Chapter 12

Chapter Eleven

¹ At dawn they were cast away. When they expected, he says, the help of the Assyrians to appear to them like a dawn, while they were in the night of the perplexity and straitness of the war, then they were cast away into Babylon as captives. Or else, because swiftly and in short order they shall undergo utter destruction; for the dawn too holds but a brief season; then the rising sun makes the day. But God also, so long as he forbears, is said to slumber; and when he begins to execute vengeances, then he seems to rise up. He says, then: For the rest of the time I slumbered, as it were overlooking them in the night; but now, as though dawn had appeared, I awake, and henceforth I will cast them away.

² The king of Israel was cast away. He was cast away, inasmuch as the king of Israel was carried off into Babylon; and he was cast away also, inasmuch as the kingdom in Samaria was thereafter brought to an end, as has often been said. And the Hebrews too, who chose the darkness, were cast away, when the light of the gospel word shone. And if the Forerunner is a “dawn,” as heralding the sun, they were cast away then also, when he said to them: Offspring of vipers, begin not to say within yourselves: We have Abraham for a father; and, Every tree that does not bring forth good fruit is cut down and cast into the fire. And why did they suffer this? Because Christ, the king of Israel, was cast away by them. And the things within us that provoke God to anger are cherished by us so long as we have night and insensibility. But when, having heard the one who says: Awake, you who sleep, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall shine upon you; we have come out of that night and insensibility, and have come to a perception of the things done, and seem to have a “dawn” — that is, the beginning of a daylit and luminous condition; then there are cast away from us the things formerly loved, and the very prince of darkness who before reigned in us.

³ Because Israel was a child, and I loved him, and out of Egypt I called back his children; as I called them back, so they departed from before my face. Out of folly, he says, and a childish mind they will undergo this punishment. For I called them back out of Egypt, and freed them from that bitter slavery; but they departed from before my face, unwilling to present themselves to me and to minister to me, but to the idols. Or you may understand it thus also. As though someone were perplexed for what reason he called at the first men so abominable, he says, On account of your fathers. For Jacob, he says — he who was renamed Israel — was a “child,” that is, without guile, and was beloved while yet in his mother’s womb. For Jacob, he says, I loved, but Esau I hated. For this cause I delivered his children also from the slavery of the Egyptians. But they, who were honored for their fathers’ sake, fled from me, not one and two at a time, but by multitudes and by tribes, even as I also called them out of Egypt in a body. And Christ himself, who is called Israel (for he has seen God; for no one has seen the Father, except him who is from God) — this One, then, became a “child,” and out of Egypt the Father called him, the truly beloved. But the children of the Jews, who are called also children of Christ by reason of the kinship of the flesh — according to the saying, Behold, I and the children whom God has given me; — as often as they were called by him, they fled away. Wherefore he said: How often would I have gathered your children, and you would not. And observe: when one is a child in respect of wickedness, then God loves him, and makes him Israel, seeing and knowing God (for into a malicious soul wisdom will not enter), and takes him out of the Egypt of the much-wandering knowledge of this age, which has withered away. Yet one must be vigilant, lest, after being called by God unto the knowledge of his Son, our children — that is, the human reasonings which we beget — fall away from God. For the reasonings of mortals are timid, and their devices uncertain. Wherefore Paul also says: If anyone thinks he knows something, he deceives himself and is puffed up, knowing nothing; for knowledge puffs up.

⁴ They sacrificed to the Baalim, and burned incense to graven images. By “Baalim,” as has often been said, he names the idols of Baal; and by “graven images,” those of the other gods. And he shows their thanklessness, in that, having forsaken him who redeemed them out of Egypt, they served such things. And his own kindness he displays through what follows.

⁵ And I bound the feet of Ephraim, I took him up upon my arm. So great goodness did I show toward them, that I became to them as a nurse; and just as she, when about to take up a little babe into her hands, gathers together its feet, and so takes it up; so also did I, and as it were binding their feet together — that is, gathering their feet — I took them up upon my right hand. And by these things he hints at this: that I did not leave them to move in disorder and lawlessly; but I gathered their motions, giving them a law, and furnishing them my arm — that is, my strength — as an ally in wars, bearing up their weakness.

⁶ And they knew not that I healed them in the destruction of men. They knew not, he says, that by destroying and utterly rooting out other nations I was healing and tending them. For I utterly destroyed the Egyptians and those who dwelt in Palestine. The Lord too bound the feet of those who, feigning, tempted him with words, and tried to take them up upon his arm, and to show them the power of the works of his Godhead — when he raised up the paralytic, when he gave eyes to the blind, when he simply wrought the other signs and wonders. But they knew not that a physician had been sent to them, healing the corrupted. For they that are strong have no need of physicians. And some who are robust in wickedness he binds at the feet, teaching them to run back to his arm — that is, his works — and to imitate his manner of life, as far as is possible. For the arm is a symbol of strength in the active life. But the many do not recognize that in the destruction of human reasonings and purposes he heals them — that is, their souls; which elsewhere too he says: I will smite the worse, and will heal the better.

⁷ I stretched them out in the bonds of my love. He who is about to bind someone’s hands stretches them out in order to bind them. This too he says here: that I stretched them out, in the sense of, I made them ready, and fitted them to be bound by my love. Or else: I spread them out, and made them many and glorious, because I was bound by my love toward them. And this he said as of a vine, as the psalm too says: She stretched out her branches as far as the sea, and her shoots as far as the rivers.[1] The Lord stretched out the withered of hand also, and the paralytics, and the woman bowed together, and the lame, by reason of his love, both taking away their infirmities and bearing their diseases. But also in the bonds with which he was bound, when he was led away to Caiaphas, on account of our love, he stretched them out — them that were held fast and bound by the enemy — having freed them from such constraint. And so whenever one is bound either by disease or by poverty, he is loved by the Lord, according to the writer of Proverbs, and this becomes to him a stretching-out toward the things before. Such was Paul too, taking good pleasure in weaknesses, in afflictions, and in the bonds which he had, not being separated, but stretching forward to the things before.

⁸ And I will be to them as a man who strikes upon his cheeks, and I will look upon him, and I will prevail against him. Since he had said that he took him up as a little child, and that he loved him, he says: For this cause, even when I smite him, I will not lay on bitter blows, but will chasten moderately, as striking him upon his cheeks, that I may shame him — as one might strike a child that has sinned. For even if I only look sharply upon him, it suffices to prevail against him, and to make the wickedness in him vanish. Of this sort is the saying: In a little affliction is your chastening to us; and, Chasten us, but in judgment, and not in wrath. If the cheeks help us toward being nourished, see how the Lord struck upon them those in Judea, sending famine upon them while they were besieged by the Romans, so that their cheeks were left idle. For he who out of the weakness of the flesh was willingly crucified, this One, when he but looked upon them, showed them his power. He too is struck upon the cheeks who falls into dishonor, that the pride may be cast down which he had while honored before; and then God looks upon him. For upon whom will I look, but upon the meek and quiet one, who trembles at my words? And then also God prevails in him. For in our humiliation the Lord remembered us, and redeemed us from our enemies.

⁹ Ephraim went down into Egypt, and Assur was his king, because he would not return. This you may understand in two ways: either that, having come to Egypt, he sought the alliance from there, yet nevertheless the Assyrians reigned over him, having prevailed and routed it, even though he was using the Egyptians as allies; or, that he shall be led away captive into Egypt, and the Assyrians shall rule over him, because he would not return to me from the idols.

¹⁰ And the sword grew weak in his cities, and rested in his hands, and they shall eat of the fruits of their own counsels. That is, no man was found in the cities mighty and able to wield a sword; but the hands of all were slackened, and ceased from working anything warlike, and of necessity they shall eat the fruits of their impious counsels, which are afflictions and tribulations. And the Hebrews too, who emulated the hardheartedness of the Egyptians, in going down and falling away from the divine height, and having for their king the great mind of the Assyrians, these grew weak. And there is not in them the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. For how should the word of God be in them, who simply put to death the Word of God? Wherefore their hands also ceased from working any work pleasing to God. For they would not repent and return, and be baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. These things befall also everyone who goes down into the land of Egypt, in which the principalities and powers of darkness bear rule. For such a man has neither the sword of discrimination, by which he might judge the worse from the better, nor is he able to work anything at all against those who war against his soul; but he is led away captive, bound hand and foot, and stripped of all active power.

¹¹ And his people hangs in suspense out of his sojourning. That is, the people of Ephraim was hung far from its own land, having become captive. And the slayer of Christ too is carried about here and there. And some have understood this thus also. For so greatly, he says, does the people of Ephraim commit impiety, and thereby becomes itself the cause to itself of being carried away, that it all but seems to hang and to be suspended toward captivity.

¹² And God shall be angered against his precious things, and will by no means exalt him. That is, against the kings and rulers; and he will no more raise up a king in Samaria, nor rulers, and will by no means exalt him — Ephraim, that is — because there shall no longer be a king among them. The precious things of the Hebrew people are the temple and the things in it, against which the Lord was angered who said: Behold, your house is left to you desolate; and the people shall by no means be exalted in anything. And he who is carried from on high against the lowlier, and ever hangs over them and is lifted up out of the goods of this life, which belong to the sojourning here, and are dissolved together with it — such a man too finds God angered against his precious things, his wealth, I mean, and his glory, or even wife and children; and having brought him low in respect of these, God will no more exalt him. For his anger, he says, will deal with him as with a stranger; for against the proud man, as against one alien to him, God goes forth in array.

¹³ How shall I deal with you, O Ephraim? Shall I shield you, O Israel?[2] He resembles one who, out of much love for mankind, is at a loss, and says: I know not how to deal with you. Shall I shield you? But your works do not justify this coming to pass. What then shall I do?

¹⁴ I will make you as Adama, and as Seboim. I will destroy you, he says, like those Sodomitic cities; for this is just.

¹⁵ My heart was turned within me. Imitating a mother and a child-loving father, he says: Within me — that is, in the very moment when I speak against you, my heart was turned, as with certain gripings, and endured in its pain; wherefore it reversed the sentence.

¹⁶ My repenting was confounded; I will by no means act according to the wrath of my anger; I will by no means abandon Ephraim to be utterly forsaken. That is, being troubled out of my great tender love toward you, I have repented, and I will by no means act according to my wrath. And these things he says, not as now fearing this, now wishing that, but fashioning his speech into anger and mercy, into punishment and love for mankind; and by the former terrifying, by the latter urging on and calling forth unto persuasion. As David says: He has not dealt with us according to our sins; but as a father pities his sons, so the Lord pitied them that fear him; and in Isaiah: Will a woman forget her child, so as not to have mercy on the offspring of her womb? But even if a woman should forget these, yet I will not forget. And not only that he might benefit them does he say these things; but that we too might fashion our own souls after such an archetype of love for mankind (for whatever things were written, were written for our admonition), and that we might not be wicked and remembering of wrongs (for the ways of those who remember wrongs lead to death), but that at the same time we might display the words of anger unto correction, and bring on the words of love for mankind, so as rather, through kindness, to turn and to shame them. For then we show ourselves presiding rationally, when we turn them by kindness rather than by wrath; for by reason, not by force, they are to be led. Wherefore Peter also said: Shepherd the flock that is among you willingly, and not by constraint.

¹⁷ Because I am God, and not man; holy in you. As though someone objected and was perplexed: Why, O Lord, having threatened so much, have you repented, and do not punish Ephraim? he says: Because I am not man, but a good God, plainly not giving the victory to anger; for this is a human passion. Why then do you punish at all? Because, he says, I am also holy, hating iniquity, and willing to be holy in you — that is, that my holiness be made known through your works, and not be blasphemed among the nations through your abominable deeds. Of this sort is the saying: Hallowed be your name; in the sense of, Let it be shown holy through us and be glorified.

¹⁸ And I will not enter into a city. That is, I shall not be enclosed in a place, nor, like men, be compelled to inhabit a city; for everywhere I am present to all. But neither did he enter into the city of Jerusalem, to visit it and to make provision for it; for because of its wicked inhabitants he forsook it.

¹⁹ I will go after the Lord. As though he teaches the people what they must say and do, and says: Since such is your love for mankind, O Lord, I will go after the Lord — I, the people that offended you; and though worthy to suffer the uttermost evils, yet not suffering them because of your mercy, I will henceforth do the things pleasing to you. Such, then, is the meaning of the saying. And reasonably did some, joining to this also the foregoing — I mean the words, I will not enter into a city — say that that too is spoken in the person of the people, who declares: Truly I fortified cities, that in time of war I might have them for a refuge; but since the Lord shows such love for mankind toward me, I will not enter into a city, but will follow the Lord, and in his back parts he will overshadow me, fighting before me and shielding me.

²⁰ He will roar like a lion, for he himself will roar aloud, and the children of the waters shall be amazed; they shall fly out like a bird from Egypt, and like a dove from the land of the Assyrians, and I will restore them to their houses. He foretells the return that should come to pass afterward in the time of Cyrus. For this man, he says, will march against the Babylonians, like a lion roaring and bellowing. And he hints, by the lion, at his power; and by the He will roar and bellow, at the war-cries in the battle. He will make the Babylonians cowardly, and they shall be amazed, like children of the waters — that is, like fishes; for a fish is a cowardly thing, enduring neither a noise nor a human shadow. When this man, therefore, has taken the Babylonians, the Jews shall return both from the land of the Assyrians and from Egypt. For Cyrus, moved by God, released those who were in Babylon. And when these had returned, and were building Jerusalem according to the command of Cyrus, the Jews in Egypt, hearing of it, took courage and themselves went up too. But some have taken the He will roar of God, that he himself will cast cowardice upon the Babylonians. For indeed what strength Cyrus had, he had from God, as Isaiah prophesied many years before, making mention of his very name. For he says: Thus says the Lord to my anointed Cyrus, whose right hand I have held, that nations might hear before him; and I will break in pieces the strength of kings. I will open before him doors, and cities shall not be shut. And our Lord Jesus Christ too says the words: I will go after the Lord; for I am not a rival of God, but he himself told me what I should say and what I should speak. And: The Father loves the Son, and shows him the works; and, Your will be done. And he roared and bellowed like a lion, when, having cried with a loud voice, he gave forth his soul into the hands of the Father, falling asleep like a lion. Then also the children of the dragon that rules the waters — the powers that apostatized along with him — were afraid, beholding death despoiled. For many bodies of the saints that had fallen asleep were raised, which the children of the dragon flew forth from both Egypt and Babylon. For, the knowledge of God taking up its citizenship there, they were driven out thence, and flew away into the abysses of darkness, which were their houses. The children of the waters are the deeds akin to the moist and dissolute life, which, when the lion of the tribe of Judah, Christ, roars forth from the good heart the good word of the Gospel, he makes to fly away from us; and thereafter we escape out of the land of Egypt, like a bird flying upward out of a snare; and we fly away like a meek and guileless dove out of the pride of the Assyrians — which, even if it is exalted, yet in truth is earth; and then we are restored by Jesus to the mansions on high.

²¹ Ephraim has encircled me with falsehood, and the house of Israel and of Judah with impieties.[3] I, he says, deem them worthy of so great forethought; but they have encircled me on every side with falsehood — that is, with idolatry. For wherever I turn, I see no place left to me, but they have dedicated all things to the demons. And now too many encircle the Lord with falsehoods, framing false testimonies.

²² Now God has known them, and a holy people shall be called God’s.[4] Nevertheless, he says, though they are such, I have known — that is, I have loved — them, and I name them my people. And some take it thus: I have known, he says, the manner by which they shall be well-pleasing to me. And they shall be called God’s, and that this shall come to pass through a certain chastening. For when they live in luxury they depart from me. And those of the Hebrews who turn to Christ are called the people of God, concerning whom he seems now to prophesy.