Sermon 14 on the Song of Songs — Bernard of Clairvaux
On the Church of the Faithful Christians, and on the Synagogue of the Faithless Jews
1. God is known in Judah, in Israel his name is great (Ps 75:2). The people of the nations who walked in darkness saw a great light (Isa 9:2), which was in Judah and in Israel, and wished to draw near and be illuminated, so that those who were once not a people might now be a people (1 Pet 2:10); and that one cornerstone might receive both walls coming from different directions into itself, and henceforth the place of his peace might be established. Moreover, the voice of the one inviting gave confidence, which had already sounded forth: Rejoice, O nations, with his people (Deut 32:43 LXX; Rom 15:10). Therefore she wished to draw near; but the Synagogue forbade it, declaring the Church from the nations to be unclean and unworthy, reproaching her with the dregs of idolatry and the blindness of ignorance, and was saying: For you, by what merit? Do not touch me. Why? she replies. Is God the God of the Jews only? Is he not also of the nations? (Rom 3:29). And if merit is certainly lacking to me, yet compassion is not lacking to him. Is he only just? He is also merciful. Lord, let your mercies come upon me, and I shall live; and again: Your mercies are many, O Lord; give me life according to your judgment (Ps 118:77, 156); which, tempered as it is, is mercy. What will the just and merciful Lord do, when one glories in the law and applauds herself for justice, neither needing mercy but despising the very one who does need it; while the other, on the contrary, acknowledges her own offenses, confesses her unworthiness, refuses judgment, and begs for mercy? What, I say, will the judge do, and that judge, for whom both to judge and to show mercy are each so familiar that neither is more familiar than the other? What indeed could be more fitting than that each should receive according to her own desire: judgment for the one, mercy for the other? The Jew seeks judgment, and let him have it; but let the nations honor God for his mercy. And this is the judgment: that those who despise God's merciful justice and wish to establish their own (which indeed does not justify but accuses), should be left to that justice of their own, to be crushed rather than justified.
2. For it is from the law, which never led anyone to perfection; it is a yoke which neither they themselves nor their fathers were ever able to bear. But the Synagogue is strong; she cares not for a light burden nor a sweet yoke. She is healthy; she has no need of a physician, nor of the anointing of the Spirit. She trusts in the law; let it deliver her if it can. But the law was not given that could give life; moreover, it even kills: For the letter kills (2 Cor 3:6). Therefore, he says, I say to you: You shall die in your sins (Jn 8:24). This, therefore, is the judgment, O Synagogue, which you demand for your error. Blind and contentious, you are abandoned until the fullness of the nations (whom you proudly spurn and enviously repel) enters in, and she too may come to know the God who is known in Judah, and that his name is great in Israel. For to this end Jesus came into this world for judgment: that those who do not see may see, and those who see may become blind (Jn 9:39). In part, however; for the Lord will not cast off his people (Ps 93:14), wholly preserving for himself as a seed the apostles and the multitude of believers, whose heart was one and soul was one. But neither will he cast them off in the end, being about to save the remnant. For again he will take up Israel his servant, and will remember his mercy (Lk 1:54), so that not even there may mercy as a companion desert the judgment, where she herself finds no place. Otherwise, if he had repaid according to merits, it would be judgment without mercy for him who shows no mercy (Jas 2:13). For Judah has much oil of divine knowledge, and she keeps it enclosed within herself as in a sealed vessel, greedy to retain it. I ask, and she does not take pity, nor does she lend. Alone she wishes to possess the worship of God, alone the knowledge, alone the great name of his; she is not zealous for herself, but envious of me.
3. Therefore you, O Lord, judge my cause, and let your great name be magnified still more, and let the oil which is much be multiplied the more. Let it increase, let it overflow, let it be poured out, let it flow forth even to the nations, and let all flesh feel the salvation of God. How should it be as the ungrateful Jew wishes, that the whole saving unction remain upon the beard of Aaron? It belongs not to the beard, but to the head. And the head belongs not to the beard alone, but also to the whole body. Let the beard receive it first, but not alone. Let it pour back upon the lower members what it has itself received from above. Let it descend, let the heavenly liquor descend even upon the breasts of the Church (for she, most eager, does not disdain to press it out for herself from the beard); and being drenched with the dew of grace, that she may prove herself not ungrateful, let her say: Your name is oil poured out (Song 1:2). But let it abound yet more, I pray, and reach even to the hem of the garment, to me indeed the very least and most unworthy of all, yet still of the garment. For I too claim that oil for myself from the maternal breasts, as a little one in Christ, by the right of piety. But if a man should murmur, whose eye is evil because of the goodness; Lord, answer for me, let my judgment proceed from your countenance and not from the brow of Israel. Rather, answer for yourself, and say to the accuser: For it is against you that he brings his charge, that you give freely; say therefore to him: I wish to give to this last one likewise (Mt 20:14). The Pharisee is displeased. Why do you grumble? My right is the will of the judge. What is more just as to merit, what richer as to reward? Is it not lawful for him to do what he wills? To me indeed mercy is done, but to you no injustice is done. Take what is yours, and go. If he has decided to save me too, what do you lose?
4. Exaggerate your merits as much as you please, and extol your labors: the mercy of the Lord is better than lives (Ps 62:4). I confess, I have not borne the burden of the day and the heat; but I carry a sweet yoke and a light burden according to the good pleasure of the master of the house. My work is scarcely of one hour; and if more, I do not feel it on account of love. Let the Jew exercise his own powers; I prefer to prove what is the good and pleasing and perfect will of the Lord. From that will, indeed, I make up for the losses of work and time. He relies on the terms of an agreement; I rely on the good pleasure of a will. I believe, and it is not unto folly for me: for life is in his will. That will reconciles the Father to me, that will restores my inheritance, even with more abundant grace; it stirs up for me the music, and singing, and feasting, and the most celebrated joys of the whole exulting household. If my elder brother is indignant, who prefers to eat a goat with his friends outside rather than with me a fatted calf in the father's house, it will be answered to him: It was fitting to make merry and rejoice, because this my son was dead and has come to life again, was lost and has been found (Lk 15:32). Still the Synagogue feasts outside with her friends the demons, whom it well pleases that she, foolish, devours the goat of sin, gulping it down and in a certain manner hiding it and storing it away for herself in the belly of her sluggishness and foolishness, while despising the justice of God and wishing to establish her own, she says she has no sin, nor does she need the death of the fatted calf, since she reckons herself clean and just from the works of the law. But the Church, once the veil of the killing letter was torn asunder in the death of the crucified Word, boldly bursts through into his inner chambers, with the spirit of liberty going before her; she is recognized, she pleases, she obtains the place of her rival, she becomes the bride, she enjoys the stolen embraces; and in the heat of the spirit, clinging to Christ the Lord, against whom she presses herself, as the oil of his exultation drips and pours forth on every side, she, receiving this above her companions, says: Your name is oil poured out. What wonder if she is anointed, who embraces the Anointed One?
5. The Church therefore reclines within, but the Church, for the present, of the perfect. Yet there is hope for us too. Let us keep watch at the doors, we who are less perfect, rejoicing in hope. Let the Bridegroom and bride be alone within for the present, let them enjoy mutual and secret embraces, with no clamor of carnal desires, no tumult of bodily phantasms disturbing them. But let the throng of young maidens, who cannot yet be free of such disturbances, wait outside; and let them wait securely, knowing that what they read pertains to them: Virgins shall be led to the king after her, her companions shall be brought to you (Ps 44:15). And that each may know of what spirit she is: I call virgins those who, having been joined to Christ before they were defiled by the embraces of the world, firmly persevere in him to whom they devoted themselves, all the more happily as they did so more promptly; but companions, those who at last blushing at and departing from their former deformity, in which, once conformed to this world, they had shamefully prostituted themselves to the princes of this world, that is, to foul spirits, in every carnal lust, hasten to reform themselves, all the more sincerely as they do so more belatedly, into the form of the new man. Let both these and those advance, not fall back, nor grow weary, even if they do not yet fully feel within themselves that from which they too might say: Your name is oil poured out. For the young maidens do not dare to speak words to the Bridegroom on their own. Yet if they strive to follow more closely in the footsteps of their mistress, they will be delighted at least by the fragrance of the poured-out oil, and they will be stirred even from the perception of the fragrance to desire and seek greater things.
6. I myself frequently -- and I am not ashamed to confess it -- especially in the beginnings of my conversion, being hard and cold of heart, and seeking him whom my soul wished to love (for it could not yet love him whom it had not yet found, or at least loved him less than it wished, and for this reason was seeking in order to love him more; though it would by no means have been seeking him unless it had already loved him in some measure): when therefore I was seeking him in whom my spirit might grow warm again and find rest, being altogether sluggish and languishing, and from no quarter did there appear anyone who might give aid, by whom namely the stiffening frost, which bound the senses between us, might be dissolved, and that springlike sweetness and spiritual pleasantness might return -- then more and more my soul was languishing and growing weary and drowsy; and, out of weariness, sad and almost despairing, murmuring within itself that word: Before this cold of his, who shall stand? (Ps 147:17). When suddenly, perhaps at the word, or even at the sight of some spiritual and perfect man, sometimes even at the mere memory of one dead or absent, the Spirit would blow and the waters would flow; and those tears were my bread day and night. What was this, if not the fragrance exhaled from the anointing with which that man was drenched? For it was not the anointing itself, which indeed did not reach me except through the mediation of a man. And therefore, even if I rejoiced at the gift, I was nevertheless confounded and humbled, because only a thin exhalation and not a rich sprinkling had reached me. Delighted by smell, not by touch, I recognized myself to be unworthy that God should become sweet to me through himself. And even now, if the same thing happens, I eagerly receive the gift bestowed, and I am grateful for it; but I grieve with deep sorrow that I have not merited it through myself, and, as the saying goes, have by no means received it from hand to hand, though I earnestly sought it. It shames me greatly to be moved more by the memory of a man than of God. And then with a groan I cry out: When shall I come and appear before the face of God? (Ps 41:3). I think some of you have experienced the same thing, and still experience it from time to time. In this matter, what should be thought, except that either our pride is convicted, or our humility is guarded, or brotherly charity is nourished, or desire is kindled? One and the same food is both medicine for the sick and a diet for the convalescent; moreover, it strengthens the weak and delights the strong. One and the same food both heals languor and preserves health, and nourishes the body and pleases the palate.
7. But let us return to the words of the bride, and let us take care to hear what she says in such a way that we also strive to savor what she savors. The bride, as I have said, is the Church. She is the one to whom more has been forgiven, and who loves more. What her rival reproaches her with as a disgrace, she herself turns to her own advantage. From this she becomes more gentle for correction, from this more patient in labor; from this more ardent in love, from this more shrewd in caution; from this more humble on account of her conscience, from this more acceptable on account of her modesty; from this more ready for obedience, from this more devoted and more careful in the giving of thanks. At length, while the other, as has been said, murmurs and recalls her own merits, and labors, and the burden of the day and the heat, the Church recollects the benefit, saying: Your name is oil poured out.
8. This is indeed the testimony of Israel for giving thanks to the name of the Lord; yet not Israel according to the flesh, but of him who is according to the spirit. For how could that one say this? Not that he does not have oil, but he does not have it poured out. He has it, but hidden away; he has it in books, but not in hearts. He clings to the outside, in the letter; he handles with his hands a vessel that is full, yet also closed, and he does not open it so as to be anointed. Within, within is the anointing of the spirit; open and be anointed, and you shall no longer be a house of provocation. What good does oil do in vessels, if you do not feel it also in your members? What does it profit you to read over and over the holy name of the Savior in books, and not to have piety in your conduct? It is oil; pour it out, and you will feel its power, which is threefold. But the Jew disdains these things; you, hear. I wish to say why the name of the Bridegroom is compared to oil, which I had not yet said. And three reasons for this matter present themselves. But since he is called by many names, for the reason that no single one by which he might be properly named is found (for he is ineffable), first we must invoke the Holy Spirit, so that of the many names he may deign to reveal to us through himself the one which he wishes to be understood in this place (since he did not choose to designate it in writing). But this too must wait for another time. For even if all things were now ready at hand, and neither you were burdened nor I wearied, the hour nevertheless imposes an end. Hold fast to that point to which I have made you attentive, so that it may not be necessary to repeat it tomorrow. This is the task at hand, this is the work in progress: to teach, namely, why the name of the Bridegroom is compared to oil, and what concerns the names. And since I can say nothing of myself, prayer is prescribed, that the Bridegroom himself may reveal it to us through his Spirit, Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom is honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.
Translated from the Latin by AI. Source: Migne, Patrologia Latina 183.