Expositions on the Book of Psalms
422 THE WORKS OF ST. AUGUSTIN. [PsaLm LXXXVII.
included therein, but all nations also, some of which are named that all may be understood.
What, my brethren, can be clearer? Truly, because "very excellent things are spoken of thee, thou city of God." Lo, "Sion, O mother, a man shall say." What man? 'He who was born in her.'"'7__ It is then the man who was born in her, and He Himself hath founded her. Yet how can He be born in the city which He Himself founded? It had already been founded, that therein He might be born. Understand it thus, if thou canst: ' Mother Sion, he shall say;" but it is "a man" that "shall say, Mother Sion ; yea, aman was born in her: " and yet "he hath founded her" (not a man, but), "the Most High." As He created a mother of whom He would be born, so He founded a city in which He would be born. What hope is ours, brethren! On our behalf the Most High, who founded the city, addresses that city as a mother: and "He was born in her, and the Most High hath founded her."
"T will think," he says, "upon Rahab:" who is that harlot? That harlot in Jericho, who received the spies and conducted them out of the city by a different road: who trusted beforehand in the promise, who feared God, who was told to hang out of the window a line of scarlet thread, that is, to bear upon her forehead the sign of the blood of Christ. She was saved there, and thus represented the Church of the Gentiles: whence our Lord said to the haughty Pharisees, " Verily I say unto you, that the publicans and the harlots go into the kingdom of God before you."! They go before, because they do violence: they push their way by faith, and to faith a way is made, nor can any resist, since they who are violent take it by force. For it is written, "The kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force.''? Such was the conduct of the robber, more courageous on the cross than in the place of ambush.3 "J will think upon Rahab and Babylon." By Babylon is meant the city of this world: as there is one holy city, Jerusalem ; one unholy, Babylon : all the unholy belong to Babylon, even as all the holy to Jerusalem. But he slideth+ from Babylon to Jerusalem. How, but by Him who justifieth the ungodly : Jerusalem is the city of the saints; Babylon of the wicked: but He cometh who justifieth the ungodly: since it is said, "I will think" not only "upon Rahab," but "upon Babylon," but with whom? "with them that know Me." ...
7. As though it were said, How do ye know this? All of us have sung these Psalms: and Christ, Man for our sake, God before us, sings within us all, But is this much to say, " before us," of Him who was before heaven and earth and time? He then, born for our sakes a man, in that city, also founded her when He was the Most High. Yet how are we assured of this? "The Lord shall rehearse it when He writeth up the people" (ver. 6), as the following verse has it. 'The Lord shall declare, when He writeth up the people, and their princes."" What princes ?® "Those who were born in her;" those princes who, born within her walls, became therein princes: for before they could become princes in her, God chose the despised things of the world to confound the strong. Was the fisherman, the publican, a prince? They were indeed princes: but because they became such in her. Princes of what kind were they? Princes come from Babylon, believing monarchs of this world, came to the city of Rome, as to the head of Babylon: they went not to the temple of the Emperor, but to the tomb of the Fisherman. Whence indeed did they rank as princes? "God chose the weak things of the world to confound the strong, and the foolish things He hath chosen, and things which are not as though they were, that things which are may be brought to nought." 9 This He doth who " from the ground raises the helpless, and from the dunghill exalts the poor." '® For what purpose? "That He may set him with the princes, even with the princes of His people." '' 'This is a mighty deed, a deep source of pleasure and exultation. Orators came later into that city, but they could
6. Listen now to a deep mystery. Rahab is there through Him, through whom also is Babylon, now no longer Babylon, but beginning to be Jerusalem. The daughter is divided against her mother, and will be among the members of that queen to whom is said, " Forget thine own people, and thy father's house, so shall the king have pleasure in thy beauty." 5 For how could Babylon aspire to Jerusalem? Howcould Rahab reach those foundations? How could the Philistines, or Tyre, or the people of the Ethiopians ? Listen to this verse, "Sion, my mother, a man shall say."® There is then a man who saith this: through whom all those I have mentioned make their approach. Who is this man? It tells if we hear, if we understand. It follows, as if a question had been raised, through whose aid Rahab, Babylon, the Philistines, Tyre, and the Morians, gained an entrance. Behold, through whom they come; " Sion, my mother, a man shall say ; and a man was born in her, and Himself the Most High hath founded her" (ver. 5).
T Matt. xxi. 3r. 2 Matt. xi. 12. 3 In fauce. 4 Dilabttur, which would seem to mean the writer; a/. derzvatur, *' there is a drawing off," z.e. of citizens.
7 Or, '' He who was made man in her," Ouz homo factus est in ea.
8 Et Princzpes is added in the text, but it has no equivalent in our version. ars II Ps, cxiii. 8. 9 1 Cor. i, 26, 27. 10 Ps, cxiii. 7.
5 Ps, xlys 10, tr. 6 St. Augustin, Tertullian, and others read uyntnp Siwy, for the reading of the LXX., wytt.