Primo interdicit sibi consortium matrimonialis conjugii, ponens jussionem: non accipies uxorem. 1 Cor. 7: solutus est ab uxore? Noli quaerere uxorem.
First, he forbids association by marriage, and issues the command: you shall not take a wife. Are you free from a wife? Do not seek a wife (1 Cor 7:27).
Et assignans rationem ex universitate punitorum, quia nulli aetati, nulli parcetur sexui: quia haec dicit Dominus super filios et filias. Infra 51: collidam in te virum, et mulierem, et collidam in te senem, et puerum, et collidam in te juvenem, et virginem.
And he gives the reason: from the universality of those who are punished, for no age or gender will be spared: for thus says the Lord concerning the sons and daughters. Below: I will break in pieces the man and the woman among you, and I will break in pieces the old man and the boy among you, and I will break in pieces the young man and the virgin among you (Jer 51:22).
Ex diversitate poenarum, comminans mortem ex causa interiori, mortibus aegrotationum, pestilentia scilicet, et diuturnis languoribus. Et adjungit congruam sepulturam: non plangentur. 1 Cor. 11: ideo inter vos multi infirmi et imbecilles, et dormiunt multi. Infra 25: non plangentur, et non colligentur, neque sepelientur; in sterquilinium super faciem terrae jacebunt. Ex causa exteriori: et gladio, ex insultu hostium, fame, ex defectu necessariorum. Et adjungit congruam sepulturam: et erint cadaver eorum in escam volatilibus caeli. Supra 14: erunt projecti in viis prae fame, et gladio, et non erit qui sepeliat eos, ipsi, et uxores eorum, filii, et filiae eorum.
From the diversity of punishments: he threatens death from an interior cause: by the death of diseases, plague and protracted illnesses. And he adjoins a fitting burial: they shall not be mourned. For this reason, many among you are sick and feeble, and many sleep (1 Cor 11:30). Below: they shall not be mourned, and they shall not be gathered together, neither shall they be buried; they shall lie as dung upon the face of the earth (Jer 25:33). From an external cause: by the sword, from the scoffing of the enemy, and by famine, from the lack of necessary things. And he adjoins a fitting burial: and their bodies shall be as food for the birds of the sky. Above: they will be cast out in the streets because of famine and the sword, and there will be none to bury them, they and their wives, their sons and daughters (Jer 14:16).
Secundo interdicit consortium socialis convivii: haec enim dicit Dominus.
Second, he forbids association by social gathering: for thus says the Lord.
Et primo interdicit convivium tristitiae, quod in consolationem pro mortuis fieri solet: ubi ponitur prohibitio, ne ingrediaris, neque plangens, neque sicut consolans.
First, he forbids gatherings of sadness—because they tend to occur so as to provide consolation when there has been a death—where the prohibition is given: you shall not enter, neither as a mourner, nor as one who consoles.
Secundo assignatur ratio ex ablatione pacis: quia abstuli pacem meam, quam scilicet ad eos habebam, indignatus eis: vel quam, me auctore, ad invicem, et ad alios habebant. Isa. 57: non est pax impiis, dicit Dominus.
Second, he gives the reason: from the removal of peace: because I have taken away my peace, which I used to maintain with them, but I have become angry with them; or the peace which they had for one another and for others, with me as its source. There is no peace for the wicked, says the Lord (Isa 48:22).
Ex comminatione mortis, morientur. Job 3: parvus et magnus ibi sunt: et servus liber a Domino suo. Ex cessatione officiosi funeris, quia carebunt obsequio sepulturae, non sepelientur. Supra 8: non colligentur, et non sepelientur; in sterquilinium super faciem terrae erunt. Planctum etiam familiae: neque plangentur neque se incident, vulnerantes, quod Judaeis prohibitum est. Deuter. 14: non vos incidetis, nec facietis calvitium super mortuo. Sed Job tonso capite cadens in terram etc. (Job 1), non peccavit, quia gentilis erat.
From the threat of death: they shall die. The small and the great are there; and there the slave is free from his master (Job 3:19). From the cessation of the due funeral rites, because they will lack the indulgence of burial: they shall not be buried. Above: they shall not be gathered up, neither shall they be buried; they shall be as dung upon the face of the earth (Jer 8:2). The mourning even of the family: neither shall they be mourned, and they shall not cut themselves, causing injury, which is forbidden to the Jews. You shall not cut yourselves, nor make a bald spot for the dead (Deut 14:1). But Job, who, having shorn his head, fell on the ground (Job 1:20), did not sin, because he was a gentile.
Carebunt etiam convivio parentelae, quod a consanguineis lugentibus fieri solet: et non frangent. Prov. ult.: date siceram moerentibus, et vinum his qui amaro sunt animo. Bibant, et obliviscantur egestatis suae, et doloris sui non recordentur amplius.
They will even lack the gathering of relations, which generally takes place among grieving relatives: and they shall not break. Give strong drink to the sorrowful, and wine to those who are bitter of spirit. Let them drink, and forget their poverty, and remember their grief no more (Prov 31:6–7).
Secundo interdicit convivium laetitiae.
Second, he forbids a gathering of joy.
Et primo ponitur prohibitio: et domum convivii non ingrediaris, neque propter societatem, neque propter comestionem. 1 Cor. 5: si is qui frater nominatur inter vos, est fornicator, avarus, aut idolis serviens, aut maledicus, aut rapax; cum hujusmodi nec cibum sumere.
First, the prohibition is given: and you shall not enter the house of feasting, neither for fellowship nor for eating. If he who is called a brother among you is a fornicator, covetous, a worshiper of idols, or foul-mouthed, or rapacious, do not even take food with such a one (1 Cor 5:11).
Secundo ponitur ratio: quia haec dicit Dominus. Thren. ult.: defecit gaudium cordis nostri, versus est in luctum chorus noster. Infra 25, idem.
Second, the reason is given: because thus says the Lord. The joy of our heart has failed, our dancing is turned into mourning (Lam 5:15). The same is said below (Jer 25:10).
Lectio 2
Lecture 2
Punishments for idolatry
16:10 Et cum annuntiaveris populo huic omnia verba haec, et dixerint tibi: quare locutus est Dominus super nos omne malum grande istud? quae iniquitas nostra, aut quod peccatum nostrum, quod peccavimus Domino Deo nostro?
16:10 And when you tell all these words to this people, and they say to you, ‘Why has the Lord spoken all this great evil concerning us? What is our iniquity, and what is our sin, that we have sinned against the Lord our God?’
16:11 dices ad eos: quia dereliquerunt me patres vestri, ait Dominus, et abierunt post deos alienos, et servierunt eis, et adoraverunt eos, et me dereliquerunt, et legem meam non custodierunt.
16:11 You shall say to them: because your fathers have abandoned me, says the Lord, and went after strange gods, and served them, and worshiped them, and forsook me, and did not keep my law.
16:12 Sed et vos pejus operati estis, quam patres vestri. Ecce enim ambulat unusquisque post pravitatem cordis sui mali, ut me non audiat.
16:12 But you have done worse than your fathers; for behold, each one walks after the depravity of his own evil heart, that he may not hear me.
16:13 Et ejiciam vos de terra hac in terram quam ignoratis vos, et patres vestri, et servietis ibi diis alienis die ac nocte, qui non dabunt vobis requiem.
16:13 I also shall drive you out from this land to a land which you know not, neither you nor your fathers; and there you will serve strange gods, day and night, who will not give you rest.
16:14 Propterea ecce dies veniunt, dicit Dominus, et non dicetur ultra: vivit Dominus, qui eduxit filios Israel de terra Aegypti;
16:14 Therefore, behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when it shall no more be said: as the Lord lives, who led the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt,
16:15 sed: vivit Dominus, qui eduxit filios Israel de terra aquilonis, et de universis terris ad quas ejeci eos; et reducam eos in terram suam, quam dedi patribus eorum.
16:15 but: as the Lord lives, who led the children of Israel out of the land of the north, and from all the lands to which I have driven them; and I will lead them back to their own land, which I gave to their fathers.
16:16 Ecce ego mittam piscatores multos, dicit Dominus, et piscabuntur eos. Et post haec mittam eis multos venatores, et venabuntur eos de omni monte et de omni colle, et de cavernis petrarum:
16:16 Behold, I shall send many fishers, says the Lord, and they shall fish them; and after these things, I will send many hunters to them, and they shall hunt them from every mountain, and from every hill, and from the caves of the rocks.
16:17 quia oculi mei super omnes vias eorum. Non sunt absconditae a facie mea, et non fuit occultata iniquitas eorum ab oculis meis.
16:17 Because my eyes are upon all their ways; and they are not hidden from my face, and their iniquity was not hidden from my eyes.
16:18 Et reddam primum duplices iniquitates, et peccata eorum, quia contaminaverunt terram meam in morticinis idolorum suorum et abominationibus suis impleverunt haereditatem meam.
16:18 And I will first pay them back double for their iniquities and for their sins, because they have polluted my land with the corpses of their idols, and have filled my inheritance with their abominations.
16:19 Domine, fortitudo mea, et robur meum, et refugium meum in die tribulationis: ad te gentes venient ab extremis terrae, et dicent: vere mendacium possederunt patres nostri, vanitatem, quae eis non profuit.
16:19 O Lord, my fortitude, and my strength, and my refuge in the day of trouble, to you shall the nations come from the ends of the earth, and they shall say, ‘Truly our fathers possessed a lie, a vanity which did not profit them.
16:20 Numquid faciet sibi homo deos? Et ipsi non sunt dii.
16:20 Shall man make gods for himself? And they are not gods.’
16:21 Idcirco ecce ego ostendam eis per vicem hanc, ostendam eis manum meam, et virtutem meam; et scient quia nomen mihi Dominus.
16:21 Therefore, behold, I shall show to them this once; I shall show them my hand, and my power, and they shall know that my name is the Lord.
98. Hic assignatur causa praedictae poenae:
98. Here, he gives the cause of the aforementioned punishment.
et primo ponitur quaestio: quare locutus est Dominus super nos omne malum grande istud? Prover. 30: talis est via mulieris adulterae, quae comedit, et tergens os suum dicit: non sum operata malum.
First, he poses the question: why has the Lord spoken all this great evil concerning us? Such is the way of the adulterous woman, who eats, and wipes her mouth and says: I have done no wrong (Prov 30:20).
Secundo ponitur Domini responsio: dices ad eos.
Second, the Lord’s response is given: you shall say to them.
Et primo ponit culpam in transgressione patrum: quia dereliquerunt. Supra 2: me dereliquerunt fontem, aquae vivae, et foderunt sibi cisternas dissipatas, quae continere non valent aquas.
First, he places the fault in the transgression of their fathers: because they have abandoned. Above: they have abandoned me, the source of living water, and they have dug for them cisterns, even broken cisterns, which are not able to hold water (Jer 2:13).
In imitatione filiorum, ne possent se excusare per id quod dicitur Ezech. 18: patres comederunt uvam acerbam, et dentes filiorum obstupuerunt. Sed et vos pejus operati estis. Matth. 23: implete mensuram patrum vestrorum.
In the imitation of the children, lest they should be able to excuse themselves by what is said: the fathers have eaten the bitter grape, and the teeth of the children were set on edge (Ezek 18:2). But you have done worse. Fulfill the measure of your fathers (Matt 23:32).
Secundo comminatur poenam:
Second, he threatens punishment:
et primo ponit poenae comminationem quantum ad captivitatem: et ejiciam vos; et quantum ad servitutem: et servietis diis, serviendo eorum cultoribus. Thren. 1: migravit Judas propter afflictionem, et multitudinem servitutis; habitavit inter gentes, nec invenit requiem. Deut. 28: in gentibus quoque illis non quiesces, neque erit requies vestigio pedis tui.
first, he gives the threat of punishment with regard to captivity: I also shall drive you out; and with regard to slavery: you will serve strange gods, by serving their worshipers. Judah has gone away because of affliction and abundance of harsh labor; he has dwelt among the nations, and has not found rest (Lam 1:3). In those nations also, you shall not rest, neither will there be any rest for the sole of your foot (Deut 28:65).
Secundo promittit consolationem, ponens juramentum quasi signum: propterea ecce dies; quasi dicat: hoc majus beneficium reputabitis, quam quod liberati estis de Aegypto; et illius quasi obliti, hoc semper in memoriam habebitis. Isa. 43: ne memineritis priorum, et antiqua ne intueamini. Infra 23, idem.
Second, he promises consolation, giving an oath as the sign: therefore, behold, the days are coming; it is as though he were saying, “You shall think of this as a greater kindness than when you were freed from Egypt; and forgetting the former, as it were, you will always remember the latter.” You shall not remember what came before, and shall not consider former things (Isa 43:18). The same is said below (Jer 23:8).
Et explicans beneficium, et reducam. Ezech. 36: tollam quippe vos de gentibus, et congregabo vos de universis terris; et reducam vos in terram vestram.
And explaining the kindness: and I will lead them back. I shall surely take you from the nations, and I will gather you from all lands; and I will lead you back to your own land (Ezek 36:24).
Tertio ponit captivitatis conditionem, ecce ego:
Third, he speaks of the nature of the captivity: behold, I.
et primo describit captivitatem Babyloniorum, piscatores, scilicet Chaldaeos, qui quasi in mari prosperitatis, et voluptatis viventes, eos ceperunt. Habac. 1: facies homines quasi pisces maris, et quasi reptilia non habentia ducem. Et Romanorum: et post haec mittam venatores, scilicet Romanos, qui eos quasi bestias pro crudelitate homicidii venati sunt. Thren. 3: venatione ceperunt me quasi avem inimici mei gratis.
First, he describes the captivity of the Babylonians: fishers, namely, the Chaldeans, who have caught them, as though living in a sea of prosperity and pleasure. You shall make men like the fish of the sea, and like the creeping things which have no leader (Hab 1:3). And of the Romans: and after these things, I will send hunters, namely, the Romans, who hunted them like beasts for the cruelty of their murder. My enemies have taken me in the chase, like a bird without cause (Lam 3:52).