Questions and Solutions

Contents

Greek pieces for which Migne prints Greek; Latin-only pieces are not included.

Reading pages: 1–28 · 29–46 · 47

1. 1Hesychius explains that Mark 1:2–3 cites Malachi and Isaiah by a transposition, and that Scripture uses transpositions for brevity and to make readers search it carefully.
2. 2Hesychius explains that Christ called John the Baptist Elijah only conditionally, because John fulfilled Elijah's ministry for the first coming, while Elijah himself will precede the second.
3. 3Hesychius distinguishes four kinds of knowledge and says the Baptist lacked only knowledge of Christ by experience until the baptism, as Adam knew good and evil only not by experience.
4. 4Hesychius explains the different accounts of the apostles' call as different calls at different times: first in John, then while mending nets in Matthew, then after the catch of fish in Luke.
5. 5Hesychius explains the different order of the temptations in Matthew and Luke by their happening in an instant and by the intertwined vices they represent.
6. 6Hesychius explains the two forms of the beatitudes as spoken on two occasions, on the mountain and on the plain.
7. 7Hesychius explains differences in the order of events between the Gospels by holding that the beatitudes were given twice and that the centurions and the healed paralytics were different persons.
8. 8Hesychius holds that Matthew's two demoniacs and the one in Mark and Luke were different healings in a place bordering three territories.
9. 9Hesychius explains that blasphemy against Christ's humanity in ignorance can be forgiven, but knowing blasphemy against the Godhead or the Spirit cannot, and infers that some sins are forgiven in this life through those who bind and loose and some in the age to come.
10. 10Hesychius holds that Matthew's ruler and haemorrhaging woman are different from those in Mark and Luke, Matthew's ruler being a gentile.
11. 11Hesychius explains that Matthew and Mark count only the days between the promise and the transfiguration, while Luke includes the first and last days.
12. 12Hesychius explains that Levi was probably one of the seventy, that the crowds heard the sermon from a low mountain, and that the apostle with three names (Thaddaeus, Judas of James, Lebbaeus) accounts for the different lists of the twelve.
13. 13Hesychius explains that the ban on Samaria was given before the cross to deprive the Jews of a pretext, that Christ only passed through Samaria, and that he could not refuse the Samaritans who believed.
14. 14Hesychius explains that hearing and seeing God mean understanding him, which the Jews addressed by Christ lacked.
15. 15Hesychius explains Christ's contrary sayings about being known by the twofold mystery of his humanity and his divinity.
16. 16Hesychius explains that the Spirit "not yet given" before Christ's glorification means the Spirit's manifold working in believers, not his substance, which descended on Christ at the baptism.
17. 17Hesychius reads "the devil ... and his father" in John 8:44 either of the Antichrist, son of Satan, or of Cain, whose ways the Jews who opposed Christ imitated.
18. 18Hesychius says Christ repeated the same instructions to the twelve and to the seventy at different times.
19. 19Hesychius explains Christ's words to Nicodemus by God's earlier ascents in the Old Testament dispensations and by the incarnate Word's being called Son of Man, as a king keeps his title when he buys a field.
20. 20Hesychius explains that Christ speaks sometimes as man, sometimes as God, and sometimes as both, so that his saying that the Son does not know the last day is spoken as man and to console the disciples.
21. 21Hesychius applies "thieves and robbers" to rebels like Theudas and Judas, not to Moses and the prophets, and reconciles Matthew and Mark on the request of Zebedee's sons.
22. 22Hesychius explains "today and tomorrow and the third day" as Christ's last days in Galilee before setting out for Jerusalem, and "you will not see me" as said to Jerusalem until the triumphal entry or until the return in judgment.
23. 23Hesychius reconciles Christ's abiding presence with the disciples' longing for his days by distinguishing his unseen help from their memory of his earthly companionship.
24. 24Hesychius holds that the blind men healed near Jericho in Luke, Mark, and Matthew were different persons.
25. 25Hesychius explains why Matthew has an ass and a colt, attributes the apostles' differences from the Septuagint to their use of Hebrew books, and reads the colt as the gentiles and its mother as the Jews.
26. 26Hesychius reconciles the accounts of the fig tree and the cleansing of the temple and explains the cursing of the fig tree as a proof of Christ's punitive power given before the passion.
27. 27Hesychius reconciles the accounts of the servants sent to the vineyard as summary and detailed descriptions of the prophets sent one by one.
28. 28Hesychius distinguishes three women who anointed Christ: the sinful woman in Galilee in Luke, the woman at Simon the leper's house in Matthew and Mark, and Mary of Bethany in John.
29. 29Hesychius explains that Judas agreed to betray Christ after the anointing at Bethany two days before the Passover, and that John omits this and records only the last night.
30. 30Hesychius explains that Christ warned Judas repeatedly, that the morsel exposed rather than caused Satan's entry, and that the Last Supper was held on the fourteenth with the typical Passover before the feast of Unleavened Bread on the fifteenth.
31. 31Hesychius explains that Christ taught humility and foretold Peter's denial more than once, so that Luke's placing of both at the supper does not conflict with Matthew and Mark.
32. 32Hesychius harmonizes Gethsemane, the Mount of Olives, and John's garden across the Kidron as one place at the foot of the mountain.
33. 33Hesychius attributes the differing accounts of Christ's prayer to the evangelists' brevity and explains John's silence on the kiss by the order of events at the arrest, which shows Christ was taken willingly.
34. 34Hesychius says John named Peter as the swordsman, while the others withheld his name out of respect.
35. 35Hesychius explains that the swords were bought to fulfil the prophecy that Christ would be counted among the lawless, not for defence, and that Christ never permitted their use.
36. 36Hesychius explains that Annas and Caiaphas shared one house with separate apartments and begins to reconcile the accounts of those who questioned Peter.
37. 37Hesychius reconciles Mark's two cock-crows with the other Gospels, and John's Passover chronology with the Synoptics by distinguishing the Passover day, the feast of the Passover, and the great Sabbath of the sheaf.
38. 38Hesychius explains that Christ carried the cross at first and Simon of Cyrene afterwards.
39. 39Hesychius reconciles the third hour in Mark and the sixth in John by counting the scourging and mockery from the third hour and the nailing at the sixth.
40. 40Hesychius explains the different drinks offered to Christ as offered at different times, and the two robbers' reviling as later changed in one by Christ's prayer for his enemies.
41. 41A fragment concluding the answer on the penitent robber: he confessed Christ as king, a detail the other evangelists passed over.
42. 42Hesychius offers two solutions to Christ's promise to the robber: a different punctuation, or the omnipresence of Christ's Godhead, by which he was in Hades and paradise at once.
43. 43Hesychius harmonizes the resurrection accounts by supposing several women of the same name, including three Mary Magdalenes, who came to the double-chambered tomb at different times and saw different visions.
44. 44Hesychius answers several questions on the resurrection narratives: the double-chambered tomb, the one and the two angels, the appearances to different women, the command not to touch Christ, and the women's report or silence.
45. 45Hesychius explains the different accounts of the visit to the tomb by different reports and visits, and holds that Matthias, though not yet chosen, was among the eleven to whom the risen Christ appeared in Jerusalem.
46. 46Hesychius orders the resurrection appearances, holding that Christ appeared to Peter while the Emmaus disciples were on the road, and that the journey to Emmaus and back could be made in one afternoon and evening.
47. 47Hesychius distinguishes the meal of fish in Luke from the breakfast by the sea of Galilee, explains Luke's compressed narrative of the ascension, reconciles Bethany with the Mount of Olives and the temple with the upper room, closes with a doxology, and adds a second answer on Simon of Cyrene.