Tractates on the Psalms 2.48–13.6

The prophet added the reason for this careful embrace and grip, saying: "Lay hold of discipline, lest at any time the Lord be angry and you perish from the just way, when his anger is kindled in a short time." For the day of punishment is at hand, which is understood to be signified by the Lord's anger being kindled; in it, if we do not hold the discipline we have laid hold of, we shall be lost from the just way. For whatever is taken away from a thing perishes for it, and what is lacking seems already lost to the one who lacks it. For though it remains in its own nature, it does not remain for the one from whom it is absent. And therefore the ungodly perish from the just way, because they will not be in it. And they perish from the just way when his anger is kindled in a short time.

This anger by which they perish from the just way is not slow, lest anyone flatter himself meanwhile with the gain of punishment delayed while judgment waits. For the anger is kindled in a short time. The avenging underworld receives us at once; and falling from the body, if we have so lived, we perish at once from the right way. Witnesses to us are the rich man and the poor man of the Gospel: angels placed the one in the seats of the blessed and in Abraham's bosom, while the region of punishment at once received the other. Punishment received the dead man so immediately that his brothers were still remaining above. There is no delay or postponement there. For the day of judgment is the eternal recompense either of blessedness or of punishment; but the time of death meanwhile holds each person under its own laws, while either Abraham or punishment reserves each for judgment.

And therefore the prophet concluded this psalm, so rich in heavenly mysteries, thus: "Blessed are all who trust in him." The perfection of blessedness does not require a fearful or doubtful hope. Trust is needed for it, that is, a firm conviction and an unchangeable will, because to trust is more than to hope. We must trust, then, lest the anger of God, kindled in a short time, destroy us from the right way. For he is faithful who said: "He who believes in me will not be judged, but will pass from death to life," our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.

The understanding of some psalms is plain, of others the sense is more obscure; the diversity of prophecy brings both kinds of diversity. For the Holy Spirit has instructed man in the knowledge of God through many and varied kinds of speech: now grasping the hidden things of the mysteries through natures and comparisons of human things, now commending the simplicity of faith by plainness of words, now confirming the order of life by the truth of commandments, now showing through the person of the prophet who writes the psalm what is to be foreseen and guarded against; so that through this manifold and rich abundance of teaching, by certain parts and increments of learning, the building up of the whole understanding may be achieved. And the psalm set before us as an example will be the one whose heading is this: "For the end, for the hidden things of the son, a psalm of David." So the understanding of the psalm is to be sought through the nature of the things that are both hidden and at the end.

The psalm was inscribed "for the end, for the hidden things of the son" only so that what the psalm consists of might be known. For everything added to the title of a discourse bears witness to the things from which the discourse began. It is not fitting that one thing should be in the discourse and another in the title, since the title is, as it were, an index of what is written about. The meaning of the word "for the end," then, must be understood. That is at the end beyond which there is nothing; that is at the end which goes beyond the present time; for the end comes from all things, not all things from the end, since all things cease in it, and it is a kind of last point of something done or said; and unless the last point of the whole universe is in it, it will not be the end, because what has something last beyond itself cannot be the last. From this it is to be understood that whenever the title has "for the end," not present things but the last things are contained in it. Hidden things are those that are concealed and lie unseen, and are hidden in secret, inaccessible, and impenetrable places, and are known only to him who stored them away, or only when he has brought them forward to be known by some.

The blessed apostle Paul is our witness concerning these, saying: "So that by reading you can understand my insight into the mystery of Christ, which in other times was not made known to the sons of men as it has now been revealed." And again: "To me, the least of all the saints, this grace was given, to preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ and to bring to light what is the dispensation of his mystery, hidden for ages in God." This, then, is the hidden thing of which the Lord also says: "There is nothing hidden that will not be known, nor covered that will not be revealed." But the psalm contains hidden things, not one hidden thing. Rightly so, for what follows teaches that there were several, not one. For it is a hidden thing that God, for the sake of human salvation, was present not in the heavenly glory and brightness of his name but put on the form of a human body. It is also a hidden thing that the nature of human flesh in him was not put on from the common kind of origin but came forth from a virgin, was brought forth by a virgin, and was begotten without the beginning of ordinary birth. It is a hidden thing that he who died came to life from death, taking up again from the body the glory of immortality. But this is not yet the end.

"The end" signifies not a kind of setting of things but the measure and completion of things running their course; not that they should cease into abolition, but that the things in question should be placed in a kind of abiding limit. What this end is, then, that is, what the complete perfection of all things is and what is hidden, the blessed apostle tells the Corinthians thus: "For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all are made alive. But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then those who are Christ's, who believed at his coming; then the end, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father, when he has destroyed every rule and authority. For he must reign until he puts all enemies under his feet; for God has subjected all things under his feet. The last enemy overcome in him is death. But when he has said, All things are subjected, except him who subjected all things to him, then he himself will be subjected to him who subjected all things to himself, that God may be all in all." This, then, is the end of the hidden things: the resurrection of the dead, the glorification of the saints, the abolition of ruling wickedness, the destruction of death; and through this the kingdom of Christ is also the kingdom of God the Father. For when these things have been done, after all things have been subjected to the Son by the Father, not so that eternity is taken from his kingdom by subjection, but so that he may lead us, glorified, clothed with immortality, and conformed to the glory of his body, into the kingdom of the Father, now worthy of co-inheritance with him, now taken into the Father's family, now sharers in his goods and glory, so that he may reign with the Father in us and God may be all in all, when the weakness of the human nature he assumed is swallowed up by the subjection of obedience into the divine nature. This eternal praise, then, is due through the Son to God the Father, when all who have lived by faith from Adam to the time of the kingdom have been raised and transfigured from the body into a heavenly state, when all the iniquity of wickedness has been taken away, the devil consigned to the punishment of eternal fire, and his name removed from human memory. These hidden things are sung in the psalm, these are celebrated when the end is complete. And because the Son is aware of all things to come, these are praised as already accomplished, because in him and with him and through him are all things: to him be glory for ever and ever. Amen.

The apostle, instructing us in many things, teaches this too, that the word of God must be handled with all reverence, saying: "Whoever speaks, as the oracles of God." For in these things there must not be the careless ease of our ordinary speech; but when we speak what we have learned and read, honour must be paid to the author through care in discoursing. The custom of human service gives us an example for heavenly teaching. For if someone interpreting the words of a king and bringing his commands to the ears of the people takes care diligently and cautiously, out of reverence for his office, to do justice to the king's dignity, so that everything is read out and heard with honour and respect, how much more fitting is it that we, in setting forth the oracles of God for human understanding, show ourselves worthy of this office? For we are a kind of instrument of the Holy Spirit, through which the variety of the voice and the diversity of teaching are to be heard. We must be watchful and careful, then, to say nothing low, fearing the law of this sentence: "Cursed is everyone who does the works of God negligently"; while on the other side a reward is set for the care and diligence of those who, with reverence and fear, commit the holy Scriptures to themselves as the words of God and instil them with due dignity into the minds of hearers, as the Lord says: "And upon whom shall I look, but upon the humble and meek and the one who trembles at my words?" Preachers, then, must consider that they are not speaking to men, and hearers must know that it is not the words of men that are brought to them, but the voices of God, the ordinances of God, the laws of God, and that the greatest reverence befits both duties. For it is a matter of the greatest danger either to bring forward anything superfluous, or to hear negligently, about the treasures of God, the hidden mysteries, the eternal testament. Everything must be sealed in the mind and entrusted to the senses, because there is nothing in the words of God that is not to be fulfilled; and everything that has been said already has a kind of necessity of being accomplished, because the words of God are decrees.

The psalm that has been read is inscribed "for the end." If all were inscribed so, there would be no difficulty, for generality would exclude every question. But since one has one inscription and another another, the differences of inscriptions must have arisen only from different causes. Now in those inscribed "for the end" the understanding is twofold: either they will contain the things that will be at the consummation, or the end of the psalm will give the resolution of everything said in the whole psalm. Everything in the psalm is harsh, dreadful, loathsome, full of blasphemies, filled with crimes, heavy with complaints. There is no confession to God, no gladness in joys, no song in choirs; but accusation against the profane, complaint against the obstinate, grief for the afflicted. For it says: "The fool has said in his heart, There is no God. They are corrupt and have become abominable in their wills; there is none who does good, not even one," and the rest. At the end it follows: "Who will give out of Sion the salvation of Israel? When the Lord turns back the captivity of his people, let Jacob rejoice and Israel be glad."

Suppose someone enters a plague-stricken city and sees all its inhabitants without exception wasted by disease, burning with fevers, and worn out by every kind of illness; he finds no physician there and groans, grieving that there is no help, no remedy for such evils, and feels the plague raging more each day in their limbs; and he knows that a physician far away could heal them if he were present. He cries out in the grief of despair (the only thing left): "Who is there to make him present and bring his salvation?", turning all his anxiety to the one he knows. In the same way the Holy Spirit, seeing the error of the human race, seeing the growing evils of this age and the disease spreading with incurable death, where God is denied by the fool, where all are corrupted by the abominable deceits of pleasures, where no one wills good, where their throats are graves of the innocent, where they use the tongue in the service of fraud, where the poison of asps is poured over their lips and words, where the mouth is full of bitterness and cursing, where the course of their feet is swift to shed blood, and, as they do not know the way of peace, unhappiness grows heavier in all their ways; where there is no reverence toward God, where the devastation of God's people is like a meal of bread to the persecutors, and the deaths, losses, and tortures of the innocent become the fill of the wicked; where God is not called upon, and fear exists where there is no cause, as they reverence the creature in idols and abandon the Creator; where it is despaired that God dwells in the righteous generation, and the counsel of the poor is confounded, and the hope of his patience is mocked: with these evils so rampant and ruling over the whole world, the Holy Spirit, knowing the one who alone can bring help, cries out: "Who will give out of Sion the salvation of Israel?" For Moses had not given it, nor Elijah, nor Isaiah, nor the prophets; all the works of the law were weak against so great a plague of diseases. There was need of a physician who would heal everything by one and the same power of his help, and would heal so many and varied sicknesses in the whole world not by art, not by labour (for when would labour and art applied to each individual have availed?), but by the power of his word. This one the Spirit seeks, this one he awaits, at whose coming fever would rest, blindness end, paralysis cease, and death not seize: this one he awaits, this one he calls out for, to this one he prays: "Who will give out of Sion the salvation of Israel?" But the powers in each word must be explained one by one.

What Sion is, the apostle teaches when he says: "Let us draw near to Mount Sion and to the holy city Jerusalem"; for we all run to lay hold of that for which we were laid hold of by Christ, that is, to be found in his body, which he took beforehand from us, in which we were chosen by the Father before the foundation of the world, in which we were reconciled from being enemies and acquired from being lost, in which the apostle, at the loss of all things, wishes to be found, saying: "And I count all things as dung, that I may gain Christ and be found in him." Since, then, these diseases of our body could be taken away only by his assuming our flesh, and all our salvation in God comes from the assumption of the flesh, therefore he says: "Who will give out of Sion the salvation of Israel?"

But in "salvation" there is the power of the name. We do not adapt or invent it, but we are taught in the books of the Old Testament that our Lord God is called Salvation, and this name has always been granted properly to the Gentiles by promise. For Isaiah says: "And the Lord has revealed his holy arm in the sight of all the nations, and all the ends of the earth shall know the salvation of our God." It has been revealed, then, to all nations and known by all. And again in the psalms the Holy Spirit cries out: "Sing to the Lord a new song, for he has done wonderful things. The Lord has shown his salvation; in the sight of the nations he has revealed his righteousness." And again: "Proclaim his glory among the nations, and his salvation among all peoples." And again: "Show us, Lord, your mercy, and give us your salvation." The Lord shows the longing for this hope in the Gospel, saying: "Many prophets and righteous men desired to see what you see, and to hear what you hear." Simeon long awaited this salvation, and when he had received it in his hands he recognized it, and amid the cries of infancy and the squalor of the cradle he saw God by faith. Recognizing him in such things, he worshipped, saying: "Now let your servant depart, Lord, according to your word, in peace; for my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the sight of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles." This salvation, then, is announced to the Gentiles, not to carnal Israel, which awaited, saw, and heard the Lord of majesty on the mountain, and which in the prophets stoned, beat, sawed, and killed him; but this whole word is to the Gentiles and is the salvation of the Gentiles.

So it says: "When the Lord turns back the captivity of his people." The captivity belongs properly to the Gentiles, who had said in their heart, "There is no God"; who had trembled where there was no fear; who had confounded and mocked the hope of the poor, because the Lord is his hope; who had denied that the Lord would dwell in the righteous generation, being captive to the worship of demons, the superstitions of times, and the service of the creature. This captivity is driven out, this slavery taken away. But Israel will be the one who believes, Israel will be the one who looks upon God with the eyes of the heart; for Israel is "one who sees God," who, after the captivity is turned back, recognizes this salvation of God. Jacob rejoices, Israel too rejoices, when captivity is turned back, freedom granted, God beheld, and Abraham and Jacob named fathers by adoption into the family. In these things, then, let us rejoice and exult, knowing that, through our redemption, there is joy among the angels in heaven over the salvation of one who repents; and since there is heavenly gladness for us, our joys must be perpetual in Christ, who is blessed for ever and ever. Amen.