Chapter 5

On the Keys of the Church Conferred by Christ upon Peter and His Power

When Christ, then in the region of Caesarea Philippi, questioned his disciples, “Whom do people say the Son of Man is?”—that is, whom did people say that he, the Virgin’s son, was?—all other people of both sexes are sons of human beings, namely of a man and a woman; Christ alone is the Son, that is, of the Virgin alone.

They answered: Some say John the Baptist, namely raised from the dead; others Jeremiah or one of the prophets. Jesus said: “But whom do you say that I am?” Peter, answering for all, said: “You are Christ, the Son of the living God.”

He designated Christ’s humanity by the fact that Christ is interpreted “anointed,” namely with the highest anointing of grace in his soul; and his divinity by “the Son of God.”

Ambrose says: What is so lofty as to behold the height of riches, to know the Son of God, and to assume the confession of divine generation? Although the human mind cannot fully comprehend it by an investigation of reason, the fullness of faith nevertheless embraces it. This is in Cause 24, Question 1, canon Non turbatur.

Christ said to Peter: “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jona,” that is, son of Jonah or John, for Bar-Jona is interpreted “son of Jonah,” that is, John, “because flesh and blood have not revealed it to you.” That is, a mere human being, who consists of flesh and blood, did not give you this knowledge of my divinity; or, human natural reason or sense knowledge did not do so, “but my Father who is in heaven.”

Faith in Christ’s divinity is God’s gift. By living faith we are beatified in hope and finally in reality. Therefore Peter is blessed. Hence the Apostle says: “You have been saved through faith, and this is not from yourselves, for it is God’s gift.”

“And I say to you that you are Peter,” derived from me, the rock, so that, with your name changed from Simon to Peter, you may be changed in reality by perfectly imitating Christ even to death on the cross. Thus his successors too will sometimes be changed.

“And upon this rock”—not indicating you but me, whom you have confessed as God and human, and upon this confessed truth—“I shall build my Church.”

Hence Pope Pelagius says: Although the universal Catholic Church throughout the world is one bridal chamber of Christ, nevertheless the holy Roman Catholic and Apostolic Church was set above the other churches by no synodal constitutions, but obtained primacy by the evangelical voice of our Lord and Savior: “You are Peter,” says the Lord, “and upon this rock I shall build my Church.” This is in Distinction 21, canon Quamvis.

Likewise Pope Leo says: The Lord wished the mystery of this office, namely preaching and the governance of souls, so to pertain to the duty of all the Apostles that he placed it principally in most blessed Peter, the highest of all the Apostles, so that from him as from a kind of head he might pour his gifts into the whole body, namely the Church. Thus anyone who dared to depart from Peter’s solidity would understand himself to be an outsider from the divine mystery.

For the Lord wished Peter, received into the partnership of indivisible unity, to be named what he himself was, saying: “You are Peter, and upon this rock I shall build my Church,” so that the building of the eternal temple might stand upon Peter’s solidity by the marvelous gift of God’s grace. This is in Distinction 19, canon Ita Dominus.

Likewise Cyprian says: Although after his Resurrection he gives equal power to all the Apostles, saying, “Receive the Holy Spirit; whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven,” and so forth, nevertheless, to manifest unity, by his authority he arranged for the origin of that same unity to begin from one. Hence he speaks to Peter alone, saying: “You are Peter, and upon this rock I shall build my Church.” He builds the Church upon one.

The other Apostles certainly were what Peter was, endowed with equal fellowship in preaching, honor, and power; but the beginning proceeds from unity so that the Church of Christ might be shown to be one. This is in Cause 24, Question 1, canon Loquitur.

The gloss says that the Apostles were equal to Peter in order, because they were consecrated in episcopal rank and dignity, but not in fullness of administration or jurisdiction.

Likewise Gregory says in the Moralia: Moses is placed upon the rock so that he may contemplate God’s face, for the Lord said to him when he asked to see his face, “Stand upon the rock.” Unless a person holds the solidity of faith, he does not recognize God’s presence. Concerning this solidity the Lord says: “Upon this rock I shall build my Church.”

For it alone is that through which the Lord willingly accepts sacrifice, it alone confidently intercedes for those who err, and it alone keeps those placed within it by the strong bond of charity. This is in Cause 24, Question 1, canon Quia ex sola.

“And the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” The gates of hell, through which human beings enter the hell of the damned, are errors and vices. They cannot prevail against the Church so that it fails. Some can fall away from the truth of faith and from grace, but not all, for some good people will always remain.

Hence Jerome also says: “The Church has neither a stain,” namely of mortal sin, “nor a wrinkle,” namely of error and duplicity. Therefore, whoever is polluted by any filth of sin cannot be said to be of the Church or subject to Christ. This is in On Penance, Distinction 1.

The same Jerome says: This Church is the house of God, which is said to be built upon firm rock; it is called the one dove, the beautiful bride without stain or wrinkle, the enclosed garden, sealed fountain, well of living water, and paradise with the fruit of apples. This house received the keys, that is, the power of loosing and binding. This is in Cause 24, Question 1, canon Omnibus.

The same Jerome says: The holy Roman Church, which has always remained immaculate, by the Lord’s providence and blessed Peter’s assistance will in the future remain without any assault of heretics and will stand firm and immovable for all time. This is in Cause 24, Question 1, canon Haec est fides.

And Christ said: “I have prayed for you, Peter, that your faith”—namely the Church’s faith—“may not fail.”

“And to you,” says the Lord, “I shall give the keys of the kingdom of heaven.” He says “to you” in the singular to intimate the Church’s unity and the origin of authority. He adds “I shall give” to show the generosity of the gift; he adds “keys” to embrace the plurality of power; and he concludes “of the kingdom of heaven” to announce the fruitfulness of its effect.

First, because he says “to you,” not “to you all,” the Church’s unity is shown. Hence Gratian says: Although the Lord gave all the disciples equal power to bind and loose, he promised that he would give the keys of the kingdom of heaven to Peter for all and before all, saying: “To you I shall give,” and so forth.

Therefore, whoever is alien from the unity of the Church, which is understood through Peter, can execrate but cannot consecrate, namely by not preserving the Church’s form. Or if he preserves the form as regards the efficacy of the sacraments, he does not have power as regards the truth of excommunication or reconciliation. This is in Cause 24, Question 1, § 2.

Likewise Anacletus says: In the New Testament after Christ the Lord, the priestly order began from Peter, because to him first was given the pontificate in Christ’s Church, the Lord saying to him: “You are Peter,” and so forth, “To you I shall give the keys of the kingdom of heaven.” He therefore first received the power of binding and loosing, and he first led the people to the faith by the strength of his preaching. This is in Distinction 21, canon In novo.

“I shall give,” he says, not “I shall sell,” but I shall bestow freely and generously. Hence it is said in Cause 1, Question 1, canon Quicquid: Whatever is bestowed by the consolation of invisible grace, that is, in the sacraments which contain grace, must not be sold for any payments or rewards whatsoever, since the Lord says: “Freely you have received; freely give.”

Hence Pope Leo also says in Cause 1, Question 1, canon 1: If grace is not freely given or received, it is not grace. Simoniacs do not receive freely; therefore they do not receive the grace that operates especially in ecclesiastical orders.

The gloss there says that “grace” means the gift of the Holy Spirit possessed in the sacraments, or ecclesiastical dignity or order.

He says “keys” in the plural because, although there is one spiritual power in essence or root, which is called a key by similarity, it is nevertheless twofold in effect: the power of order to confect the true body of Christ, and the power of jurisdiction to judge Christ’s mystical body in the forum of the soul.

This second power is made complete from two things: from the power of discerning or knowing—not through knowledge as a doctor, but through the power of office as an ecclesiastical judge—and from the power of passing sentence, namely by absolving or binding.

Hence Gratian says in Distinction 20, § 1: When Christ was about to say to Peter, “Whatever you bind,” and so forth, he first gave him, that is, promised to give him, the keys of the kingdom of heaven: in one, giving him knowledge to discern between leprosy and leprosy, that is, the power of discerning; in the other, giving him the power to cast some out of the Church and receive others. The gloss there supports this.

Likewise Pope Antherus says: Far be it from us to suppose anything sinister concerning those who, succeeding to the apostolic rank, confect Christ’s body with their sacred mouth, through whom we are Christians, and who, possessing the keys of the kingdom of heaven, judge before the day of judgment. This is in Cause 11, Question 1, canon Absit.

Through these keys, that is, this power, the kingdom of heaven is opened and closed. Hence it follows: “Whatever you bind upon earth shall be bound also in heaven, and whatever you loose upon earth shall be loosed also in heaven.” This is to be understood when the key does not err, or when Peter’s judgment—that is, the prelate’s—follows and conforms to God’s judgment.

Hence Gregory says in Cause 11, Question 3: The absolution of the one presiding is then true when it follows the judgment of the interior judge, that is, God. He gives the example of Lazarus, first raised inwardly by Christ and afterward, at Christ’s command, released by the Apostles from the bindings in which he was wrapped.

Likewise Pope Leo says in Cause 24, Question 1: Peter’s privilege remains wherever judgment is rendered from his equity. There is neither excessive severity nor remission where nothing will be bound or loosed except what blessed Peter bound or loosed, that is, justly as regards God.

Likewise Augustine says concerning “Whatever you bind upon earth,” and so forth: If this was said to Peter alone, the Church does not do this. But if it is done in the Church, certainly the things bound on earth are bound also in heaven, and those loosed on earth will be loosed also in heaven. For when the Church excommunicates, the excommunicated person is bound in heaven; and when the Church reconciles, namely by absolving, the reconciled person is loosed in heaven.

If this is therefore done in the Church, Peter signified the holy Church when he received the keys. And if in Peter’s person the good within the Church were signified, in Judas the evil within the Church, namely prelates, were signified. This is in Cause 24, Question 1, canon Quodcumque.

It is true that evil prelates loose and bind just as good ones do while they are tolerated by the Church. When Augustine says in Cause 1, Question 1 that avaricious prelates or ministers of the sacraments do not give remission of sins, it is understood, according to the gloss, as regards the merit of their life, that is, they are not worthy to give it. Nevertheless, they give it by office, and they give the truth and efficacy—that is, the effect—of the sacraments while they are tolerated. If they are cut off, they give only the truth of the sacraments, that is, true sacraments which they confect, but not their efficacy, that is, grace, if their condition is known.

What is said about the power of binding and loosing can therefore be understood in four ways.

In the first way, it concerns excommunication, by which a person is bound so that he cannot participate with the other faithful in divine rites and other common actions, and is loosed when absolved from it. This power belongs to bishops, hence it is called the episcopal sword, or to those possessing quasi-episcopal jurisdiction, such as abbots or priors with respect to their subjects, and their vicars. Other inferiors do not possess it unless contrary custom provides otherwise.

Just as excommunication can be imposed by one who is not a priest but is nevertheless a cleric, so can absolution from it. This is in the Decretals, title On Res Judicata, canon Omnis res. If it is unjust, it does not bind as regards God, according to Cause 11, Question 3, canon Cepisti, but it does bind as regards the Church.

Hence, according to Gregory in Cause 11, Question 3, a pastor’s sentence, whether just or unjust, is to be feared and observed; otherwise it would bind as regards God through contempt. This holds unless it contains an intolerable error, for then it is not to be observed, as in Cause 11, Question 3, canon Cui illata, or when it was issued after an appeal.

Nor should it be issued except for mortal sin, as is found in Cause 11, Question 3, canon Nemo episcoporum, namely mortal sin that is true or presumed, according to Thomas in Book Four.

This seems to have had its beginning implicitly from Christ when he said to Peter: “If he does not hear the Church,” that is, does not obey the prelate of the Church, “let him be to you as a gentile and publican,” namely after he has been excommunicated. A prelate ought to do this when the person is contumacious and the sin manifest, for God is the knower and judge of hidden things. This is in Distinction 32, canon Erubescat.

I say “manifest,” that is, notorious by law or by fact. Hence Christ also immediately added: “Whatever you bind upon earth,” and so forth, Matthew 18.

Its exercise began with the Apostles, especially Paul, as is evident in First Corinthians 5, when he says: “I have delivered this man to Satan.” See on this Cause 11, Question 3, canon Audi, and Cause 2, Question 1, canon Multi.

That the faithful should also avoid excommunicated persons was ordained by the Apostles. Hence the Apostle says in Second Corinthians [read: First Corinthians 5:11]: “If anyone is named a brother and is a fornicator, or serves idols, or is avaricious,” and so forth. “Is named” means that he is excommunicated or denounced as excommunicated. He says “brother,” that is, Christian, because the Church does not judge those who are outside, such as pagans and Jews altogether, as regards spiritual sentences.

With such persons, namely those named as excommunicated, it is not permitted even to take food. See Cause 2, Question 1, canon Multi, Cause 11, Question 3, canon Sicut ipsi Apostoli, and the following canon.

In the second way, it concerns sacramental confession, which can be made only to a priest, who ought to absolve the person whom he reasonably understands to be contrite. By absolving, he binds him by obligating him to perform a definite penance or satisfaction according to that priest’s judgment. See Cause 26, Question 7, canon Tempora, and On Penance, Distinction 1, canon Mensuram.

But the one he sees to be impenitent—for example, because he is not contrite for all his sins, or does not wish to make satisfaction to someone whom he is bound to satisfy, and the like—he ought to bind, that is, not absolve. See On Penance, Distinction 5, canon Falsas, and Cause 14, Question 6, canon Si res.

As Augustine says in his book On Penance: He who wishes to confess so as to find grace should seek a priest who knows how to loose and bind, lest, if he has been negligent concerning himself—namely in inquiring into his sins and seeking someone able to discern what is necessary—he be neglected, that is, rejected, by the one who salutarily warns him to avoid a blind man, lest he fall into the pit. This is in On Penance, Distinction 6, canon Qui vult.

In the third way, it is understood of indulgences, by which the debts of penalties for committed sins are loosed. This power belongs to bishops and their superiors. In these matters people are bound insofar as something to be done is imposed upon them in order to obtain the indulgences.

Then “Whatever you loose,” and so forth, can be explained in two ways. In one, “upon earth” refers to the one absolving: whatever you, existing as a prelate upon earth, absolve—whether someone living or someone deceased in grace—will be loosed, namely as regards what the indulgence contains. In this way indulgences can extend even to the dead, if the one granting it intends this, according to Thomas in Book Four.

In another way, “upon earth” refers to the one absolved: whatever you absolve upon earth, that is, provided that the one to be absolved is upon earth. In this way, according to others, no indulgence extends to the dead, but the first opinion is more common.

Understand the whole subject on the condition that the indulgence is given reasonably and that the person is fit to receive its effect, as when he is established in grace and performs what the indulgence contains.

In the fourth way, it is understood of ecclesiastical statutes that prelates can make. These certainly bind, that is, obligate subjects to observe them, when they have been promulgated and confirmed by the customs of those who use them. See Distinction 3, §§ Leges, Lex, and Si legibus; Cause 25, Question 1, canon Violatores and canon Sunt qui dicunt.

They are loosed when the prelates repeal them, or also with respect to certain persons when a dispensation is granted in them. Such a dispensation ought not to be made without reasonable cause. See Cause 1, Question 7, § Ceterum, from the canons, and canon Dispensationes.

§ I: On the Governance of the Church Conferred by Christ upon Peter, in Which He Shows What Sort of Person a Ruler Ought to Be

It must be known that when the Lord said to Peter, “To you I shall give the keys,” he did not then give him the governance of the Church, but promised it, speaking in the future: “I shall give.” He granted it and set Peter over all when, appearing to the Apostles after the Resurrection, he said to Peter: “Feed my sheep,” as the gloss says in Distinction 21, canon In novo, and in the title On Election, canon Significasti.

For its explanation, Christ’s words must be carefully considered. Christ questioned Peter, saying: “Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?”

Simon is interpreted as “obedient.” Therefore, wishing to place him over others, Christ calls one who is obedient, to intimate that no one ought from ambition to thrust himself into or seek the care of souls, but should obey only when called, as Gregory teaches in Cause 8, Question 1, canon In scripturis. Augustine says that a superior office, without which the people cannot be governed, is to be administered when it is fitting, but is nevertheless sought unfittingly. This is in Cause 8, Question 1, canon Qui episcopatum.

He adds “John,” which is interpreted as “grace,” because one who presides over the care of souls must be a son of grace—that is, must possess grace—or else he frequently sins mortally. Hence Chrysostom says: A bad priest acquires from his priesthood not dignity but guilt. This is in Distinction 40, canon Multi, where the Archdeacon, following Thomas in Book Four, says that a man in mortal sin sins mortally when administering the sacraments or exercising acts of orders, and does so as often as he acts, even also when preaching.

Christ continues: “Do you love me more than these?” He asks this three times, and Peter answers that he loves him. This shows, first, that Peter must possess love for Christ exceeding his love for all these temporal things—riches, honors, and the like—so that, when expedient, he places them all after Christ and the salvation of his flock. This is in Cause 8, Question 1, canon Sunt in ecclesia.

Second, he must love Christ more than these bodily comforts. Distinction 35, canon Ecclesiae principes, cites Jerome: It is shameful and disgraceful to preach Christ crucified, poor, and hungry with stuffed bodies, and to proclaim the teaching of fasts with red cheeks and swollen faces. If we occupy the place of the Apostles, let us imitate not only their speech but also their conduct and abstinence.

Third, he must love Christ more than these—namely, more than his own life and his contemplative studies—so that, when necessary for his flock’s salvation, he is ready to lay down his soul, that is, his life, for his sheep, as in Cause 7, Question 1, § Cum autem. Nor ought he to give himself so completely to learned contemplation that he abandons the necessities of his flock.

Hence Augustine says: If the burden of governance is imposed, it must be undertaken because charity requires it. But not even then should every delight in truth—that is, in reading and contemplation—be abandoned, lest that sweetness be withdrawn and this just necessity become crushing. This is in Cause 8, Question 1, canon Qui episcopatum. The meaning is that, in exercising pastoral care, reading and contemplation ought not to be entirely abandoned; neither should one devote himself to them so exclusively that care for necessary things is neglected.

It should be noted that Peter was saddened the third time, because it is harder to expose one’s own life than another life, and this cannot happen without natural or sensual sadness. Hence Christ, foretelling Peter’s passion, also said: “When you are old, another shall gird you,” that is, bind you, “and lead you where you do not wish,” namely to death. Augustine says that Peter was led unwillingly to that death according to the instinct of nature and sensuality, but willingly overcame it by rational will, bearing it patiently.

Ambrose says: Imitate Peter, who said for the third time, “Lord, you know that I love you.” For because he denied three times, he confesses three times. He denied in the night; he confesses in the day. This is in Cause 6, Question 1, canon Imitare: that is, if it happens that a man falls, let him rise and confess as quickly as possible.

Christ, moreover, said to him three times, “Feed my sheep,” or “my lambs,” because he must feed them with three kinds of food.

First is spiritual food, namely the word of God and the sacraments. In Distinction 43, canon Sit rector, and the following canon, Pope Nicholas says: The dispensation of heavenly seed has been entrusted to us; woe to us if we are silent, woe if we do not scatter it.

Second is the food of example. Hence Jerome says: Not only bishops, priests, and deacons ought to take the greatest care to surpass in speech and conduct all the people over whom they preside, but also those of lower rank and all who serve the house of God, because it gravely destroys God’s Church if laypeople are better than clerics. This is in Cause 8, Question 1, canon Qualis.

Third, as far as he is able, he ought to feed the poor with bodily food according to his means. Hence Jerome says in Cause 12, Question 2: It is a bishop’s glory to provide for the needs of the poor; for a priest to pursue his own riches is a disgrace. And in Cause 16, Question 1, canon Quoniam: Whatever clerics possess belongs to the poor, and their homes ought to be common to all.

What sort of shepherd of the Church he ought to be, Christ teaches by his own example when he says: “I am the good shepherd.” He is good by essence, according to the saying, “No one is good except God.” He is also the good shepherd insofar as he is man, for he has given his flesh as food and his blood as drink to his sheep, and has laid down his soul, that is, his life, unto death to deliver them. Hence he adds: “The good shepherd gives his soul for his sheep.”

He gives his vegetative soul, that is, his life, by exposing it for them when necessary, together with the temporal goods by which life is sustained. One who does not give temporal goods in alms for his sheep will never give his life. Ambrose says: The Church has gold not to preserve it, but to distribute it and bestow it upon the poor. This is in Cause 12, Question 2.

He gives his sensitive soul for his sheep, namely by hearing, investigating, and seeing what his sheep do, according to the saying, “Know the face of your flock,” and also by mortifying his senses and sensuality in himself as an example to others. Hence Distinction 41 says: Let a bishop have modest furnishings, table, and food, and let him seek the authority of his dignity through the merits of faith and life.

He lays down his intellectual soul by reading, teaching, and praying for his sheep. Hence Jerome says: These are the two works of a pontiff: that he learn from God by reading the sacred Scriptures and meditating on them often, and that he teach the people. The other work is that which Moses, shepherd of that ancient people, performed: he did not go to battle but prayed, and while he prayed the people prevailed. Therefore let the priest of the Church pray unceasingly until the people beneath him conquer their invisible Amalekites—that is, the demons. This is in Distinction 36, canon Si quis vult.

Christ continues: “But the hireling, who is not the shepherd, sees the wolf coming and flees.” Here one should note Augustine’s words in Cause 23, Question 4: The Lord named three persons, and we must seek them out in the Gospel—the shepherd, the hireling, and the thief. He said that the shepherd lays down his life for the sheep and enters through the door; that the thief and robber climbs up another way; and that the hireling flees if he sees the wolf or thief, because he has no care for the sheep. Therefore the shepherd must be loved, the hireling tolerated, and the robber guarded against. Thus Augustine.

To signify the authority and exercise of their jurisdiction, bishops, who are especially called shepherds, use a pastoral staff within the place of their jurisdiction. The supreme shepherd, however—that is, the pope, who holds Christ’s place on earth—does not, because his jurisdiction is not limited but extends everywhere on earth. Another reason is found in the Decretals, title On Sacred Unction, canon Cum venissent, at the end.

The pastoral staff signifies three things a prelate must do toward his sheep. First, its upper part is curved and hooked, signifying that a shepherd or prelate ought to lead wandering sheep back to the way of salvation. Augustine says: You should know how both to scatter fodder for feeding the flock and, with the shepherd’s scourge, to recall to the flock the animals that wander. This is in Cause 5, Question 5, canon Non omnis.

Second, insofar as we lean on a staff for support, whence the infirm rely upon one, it signifies that a prelate ought to support the infirm and weak both spiritually and temporally. Augustine says in his Rule: Let him console the fainthearted, receive the weak, and be patient toward all. Pope Leo says in Distinction 86: Let sins be hated, not people; let the proud be corrected and the weak tolerated. When it is necessary to chastise something more severely, let it be punished with the intention not of one who rages, but of one who heals.

Third, the lower part of the pastoral staff is pointed, to intimate that the negligent must be pricked and stirred to good works. Ambrose says in Cause 5, Question 5: A father does not always kiss his son, but sometimes chastises him; and when the one he loves is chastised, then devotion is exercised toward him. Love has its own wounds. These three things are embraced in the verse: “Gather and sustain; prick the wandering, the sick, and the slow.”

Concerning who the hireling is and how he flees, note Augustine’s words in Cause 8, Question 1, canon Sunt in ecclesia: There are certain rulers in the Church of whom Paul says, “Seeking their own things, not the things of Jesus Christ.” What does “seeking their own things” mean? They do not love Christ freely; they do not seek God for God’s sake, but pursue temporal comforts, gape after profits, and desire honors from people. When these things are loved by rulers and God is served on their account, everyone of this kind is a hireling. Thus Augustine.

The hireling flees when the prelate fails to resist because he remains silent. Hence Gregory says in his Pastoral Rule: Imprudent rulers, often fearing to lose human favor, are afraid to speak freely what is right. According to the voice of Truth, they no longer serve the protection of the flock with a shepherd’s zeal but act as hirelings, because when the wolf comes they flee by hiding themselves in silence. This is in Distinction 43, canon Sit rector.

The wolf here is called the devil, who through temptations to vice seeks to devour the Lord’s sheep; or a heretic coming in sheep’s clothing but inwardly a ravening wolf; or a tyrant or anyone else inducing others to evil, whom the hireling does not resist.

But as Distinction 83 says: An error that is not resisted is approved; truth, when it is not defended, is oppressed. To neglect to trouble the perverse when you are able is nothing other than to foster them, and he who ceases to oppose a manifest crime is not free from suspicion of hidden complicity. Thus Innocent. Nevertheless, this hireling is to be tolerated so long as he is tolerated by the Church. This is in Cause 8, Question 4, canon Nonne.

The Lord speaks of the thief and robber in another passage of the same Gospel chapter, where he says: “I am the door. If anyone enters through me, he shall be saved. He who enters through the door is the shepherd of the sheep. He who climbs up another way is a thief and a robber, who comes only to steal, slaughter, and destroy. But he who enters through the door, Christ, shall go in and go out and find pasture.”

A thief and robber is one who undertakes the care of others by an unjust title, as through simony, lay power, or otherwise illegitimately. A rule says that an ecclesiastical benefice cannot be possessed without canonical institution; this is in Book Six, On Rules of Law. Such a man steals the Church’s revenues, which according to Innocent he is bound to restore. And, as far as lies in him, according to Hostiensis he slaughters and kills the sheep subject to him, since he cannot absolve them. The sheep are nevertheless excused if they do not know this and otherwise live well. He destroys them by leading them to destruction with him through his evil examples.

Or the thief is the devil, who steals when he tempts, kills when the sheep consents to him, and destroys when he leads it with him to damnation. Or the thief and robber is any heretic or pagan who does not enter the fold through the door—that is, through Christ, which is faith in Christ—but another way, namely through errors. Such a man kills the sheep rather than feeding them.

Hence Augustine says on John: There were certain pagan philosophers who discussed many subtle matters concerning virtues and vices, dividing and defining, drawing the most acute conclusions, filling books, and tossing their wisdom about with clattering mouths. They even dared to say, “Follow us if you wish to live happily.” But because they did not enter through the door, that is, faith in Christ, they slaughtered and destroyed. No one is granted to live well unless he is granted to live forever. No one can have the hope of living forever unless he enters through the door, Christ, who is life and confers the blessed life through faith.

Hence Christ says: “He who enters through me shall go in,” namely into the fold of the Church, “and go out” to the blessed life. Or he shall enter into himself through good thoughts and affections and go out through good outward works. Or he shall enter toward himself and go out toward his neighbor by living well with him. Or he shall enter the blessed life by seeing the divinity and go out, as it were, by seeing Christ’s humanity, and he shall find pastures of joy and fruition.

He also says that all who came before him—that is, apart from him—were robbers, namely those who did not bring true doctrine according to the faith, as Augustine says.

Nor is it unfitting that Christ is called the door, the doorkeeper, the shepherd, and the sheep, terms all found in this Gospel passage, for these names are said of him according to different relations. He is called the door insofar as through him—that is, through faith in him and imitation of him—one enters the fold of the Church militant and triumphant. He is the doorkeeper because he himself bestows the grace and virtues by which one enters that fold. He is the shepherd because he feeds us by his teaching, sacraments, and other means. He is the sheep and lamb because he is led like a sheep to slaughter, as Isaiah 53 says, and is “the Lamb who takes away the sins of the world,” John 1.

Of him Peter says in his canonical epistle: “You were redeemed not by corruptible gold and silver, but by the precious blood of the immaculate Lamb,” namely Christ. Augustine says concerning him in On Consecration: No one takes away the sins of the world except Christ, who is the Lamb taking away the world’s sins. He takes away both those already committed, among which original sin is included; he assists so that future sins are not committed; and he leads us to the life where sins can no longer be committed.

After Christ called himself the shepherd, he added: “I have other sheep that are not of this fold.” He speaks of the Gentiles who were to be converted and were not of the fold—that is, the race—of the Jews. “And them I must bring,” namely to the faith and fold of the Church. The Gentiles were then sheep by predestination or foreknowledge, but not according to present righteousness. On this see On Penance, Distinction 4, § Finis.

“And there shall be one fold and one shepherd”: that is, one Church made from the sheep of the Jewish people and the Gentiles converted to the faith. Cyprian speaks beautifully of this unity of the Church, saying: In the Song of Songs the Holy Spirit, speaking in the person of Christ the Lord, designates one Church and says: “One is my dove,” namely in simplicity; “my perfect one,” namely in the fullness of virtues; “one is the chosen one of her mother and of her who bore her.”

The gloss says that the Church’s mother can be called the Church triumphant, because she cherishes and helps her like a mother her daughter. Or her mother is Mary who bore her, and God is her father; or her mother is the synagogue from which she proceeded.

Cyprian continues: Blessed Paul the Apostle teaches this unity of the Church and displays the mystery of unity, saying: one mystical body; one Spirit, the vivifying grace within it, namely the Holy Spirit; one hope of your calling, that is, one hoped-for reality to which we are called; one Lord, who governs the world and provides for it, especially for the Church; one faith, alike in all or concerning one who is both God and man; one baptism, of the same form and equal effect; and one God, not many gods as the pagans hold.

“This unity,” Cyprian says, “we bishops especially, who preside in God’s Church, must firmly hold and vindicate, so that we may prove the episcopate itself also to be one and undivided. The episcopate is one. The Church is one, though by the increase of her fruitfulness she extends more broadly into a multitude, just as the sun’s rays are many but its light one; the branches of a tree are many but its strength is one, founded upon a tenacious root; and many streams flow from one spring, so that although a numerous abundance seems to be diffused through the bounty of overflowing plenty, unity is nevertheless preserved in the source.

“So too the Lord’s Church, flooded with light, extends her rays throughout the whole world. Yet that which is spread everywhere is one, and the unity of the body is not divided. Tear a ray of the sun away from its body: unity admits no division. Break a branch from the tree: it will not be able to put forth fruit. Cut a stream from its spring: cut off, it dries up.

“Thus the Church extends her branches—the various nations—throughout the whole earth by the abundance of fruitfulness; she pours forth streams of teachings and spreads more widely the rays of graces. Yet there is one head, one source, and one mother abounding in fruitfulness. The bride of Christ cannot be defiled; she is incorrupt and chaste.” Thus Cyprian, in Cause 24, Question 1, canon Loquitur.

From these statements Christ’s words are evident: “There shall be one fold and one shepherd,” that is, one Church and one supreme pontiff, the vicar of Jesus Christ.

The same Cyprian says: Whoever is made after the one who alone ought to be supreme shepherd is not second but no one. This is in Cause 7, Question 1, canon Factus. He speaks of Novatian, who after Fabian had been created pope was himself made pope through schism—or rather, antipope—as is evident in the following canon, which begins Novatianus. The same point is also supported by what is found among bees. [The print here adds the unexplained abbreviation q. e.]

§ II: On the Hardness and Reprobation of the Jews, the Conversion of the Gentiles That Was to Follow, and Its Benefit

John the Evangelist says that although Jesus had worked so many signs before the Jews, they did not believe in him, so that the saying of Isaiah might be fulfilled which he spoke in chapter 53: “Lord, who has believed our report?” and so forth.

Augustine says here: Some murmur among themselves, saying, “What fault was it of the Jews if it was necessary that Isaiah’s saying be fulfilled?” We answer them that God, foreknowing the future, foretold the Jews’ unbelief through the prophet; he did not cause it. God does not compel anyone to sin because he knows human sins beforehand. He foreknew their sins, not his own. The Jews therefore committed the sins that he, from whom nothing is hidden, foretold they would commit. The same statement makes this point excellently in Cause 23, Question 4, canon Nabuchodonosor.

Therefore, concerning the words “so that Isaiah’s saying might be fulfilled,” Chrysostom says that “so that” is not causal but consequential. They did not fail to believe because Isaiah foretold it; rather, because they were not going to believe, Isaiah foretold it. “So that” is therefore understood consequentially, not causally.

“Who has believed?” does not indicate absolute negation but rarity—that is, few have believed. “Our report” means those things we heard from you when we spoke concerning your Son. “And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?” It is as if he said: to very few. The Son is called the arm of the Lord because all things were made through him. Just as a man works through his arm, so by a likeness the Son of God is called his arm.

The Gospel continues: “Therefore they could not believe, because Isaiah said again,” and so forth. What sin is it for a person not to do what he cannot do? Augustine says that no one sins in what he cannot avoid. The answer is that “they could not” means they did not wish to believe. Chrysostom says that ordinary speech preserves this usage when someone says, “I cannot love that man.” The Evangelist calls vehemence of will an inability.

But what Isaiah’s next statement says is still more serious: “He has blinded their heart [read: eyes] and hardened their heart,” namely God. I answer that their will had merited even this. God blinded them as regards intellect and hardened them as regards will by abandoning them. He does not abandon us unless we first wish it. Thus God blinds and hardens not causally but permissively.

The Gospel continues: “Isaiah said these things when he saw God’s glory.” He did not see it in its essence, but in a magnificent imaginative vision, when he saw the Lord sitting upon a high throne, Isaiah 6.

The Evangelist adds that many of the rulers believed in him, but because of the Pharisees they did not confess it, lest they be cast out of the synagogue. They did not believe perfectly, for otherwise they would not have feared displeasing the Pharisees or being expelled for confessing Christ. Hence he adds: “For they loved the glory of men more than the glory of God.” Publicly confessing Christ pertained to God’s glory.

But Christ speaks against those who fear to confess. Hence Jesus cried out, saying: “He who believes in me” as he ought “does not believe in me”—that is, merely in the one he sees, as though I were a mere man—“but in him who sent me,” whom he does not see, namely the Father. “And he who sees me” according to the divinity I possess “sees also him who sent me,” whether by the vision of faith or the vision of glory, because the Father and Son with the Holy Spirit are one Lord.

Elsewhere, namely John 15, Christ says: “If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin.” Augustine says that Christ is not speaking of every sin, but of the sin of unbelief, which surpasses almost all others and is therefore called “sin” preeminently. Certainly they could have had other sins; but they would not have had this one if he had not preached to them incarnate and worked so many signs. For the Jews had previously believed that Christ would come, and thus they did not possess this sin of unbelief. Other nations which have not heard him or seen his signs and do not believe are not thereby excused from the sin of unbelief, but it would not be so grave in them.

When on Palm Sunday Christ entered Jerusalem, the principal Jewish feast was approaching, namely the solemnity of the Unleavened Bread, at which Jews from diverse regions of the world, and sometimes Gentiles also, came together at the Temple. John reports that certain Gentiles had come to worship at that feast. They approached Philip and asked him, saying, “Sir, we wish to see Jesus.” They had heard of his teaching and miracles. Philip told Andrew, and Andrew and Philip together told Jesus.

Augustine says: Behold, the Gentiles wish to see Jesus, but those who cried, “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord,” were Jews. Behold those from the foreskin and these from the circumcision; behold two walls coming from different directions and meeting in one faith of Christ with the kiss of peace. Let us therefore hear the voice of the cornerstone.

The Gospel continues: “Jesus answered, saying: The hour has come that the Son of Man should be glorified.” Augustine says that Jesus saw that after his Passion and Resurrection the Gentiles would believe among all nations. Therefore, on the occasion of these Gentiles who desired to see him, he announces the future fullness of the Gentiles and promises that the hour of his glorification is now at hand. That glorification was to be accomplished when the nations believed, according to the words, “Be exalted above the heavens, O God, and your glory above all the earth.”

But the humility of the Passion had to precede the height of glorification. Hence he added: “Amen, amen, I say to you: Unless a grain of wheat falling into the earth dies, it remains alone.” Augustine says that he called himself the grain that would be put to death in the unbelief of the Jews and multiplied in the faith of the converted peoples, namely the Gentiles.

Bede says that Christ himself, from the seed of the patriarchs, was sown—that is, incarnate—in the field of this world so that by dying he might rise with multiplication. He died alone and rose with many. “But if it dies, it brings forth much fruit.” Christ uses natural experience, because when a grain of wheat has died it bears more fruit.

Chrysostom says that Jesus sees the Gentiles springing forward to faith and shows that it was time for him to come to the cross, on which he as the grain was put to death. Jesus did not send the Apostles to the Gentiles before the Jews crucified Christ.

And because he foresaw that the disciples would be saddened by his death, he shows that they themselves would gain nothing not only if they bore his death impatiently, but also if they did not die to the world. Therefore he adds: “He who loves his soul shall lose it”: that is, he who truly loves it loses it by killing it as regards vices and sensual appetites. Or thus: he who loves his soul according to the world loses it, that is, kills it by depriving himself of grace.

Christ also foretold this reprobation of the Jews and conversion of the Gentiles near the beginning of his preaching, when he said of the Gentile centurion who prayed for his paralytic servant: “I have not found such great faith in Israel.” That is, he had not found faith as great as the centurion displayed, because the centurion had seen or heard less about Jesus and yet believed in his divinity, as appears from his words. He signified the greatness of faith in the Gentile world that was to be converted.

Therefore, foretelling this, Christ adds: “Many shall come from east and west.” These two regions are more habitable, for in the north and south a large part is uninhabitable—in the north because of intense cold and in the south because of excessive heat—and because the principal monarchies were there. They shall come from darkness to the light of faith, from vices to virtues, and from the devil to Christ, with penance as the means in adults.

Hence Augustine says: Everyone who is established as arbiter of his own will cannot begin a new life unless he repents of his old life. Or, morally, they come from the east of childhood and the west of old age; or from the east of prosperity and the west of adversity.

“And they shall recline with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven”: that is, in the Church militant and afterward triumphant; in the faith and afterward the vision of the Trinity signified by those three; or in faith, hope, and charity; or in the kingdom of Scripture, that is, its true understanding; or in the perfection of virtues, which is also called a kingdom.

“But the children of the kingdom,” namely the Jews, for whom any of the aforesaid kingdoms had been prepared, “shall be cast out”—from the Church, from the true understanding of Scripture, and from every true virtue because of their unbelief—“into the exterior darkness,” first the darkness within and afterward that of hell.

Because it is very burdensome to be obliged to hate one’s soul, Christ consoles those to whom he had said this by adding “in this world,” thereby indicating that it is for only part of time, a short period and not forever. He also states the gain: “He preserves it for eternal life” by hating it through abstention from worldly vices.

What the promised eternal life is, or in what it consists, Christ himself declared at the end of his last discourse to the disciples, when he said: “This is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.” That is, true life, which is eternal, consists in this. For the present life should be called death rather than life. What else is the daily decay of our corruption but a certain prolongation of death?

This eternal life is our final end, which we desire naturally because it is perfect beatitude. It consists in the clear and manifest vision of the most holy Trinity and Christ’s humanity, from which vision fruition necessarily follows. This is what he means by “that they may know”—namely perfectly—“you,” the almighty Father, “and Jesus Christ,” your only-begotten Son, “whom you have sent,” that is, whom you appointed to become incarnate. The Incarnation is attributed to the Holy Spirit because it arose from immense love, and that love is called the Holy Spirit. Thus they are to know you the Father, Jesus Christ the Son, and the Holy Spirit—then the one true God—and Christ’s own humanity indicated in his mission.

As Augustine says, the vision is the entire reward and is of such beauty and so worthy of love that Plotinus, the Platonist, judged a soul furnished with any goods, however many and however great, to be most unhappy without it.

§ III: On Christ’s Transfiguration

The venerable Gratian says: Christ was transfigured twice while he was in the flesh. In one transfiguration he appeared wondrous like the sun, so that believers’ faith might be increased toward contemplating the glory raised above itself. In the other, he presented himself as a stranger and one not recognizable, feigning that he would go farther from the disciples who doubted him, and he held their eyes so that he would not be recognized. Why, unless to show that because he was not in their hearts through faith, he withdrew farther from them, and because they did not believe him to be what he was, they saw him as other than he was?

In each appearance there was presence and truth, but in one faith was exercised so that they might believe more, while in the other unbelief held them so that they did not recognize him. This is in Cause 1, Question 1, canon Dominus in patria.

Matthew, Mark, and Luke narrate the first of these transfigurations. Luke says: “It happened about eight days after these words.” He speaks of the words by which Christ had disclosed his Passion to the disciples, exhorting them to imitation and saying, “If anyone wishes to come after me,” and so forth. He enticed them by the reward to be obtained, of which he wished to grant them some foretaste in the Transfiguration, and he wished to make them stronger in their tribulation at his Passion and quicker to return when they had fallen from faith, remembering the refreshment of such great sweetness they had tasted.

Where Luke says eight days, Matthew says six. Damascene resolves this superficial contradiction by saying that Luke includes in his number the first day, on which Christ spoke those words, and the last, on which he was transfigured; Matthew counts the intervening days, which are six.

He took Peter, James, and John his brother from the Twelve and led these three with him. He chose that number because “in the mouth of two or three every word stands,” so that the truth of what was said might be confirmed through testimony and a mystery signified.

According to Damascene, he took these rather than the others for the following reasons. He took Peter because he wished the testimony Peter had borne to him when he said, “You are Christ, the Son of the living God,” to be confirmed through the Father’s testimony, and because Peter was to be the future president of the entire Church. He took James as one who would die for Christ before all the disciples. He took John as the purest instrument of theology, so that, having seen the Son’s glory which is not subject to time, he might sound forth these words: “In the beginning was the Word”; and because Christ would commend his mother to him.

Or again, through these three Apostles are signified three states of those to be saved in the Church: prelates, active persons, and contemplatives; or married persons, the continent, and virgins. They must nevertheless possess the three qualities indicated by the interpretations of the Apostles’ names. Let there be Peter, whose name is interpreted “unshod,” through contempt for earthly things; James, interpreted “supplanter,” namely of the demons’ temptations; and John the beloved, interpreted “in whom there is grace,” through love of divine things.

“He went up a high mountain,” because the valley of thought about earthly things must be abandoned so that one may ascend the mountain of contemplation. Matthew adds “apart,” in a solitary place, removed not only from people but also from images of bodily things.

As Luke says: “It came to pass while he prayed that the appearance of his countenance became other.” Damascene says: Servants pray in one way and the Lord in another. A servant’s prayer is through the ascent of the intellect to God. But Christ’s sacred intellect, which according to the hypostatic union was united to God, leads us by the hand toward ascent into God—that is, induces us by example to pray and venerate God—and entices the tyrant, the devil, to investigate whether he was God. Prayer is also a revelation of divine glory.

Thus the Evangelist says: “The appearance of his countenance became other,” for which Matthew has, “He was transfigured before them.” This does not mean that he lost the form of his body, but that a certain splendid glory supervened, not from without as in Moses, but from within. For as Damascene says, since according to the hypostatic union the glory of the Word and of the flesh is one and the same, he was transfigured not as though receiving something he did not possess, but as manifesting to the disciples what he possessed, namely the glory of the soul overflowing into the body.

Explaining this, the Evangelist Matthew says: “And his face shone like the sun.” What the sun is among sensible things, God is among intelligible things. Just as the sun, which is the source of light, cannot easily be looked upon, while its light which reaches the earth from it is seen, so Christ’s face shines more intensely than the sun.

“His garments became white as snow.” Mark adds that they were “such as no fuller upon earth can make.” The illumination of the face signifies the soul’s radiance; the whiteness of the garments, the glory and purity of the saints’ resurrected bodies, which cannot be produced by human exercise.

“And behold, two men spoke with him, Moses and Elijah, seen in majesty.” Damascene says this was so that he might be shown as the one Lord of the New and Old Testaments. Men from each Testament stood with him against the heretics: disciples, namely, and prophets.

It was also so that he might be shown as Lord of the living and the dead. Moses appeared, one already dead, whose soul either assumed a raised body, or, better, whose soul came forth from limbo and appeared in an aerial body assumed in his likeness. Elijah, still living, was brought there from the earthly paradise. They stood as the Lord’s servants in glory. “Seen in majesty” means in great glory.

Damascene says that the disciples, the Lord’s servants, had to marvel at their fellow servants’ glory and confidence, to admire the Lord’s condescension, to emulate those who had labored before them, to behold the pleasantness of future goods, and thus be strengthened more fully in their contests.

They also appeared to show that Christ was not an adversary of the Law and of God. For if he were, Moses the lawgiver, who was zealous for God’s glory, and Elijah likewise would not have stood with him. It was also to induce the disciples to imitate those who had many times exposed themselves to death for God, so that in governance they might be gentle like Moses and zealous like Elijah.

Luke says that they spoke of “his departure, which he was to accomplish in Jerusalem”: that is, the surpassing charity he was to display in his Passion, the surpassing humility he was to exhibit in death, and the surpassing pain he was to suffer on the cross.

Ambrose says: Three are chosen to ascend the mountain because no one can see the glory of the Resurrection unless he has preserved the mystery of the Trinity in the incorrupt sincerity of faith. Bede says that Christ transfigured himself to show the glory of the future resurrection, whether his or ours.

Luke says that Peter and those who were with him were heavy with sleep. Chrysostom calls the immense stupefaction produced in them by that vision “sleep.” It was not nighttime; rather, the excellence of the light oppressed the weakness of their eyes, for the incomprehensible splendor of divinity presses upon the senses of our body. Ambrose says: Perhaps they were heavy with sleep in God so that, after repose, they might see the appearance of the Resurrection.

“And awakening, they saw his majesty and the two aforesaid men who stood with him.” When those two were departing from him, Peter said to Jesus: “Lord, it is good for us to be here.” Peter supposed that the divine time of God’s kingdom was imminent. Matthew adds, “If you wish.” Peter spoke conditionally because they had often been rebuked for making requests absolutely.

“Let us make three tabernacles here: one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah,” while they themselves would be in Christ’s tabernacle. Luke adds: “Not knowing what he said.” Damascene says: Peter, it is not good for you that Christ should remain there, because if he had remained, the promise made to you would never have achieved its effect; you would not have obtained the keys of the kingdom, nor would the tyranny of death have been abolished.

The Lord appointed you builder not of tabernacles but of the universal Church. Your disciples, your sheep, will put your words into effect by constructing a tabernacle for Christ. Peter did not utter these things from his intention, however, but by inspiration of the Spirit revealing future things.

Peter did not know what he was saying. The time of the world’s end had not yet arrived, nor the time for the saints to share in the promised hope. Nor was it fitting for Christ to desist from love of the world, since he wished to die for it; nor was it fitting for the fruit of the Incarnation to be confined to the use of those present on the mountain rather than poured forth upon all believers, which was to be consummated through the Passion.

Titus says that Peter also did not know what he said because one ought not make three tabernacles for the three. Servants are not numbered together with the Lord, nor creatures with the Creator.

Peter did not know what he said because, as Ambrose says, the human condition in this corruptible body cannot make a tabernacle for God, whether in the soul, in the body, or in any other place whatsoever.

Or, according to Chrysostom, Peter heard that Christ must die, but saw the great remoteness and solitude and therefore judged that he would have abundant protection there. Moses, who entered the cloud, was also present, together with Elijah, who brought fire down upon the mountain.

Nor is there a contradiction in Luke’s saying that Peter spoke these things after Moses and Elijah had departed, while Matthew and Mark connect Peter’s suggestion as though Moses and Elijah were still speaking with the Lord. For Matthew and Mark did not express that Peter spoke at that precise time; rather, they omitted what Luke added, namely that Peter said this as the two were departing.

Theophilus says that when Peter said, “Let us make three tabernacles,” God fashioned a tabernacle not made by hands. Hence it follows: “While he was speaking, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them.” It was bright because the darkness of the Law had passed away.

Basil says: As smoke is caused by fire, so the cloud was caused by light. But because mist is a sign of tranquillity, the repose of the future dwelling is shown through the cloud’s covering.

Ambrose says: The overshadowing is that of the divine Spirit, which does not darken human affections but reveals hidden things. This cloud was the Holy Spirit, not essentially or personally but representatively, just as the dove appearing at the Baptism is called the Holy Spirit. That dove then and this newly formed cloud now represented the Holy Spirit, according to Thomas in the Third Part.

“And a voice came from the cloud, saying: This is my beloved Son.” That voice so represented the Father that it did not represent the Son; the dove or cloud so represented the Holy Spirit that it did not represent the Father or Son; and Christ in the flesh was the Son alone, not the Father or Holy Spirit. Nevertheless, that humanity, the dove or cloud, and the voice, insofar as they were creatures, were from the whole Trinity. This is in On Consecration, Distinction 4, canon Omnes.

Not Moses, not Elijah, but this man who alone remained, Jesus, “is my beloved Son.” Hence Luke also says that when the voice was heard, Jesus was found alone, for Moses and Elijah had now departed.

Cyril says: How, therefore, should one judge him who is truly the Son to have been made or caused, when the Father thundered from above, “This is my Son”? It is as if he said: He is not one of the sons, but is truly and naturally the Son, after whose exemplar others are adoptive sons.

He commanded them to obey the Son when he added, “Hear him,” more than Moses and Elijah, because Christ is the end of the Law and the prophets.

Ambrose says: Three are seen at the beginning and one at the end, because through the perfect faith, which is faith in a Trinity of persons in the unity of essence, those who are received into Christ’s body are one, for we too shall be one in Christ Jesus. Or perhaps it is because the Law and the prophets began from the Word and end in the Word.

Bede says: Note that, just as the majesty of the whole Trinity appeared when the Lord was baptized in the Jordan, so also when he was glorified upon the mountain. In Baptism we confess the Trinity; in the Resurrection we shall see it. Nor did the Holy Spirit appear without reason here in a bright cloud and there in a dove, because he who now keeps with a simple heart the faith he holds will then contemplate in the light of open vision what he believed.

Jesus then approached the disciples, withdrawing that radiance. They had been terrified by hearing the voice and become as if dead from fear. He said: “Rise, and do not fear.” Descending with them from the mountain, which is said to have been Mount Tabor, he said: “Tell no one this vision until the Son of Man rises from the dead.” He commanded this to teach that visions and hidden illuminations should not readily be made public; also lest the ministry of redemption through the cross be impeded; and lest the other disciples envy them.

§ IV: On the Counsel Held in the Council of the Jews Concerning Christ’s Death and the Supper Offered to Him at Bethany

When Jesus had raised Lazarus after four days, a miracle much more widely publicized than the others, both more marvelous because its effect was harder and immune from the Jews’ calumny that he had done it on the Sabbath, as they alleged concerning certain other miracles, and because it had been done upon a notable person known to many, they saw that his fame was thereby increasing and envied him.

John says that the chief priests and Pharisees gathered a council against Jesus and said: “What are we doing?” as though to say, “Why do we not make provision against this deed?” The right provision, however, would have been that, seeing so many signs, they believed in him.

“This man works many signs.” They judged him a mere man, although he was also true God. “He works many signs”: they could not deny so many accomplished miracles. Behold the cause they alleged for deliberating about his death: that he worked signs. On that account they ought rather to have revered and believed him. In this their folly and blindness appear.

Their folly appears because, while testifying that they knew he had always worked miracles, they believed themselves able to contend against him. Their blindness appears because it belonged to one who worked so many miracles to rescue himself from their plots, unless perhaps they believed those signs were not performed by divine power.

“If we leave him thus,” without opposing works of this kind, “all will believe in him.” And what could be better for human salvation than to believe in him? “And the Romans will come and take away our place and nation.” It is as if they said: Those who hear him will believe and follow him in great numbers. Hearing this, the Romans will think that we have rebelled and taken another lord, and on that account they will come against us in war and take away our nation by leading it into servitude, and take away our place—that is, city and Temple—by destroying them.

But what they displayed to the people was a fiction. Christ did not lead armed men with him or draw cavalry after him. Rather, he wished his disciples to be poor, fleeing honors and dominion; he preached subjection to superiors and the payment of tribute to Caesar.

Augustine says: They feared to lose temporal things, and because of this they acted against spiritual things. Hence at last they lost both temporal and spiritual things: the city, every royal and priestly dignity, and eternal life, because of the obstinacy of their unbelief.

One of them named Caiaphas cried out shamelessly and cruelly, since he was the high priest of that year. Augustine says: Although the Lord had established that a supreme priest should discharge the office of the deceased through natural succession, afterward, through ambitions and contentions among the Jews, it was established that there should be several and that they should minister by turns in individual years. Perhaps several administered even within one year, and others succeeded them the next year.

Alcuin says that Josephus reports of this Caiaphas that he bought for a price a priesthood of one year. He said to them: “You know nothing, nor do you reflect.” It is as if he said: You sit there and still consider the matter sluggishly. If you attend to the salvation of this man, you ought not to disregard the commonwealth. “It is expedient for you that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation should not perish.”

He said this with a wicked intention, wishing, as it were, to show that their whole nation would perish if Christ were not killed, because the Romans, if they perceived a very great multitude following Christ as though intending rebellion, would subdue them. But by the grace of the Holy Spirit the utterance from his mouth was drawn toward a presage of the future. Hence the Evangelist adds: “He did not say this of himself, but since he was high priest, he prophesied that Jesus was to die for the nation.”

Augustine says: From this let us perceive how great is the dignity of the priestly office or order. It was said of the most wicked Caiaphas, the Savior’s killer, “He did not say this of himself, but since he was the high priest of that year, he prophesied.” Through this it is shown that the Holy Spirit, giver of graces, follows not the person of the worthy or unworthy man but the order of tradition, so that the ordained person performs the office of ministry while God bestows the effect of the blessing. This is in Cause 1, Question 1, canon Dictum est. It speaks of the effect of grace in the sacraments, which is conferred even through evil men.

Origen says: Not everyone who prophesies is, properly speaking, a prophet, just as not everyone who pursues justice is just. It properly belongs to a prophet to understand the things he foretells. Hence Pharaoh is not called a prophet because he saw and expressed the vision concerning the ears of grain and the cattle; rather, Joseph, who understood and expounded what was foretold through them, is the prophet.

It was “expedient,” that is, necessary “for us,” meaning all who are to be saved, “that one”—the only-begotten Son of God the Father, one God with the Father and Holy Spirit, and one in humanity, that is, wholly united to God in unity of person, whose soul is called unique because it always enjoyed God—“should die” insofar as he was man, and he died as true man. For God is immortal and impassible. He died “for the people,” namely to save them. As regards the efficacy of the price, he died for all the people; as regards its effective operation, only for the people of the elect, since the reprobate deprive themselves of the fruit of his death.

“And that the whole nation should not perish.” Augustine says: So great was our debt that we could not be saved unless God’s only-begotten Son, who was not a debtor to death, died for us who were debtors to death.

The Evangelist adds that he was to die not only for the nation, but also “to gather into one the children of God who were dispersed.” Augustine says: There are some children of God who are not yet children of God to us, namely according to present righteousness, but already are so to God, namely through predestination. Of these John says that Jesus was to die not only for the nation but to gather into the unity of love the children of God who were dispersed, namely then in various places and rites of idolatry and in errors. They were certainly to become children by believing through the preaching of the Gospel; yet even before this occurred they were already inscribed in the unshaken stability of their Father’s memory. This is in On Penance, Distinction 4, canon Si ex bono.

“From that day, therefore, they devised how they might kill him.” The Evangelist adds: “Jesus therefore no longer walked openly among the Jews, but went into a region near the desert, into a city called Ephraim.” Augustine says that Jesus did this not as though he lacked the power by which, had he wished, he could have lived openly among the Jews and suffered no harm, but to give his followers an example showing that it is no sin if his faithful withdraw themselves from their persecutors’ sight and avoid the fury of criminals by hiding rather than provoke it further by displaying themselves.

The Evangelist says that the chief priests and Pharisees issued an order that if anyone knew where Jesus was, he should report it so that they might apprehend him.

“Six days before the Passover,” namely the Jews’ principal feast, “Jesus came to Bethany.” This was a village said to have belonged to Martha and Mary, who were of noble birth. It was a little less than two miles from Jerusalem, as appeared above. He came there on the Sabbath before Palm Sunday. As his Passion approached, he wished to approach the place of his Passion, to show that he suffered voluntarily and not under compulsion.

They made a supper for him there on the tenth day of the first month, which the Jews reckon according to lunar months. Accordingly, in our reckoning the first month sometimes falls in March and sometimes in April. The Hebrew year has twelve lunations and sometimes thirteen lunar months, because the excess beyond twelve lunations adds one lunar month at the completion of three years.

On the tenth day of the first month the Jews took the lamb to be sacrificed at the feast of Passover, and then began to celebrate the solemnities of that feast. Theophilus therefore says that on the day which is the ninth of the month and precedes the sixth day before Passover, the Jews feast splendidly and make that day the beginning of the feast. Thus it happened that Jesus, going to Bethany, took part in a banquet.

“And Martha served.” Attend to the woman’s fidelity. She does not impose the ministry upon servants but undertakes it herself.

Wishing to suggest the truth of Lazarus’s resurrection, the Evangelist adds: “Lazarus was one of those reclining at table.” Chrysostom says: He lived, spoke, and ate. The truth of the miracle was displayed and the Jews’ unbelief confounded. According to some, he related the punishments of hell that he had seen.

“Mary therefore took a pound of precious ointment of pure nard.” She was Martha and Lazarus’s sister, as appeared above. According to Gregory and Alcuin, as is commonly held, she was that sinful woman who, as Luke alone narrates, at the beginning of her conversion in the house of Simon the Pharisee washed Jesus’s feet with her tears and anointed them, although some say that woman was someone other than this Mary.

She therefore took a pound of ointment, that is, an unction made from the very fragrant and medicinal herb called nard. It is called pistic, a Greek word meaning trustworthy, that is, not adulterated by mixture with anything else; or, according to Augustine, it is the name of the place from which the herb came.

“And she anointed Jesus’s feet and wiped them with her hair.” Matthew and Mark, narrating by recapitulation that this anointing was performed when they begin to describe Christ’s Passion, say that she anointed not only Christ’s feet but also his head. She had gained confidence from the forgiveness of sins she had received, which John omits here.

They also report that this occurred in the house of Simon the leper, who had formerly been a leper but was afterward cleansed. It could be that, although the village of Bethany belonged to Martha, Simon had a notable house there in which Christ ate, with the aforesaid sisters and Lazarus present.

“And the house was filled with the fragrance of the ointment.” Alcuin explains mystically that Jesus’s coming six days beforehand signifies that he who made all things in six days and created man on the sixth had come to redeem the world in the sixth age, on the sixth weekday, at the sixth hour.

The Lord’s supper is the faith of the Church which works through love. Martha serves when a faithful soul devotes to the Lord the works of its devotion. Lazarus is one of those reclining at table when those raised from the death of sins to righteousness rejoice in the presence of truth together with those who have persevered in their righteousness, and are nourished by the gifts of heavenly grace.

This fittingly occurs in Bethany, interpreted “house of obedience,” which indeed is the Church. The ointment with which Mary anoints Jesus is righteousness, and it is therefore a pound. He anoints Jesus’s feet who, by living well, follows the Lord’s footsteps according to the gloss. He anoints the head who is moved with devotion toward the divinity; he anoints the feet who directs his mind and affection toward the humanity.

He wipes the feet with his hair who gives from his surplus to the poor. The house is filled by this fragrance because the world is sprinkled with the good reputation produced by the Church’s works.

One of the disciples, Judas Iscariot, said: “Why was this ointment not sold for three hundred denarii and given to the needy?” The other Evangelists say that the disciples murmured at this. Their accounts are reconciled in two ways: either the plural is placed for the singular because one of the disciples murmured, or both things happened. Judas first murmured and muttered without the others, and afterward induced the others to murmur with him.

But there was a difference: the others were moved by devotion toward the poor, while Judas was moved by avarice so that he might steal part of the things given him to keep. Hence John the Evangelist adds: “He said this not because he cared for the needy,” that is, from compassion for the poor, “but because he was a thief and, having the purse, carried what was put therein”—that is, what was given as alms to Christ and the disciples and placed in the purse, a wallet with different pouches like different compartments for the variety of coins.

Alcuin says: He carried it in ministry, namely as purse-bearer or procurator; he carried it away by theft. For he is said to have had a wife and children, to whom he carried things home.

Hence Augustine says in Cause 12, Question 1: Receive the example of the Lord living upon earth. Why did he who was served by angels have a purse, unless because the Church was to have a purse? Why did he admit thieves, unless so that his Church, when it suffers thieves, might tolerate them?

Chrysostom says that Christ entrusted the purse of the poor to Judas, who was a thief, so as to cut off every excuse from him. Judas could not say that he did this because of a desire for money, for he had enough from the purse to mitigate his covetousness. Christ knew this, but out of great condescension toward Judas did not accuse him. Instead, according to Matthew, he offered a general defense, saying: “Why are you troublesome to this woman,” namely by murmuring against her? “For she has worked a good work upon me,” not an act of wastefulness, as you think, but of devotion.

“For in pouring this ointment upon my body she has done it for my burial”: that is, she has done what she will take care to do as a service for my burial, but she will not be able to accomplish it. For after the Holy Sabbath had passed, she came with the other Marys to the tomb early the following morning with spices to anoint Jesus’s body, but they did not find it because he had already risen.

Hence John also says: “Let her alone,” namely to do what she is doing, “that she may keep it for the day of my burial”: that is, let her preserve her intention, and she will perform what she wishes to perform on the day of my burial, although she will not be able to complete it.

“For the poor you will always have with you,” according to bodily presence and need, “but me you will not always have,” namely according to bodily and visible presence. For according to his majesty, his providence, as Augustine says, his ineffable and invisible grace, and also the truth of the sacrament in the Eucharist, that saying of his is fulfilled: “Behold, I am with you until the consummation of the age.”

John says that a great crowd which had come to the feast in Jerusalem, hearing that Christ was in Bethany, came there not only because of him but also to see Lazarus, whom Christ was said by many to have raised. Because many believed in Jesus when they saw Lazarus, the Pharisees planned to kill Lazarus so as to conceal or disparage the miracle. This is in On Penance, Distinction 1, canon Quantuslibet.

§ V: On Jesus’s Entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday with Great Glory and Praise, upon an Ass and a Colt

All four Evangelists narrate this and introduce the prophet’s testimony about it. John therefore says that on the next day, namely after the aforesaid supper, a great crowd which had come for the feast day heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem and went out to meet him with palm branches.

Bede says: The command of the Law was that on the tenth moon of the first month a lamb or kid should be shut inside the house until the fourteenth moon of that month, when it was sacrificed toward evening. Hence the true Lamb also, chosen spotless from the entire flock for the sanctification of the people, went up to Jerusalem five days beforehand, that is, on the tenth moon.

The other Evangelists narrate this more fully. Matthew says that when Jesus approached Jerusalem and came to Bethphage at the Mount of Olives—Bethphage being a village near Jerusalem on the slope of the Mount of Olives, where priests dwelt—Jesus then sent two of his disciples, saying: “Go into the village.”

Jerusalem is called a village although it was a royal city, because there was no unity there but a very great division among its inhabitants. “Which is opposite you.” This is certainly Jerusalem, or also the world, to which Christ’s disciples were sent to preach. It was opposite them because it persecuted them.

“And immediately you shall find an ass and a colt with her,” namely tied. “Loose them and bring them to me.” Out of devotion toward the poor, the citizens kept a certain common ass near the gate so that poor people who did not possess animals of their own might use it for their necessities and afterward return it to the place. That ass then had a colt.

“And if anyone says, ‘Why are you loosing the colt?’ say, ‘Because the Lord has need of them,’ and he will immediately let them go.” Obeying him, they brought the ass and colt.

Basil says: Thus it is fitting for us to undertake even the lowest works with the greatest affection and diligence, knowing that whatever is done with regard for God is not small but worthy of the kingdom of heaven.

According to Augustine, one must know that although the other three Evangelists mention only the ass’s colt brought to Jesus, on which no human being had yet sat and upon which Jesus mounted, Matthew, as has been said, reports that both the ass and colt were brought. There is nevertheless no contradiction in this; Matthew supplied what the others omitted concerning the ass.

Christ rode upon both: on the ass for one part of the road, and on the colt for another—not because the animals were tired, but for the sake of signification. It signified either that Christ would dwell in both sexes, or, better, in both peoples, the Jewish and the Gentile, brought by the Apostles’ preaching and converted to the faith, and that he would lead them into the Jerusalem above.

The ass signifies the Jewish people, subjected to the yoke of the Law and tamed by the burdens of penalties. The young ass or colt signifies the wanton Gentile people, upon whom no one had sat because, according to Ambrose, no one except Christ called the peoples of the nations to grace.

Because the other three Evangelists wrote their Gospels for Gentiles, they took care to mention the ass’s colt, which figured the Gentile people. Matthew wrote for converted Hebrews, yet also preached for a long time to Gentiles, namely the Ethiopians; therefore he mentioned both the ass and the colt.

Matthew and John introduce the prophecy that foretold this deed, which is found in Zechariah 9, reporting the substance of the event rather than the prophet’s exact words. For Zechariah says: “Exult greatly, daughter of Zion; rejoice, daughter of Jerusalem. Behold, your king comes to you, just and a savior. He is poor and ascends upon an ass and the colt of an ass.”

John reports it thus: “Do not fear, daughter of Zion,” that is, Jerusalem, which is called the daughter of Zion because Zion was Jerusalem’s fortress, its guard and protection, just as a mother guards her daughter. Jerusalem is therefore called the daughter of Zion. Supply: Rather, exult, Jerusalem, you who are the daughter of Zion, as the prophet says. “Behold, your king comes, sitting upon the colt of an ass,” which occurred during one part of the journey.

Matthew says: “Tell the daughter of Zion,” namely Jerusalem, that is, its inhabitants. You preachers and doctors of the Law, comfort the people and console them at the coming of their Messiah. You will be able to recognize him by his humility and meekness; I give you this sign of the matter: “Behold, your king comes to you, meek and sitting upon an ass and a colt, the foal of a beast of burden,” that is, of an ass.

“Behold”: he is near, and therefore I point him out. Recognize his dignity, because he is king in temporality as regards dominion, for he is King of kings and Lord of lords, although he lived as a poor man in spirituality. He says in the Psalm: “I was established by him as king over Zion,” and so forth, that is, over the Church in heavenly felicity. Hence his power is eternal and his kingdom shall not be corrupted.

He is “yours” through the assumption of humanity, for “he did not take hold of angels, but of the seed of Abraham,” Hebrews 2. He is yours through his origin in the flesh: “Who was made for him from the seed of David according to the flesh,” Romans 10 [read: Romans 1:3]. He is yours through his generosity, for “he gave himself for us,” in Ephesians: as food, as price, and as reward.

“He comes,” that is, he will come soon. Scripture customarily places the present tense for the future, as in John 4, when the Samaritan woman says, “I know that Christ comes,” that is, will come; this is what she intended to say. Or “he comes” is stated in the present tense because, according to Jerome, prophets read the things they prophesy in the book of divine foreknowledge, to which all things are present.

Or venit is taken in the past tense, “he has come,” to display the infallibility of this coming. For just as it is impossible for a past thing that occurred not to have occurred, so it is impossible for something foretold by God not to happen.

He comes “to you,” namely for your benefit: to heal you, for “the Son of Man came to save what had perished,” Luke 19; to illuminate you, for “Arise, be illuminated, Jerusalem; your light has come,” Isaiah 60; to give you life and free you from the devil’s hands, for “I came that they may have life,” John 10, and “The Son of God came to destroy the works of the devil,” First John 3. But if you do not receive him, he will come “to you,” that is, against you, to condemn you.

He is “meek”: not angry and armed like Nebuchadnezzar coming to destroy you; not proud like the profane Antiochus coming to abolish the worship of the true God; not pompous and haughty like Rehoboam, Solomon’s son, excessively burdening the people; not like a tyrant coming to dominate, as the Roman people did. Rather, he is meek, and I give you an evident sign of his meekness: he sits not upon a proud horse which smells battle from afar, but upon an ass, the friend of peace and simplicity.

Therefore let every soul which desires Christ to rest upon it and to be led into the Jerusalem above be like a young ass, a lover of peace, because “his place was made in peace,” in the Psalm. Let it be simple, because his conversation is with the simple. Let it be patient and a bearer of burdens, namely labors and afflictions: “I became like a beast of burden before you, and I am always with you,” in the Psalm.

The disciples sent by Jesus went and did what had been commanded them. When they wished to loose the ass and colt as they had been told, their owners found them and asked why they were loosing them. When they answered that the Lord had need of them, the owners let them go.

When both animals had been brought, the Apostles placed their garments upon the ass. As he made the journey, some stripped off their garments and spread them in the road so that the ass might pass over them, out of devotion to him. Others cut branches from olive and palm trees and spread them in the road, as a figure of Christ’s victory over the devil and death.

Luke reports that as they approached the descent of the Mount of Olives, all the multitude of disciples who had come from Jerusalem to meet him began joyfully to praise God with a loud voice for the mighty works they had seen him perform. These are called disciples not only because they were the Twelve Apostles or his seventy-two disciples, but because they included any others who followed him from faith and devotion toward him.

Matthew says: “The crowds that went before and those that followed cried out: Hosanna to the Son of David,” that is, I beseech you, save. “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord; hosanna in the highest.” This is taken from Psalm 117. Luke adds: “Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord; peace in heaven and glory in the highest.”

Theophilus says: The Jews called him the king of Israel because they dreamed of a sense-perceptible king. They expected a king of more than human greatness to arise and save them from Roman jurisdiction.

Mark says: “Blessed is the kingdom of our father David that comes.” Bede says: He is called king because he rules minds and leads them back to heavenly things.

According to Theophilus, “peace in heaven” means that the ancient war by which we opposed God has vanished. “Glory in the highest” means that the angels praise God in such a reconciliation. For the very fact that God visibly dwells upon the earth of his enemies signifies that he has concord with us.

“The kingdom of our father David comes,” namely Christ’s kingdom, figured in King David’s. He comes “in the name of the Lord” because, according to Bede, either he comes in the name of his Father, the Lord, or in the name “Lord,” that is, he himself came as Lord.

The Pharisees murmured because the crowd called him king, as though this tended toward sedition. And because they praised him as God by crying “Hosanna,” the Pharisees rejected this as blasphemy. Moved by the zeal of envy at so great an honor, they said to him: “Master, rebuke your disciples,” namely, lest they sing such things.

He answered them: “I say to you, if these are silent, the stones will cry out.” According to Theophilus, it is as though he said: I am not the cause of human beings praising me in this way; admonished by the mighty works they have seen, they do this. When the Lord was crucified and those who knew him were silent from fear, the stones also sang when the rocks were split at his death.

Or perhaps, according to Ambrose, when the Jews became silent after the Passion, that is, failed through unbelief to confess his divinity, the living stones—according to First Peter, the Gentiles who had been converted—cried this out.

Mystically, from the Mount of Olives, that is, the height of divine mercy, it came to pass that Christ, anointed with the oil of mercy, sent the Apostles and other doctors of the Church as “two,” that is, furnished with two things: holiness of life and radiance of doctrine.

Hence Jerome says: If we occupy the Apostles’ place, let us imitate not only their speech, as regards doctrine, but also their conduct. This is in Distinction 36, canon Ecclesiae. The same author says: Not only bishops, priests, deacons, and all who serve in God’s house must take the greatest care to surpass in conduct and speech all the people over whom they preside, but those of lower rank also, and so forth. This is in Cause 8, Question 1, canon Qualis.

For this, a good conscience does not suffice unless, so far as lies in the person, a good reputation is also present. Hence Augustine says: Two things are necessary, conscience and reputation. A good conscience is necessary for you; a good reputation for your neighbor. This is in Cause 12, Question 1, canon Nolo.

The second thing required is competent learning, which is completed from two things: knowledge of the Old and New Testaments and knowledge of the canons. Matthew 13 says that one learned in the kingdom of heaven, that is, in the Church, brings forth from his treasure, namely wisdom, things new and old. Hence Distinction 38, canon Ignorantia, says: Let priests know sacred Scripture and the canons, and let their entire work consist in preaching and teaching.

He sent these two into the village, that is, the world, which was opposite them because it persecuted them, since its inhabitants lived viciously and contradicted the truth they taught, according to First John 2: “Everything in the world is either the concupiscence of the flesh, the concupiscence of the eyes, or the pride of life.” But the servants of God are not of the world, John 17.

He sent them to loose the bound ass and colt, that is, the Jewish and Gentile peoples bound by the chains of errors and vices, according to Wisdom: “They were all fettered by one chain of darkness,” and in the Psalm: “The cords of sinners have encompassed me.”

Going into the whole world, they loosed from those bonds the people who assented to their teaching. Some resisted them, but did not prevail. They brought to Jesus, that is, to faith in him, people who were generally simple and humble, signified by the ass which is called senseless. The Apostle says in First Corinthians 1: “Consider your calling: not many mighty, not many wise,” and so forth, “but God chose the weak things and the foolish.”

By placing their garments upon them, that is, the examples of their works, they caused Christ to rest in those who imitated them, and Christ led them into the Jerusalem above. The ass and colt signify women and men.

Those who spread their garments in the way so that the ass might walk more firmly are those who trampled and mortified their bodies, which are the garments of souls, through martyrdoms and the afflictions of an austere life and tribulations. These things assuredly lead a person to walk more sweetly in God’s way.

Those who cut branches from olive or palm trees are those who bestow diverse spiritual and bodily alms upon others, or offer diverse sayings of the Fathers so that others may proceed joyfully in God’s way.

All who go before and who follow cry “Hosanna” to Christ, the Son of David, because both the fathers of the Old Testament who preceded Christ in human life and the fathers of the New Testament all expect, desire, and pray to be saved through Christ.

For there is no other name—as regards the reality signified—than the name itself “in which we must be saved,” Peter says in Acts. And again: “To him,” namely Christ, “all the prophets bear testimony that through his name people receive remission of sins.”

The history reported by Luke alone follows. As Jesus approached Jerusalem, “seeing the city, he wept over it,” moved by compassion for the future destruction he foresaw. Expressing this he said: “If you also had known”—supply: you too would weep, if you knew the evils about to come upon you.

Origen says: When you understand Jesus saying such things and lamenting our sins, look also at what is written in the Gospel: “Seeing the city, he wept over it.” If he reasonably wept over that city, he wept still more reasonably over a Church which had been built but was made a den of robbers because of shameful profits. I think the saying about sales of doves applies to those who hand churches over to avaricious, tyrannical, undisciplined, and irreligious bishops and priests. This is in Cause 16, Question 7, canon Et hoc diximus.

“And indeed, in this your day, the things that are for your peace”: that is, the things presently available to you are for your temporal peace. “But now they are hidden from your eyes,” that is, the evils about to come upon you because of your unbelief are hidden from your knowledge.

Briefly explaining them, he adds: “For behold, the days will come upon you,” namely forty years from then, “and your enemies will surround you with a rampart,” that is, the Roman armies with their leaders Titus and his father Vespasian, who were sent there because the Jews had rebelled against the Romans to whom they were tributaries.

“And they will surround you,” besieging you so that no one can enter or leave, “and hem you in on every side” by war, famine, and the pestilence that followed from the dead bodies. “And they will cast you to the ground, and your children who are in you.” Those who remained were sold as slaves and dispersed throughout the world.

“And they will not leave in you one stone upon another” which is not thrown down. For that city was overturned from its foundations, since the Jerusalem now standing was built later. A sign of this is that the place of Calvary was outside that city, as is evident from the Gospel and Hebrews—“Jesus suffered outside the gate”—but is now said to be in the middle of the city which presently exists.

Assigning the cause of this destruction, he adds: “Because you did not know the time of your visitation.” Christ had come to visit the people as a physician visits the sick, a master the disciple, and a prelate the subject; the Jewish people refused to recognize this.

Gregory in a homily explains the whole passage morally of a sinful soul which, while rejoicing in its enjoyment of worldly things, does not consider the evils prepared for it when it departs from the body, and therefore does not weep but rejoices in evils. At the end of its life an army of demons besieges it with various temptations, hems it in, and casts it down to the infernal earth. See there.

Thereafter, when he entered the city, as Matthew narrates, the whole city—namely those who had remained in it—was stirred from wonder at the great honor and praise given to Christ. Hence they said: “Who is this?” The crowds answered: “This is Jesus, the prophet from Nazareth of Galilee.” Seeing this and envying him, the Pharisees said among themselves, as John reports: “You see that we accomplish nothing. Behold, the whole world goes after him.”

Augustine says: One crowd disturbed another crowd. Why does the blind crowd envy the fact that the world goes after him through whom the world was made? It is as if he said: The more you plot against him, the more his glory is increased and intensified.

Entering the Temple, “he began to cast out those selling and buying in it; he poured out the money changers’ coins and overturned the seats of those selling doves.” Origen says: The Lord casts the sellers and buyers from the Temple for the correction of the people, so that they may not celebrate the Lord’s feasts for worldly things or give themselves to buying and selling in an unfitting place, but only to prayers. This is in Cause 16, Question 7, canon Hoc diximus.

Nowhere is it read that the Lord corrected any sin with such severity as this one, expelling such people from the Temple—that is, from the Temple portico—not only by word but also, on the other occasion, with a whip. He did this at the beginning of his preaching, as appears in John 2.

Just as those who sell the imposition of hands, that is, ordinations, are denoted by the sellers of doves, so sellers of ecclesiastical benefices are signified by the money changers. This is in Cause 1, Question 3, canon Ex multis.

Gregory says in the following canon: Christ eliminates sellers and buyers from the Temple because he condemns those who bestow the imposition of hands for a gift, or who strive to buy God’s gift, namely any sacrament whatsoever. Those also sell in the Temple who bestow for a reward what by right belongs to certain people. For to sell justice is to preserve it in return for receiving a price. Thus Gregory.

Bede says in the following canon: Sellers of doves are not only those who, when bestowing sacred orders, seek the price of money, praise, or honor, but also those who exercise the rank or spiritual grace in the Church which they received by the Lord’s gift, not with a simple intention, but for any human recompense. Thus Bede.

The buyers and sellers of doves can therefore be understood as those who give and receive, for the reward of money, prayers, or service, the sacraments through which the dove—that is, the gift of the Holy Spirit—is conferred. The buyers and sellers of sheep are those of ecclesiastical benefices, which yield wool and milk. The buyers and sellers of oxen, which plow the earth, are those of preaching, by which sinners’ earthly hearts are plowed. The money changers are the intermediaries in these things, all of which pertain to simony. This is in Cause 1, Question 1, canon Sunt nonnulli; Question 3, canon Salvator; and Cause 1, Question 1, canon Reperiuntur.

Casting them out, Christ said: “It is written,” namely in Isaiah, “My house shall be called a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of robbers.”

Origen says: One who considers in many churches both these and other sins of Christians, who suppose gain to be piety, and who, although they ought to live from the Gospel according to the manner fitting God’s servants, do not do this but acquire riches and many possessions—will you not say that under such people the Church has been made a den of robbers? This is in Cause 16, Question 7, canon Et hoc diximus.

The blind and lame approached him, and he healed them. But the Pharisees, seeing those marvelous things and hearing the children cry “Hosanna,” were indignant out of envy at such great praise. They said to Christ: “Do you not hear what these are saying?” It is as if they said: You ought not permit them to praise you so greatly to your face.

Christ answered them: “Indeed. Have you never read what is written,” namely in Psalm 8, “‘Out of the mouth of infants and nursing children you have perfected praise’?” That is, you caused perfect praise to be uttered from the mouth of the simple. The Psalm continues: “Because of your enemies,” namely the Jews, scribes, and Pharisees, “that you may destroy the enemy,” that is, confound and convict anyone who opposes you, “and the avenger,” that is, one who seemed from zeal to defend the Law. It is as though Christ said: These children do what the prophet foretold; therefore it must be done.

Mark nevertheless says that Jesus’s entrance into the Temple to cast out the buyers and sellers, when he also did not permit anyone to carry a vessel through the Temple, occurred on the second weekday, that is, Monday. On the preceding day, Sunday, entering the city with the greatest glory, as has been said, he approached the Temple. Since it was the evening hour, he looked around at everything, perhaps to see whether anyone would invite him to eat. When no one did this, he left the city and went to Bethany with the Twelve.

On the following day, the second weekday, he returned to the city of Jerusalem. On the way he cursed a fig tree which had leaves but no figs, and it immediately withered. Entering the Temple, he cast out the buyers and sellers there.

As John narrates, certain Gentiles who had come to the Temple and had heard his reputation wished to see him although they did not know him. Hearing this, Philip and Andrew told Jesus. Then he said: “Unless a grain of wheat,” and so forth; and, “He who loves his soul shall lose it,” namely as regards worldly life.

A little afterward he added: “Now my soul is troubled,” that is, afflicted in its sensitive part as it considers the Passion to which it was near.

Chrysostom says: Because the Lord had exhorted the disciples toward the Passion, saying, “He who loves his soul shall lose it,” lest they say that he himself, existing outside human sufferings, easily philosophizes about death and admonishes us because he is without danger, he shows that he too is in agony, yet does not refuse death because of its usefulness.

Augustine says: You who are troubled by the will of charity console the many who are troubled in your body by the necessity of their weakness, lest they perish through despair. In himself, therefore, our Head undertakes the affection of his members. He was not troubled by another, but, as was said above, troubled himself, that is, was afflicted with sadness.

Chrysostom says: Just as it is no crime to fear, so neither is it a crime to desire present life. Christ had a body clean from sin, but not exempt from natural necessities. This, therefore, belongs to the dispensation, not to the divinity.

Augustine says: What shall I say? Finally, let the person who wishes to follow hear what comes next. Perhaps a terrible hour has approached you; the choice is set before you either to commit iniquity or to undergo suffering. The weak soul is troubled. Hear, therefore, what he adds: “And what shall I say?” It is as if, according to Bede, he said: What else shall I say except that from which the soul may be instructed?

“Father, save me from this hour,” namely of the Passion. Augustine says: He taught you whom to invoke and whose will to place before your own will. Do not think that he fails from his height, because he wishes you to advance from the depths. He assumed human weakness so as to teach the saddened person to say: “Not what I will, but what you will.”

Hence he adds here: “But for this reason I came to this hour. Father, glorify your name,” namely in my Passion and Resurrection. It is as if he said: I have nothing to say while seeking deliverance, for I came to this hour for that reason. It is as though he said: Even if we are troubled and suffer turmoil, let us not flee death when it is necessary.

For I, now troubled, do not say that I should escape. One must bear what comes upon one. I do not say, “Deliver me from this hour,” but say the contrary: “Glorify your name.” For he shows that he dies for the truth, calling this the glory of God.

And this happened. For after the cross the world was to be converted, to know and worship the Lord’s name—not only the Father’s, but also the Son’s, although Christ remains silent about this here.

John the Evangelist says that a voice came from heaven, saying: “I have glorified it, and I shall glorify it again.” Augustine says: Here God speaks in words through an angel, when nothing is shown in an image. Certainly, when speaking of heavenly things, he formed the words which he wished human beings to hear through the ministry of a rational creature.

“I have glorified it” means before, namely before I made the world; “I shall glorify it” when you rise from the dead. Or otherwise: he glorified it when Christ was born of the Virgin, when he performed miracles, and when, as the Holy Spirit descended upon him in the form of a dove, he was manifested. “I shall glorify it again” when he rises from the dead, when God is exalted above the heavens and his glory above all the earth.

The Evangelist says that the crowd standing there and hearing it said that thunder had occurred. Chrysostom says: The voice was indeed clear and well articulated, but it quickly escaped them because they were more obtuse and carnal, and these retained only the sound. Others, because the voice was articulated, recognized that it was a voice but did not know what it signified. Of these the Evangelist says: “Others said that an angel had spoken to him.”

Christ answered: “This voice came not for my sake,” namely to reveal something to me which I did not know, “but for your sake,” to reveal to them what they did not know, so that they might know he was from God. For how is one who is glorified by God not from God?

Because it was said, “And I shall glorify it,” he next shows the mode of this glory, adding: “Now is the judgment of the world.” Augustine says: Judgment is twofold. One is the judgment expected at the end, when punishments and rewards will be rendered according to human works. He is not speaking of that, but of the judgment which signifies discernment and separation, by which his redeemed were separated and rescued from the devil’s hand.

Hence he adds: “Now shall the prince of this world be cast out.” Augustine says: He calls the devil the prince of the world, not because the devil rules in the world—that is, heaven, earth, and other things—but because he rules in the minds of sinners who consent to his temptations and are called “the world” because of their affection for worldly things.

He was cast out from the minds of those converted to the faith. For although the devil tempts human beings even after conversion, it is one thing for him to reign within through consent to evil and another to assail from without by tempting, as he also does now. Through this, however, he does not reign within.

This judgment was also like the following: someone binds his debtors in prison and afterward, by his own madness, sends in another who owes him nothing, and this person by his own strength leads the others out. Thus it was with Christ.

“And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, shall draw all things to myself.” He was lifted from the earth upon the cross, afterward in the Resurrection, and from there in the Ascension.

Augustine says that he drew all things to himself, that is, those from whom the devil was cast out. He did not say “all people,” because faith does not belong to all, but “all things” that pertain to the integrity of the elect creature: body, spirit, and soul—the body by which we are sensible, the soul by which we live, and the spirit by which we understand.

Or “I shall draw all things predestined to myself,” namely by the power of my Passion, bringing them with me to glory. Or “all things” means all kinds of human beings according to the innumerable differences by which they differ among themselves.

Or, according to Pope Leo, he drew all things by withdrawing the luminaries’ light from all people. Or, rising again, he drew all things which had been separated from him: soul, body, blood, the whole. According to Chrysostom, he says “I shall draw” as of people detained by a tyrant and unable to approach by themselves.

When the Jews understood that he had spoken of his death, they put a question to him, saying: “We have heard from the Law that Christ remains forever. And how do you say that the Son of Man must be lifted up? Who is this Son of Man?”

He had frequently called himself the Son of Man because he was the son of only one human being, namely the Virgin, and not of two people, although now he was not speaking of himself in that form. They suspected that by being lifted from the earth he had spoken of death upon the cross. They understood what they were planning to do. It was therefore not infused wisdom that disclosed the obscurity of these words, but their goaded conscience.

Hence Chrysostom says: See how maliciously they question him. They did not say, “We have heard from the Law that Christ suffers nothing,” for in many places of Scripture Christ’s Passion and Resurrection are set down together. Instead they say, “He remains forever.” This was certainly not contrary to his Passion, for the Passion did not create an impediment to immortality. But they thought by this argument to show that he was not Christ, since Christ remains forever.

“Who is this Son of Man?” It is as though they said: We do not know the one of whom you speak. Christ therefore answered them: “Yet a little light is in you.”

Chrysostom explains it thus: “Yet a little,” that is, for a short time, “the light,” that is, I who am the light of the world, “is in you,” that is, I am with you. It is as if he said: The sun’s light is not destroyed when it sets, but, withdrawing for a little, appears again. So too, if I die for a short time, I shall rise again very quickly.

Augustine explains it otherwise: “Yet a little light,” that is, a small and imperfect knowledge of me, “is in you,” insofar as you understand that Christ remains forever, if indeed you believe Christ’s eternity in such a way that you deny in him the humility of death. “Walk, therefore, while you have the light,” that is, advance in the light of faith while it is with you, and so forth.

After these words he went away and hid himself from them, not by fleeing into a concealed place, but by withdrawing himself from them.

It cannot clearly be perceived whether these events—namely the Gentiles’ wish to see Jesus and the voice from heaven, of which we have spoken—occurred on Palm Sunday or the following day. John nevertheless joins them to the things done on Palm Sunday.

On the evening of the second weekday Jesus again left the city. On the next morning, the third weekday, or Tuesday, as Mark reports, he returned to Jerusalem and taught many parables in the Temple: concerning the vineyard planted and leased to tenants, who killed the lessor’s son; and concerning the king who made a marriage feast for his son.

He resolved the questions whether tribute should be given to Caesar; whose wife at the Resurrection the woman who had seven husbands would be; and concerning the greatest commandment of the Law. Matthew, Mark, and Luke narrate these matters, and they were discussed above.

He also rebuked the scribes and Pharisees for their many kinds of hypocrisy, as Matthew narrates throughout chapter 23. Finally, leaving the city for the Mount of Olives and questioned about the judgment, he foretold many things concerning its signs, as Matthew, Mark, and Luke narrate. He added the parable of the talents entrusted, in which action and an accounting are exacted, and of the ten virgins, five foolish and five wise. Finally he spoke of the examination at the judgment which Matthew records and which was discussed above.