Homily 42, on Psalm 127
Latin source: Germanus Morin (ed.), Sancti Hieronymi Presbyteri Tractatus sive Homiliae in Psalmos , Anecdota Maredsolana III (Maredsoli, 1897) — public domain. Psalm numbering follows the Septuagint/Vulgate (Morin).
Blessed are all who fear the Lord. Those who fear the Lord, what reward do they have? What crown? Let us see what praise they have, what reward. Blessed are you, and it shall be well with you. I have already spoken about blessedness; I am asking what this blessedness is: the one who fears the Lord, what blessedness does he have? Your wife like a fruitful vine on the sides of your house; your sons like young olive shoots around your table. I think that, with Christ favoring us, we all fear the Lord. Then do we not have this blessedness? For it is written that whoever fears the Lord has this blessedness: Your wife like a fruitful vine on the sides of your house, your sons like young olive shoots around your table. So then, is the man who has one son, and the man who has two, not blessed? For what does it say? Your sons like young olive shoots around your table. Unless we have so many sons that they encircle our table, will we not have the blessedness of the one who fears the Lord? Isaac did not have this blessedness: for he had two sons, one of them utterly wicked, Esau, for whom it would have been far better had he never been born. But he had one son, Jacob: so then did he not have the blessedness? because one son could not encircle the table. Virgins, then, do not fear the Lord? For what is said, that the one who fears the Lord should understand blessedness? Your wife like a fruitful vine on the sides of your house; your sons like young olive shoots around your table. John did not have this blessedness, both Johns, the evangelist as much as the baptist: for each of them was a virgin. Paul did not have this blessedness, who says: 'I wish, moreover, that all were as I am.' You see, then, that wife and sons must be understood spiritually; otherwise, unless we understand them spiritually, the angels do not have this blessedness, because they do not have sons. Let us return, therefore, to the order of the reading.
Blessed are all who fear the Lord. Just as no one can say 'The Lord is my portion' except the one who has no other portion in the world, so the one who fears anything else outside the Lord does not fear the Lord. Indeed, the Savior himself says: 'Do not fear those who can kill the body, but fear him who can kill both body and soul in hell.' You see, then, that whoever does not fear the Lord fears some other thing outside the Lord. The one who fears the Lord, what signs does he have? Those who walk in his ways. There are many ways, and many ways lead to one way. Indeed, it is also said in Jeremiah: 'Stand in the ways of the Lord, and ask for the eternal paths of the Lord, and you will find the way, and you will walk in it.' See what it says, Stand in the ways, and ask for the eternal paths of the Lord, and you will find the one way, and walk in it. See how through many ways we come to one way. This is also said in the gospel in other words, under another meaning of the parable, concerning that merchant who had many pearls, who sold them, and bought one most precious pearl. What it says is this: Stand in the ways, that is, have very many pearls. Stand in the ways, and ask for the eternal paths of the Lord. Beautifully it says eternal, lest we should think that at the coming of Christ the law and the prophets were brought to an end. But see what it says. Stand in the ways, in the law and the prophets. Stand in the ways; do not so believe in the one way that you abandon the many ways; but stand in the ways, and ask for the eternal paths of the Lord. Ask the paths of the Lord, what Jeremiah said, Isaiah, Ezekiel, what the rest of the prophets said. Ask the paths. It is better said in Greek τρίβους (tribous): for a path (semita) is so called from the fact that it is worn (trita) by the heel of those walking. And what is said is this: Ask the paths, that is τρίβους (tribous), which the foot of the Lord wore down: seeing that the Lord too walked in them. But when you have asked for the eternal paths of the Lord, and through those paths you have found the one way, which says 'I am the way and the life and the truth,' walk in it. See the mysteries of the scriptures: see in the simple words of the scriptures very many sacred meanings, in the ways and paths, in the law and the prophets. It did not say, walk, but, stand: do not abandon the law nor the prophets. Yet when you have found those ways, through these ways walk in this one way.
You will eat the labors of your hands. Many, not understanding, have interpreted this passage otherwise: 'You will eat the labors of your fruits.' Indeed the Latin copies have it thus: You will eat the labors of your fruits. But we read it written thus in the Hebrew: You will eat the labors of your hands. For who eats the labors of fruits? Surely it ought to be understood the other way around, that someone eats the fruit of his labors, and not the labors of his hands. For it is understood the other way around. For it can rather be said that someone eats the fruit of his labors, and not the labors of fruits. Since, therefore, it is written thus in the Hebrew, You will eat the labors of your hands, I think that in Greek too the Seventy translators translated this passage well. For in the Hebrew tongue the hand is called IAD; but in this passage it does not have IAD, but CAPH. And CAPH is translated καρπός (karpos)—not καρπός in the sense of fruit, but some part of the hand: seeing that καρπός in Greek means the joints (ἄρθρα, arthra). This we have said concerning the translation. You will eat, therefore, the labors of your hands. 'Whatever a man sows, this also will he reap.' Behold the man, and his works. So then we too will eat the labors of our hands. In the hands, works are understood. You will eat the labors of your hands. Someone may say: So then, are we going to eat after the resurrection? For this is said of the blessed man, You will eat the labors of your hands. I say this plainly, that man is composed of two substances, that is, of soul and body. The soul is immortal, but the body is mortal. What is mortal must of necessity have mortal food also; but what is immortal, that is, the soul, which is immortal, must have immortal food also. Do you want to know that the soul too has its own food? The Lord and Savior says it, when he was hungry. What does he say? 'My food is to do the will of him who sent me.' Do you want to know what food the soul has? The prophet too says to us: 'Taste and see that the Lord is sweet.' For just as the body, unless it receives its food, dies: so also the soul, unless it receives spiritual food, dies. Why do I say all this? Because some are accustomed to say: I do not need the holy scripture, it is enough for me only to fear God. And we have said this for this reason: as there are foods for the body, so the holy scriptures are foods also for our soul.
Your wife like a fruitful vine on the sides of your house. Solomon says that he wished to take wisdom as his bride. He says also in another place concerning wisdom: 'Love her, and she will embrace you: encompass her, and she will keep you.' Let us too, therefore, take this wife; let us hold her in our embraces, let us never let her go from our bosom, let her never flee from our hands. If this wife is always in our embrace, we will make from her sons: not daughters, but sons. Indeed, it is said here too: Your sons like young olive shoots around your table. Could it not have said, your daughters? or could it not have said τὰ τέκνα σου (ta tekna sou), so that both men and women might be understood? But see what it says, your sons. He who has wisdom as his wife does not make from her daughters, but sons. He has nothing soft, nothing dainty, nothing tender, nothing effeminate in his mind. Do you suppose it is for some other reason that the saints are written to have had not daughters, but sons? Let us read Genesis: for there the order of the generations is preserved. Holy Abraham had Sarah as his wife, had Hagar as his concubine, had afterward Keturah. From two wives he begets sons, he makes no daughters. Let us come to Isaac. Isaac too makes two sons, he has no daughters. For he was holy, and had in himself nothing soft and tender and effeminate, but all manly and firm. Blessed Jacob has twelve patriarchs as sons; and he has one daughter by the name of Dinah, which is translated cause, quarrel, strife. Indeed he had one daughter, and twelve sons; and on account of one daughter such great wars arise in Shechem. Jacob had never said: 'I am afraid, you have made me hateful.' He speaks to Levi and Simeon: 'Levi and Simeon, let my soul not come into their counsel.' Why? because as men they wished to plead the cause of a woman. Why have I said all this? Because the saints do not have daughters, but have only sons. I tell you a new thing, new to those who do not know it; but for those who read the scriptures, and read them diligently, not new, but the very thing they know. Jacob had twelve sons as patriarchs: Reuben, Simeon, Judah, Levi, Issachar, Asher, and the rest up to twelve. Read in the account of the generation, and you will never find that any of those twelve great patriarchs made a daughter, but all of them sons. I will tell you one, lest perhaps you forget. Asher had a daughter, Sarah. Jacob had twelve sons and one daughter: so among the twelve patriarchs one patriarch had only one daughter. Why have I said all this? So that we ought to understand sons and daughters in the scriptures spiritually. Your wife like a fruitful vine on the sides of your house. Like a fruitful vine. A fruitful vine has very many clusters, so also our wife, that is, wisdom our wife, who is the bride. Indeed, it is written in another place: 'Come my sister, my bride.' Lest in the fact that it had said, bride, you should understand something shameful, sister is joined, so that all shameful love may be excluded. Come my sister: for the love is holy, and therefore I call you sister. And my bride: therefore I call you bride, so that I may have a wife, and from you make many sons, many sons like clusters from a vine. Just as a vine has various clusters, and there is indeed one root, but it spreads its tendrils far and wide, here and there, and the tendrils themselves have their own fruits, and in the fruits themselves are the clusters, and one cluster is larger, another smaller, some grapes are larger, others smaller; so also from wisdom, which is our wife, provided that we never let her go, many clusters are born, that is, very many virtues, holy thoughts, splendid works. Your sons like young olive shoots around your table. We read in another place: 'And wine gladdens the heart of man.' We read also in the Song of Songs: 'Come, brothers, drink and be inebriated.' And wine which gladdens the heart of man. This fleshly wine does not gladden the heart of man, but overwhelms it, and makes it mad. Indeed, it is written that those who are powerful should not drink wine. The apostle too writes that we ought not to drink wine and eat flesh. Again it is said to us: And wine gladdens the heart of man. But it speaks of a spiritual wine, which, if anyone drinks it, he is immediately inebriated. All of you, that you might let go of your possessions and your parents and your children and your kinfolk, drank wine, and being inebriated for Christ began to be mad. Does it not seem to you to be drunkenness, does it not seem to you to be spiritual madness, to despise delights, to seek out squalor, to flee the cities, to pursue the deserts, to know no affections, to ignore the nearness of the flesh, and to know Christ alone? Indeed, the apostles were inebriated with this wine, and therefore it is said of them: 'They are full of new wine.' For they had not been inebriated from the old law, but from the gospel. Noah too, I think, was inebriated in this way with this wine. Your sons like young olive shoots. To nothing else are our sons compared except to young olive shoots. It did not say, to the old olive tree, but to the young olive. Just as there too, concerning the drunkenness of the apostles, it does not speak of old wine, but of new wine, so here too it says young olive shoots: young olive shoots, which are wholly green in the youth of the gospel, young olive shoots full of light. Oil has this nature, that it seasons food, that it provides fuel for light, that it restores an anointed body wearied by a long journey, as it were, to its former toil and to health. Indeed, whoever is weary, and is anointed, as it were recovers his former vigor. Do you think that wine and oil are named here without a reason? It could not have said honey, nor other aromatic spices, nor another tree, but only the vine and the olive. These are the remedies of our life, the vine and the olive, wine and oil. In wine, severity; in oil, mercy. Indeed, that man who was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, who had been wounded, the Samaritan, that is, the guardian, poured into him nothing except wine and oil. Wine, the severity of the precepts, astringent wine; so that whatever there is of bad humor, it may burn out and consume. But since human frailty cannot bear the truth—'for if you should mark iniquities, Lord, Lord, who shall endure it?' for if the Lord should be only just, we cannot live—therefore to his justice, that is, to the wine, the oil of mercy has been added. Behold, thus shall the man be blessed who fears the Lord. We have already spoken much, let us hasten to the end. May the Lord bless you out of Zion. Out of this Zion? And how does another prophet say 'Zion shall be plowed like a field'? The Lord also says: 'Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kill the prophets, and stone those who are sent to you.' Indeed, when the Lord had drawn near to Jerusalem, and had seen it, he wept. But when he wept over it, surely he wept over it because it was about to fall, as though about to perish. Indeed, what does he say? 'Rise, let us go from here.' And in another place, what does he say? 'Your house shall be left to you desolate.' So then, in what it says, May the Lord bless you out of Zion, it does not mean this Zion, which we see to be desolate. The gates themselves and the field itself and the ruins themselves signify the wrath of God. Even if we do not know it, the very eyes cry out the wrath of the Lord. May the Lord bless you out of Zion. Zion is translated watchtower, Jerusalem is translated vision of peace. If our soul has a watchtower, if it is on high, if it thinks not of earthly things, but of things sublime: if our soul has the vision of peace, that is, if Christ, who is true peace, dwells in it, he himself will bless us. If Christ dwells in us, we too will be Zion, and we too will be Jerusalem.
And may you see the sons of your sons. I am speaking to you. If by my discourse I instruct you, I have seen my sons: if you instruct others, I have seen the sons of my sons. Let us pray, therefore, to the Lord, that we may have sons, may have grandsons, and may always have much offspring. Let us hasten to make such sons: this union is holy. I tell you a new thing: without the embrace of a wife many such sons are born. Peace upon Israel. Israel is translated, a man seeing God. See, therefore, what is said. Peace upon Israel: upon those who have a mind seeing God. If my mind has the vision of God, if I always see Christ, I will not see others. Whoever has Christ in himself, has peace in himself. 'My peace I give to you, my peace I leave to you.' Although there are many persecutions, although there are many who persecute, yet in whomever Christ dwells, that one always has Christ.