that smaller fish are devoured by larger ones. Tell me, you hoard — for whom will you gather it? You will say: I save it for my children. This is the voice of piety, the excuse of iniquity. You save, about to pass away, for those about to pass away — nay rather, you who are passing save for those who are passing. Do you know that the one for whom you save will possess it, or if he is not yet born, do you know he will be born? You save for children — it is uncertain whether they will exist, whether they will possess: and you do not store your treasure where it should be stored: Store up for yourselves treasure in heaven." Fourth, on Psalm 137: "For the avaricious, even fertility itself (of children, which to others is a happiness) is troublesome. For they fear that those who could be born in great number would be left poor." Fifth, the author of the Sermon to the Brothers in the Desert, which is found in volume 10 of St. Augustine, sermon 48: "O man, he says, do you not know that the root of all evils is avarice, the slavery of idolatry, the mother of usury, the begetter of simony, the fuel of guilt, the road to eternal punishment, the nurse of hell? O avarice, insatiable abyss! All vices in a man grow old; avarice alone grows young." Then he adds how foolish it is to hoard for children or grandchildren, who abandon you in death: "O admirable infidelity! Behold, the beloved husband is abandoned by his beloved wife, the son is cast off by his mother, and the father by his sons, and the sons by their father are hidden beneath the earth. He alone is dismissed, and each returns to his own affairs, and quickly handed over to oblivion as though dead from the heart." And toward the end: "Remember your last things, for you were conceived in guilt, born in pain, living in misery, and you will necessarily die in anguish." Sixth, from the book On the Conflict of Virtues and Vices, chapter 16: "The disease of avarice is never better restrained than when the day of death is meditated upon without ceasing, when one considers what one will be like in the grave in a short time. This was certainly fixed in the heart of him (St. Job, chapter 15) who said: Man is rottenness, and the son of man a worm. Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return there." And the Apostle: "We brought nothing into this world, nor can we take anything away." Seventh, from the book of Salutary Teachings, 30: "The avaricious man is like hell. For hell, no matter how many it devours, never says: Enough; so even if all treasures flow into the miser, he will never be satisfied."

These are St. Ambrose's axioms on avarice. First, book 1 on Luke, near the end: "It is the rust of the mind, when the keen edge of religious attention is dulled by the filth of worldly desires, or the purity of faith is discolored by the cloud of faithlessness." Second, On Duties, book 2, chapter 21: "Avarice is like a certain dryness of good offices." Third, in his sermon on the eighth Sunday after Pentecost, he teaches that the miser is like a madman, always thinking of gold, converting everything into gold, and gazing upon gold more gladly than upon the sun. Hence he concludes: "Let us beware the example of that rich man, who while he hoards his present riches and bears anxiety about future ones, is snatched away from riches and life alike, and is dragged before the dreadful tribunal, at which his accuser stands there — that very companion of his whole life, avarice; but no defender or intercessor anywhere appears." Fourth, sermon 13: "He who seeks money loses faith: he who amasses gold squanders grace. For avarice is blindness, it introduces error in religion. Blind, I say, is avarice, but sharp-eyed in the diverse devices of fraud: it does not see the things of the divine, but thinks on the things of cupidity." Fifth, on Psalm 38: "Faith fights for God, avarice for the tempter" (the devil). Sixth, On Duties, book 1, chapter 49: "Often what the miser accumulated with the greatest anxiety, a luxurious heir squanders in headlong dissipation, and a shameful glutton, blind to the present, improvident of the future, swallows it in a kind of abyss."

To pass over others, St. Isidore of Pelusium, a disciple of St. Chrysostom, abbot of the monks of Mount Pelusium in Egypt, illustrious for learning and holiness, under Theodosius the Younger, in the year of our Lord 440, in epistle 233, excellently teaches how great a wound avarice inflicts on the head and the whole person, since it all but mutilates and maims a person of eyes, ears, feet, etc. For first he vividly compares it to the Hydra, which has an insatiable belly, and to Briareus armed with a hundred hands, and to Scylla, which swallows all things: "Then to a woman, he says, endowed with a beastly form, breathing fire, having six hundred vipers in place of hair on her head, perpetually hissing and spewing deadly venom; her hands likewise abounding with six hundred claws, with which she tears some, assails others with arrows, and extorts money from still others. And finally six hundred mouths. For she does not merely threaten or contrive calumnies; but also flatters, and speaks in a servile manner, and perjures herself, and for the sake of shameful gain devises innumerable pretexts." Then he paints her eyes: "She has eyes, not seeing as is natural, or showing reverence to anyone — not a friend, not a brother, not a relative, not a benefactor; but gazing with something harsh and fierce, cruel and inhuman, and fiery." Shortly after he describes her ears and feet: "Her ears are so blocked and stopped up that she hears neither suppliant prayers, nor groans, nor weeping, nor reproaches. So far is she from having wings (which signify satiety) that no sensible man could even attribute feet to her. For she cannot walk away and withdraw from the one she has seized; but thrusting her hands upon all, heavier than any iron or lead she sits, so as to take everything and strip everyone, yet never be filled; but she makes the multitude of things she receives the material for fuel and incitement, and makes the end of things received the beginning of things yet to be received." Hence he concludes: "Who, then, would be seized by such a most fierce and insatiable fury, which heaps upon us innumerable sins and curses, and disgrace, and intemperance and wantonness? Who would bring himself, in this life to live wretchedly, so that day and night he is torn as by whips, and feels no rest or sleep; and in the future life to receive the beginning of torments and agonies? And why do I say beginning? For those whom she has seized, she tortures and racks more bitterly than any tyrant, indeed inflicts a heavier punishment upon them than those endure who are condemned to the mines; for the latter, when their work is done, may enjoy sleep and rest; but from the former, blocking even the harbor of sleep as though with heaped-up earth, even at night she issues her cruel and inhuman decrees. She is, therefore, an earth-born beast, breathing fire, deprived of eyes and ears, execrable, hateful to God, implacable and cruel."

AND THE LAST OF THEM I WILL SLAY WITH THE SWORD. — "The last," that is, the final, or the most abject and lowest, i.e., I will slay all the Israelites down to the last and lowest with the sword. For He is speaking of the infinite multitude that was besieged in Samaria, or, as others hold, in Jerusalem, and shortly to be conquered and slaughtered. It is a hyperbole: all, that is, most of them; for it is certain that some escaped and survived the slaughter; but they were very few compared to the slain.

Verse 2: 2. IF THEY GO DOWN EVEN TO HELL, THENCE SHALL MY HAND BRING THEM OUT.

2. IF THEY GO DOWN EVEN TO HELL, THENCE SHALL MY HAND BRING THEM OUT. — For "go down" the Hebrew is יחתרו iachteru, which the Septuagint translate passively: If they are dug down into hell; Pagninus and Vatablus translate actively: If they dig in hell, i.e., If the Israelites dig a pit or hole in hell, to hide themselves in it from My sight, thence I will draw them out to punishment. Similarly: "If they climb up to heaven, thence I will bring them down." It is a hyperbole: for by the pit of hell he means a most deep pit, so deep that it seems to descend to hell; by heaven he means the highest mountains, which seem to touch heaven with their summit. So St. Jerome, the Chaldean, Lyra, and Arias. Or he certainly takes heaven and hell properly, i.e., If it were possible that they should descend to hell or ascend to heaven, even thence I will bring them down through the Assyrians. So Vatablus. In like manner, St. Job describes the immensity and omnipotence of God, which no one can escape, in chapter 11:8: "He is higher, he says, than heaven, and what will you do? Deeper than hell, and how will you know? His measure is longer than the earth, and wider than the sea." And the Psalmist, Psalm 139:8: "Where shall I go from Your Spirit, and where shall I flee from Your face? If I ascend to heaven, You are there: if I descend to hell, You are present; if I take my wings in the early morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea; even there Your hand shall lead me." So with His hand He shuts in all men and creatures, He who suspends the mass of the earth on three fingers, and weighs the mountains in His palm.

Verse 3: 3. AND IF THEY HIDE THEMSELVES ON THE TOP OF CARMEL.

3. AND IF THEY HIDE THEMSELVES ON THE TOP OF CARMEL. — There were two Mount Carmels, one in Judea, where Nabal and David dwelt, 1 Samuel 25:2; the other in Israel, overlooking the Mediterranean Sea, where Elijah lived and hid when fleeing from the face of Jezebel, as well as Elisha and the sons of the Prophets. The latter seems to be meant here, because mention is made here of the sea, and because Amos prophesies in Israel and against Israel.

AND IF THEY HIDE (that is, attempt to hide; for truly no one can be hidden) THEMSELVES FROM MY EYES IN THE DEPTH OF THE SEA (on the islands of the Mediterranean Sea), THERE WILL I COMMAND THE SERPENT — that is, fierce and serpentine men, to slaughter them, says the Chaldean and Arias. So when Attila, king of the Huns, was devastating Italy, and after the sack of Aquileia, Pavia, and Milan, was proceeding with hostile intent toward Rome, which he certainly would have taken had not St. Leo met and turned him away, many from Italy fled to the sea to escape the hands of the Huns, namely to the islands and tidal marshes inaccessible to the barbarians, and there they founded the city of those arriving, namely of the Venetians, in the year of our Lord 452, which was the 13th of Pope Leo I, the 28th of Emperor Valentinian, the 3rd of Marcian. And this is the noble origin of the city and republic of Venice. So Baronius, year of Christ 452.

Second, more simply, St. Jerome, Theodoret, Albert, and others take "depth of the sea" here literally as the very bottom of the sea, as Vatablus translates. Wherefore Pagninus renders it: on the pavement of the sea; for this is what the Hebrew קרקע karka properly means, namely pavement, bottom, ground: for it is derived by metathesis from the root רקע raka, that is, He made firm, extended, solidified. Hence rakia is called the firmament. Wherefore the Septuagint translate: If they are submerged from My eyes in the foundations of the sea, i.e., Even if they sink to the bottom of the sea to hide themselves there from My eyes and wrath, yet there I will see them. It is a hyperbole.

THERE WILL I COMMAND THE SERPENT. — The Septuagint has dragon, that is, some huge and fearsome fish, for example a whale, to bite and devour him: "I will command," that is, I will give it this instinct and this impulse to bite and devour; for brute beasts follow this instinct of the imagination as a law of nature implanted in them by God. So He gave the whale the instinct to swallow Jonah, chapter 2:1, to which St. Jerome thinks allusion is made here. In like manner, God is said to command pestilence, famine, and the sword, when He unleashes and sends them upon provinces or cities.

Tropologically, St. Gregory says on the Seventh Penitential Psalm: "What is it, he says, to hide in the depth of the sea, but to lurk in the depths of despair? He truly hides himself who does not confess his sins; and he does not confess who despairs of the mercy of God: or certainly he hides himself from the eyes of God who turns away from His commandments. For the eyes of the Lord are the spirit of God, who gave the law, that is, the commandments. Those, therefore, who hide themselves from the eyes of God in the depths of despair — the devil receives power to bite them, and to draw them into the belly of his malice. For he is the serpent to whom it was said: You shall eat earth all the days of your life."

Verse 4: 4. AND IF THEY GO INTO CAPTIVITY BEFORE THEIR ENEMIES, THERE WILL I COMMAND THE SWORD, AND IT SHALL...

4. AND IF THEY GO INTO CAPTIVITY BEFORE THEIR ENEMIES, THERE WILL I COMMAND THE SWORD, AND IT SHALL SLAY THEM — i.e., If they are not slain in Samaria, I will cause them to be slain in Assyria by their enemies, namely by the Assyrians. So the Romans used to slaughter the captives of other nations whom they led to Rome in triumph, after the triumph. Second, Arias and a Castro take "sword" by catachresis as meaning the wretched and miserable life and servitude which the Israelites would endure in Assyria: for servitude in law is equated with death, and is called "civil death": for we do not read that the Israelites were slain in Assyria. But many things predicted by the Prophets were fulfilled, of which we do not doubt, even though we do not read it recorded in the histories. The former sense, therefore, as more literal, is also more genuine and more common — namely that of St. Jerome, Remigius, Albert, Lyra, and Vatablus.

AND I WILL SET MY EYES UPON THEM FOR EVIL, AND NOT FOR GOOD — i.e., Everywhere I will do them harm, everywhere I will afflict and punish them, until I destroy them. So Vatablus. Note: That negation, "and not for good," contains a great amplification, i.e., I will bring and inflict upon them nothing good, but every evil.

Verse 5: 5. AND THE LORD GOD OF HOSTS, WHO TOUCHES THE EARTH, AND IT SHALL MELT.

5. AND THE LORD GOD OF HOSTS, WHO TOUCHES THE EARTH, AND IT SHALL MELT. — Arias translates: and it becomes barren, or becomes sterile; the Zurich version: and it melts; Pagninus: and it flows away; the Septuagint: and He moves it; because, as St. Jerome says, He will shake the foundations of the earth. The Hebrew תמוג tamog properly means to dissolve, to melt, as wax melts in fire, as snow dissolves in the sun into water and melts, i.e., Do not think God's threats are empty — know that He is as terrible as He is omnipotent; for by the mere touch of His power, indeed by His mere nod alone, He can cause, and sometimes does cause, the earth to melt and be consumed, as when He gave the law on Sinai, Mount Sinai seemed to melt with smoke and fire (Exodus 19 and 20), according to that: "Who touches the mountains and they smoke"; or He causes the earth to be submerged in water, or to be turned and flow away, as He did in the flood in the time of Noah, and at the Red Sea, when He led the Hebrews through it on dry ground, but wrapped and overwhelmed the pursuing Pharaoh and the Egyptians with the returning waters. So He often submerges islands and the continent in the sea and turns them into sea. In a similar manner, though not the same, He will devastate Samaria through the Assyrians, consume it, and as it were cause it to melt away.

This is what is said in Psalm 18:8: "The earth was moved and trembled: the foundations of the mountains were shaken and moved, because He was angry with them"; and verse 16: "And the springs of waters appeared, and the foundations of the world were revealed, at Your rebuke, O Lord, at the blast of the breath of Your anger"; and Isaiah 64:1: "O that You would rend the heavens and come down! The mountains would flow before Your face. As the burning of fire would melt, the waters would burn with fire."

AND IT SHALL RISE UP LIKE A RIVER. — He repeats this verse from chapter 8:22, where I explained it.

Verse 6: 6. HE THAT BUILDS HIS ASCENT IN HEAVEN.

6. HE THAT BUILDS HIS ASCENT IN HEAVEN. — In Hebrew מעלותו maalotav, that is, His ascents (so the Syriac) or stairways; Vatablus translates: His steps, i.e., He who made heaven, which consists of many spheres, which have a certain order among themselves, like steps by which one ascends gradually up to the highest and empyrean heaven. He proves the omnipotence and wisdom of God from created things, and especially from the heavens. Hence Pagninus: Who builds in heaven His spheres, and has founded His three elements upon the earth; the Alexandrian Arabic: Who made heaven and the things above, who established His covenant upon the earth. Second, "ascent" or "ascents" is the name for the loftiest palace of God in heaven, to which one must climb by many ascents. Hence the Chaldean translates: Who placed on high the majesty of His glory. So Theodoret, Lyra, Arias, Mariana, and others. Hence also the Antiochene Arabic translates: Who builds heaven like a tabernacle, and His preparation is directed upon the earth. It is a metonymy: for "ascent" is used for its terminus, namely heaven, into which one ascends. So often an action is taken for the place in which the action is performed, as "prayer" (oratio) for "oratory" (oratorium), in which one prays; "dining" (cenatio) for "dining room" (cenaculum), in which one dines; "walking" (deambulatio) for "walkway" (ambulacrum), in which one walks. So "congregation," "rest," "church," "mansion," "habitation" signify the place destined for those actions. So Sanchez.

Mystically, Rabbi Haccados, as cited by Galatinus, book 7, chapter 15: "The way, he says, of the eagle in the heavens is the King Messiah, who after His Passion will ascend into heaven, as it is said in Amos chapter 9: He who builds His ascent in heaven." Hence also Tertullian, Against Marcion, book 4, chapter 34, reads and explains thus: "For which (promise of the resurrection) Christ builds His ascent into heaven, according to Amos: certainly for His own: where there is also the eternal place, concerning which Isaiah says: Who will announce to you the eternal place, except Christ walking in justice?" (Isaiah 33).

Tropologically, St. Jerome, Remigius, and Hugo take the "ascents" as holy men, whose conversation is in heaven, and who dispose ascents in their heart, as the Psalmist says in Psalm 84:6, and go from virtue to virtue, until they see the God of gods in Zion. "God, says St. Jerome, daily raises believers from earth to heaven, so as to ascend in them: The Lord ascended into heaven with Enoch: He ascended with Elijah: He ascended with Moses, the place of whose burial, because he had ascended into heaven, could not be found on earth; He ascended with Paul into the third heaven."

AND HIS BUNDLE (the Syriac translates: promise; the Alexandrian Arabic: covenant; the Antiochene Arabic: preparation) HE HAS FOUNDED UPON THE EARTH. — First, Lyra, Clarius, and Vatablus say: He calls "bundle" the binding together of the three elements, namely fire, air, and water, which are founded upon the earth as upon a base and center. Hence Pagninus translates: And He founded His three elements upon the earth. For He contrasts these with the ascents, that is, the celestial spheres, i.e., Just as God built the great and numerous spheres in heaven, illustrious with so many stars; so likewise He founded upon the earth the three elements of all sublunary things, from which He fabricated all else, and fitted them together with an apt series, order, and connection, and as it were bound them into one bundle. This sense seems the genuine one: for it celebrates the magnificence of God from the fabric of heaven and earth. Hence it follows: "Who calls the waters of the sea, and pours them out (either by flooding from their own channel, or by rain from the bundle of clouds) upon the face of the earth." For He Himself "binds the waters in His clouds," as in a bundle, "so that they do not burst forth together downward" (Job 26:8). Second, Sanchez understands by "bundle" a footstool; for in a footstool there is a binding together, either of boards and planks, or of stuffing and cloth, namely when the footstool is a cushion, which is customarily placed under the feet of princes as a footstool, i.e., God's seat and throne is heaven, but His footstool is the earth and all things upon it.

Third, others understand by "bundle" the manifold law, by which God, as it were, binds and restrains men; and, if they violate it, binds and constrains them in prison.

But the first sense is the genuine one. For the Hebrew אגודה aggudda properly signifies aggregation, crowd, troop, congregation, binding, bundle, heaping together, globe, as is clear from 2 Samuel 2:25; which last meaning fits this passage perfectly. For he calls the sublunary world a heap, or elemental globe, just as mathematicians call the same thing the terrestrial globe or sphere. This globe, therefore, is called a bundle. First, on account of the aggregation of things: because just as a bundle is composed of many sticks, flowers, or herbs, so also this terrestrial globe is compounded of many elements, mixtures, and composites. For in it there are various species of herbs, trees, plants, animals, birds, fish, stones, gems, etc.; for the species of mixed things are innumerable. In a similar way, Isaiah says of the damned, chapter 24:22: "They shall be gathered together in the gathering of one bundle (like a bundle) into the pit." Second, this globe is called a bundle on account of the conjunction and friendly association of things so varied, so disparate, so unequal, so contrary and mutually opposed. For God has fitly bound together this sphere from such varied and contrary things, just as a bundle of crooked sticks, brambles, and thorns is fitly tied together by a skilled carrier. Third, the bundle signifies that the lower world is one congregation and commonwealth, in which the most diverse and numerous things are, as it were, tied together and gathered by God as in a bundle. Hence the bundle again signifies God's providence and care, by which He protects and preserves this world, as His own bundle, in this union and binding, lest one element destroy its opposite, lest wolves devour all sheep, lest fire consume all things, etc. Fourth, it is called in the diminutive a "little bundle" (fasciculus), not a "bundle" (fascis): because in the hands of God, who, as Isaiah says, suspends the mass of the earth on three fingers, it is like a tiny bundle. Fifth, because on account of its elegance, in the eyes and nostrils of God it is like a bundle of spices or flowers. Hence "bundle" is sometimes the same as a nosegay. So Cicero, Tusculan Disputations 3: "You will put a bouquet to your nose, he says, you will burn perfumes, and you will order garlands of roses." And the bride, Song of Songs 1: "My beloved is to me a bundle of myrrh." Sixth, the bundle signifies the apt order and arrangement of individual things and species among themselves, so that each seems to be fittingly and appropriately ordered and placed in its own position, as in a bundle; for in this order the wonderful wisdom and providence of God the Orderer shines forth.

Gellius relates, book 5, chapter 3, that Protagoras was made a philosopher from being a porter, by means of a bundle. For when he had very neatly tied together many logs of wood in a field into one bundle, and was carrying it on his shoulders, the philosopher Democritus met him: "He sees him walking easily and nimbly with that kind of load, so cumbersome and so unwieldy. He comes near and examines the joining and arrangement of the wood, skillfully and expertly made; and asks him to rest a little. When Protagoras, as requested, did so; and likewise Democritus noticed that that heap, that quasi-sphere of logs compressed by a short cord, was balanced and held together with a kind of quasi-geometric calculation, he asked who had arranged the wood so. And when Protagoras said he himself had done it, Democritus asked him to untie it, and reassemble it in the same manner. After he untied it, and similarly reassembled it, then Democritus, marveling at the mental acuteness and cleverness of the uneducated man, said: My young man, since you have an aptitude for doing things well, there are greater and better things you can do with me. And he took him away immediately, kept him with himself, provided for his expenses, taught him philosophy, and made him as great as he later became." If Democritus marveled at the coordination, neatness, and ingenuity of the arrangement of logs in Protagoras' bundle, who would not marvel at the wonderfully neat and wise disposition, connection, and order of so many genera, so many species, so many most diverse — indeed mutually opposed — individuals in this bundle and sublunary globe of God? Who would not exclaim with the Wise Man, chapter 11:21, and with the Apostle, Romans 11: "O the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God!" How fittingly "You have arranged all things in measure, number, and weight!" — indeed, You have bound them together, as it were, in one bundle!

Mystically, this bundle is the Church and assembly of faithful Israelites, whom God, strongly bound by the bundle of His law as well as His providence, placed and formed in the land of Canaan, as He had covenanted and promised. Hence the Chaldean translates: And He adorned His Church on the earth. So Ruffinus, Hugo, and Dionysius.

Anagogically, this bundle is that of the saints and the elect, bound by the bond of charity on earth and by the bond of predestination in the mind of God, of which it is said in the Gospel: "Fear not, little flock, for it has pleased My Father to dwell in you," says St. Jerome, who continues to speak of it thus: "The bundle is bound together by the one religion of the Lord; hence religion itself received its name from re-binding (religando), and from binding into the Lord's bundle." The Septuagint translate: He founds His promise upon the earth, so that all His promises, which (concerning Christ and Christians) the holy Prophets proclaimed with their own mouths, would be founded on earth, etc., so that those who are daily dead to sin and bound by the cords of vices (like Lazarus raised by Christ) might be commanded to come forth from the tomb of their sins: daily they would be bound by works of blood, etc. So in 1 Samuel 25:29, Abigail says to David: "The soul of my lord shall be kept as in the bundle of the living; but the soul of your enemies shall be hurled away as from the pocket of a sling," i.e., You will live most long and most safely: but your enemies will rush to destruction — for a thing stored in a binding by which the living are bound is stored so that it may be kept among the living; but what is placed in a sling is placed so that the sling may cast it away, says Cajetan in the same place.

Anagogically, Eucherius and Angelomus explain the same thing of the elect and the reprobate in the same place. The bundle, they say, of the living is the number of the predestined, and this: first, because, as Eucherius says, the bundle is tied tight so that it may be preserved; in like manner, the elect are constrained by afflictions so that they may keep faith with God; but the reprobate, who live more loosely, are cast away by God like stones from a sling. Second, because, as the same Eucherius says, just as a bundle is bound by a cord, so the company of the saints is bound by the same faith and hope, and by the same bond of charity, and is surrounded on every side by one and the same protection of God. Third, because, just as a bouquet of flowers is carried in the hand for delight, so God carries all the elect in His hand, and is wonderfully delighted by the fragrance of virtues that continually breathes forth from them. Fourth, because just as a bouquet is made only from certain selected flowers, so the number of the elect is constituted from certain selected persons, outstanding in charity and every virtue.

WHO CALLS THE WATERS OF THE SEA. — The Zurich version: who summons to Himself the waters of the sea, namely by dissolving the waters through the heat of the sun into vapor, and lifting it upward to the middle region of the air: where He makes it condense into a cloud, and by the force of the sun dissolves the cloud into rain, which He pours upon the earth. So St. Jerome, Theodoret, Hugo, Lyra, and Vatablus. Only Arias understands this of the flooding of the sea, by which it overwhelms the neighboring land. Symbolically, the Chaldean takes the waters to mean the armies of the Assyrians, as though God here threatens Israel with their coming.

Verse 7: 7. ARE NOT YOU TO ME AS THE CHILDREN OF THE ETHIOPIANS, O CHILDREN OF ISRAEL? — First, the Chaldean...

7. ARE NOT YOU TO ME AS THE CHILDREN OF THE ETHIOPIANS, O CHILDREN OF ISRAEL? — First, the Chaldean translates: Were you not esteemed as beloved children before Me? For it seems that Ethiopians were prized and cherished by the Jews on account of the difference and singularity of their color, as something rare and wonderful, just as even now princes keep an Ethiopian or a Pygmy in their courts for amusement and display. Hence in Numbers 12:1, the wife of Moses the Ethiopian woman is called by the Chaldean a beautiful wife: unless you say it is an antiphrasis — beautiful, meaning dark and ugly. And vice versa, Ethiopian, meaning not at all an Ethiopian or black, but fair and handsome. Hence you could translate from the Hebrew thus: Are you not to me like the children of the Ethiopians, O children of Israel? i.e., By no means: for the Ethiopians are dark, ugly, despised; but you are to me fair, beautiful, gracious, and beloved. Moreover, Arias explains this affection and the verse thus, i.e., The Ethiopians are a symbol of servitude: for from of old they were condemned to servitude by Noah, when he said, Genesis 9:25: "Cursed is the boy Canaan, a servant of servants shall he be to his brothers": for from Ham came Canaan, and his brother Cush, who was the father of the Ethiopians, who are therefore called in Hebrew Cushim, Genesis 10:6. You, therefore, O Israelites, were like Ethiopians when you were oppressed by the Egyptians and other nations with harsh servitude, but I, loving you, freed you from it and claimed you for Myself. It is right, therefore, that you should love Me in return, and serve Me as your liberator and Lord.

Second and more aptly, the Syriac and Arabic take these words assertively, as if to say: You, O Israelites, are like the Ethiopians, because just as I brought the Ethiopians from Egypt into Ethiopia (for this lies beyond Egypt, adjacent and, as it were, subject to it): so also I brought you from Egypt into Canaan. Hence, explaining, He presently adds: "Did I not bring Israel up from the land of Egypt?" This also agrees with what preceded: "And He founded His bundle upon the earth," i.e., God brought Israel, as His own bundle and treasure, from Egypt into Canaan, and there established and settled him. Likewise verse 5: "And it shall flow away like the river of Egypt." For He continues the comparison with the Nile and Egypt, i.e., Do not boast that you have Abraham as your father, for your nearer ancestors were Egyptians. For Moses and his contemporaries, your fathers, were born there, whom I brought from Egypt into Canaan, just as I brought the Ethiopians from the same place into Ethiopia: you are therefore kinsmen, and as it were brothers of the Ethiopians, both in origin and race, and in morals. For you are dark, ugly, hardened, and unchangeable in your crimes, so that you seem to be brothers and sons not so much of Abraham as of the Ethiopians, and therefore I will reject you and hand you over to the Assyrians. In like manner Jeremiah says, chapter 13:23: "If the Ethiopian can change his skin, or the leopard his spots: then you also may do well, when you have learned evil." And Ezekiel 16:3: "Your father was an Amorite, and your mother a Hittite."

Hence St. Jerome: "In all the Scriptures, he says, those who are deeply sunk in vices are called Ethiopians." So St. Chrysostom, homily 11 on Matthew, Lyra, Pagninus, Vatablus, and Ribera. Here belong the common proverbs: "You wash an Ethiopian," meaning you attempt something futile and impossible; for an Ethiopian does not become white with any amount of washing or lye. "I judge an Ethiopian by his face": for the Ethiopian displays his homeland by the blackness of his face, curly hair, swollen lips, and white teeth; for an Ethiopian can change his clothing, but not his face. Hence the epigram of Lucian: "In vain you wash an Ethiopian — why not give up the art? / You will never make the dark night become bright day."

Pythagoras warned us not to eat of things which have a black tail, by which he forbade associating with those who were black with moral wickedness. Lamentations 4:7: "Her Nazirites were whiter than snow, more shining than milk" — namely when they lived purely and worshipped God chastely; but when they lived impurely and unchastely, "their face was blacker than coals." Moreover, although any wickedness is called blackness, yet properly so called is slander, by which someone blackens another's reputation and his own conscience: hence one who is envious, a slanderer, a calumniator is called black. So in the title of Psalm 7, Saul, the persecutor of David, is called Cush, that is, Ethiopian. And Horace, Satire 4, book 1: "He who gnaws at an absent friend, etc. / This man is black; beware of him, O Roman."

Hence the common proverb: "Whether you are white or black, I do not know." And: "Censure spares the crows and harasses the doves." For whiteness is the symbol of a pure soul, and blackness of a malicious one. St. Jerome, Remigius, Rupert, and a Castro add that God here signifies His power and vengeance in transferring and overthrowing nations, i.e., You, O Israelites, are not superior, as you boast, but equal in all respects to other nations. For just like the Ethiopians, Philistines, and Syrians, you were created by Me, and by equal right are subject to Me. Just as with the same providence by which I settled those nations in their provinces I also settled you in Canaan: so with the same justice by which I drove them from those same places and crushed them on account of their crimes, I will also expel and crush you from Samaria. Hence He adds: "Behold, the eyes of God are upon the sinful kingdom, and I will crush it from the face of the earth."

Moreover, how and when the Ethiopians were driven out or crushed by God is not clear. Some refer this to the war which Moses waged in the name of Pharaoh against the Ethiopians, by which he subjugated them, as Josephus relates, Antiquities, book 2, chapter 5. But this history is doubtful, as it rests solely on Josephus; and he adds that in that war Moses did not crush the Ethiopians but forced them to peace, and having married the daughter of the king of the Ethiopians, departed as a friend, indeed as a son-in-law.

Others more probably refer it to Asa, king of Judah, who slew a million Ethiopians with their leader Zerah, 2 Chronicles 14:9 and 13. But these were slain outside Ethiopia, nor did Asa force the Ethiopians to change their settlements, or transfer them from Ethiopia to another region. These histories, therefore, were known in the time of Amos: hence he speaks of them as matters then common knowledge; perhaps they were also recorded in the chronicles of that age, which no longer exist. For many sacred books, as well as profane ones, have perished through so many centuries of years, and so many burnings or devastations of cities and libraries.

AND THE PHILISTINES OUT OF CAPPADOCIA. (The Cappadocians, in Hebrew כפתורים caphtorim, occupied Palestine, having expelled its first inhabitants the Hivites, as narrated in Deuteronomy 2:19 and Jeremiah 47:7. See what I said in both places.) AND THE SYRIANS OUT OF CYRENE — i.e., The Cyrenians coming from Kir, a city and region of Assyria (as I said in chapter 1:5; hence Theodoret is wrong to think Kir is Haran, or Carrhae, a city of the Parthians, to which God transferred Abraham with Terah from Ur of the Chaldeans, Genesis 11:27), I transferred into Syria of Damascus, which was formerly called Aram from Aram the son of Shem, but from these new inhabitants coming from Kir, it was called Kiria, and from that, as some think, for euphony's sake, Syria; just as later, conversely, when Tiglath-pileser conquered Damascus, he transferred the Syrians from it back into Media and Assyria, namely into Kir, from which they had originally come. The meaning is, i.e., Do not flatter yourselves, O Israelites, about My care and providence for you, by which I formerly brought you out of Egypt and settled you in Canaan. For in like manner I settled the Cappadocians in Palestine and the Kirians in Syria; and yet the former I drove out of Palestine through you on account of their crimes, and the latter I will drive out of Syria through Tiglath-pileser. Know, therefore, that I will do the same to you, unless you correct your crimes and amend your life and morals. He names the Philistines and the Syrians because the Israelites were their neighbors both in location and in morals; hence He tacitly reproaches them: for the Syrians formerly had a bad reputation for moral softness. Hence the proverb: "Since you are not a Syrian, don't play the Syrian," meaning do not assume a shameful role, or, since you are freeborn, do not act like a slave and barbarian in your morals. It is a sharp joke based on the double meaning of the word συρίζω, which means both to play the Syrian and to play the flute. And Cicero, book 2, to his brother Quintus: "We, he says, are such lovers of learning that we could even live with carpenters. We have this philosophy not from Hymettus, but from a Syrian threshing-floor (some read hara, i.e., sty)," meaning from rustic simplicity.

Verse 8: 8. NEVERTHELESS IN CRUSHING I WILL NOT UTTERLY CRUSH — i.e., I will by no means completely crush...

8. NEVERTHELESS IN CRUSHING I WILL NOT UTTERLY CRUSH — i.e., I will by no means completely crush Israel, but I will preserve and save a remnant from it.

Verse 9: 9. AS GRAIN IS SIFTED IN A SIEVE.

9. AS GRAIN IS SIFTED IN A SIEVE. — For in Rome and elsewhere in Italy they sift grain, and use a sieve instead of a winnowing fan. The Israelites seem to have done the same, as Amos indicates here, i.e., Just as when grain is winnowed in a fan, as the Zurich version translates, or sifted in a sieve, the chaff either flies away or falls through the holes of the sieve onto the floor, while the pebbles and grains remain in the sieve; so the elect and righteous from Israel will be preserved, while the rest of the wicked will perish. Hence Theodoret: "Just as, he says, the farmer separates the grain from the chaff and refuse, so I too will preserve those worthy of salvation, and hand over the rest to be slain." By the metaphor of the sieve, says St. Jerome, the very land of Israel is signified, whose edges God, holding with both hands in His greatness, will shake this way and that, like a sieve, so that when the chaff and filth of sinners are shaken out — that is, when they are agitated by labor and calamity, and fall to the ground and perish by the sword — the pure grain may remain, to be stored in granaries. Hence when Amos adds:

AND NOT A PEBBLE SHALL FALL UPON THE GROUND. — By pebble he means grain, as others translate: because grain is hard like a little stone and pebble. It is a catachresis; hence the Hebrew צרור tseror means a bundle and a pouch, and by metonymy things which are commonly gathered into a bundle or tied into a pouch, such as grains; also precious or beautiful pebbles, pearls, gold coins, silver coins, etc. For the root צרר tsarar means to tighten, compress, press. Hence tseror is a thing that is tight, compressed, squeezed, which is commonly tightened, compacted, and compressed in a sack or purse, such as grain. Hence the Septuagint translate σύστρεμμα, that is, a winding, globe, compaction, compact thing, namely a rather large grain, globular and compact, as the Complutensian translator renders it.

Others, however, take "pebble" here properly, and in various ways. First, Rupert holds that this is about a sieve, not for grain, but for masonry, by which stones are separated from dust: Ribera refutes this. Second, Palacius holds that the pebbles signify the wicked, who cannot escape through the holes of the sieve the hand and vengeance of God, and therefore must be cast out of the sieve by His hand, that is, slain or captured by enemies; and consequently that the grain signifies the righteous. But Delrio rightly refutes this in his adage 981. For grain does not usually descend through the holes of the sieve and be separated, unless by "grain" you mean not kernels but flour; for flour is separated from its husks and chaff when passed through the sieve. Third, Ruffinus holds that those purging the grain add pebbles to it in the sieve: "For this purpose, he says, that they may add force to the shaking by striking the sides, and allow nothing of the chaff to remain." Symbolically, "by the name of pebbles he indicates the firmness of those who are not easily corrupted by bad examples, as we read that in those times there were Prophets and other just men, who while the rest of the common people, like wood and straw, perished, they like solid and therefore precious stones remained, upon whom the Church was rightly founded." So also Sanchez. Fourth, Ribera thinks that the Prophet, as is his custom, here joins two metaphors, namely one of grain and another of pebbles, and passes from the simile of the sieve and grain to the thing signified, namely the house of Israel, of which he had just said: "I will shake the house of Israel among all nations," and therefore names pebbles; for stones are suited, indeed necessary, for rebuilding the house of Israel. But the first sense which I gave, as simpler, is also more genuine, and is required by the Septuagint version. Differently, John Alba, Electorum chapter 61: Pebbles, he says, or small stones are men of the lowest rank; the poor, the common people, and all the ignoble masses, i.e., The entire people will be led captive; and therefore will die not in their own land, but in captivity. For it is commonly held among men as a misfortune that someone dies outside his homeland, especially in captivity. For he explains what preceded: "I will shake the house of Israel among all nations." But this phrase is nowhere taken in that sense, especially because Amos does not say "upon their own land" or "upon the land of Israel," but absolutely "upon the ground," which can be understood of the land of Assyria as well as of Israel. And it is certain that Israel fell and died in the land of Assyria.

Verse 11: 11. IN THAT DAY (the Chaldean has: in that time) I WILL RAISE UP (the Septuagint: I will raise up...

11. IN THAT DAY (the Chaldean has: in that time) I WILL RAISE UP (the Septuagint: I will raise up again; St. James, Acts 15: I will rebuild; the Syriac: I will set up, namely firmly and permanently) THE TABERNACLE OF DAVID, WHICH HAS FALLEN. — Some hold that this raising up was accomplished by Hezekiah, who after the ten tribes were carried away by the Assyrians in the sixth year of his reign, received their fugitive remnants and confirmed them in the worship of the true God and the true Church, 2 Kings 18 and 19. Others, such as Ruffinus and Chrysostom (homily 33 on Acts), hold that it was accomplished by Ezra and Zerubbabel, who, with the consent of Cyrus, brought the Jews back from Babylon to Jerusalem, and there restored their commonwealth and Church. But these err from the true sense, for each of these restorations was slight; but the one promised here was ample and glorious. For He says: "I will rebuild it as in the days of old, that they may possess the remnant of Edom and all the nations." When, I ask, did Hezekiah or Zerubbabel possess all nations? Again, when was this fulfilled: "And the mountains shall drip sweetness, and all the hills shall be cultivated"? Add that Zerubbabel brought back only two tribes, just as Hezekiah ruled over barely two: but here the restoration of Israel, that is, the ten tribes, is promised.

I respond, therefore, that this promise pertains to Christ, and was fulfilled through Him. That this is so is clearly evident from the speech of St. James, who in Acts 15:16, at the Council of Jerusalem, interprets these words of Amos as referring to Christ and the conversion of the nations to Christ. All orthodox interpreters follow St. James. Wherefore Pope Vigilius defined the same under anathema. For when Theodore of Mopsuestia explained these words of Amos thus: "In this passage, he says, he foretells the return from Babylon, when they had Zerubbabel from the line of David as their king; James, however, in the Acts of the Apostles transferred this passage to Christ, in whom the matter was brought to its true fulfillment" — Pope Vigilius condemned this explanation under anathema at the Roman Council, which is preserved in the Vatican Library, and which Father Turrianus transcribed in his work on book 2 of the Apostolic Constitutions, chapter 5, on the grounds that Theodore asserted that a passage which is primarily and in the literal or historical sense expounded in Acts as referring to Christ should be understood in the first and literal sense as referring to Zerubbabel, and only in the second sense and by transference as referring to Christ — where, to omit other errors, Theodore manifestly errs in making Zerubbabel a king, when he was merely the leader of the people returning from Babylon. In like manner, the same Theodore held that all the oracles which were literally issued concerning Christ historically pertained to David, Hezekiah, Zerubbabel, and the Jews; but were merely accommodated to Christ by the Apostles and Evangelists based on the analogy and outcome of events. This is what Vigilius condemns under anathema, and before him the Fifth General Council, which was the Second of Constantinople, had condemned, as is clear from its fifth session, and from Leontius, who lived in the time of the Emperor Justinian, and who catalogues the errors of Theodore. See what was said in the Prooemium, note 5.

The Prophet, therefore, here as is his custom, after having set forth God's vengeance and the desolation of Israel, adds their restoration and consolation to be brought about through Christ.

The tabernacle of David, therefore, properly and formally does not signify the Church (for David was not a priest or pontiff of the Church), but the kingdom of David, namely his royal house, palace, and royal throne. For the Orientals of old dwelt in tents constructed of branches, leather, or boards: hence any house or palace is called a tabernacle, especially because the Hebrew סכה succa literally means the same as covering, veil, covering, roof, from the root סכך sucach, that is, he veiled, covered, roofed; which suits both a house and palace and a tent. But properly in Hebrew a tent is called אהל ohel, that is, a stretched-out and spread-out tent, from the root אהל ahal, that is, he stretched out, expanded. He calls it a tabernacle rather than a palace, both because David, constantly engaged in wars, commonly dwelt in military tents; and to signify that this kingdom of David was movable and temporary: but that the kingdom of Christ which was to succeed it would be immovable and eternal. For this the angel promised to the Blessed Virgin, saying, Luke 1:32: "He shall reign in the house of Jacob forever, and of His kingdom there shall be no end"; and because it alludes to the tabernacle of Moses in the desert, which presided over and, as it were, directed all the camps of the Hebrews, which were arranged around it: hence it was a type of the Church pilgrim and militant, i.e., Just as the tabernacle of old, and with it Moses and the Hebrews, traveled through the desert and proceeded to the promised land; so the Church of Christ travels through the desert of this life and tends toward heaven. It is itself, therefore, the tabernacle of David, that is, of Christ and of Christians, Hebrews 13:14.

Wherefore materially and in reality this kingdom of Christ is the Church; because this kingdom of Christ is spiritual and ecclesiastical, by which Christ rules over believers through faith and grace. And so when He says: "I will raise up the tabernacle of David," He is in reality saying: I will raise up the Church, that is, the assembly of the faithful people, over whom David once ruled. Moreover, this kingdom of David, as well as the Church of the faithful, fell through various breaches: first, when Jeroboam drew the ten tribes away from the kingdom of David and from the Church and worship of God to himself and his golden calves. Second, when the Israelites were often ground down by the Syrians, Philistines, Egyptians, and other nations. Third, when the ten tribes were carried off to Assyria and the two to Babylon. Fourth, when Antiochus Epiphanes and his successors, in the time of the Maccabees, afflicted the descendants of David. Fifth, when Herod, under whom Christ was born, all but extinguished the royal line of David, and transferred the entire kingdom to himself, that is, to a foreigner. "In that day, therefore," that is, in that time when through so many ruins, and finally through the tyranny of Herod, the kingdom of David will utterly fall and collapse, God, who is accustomed to come to aid in desperate situations, will send the Messiah, that is, Christ, who will succeed by hereditary right to this tabernacle as to His own house and the ancestral kingdom of His father David, and will restore it, indeed make it more glorious — not with temporal dominion and lordship, but with spiritual, which is more sublime and divine. For Christ welcomed and incorporated both Jews and Israelites into His kingdom and His Church, and in place of the unbelievers who refused to be enrolled in it, He substituted and adopted all nations from the whole world: and so He caused this most ample kingdom to embrace the whole world, so that all would be called Christians from Christ, and profess themselves Christ's subjects and disciples. The nations, therefore, in place of the Jews, were built into this tabernacle of David, as living stones, and, as the Apostle says in Romans 11:17, were grafted into this olive tree of David and of God. So St. Jerome, Remigius, Hugo, Lyra, Vatablus, Arias, Ribera, a Castro, and others everywhere.

Allegorically, the tabernacle of David is the body of Christ slain by the Jews through various breaches, that is, wounds inflicted upon Him, which God on the third day gloriously raised from death to life, concerning which Christ says: "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up" (John 2:19). For Christ is called David, because He is the son and heir of David. So Theodoret and Cyril, book 4 on John, chapter 35. Indeed, the Rabbis cited by Galatinus, book 8, chapter 22, where Rabbi Nahaman reads this passage thus: I will raise up the fallen hut of David, that is, I will raise up the crucified body of Christ, and from this he proves that the Messiah will die, and therefore asserts that He is called by the Hebrews Barnephili, that is, the fallen son. Hence consequently St. Chrysostom, homily 16 on John, takes the tabernacle of David to be the human nature that fell through the sin of Adam, which Christ, by assuming it, repaired and restored.

From what has been said, it is clear that the Jews wrongly abuse this passage and similar ones to prove that the Messiah has not yet come, but is to come, to restore the temporal kingdom of David and welcome the Jews into it as the chief men of the kingdom. For, to pass over other arguments, first, Amos here properly does not treat of the Jews but of the Israelites, that is, the ten tribes (for in verses 8, 9, and 14 he called them the house of Jacob and the house of Israel), and to them after the disaster he promises restoration, so that they may be grafted back and united to the kingdom of David, from which they had fallen by schism. Modern Jews, therefore, claim these things for themselves in vain. And since it is certain that Israel never returned from the Assyrian captivity, nor will return, just as the Jews from the captivity under Titus and the Romans have never returned in 1600 years, nor will return; it follows that this must be understood of the mystical return of Israel, namely of the conversion and salvation of the nations who believe in Christ, who are Israelites according to the spirit, not according to the flesh, as the Apostle says in Romans 9:8, as I proved more fully in Daniel chapter 2:44, and Daniel 9:24.

The same is again evident from the fact that God promises a similar restoration to the Sodomites, Assyrians, Egyptians, Ammonites, and Moabites, such as He promises here and elsewhere to the Israelites: but that restoration was not temporal, but spiritual through Christ; therefore such also was that of the Israelites. The major premise is clear from Ezekiel 16:55: "And your sister, He says, Sodom, and her daughters shall return to their former state," that is, to their former seat, wealth, and glory. But it is certain that Sodom and the neighboring cities were consumed by heavenly fire with all their inhabitants. Therefore this restoration of Sodom must be understood mystically, not literally as it sounds. Ezekiel promises the same of Samaria in the same place; but it is certain that the Samaritans literally never returned from the Assyrian captivity: therefore this restoration of Samaria is to be understood as spiritual through Christ, not literal and temporal. Isaiah promises the same to the Assyrians and Egyptians, as well as to the Israelites, in chapter 19:24: "In that day Israel shall be the third with the Egyptian and the Assyrian: a blessing in the midst of the earth." This literally as it sounds is false, nor would the Jews admit or tolerate being associated with and made equal to the Egyptians and Assyrians. Therefore it must be understood mystically. Jeremiah promises the same to the Moabites, chapter 48:47: "And I will bring back the captivity of Moab in the last days, says the Lord." And to the Ammonites, chapter 49:6: "And after this I will cause the captives of the children of Ammon to return, says the Lord." But literally neither the Moabites nor the Ammonites returned from Babylon. Therefore this return is mystical, namely conversion to God through Christ. Therefore the same kind of return and restoration of Israel must be understood.

Similar is the temple which Ezekiel promises in chapter 40 and following, which is more mystical than literal. Hence in chapter 47:1, 8, 9, he saw waters going out from it and gradually growing into a great river, by whose streams the waters of the Dead Sea, which in Scripture is called the saltiest, were healed and sweetened: all of which is clearly to be understood mystically. Learn from this the rule and custom of the Prophets, namely that they customarily add joyful things after sad ones, consolation after desolation, the restoration of nations through Christ after their destruction and ruin. For He is the Messiah, that is, the salvation, consolation, joy, and desire of all nations (Haggai 2:8).

Second, I assert that this kingdom of Christ is not only spiritual but also temporal. For Christ, through Christian emperors, kings, and princes, rules and governs even civilly the entire Christian world. Finally, on the day of judgment He will bring this kingdom of His, both spiritual and bodily, to perfection and make it glorious, so that He may rule over all heaven and earth with His faithful forever, and then most fully these and similar prophecies will be fulfilled.

AND I WILL REBUILD THE BREACHES OF ITS WALLS. — In Hebrew גדרתי gadarti, that is, I will fence, as Pagninus translates; I will restore, as Vatablus; I will surround with a hedge, as the Zurich version, i.e., I will repair the gaps and breaches of the walls of David and of Israel; namely, God restored the ruins of Israel: and repaired them with the multitude of nations believing in Christ, who succeeded to the place of the unbelieving Jews and Samaritans; just as when the demons fell from heaven, He substituted men for them, and with them restored the ruins of the heavenly Jerusalem. For St. James explains this passage about the faith, calling, and election of the Gentiles (Acts 15:16). Ribera holds that this prophecy was fulfilled after the destruction of the temple and city of Jerusalem by Titus: for then, with the Jews persisting in their blindness and dispersed throughout the whole world, nations were admitted into the Church in their place. But St. James (Acts 15) asserts that in his own time, that is, soon after the Passion of Christ, when Paul and Barnabas, the first to preach to the Gentiles, converted many of them, it was fulfilled — that is, began to be fulfilled. Add that the text does not treat of Judah and Jerusalem, and the destruction and ruin of the temple and city by Titus, especially because Christ did not restore this temple, which by that time was Jewish and diametrically opposed and resistant to Him, but rather the old kingdom of David and the legitimate Church. I confess, however, that after the destruction of Jerusalem this prophecy was more fully fulfilled: for then St. John, who alone of the Apostles was still alive, and the apostolic men, having abandoned the Jews — as now overthrown and dispersed — turned to preaching to the Gentiles.

AS IN THE DAYS OF OLD — as in the days of David and Solomon. For he named David shortly before: and then the glory of the kingdom of Israel flourished most greatly, indeed began. So Remigius. Thus the ancient ages were called golden, in which the commonwealth flourished with virtue, of which Virgil writes, Aeneid 6: "Here the ancient race, the most beautiful offspring of Teucer, / Great-souled heroes, born in better years."

Verse 12: 12. THAT THEY MAY POSSESS THE REMNANT OF EDOM — i.e., That just as David subjugated the Edomites...

12. THAT THEY MAY POSSESS THE REMNANT OF EDOM — i.e., That just as David subjugated the Edomites and the other neighboring nations, 2 Samuel 8:14; Psalm 60:10 and 11, where it says: "I will extend my shoe over Edom," that is, I will take possession of Edom; for this was formerly done by casting one's shoe upon the thing to be possessed: so Christ through the Apostles and apostolic men, bishops and priests, may subdue to Himself and His faith, and possess the same nations when subdued, indeed the whole world. He names the Edomites, because just as Esau persecuted his brother Jacob with deadly hatred, so also his descendants the Edomites persecuted Jacob's descendants, namely the Jacobites and Israelites, and were their sworn and most bitter enemies, i.e., The Edomites under Christ and through Christ will lay aside these ancestral hatreds and will join with the Israelites under one yoke and kingdom of Christ. Again, He names "the remnant of Edom," both because literally David through Joab, having slain most of the Edomites, preserved and subjugated only their remnants, as is clear from 1 Kings 11:14; and again, shortly before the times of Amos, when Edom rebelled against the Jews and set up its own king, Amaziah king of Judah had subdued it again, and it had so fallen that only its remnants remained, 2 Kings 14:7; and also because parabolically, just as the remnants of Israel, so also the remnants of Edom and other nations — namely those who believed the preaching of the Apostles — Christ preserved, while the rest remained unbelieving and perished through their unbelief: for the Apostles converted few to Christ, if compared with those who were not converted and persisted in unbelief. So St. Jerome and others.

Note: The Septuagint, whom St. James follows in Acts 15, translate this passage not word for word but paraphrastically in this way: That the rest of mankind may seek Me. For by the Edomites the Prophet synecdochically means any nations and peoples whatever, especially those most alien to Christ. Hence, explaining himself, he adds: And all nations; for these were admitted into the kingdom of Christ when they sought it: for no one, unless willing and asking, is taken into the kingdom of Christ. Therefore to seek the kingdom of Christ is the same as to possess it and to be possessed by it. Hence from the Hebrew it can be translated: That the remnant of Edom and all nations may possess, namely, this kingdom of David, that is, of Christ. For whoever is possessed by Christ, in turn possesses Christ and His kingdom.

Some add that the Hebrew אדום Edom means Idumea; but the Septuagint, reading with different vowel points אדם Adam, that is, man, therefore translate: That the rest of mankind may seek Me. But the Septuagint, inasmuch as St. James and St. Luke follow them, followed the true and genuine reading as well as the writing here. And this has Edom, that is, Idumea; not Adam, that is, man, especially because the letter vav is expressed, which is in the word Edom, but not in the word Adam. For the Prophet, just as he pronounced it in preaching, so also in writing out his sermon and prophecy, he wrote Edom, not Adam. Ribera says differently: Judea, he says, which formerly praised and confessed God, after it killed Christ, became Idumea, that is, earthy and bloody (for Edom in Hebrew means earthy and ruddy, red, bloody) with the blood of Christ whom it killed; and the Septuagint signified this (Judea) by "the rest of men." But this, being more obscure, also seems more far-fetched and forced, as Ribera himself admits in his commentary on Obadiah, number 6. Edom, therefore, is here taken properly, and is named before others, because just as by the nature of the place (being situated on a rock and mountain) and by the strength of the nation it was most strongly fortified; so it was most difficult to accept Christ, inasmuch as He was descended from the Jews, their most bitter enemies, as a type of which David, about to attack it, says in Psalm 60:11: "Who will bring me into the fortified city? Who will lead me into Edom?" And he answers: "Is it not You, O God?" i.e., This will happen not by my strength, but by God's. This was more truly fulfilled in the conversion of the Edomites to Christ. Hence Amos likewise adds here: "Says the Lord who does these things"; the Syriac: all these things.

BECAUSE MY NAME IS INVOKED UPON THEM — i.e., Because you are called the people of God, the assembly and Church of Christ, namely Christians; and in turn Christ is called your God, Lord, and Father, which is a great glory, as well as protection and defense in every matter, so that you may rightly congratulate yourselves on this noble name, give thanks to God, and glory among the nations. For you have the name of God, as His own possession, whose proper Lord He is, and which is His treasure and wholly dedicated to Him.

Others explain it actively, i.e., Because you invoke, that is, publicly worship, celebrate, and proclaim the name of the Lord. This sense follows from the former: for they are called the Church of God because they worship and celebrate God. Properly, however, this phrase signifies the former sense, as is clear from Isaiah 4:1: "Seven women shall take hold of one man, saying: Only let your name be invoked upon us," i.e., We ask nothing else of you than that you be and be called our husband, and that we be and be called your wives — for the rest we will feed and clothe ourselves. And in Genesis 48:16, Jacob says of his grandsons Ephraim and Manasseh: "Let my name be invoked upon them," that is, let them be called my sons, and let them constitute two tribes in Israel, just as my other sons constitute theirs, as in fact Ephraim and Manasseh each constituted his own tribe and named and designated it from his own name, as is clear from verse 5 of the same passage.

Verse 13: 13. AND THE PLOUGHMAN SHALL OVERTAKE THE REAPER — i.e., So great will be the fertility of the crops...

13. AND THE PLOUGHMAN SHALL OVERTAKE THE REAPER — i.e., So great will be the fertility of the crops that the harvest will last until ploughing time, and the vintage until sowing time, and will occupy it: you will not have time enough for reaping the grain, but the time of the new sowing will press you to put your hand to the plough, and the abundance of grapes and wine will compel you to devote yourself to gathering grapes and pressing them in the winepress, even when the time of sowing presses upon you. Hear Ruffinus, who here concludes his commentary on the minor Prophets: "I will also make you rejoice in the abundance of crops, so that there will be things to gather throughout the whole year, and by the time of vintage an exceedingly rich harvest will proceed, and the sowing will follow the vintage; according to Psalm 65:12: You will bless the crown of the year of Your goodness." He calls "crown" that continuation of fruits throughout the whole year, which encircles and crowns the year on every side, and which continually occupies people in gathering and enjoying them. Note that these things are said typically and figuratively; for literally he means to say that there will be so great an abundance of spiritual goods in the time of the Gospel that we cannot contain or express them; so great will be the conversion of souls that they will allow no time of rest for the farmers, that is, the Apostles and priests, but these must continually cultivate this field of the Lord, namely the Church — now ploughing, now reaping, now harvesting, spiritually and mystically — that is, now teaching and admonishing, now baptizing, now reconciling, now consecrating to a more perfect state, etc. So St. Jerome, Rupert, Hugo, Lyra, Vatablus, Ribera, and others.

Hear St. Jerome: "So, he says, all things will follow one upon another, that no day will be without grain, wine, and joy. In that time the grape will be trodden in full wine-presses, and musts red with the blood of Christ and the martyrs will be poured out, and such a treader will be the seedbed of the word of God, so that their blood will cry out in the world more than the blood of Abel the just cried out. And whoever by the merit of his virtues has ascended to the mountains will sweat honey, indeed will drip the sweetness of the word of God, of which it is written: Taste and see how sweet the Lord is. And: How sweet are Your words to my palate, sweeter than honey and the honeycomb to my mouth! And those who are below the mountains, indeed second after the mountains (whom the Bridegroom leaps over, Song of Songs 2, and calls hills) will be planted, and will imitate the paradise of God, so that all the fruits of teachings may hang in them."

This very thing was clearly visible, and still is, in the Apostles and apostolic men, such as St. Paul, St. Vincent Ferrer, St. Anthony of Padua, St. Francis Xavier, and others, who by sowing the word of God with holiness, miracles, and efficacious preaching so stirred up both faithful and unfaithful peoples, that when the time of harvest came — that is, the time to graft them into the Church, namely to baptize, confirm, absolve them, etc. — other nearby nations and cities, hearing about these divine men and their virtue and fruit, vied with one another to court them and compel them to sow the word of salvation in like manner among themselves, and to come over to them immediately. The Jews, therefore, wrongly expect these things literally, as they sound, under their Messiah. And Theodoret also wrongly holds that these things were fully fulfilled literally in the return from the Babylonian captivity, since rather the opposite happened to the Jews at that time, namely a sterility of grain and wine, as is clear from Haggai 1:6. Add that the text treats of the Israelites here, not the Jews, as I showed at the beginning of the chapter. Finally, verse 15 does not apply to the Jews: "And I will plant them upon their own soil, and I will not pluck them out any more from their land": for the Jews were plucked from Judea by Titus, and will remain so until the end of the world, as Daniel predicted in chapter 9, the last verse.

THE MOUNTAINS SHALL DRIP WITH SWEETNESS (sweet juice, namely new wine: for this is what the Hebrew עסיס asis means); AND ALL THE HILLS SHALL BE CULTIVATED. — The Septuagint has: shall be planted, namely with vineyards and olive groves: for "Bacchus loves the hills." In Hebrew it is תתמוגגנה, they shall melt, that is, they shall overflow with the abundance of oil and wine, or of milk and honey, from the abundance of bees and flocks, so that, as Ruffinus says, wine seems to flow from the rocks and honey from the mountains. The mountains are the Apostles and apostolic men, who dripped the sweetest new wine of Evangelical doctrine, grace, charity, joy, and all the gifts of the Holy Spirit; the hills are the preachers, who poured forth the same new wine, or milk, that is, the sweetness of doctrine. Or the mountains are the great and universal Churches; the hills, the small and particular ones. Or the mountains are men eminent in rank or virtue; the hills are the small and common people, i.e., All, both small and great, will abound in Evangelical doctrine and grace. He alludes to the mountains luxuriant with vineyards and olive groves of old in Judea, as well as to the gardens in which the Syrians rejoiced and abounded. Syria, says Pliny, book 20, chapter 3, "is most industrious in gardens; hence also the Greek proverb: Many are the vegetables of the Syrians."

Verse 14: 14. AND I WILL BRING BACK THE CAPTIVITY — i.e., I will recall My people Israel, that is, the...

14. AND I WILL BRING BACK THE CAPTIVITY — i.e., I will recall My people Israel, that is, the faithful who believe in Christ, from the captivity of Shalmaneser, that is, of the devil and of sin, so that they may build cities, that is, Churches, in which they may plant vineyards and gardens, that is, assemblies of the faithful, and hearts of the pious sown with virtues and graces, which will yield fruits and wine of the most sweet and most holy works. For that these things must be understood mystically, not literally, is clear from the fact that Israel, that is, the ten tribes, never returned from the Assyrian captivity, nor will they return. It is therefore a continuous metaphor, drawn from those who return from captivity to their homeland. For they customarily build cities, plant vineyards and gardens.

Verse 15: 15. AND I WILL PLANT THEM UPON THEIR OWN SOIL — namely in the Church, which is founded upon the...

15. AND I WILL PLANT THEM UPON THEIR OWN SOIL — namely in the Church, which is founded upon the rock, and against which the gates of hell shall not prevail, Matthew 16:18. More fully this will take place in the Church Triumphant in heaven. So St. Jerome, Albert, Ribera, a Castro, and others. And this will happen because the Lord your God, who is omnipotent, "says" and promises it, "whose promise is a law of nature," says St. Jerome — that is, it is firm and inviolable, as is the law of nature.

Tropologically, the faithful and holy soul is the tabernacle of David, that is, the house and temple of Christ, according to 2 Corinthians 6:16: "You are the temple of the living God," in which the pavement is humility, the pantry is the fear of God's judgments, the roof is charity, the fireplace is prayer, and the four walls are the cardinal virtues: fortitude, justice, temperance, and prudence. If the roof leaks, that is, if charity is loosened or relaxed; if the fireplace, that is, prayer, collapses; if the pavement is broken, that is, humility uprooted; if the walls, that is, the cardinal virtues, develop cracks or ruins — immediately each of these must be repaired and restored, lest, as the breaches and ruins gradually increase, the whole house eventually collapse, according to Ecclesiastes 10:18: "Through laziness (through slow and lazy restoration of one board, one tile, one nail) the rafters will sink (collapse), and through the weakness of hands the house will leak."

Second, the holy soul is the vineyard of the Lord, on account of the many analogies which I reviewed in Ezekiel 15. So St. Bernard, sermon 63 on the Song of Songs: "For the wise man, he says, his life is a vineyard, his mind, his conscience. For the wise man will leave nothing uncultivated or abandoned in himself: the fool does not do so. In him you will find everything neglected, everything lying fallow, everything uncultivated and sordid." And further: "The just man is a good vineyard, whose virtue is the vine, whose action is the branch, whose wine is the testimony of conscience, whose tongue is the winepress of expression. You see that in the wise man nothing is idle: speech, thought, way of life, and whatever else comes from him — is not the whole thing God's agriculture, God's building, and the vineyard of the Lord of Sabaoth?"

What the vinedresser does in the vineyard, therefore, let the cultivator of the soul do in the soul. The vinedresser plants vines, mounds the soil around them, waters them, ties them, prunes them, hoes them, digs around them, strips the leaves, harvests the grapes, and presses them in the winepress to extract the wine. Let him who cultivates the vineyard of his own or another's soul do the same things mystically — as all the faithful ought to be. Hence Christ, Matthew 20:1, sent workers into His vineyard at every hour. And the bride, Song of Songs 1:5, says: "They made me keeper of the vineyards; my own vineyard I did not keep." The essence of the soul is, then, like a vineyard planted in the earth of this body, whose faculties — intellect, will, memory, etc. — are like vines, whose wine consists of works of charity and mercy: these vines must be tied to the stake of the cross, at whose foot we dig a hole when we think that death is at hand and meditate upon the grave. This vineyard must be guarded from the boar that devastates from the forest (Psalm 80:14), that is, from the vice of obscene pleasure, which exterminates all good; and from the singular wild beast, that is, from the vice of pride, which makes a man singular; and from the fox of crafty flattery, and from the wolf of voracity, and from the dog of detraction. Again, the Lord must be asked to send the rain of His teaching, and the warmth of His grace, and manure, that is, the memory of the death of His Son and of the holy Martyrs, by which this vineyard may be stirred up and enriched to bear fruit. Flowers and leaves are holy desires, pious conversations, and edifying words, by which the soul, like a vineyard, grows green again and produces tears of compunction and sends forth the sweet fragrance of virtue, according to Song of Songs 2:13: "The vines in blossom have given forth their fragrance," and at last yields and produces the ripest and sweetest grapes of good works and all virtues.

Moreover, it should be noted what St. Bernard writes in sermon 60 on the Song of Songs: "They say, he writes, that when the vines are in bloom, every poisonous reptile departs the place and cannot at all bear the fragrance of the new flowers. I wish our novices to notice this, and to act with confidence, considering what manner of spirit they have received, whose first fruits the demons cannot endure. If the fervor of a novice is such, what will complete perfection be?" And shortly after: "Moreover, if the flower of the soul's vineyard is the work, and its fragrance is reputation, what is the fruit? Martyrdom. And truly the fruit of the vine is the blood of the martyrs."

Third, the soul is a garden, indeed a paradise of the Lord, according to Song of Songs 4:12: "A garden enclosed is my sister, my bride. Your plants are a paradise of pomegranates with the fruits of apple trees, of henna with spikenard, etc. Arise, O north wind, and come, south wind, blow through my garden, and let its spices flow." And chapter 5:1: "Let my beloved come into his garden, and eat the fruit of his apple trees." And chapter 6:1: "My beloved has gone down to his garden, to the bed of spices, to feed in the gardens and to gather lilies." Sirach 24:42 says in the person of Wisdom: "I will water my garden of plantings, and drench the fruit of my meadow." Numbers 24:5, Balaam, seeing the hosts of Israel, exclaims: "How beautiful are your tents, O Jacob, your dwellings, O Israel! Like wooded valleys, like watered gardens by rivers, like tents which the Lord has pitched, like cedars beside the waters." What, therefore, the gardener does in the garden to cultivate it, let the faithful do in the soul: let him plant in it the spikenard of humility, the lilies of chastity, the pomegranates of charity, the heliotrope of resignation, by which one conforms one's will to the divine, the cedar of hope and contemplation, the oak of constancy, the hyacinth of heavenly thoughts and desires, the amaranth of the cross, the incense of prayer, the myrrh of mortification, the fragrant roses of good edification and example, the palm of contempt of the world, of human praise and blame, etc. Therefore, as often as you elicit or exercise an act, especially a heroic one, of humility, charity, mortification, resignation, etc., so often you offer to God an illustrious spikenard, a beautiful pomegranate, a notable myrrh, an excellent heliotrope, etc., and thereby you adorn the garden and paradise of God with a new plant, as it were, with a splendid flower and fruit, so that you may say to Him confidently with the bride: "At our gates are all manner of fruits: new and old, my beloved, I have kept for you" (Song of Songs 7:13).

THE END.