Cornelius a Lapide
Table of Contents
Synopsis of the Chapter
He commands believing wives to be subject to their husbands, even to unbelieving ones, and on this occasion he treats of the duties of both wife and husband on either side. Secondly, in verse 8, he exhorts all the faithful to concord, charity, modesty, humility, and patience. Thirdly, in verse 18, he proposes to them the example of Christ, into whom they have been incorporated by baptism, so that, imitating His purity and manner of life, they may ascend with Him into heaven and be granted eternal life.
Vulgate Text: 1 Peter 3:1-22
1. Likewise also let wives be subject to their husbands: that even if any believe not the word, they may, without the word, be won by the conversation of the wives, 2. considering your chaste conversation in fear. 3. Whose adorning let it not be the outward plaiting of the hair, or the wearing of gold, or the putting on of apparel: 4. but the hidden man of the heart, in the incorruptibility of a quiet and modest spirit, which in the sight of God is rich. 5. For after this manner heretofore the holy women also, who hoped in God, adorned themselves, being subject to their own husbands. 6. As Sara obeyed Abraham, calling him lord: whose daughters you are, doing well, and not fearing any disturbance. 7. Husbands likewise dwelling with them according to knowledge, giving honor to the female as to the weaker vessel, and as to coheirs of the grace of life: that your prayers be not hindered. 8. And in the faith all of one mind, having compassion one of another, lovers of the brotherhood, merciful, modest, humble: 9. not rendering evil for evil, nor railing for railing, but contrariwise blessing: for unto this are you called, that you may inherit a blessing. 10. For he that will love life, and see good days, let him refrain his tongue from evil, and his lips that they speak no guile. 11. Let him decline from evil, and do good: let him seek after peace, and pursue it: 12. because the eyes of the Lord are upon the just, and His ears unto their prayers: but the countenance of the Lord upon them that do evil. 13. And who is he that can hurt you, if you be zealous of good? 14. But if also you suffer anything for justice' sake, blessed are you. And be not afraid of their fear, and be not troubled. 15. But sanctify the Lord Christ in your hearts, being ready always to satisfy every one that asketh you a reason of that hope which is in you. 16. But with modesty and fear, having a good conscience: that whereas they speak evil of you, they may be ashamed who falsely accuse your good conversation in Christ. 17. For it is better doing well (if such be the will of God) to suffer, than doing ill. 18. Because Christ also died once for our sins, the just for the unjust, that He might offer us to God, being put to death indeed in the flesh, but enlivened in the spirit. 19. In which also coming He preached to those spirits that were in prison: 20. which had been some time incredulous, when they waited for the patience of God in the days of Noe, when the ark was a-building, wherein a few, that is, eight souls, were saved by water. 21. Whereunto baptism, being of the like form, now also saveth you: not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the examination of a good conscience towards God by the resurrection of Jesus Christ, 22. who is on the right hand of God, swallowing up death, that we might be made heirs of life everlasting: being gone into heaven, the angels, and powers, and virtues being made subject to Him.
Verse 1: Likewise Also Let Wives Be Subject to Their Husbands
The word likewise refers back to subjects and servants, of whom he treated in the preceding chapter, verses 13 and 18, as if to say: I have commanded subjects to be subject to princes, servants to masters; now likewise I command wives to be subject to husbands; for the law of nature, both divine and human, as well Gentile as Christian, commands this. St. Peter sanctions this so explicitly because there was being spread among the Gentiles a rumor, but a false one, that Christians, as though they were sons of Christ, wished to exempt themselves from all servitude and subjection, and especially wives from the partnership of their husbands; and this partly from the fact that the lustful Gentiles abused their wives perversely against nature: but the Apostles forbade wives to permit this,
And therefore some women, whose husbands they could not persuade to use marriage lawfully, made divorce, as did that matron of whom Eusebius writes in Book IV of the Histories, ch. 17, and others of whom St. Linus speaks in the passion of St. Peter; partly because many virgins betrothed by their parents to unbelieving men, before the consummation of marriage withdrew from their betrothals and from their bridegrooms out of love for or vow of virginity, which they heard so highly extolled by the Apostles. For thus St. Flavia Domitilla, betrothed to Aurelianus, before the wedding having been converted by her eunuchs, Nereus and Achilleus, and receiving the veil of virginity from St. Clement the Pope, refused the marriage and the bridegroom: and for this cause both she and St. Clement, Nereus and Achilleus underwent martyrdom. Thus St. Thecla, converted by St. Paul, withdrew from marriage with Tamyris to whom she had been betrothed, and on this account endured many atrocious sufferings. Thus St. Iphigenia at the urging of St. Matthew refused marriage with King Hyrtacus: who for this reason inflicted death and martyrdom upon St. Matthew. So also Susanna, niece of the Emperor Diocletian, refused marriage with the Emperor Maximian, who therefore killed her and made her a martyr. Thus St. Agnes, St. Felicula, and many other virgins, because they rejected marriages and bridegrooms, were crowned with martyrdom. From this therefore a calumny was forged against Christ and Christianity, as though it were opposed to marriage and overturning the rights of bridegrooms, so that husbands forbade their wives to become Christians, lest they lose the right and authority over them. That Peter might meet this calumny, he commands wives to be subject to their husbands, namely in those things which conjugal right requires or permits. St. Augustine gives the cause in Question 153 on Genesis: There is, he says, a natural order in men, that women should serve men: because there too this is justice, that the weaker reason should serve the stronger: and this in dominations and servitudes is a clear justice, that those who excel in reason should excel in dominion.
Whence Euripides in Iphigenia: One man, he says, is better, and worthy of this gift of light More than indeed many thousands of women. Because Christ assumed human nature in the male sex, which is more worthy, more perfect, and more honorable, says St. Augustine in Book of 88 Questions, and from him St. Bonaventure, in Book III, dist. 12, art. 3, quest. 1. For, he says, the male sex excels the female: first, in respect to dignity in originating, because all both men and women came from one man, Adam. Secondly, in respect to virtue in acting: for the man is more robust and industrious than the woman. Thirdly, in respect to authority in presiding. And indeed Pythagoras asserted that the male in every kind of animals is the principle of nature and virtue. And Aelian, Book 11, ch. 26: The male sex, he says, even among brutes seems to be preferred by nature: since indeed the male serpent is distinguished by crest and bearded with shagginess: the rooster also is crested and bears moreover stalks like a beard: the stag is horned, the lion maned, the male cicada melodious.
In a similar way St. Paul in many places teaches that wives ought to be subject to their husbands, and as a sign of this subjection to wear a veil on their head, 1 Cor. 11:10. See what is said there. Clement of Alexandria in Book IV of the Stromata cites this sentence of Euripides: Every modest woman is the servant of her husband: but she that is not modest, surpasses in folly him with whom she lives. For there is nothing better or more excellent, Than a man and woman of one mind dwelling together under the same roof. Wherefore a wife ruling her husband, and a husband suffering the rule of his wife, is a monstrosity. To the Jews Isaiah turns this as the highest reproach, ch. 3, v. 4, saying: Effeminate men shall rule over them; and Aristotle, Politics II, 3, censures the Spartan women for ruling their husbands. For, as Philo says in Antonius Melissa, vol. 2, sermon 34: To be ruled by a woman is the highest disgrace for a man. Wherefore Ahasuerus repudiated his wife, who wished to rule and refused the king's commands, Esther 2:20. Truly St. Augustine in De Catechizandis rudibus says: When a woman rules over a man, the household is perverse and wretched. Plutarch in his Conjugal Precepts, ch. 5, asserts that wives who prefer to rule stupid husbands rather than to obey wise ones are like those who would rather lead the blind than follow those endowed with understanding and sight. But effeminate men Jeremiah mocks in ch. 51, v. 30, saying: Their strength is devoured, they have become as women; and Homer in Iliad II: O cowards, base reproaches, Achaean women, no longer Achaeans; and following Homer, Virgil in Aeneid IX: O true Phrygian women, for you are no Phrygians. And Turnus in Aeneid XII through contempt calls Aeneas a half-man Phrygian.
THAT EVEN IF ANY (husbands) BELIEVE NOT THE WORD (of Christ and the Gospel, namely the Gospel preaching), THEY MAY BE WON BY THE CONVERSATION OF THE WIVES WITHOUT THE WORD (without speech; the Syriac: by good manners without labor). — so that their soul and salvation may be gained as a kind of immense profit, and they may come over to Christ and the Church. Hence Paul in 1 Cor. 7:13 commands women converted to the faith not to divorce their unbelieving husbands, but to dwell with them, that by their holy conversation they may bring over both them and their children to Christ, as St. Natalia brought over St. Adrian, Clotilda Clovis, St. Cecilia St. Valerian, St. Martha St. Marius, St. Monica Patricius and St. Augustine, St. Gorgonia Vitalianus. For a woman, since she is gracious and is loved by her husband and is continually with him, slips into his mind as water into a sponge little by little without his perceiving it, and occupies and bends it whither she will, says St. Chrysostom, hom. 60 on John, especially when there is added pious and holy conversation. For, as St. Chrysostom says, hom. 19 on the Epistle to the Hebrews, To act has greater power for teaching than to teach.
Verse 2: Considering Your Chaste Conversation in Fear
2. Considering (namely the men, not the women, as Hugo and Lyranus hold, for considerantes since is masculine, refers to husbands) YOUR CHASTE CONVERSATION in fear. - Fear here is the same as the reverence with which wives reverence Christ, and out of love and in place of Christ their husband, and zealously beware lest they offend him even in the smallest matter, and especially that they preserve for him entire and total fidelity and conjugal chastity. Conversely it could be taken as the fear of husbands, namely whereby husbands considering the chaste conversation of their wife reverence and love her: and from this they are drawn to imitate her and toward Christianity. St. Peter notes here that the first dowry of a wife is faith and chastity: for woman, both by nature, by fragility, and by complexion (being warm and moist), is greatly inclined to lust. The proper passion of women is lust, says St. Chrysostom, hom. 40 on Matthew, and he gives as its cause the leisure with which they abound: for love is the passion of a mind at leisure. Hence that saying of Ovid in Book I of the Remedies of Love: Take away leisure, and Cupid's bow perishes. The question is asked, why did Aegisthus become an adulterer? The cause is at hand, he was lazy. Solomon teaches the same in Prov. 30:15, where among four insatiable things he places the womb's mouth in the second place. And Sirach 36:23: Every man, he says, will a woman receive. And Aristotle, Book IV of Problems, ch. 27, writes that women are insatiable in lust. Notable is the monstrous lust of Messalina, wife of the Emperor Claudius. Diodorus, Book II, and Herodotus, Book II, relate that when Pheron, son of Sesostris, king of Egypt, had been deprived of his sight, and therefore implored the help of the gods through various sacrifices, he received the response and remedy, that, when the god worshipped at Heliopolis was appeased, he should look upon the face of a woman who had known no other man than her own husband; beginning with his own wife he tried many, yet found none unfaithful save the wife of a certain gardener, whom, when his sight was restored, he took to wife; all the rest he burned alive. Aeschines the Satyric dared to call all the Ionian women moichadas, that is adulteresses. Josephus in Book II of the War, ch. 7, writes that the Essenes do not take a wife, because they believe that no woman keeps faith with one man only: although there was another stronger reason, namely the pursuit of piety and contemplation. Furthermore, among Christians we know many women have been and are most chaste, indeed virgins: for the Church has countless throngs of holy virgins, and in this shines forth notably the grace of Christ and of Christianity, which so corrects, strengthens, raises up, and perfects fragile nature. Plutarch in his Problems says that of old fire and water used to be carried before a new bride, that it might be signified she ought to be chaste and pure: for fire purges, water cleanses.
Verse 3: Whose Adorning Let It Not Be the Outward Plaiting of the Hair
St. Fulgentius, Book II ch. 11, the plaiting of the hair; the Zurich version, Whose adornment let it not be external, which consists in the plaiting of the hair; the Syriac, in the curls of the hair; St. Ambrose, Exhortation to Virgins, in the folding of the hair; for in Greek some read emplokes trichon, that is, of the plaiting of the hair. Others by diastole, en ploke trichon, that is, in the plaiting of the hair. But the sense comes back to the same. For he means any plegmata of the hair, whether they are made by curling them, or twisting, or knotting, or by parting them with curling-irons into ringlets and horns, or by adding others. This is what Paul says in 1 Tim. 2:9: Adorning themselves not with twisted hair. For women are accustomed to attend to the arrangement and adornment of their hair; whence Terence in the Heauton: While they polish and comb themselves, a year passes. Indeed they build up the crown of the head with another's hair, says St. Jerome to Marcella, so as to seem to raise on their forehead summits and towers of hair; whom Juvenal in satire 6 censures, saying: With so many tiers she builds up A lofty head. And Tertullian, On the Apparel of Women, ch. 7: What, he says, does so great a burden of adorning the head supply for salvation? And St. Jerome to Laeta, On the Instruction of a Daughter: Burden not, he says, the head with gems, nor make the hair red, and forebode upon it something of the fires of Gehenna; for they were accustomed to color the hair and face with white-lead, antimony and other pigments: and those who prepared these things from the ashes of dyes were called Cinerarii and Ciniflones, says Tiraquellus, Connub. law II, no. 27. Excellently Esther, ch. 14:16, addressing God: Thou knowest, she says, my necessity, that I abominate the sign of my pride and glory, which is upon my head in the days of my showing forth, and detest it as a menstruous cloth, and wear it not in the days of my silence. If this is blameworthy in women, much more in men, who effeminate themselves having openly professed womanishness, says Tertullian in On the Veiling of Virgins. Rightly St. Gregory in hom. 6 on the Gospels: Weigh, he says, how great a fault it is for men too to seek that which the Shepherd of the Church took care to forbid even women. St. Tiburtius asserted that Torquatus belied the name of Christian, because he curled his hair: so his Vita has it.
Furthermore this whole verse in Greek runs clearly thus: Whose adornment (cultus) let it not be of the outward plaiting of the hair, or putting on of gold, or wearing of garments, but the hidden man of the heart (which consists) in the incorruption of a meek and quiet spirit, as if to say: Let the adornment of women be not external, but internal, namely the spiritual interior man, that is, the incorrupt one of a placid and quiet spirit. This is the second dowry and virtue of a woman, namely modest and honorable adornment of the body: for the first is chastity, as I have said.
OR THE WEARING OF GOLD. — The Zurich version: Or in the placing about of gold, in whatever manner it be done, whether by wearing golden garments, chains, bosses; or by binding the hair with golden threads and fillets; or by distinguishing garments with golden borders and fringes. Moreover St. Peter does not forbid every use of hair-dressing and of gold, but only the immoderate, and that which exceeds one's station.
Let this be a response to Cajetan, who thinks these things pertain to the most holy faithful of St. Peter's age, not to the matrons of our century. But what measure is to be employed, St. Basil teaches on Isaiah ch. 3. Wherefore rightly St. Jerome in Book I Against Pelagius refutes Pelagius, because he said that all adornment whatsoever was forbidden by St. Peter.
OR THE PUTTING ON OF APPAREL. — The Zurich version: Or in the wearing of cloaks. For women devoted to adornment are accustomed to put on so many garments, to clothe and adorn themselves with so many tunics, robes, veils, mantles, etc., and these of silk and precious, that Isaiah in enumerating them fills many verses, ch. 3, v. 18, and Tiraquellus in Connub. law 3, no. 27 and following, fills many alphabets and many pages. Indeed some exhaust in their dress all the wealth of their husbands, according to that saying of Propertius: The matron walks clothed with the income of her grandsons, which Ovid in Book III of the Art of Love, detesting it, exclaims: What shame is it to bear one's wealth on one's body? And Seneca, Book VII On Benefits, ch. 9, says that some madwomen hang patrimonies of two gems from each ear.
Verse 4: But the Hidden Man of the Heart, in the Incorruptibility of a Quiet and Modest Spirit
(that is, the mind and soul, supply and repeat, let this be the cultivation and adornment of women, as preceded: but this is set) IN THE INCORRUPTIBILITY OF A QUIET AND MODEST spirit, - as if to say: The hidden man of the heart is the incorrupt one of a meek and modest spirit: and this is the true and only adornment of women. On the twofold man, namely interior and exterior, see St. Augustine, Book I On Marriage and Concupiscence, ch. 30, and St. Ambrose, On the Instruction of Virgins, Book II, and what I said on Rom. 2:29 and Eph. 4:24. Philosophically Cajetan judges that the hidden man is called the immortal soul hidden in the body, whose heart is the will. Better is St. Ambrose, epist. 27: The outward man, he says, has very many members in itself; but the inward man of the heart is wholly of wisdom, full of grace, full of beauty. He is called of the heart, not because he resides in the heart (for the soul rather resides in the head), but because he presides over the heart, that is, the appetite, and rules and moderates it. The Zurich version translates: But let the adornment be hidden, which is the man in the heart, if he be free from all corruption, so that the spirit is placid and quiet, as if to say: The best adornment of a woman is meekness, modesty and peace of soul; for this composes, adorns, enriches all the powers, passions and motions of the soul. For this is the hidden charm and the veiled comeliness, says Nazianzen in his Precept to a Virgin, and the Psalmist in Ps. 44:14: All the glory, he says, of the king's daughter is within. That saying is well-worn: For a woman, character is the ornament, and not gold. Ornament, says Crates, is what adorns; and that adorns which makes a woman more honorable: but such a one is produced not by gold, not by the emerald, not by scarlet, but by gravity, moderation, modesty: thus Plutarch in his Laconian Sayings. Pliny in his Panegyric of Trajan praises his wife, that she was modest in adornment. Pythagoras persuaded the matrons of Croton to lay aside golden garments and other adornments as instruments of luxury, and to consecrate them all in the temple of the goddess Juno: for the true adornments of a matron are chastity, not garments, as Justin reports in Book 20. Thus also Aristotle in the Oeconomics says that the adornment of a woman is not luxurious dress, but modesty and the pursuit of living honestly and becomingly. Clement of Alexandria, Book II of the Paedagogus, ch. 12, teaches that the true ornament of a woman is shamefastness; and that those who adorn themselves with gold imitate the barbarians, who bind their evildoers with gold. For is not, he says, a golden necklace a bond of the neck, and ornaments and the like, which take the place of chains? Hence too they are called halyseis, that is chains. Whence Philemon calls transparent garments a golden fetter. And after enumerating many ornaments of women: I marvel, he says, that they are not killed, while bearing such a burden: see the same, Book III, ch. 1 and 2. St. Chrysostom, hom. 21 to the People: Do you wish, he says, to adorn the face? adorn it not with pearls, but with modesty and honesty: and so your husband will perceive a more pleasing appearance. For that adornment is wont often to inject suspicion of jealousy, and enmities, and contentions, and fights, etc.; but the adornment of modesty drives away every dishonorable suspicion: but joins marriage more firmly than every bond. For the nature of beauty does not so much make the appearance becoming, as the affection of the beholder. But nothing so usually induces affection as modesty and honesty, etc. Around the adornment of pearls is madness, it is the pomp of Satan. For you took gold not that you might bind the body, but that you might save and feed the poor. The same, hom. 41 on Genesis: From the adornment, he says, of the body innumerable evils arise: arrogance which is born inwardly, contempt of one's neighbor, pride of spirit, corruption of the soul, the kindling of unlawful pleasures, etc. St. Gregory Nazianzen wrote an oration against women adorning themselves more ambitiously, in which he begins thus: Beware, O women, lest you fortify your head with bastard and adulterous tresses as with certain towers, daintily showing your soft necks from your shoulders: nor should you smear over the forms made by God with foul colors, so that you bear no longer faces, but masks. And after some lines: It is to be feared lest God in His wrath should thus address you: Tell, come now, O strange woman, who at last and whence is your maker and procreator? I did not paint you with a dog, but I formed you in my image. How does it come about then that I have an idol in place of My beloved image? And he adds that women devoted to outward adornment neglect the inward, and therefore inwardly represent Hecuba, outwardly Helen. St. Cyprian, On the Dress of Virgins, affirms that excessive adornment is worse than adultery itself: because, as St. Augustine says in Book I On the Sermon of the Lord on the Mount, there chastity, here nature is adulterated. The same, epist. 73 to Possidonius: The true, he says, ornament of Christian men and women, not only no false adornment, but not even the pomp of gold and dress, but good morals. Elegantly Propertius, Book I of his Elegies, I: What does it profit to walk forth with the head adorned with a fillet? And to sell yourself with foreign gifts? And to lose the natural beauty by purchased adornment? Nor allow your members to shine with their own goods? Salty but truly St. Cyprian On the Dress of Virgins: The badges of ornaments, he says, and dress, and the allurements of beauty, befit none but prostitutes and shameless women: and the adornment of scarcely any is more costly than of those whose modesty is cheap, etc. Those clothed in silk and purple cannot put on Christ: those adorned with gold and pearls and necklaces have lost the ornaments of heart and breast. I have cited more on Isaiah 3:18.
IN THE INCORRUPTIBILITY OF A QUIET AND MODEST SPIRIT. — St. Jerome, Book I Against Jovinian, in the incorruption of a meek and silent spirit. He declares who is the hidden, that is, the interior man, namely the man of the heart, that is, of the mind and soul; and in what he consists, and says that he consists in incorruptibility, in Greek aphtharto, that is, in incorruption, this is, in integrity, of a quiet, in Greek praeos, that is meek, gentle, placid, and modest (for the companion, indeed daughter, of meekness is tranquility and modesty) spirit. He calls the incorruption of a quiet spirit first the chastity and purity of the spirit, and contrasts it with the corruption of the body, which wives have undergone in marriage, as if to say, says St. Jerome, Book I Against Jovinian: Since your exterior man (the body) has been corrupted, and you have ceased to have the blessedness of incorruption which properly belongs to virgins: imitate the incorruption of the spirit, at least by belated abstinence, and what you cannot in body, perform in mind. For Christ seeks these riches and these adornments of your union. So also others take by incorruption conjugal chastity. Where note, that meekness, humility and modesty beget incorruption, that is chastity, as I have shown on Rom. 1:24: and St. Gregory teaches this in Morals 26, ch. 12, vol. 13; and St. Bernard, sermon 1 On the feast of All Saints, thus explains that saying of Christ in Matt. 5: Blessed are the meek, for they shall possess the earth, that is, he says, their own flesh. But incorruption makes one near to God, Wisd. 6:20. The chaste therefore, the humble and the modest are as it were certain earthly gods, according to that: I have said, you are gods, and all of you sons of the Most High, Ps. 81:6. Hence too the Poets, says Clement of Alexandria in Book IV of the Stromata at the end, called the elect theoeideis, that is godlike; and dious, that is divine; and antitheous, that is equal to gods; and Dii atalantos, that is equal to the counsel of Jove; and theois enalinkia med' echontes, that is in prudence like the gods; and theoeikeloi, that is, like God. Euripides accordingly: On my back, he says, are golden wings, and the welcome wings of the Sirens are fitted on, and I shall go raised aloft into the boundless aether, about to meet Jupiter. But I would wish for the Spirit of Christ, that He may lift me up to my own Jerusalem.
St. Hilary wrote an epistle to his daughter Abra, in which he promises her a most precious pearl, if she would despise common pearls: This pearl, he says, is of such virtue that, if anyone puts it on, he does not grow sick, does not grow old, does not die. Again, that he cannot have it if anyone has another pearl, for it is beautiful, precious, incomparable and heavenly, bestowing salvation and eternity, and does not deign to be there where others are: doubtless, this pearl is the state of virginity, which St. Hilary wished for and urged upon his daughter. So also St. Agnes said that she had been adorned by Christ with priceless pearls.
Secondly, incorruption of spirit is the integrity of a meek and tranquil soul, which is not agitated by any storms of cupidities, by no diseases of passions, by no anger, pride, envy, etc., is not corrupted, but stands unhurt, whole and incorrupt. For meekness and modesty produce this: with these therefore he wishes women to be adorned; and meekness indeed he opposes to envy, anger, pride: but modesty to lightness, petulance, inconstancy, garrulity, murmuring, into which vices women naturally tend who pursue external adornment and neglect the internal, says St. Chrysostom, hom. 74 on Matthew. For if, he says, we could see the conscience of each one, we should find there many worms, much corruption, and incomparable stench: I mean wicked desires, which exceed worms in filth in a wonderful manner, for the impious are like a fervent sea, which cannot be still, and its waves overflow into the trampling and the mire, Isaiah 57:20.
This is the third virtue of a woman; namely meekness, peace and modesty, whose fruit is incorruption, namely that it makes a person incorrupt from all vices, whole, imperturbable.
Of a modest (in Greek hesychiou, that is tranquil, silent, peaceful, and consequently modest) spirit. — St. Ambrose, Book I of Offices, ch. 18: Modesty, he says, which I judge to be so called from the measure of knowledge of what is becoming, etc. St. Augustine, in his book On the Blessed Life, near the end: Modesty assuredly is said, he says, from measure (modus), and from temperance of mixture (temperies). Where there is measure and tempering, there is nothing more, nothing less. St. Ambrose adds: Let us pray in the incorruption of a quiet and modest spirit, which is rich before God, as Peter says, 1 Epist. ch. 3, v. 4. Great therefore is modesty, which, since it is also more remiss of its own right, claiming nothing for itself, asserting nothing, and in some way more contracted within its own powers, is rich with God, with whom none is rich. Modesty is rich, because it is a portion of God. For God Himself is uncreated and essential modesty both within and without; so that He can be understood in the whole world, but not perceived. For the habit of the mind is discerned in the state of the body. So also St. Mary, when she heard the angel's salutation, out of shamefastness did not reply to the greeting, nor did she give any reply, except where she learned of the conception of the Lord's birth, that she might learn the quality of the effect, not that she might refute the saying, says the same in Book I on Luke. And in Book II On Virgins he depicts her thus: Nothing stern in the eyes, nothing forward in words, nothing immodest in act, no gesture too broken, no walk too loose, no voice too petulant, so that the very appearance of her body was an image of her mind, a figure of probity.
Dionysius the Carthusian relates in chapter III On the Divine Names of St. Dionysius the Areopagite, that St. Dionysius, when he had come from Greece into Judea and had met the Blessed Virgin, beheld her countenance shining with such great charity, that, fainting from excessive amazement, he fell to the ground, and said that, had he not known by natural reason and by faith that there was another divinity, he would have held this very Virgin in place of a Goddess. But hear St. Dionysius himself relating these things about himself in the epistle to St. Paul (although Bellarmine, On Ecclesiastical Writers, and others deny it to be of St. Dionysius) which our Christophorus a Castro recites in the History of the Mother of God, chapter 19, no. 10: I confess, he says, before the omnipotence of God, and the clemency of the Saviour, and the glory of the majesty of the Virgin His mother, that when I was led by John, etc., to the deiform presence of the most exalted Virgin, so great a divine splendor shone around me outwardly, and more fully illumined me inwardly; so great also in me did the fragrance of all perfumes superabound, that neither my unhappy body nor my spirit could bear the marks of the whole and so great eternal felicity. My heart failed, my spirit also failed, oppressed by such great glory of majesty. I bear witness by Him who was present in the Virgin God, if thy divine things conceived in mind had not taught me, I should have believed this one to be the true God. Whence no wonder that the Blessed Virgin by her sight and presence alone bestowed upon those whom she visited the mark of integrity, as St. Ambrose says On the Instruction of Virgins ch. 7. St. Jerome, on chapter 9 of Matthew, giving the reason why Matthew straightway followed Christ when calling him: Certainly, he says, the very splendor and majesty of the hidden divinity, which shone forth even in the human face of Christ, could draw those seeing Him from the first sight. And in ch. 21, giving the reason why, when Christ drove out the moneychangers from the temple with a scourge and overturned the tables, etc., which a great army would not have done, no one resisted: For there flashed, he says, from His eyes a fiery and starry light, and the majesty of divinity shone in His face. Whence Nazianzen, epist. 193 to Diocles: One, he says, of the goods is that Christ should be present at weddings (for where Christ is, there modesty also is), it is worth the labor that, as all other things, so also the marriages of Christians be modest and composed. Modesty moreover is set in gravity. The same, in his Poem On His Own Life, says that on account of his rivals he voluntarily renounced the Patriarchate of Constantinople for two reasons: For from this, he says, a double advantage came back to me, while as a modest man I draw them themselves to modesty, and at the same time I gather love and bright honor.
St. Jerome praises Nebridius in his epistle to Salvina, his wife now a widow, that, born of a sister of an Augusta, and nursed in the bosom of his maternal aunt, in the palace, a tent-mate and fellow-disciple of the emperors, to whose tables the world ministers, and the lands and seas serve, amid the abundance of all things, in the first flower of his age he was of so great modesty as to surpass virginal modesty, and not to give even the slightest tale of obscene rumor about himself. Then a kinsman, companion, cousin of the purple-clad, he was not puffed up with pride, but lovable to all, he loved the princes themselves as brothers, venerated them as lords: but the ministers and the whole order of the palace, by which the royal court is thronged, he had so joined to himself by charity that those who deserved to be inferior would judge themselves equal in offices. It is hard to overcome glory by virtue, and to be loved by those whom you precede. St. Gregory in Dialogues IV, ch. 17, narrates that the girl Musa by command of the Blessed Virgin changed her lighter manners into modest ones, and so was called by her into heaven.
Spirit. — St. Athanasius, in his epistle to Serapion, takes it of the Holy Spirit; for He is rich with God, because He is consort and partaker of the divinity, as if to say: Those who keep themselves pure and uncorrupt receive into themselves the Holy Spirit, who, being quiet and modest, makes them likewise quiet and modest. For modesty is a fruit of the Holy Spirit, Gal. 5:22. But take here according to the letter the human spirit, with St. Ambrose, Book I of Offices, ch. 18; for this, modest and quiet, is the garment and adornment of women: yet it flows from the Holy Spirit, and is His gift.
Which (incorrupt, quiet and modest spirit) IS RICH IN THE SIGHT OF GOD. — Because raising itself above all earthly things it possesses God, and is heir of heaven and of the eternal kingdom. For, as Seneca says, epist. 67: Reason is nothing else than a part of the divine spirit immersed in the human body. Hear St. Ambrose, Book IV, epist. 27: Truly rich is he who in the sight of God can seem rich, in whose sight the earth is small, the very world narrow. But only him does God know to be rich, who is rich for eternity, who lays up not the fruits of wealth, but of virtues. But who is rich before God, except the one quiet and modest in spirit, who is never corrupted? Does he not seem to you rich, who has peace of mind, the tranquility of quiet, so that he desires nothing, is shaken by no storms of cupidities, neither despises the old nor seeks the new, and is not always by desiring made destitute amid the greatest riches? That is peace truly rich, which surpasses every mind. Rich is peace, rich is modesty, rich is faith (for to a faithful man the whole world is a possession), rich is simplicity: for there are also riches of simplicity, which discusses nothing, considers nothing crooked, nothing suspect or fraudulent, but pours itself forth with pure affection. Rich is goodness: which if anyone shall have kept, he is fed in the riches of the heavenly inheritance. Rightly the just man is always lending out, the unjust is in want. He lends out justice by command of God to the poor and the needy: but the foolish man, and that which he thinks he has, in no way possesses. Do you suppose that man possesses anything who, brooding day and night over his treasure, is tormented with greedy and wretched anxiety? He indeed is in want, even though he seems rich to others: he is poor to himself who does not use what he has, who still seizes more, desires more. For where there is no limit to greed, what is the fruit of riches? No one is rich who cannot carry away with him what he has. For what is left here is not ours, but belongs to another.» He adds examples: «Rich was Enoch, who carried with him what he possessed and brought all his sense of goodness into the heavenly receptacles: who therefore was taken away, lest malice should change his heart. Rich was Elijah, who carried the treasures of his virtues in a fiery chariot, lifted on high to the ethereal seats. And yet he left no modest riches to his heir which he himself would not lose. Who would have called him poor even at the time when, lacking daily nourishment, he was sent to a widow to be fed by her; when at his voice heaven was closed and opened; when at his word the jar of meal and the cruse of oil did not fail for three years but abounded, was not diminished by use but was filled? Who would have called him poor at whose will fire descended, whom impassable rivers did not engulf, but flowed back to their source so that the Prophet might pass over with dry foot? Ancient history describes two neighbors, king Ahab and poor Naboth: which of these do we judge poorer, which richer? The one, supported by the royal prop of riches, insatiable and unsatisfied with his wealth, coveted the small vineyard of the poor man. The other, despising in his soul the gold-laden fortunes of kings and the imperial treasures, was content with his own vine. Does not this one seem more rich, more a king, who had abundance for himself, ruled his desires, that he might covet nothing belonging to another? But the other most needy, to whom his own gold seemed worthless, and another's vine most precious.» Then he demonstrates the same point with this sorites: «What is it to be rich, but to abound? But who abounds, who is more contracted in spirit? And he who is more contracted in spirit is surely more straitened. What abundance therefore is there in straits? Therefore he is not rich who does not abound.» Whence David beautifully says: «The rich, he says, have wanted and have suffered hunger. Nothing therefore is richer than the disposition of a wise man, nothing more needy than that of a foolish one; there is abundance where there is satiety: but where there is hunger of desires, where there is insatiable appetite, there indeed is poverty,» etc. According to these things the Apostle Peter defined that the adornment of women is not in gold and silver and garments, but in the hidden man of the heart, in what is concealed: whence let none divest herself of the cultivation of piety, the adornment of grace, the inheritance of eternal life. Socrates saw the same thing through a shadow, whose words and prayer are extant in Clement of Alexandria, book V Stromata: «O Pan and other gods, grant me to be inwardly fair and honorable: since indeed that is most beautiful which is most wise. For he said that virtue was the beauty of the soul, but vice on the contrary was the deformity of the soul.»
Verse 5: For After This Manner Heretofore the Holy Women Also, Who Hoped in God, Adorned Themselves
5. FOR AFTER THIS MANNER IN THE OLD TIME THE HOLY WOMEN ALSO, WHO HOPED IN GOD (and consequently believed in and loved God), ADORNED THEMSELVES. — The phrase «hoping in God» partly refers to «holy,» as if to say: Because they were holy, therefore they hoped in God: for the holy have fixed their heart in God by hope as if by an anchor; partly to «adorned themselves,» as if to say: Because they hoped in God, therefore they adorned themselves modestly, not with curling of hair, gold, and precious garments, but with obedience, by submitting themselves to their husbands, with chastity, and with a quiet and modest spirit. Note that «hoping» means fearing, loving, worshipping, as if to say: They worshipped God, therefore they adorned themselves with obedience, chastity, modesty; namely because they knew that this adornment was pleasing to God and commanded by Him, and through Him they hoped that in marriage they would be blessed and heaped up by God with every fruit and grace. For hope here by synecdoche embraces all worship of God, just as the fear joined with it elsewhere comprehends all worship of God, as when it is said: «Fear the Lord, all you His Saints:» fear, that is, reverence and worship. «Nothing is wanting to them that fear Him. The fear of the Lord is the fullness of wisdom,» etc. For whoever fears and hopes in God is impelled by this fear and hope and as it were compelled to obey and serve Him. So it is said of King Jehoshaphat, a worshipper of the true God, in 2 Paral. XVII, 3: «He did not hope in the Baals, but in the God of his father,» that is, he did not worship the Baals but the God of his father. Whence it is added: «And he proceeded in his commandments, and not according to the sins of Israel,» who worshipped the Baals, that is, idols. Psalm IV, 6: «Offer the sacrifice of justice, and hope in the Lord,» that is, offer sacrifice and worship the Lord; Psalm XXXIII, 9: «Taste and see that the Lord is sweet;» hence: «Blessed is the man that hopes in Him,» that is, who worships and loves Him, and so tastes His sweetness. Whence it is added: «Fear,» that is, worship, «the Lord, all you His saints, for there is no want to them that fear Him.» Psalm XXXVI, 3: «Trust in the Lord, and do good.» Similar are Psalm LXXXIII, 13; Psalm CXIII, 9; Lamentations III, 25. Thus Rebecca, when she saw Isaac her bridegroom, modestly veiled herself with a cloak, and dismounting from the camel, offered him honor, reverence, submission, and obedience, and so continued her whole life, Gen. XXIV, 64. Rachel and Leah followed their mother-in-law Rebecca, the daughters-in-law, and from them came Naomi, Hannah, Abigail, Esther, Judith, and Ruth the Moabitess. Thus the Wise Man, depicting the adornment of the strong woman, Prov. ch. XXXI, v. 25: «Strength, he says, and beauty are her clothing.»
Thus St. Gregory Nazianzen, oration 11, praises his sister St. Gorgonia: «Her, he says, no gold adorned, nor blonde tresses, nor knots of hair and impostures making the precious head a stage with utmost folly, nor the magnificence of flowing and translucent garments, nor the splendors of jewels coloring the surrounding air, nor the arts and tricks of painters, and the earthly fashioner working against the contrary, and obscuring God's creation with treacherous colors, and through honor branding it with infamy, and presenting the divine form to the impudent eyes of harlots as an idol, that an adulterine beauty might steal away the natural image which is reserved for God in the age to come. But although she knew many and varied external adornments of women, yet she recognized none more excellent than her own character and the splendor stored within. One blush pleased her, which modesty produces; one fairness, which abstinence brings forth. For paints and rouges, and the fleeting charm of beauty, she left to actresses and common women, for whom it is a shame and disgrace to blush.» Whence after enumerating many heroic works of her mortification, austerity, piety, and devotion, he exclaims: «O womanly nature, which on account of every contest for salvation has surpassed the manly nature; and have made it evident that male and female is a distinction of body, not of soul! O the great chastity after baptism, and the soul as the bride of Christ in the pure bridal-chamber of the body! O the self-emptying of Christ, and the form of a servant, and His sufferings honored by mortification!»
St. Ignatius, epistle 12 to the Antiochenes, exhorts wives to so reverence their husbands that they do not even dare to address them by name.
Clement of Alexandria, book IV of the Stromata: «Euripides describes a wife, he says, who loves her husband with honor, thus exhorting: With good words must one respond, if the spouse has said anything; And if he has not spoken, work to speak to the husband's pleasure. It is sweet for a wife, if any evil befalls, To grieve with her husband, to share his sorrow and his joy. Thus showing gentleness of manners and benevolence even in calamities.» Then he adds that the wife's voice is worthy: Though you be sick, I too will bear your sickness, And suffer your misfortunes; and surely to me Nothing is bitter. For with friends it befits To be blessed: for what is friendship if not this? The same Clement, book III of the Pedagogue, ch. xi: «A most beautiful thing, he says, is the woman who is the keeper of the house, who clothes both herself and her husband with their proper adornments, by which all rejoice: the children indeed on account of the mother, the husband on account of the wife, she herself on account of them, and all on account of God. To say it briefly, the strong woman is the storehouse of virtue.» St. Ambrose on Proverbs ch. XXXI, ch. III: «A good, he says, wife calls her husband lord, as Sara obeyed Abraham, said the Apostle Peter, calling him lord. A good wife, I say, not only calls her husband her lord, but tastes this, sounds this, bears this in her heart, professes this with her mouth, and considers the marriage tablets the instruments of her purchase (for in former times the wife used to be bought by husbands, and led by purchase); she is therefore a handmaid giving works to handmaidens.» Thus St. Natalia called her husband Adrian lord. Thus St. Monica served her husband Patricius as a lord, says St. Augustine, IX Confessions, IX. See the six precepts which I gave to the wife from Aristotle, Eph. V. 22, and the last verse, at the end of the chapter. See also the examples of honor and love of spouses which I recounted in Gen. ch. II, v. 24.
Finally St. Jerome, writing to Celantia, gives this precept to her and to wives: «Especially in honorable and undefiled marriage let the Apostolic
Verse 6: As Sara Obeyed Abraham, Calling Him Lord: Whose Daughters You Are
6. AS SARA OBEYED ABRAHAM, — to such an extent that she followed him as he departed from his fatherland of Chaldea, leaving parents and kinsmen, and continuously sojourned with him through Canaan, and there exposed herself for him even to dangers of her chastity. See what is said in Gen. XII, 13ff.
CALLING HIM LORD, — saying, Gen. XVIII, 12: «After I am grown old, and my lord (my husband Abraham) is an old man, shall I give myself to pleasure?» Sara was originally called by the proper name Jescha, as I said at the end of Gen. XI; afterwards she was called Sarai, that is, my lady or my princess, and this, as it seems, by Abraham, who, seeing himself honored by her and called lord, in turn wished to honor her, and therefore called her Sarai: so our Lorinus. A great proof of this is that she was originally called Sarai, that is, my lady, by which she could fittingly have been called by no one else than by her husband Abraham. Then by God promising her the son Isaac, from whom Christ was to be born, she was called absolutely Sara, that is, lady: because through Christ her Son she was to rule the whole world, Gen. XVII, 15. Let wives therefore learn from Sara to honor their husbands, and so in turn they will be honored by them; let them learn to obey them, because by obeying they will rule, and will obtain from them whatever they wish. So today we see grave men call their wives ladies. Indeed, that saying of Seneca is true: «A chaste matron rules her husband by obeying him.» Whence Origen mystically, hom. 6 on Genesis: «Sara, he says, which is interpreted as ruler, or one exercising rule, holds the form of ἀρετή, which is virtue of soul. This virtue therefore is conjoined and coheres with a wise and faithful man, just as that wise man who said of wisdom: Her have I sought to take to me as bride; therefore it is said to Abraham: All things whatsoever rule of the Apostle's order be observed: let the husband's authority be preserved in the first place, and let the whole house learn from you how much honor is owed to him; show him to be your lord by your obedience, show him to be great by your humility: she will be more honored herself, the more she has honored him. For the head (as the Apostle says) of the woman is the husband: nor is the rest of the body adorned more from any other source than from the dignity of the head.» For the wife passes into the household, lineage, and family of her husband, and receives from him all her grace, nobility, and dignity. Moreover for this reason the wise Chilon and Pittacus advise that a wife should be taken from an equal station, not a superior one, lest she wish to preside proudly over her husband. Hear Ausonius, On the Seven Wise Men, in Solon: «Pair to pair, he says, let the spouse be yoked: what is unequal is at variance.» And Ovid, in the epistle On Love, to Hercules: If you wish to marry suitably, marry an equal. Whence the common saying: «Take you yourself an equal.»
WHOSE DAUGHTERS YOU ARE. — From this it is clear that St. Peter wrote these things properly and directly to the Jews: for they were the sons and daughters of Sara according to the letter; consequently, however, he also writes to the Gentiles: for they were sons and daughters of Sara and Abraham according to the spirit, because they imitated her faith, piety, and holy works, Rom. IX, 8. So Didymus. Whence Peter adds «doing good»; the Syriac has «in good works,» namely by imitating Sara's almsgiving and beneficence. For this is what the Greek ἀγαθοποιοῦντες signifies, although the same word can extend to the honor and benevolence to be shown to a husband, and to any other good works. Moreover the Wise Man excellently depicts the duties and good works of a wife, in Proverbs XXXI, and Tobit ch. X, v. 13, and St. Paul to Titus II, 4 and 5.
NOT FEARING ANY DISTURBANCE, — as if to say: if you submit to your husbands and are benevolent, beneficent, and obedient to them, you would be treated more imperiously by them; rather, your obedience will win for you the love, peace, and honor of your husbands; for love is a magnet of love: so Oecumenius. Again, as if to say: Do not fear disturbances, that is, the troubles of marriage: for if you do good and live worthily of marriage, God by His grace will make these things easy for you. For this grace is an effect of the sacrament of matrimony, prepared by God for spouses, that they may bravely bear the burdens of marriage, and being well conscious of themselves, fear nothing. Thirdly and forcefully, as if to say: If any disturbance arises at home, as often happens; if the husband is angry, if the children quarrel, if among the maidservants, servants, kinsmen, neighbors, strife and contention arise, do not fear, do not be shaken; but bear all things bravely as heroines, and by your prudence and grace soothe and reconcile them. Be imperturbable; thus you will calm all the disturbances of the house, and make the whole family, after your example, tranquil and peaceful. Less chastely some take «disturbance» for that of lust (for this is what the Greek πτόησις signifies in Aristotle, On the Generation of Animals, ch. v), as if to say: Fear not lest by obedience toward the husband lust be inflamed in you, because such things produce charity, not lust.
Verse 7: Husbands Likewise Dwelling With Them According to Knowledge, Giving Honor to the Female as to the Weaker Vessel
7. HUSBANDS LIKEWISE DWELLING WITH THEM — that is, with the wife, as follows. «Dwelling with,» that is, let them dwell together, namely so that they share the same roof and bed, lest they divorce their wives either of household or of bed, nor turn aside to others or spend the night outside. It is a Hebraism. For the Hebrews use the participle for the indicative which they lack; of which there are many examples, Rom. XII, 10ff.
According to knowledge. — «Knowledge» here signifies prudence and discretion, which dictates to the husband that he accommodate himself to the weakness of his wife, that he show her honor, and treat her as a companion, not as a handmaid: so Lyranus, Dionysius and others. For the husband is in the home what the king is in the kingdom, says Aristotle in the Economics. As therefore the king should be endowed with political prudence, by which he may rule the kingdom suitably for the capacity and disposition of his subjects, so the husband ought to be endowed with economic prudence, by which he so rules his wife, children, and household that there be among all unity, peace, and love. Again, that he may teach all the law and will of God, namely what they ought to do or avoid in any matter so that they may please God and obtain His grace and glory. For the husband in the home is as the eye, lamp, and sun teaching and illuminating the whole house: so Bede (1).
GIVING HONOR AS TO THE WEAKER VESSEL OF THE WOMAN (St. Ambrose, On Paradise, ch. IV, reads: «As to the weaker vessel, the wife») bestowing honor. — Women are weaker both in sex and constitution, both in mind and judgment, and in skill, industry and wisdom for managing affairs; whence it is the man's part to care for external matters, the woman's for domestic ones. This weakness makes her prone to easily think herself despised and held in contempt: therefore St. Peter commands that this be met, and that she be raised up through honor, so that wives, seeing themselves honored by their husbands, may live content with their state, love their husband, and live peacefully with him as one flesh, that is, one civil and economic person, Gen. II, 24.
By «honor» St. Jerome, book I Against Jovinian, and Hesselius understand abstinence from the use of matrimony, that at appointed times they may be free for prayer, as follows. «If we abstain, he says, from coitus, we give honor to wives: if we do not abstain, it is clear that contumely is contrary to honor;» by which he indicates that the use of matrimony is contumely, that is, something base, carnal and shameful; for which reason this act is commonly called shameful, and by Scripture the revelation of ignominy and shame, Lev. XVIII, 7.
Secondly, Oecumenius understands by «honor» gentleness, so that, as he says, husbands gently with a certain reverence may persuade wives prone to pleasure to admit abstinence from marriage at the time of prayer. Thirdly, others on the contrary take by «honor» the conjugal debt, as if he commands it to be rendered to wives; but honestly, not wantonly and dishonestly like a horse and ass. This is what Paul says, I Thess. IV, 3: «That you abstain from fornication, that every one of you should know how to possess his vessel (his wife) in sanctification and honor, not in the passion of desire, like the Gentiles who know not God;» so our Lorinus from Turrianus. Fourthly, better and more fully, Oecumenius again takes «honor» generally and properly as it sounds, and especially that, as he says, the husband may show himself gentle and pleasing to his wife, and may not exact from her too strict or precise an account of domestic matters which are entrusted to her trust. Again, that he treat her honorably and address her, saying for example with Abraham, Sarai, that is, my lady, what do you wish, what do you ask of me? For woman by her nature is timid, modest and pusillanimous: the remedy for this fear, modesty and pusillanimity is honor, if she sees herself honored by her husband. Thus Emperor Claudius called his wife Messalina, though impure, his lady. Nestor in Homer, Odyssey III, calls his spouse «lady»; so too St. Adrian addressed his St. Natalia. Hence many Italians, Spaniards, and Frenchmen call their wives «dames,» the Greeks δέσποιναι, that is, ladies. To this point relates that of Martial, book XI, epigram 8 to Paula: The husband himself shall cling as companion to his lady. And Virgil, Aeneid VI: These, attempting to lead the lady from the bridal chamber of Dis, And Catullus in the Epithalamium of Julia: Call the lady to the house.
Excellently St. Basil, hom. 7 of the Hexaemeron: «You, he says, O husbands, love your wives, even if you have come together in marriage from distant places, let the bond of nature, secured by laws and blessing, be the union and yoke of those separated.» And below, after he had taught by the example of the viper and the lamprey that the harsh manners of the husband must be borne by the wife, he adds: Let the husband himself also hear an admonition fitting and becoming to him: the viper vomits forth its venom out of reverence for marriage, will you not lay aside hardness of soul, fierceness, cruelty out of reverence for union?»
And St. Chrysostom, hom. 26 on I Corinthians: «Consider that the woman is a weak vessel. But you, husband, were therefore made head and placed in the position of head, that you might bear the weakness of one subject: would you therefore make your headship illustrious; you will do this if you do not insult her who is subject; and just as a king appears more glorious in proportion as he shows his prefect more glorious; whom if he were to dishonor, and afflict the greatness of that dignity with contumely, he would take away no small part of his own glory: likewise you also, if you afflict with contumely her who holds the second place after you, derogate not a little from the honor of your headship. Whenever something troublesome happens at home, if the wife has erred in anything, console her, and do not increase her sorrow. For though you cast away all things, nothing more grievous shall happen than not to have a benevolent wife at home: though you mention any sin whatever, you will find no greater grief than to have strife with your wife. Therefore for this reason this kind of love is to be held in the greatest honor of all. But if burdens must be borne mutually, much more those of the wife, and if she is poor, do not reproach her; and if foolish, do not insult her, but be more modest: for she is your member, and you have been made one flesh. But she is foolish, drunken, irascible: therefore she is to be grieved over, not raged against; and God is to be entreated, and she herself to be admonished and helped by counsel, and every effort to be made that she may be freed from those affections. But if you strike her, you will exasperate the disease: for harshness is dissolved by gentleness, not by other harshness.» He adds the example of Socrates, who when asked how he tolerated the manners of his depraved and drunken wife, replied, «that I may have at home the gymnasium and palaestra of philosophy (of patience). For I shall be, he said, gentle with others, when I am trained by daily having to bear with her.»
AS TO COHEIRS OF THE GRACE OF LIFE. — He gives the reason why husbands ought to honor their wives, namely because, although by nature and sex they are weak and unequal, yet by grace and calling they are equal to husbands; for they are called to the same grace and glory as husbands. Let them therefore honor them, as coheirs with themselves in the Church both militant and triumphant. Note: Grace is called «of life,» that is, first, vital, because grace gives the soul spiritual life, that it may live by the Spirit of God. Secondly, because grace leads to eternal life: for grace is the seed of glory, wherefore by Christ it is called the fountain of water springing up unto life eternal, John IV, 14. Whence for ζωῆς, that is of life, the Greek Regia has ζώσης, that is, living, life-giving, and conferring eternal life. St. Jerome, book I Against Jovinian, reads, as to coheirs of manifold grace. For the grace of Christ and of Christianity is manifold, and embraces many virtues and gifts. Moreover the «coheirs,» namely, the wives: for by these he understood the «vessel of the woman.» For so the Hebrews often by enallage change numbers, as well as persons and genders, especially when one is included in the other, as happens here. The Greek has συγκληρονόμοι, that is coheirs, in the nominative, so that it refers to the husbands. But the meaning comes back to the same. For if the husband is coheir to the wife, therefore the wife also to the husband: for the coheir of a coheir is a coheir: for these are correlatives.
THAT YOUR PRAYERS BE NOT HINDERED. — In Greek ἐγκόπτεσθαι, that is, may be broken off, intercepted, abrogated, extirpated. The Tigurine version: lest they be interrupted your prayers, to signify that prayer should be made assiduously, that is, frequently, even by spouses. The sense is, as if to say: If the husband does not show honor to his wife, but treats her basely, harshly and unworthily, if he is angry with her, indignant, scolds her, beats her, she in turn will be indignant with her husband, will quarrel and brawl with him, and pour out wagonloads of insults and curses against him. Thus the piety and prayer of both will be hindered: for nothing is so contrary to this as anger and brawling, and a soul disturbed, impatient, and eager for revenge. Whence Christ commands us to be reconciled to our brother before we offer our gift to God, Matt. V, 23. So Hugh, Lyranus, Dionysius and others. Secondly, others say, as if: Impart honor, that is, the conjugal debt to the wife, yet so that your prayers be not hindered, but when the Eucharist is to be received, or otherwise prayer is to be attended to, abstain from the use of marriage, as Paul advises, I Cor. VII, 5. Whence St. Jerome, the Gloss and Bede take by «honor» abstinence from marriage, as I said a little before. But this exposition supplies «yet so,» which is not in the Greek, indeed it is excluded by the Greek, for it has thus: εἰς τὸ μὴ ἐγκόπτεσθαι τὰς προσευχὰς ὑμῶν, that is, for the not hindering of your prayers, which is to be referred to all the preceding things which were said both about the wife's duties toward the husband and the husband's toward the wife, as if to say: You, O women, be subject to your husbands, obey them, and put away all disturbance. You likewise, O husbands, impart honor to your wives, lest your prayers be interrupted, so that the husband offended by the wife, or the wife offended by the husband, or both bearing a bitter heart toward the other, may not be able to pray piously, tranquilly and fruitfully, but each obeying the other, agreeing and as it were singing together, may offer prayer to God in concord with the other. For this concord God wonderfully loves and demands, especially from spouses and confederates, according to that of Ecclus. XXV, 1: «In three things was my spirit pleased, which are approved before God and men: the concord of brethren, and the love of neighbors, and a husband and wife well agreeing.» Wherefore the prayer of husband and wife in concord is winged with two wings, by which it easily flies up to God, and there produces a sweet harmony and concert. But the prayer of those in discord, if namely one is in discord with the other, lacks either one or both wings (for the wing is concord), and therefore cannot fly up to God, and is as it were a gaping and dissonant harmony; for the force of the prayer of one is hindered and crushed by the other consort and spouse, who, offended, tacitly, and often actively and explicitly, seeks revenge, that God may not hear the voice of the consort. And this is what the Greek ἐγκόπτεσθαι signifies, as if to say: Lest the force of your prayer be cut into, or be cut off and enervated. For it is cut into and crushed through dissension and discord; but coalesces and is strengthened through concord, according to that saying of Christ: «I say to you, that if two of you shall consent upon earth, concerning anything whatsoever they shall ask, it shall be done to them by My Father,» Matt. XVIII, 19.
Verse 8: And in the Faith All of One Mind, Having Compassion One of Another, Lovers of the Brotherhood, Merciful, Modest, Humble
8. IN THE END. — Wrongly Bede, Lyranus, the Gloss and Hugh read «in faith.» For in Greek it is τὸ δὲ τέλος, that is, as the Syriac has it, «but the end,» as if to say: Finally, lastly, in the end; the Tigurine version, «in sum;» which from Seneca, epistle 40, we say, the sum of sums, when we wish to conclude a matter or speech. See Francis Lucas. For St. Peter, after he gave precepts proper to servants, wives, and husbands, concludes by giving precepts common to all the faithful, lest he be compelled tediously and at length to assign each thing to each state of men.
ALL OF ONE MIND. — Here St. Peter portrays the Christian, perfect, and adorned with virtues as with all his endowments. He therefore requires of him nine virtues: first, unanimity; second, compassion; third, fraternal love; fourth, mercy; fifth, modesty; sixth, humility; seventh, charity, by which he renders good for evil; eighth, patience and constancy in persecutions; ninth, sanctity, that he may sanctify Christ in his heart: these are the nine virtues of Christians, as it were the nine choirs of angels, and so they transmit to those choirs the faithful; and as all the choirs of angels are connected and associated with one another, so also are these virtues. For one is the inseparable companion of another, indeed of all the rest, so that it seems to be its sister, or often even mother or daughter. For unanimity begets compassion, compassion fraternal love, love mercy, mercy modesty, modesty humility, humility charity, charity patience, patience sanctity.
For «unanimous,» in Greek it is ὁμόφρονες, that is, of the same mind and spirit, thinking the same, agreeing. Peter commands that the faithful agree with one another in mind and will, so that what one wills, the other wills also; which St. Paul clearly and frequently inculcates upon his own, saying: «Being of one mind one toward another,» Rom. XII, 16. And: «Fulfill my joy, that you may be of one mind, having the same charity, being unanimous, agreeing in sentiment,» Phil. II, 2. And: «Now the God of patience and of comfort grant you to be of one mind one toward another, according to Jesus Christ, that with one mind, and with one mouth, you may glorify God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.» Some add, «unanimous in prayer;» but this is their own gloss, which explains the text of Scripture, but not fully nor adequately: for Peter requires that the faithful be unanimous not only in prayer, but in all things.
Moreover St. Peter assigns unanimity as the first virtue of the faithful and of the Church, because it is the indissoluble bond among them, which makes them unconquered and insuperable against all enemies. This is the common voice and judgment of all Philosophers and of all nations. Antisthenes, Laertius says, book VI, ch. 1, «said that concord of brothers among themselves was a fortification stronger than any wall.» Agesilaus, king of the Lacedaemonians, when asked why Lacedaemon was not surrounded by walls, showing his armed and unanimous citizens, replied: «These, he said, are the walls of Sparta,» signifying that the unanimity of citizens is stronger than any walls, according to that line of Homer: Shield clung to shield, helmet to helmet, and man to man. For citizens whom concord joins, no wall can be more impregnable. So Plutarch in the Laconica, who also adds: Lycurgus, returning to Lacedaemon, seeing the heaps of citizens' sheaves placed in order at the harvest, smiling said: «So that all Lacedaemon seemed to be of many brothers who had divided the inheritance among themselves.» The same man, when asked by the citizens by what means they could be safe against enemies, replied: «If you remain poor, and lay aside mutual contentions,» signifying that immoderate wealth and discord are the two destructive plagues of a city.
Scipio Africanus, after capturing Numantia, asked the chief Tyresius by what means Numantia, previously unconquered, had now given up its hands to the enemy; he replied: «Concord brought victory, discord destruction.»
Micipsa in Sallust, in the Jugurtha, when about to die, exhorting his sons to concord, set forth this golden maxim about it: «For by concord small things grow, but by discord the greatest fall apart.»
The Roman Emperor Severus, when dying, called his sons M. Antoninus and Geta, and said: «See that there is agreement among you, enrich the soldiers, despise all others,» So Dio and Xiphilinus in the Life of Severus.
Scilurus, having eighty sons, when about to die handed each one a bundle of darts and ordered them to break it. When each had refused as impossible, he himself drew them out one by one, and so broke them all easily one by one, and added: «If you shall be in concord, you will remain strong and unconquered: on the contrary, if you are torn apart by dissensions and sedition, you will be weak and easy to overcome.» So Plutarch in the Apophthegms of Kings.
More clearly and particularly Ecclesiastes ch. IV, v. 9 teaches the same thing: «Better it is, he says, that two should be together than one; for they have the advantage of their society. If one falls, he shall be supported by the other. Woe to him that is alone, for when he falls, he has none to lift him up, and if two sleep together, they shall warm one another: how shall one alone be warmed? And if a man prevail against one, two shall withstand him: a threefold cord is not easily broken.»
The a priori reason for this matter is that the origin of concord is the Most Holy Trinity Itself: for this is the first essential and uncreated concord, and so great is it, that for the three divine Persons there is not only one and the same mind and will, but one and the same singular and undivided essence, which therefore imparts to creatures, the more they are near to It, the greater concord from Itself. Wherefore among so many millions of angels there is the highest concord, just as in all the heavenly orbs, planets and stars, although they have very many and contrary motions. Whence that of Job XXV, 2: «Who makes peace in His high places.» And ch. XXXVIII, 37: «Who shall make the harmony of heaven to sleep?»
On the contrary, in hell there is the greatest discord. Wherefore men on earth in concord imitate the life of the heavenly ones and angels: but those in discord follow the life of the infernal beings and demons, among whom there is perpetual strife and quarrel. Again, Christ, in order to establish concord between men and angels, between heaven and earth, between God and the descendants of Adam, descended to earth, and assumed flesh, that being God-man He might unite in Himself God and men. Moreover the Holy Spirit is the personal love and concord of the Father and the Son: those therefore who are in concord are the temple of the Holy Spirit as well as of Christ, according to that promise of His: «Wherever two or three are gathered in My name, there I am in the midst of them,» Matt. ch. XVIII, v. 20.
For this reason the early Christians, obeying this precept of St. Peter, eagerly devoted themselves to unanimity, as is clear from the Apologies of Tertullian, Justin, Athenagoras and others, indeed from St. Luke, Acts IV, 32: «Of the multitude, he says, of the believers there was one heart and one soul.» St. Cyprian, epistle I to Cornelius, celebrates the concord of the Roman people, because they all unanimously with their Pontiff Cornelius offered themselves to martyrdom: «The virtue, he says, of the Bishop going before there was publicly approved, the union of the following brotherhood was shown; while among you there is one soul and one voice, the whole Roman Church has confessed, etc. You have taught greatly to fear God, to adhere firmly to Christ, that the people should be joined to the priests in danger, that in persecution brothers should not be separated from brothers, that concord joined together can in no way be conquered; whatever is asked together by all, the God of peace shows to the peaceful.» And shortly after: «What a glorious spectacle was this under the eyes of God? what a joy in the sight of His Christ, of His Church, that not single soldiers, but the whole camp at once came forth to the battle which the enemy had attempted to bring on?»
Memorable is what we read in the Life of St. Macarius, namely that it was revealed to him that with all his prayer, fasting, and zeal for the virtues he had not yet attained the measure of merit of two women, who with their husbands had lived for fifteen years in the same house in peace and concord, so that one had never said a harsher word to the other.
Excellently St. Antiochus, hom. 80 On Concord: «Just as, he says, a swarm of bees produces for itself a honeycomb of honey, so the congregation of brethren represents the kingdom of God; as the sound of trumpets stirs up and excites the alacrity of those waging war, so also the doctrine of practical virtue wonderfully sharpens the zeal of the disciples.» And St. Maximus, sermon 6 On Fraternal Love: «Nothing, he says, can be comthe congregation and the Church. See what was said at chapter I, verse 22, and chapter II, verse 17.
Merciful — out of the inmost bowels of the soul; for this is what εὐσπλαγχνίαν signifies. Mercy, says St. Augustine in book IX of The City of God, chapter v, "is a certain compassion in our heart for the misery of another, by which indeed, if we are able, we are compelled to come to his aid. For this movement serves reason when mercy is so shown that justice is preserved, whether something is bestowed upon the needy or pardon is given to the penitent. This Cicero, that distinguished orator, did not hesitate to call a virtue. For so addressing Caesar (in his oration for Q. Ligarius) he says: Of your virtues none is more admirable nor more pleasing than mercy." Therefore Seneca and the Stoics err in thinking that mercy is a vice, namely a passion and infirmity of a soft and commiserating mind, as I said at Acts xvii, 18.
Compassionate. — The Syriac: suffering with those who suffer. The Greek συμπάθεις is highly significant. The Zurich version translates: similarly affected; Vatablus, be moved with mutual affection; Pagninus, affected with the same afflictions. For συμπάθεια is the natural consent and agreement, and as it were the harmony of the members, or of like things, by which one member feels and undergoes the suffering of another, as if a fellow-member with it. Hence by Pliny it is called the consent of the members and the fellowship of nature, to which he opposed antipathy or natural repugnance. Therefore St. Peter commands that the faithful should suffer with one another and feel each other's afflictions, and by feeling and grieving together should give relief — just as the soul, through natural union and sympathy, feels the troubles of the body and grieves with it; or as the head through sympathy feels the pains of the stomach and of any other member, and grieves with it and assists it. This is what Paul says, Rom. xii, 4: "Rejoice with them that rejoice, and weep with them that weep." And I Cor. chapter xii, verse 26: "If one member suffers, all the members suffer with it; or if one member is glorified, all the members rejoice with it." For this sympathy of the members holds good in both good and evil: in the good they rejoice together, in the evil they grieve together. And Galat. vi, 2: "Bear one another's burdens, and so you shall fulfill the law of Christ." See what is said there.
Excellently St. Maximus, On Charity, book III, number 78: "He, he says, is a true friend who, when misfortune presses, in the time of temptation bears tribulations and difficulties and calamities together with his neighbor as if they were his own, without dismay or perturbation of mind."
And St. Chrysostom in Antonius, in the Melissa, part II, chapter lv: "The stronger you are, the more fitting it is that you bear with one weaker. For he who is endowed with strength ought not to be strong for himself alone, but also for others. But if you say that you are strong and despise his weakness, you will incur a twofold penalty; for each one ought to be solicitous for the salvation of his neighbor."
LOVERS OF THE BROTHERHOOD. — The Zurich version: endowed with brotherly charity. This is the philadelphia of the faithful, by which they love one another — that is, the whole assembly of the faithful — as brothers; so that, just as a brother fervently loves his whole brotherhood, that is, the whole assembly of brothers, namely all and each of the brothers: so the faithful man should fraternally love all and each of the faithful, and their whole congregation and Church.
Modest, Humble. — Humility is the companion and sister of modesty. "Meekness and humility are like foster-sisters," says St. Bernard in his sermon on that passage of Apocalypse xii, Signum magnum. Hence in Greek for these two there is a single word φιλόφρονες, which the Zurich version and Pagninus translate as affable; others, those whose mind is kindly and benevolent, for φρήν is the mind. Budaeus in his later Epistle: "benevolent, friendly, humane, easy, accommodating, courteous, cheerful, gentle, kindly"; for φιλοφροσύνη is courtesy, kindness, affability, benevolence, cheerfulness, kindly reception, hospitality, familiarity, liberality, all of which proceed from modesty and humility. So courtesy and benevolence are the foremost and most welcome part of modesty. Add that one word seems to be missing in the Greek; I gather this both from the fact that some codices have φιλόφρονες, that is modest, courteous, kind, etc., and others φιλοταπεινόφρονες, that is, lovers of humility; and so Oecumenius reads. It seems therefore that both words were once in the Greek, but certain smatterers, thinking one redundant, either expunged it or rejected it to the margin. I gather it also from the fact that Our (translator) renders by two words, modest, humble; hence he too seems to have read in the Greek two corresponding words. Therefore St. Peter commands the faithful to be modest, that is, humane, gentle, affable to all, and easy in common life, so as to conciliate everyone to themselves and to Christ; and accordingly that they should despise no one however lowly and poor, nor offend any by harsh words or manners. For there are some, like Timon the misanthrope, so morose, difficult, and rough, that one can scarcely deal or speak with them, because they are constantly grumbling, murmuring, detracting, growing angry, and quarreling. Furthermore, the modest and courteous are called φιλόφρονες, as it were knowing all things, or as if lovers of wisdom and prudence; for φρονεῖν is to be wise, and φρόνησις is prudence; because true wisdom and prudence is modesty: for it draws to itself the eyes and minds of God and of men, obtains all things, persuades all things. On the contrary arrogance, immodesty, and harshness are hateful to all; they disturb all, overthrow all. Hence modesty, like temperance, is called σωφροσύνη, as σώζουσα τὴν φρόνησιν, that is, preserving mind and wisdom, says Aristotle, book VI of the Ethics, chapter v; and as Socrates in Plato has it, σωτηρία τῆς φρονήσεως, that is, the safety of mind and wisdom.
You will ask: what kind of virtue is modesty? what are its duties? how is it to be acquired? I say first: Modesty composes the whole exterior man honorably and becomingly, just as the other virtues compose the interior. Modesty therefore is the composition of the limbs, the senses, the clothing, the gait, the speech, the look, the countenance, and of all external movements and actions. For this reason it is itself the purple of the virtues, as St. Ambrose says; nor does the purple so adorn Kings and Cardinals as modesty adorns the faithful. So it is the golden and bejeweled robe adorning the Christian, according to that of Canticles i, 11: "We will make you chains of gold inlaid with silver." And: "The queen stood at your right hand in golden raiment, surrounded with variety." And: "All the glory of the king's daughter is from within, in golden fringes clothed about with varieties," Psalm xliv, verses 10 and 14. Therefore modesty is first the ornament and royal vesture of man, which makes him wonderfully beautiful. For as a beautiful body adorns the soul, and beautiful clothing adorns the body: so modesty adorns both clothing and body and soul. For modesty is named from mode and moderation, because it places a measure upon all of man's acts and gestures, and moderates them with decorum. Hence St. Augustine in the Rule: "In all your motions," he says, "let nothing be done which may offend the sight of anyone, but what may show forth your sanctity." Some Religious are not distinguished from others by their dress, so that modesty as it were a dress may distinguish them.
Hence secondly, modesty wonderfully pleases God, and greatly refreshes His eyes and those of the angels, just as immodesty and shamelessness offend them. For as men are delighted to see queens adorned with royal robes, so the angels delight to see men clothed and adorned with modesty. Hence the spouse says in Canticles vii, 1: "How beautiful are your steps in sandals, O daughter of the prince?" And St. Paul: "We are made a spectacle to the world, and to angels, and to men," 1 Cor. iv.
Thirdly, modesty greatly edifies neighbors: for they cannot perceive interior virtue except through external modesty. The modest man therefore is as it were a statue of virtue. Such were the Essenes, who were so modest that in their assembly no one spat, nor uttered the slightest hiss or noise, so that they appeared as angels. See about them Philo, Josephus, and from them Eusebius.
I say secondly: Modesty is the effect and external act of internal virtue and composition, and therefore it is impossible for anyone to be continually and in all actions modest and composed, unless he has first subdued and ordered his manners, affections, and internal passions. For external composure flows from the internal, and, as Hugh of St. Victor says: "The state of the mind is recognized in the bearing of the body." Wherefore the angels, in order to teach us modesty, often appeared in an assumed body, that in it they might express angelic manners and modesty; nay, the divine Word was incarnate for this reason also, that in the flesh He might express divine manners. Represent therefore to yourself the conversation and modesty of the angels and of Christ in the flesh, and in this as in a mirror look upon yourself, and reform and conform your manners thereto. "Act as if a certain God walking abroad upon the earth, and a holy angel in the flesh."
I say thirdly: St. Thomas, II II, Question clx, article 2, posits four species of modesty. The first, he says, is humility, which moderates the appetite for excellence. The second is studiousness, which moderates curiosity in knowing. The third is modesty, which moderates the senses and acts of man. The fourth is modesty of dress. But he takes modesty in a broad sense; for properly modesty is the composition of the exterior man, whose acts are various. The first, to compose modestly the individual members. The second, to compose habit and dress. The third, to compose gait and conversation. The fourth, to compose the senses, especially the eyes, that they be not wandering, but modest and downcast; the ears, that they be not open to vain, curious, and detracting things; the tongue, that it utter not idle, harmful, slanderous, angry, proud things, etc. For to modesty are opposed immodesty, petulance, and levity.
Furthermore, modesty composes manners everywhere, namely in the bedroom, in the oratory, in the school, in the temple, at table. Worldly people especially mark priests and Religious at table, because there one easily transgresses in food, drink, and chatter. Let Religious therefore beware, and preserve modesty, especially when at the tables of seculars, if they wish to safeguard their honor, name, and reputation. Wherefore, if you are wise, so compose your eyes, countenance, voice, bearing, gait, and all your motions, that they may befit God, adorn you, and edify your neighbor: for otherwise honor lies hidden in the soul, while dishonor is open in the voice, countenance, and bearing. Let the Religious know, let the priest consider, that by his bearing he carries about the honor and dignity of his rank, Order, and monastery. For seculars judge and estimate the rest from a single one, and say: I have seen one Religious of such an Order, or one priest of such a Church, so modest, pious, devout; or so immodest, dissolute, irreligious: therefore the rest are such. Would that each one would consider this, and would restrain himself by it as by a bridle: surely they would arouse a great opinion of themselves and of their company!
I say fourthly: Modesty is most to be seen in words, especially in reproof and correction. Let it therefore be humble, gentle, modest, and pleasant. So Christ reproved the Samaritan woman, saying: "Call your husband," John iv. He did not say: You are a harlot; but gently and by indirection led her on, so that she herself might confess it of her own accord. Again He admonished more by life than by word: as also St. Basil, "whose speech was thunder, because his life was lightning," says Nazianzen in his Encomium.
Thus St. Bonaventure was so modest, humble, pleasant, and devout, that as many as heard or saw him were straightway captivated by love of him.
St. Mechtilde so cultivated silence that she seemed mute; but if anyone conversed with her, he thought he was hearing an angel. So her Life relates.
Outstanding in modesty was St. Lucian, whom the Emperor Maximianus did not dare to look upon at close quarters, but only through a veil, lest he should be bewitched by him and willy-nilly become a Christian. See what is said at Philippians iv, 5.
I say fifthly: The ways and means of acquiring modesty are various. The first, to consider that we live in the presence of God, the angels, and men, and that we are everywhere seen, heard, and noted by them. For we are made a spectacle to God, to angels, and to men. So our Edmund Campion, martyr of England: "Wherever I am," he said, "I remember that I move in the theater of the world." For if we are modest and circumspect when we know that we are in the sight of the Pontiff, of a Bishop, of the King, or even of a Rector or grave man, what shall we do when we know that we stand before God, and that He looks upon us and all that is ours most intimately and contemplates them, that He may judge them and either punish or reward? Again, like Enoch, Noah, and Elijah, to walk with God, often to deal and converse with Him; likewise with the most holy angels, for thus we shall put on their manners. Consider, if an angel fallen from heaven were to deal with us, with what gravity, decorum, honor would he act: consider yourself, and that your soul is as it were an angel fallen from heaven. Furthermore, pray God that He may possess, compose, and direct you and your heart, mouth, tongue, and your whole body and mind to His praise, that in all your motions and manners He Himself may be honored and glorified, so that not so much you as God through you may act, see, speak, and work.
The second is internal modesty and peace of soul; for from it external modesty naturally follows, as from a cithara whose strings are properly composed in tune there follows a harmonious sound. Therefore the passions of the soul must be mortified and ordered, especially ambition, anger, and sadness. For as in the sea there is tranquility if no wind is in it; but waves and storms arise from the breath and wind enclosed within, which agitates and dashes it: so too the composition or perturbation of external manners arises from the internal. St. Gregory Nazianzen in oration 41 praises his sister Gorgonia for her mortification, modesty, shame, contempt of the world, so much so that she desired to be dissolved and to be with Christ. Wherefore God revealed to her the day of her death; and because she had lived in full peace of soul, she died in that very state, saying: "In peace in the selfsame I shall sleep and shall rest."
The third is, to have monitors who note our manners and admonish us if at any point we are less composed. Thus St. Charles Borromeo maintained two priests for this purpose, that they should keep watch over all his actions, and freely admonish him if he did anything unbecoming. Hence his whole life was so composed, becoming, and holy. Well known is that saying of Zeno in Laertius, book VII:
Best indeed is he who obeys one who admonishes him aright; for others look upon us with sharper eyes than we ourselves do.
The fourth, to reflect frequently on individual actions — whether we do anything immodestly and unbecomingly at Mass, at table, in walking, in conversation, etc., and to correct it, and constantly and strongly to apply ourselves to correction by assiduous reflection, premeditation, and prayer, until we have plainly amended it: so as to attain to that of St. Ambrose, book I of the Offices, chapter xxii: "Let dispute be without anger, sweetness without bitterness, admonition without asperity, exhortation without offense." And shortly after: "Let speech be pure, simple, clear and manifest, full of gravity and weight, not of affected elegance, yet not interrupted in grace."
The fifth, to consider the manners of Christ while He lived, preached, went about the villages and towns, and especially in His passion and on the cross; who, as St. Peter says, chapter ii: "He did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth. Who, when He was reviled, reviled not; when He suffered, He threatened not, but delivered Himself to him who judged Him unjustly." Truly wondrous, delightful, and most moving is the consideration of the humanity of Christ — that in it God deigned to deal with us, to eat, to teach, to journey, to suffer contradictions, mockeries, blasphemies, with the highest equanimity and peace of soul, so that a man should be ashamed to grow angry, to be impatient or immodest, when he sees Christ showing Himself so meek, patient, and modest, that He might teach us to imitate the same. Thus St. Bernard, sermon 45 on the Canticles: "When I name Jesus," he says, "I set before myself a man meek and humble of heart, kind, sober, chaste, merciful, and finally conspicuous for every honor and sanctity, and the same one almighty God, who by His example and aid may heal and strengthen me. I take therefore examples for myself from the man, and help from the mighty one, etc. Let Him always be in your bosom, always in your hand, that all your senses and acts may be directed to Jesus. Lastly, you are invited: Place me, He says, as a seal upon your heart, as a seal upon your arm."
The sixth is, to consort with the modest. Consort with Catos and Scipios, says Seneca. For a modest man makes others modest, just as God who is tranquil makes all things tranquil; so he who looks upon the quiet and modest composes himself to quiet and modesty. St. Ambrose gives an example in Psalm cxviii, sermon 40, of the bird called Icterus, which heals the jaundiced and draws their disease into itself, as Pliny attests, book XXX, chapter xi. So St. Ambrose says of it: "If there is such force in natural things that the very animal benefits the jaundiced, so that even the body of the dead is said to be of benefit if it has been shown to those who have fallen into this kind of passion, can we doubt that the sight of a just man heals? Do not the very rays of the eyes seem to infuse some virtue into those who faithfully desire to see Him? But just as a just man gladdens the heart of the innocent when he is seen, so the wicked are tortured by the knowledge of the just, because they are rebuked even by the silent manners of the Saints. Chastity tortures incontinence, liberality avarice, faith impiety." He brings forward the example of the basilisk, which, if it has first seen a man, kills him; but if it has been seen first by him, is itself killed; and from this he concludes: "Therefore if there is such virtue in the eyes of the serpent, or in the eyes of man, that whichever has first seen the other can kill, is there not virtue in the eyes of the just man, who is filled with the grace of virtue, especially since faith works so much that even she who touched the hem of the Lord was healed, Matthew ix, and he upon whom the Lord Jesus turned His gaze straightway drew from His eyes the grace of healing? Luke ix. But he who sees a just man ought to know what he sees: he does not see him in the body, nor in his clothing, nor in his patrimony, nor in his face, but he sees him within, etc. Truly in him who is without we frequently behold him who is within."
Such was St. Cyprian, of whom Pontius the Deacon says in his Life: "So much sanctity and grace shone from his face, that his grave yet cheerful countenance confounded the minds of those who looked upon him: there was neither sad severity nor excessive friendliness, but a temper mingled of both, so that one might doubt whether he deserved to be revered or loved, except that he deserved both to be revered and to be loved."
St. Francis used to send his brethren to walk through the city, saying: "Go and preach," namely by your modest and religious gait; and by it they moved the souls of the citizens more than if they had preached to them. For the sermon of conduct is living, that of words dead. The Pontiff, visiting St. Bernard at Clairvaux with his Prelates, was so moved and compunct by the modesty of him and of his monks, that most of them shed copious tears out of devotion. So the Life of St. Bernard has it. I have recounted more at verse 4.
Humble. — "Humility is the virtue by which one becomes vile to himself out of the truest knowledge of himself," says St. Bernard, On the Degrees of Humility. Golden is the maxim of St. Nilus in St. Antonius in the Melissa, sermon 73 On the Modest: "Blessed is he whose life is exalted, but whose spirit is humble." And St. Chrysostom: "Nothing is so pleasing to God as to number oneself with the lowest." And St. Basil: "Let us be lofty in life, but humble in spirit; and inaccessible in virtue, but in conversation let access to us be most easy." And Evagrius: "The safest armor of the soul is modesty," in the same place. Furthermore St. Antiochus, sermon 70 On Humility: "This," he says, "is the mark of truest humility: to hurl no insults against anyone, but to bear those hurled at you by others with generous and unbroken spirit. For as an exuberant abundance of fruit bends the branches of trees downward, so also the rich accession of virtues lowers and humbles the disposition of the man who possesses it." Wherefore St. Ephrem, sermon 1 On the Overthrow of Pride, points to humility as the beginning and end of all good things. Dorotheus, doctrine 14, calls it the absolute perfection of all virtues, indeed their capstone and cement, which glues them all together. St. Augustine, epistle 56, assigns the first, second, third, etc., places in Christian wisdom to humility, as Demosthenes assigned the first, second, third, etc., in an orator to delivery and action. The same, sermon 10 On the Words of the Lord: "Do you intend," he says, "to build a great structure of loftiness? Think first of the foundation of humility." And shortly after: "Dig in yourself this foundation of humility, and you will reach the summit of charity." And sermon 27: "Water flows together to the humility of the valley, but flows away from the swellings of the hill." And sermon 157 On the Times: "Behold a great miracle. God is on high: you exalt yourself, and He flees from you; you humble yourself, and He descends to you. Why is this? Because the Lord is exalted, and looks upon the humble things, that He may lift them up; the high things, that is the proud, He knows from afar, that He may cast them down." St. Basil, Admonition to the Spiritual Son: "My son," he says, "in all things study humility; for this is loftier than every virtue, that you may be able to ascend to the summit of perfection; since just observances are fulfilled in no other way save by humility, and the labors of many times are reckoned to nothing through pride. The humble man is like to God, and bears Him in the temple of his breast. The proud man, on the other hand, since he is hateful to God, is like the devil. The humble man, although he seem of mean appearance in dress, is glorious in virtues; but the proud man, even if he appear comely in aspect and bright, yet his very works show him to be useless, and by his bearing and motions his pride is recognized, and from his words his levity will be made public. He always desires to be praised by men, and seeks to proclaim himself for virtues to which he is a stranger. He suffers himself to be subject to no one, but always desires the first place, and strives to thrust himself into a higher rank. And what he cannot obtain by merits, he hastens to obtain by ambition. He always walks puffed up like an empty and hollow wineskin. And as a ship without a helmsman is tossed by the waves, so he is borne about among all his actions. The humble man on the contrary spurns all earthly honor, and judges himself the lowest of all men. For although he appear mediocre in countenance, he is regarded as eminent by the Lord; when he has fulfilled all the Lord's commandments, he testifies that he has done nothing, and hastens to conceal all the virtues of his soul: but the Lord publishes all his works, and brings them into the open, and magnifies his deeds, and will exalt him and make him illustrious, and at the time of his prayers he will obtain what he asks for."
Verse 9: Not Rendering Evil for Evil, nor Railing for Railing, but Contrariwise Blessing
9. NOT RENDERING EVIL FOR EVIL, — not retaliating injury for injury, reviling for reviling. Peter does not here forbid just judgment and just vindication, but that which is exercised either by private authority, or not from love of justice, but from a lust for revenge or out of hatred. So Hesselius. To St. Peter St. Paul concurs: "Not defending yourselves, dearly beloved," he says, "but give place to wrath," etc. See what is said there. Excellently St. Chrysostom, homily 48 on Matthew: "Nothing," he says, "so restrains those who injure us as the patience and modesty of those injured, etc. Fire is not extinguished by fire, but by water: so injury and anger are not extinguished by the requital of anger, but by meekness, humility, kindnesses." Following his master Chrysostom, Isidore of Pelusium his disciple, book III, epistle 21 to Eustathius: "Enmity," he says, "is to be written in water, that it may straightway flow away from mind and memory: but friendship is to be engraved in bronze, that it may continually cleave to the mind." Peter inculcates this upon the faithful, because this is the summit of virtue: for in the toleration of injuries and the love of enemies the perfection of the Christian life consists. Hence St. Basil, prescribing a formula of perfect life to Religious and Anchorites, in his Admonition to the Younger, inculcates almost this alone: "Whoever you are," he says, "who have once embraced the solitary life, O faithful man, and likewise a cultivator of piety, learn and be taught the formula of the Evangelical conversation: in the first place, so consign your body that it be the slave of holy service; instruct your mind to think nothing lofty of itself; train your thoughts to be pure; empty out the impulse of anger. Has anyone done you violence? for the sake of the one Lord, give him even more than he wishes. Have you been despoiled of anything? do not summon the despoiler to court, nor pursue him at law. Are you hated? love the one who hates. Are you struck by persecution? endure it. Has anyone devoted you to execration or evil-speaking? exhort him to recognize the insult he has offered, or at any rate intercede for one of his kind. Be dead to sins to be committed in the future. Be fastened to the cross of Christ. Transcribe all the solicitude of your soul to the Lord Himself, that you may finally deserve to be found where there are myriads of angels, the assembly of the firstborn, the most festive thrones of the Apostles, the seats of the primary authority of the Prophets, the scepters of the Patriarchs, the crowns of the Martyrs, the heralds of the just. Desire with your whole heart that you may be enrolled and numbered among those just ones of old. In Christ Jesus our Lord. To Him be glory unto the ages. Amen."
BUT ON THE CONTRARY BLESSING, — that is, To those who pray ill against you, pray well; recompense curses with blessings, reproaches with praises, harsh words with soft, indeed even evil deeds with kindnesses, as Christ commands, Matthew v, 44. St. Basil gives the reason in his Brief Rule, response 176: because slanderers and evildoers are for us the occasion and cause of heroic patience, and therefore make us blessed, according to that of Christ, Matthew v, 11: "You shall be blessed when men shall revile you."
This was the wisdom of that Religious of whom we read in the Apophthegmata of the Fathers, number 76, who, the greater the injury and mockery with which he was treated, the more he rejoiced, saying: "These are they who give us occasion for our advancement: but those who praise us blessed disturb our souls. For it is written: Those who call you blessed, they themselves deceive you."
And St. Francis, who used to bid his brethren to assail him with abuses and reproaches, on hearing them would say: "May God bless you, because it befits the son of Pietro Bernardone to hear such things." So St. Bonaventure in his Life. Seneca too, book II On Anger, xxxiii, praises the saying of a courtier, "who being asked how he had obtained that rarest thing at court, old age, replied: By receiving injuries and giving thanks."
Excellently Nazianzen in Antonius in the Melissa, part I, sermon 55: "Let us yield," he says, "some little thing that we may obtain something greater, namely concord: let us suffer ourselves to be conquered, that we may conquer. Look at the practice of athletes, and the contests of wrestlers, who often by this very fact of being underneath conquer their adversaries who press upon them. It is good to conquer audacity by meekness, and to make better those who do us injury, which we tolerate by enduring. Each of us owes much to Christ. Let us pardon, that we may obtain pardon; let us forgive, that we may be forgiven."
In the Lives of the Fathers, in the Life of St. Apollonius, it is related that when he was abused with many injuries by Philemon the flute-player, and called impious, seducer, criminal, he answered: "May the Lord have mercy on you, my son, and not impute any of these things you have spoken to your sin." Compunct by this blessing, Philemon converted to Christ, and so for His sake underwent a glorious martyrdom together with Apollonius. This is what Christ commands His own, Matthew chapter v, verse 43: "You have heard that it was said: You shall love your neighbor, and hate your enemy. But I say to you: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who persecute and calumniate you." For, as St. Chrysostom says in the same place, "the time of prayer is the time of meekness: therefore he drives God from himself who turns Him away from his neighbor." Indeed, as St. Augustine says, sermon 4 On the Saints: "He does injury to God, who sets himself up as judge, and God as torturer," since on the contrary Christ adds: "That you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven, who makes His sun to rise upon the good and the bad, and rains upon the just and the unjust."
BECAUSE TO THIS YOU ARE CALLED, THAT YOU MAY POSSESS BLESSING BY INHERITANCE (St. Fulgentius, book I to Thrasimundus, reads of inheritance), — that is: To this you have been called, that through the toleration of injuries, namely by blessing those who curse, you may inherit the blessing of God, both present and eternal, namely beatitude and eternal glory. You will ask: why does he call the heavenly inheritance and felicity blessing? I answer, first, because it is itself the supreme blessing of God, that is, the supreme gift: for to bless on God's part is efficacious, and the same as to bestow good. Secondly, because the elect, who are to be adjudged to heaven by Christ on the day of judgment, will be blessed when they hear: "Come, you blessed of My Father, possess the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world," Matthew xxv, 34, to which Peter here alludes. Thirdly, because he likewise alludes to Deuteronomy chapter xxvii, verse 13, where six more noble tribes bless those who keep the law of Moses, while the less noble curse those who violate it: by which figure is represented the eternal blessing for the elect, and the curse for the reprobate, to be inflicted by Christ on the day of judgment. Fourthly, because he fittingly signifies the reward of blessing by the name of blessing: for it is fitting that he who blesses those who injure him should be blessed and made happy by Christ; indeed this has been promised by Him, and is therefore a debt. For He says, Matthew v, 11: "You are blessed when men shall revile you and persecute you, and shall speak all manner of evil against you, lying, for My sake; rejoice and exult, because your reward is great in heaven." Fifthly, because the felicity of the Saints consists in great part in blessing, that is, in continual praise and joyful song of God: for the praise of God is the busy leisure and the leisurely business of the Blessed.
Note that, besides the other virtues, love of enemies and toleration of injuries give us a right to heaven and open it to us: just as on the contrary the memory of injuries, anger, and bitterness, even slight, close it to us; on which matter hear a memorable example.
St. Anno, Archbishop of Cologne, a little before his death was caught up in a vision into heaven, and saw the illustrious assembly of the holy Bishops of Germany and Gaul of his age, and among them a splendid seat prepared for him; to which when he was making his way, he was prevented by Arnulph, Bishop of Worms, who told him that he must first wash off one stain that he had in his vestment over his breast. When he awoke, he understood that this stain was the memory of an injury and the bitterness of soul against the citizens of Cologne, because they had expelled him. Wherefore he straightway returned into favor with them, and so washed away the stain, and shortly after migrated to heaven completely immaculate. So Lambert of Hersfeld narrates in his Description of Anno, in the year of the Lord 1075.
Finally, to this saying of St. Peter pertains that of Clement of Alexandria, book IV of the Stromata: "I admire," he says, "Epicharmus, who openly says: If you are pious in mind, you will suffer no evil after death. The spirit remains above in heaven." And the lyric poet who sings: "But the souls of the impious flit beneath heaven in bloody pains, beneath the inevitable yokes of evils; but the minds of the pious will dwell in the heavens, singing the great Blessed in hymns of song."
Verse 10: For He That Will Love Life, and See Good Days, Let Him Refrain His Tongue From Evil
10. FOR HE WHO WILL LOVE LIFE, — that is, he who desires and loves life, both this long and prosperous one, and the eternal and blessed life in heaven; that is, He who wishes to live blessedly, both in this life, and rather in the life to come. Hence Clement of Alexandria explains thus: "He who wishes to become eternal and incorruptible." St. Peter proves what he said, namely that one must bless those who curse, so that we may possess blessing by inheritance, from Psalm xxxiii, 13, where it is said: "Who is the man who wills life, who loves to see good days?" (for which St. Peter, with the words but slightly altered, says: "For he who would love life, and see good days"). "Restrain your tongue from evil," etc.
AND TO SEE GOOD DAYS. — "To see," that is, to feel, to rejoice, to enjoy. For seeing and sight in Scripture are taken by catachresis for any sense or taste.
"Good days" are called those that are favorable, glad, happy, both of this and rather of the future life, namely the days of grace and of glory. Hence Clement of Alexandria explains "good days" as holy ones. For, as St. Augustine says on Psalm xxxiii: "In the world the days are always evil, in God the days are always good." And St. Basil in the same place: "The days of this world are evil, because this world too, since it is the measure of the universe, of which it is said that the whole world is set in evil, is likened to the nature of the world by which it is measured: the parts of this time are days themselves; therefore the Apostle says: Redeeming the time, because the days are evil. And Jacob: The days, he says, of my years are few and evil (that is, wretched and toilsome)." Therefore the good days, says St. Basil, are not of this but of the future age, "and those which this perceptible sun completes are fleeting and perish." But of the future days it is said: "Better is one day in your courts above thousands," Psalm lxxxiii, 11.
LET HIM RESTRAIN HIS TONGUE FROM EVIL: — for an unrestrained, unbridled tongue brings upon the chatterer evil days, that is, wretched and calamitous ones: see what is said at James III, 2 and following.
AND HIS LIPS THAT THEY SPEAK NO GUILE. — The Greeks define "guile" as a hidden evildoing under a good pretext. "A good rind with a blemish lying beneath," says Eugubinus on Psalm xxxiii. See what is said at verse 1.
Verse 11: Let Him Decline From Evil, and Do Good: Let Him Seek After Peace, and Pursue It
11. LET HIM TURN AWAY FROM EVIL, AND DO GOOD. — In these two precepts is comprised all the law of justice, all the rule and prescription of virtue.
LET HIM SEEK PEACE — with God, with himself, and with his neighbors. This peace Christ brought down from heaven to earth as a divine gift. Hence at His birth the angels sang: "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men of good will," Luke chapter ii, verse 14. Hence Isaiah greatly celebrated and foretold it, chapter ii, 4, and chapter xi, 6 and following.
AND LET HIM PURSUE IT. — Διωκέτω, that is, let him pursue it with fixed eyes, with all his heart and effort, as a hunter pursues a hare. So St. Jerome to Rusticus. For this peace surpasses every sense, Philippians iv, 7. This sits like a queen on the throne of the soul, and tranquilly and joyfully governs its powers, senses, and members, according to that: "Let the peace of Christ exult in your hearts," Colossians iii, 15. See what is said there. Truly St. Augustine On Continence, chapter vii: "Then," he says, "will perfect peace be ours, when our nature inseparably cleaves to its Creator, and nothing in us will resist us."
Verse 12: Because the Eyes of the Lord Are Upon the Just, and His Ears Unto Their Prayers
12. For the eyes of the Lord are upon the just. — that is, the Lord with kindly, fatherly, and beneficent eyes will look upon the just, who have kept the precepts already mentioned.
AND HIS EARS UNTO THEIR PRAYERS, — that He may hear and answer them, assent to them, and grant their petitions.
BUT THE COUNTENANCE OF THE LORD UPON THEM THAT DO EVIL. — "Countenance," namely angry, fierce, and threatening, that He may indignantly behold evils and the wicked and punish them. Hence Aben-Ezra and Eugubinus on Psalm 33, in place of "countenance," render it "wrath"; whence also follows: "That He may destroy the memory of them from the earth." Thus the Latins call "vultuosus" one who is gloomy, morose, and harsh. There is here a powerful spur to turning away from evil and doing good, namely to consider that God, as a kind of presider of contests, looks upon the good and on good things with a pleasant countenance, that He may reward them; but on the wicked and on evils with a stern and threatening one, that He may punish most severely. "Nothing," says Tertullian, On Penitence, chapter 6, "is hidden which shall not be revealed: however many shadows you may pile upon your deeds, God is light, and His eyes are brighter than the sun, surveying all the ways of men, and the depth of the abyss, and beholding the hearts of men in their hidden parts." Furthermore, since God is incorporeal, He has no eyes or face, but His eyes are called the most luminous keenness of His mind itself, by which He beholds all things; His countenance is called that very gaze of His, which we may gather is so terrible to the wicked from this, that the countenance of Christ as man and judge will on the day of judgment be so dreadful to the reprobate, that they themselves will wish to remain in hell, nor go forth from there into the valley of Jehoshaphat, lest they look upon Him, and they will be compelled to be struck down by it. Hence "the kings and princes," says St. John, Apocalypse chapter 6, verse 16, "shall say to the mountains and to the rocks: Fall upon us, and hide us from the face of Him that sitteth upon the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: for the great day of their wrath is come, and who shall be able to stand?"
Think upon this countenance when the devil tempts you, when in secret concupiscence solicits you to sin. Truly Boethius says: "A great necessity of acting well lies upon us, since we do all things in the sight of a judge who discerns all." And Clement of Alexandria, Stromata Book V: "There is no one," he says, "so great as to overcome justice, nor so small as to lie hidden." And St. Bernard in his Meditations, chapter 6: "We ought always to have before our eyes Him through whom we exist, live, and know." In the Life of St. Dositheus we read that he received this lesson of life from the blessed Dorotheus his master: "Let God never depart from your heart. Think always that God is present to you, and that you stand before Him," and that, constantly ruminating on this, he turned from a soldierly and dissolute life to a religious and holy one. St. Ephraem, in his treatise On Patience: "Always," he says, "be mindful of God, and your mind will become heaven." St. Jerome on Ezekiel chapter 5: "The memory of God excludes all wickedness." Clement of Alexandria, Paedagogus III, 5: "By this reasoning alone does it come about that one never falls, if he reckon God to be always present to himself."
Verse 13: And Who Is He That Can Hurt You, if You Be Zealous of Good?
13. AND WHO IS HE THAT CAN HURT YOU, IF YOU BE FOLLOWERS OF THAT WHICH IS GOOD? — "Of good," that is, of goodness, as the Syriac and Vatablus translate it, for in Greek it is τοῦ ἀγαθοῦ μιμηταί, that is, imitators of the good (in the genitive). By "good" understand either God and Christ, with St. Augustine, Sermon 107 De Diversis, chapters 6 and 7; or rather the good and honorable itself, namely virtue, of which he spoke a little before: "Let him decline from evil and do good"; for it is to this he refers. So Lyranus, Hugo, Cajetan and Thomas Anglicus. For the good and honorable is, as it were, the idea and norm of virtue, which is set forth before all to imitate, that they may express it in their conduct and depict it in themselves. So St. John says, in his epistle chapter 3, verse 11: "Dearly beloved, follow not that which is evil, but that which is good." Truly St. Prosper, epigram 1:
Perfectly good is he, and rightly called innocent, Who does no harm to himself nor to anyone else. For whoever schemes to injure another, first Will strike himself with his own dart.
The word "emulators" signifies a vehement zeal and ardor for the good, or for virtue, and that it is to be loved and pursued more ardently than a bridegroom loves and pursues his most beloved bride. To this pertains that saying: "He who does not zealously emulate does not love"; and that of St. Ambrose, On the Institution of Virgins, chapter 11: "Why," he says, "do we rather labor for the world, and defraud our soul at the cost of so great goodness, when we ought to serve no other than this Lord?" For thus nothing and no one shall harm us. For truly St. Augustine, in the place just cited, says: The wicked man harms himself, not the one whom he desires to harm. And St. Chrysostom wrote his last work to Olympias, in which he sings this swan-song, and confirms with many proofs: "That no one is injured except by himself"; it is found in volume V of his works.
St. Peter meets an objection. For someone will say: If we decline from evil and follow what is good; if we tolerate evils and do not avenge them, we shall lie open to the injuries and depredations of all. St. Peter answers: No one will be able to harm you, in Greek κακῶσαι, that is, to afflict, if you follow the good of patience and virtue, both because virtue overcomes all evils, and because God is the guardian and protector of virtue and of those who pursue it. Wherefore "to them that love God, all things work together unto good," Romans 8:28. This is what the Church professes in prayer: "No adversity shall harm us, if no iniquity have dominion over us." Thus Valerian by his fiery gridiron did not harm St. Lawrence, but profited him, because it kindled his charity all the more. Thus all the adversities, as it were rushing in one host upon St. Job, did not harm him, but displayed the strength of his soul to the whole world. Thus the Arians, persecuting St. Athanasius incessantly by land and sea, increased and illustrated his virtue. Thus the Decii, Aurelians, Neros, Domitians, Diocletians, with their torments did not harm St. Vincent, St. Sebastian, St. Maurice, St. Tiburtius, St. George, and the rest of the Martyrs, but adorned them with the laurels of martyrdom, nor they were no other than smiths and goldsmiths of heavenly crowns.
Excellently Origen, Homily 23 on Numbers: "All things in this world are so arranged that nothing whatever is idle in God's sight, even if it be evil. God does not make malice, yet when He could prevent it once devised by others, He does not prevent it, but uses it, together with those in whom it resides, for necessary purposes. For through those very ones in whom malice resides, He makes glorious and proven those who tend toward the glory of the virtues. For if malice were destroyed, there would be no one to oppose the virtues. But virtue, having nothing contrary to it, would not shine forth, nor become more splendid and tried. And virtue not proved nor tested is not virtue at all." He gives the example of Joseph: "Take away the malice of his brothers, take away their envy, take away all that fratricidal scheme by which they raged against their brother, even to the point of selling him. If you take these away, see how great a dispensation of God you will have destroyed. For at the same time you will cut off all those things which were done in Egypt, not only through Joseph but also through Moses, for the salvation of all: Egypt would have perished, the surrounding regions would have perished by famine, Israel itself would have died out. There would be no plagues upon the Egyptians, nor those wonders which God wrought through Moses and Aaron. No one would have walked through the Red Sea on dry foot, no one would have entered the Promised Land, mortal life would not have known the food of manna. No streams of water would have burst from the rock that followed them. The Law would not have been given to men by God." And below: "If you take away the malice and treachery of Judas, you will likewise take away the cross and passion of Christ: and if there be no cross, the principalities and powers are not stripped, nor are they triumphed over on the wood of the cross. If there had been no death of Christ, there would surely have been no resurrection, no firstborn from the dead, no hope of resurrection for us. Take away sin and the malice of the devil, and you take away from us at the same time the struggle against his snares, nor will the crown of victory be awaited by him who lawfully strives. If we had none to resist us, there would be no contests, no rewards set out for victors, no kingdom of heaven prepared for those who conquer: nor would this momentary and light tribulation of ours work for us above measure an exceeding weight of glory in the future. And this is exceedingly wonderful, that God uses evil vessels for a good work." Origen taught this not only by word but also by example. For he burned with the desire of martyrdom, and as a boy would have run to it, had not his parents hidden his clothes, as Eusebius bears witness.
Verse 14: But if Also You Suffer Anything for Justice's Sake, Blessed Are You. And Be Not Afraid of Their Fear
14. BUT IF ALSO YOU SUFFER ANYTHING FOR JUSTICE' SAKE, BLESSED ARE YOU. — He alludes to, indeed cites, that saying of Christ in Matthew 5:10: "Blessed are they that suffer persecution for justice' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven," for which Clement, Stromata Book IV, 3, reads: "Blessed are they that suffer persecution for justice, and for my sake, for they shall have a place where they shall not suffer persecution."
Note first, the phrase "but and if you suffer anything," that is: Light and as it were nothing is whatever you suffer: "for the sufferings of this time are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come, that shall be revealed in us."
Note second, "for justice' sake," that is, because they are just, because Christians, because they follow "justice," that is, virtue, e.g. because they keep God's law, chastity, temperance, the statutes of the Church or of an order, because they protect the property of orphans, the faith, the lands and goods of the Church, because they strive for the reform of the Church, the Clergy, or a monastery. For although the Philosophers may seem to have suffered for justice' sake, as Socrates for the doctrine of one God; yet where there is no true faith, nor charity, there is no true justice either, says St. Augustine, Epistle 50 Against the Donatists after the Conference, chapter 17. Justice here, then, is not taken properly and strictly, for the virtue which renders to each the right that is owed him, but generally for any virtue. For he is a martyr who suffers death, not for justice alone, but also for faith, chastity, or any other virtue, as Theologians commonly teach. Thus St. Agnes, St. Felicula, and other virgins slain for chastity, are martyrs. Thus the Maccabees, slain for the law of Moses, and specifically for temperance, because they refused to eat swine's flesh forbidden by the Law, are martyrs. Thus St. Thomas of Canterbury, St. Stanislaus, and others slain for ecclesiastical liberty, are martyrs. Furthermore, St. Augustine rightly says, Book III Against Crescentius, 48: "It is not the punishment that makes the martyr, but the cause."
Note third: Those who suffer for justice' sake are blessed, with a blessedness both of fact and of hope. Of fact, because they possess the good of patience, which has a perfect work, James 1, and therefore makes blessed: for the blessedness of this life consists in patience and charity. Of hope, because they confidently hope for the kingdom of heaven promised to those who suffer, as Christ adds and explains, Matthew 5:12. Add that God is present to those who suffer, and increases in them strength, hope, charity, etc., and soothes them with wondrous consolations, according to the saying of St. Paul: "As the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so also by Christ doth our comfort abound," 2 Corinthians 1:5. Wherefore St. Cyprian, Book IV, Epistle 6 to the Thibaritans: "The Lord," he says, "willed us to exult in persecutions, because when persecutions arise, then crowns of faith are given, then God's soldiers are tested, then heaven lies open to the Martyrs." The same, Exhortation to Martyrdom: "This (martyrdom)," he says, "is a baptism greater in grace, more sublime in power, more precious in honor: a baptism in which angels baptize; a baptism after which one no longer sins; a baptism which consummates the increase of our faith; a baptism which, when we depart from the world, immediately joins us to God. In the baptism of water is received the remission of sins; in that of blood, the crown of virtues."
AND BE NOT AFRAID OF THEIR FEAR (those who afflict you and make you suffer for justice' sake). — "Fear," that is terror, threats, and blows: for otherwise fear is what fears, not what is feared; but it fears not fear itself, but the thing to be feared. It is therefore a metonymy. For fear is put not for the act of fearing, but for its object, namely for terrifying things which strike fear, such as threats, racks, swords, fires, the cross, death; whence the Syriac translates, "neither dread those who strike terror into you." The faithful then ought to fear none of these things, both because in themselves they are brief and light, and because the grace of Christ makes them superior to all these, and because through them they pass over to the eternal crown and kingdom. "For death, the penalty of him who is born, if it be paid for justice and piety, becomes the glory of him who is reborn," says St. Augustine, Book VI of the City of God, chapter 12. Wherefore St. Ambrose on Psalm 118, octave 21: "Let the just man, then, be broken by no injuries, moved by no perils, tempted by no storms, whether death threatens, or life, or the angels of heaven, neither cast down by adversities nor lifted up by prosperity, never let his affection be infirm." And after much more: "Where there is peace, and much peace, there the cross of Christ is not a reproach, but salvation. The cross of Christ was no reproach to Peter, because he gave it so much of his own glory that he honored Christ with reversed feet, fearing lest, if he had been crucified in the same manner as the Lord, he might seem to have aspired to the Lord's glory. The cross then is a reproach to the unbeliever, but to the believer it is grace, to the believer it is redemption, to the believer it is resurrection, because the Lord suffered for us, because by it He redeemed us with His blood, because by it He called us back to paradise by His resurrection."
Thus St. Ignatius did not fear the lions, but sought them out; whence in his Epistle to the Romans: "Let fire," he says, "cross, beasts, breaking of bones, division of limbs, crushing of the whole body, and torments of the devil come upon me, so long as I may enjoy Christ." "And when he had been condemned," says St. Jerome in On Ecclesiastical Writers, on Ignatius, "to the beasts, and in his ardor for suffering heard the lions roaring, he said: I am the wheat of Christ, let me be ground by the teeth of the beasts, that I may be found pure bread"; for the just man trusts as a lion, fixed in God, saying:
Though the shattered world should fall about him, The ruins would strike him unafraid.
Thus Confessors and Martyrs stood undaunted before judges and Emperors, indeed they terrified and struck them down by their constancy and courage. Thus St. Andrew struck Aegeas by calling him a son of the devil and threatening him with the eternal fires of hell. The Maccabees did the same to King Antiochus the tyrant, 2 Maccabees 7.
Not to mention others, in this matter St. Hilary excelled, who with undaunted and lionhearted spirit resisted the Arian Emperor Constantius, who raged against the Orthodox and threatened them with utter ruin, and repressed his fury, reproaching to his face all his crimes and sacrileges, and calling him an Antichrist. Hear in his Apology to Constantius his free, fiery, and adamantine words, worthy of a Bishop and Martyr, indeed worthy of Hilary: "And would, almighty God and Creator of all things, but Father of our one Lord Jesus Christ, that You had granted to my age and time that I might have completed this ministry of my confession in You, and in Your Only-begotten, in the times of Nero or Decius! Nor would I, by the mercy of the Lord God Your Son Jesus Christ, have feared a glowing rack, who should have remembered Isaiah being sawn asunder; nor would I have feared the fires, among which I should have remembered the Hebrew boys singing; nor would I have shunned the cross and the breaking of my legs, after I had recalled the thief carried over into paradise; nor would I have trembled at the depth of the sea, and the surging Pontic flood, when through Jonah and Paul You had taught the faithful that there is life in the sea. For against open enemies that contest would have been a happy one for me. But now we fight against a deceiving persecutor, against a flattering enemy, against Constantius the Antichrist, who does not strike the back, but pats the belly; who does not proscribe unto life, but enriches unto death; who does not thrust into prison unto liberty, but honors within the palace unto servitude; who does not vex the sides, but occupies the heart; who does not cut off the head with the sword, but kills the soul with gold; who does not threaten public fires, but kindles a private hell; who does not contend lest he be conquered, but flatters to dominate: he confesses Christ in order to deny Him; he procures unity, that there may be no peace; he suppresses heresies, that there may be no Christians; he honors priests, that they may not be Bishops; he builds the roofs of the Church, that he may destroy the faith. He carries You in his words, You in his mouth, and does absolutely all things, that You may not be believed to be Father, as You are God." And after a few words: "I proclaim to you, Constantius, what I would have said to Nero, what Decius and Maximian would have heard from me: you fight against God, you rage against the Church, you persecute the Saints, you hate the preachers of Christ, you abolish religion, no longer a tyrant of human things, but of divine. These are common between you and me and them; but now receive what is your own: you lie when you call yourself a Christian, you are a new enemy of Christ; you anticipate Antichrist, and you work his hidden mysteries. You compose a faith, while you live against the faith; you are a teacher of the profane, untaught of the pious; you bestow Bishoprics on your own people, you exchange the good for the bad; you commit priests to custody, you arrange your armies for the terror of the Church. You assemble Synods, and compel the faith of the Westerners to impiety: the enclosed in one city you terrify with threats, weaken with hunger, finish off with winter, corrupt with dissimulation. As an artificer you nourish the dissensions of the Easterners, you elicit the suave, you instigate accomplices, you are a disturber of old men, profane of the new. You carry out all the most savage things, without the envy of glorious deaths. With a new and unheard-of triumph of cunning you conquer the devil, and persecute without martyrdom. We owe more to your cruelty, Nero, Decius, Maximian; for through you we conquered the devil. Everywhere the holy blood of the blessed martyrs has been received; while among them demons bellow, while sicknesses are driven away, while works of wonders are seen; bodies lifted up without ropes, and the garments of women hanging by the foot do not fall down upon the face, spirits burning without fires, confessing without the increase of faith of one questioning. So that you, most cruel of all cruelties, with greater harm to us and lesser pardon, rage against us. You creep in with a flattering name, you slay under the appearance of religion, you carry out impiety, you, a lying preacher of Christ, extinguish the faith of Christ. You do not even leave to the wretched any excuses, that they might offer to their eternal judge their punishments and some scars of their torn bodies, that infirmity might defend necessity. Most wicked of mortals, you so temper all the evils of persecution that you exclude both pardon in sin and martyrdom in confession. But these things that father of yours, the artificer of human deaths, taught: to conquer without contumacy, to slay without the sword, to persecute without infamy, to hate without suspicion, to lie without understanding, to profess without faith, to flatter without goodness, to do what you will, and not to manifest what you will."
And be not troubled. — For the just man at times fears, but is not troubled. Isaiah has: "Be not afraid," for this whole passage is cited by St. Peter from Isaiah 8:12, where we read: "Fear not their fear, neither be afraid. Sanctify the Lord of hosts Himself (that is, celebrate, worship, glorify Him as holy): let Him Himself be your fear and your dread; and He shall be to you for a sanctification." See what is said there, lest I be compelled to repeat it here. Note here: nothing so dispels fear and makes a man undaunted in all things, as does sanctity and sanctification, that is, hope, love, and praise of God. For he who fears, that is, reverences, hopes in, and loves God, does not fear men, nor desires to please men, nor fears to displease them, but God alone. For, as St. Hilary says on Psalm 3: "To wish only to please men is to displease God." But to please men so that they may be saved, "this is not to please men, but God, since through that by which God is pleased, men also are to be pleased. For from the cause of pleasing God, the cause of pleasing men is also made acceptable."
Verse 15: But Sanctify the Lord Christ in Your Hearts, Being Ready Always to Satisfy Every One That Asks You
15. BEING ALWAYS READY TO SATISFY (Greek ἀπολογίαν, that is, defense) EVERYONE THAT ASKS YOU A REASON OF THAT HOPE WHICH IS IN YOU. — The Syriac: "of the hope of faith," that is, of the hope which faith begets and sharpens, according to that of Hebrews 11:1: "Faith is the substance of things to be hoped for." Whence St. Fulgentius, Book I to Thrasimund, reads, "of faith and hope." For because the infidels pressed the first believers in Christ and asked them, "Why do you believe in a man crucified and slain? Why do you take up so rigid a law of Christ? Why do you endure so many and so great torments and martyrdoms for it?" Hence St. Peter commands them to have ready what they may answer them, namely that they believe in Christ crucified, not for His own, but for our sins, that He might expiate them, and therefore that He on the third day rose from death to a glorious life; wherefore they believe in Him, as Redeemer of the world and conqueror and triumpher over sin, death, and hell. Again, that they suffer so much with Him and for Him, because with sure faith and hope they believe and hope that through Him and with Him they will go to heaven, and at the end of the world will rise again together with the body to a blessed and eternal life, in comparison with which all the delights of this world, and all threats and punishments, are nothing else than children's playthings. For that the Martyrs answered the infidels everywhere with great freedom, ardor, and spirit, we read in their Acts, and specifically in the Acts of St. Cecilia, who, when asked by the infidels why she lavished her age, nobility, wealth, and life for Christ? answered with such alacrity and ardor that she did this in order to repay Christ who died for her; and therefore most willingly to die for Him, and that she was certain that for this contempt of life she would receive a better life, indeed a blessed and eternal one, with the result that she converted four hundred to Christ.
Wherefore the heretics wrongly press from these words of St. Peter unlearned laymen to dispute with them concerning the faith: for this pertains to priests and doctors. St. Peter requires a response, not a disputation, and that one to be given to infidels in the origin of the Church, not to heretics, the faith now being confirmed by the consensus of all ages. Laymen, therefore, when asked by heretics why they believe, e.g. that Christ is present in the Eucharist, let them answer: Because the Church believes this and has believed this in every age, which is the pillar and ground of truth, as the spouse of Christ, governed and protected by the Holy Spirit; wherefore it is stupid to call this into doubt after so many ages. So Tertullian, Book On the Prescription against Heretics, chapter 17, where he also adds the reason: "For nothing," he says, "will be gained by an engagement with Scripture, unless plainly that one suffer an upset of the stomach, or of the brain."
Hear Bede: "In two ways," he says, "we ought to render a reason of our hope and faith to those who ask it. First, that we may make known to all the just causes of our hope and faith, whether they ask in a faithful or unfaithful spirit. Second, that we may always keep unimpaired the possession of our faith and hope, even amid the pressures of adversaries, showing through patience how reasonably we have learned to keep it, for love of which we fear neither to suffer adversities nor to undergo death."
In this praise Origen excelled, who continually rendered to all a reason of his own and our faith and hope, and therefore tirelessly teaching, reading, and writing, was the preceptor of the faithful, the catechist of the infidels, the father of martyrs, so that that saying of Horace about the Greeks may rightly be applied to him:
To Origen genius, to Origen the Muse gave To speak with a round mouth, greedy of none but Christ.
Hence he was surnamed Adamantius. For Adamas obtained the name of "untamable," because, although it is most luminous, it yields neither to the hardness of steel, nor to the blows of hammers nor to fires. Now Origen's spirit was adamantine, since neither the austerity of life, nor unceasing labors, nor harsh poverty, nor the wickedness of rivals, nor the fear of punishments, nor any face of death, could move him even a hair's breadth from his holy purpose. His phrasing is vivid, distinct, lucid; by its very brevity it avoids tedium. He loved what he spoke about and speaks of what he loved with delight: therefore he is ardent. When he treats of martyrdom, you sense a kind of enthusiasm. Wherefore that beloved Adamantius begot for Christ many Bishops, Doctors, and Martyrs, as it were like adamants, such as St. Gregory Thaumaturgus, Athenagoras, Theodore, Ambrose, Firmilian, Clement of Alexandria, and many others. Would that, when older and more honored, he had not laid a stain upon his glory!
Finally, St. Peter cautiously says "ready," not "giving," because we must always be ready, but not always actually give a reason of our faith and hope, e.g. when scoffers ask the reason in order to mock, when they are incapable, when by this harm or danger is created for those asking, or for others, according to that of Christ: "Give not that which is holy to dogs; neither cast ye your pearls before swine," Matthew 7:6.
Verse 16: But With Modesty and Fear, Having a Good Conscience: That Whereas They Speak Evil of You, They May Be Ashamed
16. But with modesty and fear, — that is, give a reason for your hope and faith to those who ask, but not arrogantly and impudently, but modestly and timidly and reverently. For Nazianzen teaches that one ought thus to speak about God and divine things, Oration 26, On the Moderation to Be Kept in Disputation. For "with modesty" the Greek is μετὰ πραΰτητος, that is, "with meekness"; the Syriac, "with humility": for the certain companion and index of meekness and humility is modesty.
Excellently St. Athanasius, or whoever is the author, in the Exhortation to Monks: "Rather," he says, "by the exhortation of kindness, and by alluring blandishment, when the way of truth has been shown, the cloud of error is opened, so that each one may begin not to be dragged, but to follow him who goes before; harder things must always be bent gradually, lest the curving inclined by force, before it comes round into a circle, weakening, should burst into fragments."
HAVING A GOOD CONSCIENCE. — For a good conscience is safe, fears nothing, and gives strength and efficacy to speech and to apology, especially when (as is its wont) it shows itself to men through pure and holy conversation. So Oecumenius. St. Peter, he says, "counsels that our responses also be confirmed by our life, which he calls conscience"; and shortly: "so that you also display good actions before yourselves. For if you act humanely and meekly, you will also prove that your conscience is good, that is, that you are conscious of good things, and not of evil things, as those who calumniate you say." Excellently Cicero in the Tusculan Disputations: "No theater for virtue," he says, "is greater than conscience;" and Juvenal, Satire 13:
This is the height of good, a mind conscious to itself of the right.
More excellently St. Bernard, Sermon 71 on the Canticle, explaining that text, "I am the flower of the field and the lily of the valleys": "Morals," he says, "have their own colors, they have also their fragrances: fragrance in reputation, color in conscience. The goodness of your work and the intention of the heart give color to your work; the example of modesty and virtue gives its fragrance. The just man is a lily, in himself white, but to his neighbor fragrant: for to our neighbor we owe and provide reputation, to ourselves conscience."
THAT IN THAT WHICH THEY SPEAK AGAINST YOU, THEY MAY BE CONFOUNDED. — For when by holy conversation you powerfully refute their detractions and calumnies, they blush at their own falsehood and calumny. This is what he said in the preceding chapter, verse 12: "Having your conversation good among the Gentiles, that whereas they speak against you as evildoers, they may, by the good works which they shall behold in you, glorify God in the day of visitation." To this purpose belongs that of Origen, Homily 7 on Judges: "Let the patience of Christians overcome the impudence of persecutors"; let angelic chastity overcome the calumny of incest; profound humility, that of pride; holy sobriety, that of drunkenness; the generosity of almsgiving, that of avarice, etc. That the first Christians studiously did this in St. Peter's time and thereafter, is clear from the letter of Pliny to Trajan, and from the Apologies of Justin, Athenagoras, Tertullian, Arnobius, and the rest, so that Justin in his Apology to Antoninus asserts that many Gentiles, by the example of the holiness of the Christians, changed their morals, and from cruel and truculent became humane and meek, when they "perceived the patience of those (Christians) who endured injuries, or experienced their fidelity in contracts."
Verse 17: For It Is Better Doing Well (if Such Be the Will of God) to Suffer, Than Doing Ill
17. FOR IT IS BETTER DOING WELL (IF SUCH BE THE WILL OF GOD) THAT YOU SUFFER, — namely if God should will us to suffer, if He sends afflictions upon us, or permits them to be sent. He adds this for the consolation of the faithful, that they may know that nothing harsh befalls them except by the nod and ordinance of God, who orders all things to His own glory and to their salvation. Let them therefore resign themselves into the hands of God the Father and into His divine providence over them, and let them not doubt that God will give them strength to suffer, and then the laurel of patience. So Oecumenius. Bede says he reproves certain ones who, if they suffer for fault, bear it patiently: but if they suffer when blameless, they murmur, and so lose the good of innocence through the fault of impatience, when rather they ought to increase and adorn it by the merit of patience. So Socrates, condemned to death, to Apollodorus weeping and saying: "You will die innocent." "What," he said, "would you rather have me die guilty?" That death, then, is to be undergone more willingly, in which the innocence of the crime is excused. So Xenophon in the Apology of Socrates.
Otherwise St. Augustine reads in De Bono Perseverantiae II, namely, "if the Spirit of God should will," and thus explains it, as if to say: If the Spirit of God should grant, and breathe upon you the gift of patience, by which you bravely suffer hard things for God and Christ.
THAN DOING ILL, — that is, it is good for the guilty to suffer, but better for the innocent to suffer. Whence you may gather that it is good for evildoers to suffer and to be punished; for this is an act of vindictive justice, by which both past crime is avenged, and satisfaction is made to the commonwealth to each man's injury and scandal: wherefore thieves and robbers, while they are punished and patiently bear the penalty, perform an act of virtue, and not of one only, but of many, namely of penance, patience, justice, by which, for the injury inflicted on God, neighbor, and the commonwealth, they sufficiently satisfy by suffering, and are set up as an example to malefactors, that by fear of like punishment they may restrain themselves from crime. As therefore the greatest evil of sinners is impunity, so their greatest good is punishment. Excellently Bede here: "If the choice were given me," he says, "I would prefer with St. Tobias, just as I am, to be subjected to either divine or human stripes, than by the violence of unjust stripes to be drawn to the pursuits of justice. And again I would prefer to be drawn back from faults by the scourge (as Saul was), than for the incurable weight of sins to be subjected to eternal vengeance, as Elymas was."
Indeed it is a sign of eternal reprobation when thieves and the wicked are allowed by God to roam unpunished and to triumph and die in their crimes. It is a sign of divine election, if He delivers them into the hands of justice: for then through Confessors they are led to contrition and change of mind, and dispose themselves to a pious death. Indeed a wise man not rashly said: "Proportionally more ascend to heaven from the gallows than from the bed."
The Gentiles too saw this through a shadow. Cato the Censor used to say, "that he would rather receive no thanks for a kindness conferred than not pay a penalty for a misdeed perpetrated," meaning that nothing is more dangerous than impunity, which always invites to worse things. He also used to say: "Magistrates who grant impunity to evildoers should be stoned as most pernicious to the commonwealth." He also used to say, "that he forgave all sinners, except himself."
Far unlike that Mevius, who, carping at others, forgave himself everything. He pardons himself who does not repent of his crime; he does not pardon himself who exacts punishments of himself, or willingly undergoes those imposed by a judge. So Plutarch in the Roman Apophthegms.
Agesipolis, son of Cleombrotus, when someone had said to him that he himself had been a hostage along with his peers, said: "Rightly, for it is fitting that we should bear our own sins and our own faults."
Socrates judged that cities are best governed when the impious pay penalties, as Plato testifies. Solon, when asked "in what does the safety of the commonwealth consist? If the good," he said, "are invited by rewards and the wicked restrained by punishments," as Cicero to Brutus testifies. Where he adds that Lycurgus said the same, who was the lawgiver of the Lacedaemonians, just as Solon was of the Athenians.
Bias, when about to condemn a defendant to death, wept; and when someone said: "Why do you weep, when it is in your power either to absolve or to condemn the man?" he answered: "Because it is necessary indeed to feel pity in nature, but to vote with the law." So Maximus, Sermon 6.
Junius Brutus and Manlius Torquatus condemned their own delinquent sons to death, that they might sanction the public discipline of the laws with the blood of their own kin, lest anyone violating it should promise himself impunity.
Verse 18: Because Christ Also Died Once for Our Sins, the Just for the Unjust, That He Might Offer Us to God
18. BECAUSE CHRIST ALSO DIED ONCE FOR OUR SINS (so the Greeks read ἀπέθανε; others, however, read ἔπαθε, that is, suffered) the just for the unjust. — He proves that the faithful, although innocent, must suffer by the example of Christ, who, innocent and just, suffered for the unjust, namely for the sinners of the whole world, whose sins He took upon Himself to expiate. He sets forth, then, that example as of their leader, to be continually contemplated and imitated by them, as he also did in the preceding chapter, verse 21, and in the following chapter, verse 13. The same thing Jeremias does in Lamentations 4:20, saying: "The breath of our mouth, Christ the Lord, is taken in our sins; to whom we said: Under Thy shadow we shall live among the Gentiles." Let us therefore suffer for Christ, because He suffered for us: He was innocent, we guilty; let us say with St. Francis: "Grant, Lord, that I may die for love of Thy love, who hast deigned to die for love of my love." Excellently St. Paulinus, Epistle 4 to Severus, near the end: "What then," he says, "shall we render to Him for all things that He has rendered to us? For He rendered, but as a good Lord, good for evil, to whom we had heaped evils for good. He blessed, and we cursed. He healed, and we blasphemed: He justified the wicked, and was reckoned with the iniquitous. What then shall I render to Him for the evils of mine which He bore, what for the good things of His which He bestowed? What for the flesh assumed? what for the slaps, for the reproaches? what shall I repay for the scourges, for the cross, the death, the burial? Suppose we render cross for cross, funeral for funeral: shall we be able to render that all things we have we have from Him, and through Him, and in Him, and we ourselves who have are from Him? For He made us, and not we ourselves, and our soul is always in His hands. Let us render therefore love for debt, charity for gift, gratitude for money."
Note the word "once," that is: First, Christ at once and one time underwent all kinds of torments and absorbed the whole sea of sufferings, that He might teach us to drink the brief, slight, and divided drops of suffering. Second, "once," that is, Christ by one heroic act of patience wiped out all the force of sufferings, and was made victor and triumpher over them all: therefore you also by one heroic resolution decide to suffer willingly any adversities by the example of Christ: thus you shall come forth superior to every passion, and shall lord it over all adversities and torments. Third, that is: Christ's one Passion and patience was so great that by it He redeemed the whole world, indeed a thousand worlds, if they existed; and so nothing remains, or can remain, for Him to suffer. "For by one oblation He hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified," Hebrews 10:14. So you also, plainly and fully offer your life and your death to Christ, and nothing more will remain to offer and to suffer: but as Christ, after a single death, immediately passed over to life and eternal glory, so you also after a brief Passion and death will pass over to the same, with St. Peter let us live, and let us lift our mind to spiritual and heavenly goods. Or, as the Gloss says: Christ offered us to the Father as a victim through the mortification of our flesh, and, having freed us from the flesh, will lead us into the eternal kingdom, that there we may live a spiritual, blessed and divine life. He proves this from those submerged in the flood; for these, mortified in the flesh, Christ vivified in the spirit, when descending to those below He preached to them. But the true reading is that Christ was «mortified indeed in the flesh, but vivified in the spirit.» For so the Roman and Greek versions, the Syriac, St. Augustine in epistle 99, St. Cyprian (or rather Rufinus in his Exposition of the Symbol), Cyril in De Fide ad Reginas, Peter of Alexandria in the Council of Ephesus, tom. II, ch. 7, read it: for he indeed proves the divinity of Christ from these words of Peter; St. Jerome on Isaiah ch. 54, who reads slain; Oecumenius, Vatablus, Cajetan, Hesselius and others here. The sense is, as if to say: Christ according to the flesh was put to death and slain, but vivified in the spirit.
You will ask: By what spirit, and in what manner? I answer: First, St. Athanasius, in his book On the Holy Spirit, takes «spirit» as the Holy Spirit — as if to say, Christ rose from the dead by the power and virtue of the Holy Spirit. Or, as St. Augustine in epistle 99 and Oecumenius say, by the power and potency of the divinity, which is most pure spirit, according to that of 2 Cor. 13:4: «And though Christ was crucified through weakness, yet He liveth by the power of God.» Second, Clement of Alexandria, in book VI of the Stromata, takes it as the spirit of the faithful — as if to say, Christ vivifies the mind and spirit of the faithful, and lives in it through faith and grace. Third and genuinely, by «spirit» take the soul: for Peter opposes this to the flesh of Christ, and this is what He preached to those below, as follows; as if to say: Christ was mortified and slain according to the flesh, but vivified according to the soul, and that in three ways. First, that when the flesh of Christ was dying, His soul did not die, but was vivified — that is, remained alive and glorious. For so the Hebrews sometimes take «to vivify» as meaning to leave alive or to remain, as when in 2 Samuel 8:2 it is said of David: «He measured out two lines, one to kill and one to vivify,» as if to say David partly killed the Moabite enemies vanquished by him, and partly preserved them in life; and 1 Sam. 27:11: «David did not vivify man or woman» (that is, did not leave alive, but slew). Similar passages are Acts 7:19, Ps. 137:7, and elsewhere. For active verbs among the Hebrews signify an action sometimes begun, sometimes continued (as here), sometimes completed. So Hesselius. Second, after the death of the flesh, the soul of Christ was vivified — that is, made fully alive, blessed and glorious, so that as a triumphant victor it ruled over the demons and hell, as follows; which act of vivification came to Christ when He died in the flesh, says Cajetan.
Third, plainly and fully Christ was vivified in the spirit when by the power of the spirit, that is, of the soul, St. Paul sings the antistrophe in Rom. 6:9: «Knowing that Christ rising again from the dead, dieth now no more, death shall no more have dominion over Him. For in that He died to sin, He died once; but in that He liveth, He liveth unto God.» Bede aptly: «He, then, who suffers as a just man imitates Christ; he who is corrected by scourges imitates the thief who acknowledged Christ on the cross, and from the cross entered paradise with Christ; but he who even in the midst of scourges does not desist from sins imitates the thief on the left hand, who because of his sins ascended the cross, and after the cross fell into hell.» Hereby is refuted the error of some who say Christ will suffer again to redeem the demons. Origen is supposed to have held this opinion, as is recorded in the Fifth Ecumenical Council, and as Nicephorus relates in book 17, ch. 27. Whence St. Epiphanius, in his epistle to John of Jerusalem, says Origen held that «the devil will again become what he was (a holy angel), and will return to the same dignity, and will ascend to the kingdom of heaven.» Again, that «the souls» of men «were angels in heaven, and after they sinned were cast down into this world, and as into tombs and sepulchres, so were relegated to these bodies, to pay the penalties of their ancient sins; and that the bodies of believers are not temples of Christ but prisons of the damned. And from this ψύχας is said to come from ἀπὸ τοῦ ψύχεσθαι, that is, to grow cold, because, coming down from the heavenly to the lower regions, they lost their pristine warmth; and σῶμα, that is body, is said as if σῆμα, that is monument, because it holds the soul thus enclosed within itself, as sepulchres and tombs hold the corpses of the dead.» He proves it from Ps. 118: «Before I was humbled I offended;» and from Ps. 141: «Return, my soul, into thy rest;» and Ps. 114: «Bring my soul out of prison;» and elsewhere: «I will confess to the Lord in the land of the living.»
But these dogmas of Origen have been refuted by St. Epiphanius, St. Jerome (in his epistle to Avitus), St. Augustine and others, and condemned by the Church. Moreover Jerome there clearly assigns to Origen the aforesaid error. For he says of him: «He went so far at last as to assert (which it is sacrilegious even to have thought) that for the salvation of the demons Christ would suffer even in the air and in the upper regions. And although he did not say so, yet what follows from it is understood — namely, that just as for men He became man in order to free men, so for the salvation of the demons God will become what those are whom He is to come to deliver.» As if to say, From Origen's opinion you would gather that Christ would become a demon, just as He became man.
THAT HE MIGHT OFFER US (now redeemed, purified and sanctified as His sons and co-heirs) TO GOD, MORTIFIED INDEED IN THE FLESH, BUT VIVIFIED IN THE SPIRIT. — So read the Complutensian editors, the Gloss, Lyranus and other older Latins, and among the moderns Gagneius, Catharinus, Arias, and Suarez (III part., tom. II, disp. 43, sect. 3), and they aptly explain it as if to say: Christ by His grace makes us mortify the flesh and subject it to the spirit, so that by it...
...He rose from the dead. For then the soul, as the instrument of His divinity, entering the flesh, again animated and vivified it, and communicated to it a new immortal and glorious life. So Vatablus and others elsewhere. Peter says this in order to stir up Christians, by the example of the risen Christ, to patience — inasmuch as they ought certainly to hope they will rise through Christ — so that through the mortification of the flesh they may pass over to the vivification of the spirit, and therefore should encourage themselves in afflictions by saying: Although we suffer many things in the body, yet with Christ and through Christ we are saved in the spirit. With a similar phrase and sense, St. Paul in 1 Cor. 15:43: «The first man Adam, he says, was made into a living soul (that is, an animal and living man), the last Adam (Christ) into a vivifying spirit,» that is, that the glorious soul of Christ might vivify the body, and render it immortal and glorious — the body, I say, both His and ours. Whence he tropologically adds: «The first man, of the earth, earthy; the second man, from heaven, heavenly. Therefore as we have borne the image of the earthly, let us bear also the image of the heavenly,» through temperance, patience, and other heavenly virtues.
Wherefore Clement of Alexandria, in his Exhortation to the Gentiles, teaches that Christ by His incarnation and coming into the world changed the earth (and even hell, when after death He descended there) into heaven, and that He must therefore be hailed with this hymn: «Hail, light, since light has risen for us from heaven, who were buried in darkness and shut up in the shadow of death. Light, I say, purer than the sun, and life more delightful than this. That light is eternal, and whatever partakes of it lives. All things become a light which cannot be extinguished, and the setting yields to the rising: this the new creation has willed. For He who courses over all, the sun of righteousness, equally visits humanity, imitating the Father, who equally makes His sun rise upon all and instils the dew of truth. He has transferred the setting into the rising, and has fastened death into life upon the cross: and man, snatched from destruction, He has suspended in the heavens, transplanting destruction and corruption into the void of destruction and corruption: and God's husbandman changes the earth into heaven, etc. Recalling true life to mind, and bestowing on us a truly great and divine inheritance which cannot be taken away, by His heavenly teaching making man God;» and presently: «For thy little faith He gives thee so great an earth to till; water to drink; and another to sail; air to breathe; fire to work with; a world to dwell in. Hence He has granted thee to send a colony into the heavens;» and later: «Christ, he says, is the Word of truth, the Word of incorruption, who regenerates man, leading him back to truth, the goad of salvation that drives away destruction, that pursues death, that has built a temple in men, that He may place God in men. Make sure the temple be chaste and clean, and abandon pleasures and delights as a fleeting and brief flower to the wind and fire;» and toward the end: «Let us run, take up His yoke, undergo incorruption. Let us love Christ, the beautiful charioteer of men. He led the colt under the same yoke as the old, and joined together a chariot of two men of human nature, He directs the chariot toward immortality, striving toward God, that He may evidently fulfil what He had silently signified: first indeed in Jerusalem, but now driving into the heavens.»
Verse 19: In Which Also Coming He Preached to Those Spirits That Were in Prison
IN WHICH, — namely in the spirit, that is, in the living and glorious soul of Christ. He proves that Christ, though mortified in the flesh, was nevertheless vivified in the spirit, by the fact that in the spirit (that is, as to the soul) He came into the prison of hell, and there preached to the spirits. Whence Oecumenius interprets ἐν ᾧ, that is, «in which,» causally — «for which reason, therefore, wherefore» — as if to say: Because Christ died for the unjust, not only of His own age and the subsequent one, but also for those who preceded His incarnation, namely those who lived in the time of Noah; therefore He descended to them into hell, in order to free them from there and to impart to them the fruit of His death, namely beatitude and the vision of God.
AND TO THOSE WHO WERE IN PRISON. — In Greek ἐν φυλακῇ, that is, in custody; the Syriac בשיול basciul, that is, in hell: for the Syriac interpreter wrongly translates «in the sepulchre»; for sheol among the Hebrews and Syrians properly means hell, not sepulchre. Beza wrongly renders «were» as «are.» For he, with Calvin, denies that Christ descended to hell personally as to His soul, but only as to His power and operation — namely, by freeing the fathers from limbo. Whence he so distorts and explains this passage of St. Peter, from which Christ's real descent to hell is clearly proved, as if to say: Christ in the spirit, that is, by the power of His divinity, coming through Noah, preached to the unbelievers in the time of the flood, who, condemned then for unbelief, are now in prison, namely in hell. Wrongly, I say: for first, St. Peter by «spirit» takes the soul of Christ, for he opposes this to the flesh, not to the divinity. Second, because the divinity of Christ did not come — or, as the Greek has it, πορευθείς, that is, set out — into the prison, since it was always there and everywhere present; He came therefore as to the soul. Third, because the ancients render «were,» not «are.» Whence also the Syriac says, «He preached to those souls who were detained in hell.»
TO THE SPIRITS, — the Syriac «to the souls»: for the Greek is πνεύμασι. Some therefore wrongly read πνεύματι, that is «in the spirit,» as if Christ came into the prison not personally but in spirit — that is, by power and efficacy. Whence John Benedict translates and reads «spiritually.» So too read the old manuscript Bibles of the Roman College, but wrongly. For the Greek and Latin codices, just as the Syriac and the interpreters, consistently read πνεύμασι, that is, «to the spirits.»
You will ask first: What is this prison, who are the spirits, and what is the preaching of Christ to them? ...and they teach that Christ opened heaven, which till then had been closed, and that He was the first to enter into it at the Ascension: therefore the souls of the just before Christ did not ascend to heaven but descended to hell, namely to the limbo of the fathers, and so Christ after death descended to that same place, in order to free and lead them out from there. For this is what the Psalmist says, and from him Peter in Acts 2:27: «For Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell;» and Zach. 9:11: «Thou also, by the blood of Thy testament, hast sent forth Thy prisoners out of the pit wherein is no water;» and the Wise One, Sirach 24:45: «I will penetrate all the lower parts of the earth, and will look upon all that sleep, and will enlighten all that hope in the Lord;» and Christ, Matt. 12:40: «As Jonas was in the whale's belly three days and three nights, so shall the Son of Man be in the heart of the earth three days and three nights.» The same is expressly taught by St. Jerome in his epistle to Heliodorus: «Abraham, he says, was in hell;» by St. Gregory, book 12 of the Moralia, ch. 6; by St. Chrysostom, homily 4 on Mark: «Before, he says, Christ opened the gate of paradise, all the souls of the saints, with the thief, were led down to hell. For Jacob says, Gen. 37: I will go down mourning to hell. The Gospel also places Abraham and Lazarus in hell.» The same teach St. Thomas and the Scholastics, III part., Question 52.
You will ask second: To which spirits did Christ preach in hell? and what or by what reasoning? First, some think He preached to the damned and converted and freed them from hell — at least some of them, who had been less wicked and unbelieving. This Clement of Alexandria seems to say, drawing on Hermas or the Shepherd, in book VI of the Stromata; Augustine, book XII On Genesis according to the letter, ch. 33, where he says Christ loosed the pains of hell, freeing sinners from the torments by which they were tormented in it; St. Epiphanius, heresy 46, and Ambrosiaster on ch. 4 to the Ephesians.
St. Gregory Nazianzen seems to have doubted, in oration 42 near the end, where Nicetas, his Platonist interpreter, narrates this story of Plato's faith and salvation in Christ (you may say the same equally of Trismegistus, Seneca, Socrates and the like). «Something of this kind,» he says, «is told of the heathen Plato in the histories of the Fathers. For long after he had departed life, when he had been savaged by a certain Christian as an evil and impious man with curses, he came by night to his reviler and accused the man for unjustly assailing him with curses. For I do not at all,» he said, «deny that I am a sinner. But when Christ descended into hell, no one came to faith before me.» St. Hilary is also cited on Ps. 118, letter Caph, where he says: «When the Lord descended into hell, exhortation was preached even to those who were in prison and had once been unbelievers in the days of Noah.» But this is wrong: for by «exhortation» he understands the consolation of the holy fathers, of whom he had said immediately before: «He knows that the saints resting in hell desire this exhortation.» This same thing was indeed expressly asserted...
First. Arias Montanus takes by «prison» Noah's ark, and by «spirits» the eight souls — namely Noah, his sons, and their wives — who were saved through the ark; for he says Christ preached to them through Noah, that they should take refuge in the ark, and, after the flood was over, that they should come out and inhabit the earth. But this exposition is Arias's alone, and is rightly rejected everywhere by others, on the grounds adduced a little before against Beza; and because the ark was a refuge for salvation, not a prison for punishment; and the eight souls were men, not spirits.
Secondly, others think the discourse here is about the calling of the Gentiles, and so by «prison» are called the darkness of paganism — namely, infidelity — and by «spirits» the souls of the Gentiles: to whom Christ preached through the Apostles, when He converted them and made them Christians: for these are the unjust for whom St. Peter just said Christ suffered. So Isaiah 9:2 and 42:19 calls the Gentiles those sitting in darkness and the shadow of death, and bound. So Hesselius — as if to say: Christ, preaching through the Apostles to the Gentiles set in paganism as in a prison, led them out to the light and Evangelical liberty. But anyone can see that this is symbolic and mystical, not literal and genuine, especially because the Apostles did not preach to the unbelievers who lived in the time of Noah (for Noah preceded the Apostles by nearly three thousand years), which St. Peter nonetheless says.
Thirdly, St. Augustine, epistle 99, and from him Bede, Hugh, Dionysius and St. Thomas (III part., Question 52, art. 1, ad 3) take by «prison» the body, which is as it were the prison of the soul; by «spirits,» the souls enclosed in the body in the time of Noah: for to these Christ preached through Noah while he was building the ark, that by repenting they might escape the impending flood. But this prison is more symbolic and mystical than the preceding. Moreover Thomas the Englishman wrongly reads «in the flesh» for «in prison.»
Fourthly therefore, and genuinely, the rest of the Greek and Latin Fathers, equally with the Doctors and Interpreters — and even Beza — take this prison to mean hell, as the Syriac clearly translates, and it will appear to be so from what follows. So St. Athanasius, in his epistle to Epictetus; St. Cyril, De Fide ad Reginas; St. Epiphanius, heresy 77; Clement of Alexandria, VI Stromata; St. Justin, Contra Tryphonem; St. Irenaeus, book III, ch. 23; St. Jerome, on Isaiah ch. 54; Ambrosiaster on ch. 4 to the Ephesians; St. Hilary on Ps. 118, [verse] 82. Whence from this passage they prove that Christ really descended to hell. See Bellarmine, book IV On the Soul of Christ, ch. 13, who also refutes Calvin in his «psychopannychia,» that is, the sleep of souls, in which he says that these souls were εἰς πολάζιν, that is, in a cavern — namely in heaven, as he himself thinks — awaiting the coming and death of Christ: that Christ preached to them not personally but causally, by freeing them from their cave and waiting, and bestowing on them eternal beatitude and glory. For the Scriptures and Fathers consistently refute this,
...this very thing was indeed expressly asserted by the heresiarch Marcion. For he taught, as St. Epiphanius says in heresy 42, that Christ descended from the heights from the invisible unnamed Father for the salvation of souls, and to refute the God of the Jews, and the Law and the Prophets, and that He descended into hell to save Cain, Korah, Dathan and Abiron, and Esau, and all the nations who did not know the God of the Jews. But Abel, and Enoch, and Noah, and Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and likewise Moses, David and Solomon He left there, because they knew the God of the Jews and did not give themselves to the invisible God.»
But this is an error, a fable and heresy refuted by St. Augustine in his book On Heresies, ch. 79; and by Philastrius in his book On Heresies; and by St. Gregory, Register VI, epistle 15 (or by another reckoning 179): for in hell there is no redemption. Wherefore Christ descending to hell, says St. Gregory, freed by His grace only those who both believed He was to come and held His commandments by their lives.» Therefore the Fathers who seem to indicate the contrary are to be interpreted appropriately and benignly, as I shall explain in what follows.
Secondly, others think Christ preached to the damned, but by reproving, mocking, reproaching their unbelief and crimes, and confirming their damnation. So Angelus Paz, book VII On the Symbol, ch. 20. But this is not preaching.
Thirdly, our Turrianus, book IV in defense of the epistles of the Roman Pontiff, ch. 12, and others (nor does St. Augustine seem to have wished anything else, book XII On Genesis according to the letter, ch. 33) think that Christ preached to the souls held in Purgatory, and proclaimed to them the first jubilee of His own, and granted them a plenary indulgence by freeing all from the pains. And it is very probable that Christ did this, as I said on Acts 2:24, although it seems hardly credible that souls which at the time of the flood had gone to Purgatory paid penalties in it until Christ, for 2928 years: for so many years precisely passed from the flood to the death of Christ; but if it did happen for some, surely they had a long Purgatory. There exists a revelation about a certain famous prelate who will be in Purgatory until the day of judgment.
Fourthly, and more properly and genuinely, Christ preached to the souls of the fathers detained in limbo, who were most eagerly awaiting Christ's coming and their own liberation. To these properly He preached — not in order then for the first time to convert them, as Beza wishes; for before they departed life they were converted and did penance. But He preached, first, because He reproached their long-standing former unbelief, as Peter says: We too therefore must believe and hope in Christ, and for the sake of this hope endure any adversity whatever, lest in like manner we be at some point reproached by Him, as those who were unbelievers in the time of Noah were reproached and rebuked by Him in limbo. Second, «He preached,» Greek ἐκήρυξεν, that is, He proclaimed, acted as a herald — because He evangelized them and brought the most joyful news of redemption, liberation, and beatitude, by communicating to them the beatific vision. Therefore He then showed Himself vivified in the spirit when He vivified the spirits, that is, the souls, of the fathers in limbo — that is, gave them the life of glory, and indeed restored bodily life to many also, by raising them, as Matthew ch. 27, v. 51 says. So Oecumenius, Dionysius, Lyranus, Catharinus, Bellarmine, Suarez and others everywhere.
Moreover this preaching was a mental utterance, by which Christ mentally spoke to the souls of the fathers and proclaimed to them redemption, salvation and glory: just as God speaks to the angels, and the angels to one another.
You will say: These spirits were unbelievers as Noah preached the flood, and so they were all submerged in it, and so all seem damned: but Christ did not preach to the damned, nor bring them salvation. I answer first: many of those who at first did not believe Noah threatening the flood, afterwards, when they saw it actually beginning, believed, because they saw it with their own eyes, and so when they saw it was over with their life, before they were drowned they repented, in order to save their soul — as in shipwreck even all the most obstinate sinners are pricked with compunction and repent: so St. Jerome and others whom I cited at Gen. 6:5. Second, granted that we should grant that all those submerged in the flood were impenitent and so damned, nevertheless many died before the flood, during the hundred years in which Noah was building the ark, repentant and so saved: to these therefore Christ preached, descending to limbo. For, to pass over others, Methuselah, Noah's grandfather, died the same year in which the flood happened: but he seems to have died just, and so saved, for he was holily brought up by his holy father — namely Enoch, who for his holiness was taken up into paradise, Gen. 5:24. Likewise Lamech, Noah's father, died six years before the flood, as I showed at Gen. 5:27. And Lamech seems to have been just, and so saved, both because he was the son of Methuselah and grandson of Enoch, surely brought up in piety by the pious; and because he seems to have been a prophet. For when his son Noah was born, he said and foretold: «He shall comfort us from the works and labors of our hands,» and therefore he called him Noah, that is, comforter, Gen. 6:29.
Moreover Christ preached to the souls in hell, not only by word, but more by «deed,» says Oecumenius, «to those who had lived according to the flesh, unto judgment» (judging and condemning them); «but to those who had lived according to the spirit, unto glory and salvation,» by saving and glorifying them; whence Origen, homily 15 on Genesis: «That which Christ said to the thief: Today thou shalt be with Me in paradise — understand it as said not to him alone, but to all the Saints, for whom He descended into hell.»
Some think Christ was in hell only for the briefest time, scarcely one hour, and there preached:
...for they say He immediately led the souls out from there with Him. Thus Venerable Anselm, in the Elucidarium, in the middle: «So long, he says, was Christ in hell and laid it waste, as long as when He comes to judgment He will examine each man's deeds — in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, that is, as quickly as you can move the eye.» So Nicephorus, book III, ch. 31, says that Christ in the very hour in which He descended to hell, returned like lightning. The same is intimated by Justin, Question 76 to the Orthodox, and Euthymius on Luke ch. 23. But the truer view is that Christ as to His soul was in limbo as long as as to His body He was in the sepulchre — namely a triduum not full, but begun: from the Parasceve until the Lord's day of Passover. For then the soul returning from limbo to the sepulchre took up the body again. For this Christ insinuates, saying in Matt. 12:40: «As Jonas was in the belly of the whale three days and three nights, so shall the Son of Man be in the heart of the earth three days and three nights,» where by «heart of the earth» St. Jerome, Theophylact, and Gregory of Nyssa (oration 1 On the Resurrection); Tertullian (book On the Soul, ch. 31 and 55); Irenaeus (book V, ch. 31), and Ambrosiaster (on ch. 4 to the Ephesians); St. Thomas and his followers (III part., Question 52, art. 4) understand hell.
You will say: Christ when dying said to the thief: «Today thou shalt be with Me in paradise.» Therefore on the same day He passed from hell to paradise. I answer: paradise is wherever Christ communicates Himself, His divinity and beatitude to His own — as if to say, Today thou shalt be with Me in the eternal felicity and glory, which when descending to limbo I shall communicate to the fathers. Then therefore hell was paradise. So St. Augustine, epistle 57.
Finally St. Justin, Contra Tryphonem, cites certain words of Isaiah, and Irenaeus, book III, ch. 23, attributes the same to Jeremiah, words which are now found in neither, but very similar to these of Peter, so that it is likely that Peter took them from there. The words are these: «The Lord remembered His dead of Israel, who slept in the land of burial, and He descended to them to evangelize the salvation which is from Him, in order to save them.»
The causes why Christ descended to hell I rehearsed at Eph. 4:10, on the words: «That He might fill all things.» Similar ones St. Thomas rehearses, III part., Question 52, art. 1: namely, the first, that He might fully undergo and pay the penalties of our sins, among which one is death, and after death descent to hell. The second, that the devil being conquered through the Passion, He might rescue his prisoners who were detained in hell. The third, that just as He had shown His power on earth by living and dying, so also He might show His power in hell, by visiting and illuminating it, according to that of Ps. 23: «Lift up your gates, O princes,» that is, as the Gloss says, princes of hell, take away your power by which until now you have detained men in hell: and so in the name of Jesus every knee shall bow, not only of heavenly things but also of hellish, as is said in Phil. 2.
Tropologically: behold and marvel here at the riches of the goodness and the bowels of mercy of our God, by which He deigned to descend into the depths of the earth, into the place of the damned, in order to free the saints who had been detained there for three and four thousand years, and were most eagerly awaiting Him. Christ therefore is as it were a certain divine sun, who scattered not only the rays of His beneficence but also Himself through all parts of the world — highest, middle, lowest, namely through heaven, earth, and hell, in order to illuminate, gladden, vivify all things by His light and presence, and to bestow upon them grace and eternal glory.
Verse 20: Which Had Been Some Time Incredulous, When They Waited for the Patience of God in the Days of Noah
20. Who had been unbelievers in former times. — St. Epiphanius, heresy 46, interprets «unbelievers» as those who had the true faith of God, but had other errors mixed in: for these Christ freed from error and saved through indulgence. Understand «errors» as invincible, inculpable, or at least venial. For those who departed in error and mortal sin were damned without any hope of pardon.
Second, St. Athanasius, treatise On the Incarnation, and St. Jerome on ch. 9 of Zechariah, take by «unbelievers» the disobedient (for this is what the Greek ἀπειθήσασιν means) — namely, those who in Adam violated God's commandment about not eating of the forbidden fruit, which is what all men are: for all sinned in Adam. But St. Peter says these unbelievers were in the days of Noah, not of Adam.
Third, others think «unbelievers» are called the unfaithful, which is what nearly all in the time of Noah were. Whence the Hebrews in the Bereshith Rabba hand down that in the time of Enos men abjured the faith of one God and were idolaters, and so Enos began publicly to invoke the name of the Lord, Gen. 4:17. Fourth, our Salmeron interprets «unbelievers» as the men of Noah's age, who were ignorant of much concerning God, and did not have explicit faith concerning Christ's birth and death, but only implicit. Fifth, Arias takes by «unbelievers» the sons of Noah, who at first did not believe their father Noah preaching the flood, but after many of his arguments and signs gave him faith, and so entered the ark with him. But I refuted this above.
Sixth and genuinely, these unbelievers are understood as those who did not believe Noah blaming their sins and threatening sinners with the flood — who in former times, that is at first did not believe him, but afterwards believed, especially when they actually saw the flood predicted by Noah, and then, pricked with compunction and repentant, they corrected their mind and life, because they were expecting God's patience, as follows.
Note: Christ freed all the just out of hell; nevertheless St. Peter mentions only those who were in the time of Noah and the flood, both because there was greater reason for doubting concerning their salvation: for since they had been drowned by waters by God the avenger, their souls also could seem to be relegated to gehenna: so Bellarmine, book IV On the Soul of Christ, ch. 13; ...both because he wishes to encourage the faithful by a striking example to endure adversities, on account of their usefulness — inasmuch as they were even for the impious in the flood a cause of repentance and salvation: so Suarez, III part., tom. II, disp. 45, sect. 3; and because the flood and the ark were a type of baptism, of which he was about to treat next.
WHEN THEY WAITED FOR THE PATIENCE OF GOD. — Hesselius and others think we should read «when God's patience was waiting.» For so reads St. Augustine, epistle 49; St. Jerome on Isaiah ch. 54; Idacius, Contra Varimondum; Bede and Dionysius here. The same is signified by the Greek ὅτε ἀπεξεδέχετο (Bede and the Tigurine wrongly read ἅπαξ ἐξεδέχετο, that is, «they were waiting once and at once») ἡ τοῦ Θεοῦ μακροθυμία; and the Syriac, «when the longsuffering of God commanded that the ark should be made on account of hope of their repentance.» This reading is plain and apt: for it commends the patience of God, that He patiently waited for the unbelievers and impious in the time of Noah for a hundred years for repentance. For when He could justly have sent the flood upon them at once — as Noah had threatened — He would not, but deferred for a hundred years, commanding Noah meanwhile to build the ark, so that this construction might continually strike their eyes and mind and force them to believe Noah threatening the flood: whence it does not seem to be doubted that not a few, terrified by Noah's so constant threatening and the building of the ark, believed him and did penance. For this God's patience was waiting for them, and was secretly working.
But because the Greek ἀπεξεδέχετο is a middle verb, meaning both «was being awaited» and «was awaiting,» hence others translate «when God's patience was being awaited.» So Pagninus, the Tigurine, Vatablus, and Rupert (book IV on Genesis, ch. 17). But this is the same as what we read in the Vulgate version: «When they were awaiting God's patience;» for it is the same thing for men to wait for the patience of God, as for the patience of God to be awaited by men. And this reading aptly coheres with what precedes: for it gives the reason why they were «unbelievers,» namely because they were awaiting God's patience — that is, because, promising themselves too much of God's patience, they did not think there would be a flood, but that God would patiently bear with their morals and crimes, as before through six hundred years from Enos to Noah He had borne. Second, by «the patience of God» the flood itself can be understood, the sending of which God patiently and long-sufferingly deferred, awaiting the repentance of sinners, so as to be a catachresis and metonymy. For the sinners, seeing the flood deferred, mockingly asked Noah: Why does the flood you threatened not come? When will it come? Noah answered: God will send it in His time, but He defers and patiently waits for you to do penance, and so to avert the flood. Hence they, mocking Noah's response, called the flood «God's patience,» saying: When will that patience of your God which you preach come? It is long and slow; we would like to see it and swim in your flood. When it comes, we will believe you and your threats about it, but not before. In a similar way the Jews, mocking the oracles of Isaiah who said «Thus the Lord commandeth,» would say: «Command, command again; await, await again; a little there, a little there,» Isaiah 28:10 — as if to say: You, Isaiah, threaten us with destruction and say God commanded you to do so, and through so many years we have seen nothing of it, nor do we yet see a shadow. Therefore your threats are false and illusory.
Morally: see here how great is God's patience, who awaits sinners so long to repentance. Thus He waited for the Jews through many hundreds of years, until they should fill up the measure of their sins, and that being filled, He at last punished them through Titus and Vespasian, Matt. 23:32. Thus He waited for the Canaanites and Amorrhites from Ham their father, who was at the time of the flood, until Joshua, who destroyed them, for eight hundred years. Thus He waited for other nations until Nebuchadnezzar, by whom He overthrew them. But then, indignant that His patience was being despised, He compensates the slowness of punishment by its severity, according to the saying of the ancients: «The gods have feet of wool, but hands of iron.» Wherefore all the men of the whole world, except Noah with his sons and daughters-in-law, He drowned in the flood. Thus He awaits every sinner for many months and years: indeed even just and religious men He awaits long, that they may seriously renounce all vanities and give themselves wholly to God and perfection.
See on the contrary how great is the obstinacy and ingratitude of men, by which they elude God's patience, indeed contend with it, and do not desist from their wantonness until they are crushed and ground down by God. Wiser were the Ninevites, who, when Jonah threatened destruction, at once did penance, and through it reconciling themselves to God escaped it.
Moreover some, with Hesselius, punctuate this differently, and begin a new sentence at: «In the days of Noah;» and they then give this sense: God's patience, lest it should destroy unbelieving nations, waited long until Christ should come, who would take away their sins. Likewise the guilty also, condemned for their crimes, who at their last hour are converted, God long patiently waited for, while they acted impiously. In turn the Saints of the Old Testament were awaiting God's patience, that is the coming of Christ, on account of whom God was patient over the malice of men, and so prolonged His patience until His coming, and in Him terminated it.
WHILE THE ARK WAS BEING BUILT (Greek κατασκευαζομένης, that is, while it was being prepared), — for a hundred years, as I have already said. See what I said about the building of the ark at Gen. 6:13 and following.
IN WHICH FEW, THAT IS EIGHT SOULS, — namely eight people: Noah with his wife and his three sons with their three wives, whom God was preserving as a seedplot of new offspring, lest the whole human race should perish. It is a synecdoche. There was also a ninth survivor, Enoch, the great-grandfather of Noah, who from Paradise, or rather from the upper air (Paradise...
Vatablus. The Complutensian and Royal editions read it differently, namely ᾧ, that is, "to which," referring to the ark and the flood, to which baptism corresponds antitypically. So Gagneius and Cajetan. But other Greeks and Latins read ὅ, that is, "which."
Of like form. — St. Augustine, in his book On Baptism, last chapter, reads "of like form," that is, by like type and analogy; the Syriac, "by like example"; St. Cyprian, in epistle 74, similarly; in Greek, ἀντίτυπον, as if to say: To which baptism is now the antitype, that is, as the thing figured corresponds to the type. The ark was the type, baptism is the antitype of the ark, because through the ark as type it was prefigured, and corresponds to it with fitting proportion and agreement, as antitype to type, as exemplar to image, as body to shadow. For the type is the type of the antitype, and the antitype is the antitype of the type.
The sense is, as if to say: Just as the ark once preserved eight souls in bodily life, so now baptism saves souls in spiritual life. The ark therefore was the type and figure of baptism: for the flood signifies sin and death overflowing through the whole human race; Noah is Christ, victor over sin and death; the ark is the Church, whose door is baptism; the eight souls are all the faithful who have been baptized so that they may attain to the eighth day of the resurrection and of eternal glory.
By a like reasoning, the Eucharist is called antitype by St. Basil in his Liturgy and other Greek Fathers, both passively, namely because it was prefigured by the types of the paschal lamb, the manna, and the loaves of proposition, and corresponds to them with fitting analogy; and actively, because it itself is the type and representation of Christ suffering, dying, and reigning in heaven. From this, however, it does not follow that Christ is not really present in it, but only that He is not there visibly, suffering, dying, and reigning in heaven, and is veiled and represented under the sacramental species of bread and wine as under types. Hence by Theodoret, on 1 Corinthians 11, it is called the archetype of types. "Antitype" therefore is the same as "sacrament," and "antitypically" is the same as "sacramentally." Now a sacrament is the sign of a thing not absent, but present, though hidden, as for example the body of Christ in the Eucharist. See Bellarmine, book II On the Eucharist, ch. XVI, and book IV, ch. XIV.
Through water. — For the waters of the flood lifted up the ark, and consequently the eight souls dwelling in it, lest they, remaining on the ground, should be overwhelmed by the waters; but rather, by means of the ark, they should escape, rising above them.
Learn from this how great was the corruption of that age, so great and so universal that only Noah with his household was just, and therefore worthy to escape the flood. Again, learn how few are the saints and those to be saved: for the type of this was the one Noah among so great a multitude of men, just as the one Lot in the burning of Sodom; and Joshua and Caleb, who alone out of so many thousands of Hebrews entered the promised land.
Tropologically, Noah is Christ and the Apostles, who receive the sevenfold grace of the Holy Spirit, says Rupert.
Anagogically, the number eight of the elect souls is a symbol of the eighth day of the resurrection and of eternal happiness, and of the Church triumphant as well as militant. So St. Jerome, in his Dialogue against the Luciferians, near the end: "Eight human souls," he says, "were preserved in the ark of Noah, and Ecclesiastes bids us give a portion to seven, also to eight, that is, to believe in both Testaments: therefore certain Psalms are inscribed 'for the eighth,' and from the groups of eight verses placed under each letter, the just man is instructed in Psalm 118. The Beatitudes also, by which the Lord, proclaiming them to the disciples on the mount, sketched out the Church, are eight in number. And Ezekiel adopts the number eight in the building of the temple." He then adds other analogies of the ark and the Church. First, "in the ark," he says, "there were clean and unclean animals: in the Church there are the just and sinners. Secondly, a raven is sent out from the ark and does not return, and afterward a dove announces peace upon the earth: so also in the baptism of the Church, the most foul bird being driven out, that is, the devil, the dove of the Holy Spirit announces peace upon our earth. Thirdly, beginning at thirty cubits and going down to one cubit, the ark is built gradually narrowing: in like manner the Church also, consisting of many grades, ends at the lowest with Deacons, Presbyters, and Bishops. Fourthly, the ark was endangered in the flood: the Church is endangered in the world. Fifthly, having gone forth, Noah planted a vineyard and, drinking of it, became drunk: Christ also, born in the flesh, planted the Church and suffered. Sixthly, the elder son mocked his uncovered father, and the younger covered him: and the Jews mocked the crucified God, and the Gentiles honored Him."
Verse 21: Whereunto Baptism, Being of the Like Form, Now Also Saves You
21. WHEREUNTO BAPTISM, BEING OF THE LIKE FORM, NOW SAVETH YOU ALSO. — "Whereunto," that is, in what manner; or rather it is a Hebraism, by which the relative is placed before its antecedent, which is rendered in Latin thus: And then baptism saves us, which is ἀντίτυπον, that is, of like form, and corresponds by typical similarity, supply, to the waters of the flood, as the reality to the type — as if to say: Just as Noah with his family was preserved in the ark lifted up by the waters, so also are we through baptism. So
Not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, — as if to say: Baptism saves us, not insofar as it is a washing of the flesh, that it may wash away the filth from it and put it off, as the baptisms and washings of the Jews used to do; but insofar as it is a washing of the soul and conscience, and makes it good, that is, pure and holy.
BUT THE EXAMINATION OF A GOOD CONSCIENCE TOWARD GOD. — "Examination," that is, proving and testing. As if to say: Baptism saves us, because it brings it about that we have, proven before God, a good conscience, namely pure and clean, according to that of Hebrews 10:22: "Having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water." For "to interrogate" often in Scripture means to prove and to test, because through the interrogation the truth of a deed, of a fault, or of innocence is sought out and explored from the accused: it is a metalepsis. So in Psalm 11:4 it is said:
"His eyelids examine the sons of men," that is, the eyes of God explore and survey all men; and verse 5: "The Lord examines," that is, He tests the just and the wicked; and Psalm 138:23: "Examine me, and know my paths," that is, as he said a little before: "Prove me, O God, and know my heart": for in the Psalms one part of a verse is often the explanation and confirmation of another.
Hence secondly, by the same metalepsis, "interrogation," that is, response, both because the response correlatively answers to the interrogation, and is required and elicited by it, so much so that from the interrogation the response is often understood, just as one similar thing is known from another. Hence in Ecclesiasticus 33:4 it is said: "He that maketh the interrogation manifest, shall prepare the word," that is, he who desires to answer the interrogation clearly and correctly will first think and study how he ought to respond. Also because the Hebrews, when they wish to respond or assert something with certainty, declare that very thing in the form of an interrogation. For sharp interrogations move more vehemently than simple assertions, as in Genesis 13:8 Abraham says to Lot: "Behold the whole land is before thee." In Hebrew: Is not the land before thee? In the books of Kings it is repeatedly said: "Are not these things written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah?" — as if to say: Indeed they are written in the chronicles of the kings, all know them to be written there: it would be in vain therefore for me to repeat them here. Ezekiel 22:2: "And thou, son of man, dost thou not judge the city of bloods?" — as if to say: It is wholly thy task to judge it, that thou mayest show her all her abominations." The sense therefore is, as if to say: Baptism produces a good conscience, so much so that it itself dares to be examined by God, and confidently presents itself before His tribunal in judgment, not fearing that it will be condemned, but, when questioned, fearlessly responds before God who knows all things that it is good and cleansed of every stain. This sense is required by the antithesis, which is this: Baptism is the washing, the putting off, and the submersion of all defilements, not of the flesh, but of the soul, namely of all sins; and therefore it produces a good and pure conscience, so much so that it can freely and truly answer to anyone, even God, when interrogating, that it is such. He alludes to the rite of the Church, in which the one to be baptized is asked by her through the priest whether he wishes to be baptized, and whether he renounces Satan and all his pomps. To which he responds: I wish to be baptized; I renounce Satan and his pomps — as St. Dionysius testifies in Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, near the end, and Cyril in book XII on John, ch. LXIV, and St. Augustine, epistle 23.
Hence thirdly, baptism gives to a good conscience not only a passive but also an active examination, namely because it makes that conscience secure of its purity, so that it may confidently dare to question, ask, and call upon God, saying: Abba Father, am I not Thy son? Art Thou not my Father? Therefore feed, care for, govern, and protect me as Thy son, direct me to Thee on the way of eternal salvation, grant that I may wholly please Thee, wholly serve Thee, be wholly united to Thee. This is what Christ taught us to pray: "Our Father who art in heaven, Thy kingdom come. Give us this day our daily bread. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil." So Arias. Whence the Syriac translates: but giving thanks to God with a pure conscience. This is likewise what Paul says: "You have received the spirit of adoption of sons, by which we cry: Abba Father. For the Spirit Himself bears witness to our spirit that we are children of God," Romans 8:15; and St. John, epistle 1, ch. 3, verse 21: "If our heart does not reprove us, we have confidence toward God, and whatever we ask, we shall receive from Him." Hence the faithful man, like a son, in all doubts, difficulties, temptations, etc., has recourse to God, as an infant to its mother, and interrogates, invokes, and consults Him. So Thucydides says: ἐπερωτῶ τὸν Θεόν, that is, I consult God.
Others translate the Greek ἐπερώτημα, that is, "interrogation," differently. First, Cajetan renders it "inquiry," as if to say: Baptism causes a person to inquire after, or seek to obtain, a good conscience before God. And Oecumenius: Baptism, he says, is as it were a kind of pledge and earnest of a good conscience toward God. For those who have a good conscience to themselves, that is, those who embrace a blameless life, and who diligently search it out and as it were interrogate it, these will also hasten to the sacred baptism. Hence the Gloss, Gagneius, and Suarez (Part III, Question 62, disputation 7, section 1) hold that here is signified only the disposition with which one should approach baptism, namely that we should ask and desire that through baptism not our body but our conscience be cleansed.
St. Augustine joins in (tract 8 on John), and St. Ambrose (On Those Who Are Initiated into the Mysteries, ch. III and IV), who take this passage to refer to the questioning and examination by which the candidate for baptism is examined as to whether he comes with a good conscience, that is, with good faith and disposition, namely not feignedly but sincerely, not impenitent but penitent and contrite — or at least attrite — that is, whether he comes to baptism with true faith and hope and detestation of sins, and with a serious resolution of a new life: understand this of adults, such as were nearly all who came to baptism in that earliest age of the Church. Wherefore the Anabaptists wrongly contend from these words of Peter that infants should not be baptized, but only adults, who when questioned can answer that they wish to be baptized. Erasmus, in his preface to St. Matthew, holds something even worse: that baptized infants, when they have become adults, should be asked whether they ratify the pacts and promises made at baptism; and if they refuse, should be left to their own freedom.
Secondly, Gagneius and others translate ἐπερώτημα as "stipulation," "pact," or "contract," as if to say: Baptism saves us insofar as it is a stipulation and pact between God and the one baptized. For God enters into a covenant in baptism with the one baptized, and from the pact gives him a good conscience, that is, the remission of sins, grace, grace, justice, and the promise of eternal life. Moreover He promises that He will be to him God, Father, Provider, and Protector: in turn the baptized person promises that he will be to God a faithful servant and son, and that he will enter upon a new life, will preserve the good conscience received from Him until the last breath of life, and will obey His law and commandments in all things. For this reason in former times those who were about to profess the Christian faith in baptism would publicly look up to heaven, and raise their right hands on high, with an oath taken before witnesses; and the oath, signed by the hand of the baptized and sealed with his ring, was recorded on tablets, as Josephus Vicecomes teaches from the Fathers, in book II On the Rites of Baptism, ch. XXVII. Again, some translate ἐπερώτημα εἰς Θεόν as "a stipulation toward God," as if to say: Baptism saves us not by virtue of the water which washes the body, but because by the divine pact and promise it has the Holy Spirit assisting and operating, who cleanses and sanctifies the conscience. So St. Basil, in his book On the Holy Spirit, ch. XV: "Therefore," he says, "if there is any grace in the water, it is not from the nature of the water itself, but from the presence of the Spirit. For baptism is not the putting away of the filth of the body, but the interrogation of a good conscience before God." And shortly after: "Through the Holy Spirit is given restoration to paradise, return to the kingdom of heaven, restoration to the adoption of sons; through Him is given the boldness to call God one's Father, to become a partaker in the grace of Christ, to be called a son of light, to be a participant of eternal grace, and — to say all in a word — to be in every fullness of blessing, both in this present age and in the age to come."
Wherefore the Fathers often admonish the faithful that, mindful of their stipulation and promise, they should fulfill it in deed. So St. Ambrose, in his book On Those Who Are Initiated into the Mysteries, ch. II: "Recall," he says, "what was asked of thee, recognize what thou hast pledged: thou hast renounced the devil and his works, the world and its luxury and pleasures: thy voice is held, not in the tomb of the dead, but in the book of the living." St. Augustine, in book IV On the Creed to the Catechumens, ch. 1: "You have professed," he says, "to renounce the devil; in which profession not to men, but to God and His angels, who were taking it down in writing, you said: I renounce." St. Gregory Nazianzen, oration 40, defines baptism as "a pact entered into with God for a second life and a purer manner of living," and from this concludes: "And therefore we ought all to be in the greatest fear, and to guard our souls with every watchfulness, lest we be found to have violated this pact (1)."
Thirdly, Luther and his followers wrongly translate ἐπερώτημα as "testimony," "seal," or "sealing," as if to say: Baptism saves us, not by its own power (for it is a mere sign), but because it is the testimony of a good — that is, a faithful — conscience, and seals and confirms its faith. For the heretics hold that faith alone justifies, but the Sacraments are only signs, protestations, and seals of justifying faith: they have themselves intruded this dogma of theirs into the scholia of Vatablus, which explain ἐπερώτημα as the declaration of an upright and faithful spirit toward God. But this is a heresy condemned by the Council of Trent and by the whole Church, and refuted here by St. Peter. For he says: "Which baptism, being of like form, also saves us," as if to say: Just as the waters of the flood, lifting up the ark, and with it Noah and his household, did not merely declare them safe from death, but in fact saved them, so also baptism in fact makes us saved, that is, just and holy — not merely declares us just.
From this passage it is plain how great is the power and dignity of baptism: wherefore the Fathers represent it under various titles and praises. From the matter, namely from the water and the washing, they call it the laver of life, the water of salvation, the fountain and river of the water of life, the laver of the regenerative wave. So it is called by St. Cyprian (epistles 2, 73, and 76) and Tertullian (in his book On Baptism), Clement of Alexandria (Paedagogue I, ch. VI), and Damascene (On the Faith IV, ch. X). From its form it is called the seal of faith, the Sacrament of faith, the confession of faith, the Sacrament of the Holy Trinity. So St. Basil (book III Against Eunomius), and St. Ambrose (book I On the Holy Spirit, ch. III). From its effect it is called the Sacrament of illumination and regeneration, the Sacrament of Christians, the badge of the Christian soldier, the deluge of sins, the river of grace, the womb of the Church, the death of sins and the life of virtues. Hear St. Gregory Nazianzen, oration 4 On Holy Baptism: "Baptism," he says, "is the splendor of souls, the changing of life for the better, the interrogation of the conscience toward God. Baptism is the support of our weakness. Baptism is the casting off of the flesh, the seeking of the spirit, the participation in the Word, the correction of our fashioning, the deluge of sin, the communication of light, the suppression of darkness. Baptism is the chariot to God, the pilgrimage with Christ, the support of faith, the perfection of the mind, the key of the heavenly kingdom, the change of life, the casting off of slavery, the loosing of bonds, the conversion of our composition into a better state. What need is there to mention more? Baptism is the most splendid and excellent of all God's benefits. For just as certain things are called the Holy of holies, and the Song of songs, namely because they extend more widely and embrace more, and have a special dignity: in the same way baptism also is called illumination, because it surpasses in holiness all other illuminations." And shortly after, he calls it gift, grace, unction, illumination, the garment of incorruption, the laver of regeneration, seal, and, finally, deserving to be called by every most excellent name. It is called "gift," because it is given to those who have brought nothing before. "Grace," because it is given even to debtors. "Baptism," because sin is buried in the water. "Unction," because it is sacred and royal: for such were those who used to be anointed. Furthermore, "illumination," because it is splensplendor and brightness. "Garment," because it is the veiling of our shame. "Laver," because it washes. "Seal," because it is preservation and a sign of lordship. The heavens rejoice over it; the angels celebrate it on account of their kinship in splendor; it bears the image of that beatitude; we wish indeed to celebrate it with praises and hymns, but we cannot do so according to the dignity of the matter."
THROUGH THE RESURRECTION OF JESUS CHRIST. — First, as if to say: This power, namely of producing a good and holy conscience, baptism has from the merit of the passion of Christ, whose end and completion was His own resurrection, according to that: "He was delivered up for our sins, and rose again for our justification," Romans 4:25. See what was said there. Secondly, "through the resurrection," because through it Christ overcame and swallowed up death, both His own and consequently ours, and opened to us the entrance into heaven, which is the second effect of baptism — namely, that just as it gives us the life of grace, so likewise after it He gives the life of glory, and makes us heirs of eternal life. So Bede and Lyranus. Thirdly, because the resurrection of Christ is the exemplary and final cause of our holiness and new life, which we receive and enter upon by baptism. So the Gloss, Hugo, and Thomas the Englishman. St. Basil agrees (book On the Holy Spirit, ch. XV): "The Lord," he says, "preparing us for life from the resurrection, sets forth the whole evangelical manner of life, that we be not angry, that we be patient of evils, and pure from the love of pleasures, that our morals be free from the eager pursuit of money, etc. Accordingly, if anyone defining it should say that the Gospel is the form of life which is from the resurrection, I should in no way think him to wander from the truth." This is what Paul says in Romans 6:4: "For we are buried together with Him by baptism into death, that as Christ rose from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we also may walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of His death, we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection."
Finally, Paul and the Apostles are accustomed to attribute our justification and salvation to the resurrection, because it, as it were the closing clause and seal, sealed up all the dogmas and sacraments of Christ. "For if Christ has not risen, our faith and hope is vain," 1 Corinthians 15:15.
Morally, note that the highest good of baptism and of Christianity is a good conscience, and therefore that this is the genuine token of a true Christian. For this God gave us in baptism, this He commanded us to guard and increase throughout our whole life, about this He will examine us in the hour of death, this He will demand back from us on the day of judgment. For then He will examine us not on wealth, wisdom, or knowledge, but on a good conscience. Then "there will not be inquired of us what we read, but what we did; nor how well we lived, but how religiously we lived," says our Thomas the Divinely Taught, in book I of the Imitation of Christ, ch. III. For this reason Paul was so solicitous about it: "I give thanks," he says, "to God, whom I serve from my forefathers with a pure conscience," 2 Timothy 1:3; and Acts 24:16: "I always endeavor to have a conscience without offense toward God and toward men." And he warmly commends it to Christians: "For our glory is this," he says, "the testimony of our conscience, that in simplicity of heart and in the sincerity of God, and not in carnal wisdom, but in the grace of God, we have conversed in this world." 2 Corinthians 1:12. "The end of the commandment is charity from a pure heart, and a good conscience, and an unfeigned faith," 1 Timothy 1:5; and v. 19: "Fighting in them the good fight, having faith and a good conscience, which some rejecting have made shipwreck concerning the faith"; and ch. 3, v. 9: "Holding the mystery of faith in a pure conscience"; and ch. 4, v. 2, he says that heretics have a seared conscience. To Titus 1:15: "To the unbelieving," he says, "nothing is clean, but their mind and conscience are defiled." Hebrews 13:19: "Pray for us: for we trust we have a good conscience, being willing to converse rightly in all things."
Excellently does Nazianzen say (oration 40): "If the devil," he says, "attacks thee through avarice, showing all the kingdoms as belonging to himself and demanding adoration from thee, despise him as a beggar; say, trusting in thy seal: I too am the image of God, not yet, like thee, cast down from the supernal glory because of pride; I have put on Christ, I have been transformed into Christ: do thou rather adore me."
Verse 22: Who Is on the Right Hand of God, Swallowing Up Death, That We Might Be Made Heirs of Life Everlasting
22. Who is on the right hand of God. — As if to say: Christ, by suffering and descending to the lowest, ascended to the highest, namely to the right hand of God: so it shall happen also to you, O Christians: bear therefore bravely whatever is hard and lowly. How Christ sits at the right hand of God, I have said at Colossians 3:1.
SWALLOWING UP DEATH. — These words are now lacking in the Greek. The sense is, as if to say: Christ by dying and rising abolished His own death and ours, and as it were swallowed it up, according to Hosea 13:14: "I will be thy death, O death; I will be thy bite, O hell." And: "Death is swallowed up in victory," 1 Corinthians 15:54. See what was said there. He animates the faithful to suffering and dying with the hope of resurrection and of immortal and blessed life, opened up and promised to them by Christ.
HAVING GONE INTO HEAVEN. — The Syriac: "having been carried up," not by angels, but by His own power, not only of His divinity but also of His glorified humanity, namely ascending by the gift of agility above all the heavens, as I said at Acts 1:9.
The angels being made subject to Him. — For Christ, not only as God, but also as man, by virtue and dignity of the hypostatic union, is the firstborn of every creature, Colossians 1:15, that is, the prince of all creatures and the lord of the universe, and therefore the head and King of all angels as well as of men, as Paul says, Colossians 1:18, and ch. 2 v. 10, and Ephesians 1:22. See what was said there. For Christ is the head of the whole Church, both militant and triumphant, which, since it is one, is composed of angels as well as of men. Hence weighty theologians hold with probability that the angels also obtained grace and glory from the merits of Christ — this would have pertained to the dignity of Christ, and to the greater association of the Church, which consists of angels as well as of men. See Gregory of Valencia, Part III, disputation 1, Question VIII, point 3, and Suarez, Part III, tome I, disputation 42, sections 1 and 2.
Wherefore deservedly does St. Leo say in sermon 1 On the Ascension: Truly, he says, there was a great and ineffable cause for rejoicing, when in the sight of the holy multitude the nature of the human race was ascending above the dignity of all heavenly creatures, about to surpass the angelic orders, and to be lifted beyond the height of the Archangels, and to have no measure of its advancement set by any sublimities, until being received into the company of the eternal Father, it was associated on the throne of that glory whose nature it was united to in the Son.