Homilies on Ezekiel 12.1–12.5

The things I have already mentioned above about the two great eagles, with great wings and great talons, and what the first and the second eagle did, the divine word now wishes to expound in part, as they were figured in the prophecy, leaving us to understand what it has itself left untouched. And first, though I have often said it already, I will nevertheless try even now to bring in something, not new, that may give salvation to our souls, from what is said to the prophet: “Say to the embittering house,” or “the exasperating house.” For he did not add, “to the house that embitters or exasperates me.” And if we wish to see what kind of sin exasperation is, let us hear how sweet the words of God are to one who understands them, as he says: “How sweet are your words to my throat!” When believers have taken in these words, sweet by nature, they either live well or indeed do the contrary. If they walk according to the divine rule, they keep the words of God in the sweetness in which they were born; and, as my mind moves me to think, by the goodness of their conduct they even increase the pleasantness of God’s words, mixing the sweetness of their life with the sweetness of the word. But if anyone sins and goes perversely outside God’s commands, he receives the sweetest words of God and, through the nature of most bitter sin (for sin is bitter, which destroys the sweetness of the word), reduces all their pleasantness to a bitter taste. You will grasp what we say more fully if you take an example. The herb called wormwood is bitter by nature: if you throw it into honey in proportion to the quality and quantity of the honey, it overcomes the honey’s sweetness with its bitterness and forces what is sweet to be bitter. Sin has the power of this herb. If I sin more, I put more bitterness into the sweetness of God’s words. If my offense is great, I turn all the sweetness of the honey into a harsh taste. And therefore God, who avenges his word trampled by sinners, pays back to each, according to the quality of his more bitter life and the measure of his intention, the bitterness of penalties and punishments. And if we who say these things, and have once believed God, sin, we strive to embitter his word; but those who have wholly withdrawn from faith in him, and have not entered the Church, do not make God’s words bitter. For how can they embitter the sweetness of words which they have not yet believed? And therefore other torments are reserved for us, who seem to believe and sin in our very belief, than the punishment of those who have not had even the beginning of belief. And lest we think that by sinning we only embitter the word of the Lord, our offense reaches even to injury to God himself. For it is written that one who sins dishonors God by transgressing the law. It would have been little if he had said, “dishonors an angel”; but as it is, he says, “through transgression of the law he dishonors God.” As often as we transgress God’s law, so often do we dishonor God; the greater our offenses, the greater the insults we inflict on God; the more we sin, the more we dishonor the Father and his Christ, as it is written: “How much worse punishment do you think he deserves who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, and counted the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified as defiled, and insulted the Spirit of grace?” So whoever sins embitters, insults, and dishonors both the words of God which he received and him who taught them. “Say now to the exasperating house: Do you not know what these things are?” that is, what was said in the parable of the eagles. “Say: When the king of Babylon came to Jerusalem and took her king and her princes.” As far as the history of the prophecy goes, it has been explained that Nebuchadnezzar came to Jerusalem and led captive Zedekiah king of Judea and the princes who were with him, and part of the people

of the Jews; and we will also add how he planted them in the land of Babylon. But let us not stand on the letter nor stick to the history. You, rather, who have made progress in God’s Scriptures and know that “all these things happened to them figuratively, but were written for us, upon whom the ends of the ages have come,” know that the true Nebuchadnezzar presses on, seeking to capture some of us. And first he desires, if he can, to lead off captives for himself from among the leaders of the Church. But as long as a Hezekiah, a Josiah, or any righteous king reigns among the people, this Nebuchadnezzar cannot lead away in chains either the leaders or the people of Judea. But if we who seem to preside over the Church sin, giving place to the devil against the command of Paul, who says, “Do not give place to the devil,” then in a way, through the offenses we have committed in Jerusalem, we give Nebuchadnezzar an occasion to enter the holy city and lead away whomever he wishes. But one who does not sin shuts Nebuchadnezzar out, so that he cannot enter the land of God. So let us shut Nebuchadnezzar out with all our strength, so that he may not come near the blessed assembly of this Church. Let us shut him out by taking up the key of knowledge; let us shut him out by our conduct and good deeds, so that he may not seize the king of Jerusalem and her princes, nor lead them away into Babylon as the triumph of his captivity. But if the savage enemy has been able to conquer any of us, he leads him into Babylon: not into the broad expanse of some land, but into the Babylon of the soul, that is, confusion. We have often said that Babylon means confusion. Whoever, conquered by him, is led away into the confusion of his mind is transferred into Babylon. Let us look at daily life. If ever we see a soul confused by sins, by vices, by sadness, by anger, by desires, by avarice, let us know that this is the soul which the devil leads away into Babylon. But if tranquillity, serenity, and peace have borne fruit in the ruling part of the heart, let us know that Jerusalem dwells in it; for the vision of peace is within.

“And he leads them to himself into Babylon, and takes of the seed of the kingdom, and makes a covenant with him.” All of us who have received the word of God are royal seed: “For we are called a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s possession.” So if any of us who have been placed in the rank of the royal seed is led away captive by the devil through his sin, there is no doubt that he has been led away from the royal race into Babylon and makes a covenant with Nebuchadnezzar, since he has despised the covenant of God. For it is impossible for a man to be without a covenant. If you do not have God’s, you have accepted the covenant of Nebuchadnezzar. For it is written: “He makes his covenant with him and brings him into a curse.” God makes a covenant with us in blessing; but Nebuchadnezzar establishes his covenant in a curse. One who has made a pact with Nebuchadnezzar cannot be in blessing. But someone learned in the divine Scriptures says to me: “I find curses laid down against the sinner in the law of Moses. If, then, by God’s command a curse is laid down against sinners, why should there not, conversely, be some blessing with the devil, so that some are in blessing with him and others in a curse?” To one who asks so acutely and so sharply I will try to reply thus: there is indeed a certain blessing from Nebuchadnezzar, which may God cast far from us; and there is the curse of which we must now speak, which deservedly comes upon sinners. What, then, is the blessing of Nebuchadnezzar? When someone in this world is wealthy and fares well, and everything has flowed for him in a prosperous course, so that what is written can be applied to him, “His cow will not miscarry”: if he has had all the prosperity of the world, the blessing of Nebuchadnezzar is upon him. But the curse lies in this: when someone withdraws from God and is nonetheless, placed on the devil’s side, tormented with miseries and punishments. So God wills, as Scripture now records, that Israel’s covenant with Nebuchadnezzar be a curse. And so, because the king of Jerusalem chose to despise the covenant of Nebuchadnezzar, and, sending his messengers into Egypt, tried to make a covenant with Pharaoh, the divine word says: “He will not prosper, he will not be saved.” Therefore we must bear it patiently when we are handed over by God to punishment. The Apostle handed over someone from the assembly of the Church to the devil for the destruction of the flesh; and he handed him over for the destruction of the flesh not to destroy the one handed over, but to preserve his spirit. Hence Scripture says: “To hand such a one over to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, so that the spirit may be saved in the day of judgment of the Lord Jesus.” The sinner is handed over to torments, so that he may receive punishments in the present and torments for his sins, and in the future obtain refreshment, and it may be said of him: “He received his evil things in his life.” So if one who is tormented with punishments according to the curse in which God placed sinners prefers to flee the punishments and to send to Egypt to obtain help from Pharaoh, from whom God freed his people, he will not prosper, he will not be saved. But if anyone patiently endures the curse and the punishments of Nebuchadnezzar, and completes the time of his sins in torment, like the man who, according to Paul’s epistles, was tormented so that his spirit might be saved in the day of judgment, he will attain the best end. “So he brings him into a curse, and will take the leaders of his land, so that they may become a weak kingdom.” The kingdom which is transferred from the holy land to Babylon is called weak. For no one is strong in Babylon, that is, in the confusion of his own mind. A man who is confused cannot be lifted up at all, “so as to keep my covenant, to establish it. And he departed from it, to send his messengers into Egypt.” This man, who suffers torments from Nebuchadnezzar for his sins and sends his messengers into Egypt, not bearing the handing over by which God gave him up to the enemy, “that it might give him horses and many people,” asks for what is forbidden in another place: “For you shall not multiply horses for yourself,” says Scripture. “Will he prosper, will he be saved, who does contrary things and transgresses the covenant?” The one who had been handed over ought to have endured the covenant of Nebuchadnezzar as his punishment; but he does not endure it, and so it is said of him, “He will not be saved.”

“As I live, says Adonai the Lord, he will die in the place of the king who made him king, who despised my curse and transgressed my covenant.” There is one who dishonors God’s curse, and another who honors it. And no doubt in the present passage God complains of the one who has dishonored his curse. For when someone has been handed over to punishments to be chastised and does not endure what has been commanded, he dishonors God’s curse. But if he endures it with all meekness and with blessing and thanksgiving to God, he honors his curse; and when he has honored the curse, he must also obtain his blessing. “And he transgressed my covenant; with him he will die in the midst of Babylon, and Pharaoh will not make war with great power or with a great multitude.” Pharaoh cannot give help to one who has transgressed and dishonored the curse of God; rather, he will die in the midst of Babylon for his transgression.

Then he goes on and tells what sinners are going to suffer, and after that recounts more favorable things, saying: “I will take of the choice parts of the cedar, and from the top of their heart I will pluck it off, and I will plant it on a high mountain.” After the curses which we mentioned above, a promise of blessedness and a most sweet pledge is brought forward at the end of the discourse, because those who needed punishments had already suffered torments for their sins. Considering it within myself, and carefully handling the sense of this passage, I think that it prophesies of the apostles. For they are of the choice parts of the cedar, of its summit, of its top, whom God gave for the greening of the world, plucking their hearts and planting them on the high mountain, Jesus Christ our Lord. “And I will hang it on the high mountain of Israel, and I will plant it, and it will put forth shoots and bear fruit.” These made shoots and bore fruit. “And it will become a great cedar.” Consider the greatness and loftiness of the Church of Christ, so that you may understand that what is said has come about according to God’s promise: “And it will become a great cedar, and every bird will rest upon it, and every winged thing will rest under its shade.” Take to yourself the wings of the word of God, and you will be able to rest under this tree which has been planted on the high mountain. “And it will rest, and its shoots will be restored.” See how the prophecy ends on a good note. For there follows: “And all the trees of the field will know that I am the Lord, who humble the high tree.” The high tree is the people of the Jews, which, now humbled, pays the penalty of its crime, because it dared to lay hands on our God Jesus Christ. “And I exalt the low tree.” You were the low tree, the cast-down tree, the barren tree; but God has raised you up. “And I dry up the green tree.” The green tree is the people of the circumcision, which once sprouted and flourished but now has wasted away in excessive drought: for where among them now is a living word? Where is a choir of virtues? “And I make the dry tree flourish again.” You were the dry tree, and the coming of Christ made you flourish again. “I the Lord have spoken, and I will do it.” Having said these things, let us pray the more earnestly to Jesus Christ our Lord with his Father that we too may flourish again, that we may be able to bear fruit, that we may become a budding and not a dry tree, so that the axe that is preached in the Gospel may never be laid to our roots: to whom be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.