rather too soon, by talking of their being suckled and reared and advancing in wisdom and age, like
SERMON 216 175
11. After baptism.
12. See Ps 19:12-13.
13. His hearers now replace the word of God as the seed. The same ambiguity is to be found in the interpretation of the parable of the sower given in the gospel itself. See Mt 13:3-9 and 19-23.
14. He could mean himself and his colleagues here rather than God; but at the end of the section it is certainly God who is sower, rainmaker, irrigator, and giver of increase.
15. See Jn 1:47; also 6:33. That the blessed also form the substance of the heavenly eucharist, as well as feasting on it, is a most original idea. See also Mt 20:11-16.
16. SeePs 34:5-6.19.
17. In a nutshell, the longer you live, the closer you are to death, the fewer days remain to you. He presses the smoke image very effectively: it billows up thickly at its source, but as it rises it thins out and fades away.
18. A phrase being contrasted with "in the shadow of death." He means that their years as Christians, though of course ending eventually in death, will by grace partake of eternal life; in the first stage, in the Church they will be fed on faith; in the next, in the kingdom they will be given wisdom to drink.
19. See Ps 68:26. 20. See Ps 69:4. 21. See Acts 9:15. 22. See 1 Cor 6:15. 23. In the exorcisms which were the main element in the scrutinies of the candidates, and which were performed probably by teams of clergy, including those in minor orders, especially the exor¬ cists.
24. See Col 1:13. He alters the last phrase of the text because of the liturgical, or ritual context. See next note.
25. A renunciation of Satan and all his works was a rite that inaugurated the last stage of the catechumenate, the stage of the competentes. It included a ceremony of "aversion" in which the candidates, first facing the West, the region of darkness (sunset), then turned round to the East, the region of light (sunrise). They did this standing on goatskins or sackcloth. See sections 10 and 11 below.
26. An allusion, probably, to Rv 12:15-16.
27. See Gn 15:22. 28. See Lk 2:52. Augustine evidently now realizes that he has let them out of the Church's womb rather too soon, by talking of their being suckled and reared and advancing in wisdom and age, like the twelve-year-old Jesus. So he immediately goes on to remind them that Jesus too put up with being nine months in the womb.
29. Ut competentes, competenter adolescite in Christo. He is also sketching a rapid progress through adolescence to young manhood which I find it impossible to indicate in English.
30. See Prv 10:1. 31. See Gal 4:4-5.1 keep "sons" here instead of "children," because it is a matter of a share (by both sexes of course) in the divine sonship of the Son.
32. It is a more happy bereavement (than the literal one), because of the next phrase, which he alludes to, but allows to be overridden by a similar text in another psalm.
33. From the beginning of the paragraph to this point is a passage of quite extraordinary rhetorical skill, that must have been carefully prepared. This may not be very obvious in my English translation, but it leaps to the eye in the Latin. It is interesting to compare it with another piece on the theme of the ages of man, or "All the world's a stage," in his explanation of Psalm 128, preached many years later. Here are the two passages, for readers to judge for themselves":
Sermon 216, 8—Infantia vestra innocentia erit, pueritia reverentia, adolescentia patientia, juventus virtus, senium meritum, senectus nihil aliud quam canus sapiensque intellectus. Per hos articulos vel gradus aetatis non tu evolveris, sed permanens innovaris. Non enim ut decidat prior secunda succedet, aut tertiae ortus secundae erit interitus, aut quarta jam nascitur ut tertia moriatur; non quinta quartae invidebit ut maneat, nec quintam sexta sepeliet.