Saturday of the 24th week after Pentecost

This is a great vision. But if you wish to see it, remove the sandals from your feet. Remove every chain of sin. Remove the chains of the world. Leave behind earthly sandals. Jesus sent the apostles without sandals, without money, gold and silver, so that they would not carry earthly things with them. The one who seeks to do good is praised not for his sandals but for the swiftness and grace of his feet. The Scripture says, "How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the gospel of peace, of those who bring glad tidings of good things!" Therefore remove the sandals from your feet, that they may be beautiful for preaching the gospel.

Of what kind then he ought to be who preaches the Gospel of the kingdom of God is marked out by these Gospel precepts; that is, he must not require the supports of secular aid; and clinging wholly to faith, he must believe that the less he requires those things, the more they will be supplied to him.

To those also who wish it, this place admits of being explained, so as to seem only to represent a spiritual temper of mind, which appears to have cast off as it were a certain covering of the body; not only rejecting power and despising wealth, but renouncing also the delights of the flesh itself.

(de Con. l. 2. c. 30.) Or, the Lord did not wish the disciples to possess and carry with them these things, not that they were not necessary to the support of this life, but because He sent them thus to show that these things were due to them from those believers to whom they announced the Gospel, that so they might neither possess security, nor carry about with them the necessaries of this life, either great or little. He has therefore, according to Mark, excluded all except a staff, showing that the faithful owe every thing to their ministers who require no superfluities. But this permission of the staff He has mentioned by name, when He says, They should take nothing in the way, but a staff only.

And he said to them: Take nothing for the journey, neither a staff, nor a bag, nor bread, nor money, nor have two tunics. It is usual to inquire how Matthew and Luke mentioned that the Lord told the disciples not to carry a staff, when Mark says, and he commanded them not to take anything for the road except a staff only. This is resolved in such a way that we understand the staff mentioned under a different meaning which, according to Mark, should be carried, and a different one that, according to Matthew and Luke, should not be carried. Just as temptation is understood under a different meaning when it is said: God tempts no one, and under another when it is said: The Lord your God is testing you, to know whether you love him. One denotes seduction, the other probation. Therefore, both statements must be taken as said by the Lord to the apostles, both to not carry a staff, and to carry only a staff. For when, according to Matthew, he told them: Do not possess gold or silver (Matthew X), and other things, he immediately added: For the laborer is worthy of his food(Bidad). Hence he sufficiently showed why he did not want them to possess and carry these things. Not because these things were not necessary for the sustenance of this life, but because he sent them in such a way as to show that these things were due to them from those to whom the Gospel believers were announcing. However, it is clear that the Lord did not command in such a way that the Evangelists should live from other sources than those who provide for them, to whom they announce the Gospel. Otherwise, the Apostle went against this precept, who earned his living from the labor of his hands, so as not to be a burden to anyone. But he gave authority, wherein they knew these things were due to them. However, when something is commanded by the Lord, if it is not done, it is a fault of disobedience. When authority is given, it is permissible for anyone not to use it, and as if to give up their right. Therefore, the Lord ordained this, which the Apostle says he ordained, that those who announce the Gospel should live from the Gospel, he spoke to the apostles, that secure they should neither possess nor carry the essentials of this life, neither great nor small. Therefore, he said, Nor a staff, showing that from their faithful ones, all things are due to his ministers, requiring nothing superfluous. And therefore adding: For the laborer is worthy of his food (Matthew X), he thoroughly opened and illustrated wherefrom he spoke these things. Thus, he signified this authority by the name of the staff when he says, not to take anything for the road, except a staff only. It is understood that by the authority accepted from the Lord, which is signified by the name of the staff, even those things that are not carried will not be lacking. This must also be understood about two tunics, so none of them would think to carry another, besides the one they were wearing, worried it might be needed, as they could receive from that authority. But according to Mark, not to carry or have two tunics, but more expressively not to be clothed in two tunics, saying: And they were not to put on two tunics (Mark VI): what does he advise them except to walk not doubly but simply? Otherwise. In two tunics, they seem to me to show a double garment. Not that in the icy places of Scythia and snow, someone should be content with one tunic, but that in a tunic, we understand clothing, so we should not be dressed in one and reserve another for ourselves from fear of the future.

Now, some people say: The totally poor do not keep the middle way. I answer: On the contrary, they truly keep it. For this middle way is not a matter of things, but of the soul's desire. For if you desire these things in order to be sustained by them, be they your own or those of others, you keep the middle way. If you overestimate them as if happiness were to be found in them, you are at one extreme; if you spurn them as being wicked, you are at the other. So did the Manichees believe in the wickedness of intercourse with a woman, be she wife or whore. Likewise, they taught that no man could own anything. And Augustine teaches that this was never a command, although the Lord said to the apostles: "Take nothing for your journey." The middle way, then, consists in being sustained either by your own goods or by those of another.

And he said to them: Take nothing for your journey. After the explanation of the authority entrusted, there follows the description of the uprightness enjoined. This consists in three things, namely in poverty of sustenance, scantiness of clothing, and humility of common life.

First, therefore, with regard to poverty in sustenance, it is said: And he said to them: Take nothing for your journey, that is, by way of temporal sustenance, so that by your example you might preach that word of 1 Timothy 6: "We brought nothing into this world, and it is certain that we can carry nothing out." And that it might become more apparent, he descends to particulars, when he adds: Neither a staff, namely for support, nor a scrip, for storing, nor bread, for eating, nor money, for buying. In this there is a prohibition of every means of sustenance, so that it may be shown that the preacher, by the greatness of his hope, ought to rely on God alone, according to that word of 1 Peter 5: "Casting all your care upon him, for he has care of you." Whence also blessed Francis, when he sent the brothers to preach, would say to them that word of the Psalm: "Cast your thought upon the Lord," etc. In this, however, he does not prohibit, as Augustine says, diligent provision, but anxious solicitude, according to that word of Matthew 6: "Be not anxious for the morrow: for sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof."

And therefore, for the right understanding of this precept, what one Evangelist denies, namely Luke, another Evangelist affirms, namely Mark, in the sixth chapter, where it is said: "And Jesus commanded them that they should take nothing for the journey except a staff only." Upon which Augustine says in On the Harmony of the Evangelists: "Both were commanded by the Lord: that they should carry nothing except a staff, and that they should not carry even a staff. Not to carry a staff is not to be anxious; to carry nothing except a staff is to use the power of receiving granted to preachers." Whence Luke ten: "Eating and drinking such things as they have." — The literal observance of this precept, however, belongs to perfect preachers who perfectly imitate Christ, in whose person Peter says in Matthew nineteen: "Behold, we have left all things and followed you." But the spiritual observance extends to all, so that the preacher of truth may be a despiser of earthly things; otherwise, if they announce the word of God out of desire for gain, they are not disciples of Christ but of Balaam the soothsayer, according to that passage of Second Peter two: "Having a heart exercised with covetousness, children of malediction, forsaking the right way," that is, the way of poverty; concerning which it says there, "they have gone astray, following the way of Balaam, who loved the wages of iniquity."

Whence the preacher of truth must above all avoid the vice of cupidity; otherwise he will not be a preacher but a flatterer. On account of which, First Thessalonians two: "Neither were we at any time in the word of flattery, as you know, nor in an occasion of avarice — God is witness." For he knew that from this he would provoke the wrath of God, as is said in Micah three: "Her princes judged for bribes, and her priests taught for hire, and her prophets divined for money," etc. "For this reason Zion shall be plowed as a field," etc.

Secondly, as regards scantiness in clothing, it is added: Neither have two tunics, so that thus the teaching of the Master may accord with the teaching of the Precursor, according to that passage of Luke three: "He who has two tunics, let him give one to him who has none"; and according to that passage of the Apostle in First Timothy six: "Having food and covering, let us be content with these." In this, moreover, that He does not prohibit a single garment but a double one, He grants necessity and forbids fastidiousness in changing and superfluity in possession. Whence Bede says: "A single garment is whatever is necessary for someone according to the quality of place or time; a double garment is what exceeds necessity"; and this is manifest in the Lord Himself, who besides the seamless tunic had other garments, which were divided, as is said in John nineteen.

According to the spiritual understanding, however, the duplicity of simulation and hypocrisy is prohibited, lest they have one garment in secret and another in public, lest they be among those of whom it is said in Matthew 7: "They come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves." Similarly avoiding this, blessed Francis, when he was ill, refused to place a piece of fur on the inside before his chest unless he also placed one on the outside.

Likewise, Luke 9: Take nothing for the journey, neither staff, nor wallet, nor bread, nor money: Gloss: "Not to carry a staff is not to be anxious about those things which are necessary for human sustenance, because these things are owed to preachers"; if therefore the Lord urged the Apostles, whom He also sent to preach among the unbelievers, to exclude anxiety about necessary sustenance: much more strongly, when the Gospel is preached to the faithful, it belongs to perfection not to be anxious about such things, but to be content with the food and clothing given to oneself.

For this reason very fitly He bade them take nothing with them, wishing them both to be free from all worldly care, and so entirely exempt from the labours that worldly things occasion, as even to pay no regard to their necessary and indispensable food. But manifestly One Who bids them abstain even from things such as these, entirely cuts away the love of riches and the desire of gain. For their glory, He said, and, so to speak, their crown, is to possess nothing. And He withdraws them even from such things as are necessary for their use, by the command to carry nothing whatsoever, neither staff, nor scrip, nor bread, nor money, nor two coats. Observe, therefore, as I said, that He withdraws them from vain distractions, and anxiety about the body, and bids them have no cares about food, repeating to them, as it were, that passage in the Psalm: "Cast thy care upon the Lord, and He shall feed thee." For true also is that which Christ said: "Ye are not able to serve God and Mammon." And again; "For where thy treasure is, there will thy heart be also."

That they may lead, therefore, a consistent and simple life, and, being free from vain and superfluous anxiety, may devote themselves entirely to the duty of proclaiming His mystery, and labour without ceasing in publishing to men everywhere the tidings of salvation, He commands them to be indifferent both as regards clothing and food. And to the same effect the Saviour elsewhere spake: "For let your loins, He says, be girt, and your lights burning." But by their loins being girt, He means the readiness of the mind for every good work: and by their lights burning, that their heart be filled with divine light. And in like manner the law also of Moses plainly commands those who ate of the lamb: "Thus shall ye eat it: your loins shall be girt: and your staves in your hands: and your sandals on your feet." Observe, therefore, that those in whom Christ, the true Lamb, dwells, must be like men girt for a journey: for they must "shoe their feet with the readiness of the Gospel of peace," as blessed Paul wrote unto us; and be clad as becometh wayfarers. For it is not fitting for those charged with the divine message, if they would prosper in their office, to remain stationary; but, as it were, they must constantly be moving forward, and run, not for an uncertainty, but to win a glorious hope. For even those who once had fallen under the hand of the enemy, if by faith they fight for Christ, the Saviour of us all, will inherit an incorruptible crown.

Wishing then that they should be free from the desire of wealth and the anxieties of life, He gave this injunction. He took it as a proof of their faith and courage, that when it was commanded them to lead a life of extreme poverty, they would not escape from what was ordered. For it was fitting that they should make a kind of bargain, receiving these saving virtues to recompense them for obedience to commands. And when He was making them soldiers of God, He girds them for battle against their enemies, by telling them to embrace poverty. For no soldier of God entangles himself in the affairs of a secular life. (2 Tim. 2:4.)

(Orat. ii. 69.) Now in sending His disciples to preach, our Lord enjoined many things on them, the chief of which are, that they should be so virtuous, so constant, so temperate, and, to speak briefly, so heavenly, that no less through their manner of living than their words, the teaching of the Gospel might be spread abroad. And therefore were they sent with lack of money, and staves, and a single garment; He accordingly adds, And he said to them, Take nothing in the way, neither staves.

For He sends them out as very beggars, so that He would have them neither carry bread, nor any thing else of which men are generally in want.

Some also understand by the Apostles not carrying scrip, nor staff, nor two coats, that they must not lay up treasures, (which a scrip implies, collecting many things,) nor be angry and of a quarrelsome spirit, (which the staff signifies,) nor be false and of a double heart, (which is meant by the two coats.)

So the faith of the church must be sought first and foremost. If Christ is to dwell in a house, it undoubtedly must be chosen. But lest an unbelieving people or a heretical teacher deface its home, the church is commanded that the fellowship of heretics be avoided and the synagogue shunned. The dust is to be shaken off your feet lest when the dryness of barren unbelief crumbles the sole of your mind it is stained as if by a dry and sandy soil. A preacher of the gospel must take on himself the bodily weaknesses of a faithful people, so to speak. He must lift up and remove from his own soles worthless actions as if they were dust. For it is written: "Who is weak, and I am not weak?" Any church which rejects faith and does not possess the foundations of apostolic preaching is to be abandoned lest it be able to stain others with unbelief. The apostle also clearly affirmed this by saying "Reject a man that is a heretic after the first admonition."

He pronounces it to be foreign to the character of a preacher of the heavenly kingdom to run from house to house and change the rights of inviolable hospitality; but as the grace of hospitality is supposed to be offered, so also if they are not received the dust must be shaken off, and they are commanded to depart from the city; as it follows, And whosoever will not receive you when ye go out of that city, shake off the very dust from your feet for a testimony, &c.

Or it is a great return of hospitality which is here taught, i. e. that we should not only wish peace to our hosts, but also if any faults of earthly infirmity obscure them, they should be removed by receiving the footsteps of apostolical preaching.

And in whatever house you enter, stay there and do not go out from there. He gives a general command of constancy, so that they may uphold the laws of hospitable necessity, asserting that it is foreign to the preacher of the heavenly kingdom to wander through houses and change the inviolate laws of hospitality. Nor is it without reason that, according to Matthew, the house that the apostles enter is decreed to be observed, so that the reason for changing the hospitality and violating necessity does not suffice.

Thirdly, with regard to humility in lodging, he adds: And into whatever house you enter, remain there, being content, that is, with that lodging: and do not depart from there, in search of something better, because, as it is said in Sirach 29, "a wretched life it is to lodge from house to house." For the changing of lodging attests to impatience, which is moved by a slight cause and cannot rest, according to that saying of Jeremiah 14: "This people has loved to move their feet and has not rested, and it did not please the Lord."

And this is especially to be avoided by the preacher, because, according to that saying of Proverbs 19, "the doctrine of a man is known through patience." And therefore Ambrose says: "It is unfitting for a preacher to run about through houses and to change the established rights of a settled lodging." But the mother of this inconstancy and impatience is pride, which can dwell in peace with no one, according to that saying of Proverbs 13: "Among the proud there are always quarrels."

He commanded them both to remain in one house, and from it to take their departure. For it was right that those who had once received them should not be defrauded of the gift. It is also right that the holy apostles themselves should not place any impediment in the way of their own zeal and earnestness in preaching God's message. This would happen if they allowed themselves to be carried off to various houses by those whose object was not to learn some necessary lesson but to set before them a luxurious table, beyond what was moderate and necessary.

But it may be said, How then shall necessary things be prepared for them. He therefore adds, And into whatsoever house ye enter, there abide, and thence depart. As if He said, Let the food of disciples suffice you, who receiving from you spiritual things, will minister unto you temporal. But He ordered them to abide in one house, so as neither to incommode the host, (that is, so as to send him away,) nor themselves to incur the suspicion of gluttony and wantonness.

And whoever will not receive you, as you go out from that city, even shake off the dust of your feet as a testimony against them. The dust is shaken off their feet in testimony of their labor, in that they have entered the city, and the apostolic preaching has reached them. Or the dust is shaken off so that they may accept nothing from them, not even what is necessary for sustenance, who have spurned the Gospel. Allegorically, those who humbly attend to the word, if they are obscured by the spots of earthly levity as men, are soon purified by those marks of the evangelical preaching which they receive. But those who scorn through unbelief, negligence, or even deliberate effort, are judged to have their communion to be avoided, their synagogue to be shunned, and the dust of their feet shaken off, lest the mind's chaste mark be stained by what is handled and compared to dust.

The dust is shaken off from the Apostles' feet as a testimony of their labours, that they entered into a city, and the apostolical preaching had reached to the inhabitants thereof. Or the dust is shaken off when they receive nothing (not even of the necessaries of life) from those who despised the Gospel.

But if any by treacherous negligence, or even from zeal, despise the word of God, their communion must be shunned, the dust of the feet must be shaken off, lest by their vain deeds which are to be compared to the dust, the footstep of a chaste mind be defiled.

And since it belongs to true humility to refuse the company of no one, nor even to be burdensome to another, therefore for the perfection of humility it is added: And whoever do not receive you, that is, despising your doctrine, like those who also did not receive the Lord: John 1: "He came unto his own, and his own received him not." - And because this is a great offense, which is not to be shared in, therefore he adds: Going out from that city, that is, turning away from their wickedness, according to that saying of Numbers 16: "Depart from the tents of wicked men and do not touch what is theirs, lest you be involved with them"; Isaiah 52: "Depart from their midst, do not touch what is unclean"; and Jeremiah 48: "Leave the cities and dwell in the rock."

And this, lest they be defiled by the filth of others; on account of which he adds: And shake off the dust from your feet as a testimony against them, that is, to show your innocence. This Barnabas and Paul did, of whom it is said in Acts 13 that "having shaken the dust from their feet, they came to Iconium." But to shake the dust from one's feet is to permit nothing of the vain glory of men to cling to one's affections. For vain glory is rightly designated by dust, which is lifted up by the wind, according to that saying of the Psalm: "He shall be like the dust which the wind casts from the face of the earth."

For it is very improbable that those who despise the saving Word, and the Master of the household, will show themselves kind to His servants, and seek further blessings.

The beloved generates love, and the light immaterial the light inaccessible. "This is my beloved Son," He who, being manifested on earth and yet unseparated from the Father's bosom, was manifested, and yet did not appear. For the appearing is a different thing, since in appearance the baptizer here is superior to the baptized. For this reason did the Father send down the Holy Spirit from heaven upon Him who was baptized. For as in the ark of Noah the love of God toward man is signified by the dove, so also now the Spirit, descending in the form of a dove, bearing as it were the fruit of the olive, rested on Him to whom the witness was borne. For what reason? That the faithfulness of the Father's voice might be made known, and that the prophetic utterance of a long time past might be ratified. And what utterance is this? "The voice of the Lord (is) on the waters, the God of glory thundered; the Lord (is) upon many waters." And what voice? "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." This is He who is named the son of Joseph, and (who is) according to the divine essence my Only-begotten. "This is my beloved Son"-He who is hungry, and yet maintains myriads; who is weary, and yet gives rest to the weary; who has not where to lay His head, and yet bears up all things in His hand; who suffers, and yet heals sufferings; who is smitten, and yet confers liberty on the world; who is pierced in the side, and yet repairs the side of Adam.