Homilies on Exodus 11.1–11.7

On the thirst of the people at Rephidim, and the war of the Amalekites, and the coming of Jethro.

1. Since everyone who wishes to live godly in Christ suffers persecution and is attacked by enemies, he must always be armed as he travels the road of this life, and must always stand in camp. Therefore it is also related of the people of God: “All the congregation of the sons of Israel set out from the desert of Sin, by their camps, at the word of the Lord.” So there is one congregation of the Lord, but it is divided into four camps. For four camps are described as placed around the tabernacle of the Lord, as is related in Numbers. You too, then, if you are always watchful and always armed, and know that you are serving as a soldier in the camp of the Lord, keep that commandment, that no one serving as a soldier for God entangles himself in worldly affairs, so that he may please him who enlisted him; because if you so serve as to be free of worldly things and always keep watch in the camp of the Lord, it is said of you too that at the word of the Lord you go out from the desert of Sin and come to Rephidim. For Sin is interpreted “temptation,” and Rephidim “soundness of judgment.” Whoever comes out of temptation well, and whom temptation makes approved, comes to soundness of judgment. For on the day of judgment he will be sound, and soundness will be with him who has not been wounded in temptation, as it is also written in the Apocalypse: “But to him who conquers I will give of the tree of life, which is in the paradise of my God.” So he comes to soundness of judgment who disposes his words well in judgment.

But what is it that follows? “There,” it says, “the people thirsted for water, and they murmured against Moses.” It may perhaps seem superfluous that it said the people thirsted for water. For it would have been enough to say that it thirsted; what need was there to add “thirsted for water”? The addition is not superfluous. For there are different thirsts, and each one has his own thirst. Those who are blessed according to the word of the Lord hunger and thirst for righteousness; and others likewise say: “My soul has thirsted for you, O God.” But those who are sinners suffer not a thirst for water nor a hunger for bread, but a thirst for hearing the word of God. Therefore here too it adds that the people thirsted for water, the people which ought to have thirsted for God, which ought to have thirsted for righteousness. But because God is truly the instructor of infants and the teacher of the foolish, he corrects faults and amends errors, and tells Moses to take his rod and, striking the rock, bring out water for them. For he wants them now to drink from the rock; he wants them to advance and come to the inner mysteries. For they murmured against Moses, and therefore the Lord commands him to show them the rock from which they may drink. If there is anyone who, reading Moses, murmurs against him, and the law written according to the letter displeases him because in many things it does not seem to keep consistency, Moses shows him the rock, which is Christ, and leads him to it, so that he may drink from there and relieve his thirst. But this rock will not give water unless it is struck; when struck, it produces springs. For Christ, struck and put on the cross, produced the springs of the New Testament; and therefore it was said of him: “I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered.” It was necessary, then, that he be struck. For unless he had been struck, and water and blood had come out of his side, we would all suffer thirst for the word of God. This, then, is what the Apostle too interpreted: that “all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual rock that followed them; and the rock was Christ.” Notice, however, what God said to Moses in this place: “Go before the people, and take with you the elders,” that is, the presbyters of the people. Not Moses alone leads the people to the waters of the rock, but the elders of the people with him. For not the law alone announces Christ, but also the prophets and the patriarchs, all the elders.

After this a war is described, waged with the Amalekites; the people are related to have fought and won. Before it ate bread from heaven and drank water from the rock, the people are not related to have fought; rather it is said to them: “The Lord will fight for you, and you shall keep silent.” There is, then, a time when the Lord fights for us, and does not allow us to be tempted beyond what we are able, nor lets us, unequal in strength, come to an encounter with the strong. Indeed, Job too fulfilled that most famous contest of his temptation when he was already perfect. You too, then, when you have begun to eat manna, the heavenly bread of the word of God, and to drink water from the rock, and have come to the inner things of spiritual doctrine, expect the fight and prepare yourself for war. With war imminent, then, let us see what Moses commands: “He said,” it says, “to Jesus: Choose for yourself men, and go out and fight with Amalek tomorrow.” Up to this place no mention has been made anywhere of the blessed name of Jesus. Here first the splendour of this name shone out. Here first Moses called Jesus and said to him: “Choose for yourself men.” Moses calls Jesus; the law calls Christ, to choose for himself mighty men from the people. Moses could not choose, but Jesus alone is the one who can choose mighty men, he who said: “You did not choose me, but I chose you.” For he is the leader of the chosen, he is the prince of the mighty, he it is who fights with Amalek. For he is the one who enters the house of the strong man, binds the strong man, and plunders his goods.

But meanwhile let us see what the present account relates: “Moses went up,” it says, “to the top of the hill.” He does not yet go up to the top of the mountain, but to the top of the hill. For it was reserved for him then to go up to the top of the mountain when Jesus was to go up, and with him Moses and Elijah, to be transfigured there in glory. Now, then, as not yet glorified by the transfiguration of Jesus, he does not yet go up to the top of the mountain, but goes up to the top of the hill. “And it happened,” it says, “when Moses raised his hands, Israel prevailed.” Moses raises his hands, he does not stretch them out; but Jesus, who, lifted up on the cross, was to embrace the whole world with his arms, says: “I stretched out my hands to a people not believing and contradicting me.” Moses, then, raises his hands, and when he raised his hands Amalek was defeated. To raise the hands is to raise works and deeds to God, and not to have deeds cast down and lying on the ground, but deeds pleasing to God and lifted up to heaven. So he raises his hands who stores up treasure in heaven; for where his treasure is, there is his eye, there his hand too. He too raises his hands who says: “The lifting up of my hands as an evening sacrifice.” If, then, our deeds are raised up and are not on the earth, Amalek is defeated. The Apostle too commands us to lift up holy hands without anger and dispute; and to some he said: “Lift up the hands that hang down and the weak knees, and make straight paths for your feet.” If, then, the people keeps the law, Moses raises his hands and the adversary is defeated; if it does not keep the law, Amalek grows strong. Since, then, we too have a fight against the princes and powers and the world-rulers of this darkness, if you want to conquer, if you want to prevail, raise your hands, raise your deeds, and let your way of life not be on earth, but as the Apostle said: “Walking on earth, we have our citizenship in heaven.” And so you will be able to overcome the people of Amalek that opposes you, so that it may be said of you too: “For with a hidden hand the Lord fought against Amalek.” You too raise your hands to God and fulfil the commandment in which the Apostle says, “Pray without ceasing”; and then what is written will happen, that as a calf licks up the green grass in the fields, … cry out to God, as the Apostle says: “Persevering in prayer and watching in it.” For this is the Christian's fight, by which he overcomes the enemy. I think, moreover, that by this figure Moses also signifies the form of two peoples, and shows that one is the people from the Gentiles, which raises the hands of Moses and lifts them up, that is, which exalts on high what Moses wrote and sets their understanding on high, and by this conquers; but that the other is the people which, because it does not raise the hands of Moses nor lift them from the earth, nor consider anything lofty and subtle in him, is conquered by its adversaries and laid low.

After this Moses came to the mountain of God, and Jethro his father-in-law met him. And he went out to meet him from the camp, and did not lead him to the mountain of God but led him to his tent. For the priest of Midian could not go up to the mountain of God; but neither could he, nor Moses' wife, go down into Egypt; but now he comes to him with his sons. For no one can go down into Egypt and undergo the Egyptian contests unless he is a proven athlete, and such as the Apostle describes: “Everyone who strives in the contest exercises self-control in all things; and they do it to receive a perishable crown, but we an imperishable. So I run, not as uncertainly; so I fight, not as one beating the air.” Moses, then, because he was a great and mighty athlete, went down to the contests and exercises of virtues. And Abraham too went down into Egypt, because he himself was a great and mighty athlete. And what shall one say of Jacob, who is an athlete by his very name? For it is interpreted “wrestler” and “supplanter.” And therefore when Jacob had gone down into Egypt with seventy-five souls, he became like the stars of heaven in multitude. But all who go down into Egypt fight and complete their contests in such a way that they become a multitude and are multiplied like the stars of heaven. For others, going down into Egypt turns out the opposite. I know that Jeroboam, fleeing from Solomon, went down into Egypt, and not only did not grow into a multitude but also split and corrupted the people of God, because, going down into Egypt, he received from King Shishak as wife the sister of Thekemina, Shishak's wife. But meanwhile Jethro comes to Moses, bringing with him his daughter, Moses' wife, and his sons. “And Aaron came,” it says, “and all the presbyters of Israel, to eat bread with Moses' father-in-law before God.” Not all eat bread before God; but those who are presbyters, who are elders, who are perfect and proven by their merits, keep what the Apostle says: “Whether you eat or drink or do anything else, do all to the glory of God.” So everything the saints do they do before God. But the sinner flees from the presence of God. Indeed, it is written that Adam, after he had sinned, fled from the presence of God, and when asked he answered: “I heard your voice and hid myself, because I was naked.” And Cain too, after he was condemned by God for fratricide, “went out,” it says, “from the face of God and dwelt in the land of Nod.” So he who is unworthy of God's presence went out from the face of God. But the saints eat and drink before God, and do all that they do before him. Examining the present passage further, I see that those who receive a fuller knowledge of God and are more fully steeped in divine teachings, even if they do evil, do it before God and in his sight, as he said: “Against you alone have I sinned, and done evil before you.” What more, then, has one who does evil before God? This, surely: that he at once repents and says, “I have sinned.” But one who departs from God's presence does not know how to turn back and purge his sin by repentance. This, then, is the difference between doing evil before God and, when sinning, not having departed from God's presence.

But, as I see, Jethro did not come to Moses in vain, nor in vain did he eat bread with the elders of the people before the Lord. For he gives Moses very sound and useful advice: to choose men and appoint princes of the people, men who worship God, mighty men, and men who hate pride. For such must the princes of the people be: not only not proud themselves but also hating pride; that is, not only themselves without vice but also hating vices in others. I do not say hating people, but vices. “And you shall appoint them,” it says, “tribunes and centurions and captains of fifty and of ten, and they judged the people at every hour. But any matter that was weightier they would refer to you.” Let the princes of the people and the presbyters of the people hear that they ought to judge the people at every hour, to sit in judgment always and without ceasing, to settle quarrels, reconcile those at odds, bring back into favour those in discord. Let each one learn his office from the holy Scriptures. Moses, it says, is to be in the things that pertain to God and to expound the word of God to the people. But the other princes, whom they call tribunes (for they are called tribunes because they preside over a tribe), the other tribunes, then, or centurions, or captains of fifty … settling the matters that pertain to each. And I think that this very figure was given to the Church not only in the present age but is also to be kept in the future. Hear, indeed, what the Lord says in the Gospel: “When the Son of man,” he says, “sits on the throne of his glory, you too will sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.” You see, then, that not only does the Lord judge, to whom the Father has given all judgment, but he also appoints for himself other princes to judge the people in lesser cases, while they refer to him any matter that is weightier. For this reason the Lord also said of one that he will be liable to the council, of another that he will be liable to judgment, and of another that he will be liable to the hell of fire. And we are told that we shall render an account of every idle word, and he did not say that we shall render the account to God, as he says of perjury: “But you shall render your oaths to the Lord.” And “the queen of the south will rise up in the judgment with the men of this generation and condemn them.” Behold another kind of judgment too. “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.” For all these things are a type and shadow of heavenly things and an image of things to come. But just as we read it written that the eye is not satisfied with seeing nor the ear with hearing, so we cannot be satisfied with looking at and considering in how many ways what is written builds us up, in how many ways it instructs us. For when I observe that Moses, the prophet full of God, to whom God spoke face to face, accepted advice from Jethro, the priest of Midian, I fall into a stupor of mind from excessive wonder. For Scripture says: “And Moses listened to the voice of his father-in-law and did whatever he said to him.” He did not say: God speaks to me, and what I ought to do is brought to me by heavenly speech; how shall I accept advice from a man, and a Gentile man, a stranger to the people of God? But he hears his voice and does all that he says, and listens not to who speaks but to what he says. Hence we too, if we perhaps sometimes find something wisely said by the Gentiles, ought not at once to spurn the sayings together with the author's name; nor, because we hold a law given by God, is it fitting for us to swell with pride and spurn the words of the prudent, but, as the Apostle says, “testing all things, holding fast what is good.” But who today of those who preside over the peoples (I do not say if some things have already been revealed to him by God, but if he has some merit in knowledge of the law) deigns to accept advice from a priest even of lower rank, not to mention from a layman or a Gentile? But Moses, who was the meekest of all men, accepted the advice of an inferior, so as both to give the princes of the peoples a pattern of humility and to signify the image of a future mystery. For he knew that one day the Gentiles would bring good advice to Moses, would bring a good and spiritual understanding to the law of God; and he knew that the law would listen to them and do everything as they say. For the law cannot do as the Jews say, because the law is weak in the flesh, that is, in the letter, and can do nothing according to the letter: for the law brings nothing to perfection. But according to the advice which we bring to the law, all things can be done spiritually. Sacrifices too can be offered spiritually, which now cannot be offered carnally. The law of leprosy too can be kept spiritually, which cannot be kept according to the letter. So, as we understand, as we perceive, and as we give advice, the law does everything; but according to the letter, not everything, but very little.

After this, when Jethro had departed, and Moses had come from Rephidim into the desert of Sinai, and there the Lord had come down to Moses in a pillar of cloud, so that the people, seeing, might believe him and hear his words, the Lord said to Moses: “Go down, testify to the people, and purify them today and tomorrow, and let them wash their garments and be ready for the third day.” If there is anyone who comes together to hear the word of God, let him hear what the Lord commanded: he ought to come sanctified to hear the word; he ought to wash his garments. For if you have brought soiled garments here, you too will hear: “Friend, how did you come in here not having a wedding garment?” No one, then, can hear the word of God unless he has first been sanctified, that is, unless he is holy in body and spirit, unless he has washed his garments. For he is about to go in a little later to the wedding supper, he is about to eat of the flesh of the Lamb, he is about to drink the cup of salvation. Let no one enter this supper in soiled garments. For Wisdom too commanded this elsewhere, saying: “At all times let your garments be white.” For your garments were washed once, when you came to the grace of baptism; you were purified in body, you were cleansed from all defilement of flesh and spirit. What God has cleansed, then, do not you make unclean. Hear now, then, the kind of sanctification too: “Do not approach a woman,” it says, “today and tomorrow, so that on the third day you may hear the word of God.” This is what the Apostle too says: “It is good for a man not to touch a woman,” while keeping the remedy for those who, because of their weakness, need the remedy of marriage. Yet let us hear the Apostle's advice, saying: “Because the time is short, it remains that those who have wives be as though they had none, and those who buy as though they did not possess, and those who use this world as though they did not use it. For the form of this world is passing away”: the temporal kingdom is passing away, so that the perpetual and eternal may come, as we are commanded to say in prayer too, “Thy kingdom come,” in Christ Jesus our Lord, to whom be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.