I believe the heads of many fish and cattle had already been set before them; but what is that compared to a royal appetite? Perhaps a private table too could look upon this. Nothing would have been accomplished, nothing at last procured, had the human head been lacking to the royal feast. And this not any common or chance head, but from the prison a prophet's head was brought to the table. Kings are wont on their solemnities to seek great and earthly banquets; but to Herod the prison too began to minister delicacies. And therefore poverty is ever pleasing to God, whose food has no blood, but a cheap little vegetable supplies its gentle hunger. For to the three youths (Daniel 1:16) the food was vegetables and pulse. Otherwise they would never have overcome the flames, had they wished to love delicacies.
Truly, because thou knowest not what impiety does, since him whom thou hatest thou honourest more than thou condemnest. Assuredly, when thou biddest the head be presented at the table on a silver platter, it is not, as thou believest, a memorial of cruelty, but rather the glory of that honour is shown forth. For thus shall it also be borne to heaven, that thence it may rouse against thee an angry Judge, even God, to whom is glory unto the ages of ages. SERMON 56. On the Nativity of Saint John the Baptist. A good banquet of the forerunner has today been prepared for us at the table of a confessor. Cyprian provided hospitality to a friend, but John has prepared for us a heavenly feast. John, I say, and Cyprian. The one a boy, the Prophet of the Most High (Luke 1:76); the other an old man, a priest of Christ.
The one sanctified in the womb, the other sanctified in his own blood. The one a herald, the other robed in the toga. For both, the one Christ is advocate. The one leaping in the womb, the other triumphing beneath the sword. The one a forerunner, the other a confessor. The one at the table, the other beneath the table. The one at the table lost his head, but did not lose it; the other at the table did not lose his head, but found it. For the head of the one was in a dish, the head of the other in the temple. Both at the table, but both also beneath the table—he who saw, he says, the souls of the just beneath the altar of God (Revelation 6:9). Beneath is John, of whom the barren mother blushed, and set upon the altar is Christ, of whom the virgin mother rejoiced. But since the gifts of God are not our own, we have taken from a friend in honour of a friend.
Let us for a little while set aside the glorious passion of both, content with their palms and triumphs, and let us believe the wondrous nativity. Today the herald is born; but since the dignity is unlike and the coming not equal, the herald came in a chariot of old age, but the Judge came in a virginal carriage. Which carriage was born not for man alone, but for the Lord. Earthly emperors are said to have, among their various chariots which they use for sitting, a chariot in which no one sits, which is called the angelic one. But this carriage is not only angelic, but also the Lord's, in which sits not a man, but God and man. Behold the carriage, behold the coming: what manner of herald is sent? The herald went before the carriage of the coming common Lord. What did he say?
O Lord, I go before thy steps, because thou hast possessed my reins (cf. Psalm 139:13). Thanks be to thee, O Lord: thou hast known my ways from afar, and thou hast committed to me thy nearby ways. Thanks be to thee, O Lord, thou hast reversed my condition, and hast promised thy grace. Thy mother went to my mother, and I go before thy face. Thanks be to thee, O Lord: thou hast received me from my mother's womb, that I might recognize thee in thy mother's womb. My mother's womb held me shut within the sanctuary of a narrow belly; thou didst send thy Christ, thou didst enlighten the maternal heart. Thou didst send within thy shining lamp, that I might recognize thy mother. O good lamp, not one that loves the world, but one that loves heaven.
If you wish to name the day of lamps with a correct tongue, love the Holy Spirit; but this we lament, that there are many who call the day 'the lamp,' and yet are in the midst of darkness. We have therefore spoken of the quality of the carriage, we have spoken of the lawful service of the one going before; let us come to the dignity of the Lord's own coming. Before the emperor's carriage go the surveyors, the palace-officials, the guards, the tribunes, the leaders and counts, the standards, the dragon-ensigns and banners, and those most harmonious pennants rejoicing in the variety of their cloth, the trumpets sounding, the cities trembling, the innocent rejoicing, the guilty growing pale. Before the carriage of our King let us see what go before:
the venerable sacraments, the temple, the Holy of Holies, the golden altar, the mercy-seat where there is remission of sins; the golden urn, in which is the judgment of the divine lot, not the arbitrament of human choice that stood there; the Cherubim protecting the mercy-seat with their wings and diligent with their eyes; the flowering rod, great as an example of piety, because 'he gave them the bread of heaven' (Psalm 78:24). There too were the tablets of heavenly doctrine, given to good disciples, but made for the hard. There the priest, there the altar, there the incense blazes. There the angel stands with man at one altar. Thanks be to thee, O Lord, thou hast begun to make peace by the blood of thy cross, whether the things in heaven or the things on earth. Today the angel stands with man at the altar.
Would that Gabriel might stand with us, so that by paternal purity through angelic fellowship brotherly discord might flee, and ancient concord be restored. Let us therefore see the angel coming, the priest standing in trembling: the one announcing, the other hearing and not believing. Suddenly the heavenly one stood, coming with spiritual flight, a spirit and a burning fire: for 'he maketh his angels spirits, and his ministers a flaming fire' (Psalm 104:4). He came, he stood, he greeted, he takes away terror, he gives assurance. 'Fear not,' he says, 'Zacharias.' Thy incense, leaping up in sweet smoke from the golden censer, blazed upon the golden altar in heaven, and gladdened all the angelic legion.
From that court I, Gabriel, courtier, have come to thee, while heaven now rejoices with the world at a single offering of incense. Fear not, Zacharias (Luke 1:13); I see that in thee the priestly garment, bent down with fear, is shaken. Fear not, Zacharias; a messenger of peace has come to thee, not of fear. Fear not; thy prayer is heard (ibid.), and mayest thou love my presence. Lay aside, lay aside for a little while thine ancient service; hear from me a new answer. Lay aside that observance of the ancient servitude in the worship of the law, where the priest entered once every year in another's blood. Behold, there shall come a Priest who shall enter once in his own blood. What manner of priest? A High Priest of the good things to come, building a greater and more perfect tabernacle not made with hands (Hebrews
9:11), which a virgin bore and man knew not. Neither by the blood of goats and calves, in which there is no remission of sins, but by his own blood he enters once into the holies, having found eternal redemption (ibid., 12). Thus shall come the Prince of priests; but first thou in old age shalt receive a son. 'How, O Lord,' he says, 'shall I know this? The condition of old age denies it; I hear a great tidings of novelty. How? I am an old man, and my wife is advanced in her days' (Luke 1:18). It would have been a great thing, had you heard me with grace: it would not have been a punishment following, but grace. Because my mouth spoke, and your heart believed not, your mouth wastes away. Within, the angel mingled speech with the priest, a man, by a heavenly trumpet:
condemning the unbeliever, while outside the praying people thought overmuch about the priest's tardiness. The priest went out mute and unbelieving, to speak better with a new tongue of faith. The people awaited an answer, not understanding the mystery. They are amazed at the great miracle. He nodded with his fingers, wishing only by fingers and gestures to indicate what he had not believed with his senses. Not thus shall that Prince of priests come from the holy heavens: he shall not come mute, 'for our God shall come, and shall not keep silence' (Psalm 50:3). Behold, now the whole age is the temple. All this world is the temple; in the courts of the world, as of the temple, all that throng, spread everywhere, awaits the hour,
when the priest shall come forth from the Holy of Holies, to bring not a new tidings, but a fearful judgment. In what manner shall he come? The windows of heaven shall be opened, all creation shall be in fear. Even the very offices of the angels shall begin to seethe with the fear of a shaking dread, when the human race shall begin to be heard trembling. Heavenly retinues shall go before him, like the cloud-bearing attendants of the coming Judge's carriage from his throne: fire, tempest, flames, worms. Flames that are not quenched, worms that die not, a river of fire, a flaming throne. Angels with a voice and a great trumpet, tombs burst open, no tongue confounded. He himself, of what sort, who visited us, the Dayspring from on high (Luke
1:78), and ascended above the heaven of heavens to the east (Psalm 68:33). He shall come and shall utter a great voice, a voice of power. The prophet shall go before him, saying: 'Let all flesh fear before the face of the Lord, for he is risen up out of his holy habitation' (Zechariah 2:13). Therefore let us remain secure in his question of judgment; this is what we must do—that we serve the Lord in piety and justice before him all the days of our life (Luke 1:75). SERMON 57. On Saint Peter, where he says to the Lord: Feed my sheep. The whole salvation of the heavenly flock is the care of the shepherd, who came down, the heavens bowed, to raise up the fallen sheep whom the ravaging wolf had scattered.
He gathers them from disease, healing their wounds, binding them with the sweet chain of his love, applying a bandage to their broken bones, laying on a healing poultice. While he heals the lame, visits the sick, enlightens the blind, cures the ailing, raises the dead. Love was the care of the shepherd of so great a flock. Still he cares for the flock through his own passion; he lifts them upon the cross, that they might pluck the buds of his wounds, and hang in sweet rumination upon the shepherd's love. He commends them to the Father, he commends them also to Peter. To the Father he commends them as one about to suffer; to Peter he commends them as one about to return to the heavens. For when at the moment of his passion he commends the little sheep of the chosen flock to the Father, he was commending Peter too with the rest to the Father (John 17:6).
The twofold commendation profited, where there was one protection. The Father guards Peter from heaven, and Christ visits Peter in the praetorium: for unless he had been visited, he would not have wept, and his wounds would not have been wiped away, unless they had been washed with weeping. The ascension is at hand; from Peter is demanded the noted confession of love, as you were hearing in the Gospel. Sheep, to whom the Shepherd of shepherds, Christ the Lord of angels, was commending you to a shepherd. 'Simon,' he says, 'son of John, lovest thou me?' (John 21:15). And he: I love thee, Lord. Thou art sweet and gentle, and shall I not love thee? In thee stands fast all the eternal sweetness of virtue, and shall I not love thee? That I am questioned by thee, I give thee thanks. For while I love thee, I am loved by thee. Had not thy love gone before, my love would not follow.
They love thee, O Lord: the angels chanting thy glory love thee; the heavens love thee, because 'the heavens declare the glory of God' (Psalm 19:1); the earth loves thee, drenched with the droppings of so much blood dripping from thy side; those made alive love thee, the dead raised up love thee. What shall I render to thee? Thou hast healed my wounds, and shall I not love thy medicine? Feed therefore my sheep (John 21:17); what thou professest in love, show forth upon the flock. And thou too wast a sheep, and art. I set thee over the sheepfold as shepherd. I leave thee to my sheep as a substitute caretaker. Feed my sheep. First he plants pastures, and thus he commends the sheep to Peter. I have planted pastures on the living wood, on the cross that does not wither. He planted wounded buds; he opened man for a fountain, nay, the cross for the true fountain.
Behold, thou hast a field of meadows, the passion of wounds and scars; and for the solicitude of my little lambs, lead them to the pastures, to my passion. Teach them to pluck the buds, to believe my wounds. Teach them to pluck the most fragrant roses, the scars laid open in the Sun of righteousness. There let my sheep flourish in diverse profession; that by these anxious pastures redeemed by me the Church may not be violated. He commends them a second and a third time, and returns to the heavens, sitting on his own throne. Let us entreat him; nor is Peter silent—the legate, the shepherd, the vicar who wept for his own denial, weeps for human hardness. Let us say to him: Lord, thou hast commended them; hast thou departed utterly? If thou defend not the shepherds, neither would the sheep be safe.
Look therefore upon the raging wolves, and the lambs pitifully groaning. Why has the cruel pirate torn apart thy sheep, whom thou didst redeem, having been led like a sheep to the sacrifice? Beneath the shearer thou, like a lamb, didst not open thy mouth; the tongue of the suffering one was silent. No guilt, and a great silence—so that heaven marvelled, earth was astonished, the luminaries fled. And now dost thou keep silence while thy sheep are shorn by swords and by the storms which thou didst seek by the purple passion of thy body? Let not those be laid waste on the shore whom thou didst beget from thy side. With these prayers let us approach the most faithful Redeemer, by the amendment of our works, not by the mere embassy of words. SERMON 58. On the Nativity of the Apostles Peter and Paul. The nativity of the Apostles Peter and Paul has shone forth—a nativity
not that which entangled in the world, but that which freed from the world. For through human weakness man is born to hardship; through the living charity of Christ martyrs are born to a crown. Today Peter first suffered; today Paul first suffered. Merit equalled the passion; charity ran together to the day. And this day, on account of their merit, has been set before us for the solemnity of celebrating and the sanctity of imitating: that we, loving the glories of the martyrs, may be able to imitate their footsteps. O blessed merits of the Apostles, that one grace should be granted to the two—so much so that thou seemest to call the names of both! For if thou sayest Paul, thou art not silent about Peter; and if thou sayest Peter, thou art not silent about Paul.
In short, each holds the other's names as surnames. Deservedly the Saviour willed to name Paul out of Saul, that by a surname he might make him a companion: whose fellowship and life he joined, the passion of one day confirmed. Paul therefore is loved by God, while he persecutes the law of God. And he who, being humble, was unwilling to be God's that he might be saved, being humbled suffers God. For while he was journeying, a destroyer, the Saviour, coming in a cloud, laid low the one oppressed by his own weight—not to wound one whom he had loved, but to raise up as though reborn, humble in spirit, the one cast down from carnal pride, that he who had fallen an enemy might rise a Christian. To whom the voice from the cloud answered: Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? (Acts 9:4).
That is to say: Proud man, proud now, destructive to thyself, why dost thou persecute thyself in me? Thou grievest the Fabricator, while thou destroyest his fabric in thyself. Thou woundest the Maker, while thou losest his workmanship. The craftsman does not lack vessels necessary for worthy use, but in a work he approves the master will not suffer loss. Thou dost acquire for me those whom, by wounding in the world, thou makest perfect in me; but there perishes for thee the fact that thou departest from me. I cry out now, grieved, before thou perish utterly; I shall laugh now if, being hardened, thou wilt not hear. God entreats a man, and shows the hope of mercy to the humble, since he easily has mercy on the proud. And Saul to this says: Who art thou, Lord? (ibid., 5). The dreadful pride of Saul,
the credulity of Paul worthy of imitation, since with one word he sends forth the voice both of one ignorant and of one believing. For no one inquires the name of the one crying out, unless he knows not by whom he is called; and no one says 'Lord,' unless he who promises servitude. There was therefore no distinction made between the ignorant and the consenting one. For he who had willed Saul to be for a long time unknown, suddenly made Paul known to himself. And the Lord to him: It is hard for thee to kick against the goad (Acts 9:5): assuredly it is hard for the fragile to contend with the solid, who, when thou collidest with it, art at once broken. But that thou resistest is grief to me, death to thee. For if thou perish, it is evil for thee; but if thou profit, it is good both for me and for thee.
Paul therefore, no longer Saul, goes forth to profit the divine law, he who had come to persecute that same law. He is baptized in the hope of resurrection, who had been preparing death for those preaching resurrection. He teaches the law which he knew not, he forgets the law which he had learned; by which merit, with his own mouth, in spiritual words he commemorates the praise of his own deeds, saying: I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith: there remains for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord shall render to me in that day (2 Timothy 4:7-8). He does not say 'gives,' but 'shall render.' If he shall render, he owed it. And had he then received a loan, that he should owe? God has not been made a debtor by our merit, but by his own promise. For I dare to say, he owed the Apostle a crown.
Accordingly, if anyone promises us something, we use this word, when we accost him saying: Render what thou hast promised. We demand of a debtor when we say 'render'; but we confess his benevolence when we say 'what thou hast promised,' not 'what thou hast received.' SERMON 59. Again concerning Paul. Saul the Jew, who was awaiting that Paul should become a Christian, while he persecutes what he was to be, merited to become an Apostle. This man therefore is sent by his elders to him whose punishment was to be his salvation; he is sent to be blinded. He is blinded therefore that he might see the true way, which does not deceive the eyes but directs the steps. He is blinded in the flesh, illumined in the heart, that the eyes of the heart might be enlightened, and those of the flesh. He was sent therefore, that whom Saul persecuted,
Paul might believe. He was being sent into himself that he might seek himself. The traveller wandered, ignorant, with himself, and did not find himself, because he had lost the way in himself. Therefore he hears a voice saying to him: Why persecutest thou me? (Acts 9:4). That is, Saul, why dost thou persecute Paul? For mine is he whom thou hast with thee, and thou seest not, because thou hast the eyes of one raging, not of one seeing; that is, thou believest not him whom thou art about to believe, and thou persecutest him whom thou shalt afterwards preach. Correct therefore, correct thy feet from the ways of Saul, that thou mayest find the faith of Paul. Put off, Paul, the tunic of blindness, and put on at last the robe of the Saviour. Cast away what thou art, that thou mayest be able to be what thou art not. For the punishment is not of thy blindness, but blindness is the cause.
For I wished to show you in the flesh what you hold in your heart, that you might see what you did not see, lest you be like those who have eyes and see not, ears and hear not (Ps. 113:5-6). I bore with you while you were a zealot for the Law and a sinner, when you were being armed by the false and lying elders of the Synagogue. Therefore I wished to show you, as you tossed to and fro, your own advantage, that you might come to love the contest of a good soldier. Let Saul, then, return with his superfluous letters, that Paul may write the necessary Epistles. Let the blindness of Saul go back to the blind, that the light of Paul may profit believers. Go, Saul; return, Paul. Go to Ananias my priest, where you may render up the Apostle whom you owe. Go — why do you delay to render what must serve for your own punishment?
Go to Ananias: there you have the fountain in which to cancel your bond. And therefore, Saul, may you see your way, that Paul may see the heavenly homeland. Where are you, O vanity that persecuted me to keep hold of my soldier? Behold, he learns to know me who did not know me. Behold, he loves who in ignorance had hated. This is the Vessel of election, who had been an armoury of iniquity. Behold Siloam, Saul: wash your eyes. Behold the fountain, Paul: restore your eyes. You, Saul, wash off the mud; you, Paul, behold Christ. Both of you wash, both of you see, that you too, Saul, may see that you are in the mire, and you, Paul, that you reign in Christ. Now therefore question yourselves, you elders: Saul, the blind man of your own stock — who has made him the Paul of his own light? Who has made you Paul?
Do you wish to hear who made me Paul? The Man who is called Christ. When He made me, He made clay. What is the clay? A medicine for the flesh, for with it He anointed my eyes and said to me, Go to the pool of Siloam, and wash, and see. And I went, and I washed, and I see (John 9:7). But why do you marvel? He who made me, He Himself remade me; whence He made, thence He healed; wherein I had sinned, thence He cleansed. Come therefore, Paul, out of the old Saul, for it is not far to go where you may be counted worthy to find Peter also. Come, let Ananias touch you, that the Christian may no longer fear the wolf, but the Jew may be grieved at the Apostle. Touch Saul, Ananias, and give us Paul. Drive out the persecutor and send forth the preacher, in whom the lambs need not fear, but the sheep of Christ may rejoice.
Touch the wolf who used to snatch away Christ, that he may now pasture the sheep with Peter; that he who was wont cruelly to destroy may learn mercifully to gain. You have found gains out of losses — losses which he made, not against us, but against himself. You used to send out whole what was on every side shattered. Let him return, reformed, from the potter's wheel, who had grown old in the counsel of his ways. Let one be given back who suffers what the persecutor once did — when in his own evils he rejoiced over another's good; when he made Stephen a gift by the hidden design of his own name; when in violent fury he made a martyr of Christ. Let the pursuer flee, let the persecutor fear. Let him love what we used to fear, that we may hold a teacher of patience. Let him be shipwrecked, beaten, scourged, imprisoned, that through the penalties of the flesh he may merit the grace of the cross.
Come, see, and hear, you who inhabit the earth in the place of mourners, that Paul is a citizen in the city of those who rejoice. See the works of God: Paul, headlong in his swelling pride, a fugitive in a basket, the preacher of Christ let down in disgrace over the wall — Christ whom he had hated; now snatching the wolf of the Jews, the sheep of the Christians, seizing the kids out of the synagogues, making them lambs of the Church; persuading the executioner to piety, promising pardon to the guilty, patience to the harsh, grace to the Gentile, concord to the Jew. See how he is beaten for Christ, and does not faint for Christ. He is scourged and yet preaches, that by his suffering he may gain necessary profits. He is shipwrecked, and yet is a harbour; he is in want, and yet he feeds; he is sick, and yet he saves. Behold, as though a sinner, he sets sinners free.
For by the bite of the viper he was shown to be a sinner, when he was bitten on behalf of sinners; yet had not the serpent bitten his hand, he would not have laid on hands. And now behold the devil made subject beneath Paul and Peter. See also the crown of the world beneath Peter's feet, in which Saul used to glory when he knew nothing of Paul — because Peter was owed to him for fellowship, not by the merit of any debt, but by the grace of Christ, without which, when sent, he slew, betrayed, and destroyed; but now indeed he redeems, saves, and gains — for those to whom Peter may open, Christ receive, and Paul rejoice. SERMON 60. On Saint Lawrence. We who celebrate the martyrdom of blessed Lawrence, let us bear his trophy upon our glad necks. Above the standards shines the triumph of the earthly king; the martyr's is the triumph of the confessor.
For in his triumph pearls and gems do not glitter, but the blind who now see flash forth, and the needy who are filled with bread. O standard of the Lord's cross, which he bore upon his shoulders and set upon closed eyes, opening the gates of blindness! For his standard was purple, not with gems set in it, but purpled with a mantle in the blood of the grape — that is, with the wounds of the Saviour, precious in blood. What praise shall we speak to blessed Lawrence? We are weak, we are poor; he himself is a column of the heavenly altar. Let him restrain our tongue, that we may be able to praise his crown. A precious column: a deacon in the Church, a martyr on the gridiron. And a true column upholds the walls, and blessed Lawrence sustains the needy.
You are rich: feed the poor, dismiss your heirs, and gladden the angelic powers. He followed the testator, and himself, suffering, left an heir. That testator was father Xystus, and blessed Hippolytus follows that testator himself. For while he stood beside the glorious bed of father Xystus, beside the rack of the hanging pontiff, a testament is written with a pen of blood. The son wept, and the father was promising precious riches. Son, he said, do not be sad; you shall follow me after three days. The testament of the martyr is the resurrection of the Saviour. The pen was the rack, just as the cross too was a pen. The Lord was writing a testament for the thief; Xystus was saying, You shall follow me after three days;
and the Saviour said to the thief, Amen I say to you, this day you shall be with me in paradise (Luke 23:43). A faithful testament — the testator does not lie, nor is the heir defrauded. The thief follows Christ into paradise in one chariot, and blessed Lawrence, from father Xystus, comes to the gridiron. A fiery chariot, which precious offices go before — not men in cloaks, not the shield-bearers and silk-clad, but the blind enlightened, the poor enriched, and the wretched filled. The impious emperor was aghast: what do these men want for themselves? Where are the treasures you promised? Behold, these are my treasures — my good porters, who have carried my riches there, where you cannot stretch out your hands. Gold and silver I do not have; but what I have, this I give you.
My gold the belly of these men has eaten, but the belly has received it: your gold is the idols of the nations, my gold is the satisfaction of the poor. From your gold the images do not see; from my gold the blind see and the poor rejoice. He too is laid upon the cooling bed of the gridiron, and he leaves Hippolytus as his heir. He handed over to him the gems of the coals and the opened eyes of the blind, that out of contempt for the torments he too might make himself an ornament as his heir. O pearls of the live coals, with which Lawrence's inward parts are adorned! The fires gasped, and the gems glittered, and the martyr's limbs shone.