This work was not written in such a way as if I had undertaken to expound the Gospel in order, but according to the choice and occasion of the one consulting me, with whom it was being read, whenever something seemed obscure to him. And for that reason many things, and perhaps more obscure ones, have been passed over, because the one who inquired about what he did not yet know already knew them, and did not wish his haste to be held back over those things which he had already received in such a way that, by the very constancy of hearing and discussing them, he had committed them firmly and stably to memory.

Some things here are also found expounded not in the same order in which they are narrated in the Gospel, since certain things, deferred in haste, were taken up again when time was given and were written in the place that followed, left vacant in the order of the matters already expounded. After I discovered this, lest anyone, perhaps seeking to read something in this work that had stirred him in the Gospel and prompted him to inquire, should be put off by weariness at the disordered arrangement (since indeed I came to know that things dictated piecemeal as they could be had been gathered and woven into one), I arranged, by prefixing titles in numerical order, that each one might easily find what he needed.

28. That as he was going out from Jericho he gave sight to two blind men.

29. That he said to the disciples: you will say to this mountain: 'be taken up and cast into the sea.'

30. On his saying: and whoever falls on this stone will be broken to pieces.

31. On the man, a king, who made a marriage feast for his son.

32. On the seven brothers who had one wife.

33. What this means, that he said: the whole Law hangs on these two commandments.

34. On his saying: for which is greater, the gold or the temple that sanctifies the gold?

35. On his saying: straining out a gnat, but swallowing a camel.

36. On his saying: how often have I wished to gather your children as a hen.

37. On his saying: pray that your flight may not be in winter or on a sabbath.

38. On his saying: for as lightning comes from the east and shines as far as the west.

39. On his saying: from the fig tree learn its lesson.

40. On his saying of Judas: it would have been better for him not to have been born.

41. That he was sold for thirty pieces of silver.

42. On his saying: where the body is, there the eagles will be gathered.

43. On his saying: I will not drink from this fruit of the vine from now on.

44. That they spat in his face and struck him with their fists.

45. On Peter's threefold denial.

46. That he followed at a distance the Lord going to his passion.

47. That the Lord prayed three times before he was handed over.

Question 1. When he said, no one knows the Son except the Father, he did not add, "and anyone to whom the Father chooses to reveal him," as he did when he said, no one knows the Father except the Son, and added, and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.

This is not to be understood as though the Son could be known by no one except the Father alone, while the Father could be known not only by the Son but also by those to whom the Son has revealed him.

It was rather said in this way so that we might understand that both the Father and the Son himself are revealed through the Son, because he himself is the light of our mind; so that in what he added afterward, and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him, you may take not only the Father but also the Son; for the addition was made with reference to the whole of what he had said.

For the Father declares himself by his Word; and the Word declares not only that which is declared through the Word, but also itself.

2. That the Lord's disciples began to pluck ears of grain and eat them, which they could not do without rubbing them, is this: put to death your members which are upon the earth (Col 3:5), that is, because no one passes into the body of Christ unless he has been stripped of his carnal garments. Hence comes put off the old man (Col 3:9), hence too comes the circumcision made without hands in the stripping off of the flesh (Col 2:11).

3. In the smoking flax it is to be noted that the light, once forsaken, produces a stench.

4. Then there was brought to him a blind and mute man who had a demon, that is, one who does not believe and is subject to the devil, who does not understand and does not confess the faith itself, of which it is said: with the mouth confession is made unto salvation (Rom 10:10), or one who does not give praise to God.

5. In that he said, and if I cast out demons by Beelzebul, then even according to your own opinion, therefore the kingdom of God has come upon you, because the kingdom of the devil cannot stand, which you confess to be divided against itself.

He now calls it the kingdom of God, by which the impious are condemned and separated from the faithful who are now doing penance for their sins. He calls that one the strong man, because he himself held people fast, so that they could not by their own strength rescue themselves from him, but only through the grace of God.

By his goods he means all unbelievers. Unless he first binds the strong man. By he will have bound he means that he will have taken from him the power of hindering the will of the faithful from following Christ and obtaining the kingdom of God.

6. He calls them a brood of vipers because he also calls them sons of the devil. For a man is a son of the devil to the extent that he imitates him by sinning.

7. For as Jonah was in the belly of the whale three days and three nights, so will the Son of man be in the heart of the earth three days and three nights. You are to take the part of the sixth day on which he was buried, together with the preceding night, as one night and day, that is, as a whole day; the sabbath as a night and a day; and the Lord's night with the same day dawning. And so, by taking the part for the whole, you have three days and three nights. For just as a pregnant woman is said to carry for ten months, nine are complete; but the beginning of the tenth is taken for the whole.

And that the Lord showed himself on the mountain, one evangelist says this happened after six days (See Mt 17:1), but another says after eight days (See Lk 9:28), reckoning the latter part of the first day, on which the Lord promised this would come to pass, and the earlier part of the last day, on which what he promised was fulfilled, as whole and complete days; so that you may understand that the one who said "after six days" mentioned only the days in between, which were truly whole and completely finished. For in Genesis the day begins from light and ends in darkness (See Gen 1:5), to signify the fall of man; but now it goes from darkness to light, as it is said, that light might shine out of darkness (2 Cor 4:6), because a man freed from sins comes to the light of righteousness.

8. When the unclean spirit has gone out of a man and so forth signifies that certain people will so believe that they cannot bear the labors of continence and will return to the world. What is said, he takes with him seven other spirits, is understood to mean that when someone has fallen away from righteousness he will also practice pretense.

For the desire of the flesh, driven out from its accustomed works through penance, when it finds no delights in which to rest, returns more greedily and again takes possession of the man's mind, if, when it was driven out, negligence followed, so that the Word of God was not brought in, through sound doctrine, as a dweller in the cleansed house. And since he will have not only those seven vices that are contrary to the seven spiritual virtues, but will also pretend through hypocrisy to have the very virtues themselves, therefore, having taken with him seven other spirits more wicked, that is, by this sevenfold pretense, that concupiscence returns, so that the last state of the man is worse than the first.

9. As to what he says, one a hundredfold, another sixtyfold, another thirtyfold: the hundredfold belongs to martyrs, on account of holiness of life or contempt of death; the sixtyfold to virgins, on account of interior repose, since they do not fight against the habit of the flesh, for repose is customarily granted to those of sixty years after their military service or after public affairs; the thirtyfold to the married, since this is the age of those who do battle, for they have the sharper struggle, lest they be overcome by their desires.

10. All uncleanness in the crop is called weeds. That the weeds are first separated is said because, with tribulation going before, the impious will be separated from the pious, which is understood to be done through the good angels, since the good can carry out the offices of punishment with a good mind, as a king does, as a judge does; but the wicked cannot carry out the offices of mercy.

11. The grain of mustard seed, by reason of the fervor of faith or because it is said to drive out poisons, becomes greater than all the herbs, that is, than the teachings. Now teachings are the tenets of the sects, that is, what has pleased each of the sects.

12. The leaven that the woman took and hid in three measures of flour: by the woman he means wisdom; by the leaven, love, which makes it ferment and rouses it; by the three measures of flour, either those three things in man: with the whole heart and with the whole soul and with the whole mind (Mt 22:37), or those three fruitful measures: a hundredfold, sixtyfold, thirtyfold (Mt 13:23), or those three kinds of men: Noah, Daniel, and Job (Ezek 14:14).

13. By the treasure hidden in a field he meant the two Testaments of the Law in the Church, which, when someone has touched them with a partial understanding, he perceives that great things lie hidden there. And he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field, that is, by contempt for temporal things he procures for himself leisure, so that he may be rich in the knowledge of God.

14. That the Jews said: where did this man get this wisdom and these mighty works? Wisdom in the things he was speaking, mighty works in the things he was doing. And so the Apostle too, when he said Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God (1 Cor 1:24), referred the power to signs, on account of the Jews, but the wisdom to teaching, on account of the Greeks, that is, the gentiles.

15. That the disciples said he was a ghost signifies what was said: will he find faith on the earth? (Lk 18:8), because certain people who have yielded to the devil will doubt about the coming of Christ. But that Peter implores the Lord's help lest he sink signifies that even after the last persecution the Church is to be purified by certain tribulations; which Paul also signifies when he says: he will be saved, but only as through fire (1 Cor 3:15). That it follows that all who were in the boat, worshiping, said: truly you are the Son of God, signifies that his glory will then be made manifest, through a clear vision, to those who now walk by faith.

16. Whatever gift comes from me will profit you, that is, the gift you offer for my sake will now belong to you. By these words the children signify that their parents' offerings on their behalf are no longer needed, since they had reached an age at which they could now make offerings for themselves. The Pharisees, then, denied that those who had come to this age, so that they could say this to their parents, were guilty if, after they had said it, they did not render honor to their parents.

17. Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted will be rooted up, that is, carnal desire, in keeping with which those who thought as they did were offended at the omission of miraculous signs or even at their own traditions, and did not care for the precepts of life, which purify the mind from desire.

18. That he saves both the centurion's servant and the daughter of the Canaanite woman without coming to their houses signifies that the gentiles, to whom he did not come, would be saved through his word. That their children are healed at their request, the person of the Church is to be understood, which is to itself both mother and children; for all together, of whom the Church consists, are called the mother, while the individuals are called the children.

19. That the crowds brought to the Lord the mute, who do not praise God or do not confess the faith; the blind, who do not understand even if they obey those who command; the deaf, who do not obey even if they understand; the lame, who do not fulfill the precepts.

20. That the Lord said: when it is evening, you say: 'it will be fair weather, for the sky is red,' that is, by the blood of Christ's passion at his first coming the forgiveness of sins is given; and in the morning: 'today there will be a storm, for the sky is red and lowering,' that is, that at his second coming he is to come with fire going before him. You know, then, how to interpret the face of the sky, but you cannot interpret the signs of the times? By the signs of the times he spoke of his coming or his passion, which the rosy sky in the evening resembles, and likewise of the tribulation that is to come before his coming, which the rosy and lowering sky in the morning resembles.

21. That the Lord said: Elijah indeed is to come and will restore all things, that is, either those whom the persecution of the Antichrist will have thrown into confusion, or that he himself will restore by dying what he owes.

22. That he said: he often falls into the fire and sometimes into the water. The fire refers to anger, because it seeks the heights; the water to the pleasures of the flesh. Likewise, in that the disciples say: why could we not cast it out?, lest they be lifted up into pride by working such miracles, they were rather admonished, through the humility of faith, as through a grain of mustard seed, to take care that earthly elation, which is signified by the name of the mountain, should pass away.

23. That he said: then the sons are free, in every kingdom the sons are to be understood as free, that is, as not liable to tribute. Much more, then, ought the sons of that kingdom under which all earthly kingdoms stand to be free in any earthly kingdom whatever.

24. That the Lord says: but whoever causes one of these little ones to stumble, that is, of the humble, such as he wishes his disciples to be, by not obeying or even by opposing him, as the Apostle says of Alexander the coppersmith (2 Tim 4:14), it would be better for him to have a millstone hung around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea, that is, it befits him that the desire of temporal things, to which the foolish and the blind are bound fast, should drag him down to ruin, fettered by its own weight.

25. That a debtor of ten thousand talents was brought to the lord, and he ordered him to be sold, along with his wife and children and all that he had, and payment to be made, it is to be understood that he was a debtor of the ten precepts of the Law; and that, on account of his desire and his works, as a wife and children, he had to pay the penalty, which is his price; for the price of one sold is understood as the punishment of one condemned.

In that he said: he refused to forgive his fellow servant, but went out and cast him into prison and so forth, it is to be understood: he held this disposition against him, namely that he wished him punished. But the fellow servants who told the lord what was being done can be understood as the Church, which both looses that man and binds the other.

26. That the Lord says the rich man does not enter the kingdom of God, and the disciples say: who can be saved?, since the rich are few in comparison with the multitude of the poor, it is to be understood that all who desire such things noticed that they were reckoned in the number of the rich.

27. That the Lord tells two of his disciples apart that he is to suffer, he did this to confirm the testimony for the future, since he said: by the mouth of two or three witnesses every word shall stand (Mt 18:16); for so that what he said might neither be made common nor lack the firmness of human testimony, he could not say it to fewer than two; or else to show forth the sacrament of love, for there cannot be love among fewer than two. Now he was to suffer not out of the necessity of a debt on account of his own sin, but out of love, to discharge our sins.

28. The Lord goes out from Jericho, now departing from this earth by his resurrection. Great crowds follow him; peoples and gentiles believe in him. But the two blind men sitting beside the way signify those from each people who already cling, through faith, to the temporal dispensation, in keeping with which Christ is the way, and who desire to be enlightened, that is, to understand something of the eternity of the Word, which they desired to obtain as Jesus passed by, that is, through the merit of faith, by which one believes that the Son of God was both born a man and suffered for us. For through this dispensation Jesus, as it were, passes by, because such action is temporal.

But it was fitting that they should cry out so loudly until they overcame the noise of the crowd resisting them, that is, that they should so perseveringly stretch out their mind in praying and knocking, until by the strongest effort they overcame the habit of carnal desires, which, like a crowd, clamors against the thought striving to see the light of eternal truth, or overcame the very crowd of carnal men hindering spiritual pursuits.

And so Jesus, who says, to him who asks it will be given, and he who seeks will find, and to him who knocks it will be opened (Mt 7:7), hearing those coming to him, namely those reaching by the very ardor of their desire what they desire, stands still, touches them, and enlightens them. For the eternity of the Word does not pass by as that temporal dispensation does, since it, remaining in itself, makes all things new (See Wis 7:27).

Therefore, because faith in the temporal incarnation prepares us to understand eternal things, they were admonished, as Jesus passed by, that they should be enlightened, and they were enlightened by him as he stood still. For temporal things pass by, but eternal things stand.

29. That the Lord says to the disciples: you will say to this mountain: be taken up and cast into the sea, he spoke of pride, which belongs to the worldly: the servant of God ought to say this to himself, that he may drive it away from himself, since it does not befit him; or else that through their faith, since the Gospel was preached through them, the Lord himself, who has been called a mountain (See Isa 2:2), was taken away from the Jews, so as to be cast forth into the gentiles as into the sea.

30. That the Lord says: and whoever falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; but on whomever it falls, it will crush him, by those who fall on it he means those who now despise him or treat him with insult, and therefore do not yet perish utterly, but are nonetheless broken, so that they do not walk rightly. But on those upon whom it falls, it will come down from above upon them in judgment with the punishment of perdition; therefore he said it will crush them, so that the impious are like the dust which the wind drives from the face of the earth (Ps 1:4).

31. That the Lord said: the kingdom of heaven is like a man, a king, who made a marriage feast for his son: by the marriage he meant the Word made flesh, because in that man whom he took on the Church was joined to God. In that he said: my oxen and fatlings are killed: by the oxen he meant the leaders of the peoples, by the fatlings all who are fattened. In that the lord said: go to the partings of the ways, and whomever you find call to the marriage feast: by the ways are understood the teachings of the gentiles, because from all of them they came to the marriage feast, that is, they believed in Christ.

32. That the Sadducees say to the Lord: there were among us seven brothers, and one, having taken a wife, died, and the second, and the rest, are understood as impious men, who could not bear the fruit of righteousness on earth through all the seven ages of the world, in which this earth subsists; for afterward this earth itself will pass away, through which all those, like seven husbands, passed barrenly.

33. That the Lord said: on these two commandments depend the whole Law and the prophets: by depend he meant, that is, it is referred to that point where it has its end.

34. That the Lord said: for which is greater, the gold or the temple that sanctifies the gold?, and likewise said: for which is greater, the gift or the altar that sanctifies the gift?, by the temple and the altar Christ himself is to be understood, and by the gold and the gift the praises and the sacrifices of prayers which we offer in him through him. For he is not sanctified by these, but these are sanctified through him.

35. That the Lord said: straining out a gnat, refers to what he said: they tithe all the little things. Swallowing a camel refers to what he said: they have neglected the weightier matters of the Law, mercy and judgment and faith, so that this is the meaning: you observe the least things, you despise the greatest.

For from this perversity that also happened to them by which these things can be referred allegorically, namely that they released Barabbas (See Mt 27:20), because of course he did not break the sabbath, which they observed carnally with great diligence, but killed the Lord, who set forth the sabbath spiritually through judgment and mercy and faith, which they most despised. For by the name gnat a seditious murderer is not absurdly figured, because this creature both disturbs by its buzzing and delights in blood; and by the name camel, on account of the greatness that humbles itself to undergo burdens, the Lord is fittingly understood.

36. That the Lord said to Jerusalem: how often have I wished to gather your children, as a hen gathers her young under her wings, and you would not. This kind of creature has great affection for its young, so that, affected by their weakness, it too grows weak; and, what you will find more rarely in other creatures, protecting its young with its wings, it fights against the hawk. So too our mother, the Wisdom of God, in a certain way made weak through the assumption of flesh, whence the Apostle says: what is weak in God is stronger than men (1 Cor 1:25), protects our weakness and resists the devil, lest he carry us off. And in this defense what the hen attempts against the hawk by affection, Wisdom accomplishes against the devil by power.

37. That the Lord said: pray that your flight may not be in winter or on a sabbath, that is, that you be not held back by any hindrance, since in winter one was hindered from a journey by rains or cold, and on the sabbath, on which it was not permitted to set out; or else, in another sense, that no one be found, on that day, amid the sorrow or the joy of temporal things.

38. That the Lord said: for as lightning comes from the east and shines as far as the west, so will the coming of the Son of man be: by the name of the east and the west he wished to signify the whole world, throughout which the Church was to exist, the Gospel beginning from Jerusalem (See Lk 24:47), according to that sense in which he said: from now on you will see the Son of man coming on the clouds (Mt 26:64). For he fittingly named the Church now lightning, which especially is wont to flash out from the clouds. Therefore, the authority of the Church having been established throughout the world, bright and manifest, he consequently admonishes the disciples and all the faithful and those who shall wish to believe in him, not to believe schismatics and heretics. For each schism and each heresy either has its place in the world, holding some particular part, or deceives the curiosity of men by hidden and obscure gatherings. To this belongs what he says: if anyone says to you: 'behold, here is the Christ, or there,' which signifies the regions of lands and provinces, or in the inner rooms or in the desert, which signifies the hidden and obscure gatherings of heretics. Therefore, in that he said his coming would reach from the east to the west, it tells against those who are named after particular parts of the lands and say that the Christ is among them. And in that he says as lightning, it tells against those who gather secretly, as it were in inner rooms, and few, as it were in the desert. For the name lightning belongs to the manifestation and brightness of the Church, signifying also the night or the clouds of this age; for then the brightness of the lightning appears.

39. That the Lord said: but from the fig tree learn its lesson: by the fig tree understand the human race, on account of the itch of the flesh. When its branch has now become tender, that is, when the sons of men have, through faith in Christ, advanced to spiritual fruits, and in them the honor of adoption as sons of God has shone forth.

40. That the Lord said of Judas: it would have been better for him not to have been born, was this perhaps into this life, so that he spoke in the usual way? For nothing can be good for one who is not. And if anyone contends that there is some life before this one, it is proved that it was expedient not only for Judas, but for no one, to be born. Or does he mean it would have been good for the devil not to be born to sin? Or was it also good for that one not to be born to Christ through his calling, so that he might not be an apostate?

41. That the Lord was sold for thirty pieces of silver signified, through Judas, the wicked Jews, who, following carnal and temporal things, which belong to the five senses of the body, refused to have Christ. And because they did this in the sixth age of the world, it was signified that they received six times five as the price of the Lord sold. At which time the prophet rebukes such men, saying: O sons of men, how long will you be heavy of heart? Why do you love vanity and seek a lie? (Ps 4:2 (4:3)), so that, even if in the five ages there had been some excuse for following vanity, at least in the sixth they might grasp the truth, which was preached and shown through the Lord Jesus, just as on the sixth day man was made in the image of God (See Gen 1:26). And because they refused, they have the image of the prince of this age impressed six times five, and they do not have Christ, through whom there has been sealed upon us the light of your countenance, O Lord (Ps 4:6 (4:7)). And because the word of the Lord is silver (See Ps 12:6 (11:7)), but they understood even the Law itself carnally, they held, as it were in silver, the image of worldly rule impressed, having lost the Lord.

42. That the Lord says: where the body is, there the eagles will be gathered, that is, into heaven, whither he raised the body with himself in the man he assumed, which was also called a corpse for this reason, that he was speaking these things as one about to die. There the eagles will be gathered is said of the spiritual, who, by imitating his passion and humility, are filled as it were from his body. For he took on a body for our sake, on account of humility, and likewise his passion.

43. That the Lord says to the disciples at the time of his passion: I will not drink from this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it new with you in the kingdom of my Father, he wishes us to understand this to be old, when he calls that one new. Therefore, since he had taken a body from the stock of Adam, who is called the old man, which he was to hand over to death in his passion, whence also through the sacrament of wine he commends his blood, what else ought we to understand by new wine than the immortality of renewed bodies? In that he says I will drink with you, he also promises to them the resurrection of their bodies for the putting on of immortality; for with you is to be taken as said not of the same time, but of the same renewal. For the Apostle says that we too have risen with Christ (See Col 2:12), so that the hope of the thing to come may bring present gladness even now. And in that he says that this fruit of the vine too will be new, it signifies that these very bodies will rise according to the heavenly renewal, which now, according to their earthly oldness, are to die. But if you understand the vine, from whose oldness he drinks this cup of the passion, as the Jews themselves, it is signified that this very people will come to the body of Christ through newness of life, when, the fullness of the gentiles having entered in, all Israel will be saved (See Rom 11:25-26).

44. In that it was said: they spat in his face, it signified those who spurn the presence of his grace. Likewise, as it were, those strike him with their fists who prefer their own honors to him; those give blows on his face who, blinded by faithlessness, affirm that he has not come, as though banishing and repelling his presence.

45. That Peter, not yet firmly established in faith, denied the Lord three times, his very threefold denial seems to have designated the depraved error of heretics. For the error of heretics concerning Christ is bounded by three kinds: for they are deceived either about his divinity, or about his humanity, or about both.

46. That Peter follows at a distance the Lord going to his passion signifies that the Church will indeed follow, that is, imitate, the passion of the Lord, but in a far different way; for the Church suffers for itself, but he suffered for the Church.

47. Just as the temptation of desire is threefold, so too the temptation of fear is threefold. To the desire that lies in curiosity is opposed the fear of death; for as in the former there is a greed for knowing things, so in the latter there is a dread of losing such knowledge. To the desire of honors or praise is opposed the fear of disgrace and insults. To the desire of pleasure is opposed the fear of pain. It is therefore not absurd to understand that, on account of the threefold temptation of the passion, the Lord prayed three times that the cup might pass, but in such a way that the will of the Father might rather be fulfilled.

1. That Zechariah hears from the angel: your prayer has been heard.

2. That he teaches the crowds from the boat.

3. That he says to the cleansed leper: go, show yourself to the priest.

4. On the paralytic who was let down to him through the roof.

5. How Joseph could have had two fathers.

6. On the seventy-seven generations.

7. On the one who had a withered right hand.

8. On his saying: good measure, pressed down and shaken together and running over, they will give into your bosom.

9. On his saying: can a blind man lead a blind man?

10. On the one who dug deep and laid the foundation upon the rock.

11. On the children sitting in the marketplace and calling to one another.

12. On his saying: no one lights a lamp and covers it with a vessel or puts it under a bed.

13. On the one in whom there was a legion of demons.

14. On the seventy-two disciples.

15. On his saying: if the light that is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness?

16. On his saying: now you Pharisees cleanse the outside of the cup and the dish.

17. On the finger of God.

18. On the fasting of the bridegroom's sons.

19. On the one who, going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, fell among robbers.

20. That Martha received him into her house, where Mary sat at his feet.

21. On the one who at midnight asks three loaves from a friend.

22. On the bread and the fish and the egg.

23. On his saying: you have taken away the key of knowledge.

24. On his saying: the soul is more than food.

25. On his saying: let your loins be girded and your lamps burning.

26. On the measure of wheat that the faithful steward gives to the household.

27. On his saying: when you see a cloud rising in the west.

28. On his saying about the stature of the body, to which they cannot add anything.

29. On his saying: do not be lifted up on high.

30. On those invited to the supper.

31. On the cost of building a tower and the king who has twenty thousand.

32. On the salt that has lost its savor and the lost sheep.

33. On the two sons, of whom the younger set out into a far country.

34. On his saying: make for yourselves friends from the mammon of iniquity.

35. On his saying: if you have not been faithful in what is another's.

36. On his saying: no one can serve two masters.

37. On his saying: the kingdom of heaven suffers violence.

38. On the rich man at whose gate Lazarus lay covered with sores.

39. That the disciples said: Lord, increase our faith.

40. On the ten lepers.

41. On the one who is on the roof and his goods are in the house.

42. On the one who is in the field, that he not turn back.

43. On Lot's wife.

44. On the two in a bed and the two women grinding and the two in a field.

45. On the unjust judge whom the widow kept entreating.

46. On the nobleman who went into a far country to receive a kingdom for himself.

47. On the camel passing through the eye of a needle.

48. On the blind man given sight as he drew near to Jericho.

49. On the life of the saints when they have risen.

50. On his saying: pray that you do not enter into temptation.

51. On what is written of the Lord: he made as though to go farther.

1. That Zechariah, praying for the people, hears from the angel: your prayer has been heard; behold, your wife Elizabeth will conceive and bear a son, and you will call his name John, this first must be noted: that it is not verisimilar that, when he was offering for the sins or the salvation or the redemption of the people, since indeed the people were awaiting him as he offered, an old man with an aged wife could, abandoning the public vows, pray for the receiving of children, especially since no one prays to receive what he despairs of receiving; and he had so despaired of ever having children that he did not believe the angel who promised it.

Therefore, that it is said to him: your prayer has been heard, is to be understood as said for the people. And since the salvation and redemption and abolition of sins of that people was to come through Christ, for this reason it is announced to Zechariah that a son is to be born, because he was destined to be the forerunner of Christ.

And that to him, not believing the angel, it is said by the same angel: and behold, you will be silent until these things are fulfilled in their time, it is to be understood that this signified that prophecy was, as it were, silent, as far as an intelligible sound is concerned, until John's time, because it was not understood until it was fulfilled in the Lord.

2. That the Lord teaches the crowds from the boat signified this time, when the Lord teaches the gentiles from the authority of the Church.

That the Lord, getting into the boat, which was Peter's, asks him to put out a little from the land, signifies either that the word is to be used with moderation toward the crowds, so that neither are earthly things enjoined on them nor are they so withdrawn from earthly things into the deeper things of the sacraments that they do not understand them at all;

or that preaching is to be done first to the gentiles in the nearer regions, so that what he likewise says to Peter, put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch, may pertain to the more remote gentiles, to whom it was preached afterward, as Isaiah says: raise a standard over the nations, to those who are near and to those who are far off (Isa 62:10; 57:19).

So that the fact that even the nets were breaking from the multitude of fish, and the boats were filled so that they began to sink, may signify that there would be so great a multitude of carnal men in the Church, that, even with the rupture of peace as heresies and schisms went out from there, so great a number would remain, and there would be so great a loss of faith and of good morals in it, that such a Church might seem to say to Christ: depart from me, for I am a sinful man, as though, filled with crowds of the carnal and almost submerged by their morals, it in a certain way repelled from itself the governance of the spiritual, in whom above all the person of Christ stands out.

For men do not say this with the voice of the tongue to the good ministers of God, that they should repel them; but with the voice of their morals and deeds they urge that they be withdrawn from, so as not to be governed by the good, and all the more vehemently the more they pay them honor, and yet by their deeds admonish them to withdraw; so that Peter, falling at the feet of the Lord, signified their honoring, but their morals in his saying: depart from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man.

But since the Lord did not do this, for he did not withdraw from them, but, drawing up the boats, brought them to the shore, it signifies that in good and spiritual men there ought not to be this will, that, disturbed by the sins of the crowds, they should desert the ecclesiastical office in order to live, as it were, more securely and tranquilly. Therefore, that, the boats having been drawn up to the land, and all things left behind, they followed him—Peter and James and John—can signify the end of time, when those who have clung to Christ are utterly to withdraw from the sea of this world.

3. That the Lord says to the cleansed leper: go, show yourself to the priest and offer for your cleansing, as Moses commanded, for a testimony to them, here he seems to approve the sacrifice that was commanded through Moses (See Lev 14:10), although the Church has not received it. This can be understood to have been commanded for this reason, that the sacrifice of the Holy of Holies (See Lev 6:25), which is his body, had not yet begun to be. For he had not yet offered his holocaust in the passion, by which sacrifice, once confirmed among the believing peoples, the very temple itself, where those sacrifices were wont to be offered, was overthrown. And this was done according to the prophecy of Daniel (See Dan 9:27). For the signifying sacrifices ought not to be taken away before that which was signified had been confirmed by the testimony of the apostles preaching and the faith of the believing peoples.

4. By the paralytic can be understood the soul slack in its members, that is, in good works, seeking Christ, that is, the will of the Word of God, but hindered by the crowds, unless the tile—that is, the covering of the Scriptures—is opened, and through these he comes to the knowledge of Christ, that is, descends to his humility by the devotion of faith. But those by whom he is let down can signify the good teachers in the Church. And that he is let down with his bed signifies that Christ ought to be known by a man still established in this flesh. Yet that bed, once healed, he is afterward commanded to carry and to go into his house, so that it may be understood that, with the forgiveness of sins and the members of the soul growing strong again through good hope, this work remains: that the weakness of the soul should not now rest, as on a bed, in carnal joys, but should rather itself restrain the carnal affections and reach toward the rest of the secret places of its own heart.

5. 1. The question is not absurdly raised, how Joseph could have had two fathers; for Matthew says he was begotten by the one who was called Jacob (See Mt 1:16), but Luke says he was the son of the one who was called Heli. Nor can it be said in this case that one man had two names, as is clearly wont to happen not only among the gentiles but also among the Jews; for whoever thinks this is easily refuted by the rest of the series of generations. For what will he say about the grandfathers, great-great-grandfathers, great-grandfathers, and the other ancestors, whose different names each evangelist weaves into his own account? And finally, what about the very number, since Luke counts forty-three generations from the Lord back to David (See Lk 3:23-31), but Matthew twenty-eight, or twenty-seven, from David to the Lord (See Mt 1:6-16)? For, by the grace of a certain sacrament, one man is counted twice, up to the deportation and again from that same deportation.

5. 2. We must therefore ask how Joseph could have had two fathers. And to me, for the present, three explanations occur, one of which the evangelist may have followed. For either Joseph had one natural father, and another had adopted him. Or, in the manner of the Jews, when one man had died without children, a kinsman taking his wife reckoned the son whom he begot to the deceased kinsman (See Deut 25:5-6), so that, since he was begotten by one and to another, Joseph might fittingly be said to have two fathers. Or one evangelist named the father by whom he was begotten, but the other set down either his maternal grandfather or some other of his more distant kinsmen, in whose place, on account of the bond of kinship, Joseph might not absurdly be set as a son, so that from there on, all the way to David, he would weave a different order of generations than Matthew does. Among these explanations, the one we placed second seems weak, because, when among the Jews anyone raises up offspring by the wife of a deceased brother or kinsman, the child that is born usually takes the name of the deceased (See Retract. 2, 12). Therefore either adoption resolves this question, or descent from ancestors, or some other explanation that does not occur to us at present. And so the folly of those who easily slip into accusing one of the evangelists of falsehood is so great—those who ask why each one mentioned different names of fathers—that it is rashly said that there are only two explanations by which this could rightly have come about, when even to find one suffices to resolve the question.

6. 1. What it may mean that seventy-seven persons are found according to the generations that Luke followed can be asked. For the Lord too made mention of this number, when Peter had asked him about forgiving a brother's sins; for he said one must forgive not only seven times, but seventy times seven (See Mt 18:21-22). Hence it is rightly believed that by the mention of this number he commanded all sins to be forgiven, since indeed he himself, through whom all sins are forgiven, deigned to come to men in a human way in the seventy-seventh generation, according to the testimony of the said evangelist. And most fittingly, since there is also another series of generations, which Matthew sets forth (See Mt 1:1-17), the one who, after the Lord's baptism, counts the generations themselves upward through seventy-seven persons held to this one. For both a return and, as it were, an ascent to God, to whom we are reconciled after the abolition of sins, is expressed when one ascends upward through those generations. And surely through baptism there comes the remission of all sins (See Acts 2:38), which is signified by that number. For in the Lord's baptism (See Mt 3:13-17) sins were not forgiven to the Lord himself, but the very remission of all sins, which by his mercy and power was granted to men, was through that baptism of the Lord and through that number of generations consecrated and sealed.

6. 2. Nor was it without reason and to no purpose that the Lord came in the seventy-seventh generation to abolish all sins, except that in that number something lies hidden which pertains to the signification of all sins. And this is to be considered in the number eleven and the number seven, which numbers, multiplied by each other, reach that total; for eleven times seven, or seven times eleven, make seventy-seven.

Now eleven signifies the transgression of ten. And if in the number ten the perfection of beatitude is signified—whence comes also the fact that all who were hired for the vineyard are rewarded with a denarius (See Mt 20:9-10), which happens when the sevenfold creature is joined to the Trinity of the Creator—it is manifest that the transgression of ten signifies the sin of one who through pride desires to have something more and loses wholeness and perfection.

Now this is multiplied by seven for this reason, that the transgression may be signified as done by the movement of man (See Gen 2:15–3:24). For by the number three the incorporeal part of man is signified, whence comes the fact that we are commanded to love God with the whole heart and with the whole soul and with the whole mind (See Deut 6:5; Mt 22:37), but by the number four the body; for in many ways the nature of the body is found to be fourfold. From these two joined together, then, man, consisting of them, is not absurdly signified by the number seven. But movement is not expressed in numbers when we say "one, two, three, four" and so on, but when we say "once, twice, three times, four times."

Therefore, as I said, not seven and eleven, but seven times eleven, signify the transgression that was done by the movement of sinning man, that is, of one transgressing the stability of his own perfection by the desire of having something more (See Gen 3:1-7), so that long afterward it would be said to the soul through the prophet: you hoped that, if you departed from me, you would have something more. From this beginning of pride all sins run wild (See Sir 10:14-15); and when these are forgiven, we are admonished that pardon must be granted seventy times seven (See Mt 18:22), so that we may understand that no sin is excepted which is not forgiven, through the Church, whose person Peter bears, to one repenting and begging pardon.

7. As to what the Lord says to the Jews about the one who had a withered right hand: I will ask you whether it is lawful on the sabbath to do good or to do evil, to save a soul or to destroy it, the question is, since he healed a body, why he asked thus: to save a soul or to destroy it. Either because he worked those miracles for the sake of faith, in which is the salvation of the soul; or because the very healing of the right hand signified the salvation of the soul, which, ceasing from good works, seemed in a certain way to have a withered right hand; or he put "soul" for "man," as it is customarily said: so many souls were there.

8. That the Lord says: give, and it will be given to you; good measure, pressed down and shaken together and running over, they will give into your bosom, can be taken from that saying by which he says elsewhere: so that they too may receive you into eternal dwellings (Lk 16:9), so that what is said, give, and it will be given to you, may seem to be enjoined on the people, in keeping with which saying the Apostle says: let him who is taught the word share in all good things with him who teaches him (Gal 6:6). For he would not say, they will give into your bosom, except that through the merits of those to whom they will have given even a cup of cold water in the name of a disciple, they will be worthy to receive the heavenly reward (See Mt 10:42).

9. That the Lord says: can a blind man lead a blind man? Will they not both fall into a pit?, perhaps he added this for this reason, lest they should hope to receive from the Levites that measure of which he said, they will give into your bosom, since they gave them tithes (See Num 18:26)—those whom he called blind, because they did not hold to the Gospel—so that the people might rather begin now to hope for that recompense through the disciples of the Lord, whom, wishing to show them to be his imitators, he added also: a disciple is not above his teacher.

10. That the Lord says: everyone who comes to me and hears my words and does them, I will show you whom he is like. He is like a man building a house, who dug deep and laid the foundation upon the rock; by "to dig" he meant, by Christian humility, to empty out from one's heart all earthly things, lest one worship God for the sake of any such thing; and "to dig deep until one reaches the rock," to follow Christ freely and to worship him freely to such a degree, that God is thought to be worshiped not only not for the sake of superfluous things, but not even for the sake of those things which seem necessary to this life and which can be taken and held without fault by any righteous person, yet are temporal and earthly.

11. On the children sitting in the marketplace and calling to one another, he answered the proposals in reverse order. For what he says, we wailed and you did not weep, pertains to John, whose abstinence from food and drink signified the mourning of penance; but what he says, we played the flute and you did not dance, pertains to the Lord himself, who, by partaking of food and drink with the rest, figured the gladness of the kingdom. But they were willing neither to be humbled with John nor to rejoice with Christ, saying that the one had a demon, and that the other was a glutton and a drunkard and a friend of tax collectors and sinners.

But what he adds, and wisdom is justified by all her children, shows that the children of wisdom understand that righteousness lies neither in abstaining nor in eating, but in the evenness of mind in bearing want, and in temperance in not corrupting oneself through abundance, and in seasonably taking or not taking those things of which not the use but the desire is to be blamed.

For it makes no difference at all what kind of food you take to relieve the necessity of the body, provided you conform, in the kinds of food, to those among whom you must live. Nor does it make much difference how much you take, since we see that the stomach of some is sooner satisfied, and yet they gape with longing for that very little by which they are satisfied, ardently and intolerably and altogether shamefully, while others are indeed satisfied by somewhat more, but bear want more tolerably, and, even with a feast set before their faces, can, if at the time it is fitting or necessary, look upon it with tranquility and not touch it.

It matters more, then, not what or how much food one takes, according to what suits men and one's own person and the necessity of one's health, but with how great ease and serenity of mind one does without these things, when one ought or even must do without them, so that there may be fulfilled in the mind of the Christian what the Apostle says: I know how to have little, and I know how to abound; in any and all circumstances I have been instructed both to be filled and to hunger, both to abound and to suffer want. I can do all things in him who strengthens me (Phil 4:12-13); and that: neither if we eat shall we have abundance, nor if we do not eat shall we be in want (1 Cor 8:8); and that: for the kingdom of God is not food and drink, but righteousness and peace and joy, and, because men are wont to rejoice greatly over carnal feasts, he added: in the Holy Spirit (Rom 14:17).

Therefore wisdom is justified by all her children, who understand that for the use of earthly things there should be suitable times, but that the ease in doing without such things and the love of enjoying eternal things ought not to vary with the times, but be held perpetually.

12. That the Lord says: no one lights a lamp and covers it with a vessel or puts it under a bed, but sets it on a lampstand, so that those who enter may see the light; whoever hides the word of God through fear of carnal disadvantages certainly puts his very flesh before the manifestation of the truth, and, as it were, covers the word by being afraid to preach it. He therefore called such a person, who does this, by the name of a vessel and a bed, under which he says the lamp is put.

13. That in the region of the Gerasenes the Lord healed the man in whom there was a legion of demons, the gentiles were signified, who served many demons; that he was without clothing, he did not have faith; that he did not dwell in a house, he did not rest in his own conscience; that he stayed among the tombs, he delighted in dead works, that is, in sins.

And that he was bound with iron fetters and chains signifies the heavy and harsh laws of the gentiles, by which in their commonwealth too sins are restrained.

That, even with such bonds broken, he was driven by the demon into the wilderness, signifies that, even those laws being transgressed, he was led by desire to those crimes which now exceeded common custom.

And that the demons were permitted to go into the swine feeding on the mountains signifies the unclean and proud men over whom the demons hold sway through the worship of idols.

And that they were cast headlong into the lake signifies that, with the Church now made glorious and the gentile people freed from the dominion of demons, those who refused to believe in Christ (See De civ. Dei 18, 54) carry on their sacrilegious rites in hidden places, submerged in blind and deep curiosity.

And that the swineherds, fleeing, reported these things, signifies that certain leaders even of the impious, although they flee the Christian law, nevertheless, in amazement and wonder, proclaim its power among the gentiles.

That the Gerasenes come out to see what had happened, and find the man clothed and in his right mind sitting at the feet of Jesus, and, learning what had been done, ask Jesus to depart from them, struck with great fear, signifies the multitude delighting in their old life, who indeed honor the Christian law but are unwilling to bear it, while they say that they cannot fulfill it, yet marvel at the faithful people healed from their former lost way of living.

That the man now desires to be with Christ, and it is said to him: return to your house, and tell how much God has done for you, can rightly be understood from that saying of the Apostle, when he says: to be dissolved and to be with Christ is far better, yet to remain in the flesh is necessary for your sake (Phil 1:23-24), so that each one may thus understand that, after the remission of sins, he must return into a good conscience and must serve the Gospel for the sake of others' salvation also, so that he may afterward rest with Christ, lest, when he too prematurely wishes to be with Christ, he neglect the ministry of preaching, suited to the redemption of his brethren.

14. Just as in twenty-four hours the whole world is traversed and lit, so the ministry of illuminating the world through the Gospel of the Trinity is intimated in the seventy-two disciples; for twenty-four times three make seventy-two. And that he sends them two by two is a sacrament of love, either because there are two precepts of love (See Mt 22:39), or because all love cannot exist among fewer than two.

15. If the light that is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness? (Mt 6:23); by the light he meant the good intention of the mind by which we act, but by the darkness he calls the very works, either because it is unknown to others with what mind we do them, or because we ourselves do not know their outcome, that is, how they turn out and result for those on whom we bestow them with a good mind. For very often, by misusing our benefits, those are corrupted to whom we mercifully grant them with a benevolent intention.

16. Now you Pharisees cleanse the outside of the cup and the dish. What he says from here onward against the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law (See Lk 11:37-54) is this, what he said above: he had set his face firmly toward Jerusalem (Lk 9:51), so as to tell them openly their vices and sins.

17. The Holy Spirit is called the finger of God (See Mt 12:28) on account of the distribution of the gifts which are given in him to each one as his own, whether of men or of angels. For in no members of ours does distribution appear more than in the fingers.

18. Fasting is either in tribulation or in joy: in tribulation, to make God favorable for sins; in joy, when carnal things delight one all the less, the greater is the fullness of spiritual things. When, therefore, the Lord was asked why his disciples did not fast, he answered concerning both kinds of fasting. For to that which is wont to be fasted in tribulation pertains what he says, that the bridegroom's sons will then fast, when the bridegroom has been taken from them; for then they will be desolate, and will be in grief and mourning, until through the Holy Spirit consoling joys are repaid to them. When this gift has been received, they, now renewed unto the spiritual life, will most fittingly celebrate also the other kind of fasting, which is done through gladness.

Before they receive it, he says they are like old garments, to which a new patch is unsuitably sewn, that is, some particular bit of teaching which pertains to the temperance of the new life; because if this is done, the teaching itself is in a way torn, the particular bit of which that bears on the fasting from foods is handed on inopportunely, since that teaching enjoins a general fasting not only from the desire of foods, but from all gladness in temporal delights. And he says that this patch, as it were, that is, some part of it which pertains to foods, ought not to be imparted to men still given over to their old custom, because from there too a kind of tearing seems to occur, and it does not suit their oldness.

He also says they are like old wineskins, which he says are more easily burst by new wine, that is, by spiritual precepts, than able to contain it. But they were now new wineskins, when, after the Lord's ascension, by the desire of his consolation, in praying and hoping they were renewed. For then they received the Holy Spirit, filled with whom, when they spoke in the tongues of all who were present from the various nations, they were said to be full of new wine (See Acts 2:1-13). For the new wine had now come into new wineskins.

19. A certain man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, by him Adam himself is understood in the human race; Jerusalem, that heavenly city of peace (See Heb 12:22), from whose beatitude he fell; Jericho means "moon" and signifies our mortality, because it is born, grows, grows old, and sets; the robbers are the devil and his angels, who stripped him of immortality, and, having laid blows on him by persuading him to sin, left him half dead, because in the part by which he can understand and know God he is alive—man—but in the part in which he wastes away and is weighed down by sins he is dead, and therefore is called half dead (See Gen 3).

But the priest and the Levite who passed by when they saw him signify the priesthood and ministry of the Old Testament, which could not avail unto salvation.

Samaritan means "guardian," and therefore the Lord himself is signified by this name. The binding of the wounds is the restraining of sins; the oil is the consolation of good hope on account of the pardon given for the reconciliation of peace; the wine is the exhortation to work with a most fervent spirit. His beast is the flesh in which he deigned to come to us. To be placed on the beast is to believe in the very incarnation of Christ. The inn is the Church, where travelers are refreshed as they return from their pilgrimage into the eternal homeland. The next day is after the resurrection of the Lord.

The two denarii are either the two precepts of love, which the apostles received through the Holy Spirit for evangelizing the rest, or the promise of the present and the future life; for according to the two promises it was said: he will receive sevenfold in this age, and in the age to come he will obtain eternal life (Lk 18:30; Mt 19:29). The innkeeper, then, is the Apostle.

What he spends over and above is either that counsel which he gives when he says: concerning virgins I have no command of the Lord, but I give counsel (1 Cor 7:25), or that he also worked with his own hands (See 1 Cor 4:12), lest he burden any of the weak in the newness of the Gospel (See 2 Thess 3:8-9), although it was permitted him to be supported from the Gospel (See 1 Cor 9:14).

20. That Martha received him into her house signifies the Church that now is, receiving the Lord into its heart. Mary her sister, who sat at the feet of the Lord and heard his word, signifies the same Church, but in the age to come, where, ceasing from the work and ministry of need, it will enjoy wisdom alone. Martha, then, is occupied about much serving, because now the Church is busied with such works. But that she complains that her sister does not help her gives occasion for that saying of the Lord by which he shows that this Church is anxious and troubled about many things, while there is one thing necessary, to which one comes through the merits of this ministry. But he says that Mary chose the best part, which will not be taken from her; and therefore it is understood to be the best, because through this part one reaches toward that other, and it will not be taken away; but that of ministry, although it is good, will nonetheless be taken away when the need to which it ministers has passed.

21. The friend to whom one comes at midnight to borrow three loaves is surely set down by way of likeness, in keeping with which one set in the midst of tribulation asks God to grant him the understanding of the Trinity, by which he may be consoled in the labors of the present life. But the comparison is from the lesser.

For if a friend, a man, rises from his bed and gives, compelled not by friendship but by annoyance, how much more does God give, who without annoyance most generously grants what is asked, but wishes to be asked for this end, that those who ask may become capable of his gifts. And in the three loaves this too is signified, that the Trinity is of one substance.

But the friend whom the one asking says has come from a journey, and that he has nothing to set before him, is understood as the appetite of man, which ought to obey reason. But it was serving temporal custom, which he calls a journey on account of all things passing away in time.

But when a man has been turned to God, that appetite too is recalled from its custom; yet if there is no inward consolation of joy from spiritual teaching, by which the Trinity of the Creator is proclaimed, there are great straits in the man whom mortal hardship oppresses, when abstinence is enjoined from the things that delight outwardly, and inwardly there is no refreshment from the gladness of saving doctrine. And this very straitness is the midnight, in which he is compelled to press on vehemently in asking, that he may receive the three loaves.

But that it is said to him that the door is already shut from within, and that his children are with him in bed, signifies the time of famine of the word, when understanding is closed, and those who, distributing evangelical wisdom as bread, preached throughout the world, the children of the head of the household, are now in the hidden rest with the Lord; and yet by praying it is brought about that, desiring it, he receives understanding from God himself, even if the man through whom wisdom might be preached is lacking.

22. By the bread and the fish and the egg, to which he set as contraries the stone, the serpent, and the scorpion, the bread is understood as love, on account of its greater appeal and its being so necessary that without it the rest are nothing, as without bread the table is poor; to which is contrary the hardness of heart, which he compared to the stone.

But the fish is understood as faith in things invisible, either on account of the water of baptism or because it is caught from invisible places; and that faith, surrounded by the waves of this world barking against it, is not broken, is rightly compared to a fish; to which he set as contrary the serpent, on account of the poisons of deceit, which it sowed in advance, by evil persuasion, even in the first man (See Gen 3).

In the egg is understood hope; for the egg is not yet a complete offspring, but is hoped for by warming it; to which he set as contrary the scorpion, whose poisoned sting is to be feared at the rear, just as contrary to hope is to look back, since the hope of future things stretches itself out toward the things that are ahead (See Phil 3:13; 1 Cor 13:13).

23. As to what the Lord says to the scribes or teachers of the Jews: you have taken away the key of knowledge; you yourselves did not enter, and you hindered those who were entering, this is because, in the Scripture of God, they neither wished to understand the humility of Christ themselves nor wished it to be understood by others.

24. That the Lord says to the disciples: the soul is more than food, and the body more than clothing, and surely, if he gave you that which is more, how much more will he give what is less?

25. That the Lord says: let your loins be girded, on account of continence from the love of worldly things; your lamps burning, namely that you do this very thing with a true end and a right intention.

26. That the Lord said to Peter: who do you think is the faithful and prudent steward, whom the Lord set over his household, to give them their measure of wheat in due time?; he says "measure" on account of the degree of capacity of the various hearers.

27. That the Lord said: when you see a cloud rising in the west, he signifies his flesh rising from death; for from that rose the rain of evangelical preaching, poured upon all lands; the south wind blowing before the heat, the lighter tribulations before the judgment.

28. That the Lord said: if then you cannot do that which is least, when he was speaking of increasing the stature of the body: this is the least, namely for God to fashion bodies.

29. 1. When he said to the disciples that there should be no anxiety about food, he said: and do not be lifted up on high. For man first seeks these things to meet his need; but when they abound, he begins to grow proud of such things as well. This is just as if a wounded man should boast that he has many plasters in his house, when it would be good for him not to have wounds and not to need even one plaster.

29. 2. He fittingly compared the man with dropsy to an animal that had fallen into a well, for he labored under fluid, just as he compared that woman whom he had said was bound for eighteen years, and whom he was loosing from that same binding, to a beast that is loosed to be led to water. But we rightly compare the man with dropsy to a greedy rich man, for just as the one, the more he abounds in disordered fluid, the more he thirsts, so the latter, the more abundant he is in riches which he does not use well, the more ardently he desires such things; and that woman, so bent over by disease that she could not raise herself, we compare to a soul weakened and oppressed by earthly opinions, so that it cannot have the strength to think of divine things.

30. That he brings in from the city those invited to the supper signifies, from the very people of the Jews, those who believed, the weak with sins, not having the pride, as it were, of righteousness, which, being false, kept their leaders from grace. But that he commanded others to be brought in from the hedges and the ways, while there was still room, signifies the gentiles, on account of the various ways of the sects and the thorns of sins.

31. The cost of building a tower—the strength for obtaining discipleship of Christ—and the ten thousand who are to do battle with a king who has twenty thousand—the simplicity of the Christian who is to fight against the duplicity of the devil, that is, against his wiles and deceits—he placed in the disposition of one renouncing all that is his; for he so concludes: so therefore, every one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple. Among all these it is necessary that even this temporal life itself be understood, which one ought so to possess for a time that he who has threatened to take it away may not hinder you from the eternal life.

But just as he deterred from the unfinished tower by the reproach of those saying: this man began to build and could not finish, so in the king with whom one must do battle he accused peace itself, when he said: while the other is yet far off, he sends an embassy and asks for terms of peace, signifying also that men who do not renounce all that they possess do not withstand the threats of impending temptations from the devil, and make peace with him by consenting to him for the committing of sins. For to build the tower and to do battle against that king is to be a disciple of Christ; but to have the cost for finishing the tower and to have the strong ten thousand against the king's twenty thousand is to renounce all that is one's own.

32. By the salt that has lost its savor he meant the apostate; by the lost sheep, all sinners who are reconciled to God through penance; which he carries on his shoulders, because by humbling himself he raised up such persons. And he said that there were those ninety-nine which he left in the desert, because they signify the proud, who, as it were, bear a solitude in their mind, while they wish to be seen as alone, and who lack the unity that belongs to perfection. For when anyone is torn away from true unity, he is torn away by pride; for, desiring to be his own master, he does not follow the One, which is God. And therefore both in the ninety-nine sheep and in the nine drachmas he places the signification of those who, presuming on themselves, set themselves above sinners returning to salvation. For one is lacking both to nine, that they may be ten, and to ninety-nine, that they may be a hundred, and so if you consider this with the other numbers. For one is lacking to nine hundred ninety-nine, that they may be a thousand, and one is lacking to nine thousand nine hundred ninety-nine, that they may be ten thousand. Therefore the numbers that lack one in order to be made complete can vary by smallness and greatness, but the One itself, remaining in itself without variation, when it is added, makes them complete; to which he assigns all who are reconciled through penance, which is obtained by humility.

33. 1. By the man having two sons, God having two peoples is understood, as it were two stocks of the human race: one of those who remained in the worship of the one God, the other of those who deserted God to the point of worshiping idols. And the consideration ought to be directed to the very beginning of the creation of mortals. The elder son, then, belongs to the worship of the one God; the younger he says set out into a far country. For he asked that the part of the substance that fell to him be given him by his father, as a soul delighting in its own power, in that which is its own—to live, to understand, to remember, to excel by a lively wit. All these are divine gifts, which, receiving into his own power through free choice, since the father divided the substance among the sons, the younger son set out into a far country, by misusing his natural goods in the very fact that he deserted the Father through the desire of enjoying the creature, having forsaken the Creator himself (See Rom 1:25).

That he said it was done not many days after, so that, having gathered everything together, he set out abroad into a far country, is because not long after the establishment of the human race it pleased the soul, through free choice, to carry off with itself a kind of power of its own nature and to desert him by whom it was made, trusting in its own strength (See Gen 3:1-7), which strength it consumes the more quickly, the more it deserts him by whom it was given. And so he calls this life prodigal, loving to pour itself out and to range abroad in outward shows, becoming empty within, when one follows the things that proceed from it and forsakes him who is more inward to oneself.

The far country, then, is the forgetfulness of God. But the famine in that country is the want of the word of truth. One of the citizens of that country is some prince of the air belonging to the army of the devil; his estate is the measure of his power; the swine are the unclean spirits that are under him; the husks with which he fed the swine are the secular teachings resounding with barren vanity, by which in varied speech and songs they ring out the praises of idols and of fables belonging to the gods of the gentiles, in which the demons delight. Hence, when this man desired to be filled, he wished to find in such things something solid and right, which might belong to the blessed life, and he could not. For this is what he says: and no one gave him anything.

33. 2. But coming to himself, namely now leading his attention back from those things which outwardly entice and seduce in vain into the inner places of his conscience, he said: how many of my father's hired servants have abundance of bread! Whence could he know this, he in whom there was so great a forgetfulness of God, as there was in all idolaters, unless this reconsidering is that of one now coming to his senses, when the Gospel was being preached?

For such a one could now notice that many preached the truth, among whom some were led not by love of the truth itself, but by the desire of acquiring worldly advantages, about whom the Apostle said there are some who proclaim the Gospel not with pure motives (See Phil 1:17), thinking that godliness is gain (See 1 Tim 6:5). For they did not proclaim something different, as the heretics do, but the same as the apostle Paul, yet not with the mind with which the apostle Paul did; whence they are rightly called hired servants, handling indeed in the same house the same bread of the word, yet not called to the eternal inheritance, but hired for a temporal wage. Of such it was said: amen, I say to you, they have received their reward (Mt 6:2). I, then, he says, perish here with hunger.

Then he says: I will arise, because he was lying down, and I will go, because he had gone far off, to my father, because he was under the prince of the swine. The rest are the words of one meditating penance in the confession of sin, yet not yet doing it. For he does not yet say it to the father, but promises that he will say it when he has come.

Understand, then, that this is now to be taken as "coming to the father": to be established in the Church through faith, where there can now be a lawful and fruitful confession of sins. What, then, does he say he will say to the father? Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you, and I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me as one of your hired servants.

Is this I have sinned against heaven the same as before you, so that he called "heaven" the very height of the Father, whence comes also that saying in the psalm: his going forth is from the height of heaven (Ps 19:6 (18:7)), since by it he wished the Father himself to be understood; or rather I have sinned against heaven in the presence of the holy souls, in which is the seat of God, but before you in that inner recess of conscience itself?

33. 3. And rising, he came to his father. But while he was yet far off, before he understood God, yet now seeking him piously, his father saw him. For the impious and the proud are fittingly said not to be seen, as not being before his eyes; for only those who are loved are usually said to be held before his eyes. And, moved with mercy, running to him, he fell upon his neck. For the Father did not desert his only-begotten Son, in whom he ran and descended even to our far-off pilgrimage, because God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself (See 2 Cor 5:19), and the Lord himself says: the Father, remaining in me, himself does his works (Jn 14:10). But what is it to fall upon his neck, except to bend down and humble his arm into an embrace of him? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? (Isa 53:1), which is surely our Lord Jesus Christ.

And he kissed him. To be consoled by the word of the grace of God unto the hope of the forgiveness of sins, this is, after long journeys, returning, to merit the kiss of love from the Father. And, now established in the Church, he begins to confess his sins; nor does he say all that he had promised he would say, but only as far as: I am not worthy to be called your son. For he wishes to be made through grace that of which he confesses himself unworthy through his merits. He does not add what he had said in that meditation: make me as one of your hired servants. For when he had no bread, he even desired to be a hired servant, which, after the Father's kiss, he now most nobly disdains.

The first robe is the dignity that Adam lost; the servants who bring it forth are the preachers of reconciliation; the ring on the hand is the pledge of the Holy Spirit (See 2 Cor 5:5) on account of the distribution of grace, which is well signified by the finger; the sandals on the feet are the preparation for evangelizing, so as not to touch earthly things; the fatted calf is the Lord himself, but according to the flesh sated with reproaches. And that he commands them to bring it, what else is it but that they should preach him and, by proclaiming him, make him come into the emptied-out, hungering inward parts of the hungering son?

For he even commands them to kill him, that is, to set forth his death; for he is slain for each one when one believes him slain. And let us feast, he says. This bears on gladness, on account of those things which he consequently says: for this my son was dead and is alive again, he was lost and is found. And this feast and festivity is now celebrated, as the Church is spread abroad and diffused throughout the world. For that calf, in the Lord's body and blood, is both offered to the Father and feeds the whole household.

33. 4. Meanwhile the elder son, the people of Israel according to the flesh, did not indeed set out into a far country, but yet is not in the house; he is in the field, however, that is, in the very hereditary opulence of the Law and the Prophets he labors at earthly things rather, and that in whatever Israelites are more thoughtful. For many such were found among them, and are often found.

Coming from the field, he began to draw near the house, that is, having reproved the labor of servile work, from the same Scriptures he considered the freedom of the Church. He hears the music and the dancing, namely those full of the Spirit preaching the Gospel with harmonious voices (See Acts 2:4), to whom it was said: I beseech you, brothers, that you all say the same thing (1 Cor 1:10), and the soul and heart, made one in harmonious living (See Acts 4:32), in the praises of God. He calls one of the servants and asks what these things are; he takes up, of course, some one of the Prophets to read, and, seeking in him, in a way inquires whence these feasts are celebrated in the Church, in which he does not see himself to be.

The prophet, the servant of the father, answers him: your brother has come, and your father has killed the fatted calf, because he has received him safe; for your brother was at the ends of the earth. But from there comes the greater exultation of those singing to the Lord a new song, because his praise is from the ends of the earth (See Isa 42:10). And for the sake of him who was absent, the man set among the stricken and knowing how to bear weakness was slain (See Isa 53:3), because those to whom it had not been told of him have seen, and those who had not heard have understood (Isa 52:15). But he is indignant even now, and still does not wish to enter.

33. 5. When, therefore, the fullness of the gentiles has entered in, his father will go out at the opportune time, so that all Israel too may be saved, to whom in part blindness has come, as to one absent in the field, until the fullness of the younger son, established far off in the idolatry of the gentiles, should enter as one returning to eat the calf (See Rom 11:25). For there will at some time be an open calling of the Jews into the salvation of the Gospel. And this manifestation of the calling he calls, as it were, the going out of the father to entreat the elder son.

Then what the same elder son answers contains two questions: how that people is to be understood as having never transgressed God's commandment, and what kid he means that he never received, to feast with his friends. But about the commandment not transgressed, this readily occurs: that it was not said of every commandment, but of the one most necessary, by which he was commanded to worship no other God except the one Creator of all (See Exod 20:3); nor is this son understood to bear the person of all Israelites, but of those who were never turned from the one God to images.

For although this son, as one set in the field, desired earthly things, yet he desired these goods from the one God, though they are shared in common with the beasts; whence in the Psalm, from the person of the Synagogue, which is what Asaph means, it is fittingly taken as said: I have become as a beast before you, and I am always with you (Ps 73:22-23 (72:23)). This is confirmed also by the testimony of the father himself, when he says: you are always with me; for he does not refute him as one lying, but, approving his perseverance with him, invites him to the enjoyment of a more excellent and more joyful exultation.

33. 6. Who, then, is the kid which he never received to feast on? A sinner is usually signified by the name of a kid (See Mt 25:32-33). But far be it that I should understand the Antichrist; for I find no resolution of this saying. For it is very absurd that the one to whom it is said, you are always with me, should have wished this from the father, that he might believe in the Antichrist. Nor at all is it lawful to understand this son among those Jews who are to believe in the Antichrist.

But how would he feast on that kid, if it were the Antichrist himself, in whom he would not believe? Or if to feast on the killing of the kid is to rejoice over the perdition of the Antichrist, how does the son whom the Father received say that this was not granted to him, since all the sons of God will rejoice over the damnation of that adversary? Therefore, without prejudice to a more careful inquiry, what I would say in a most obscure matter is that he complains that the Lord himself was denied to him to feast on, while he thinks him a sinner.

For when he is a kid to that people, that is, when it reckons him a violator of the sabbath (See Mt 12:1-13) and a profaner of the Law (See Mt 5:17), it did not deserve to be gladdened by his feast; so that what he says, you never gave me a kid, that I might feast with my friends, is as if he said: the one who seemed to me a kid you never gave me to feast on, by that very thing not granting him to me, by which he seemed to me a kid.

But that he says with my friends is understood either of the person of the leaders together with the people, or of the person of the people of Jerusalem together with the rest of the peoples of Judah. But the harlots with whom the younger son was accused of having squandered his substance are rightly understood as the superstitions, namely, having forsaken the one lawful marriage of the word of God, to fornicate with a crowd of demons by a most shameful desire.

33. 7. Then what does it mean that, when the father said: you are always with me, which has already been treated, he added: and all that is mine is yours?

In this matter we must first beware lest you understand all that is mine is yours as said as though they were not also the brother's, or as though, in an earthly inheritance, you suffer straits; for how can all things belong to the elder, if the younger too has there his own part?

For all things are so possessed by the perfect and fully purified and now immortal sons, that all things belong to each and each to all. For just as desire holds nothing without straits, so love holds nothing with straits.

But how all things? Surely, says someone, is God to be thought to have subjected to such a son, as his possession, even the angels and the sublime virtues and powers and all the heavenly ministries of God? If you take "possession" in such a way that its possessor is its lord, then surely not all things. For they will not be lords, but rather consorts of the angels, of whom it was said: they will be equal to the angels of God (Mt 22:30). But if "possession" is understood in the way in which we rightly say that souls possess the truth, I find no reason why we should not be able, truly and properly, to take "all things" as all the things that have been said; for we do not speak in such a way as to say that souls are lords of the truth, which we say is possessed by them.

Or if by the name of "possession" we are hindered from this sense, let that too be taken away. For the father does not say: I will give you all things as a possession, or: You possess or will possess all that is mine, but: all that is mine is yours. Yet they are not his in the way they are God's own. For what is in our money can be either food or adornment or something of the kind for our household. And surely, since that son could rightly call the father himself his own, I do not see what of his he could not rightly call his own, though in different ways. For when we have obtained that beatitude, the higher things will be ours for living, the equal things will be ours for living together, the lower things will be ours for ruling. Let the elder brother, then, rejoice together most securely, because the younger brother was dead and is alive again, he was lost and is found.

34. 1. In the steward whom the Lord was casting out of the stewardship, and whom he praised because he provided for himself for the future, we ought not to take everything for imitation. For neither is fraud to be done in any matter against our Lord, that from the fraud itself we may give alms, nor is it lawful to understand those by whom we wish to be received into eternal dwellings as debtors of God and our Lord, since in this place the righteous and holy are signified, who lead into the eternal dwellings those who shared their earthly goods with their needs; of whom he also says that if anyone gives one of them even a cup of cold water only in the name of a disciple, he will not lose his reward (See Mt 10:42). But these likenesses are also stated by contrast, so that we may understand: if that man who committed fraud could be praised by his lord, how much more do those please the Lord God who do those works according to his precept, just as he also drew a comparison from the unjust judge who was entreated by the widow (See Lk 18:2-8) to God the judge, to whom the unjust judge is in no respect to be compared.

34. 2. But that he had the debtor write fifty for the hundred measures of oil, and eighty for the hundred measures of wheat, I judge to avail to nothing else than that, in the things one does likewise toward the Church of Christ as the Jews did toward the Levites, his righteousness should abound beyond that of the scribes and Pharisees (See Mt 5:20), so that, whereas they gave tithes (See Num 18:21), he should give halves, as Zacchaeus did, not from the produce but from his very goods (See Lk 19:8), or at least should double the tithe, so that by giving two tithes he might surpass the contributions of the Jews. But this money which we possess for a time is called by the Lord the mammon of iniquity for this reason, because mammon means "riches," and these are not riches except to the unjust, who place in them the hope and abundance of their beatitude; but when these are possessed by the just, there is indeed this money, yet they have no riches except the heavenly and spiritual, by which, spiritually supplying their want, with the poverty of misery shut out, they are enriched with the abundance of beatitude.

35. That he says: if you have not been faithful in what is another's, he calls earthly resources "another's," because no one carries them with him when he dies (See 1 Tim 6:7). This is what David says: do not be afraid when a man becomes rich, and when the glory of his house is multiplied, for when he dies he will take nothing, nor will his glory descend together with him (Ps 49:16-17 (48:17-18)).

36. As to what he says: either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will cling to the one and despise the other, these are not to be distinguished without consideration; for they were not said at random or as if rashly. For no one, when asked whether he loves the devil, answers that he loves him, but rather that he hates him; but almost all proclaim that they love God. Therefore either he will hate the one and love the other, as ought to be done, namely he will hate the devil and love God.

But what he added: or he will cling to the one and despise the other: he will cling, namely, to the devil, when he pursues, as it were, his temporal rewards, but he will despise God. He did not say: he will hate, but he will despise, as those are wont to put his threats after their own desires, who flatter themselves out of his goodness into impunity. To whom it is said through Solomon: son, do not add sin upon sin and say: the mercy of God is great (Sir 5:5-6).

37. The kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and the violent seize it (Mt 11:12). Not only that one should despise these things, but also the tongues of those who deride him for despising such things. For by this violence done, one in a way invades, like a violent plunderer, the kingdoms of heaven. For the evangelist added this when he had said that Jesus was derided by the Pharisees, when he was speaking of despising earthly riches (See Lk 16:14).

38. 1. A certain man was rich, and was clothed in purple and fine linen, and feasted sumptuously every day and so forth can be taken allegorically in this way, that in the rich man are understood the proud among the Jews, ignorant of God's righteousness and wishing to establish their own (See Rom 10:3).

The purple and fine linen are the dignity of the kingdom. And it will be taken, he says, from you, the kingdom of God, and will be given to a nation doing righteousness (Mt 21:43).

The sumptuous feasting is the boasting of the Law, in which they gloried, abusing it more for the pomp of self-exaltation than using it for the necessity of salvation.

But the beggar by the name of Lazarus, which means "helped," signifies someone in need, as it were some gentile or tax collector, who is helped all the more, the less he presumes on the abundance of his own resources. Such were those two who prayed in the temple, the one a tax collector and the other a Pharisee (See Lk 18:10).

The rich man, then, as one sated with righteousness, not to be numbered among those blessed who hunger and thirst for righteousness (See Mt 5:6), says: I thank you that I am not like this tax collector; but the poor man, who desires to be helped, says: be merciful to me a sinner (Lk 18:11-13). He desires, however, to be filled with the crumbs that fall from the rich man's table, lying at the gate; for he was not admitted to his feast, who neither used those things well nor gave to the needy, like a scribe holding the keys of the kingdom of heaven, neither entering himself nor permitting others to enter (See Lk 11:52).

The crumbs falling from the rich man's table are certain words of the Law, which they, boasting, cast as it were upon the ground, when they spoke proudly to the people. The sores are the confessions of sins, like evil humors bursting forth from the inmost vitals; the dogs that licked them are most wicked men who love sins, who with a broad tongue do not cease even to praise the evil works which another, groaning and confessing, detests in himself; the bosom of Abraham is the rest of the blessed poor, whose is the kingdom of heaven (See Mt 5:3), into which they are received after this life; the burial of hell is the depth of punishments, which devours the proud and the unmerciful after this life; whom nevertheless the Lord, in this narrative, says see from afar and perceive the rest of the blessed, to which indeed they cannot cross over.

38. 2. But that he wishes his tongue to be cooled, when he was surely burning all over in the flame, signifies what is written: death and life are in the power of the tongue (Prov 18:21), and that with the mouth confession is made unto salvation (Rom 10:10), which through pride he did not do. But the tip of the finger signifies even the least work of mercy, by which help is given through the Holy Spirit. And when it is said to him: you received good things in your life, this is touched on, that he loved the felicity of the age, and loved no other life than that in which he swelled with pride. But he says that Lazarus received evil things, because he understood the mortality of this life, the labors, sorrows, and hardships, to be the punishment of sin, of which it is written: we too were by nature children of wrath, like the rest (Eph 2:3); of which it is again written that not even an infant whose life upon earth is of one day is clean from sin (See Job 14:4-5 (LXX)), because all of us surely die in Adam (See 1 Cor 15:22), who was made mortal by transgression (See Gen 3:6-19).

38. 3. But that he says that to those places where the impious are tormented the just cannot cross over even if they wish, what else does it signify than that, after this life, to those received into prison in such a way that they do not come out until they have paid the last farthing (See Mt 5:26), through the unchangeableness of the divine sentence no help of mercy can be afforded by the just, even if they wish to afford it? By this he admonishes us, of course, that in this life men should help those whom they can, lest afterward, even if they themselves are most blessedly received, they should be unable to aid those whom they love.

For what is written: that they too may receive you into eternal dwellings (Lk 16:9), is not written of the proud and unmerciful, such as this rich man is shown to have been, that they should deserve to be received by the saints into those dwellings, but of those who have made friends for themselves by most dutiful works of mercy; although not even these do the just receive, as it were by their own power, as though bestowing a favor, but by the promise and permission of him who forewarned them by counsel to make friends for themselves, and who deigned, by the goodness of the Liberator, to be fed, clothed, received with hospitality, visited in each one of his least (See Mt 25:35-40).

Although whether that receiving takes place immediately after this life, or at the end of the age in the resurrection of the dead and the last requital of judgment, is no small question. But whenever it takes place, surely no Scripture promises that it happens for such persons as that rich man is set forth to be.

38. 4. But the five brothers whom he says he has in his father's house signify the Jews. For they were called five, because they were held under the Law that was given through Moses (See Jn 1:17), who wrote five books. But that he asks Lazarus to be sent to his brothers, he surely felt himself unworthy to bear witness to the truth; and because he had not obtained that he be cooled a little, much less does he believe that he can be released from hell for the preaching of the truth.

That Abraham says: if they wish to believe, they have Moses and the Prophets, he did not set these before the Gospel; but because the Gospel, as the Apostle says, has testimony from the Law and the Prophets (See Rom 3:21), he signifies that by believing them they can come to the Gospel, just as in another place the Lord himself says: if you believed Moses, you would also believe me, for he wrote of me (Jn 5:46).

Finally, to this pertains what he also says afterward: if they do not hear Moses and the Prophets, neither will they believe if someone rises from the dead, because Moses and the Prophets foretold the one who rose from the dead, this very thing too about him, that he would rise from the dead; and by not believing them they surely refuse to believe Christ as well. Much less, then, can they believe anyone who rises from the dead, when they do not believe him whose resurrection Moses and the Prophets foretold, whom they refuse to believe.

38. 5. This narrative can also be understood otherwise, so that we take Lazarus to signify the Lord lying at the gate of that rich man, because he cast himself down to the most proud ears of the Jews by the humility of the incarnation, desiring to be filled with the crumbs that fell from the rich man's table, seeking from them even the least works of righteousness, which they did not, through pride, usurp to their own table, that is, to their own power; works of mercy and humility which, though least and without the discipline and perseverance of a good life, they might at least do now and then or by chance, as crumbs are wont to fall from a table. The sores are the sufferings of the Lord from the weakness of the flesh, which he deigned to take on for our sake. The dogs, then, that licked them are the gentiles, whom the Jews called sinful and unclean men, and who nevertheless now lick the sufferings of the Lord, in the sacraments of his body and blood, throughout the whole world with most devout sweetness.

Now the bosom of Abraham is understood as the secret place of the Father, to which the Lord, rising after his passion, was taken up (See Mk 16:19); and that he is said to have been carried there by the angels, I believe is said because the angels announced to the gazing disciples that very reception by which he withdrew into the secret place of the Father. For by saying: why do you stand looking into heaven? (Acts 1:9-11), what else did they say than that in no way could the eyes of men penetrate even into that secret place to which the Lord was going, when he was borne into heaven in the sight of the disciples?

Now the rest can be taken according to the earlier exposition, because the secret place of the Father is rightly understood as the place where, even before the resurrection of the just, the souls of the just live with God. For God is everywhere all the more truly, in that he is contained by no place, as it was also said to the thief: today you will be with me in paradise (Lk 23:43), from which the Son of God never withdrew, although through the flesh he assumed he suffered so much from men in the city of the Jews.

39. 1. That the disciples said: Lord, increase our faith, can indeed be understood to mean that they asked for that faith to be increased in them by which the things that are not seen are believed; but yet there is also called a faith of things, when one believes not by words but by the very things present, which is to come, when the very Wisdom of God, through which all things were made (See Ps 104:24 (103:24)), will offer itself to be contemplated by the saints through a manifest vision.

Concerning this faith of things and of that light made present, perhaps the apostle Paul says: for the righteousness of God is revealed in it from faith to faith (Rom 1:17), for he says in another place: but we, beholding with unveiled face the glory of the Lord, are transformed into the same image from glory to glory, as by the Spirit of the Lord (2 Cor 3:18).

For just as here he says from glory to glory, so there too from faith to faith: from the glory of the Gospel, by which believers are now enlightened, into the glory of that very unchangeable and manifest truth, which then, transformed, they will enjoy; thus from the faith of words, by which we now believe what we do not yet see, into the faith of things, by which we will hold for eternity what we now believe.

According to this sense that too was said by John in the Epistle to the Parthians: beloved, now we are sons of God, and it has not yet appeared what we shall be. We know that when he appears we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is (1 Jn 3:2). For whence are we now sons of God, except that he gave us the power to become sons of God, to those believing in his name (See Jn 1:12), so that we may see in a riddle? And whence shall we then be like him, except because, as he himself says, we shall see him as he is? Which was also said: but then face to face (See 1 Cor 13:12).

39. 2. That faith, then, of the most present truth, since many do not understand it, our Lord may seem to his disciples not to have answered what they had asked. For when they had said: Lord, increase our faith, he says to them: if you had faith like a grain of mustard seed, you would say to this mulberry tree: be uprooted and transplanted into the sea, and it would obey you. Then it follows: but which of you, having a servant plowing or feeding sheep, says to him at once when he returns from the field: come, recline at table; and does he not say to him: prepare what I am to dine on, and gird yourself and serve me until I have eaten and drunk, and after these things you shall eat and drink? Does he thank that servant because he did what was commanded him? I think not. So you also, when you have done all that has been commanded you, say: we are unprofitable servants, we have done what we ought to have done.

How these things bear on what was said, Lord, increase our faith, appears difficult, unless we understand from faith to faith (Rom 1:17), that is, that he signified them as transferred from this faith by which God is served into that faith where they may enjoy God. For faith is increased when first it is believed by the words of those preaching, and then by the things appearing. But that contemplation has the highest rest, which is granted in the eternal kingdom of God; and that highest rest is the reward of the righteous labors which are accomplished in the ministry of the Church.

And therefore, although the servant plows or feeds sheep in the field, that is, in the secular life either occupies himself with earthly affairs or serves foolish men as cattle, it is necessary that after those labors he come into the house, that is, be joined to the Church, and labor there too, ministering to his Lord until he eats and drinks; for that one, hungering, sought fruit on the tree (See Mt 21:18-19), and, thirsting, asked water from the Samaritan woman (See Jn 4:7): let him then eat and drink the confession and faith of the gentiles, ministered, that is, by his servants who evangelize.

39. 3. To this also pertains what he first answered them about the grain of mustard seed, that they must first have the faith necessary to the present life, which seems least so long as the treasure is in earthen vessels (See 2 Cor 4:7), but with the greatest force boils up and germinates (See Mt 13:31-32), when our Lord Jesus Christ, who wishes to be fed by the ministry of his servants, that is, to transfer believers, as it were slain and eaten, into his own body, even here feeds them with the word of faith and the sacrament of his passion. For he came not to be ministered to, but to minister (See Mt 20:28). Let those servants, then, by the grain of mustard seed, say to this mulberry tree, that is, to the very Gospel of the Lord's cross, which through its blood-red fruits, like wounds hanging on the wood, is to give food to the peoples; let them say, then, that it be uprooted from the faithlessness of the Jews and transplanted into the sea of the gentiles and planted there. For by this domestic service they will minister to the Lord hungering and thirsting (See Mt 25:35, 40).

39. 4. Then at last let them seek to enjoy forever, with incorruptible food, the divine wisdom, when they have said: we are unprofitable servants, we have done what we ought to have done, no work remains for us: we have finished the course, we have completed the contest, there remains for us the crown of righteousness (See 2 Tim 4:7-8). For all things can be said of that ineffable enjoyment of the truth; and all things can be said the more, the less anything can be worthily said. For it is both the light of the enlightened and the rest of the wearied and the homeland of those returning and the food of the needy and the crown of the victorious, and whatever goods, passing away in time, the error of unbelievers seeks through the parts of creation, more truly remaining for eternity in the Creator of all, the devotion of the sons will find them all together.

40. 1. In the ten lepers whom the Lord thus cleansed when he said: go, show yourselves to the priests, many things can be asked which rightly stir those who inquire: not only about the number, what it may mean that they are ten, and that one of them alone gives thanks—for these are freely inquired into, so that even if they are not investigated they impede the attention of the reader either not at all or not much—;

but rather these: why he sent them to the priests, so that as they went they were cleansed, for none of those to whom he granted these bodily benefits is found to have sent any to the priests except the lepers, for that man too, whom he had cleansed from leprosy, to whom he said: go, show yourself to the priests, and offer for yourself the sacrifice that Moses commanded, for a testimony to them (Lk 5:13-14);

then, what spiritual cleansing can be understood of those whom he reproves for having proved ungrateful, for, according to the body, it is easy to see that a man can be without leprosy and yet not be of a good mind; but according to the signification of this miracle it troubles the one considering it, how one cleansed can be called ungrateful.

40. 2. It must therefore be asked what leprosy itself signifies; for those who were rid of it are said to be not healed but cleansed; it is indeed a fault of color, not of health or of the integrity of the senses and members. Lepers, then, can not absurdly be understood as those who, not having the knowledge of true faith, profess various teachings of error. For they do not hide their ignorance, but bring it out into the light as the highest expertise and display it by boastful speech. Moreover, there is no false teaching which does not mingle in some truths. Therefore truths disorderedly mingled with falsehoods in one man's disputation or narrative, appearing as it were in the color of one body, signify leprosy, as it were varying and staining human bodies with true and false marks of color. But such men are so to be avoided by the Church that, if it can be, removed at a distance, they should call upon Christ with a great cry, just as these ten stood at a distance and lifted up their voice, saying: Jesus, master, have mercy on us. For the fact that they call him master, by which name I do not know whether anyone ever entreated the Lord for a bodily cure, signifies sufficiently, I think, that the leprosy is false teaching, which the good master wipes away.

40. 3. That the priesthood of the Jews was a figure of the future royal priesthood, which is in the Church, by which all who belong to the body of Christ, the highest and true prince of priests, are consecrated, almost no one of the faithful doubts.

For now all are anointed, which then was done only for kings and priests; and what Peter says, writing to the Christian people: a royal priesthood (1 Pet 2:9), declared that both names suit that people to which that anointing belonged. The other vices, then, as it were of the health and as it were of the members of the soul and of the senses, the Lord heals and corrects through himself inwardly, in the conscience and the understanding. But teaching, whether of those to be imbued through the sacraments or of those to be catechized through the spoken word and the reading, where a certain color is understood, true and sincere—because it is in the open and outwardly most prominent, for these things are done not in hidden thoughts but in manifest works—has been properly assigned to the Church.

And so Paul too, when he had heard the voice of the Lord: why do you persecute me? and: I am Jesus whom you persecute (Acts 9:4-5), was nevertheless sent to Ananias, so that from that priesthood which is established in the Church he might receive the sacrament of the teaching of faith, and his true color might be approved (See Acts 9:10-18). Not because the Lord cannot do all things through himself—for who else does these things even in the Church?—but so that the very fellowship of the assembled faithful, by approving one another and sharing the teaching of true faith in all the things that are said in words or signified in sacraments, might draw over, as it were, one form of true color.

To this also pertains what the same Apostle says: then after fourteen years I went up to Jerusalem with Barnabas, taking Titus also along. But I went up by revelation, and I set before them the Gospel which I preach among the gentiles, but privately before those who were of repute, lest perhaps I should be running or had run in vain. And a little after: when they recognized, he says, the grace that was given to me, James, Peter, and John, who seemed to be pillars, gave to me and Barnabas the right hands of fellowship (Gal 2:1-2, 9). For that very conferring showed one form of teaching, with all variety excluded, which he also salutarily admonishes the Corinthians, saying: I beseech you, brothers, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all say the same thing (1 Cor 1:10).

Cornelius too, when both his alms accepted and his prayers heard are announced to him by an angel, is nevertheless, on account of the unity of teaching and of the sacraments, commanded to send to Peter, as though to him and his it were said: go, show yourselves to the priests. For as they went, they were cleansed; for Peter had already come to them, but yet they themselves, the sacrament of baptism not yet received, had not yet come spiritually to the priests; and nevertheless by the infusion of the Holy Spirit and the wonder of their tongues their cleansing was declared (See Acts 10:25-26).

40. 4. Since these things are so, it is now easy to see also that it can happen that someone in the fellowship of the Church attains sound and true teaching, and sets forth everything according to the rule of catholic faith, distinguishes the creature from the Creator (See Rom 1:25), and thereby is shown to have been free, as it were, from the leprosy of the variety of lies, and yet is ungrateful to God and the Lord who cleansed him, because, lifted up by pride, he is not laid low by the pious humility of giving thanks, and becomes like those of whom the Apostle says: who, when they had known God, did not glorify him as God or give thanks (Rom 1:21).

For in that he says they knew God, he shows indeed that they had been cleansed from leprosy, but yet at once accuses them as ungrateful. And therefore such persons will remain, as it were imperfect, in the number nine. For if one is added to nine, a certain figure of unity is fulfilled. By this so great a completion comes about that the number does not advance further, unless one returns again to one; and this rule is kept throughout the infinity of number. The nine, then, need the one, that they may be curdled into a certain form of unity and be ten; but the one does not need them in order to keep its unity. Wherefore, just as those nine who did not give thanks, made reprobate, were excluded from the partnership of unity, so that one who gave thanks was approved and praised, with the signification of the one Church. And because those were Jews, they were declared to have lost, through pride, the kingdom of heaven, where unity is especially kept; but that one, who was a Samaritan, which means "guardian," rendering to him from whom he received what he had received, and as it were singing that verse of the psalm: my strength, I will keep it for you (Ps 59:9 (58:10)), subject to the king through the giving of thanks, kept the unity of the kingdom by humble devotion.

41. What does it mean that the Lord says: whoever is on the roof and his goods in the house, let him not go down to take them? On the roof is the one who, going beyond carnal things, lives spiritually as in free air. His goods in the house are the carnal senses, which many, using to investigate the truth that is grasped by the understanding, have utterly erred. Of this spiritual man, then, those goods are now empty in the house, because, by his mind rising above the body, through the keen edge of understanding, set as it were on the roof, he enjoys the clearness of wisdom as in a most open sky. Let this man, then, beware lest in the day of tribulation, again delighting in the carnal life, which is fed through the senses of the body, he go down to take goods of this kind.

42. What does it mean that it was said: likewise, whoever is in the field, let him not turn back? Whoever labors in the Church and, like Paul and Apollos, plants and waters (See 1 Cor 3:6), let him not look back to the worldly hope which he renounced.

43. What did Lot's wife signify? Those who in tribulation look back and turn themselves away from the hope of the divine promise. And therefore she was made a pillar of salt (See Gen 19:26), so that, by admonishing men not to do this, she might as it were season their heart, lest they be foolish.

44. 1. Who are the two in a bed on that night, and the two women grinding together, and the two in a field, of all of whom, by twos, one will be taken and one left? Three kinds of men seem here to be signified:

one, of those who choose leisure and quiet, occupied neither with worldly nor with ecclesiastical affairs, whose quiet was signified by the name of the bed;

another, of those who, set among the common people, are governed by teachers, doing the things that are of this age, whom he also signified by the name of women, because it is expedient for them, as I said, to be governed by the counsels of the skilled; and he called them grinding on account of the round and circuit of temporal affairs, yet he said they were grinding together, insofar as, from their very things and affairs, they furnish for the uses of the Church;

a third, of those who work in the ministry of the Church as in God's field, of which husbandry the Apostle speaks (See 1 Cor 3:9).

In these three kinds, then, there are again two kinds of men in each, and they are distinguished according to the strength of their powers. For though all seem to belong to the members of the Church, yet when the temptation of tribulation comes, both from those who are in leisure and from those who are in the affairs of the age and from those who minister to God in the Church, some remain and some fall; those who remain are taken, those who fall are left. Therefore one will be taken and one left was said not as though of two men, but of two kinds of dispositions in each of the three kinds of callings. On that night, then, he meant in that tribulation.

44. 2. To these same three kinds which are taken I think there pertain also those three names of holy men whom the prophet Ezekiel declares to be the only ones to be freed: Noah, Daniel, and Job (See Ezek 14:14). For Noah seems to pertain to those by whom the Church is governed, just as through him the ark was steered in the waters, which bore a figure of the Church (See Gen 7:7). But Daniel, because he chose the celibate life, that is, despised earthly marriage, so that, as the Apostle says, he might live without anxiety, thinking on the things of God (See 1 Cor 7:32-34), signifies the kind of those who are in leisure, but yet most strong in temptations, so that they can be taken. And Job, because he had both a wife and children and ample abundance of earthly things (See Job 1:1-3), pertains to that kind to which the mill was assigned, but yet so that they are most strong in temptations as he was; for otherwise they cannot be taken. Nor do I think there are other kinds of men of whom the Church consists than these three, having two differences on account of the taking and the leaving, although in each, many diversities of pursuits and wills, yet running together into concord and unity, can be found.

45. 1. What does it mean that, in regard to praying always and not failing, he wished to set down the parable of the unjust judge, who, though he did not fear God and did not respect man, yet yielded to the widow's constant entreaties, that he might vindicate her, lest she weary him? For this is what he says: lest she come and wear me out.

Since the Lord sets down parables either according to some likeness, as about that servant to whom the Lord forgave what, after his account was rendered, he was found to owe, and who himself refused to give even a delay to his fellow servant (See Mt 18:23-35), and about the moneylender who, when he had forgiven two debtors what they owed, was loved more by the one to whom he forgave more (See Lk 7:41-43), and about the man who had two sons, the elder drawing near to him in the field, the younger living wantonly in a far country (See Lk 15:11-32), and countless such; for from these, insofar as they are alike, the understanding of the thing to be intimated or sought is drawn;

or else he proves something from the very unlikeness, as in this: but if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is and tomorrow is cast into the oven, how much more you, O you of little faith? (Mt 6:30) To this kind belongs also that which he says about the servant to whom the lord had given notice that he would be removed from his stewardship; for he committed a fraud against his lord, in that, having falsified his debtors' bonds, he released them as much as seemed advantageous. Nor does the Lord in any way exhort us to commit fraud against him; but if, because by defrauding he provided for himself for the future, he says that he was praised by his lord, how much greater alacrity ought those to have in providing for themselves unto eternal life, who, in order to act justly, are commanded to make friends from the mammon of iniquity (See Lk 16:1), which was expounded in its place (See above, 2, 34). To this kind belongs also that one who, not on account of friendship, but to be rid of annoyance, is roused though already asleep, to lend three loaves to his friend. For if that man, compelled by trouble, gave (See Lk 11:5-8), how much more will God, who, loving his own (See Jn 13:1), exhorts us to ask, give good things to those who ask him (See Mt 7:7-11).

And so the former kind can be joined by these words: as this, so also that; but the latter by these words: if this, how much more that; or: if not this, how much less that. But in some places these are set down obscurely, in others openly.

45. 2. This unjust judge, then, was brought in not from a likeness but from an unlikeness, so that the Lord might show how much more confident those ought to be who perseveringly entreat God, the fount of righteousness and mercy, or whatever more excellent can be said or heard, since with a most unjust judge the perseverance of the one entreating availed even to the effect of fulfilling her desire.

But the widow herself can have a likeness to the Church, which seems desolate until the Lord comes, who yet even now in secret takes care of her. But if it troubles anyone why the elect of God pray to be vindicated, which is also said in John's Apocalypse of the martyrs (See Rev 6:10), when we are most openly admonished to pray for our enemies and persecutors (See Mt 5:44), it is to be understood that this vindication of the just is that all the evil should perish.

But they perish in two ways: either by conversion to righteousness or by losing, through punishment, the power by which now, against the good, as long as this very thing is expedient for the good, they avail something, even if only temporally. And so, even if all men were converted to God, among whom are also the enemies for whom we are commanded to pray, the devil nevertheless, who works in the sons of unbelief (See Eph 2:2), would remain, to be damned at the end of the age. And when the just desire this end to come, although they pray for their enemies, yet they are not absurdly said to desire vindication.

46. 1. A certain nobleman went into a far country to receive a kingdom for himself and to return, our Lord Jesus Christ himself is understood; the far country is the Church of the gentiles unto the ends of the earth. Yet he says he will return; for he went away that the fullness of the gentiles might enter in, he will return that all Israel may be saved (See Rom 11:25). The ten minas signify the Law, on account of the Decalogue, but the ten servants those to whom, set under it, grace was preached. For thus it is to be understood that the minas were given them for use, when they understood that very Law, the veil removed (See 2 Cor 3:16), to belong to the Gospel.

His citizens who sent an embassy after him, saying that they did not wish him to reign over them, are the Jews, who even after his resurrection sent persecutors after the apostles and spurned the preaching of the Gospel. But he returned having received the kingdom, because he is to come in most manifest and most eminent glory (See Mt 16:27), who appeared to them humble when he said: my kingdom is not of this world (Jn 18:36).

46. 2. But that the servants who, rendering account from what they had received, are praised, who made a gain, signifies that those render a good account who used well what they had received to increase their lord's riches through those who believe in him. And those who refuse to do this were signified in the one who kept his coin in a napkin. For there are men flattering themselves with this perversity, so that they say: It is enough that each render account of himself. What need is there to preach or minister to others, so that each is compelled to render account of them too, when before the Lord even those are inexcusable to whom the Law was not given nor, having heard the Gospel, slept, because through the creature they could know the Creator, whose invisible things, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen, being understood through the things that are made (See Rom 1:20-21)?

For this is, as it were, to reap where he did not sow, that is, to hold even those guilty of impiety to whom the word of the Law or of the Gospel was not ministered; but these, as though avoiding the danger of judgment, rest in slothful languor from the ministry of the word. And this is, as it were, to bind in a napkin what they had received. The table at which the money was to be given we take as the very profession of religion, which is, as it were, publicly set forth for the use necessary to salvation.

46. 3. But that one of those who used well acquired ten and another five signifies that they were acquired into the flock of God, by whom the very Law was understood through grace, whether because it is contained in the Decalogue, or because he through whom it was given wrote five books. To this pertain both the ten and the five cities over which he sets them. For the multiplication of understanding in the very truth, which sprouts forth from each precept or from each book, brought back to one, makes as it were a city of living eternal reasons. For a city is a multitude not of any living beings whatever, but of rational ones, bound together by the fellowship of one law. But that from the one who refused to use it is taken what he had received, and it is given to the one who had ten, signifies both that the one who, having, does not have, that is, does not use, can lose the gift of God, and that it is increased in the one who, having, has, that is, uses well. His enemies, then, whom he orders to be slain before him, signify the impiety of the Jews who refused to be converted to him.

47. What does it mean that he says: it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God? He here calls "rich" the one greedy for temporal things and proud of such things. To these rich are contrary the poor in spirit, whose is the kingdom of heaven (See Mt 5:3). For it is manifested by this that all the greedy, even if they lack the resources of this world, belong to this kind of rich which is reproved, because afterward those who heard said: and who can be saved?, when the crowd of the poor is incomparably greater, namely understanding that even those are reckoned in that number who, although they do not have such things, are nevertheless seized by the desire of having them.

But the meaning is that it is easier for Christ to suffer for the lovers of the world than for the lovers of the world to be able to be converted to Christ. And by the name of camel he wished himself to be understood, because, humbled, he bore burdens. For in whom is it more manifestly understood than in him of whom it is written: the greater you are, humble yourself in all things (Sir 3:18 (3:20))? And by the needle he signifies prickings, and by the prickings the pains undergone in his passion. The eye of the needle, then, he calls the straits of the passion. But that he says: the things that are impossible with men are possible with God, is not to be taken to mean that the greedy and proud, who were signified by the name of that rich man, will enter into the kingdom of heaven with their desires and pride, but it is possible for God that, through his word, as we see has both already been done and is daily done, they should be converted from the desire of temporal things to the love of eternal things, and from pernicious pride to most salutary humility.

48. 1. We could understand those drawing near to Jericho in such a way that, having now gone out from it, they were yet still near to that city. This indeed is said less usually, but yet it could seem to have been said thus, since Matthew says that as they were going out from Jericho the two blind men who sat beside the way were given sight (See Mt 20:29-34).

About the number indeed there would be no question if one of the evangelists had been silent about the one, recalling the other; for Mark too mentions one, when he likewise says that one was given sight as they were going out from Jericho (See Mk 10:46-52), whose name too he gave, and his father, so that we may understand that he was the better known, the other unknown, so that the well-known one might deservedly be mentioned even alone and fittingly.

But since the things that follow in the Gospel according to Luke most openly show that what he himself narrates happened while they were still coming to Jericho, nothing else remains to understand than that this miracle was done twice, once in one blind man, when he was still coming to that city, and again in two, when he was going out from it, so that Luke narrated the one, Matthew the other, and this not without some sacrament. For if we interpret Jericho as the moon and, on account of this, mortality, the Lord, drawing near to death, had commanded the light of the Gospel to be preached to the Jews alone, whom that one blind man whom Luke mentions signified; but rising from death and ascending, both to the Jews and to the gentiles, which two peoples the two blind men mentioned by Matthew seem to signify.

48. 2. By the temple in the Gospel understand the man himself, or also with his body joined to it, which is the Church (See Col 1:18). But according to that which is the head of the Church it was said: destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up. But according to that by which the temple is understood with the Church also joined to it, he seems to have said: take these things away. It is written: my house shall be called a house of prayer, but you have made it a house of trade or a den of robbers (Jn 2:16, 19). For he signified that there would be those in the Church who would rather carry on their own business, or have there a hiding place for concealing their crimes, than follow the love of Christ and, having received pardon by the confession of sins, be corrected.

49. As to what he said: for they no longer begin to die, because marriages are for the sake of children, children for the sake of succession, succession for the sake of death; where, then, there is no death, neither are there marriages. For just as now our speech is carried out and completed by syllables passing away and following one after another, so men themselves, whose the speech is, by passing away and succeeding, carry out and complete the order of this age, which is woven from the beauty of temporal things. But in that life, since the Word of God, which we shall enjoy, is completed by no passing away and succession of syllables, but has all the things it has at once by always remaining, so those who partake of it, to whom it alone will be life, will neither pass away from themselves by dying nor succeed by being born.

50. That the Lord said to the disciples: pray that you do not enter into temptation. And he himself was drawn away from them about a stone's throw, as though he admonished them by this to direct toward him the stone, that is, to carry the intention of the Law even to him, the Law which was written on stone (See Exod 31:18; 34:4). For that stone can reach even to him, since Christ is the end of the Law unto righteousness for everyone who believes (Rom 10:4).

51. 1. What is written of the Lord: he made as though to go farther, does not pertain to a lie. For not everything that we feign is a lie; but when we feign that which signifies nothing, then it is a lie. But when our feigning refers to some signification, it is not a lie but a certain figure of the truth. Otherwise all the things that have been said figuratively by wise and holy men, or even by the Lord himself, will be reckoned lies, because, according to the usual understanding, truth does not subsist in such sayings. For the man who had two sons, of whom the younger, having received the portion of his patrimony, set out into a far country, and the rest that is woven into that narrative (See Lk 15:11-32), are not stated as though there was truly some man who suffered or did this with his two sons. These things, then, are feigned to signify a certain thing far and deeply greater and so incomparably different, that through that feigned man the true God is understood. But just as words, so deeds too are feigned without a lie to signify some thing. Hence comes also that saying of the same Lord, that he sought fruit on the fig tree at a time when those fruits did not yet exist (See Mk 11:13). For there is no doubt that that seeking was not true; for any man at all would know that the tree did not have fruit either through barrenness or because of the season. Therefore a feigning which refers to some truth is a figure; one which does not so refer is a lie.

51. 2. What, then, does it signify that the Lord made as though to go farther, when he was accompanying the disciples, expounding to them the holy Scriptures, while they did not know whether it was he himself? What do we think but that he intimated that men can come to the knowledge of him through the duty of hospitality, so that, when he himself has withdrawn farther from men, above all the heavens, he is nevertheless so with those who show these things to his servants, that, when they begin to say: Lord, when did we see you a guest and take you in?, he—namely the one who had withdrawn far off—may answer: when you did it to one of my least, you did it to me (Mt 25:38-40).

He holds Christ, then, lest he go farther from him, whoever, catechized in the word, shares in all good things with the one who catechizes him, as the Apostle says: let him who is catechized in the word share in all good things with him who catechizes him (Gal 6:6), and in another place, when he had said: sharing in the needs of the saints, he at once added: pursuing hospitality (Rom 12:13).

For these too had been catechized in the word, when he was expounding the Scriptures to them; and because they pursued hospitality, the one whom in the very exposition of the Scriptures they had not recognized, they recognize in the breaking of the bread. For the hearers of the Law are not righteous before God, but the doers of the Law will be justified (Rom 2:13).

51. 3. That in the passion they stripped the Lord of his own garment and clothed him in a counterfeit one (See Mt 27:28), those heretics were signified who say that he did not have a true body, but a feigned one.