Judges 2

4–5

Let us consider where he has set his ascent: “In the valley of tears, in the place that he has appointed.” We have read in the book of Judges that when the angel came and preached repentance to the people, saying, “You have abandoned the Lord, and the Lord shall abandon you,” the Israelites wept aloud when they heard the threat; and that place was called the valley of tears. We have called attention to ancient history in order to avoid heresy. The valley of tears, moreover, we may understand allegorically as this world, for we are not on the mountain, that is, in the kingdom of heaven, but in the valley, in the darknesses of this world; through a fault, we have been cast out of Paradise with Adam into a lowly vale of tears where there is repentance and weeping. “In the valley of tears, in the place that he has appointed.” What did the prophet mean? God made this world an arena that here we may strive against the devil, against sin, in order to receive our crown in heaven. Why did he ordain a contest? Could not he save us without the struggle? He gave us, as it were, a master of contests; he gave us a stadium in which to carry on our wrestling against vices, so that afterwards he may crown us meritoriously, not as those who sleep but as those who labor.

Homilies on the Psalms, Alternate Series 63 (ps 83)

Who are these elders who either came with Joshua/Jesus or after him, if not the very apostles who illumined our hearts by their writings and precepts, even bringing a certain kind of “day” among us from that “true light” in which they were partakers? Whoever, therefore, is enlightened and instructed from the precepts of the apostles and is ordained according to the apostolic rules for the service of the Lord is the very person who is said to serve the Lord in the days of the elders who came after Jesus. Do you wish to see that the apostles also were the “light of the world,” just as the Savior “was the true light which illumines every person coming into the world”2? The Lord himself said to them, as it is written in the Gospel, “You are the light of the world.” But if the apostles are also the light of the world, then the “days” in which “we serve the Lord” undoubtedly illuminate us through their precepts and commandments.

Homilies on Judges 1.2

It mentions “the days of the elders who knew all the works of the Lord.” Who is the person who “knows all the works of the Lord,” except the one who does them himself? For just as it was said that the sons of Eli were “sons of pestilence, having no knowledge of the Lord,” yet not meaning that these men who taught others were ignorant of the Lord, but rather that they behaved like those who did not know the Lord, so also in like manner is this statement to be understood that the elders “knew all the works of the Lord.” Moreover, it does not merely say that “they knew the works of the Lord” but specifies that “they knew every work of the Lord,” that is, that they knew the Lord’s work of justice and work of sanctification and patience and kindness and piety, for everything that comes from the commandments of God is called a “work of the Lord.” … Therefore, they are said to “know” the work of God who do his work. But that its customary use of “to know” and “not to know” may shine still more clearly from the authority of the Scriptures, observe how it is written elsewhere that “he who keeps the commandment,” it says, “will not know an evil word.” Can, therefore, one who keeps the commandments become one who does not know evil? He knows, of course, but “not know” is said of him because he is careful to avoid the evil. It is even said of the Lord and Savior himself that “he did not know sin,” certainly indicating in this case that to be ignorant of sin is equivalent to refraining from every sinful act. In this way, therefore, he is said to “know the works of the Lord” who performs “the works of the Lord,” whereas he who does not do the work of God is ignorant of the work of God.

Homilies on Judges 1.4

Joshua’s death is also recounted for us. But it is nothing unusual that he who was the “son of Nun” died, for everything that is owed to nature gets paid. Yet, because we have established that what is read here about the son of Nun must be seen as referring to our Lord Jesus Christ, we need to ask how is it befitting to say that “Jesus died.” It is my opinion, though speaking according to the authority of Scripture, that Jesus lives in certain persons and is dead in other persons. Jesus lives in Paul and in Peter and in all those who can rightly say, “It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me.” and, again, “But for me to live is Christ and to die is profit.” In persons such as those, therefore, Jesus is rightly said to live. But in whom is Jesus dead? He is dead in those persons, undoubtedly, who are said to insult the death of Jesus by frequently repenting and then failing again, persons whom the apostle describes in his letter to the Hebrews as “crucifying the Son of God again for their own sake and holding him out for show.” You can see why, therefore, Jesus is not only said to be “dead” in those sinners but is also asserted to be “crucified” and “mocked” by them. But examine yourself as well and ask, when you have avaricious thoughts and desire to despoil others, if you are ever able to say that “Christ lives in me.” If you have thoughts of defilement, if you are harassed by fury, if you are inflamed with envy and aroused with jealousy, if you revel in drunkenness, if you are exalted with pride, or if you act with cruelty, will you be able to say in all of these things that “Christ lives in me”? Christ is dead in sinners, therefore, because no justice, no patience, no truth, nor anything else that Christ is operates within them. But for saints, on the other hand, Christ is said to be the one who enacts whatever they do, as the apostle declares: “I can do all things in him who strengthens me, Christ.”

Homilies on Judges 2.1

It was the ancients who did this, of course, but because what was written is said to be “written for our sake, to whom the end of the ages has arrived,” not on their account, we should watch lest these sayings are seen to be true of more of us than of them. Do you want to see that such things are applied to us through the apostle, rather than through me? Listen for yourself to what he said: “What does Scripture say about how Elijah interceded with God against Israel? ‘Lord, they killed your prophets, they destroyed your altars, and I am left alone and they seek my soul.’ But what was the divine response? ‘I preserved for myself seven thousand men who did not bend the knee to Baal,’ ” then the apostle adds “ ‘thus, in this time also a remnant chosen by grace is saved,’ ” You can see, therefore, that those who “bent the knee to Baal” and those who “did not bend the knee” are understood by the apostle as the multitude of unbelievers and the remnant of believers, respectively. This demonstrates, then, that those who lived in unbelief and impiety at the time of the Savior also “bent the knee to Baal” and worshiped idols, whereas those who believed and fulfilled the works of faith “did not bend the knee to Baal.” It is never mentioned in the historical books or in the Gospels or in any other book of Scripture that some at the time of the Savior did in fact bend the knee to idols, but such an act is indeed attributed to those persons who were bound by their sins, as though held by fetters. Whenever we sin and “are taken captive to the law of sin,” therefore, we “bend our knees to Baal.” But we are not called to this, nor do we believe in this, such that we would again become servants of sin and again “bend the knee” to the devil. Instead, our calling and the purpose of our faith is both to bend the knee at the name of Jesus, for “at the name of Jesus, every knee bends in heaven and on earth and in hell,” and to bend the knee to “the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named.”

Homilies on Judges 2.3

12–15

After the death of Joshua the son of Nave [Nun] they forsook the God of their fathers and served idols, Baalim and Ashtaroth; and the Lord in anger delivered them up to the hands of plunderers, and they continued to be plundered by them and to be sold to their adversaries, and [they] could not at all stand before their enemies. Wherever they went forth, his hand was upon them for evil, and they were greatly distressed. And after this God sets judges, the same as our censors, over them. But not even these did they continue steadfastly to obey. So soon as one of the judges died, they proceeded to transgress more than their fathers had done by going after the gods of others and serving and worshiping them. Therefore the Lord was angry. “Since, indeed,” he says, “this nation has transgressed my covenant which I established with their fathers and has not hearkened to my voice, I will not remove from them any of the nations which Joshua left at his death.” And thus, throughout almost all the annals of the judges and of the kings who succeeded them, while the strength of the surrounding nations was preserved, he meted wrath out to Israel by war and captivity and a foreign yoke, as often as they turned aside from him, especially to idolatry.

Scorpiace 3

12–14

As long as a people serves God, they are not "delivered into the hands of plunderers." But when they "abandon the Lord" and begin to serve their own passions, then it is said of them that "God gave them over to shameful passions" and, again, "He gave them over to a reprobate mind, that they would do unsuitable things." Why? Because, he says, "they were filled with every iniquity, wickedness, fornication, greed" and all other evils. It was because "they served and worshiped Baal and Ashtaroth" that "God delivered them into the hands of plunderers and handed them over to their enemies." This, as I have often said before, the Jews read as though it were merely a record of past events. We, however, "for whose sake this was written," it is said, ought to know that if we sin against the Lord and against our own souls by indulging the desires of the flesh as though we were worshiping our God, we also betray ourselves and concede our apostolic authority into the hands of Zebulun. Listen, then, to [Paul] speaking about one who sins: "I delivered this man to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that his spirit might be saved." You can see, therefore, that it was not only through his apostles that God "delivered" sinners "over to their enemies," but even now, through those who govern the church and have the power not only of releasing but also of binding, sinners "are delivered for the destruction of the flesh" when they are separated from the body of Christ for their crimes.

Homilies on Judges 2.5

21–23

Divine grace ever stirs up the will of human beings, not so as to protect and defend it in all things in such a way as to cause it not to fight by its own efforts against its spiritual adversaries, the victor over whom may set it down to God’s grace, and the vanquished to his own weakness, and thus learn that his hope is always not in his own courage but in the divine assistance and that he must ever fly to his Protector. And to prove this not by our own conjecture but by still clearer passages of holy Scripture let us consider what we read in Joshua the son of Nun: “The Lord,” it says, “left these nations and would not destroy them, that by them he might test Israel, whether they would keep the commandments of the Lord their God, and that they might learn to fight with their enemies.” And if we may illustrate the incomparable mercy of our Creator from something earthly, not as being equal in kindness but as an illustration of mercy: if a tender and anxious nurse carries an infant in her bosom for a long time in order sometime to teach it to walk, and first allows it to crawl, then supports it that by the aid of her right hand it may lean on its alternate steps, presently leaves it for a little and if she sees it tottering at all, catches hold of it and grabs at it when falling, when down picks it up, and either shields it from a fall or allows it to fall lightly, and sets it up again after a tumble, but when she has brought it up to boyhood or the strength of youth or early manhood, lays upon it some burdens or labors by which it may be not overwhelmed but exercised, and allows it to vie with those of its own age; how much more does the heavenly Father of all know whom to carry in the bosom of his grace, whom to train to virtue in his sight by the exercise of free will, and yet he helps him in his efforts, hears him when he calls, leaves him not when he seeks him, and sometimes snatches him from peril even without his knowing it.

Conference 13.14

21–22

Although all the nations in the surrounding country were subject to king David, still God did not allow the Jebusites to be destroyed entirely, as he himself says elsewhere: “I for my part will not clear away for them any more of the nations. Through them the Israelites were to be made to prove whether they would fear me.” For this reason the prophet said to David, “Go up, and build an altar to the Lord in the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.” That pagan king represented the people of the Gentiles. Notice, brothers, that no place in the land of the Jews was found worthy for the altar of the Lord to be built; but in the land of the Gentiles a place is chosen where the angel is seen and the altar of the Lord is built, and thus the wrath of the almighty Lord is appeased. Then already was prefigured the fact that in the hearts of the Jews no worthy place could be found to offer spiritual victims; the land of the Gentiles, that is, the conscience of Christians, is chosen as the place for the Lord’s temple.

Sermon 122.1

Scripture tells you that the nations could have been cut off all at once from the land given to the children of Israel; yet God willed that it should only be little by little. We can think of any number of other things which we admit might have happened or may happen, though we can allege no instance of their occurrence. We should not then deny the possibility of human sinlessness, simply because there is no [sinless] person, save him who is not only man but very God, in whom we can show this perfection actually achieved.

On the Spirit and the Letter 1

Some of his [humanity’s] petitions God grants him promptly (I mean those without which no one can be saved), but some He withholds from him. And on certain occasions He restrains and dispels from him the scorching assault of the enemy, while on others, He permits him to be tempted, that this trial may become to him a cause for drawing near to God (as I said before), and also that he may be instructed and have the experience of temptations. And such is the word of Scripture: “The Lord left many nations, without driving them out; neither delivered He them into the hands of Jesus [Joshua], the son of Navi, to chastise the sons of Israel by them, and that the tribes of the sons of Israel might be taught, and learn war.” For the righteous man who has no consciousness of his own weakness walks on a razor’s edge, and is never far from falling, nor from the ravening lion—I mean the demon of pride. And again, a man who does not know his own weakness falls short of humility; and he who falls short of this, also falls short of perfection; and he who falls short of perfection is forever held by dread, because his city is not founded on pillars of iron, neither upon lintels of brass, that is, humility.

Ascetical Homilies 8