Cornelius a Lapide
Table of Contents
Synopsis of the Chapter
First, having shown his love toward the Corinthians, he proceeds to defend his apostleship against the false apostles, verse 1: that they bring no greater spirit or Christian doctrine than what Paul has handed down.
Second, verse 7: that they preach for gain, while Paul evangelized freely.
Third, verse 22: that just as they, he is a Hebrew, and more than they a minister of Christ. Whence he recounts the marks of his apostleship, namely his labors for Christ, persecutions, perils, blows, sufferings, anxieties and cares for all the Churches, and in these things he glories.
Vulgate Text: 2 Corinthians 11:1-33
1. Would to God you could bear with some little of my folly: but do bear with me. 2. For I am jealous of you with the jealousy of God. For I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ. 3. But I fear lest, as the serpent seduced Eve by his subtilty, so your minds should be corrupted, and fall from the simplicity that is in Christ. 4. For if he that cometh, preacheth another Christ, whom we have not preached; or if you receive another Spirit, whom you have not received; or another gospel which you have not received; you might well bear with him. 5. For I suppose that I have done nothing less than the great apostles. 6. For although I be rude in speech, yet not in knowledge; but in all things we have been made manifest to you. 7. Or did I commit a fault, humbling myself, that you might be exalted? Because I preached unto you the gospel of God freely? 8. I have taken from other churches, receiving wages of them for your ministry. 9. And, when I was present with you, and wanted, I was chargeable to no man: for that which was wanting to me, the brethren supplied who came from Macedonia; and in all things I have kept myself from being burdensome to you, and so I will keep myself. 10. The truth of Christ is in me, that this glorying shall not be broken off in me in the regions of Achaia. 11. Wherefore? Because I love you not? God knoweth it. 12. But what I do, that I will do, that I may cut off the occasion from them that desire occasion, that wherein they glory, they may be found even as we. 13. For such false apostles are deceitful workmen, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ. 14. And no wonder: for Satan himself transformeth himself into an angel of light. 15. Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers be transformed as the ministers of justice, whose end shall be according to their works. 16. I say again (let no man think me to be foolish, otherwise take me as one foolish, that I also may glory a little), 17. That which I speak, I speak not according to God, but as it were in foolishness, in this matter of glorying. 18. Seeing that many glory according to the flesh, I will glory also. 19. For you gladly suffer the foolish; whereas yourselves are wise. 20. For you suffer if a man bring you into bondage, if a man devour you, if a man take from you, if a man be lifted up, if a man strike you on the face. 21. I speak according to dishonour, as if we had been weak in this part. Wherein if any man dare (I speak foolishly), I dare also. 22. They are Hebrews: so am I. They are Israelites: so am I. They are the seed of Abraham: so am I. 23. They are the ministers of Christ (I speak as one less wise): I am more; in many more labours, in prisons more frequently, in stripes above measure, in deaths often. 24. Of the Jews five times did I receive forty stripes, save one. 25. Thrice was I beaten with rods, once I was stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I was in the depth of the sea. 26. In journeying often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils from my own nation, in perils from the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils from false brethren. 27. In labour and painfulness, in much watchings, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness. 28. Besides those things which are without: my daily instance, the solicitude for all the churches. 29. Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is scandalized, and I am not on fire? 30. If I must needs glory, I will glory of the things that concern my infirmity. 31. The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed for ever, knoweth that I lie not. 32. At Damascus, the governor of the nation under Aretas the king, guarded the city of the Damascenes, to apprehend me. 33. And through a window in a basket was I let down by the wall, and so escaped his hands.
Verse 1: Would That You Would Bear With Me a Little in My Foolishness
1. Would that you would bear with me a little in my foolishness, — that is, in my glorying, which seems to be foolishness; yet I employ it most wisely out of zeal, that I may defend my Gospel and the faith among you against the false apostles. So Anselm and Chrysostom. It is a forestalling: for being about to praise himself, he forestalls and excuses, lest he seem vain or ambitious. The Greek has, ὄφελον ἀνείχεσθέ μου μικρόν ἐν ἀφροσύνῃ, ἀλλὰ καὶ ἀνέχεσθέ μου, that is, would that you had borne with or tolerated me a little in my imprudence! nay, you do bear with me, or tolerate me; for ἀνέχεσθε here seems rather to be indicative than imperative. For he corrects what he had said: Would that you would bear with, or had borne with me: nay, he says, you do bear with me, and what I wish to be done, that very thing you do.
Paul here, beginning to praise himself, again and again draws back, and excuses himself three times. First, when he says: "Would that you would bear with me!" Second, when he calls himself foolish. Third, when he adds, "but bear with me, for I am jealous over you": and this in order to show how much force he must do himself when he descends to his own praises. "As," says Chrysostom, "a horse about to traverse some precipice or steep cliff gathers himself together, as though intending to leap over it in one bound; but looking down at the deep chasm he is stunned; then, the rider urging him, he attempts it again, and judging the necessity and force, he stands still for some time, until at last, having recovered his courage, he drives himself forward confidently of his own accord: so too Paul, as though about to plunge headlong in the recital of his own praises, draws back once, twice, and a third time, and at last drives himself to his own praises."
Verse 2: For I Am Jealous Over You With the Jealousy of God
2. For I am jealous over you with the jealousy of God. — Greek ζηλῶ, I am zealous, I am jealous toward you with the jealousy of God, as if to say: I do not endure rival false apostles, who court you with me as though you were a virgin. For Paul calls zeal a certain immense and excessive love: as if he were ambitious to be first in love and zeal among the Corinthians, and that no one be preferred to him in that regard. Hence Maldonatus in his manuscript Notes renders it, I am afflicted with jealousy.
Chrysostom notes that the emulation, that is the zeal, is called of God, as if to say: I do not court this bride for myself, but for Christ and for God; not for my own glory, advantages, or gains, but for Christ's I adorn all these things: for Christ is the bridegroom; I am only the conductor of the bridegroom and the bridesman.
For I have espoused you to one man, — ἡρμοσάμην, that is, I fitted you, as Augustine reads it, Book II On Genesis against the Manichees; Ambrose, I prepared; Theophylact, I glued together; for ἁρμόζειν is to apply and connect aptly and gracefully, for example, those things which are joined by glue or solder. So νοῦς can be rendered otherwise: first, I conciliated; second, I betrothed; third, I joined in matrimony. For these are the three duties of the bridesman and the matchmaker: first, to conciliate the virgin to that bridegroom to whom he is striving to give her in marriage; second, to take care that she be betrothed to him; third, to join her, once betrothed, in matrimony. Our [Vulgate] translates best, I betrothed, because there follows, that I may present, namely in matrimony, when the nuptials are celebrated, a chaste virgin, as if to say: I, as it were the bridesman of spiritual nuptials, by my preaching "have betrothed you to one man," namely Christ, and by betrothing have persuaded you "to be presented," that is, that you may present yourselves to Christ as a virgin bride. Or rather, as Anselm and Theophylact have it, through faith, baptism, and Christianity I have already betrothed you to Christ, that I myself may present you on the day of judgment as virgins, that is whole in faith, hope, and nuptial charity to the bridal chamber of the glory of Christ.
Chrysostom notes that in this life the espousals are conducted, but the bridal chamber in the next, when the Church the bride, that is all the elect, will be led in to the nuptials of the Lamb and to the eternal kingdom, Apoc. xxi, 2.
Note: the Church of the Corinthians, and any soul, is as it were a virgin and the bride of Christ the bridegroom, whose bridesman is Paul. Hence he transfers to himself the jealousy of Christ the bridegroom Himself, and does not allow the bride to be snatched from Christ, and to be handed over to false bridegrooms — false apostles and heretics — to be violated; for sincere Apostles and preachers are as it were the bridesmen of the Church and of Christ, John iii, 29. As, on the contrary, false heralds are the panders of Satan.
This is a passage about the betrothal of the virgin, that is the Church, and of every faithful soul — illustrious and of the greatest consolation, and excellently treated by most of the Fathers, and which even now often comes up and is treated in chairs and pulpits. So that it may be genuinely and fully understood, it must be explained here a little more fully. Hence note first: This betrothal is brought about through faith, hope, and the other virtues. For, as St. Augustine says, tract. 13 on John, tom. IX: "The virginity of the mind is whole faith, solid hope, sincere charity." On the contrary, a soul becomes a harlot and adulteress, when she consents to infidelity, sins, suggestions, and the will of the demon. "If therefore," says Origen, hom. 12 on Leviticus, chap. II, "you receive, O man, into the chamber of your soul the adulterer the devil, your soul has played the harlot with the devil. If a spirit of wrath, if of envy, if of pride, if of impurity, has entered into your soul, and you have received it, and consented to it speaking, and in your heart been delighted with the things it suggests to you according to its own mind, you have committed fornication with it."
Note second: This betrothal makes the goods of both spouses common, and so communicates to the bride the immense goods of Christ the bridegroom, namely to the Church and to every faithful soul. Hence since the bridegroom is king, He makes the bride-soul a queen, whether she be a maidservant, or worthless and poor. "Of whom," says Basil, Book On True Virginity, "it is said Ps. xliv: The queen stood at your right hand in golden vesture, surrounded with variety. Wherefore she who is now thought worthless in tattered clothing and servile attire, is found in the kingdom of heaven a queen, and a noble lady standing by the king. Let her therefore despise whatever appears to the eyes, and with bare mind let her be sated with the love of the bridegroom, making all her own powers handmaids of her own bridegroom; and in no part should the virgin be adulterous: not in tongue, not in ears, not in eye, not in any other sense at all, nay not even in thought; but let her keep her body as a kind of temple or bridal chamber prepared for the bridegroom: for no woman committing adultery is hidden from the gaze of Him concerning whom it is said in Psalm xciii: He who planted the ear, shall He not hear? or He who fashioned the eye, does He not consider?"
And Bernard, serm. 2 on the 1st Sunday after Epiphany, first describes the election, dignity and glory of this bride: "For the sake of that Ethiopian woman the Son of God came from afar, that He might betroth her to Himself. Moses indeed took an Ethiopian woman to wife, but he could not change her color: but Christ presented to Himself as a glorious Church her whom He loved when she was still ignoble and hideous, not having spot or wrinkle. Whence, O human soul, whence is this to you? whence so inestimable a glory, that you should merit to be the bride of Him into whom the angels desire to look? Whence is this to you, that He should be your bridegroom, whose beauty the sun and moon admire, at whose nod all things are changed?"
Second, he thus pursues the bride's obligation to giving of thanks and reciprocal love: "What will you render to the Lord for all the things He has rendered to you, that you should be a companion at His table, a companion of His kingdom, and a companion of His bridal chamber, that the king should bring you into His chamber? See with what arms of vicarious charity He must be loved in return and embraced — He who esteemed you so highly, indeed who made you of such great worth. Forsake carnal affections, unlearn worldly habits, forget hurtful customs: for what do you think? does not the angel of the Lord stand by, who would cut you in half, if perchance (may He Himself avert it) you should admit another lover?"
Third, he distinguishes the breakfast and the supper of these nuptials thus: "For already you are betrothed to Him, already the wedding-breakfast is celebrated; for the supper indeed is prepared in heaven, but there the wine will not fail: for there we shall be inebriated by the abundance of the house of God, and we shall drink of the torrent of His pleasure. There is prepared, indeed, for those nuptials a river of wine, wine, I say, which makes glad the heart, since the rush of the river makes glad the city of God."
Note third: From this betrothal and the soul's union with God most beautiful offspring are conceived and born, which Origen describes, homily 20 on Numbers, when he says: "When therefore the soul has approached her bridegroom, and hears His word, and embraces Him, without doubt she receives seed from Him, and as that one said: From fear of you, O Lord, I conceived in the womb and brought forth, and made the spirit of your salvation upon the earth: thence will be born noble offspring, thence will spring forth chastity, thence justice, thence patience, thence meekness and charity, and the venerable offspring of all virtues will succeed."
Then on the contrary he explains the conception and offspring which the soul conceives of the devil, saying: "But if the unhappy soul should forsake the holy nuptials of the divine Word, and give itself over into the adulterous embraces of the devil, it will without doubt generate sons even thence, but those of whom it is written: But the sons of adulterers shall be imperfect, and from an unjust bed seed shall be exterminated. All sins therefore are sons of adultery, and sons of fornication."
Note fourth: Although, as I said, this betrothal is brought about through any of the virtues, yet it is chiefly brought about through charity: for this draws with itself into God all the soul's powers and affections, and the more charity grows in a man, the more this union and betrothal of the soul with God grows, so that souls burning with charity, and assiduously exercising themselves in it, enjoy the nuptials with God and the divine nuptial goods and joys. For charity is the marriage, the conspiring and confirmation of two wills, the human, namely, and the divine, into one, by which God and man mutually agree and are conformed in all things. Hence arises the communication and familiarity of the soul with God, arises the rest and wonderful delight of the soul, and so great a fervor of divine love, that all the other affections of the soul are absorbed in it, and immersed in God. "Such conformity," says St. Bernard, serm. 38 on the Song, "weds the soul to the Word, since to Him to whom indeed she is like by nature, she nonetheless makes herself like by will, loving as she has been loved. Therefore if she loves perfectly, she has wed Him. What is more delightful than this conformity? what more desirable than charity? by which it comes about that, not content with human teaching, you yourself, O soul, confidently approaching the Word, cling constantly to the Word, familiarly inquire of the Word, and take counsel of Him about every matter, as bold in desire as you are capacious in understanding. Truly this is the contract of a spiritual and holy marriage. I have said too little — Contract; it is an embrace. An embrace clearly, where to will the same and to refuse the same makes one spirit out of two. Nor need it be feared that the disparity of persons make the agreement of wills limp, because love knows no reverence. Love is abundant in itself; love, when it has come, draws over to itself and captivates all other affections. Therefore she who loves, loves, and knows nothing else. They are bridegroom and bride. What other relation or connection do you seek between bridegroom and bride besides loving and being loved?"
If you should say that the soul's condition and love is far inferior and unequal to God, and consequently between God and the soul there cannot be friendship (for this is between equals), and much less marriage and betrothal, St. Bernard answers: "Plainly the lover and the love do not flow with equal abundance, the soul and the Word, the bride and the bridegroom, the Creator and the creature, no more than the thirsty man and the fountain. What then? Will the bride's vow on that account perish, and be wholly emptied — the desire of one sighing, the ardor of one loving, the confidence of one presuming — because she cannot run on equal terms with the giant, contend in sweetness with honey, in mildness with the lamb, in whiteness with the lily, in brightness with the sun, in charity with Him who is charity? No, for although the creature loves less, since she is less, yet if she loves with her whole self, nothing is lacking where the whole is. Therefore I said: To love thus is to have wed; unless anyone doubts that the soul is both first loved by the Word, and loved more. She is altogether preceded by being loved, and overcome. Happy she who has merited to be preceded by such a blessing of sweetness!"
Hence consequently fifth, this betrothal is most perfectly brought about through virginity, and the vows of chastity and Religion. So St. Augustine, tract. 9 on John: "Those who vow virginity to God," he says, "although they hold a fuller grade of honor and dignity in the Church, are not without nuptials: for they themselves also pertain to the nuptials with the whole Church, in which nuptials the bridegroom is Christ." And the reason is, because just as the bride hands over with herself to the husband all love and all her possessions, so the virgin and the Religious consecrates and hands over himself and all his own to Christ. Hence Religion is called and is the state of perfection, or of perfect charity. Second, just as the bride contracting matrimony with the bridegroom says: I take you as my own; so the Religious says: I vow to God poverty, chastity, obedience; by which he is so bound and tied to Christ, as a wife is obligated to her husband. Hence Tertullian, On the Veiling of Virgins, chap. xvi: "You have wed Christ," he says, "to Him you have handed over your flesh, to Him you have betrothed your maturity, walk according to the will of your bridegroom." For this reason St. Jerome, epist. 27, dared to call the mother of a virgin consecrated to God 'God's mother-in-law' — which Rufinus, an exceedingly critical man, wishing to carp at Jerome, among other things objected to him. As a sign of the nuptials a ring was given to virgins, by which they were as it were betrothed to Christ: "With the ring," says St. Agnes in Ambrose, serm. 90, "of faith He has pledged me." In addition to this the virgins were veiled (just as those who marry husbands are veiled), and that with solemn pomp by the priests, and only on certain days, as Gelasius teaches to the Bishops of Lucania, chap. xiv, and Optatus of Milevis, book VI: "Spiritual," he says, "is this kind of marriage: they had already come into the nuptials of the bridegroom by their will and profession, and to show that they had renounced secular nuptials, they had loosened their hair for the spiritual bridegroom, and had already celebrated heavenly nuptials." And Ambrose To the Fallen Virgin: "Moreover," he says, "she who has pledged herself to Christ, and has received the holy veil, has already wed, is already joined to an immortal husband; and now if she should wish to wed by the common law, she commits adultery, she is made the handmaid of death." Thus Cyprian, epist. 62, calls these same women brides of Christ. From all of which it is clear that the Church (whatever Marlorat may yelp here) rightly accommodates this passage of the Apostle to virgins, and reads it in the Mass for the epistle of the most holy virgins.
Let virgins weigh these things, and acknowledge their own dignity, that they may religiously cultivate and guard these nuptials, and be intent upon the one bridegroom Christ. "Hear," says Jerome to Eustochium, "daughter, and see, and incline your ear, and forget your people, and your father's house, and the king will desire your beauty. It is not enough for you to go out from your own land, unless you forget your people and your father's house, that, the flesh being despised, you may be joined to the embraces of the bridegroom. You will say: I have gone out from the house of my infancy, I have forgotten my father's house, I am born again in Christ. What reward do I receive for this? It follows: And the king will desire your beauty. This therefore is that great Sacrament: For this a man shall leave his father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife, and they shall be two; not now, as there, in one flesh, but in one spirit. Your bridegroom is not arrogant — He took an Ethiopian woman to wife: as soon as you have wished to hear the wisdom of the true Solomon, and have come to Him, He will confess to you all things that He knows, and the king will lead you into His chamber; and in a wonderful way, your color being changed, that saying applies to you: Who is this who comes up made white?" And below he compares the bride to the ark of the covenant, saying: "The bride of Christ is the ark of the testament, gilded within and without, guardian of the law of the Lord. Just as in that ark there was nothing else but the tables of the testament, so also in you let there be no external thought. The Lord wishes to sit upon this propitiatory as upon the Cherubim. The Lord wishes to free you from secular cares, that, leaving the chaff and bricks of Egypt, you may follow Moses into the wilderness, and enter the land of promise. When in a virginal heart the care of secular business seethes, immediately the veil of the temple is rent, the bridegroom rises in anger, and says: Your house shall be left to you desolate." And further on he describes the conversations of bridegroom and bride thus: "Once the burden of the world has been cast off, sit at the feet of the Lord, and say: I have found Him whom my soul loves, I held Him, nor will I let Him go. And He will reply: My dove is one, my perfect one. Let the secrets of your chamber always guard you, let the bridegroom always play with you within. You pray, you speak to the bridegroom; you read, He speaks to you. And when sleep has overcome you, He will come behind the wall, and being awakened you will say: I am wounded with love; and again you will hear from Him: A garden enclosed is my sister, my spouse."
To present a chaste virgin (St. Cyprian reads, to assign) to Christ. — Note what is wonderful in these nuptials. In the world, says Theophylact out of Chrysostom, brides do not remain virgins after the nuptials: but the brides of Christ — as though they had not been virgins before — become virgins after their nuptials with Christ, that is most pure in faith and whole and incorrupt in morals; so the whole Church is a virgin. "The virginity of the flesh is the body untouched; the virginity of the soul is incorrupt faith," says St. Augustine in Sentences, num. 79.
So that noble heroine and martyr under the tyrant Dunaan among the Homerites — when first she had betrothed her two daughters to God by virginity, secondly she betrothed and consecrated those same daughters to the same God by martyrdom together with herself. For when she saw them pierced through with the sword, and their blood handed to her by the tyrant, taking it, tasting it, and lifting it up to heaven: "To You," she said, "Christ Lord, I offer this my sacrifice, and to You I present as martyrs chaste virgins, who have come forth from my womb; with whom lead me also, numbered among them, into Your bridal chamber, and show a mother rejoicing on account of her daughters." Wherefore she also through martyrdom was joined to Christ. Baronius narrates the matter at length out of Procopius, tom. VII, in the year of Christ 522, p. 91.
So St. Paul converted to Christ at Iconium Thecla, a most noble virgin, called her away from marriage, and betrothed her to Christ. The witness is St. Gregory of Nyssa, hom. 4 on the Canticle: "Such myrrh," he says, "did Paul once pour out from his mouth, mixed with the pure lily of chastity, into the ears of the holy virgin. This was Thecla, who, with the drops flowing from the lily nobly into her soul, slew the external man with death, every desire being extinguished." And St. Epiphanius, heresy 78: "Thecla," he says, "fell in with St. Paul, and is loosed from her nuptials, although she had a bridegroom most beautiful, most rich, most noble and most illustrious." And St. Augustine, book XXX Against Faustus, chap. IV: "In her life," he says, "that Saint (Thecla) despised earthly things that she might become powerful in heavenly ones, and pledged to the bridal chamber, was kindled by Paul's eloquence to the love of perpetual virginity." Wherefore Thecla overcame fires, lions, bulls, and serpents; and on account of her virginity remained, in the midst of the flames, like asbestos, unharmed. So St. Paul armed Poppaea the concubine, and other virgins, against the allurements of Nero, that, having spurned his bridal chamber, they might consecrate themselves to Christ: wherefore, condemned by Nero to the sword, he obtained the laurels of virginity and martyrdom; and therefore from his severed neck, instead of red blood, white and virginal milk flowed forth.
Verse 3: But I Fear Lest Your Minds Be Corrupted From the Simplicity Which Is in Christ
3. But I fear lest (by the false apostles, as it were the violators of your virginity) your minds (νοήματα, your senses, your judgments) be corrupted, and fall away from the simplicity which is in Christ, — that is, from the native and genuine Christian doctrine, by corrupting through admixture of errors the simple truth of faith. So Anselm and Theophylact, as if to say: Beware of the false apostles as the panders of Satan, and as the adulterers of the genuine doctrine of Christ, and consequently of the Church and of your souls.
Verse 4: If He Preaches Another Christ, You Would Rightly Bear With Him
4. If he preaches another Christ, — that is, were preaching. There is an enallage: for the indicative is put for the subjunctive, as if to say: If the false apostles were preaching another doctrine more perfect about Christ, or of Christ, which I did not preach; as though my preaching did not suffice for salvation and the perfection of Christianity. It is a metonymy: for Christ is put for Christianity and its perfection. See Canon 37. He soon calls the same thing another Gospel: for otherwise he commands that one who brings a contrary gospel be not only not tolerated or heard, but also devoted to anathema, Galatians I, verse 8. Another Gospel therefore here he calls another clearer or more sublime explanation of the Gospel.
If you receive another spirit (as if to say: If you were receiving from those false apostles other gifts of the Holy Spirit which you did not receive through me), you would rightly bear with him. — He chides the haughtiness of the false apostles, who boasted of bringing something greater than Paul. So Theophylact, as if to say: Where is that other Spirit, those other gifts, of which they boast? Plainly they appear nowhere. I call you as witnesses, you who have received nothing else from them but windy words.
Verse 5: I Think I Have Done Nothing Less Than the Great Apostles
5. For I think I have done nothing less (Greek μηδὲν ὑστερηκέναι, to have been in no respect inferior, τῶν ὑπερλίαν ἀποστόλων, than those who are exceedingly excellent and outstanding apostles: which Our [Vulgate] renders) than the great Apostles, — that is, in comparison with the great, or, in the way the great Apostles do. Beza objects: if Paul is in no respect inferior to the eminent Apostles, therefore not to Peter either in power and authority; and consequently Peter is not the first of the Apostles and of the Church. I reply: In nothing, namely of the things said in the preceding verse, that is, in preaching Christ, in the bestowal of the Spirit, in the sincerity of the Gospel — particularly in labors and in the apostolic graces, I yield to no one, as he explains in verse 23. He is not therefore dealing with power and primacy: for thus he would arrogate that to himself. Which would be of the most vain ambition. Add: although by the great Apostles Chrysostom, Theophylact, Œcumenius understand Peter, James, John, and that seems more straightforward and truer; nevertheless most more recent commentators take it of the false apostles, who boasted of themselves as though great, so that it is irony.
Verse 6: Although Untrained in Speech, Yet Not in Knowledge
6. Untrained in speech, — namely in Greek, that is to say in the polished and verbose eloquence of the Greeks, such as that of Isocrates, Demosthenes, Lucian. Hence in Paul there are so many hyperbata, ellipses, even Greek solecisms. So Chrysostom, Theophylact, and Jerome, epist. 151, Question X to Algasia, where he says thus: "That which we have often said, that although untrained in speech, yet not in knowledge — that Paul by no means said this from humility but from the truth of conscience, even now we approve. For the tongue does not explain deep and hidden senses: and although he himself perceives what he is speaking, into the ears of others he cannot transfer more by speech." The same he asserts in the epistle to Hedibia, where he adds, that for this cause Paul kept Titus, learned in Greek, with him, just as Blessed Peter kept Mark. See what was said Epist. I, chap. II, verse 1 and 4. On the contrary St. Augustine, book IV On Christian Doctrine, chap. VII, thinks that Paul here calls himself untrained in speech not from his own opinion, but from that of his detractors: for there Augustine shows at length the eloquence of the Apostle, namely sinewy in art and matter, and having its own figures; which is also true: for the Apostle's rhetoric is not verbose but serious, efficacious, masculine, divine, so that the Apostle was untrained not so much in Rhetoric as in Grammar: for it is clear that the Apostle by his rhetoric moved all, struck them with the fear of God, and impelled them to faith, piety, mercy, and indeed wherever he wished, with marvelous artifice and force of speaking.
Excellently St. Augustine in the Sentences, num. 266: "It is the clear mark of good intellects," he says, "in the words of those discoursing to love truth, not words. For what does a golden key profit, if it cannot open what we wish? Or what does a wooden one hinder, if it can do this, when we seek nothing else but that what is closed should lie open?"
Verse 7: Or Did I Commit a Sin in Humbling Myself That You Might Be Exalted?
7. Or did I commit a sin? — The Greek ἢ signifies whether and or. Here you may better translate with the Syriac and others: did I commit a sin in humbling myself, casting myself down to tent-making and the labors of my hands, by which I might procure food for myself — humbly and meanly, sustaining myself at my own expense, that I might not be a burden to you, but rather exalt and honor you by this my humiliation? as if to say: This very thing which is for glory and beneficence, do you reproach me with? It is plain from what follows. So Anselm. It is irony, or rather sarcasm. For Paul reproaches the Corinthians to their face with their ingratitude, that, when he could have asked and received from them by his evangelizing the wages for sustenance, yet he did not do so, but wished to be sustained by other poorer Churches while acting and preaching at Corinth: yet these Corinthians made little of these benefits of Paul, and rather listened to the false apostles, Paul's rivals, who wiped out their purses.
Verse 8: I Despoiled Other Churches
8. I despoiled other Churches, — ἐσύλησα, I plundered, namely accepting from them wages and the supports of life, that I might serve you, and with means received from elsewhere, preach to you freely. He uses an intensification according to Canon 36, that he may sting the Corinthians more grievously, as if to say: See my continence and charity; I as it were despoiled even other poor Churches, that I might spare you and enrich you, and this lest you might think (as the rich and merchants, such as were the Corinthians, often think) that I am seeking not you but your goods, and that I might shut the mouth of the false apostles: acknowledge therefore me as your sincere and genuine Apostle.
Verse 9: I Was a Burden to No One
9. I was a burden to no one. — Greek κατενάρκησα οὐδενός; which verb is drawn from torpor and idleness; for the idle press upon others and weigh upon them by constantly entreating, which is to be a burden; for ναρκᾶν is to grow numb. Whence also νάρκη is the name of the torpedo-fish. Word for word you may render κατενάρκησα οὐδενός: I did not grow numb upon anyone, that is, by my torpor weigh upon anyone who would feed me, and to whom I would be a burden, but I labored strenuously with my hands: nor yet did I grow numb in preaching, but with equal diligence I spent myself for all and each, by teaching, admonishing, counseling, just as if nothing else — no necessity or care of sustaining life — had pressed upon me.
Verse 10: The Truth of Christ Is in Me
10. The truth of Christ is in me, — I speak in the truth of Christ, I attest the truth of Christ; through Christ I (Ambrose: under Christ's testimony) truly and holily affirm and swear, that I shall accept nothing from you for expense. So Theophylact.
This glorying (that I evangelized you freely) shall not be broken (Greek οὐ σφραγίσεται, that is, shall not be sealed, shall not be shut up) in me, — εἰς ἐμέ; Vatablus, against me, or rather concerning me, this of mine, namely my liberty and liberality, and consequently neither my mouth, but that I should glory about it. The metaphor is from springs and rivers, which cannot be shut up by an obstacle. So Chrysostom and Theophylact. Hence Maldonatus in his manuscript Notes renders it: no one will be able to obstruct my mouth, but that I may truly glory about this matter.
Second, and better according to the Hebrew idiom, the simple is put for the compound: σφραγίζω for ἀνασφραγίζω, or ἀποσφραγίζω, that is, I sign or seal, for I unseal, I take away the seal; which Our [Vulgate] renders 'I break.' For the Hebrews lack compounds, but express them through the simple, as if to say: I have determined by a firm decree that I shall accept nothing from you, and I have so fortified that resolve with the seal of my constancy and oath, that I shall never unseal this seal, nor break this my purpose, whatever poverty or necessity may press upon me.
Verse 11: God Knows
11. God knows, — whether I do not love you.
Verse 12: But What I Do, I Will Continue to Do
12. But what I do (ὃ δὲ ποιῶ, but what I do) and will continue to do (also from now on I will do, not because I do not love you, but) that I may cut off the occasion — of carping at me, that I bring nothing singular, nothing greater than others.
That wherein they glory, they may be found even as we. — They glory in their preaching that they are equal to me, although they are inferior; for I evangelize freely, while they evangelize for the sake of gain. It is plain from verse 21. So Anselm, Chrysostom and Theophylact.
Verse 13: Transforming Themselves Into Apostles of Christ
13. Transforming themselves into Apostles of Christ. — Hence it is plain that these detractors of Paul were not faithful Christians who labored only with vanity, or with envy of Paul, but were heretics: for he calls them "false apostles," and "ministers of Satan," verse 15.
Second, he notes their deceit, namely, that in order to impose upon the Christians, they assumed for themselves the figure, appearance, and name of Christ's Apostles, as if they were Christ's and heralds of Christian piety — just like our Calvinists, who deform and profane all sacred things, rites, Sacraments, temples, monasteries, priesthoods, altars, piety, the worship of God and religion, yet still wish to be considered and called reformers.
Verse 14: For Satan Himself Transforms Himself Into an Angel of Light
14. For Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light. — He says "of light": for good angels, being blessed, are accustomed to appear bright and glorious when they show themselves to men. Second, "of light," that is, of truth, justice, piety; these things Satan presents, these he promises to men, to whose eyes he visibly appears, or whose imagination he insinuates, displays, and impresses with his counsels, though he is in fact an angel of darkness, since he suggests nothing but sins, errors, and deceits. To detect him and recognize his frauds, there is no sounder counsel (as the Fathers, as holy men, and as experience itself teaches) than to disclose your thoughts and suggestions to a prudent, pious, learned man — especially a Superior or confessor — and to follow his judgment. But Satan, the light-shunner, who does not wish to be exposed, hates this, dissuades and forbids his own from doing it. Hence by neglect of this counsel many, even hermits, have been most gravely deceived by him. In the Lives of the Fathers many sorrowful examples of this exist: among others, that of the monk Hieron, whom the devil persuaded to throw himself headlong into a well, asserting that God on account of his merits would gloriously bring him out. Likewise, how foul, horrid, and abominable were the things the devil persuaded the Ophites, Archontites, Cainites, Circumcellions, and other heretics to do — see in St. Epiphanius, Irenaeus, and Augustine on their heresies.
Thus the demon, in the form of a good angel, attempted to deceive St. Abraham the hermit, as St. Ephrem testifies in his Life. For when he was singing psalms at midnight, a light like the sun shone in his cell, and a voice was heard saying: "Blessed are you, Abraham, and none is like you, who have fulfilled all my will." But the humble man, recognizing the devil's deceit, cried out: "Your darkness be with you unto perdition, O one full of deceit and falsehood. For I am a sinful man; but the name of my Lord Jesus Christ, whom I have loved and love, is a wall to me, in which I rebuke you, unclean dog." And immediately he vanished like smoke from his eyes.
In a similar way the demon, gleaming in splendor with fiery horses and as it were a fiery chariot, appeared beside the column on which St. Simeon Stylites stood, saying: "The Lord has sent me, His angel, to snatch you away as I snatched Elijah. Ascend therefore with me into the chariot, and let us go into the heavens: the holy Angels, Apostles, Martyrs, and Prophets, together with Mary the Mother of the Lord, long to see you." And when Simeon lifted his right foot to mount the chariot and made the sign of the cross, the demon at once disappeared. Antony, his disciple, attests this in his Life.
Another also, hearing from a demon, "I am Christ," closed his eyes, saying: "In this life I do not wish to see Christ, but in the other life." Hence the Fathers admonished, saying: "Even if an angel appears to you in truth, do not receive him easily, but humble yourself, saying: I am not worthy to see an angel, living in sins."
St. John, who foretold to the Emperor Theodosius victory against the tyrants, saw demons in the form of an army and a fiery chariot, saying: "In all things, O man, you have acted rightly; from now on adore me, and I will take you up like Elijah." To whom John replied: "I have my Lord and King, God, whom I always adore; you, however, are not my king." Immediately he vanished. Palladius is the witness in the Lausiac History, ch. XLVI.
To St. Pachomius the devil appeared in the form of Christ, saying: "Pachomius, I am Christ, and I come to you, My faithful friend." Pachomius, by divine inspiration, recognized the fraud, thinking within himself: "The coming of Christ is tranquil, but I am now disturbed and tossed about by various thoughts." So forming the sign of the cross and breathing upon him, he said: "Depart from me, devil, because you are accursed, and your vision, and the arts of your snares, nor have you any place among the servants of God." At once that one, leaving behind a stench, departed, saying: "I would have gained you, had not the lofty power of Christ hindered me; but as much as I can, I shall not cease to attack you." So Dionysius in the Life of Pachomius.
The devil deceived the monk Valens, frequently appearing to him as an angel. From this Valens swelled with pride, as one who consorted with angels. Finally the demon appeared to him pretending to be Christ, with a thousand angels holding lamps, and a fiery wheel; and one of them said to him: "Christ has loved your freedom and confidence in living, and has come to see you: go out, then, and adore Him." He went out and adored the devil instead of Christ: whence he became so unhinged in mind that, on entering the church, he said: "I have no need of communion: for I have seen Christ today." Therefore the Fathers bound him and cast him into iron fetters. Palladius is the witness, ch. XXXI.
Verse 16: Otherwise Receive Me as a Fool
16. Otherwise receive me as a fool. — As if to say: But if I cannot obtain anything else, receive me as a fool, only that it may be permitted me to boast a little; for, as Cato says, Do not praise yourself, nor blame yourself: Fools do this, whom empty glory torments. Note: He greatly softens his approach to show how unwillingly, and only when forced, he descends to his own praises. So Chrysostom.
Verse 17: What I Speak, I Speak Not According to God
17. What I speak, — what I propose and intend to speak, namely my own praises. See Canon 32. Not according to God — it will be so, if considered in itself; it will however be "according to God," if charity and necessity be considered, lest indeed, with me despised, you should glorify the false apostles. In this substance (in this subject, in this matter) of glory, — wherein I intend in what follows to glory concerning my labors.
Verse 18: Since Many Glory According to the Flesh, I Also Will Glory
18. Since many glory according to the flesh (in carnal and external things — for example, in nobility, riches, wisdom, circumcision, Hebrew parents — the false apostles glory: hence) I too (in the same things) will glory. — So Chrysostom. See what is said in chapter X, verse 2.
Verse 19: For You Gladly Bear With the Foolish, Since You Yourselves Are Wise
19. For you gladly bear with the foolish, since you yourselves are wise. — It is irony, as if to say: You have borne with those false apostles foolishly boasting and glorying; you will bear with me also, I hope, wisely and usefully glorying among the wise. Theophylact, however, and Anselm think this was said seriously, for emphasis and rebuke, as if to say: Since you are wise in Christ, you ought to drive out the foolishness of the false apostles; how then do you gladly bear with them?
Verse 20: For You Bear With It If Anyone Reduces You Into Servitude
20. For you bear with it if anyone reduces you into servitude. — He notes the insatiable arrogance, avarice, and tyranny of the false apostles, as if to say: You bear with the false apostles, who imperiously use you as slaves, who devour you (that is, extort your goods), who exalt themselves (that is, praise themselves and make much of themselves and their things and proclaim them widely), and who strike you in the face — not with blows, but with insults. Whence follows: "I speak according to ignobility," of which presently. There is therefore here a sharp rebuke, as if to say: They wring out your wealth, take away your freedom and honor, and on top of this load you with insults as if you were slaves; but I have conducted myself humbly, lived at my own expense, and wished to lay upon you the light yoke of Christ; and yet you prefer them to me, as though I were not noble enough, not powerful enough, not eloquent enough compared to those so imperious lords — nay, tyrants. Hence St. Bernard, Bk. I On Consideration, ch. III: "You bear with it, if anyone reduces you into servitude. It is not," he says, "good patience, when you can be free, to allow yourself to be made a slave. I do not wish you to dissemble the servitude into which day by day, while you do not notice, you are certainly being reduced. It is a sign of a dulled heart not to feel one's own continual vexation. Vexation gives understanding to the hearer, but only if it be not excessive: for if it be, it gives not understanding but contempt."
Verse 21: I Speak According to Ignobility
21. I speak according to ignobility, — κατ' ἀτιμίαν λέγω: which you should properly render: I speak as regards ignominy and insult; for the Greeks so use κατά. These words are to be referred to what precedes, as if to say: When I say that the false apostles strike you in the face, I do not speak simply, but as regards the ignominy and insults that they hurl at you and reproach you with to your face — which is no lesser injury than if they were striking you with blows like slaves. Note: By "ignobility" Our author means ignominy, insult: for this the Greek ἀτιμία signifies. Others explain it thus, as if he said: To your ignominy and insult I have said and do say this concerning their tyranny and avarice, that you may be ashamed — you who despise me, your legitimate Apostle, so modest, in preference to those bastards and tyrants. So Chrysostom. But then he would have said not κατά, that is according to, but πρὸς ἀτιμίαν, that is, to ignominy. Hence Maldonatus, in his manuscript Notes, renders κατ' ἀτιμίαν λέγω thus: I speak ignominiously of myself, as if I had reduced you into servitude, as if I had devoured, as if I had received — that is, despoiled — etc. For what he had said in verse 20 about himself, he had said in the person of his adversaries, who accused St. Paul of being such. So he.
As though we were weak in this regard. — He refers this to "you bear with," etc., as if to say: You bear with the strong, daring, threatening, and imperious false apostles; but me you do not bear with, but despise as if weak, faint-hearted, and timid, as though I could not have acted more imperiously than I did. This is a mycterism, that is, an ironic mockery as if with the nose drawn up, such as that of the one who said: "Truly a noble praise and ample spoils you bring back," as if Paul were saying: I certainly could have used the same license and command toward you that the false apostles used; but I did not wish to, out of humility, modesty, and exceptional charity. So Chrysostom.
In whatever anyone dares (supply: to glory), in foolishness (that is, as a fool, or foolishly) I say, I also dare — namely to glory. For the Hebrews thus express adverbs by a noun and preposition, as they say: in justice, that is, justly; in holiness, that is, holily.
Verse 22: They Are Hebrews, and I Am Too
22. They are Hebrews, and I am too. — Note: "Hebrews" are so called either from the root עבר abar, that is, "he crossed over," because, originating from Chaldea, they crossed the Euphrates to dwell in Palestine — as if to say, "Trans-river-people," as we say "transmarine" or "transalpine." Hence first Abraham, after crossing the Euphrates, in Gen. XIV:13, is called a Hebrew, where the Septuagint and Aquila render it περάτην, that is, "crosser"; St. Augustine, in Question XXXIX on Genesis, renders it "trans-fluvial"; so also Chrysostom, Origen, and Theodoret on this passage. Or surely the Hebrews were so named because they were descendants of Heber, the great-great-grandfather of Abraham, who in the confusion of tongues at Babel, Gen. X:21 and XI:1ff., alone with his family retained, along with the true faith, religion, and piety, the primitive Hebrew language. Wrongly, therefore, do some think the Hebrews are so called as if from Abraham. So St. Augustine once thought, in Book I On the Agreement of the Gospels, ch. XIV, but he retracts this in Book II of the Retractations, XIV. The sense therefore is, as the Apostle says: These false apostles glory in their noble stock, namely that they are Hebrews, descendants of Heber, of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and tenacious followers of the holy ancestral religion and calling of those fathers, as also of their language: but I too am a Hebrew, and an Abrahamite by lineage, by speech, by faith, by religion.
Verse 23: They Are Ministers of Christ; I Am More So
23. They are Christ's ministers. — He says this by way of concession: granted that they call themselves Christ's ministers — I too am one, indeed more than they. As speaking with less wisdom. — That is, as though foolish, as I said in verse 21; Chrysostom's interpreter renders: I speak as one delirious.
In most abundant labors, — ἐν κόποις περισσοτέρως, in abundant labors, that is, more numerous than those of the false apostles. Let prelates and teachers note this example of Paul, that they may win authority among their own not by external pomp, but, with Paul, by labors and a holy life. So the Fourth Council of Carthage exhorts and decrees, ch. XV: "Let a bishop," it says, "have plain furniture, a poor table and food, and let him seek the authority of his dignity by faith and by the merits of his life."
St. Bernard, citing this passage in Book II On Consideration to Pope Eugenius, ch. VI, exclaims: "O illustrious ministry! What is more glorious than this principate? If one must glory, the form of the Saints is set before you, the glory of the Apostles is held out. Does it seem small to you? Who will grant me to become like one in the glory of the Saints? The Apostle cries: Far be it from me to glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. Acknowledge your inheritance (O Pope Eugenius) in Christ's cross, in most abundant labors. Happy the man who could say: I labored more than all. It is glory, but in it there is nothing empty, nothing soft, nothing supine. If labor frightens, let the reward invite. Though he labored more than all, yet he did not work the whole, and there is still room; go out into the field of your Lord, and consider diligently how it is today overrun with thorns and thistles from the old curse. Go out, I say, into the world: for the field is the world, and it is entrusted to you. Go out into it not as a lord, but as a steward, to see and provide for that of which you must give account."
In stripes beyond measure, — ὑπερβαλλόντως, excessively, beyond what can be said or believed.
In deaths, — in dangers of death, where my companions or others were either struck down or slaughtered by robbers or by seditious mobs: you have something similar in chapter I, verse 10, and 1 Cor. XV:31.
Verse 24: From the Jews Five Times I Received Forty Lashes Less One
24. From the Jews five times I received forty lashes less one. — The Lord had commanded in Deut. XXV:3 that the number of stripes should not exceed forty; in order to satisfy this command more surely and fully, the Jews inflicted not 40 but one less, that is, 39 on the guilty. So the Talmudists.
Verse 25: Thrice I Suffered Shipwreck; I Was in the Deep of the Sea
25. Thrice I suffered shipwreck, — ἐναυάγησα, I was shipwrecked, I suffered shipwreck. I was in the deep of the sea. — In Greek ἐν βυθῷ, "in the deep," which is said both of a well and a prison, and of the sea. Hence first, some, says Theophylact, understand it of a well which from its depth was named Bythus, in which they hand down that Paul hid after he had escaped the danger at Lystra, Acts XIV:18. Second, Baronius, in the year of Christ 58, following Bede and Theodoret, by "the deep" understands the deepest and foulest of all prisons, the Cyzicene, into which Paul was thrown — like that famous prison at Athens called the Barathrum, and the Roman one called the Tullianum. Third, our author renders better: "in the deep of the sea"; for he is explaining the hardships of shipwreck — namely, that having been shipwrecked, νυχθήμερον, he says, ἐν βυθῷ πεποίηκα, "a night and day I have spent in the deep," as if to say: I was tossed by so terrible a tempest that I seemed to be day and night beneath the deep of the sea, says Maldonatus in his manuscript Notes. Or: after shipwreck, not on a ship or plank, but swimming in the deep — that is, on the high and mid sea — I spent a day and night tossed by the waves. So Theophylact, Ambrose, St. Thomas. Indeed Anselm here teaches that Paul spent a day and night beneath the waters in the deep — that is, on the bed of the sea — and by miracle was not suffocated by the waters, not devoured by fish, but, brought alive thence by God like another Jonah, was led to shore: and this, Haymo says, is the tradition of the holy Fathers.
Note: Concerning the scourging and the shipwreck up to this point — that is, up to the time when Paul wrote this — nothing is found in the Acts of the Apostles: for the shipwreck at Melita, Acts XXVII, happened long afterward, when Paul was sent in chains to Rome; we find only one scourging, Acts XVI; and likewise only one stoning, at Lystra, Acts XIV. Many things therefore Luke passes over in silence in the Acts.
Verse 26: In Perils From My Kin
26. In perils from my kin, — from my nation. He means the snares that the Jews themselves often laid. So Anselm.
Verse 27: In Labor and Affliction
27. In labor, — ἐν κόπῳ, in weariness. In affliction, — καὶ μόχθῳ; Ambrose and Vatablus, in trouble. "Aerumna," says Cicero, is "laborious sickness," as when someone wearied is forced to take up new labors instead of rest. Whence the calamitous are called μοχθηροί. Behold in what things the Apostle glories — namely those things over which now many, not only Christians, but even clergy and ministers of the Church should blush, as Blessed Bernard greatly bewails in his declamation on the text: "Behold, we have left all things." Whither have we gone? whither has the Apostolic spirit gone? whither Christian simplicity? whither the humility, labors, passions, and zeal of the primitive Church? The Apostles, the Princes of Christ, the chief men of the Church, do not triumph in palaces, in carriages, in silken robes, in a throng of nobles, servants, soldiers, horses, and hunting dogs, in banquets and symposia, in rich benefices, in a soft, delicate, and splendid life: but they exult and glory in hunger, in thirst, in labor and affliction, in cold and nakedness, in perpetual journeying to barbarous nations, in persecution, in preaching, in cudgeling, scourging, stoning, in death, in martyrdom, in fatigues by night and day; they become all things to all, they spurn no one; they are fathers of the poor and afflicted; they teach, evangelize, console barbarians, the rude, and the destitute; they beg alms. This was the calling of the Apostles; this was the dignity of the Princes of the Church, in which Paul thus glories; this was the spirit of the first ministers and the first Christians of the Church: nor even now (praise be to God) has it grown cold in our age. Our age has had and has its Borromeos, Piuses, Xaviers, Meneses, Gasparses, Hosiuses.
Therefore let it not shame you, O Bishop, O Provost, O Doctor, O Pastor, to imitate these — by their example to approach the poor, visit hospitals and prisons, hear the confessions of country folk, counsel the wretched, instruct the simple and rude, become all things to all, zealously seek the salvation of all. In these things let it not weary you to labor, to be fatigued, to sweat even unto death; for this cause let it please and delight you to endure mockery, even blows: these very things Christ did and suffered, Paul did, the Apostles did. In these consisted their virtue, holiness, apostolate. On that final and decisive day of the world, when that Prince of Pastors and Teacher of teachers will sit as judge to examine the deeds of each, and to pronounce on each the sentence either of most blessed or of most wretched eternity, He will not ask you how many benefices, how much wealth, how many servants, how much knowledge you had; but how you used them, how many you converted by them, how many poor you fed and gave drink, how many you visited in prison; how much you propagated My Gospel, faith, and glory; how many labors and dangers for it, how many mockeries and persecutions, how much hunger or cold, how many afflictions you bore for it. May God grant that, while we have time, we may think on these things, do these things, that we may rouse up in ourselves and all ours the primitive spirit of the Church and the Apostles; may follow Christ as our leader, the Apostles as our princes; may set on fire with kindled charity and zeal the world growing old and cold; that with the Apostles we may one day hear: "Amen, I say to you, that you who have followed Me, in the regeneration, when the Son of Man shall sit on the seat of His majesty, you also shall sit upon twelve seats, judging the twelve tribes of Israel."
See Chrysostom praising these sufferings, victories, and spirits of Paul in his moral homilies 25 and 26, where among other things: "Paul," he says, "the wrestler of the world and boxer, contends and conquers in every kind of struggle: this is the Apostolic character; by these struggles the Gospel is woven; and as a flame of inextinguishable fire, if dropped into the sea, is submerged on all sides by the waves and again rises shining: so St. Paul, pressed on every side yet not crushed, knowing not to yield, returns ever brighter — a victor by suffering, a martyr a thousand times over."
The same Chrysostom, in homily 2 On the Praise of St. Paul, at the end of vol. III: "Paul," he says, "by the abundance of his devotion, in some measure did not feel the pains undertaken for virtue; nay, he counted virtue itself as the reward: daily he rose higher, daily more ardent; rejoicing in every assault he carried off the victory; struck with blows and injuries he triumphed; longing for death rather than life, for poverty rather than wealth; desiring labor far more than others desire rest; he reckoned cities, nations, provinces, powers as cheap as sand; he esteemed nothing here as hard, nothing even as sweet; he reckoned tyrants as so many gnats; he thought death, tortures, a thousand torments to be like the play of children, provided he might endure something for Christ's sake; he was a diamond, nay, harder and stronger than diamond; as if winged he flew about the whole world teaching, and as one bodiless he despised all labors and dangers, and as one already possessing heaven he utterly despised all earthly things." So far Chrysostom.
Verse 28: Besides Those Things Which Are From Without, My Daily Instancy
28. Besides those things which are from without, my daily instancy. — "Instancy," that is, the mass of business pressing in upon me, surrounding me and weighing on me. This is clear from what follows: for the Greek ἐπισύστασις, on Budaeus's testimony, signifies to muster a troop, to stir up a faction — for example, when the populace gathers in a body and rushes against the nobles and magistrates. Hence the Apostle here calls by ἐπισύστασις the manifold cares which, as if in a mustered band, rushed at him from all sides and almost overwhelmed him — and that not once, but constantly. Hence Augustine on Psalm XCVIII reads "the daily attack upon me," namely of the solicitude of all the Churches; and Ambrose says: "the pressing care of all the Churches." Chrysostom, Theophylact, and the Syriac explain otherwise, as if to say: A factious conspiracy against me, seditions, tumults, disturbances, sieges of peoples, plots of cities are stirred up against me from all sides; for this also, as I said, the Greek ἐπισύστασις and ἐπισυσταί signify. But these things he has already sufficiently recounted in verse 26, in his many perils on every side. Therefore the former sense is better. Whence in explanation he adds: "the solicitude of all the Churches." Beautifully Anselm and Theophylact: "Paul teaches everywhere, but also suffers so many things: he bears his own afflictions, and at the same time tolerates and consoles the infirmities of others: he bears the infirmities of individuals, and at the same time is solicitous for the common salvation and for the whole world."
Excellently does St. Chrysostom here, in homily 18, teach by his own example that nothing is sweeter than this solicitude, care, zeal, labor, and grief of the good Pastor for the Church. "For even a mother," he says, "grieving with grief for her son, finds delight; anxious, she rejoices: for though care be bitter in itself, yet when expended for one's children it has much pleasure." Great and heavenly men long to be driven by perpetual labors and cares, and like the heart or the sky to be always in motion, and — as Vespasian said, on Suetonius's testimony — to "die standing." Wherefore Pacatus, in his Panegyric of Theodosius: "The divine things," he says, "rejoice in perpetual motion, and eternity invigorates itself by ceaseless agitation; and whatever we men call labor is your nature; as the untiring whirl turns the heavens, as the seas are restless with their tides, and the sun knows not how to stand still: so you, O Emperor, are ever exercised by continual affairs returning, as it were, in their own orbit."
Verse 29: Who Is Weak, and I Am Not Weak?
29. Who is weak (suffers, is afflicted), and I am not weak (do not suffer, am not afflicted)? Who is scandalized, and I am not burned. — In Greek πυροῦμαι, that is, as Theophylact says, I take fire, am set ablaze, burn — both with grief, as if the evil that befalls one's neighbor when he is scandalized were my own; and with zeal, that I may care for him and remove the scandal. Hence St. Gregory, in homily 12 on Ezekiel, on the passage in chapter IV, "Take to yourself an iron pan," thinks that by the pan is signified the spirit of Ezekiel, who, beholding the overthrow of Jerusalem, was as it were fried in a pan through compassion, and that he is admonished of this by God, when he is commanded to set a pan between himself and the city; and that such was Paul when he said: "Who is scandalized and I am not burned?" "Paul," says Gregory, "had made his very heart, which he had set on fire with zeal for souls, into a pan, in which he burned with love for the virtues against the vices," and was fried by compassion for the miseries of his neighbors.
Verse 30: I Will Glory of the Things That Belong to My Weakness
30. The things which belong to my weakness (that is, concerning the afflictions, scourgings, persecutions, and sufferings undertaken for Christ), I will glory, — on account of which I seem weak, that is, abject, afflicted, feeble, and contemptible. So Chrysostom. Note: Paul glories not in his miracles but in his weaknesses, because in these the power and efficacy of God's grace shines forth. Second, because by these he surpassed the false apostles. Third, because these are signs of true virtue and of an Apostle.
Verse 32: The Governor of the Nation of Aretas
32. The governor of the nation of Aretas. — In Greek ἐθνάρχης Ἀρέτα, satrap of King Aretas. He was the father-in-law of Herod, says Theophylact. For Herod Antipas, who killed John the Baptist, had taken the daughter of Aretas to wife, on Josephus's testimony.
Verse 33: Through a Window I Was Let Down in a Basket
33. Through a window I was let down in a basket. — Note: This flight of Paul through a basket happened at Damascus, Acts IX:25, in the year of Christ 39; for then Aretas, king of Arabia and lord of the neighboring city of Damascus, says Josephus, made war on Herod, because Herod had repudiated Aretas's daughter in order to marry Herodias. In this war Herod was defeated; therefore having been struck down by Aretas, he stirred up Tiberius Caesar against him, who sent Vitellius, governor of Syria, to capture or kill Aretas, on Josephus's testimony, Bk. XVIII of the Antiquities, ch. VII. The Jews, hostile to Paul, taking this occasion, seem to have accused him before the prefect of Aretas, that under the appearance and pretext of the Gospel he was stirring up disturbances, and turning citizens from paganism — and consequently from Aretas — and that he would betray Damascus to the Jews and Vitellius. Hence the fearful and credulous prefect sought Paul: he, warned, slipped away, let down through a window in a basket. So Baronius, vol. I, p. 304, and others.