Above, you have that he spent the night in prayer (Luke 6:12): how could he sleep in the storm? But the confidence of his power is expressed, because while everyone else was afraid, he alone slept fearlessly. Therefore, he is not a partner in nature who is not a partner in danger. And if the body sleeps, divinity works, faith works. Finally, he says: O you of little faith, why do you doubt (Matthew 8:26)? And those who feared in the presence of Christ are rightly criticized, since certainly anyone who adheres to Him cannot perish.
Therefore, he confirmed the faith and repelled the tranquility. He commanded the wind to cease, not the north wind, not the south wind, but surely that wind to which the angel Michael said in the Epistle of Jude: 'May the Lord command you' (Jude IX). Therefore, even Saint Matthew said: 'He commanded the wind and the sea' (Matthew VIII, 26). And may he deign to restrain his harsh gusts in us; so that the tranquility rejected by the fluctuating life may remove the fear of shipwreck! And even if it does not sleep with the sleep of its body, let us be careful that the sleep of our body does not sleep and rest for us.
44. And since what we have discussed in the previous passage is enough, now we have come to know that in the book according to Matthew, two men possessed by demons in the region of the Gerasenes encountered Christ (Ibid., 28), but here the holy Luke introduces only one, who is also described as naked (for anyone who has lost the covering of their nature and virtue is naked), I think it is not to be overlooked but rather must be investigated why the evangelists seem to disagree on the number. And indeed, although the number may differ, the mystery remains the same; for that man who had a demon is a symbol of the Gentile people, covered in vices, naked with error, openly guilty. These two also symbolize the Gentile people; for when Noah fathered three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth (Gen. 9:18), only the family of Shem was chosen by God. From these two different nations, peoples sprang forth, one cursed because he did not cover his father's nakedness; the other blessed because, though facing away, he did not draw in the shame of his naked parent, but rather covered his father with piety and thus averted the curse of their shared lineage.
(Vers. 27.)
(Verse 27.) He says that he lived for many years.
45. Indeed, he who was tormented from the flood until the coming of the Lord, breaking the chains of nature with wild madness. And not without reason did the holy Matthew indicate that those spirits dwelt in the tombs (Matt. VIII, 28), since such souls seem to dwell in certain burial mounds. For what else are the bodies of the faithless, if not the burial places of the dead, in which the words of God do not dwell? Therefore, he wandered in deserted places, barren of spiritual virtues; a fugitive from the Law, separated from the prophets, removed from grace.
46. (Vers. 30-33.) For it was not by one demon, but by the attack of the whole legion, that she was troubled; and when she saw the Lord and knew that at the time of the Lord's coming she would be cast into the depths, she began to pray that she might receive the opportunity to enter into the pigs. And first we must note the mercy of the Lord, that he does not condemn anyone beforehand, but each one is the author of his own punishment. The demons are not sent into the pigs, but they themselves request it; because they cannot bear the brightness of heavenly light, just as those whose eyes hurt cannot bear the rays of the sun; but they choose the darkness and abandon the shining. Therefore let the demons flee from the splendor of eternal light, and let them fear the torments that are due to them at the appointed time, not foreseeing what is to come, but remembering what has been prophesied; for Zacharias said: And it shall be in that day, saith the Lord, that I will destroy the names of the idols out of the land, and they shall no more be remembered ... and I will take away the unclean spirit out of the land (Zach. XIII, 2). Therefore we are taught that they will not always remain; so that their wickedness may not be perpetuated among men. Therefore, fearing that punishment, they say: You came... to destroy us (Matthew VIII, 29). But because they still want to exist, already departing from men, for whom they know that punishment must be undergone, they ask to be sent into pigs.
Who are these pigs, if not perhaps those about whom it has been said: Do not give what is holy to dogs, nor cast pearls before swine; lest they trample them under their feet (Matth. VII, 6)? Namely, those who, devoid of the use of voice and reason, have defiled the ornaments of virtues with the dirty actions of their sinful life. They rush headlong; for they are not recalled by contemplation of any merit, but, as if pushed down from higher things to lower things by the downward slope of wickedness, they are suffocated in the waters, like strangled creatures amidst the waves of this world, their breath being cut off; for there can be no vital intercourse of the spirit in those who are carried back and forth here and there by the fluid heat of pleasures.
We see, therefore, that man himself is the cause of his own suffering. For unless someone had lived like a pig, the devil could not have gained power over him; or if he had gained power, it would not have been to destroy him, but to test him. Or perhaps, because after the coming of the Lord he could no longer corrupt the good, he seeks the destruction of not all men, but only the weak; so that a thief does not lay a trap for armed men, but for the unarmed; and he harasses the weak with insults, knowing that he can be either worn down by the strong or condemned by the powerful.
49. But someone may say: why is this allowed by God for the devil? But I say, so that the good may be tested, and the wicked may be punished; for this is the punishment of sin. Finally, it is written that the Lord sends fever, and trembling, and evil spirits, and blindness, and all scourges, according to the merits of sins (Deuteronomy 28:59ff). But let us return to the reading.
(Vers. 34.)
(Verse 34) They saw, says he, this shepherd's magicians, and they fled.
50. For neither can the professors of philosophy, nor the leaders of the Synagogue, provide a remedy for dying peoples. Christ alone is the one who takes away the sins of the people, if, however, they do not refuse the patience of being healed. Moreover, he does not deign to care for those who are unwilling, and quickly abandons the sick, whom he sees to be a burden to his presence, like the people of Gerasa, who, when they went out of the city in which the appearance of a Synagogue seems to exist, were begging him to depart.
(Vers. 37.)
(Verse 37) Because they were greatly afraid;
For a weak mind does not grasp the word of God, nor can it bear the weight of wisdom; it weakens and dissolves.
And therefore he was no longer bothersome: but He ascended and returned: He ascended indeed from the lower to the higher, from the Synagogue namely to the Church. He returned through the sea, as he says here: or as Matthew through the strait (Matth. IX, 1); for there is a great strait between us and them. Therefore, no one transitions from the Church to the Synagogue without danger to salvation. But even he who desires to transition from the Synagogue to the Church, let him take up his cross, so that he may escape the danger.
53. But why is the one who has been freed not received, but rather considered to return home, unless it is to avoid boasting and to serve as an example to the unbelievers, since that home is a natural inn? And therefore, the one who has obtained the remedy of health is commanded to return from graves and tombs to that spiritual home, so that it may become a temple of God, in which the tomb of the mind was.
(Verse 41, 42.) And behold, there came a man named Jairus, and he was an official of the synagogue; and he fell at Jesus' feet, begging him to come into his house; for he had an only daughter, about twelve years old, and she was dying.
54. As we have said, Christ had left into the Gerasene Synagogue; and whom his own had not received, we received as strangers, we received whom we were expecting. Therefore, he was absent from those from whom he was expected for a long time; nor did he disdain to return to them, if asked. For this man, the leader of the Synagogue, whose daughter was the only one, was praying for the remedy of the perishing Synagogue, which was being pressed to death; because it was being abandoned by Christ. Whom do we think the leader of the Synagogue to be, if not the Law, by whose contemplation the Lord did not completely abandon the Synagogue, but reserved the medicine of salvation for those who believe? Therefore, as the Son of God hastened to save the sons of Israel, the holy Church, gathered from the Gentiles, who were perishing in the downfall of their lower sins, snatched away health prepared for others by faith.
55. Morally, we thought it sufficient to explain this place; and therefore we do not retract what has been said, but briefly wanted to touch upon the mystical meaning. Was it not done in this way, that when the Word of God came to the Jews, it was accepted by the Gentiles, and first believed in by those who did not believe in the Law, that they might receive grace?
56. (Verse 43.) For just as she who had spent all her substance on physicians, so the congregation of nations had lost all the gifts of nature, and had wasted its vital inheritance, holy, modest, religious, more prompt in faith, more hesitant in shame; for to recognize weakness is the mark of modesty and faith, not to despair of forgiveness. Therefore, she touched the fringe with modesty, approached with faith, believed with religious devotion, and the wise woman knew herself to be healed. Thus the holy people of the nations, which believed in God, blushed at sin in order to abandon it: it brought faith in order to believe; it showed devotion in order to pray; it gained wisdom in order to feel its own health; it took confidence in order to confess what it had stolen.
(Vers. 44.)
(Verse 44.) He approached from behind.
57. But why does Christ touch backward? Is it because it is written: You shall walk after the Lord your God (Deut. XIII, 4)? What also does it mean that the daughter of the prince, who was twelve years old, was dying, and that this woman had a flow of blood for twelve years; except that it may be understood that as long as the Synagogue existed, the Church labored? Her weakness is the power of this woman, because salvation came to the Gentiles through their fault (Rom. XI, 11); and the completion of that [Synagogue], the beginning of this [Church], not the beginning of nature, but of salvation: For blindness in part has come to Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles should enter (Ibid., 25). Therefore, the synagogue is older in appearance of health than the Church; because as long as the former believed, the latter did not believe, and it languished in various bodily and mental sufferings that cannot be healed. It heard that the Jewish people were sick, it began to hope for a remedy for its own salvation: it knew that the time had come when the physician would come from heaven, so it rose up to meet the Word, and it saw that it was being oppressed by crowds; for those who oppress do not believe, but those who touch believe. Christ is touched by faith, Christ is seen by faith: he is not touched by the body, he is not comprehended by the eyes; for he does not see, who does not see while seeing; nor does he hear, who does not understand what he hears; nor does he touch, who does not touch faithfully. Finally, to express the faith of the one touching, he says: