HOMILY 12
HOMILY 12
ON PSALM 78 (79)
(l OR WE ARE brought very IOW.'l Because for our sake You became lowly and as one in sore need, we, too, are brought very low. This is 'The prayer of an afflicted one when he is faint and pours out his anguish before the Lord.'2 Because You became poor, although You were rich,3 we, too, have become poor and wretched.
'Help us, 0 God, our Savior.' In Hebrew the psalm has:
'Help us, 0 Jesus, our God.' Wherever, in fact, our text has 'Savior,' the Hebrew text has 'Jesus.' We know that when
Gabriel4 came to Mary, he said: 'Thou shalt call his name Jesus; for he shall save his people.' 'Help us, Jesus, our God.'
Mark you that it says 'help.' Now, one who cries 'help,' is himself making an effort to be saved, for it is not while we are sleeping that God helps us, but while we are exerting ourselves.
'Because of the glory of your name, 0 Lord, deliver US';5 because Your new name which is blessed among the Gentiles has been invoked upon us. 'And, pardon our sins for your name's sake.' You the Savior, You the Christ, and we the Christians: have mercy upon us for Your name's sake.
'Let the prisoners' sighing come before you.' The followers of the teachings of Origen6 are wont to maintain that the sighing of prisoners refers to the sighing 9f angels that are im1 Ps. 78 (79).8.
2 Ps. 101.1.
3 Cf. 2 Cor. 8.9.
4 Cf. Matt. 1.21; cf. Luke 1.31.
5 Cf. Ps. 78 (79).9.
6 Cf. Against lohn of lermalem 17, PL 23.385 (423).
HOMILY 12
prisoned in bodies, for in the same way that shackles weigh down the body and prevent it from running, our bodies imprison souls-or angels-and hold them down to earth. What proof for this do they adduce from Scripture? 'Unhappy man that I am! Who will deliver me from the body of this death?'7
And again from the Apostle: 'I desire to be released and to be with Christ,'S to return and to be with Christ. Be sure, they say, that you understand what the Apostle means; anyone who says, I desire to return, certainly means to that place where he had been before. 'Let the prisoners' sighing come before you.' I shall answer you very candidly, indeed, with the rustic simplicity of the for that is how the apostles gave their answers, that is how they spoke; they did not speak in diabolical rhetoric. 'It is better to return and to be with Christ.' That is the way it is rendered in Greek. The Greek does not have 'to be released' but 'to return';9 to return and to be with Christ. Where Adam my father was, there is where I also long to be; I desire to return to that place whence he was banished. In Adam we have all been cast out of Paradise.
'Let the prisoners' sighing come before you.' What, in fact, prevents me from interpreting this simply as a reference to the martyrs who are confined in prisons? How many, in truth, have been sent to the mines! Most sincerely do I pray, may
God graciously hear the cry of those captives.
'With your great power take possession of the children of those doomed to death.'l0 All of us, if only we deserve to be, are the sons of martyrs. When the Apostle was in prison, he was shackled; all the apostles were in chains when they were in prison; all the martyrs who have been killed in prisons were in chains. That is why Scripture says: Set free the sons of those who are doomed to death. 'And repay our neighbors sevenfold into their bosoms.' This does not seem to me a 7 Rom. 7.24.
8 Phil. 1.23.
9 Cf. Commentary on Ephesians 1.4, PL 26.476 (548-49); Against Rufinus
1.25, PL 23.437 (481).
10 Cf. Ps. 78 (79).11.
SAINT JEROME
petition against our neighbor, but in his behalf and means accordingly: Grant them Your sabbath. Sabbath, moreover, is a synonym for rest. The real meaning is: Grant that they halt in their malice; or else, surely, punish them now in this world and not in the future.
'Then we, your people and the sheep of your pasture.' When Holy Writ says sheep, it is a figure for the innocent. Sheep have nothing save a shepherd. 'Will confess to you forever.'ll
We will confess: either we will repent, or better still, we shall give glory to You forever. 'Unto generation and generation':12 in the fi,rst people and in the second people. Ezechiel may have spoken in the literal sense, but we shall interpret him spiritually and say that there are two nations implied where he says, two sticks are united and made one kingdom.13 'Unto generation and generation we will declare your praise.' This is the voice of the apostles, of Peter among the people of the circumcision; of Paul and Barnabas among the Gentiles.
11 Cf. Ps. 78 (79).13.
12 Ibid.
13 Cf. Ezech. 37.16·22; cf. Letter 74.3, PL 22.683 (448); Commentary on Ezechiel 37.15, PL 25.353 (440); on lsaia 54.4, 5, PL 24.518 (630).