HOMILY VI

Although he had delivered a long homily against the Jews on the previous day, and had become hoarse from the length of his Sermon, he now delivered the following discourse.

WILD BEASTS ARE less savage and fierce as long they live in the forests and have had no experience fighting against men. But when the hunters capture them, they drag them into the cities, lock them in cages, and goad them on to do battle with beast-fighting gladiators. Then the beasts spring upon their prey, taste human flesh and drink human blood. After that, they would find it no easy task to keep away from such a feast but they avidly rush to this bloody banquet.

(2) This has been my experience, too. Once I took up my fight against the Jews and rushed to meet their shameless assaults, "I destroyed their reasoning and every lofty thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, and I brought their minds into captivity to the obedience of Christ. And after that I somehow acquired a stronger yearning to do battle against them.

(3) But what is the matter with me? You see that my voice has grown weaker and cannot again last for so long a time. I think that what has happened to me is much the same as what happens to a soldier in battle. He cuts to pieces a number of his foes, courageously throws himself against the enemy lines, strews the ground with corpses, but then breaks his sword; disheartened by this mishap he must retreat to his own ranks. Indeed, what has happened to me is worse. The soldier who has broken his sword can snatch another from some bystander, prove his courage, and show how eager he is for victory. But when the voice becomes weak and exhausted, you cannot borrow another from somebody else.

(4) What shall I do, then? Shall I, too, run away? The power your loving assembly holds over me does not let me run away. I reverence and respect our father, who is here. I reverence and respect your eagerness and earnestness. Therefore, I shall entrust the whole undertaking to his prayers and your charity and I will attempt what lies beyond my power.

(5) It is true that today's feast of the martyrs invites me to recount the conflicts they underwent. If I neglect this topic, if I strip and get ready to enter the arena against the Jews, let no one accuse me of choosing the wrong time for my discourse. The martyrs would find a discourse against the Jews more desirable than any panegyric of mine, since I could never make them more illustrious than they are.

(6) What need could they have of my tongue? Their own struggles surpass our mortal nature. The prizes they won go beyond our powers and understanding. They laughed at the life lived on earth; they trampled underfoot the punishment of the rack; they scorned death and took wing to heaven; they escaped from the storms of temporal things and sailed into a calm harbor; they brought with them no gold or silver or expensive garments; they carried along no treasure which could be plundered, but the riches of patience, courage, and love. Now they belong to Paul's choral band while they still await their crowns, but they find delight in the expectation of their crowns, because they have escaped henceforth the uncertainty of the future.

(7) What need could they have of any words of mine? Therefore, they will find this topic more desirable than any panegyric of mine which, as I said before, will bring no increase to their personal glory. But it could be that they will derive great pleasure from my conflict with the Jews; they might well listen most intently to a discourse given for God's glory. For the martyrs have a special hatred for the Jews since the Jews crucified him for whom they have a special love. The Jews said: "His blood be on us and on our children" the martyrs poured out their own blood for him whom the Jews had slain. So the martyrs would be glad to hear this discourse.

II

If the present captivity of the Jews were going to come to an end, the prophets would not have remained silent on this but would have foretold it. I gave adequate proof of this when I showed that all their bondages were brought upon them after they had been predicted: the bondage in Egypt, the bondage in Babylon, and the bondage in the time of Antiochus Epiphanes. I proved that for each of these the Sacred Scriptures had proclaimed beforehand both a time and a place. But no prophet defined a duration for the present bondage, although Daniel did predict that it would come, that it would bring total desolation, that it would change their old commonwealth and way of life, and how long after the return from Babylon it would come to pass.

(2) But Daniel did not reveal that it would come to an end nor that these troubles would ever stop. Nor did any other prophet. Daniel did, however, predict the opposite, namely, that this bondage would hold them in slavery until the end of time The great number of years which have come and gone since that day are witnesses to the truth of what he said. And the years have shown neither trace nor beginning of a change for the better, even though the Jews tried many times to rebuild their temple. Not once, not twice, but three times they tried. They tried ill the time of Hadrian, in the time of Constantine, and in the time of Julian. But each time they tried they were stopped. The first two times they were stopped by military force; later it was by the fire which leaped forth from the foundations and restrained them from their untimely obstinacy.

(3) Now I would be glad to ask them a few questions. Why, tell me, did you recover your own country after spending so many years in Egypt? And after you had been again dragged away into Babylon, wily did you come back to Jerusalem? Again, in the time of Antiochus, you suffered many evils, but you came back to your old state, you again recovered your sacrifices, your altar, your holy of holies, and all the rest, along with the dignity these things once had. But nothing such as this has happened ill your present bondage. One hundred, two hundred, three hundred, four hundred years and many more than that have passed This is the five hundredth year up to our own day,! t but we see no hint of such a change for the better on the horizon. What we do see is that the Jewish fortunes have completely collapsed; they do not even have a dream to show they might have ally expectation such as they had in their former captivities.

(4) Suppose the Jews should plead their sins as an excuse. Suppose they should say: "We sinned against God and offended him. This is the reason why we are not recovering our homeland. We did treat shamelessly the prophets who never ceased to accuse us, we did deny the blood-guilt of which the prophets spoke in tragic phrases, but we will now confess and condemn ourselves for our own sins." If the Jews should plead this excuse, I will be glad to question each one of them again.

(5) Is it because of your sins that you Jews have been living for so long a time outside Jerusalem? What is strange and unusual about that? It is not only now that your people are living sin fill lives. Did you, in the beginning, live your lives injustice and good deeds? ls it not true that from the beginning and long before today you lived with countless transgressions of the Law? Did not the prophet Ezechiel accuse you ten thousand times when he brought in the two harlots, Oholah and Oholibah, and said "You built a brothel in Egypt; you passionately loved barbarians, and you worshipped strange gods."

(6) What about this? After the waters of the sea were divided, after the rocks were broken asunder, after so many miracles were worked in the desert, did you not worship the calf?. Did you not try many times to kill Moses, now by stoning him, now by driving him into exile, and in ten thousand other ways? Did you ever stop hurling blasphemies at God? Were you not initiated in the rites of Baal of Peor? Did you not sacrifice your sons and daughters to demons? Did you not make a display of every form of ungodliness and sin?

(7) Did not the prophet, speaking in behalf of God, say to you: "Forty years I was offended with that generation, and I said: 'These always err in heart.' "' How was it, then, that at that time God did not turn himself away from you? How is it that after you slew your children, after your idolatries, after your many acts of arrogance, after your unspeakable ingratitude, that God even allowed the great Moses to be a prophet among you and that he worked wondrous and marvelous signs himself?. What happened in the case of no human being did happen to you. A cloud was stretched over you in place of a roof; a pillar instead of a lamp served to guide you; your enemies retreated of their own accord; cities were captured almost at the first battle-shout. You had no need of weapons. no need of an army in array, no need to do battle. You had only to sound your trumpets and the walls came tumbling down of their own accord. And you had a strange and marvelous food which the prophet spoke of when he exclaimed: "He gave them the bread of heaven. Man ate the bread of angels: he sent them provisions in abundance.

(8) Tell me this. In those days you were guilty of ungodliness, you worshipped idols, you slew your children, you stoned the prophets, and you did ten thousand dreadful deeds. Why, then, did you enjoy such great kindness and good will from Him? Why did He offer you such protection at that time? Now you do not worship idols, you do not slay your children, you do not stone the prophets. Why are you now spending your lives in endless captivity? God was not one kind of God then and a different kind now, was he? Is it not the same God who governed those past events and who brings to pass what goes on today? Tell me this. Why did you have great honor from God when your sins were greater? Now that your sins are less serious, tie has turned himself altogether away from you and has given you over to unending disgrace.

(9) If he turns away from you now because of your sins, lie should have done so all the more in those days. If he put up with you when you were living lives of ungodliness, he ought to put up with you all the more now that you venture no such enormities. Why, then, has he not put up with you? Even if you are too ashamed to give the reason, I will state it clearly. Rather, I will not state it, but the truth of the facts will do so.

(10) You did slay Christ, you did lift violent hands against the Master, you did spill his precious blood. This is why you have no chance for atonement, excuse, or defense. In the old days your reckless deeds were aimed against his servants, against Moses, Isaiah, and Jeremiah. Even if there was ungodliness in your acts then, your boldness had not yet dared the crowning crime. But now you have put all the sins of your fathers into the shade. Your mad rage against Christ, the Anointed One, left no way for anyone to surpass your sin. This is why the penalty you now pay is greater than that paid by your fathers. If tiffs is not the reason for your present disgrace, why is it that God put up with you in the old days when you sacrificed your children to idols, but turns himself away from you now when you are not so bold as to commit such a crime? Is it not clear that you dared a deed much worse and much greater than any sacrifice of children or transgression of the Law when you slew Christ?

III

Tell me this. Will you still dare to call him an imposter and lawbreaker? Will you not instead go off and bury yourselves somewhere, when you look the facts in the face, since their truth is so obvious? If Jesus were an imposter and lawbreaker, as you say he was, you should have been held in high honor for putting him to death. Phinehas slew a mall and put an end to all God's wrath against the people? The Psalmist said: "Then Phinehas stood up and propitiated him and the slaughter stopped? He rescued a great many ungodly men from the wrath of God .by slaying a single lawbreaker. This should have happened all the more in your case, if indeed the man you crucified was a transgressor of the Law.

(2) Phinehas, then, was held guiltless after he slew a lawbreaker; indeed, he was honored with the priesthood. But after you crucified an imposter, as you say, who made himself equal to God, you did not receive esteem nor were you held in honor. Instead you suffered a more grievous punishment than you did when you sacrificed your children to idols. Why is this so? Is it not clear even to the dullest minds? You committed outrage on him who saved and rules the world; now you are enduring this great punishment. Is this not the reason?

(3) Yet even today you abstain from blood which would defile you and you observe the Sabbath. But at the time you slew Christ, you violated the Sabbath. God even promised, through Jeremiah, to spare your city if you would stop carrying burdens on the Sabbath. Look, you are observing this law now; you are not carrying burdens on the Sabbath. But God is not reconciled to you on this account. Since that sin of yours surpassed all sins, it is useless to say your sins are keeping you from recovering your homeland. You are in the grip of your present sufferings not because of the sins committed in the rest of your lives but because of that one reckless act. If this were not the case, God would not have turned his back on you in such a way, even if you had sinned ten thousand times. This is clear not only from all I have already said but from what I am now going to tell you.

(4) What is this? Oftentimes we have heard God speak to your fathers through the prophets and say: "You deserve countless evils. But I do this for my name's sake, that it may not be profaned among the nations." And again: "It is not for your sakes that I do this, O house of Israel, but for my name's sake."

What God is saying is this: "You deserved heavier vengeance and punishment. But so that no one may say that God let the Jews stay in the power of their enemies because God was weak and unable to save them, I am helping you and protecting you."

(5) Suppose Christ were a lawbreaker and you crucified him; suppose you had committed countless sins and much worse ones than the sins of your fathers. God would still have saved you to keep his name from being profaned. If Christ were a lawbreaker, God would not have let him be considered a great man, God would not want people putting the blame on Christ for your misfortunes. If God clearly overlooks your sins for Iris glory's sake, he would have done so all the more if you crucified a lawbreaker. He would have approved of this slaughter and would have blotted out your sins, many as they are. But when God clearly and completely turns himself from you, it is obvious that, by his anger and by abandoning you forever, he is proving even to the most shameless that he who was slain was not a lawbreaker, but the lawgiver who has come as the author of countless blessings. You acted outrageously against him and you are now held in indignity and dishonor. We worship him and, even though heretofore we were held in greater dishonor than all of you, now, through the grace of God, we are more venerable than all .of you and are held in higher esteem.

(6) But the Jews will say: "Where is the evidence that God has turned away front us?" Does this still need proof in words? Tell me this. Do not the facts themselves shout it out? Do they not send forth a sound clearer titan the trumpet's call? Do you still ask for proof in words when you see the destruction of your city, the desolation of your temple, and all the other misfortunes which have come upon you? "But men brought these things upon us, not God." Rather it was God above all others who did these things. If you attribute them to men. then you must consider that, even if men were to have the boldness, they would not have had the power to bring these things to accomplishment, unless it were by God's decree.

(7) The barbarian came down upon you and brought all Persia with him. He expected that lie would catch you all by the suddenness of his attack and lie kept you all locked up in the city as if you were caught in the net of a hunter or fisherman. Because God was gracious to you at that time-I repeat, at that time without a battle, without a war, without a hostile encounter, the barbarian king left one hundred and eighty-five thousand of his slain soldiers among you and fled, contented that he alone was saved. And God often decided countless other battles in this way. So also now, if God had not deserted you once and for all, your enemies would not have had the power to destroy your city and leave your temple desolate. If God had not abandoned you, the ruin of desolation would not have lasted so long a time, nor would your frequent efforts to rebuild the temple have been in vain.

IV

These are not my only arguments. I shall use other sources as well in my efforts to prevail upon you to agree that it was not by their own power that the Roman emperors did what they did.

They did what they did because God was angry with the Jews and had abandoned them. If the things that happened were the work of men, your misfortunes should have ended with the capture of Jerusalem and your disgrace should not have gone beyond it. Let me grant, according to your argument, that men demolished the walls, destroyed the city, and overturned the altar, Was it the work of men that you have no more prophets? Men did not take away the grace of the Spirit, did they? Did men destroy the other things you held solemn, such as the voice from the propitiatory, the power which came in the anointing, the declaration made by the priest from the stones?

(2) The Jewish religious way of life did not have all its origins from here below; the greater number and the more solemn things came from heaven above. For example, God permitted the sacrifices. The altar was from here below as were the faggots, the knife, and the priest. But the rite which was going to enter the sanctuary and consume the sacrifices had its source from on high; no man carried the fire into the temple, but a flame came down from above and by this the ministry for the sacrifice was fulfilled.

(3) And, again, if they ever had to know something, a voice came forth from the propitiatory, or mercy-seat, from between the cherubim, and foretold the future. Again from the stones which were on the breast of the high priest, which they called the declaration, there came a sort of flashing which indicated the future.

Furthermore, whenever someone had to be chosen and anointed, the grace of the Spirit would wing its way down and the oil would run on the forehead of the elect. Prophets fulfilled these ministries. And many a time a cloud of smoke obscured the sanctuary. To keep the Jews from continuing their shameless ways and attributing their desolation to men, God not only permitted the city to fall and the temple to be destroyed but he also removed the things which had their source from heaven above: the fire, the voice, the flashing of the stones, and all other such things.

(4) The Jews will tell you: "Men waged war on us; men plotted against us." When they say this, tell them that men would certainly not have waged war against them unless God had permitted it. Granted that men tore down your walls. Did a man keep the fire from Coming down from heaven? Did a man stop the voice which was continually heard from the propitiatory? Did a man stop the declaration from the stones? Did a man put an end to the anointing of your priests? Did a man take away all those other things? Was it not God who withdrew them? Surely, this is clear to everybody. Why, then, did God take them away? Is it not obvious that he hated you and turned his back on you once and for all? The Jews will say: "By no means! The reason why we do not have these is because we do not have our mother-city." But why do you not have your mother-city? Is it not because God has abandoned you?

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