Cornelius a Lapide
Table of Contents
Synopsis of the Chapter
First, in this chapter he chiefly takes up the argument of the epistle, namely, that he may refute the Judaizers and the Simonian heretics, and teach against them that true righteousness and salvation are to be sought and expected not from the law of Moses, but from Christ incarnate and crucified. He taught the same in the epistle to the Romans and to the Galatians.
Then secondly, in verse 7, he says that he counts the legal observances, and all the rest, as losses for the sake of Christ, indeed as dung.
Third, in verse 12, he teaches that he is not perfect, but tends toward the perfection of Christianity.
Fourth, in verse 18, he assails the enemies of the cross of Christ, whose God is the belly: But our conversation, he says, is in heaven, etc.
Vulgate Text: Philippians 3:1-21
1. As for the rest, my brethren, rejoice in the Lord. To write the same things to you, to me indeed is not irksome, but to you it is necessary. 2. Beware of dogs, beware of evil workers, beware of the concision. 3. For we are the circumcision, who serve God in the spirit and glory in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh: 4. though I might also have confidence in the flesh. If any other man thinketh that he hath whereof he might trust in the flesh, I more. 5. Circumcised the eighth day, of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of the Hebrews, according to the law a Pharisee, 6. according to zeal persecuting the Church of God, according to the justice that is in the law, conversing without blame. 7. But the things that were gain to me, the same I have counted loss for Christ. 8. Furthermore I count all things to be but loss for the excellent knowledge of Jesus Christ my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but as dung, that I may gain Christ, 9. and may be found in Him, not having my justice, which is of the law, but that which is of the faith of Christ Jesus: which is of God, justice in faith, 10. that I may know Him and the virtue of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings: being made conformable to His death. 11. If by any means I may attain to the resurrection which is from the dead. 12. Not as though I had already attained, or were already perfect: but I follow after, if I may by any means apprehend that wherein I am also apprehended by Christ Jesus. 13. Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended. But one thing I do: forgetting the things that are behind, and stretching forth myself to those that are before, 14. I press toward the mark, to the prize of the supernal vocation of God in Christ Jesus. 15. Let us therefore as many as are perfect, be thus minded: and if in anything you be otherwise minded, this also God will reveal to you. 16. Nevertheless whereunto we are come, that we be of the same mind: and that we continue in the same rule. 17. Be ye followers of me, brethren, and observe them who walk so as you have our model. 18. For many walk, of whom I have told you often (and now tell you weeping) that they are enemies of the cross of Christ: 19. whose end is destruction: whose God is the belly: and whose glory is in their shame; who mind earthly things. 20. But our conversation is in heaven, from whence also we look for the Saviour, our Lord Jesus Christ, 21. who will reform the body of our lowliness, configured to the body of His glory, according to the operation by which He is able also to subject all things to Himself.
Verse 1: As for the Rest, My Brethren, Rejoice in the Lord
As for the rest (τὸ λοιπόν, that is, what remains; the Syriac translates: therefore), my brethren, rejoice in the Lord, — as if to say: You were anxious and sorrowful about my chains and about the illness of Epaphroditus your teacher; now you receive both him healthy, and I have informed you in chapter 1 that my chains have been a joy to me, an honor to the Gospel, and a salvation to many; therefore it remains that, having wiped away all sadness, you should rejoice, but "in the Lord" Christ, who imparts all this consolation and grace to you, and who so propagates and exalts His Christian faith, religion, and Church, both at Rome and among you.
To write the same things to you is not irksome to me, — that is, as Vatablus has it, it does not weary me, and the Syriac, it is not tedious to me, or burdensome, to write the same things to you and impress them so often: for the charity with which I embrace you absorbs all this weariness, shakes off all sluggishness, and makes me diligent and assiduous in teaching and admonishing you.
But for you it is necessary. — Greek ὑμῖν δὲ ἀσφαλὲς, that is, but for you it is safe, as if to say: That I write the same things so often, I do so that I may strengthen you and make you safer, more cautious, and more vigilant, lest you fall into any error or sin. Our [translator] together with Ambrose seems to have read for ἀσφαλὲς the word ἀναγκὲς placed for ἐπαναγκὲς, that is, necessary.
Verse 2: Beware of Dogs, Beware of Evil Workers, Beware of the Concision
Beware of dogs, — as if to say: Observe, and as the Syriac has it, beware of the impudent and wicked Judaizers and heretics, who bark at us and bite us, as it were dogs. Note the catachresis: to see here is the same as to beware. Thus in Col. 2:8: "See," that is, by seeing beware, "lest any man cheat you by philosophy." Note secondly, here the cynical or canine character of heretics, which Blessed Thomas More, Chancellor of England, experienced in our age: "The heretics," he says, "have now laid aside their first hypocrisy, but have substituted impudence; so that those who before pretended religion now glory in impiety." Hence flowed that phrase by which we commonly compare heretics to dogs, saying: "oh, it is such a people as a dog."
Beware of evil workers, — beware of and flee the false apostles, who mix and corrupt Christianity with Judaism, says Chrysostom.
Beware (be on guard against) the concision. — Note first: He calls circumcision "concision," as will be clear from the following verse, and this so as to lower it and teach that it is to be lightly esteemed by Christians, as if to say: Circumcision once so precious is now after Christ only a concision: "For," says Chrysostom, "they (the Jews who circumcise themselves) now do nothing other than cut up the flesh; for since what they do is not legitimate, it is nothing other than a cutting and concision of the flesh." Chrysostom adds that those things are said to be cut up (concidi) which are cut rashly and idly, and apart from skill; but those things are circumcised which, with the superfluous cut away, are refined. Again, by concision or circumcision he means the circumcised and those who circumcise, namely the Jewish pseudo-apostles. So Chrysostom, the Syriac, Theodoret; for the abstract is put for the concrete, according to Canon 21.
Secondly, he calls "concision" the very heresy of Simon, Basilides, Cerinthus, "who," as St. Ignatius says in his epistle to these same Philippians, "circumcise and mutilate the birth of the Virgin, namely dividing Jesus from Christ" (the man from God), and saying that the Blessed Virgin is the mother of Jesus, not of Christ, and that Christ did not truly suffer, but only by an image, or by opinion and only in appearance, or that Christ did not suffer, but only Jesus, concerning whom verse 18.
Thirdly, as Chrysostom has it, he calls "concision" the schism and tearing of religion and the Church, which these false teachers were making; for he alludes to the dogs whom he just named in this verse 2, as if to say: These false teachers, like rabid dogs, cut up and lacerate the Church, and from her and from Christ are themselves cut off, says Anselm, and they cut off others.
Fourthly, he alludes to the "concision" of these same men, that is, perdition and eternal death, which they bring upon themselves by the aforementioned concision and circumcision. For the Greek κατατομὴ signifies both concision and slaughter.
Verse 3: We Are the Circumcision, Who Serve God in the Spirit and Glory in Christ Jesus
3. We are the circumcision, who serve God in the spirit, and glory in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh, — as if to say: I rightly said that carnal circumcision and the circumcised Judaizers, who wish likewise to circumcise you, must be guarded against: for this carnal circumcision is not true circumcision, but only a concision of the flesh, as I called it in the preceding verse; for true circumcision is among us Christians, who are "the circumcision," that is, circumcised (according to Canon 21) in spirit, who, cutting away and excising both carnal desires and Jewish ceremonies, serve God in spirit, which alone is true and God-pleasing circumcision. So Theodoret and others. Thus in Rom. 2:28 he said: "For he is not a Jew, who is so outwardly; nor is that circumcision, which is outwardly in the flesh: but he is a Jew that is one inwardly: and the circumcision of the heart, in the spirit, not in the letter, whose praise is not of men, but of God."
We serve God in spirit. — There is here a threefold reading, as St. Augustine indicates in book I On the Trinity, chapter 6. First, "We who serve in the Spirit of God." Second, "We who serve the Spirit of God." Ambrose tenaciously holds this in book II On the Holy Spirit, chapter 6, in order to prove that the Holy Spirit is God and is to be worshiped with latria.
The third and true and genuine reading is, "We who serve God in spirit:" for he opposes the "serving God in spirit" to what follows, "trusting in the flesh and serving God [thereby]." Therefore the "in spirit" signifies not the person who is worshiped and whom one serves, but the manner in which He is worshiped. Hence Chrysostom interprets τὸ πνεύματι, that is in spirit, as πνευματικῶς, that is, spiritually; and Theophylact, πνευματικῶς καὶ διὰ νοῦς, that is, spiritually and with the mind. Hence also the Syriac translates: we who worship God in spirit. So also Vatablus, Erasmus, and others everywhere, as if to say: We Christians are truly circumcised, who religiously serve God with spiritual faith, hope, and charity (for in Greek it is λατρεύοντες, as if to say: worshiping God with latria); "and we glory in Christ Jesus," as our Messiah, Saviour, and Redeemer, not in Moses, now obliterated and abolished, "and have no confidence in the flesh," that is, we have, according to Canon 29.
Note: He calls "flesh" external and fleshly things, namely circumcision of the flesh, nobility, knowledge of the law, Pharisaism: for so he explains himself in verse 5. So Chrysostom, Theophylact, Anselm.
Verse 4: Though I Might Have Confidence in the Flesh. If Any Other Man Thinks He Has Whereof to Trust in the Flesh, I More
4. Though I might have (be able to have, Sonnes, in the potential mood) confidence in the flesh. If any other man thinketh he hath whereof to trust in the flesh, I more. — He calls "confidence" presumption and the boasting that follows from it, and "to trust" he calls to presume and to glory; for it is a catachresis or metalepsis. Hence in the preceding verse he opposed "glorying in Christ" to that which is "having confidence in the flesh," that is, glorying.
Secondly, what he means by "flesh" he explains in the next verse, as if to say: If I wished, I, just like the Jews, could glory in carnal circumcision, nobility, knowledge, etc.; therefore there is no reason for the Jews to suppose that I detract from these out of zeal and envy, as if I were inferior to them; but let them know that I do this out of zeal for truth, faith, and salvation, in order that I may transfer all from the flesh to the spirit, and teach both Jews and Gentiles to worship God in spirit and in truth.
Verse 5: Circumcised the Eighth Day, of the Stock of Israel, of the Tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of the Hebrews, According to the Law a Pharisee
5. Circumcised the eighth day. — In Greek: περιτομῇ ὀκταήμερος, that is, the circumcision of the eighth day. "Circumcision," that is, circumcised; as elsewhere he calls those uncircumcised the foreskin, namely the Gentiles (according to Canon 21). Note: He not only says he was circumcised, but adds that this was done on the eighth day, in order to signify that he was a Jew, not a newcomer or proselyte (for these were converted to Judaism as adults and were circumcised), but a natural one; for as soon as he was born of Jewish parents, according to the law he was circumcised on the eighth day, and so he himself became a Jew. Again, he says, lest you say I was born of Jews, but of proselytes, I add that I was born "of the stock of Israel," that is, of the lineage of the patriarch Jacob, who by another name was called Israel, as if to say: I am an Israelite by stock and lineage. Thirdly, lest you object that I was born of the ten tribes which made a schism from the Jews, I add that I was born "of the tribe of Benjamin," which was the strongest, and gave the first king Saul to all Israel, and which in the schism faithfully and constantly adhered to the tribe of Judah and to the temple and kingdom of God. So St. Augustine, sermon 15 On the Words of the Apostles. Finally, in order to express in a word the nobility and antiquity of this people and stock of mine, add that I am "a Hebrew of the Hebrews" by origin; namely, descended from those first most praised and most ancient Hebrews, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob. See what is said at II Cor. 11:22.
According to the law (that is, the sect of the law), I was a Pharisee. (Or, as Maldonatus has it in his manuscript notes, as if to say: As for what concerns the law, understand, I was so observant of it that I was even a Pharisee: for the Pharisees were among all the Jews the most observant of the law.)
Pharisee. — Note: There were three principal sects of the Jews in the time of Christ and Paul: namely the Pharisees, the Essenes, and the Sadducees; for there were several others less celebrated, namely the Dositheans (although these were not so much Jews as schismatic Samaritans), the Hemerobaptists, the Herodians, the Nazarenes, and others.
First, the Essenes professed a holier life, but were divided from the rest by schism. Hence neither did they sacrifice in the temple, because they said they used holier ceremonies.
Second, the Sadducees said there is no resurrection of the dead, nor angel, nor spirit, all of which the Pharisees confessed and taught, Acts 23:8.
Third, the Dositheans abstained from animate things, and so superstitiously kept the sabbath that, in whatever posture each of them was found on the sabbath day, in the same he would remain until evening. Synesius, an eyewitness, in his letter to Euoptius narrates an amusing example of this matter concerning his ship's captain.
Fourth, the Hemerobaptists were so called because they baptized themselves daily, supposing forsooth that a man could not live purely unless he were immersed in water every single day, and so by immersion be washed and sanctified.
Fifth, the Nazarenes rejected the Pentateuch and the sacrifices of the Jews, and abstained from animate things, as unclean.
Sixth, the Herodians said that Herod the Ascalonite was the Christ, because under him and through him, a foreigner, namely an Idumean, designated and declared king of the Jews, the scepter had failed from Judah and the leader from his thigh, which was the sign and indication of the coming of the Messiah, according to the prophecy of Jacob, Gen. 49.
Seventh, the Pharisees surpassed all in knowledge of the law and in life and morals. Hence Acts 26:5, Paul says: "According to the most certain (in Greek ἀκριβεστάτην, that is, most exact; the Syriac translates: the chief discipline) sect of our religion I lived a Pharisee." Hence the Scribes and Pharisees in the time of Christ were the highest doctors of the law; they opposed Christ. This sect therefore, which taught the immortality of the soul and rewards for the good and punishments for the wicked after this life, was more learned, purer, truer than the others, yet not so much that it did not have its own errors as well: for, as Josephus, who was himself a Pharisee, teaches in book 18 of the Antiquities, chapter 2, and book 2, chapter 7, the Pharisees attributed everything to fate, and asserted μετεμψύχωσιν, that is, the transmigration of souls, if they had been good, into other and other bodies, from the doctrine of Pythagoras. Hence arose that opinion of theirs by which they thought Christ to be Elijah, others Jeremiah, others John the Baptist, or some other one of the Prophets, Matt. 16:14, because, namely, they thought the soul of Elijah, of Jeremiah, of John the Baptist, or of another Prophet had transmigrated into Christ.
From this knowledge and interpretation of the law they were called Pharisees, from the root פרש paras, that is to expound, explain, teach; or rather, as Epiphanius in book I of the Panarion, chapter 16, and others have it, from the same root paras, insofar as it signifies to divide and separate, because the Pharisees were separated from the other Jews by doctrine, religion, and morals, and excelled them all. As therefore the most learned of the Gentiles were called Philosophers, so the most learned of the Jews were called Pharisees, as if to say: Set forth and separated on account of eminent knowledge and sanctity. For the life of the Pharisees was especially rigid in the novitiate, and outwardly holy, and for many years they cultivated continence and virginity, abstaining from pleasures, living frugally, devoted to vigils and prayers, fasting on the sabbath and on the second and fifth weekdays; so that among the Jews the Pharisees were what among Christians the Religious are; they also had clothing proper to their profession, having hyacinth fringes (which perpetually admonished them of the law to be observed and of the heavenly life, according to the precept of the Lord, Deut. 22:12) longer than those of the other Jews, and on the borders of these they tied thorns, says Jerome on Matt. 23, that by the prickings of these they might display their crucified feet as a sign of the austerity of their life and of their strict memory and observance of the law.
Furthermore they bound the law written on parchments on the forehead, or placed it around the head in the manner of a crown: thus indeed they declared the profession of Pharisaism, so that no one might touch them, as though sanctified, says Epiphanius, book I, chapter 15. Again, they were given to many and daily purifications. From all these things, so great was their authority with the people, says Josephus, book 13, chapter 18, that even if they spoke against the king or the high priest, the common people still gave them credit, and, as the same says in book 13, chapter 8, according to their responses were performed those things which pertained to divine worship and solemn prayers. About this sect therefore the Apostle could glory equally with others. Indeed in Acts 23:6, having become a Christian and an Apostle, he glories that he is still even now a Pharisee, namely as to the profession of the immortality of the soul and other dogmas and morals consistent with Christian life.
Verse 6: According to Zeal, Persecuting the Church of God, According to the Justice Which Is in the Law, Conversing Without Blame
6. According to zeal, persecuting the Church of God, according to the justice which is in the law, conversing without blame. — Note: In the preceding verse he commended himself to the Judaizers from his stock and people, that he was a Jew; here he commends himself from his own zeal and deeds in Judaism. First then he commends himself here, that he was of the Pharisee sect, whose sect was held to be the most noble. Secondly, lest you suppose that he was cold and lukewarm in it, he says he was a zealot of it, and out of zeal and emulation for it persecuted the Church of Christ. "I was not," he says, "a sluggish Jew: whatever seemed adverse to my law, I bore impatiently, I pursued sharply. This is nobility among the Jews, but humility is sought before Christ. Therefore there [he is] that Saul, here Paul," says St. Augustine, sermon 13 On the Words of the Apostles. Thirdly, lest you blame his life as inconsistent with the sect and zeal, he adds: "According to the justice which is in the law," that is, according to the justice of the law; that he had conversed without blame, that is, he had kept every right and precept which the law prescribed, so that in nothing could he be blamed or reprehended as a transgressor of any precept, nor could anyone complain about him, but all proclaimed him to be in the observance of the law a just and religious man.
Verse 7: But What Things Were Gain to Me, the Same I Have Counted Loss for Christ
7. But what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ, — as if to say: These excellences of the flesh which I have just recounted, and which once when I was a Jew I held in such high regard, gathered, and stored away, as a merchant is wont to hold his profits and rare wares in regard, to gather and store them, namely that I am circumcised, that I am of the stock of Israel, that I am of the tribe of Benjamin, that I am a Pharisee, that I am a zealot of the law, that I daily strive for righteousness from observance of the law: all these prerogatives of the flesh, I say, that is, of carnal Judaism, after I came to know the truth and dignity of the Gospel of Christ, I now hold, before Christ and for Christ's sake, as of no price; nay, as losses, namely impediments to truth and to the salvation to be received from Christ. So Anselm and others.
Verse 8: Furthermore I Count All Things to Be Loss for the Excellent Knowledge of Jesus Christ My Lord
8. Nevertheless I count all things to be loss for the excellent knowledge of Jesus Christ my Lord, and I count them as dung, that I may gain Christ. — Note, the "all things" looks back to the preceding, namely to all the excellences of the flesh, that is, of Judaism, which I recounted in verse 7. Secondly, and more worthily and more in keeping with Paul's mind, not only the "all" goods of Judaism, but "all" altogether, that is, all things, namely eloquence, riches, pleasures, glory, favors, and whatever else this world loves and admires, I count to be losses and harms for Christ and for the sake of Christ, indeed as dung; for to this height the lofty soul of Paul rises, and this the Greek ἀλλὰ μενοῦνγε signifies, that is, "nay rather" (for which our [Vulgate] has "nevertheless"), which is the part of one correcting, or rather amplifying, as if to say: I said too little, when I said all the gains of Judaism and the legal observances of the Jews, that I count them as losses for Christ's sake. I say further: I despise all the goods of the world, all earthly things for Christ's sake, I count them as loss, indeed I scorn and abhor them as dung defiling me. So Chrysostom and Theophylact.
And I count them as dung. — Greek σκύβαλα. Which first signifies excrement and harder dung, as if to say: The legal observances now, like dung, contaminate and pollute their observers, says Anselm, and so also do all the things of the world deface them. Secondly, Chrysostom, Theodoret, Theophylact translate σκύβαλα as the rejected parts of grain, or chaff, as if to say: Such is the law, after it has presented Christ to us as it were grain threshed out, namely empty, superfluous, to be rejected. Such likewise are all earthly goods. Thirdly, σκύβαλα are properly said to be those things which from the intestines of oxen, sheep, or cattle are thrown to the dogs, ἀπὸ τοῦ τοῖς κυσὶ βάλλεσθαι, because they are thrown and cast aside to dogs by way of contempt. He alludes to the Judaizers, whom in verse 2 he called dogs, as if to say: They are dogs, let them devour their σκύβαλα, their canine refuse, that is, let them enjoy their legal and Jewish ceremonies. At the same time however he calls all other earthly goods σκύβαλα, as I said, which ought to be the delight of the brute and voracious dogs, not of men, not of Christians, who enjoy the delights of Christ and of Christianity. To these therefore all beauty, honor, riches, and pleasures are dung. Wherefore St. Jerome, in instructing the monk Paulinus, says: "Let the food be cheap and taken in the evening, herbs and pulses: he who desires Christ and feeds on that bread does not greatly inquire from how precious foods he makes his dung."
That I may gain Christ (the grace of Christ, righteousness, friendship, virtues and gifts, and at last glory). — See how all earthly things are losses, and Christ alone is gain, as Chrysostom teaches in moral homilies 10 and 11, where among other things he says: "For this reason monies are called χρήματα, not so that they may be displayed as if before goldsmiths, but that we may work something good with them:" for χρῆμα is said παρὰ τὸ χρῆσθαι, from using, because monies have been invented in order that we may use them for mutual commerce and mutual help. And further below, how all things are to be turned to the service of Christ and virtue, and so become not losses but gains, he teaches thus: "He made an eye; show that eye to be used by Him, not by the devil. But how will you show it to Him? If, having seen His creatures, you glorify Him, and turn your sight away from gazing at women. He made hands for you; possess them for Him, not for the devil: not for rapine and avarice, but for God's own commandments and benefits, and for continual prayers, and for relieving those in want by stretching them out and extending them. He made ears for you; show them to Him, not to lascivious concerts, obscene tales; but let your every meditation be in the law of the Most High. He made you a mouth; let it do nothing of those things which are not approved by Him, but sing psalmodies, hymns, and spiritual odes. He made you feet, not to run to evil, but to those things which are good. He made you a belly, not that you might burst it with foods, but that you might philosophize. He gave clothing, that we may be covered, not for ostentation; not that the clothing should have much gold while Christ goes naked and perishes. He gave a house, monies, and fruits, not that you should have them alone, but that you may share with others, especially the needy."
My Lord. — Note the delights of Paul's love for Christ: Christ, he says, is the Lord of all of us, but properly mine, who called me — stubborn and rebellious — to Himself with immense charity, indeed compelled me, who made me not only His servant but also His Apostle, who established me as the teacher of the Gentiles with such great grace, so many miracles, such great fruit and efficacy; He is mine, who gave Himself for me especially, who shared all His own with me, so that I may rightly say: My Lord and my God, my love and my all; for before You I count as nothing knowledge, Pharisaism, fame, glory, nobility, riches, pleasures; I esteem them losses and dung; because You are to me true glory, true nobility, knowledge, delights, honor, life, salvation, and all things.
For whom I have suffered the loss of all things, — that is, as Vatablus, the Syriac, and others have it, for whose sake I counted all things as losses, for whom all things appeared harmful to me. Secondly and rather: for whose sake I made the loss of all things: for this is the Greek διʼ ὃν τὰ πάντα ἐζημιώθην, because forsooth I stripped myself of all things, abandoned and despised all things, esteeming all as losses, indeed as dung.
For the excellent knowledge of Jesus Christ, — διὰ τὸ ὑπερέχον τῆς γνώσεως, that is, through the eminence of the knowledge or science of Jesus Christ, as if to say: Because I see, perceive, and experience that the faith and teaching of the Gospel is so glorious, eminent, and sublime (for this he calls "knowledge"), hence I count as nothing all the knowledge that I drew from Gamaliel, the law, and the Pharisees, indeed all other things and any matters whatever.
He touches here on a twofold cause why Paul reckoned all things, even the righteousness of the law, and so the very circumcision and the Old Law (says St. Chrysostom, Theophylact, and Œcumenius), although otherwise good in itself, to be losses to him, indeed as dung. The first is the excellence of the Gospel and of Christianity, which is so great that all the rest, even the Old Law, compared to it appears to be nothing but trifles and filth, so that, if you should have to choose one or the other, namely Judaism or Christianity, you would suffer a vast loss if you chose Judaism over Christianity: just as if to a peasant who had found a huge diamond a jeweler should offer the same weight in lead, the peasant would be a fool and would suffer a huge loss if he chose and accepted lead in place of the diamond, says Chrysostom. The second cause is that the rest, especially circumcision and the legal observances, although once good, now after Christ are impediments to Christianity, and consequently to grace and salvation: for if a Jew wishes to become a Christian, it is necessary that he say farewell to the legal observances; for they have been abolished, indeed are now opposed to Christianity: therefore if a Jew adheres to his legal observances, he makes himself a vast loss, because he deprives himself of the greatest good, namely Christianity; nay, by this very fact, that he is and remains a Jew, he is an enemy of Christ and of Christianity. Both these causes are alleged by Chrysostom, Theophylact, and Œcumenius.
Verse 9: And May Be Found in Him, Not Having My Own Justice, Which Is of the Law, but That Which Is of the Faith of Christ Jesus
9. And may be found in Him, not having my own justice, which is of the law, but that which is of the faith of Christ Jesus. — "May be found," that is, may exist, and may be in Christ, that is, in the faith, grace, and Church of Christ. Thus it is said of the evil angels in Apoc. 12:8: "Neither was their place found any more in heaven," that is, they were cast down from heaven, so that they might no more be in heaven, nor could be found there. It is a catachresis.
Not having my own justice. — "My own," that is, acquired by my own natural powers, by my own labors, says St. Chrysostom.
Which is of the law. — That is, the legal one, which is acquired from observance of the law without the spirit of faith and the grace of Christ.
But that which is of the faith of Christ. — That is, but that I may have righteousness, which is freely acquired through the faith of Christ.
Which is of God, justice. — That is, which is divine justice, flowing from God, so that God may make and have us just, and that we may be truly just before Him; not however human, which is from the law: for this only makes us just before men politically, so that men may proclaim us just when they see us zealous in the observance of the law. See Augustine, sermon 5 On the Words of the Apostle, vol. 10, where he treats this passage.
Verse 10: That I May Know Him, and the Virtue of His Resurrection, and the Fellowship of His Sufferings, Being Made Conformable to His Death
10. That I may know Him, and the virtue of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings. — Paul desires to know three things, not so much speculatively as practically. First, "Him," namely Christ, and the grace, justice, and redemption of Christ, or that Christ is the Messiah Redeemer, who justifies and saves us.
Second, "the virtue of His resurrection," in Greek δύναμιν, that is, the power, not by which Christ rose, but by which through His resurrection, as now the conqueror and triumpher over death, He will cause us to rise. He desires to know this both through faith and rather through experience, namely that he may be raised from the dead by the power of Christ, and rise with Christ in glory among the Saints.
Third, "the fellowship of His sufferings," in Greek παθημάτων, that is, of His sufferings, afflictions, that he may namely acknowledge and taste how sweet, holy, meritorious, and excellent it is to suffer and be afflicted with Christ and for the sake of Christ, and to have Him as a companion both in punishment and in cause, so that, as Christ suffered such great things for truth, faith, justice, the Church, and the salvation of souls, so we too may suffer for the same.
Being made conformable to His death, — συμμορφούμενος is a present participle, as if to say: While I am being made conformable to Christ dying, through mortification both of my own and that brought upon me by those who persecute me. So Anselm, as if to say: I do not give myself to delights, I do not lead an idle and delicate life, but I take upon myself and express in myself the labors and passions of Christ, I assimilate and configure myself to them, I rejoice and exult in them, and I desire to know and feel of how great consolation, dignity, grace, and merit it is to have fellowship with Christ in suffering, so that through suffering I may merit to rise with Him to glory.
Verse 11: If by Any Means I May Attain to the Resurrection Which Is From the Dead
11. If by any means I may attain (to Christ and the Saints rising) to the resurrection (so that I may rise in the common resurrection of all), which is from the dead. — He calls the resurrection of the good in Greek ἐξανάστασιν, as if a rousing-up from death to glory; of others however ἀνάστασιν, that is, raising and resurrection simply. Note here first, against the special faith of the Novatians, the uncertainty of grace and perseverance; for the conjunction "if" signifies this, which is the mark of one doubting: for if Paul doubts of it, who would not doubt? For he could not doubt of the blessed resurrection, except because he doubted whether he would die in grace or not. Hence the same Paul, in I Cor. 10:12, says Chrysostom, says: "He who thinks he stands, let him take heed lest he fall." Secondly, hence it is clear that resurrection and beatitude are not obtained from faith alone, but from good works, labors, sufferings. So Chrysostom. Thirdly, hence it seems more probable that Paul had not had his election and salvation revealed to him; and indeed that cannot be proved from any passage of Paul. The reasons however which some bring forward to establish it are weak, and only certain moral congruities; nay, the Apostle himself in I Cor. 9:27 says: "I chastise my body, lest, etc., I become a reprobate."
Verse 12: Not as Though I Had Already Attained, or Were Already Perfect: but I Follow After, if I May by Any Means Apprehend
12. Not as though I had already attained, or were already perfect. — For "I had attained," in Greek it is ἔλαβον, that is, as the Syriac and Vatablus have it, I had apprehended, or rather I had grasped, the compound of which the Apostle adds shortly: εἰ καὶ καταλάβω, if I may comprehend, as if to say: These things which I have said about the contempt of all things, by which for Christ's sake I count all things as dung, about the righteousness which is from God by faith in Christ, about the knowledge of the virtue, the resurrection and the fellowship of the suffering of Christ, and especially what I said: Being made conformable to His death — I did not say with the intention as though I think I have already apprehended this contempt, this summit of Christian righteousness, this perfect knowledge of Christ's resurrection and passion; nor did I say assertively that I am configured to the death of Christ, but conditionally and inchoately, namely that I desire and hope for the aforesaid knowledge of the resurrection and passion of Christ through configuration to His death, that is, when I shall be conformed and configured to the dying Christ, which configuration, although I have already begun, yet I am still far from its perfection, much still remains for me to labor, that I may perfect in myself the image of Christ crucified, and perfectly express and depict it. So Œcumenius and others.
Note that the Apostle says these things out of zeal for humility. Ambrose and Chrysostom add that he says these things not so much for his own sake as for the Philippians, who attributed too much to themselves, as if they had already attained the perfection of Christianity. As if to say: O Philippians, my disciples, do not be high-minded; do not think you have apprehended the summit either of knowledge and doctrine or of righteousness and Christian life. Behold, I, who am yours both as master and Apostle, who for so many years have so eagerly pursued this perfection, confess and affirm that I have not yet apprehended this perfection, that I am still pursuing it by running, and doubt whether at last I shall apprehend it with all my running and effort. See therefore how far you, recently converted and scarcely disciples, are from it.
Note: This is the temptation and persuasion of beginners, that, when they have begun to serve God, they soon think themselves perfect, partly because they see they have left others, who serve the world and sin, far behind them, and partly because they do not yet have a clear view of their own vices, nor of the summit of the virtues.
I follow after, if by any means I may apprehend, in which also I have been apprehended by Christ Jesus. — For "follow," the Greek has διώκω, that is, "I pursue," whose force Chrysostom and Theophylact explain: "Still," he says, "my life is full of contests; I am still far from the goal, still distant from the prizes; I am still running and pursuing. Indeed, he did not say 'I run,' but 'I pursue'; you know with what striving one who pursues runs; he looks at no one, hurls aside with great force whoever hinders him; he gathers his mind, eye, strength, spirit and body into one, intent on nothing else but the prize alone."
"To follow" therefore here is the same as "to pursue," as when we follow fleeing things which we very much desire to seize. Thus Virgil says in Eclogue II:
The fierce lioness pursues the wolf, the wolf himself the she-goat,
The wanton she-goat pursues the flowering cytisus,
You, Corydon, O Alexis: each is drawn by his own pleasure.
For where Theocritus, whom Virgil is wont to follow in his Eclogues, had said διώκει, that is, "pursues," Virgil said "follows."
Thus that Abbot, in Lives of the Fathers, book V, chap. vii On Patience, num. 35, when asked how a Religious ought not to be scandalized when he sees some turning back to the world, but rather progress toward the perfection of Religious life, replied: "He should consider the hounds that hunt hares; and just as one of them, seeing the hare, gives chase, while the others, seeing only the hound running, run with him for a while, but afterwards, growing tired, turn back; he alone who saw the hare follows on until he catches it, neither held back by the example of those turning back, nor by precipices, nor by woods, nor by brambles, but is pricked by thorns and does not rest until he catches it. So also the monk, or whoever seeks the Lord Jesus, fixes his gaze unceasingly on the cross, passing by all scandals which present themselves, until he reaches the Crucified."
I shall apprehend — I shall lay hold of the perfection of knowledge and life of Christ already mentioned. He is therefore speaking of apprehension in this life, not in the future life in heaven, lest anyone infer from this that the blessed in heaven apprehend the divine essence by their vision — which, though visible, is nevertheless incomprehensible.
In which I have also been apprehended. — First, St. Thomas explains it thus, as if to say: Just as I have been perfectly apprehended by Christ's foreknowledge and cognition, so I strive in turn to apprehend Christ Himself — that is, to know Christ perfectly, just as Christ Himself perfectly knows me and apprehends me by His knowledge.
Secondly (Œcumenius), "in which," that is "unto which I have been apprehended" by God, that is, called and chosen, namely that I might run to the perfection of Christianity and apprehend it. Hence Vatablus and Erasmus explain it thus: "if by any means I may attain to that to which Christ has chosen me, and bidden me to contend in this stadium." This sense is fitting, but does not sufficiently explain the force of the word "apprehended" or "laid hold of."
Hence thirdly, more simply and plainly, Chrysostom, Ambrose, and Vatablus, as if to say: When in the heat of persecution I was going to Damascus to seize and bind Christians, I was apprehended by Christ on the way, when Christ laid His hand on me, threw me down, struck me with blindness, subjected my body and soul to Himself, and compelled me to say: Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do? And Christ did all these things to this end, that I in turn should strive to apprehend both Him and the perfection of Christianity. Hence Chrysostom secondly notes that the word "apprehended" signifies Paul's turning away and flight, namely that God apprehended him as one turned away and fleeing from Him, and drew him back to Himself.
Note thirdly the enallage of the preposition "in which," that is, "unto which I have been apprehended by Christ," namely to this end, that I in turn may strive to apprehend Him. Yet Chrysostom takes the Greek ἐφ' ᾧ, which our version renders "in which," causally for "inasmuch as": namely, Christ so prevented me with His love that He apprehended me when I was turned away, fleeing, indeed an enemy, and drew me to Himself; hence, that I may be grateful and respond to His love, with all my effort and zeal I run and pursue, to apprehend Him, His life, His virtues, and His perfection.
Let penitents and converts note this example of Paul, and consider and weigh this benefit of God, by which He pursued them, given over to sins and filth, turned away from Him and fleeing from Him, apprehended them, drew them back to Himself, and led them back into the way of grace and salvation; and with Paul and Magdalene and the bride wandering in the Song of Songs, let them recognize the Bridegroom who so loves them, and seek Him through the streets and squares, let them pursue Him, and let them say: "I sought Him whom my soul loves; I held Him, and will not let Him go," etc.; that they may now love Him as much as they previously hated Him, pursue Him as much as they fled, serve Him as much as they offended Him, and propagate His honor and glory as much as by their sins and scandals they obscured it and dishonored God. And so we see this happens with great sinners when, touched by God, they are seriously converted. "Let us run," they say in Climacus, step 5, "let us run, brethren, let us run; for there is need of running, and of vehement running, since we have fallen from our seemly and excellent assembly; let us run, and let us not spare this our filthy and worthless flesh, but let us slay it, as it first slew us." And this is a sign of true conversion and penitence. Hence St. Gregory: "Often," he says, "a life ardent with love after a fault is more pleasing to God than an innocence torpid in security."
Verse 13: Brethren, I Do Not Count Myself to Have Apprehended; but One Thing I Do: Forgetting the Things Behind, and Stretching Forth Myself to Those Before
13. I do not consider myself to have apprehended. — Hence Chrysostom, in homily 3 On the Incomprehensible Nature of God, charges Eunomius with rash error for saying that he had comprehended God in this life. For, as St. Augustine rightly says in his Sentences, num. 102: "In this life, which is wholly a temptation, even in the most sublime Saints there is not apprehended that perfection beyond which there remains no ascent." And num. 103: "While the course of the present life is run, however much one may advance — whose outer man is corrupted, the inner renewed — yet, as long as he is subject to the condition of death, he must necessarily endure the labors of old age."
Note: There is here a continuous metaphor taken from the stadium-runners who contend by running in the stadium, as the Syriac rightly has it. The runner is Paul and every Christian; the stadium is the Christian life; the goal is its perfection; the prize is the heavenly crown which Christ the umpire of the contest will give. The Apostle uses a similar metaphor in 1 Corinthians 9: "Every man," he says, "that strives for the mastery is temperate in all things; and they indeed that they may receive a corruptible crown, but we an incorruptible," etc.
But one thing, — supply, is necessary, says Anselm. Secondly and genuinely, "this one thing," supply, I study and pursue, to this one thing alone I attend wholly. So Chrysostom, Theophylact, and others. This one thing is what he explains when he adds:
Forgetting indeed the things that are behind, and stretching forth myself to those that are before. — "The things that are behind" he calls temporal goods and profits, says St. Thomas, which Paul had left behind in the world (for he was rich and noble), which here he says he forgets. Secondly, Augustine on Psalm 89, "the things that are behind," that is, my past sins; or, as Vatablus has it, I forget Judaism and the life I led in Judaism. Thirdly and best, "the things that are behind," that is, my past good works, labors, sufferings for Christ, I forget, because the memory of them makes us both lazy and proud. So Chrysostom, Ambrose, Theodoret, Theophylact, Anselm — as if to say: As the stadium-runners, while they run in the stadium, do not look back at how much ground they have crossed, but at how much remains to the goal, and are borne with their whole effort and impetus and direct course toward it: so I too forget my past course and am borne wholly toward the goal, and do not look at what I have done, but at what remains to be done.
St. Jerome inculcates this precept of the Apostle to Gelantia, who aspired to perfection: "Blessed," he says, "are those who, not flattering themselves with past righteousness, are renewed in virtue daily according to the Apostle. For righteousness will not profit one who has on any day ceased to be righteous. Let the whole span of your life be such that you may carry righteousness through to completion, lest, trusting in past righteousness, you become more remiss; but, as the Apostle says: Forgetting the things behind, and stretching forth myself unto those things which are before, I press on toward the appointed prize of the supernal vocation. Therefore, act so that you may order the remaining time of your life that you may sing with the Prophet: I walked in the innocence of my heart; for to have begun is not enough, but to have completed is righteousness."
The same to Eustochium: "Hear, daughter," he says, "and see and incline your ear, and forget your people and your father's house, and the King will desire your beauty. God speaks to the human soul, that, after the example of Abraham going forth from his land and from his kindred, she may leave the Chaldeans, the demons, and dwell in the land of the living. But it is not enough for you to go forth from your land unless you also forget your people and your father's house, so that, despising the flesh, you may be joined to the embraces of the Bridegroom. Do not look back, he says, do not stand in any region round about; but save yourself in the mountain, lest perhaps you be overtaken. It is not expedient, having put your hand to the plow, to look back; nor to return home from the plow; nor to descend from the housetop after Christ's tunic to fetch other clothing. These things I have said to you, that you may understand that one going forth from Sodom must fear the example of Lot's wife."
Finally St. Augustine, in the book On the New Song, chap. iv, vol. IX: "This way of ours," he says, "seeks those who walk: there are three kinds of men whom it hates: the one who remains, the one who turns back, and the one who wanders. He who does not advance has remained on the way; he who perchance turns aside from a better purpose to what — being worse — he had abandoned, has turned back; he who deserts the faith has wandered from the way. Who is the one who does not advance? He who has thought himself wise, who has said: It is enough for me to be what I am; who has not heeded Him who says: Forgetting the things that are behind, I extend myself unto those things which are before, I press on toward the prize of the supernal vocation. He called himself running, he called himself following; he did not remain, he did not look back. Who are those who turn back? Those who from continence return to uncleanness, those who from a holy and singular good purpose are corrupted into evil. The Apostle rebukes these, saying: It were better for them not to have known the way of righteousness than, after having known it, to turn back. It is said, because they turned back in heart to Egypt; for before us are eternal things, behind us temporal: O what an evil to look back! For Lot's wife, who had been delivered from Sodom, contrary to the command looked back, and was turned into a pillar of salt."
To the things that are before. — "Before," in Greek ἔμπροσθεν, that is, as the Syriac and Vatablus have it, "in front": for he opposes these to those which are behind, at the back.
Stretching forth. — In Greek ἐπεκτεινόμενος, which has great emphasis; for it signifies stretching out the hands and the whole body toward the goal, so as to seize it before you have reached it with your feet. This is what the stadium-runners do, who strain with their utmost effort, especially when they are near the goal and victory, in order to outstrip an opponent running with almost equal pace; they exert head and whole body and strength, and rush headlong toward the goal, stretching themselves to grasp it with their highest hands. So Chrysostom and Theophylact.
This stretching in the Christian runner, as St. Augustine teaches in tract 4 on the first epistle of St. John, vol. IX, takes place through desire: for this enlarges his mind and increases his effort and impetus: "The whole life," he says, "of a good Christian is a holy desire of advancing: this is our bosom, this is our sack, and because it is narrow, by stretching it you make it more capacious. Thus God, by deferring, stretches our desire; by desiring, He stretches our mind; by stretching, He makes it more capacious; let us therefore desire, brethren, for we are to be filled."
Secondly, this stretching takes place through the effort of the virtues, that you may strive to acquire those that you lack. Thus St. Basil, homily 11 of the Hexameron, on those words of Genesis 1, Increase and multiply: "The soul," he says, "grows, as by daily propagation it advances itself to perfection. To us it has been said: Increase, by the wonderful reason of the inner man, by whose advancement we tend straight toward God. Such was Paul, who, while he strove and stretched himself with manly effort to the things before, forgot those which were behind. This stretching itself consists in this, that we extend ourselves to greater things by daily propagation beyond what we have already sought; namely, that with what you have already attained removed from memory, you may then with all your might pursue what, as a rival of perfect piety, you recognize is wanting to you. Such was Isaac, of whom that famous eulogy has been handed down to memory, that as he advanced his step, he was lifted up on high, until he became great." See what follows.
Thirdly, let us thus always direct the mind to the things before, which are in front of us. Thus Ezekiel says of the four Cherubim in chap. 1: "They turned not when they went, but each one walked before his face." Explaining these words, St. Gregory, in homily 3 on Ezekiel, says: "The Saints," he says, "when they walk, do not at all turn back, because they pass over thus from earthly to spiritual things, that they are in no way turned back to those things which they have left. For to walk for them is, as it were, by a certain way, to go in mind always to better things. The contrary is said of the reprobate, because they turned back in heart to Egypt; for before us are eternal things, behind us temporal."
Verse 14: I Press Toward the Mark, to the Prize of the Supernal Vocation of God in Christ Jesus
14. I press on toward the goal, — κατὰ σκοπὸν διώκω, that is, I am borne wholly toward the mark.
Note: The mark (scopus) is a sign set up for archers, that they may aim their arrows at it and pierce it; but the Apostle is treating not of archers, but of runners or stadium-racers, who contend by running not toward the scopus, but toward the meta (goal-post); by scopus, then, here he means meta. Hence the Syriac translates, "I run down to the goal." This goal is Christian perfection, often already mentioned. The Fathers translate this otherwise: Augustine, on Psalm 38, translates, "I am borne according to my intention"; for σκοπεῖν means to consider and attend to: whence a Bishop is so called because he attends to and watches over those subject to him. Secondly, Cyprian, or whoever is the author of the book On the Life of Clerics, translates, "I am borne toward the rule." Thirdly, Tertullian, in the book On the Resurrection of the flesh, translates, "according to the mark I press on toward the palm (toward the prize)."
Note here the means that incite to running in the Christian life, by which you may attain the goal, that is, perfection, which the Apostle here suggests.
The first is that you should know and convince yourself that you are not perfect, and say with St. Paul here: "Brethren, I do not consider that I have apprehended;" for he who thinks himself perfect, as if secure of the goal, comes to a halt, and does not labor to advance or perfect himself; but he who sees himself further from the goal is incited to strive toward it. Hence however much you have advanced, think that you are not yet perfect, but ought daily to advance more. "The path of the just," says the Wise Man, Prov. 4:18, "is as a shining light, that goes forward and grows even unto the perfect day." And of the Church (and consequently of the faithful, who live and advance in the Church as members in a body) it is said in Cant. 6:9: "Who is she that comes forth as the rising dawn (in beginners), fair as the moon (in those who are advancing), choice as the sun (in the perfect)?" Yet let the Christian runner never lose heart, or become faint-hearted if he stumbles, or if he does not advance as much as he would wish: rather, let him take this as a sign that he tends toward perfection, if he notes and recognizes this very thing in himself, and is therefore displeased with himself; for, as St. Augustine says in sermon 50 On the Times: "This is the perfection of a man, to have found himself not to be perfect." And in sermon 13 On the Words of the Apostle: "Therefore advance, brethren; examine yourselves always, without deceit, without flattery, without coddling; let what you are always displease you, if you wish to attain to what you are not; for where you have pleased yourself, there you have remained. But if you have said, 'It is enough,' you have perished."
The second means to perfection is strenuous generosity and zeal in advancing in the virtues; namely, if you exert yourself strenuously and drive yourself to heroic works of virtue: for you will profit more by one heroic act than by twenty common and ordinary ones. Furthermore, these heroic works are: First, heroic victory over self, and heroic restraint of one's passions and appetites. Second, to overcome and transcend heroically the difficulties and obstacles that are wont to oppose virtue. Third, to aim at and undertake arduous and lofty things, great works by which God's glory is promoted as much as possible both in ourselves and in others. So St. Bernard, epistle 254 to Guarinus: "An untiring zeal," he says, "to advance, and a constant effort toward perfection, is reputed perfection. For if to be zealous for perfection is to be perfect, surely to be unwilling to advance is to fall back. Where then are those who are wont to say: It is enough for us; we do not wish to be better than our fathers? O monk, do you not wish to advance? No. Do you then wish to fall back? By no means. What then? Thus, you say, I wish to live and remain where I have come, and I neither permit myself to become worse, nor desire to become better." And soon he refutes this, saying: First, "This then you wish, which cannot be; for what stands still in this age? And surely it is written especially of man: He flees like a shadow, and never remains in the same state. Second, our Lord exulted as a giant to run His way. Furthermore, He does not apprehend the runner who himself does not also equally run. Hence Paul said: So run, that you may obtain. Third, if while the Lord is running you halt your step, you do not approach Christ, but distance yourself further, and you must fear what David says: Behold, those who distance themselves from You, O Lord, will perish. So therefore, if to advance is to run, where you cease to advance, there you also cease to run; and where you cease to run, there you begin to fall back. Hence it is plainly inferred, that not to wish to advance is nothing else than to fall back."
Then he confirms the same point fourthly by the example of the angels on Jacob's ladder, saying: "He saw the ladder of Jacob, and angels on the ladder, where none was seen sitting, none standing still; but all were seen either ascending or descending: that it might be plainly given to understand that, between perfection and defect in this state of mortal life, no middle condition is to be found. Fifth, just as our very body is established to be continuously either growing or decreasing, so likewise it is necessary that the spirit either always advance or fall back."
But what most incites to perfection is fervor and an insatiable desire of advancing and tending toward perfection: for which a certain ancient author applies notable stimuli to us, writing thus: First, "It is shameful to consider how much fervor there is in the world, with what care every single pursuit of men daily strives toward perfection. The love of riches is insatiable; the desire of honors knows no satisfying; things which are about to have a swift end are sought without end. We neglect heavenly riches with a certain lazy dissimulation; spiritual riches we either do not even touch, or, if we have lightly tasted them, we forthwith think ourselves satiated. Second, otherwise does divine wisdom invite us to her banquets, saying: Those who eat me will still hunger, and those who drink me will still thirst. No one is ever filled with such banquets, nor at any time suffers loathing from satiety. Each one will be the more capacious, the more avid, the more he has drawn from there. He wishes us here always to hunger and thirst after righteousness, that in the future retribution of righteousness we may be satisfied. The very force of these words is to be considered, and we are to desire righteousness as food or drink is desired in hunger or thirst." And toward the end of the epistle: Third, "nothing in this purpose is worse than idleness, which not only does not acquire new things, but even consumes what has been prepared. Fourth, the principle of the holy life rejoices and grows in progress; in cessation it grows torpid and fails. The mind must be renewed by daily and fresh increases of virtues, and this journey of our living must be measured by us not from what has been done, but from what remains. Fifth, if blessed Paul, the vessel of election, who had so put on Christ that he could say: Now I live, not I, but Christ lives in me — yet still stretches himself further, still grows and advances: what ought we to do, who ought to wish that at our end we may be compared to Paul's beginning? Therefore forget all past, and consider yourself as beginning daily, lest, for the present day in which you ought to serve God, you reckon the past. Sixth, you will best preserve what you have sought, if you are always seeking. They will easily feel loss, if you have ceased to provide."
Hence note here the word διώκω, that is, "I pursue." For just as a runner most intently follows his course and pursues the very goal, so also we must pursue perfection. That elder, in the Lives of the Fathers, when asked what one zealous for perfection should do, replied that he ought to imitate hunting hounds. For just as they pursue the hare most swiftly and with all their effort, do not regard the things that are in the way or offered, do not attend to them, but with all their eyes, senses, and strength, even through stones, briars, and brambles, are borne after the hare, and do not rest until they have caught it; so the seeker of virtue ought to do regarding virtue. And thus did St. Marcianus the anchorite, as Theodoret relates in the Philotheus. For when he had encountered a hunter and was asked what he was doing alone and idle in the wilderness, he in turn asked: But what are you doing? To whom the hunter said: I am hunting deer and hares, as you see. Then Marcianus said: "And I am hunting my God here, nor will I cease from this beautiful hunt, until I have apprehended Him."
The third means to perfection is always to keep before our eyes the prize of the supernal vocation of God, that is, the palm — and, as the Syriac translates, the victorious reward — to be given on high in the heavens, to which God calls us. For God, who, as the umpire of the contest, sits on the supernal throne of the heavens, will, after death, call us strenuous runners up to Himself in heaven, that there He may bestow on us the supernal and heavenly palm in the presence of all the Saints and Angels, and crown us, as victors and triumphators, with the crown of glory; but each one according to his merits — so that he who has been more eager and strenuous in this race shall receive a greater crown, he who less, a lesser crown. From heaven, therefore, God and the Angels display and promise these crowns to us, that by them they may incite us to run. Father Alphonsus Rodriguez suggests many more practical and effective means in part I, On Perfection, treatise 4 and 5.
Furthermore, the practice of this race of running toward perfection is convenient and effective, if everyone first sincerely and most thoroughly examines himself before God, and scrutinizes the depth of his soul, so that he may inwardly perceive himself and all his inclinations, both bad and good, and clearly recognize what most especially impedes and delays him from progress in the virtues, what is the origin and root of all his vices and imperfections. For there is in everyone some one or other capital and radical vice, from which his other vices, as it were branches, sprout and arise, and which being eradicated, all the others are likewise eradicated.
Secondly, when this radical vice of his has been recognized and discerned, he should seriously and efficaciously resolve to extirpate it, and throughout the day keep his eyes intent and fixed upon it, just as upon a chief enemy, with whom a daily duel must be entered. Then let him gather weapons from every quarter to overcome it; and let him not desist until, by assiduous reflection upon it, vigilance over self, mortification, prayer, and love of God, he overcomes and conquers it.
Thirdly, the particular examination of self will greatly help here: if in the morning you resolutely purpose to suppress that very thing heroically throughout the whole day; throughout the day you assiduously direct yourself against that same thing, and continually restrain it; if at any time it should happen that you fall, soon grieve, and rise again more eager and stronger; in the evening, remember how often, in what way, and on what occasion during the day you have fallen into it, and strive to amend all your falls by penance, and by a new and stronger resolve to avoid or overcome its occasions, and by other remedies proper to each. Carry out the same examination every week, so that on Sunday you may survey and see what during the past week you have advanced or fallen back, and resolve to compensate or augment that in the following week; and resolve seriously to advance and rise higher daily by three degrees in the opposite virtue, whether of humility, or temperance, or continence, or some similar virtue. Undertake a similar examination at the beginning of each month, and a similar one at the beginning of each year. There is nothing which by this constancy and continual and watchful labor cannot be conquered and eradicated. For which reason St. Chrysostom and Cassian teach that a man can become perfect in one year. For if soldiers resolute and certain either to conquer or to die break through any battle lines and citadels, what will the generous and resolute soldier of Christ not break through in himself and in his own will?
Fourthly, if you exercise yourself in the continual love of God, and strive, with the love of God roused and conceived at the beginning of each work, to begin and complete all your works — even indifferent ones, such as studying, eating, playing, sleeping, walking, working — out of love of God. Again, if you offer all adversities and crosses to God through love, and bear all things generously and cheerfully out of God's love. Lastly, if, as often as your vices — and especially your radical one — break out, you mortify and cut them off by the love of God. For, as Peter of Ravenna says: "It belongs to a tender warfare to win victory over all vices by love alone."
Come then, O athlete of Christ, with strained powers run down this stadium, fight the good fight, lay hold on eternal life. As hard as it is for you now to run and grow weary, so pleasant will it be for you at the goal to say with St. Paul: "I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith; for the rest there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness." Life is short, the stadium is short, the crown is eternal. Perhaps today God will cut off your course, will sever your life: then you will be able to run no further; then what in your course you have neglected at this moment of time, you will too late wish to repair; for this negligence you will not be able to mend or restore through all eternity. What you now neglect, you neglect forever; what you now lose, you lose forever. And what is so long as eternity is long? And what do you lose? At every moment you lose the most ample crowns — not of gold, nor of gems, but heavenly, but angelic; so that you, who by your course could have arrived at the Cherubim and Seraphim, because of your lukewarmness, sluggishness, and tardiness, hang back, and in eternity hang back among the lowest, in the lowest order of angels.
Thus Abbot Pambo, when about to die, said: "I do not repent of any word which I have spoken up to this hour: and thus I go to the Lord as one who has not even made a beginning of serving God," as is found in the Lives of the Fathers, book V, vol. I, num. 16. And Abbot Silvanus, when asked by Abbot Moses: "Can a man begin his conversion every day?" replied: "If he is a hardworking man, he can each day and each hour begin the beginning of his conversion." Ibid., title XI, num. 29. Another, asked what he daily thought and meditated upon in his cell, said: "I say to myself: Today you are reborn, today you have begun to serve God, today you have begun to dwell here: be daily a pilgrim about to be set free tomorrow; this I daily counsel myself." Ibid., book VII, chap. XLIV, num. 2. Another, asked what was his spur to virtue? what he meditated upon daily? replied: "I have determined that on each single day my words should be heard by the Lord, thinking that it is said to me: Labor for Me, and I will make you rest. Strive yet a little, and you will see My salvation and My glory. If you love Me, if you are My sons, return to the Father, asking. If you are My brethren, blush for Me, as I suffered many things for you. If you are My sheep, follow the Lord's passion."
Therefore in the morning when you rise, think with St. Antony: Today I have begun to run, today I have begun to serve God, today perhaps I shall also finish. Thus I shall live as if about to die today; thus I shall run as if about to finish my course today. Therefore I shall run swiftly, because the time of running is short, and a great way remains for me into heaven.
In Christ Jesus, — through Christ Jesus, through the merits of Christ. So Chrysostom. This can be referred first to the prize of the supernal vocation, as if to say: God has set this prize before us, and calls us to it through the merits of Christ; Christ has merited this with the Father, that He might offer and set forth this prize for us as the reward of our race. Secondly, this can be referred to "I press on," as if to say: I run, I pursue this prize, not by my own strength, but by the strength of grace, which Christ has merited for me.
Verse 15: Let Us Therefore, as Many as Are Perfect, Be Thus Minded; and if in Anything You Are Otherwise Minded, This Also God Will Reveal to You
15. Let us therefore, as many as are perfect, be thus minded. — You will say: in verses 12 and 13 he denied himself to be perfect; how then does he here number himself among the perfect? Some answer with St. Augustine that the Apostle in verse 12 denied himself to be perfect with the perfection of the heavenly fatherland, but here asserts himself to be perfect with the perfection of the way — that is, of such kind as can be had in this life. But from what has been said it is clear that the Apostle in verse 12 also is speaking of the perfection not of the fatherland, but of the way.
Secondly, Ambrose answers that the Apostle calls himself perfect with respect to the more imperfect: just as we call Religious men perfect in comparison with the common people, because they perform more offices of piety and virtue than the common people.
Thirdly and genuinely: "perfect," that is, those zealous for perfection, or, as Anselm has it, perfect wayfarers: for here "perfect" is taken in act not as completed but as begun, according to canon 32. As if to say: Since I, Paul — who seem to you perfect — feel that I have not yet apprehended, but, forgetting those things which are behind, stretch myself out to the things before, and pursue the goal and the prize; therefore likewise — indeed much more so — whoever among you aspire and strive with me toward the perfection of Christian life, let them feel this with me, namely, that they have not yet attained perfection, but ought to run toward it by a direct and continuous course, as I have already said; for this pronoun demonstrates what was said in the preceding verses 13 and 14. So Anselm.
Where note: the perfection of this life consists not so much in this, that someone is plainly perfect, having nothing of vice or concupiscence, for this is impossible: but in a continual tending and running toward perfection. For this is the perfection of wayfarers, that they advance continuously and swiftly along their way toward the goal: now in this life we are wayfarers, and our life is the way — both to perfection and to heaven. Therefore the more we advance through the virtues toward perfection and toward heaven, the more we are perfect wayfarers. So St. Augustine, in the book On Perfect Righteousness, chap. ix: "He is perfect (as a wayfarer)," he says, "who runs toward perfection irreproachably, lacking damnable crimes, and not neglecting to cleanse even venial sins themselves by alms."
And if in anything you are otherwise minded, this also God will reveal to you. — So the Roman, Greek and Syriac, not "He has revealed," as many read with Ambrose and Augustine, epistle 48. Vatablus expounds it thus, "Whoever of us are perfect, let us be of this mind," namely that righteousness is not from the law, but from the faith of Christ, "and if in anything you are otherwise minded," as if to say: If you think the contrary, that is, that righteousness comes to a man from the observance of the law of Moses, "this also will God reveal to you," as if to say, says Erasmus: If anyone still attributes anything to the law of Moses, so as to think himself justified by it, let not Christian concord be broken on that account, but let him be borne with and excused, because he is new in the faith, and recently converted from Judaism: but when he has been more instructed, God will inspire this mind in him, that he may despise those things which he is not yet able to despise. Secondly, Theodoret explains thus, as if to say: If you are minded of anything more perfect than I have already said, you have it from God. Thirdly, Hilary, in book XI On the Trinity, and Chrysostom here favors this, expounds thus, as if to say: For those who have not yet attained the full knowledge of the mysteries of faith and of truth, there is to be awaited a revelation of God, who will bestow a full knowledge of the truth, and correct anything that has previously been mistaken.
Fourthly and genuinely, as if to say: If concerning perfection "you are otherwise minded" than I — namely, because you feel and think that you have apprehended the goal, that is, perfection, or are very near it, or this also as the rest — God in His time will "reveal" to "you," who are ignorant and erring, namely that it is an error, and that you are erring in that thought of yours. So Theodoret and Anselm.
Note: God reveals this when He gradually discloses to a man himself and his vices, when [He sets before him] the arduous works of the virtues, in which the weakness of the perfect man lies.
Verse 16: Nevertheless, Whereunto We Are Come, That We Be of the Same Mind, and That We Continue in the Same Rule
16. Nevertheless (supply, I ask or exhort) whereunto we are come, that we be of the same mind, and continue in the same rule. — As if to say: But indeed, to return to what I said at the beginning of the chapter about avoiding Judaizers, and shortly before about the race toward perfection, I ask all to retain the rule of doctrine, and likewise of the life of Christ, to which they came in baptism, and to remain in it: namely, that they may be of the same mind and be in concord in Christianity, in faith in Christ as well as in morals, and not admit the Judaizers, who sow discord and create schism, wishing to mix Judaism with Christianity.
Note here first: The word "Nevertheless" signifies that the Apostle returns and resumes the principal argument of this chapter, indeed of the whole epistle, which is to establish the rule of faith and of Christianity, namely that they should not admit Judaism. This is clear from the following verses, where he argues against the Judaizers who deny the cross of Christ. Second, by "rule," or measuring-line, and as it is in Greek, canon, he calls the law and faith of Christ, which is straight like a measuring-line, to which nothing may be added or taken away, nor may it be bent or twisted toward Judaism or anything else. So Theophylact. For faith is like the straightest line and rule, which if you bend even slightly, you stray from the truth and fall into falsehood; for truth consists in a point, in the indivisible: such is the norm of believing and living, which the faith and law of Christ prescribes to us. For that the Apostle is speaking not only of the norm of believing but also of living is clear from the following verse, where he says: "Be imitators of me, and observe those who walk so, as you have our form." So Œcumenius and Ambrose. Hence third, for "let us remain," in Greek it is στοιχεῖν, that is, let us march like soldiers in battle line, in our order and rank. About which I have spoken on Gal. IV, 25, and to the same, chap. vi, vers. 16. Fourth, the Greek has thus: πλὴν εἰς ὃ ἐφθάσαμεν τῷ αὐτῷ κανόνι στοιχεῖν, τὸ αὐτὸ φρονεῖν, that is, nevertheless in that to which we have attained, to walk by the same rule (i.e. let us walk), to be of the same mind (i.e. let us be of the same mind); for infinitives are placed for imperatives in the Hebrew manner. Then in the second clause we must understand "and," as if to say: "and let us be of the same mind"; for this is required by a two-membered sentence, in which the Hebrews often suppress the conjunction.
Verse 17: Be Imitators of Me, Brethren, and Observe Those Who Walk So, as You Have Our Form
17. Be imitators of me, brethren, and observe those who walk so, as you have our form. — In Greek, συμμιμηταί, that is, fellow-imitators of me, as if to say: Together with others who imitate me, you also, O Philippians, imitate me. Nazianzen wisely says in his letter to Nicobulus: "It is the mark of a prudent and sound-hearted man to measure his life by a great standard, and to set himself in imitation of excellent men. For it is better to bear second place among great and wealthy men than first place among the poor and abject: just as it is a greater glory to fly a little below the eagle than above the humble larks." Second, for "our form," in Greek it is τύπον ἡμᾶς, that is, type and example us, which Vatablus clearly translates as "just as you have us for an example." O how effective is the word and command of a Pastor, Bishop, and Prince, when he himself is the first to undertake what he commands, and offers himself to others as a form for acting and living. How beautiful and fitting it is when a Prelate and Prince does not command imperiously saying: "You people or servants, go, work, do what I command," but rather rousing and exhorting says: "Let us go, let us do, let us work, follow me and the form and norm of my life." Thus Julius Caesar in the camps went before his soldiers in labor, vigils, and every kind of difficulty, so that no one dared to refuse what he had seen the leader doing. Thus Alphonsus, king of Aragon, when his army was suffering greatly from lack of food, and a radish with bread was offered to him, refused saying: "It does not become an emperor to eat while his army is fasting." Panormitanus is witness, in his book On the Deeds of Alphonsus.
In the Lives of the Fathers, in the Sayings of the Fathers, century 196, a brother asked an elder saying: "Other brothers dwell with me and want me to give them commands; how do you bid me to act?" He answered: "Do yourself what you command, so that you may give them not only precepts but also a model." Hence St. Dionysius the Areopagite said that priests ought to be like translucent and radiant crystal, into which the rays of the sun fall and are reflected upon other things nearby. Sulpicius writes that St. Martin stayed with St. Hilary, Bishop of Poitiers, and made great progress through his learning and piety, and being ordained an exorcist by him, began to prepare himself for the priesthood. St. Hilary therefore was the form of life for St. Martin, and the leader and author of his sanctity. St. Hilarion, in his zeal to see St. Anthony, hastened into the desert: dwelling with him for two months, he learned every detail of his life; whence returning home, he distributed his goods to the poor, returned to the wilderness, and led that wonderful life which St. Jerome describes, making himself a mirror and marvel of the world. Maffeius narrates in the Life of St. Father Ignatius, book II, chapter 13, that a certain young Lutheran, who could not be converted by disputation, was handed over to Ignatius and was converted after being received into his house. When asked how he had so changed a mind previously unconquerable, he answered that he had yielded to Ignatius and his Companions not so much by arguments (though these had great force) as by their visible sanctity and virtue; for he had concluded almost of necessity that, given such uncorrupted morals, such peace and concord, such good works, true faith in God could in no way be absent.
Hence the making of the sign of the cross became solemn for the faithful, for blessing, for putting demons to flight, indeed for beginning any works whatever and to be offered to God. Hence Tertullian, as if speaking of an ancient practice, in his book On the Soldier's Crown, chapters III and IV: "At every advance and movement, at every entrance and exit, at clothing and putting on shoes, at baths, at meals, at lamps, at beds, at seats, in whatever activity our way of life engages us, we wear down our forehead with the sign of the cross." (Note: he does not say "we sign," but "we wear down"; so frequently did they sign themselves that they seemed to wear down their forehead.) "If you demand a law for these and other disciplines, you will find none in the Scriptures. Tradition (let the Innovators note this, who admit nothing except what is expressed in Holy Scripture) will be claimed as your authority, custom as confirmer, and faith as observer." So also Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechesis 13: "Be not ashamed," he says, "to confess the Crucified, but on your forehead let the sign of the cross be confidently impressed with the fingers, and in everything else let the cross be made, in eating bread and in drinking from cups, in entering and going out, before sleep, in lying down and rising, in going and resting. Great is this protection, which is given freely for the poor, without labor for the weak, since this grace is from God and a terror to demons: for He has triumphed over him by this sign. Display it boldly to him: for when he sees the cross, he remembers the Crucified; for he fears Him who crushed the head of the dragon." So also Jerome, to Eustochium, epistle 22: "At every act," he says, "at every step, let the hand draw the cross." Indeed, that crosses ought to be painted in individual houses, and even in the bedrooms of Christians, St. Nilus teaches in writing to the Proconsul Olympiodorus.
Note second: These heretics were enemies, just as of the cross of Christ, so also of the continence, severity, and austerity of life which the cross of Christ teaches Christians, and they led and preached a life of leisure and pleasures, soft, lascivious, and Epicurean: just as now also our heresies indulge every license of the flesh. And for this reason too the Apostle calls them enemies of the cross of Christ, because, as follows, their God is their belly, and they savor only earthly things. Whence the Apostle censures with these words also any others, even Catholics, given over to the belly and to lust.
Verse 18: For Many Walk, of Whom I Have Often Told You (and Now Tell You Weeping) That They Are Enemies of the Cross of Christ
18. For many walk. — Understand, otherwise than I: because I preach and follow the cross of Christ and a strict life, while they by word and deed deny the cross of Christ, live in leisure, delights, pomp, and Judaic ceremonies, as enemies of the cross of Christ.
Whom I often told you (understand, are) (and now tell you even weeping) enemies of the cross of Christ. — He notes Simon Magus and his followers, who denied that Christ was truly crucified; for they said that Christ withdrew Himself from the cross, and that only His image suffered. Thus Cerinthus, dividing Jesus from Christ, said that Jesus suffered and rose again, but that Christ did not at all, but remained impassible, and at the time of the passion withdrew from Jesus. Witnesses are Irenaeus, book I, chap. 25, and Epiphanius, heresy 28. Basilides added that Jesus transformed Himself into Simon of Cyrene, and that this man was crucified in place of Jesus, who slipped away. Witness is Epiphanius, heresy 24. Paul here, and after forty years St. Ignatius, censures these heretics, writing to the same Philippians, and warning them to beware of these very men who would deny the cross of Christ: "For the prince," he says, "of this world rejoices when anyone has denied the cross; he recognizes that the confession of the cross is his own destruction: for it is the trophy against his power, which seeing he is terrified, and hearing he fears." And below: "Therefore he also brings it about in certain men that they deny the cross, that they may blush at the passion; that they may call death an opinion; that they may cut off the nativity and birth from the Virgin," evidently dividing Jesus from Christ and calling the Blessed Virgin the mother of Jesus, but not of Christ. And this is what Paul said in verse 2: "Beware of the concision," that is, beware of those who thus cut and divide Jesus from Christ. This heresy crept not only through Judaea, but also through Greece and Asia. Hence Paul, writing to the Corinthians and to the Philippians and others, so often extols the cross of Christ, and professes to know nothing other than Jesus Christ crucified. Hence, in order to abolish this heresy and exalt the cross, the Church from its very beginning set up a wooden cross as its sign, as it were as a trophy, as St. Ignatius says, erected against the power of the devil, which when he sees, he shudders. Indeed this was the sign of the Church, and by this very fact a house was erected into a church, if a sign of the cross was erected in it, as Baronius and Jacobus Gretserus teach, book II On the Cross, chapter VII.
Verse 19: Whose End Is Destruction; Whose God Is the Belly; and Whose Glory Is in Their Shame; Who Savor Earthly Things
19. Whose end is destruction. — In Greek ἀπώλεια, that is, perdition, as if to say: They who in the end will be destroyed and perish; the end of their lasciviousness and gluttony will be eternal death; their pleasures will cease and end in the fire and ruin of hell.
Whose God is the belly, — who in all things indulge the belly, who are wholly addicted to the belly, who are entirely devoted only to the belly: for to each one his God is that which he most worships, which he wholly serves, and on which he spends himself and all his goods. And properly speaking, such are they who refer all their pursuits, thoughts, and resources to the throat and belly, as to the highest and final good: again, those who set the belly above God, ready for the sake of gluttony to violate God's law and friendship: for then gluttony is a mortal sin; otherwise gluttony is generally only a venial sin, as I have said on Gal. v, 21. Beautifully says St. Chrysostom: "The sea," he says, "does not do as much harm in passing its bounds, as the belly does, if it overcomes our body together with the soul; the sea floods the whole world, and the belly the whole body. Set as its limit the sufficiency of nature, as God set sand for the sea, and if it boils and rages, rebuke it with the virtue you have within you: see how God rebuked it, that you may imitate Him."
Paul seems to allude to Dagon, the god of the Philistines, in 1 Kings v. For Dagon is the god "belly," because he was worshipped for the sake of the belly: for Dagon seems to have been the god of fishes, of offspring, and of grain, from whom they sought abundance of fish, of offspring (after the manner of the multiplication of fish), and of grain. For Dagon is called in Hebrew from דג dag, or דגה daga, that is from "fish." Whence the Hebrews relate that Dagon was an idol of a man mixed with a fish, in such wise that from the navel and below it had the figure of a fish, but above of a man, such as Sirens are imagined. For the Philistines devoted themselves to fishing, and lived from it; for they were dwellers along the Mediterranean Sea. Lilius Gyraldus, in his book On the Gods of the Gentiles, syntagm. 2, p. 103, thinks Dagon was Jupiter Aratrius, whom the Phoenicians worshipped as the inventor of grain and the plough, as if Dagon were called from דגן dagan, that is grain. Again, Dagon is the god "belly": because when the ark of the covenant captured by the Philistines was placed beside Dagon, Dagon fell down before it, with his head and hands torn from his body, so that only the trunk or belly was left remaining, which they afterwards worshipped; and Paul alludes to this when he says: "And glory in the confusion of those who savor earthly things." Whence also the worshippers of Dagon were struck with shameful tumors, with diseases new and unknown to former times, and with that shameful and infamous plague or French disease. To this the name Dagon also aptly alludes, which in Hebrew signifies both "fish of iniquity" and "fish of sorrow and sadness," as St. Jerome translates in the Hebrew Names.
Note: The god "belly" is a chasm of all goods. Hence Diogenes the Cynic called the belly of gluttons the Charybdis of life, because it devours all things and is never satisfied; indeed Charybdis only swallows what is carried on the sea, and finally vomits up what it has absorbed; but for the bellies of gluttons neither air, nor earth, nor rivers, nor seas suffice: indeed they swallow up whole houses and fields, and do not vomit them back. Laertius reports this, book VI.
And glory in their confusion, — that is, these Judaizers glory in their circumcision, of which they ought to be ashamed; for it is performed on a private member, of which we are most ashamed. So St. Augustine, sermon 14 On the Words of the Apostle. Second and better, St. Chrysostom, Theophylact, Œcumenius, as if to say: They even glory in shameful sins, of which they ought to be ashamed, and which ought to make them blush, and they boast of them. Aptly Pythagoras, when he heard someone say that he preferred to spend his time among women rather than among Philosophers, replied: "Pigs," he said, "prefer to wallow in mud rather than in clear waters."
Who savor earthly things, — whose heart, fixed to the earth, has only earthly affections, loves, desires, cares for, and thinks of only earthly goods.
Verse 20: But Our Conversation Is in Heaven, From Whence Also We Await the Saviour, Our Lord Jesus Christ
20. But our conversation is in heaven. — In the Greek is read πολίτευμα, that is, way of life, institution, says Budaeus, as if to say: The institution of the Christian life is to dwell in heaven; Christianity is a profession of the heavenly life. Note second, πολίτευμα also signifies "conversation." Note: He opposes conversation in heaven to conversation on earth and in earthly things, or to those who savor earthly things, as if to say: Earthly and worldly people savor, love, care for earthly things: we Christians savor, love, care for heavenly things; the earthly are like moles dwelling in the earth, digging the earth, gaping after the earth, delighting in the riches of the earth: we Christians are fed on heavenly things, we tend toward heaven, we long for heavenly things, in heaven is our heart and all our goods; therefore we are in heaven, not on earth, because the soul is more where it loves than where it animates. "Just as a house," says St. Gregory, book VIII Morals, chapter 31, "of outward conversation is the building which the body inhabits: so the house of our thought is whatever thing the mind inhabits through love. Whence Paul, who had fixed his heart on things above, though placed on earth, yet as a stranger to earth, said: Our conversation is in heaven."
Therefore "our conversation is in heaven," first, because we have our mind and thought in heaven, we have our hearts on high, we often think and speak about the Saints, Angels, God, the blessed life, and heavenly things — indeed, we converse with the Saints. In which matter Blessed Maria of Oignies excelled formerly among us, who was so familiar with the Saints and Angels that the weighty author Jacobus de Vitriaco Cardinal writes thus about her in chapter VIII of her Life: "When," he says, "the feast day of some Saint was approaching, that Saint would announce his festal days to her, and on those very feasts would visit her, bringing many blessed citizens with him, and so her spirit would spend that whole joyful day with the Saint. From familiar and frequent conversation with the Saints she obtained this: that just as men distinguish their neighbors one from another, so she herself could distinguish angels and holy men one from another."
Second, "our conversation is in heaven," through the heavenly life, because on earth we live a pure and holy life, such as the Angels live in heaven. Hence to the Church, which is the assembly of Saints and the faithful, God has given the violet shoe, or heavenly shoe, Ezekiel xvi, 40: "I have shod you," He says, "with violet," namely with a hyacinth-colored shoe, as the Septuagint translates, that is, of violet and heavenly color, that by this symbol God might signify that the conversation of the Saints, who are in the Church, is in the heavens. Again, by the hyacinth, which is the garment of kings, as is clear from Ecclus. xl, 4, God signified the kingly and lofty spirit of the Saints of the Church, who, evidently fixed in heaven, casts down and tramples on all these earthly things. Whence also the moon is placed under the feet of the Church, Apocalypse XII, 1.
Third, "our conversation is in heaven," through hope, because we tend toward heaven and hope soon to come to Christ, who has prepared the way for us into heaven; thither, therefore, we send ahead our hope, our affection, and our works, by which we hope after this life to ascend in actual fact both in soul and in body. Empedocles, when asked why he lived, answered: "That I may behold the heaven; take away the heaven, and I shall be nothing." Far more truly the Christian, asked why he lives, will answer: "That I may not only behold heaven, but also attain it." Wherefore St. Bernard rightly says to those who gape after earthly things: "Are you not ashamed," he says, "to look up to heaven with your body, and to creep on earth with your mind: to have the head above and the heart below?"
Note third: πολίτευμα means besides, says Budaeus, the political government of a republic or city, as if to say: Our government, our republic, our city is in heaven; we conduct ourselves as citizens of the heavens; the kingdom of heaven is our city, by whose municipal law all the Saints are governed. Which government is spiritual and heavenly, not carnal and earthly: because it is set not in carnal, external, and earthly things, but in spiritual, internal, and heavenly laws and institutions. Hence Tertullian, in his book On the Soldier's Crown, reads: "Our citizenship is in heaven," as if to say: We are pilgrims of the world, but citizens and inhabitants of heaven. Thus "conversation" here (as Our [translator] renders it) can be taken as civic, or such as belongs to citizens; for this is πολίτευμα. Whence this passage can also be translated thus: "We live as citizens of the heavens," who, namely, are governed and live by the laws, custom, polity, right, and goods of the heavenly city and kingdom. So Ephesians chapter II, 19 says: "You are no longer strangers and foreigners, but you are fellow-citizens with the saints and members of the household of God." And Hebrews XII, 22: "You have come," he says, "to mount Zion, and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to the company of many thousands of angels, and to the Church of the firstborn who are written in heaven," etc. About the word πολίτευμα or πολιτεία (for these two are often taken for the same, as Budaeus testifies), I have said more on Ephesians II, 12.
Hence morally St. Gregory, explaining that passage of Job xxxix: "Will the eagle mount up at your command, and place her nest on high?" compares St. Paul and the Saints to the eagle, in book XXXI of the Morals, chapter XIX: "Let us see," he says, "the eagle building her nest for herself on high, who says: Our conversation is in heaven; and again: He has raised us up together and made us sit together in the heavenly places. He has his nest on high, because he assuredly fixes his counsel in the things above. He does not wish to cast down his mind to the depths, he does not wish to dwell in the lowest places through the abjection of human conversation. Perhaps Paul was held in prison when he testified that he was seated with Christ in the heavenly places; but he was there where he had already fixed his ardent mind, not there where his still sluggish flesh necessarily held him." Then he teaches that this loftiness of mind placed in heaven is a sign of divine predestination, thus: "For this is wont to be the special mark of the elect, that they know how to take the journey of the present life in such a way that through the certainty of hope they know they have already reached the heights, inasmuch as they see all things that flow past to be beneath them, and they trample under foot, by love of eternity, every thing that stands high in this world. For this is what the Lord says through the Prophet to the soul that follows Him: I will lift you up upon the heights of the earth; for there are, as it were, certain lower things of the earth — losses, insults, want, abjection — which even the lovers of the world, as they walk along the plain of the broad way, do not cease to trample under foot in avoiding them. But the heights of the earth are the gains of things, the flatteries of subjects, the abundance of riches, the honor and loftiness of dignities, which whoever still walks among the lowest desires reckons high precisely as he reckons them great. But once the heart is fixed on heavenly things, soon it sees how abject are those things that seemed lofty; for just as one who climbs a mountain immediately looks down upon the other things lying below, the further his step extends to higher things: so he who strives to fix his intention on the highest, when by that very effort he discovers no glory in the present life, is raised above the heights of the earth; and what previously, while placed in the lowest desires, he believed to be above himself, afterwards, advancing by ascending, he recognizes to be beneath himself."
Whence (ἐξ οὗ, from which, namely from heaven) we also await as Saviour our Lord Jesus Christ, — that He, coming to judgment, may adjudge us, the faithful, us, His friends panting after heavenly things, to heaven, and may lead us with Himself in triumph into the heavens; and then He will bring us full salvation from all hardship of body and mind, and will grant us glory, both of body and of soul, and will be the full and perfect Saviour.
Note: "To save" properly means to recover a thing lost or perished. Whence the Greek σώζων is derived from σός, σά, σόν, so that to say σώζω σε is the same as: "I give you back to yourself and restore you." Thus Christ is called σωτήρ, that is Saviour, because He restores us to ourselves, namely to our pristine integrity, hope, salvation, and happiness. Among the Greeks they were called ἀλεξίκακοι (averters of evil) who drove off evils, diseases, and monsters from men, such as Hercules and Aesculapius. Among the Romans, those were called Fathers of the Country who freed the republic from an imminent enemy or danger. Such is Christ.
Verse 21: Who Will Reform the Body of Our Lowness, Conformed to the Body of His Glory
21. Who will reform the body of our lowliness, conformed to the body of His glory. — For "will reform," in Greek it is μετασχηματίσει, will transfigure, will transform, that is, will change into another figure and form, not essential but accidental, namely so as to make from a corruptible body an incorruptible one, from a passible an impassible, from earthly a heavenly one. Second, by "body of lowliness," by a Hebraism he calls the lowly body, that is, vile, abject, and miserable. Otherwise St. Bernard, sermon 47 on the Canticles: "He calls it," he says, "the body of lowliness, because only the humble shall be reformed by this glory;" but this is not literal nor genuine. Third, by "body of glory" he calls the body of Christ, glorious and bright. Fourth, for "conformed to the body," in Greek it is εἰς τὸ γενέσθαι αὐτὸ σύμμορφον τῷ σώματι, etc., that is, that it may be made conformable to the body of the glory of Christ. The Syriac translates: "that it may be made into the likeness of the body of His glory." Hence is clear the falsity and folly of that opinion of the heretics, who taught that in the resurrection our body would be transformed into a sphere, so that it might be like the body of the sun, because it is written: "The just shall shine as the sun;" for the figure of the human body is not such, namely round, nor is the body of the glorious Christ. Whence Justinian the Emperor ascribes this heresy to Origen, and condemns it in his Constitution which Baronius recites, tom. 13, year of Christ 538, p. 289, 293.
Note: The Apostle places this configuration or conformation in brightness, that is, in glory, as if to say: This body of ours, which equally as the body of Christ here is worn out, hungers, freezes, is heated, weakens, is beaten, scourged, torn, will become through these sufferings, in the resurrection, glorious and like the glorious body of Christ. Whence Chrysostom exclaims: "Bah!" he says, "will this body of ours be made conformable to Him who sits at the right hand of the Father? to Him who is adored by angels; to Him to whom those incorporeal virtues stand beside? to Him who is above every principality, power, and virtues — to Him will it be made conformable? If then the whole world should weep with all its tears for those who have fallen from this hope, would they be worthily lamented? — for, since the promise has been made to us that our body will be so conformed to the glorious body of Christ, that they should depart with the demons?"
And St. Bernard, sermon 2 On the Words of Isaiah, citing this passage of the Apostle: "Why," he says, "do you still murmur, miserable flesh, why do you still kick back, and lust against the spirit? If He humbles you, if He chastises you, if He reduces you to servitude, this assuredly in your kind is no less your interest than His. Why do you envy those who are not ashamed to beg empty glory from the works of worms and the skins of mice, you live in unworthy adornment, forbidden even to women, dishonoring rather than adorning themselves? Let them reform, or rather more certainly deform their own bodies: as for you, if you have been a body of lowliness, the same Artisan who formed you will reform you. Wait (if you are not foolish) for that hand, that He who made you may remake you."
According to the operation whereby He is able also to subject all things to Himself. — He gives the cause of this transformation, namely the power and the powerful operation of Christ, by which He is able to subject all things to Himself; if all things, then also corruption and death, as if to say: Christ rules over death and life, and over all things which are in heaven and on earth; therefore it is easy for Him by His command to make our corrupted bodies rise again to immortality and glory. So Chrysostom.
Excellently and piously the Manual of St. Augustine, chapter 24: "O my soul," he says, "marked with the image of God, redeemed by the blood of Christ, betrothed by faith, endowed with the Spirit, adorned with virtues, appointed to be with the angels, love Him by whom you have been so greatly loved. Attend to Him who attends to you, seek Him who seeks you, love your Lover. Be solicitous with the solicitous, at leisure with the one at leisure, clean with the clean, holy with the Holy." And a little below: "Choose Him as your friend before all your friends, because when all things shall have been taken from you, He alone will keep faith with you: on the day of your burial, and when all your friends withdraw from you, He will not abandon you: but He will defend you from the roaring infernal lions prepared for prey, and will lead you through an unknown region, and will bring you to the streets of the heavenly Sion, and there will set you with His angels before the face of His majesty: where you shall hear that angelic song, Holy, holy, holy, etc. There is the song of joy, the voice of exultation and salvation, thanksgiving, the voice of praise and perpetual alleluia. There is the heap of happiness, supereminent glory, superabundant joy and all good things." And finally he concludes: "O my soul, sigh ardently, and desire vehemently, that you may be able to come to that heavenly city, of which such glorious things have been said: in which is, as it were, the dwelling-place of all who rejoice. By love you can ascend: to one who loves, nothing is difficult, nothing impossible. The soul which loves frequently ascends and runs familiarly through the streets of the heavenly Jerusalem, visiting those Patriarchs and Prophets, greeting the Apostles, admiring the armies of Martyrs and Confessors, gazing on the choirs of Virgins, and of all the Saints." Behold, thus the conversation of St. Augustine was in heaven, awaiting from thence the Saviour.