Letter V

V.

VERBORVM Domini Liber — The Book of the Words of the Lord — is cited in the Recognitions of Clement. There are those who suppose this to be the book out of which Paul (as is had in the volume of Acts, chapter twenty), speaking to the presbyters of Ephesus, brought forth the oracle of Christ, saying:¹ “It behooves [us] to remember the word of the Lord Jesus (since he himself said): It is more blessed to give than to receive.” But certain others think that Paul said this either as received from tradition, or that he deduced it by reasoning out of various sentences of the Gospels signifying the same thing — such as these: “Give to everyone that asks you,” and “Lend, hoping for nothing thence.”

VERBA vetera — Ancient Words, in Hebrew הַדְּבָרִים הָעַתִּיקִים Haddevarim Hatthikim, or, according to the Seventy interpreters, λόγοι παλαιοί (logoi palaioi), that is, Ancient sayings — this work is cited in the first [book] of Paralipomenon, chapter four,² the expositors being in doubt as much about the work itself as about the things which are reported to be written in it. The author of the book of Questions, or of the Hebrew Traditions, reckons this work to be the book of Ruth,³ because it contains those same things which in the first [book] of Paralipomenon are taken from the book of the Ancient Words. Certain of the Hebrews think it to be another work far different, comprising a particular history of the ancestors of King David. And concerning those things also which were written in the same volume of the Ancient Words, there is no less hesitation. For our Vulgate edition shows that in this book was described the history of certain princes of the tribe of Judah who reigned in Moab, and the history of a certain illustrious man of the same tribe, who — about two hundred years after Joshua the Ephraimite, leader of the Hebrews, who first made the Sun to stand still — himself, the miracle being renewed, delayed the course of the Sun. For thus it is read in the Vulgate Latin edition:⁴ “AND [they] WHO made the Sun to stand still, and the Men of Lying, and Secure, and Walking, who were princes in Moab, and who returned to Lehem [Bethlehem]. These are the ancient words.” But, on the contrary, in the Hebrew exemplars and in the Greek codices, nothing of these things is read, but other things far distant from these are had,⁵ in these words: “And Joachin, and the men of Cozeba, and Joash, and Saraph, who reigned in Moab, and [those] dwelling in Lachem. And these are ancient words.” For which the Seventy thus translated (λόγοι παλαιοί): that is, “And Joachin, men of Chozeba, and Joash, and Sapham, who had dominion over the people of Moab, and [those] dwelling in Lehem. And these are ancient sayings.” Which words indeed — as well the Greek as the Hebrew (as appears even to those who have but tasted Hebrew and Greek with the outermost lips) — have nothing concerning the miraculous standing of the Sun which is read among us. Yet the author of the Hebrew Traditions, in the reading of our—

—our [edition] seems to approve; which also, expounding, he thus writes: “But that which follows — WHO MADE THE SUN TO STAND STILL — returns to the offspring of Pharez, from whom David sprang, judging it opportune to terminate in David the reckoning of the offspring of Judah, from which tribe the royal line arose. For the Hebrews hand down that this [man] was Elimelech, the husband of Naomi, the father of Mahlon and Chilion, in whose time the Sun stood still on account of the transgressors of the law — so that, such a miracle being seen, they might be converted to the Lord their God; which, because they scorned to do, therefore the famine grew strong: so that he who in the tribe of Judah had seemed the foremost, by the want of famine, together with his wife and sons, was not only driven from his fatherland, but also died, together with his sons, in that same pilgrimage. But that the ‘men of lying’ are Mahlon and Chilion — who here are called Securus [Secure] and Incedens [Walking], according to the proper interpretation of the name, and of whom it is said that they were ‘princes in Moab,’ because they took Moabite wives — is more expressly set down in the Hebrew; and we have learned from those learned in that tongue that they are to be called not ‘princes,’ but ‘husbands.’ But that which follows — WHO RETURNED TO LEHEM — Naomi and Ruth show, who returned into Lehem, that is, into Bread (the abundance of bread being heard of after the want of famine), into Bethlehem. And because this history is written in the book of Ruth, therefore there follows: AND THESE ARE THE ANCIENT WORDS.” Thus far the author of the Hebrew Questions.

Lyra,⁶ from the opinion of the Hebrew masters, adds that the Sun ceased from its course not by the prayers and supplications of Elimelech (who was most avaricious, and in the time of famine withdrew into the region of Moab, lest he should be compelled to bring aid from his riches to his imperiled fatherland), but that this happened by the most pious will of God, who by that miracle willed to deter his people from [their] crimes.

VITAE Liber — The First Book of Life,⁷ which David in Psalm 63 names ספר חיים Sepher Chaiim, that is, the Book of the living — is the divine enrollment of the predestined unto eternal life; or, as Augustine hands down in the twentieth [book] On the City of God, it is the knowledge of God by which he predestined those to whom he foreknew that he would give eternal life. Of which book Paul, in the epistle to the Philippians, says:⁸ “WHOSE names are in the book of Life.” And Christ said to his disciples:⁹ “REJOICE, because your names are written in heaven.” Now this book is of such moment for eternal felicity¹⁰ that no one can attain it who has not been enrolled in it — John saying:¹¹ “THERE shall not enter into it [any], save those who are written in the book of life of the Lamb.” And Daniel says:¹² “IN that time shall thy whole people be saved, whosoever shall be found written in the book.” But, on the contrary, whosoever shall not have been written in this book will either live forever in [his] sins, or at least will depart a sinner out of this life, and, after this life, will be smitten with the punishment of eternal damnation. For concerning the wicked life of those who are not in this book, John is witness, saying:¹³ “ALL WORSHIPPED the beast, whose names are not written in the Book of Life of the Lamb, who was slain from the origin of the world.” And again:¹⁴ “THEY SHALL WONDER, the inhabitants of the earth, whose names are not written in the book of Life from the constitution of the world.” Concerning the everlasting perishing also of the same, the same John adds:¹⁵ “THIS is the second death: he who was not found written in the Book of Life was cast into the pool of fire.” There is, then, a First Book of Life,¹⁶ consisting of the standing and perpetual knowledge, in the mind of God, of predestination — of which Paul, writing to Timothy, said:¹⁷ “The firm foundation of God stands: the Lord knows who are his.”

But some,¹⁸ to whom it is not altogether pleasing that the Book of Life be the knowledge of predestination, are wont to use these arguments against the aforesaid [view]. First: because the knowledge of predestination contains not all, but only some — and those very few — as elect; whereas the Book of Life seems to comprehend all men, however many there are, according to that sentence of David:¹⁹ “In thy book all shall be written.” “All,” that is, not only the perfect, but also (as Augustine says) the imperfect. Then: since the decrees of divine predestination are eternal, fixed, and indelible, the knowledge of predestination cannot rightly be signified and expressed by the Book of Life — in which both that things written are deleted, and things deleted are written again, the divine letters testify in many places, especially in the volume of Exodus, where God says to Moses:²⁰ “WHOEVER shall have sinned against me, I will delete him out of my book”; and in the Apocalypse:²¹ “HE that shall conquer, I will not delete his name out of the book of life, and I will confess his name before my Father, and before his angels.” And David, among other evils which he imprecates upon the impious, says:²² “LET THEM BE DELETED out of the Book of the living, and with the just let them not be written.” Lastly: if the Book of Life were the very enrollment of the elect and predestined, Moses would never have wished and sought to be deleted out of this very Book, saying:²³ “LORD, either forgive them this offense; or, if thou do it not, delete me out of thy Book which thou hast written.” For as no wise [man] ought to ask that those things be done which he already knows can in no way be done, so no one who truly loves God ought — or is able — to wish that he be cast out of the number of the friends and elect of God, and be excluded from the eternal fruition of the divine majesty.

TO THESE ARGUMENTS it is easily answered: namely, that that sentence of Psalm 138 pertains not to all — as much reprobate as elect — but to the elect alone,²⁴ of whom David said, “IN thy book all shall be written” — “all,” namely, whosoever are elect before the constitution of the world unto eternal life, whether they be perfect, or whether they be as yet imperfect in the way of virtue. But as to what they say — that the Book of Life is different from the enrollment of eternal predestination, because the former can be deleted and changed, but the latter is wholly immovable and indelible — Augustine dissolves [this], in the exposition of Psalm 68, saying that no one²⁵ is deleted from the Book of Life according to the truth of the matter; because, if a man, concerning the title which he had inscribed upon the Lord’s cross, said:²⁶ “WHAT I HAVE WRITTEN, I HAVE WRITTEN,” how much more will God will that what he has written remain undeleted? But some²⁷ are said to be deleted according to the opinion and hope of certain men, who thought that they were written in the Book of Life — in which they had never been written. According to which manner of speaking it is said, “LET THEM BE DELETED OUT OF THE BOOK OF THE LIVING”²⁸ — that is, let it become known even to them, and be made manifest, that they had never been enrolled in the Book of God. In another way also, from the doctrine of Augustine, D[ivus] Thomas answers, in the 24th question of the first part, article 3: that some are [written] in the Book of God simply — that is, according to the purpose of eternal predestination unto—

—unto eternal life to be attained, are written [in the Book of God], and these cannot be deleted; but certain [others] according to something — that is, according to the sole grace of present justice — and these can be deleted, because they had been written in the Book of Life not for eternal time and for the attaining of eternal glory indelibly, but designated only for the brief time of present grace by a deletable writing. Which same sentence, others — expressing it in different words — say that the Book of Life is written within and without,²⁹ and that some are written within, who can in no way be deleted, but others without and extrinsically, whom nothing prohibits both to be deleted, and, being deleted, to be written again.

There are also [those] who add a third response similar to this, saying that there are two Books of Life:³⁰ one, in which are written those alone whom God has destined for everlasting beatitude by the infallible and immutable decree of predestination — and from this [Book] none of those enrolled [can] be deleted; the other, in which are written those who live according to this present justice and the disposition of temporal grace, remaining written in it so long as, exercising the grace of God, they live pleasing to God, but who are deleted straightway, when — the grace of God being rejected — they cease to live justly.

But as to that which they add — that Moses, a most wise man and most loving of God, would by no means have sought to be deleted from the Book of Life,³¹ if that Book contained the indelible writing of the predestined — there are various responses of the Fathers, showing that this petition of Moses is in no way adverse to our opinion; which [responses] it does not irk [me] to relate in this place, that from these each one may choose that which shall more please him.

JEROME,³² in the ninth question to Algasia, following the opinion of Origen (which is had in the commentaries on the epistle to the Romans), says that Moses, out of charity toward God and toward his people, was unwilling to be deleted from the Book of Life forever, but for the present — not in spirit, but in flesh, that is, through bodily death — just as Paul also wished to be made anathema for his brethren,³³ that is, to be mortified the whole day (according to the sentence of the psalm), alone to perish for them in the flesh, and to shed [his] blood, that his brethren might be saved in spirit.

JOHN Chrysostom,³⁴ in the book On Compunction of Heart, and in book 3 On the Providence of God, and in homily 16 on the epistle to the Romans, rejects the opinion of those who think that Moses and Paul spoke of temporal death, judging [thus]: “FOR HOW,” he says, “could Paul have wished to be made anathema from Christ — that is, to be separated from him through the death of the flesh — since death itself rather joins him to that choir which is with Christ, and makes [him] obtain his glory? This suspicion, therefore, is [that] of little worms lurking in the mud; for both Moses and Paul, when they said these things, not only in thought transcended all the contests and death of the present life, but even — for God, whom they loved more than themselves — surmounting the heavens and the angels, and despising all invisible things, and, for the love of God, to fall away from the very fruition of God and [his] ineffable glory, not only sought, but (what is more) even wished. For thus the insatiable affection of charity overcame their whole mind, that even that which above all other things was more lovable [to them] — to enjoy God, and the kingdom of the heavens, and the divine fruition which they were expecting, the reward of [their] labors — they suffered to be forfeited: namely, lest God should be so mocked and blasphemed by the impious on account of the very beloved [ones], because — since he could not fulfill the promises made to his people, whom he had chosen — he should have deserted them, and should have introduced into their goods other nations, which had never known him.”

AUGUSTINE,³⁵ in question 147 on the book of Exodus, says that Moses, out of a certain immense security of divine familiarity, interpellated God with such a reasoning: “Either forgive them this offense, or delete me out of thy book — but thou wilt not delete me out of thy book, in which thou hast enrolled me with an indelible character: forgive them, therefore, this offense.” Which kind of argumentation the common crowd of Dialecticians is wont to deduce from that rule:³⁶ “From the whole disjunctive [proposition], affirmatively, with the destruction of one part, the argument avails unto the other part of it” — as if we should say: “It is necessary that the soul be either mortal or immortal; but it is not mortal; therefore [it is] immortal.”

EUTHYMIUS Zigabenus,³⁷ on Psalm 68 and 138, thus writes: “The Book of God is the sum of his knowledge; but the scripture [writing], indeed, [is] the perpetual memory” — for by “books” they figuratively understand the various and manifold cognition of God, [figured] by the divine letters. But here the book of divine knowledge is threefold:³⁸ of which one is more universal, in which all are written, as well the just as sinners, who are to come into this mortal life and a little after are to die — which David in Psalm 68 called “the book of the living,” and which in Psalm 138 he signified, saying: “In thy book all shall be written.” There is also another book of the knowledge of God, more private, in which the just alone are written, for this reason: that he knows them only — that is, approves [them] — according to that which is written:³⁹ “THE LORD knows the way of the just”; which [book] David indicated to us, saying:⁴⁰ “AND with the just let them not be written.” There is also a third, particular book, in which sinners are written;⁴¹ for “the judgment,” as Daniel says, “sat, and the books were opened, and from these were judged the living and the dead.”⁴² Moses, therefore, spoke to God concerning that first universal book: “if indeed thou forgive them [their] sin, forgive [it]; but if not, delete me out of the book which thou hast written.”⁴³

BERNARD,⁴⁴ in sermon 12 on the Canticle of Canticles, thinks that Moses sought to be deleted from the Book of Life not in this sense, that he should be excluded from eternal glory, but rather that he asked this out of a certain paternal affection — namely, lest he alone, without his nation, should remain written in the Book of Life, and he alone should be introduced into eternal felicity, his people being excluded; but, as some poor little woman, invited to the banquet of a rich man on this condition — that she leave outside the little infant which she carries in [her] bosom, because it cries and will be troublesome to the banquet — would answer that she had rather fast than, the beloved pledge being set aside, dine alone with the rich [man]: so neither does Moses wish to be introduced alone into the joy of his Lord, his people (namely) remaining outside — to which, although restless and ungrateful, he clings in turn, and with a mother’s affection.

RUPERT, Abbot of Deutz, in book 3 of the commentaries on Exodus, writes that Moses wished by these words to convince God that he should pardon the people, and that he used such an argument: “If [thou do] not—

—delete me out of the book of the law, that the memory of my name be not had in it — preferring rather that the memory of the things done by me be deleted by perpetual oblivion, than that the people perish.” And let these things concerning the First Book of Life be enough said.

HUGH,⁴⁵ presbyter Cardinalis [Hugh of Saint-Cher], in the exposition of Psalm 138, says that there are twin Books of Life: one, of present justice and grace, out of which Moses preferred to be deleted rather than that the people should perish; the other, of everlasting predestination, out of which Moses did not wish to be deleted, knowing that from it none could be deleted.

THOMAS Cajetan, Cardinal of St. Sixtus, in the commentary on Exodus, believes this book to be the ordination of divine providence concerning those who in this world are to be princes; and he calls this book “of the principate.” For it is written in the divine mind, and in it — as in a book — most diligently engraved who and how many and of what sort in this life are to be, among mortals, princes, leaders, and kings. But since God had said to Moses:⁴⁶ “LET ME ALONE, that my fury may be angry against the people, and I may delete them; but thee I will make into a great nation” — Moses had understood that God had written him in the book of the principate, from this: that even if that people should be destroyed, God would nonetheless constitute him Prince over a great nation. Therefore he asks that God either pardon this sin, or delete him out of the book of the principate — signifying by this that he does not wish to be prince of another nation, if this nation be consumed.

NICHOLAS of Lyra says that, just as our Savior — according to the will of the sensitive part [of the soul], dreading death — sought that the chalice of the passion be transferred from him (which the rational will most ardently desired): so Moses, according to the desire of the lower part of the soul,⁴⁷ sought from God to be deleted out of the book of life; which, however, according to the superior portion of the soul, he did not wish [done] — explaining by this prayer not what the Mind itself, consenting to God, would will, but what the will of the flesh itself would desire for its own flesh, that is, compassionating his own people.

ALPHONSUS [Tostatus], bishop of Ávila, in the commentaries on Exodus, teaches that this saying is not to be understood according to the naked and simple signification of the word, but according to a hyperbolic trope, by which we are wont to express the most ardent desire of a thing eagerly demanded, saying: “Either grant me this, or I shall die” — which trope indeed Rachel used, when she said to her husband:⁴⁸ “Give me children, otherwise I shall die.” Not that she preferred children to life did she say this, but that she might demonstrate, by this figure of pathetic speech, hyperbolically, [her] most vehement desire of having offspring.

RABBI Moses Gerundensis [Nachmanides] hands down that Moses, scarcely master of himself, and almost rapt out of himself, uttered these [words] rather from the impulse of a most abundant charity than from the deliberation of reason.

RABBI Solomon Iarchi [Rashi] the Frenchman expounds: “DELETE ME OUT OF THY BOOK” — that is, “Delete me out of the book of the law, that the memory of my name be not had in it” — as above.

VITAE Liber Secundus — The Second Book of Life, which is also called the Book of the commandments of God — is the sacrosanct and divine scripture, deservedly called the Book of Life,⁴⁹ because in it are contained the promises of eternal life, together with the precepts necessary for attaining eternal life. Speaking of which, the most wise son of Sirach said:⁵⁰ “ALL THESE THINGS are the book of life, and the testament of the Most High, and the knowledge of truth.” And the prophet Baruch:⁵¹ “THIS is the book of the commandments of God, and the law which is forever; all who hold it shall come to life, but those who forsook it, unto death.” And Christ, making words about this book to the lawyers, says:⁵² “SEARCH the scriptures, for you think in them to have eternal life.” Divine scripture is also called the Book of Life because the argument, scope, end, and whole intent of all sacrosanct scripture⁵³ is Christ, who everywhere calls himself Life, and our Life; whence also in Psalm 39 it is said:⁵⁴ “IN the head of the book it is written of me.” Which Arnobius and Augustine expound of the book of Psalms, in the beginning of which is written:⁵⁵ “BLESSED is the man who has not gone in the counsel of the impious, and in the way of sinners has not stood, and in the seat of pestilence has not sat.” Which words indeed can suit none more than Christ, who alone is without sin.⁵⁶ But Tertullian, in the book against Praxeas, and Hilary in the exposition of the second Psalm, understand by the “head of the book” the beginning of the whole divine scripture; where, for that which we read, “In the beginning God created heaven and earth,”⁵⁷ they read “In the son” — which the truth of the matter itself proves to be false.⁵⁸ For in the Hebrew it is not read בבן be ben, that is, “in the son,” but בראשית bereshith, which the Seventy interpreters, and Symmachus, and Theodotion, and Jerome interpreted “In the beginning”;⁵⁹ which beginning, nevertheless, Jerome, Augustine, and Gregory assert (according to the mystical and spiritual sense) to signify Christ the Son of God — who, both in the very front of Genesis (which is the head of all the books) and also in the beginning of John the Evangelist, is approved [to be] the founder of heaven and earth,⁶⁰ where it is said:⁶¹ “ALL things were made through him, and without him was made nothing.”

VITAE Liber Tertius — The Third Book of Life — is that which, in the Revelation of John, is called τὸ βιβλίον τοῦ ζωῆς τοῦ ἀρνίου [ἐσφαγμένου] ἀπὸ καταβολῆς κόσμου,⁶² that is, the Book of Life of the Lamb slain from the origin of the world. Now this Lamb is our Savior, whom it is not doubtful to have been slain for our sins; although it be not so manifest to all how he was slain from the very first constitution of the world. Certain expositors — among whom is Rupert, Abbot of Deutz —⁶³ say that that phrase “from the origin of the world” is not to be referred to the slaying of the Lamb, but to those whom John had said were not written in the book of Life; so that it is to be read and understood by transposition: “Whose names are not written from the origin of the world in the Book of Life of the Lamb, who was slain.” But others, and perhaps more rightly—

—more rightly, wish the slaying of the Lamb to be joined with the very origin of the world: in which [origin] the Lamb first began to be slain — not indeed in himself, since he was not yet clothed with flesh, but in his members and elect,⁶⁴ in whom the impious began to afflict him from the very first constitution of the world, slaying him in Abel, mocking [him] in Noah, casting [him] out in Abraham, persecuting [him] in Jacob, accusing and selling [him] in Joseph, making [him] an exile in Moses — who, as Paul says,⁶⁵ “esteemed the reproach of Christ above all the treasure of the Egyptians, choosing rather to be afflicted with the people than, in the court of Pharaoh, to be held in the place of a son.” Whatever things, therefore, before the coming of the Lamb into the flesh, his members suffered, the Lamb himself is understood to have borne — just as also, after the resurrection of Christ, the persecutions brought upon his servants by Saul, Christ himself testified to be brought upon himself, saying:⁶⁶ “SAUL, Saul, why persecutest thou me?” The Lamb was also slain from the very first constitution of the world — not only in a temporal [way], but in an eternal [way], from the beginning and before the ages and the secular times, in that blessed foreknowledge and predestination of the divine mind,⁶⁷ in which God, in one and the same moment, established the creation of the world, foresaw the perdition of the world in the sin of Adam, and preordained the death of Christ for the life of the whole world: which the Apostles, after the Savior’s assumption, openly knowing, said:⁶⁸ “LORD, who madest heaven and earth, &c. Truly there came together against Jesus, Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the gentiles and the peoples of Israel, to do what thy hand and thy counsel decreed to be done.” The Lamb was also slain from the origin of the world, because — from the founding of the world even to the taking-up of our humanity — through the diverse ages of the flowing world he was, by various and innumerable figures, types, shadows, mysteries, sacraments, oblations, oracles, prophecies, libations, victims, and sacrifices of the old testament, adumbrated and foreshown:⁶⁹ that one and everlasting sacrifice by which the Lamb, slain on the altar of the cross, offered himself to the living God for an odor of sweetness. This Lamb, therefore, lifted up and slain on the cross, is called the Book of Life⁷⁰ — not only for this, that his death is our life (life, I say, and resurrection from the death of sin — the life of present grace, and the life of everlasting felicity), but because Christ, exalted on the wood of the cross, is, as it were, a certain famous and conspicuous book: not [written] on papyrus and parchments, but fitted [written] in the very flesh and members of Christ; not with ink or vermilion inscribed, but with the precious and undefiled blood of the immaculate Lamb; not with pens and the feathers of birds, but with thorns, nails, whips, and lances engraved from head to heel; and with the twin wood of the cross, as it were within two writing-tablets, joined together and enclosed. Out of which book, indeed, any Christian can take the most perfect institution of the Christian life; nor is there anyone — however rude and dull a mannikin — who, if only he will, cannot in it (as in a compendium, and, as it were, at a single glance) at once read and learn thoroughly whatsoever things are necessary to a pious and truly Christian life: singular innocence, humility, obedience, the highest poverty, sublime contempt of the world, assiduous patience, incredible endurance of sorrows, most ardent charity, and all the other virtues most necessary for the entrance to eternal beatitude. For on this account the Book of Life of the Lamb — the pages of the whole fleshly volume being spread out on the cross — willed, as it were, to be opened and extended in a display-book [ypobiblium]: that in the very form of the cross and the effigy of the affixed body we might read, and as in a mirror contemplate, what manner of form and exemplar it behooves the best Christian to be — namely, that he compose himself to the image of the crucified man; that is, that he not only, denying himself, take up his cross daily and follow Christ, but (what is more laborious and more glorious) extend his whole body and soul, hands, feet, and works into the service of God,⁷¹ and so affix his flesh, with all its vices, concupiscences, and carnal desires, to the cross, that he may piously glory with Paul, saying to Christ:⁷² “I am nailed [crucified] with the Cross” — and likewise: “I bear the marks of the Lord Jesus in my body”;⁷³ and again: “To me the world is crucified, &c., and I to the world.” This, then, is the Book of Life of the Lamb, slain from the origin of the world; on beholding which, no one — unless utterly mad, or altogether impious — is not straightway compelled to acknowledge in what manner he ought to live.

VITAE LIBER QVARTVS — The Fourth Book of Life, or the Book of past life. This is called by another name by John,⁷⁴ the Book of the life of each one; for so the edition has [it] which he cites from the 20th chapter of the Apocalypse, and which Augustine expounds in book 20 On the City of God, and in homily 17 on the Apocalypse: καὶ βιβλίον ἄλλο ἠνοίχθη, ὅ ἐστι ζωῆς ἑκάστου — that is, “And another book was opened, which is [the book] of the life of each one.” This book the Theologians say to be a certain divine power, by whose virtue, in the day of judgment, there shall so be brought back into the memory of each one his past deeds, and set before the eyes of the mind, that it shall be lawful to none then either to be ignorant of, or to dissemble, or to hide his sins.⁷⁵ Concerning this book also Augustine, in chapter 14 of book 20 On the City of God, writes thus:⁷⁶ “AND I saw,” says John, “the dead, great and small: and the books were opened; and another book was opened, [which is] of the life of each one; and the dead were judged out of those scriptures of the books, according to their deeds. He said the books were opened, and a book — but the book, of what sort it is, he was not silent: WHICH IS,” he says, “of the life of each one. Therefore those books which he placed in the first place are to be understood [as] the holy [scriptures], both old and new, that in them might be shown what things God had commanded to be done; but in that [book] WHICH IS of the life [of each one], what things each one had either done or not done of these [commands] — whether he had done [them], or had not done [them]. Which book, if it be carnally thought of, who could avail to estimate its magnitude or length? or in how great a time could that book be read, in which are written all the lives of all men? Or shall there be present a number of Angels equal to the number of men, that each one may hear his own life recited to him by an Angel assigned to him? There shall be, therefore, not one book of all, but single [books] of single [persons]. But this Scripture, wishing one [book] to be understood, says: another book was opened. There is, therefore, a certain divine power to be understood, by which it shall come to pass that to each one all his deeds, whether good or bad, shall be recalled into memory, and be discerned by the intuition of the mind with a wondrous swiftness, so that knowledge may accuse or excuse conscience; and thus at once both all and single shall be judged. Which divine power, indeed, has received the name of ‘book’; for in it, in a certain manner, whatsoever is done by the doer is read [back].” These things Augustine, in—

[continuing from p146] …—nus, to whose opinion the author of that rough Rhythm seems to have looked back — [the hymn] which the Church chants in the sacred obsequies of the dead:

A written book shall be brought forth, In which the whole is contained, Whence the World shall be judged.

THE FIFTH BOOK OF LIFE, and the last of all — which is also called the book of eternal Life — is the blessed and everlasting presence of Christ the Son of God according to [his] divinity, by the sight of which he bestows upon his beholders the eternal felicity of the glorious life. Of which book Augustine, in the treatise On the threefold dwelling, chapter 4, thus speaks: ⁷⁷ “IN THAT heavenly city the food and drink of all will be the vision of Christ and of the holy Trinity, and the contemplation, with the pure eye of the heart, of his very divinity, and the assiduous reading — so to speak — of the book of Life, that is, of eternal truth, and of the highest wisdom, and of the Word of God, because it is the vision of Christ Jesus: where whatsoever is now hidden from us will be manifest; where the reason will be manifest why this man was elected and that one reprobated; why this one was taken up into the kingdom, and that one reduced into servitude; why one dies in the womb, another in infancy, another in youth, another in old age; why one is poor and another rich; why the son of an adulteress is baptized, and sometimes the son of a lawful spouse dies before baptism; why he who begins to live well sometimes ends ill, and he who begins ill often ends well. All these things, and many of this kind, will be plain and open to all in the book of Life.” Thus far the words of Augustine — to which we once alluded, in the epitaph of Cyprian, that most excellent Theologian, in this distich:

If aught of sacred things by chance lay hidden from you, Now, Cyprian, you read [it] in the book of life.

There are also [those] who judge that by this last book of Life is signified a certain created light, flowing forth perpetually from that uncreated, Vital, and perennial fountain of divine light: by the splendor of which created light our mind — by its own nature blind, and too weak to behold the incomprehensible majesty of God — lays aside the dullness of its darkened eyes, and is raised up to the sublimity of the divine vision. Of which volume, and of the vital fountain of the same light, David sang in the Psalm: ⁷⁸ FOR with thee is the Fountain of Life, and in thy light we shall see light. And John in the Apocalypse, ⁷⁹ speaking of the fellowship of the blessed who see God; and Christ, concerning the same light, added: ⁸⁰ HE who follows me walks not in darkness, but shall have the light of life. According to the opinion of these, it is the same as the book of Life.

A VOLUME (in Hebrew מגלת ספר Meghilath Sepher [the Roll of the Book]), for which the Seventy put κεφαλὶς βιβλίου, that is, “the head-roll of a book,” and by Jerome “a rolled-up book,” is a kind of oblong sheet, rollable around itself in the manner of a coil, after the manner of the Orientals, who even in this age thus roll up their books. A book of this kind, filled with great mysteries, the prophet Ezekiel describes as shown to him in a vision, in the 2nd chapter of his prophecy, in these words: ⁸¹ AND I SAW, and behold, a hand was sent to me, in which was a rolled-up book, and he spread it before me, which was written within and without; and there were written in it lamentations, and a song, and woe; and he said to me, Son of man, eat this volume, and go, speak to the sons of Israel. And I opened my mouth, and he fed me with the volume, &c. And I ate it, and it became in my mouth sweet as honey.

Which words Rabbi David Kimchi thus expounds: ⁸² THE VOLUME of the book signifies the knowledge of prophesying divinely given to Ezekiel; but that which is in it — the writing of lamentations, and mournful songs, and woe — denotes the lamentable matter of the prophecies which the prophet was to announce to the people, namely the just wrath of God for the crimes of the Jews, and the imminent vengeance of divine justice upon the holy city, and the other future calamities of his whole nation — so copious that, since they could not be grazed [contained] upon the inner face of the sheet, it was necessary that they be extended also over the whole outer part of the page. And the volume was spread open before Ezekiel, that he might know that the understanding of prophecy falls to no one, save to him for whom God has opened the wrapping of his secrets. He was also commanded first to devour the book before he should speak to the people, that he might mark that the prophetic revelations were not to be run over cursorily by him, but to be eagerly received, and to be thoroughly digested [cooked down] in the belly of inner meditation, before they be poured out.

But the prophet’s volume was at first sweet, like honey: because the knowledge of the divine judgments, and the meditation of the divine vengeances — which the impious shun and abhor — are to the just the greatest delight. For the just man shall rejoice, says the Psalm, when he shall see the vengeance. ⁸³ But after the prophet had digested the volume in his belly, he perceived it to be bitter; and on account of this, a little after its devouring, he added: AND I went away bitter and sad in the indignation of my spirit. For when he began to preach the things which he had learned with the highest sweetness, straightway he experienced in himself the bitterness of toil, of persecution, of prison, and at last even the punishment of inflicted death. Rabbi Solomon [Rashi] judges that in this volume, on account of the narrowness of the page, the several afflictions of the Jews were not described in particular, but only those three words mentioned by the prophet — namely קינים והגה והי Kinim, Hegha, Hi, that is, Lamentations, Muttering [Sighing], Woe — by which all the losses of the Jews are denoted, comprised in a summary. And the book is said to be written on front and back, because its words contain the signification both of present and of future calamities. Jerome and Gregory, ⁸⁴ interpreting this place mystically, say that that volume is the book of divine scripture — which indeed is therefore called “rolled up,” because it is wrapped in so great a depth of mysteries that it is permitted to no one to look into and understand it, unless the extended hand of God, which is Christ, first spread it open, and, spread open, explain it. And it is written within and without: that is, within by allegory and the spiritual understanding, without by the sense of the letter and history; within, teaching invisible things and promising heavenly [things]; without, prescribing visible and earthly [things], insofar as they are to be sought or to be shunned. There are also written in it, according to the interpretation of the Seventy, θρῆνος, καὶ μέλος, καὶ οὐαί — Lamentation, Song, and Woe. And first Lamentation, because in it, before all things, penitence is proclaimed to sinners; Song, or Verse, or Canticle, because there is promised to the just as a re—

[continuing from p147] …reward, song, and exultation of eternal felicity; Woe, because there [in it] the misery of everlasting damnation is foretold to the impious. It is likewise needful to eat a volume of this kind — that is, of truth — to store away in the depth of the heart the pastures that are in it, and to ruminate [upon them] with the assiduous thought of the mind so long, until you are compelled to burst forth into that voice of David: ⁸⁵ HOW sweet are thy words to my jaws, above honey to my mouth.

A FLYING VOLUME (which by Zechariah is called מגלה עפה Meghila Apha): Aquila and Theodotion rendered [it] διφθέρα, that is, a Skin, or a goatskin membrane — like that skin of the goat Amalthea, on which the poets feign that Jupiter writes human affairs; Symmachus rendered [it] τὴν κεφαλίδα, that is, the Chapter, or the summary, according to that [text]: “In the chapter of the book it is written of me”; the Seventy translated δρέπανον πετόμενον, that is, a Flying Sickle; Jonathan, a Flying Little-book; but Jerome rendered [it] “a Flying Volume.” The vision of this volume is described by the prophet Zechariah in this manner: ⁸⁶ AND I TURNED, and lifted up my eyes, and saw, and behold a flying volume; and he said to me, What seest thou? And I said, I see a flying volume: its length twenty cubits, and its breadth ten cubits. And he said to me, This is the curse that goes forth over the face of the whole earth; for every thief, as it is there written, shall be judged, and everyone who swears [falsely], from this likewise shall be judged. I will bring it forth, says the Lord of hosts, and it shall come to the house of the thief, and to the house of him who swears a lie in my name; and it shall abide in the midst of his house, and shall consume it, both its timbers and its stones. Thus far Zechariah.

That volume was not compacted of many sheets, as ours are, but of only one oblong membrane, rollable around itself — which our notaries call a Roll [Rotulus]. ⁸⁷ And it is said to have had a length of twenty cubits, and a breadth of ten cubits, which are dimensions equal to the vestibule of the temple; because it seemed to the prophet that the volume itself was going forth out of the temple. For although — Rabbi David Kimki says — at that time that temple of Solomon (whose vestibule’s length extended to twenty cubits and breadth to ten) lay utterly wasted and demolished, yet from thence, the proportion of length and breadth which had formerly been in it being preserved, Zechariah saw that volume go forth. And this is what he says: This is the curse that goes forth, &c.

AND this volume was written on both sides, as well on the back as on the front. On the one side was written the execration of the [false] swearer, in these words: כל הגונב מזה כמוה נקה Cal haggoneb mize camoah nikka, that is, Everyone who steals from another, even as he is, shall be cut off. On the other side was contained the curse of the perjurer, of this kind: כל הנשבע מזה כמוה נקה Cal annischba mize camoah nikka, that is, Everyone who swears falsely against another, even as he is, shall be cut off. Now when this volume flew through the whole earth, it came to the houses of those who stole and who swore mendaciously; and there it began to abide in the very inner chambers of the houses; nor would it depart thence before it had consumed the timbers, the stones, and the walls of the houses together with the owners themselves.

John Chrysostom — in homilies 15 and 26 to the people of Antioch, reading (according to the edition of the Seventy) “a Flying Sickle” — interprets this place thus: ⁸⁸ A FLYING SICKLE signifies the most swift onset of vengeance, pursuing false oaths. The breadth and length of many cubits indicates the vehemence, and the magnitude, of the evils; but that it flies from heaven [signifies] that the sentence is borne from the supreme tribunal. The sickle-shaped form [signifies] the inevitable lot of punishment; for just as a sickle, wherever it strikes, not only seizes [the thing] with itself, but also cuts off the head, so likewise the penalty rushing upon perjurers is most difficult [to escape]. And it dissolves the stones and timbers of the perjurer’s house, that its ruin may be a correction to others; for after the dead perjurer must be buried in the earth, the house being dissolved and the ruin made, it will be an admonition through the sight to all who pass by and behold, lest they dare the same things and suffer the same. For God wills the punishments of the most grievous sinners to remain continual, and the accusers of the dead man’s crime to be perpetual, that all hereafter may be corrected.

Paul, bishop of Burgos, judges that by the Flying Volume is signified the impious volume of the Talmudic books: which is called “Flying,” because it has no solidity of a stable foundation; and is called “a Curse,” by reason of its execrable doctrine; but because it seems to go forth from the temple and holy doctrine, it is said to have measures of length and breadth conformable to the temple. And it destroys the houses to which it comes, because this cursed volume will at last bring the utmost destruction of souls and of bodies upon the whole race of the Jews.