Demonstratio Evangelica 10 part 1/5

After the prophecies already set forth concerning the coming to men of the God who was foretold, the time now calls us to go through also the matters concerning his departure from life among men, and to observe again what things were of old foretold, from prophetic times, as destined to befall him.

First I shall go through the matters concerning those who contrived his death, which forms no small part of the proposition now before us. But before the discussion, we must keep in mind what has often been said by us concerning the dispensation relating to him: that some things are conceived with reference to his divinity, and others with reference to his becoming man.

For in one respect he is introduced as being the Word of God, and the Power of God, and the Wisdom of God, the Angel of Great Counsel, the great and eternal High Priest consecrated for the coming-into-being and the salvation of all begotten things, and propitiating the Father; but in another respect as the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, and a sheep led to slaughter. And this was the human tabernacle which, after the manner of a lamb and a sheep taken from our flock, he — as a kind of high priest — assumed, and, having offered up as a goodly sacrifice the firstfruits of the human race, brought to the Father; through which also he held converse with human nature, which was unable, otherwise, to become obedient to a power that is bodiless and intellectual, nor could it conceive of anything greater than flesh and bodies by means of eyes of flesh.

Whatever, then, in the passages before us concerning him should seem to be spoken in a lower sense, all such things it suggests we should understand as looking to the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, and to the human tabernacle. For he was a lamb taking away the sin of the world, according to John the Baptist, who says, 'Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world'; and he was also the lamb led to slaughter, according to the oracle in Isaiah which says, 'He was led as a sheep to the slaughter, and as a lamb before its shearer is dumb.'

And of the same one, as being a lamb, it was also said, 'because of the sins of my people he was led to death.' For it was necessary that the Lamb of God, taken up by the great High Priest on behalf of the other kindred lambs and on behalf of the whole human flock, should be brought to God as a sacrifice.

For, 'since through man came death, and through man the resurrection from the dead,' says the Apostle; 'and as through one trespass condemnation came upon all men, so also through one act of righteousness the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life.'

Hence he himself also taught his own disciples that he was life and light and truth, and the other conceptions of the theology concerning him; but to those uninitiated into the mysteries concerning him he said, 'Why do you seek to kill me, a man who have spoken to you the truth?' As, then, the properties of the theology concerning him have been set forth in what precedes, in the same manner also here the human sufferings of the Lamb will be presented, the events before his passion occupying the middle place, embracing together both, at once, the things pertaining to him as God and the things pertaining to him as man.

Now that these things have been usefully observed by us beforehand, let us at last lay hold of the oracles themselves, concerning the plot formed by Judas the traitor and those with him against the Christ, and concerning the events that happened around the time of his passion.

Blessed is he who has understanding of the poor and needy; the Lord will deliver him in an evil day. The Lord preserve him, and give him life, and make him blessed on the earth, and not deliver him into the hands of his enemy. The Lord will help him upon the bed of his pain; you have turned all his couch in his sickness. I said, Lord, have mercy on me; heal my soul, for I have sinned against you. My enemies have spoken evil against me: When shall he die, and his name perish? And if he came in to see me, his heart spoke vain things; he gathered iniquity to himself; he went out, and spoke it together.

All my enemies whispered against me; against me they devised evils for me. They laid up against me a lawless word: 'Shall not he who sleeps rise up again no more?' For even the man of my peace, in whom I hoped, who ate my bread, lifted up his heel against me. But you, Lord, have mercy on me, and raise me up, and I will repay them. By this I knew that you have taken delight in me, that my enemy shall not triumph over me. And as for me, you have upheld me because of my innocence, and have established me before you forever.

Since some have supposed that the Book of Psalms contains only hymns to God and theological odes, but not also foreknowledge nor prophecies of things to come, this must first be observed: that countless things are foretold through them, which it would be tedious to gather together for the present purpose; but it suffices, for testimony to this statement, to make use of two Psalms inscribed indeed to Asaph, but spoken in the times of David.

For Asaph, being at that time one of the sacred psalmists, as is recorded in the Book of Chronicles, uttered the Psalms inscribed with his name by the divine Spirit.

What, then, do these Psalms contain? Predictions of the siege of the royal city of the Jewish nation, which took place nearly five hundred years after the prediction.

The seventy-third Psalm, then, inscribed 'of understanding, of Asaph,' says: 'O God, why have you rejected us to the end? Why has your wrath been kindled against the sheep of your pasture? Remember your congregation, which you acquired from the beginning; you redeemed the rod of your inheritance — this Mount Zion, in which you dwelt. Lift up your hands against their arrogance forever. How the enemy has done wickedly in your holy places, and those who hate you have boasted in the midst of your feast.'

They have set up their own signs for signs, and they did not know them, as at the entrance above. As in a forest of trees with axes they cut down her doors together; with hatchet and chisel they cast her down. They have set fire to your sanctuary; they have profaned the dwelling-place of your name, down to the ground. This, then, is the seventy-third Psalm.

And the seventy-eighth Psalm, likewise being of Asaph, contains the following: 'O God, the nations have come into your inheritance; they have defiled your holy temple. They have made Jerusalem as a fruit-store; they have given the dead bodies of your servants to be food for the birds of heaven, the flesh of your holy ones to the beasts of the earth.'

Now the first of these, I mean the words from the seventy-third Psalm, were spoken while David was still reigning, before the temple was built by Solomon; and they received their fulfilment at no other time than, first, at the siege by the Babylonians, and secondly, at the Roman war against the Jews.

For each of the things spoken were fulfilled both at the first and at the second demolition of the temple, having been foreknown and proclaimed beforehand in the aforesaid Psalms by Asaph. But the second set of predictions, those from the seventy-eighth Psalm, were fulfilled in the times of Antiochus, called Epiphanes, who, having become king of Syria, brought Jerusalem into subjection, defiled the temple and demolished the altar, and then, compelling the Jews to adopt Greek customs, put to death very many of them, both men and women, on behalf of their own law and their ancestral piety, first torturing them with various punishments.

To that time, then, and to those who afterwards did the same things as Antiochus, Asaph proclaims beforehand the words from the seventy-eighth Psalm. And the writing of the books called Maccabees bears witness to this statement, containing this account: 'And there was gathered to Alcimus and Bacchides a company of scribes, seeking what was just.'

And it goes on to say: 'And he swore to them, saying, We will not seek any harm against you or your friends. And they trusted him; and he seized sixty of their men, and killed them in one day, according to the word which Asaph wrote: They gave the dead bodies of your servants to be food for the birds of heaven, the flesh of your holy ones to the beasts of the earth; they poured out their blood round about Jerusalem, and there was none to bury them.'

Since these things were thus foretold and fulfilled, it is not to be wondered at if, in the same manner, the oracles of the fortieth Psalm set forth above also signify the things that were to happen at the time of the plot against our Saviour — things which not all men understand: namely, how he who is the Word of God, and Wisdom, and Life, and true Light, and who possessed every wealth of good things, became poor for our sake by taking flesh, and, being made like to men who are by nature mortal and poor, having assumed the form of a slave and a poor man — and this especially at the time when he was fulfilling the prophecy of the Psalm — fittingly, at the beginning of the Psalm, he who understands these things concerning him is pronounced blessed, obtaining the promise that is recorded. Then, next, thereafter, in the person now of the poor and needy man — that is, plainly, of our Saviour himself who became poor for our sakes — it is said, 'I said, Lord, have mercy on me.' And that the words in the Psalm are proclaimed in the person of the Saviour, the evangelist John is a sufficient witness.

For he relates that Jesus, having once taken a towel, girded himself, and having washed the feet of his disciples, said, 'I know whom I have chosen; but that the scripture may be fulfilled: He who eats bread with me has lifted up his heel against me.'

For what scripture did he indicate as being fulfilled in these words, but that of the Psalm now before us, in which it is said, 'For even the man of my peace, in whom I hoped, who ate my bread, lifted up his heel against me'? He says, then, at the beginning: 'I said, Lord, have mercy on me; heal my soul, for I have sinned against you' — and so on throughout the whole Psalm.

These things Symmachus rendered more clearly in this manner: 'As I said, Lord, have compassion on me; heal my soul, even if I have sinned against you. My enemies spoke evil of me: When will he die, and his name perish? And coming in to visit, his heart spoke vain things; it heaped up injustice for itself; and going out, he spoke against me. With one accord all who hated me whispered against me, devising evil against me.'

A lawless word was poured out within them, 'and he who has fallen shall rise up no more.' But also the man who was at peace with me, in whom I trusted, who ate my bread with me, exalted himself greatly against me. Accordingly, 'But you, Lord, have compassion on me, and raise me up, that I may repay them. By this I shall know that you will it, if my enemy does not speak against me. And as for me, you have upheld me because of my sincerity, and you will set me before you forever.'

And the rendering of Aquila is equivalent to that of Symmachus. First, then, concerning the seeming implication, as spoken in the person of our Saviour, of the words 'Heal my soul, because I have sinned against you' — you will observe that in Symmachus it does not stand thus, but rather, 'Heal my soul, even if I have sinned against you.' And even so he says this, because he makes our sins common to himself.

Wherefore it is also said, 'And the Lord delivered him up for our sins,' and, 'He himself bears our sins.'

The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, then, became a curse for us; him who knew no sin, God made to be sin for us, giving himself up as a ransom for us all, that we might become the righteousness of God in him. But since, having also come in the likeness of sinful flesh, he condemned sin in the flesh, the words set out above are fittingly brought forward.

And that it is because he makes our sins his own, on account of his love and benevolence towards us, that he says these things, he goes on to add, further down in the same Psalm: 'And as for me, you have upheld me because of my innocence' — clearly setting forth the guilelessness of God the Word. And how does he make our sins his own, and how is he said to bear our iniquities, except in that we are said to be his body, according to the Apostle who says, 'Now you are the body of Christ, and members individually'?

And just as, when one member suffers, all the members suffer with it, so also, when the many members suffer and sin, he too, according to the principles of sympathy — since, being the Word of God, he was pleased to take the form of a slave and to be joined to the common tabernacle of us all — takes upon himself the pains of the suffering members, and makes our diseases his own, and suffers and toils exceedingly for us all, according to the laws of loving-kindness.

And the Lamb of God, having not only done these things, but also having been punished on our behalf and having undergone a penalty which he himself did not owe — but we, because of the multitude of our transgressions — became for us the cause of the forgiveness of sins, inasmuch as he took upon himself the death that was due for us, transferring to himself the stripes and insults and dishonours that were owed to us, and drawing upon himself the curse that had been laid up in store for us, having become a curse for us — and what else is this but a ransom in exchange for a life? Wherefore the oracle says, in our person, 'By his stripes we were healed,' and, 'The Lord delivered him up for our sins'; so that, fittingly, uniting himself to us and us to himself, and making our sufferings his own, he says, 'I said, Lord, have mercy on me; heal my soul, for I have sinned against you.'

And it is reasonable that those who plotted against him — not men only, but powers also — seeing the surpassing might of his divine title and name, by which, a little later, he filled the whole inhabited world with Christians, supposed that they would extinguish it, if they should plot against him unto death.

This very thing, then, the Psalm convicts them of, saying: 'My enemies spoke evil of me: When will he die, and his name perish?' And since, feigning good will, they approached him, testing him, in order to entrap him — as the divine scripture testifies, relating that at different times they contrived different pretexts and accusations against him — it is for this reason that it adds: 'And if he came in to see me, his heart spoke vain things; he gathered iniquity to himself; he went out, and spoke together against me.'

And next after these words, the Psalm now plainly indicates also that most impious traitor himself, seeing that, after the agreement he had made with the rulers of the Jews concerning the betrayal of his teacher, it came about that he no longer attended, as was his custom, the teaching of the divine lessons, nor resorted to Jesus as to a teacher, nor, like the others, kept company at the Saviour's meetings, but instead watched and hunted for an opportunity, when it should be needful to attack him.

This, then, is also charged as his deed by the sacred evangelists, of whom Matthew says: 'Then one of the twelve, called Judas Iscariot, went to the chief priests and said to them, What are you willing to give me, and I will deliver him to you? And they set for him thirty pieces of silver. And from that time he sought an opportunity to betray him.' And Mark: 'And Judas Iscariot, one of the twelve, went away to the chief priests, that he might betray him to them.'

'And when they heard it, they rejoiced, and promised to give him money; and he sought how he might conveniently betray him.' And Luke writes, saying: 'Then Satan entered into Judas, called Iscariot, being of the number of the twelve, and he went away and conferred with the chief priests and scribes and the officers of the temple, how he might betray him to them. And they rejoiced, and agreed to give him money. And he sought an opportunity to betray him to them in the absence of the crowd.'

Foretelling, then, these very things, the prediction now before us adds: 'And if he came in to see me, his heart spoke vain things; he gathered iniquity to himself; he went out, and spoke together. All my enemies whispered against me.'

Symmachus, then, says: 'Coming in to visit, his heart spoke vain things; it heaped up injustice for itself; and going out, he spoke against me. With one accord all who hated me whispered against me.' Alone, then, as one who was an acquaintance and disciple coming in to his teacher, he looked about and observed closely, hiding his plot within, in his own heart.

But going out with a good many others, with one accord and together he spoke against him, betraying the Saviour to his enemies, and secretly conspiring with the rulers of the Jews about other matters, and not least also about the money, upon which he promised to deliver him up — matters about which he whispered together with those same men. Wherefore it says: 'He went out, and spoke together. All my enemies whispered against me; against me they devised evils for me.'

'They laid up against me a lawless word.' It seems that the prophecy calls the agreement concerning the money a 'lawless word'; or else it means that they devised impious and lawless things against him, on the supposition that he would be extinguished and destroyed after death, and would no longer be counted among the living.

For such is the sense of 'Shall not he who sleeps rise up again no more?' — which Symmachus set forth more plainly, saying, 'and having fallen, he shall rise no more.' And Aquila says, 'and he who sleeps shall not add to rise up.' And these words, too, are spoken generally of all those who plotted against him at the time of his passion; but particularly again, concerning the traitor, as being one who had been made his disciple, it goes on to add: 'For even the man of my peace, in whom I hoped, who ate my bread, lifted up his heel against me.'

In place of which, again, Symmachus says: 'And the man who was at peace with me, in whom I trusted, who ate my bread with me, exalted himself greatly against me.' For truly the worst and most execrable of all is he who, after sharing a common table and the nourishment of his teacher's words, turned to the worse and repaid his benefactor with the opposite.

But since the plotting enemies said, 'When will he die, and his name perish?' and supposed that, once he had fallen asleep, he would rise no more, on this account our Saviour and Lord himself, praying for the opposite of these things, and asking of the Father that he might obtain the resurrection without hindrance, says: 'But you, Lord, have mercy on me, and raise me up, and I will repay them. By this I knew that you have taken delight in me, that my enemy shall not triumph over me.'

And it is quite clear in what manner, immediately after his resurrection from the dead, and not after a long time, retribution overtook those who had plotted against him, and how death, his enemy, was put to shame at his obtaining life, so that those who taunted it could say, 'Where, O death, is your sting? Where, O death, is your victory?' And whoever consults the histories written by Josephus concerning the events after our Saviour's resurrection will know the calamities that overtook the Jewish nation and its rulers, into which they fittingly fell, receiving the wages of what they had done against him.

All these things, then, were fulfilled against those men according to the prediction; but the resurrection of our Saviour from the dead showed to all how the Father was well pleased in him, which also he himself teaches, saying, 'Have mercy on me, and raise me up, and I will repay them. By this I knew that you have taken delight in me, that my enemy shall not triumph over me.' To these he adds: 'And as for me, you have upheld me because of my innocence.'

And observe in what manner, in sending up this prayer to God his own Father, he has been so bold with such confidence as to testify to his own guilelessness, even though he had said above, 'Heal my soul, for I have sinned against you.'

But what sense the words 'I have sinned against you' bear, we have already explained beforehand; and Symmachus set it forth more clearly, saying, 'Heal my soul, even if I have sinned against you,' which itself might also be said concerning our sins, which our Saviour and Lord took upon himself.

And the words 'And as for me, you have upheld me because of my innocence' set forth the thorough purity of his nature; on account of which, teaching also the stability and unshakenness of the life and salvation that followed his resurrection, he adds: 'And you have established me before you forever,' or, according to Symmachus, 'and you will set me before you forever.' From Psalm 54.

Give ear, O God, to my prayer, and do not disregard my supplication; attend to me, and listen to me. I was grieved in my meditation, and was troubled by the voice of the enemy, and by the affliction of the sinner. For they turned iniquity against me, and in wrath they were hostile to me. My heart was troubled within me, and the terror of death fell upon me. Fear and trembling came upon me, and darkness covered me — and so on.

Concerning whom, submerge them, O Lord, and divide their tongues, for I have seen lawlessness and contradiction in the city. Day and night it will go around it upon its walls, and lawlessness and toil are in its midst, and injustice; and usury and deceit have not departed from its streets. For if an enemy had reproached me, I would have borne it; and if he who hated me had spoken great things against me, I would have hidden myself from him. But you, a man of like soul, my leader and my acquaintance, who together with me sweetened our food, we walked in the house of God in concord.

The words, 'For if an enemy had reproached me, I would have borne it, and if he who hated me had spoken great things against me, I would have hidden myself from him; but you, a man of like soul, my leader and my acquaintance, who together with me sweetened our food' — are similar to the words, 'For even the man of my peace, in whom I hoped, who ate my bread, lifted up his heel against me,' which stood concerning Judas in the prophecy before this one.

As, then, in that passage he was shown to have once been 'a man of peace,' when he was a disciple of the Saviour, being himself styled one of the number of the apostles, so also in the passage before us he is addressed as 'of like soul,' and 'leader,' and 'acquaintance' to him.

And again, as in that passage it was said concerning him, 'He who ate my bread lifted up his heel against me,' in the same manner also, in the present passage, it is said with reference to his person, 'who together with me sweetened our food'; for he too was one of those accounted worthy of the secret converse and spiritual nourishment which our Saviour gave to his disciples.

For to the multitudes and crowds outside he spoke in parables, but to his own disciples alone, among whom Judas too was numbered, he explained everything. Wherefore it is said, 'He who ate my bread lifted up his heel against me,' and, 'Who together with me sweetened our food.'

These words Aquila expressed more plainly, saying, 'we who together sweetened a secret'; and Symmachus, 'we who conferred together in sweet converse.' And instead of 'But you, a man of like soul, my leader, and my acquaintance,' Symmachus says, 'But you, a man of like disposition to me, and my leader, and my acquaintance.' Since he had been deemed worthy of so much, being a friend most closely attached to the Saviour, it is fittingly said concerning him, 'For if an enemy had reproached me, I would have borne it,' and so on.

Having thus prophesied these things concerning Judas, he consistently goes on to foretell his own salvation from death and his escape, saying: 'I cried to God, and the Lord saved me, evening and morning; and I will tell it and declare it, and he will hearken to my voice; he will redeem my soul in peace.'

As in a prayer, he signifies the time before his death, during which Judas also contrived the matters of his betrayal against him.

At that time, then, our Saviour and Lord, being distressed as at the ruin and destruction of his acquaintance, and even more at the rejection of the whole Jewish nation, and suffering as one who sympathizes over kinsfolk gone mad and over most beloved ones, calls all his converse and teaching towards them, because it had profited them nothing, a 'meditation,' saying: 'I was grieved in my meditation, and was troubled by the voice of the enemy, and by the affliction of the sinner; for they turned,' he says, 'iniquity against me, and in wrath they were hostile to me.'

These words can be referred both to the rulers of the circumcision, who tried in hostility and treachery to lie in wait for him, and can also be said concerning invisible powers warring against him from without and working through the agency of men.

These seem to me to accord with what was said by him in the Gospel, at the time of his passion, when he says to his own disciples, 'My soul is exceedingly sorrowful, even unto death; remain here, and watch with me'; and again, 'Now is my soul troubled.' Similar, then, to these are also the words in the Psalm, in which it is said, 'My heart was troubled within me, and the terror of death fell upon me; fear and trembling came upon me, and darkness covered me' — words by which he signifies the assaults of the opposing powers against him.

As, then, in the prophecies a certain 'spirit of fornication' has been named, according to the words, 'by a spirit of fornication they went astray,' and another, 'spirit of leading astray, in the wilderness,' in the same manner also there might be a 'spirit of death' productive of cowardice, just as there is a spirit of strength and power and courage that is active according to God.

So, too, one might speak of a 'spirit of fear and trembling,' and again another, distinct from these, a 'spirit of fear and confusion' — spirits which are wont, one might almost say, to assail all those who undergo death for piety in martyrdom, but which pressed upon him far more and to a greater degree, since he endured death on behalf of all.

But nevertheless, whether it was a spirit of cowardice and death, or of fear and trembling, or whatever other such power it was that fell upon him, it did not, in any case, cast him down; since, like a noble athlete, he cast far away and shook off the cowardice of death by confidence in life — for he himself is the life. And likewise, too, the spirit that came upon him productive of fear or trembling, he hurled to the farthest distance by a spirit of courage and power and strength.

For, according to Isaiah, there rested upon him, together with the other spirits, also the spirit of counsel and of strength. So too the spirit of darkness he dispersed by the power of his own light, since 'the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.' And you would find things closely resembling these also in the twenty-first Psalm, in which again, in the same person, it is said, somewhere near the beginning, 'Many calves have surrounded me; fat bulls have beset me. They have opened their mouth against me, as a ravening and roaring lion.'

And again, 'For many dogs have surrounded me; a congregation of evildoers has beset me.' And once more, 'Deliver my soul from the sword, and my only one from the hand of the dog. Save me from the mouth of the lion, and my lowliness from the horns of the unicorns.'

For clearly in these words he calls evil powers 'bulls,' and 'calves,' and 'lions,' and 'dogs,' and 'unicorns' — powers which did beset and surround him at the time of his passion, but were nevertheless unable to accomplish anything against him.