HOMILY 53
HOMILY 53
ON PSALM 142 (143)
LORD, HEAR my prayer.' Modest words, full of humility and compassion. 'Hearken to my pleading in your truth.'l These are the words of a man who trusts. 'In your truth,' in Your Christ, of course: 'I am the way, and the truth, and the life.'2 'In your justice answer me.'
Here, likewise, in Your Christ; I place no trust in myself, but I seek the mercy of Your truth and justice.
'Enter not into judgment with your servant.' How clearly the prophet reveals his trust in the loving kindness of Christ when he says: Do not summon Your servant to trial before You. Here, someone seems to be passing judgment in the presence of God and the prophet, in terms of the versicles in the fiftieth psalm: 'That you may be justified in your sentence, vindicated when you condemn.'3 For no other reason does
God enter into judgment but that He may punish justly.
Thus Cyrus, the king of the Medes and the Persians, acted in the case of the king of the Armenians when his people violated the bonds of friendship. Cyrus conquered the king and took him prisoner, and at his trial had the Armenian's own kindred and wife and sons present to join in judgment to insure the fulfillment of justice either in punishment or acquittal.4 'For before you no living man is just.' 'The God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. Now he is not the 1 Cf. Ps. 142 (143).1.
2 John 14.6; cf. Against Jovinian 2.2, PL 23.296 (322).
3 Ps.50.6.
4 Xenophon, Cyropaedia 3.1.
SAINT JEROME
God of the dead, but of the living.'5 Not even the patriarchs are just in the sight of God; 'the stars are not clear in his sight.'6
'For the enemy pursues me.' No need for clarification here; anyone knows it is the devil. 'He has crushed my life to the ground': formerly I had wings and I could fiy; now, however, the enemy has pursued and captured me, and has bound my feet and hands. I am like a bird caught by a man, as good as dead without the freedom of its wings. So, the psalmist says, did the consciousness of my sins hold me captive.
'He has left me dwelling in the dark, like those long dead.'
Like those long dead, yet not actually dead. How so? Because he is contrite of heart. If, however, anyone sins and does not repent, then, he is long dead; he is not merely like those dead, but is actually dead. That is what the enemy has taken for granted is my condition: that I am not doing penance for the sins that he prompted me to commit. 'My spirit is faint within me.' 'First tell your sins that you may be acquitted';7 again: 'If you do penance for your sins, you shall live.'8 'My heart within me is appalled,' because I know that I have sinned.
'I remember the days of old.' I recall the days that are past and how confident I was, but now for me it is all black night.
'I stretch out my hands to you.' Bound by the enemy, there was nothing else I could do but repent of my sins and lift my hands to You in supplication. 'My soul thirsts for you like parched land.' Just as the earth becomes parched with drought and craves the rain, even so my soul longs and thirsts for You its God.
'Hasten to answer me, 0 Lord, for my spirit fails me.' My soul is faint within me, my body has failed me; only my spirit is left and it, too, is crushed. Come quickly to my assistance;
5 Cf. Luke 20.37,38.
6 Job 25.5.
7 Cf. Isa. 43.26, LXX; cf. Against the Pelagians 1.13, PL 23.527 (705).
8 Cf. Ezech. 18.21.
HOMILY 53
Lord, have pity on me. 'Show me the way in which I should walk.' Show me Your Christ who said: 'I am the way.'9
'May your good spirit guide me on level ground.' Here, the impious Arians quote Scripture at us and say: ' "Good Master, what shall I do to gain eternal life?" But Jesus said to him:
"Why dost thou call me good? No one is good but God only." '10 If, therefore, the Son is not good but only the Father, the Father is greater than the Son. Very well. According to your own mode of thinking, impious Arian, who is greater, the Son or the Holy Spirit? Obviously, you say: The Son.
But in this psalm, the Son is saying: May Your good Spirit guide me on level ground. If, therefore, as you say, the Spirit is good who is less, how much more is the Son good who is greater, namely, Christ? Now this is how the Gospel intends it: 'One of the Scribes coming up to test Him says, "Good
Master." But Jesus,says, "Why d? you call me good, and yet do not acknowledge Me?" '11 It is the same as one tempting his bishop whom he despises who says to him, 'Bishop'; and the Bishop answers, 'To you I am not the bishop; you may leave my presence: Besides, have you not read in some other place in Holy Writ: 'The good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep'?12 What more is this than the Son has done who was incarnated for our sake and suffered? Nine months
He was in the womb of the Virgin, and descending from His majesty, He was slaughtered. He was in a cradle; He suffered Himself to grow and develop gradually at man's pace; to be beaten with rods, and struck with blows, and crucified. What more than this?
9 John 14.6.
10 Luke 18.18. 19; Mark 10.17, 18.
I! Cf. Luke 10.25; Matt. 22.35.
12 John 10.11; d. Commentary on Matthew 19.17, PL 26.141-142 (148).