Homilies on Psalms 36–38 (LXX numbering; Psalms 37–39 in English Bibles) 3.10–4.1

“And they will not be put to shame in the evil time.” Only the righteous will not be put to shame in the evil time. Here he calls the time of judgment the evil time, because of the multitude of sinners and of those whom cruel torments will receive. Then, in the time of the resurrection, when all have risen, and some rise to eternal life and others to eternal shame, then, he says, the righteous will not be put to shame, because nothing worthy of shame will be found in their deeds. And he adds: “And in the days of famine they will be satisfied.” First we must ask what the days of famine are. God threatens in a certain place through the prophet: “I will send famine upon the earth, not a famine of bread nor a thirst for water, but a famine of hearing the word of God. And they will go about from the east to the west to hear the word of the Lord, and will not find it.” These, then, are the days, and this is the time of famine, when there is no one to speak the word of God, as there is now a famine among the Jews. For nowhere is there a prophet, nowhere a wise man, nowhere a prudent judge, nowhere a captain of fifty, nowhere a wise counselor, nowhere an intelligent hearer: God has taken away everything from Judea and Jerusalem. But among us too there is great fear lest a famine threaten us also. For as those of whom we spoke above, by reading the law and not doing it, brought it upon themselves to suffer a famine of the word of God, and all the gifts of God we mentioned above were taken away from them, and the clouds (that is, the prophets) were commanded not to rain upon them the rain of the word of God, so we must fear lest some such kind of correction be brought upon us too. Rather let us become not only hearers of the law but also doers, so that the Lord may command his clouds, not one or two but many, to rain upon us, so that in the Church “two or three prophets may speak, and the others judge; and if something is revealed to another who sits by, let the first be silent”; so that there may be more workers who need not be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth; so that each of the teachers and preachers of the word of God may say with Paul: “I planted, and he watered, but God gave the growth.” This will happen if we, who are watered by the clouds and have heard the word of God, bear the fruits that the Apostle lists, that is, the fruits of the Spirit, which are joy, love, peace, patience, long-suffering, and the like. If we are slow to bear these fruits, we must fear lest the clouds be commanded to withhold their showers from us, and each of the saints begin to do what is written: “He who understands will sit and be silent at that time, for it is an evil time.” But we ought to remember the history of the ancients concerning a time of famine, and how the righteous man is satisfied in a time of famine. There was, I think, a famine in the times of the prophet Elijah, when heaven was shut for three years and six months. At that time the people were in danger from famine, but Elijah did not suffer famine. At one time he was fed by an angel, when he went in the strength of that food and remained forty days and forty nights; at another he was fed by the ministry of ravens, which brought him bread in the morning and meat in the evening; again, he is related to have drunk water from the brook Cherith, and to have come to Zarephath of the Sidonians, to a widow, in time of famine. And because he was righteous, he did not suffer the want of famine, but everywhere abundance was at hand for him; and at one and the same time there was famine for sinners, while Elijah … Even if a famine should come at some time (may the Lord not bring it upon his Church!), yet if it does happen, he who has understanding and exercise in meditating on the word of God, who has resolved to meditate on his law day and night and to train himself to grasp the spiritual understanding, will find in them that bread which came down from heaven, and the word of God will become for him abundant food and flowing drink; and not only food and drink, but, if he can search out the deeper mysteries of the mystical understanding, the words of God will be delicacies for him. A deeper sense can also be opened in this place in another way. The Lord and Savior says: “Night will come, when no one can work.” He says this of the time that will come after this age, the time when each will receive punishment for his evils. He says, then, that that night will come when no one can any longer do anything, but each is then fed from the works that he worked while he was here. When it is night, then, no one works in that time; when sinners are afflicted with punishments, there will doubtless be famine for those who have gathered no fruits of good works. But in that time of famine the righteous will be satisfied, namely from the fruits of their righteousness. For as in the desert they gathered manna for six days, but on the sixth day gathered not one day’s measure but as much as would suffice for the next day, and each ate on the Sabbath day what he had gathered on the sixth, so now too the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ is to be thought of as a kind of sixth day, together with this time of his dispensation, which he accomplished in this age by his passion. And therefore, while we are in the sixth day, let us gather a double portion of manna, so that it may suffice us when the true Sabbath observance of the people of God comes. For if we have not gathered a double portion of food, to suffice us both in the present age and in the future, we shall not be satisfied in the days of famine. For so, when the righteous are satisfied in the days of famine, “sinners,” it says, “will perish; but the enemies of the Lord, as soon as they have been honored and raised up, will vanish, vanishing like smoke.” The divine word teaches us what the honors of this age are. When you see one man swollen with pride after receiving the fasces of a province, another lifted up by consulships, another raised by various magistracies, when you see all this elevation, consider that “vanishing, they will vanish like smoke.” Remember also how many you have seen in these honors, and to what heights you remember them climbing, even in your own time, and see whether all of them, after they were exalted, were not cast down again and laid low, and vanished like smoke. “But the enemies of the Lord, as soon as they were honored and raised up, vanishing, will vanish like smoke.” On the contrary, the friends of the Lord, as soon as they have been despised, scorned, and humbled by people, will be exalted and raised up by God, for he who humbles himself will be exalted. After this some things are added that need no small explanation; for it says: “The sinner borrows and will not repay, but the righteous shows mercy and lends.” Even this, if we take it according to the letter, will not seem true. For many sinners receive money on loan and repay it with interest, so that they themselves sometimes make a profit from the money they borrowed. But here the prophet lays it down: “The sinner will borrow and will not pay back.” If, however, you understand who it is who lends at interest and who receives the loan, and ask who the sinner is who does not repay the money he took, you will understand that what is written is consistent. For example, Paul … and his hearers. Paul is the one who lends the Lord’s money at interest; the hearers are those who receive from his mouth the money of the word lent at interest. If the one who receives the money from him is righteous, he will repay the full interest and say: “You gave me five minas; see, I have gained five more.” If he is righteous, he says: “You gave me five talents; see, you have ten”; or, “You gave me two talents; see, you have four.” But if he is a sinner, after receiving the word of God he does not work from it the works of the commandment and does not pay the interest, but consumes all that he received on loan. See, now too all of you to whom I am speaking are receiving money lent at interest: my words. This money is the Lord’s. Or if you doubt it, hear the prophet saying that “the words of the Lord are pure words, silver tested by fire, purified from earth seven times.” If, then, I teach badly, my money is counterfeit, like that of those to whom it was said, “Your silver is counterfeit.” But if I teach well, the money or silver is not mine but the Lord’s, and it is tested. I am permitted, then, to lend the Lord’s money at interest, but not my own money, because the word of the Lord forbids lending human money at interest. What, then, is human money, and what is the Lord’s? I think that the word of Valentinus is human and counterfeit money; the money of Marcion and Basilides is human and counterfeit; and the word of all the heretics is not tested money, nor does it bear the Lord’s image intact, but a forged one, which was stamped, so to speak, outside the mint, because it was composed outside the Church. But if you see someone speaking not his own words but God’s, who truly dares to say, “Or do you seek proof of Christ who speaks in me?”, know that he lends at interest, and lends not his own money but the Lord’s, and does what is written: “All day long he shows mercy and lends,” having the authority to lend given to him by my God Jesus Christ himself. For it is the Lord himself who in the parable, having given out money, says to the servants … to the wicked servant, who had disdained to multiply the money, he says: “You ought to have given my money to the bankers, and on my return I would have demanded it with interest.” This is the sinner who borrows and will not pay. But the righteous man will return the money he received with interest, that is, he presents the word of God he received together with works. You hear a sermon on chastity, you praise the teacher, you embrace the teaching, you admire the instruction: by these you have received the money of chastity. And if you are a sinner, when you leave the church you throw yourself into worldly business, lewdness receives you, drunkenness follows, and the evil conversations of corrupt people; at once you forget all that you had received from the teacher, that you had praised and admired, and you roll back again to shameless harlots, and you have become a sinner who borrowed the word of chastity and does not repay the works of chastity. Similarly, if you have heard the word of righteousness in church and gone outside, and your neighbor meets you, whose little field you had coveted, at once you forget what was said and, to satisfy your greed, you seize what belongs to others; and so, having borrowed the money of righteousness, you do not pay the interest by doing deeds of righteousness. So in each matter “the sinner borrows and will not pay, but the righteous shows mercy and lends.” Not only, it says, does the righteous man lend, that is, not only does he preach the word and teach the unlearned, but he also has mercy on the weak. For he follows the example of the Lord, who says: “I desire mercy rather than sacrifice.”

“For those who bless him will inherit the land, but those who curse him will be destroyed.” Those who bless him, that is, who bless the righteous man, will inherit the land. What land? That good land, that broad land flowing with milk and honey, where the goods are that are truly good: those who bless the righteous man will possess it, but those who curse him will be destroyed. And does it seem a small thing to you sometimes to speak ill of the saints? Is it a very light matter for you to say of the servants of God, “That one is such and such, that one is a pretender, that one loves the world, and that one is an impostor”? Do you not hear that those who curse the righteous man will be destroyed? Or if this seems small to you, hear God saying elsewhere to the righteous man: “I will be an enemy to your enemies, and I will oppose your adversaries.” You see how dangerous it is to be hostile to the righteous or to speak ill of the saints. For if we truly believe what the Lord said of each of his servants, “I was hungry and you did not give me to eat,” and what he adds, that whoever did it to one of the least of his did it to him, it follows that he would also say this: … “or when did we slander you, speaking falsely against you?” Then he will say to us: “Truly I say to you, what you did to one of these least of mine, you did to me.” For as by giving food to one of these you did it to me, and by giving drink to one of these you gave it to me, and as by clothing one of these you clothed me, so by cursing one of these you cursed me; and if you blessed or honored one of these, you blessed me and honored me. As he also says elsewhere: “Whoever receives you receives me,” and “Whoever rejects them rejects me.” Therefore let us restrain our tongue, admire the servants of the Lord, bless the righteous, and never disparage them nor open our mouth to speak evil, lest we be destroyed; but let us bless, so that we too may obtain a blessing through Christ our Lord, to whom be glory and power for ages of ages. Amen.

“By the Lord,” it says, “the steps of a man are directed.” And elsewhere in this psalm he speaks of the steps of the righteous man in this way: “The law of his God is in his heart, and his steps will not be tripped.” And in the seventy-second psalm it is said: “My steps were all but poured out.” We call them steps from walking, according to what is written in Exodus, that Moses saw the flame of fire and the angel, when the bush was burning but not consumed, and said: “Going aside, or passing over, I will see this great sight.” This passage, then, gives us an occasion for understanding the text we have in hand. On what we recalled as written in Exodus, “going aside I will see this great sight,” I heard one of the wise men before us say, when he explained this passage, that it is not possible for one who stands in the way of life and the business of this world to see the great sight first, that is, to behold and perceive great mysteries; one must first pass from these, rise above everything worldly, and set our sense and mind free, and then come to the contemplation of great and spiritual things, and so at last see the great sight. So he explained the passage we have recalled. But we, whose aim, according to the admonitions of Scripture, is to praise the words of the wise and add to them, can add something of this kind to what he said. Everyone who travels the road to virtue advances by walking, so that little by little, through many stages of the journey, he may reach it. Traveling, then, and walking, as it were, with certain steps, he is always going aside and passing what he has completed, and, leaving behind what is behind, he stretches out to what lies ahead. Going aside, then, he passes the first place of wickedness, and advancing from there with steps and strides he passes other plagues, the slippery and precipitous places of the vices. When he has escaped these too, always stretching out to what lies ahead, less of wickedness remains for him, and all his advance is on the way, provided that as he walks he watches his steps carefully so as not to slip; so that, going past each place of wickedness without striking his foot against it, he may, according to what is written in Exodus, see the great sight. For no one who is still in wickedness, and does not go aside from it and pass it, will be able to behold this great sight of the secrets of God, namely of knowledge and wisdom. It is a great sight, then, when God is seen with a pure heart. It is a great sight when the Word of God and the Wisdom of God, who is his Christ, is known with a pure heart. It is a great sight to know and to believe in the Holy Spirit. This great sight, then, is the knowledge of the Trinity. Yet Moses too saw a great sight then in Exodus: it is an angel that is said to have been seen in the bush, in the fire, and he calls it a great sight. For he understood who was in the angel. At once, indeed, it says to him: “I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” See, then, how great this sight is, though this very thing too is great, to know that God makes his angels spirits and his ministers a burning fire. And now, for Moses, still feeding the flocks of Jethro his father-in-law, and going aside or passing from them, this is a great sight, in which an angel is said to appear to him. But if he also crosses the Red Sea, and the pillar of cloud covers him, and he has venerated the mysteries of the baptism to come, then he will be able to see a still greater sight. For he will enter the darkness and the whirlwind where God himself is said to be, where it is written that Moses alone drew near to God, while the others stood far off. And he advanced so far through these great visions that he said to God: “If I have found favor before you, show yourself to me, that I may see you clearly.” And then he hears from God: “I will put you in a cleft of the rock” (and the rock was Christ), “so that through a very narrow opening you may see my back,” that is, that you may know the things that will be fulfilled in the last times through the assumption of flesh; “but my face you will not be able to see.” But having digressed through very many visions, let us now return to what we set out from the psalm: “By the Lord,” it says, “the steps of a man are directed.” Above we explained how one enters the road to virtue, since one who travels the road to virtue has many things to go aside from and pass. So you too, who are heading toward Christ, who is the power of God, go aside from luxury, harlots, adulteries; go aside from thefts and false witness; then go aside from avarice too, and … There are, then, certain steps and feet in us by which we make this journey: there are steps of the inner man by which we can walk on that way which says, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” As we make this journey, then, we must use many steps in order to pass all the things we mentioned above, because “the steps of a man are directed by the Lord.” For a man who wishes to walk this road, the mere will of his purpose is not enough unless the Lord also directs his steps. For it often happens to travelers that they walk, yet cannot keep to the right road but fall into some errors: like those who are engaged in the learning of philosophy, who seem indeed to walk the road of virtue, but because their steps are not directed by the Lord, do not keep to the right road. The heretics too likewise set out on the road; but when they understand the Scriptures in a fleshly and not a spiritual way, they turn aside to the left. And if they understand them spiritually, but in this spiritual understanding do not hold to the apostolic rule of truth, they too nonetheless fall away to the right, the devil, so to speak, not directing their steps but twisting them from the right way. Let us, then, turning neither to the right nor to the left, enter on the middle way, which is Christ the Lord, for in him the Lord directs the steps of those who walk. “By the Lord, then, the steps of a man will be directed, and he will desire his way,” namely that way of which we spoke above. For he who is directed by God will desire Christ and will long to remain always in Christ.