[Sermon] 1. The disciples rejoiced on seeing the Lord.
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SERMON 22: SUNDAY IN THE OCTAVE OF EASTER
[Sermon] 1. The disciples rejoiced on seeing the Lord.
John 20:20. As the absence of a person brings great desolation, so also the return of the person brings great comfort; hence here the apostles suffered the absence of the bodily presence of the Son of God, whom they loved more than themselves and above all things, and when they discerned with their bodily vision he had risen from the dead, they were filled with great joy. But since a person, who does not have the fear of filial reverence first, and then the splendor of celestial understanding, is unable to experience the joy and sweetness of spiritual happiness; therefore, so that the literal sense be interpreted in the right order, the submission of reverence and humility is noted first; second, the contemplation of divine majesty; third, the pleasure of interior enjoyment. The submission of reverence and humility is noted, when it says: disciples, not teachers, not lords, and not companions; the contemplation of divine majesty is noted, when it adds: on seeing the Lord; and the pleasure of interior enjoyment, when it inserts: they rejoiced.
2. First, the submission of reverence and humility is noted in the proposed passage, when it says: disciples.
Those disciples are reverential and subject to Christ, who regulate and live a holy life according to the example of his life and doctrine. The life and doctrine of the good teacher,
Jesus Christ, teaches each what is needed: first, the humility of faithful obedience with respect to contempt for the world; second, the union of charity and benevolence
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with respect to love of neighbor; third, the endurance of final perseverance with respect to the continuance of the good already initiated. And these three things are necessary for the salvation of every adult.
3. First, in the disciple of Christ there must be the humility of faithful obedience with respect to contempt for the world. Luke 14:33 says: If one does not renounce all that he possesses, he cannot become my disciple. Christ, the wisest of teachers, gives to every Christian the doctrine necessary for salvation, when he says: Unless someone renounces all that he possesses, he cannot be my disciple.
And although we are not held to relinquish everything or disburse it to the poor or beg from door to door according to the example of Christ or serve God in a monastery unless we are among the perfect who are bound by the vow of poverty;°* nevertheless, we are held to relinquish affection for all we possess according to Psalm 61:11: If riches abound, do not set your heart on them; so that with cupidity, which is the root of all evil,' eradicated from the heart, poverty, which is the foundation of all virtues, is planted.
4. Second, in the disciple of Christ there must be the union of charity and benevolence with respect to love of neighbor. And John 13:34-35 speaks of this: A new commandment I give you that you love one another: that as I have loved you, you also love one another. By this will all people know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another. The command of love, although it may be old as to its ancient proclamation, is spoken of as new
36 There is a parallel to these thoughts in Sermon 225 n. 3 of Ps.Augustine in PL39:2161: "A person can say: I cannot give all my goods to the poor and serve God in a monastery. But can a person ever say:
I cannot love?"
397 See 1 Tim 6:10.
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because of its firm obligation; whence, lest one believe it might be dispensable given its antiquity, the Lord adds the newness of obligation when it says: A new commandment I give you that you love one another: that as I have loved you; because he was unable to give a greater sign of love to us than laying down his soul for us.3% But since the sign of the true disciple who imitates Christ is the unity of mutual love, it even adds: By this will all people know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another. The Lord established the new command or precept such that due to its firm obligation, it cannot be dispensed by anyone. Whence, in the book On Consideration,
Bernard says that the rationale of a dispensation from a precept is found in urgent need or communal utility:
"Where necessity urges, a dispensation is excusable. But where communal utility does not provoke, a dispensation is inexcusable."?" It is not useful then for anyone to be possessed by anger, but truly it is injurious and a mortal sin. "Nor is anyone ever able to excuse oneself from loving an enemy because of some necessity," according to blessed Augustine;*" because it does not cause vertigo to the head, or pain, or churning or constipation or some suffering to the stomach, or bodily weakness like a forceful vigil or fasts may do, nor does it lead to indigence, like the renunciation of worldly prosperity may do; therefore, it was not fitting, that some might be dispensed, but all be held to love each other.*"
5. Third, in the disciple of Christ there must be the endurance of final perseverance with respect to the con398 See John 10:15 and John 15:13.
399 See Book III, c.
4n. 18 in SBOp 3.345: "Where necessity urges, a dispensation is excusable. But where utility provokes, a dispensation is laudatory. A common utility, I say, not one's own."
400 See Sermon 225 n. 3 of Ps-Augustine in PL 39:2161.
401 See John 13:35 and 15:17.
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tinuance of the good already initiated. And John 8:31-32 speaks of this: If you remain in my word, you will be my disciples indeed, and you will know the truth and the truth will set you free. The true disciple of Christ is the one who always remains in his doctrine and word, and is never separated from his love by some temptation, or at anytime ceases to confess his name when afflicted by whatever loss, reproach, and punishment. He merits, therefore, to be illuminated by the first truth; and this is what it states: you will know the truth, assisted by divine strength or power; and this is what it adds: and the truth will set you free, from all adversity, and he merits likewise to be rewarded this goodness.
6. Second, the contemplation of divine majesty follows, when it adds: on seeing the Lord. The apostles saw or contemplated the divine majesty in three ways. First, in the created world, they saw the Lord eminent in its properties. Second, they saw the risen Lord with the wounds in the nature he assumed. Third, they saw the Lord reigning in heaven in their consciences. Through the first vision, appropriately speaking, they were illuminated with enigmatic knowledge to understand, that the divine presence is in all creatures; through the second vision, they were illuminated and informed with internal revelation to believe, that divine wisdom restores all things; third, they were lifted up in ecstatic love to love the divine clemency that rewards all.
7. First, they saw the Lord Jesus Christ, creator of all things in the created world, eminent in its properties. Wisdom 13:5 speaks of this: From the greatness of the beauty and of the creature, the creator of them may be seen. We see, therefore, the invisible things of God through those
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things that were made,* when we are lifted up from the knowledge of creatures to the knowledge of God as if by means of a ladder, according to Bernard to Eugenius: for the greatness and beauty of creation calls out the greatness and beauty of the creator, for the wisdom of the artisan is manifest in work and reflected in the effect.*"
Whence Damascene states: "The heavens narrate the glory of God, not in a voice which is heard by bodily ears, but because the great virtues of the maker are displayed.
Recognizing their plenitude, we admire and give glory to the maker, the optimum artisan."*4 And for this reason one must not rest in the beauty of creation, but believe in the most high creator through it; otherwise it would the greatest perversion and abuse if one were to make the path into the goal. Whence Augustine in the book On Free
Will: "Woe to those who have abandoned you, the leader, and gone astray amidst your vestiges, who for your sake love your signs and have forgotten what they make known."4
8. Second, they saw the risen Lord Jesus Christ, redeemer of all, with the wounds in the nature he assumed.
Concerning this, Luke 24:39 says: See my hands, because it is I myself. Our Lord Jesus Christ wished by the divine dispensation to retain in his body, after he was glorified, the wounds he received in the passion, and to show them to the disciples, so he might prove his identity as the one who suffered and rose. For if the same accidents, that is the wounds, are preserved, the body or subject must be the same. It is impossible for the accidents to change the 402 See Rom 1:20.
403 Bonaventure gives the gist of what Bernard, quoting Rom 1:20, says in Book V, c. n. 1 of his De consideratione. See SBOp 3.467.
404 See c, 20 in Saint John Damascene De fide orthodoxa, 83. The citation is almost verbatim.
405 Bonaventure adapts Book II, c. 16 n. 43. See CCSL xxix, 266.
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subject. And this is why the Lord first proposed to show his hands in which the wounds remained, when he said:
See my hands; next he inferred the identity of suffering and risen body, when he added: because it is I myself, who suffered and not another. John 20:27 speaks in a similar manner of this vision: Put your finger here and see my hands; and bring your hand here and place it in my side; do not doubt but believe. Whence Gregory says: "Mary
Magdalene, who quickly believed, is less valuable to me than Thomas, who doubted for a long time. For while doubting, he touched the wounds and removed from our heart the wound of doubt,"*°° because blessed are those who have not seen yet have believed.*"
9. Third, they saw the Lord Jesus Christ, the reward of all, who reigns in heaven, in their own consciences. Matthew 5:8 speaks of this: Blessed are the pure in heart for they will see God. Behold, purity of conscience is required to see the Lord in one's own conscience. Whence Augustine in the book On the Trinity: "Justice is necessary for the knowledge of God, because the one who gazes upon the truth is renewed day after day, transferring love from temporal things to eternal things, from carnal things to spiritual things, from visible things to spiritual things."*8
Not only is purgation from sin required for the divine vision, but also separation from worldly love, according to Psalm 45:11: Be still and see that the Lord is sweet. Be still, from the works and worldly desires by quieting the mind; and see, the Lord in one's own conscience through ecstatic contemplation; that the Lord is sweet, due to the 46 See Homily 29 n. 1 in GGHG in CCSL exli, 245. Bonaventure reads profuit ("is valuable") while the critical edition has praestitit
("furnishes an example").
407 See John 20:29.
"8 Bonaventure has adapted Book XIV, c. 17 n. 23. See CCSL la, 454-55.
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sweetness of sapiential pleasure, which sweetness the soul certainly experiences when affection is purged from the foulness of sin, and the intellect is separated from sensate beauty, fanciful images, and philosophical arguments. Whence Augustine in On the Trinity: "This vision seizes the entire soul in its desire, more ardently to the degree that one rises upward toward spiritual things and dies to carnal things."*°9 10. Third, the pleasure of interior enjoyment is noted, when it adds: they rejoiced. Since no one is able to experience this joy of sapiential pleasure, appropriately speaking, unless illuminated by the wisdom of the Son, then adopted as a child by the power of the Father, and afterwards filled with the delights of the Holy Spirit, the apostles and their followers, therefore, in order to possess the perfect joy of interior pleasure, rejoiced, first, due to the knowledge of the first truth; second, due to the acquisition of the everlasting inheritance; third, due to the taste of divine sweetness. First, their joy was true because falsity was removed; second, their joy was perpetual because it was without end; third, their joy was full because it was the completion of desire.
11. First, truly they rejoiced without any mingling of falsehood with the knowledge of the first truth. And Jeremiah 15:6 speaks of this: Your word was a joy and gladness to my heart. The divine word, once it is believed with perfect faith, delights in a manner so marvelous, when it is understood, that it becomes the joy and gladness of the understanding heart. Whence Bernard says: "We understand nothing more willingly than that which we believe
409 Bonaventure has adapted Book II, c. 17 n. 28. See CCSL 1, 119.
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in faith,"""° yet nevertheless a person does not assent to the first truth because of reason, but only because of one's love, because human reason does not invalidate merit, but augments solace.
12. Second, they rejoiced perpetually without a predetermined end in the acquisition of the everlasting inheritance. And Luke 10:20 speaks of this: Rejoice and exult because your names are written in heaven. The Gloss:
"The one who accomplishes celestial-or terrestrial works is marked accordingly as if with letters and affixed to the memory of God."4"! When the disciples of Christ accomplish celestial works, given their citizenship is in heaven,'!? they are rightly enrolled in the eternal kingdom, in whose memory the entire soul rejoices in the present in accord with the certitude of faith and expectation of hope; in fact the fragrance of that supernatural inheritance draws the entire soul to rejoice, because it excites eternal desires.
13. Third, they rejoiced, above all, with the completion of desire in the taste of divine sweetness. And Isaiah
66:10 speaks of this: Rejoice with Jerusalem, and be glad with her, all you that mourn for her, that you may nurse and be satisfied from her consoling breasts, that you may milk and flow with delights. The one who wishes to arrive at ecstatic contemplation must first practice the weeping of penance in the active state, because the contemplative soul then nurses such sweet grace from the consoling breasts of the Holy Spirit that it is completely satiated, imbued, and raised beyond human matters into the "0 Bonaventure gives the gist of Book V, c. 3 n. 6 of De consideratione. SBOp 3.471.
"| The critical edition states that this comes from the Glossa Ordinaria.
412 See Phil 3:20.
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heavens and suspended above itself on high. Beside itself, delighting and rejoicing with such interior gladness, it appears to be more intoxicated than sober. Whence at times Sacred Scripture names that sweetness taste, and at times calls it intoxication. O God, if a little scintilla from such a sweet torrent drops and falls upon the human mind, and perfectly intoxicates it, what will it be like when the soul is totally absorbed and intoxicated in that sea of infinite happiness! Thus the soul melts, sweetens, and rejoices so perfectly in one drop that it cannot be expressed or narrated; much less will the fullness of the depths be known. Whence Chrysostom: "We rightly rejoice due to the greatness of the gifts, which we accept here and expect there."*!? Let us ask, etc.
413 The critical edition refers to PLS 4:771-72.