HOMILY 14
HOMILY 14
ON PSALM 81 (82)
[(t 0D ARISES in the divine assembly.' There are many . different postures that one adopts. Frequently we are sitting down; sometimes we are standing; other times we are lying down; at times we are running; then again we are walking. In the same way, God is described in terms of human individual differences, and His attitude is represented in a variety of ways. If we are saints, then, we are like
Moses, and God says to us: 'You wait here near me,'l for that is what He said to Moses. Now Moses at that time was standing on a rock; hence, for him, God also was standing. If, however, from saints we have afterwards become sinners, for us
God no longer is standing, but is walking about; He who before had been standing for us moves from His place. As soon as we change, God changes at the same time with us. I may even say, as long as Adam was in Paradise and observed the law, God for him was standing. After Adam sinned, however, he heard the voice of God who was now walking about in the Garden of Eden. Would you like proof that as far as Adam was concerned God was walking? Wp.at did God say to him?
'Adam, where are yoU?'2 He who had not avoided God while He was standing, fled from Him walking.
We have talked about standing; we have talked about walking; let us talk about sitting. Whenever God is represented as seated, the portraiture takes one of two forms: either
He appears as the ruler or as the judge. If He is like a king, I Deut. 5.31.
2 Cf. Gen. 3.9.
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one sees Him as Isaia does: 'I saw the Lord seated on a high and lofty throne.'3 There He is presented as the sovereign king. When He is portrayed as judge: 'Thrones were set up, and the books were opened:4 This description comes from the Book of Daniel. What does it mean? 'Thrones were set up, and the books were opened': the Lord shall be seated upon a throne as judge and He shall rehearse everyone's deeds. The books that up to that time had been closed will then be opened. We shall give an account of everything we do, every word we utter, every thought, even the most idle word;5 everything is recorded in God's books. Some think that there are actually books in heaven in which our sins are inscribed.
I think these books are our consciences6 which will be revealed on that day, and each one will see for himself just what he has done. 'There is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed.'7 So thrones were placed, and the books were opened.
How much is written in my book, I dare not confess even to my brother, nor to my friend! The angels know what I have done; the thrones know; the seraphim know; the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit knows.
We have mentioned how for some God is standing; for others He is walking; for still others, indeed, He is seated either in the role of king or of judge; but for another some in truth He sleeps. If at any time He abandons us to temptation-granted we are saints, nevertheless, we are abandoned to temptations in order to prove ourselves-at that time, for us God is asleep. In fact, what does the psalmist say? 'Awake!
'tVhy are you asleep, a Lord?'8 For the apostles, too, when they were in the boat and the waves were beating in upon them, the Lord was asleep and that is why their boat was
3 Isa. 6.1; d. Commentary on Isaia 6.1, PL 24.91 (88).
4 Cf. Dan. 7.9, 10; d. Commentary on Isaia 3.13, PL 24.67 (58).
5 Cf. Matt. 12.36.
6 Cf. Commentary on Daniel 7.10, PL 25.532 (699).
7 Matt. 10.26; Luke 12.2.
8 Ps. 43.24.
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being tossed about. At length they rouse Him, He awakes, and immediately the storm subsides and the sea is calm.
We have discussed four of God's postures; for some He stands; for some He walks; for some He sits; for some He seems to sleep, but for others He awakes and arises. 'God arises in the divine assembly: Because they were gods, for them God was standing. In all our assemblies, God takes different positions: He is standing for some; for others He is seated; for some He is walking; for others He is sleeping.
Although God is in Himself immutable, He adapts Himself to our human individuality. Just appreciate the dignity of manl 'God arises in the divine assembly: He bestows a title of that kind upon us that He may also bestow its merit. 'He judges in the midst of the gods: As a commander in the midst of His army He judges gods. 'He judges gods'-a fearful thought, full of terror. If He judges gods, what does He do about the sinner?
The psalmist uttered the last two verses as a prophet. In the next short verse, however, God Himself is speaking to the judges, that is, to the rulers of the people: 'How long will you judge unjustly?' The following versicles are addressed especially to judges. If they are secular judges, the sense is obvious; but if they are judges of the Church, we must understand then:l to be bishops and priests. 'How long will you judge unjustly?' He who perverts justice is the judge of injustice; he is that unjust judge of whom the Gospel says he neither feared God nor respected man.9 'How long will you judge unjustly?' I gave you power over My flock and over the people of God; you must be judges, not wolves.
'And favor the cause of the wicked? Defend the lowly and the fatherless; render justice to the afflicted and the destitute,' and so on. When jurisdiction falls to you, it is not the case that you espouse, it is not the legal process, but the persons who have the lawsuits. If, for example, a poor man comes with 9 Luke 18.2.
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just grounds for redress and a rich man with a criminal claim, you respect the persons and not the case. This, by the way, is just one manner of interpretation. There is also another more hallowed explanation. It is frequently a practice in the theatre for one actor to have many different masks10 and thereby to play many different roles. At one time he steps into the mask of a woman, at another time that of a man, now that of a king; and the one who had just appeared as a king, comes out again in the character of a slave .. I have given this example that from the carnal we may arrive at the spiritual. We ourselves assume different characters. When I am angry, I put on the mask of a lion; when I grasp at other peoples' property, I play the part of the wolf; when, indeed, I am cruel and a murderer,
I am wearing the mask of a brutal man. In the same way that sinners wear different masks in their sins, saints also have different masks but in their good deeds. When I give alms,
I have, as it were, the mask of a kind person; when truly I do right in judging, I have the mask of a good judge; when I suffer an injury with humility, then, mine is the mask of a humble man. Unhappy the man who has many masks for evil; happy the man who has a variety of masks for good.
'They know not, neither do they understand; they go about in darkness.' Who? Evil judges. Those whom I was calling gods, are called wicked judges because of their vice. 'They know not' Me; 'neither do they understand' My judgment;
'they go about in darkness.' They grope in darkness because they have forsaken the light. I have said: 'You are the light of the world:ll but you have turned away from the light, and have become darkness. Because that is what they have done, let us see what follows.
'All the foundations of the earth are shaken.' You see the kind of punishment meted out to evil rulers; because of evil judges the foundations of the earth are shaken. Thus far we have been giving the literal sense, namely, that the convulsion
10 Cf. Letter 43.2, PL 22.479 (193).
11 Matt. 5.14; cf. Letter 15.1, PL 22.355 (38).
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of the whole world is due to wicked judges. Let us now, however, look into a different meaning. 'All the foundations of the world are shaken: I shall overthrow wicked judges that have laid their foundations on earth and not in heaven; they who should have for their foundation Christ, upon whom the architect Paul12 built, rejected Him and laid their foundations upon earth.
'I said: You are gods, all of you sons of the Most High: Let Eunomius hear this, let Arius, who say that the Son of God is son in the same way that we are. That we are gods is not so by nature, but by grace. 'But to as many as received him he gave power of becoming sons of God:13 I made man for that purpose, that from men they may become gods. 'I said: You are gods, all of you sons of the Most High.' Imagine the grandeur of our dignity; we are called gods and sons! I have made you gods just as I made Moses a god to Pharao,14 so that after you are gods, you may be made worthy to be sons of God.
Reflect upon the divine words: 'With God there is no respect of persons:15 God did not say: 'I said, You are gods,' you kings and princes; but 'all' to whom I have given equally a body, a soul, and a spirit, I have given equally divinity and adoption.
We are all born equal, emperors and paupers; and we die as equals. Our humanity is of one quality.
'Yet like men you shall die.' You see, therefore, that man will die. God does not die. Adam, too, as long as he obeyed the precept and was a god, did not die. After he tasted of the forbidden tree, however, he died immediately. In fact, God says to him: 'The day you eat of it, you must die:16 The Hebrew has a better way of e:x:pressing this: 'But you like Adam shall die.' Just as Adam was cast out of the Garden of Eden, so, likewise, were we. 'And shall fall like one of the princes:17
12 Cf. 1 Cor. 3.10; d. Letter 48.2, PL 22.494-495 (213).
13 John 1.12.
14 cr. Exod. 7.1.
15 Rom. 2.11.
16 Gen. 2.17.
17 cr. Ps. 81 (82).7.
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Since the Lord had said: 'all of you sons of the Most High,' it is not possible to be the son of the Most High, unless He himself is the Most High. I said that all of you would be exalted as I am exalted. But, you 'shall fall like one of the princes.' It is precisely because we had been so elevated that we are said to have fallen.
Where are they who say that the devil was created the devil?
Where are they who say that an evil nature had been created by God? The Hebrew text admits of two alternatives.1s You, indeed, like Adam shall die; just as your father refused to obey the command of the Lord and thereby fell, even so you shall die. That, to be sure, was said of Adam. But in the words that follow: 'you shall fall like one of the princes,' who is this prince who fell? If you mean Adam, he has already been taken care of in the earlier versicle: yet like Adam you shall die. At the same time, grasp the import of the words: Yet like Adam you shall die. Adam died; we, too, are subject to death, but the devil who was a prince and fell did not die. It is not possible for the angelic order to submit to death, but only to damnation; hence, He said you shall fall like one of the princes. 'How has the morning star fallen, the son of the dawn?'19 Behold, here he fell, and there he fell. He fell, for his dwelling place was always in heaven. He is the one to whom the words of Ezechiel are addressed: 'You were stamped with the seal of perfection.'20 Notice exactly what the prophet says: 'the seal of perfection.' He did not say to the devil, you are the sign of perfection, but the seal of perfection. God had set His impression upon you and made you like unto Himself; but you afterwards destroyed the resemblance. You were created in the image and likeness of God.
In that same prophecy21 it says, moreover: 'With the Cherub I placed you; you were in the Garden of God among precious
18 Cf. Commentarioli in ps. 81.7.
19 Cf. Isa. 14.12; cf. Letter 22.4, PL 22.396 (90).
20 Ezech. 28.12; d. Commentary on Ezechiel 28:11-20, PL 25.269 (331).
21 Cf. Ezech. 28.13, 14, 16; d. Against Jovinian 2.4, PL 23.302 (328).
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stones, the beryl and the garnet. And you fell,' Ezechiel 'and were banned from the mountain of the Lord.' This prino is the king of Tyre, the king of Tyre from the time he fellinasmuch as Tyre in Hebrew means SOR, that is tribulation.2
That prince, therefore, who at first was in heaven, has nm become the king of Tyre, the king of the tribulation of thi world. 'You shall fall like one of the princes.' Since it sa}
'like one,' it shows that there are others also. Read the lypse23 of John: when the dragon fell from heaven, he dre1 down with him a third part of the stars.
Up to this point, God has been speaking to man; once mor the prophet speaks. 'Rise, 0 God; judge the earth.' Rise, fe our boat is being tossed about by the waves. 'Rise, 0 Goc judge the earth'; for evil judges are not rendering judgmen but perverting Your law and slaughtering Your flocks. Risl o You, who are the true Judge. Because the wicked judges al dead like Adam, and have fallen like one of the princes, Y 01 rise; You, judge; You, save Your creature. 'But the hirelill sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees' ;24 he cal not suffer for a stranger as he suffers for a father and a mothe
Let us express this otherwise. Arise, You who have suffen for us and have died for us; arise and save us. Let us say th in still another way. You who have come in humility and 101 liness, come as a judge and set us free. 'Rise, 0 God; judge tl earth.' Note the proper meaning and the exact choice of wore
He did not say, judge heaven, but judge the earth; hene earth is judged, not heaven. If, therefore, earth is to be judge and not heaven, sins are not committed in heaven. If, ho' ever, sins were committed in heaven, he would say: o God; judge earth and heaven. Notice the clemency of tl prophet. He did not say, destroy earth; but judge, judge at save. He did not say, judge through Your angels, judge
Your ministers, for if they judged, they could not be mercift 22 Cf. Commentary on E%echiel 26.1-6. PL 25.240(294).
28 Apoc. 8.12.
24 John 10.12.
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they are the executors of Your judgment. But if You judge, You Yourself can be merciful. 'Rise, 0 God; judge the earth.'
The emperor is able to change his sentence; the governor, on the other hand, cannot. That is why we are imploring
You to be Judge, not in a spirit of defiance, but with entreaty.
Men and angels are cruel, indeed, when compared to You; You alone are the most kind Judge. Do you want me to prove that God is compassionate, whereas every man is cruel? While the householder was asleep, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat. The servants want to root up the weeds, but the householder says: 'No, let them grow, lest in gathering the weeds you root up the wheat along with them.'25
'For you shall inherit all the nations.'26 We pray that You be Judge because You have compassion on all nations. What was the prophet's intention in saying: 'You shall inherit all the nations,' instead of, You shall have all the nations? Whenever an inheritance has been bestowed, death has preceded; hence, we are called heirs and co-heirs. Heirs, the Apostle said, of Christ because Christ died for us; co-heirs because Christ will reign with us.
'You shall inherit.' You sent Your servants (we revert again to the apostles), one among the circumcised, another among the Gentiles. As long as You had sent Moses, as long as You had sent Isaia, as long as Jeremia, as long as all the other prophets, God was renowned in Juda, in Israel great was His name.27 Knowledge of God's name was heralded to a moderate part of the earth. You sent Peter, Peter the fisherman who had let down his nets, who had calloused his hands with hard work.
You did not send an orator, You did not send a philosopher; You sent a rustic, a fisherman. That fisherman, that rustic from Jerusalem, ruled throughout Rome; a rustic captured the Rome that the eloquent could not. Next, Paul the Apostle went forth from Jerusalem and preached the word of God all
25 Cf. Matt. 13.29.
26 Cf. Ps. 81 (82).8.
27 Cf. Ps. 75.2; cf. Letter 60.4. PL 22.591 (333).
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the way to Illyricum. He preached where the Gospel had not been preached before, lest he build28 on another man's foundation. After that, he says, from Rome he intended to set out for Spain.29 See, Paul the persecutor, who had been a persecutor in Judea, preaches among the Gentiles! Where are they who proclaim Alexander, the great Macedonian Commander, because in such brief time he conquered so many nations? He had an army, he had vast multitudes; yet he was not able to accomplish anything really stupendous but rather something comparatively slight. But this Paul, a one time persecutor, who used to say: 'Even though I be rude in speech, yet I am not so in knowledge,'30 who commits so many solecisms in speaking, carries the Cross of Christ and as a victor captures all. He conquered the whole world from the ocean all the way to the Red Sea.31
Somebody may say: But they did all that for the sake of money. Porphyry says: Rustic men and paupers, because they had nothing, worked certain wonders with magic arts. There is nothing to boast about in performing wonders. The magi worked wonders in Egypt in contradiction to Moses. Apollonius worked wonders, Apuleius, too; in fact, they performed any number of marvels. I grant you, Porphyry, that the men you mention, worked signs by the arts of magic in order to obtain riches from wealthy common women whom they had seduced; for that is what you say. Why did they die? Why were they crucified? Some did work miracles with magic arts, but they did not give their lives for a man who had died, for a man who had been crucified. They know that man has died for Him, yet they do not die for a worthy cause. Happy, indeed, is our victory consecrated in the blood of the apostles.
By their blood alone our faith is confirmed. Let us, therefore, bless God to whom is glory forever and ever. Amen.
28 Cf. Rom. 15.20.
29 Cf. Rom. 15, 24, 28; cf. Letter 71.1, PL 22.669 (431).
30 2 Cor. 11.6.
31 Cf. Commentary on Amos 5.8, 9, PL 25.1043 (290·291).