Homily 55, on Psalm 145
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).
Praise the Lord, O my soul. This psalm has a heading: Of Haggai and Zechariah. And this we must know first of all, that it is not found in the Hebrew, but in the Septuagint translators. But let us speak also according to the common edition, Of Haggai and Zechariah. Since the restoration of Jerusalem is here spoken of — The Lord shall reign forever, thy God, O Sion, unto generation and generation — they suppose it to be said, as it were, concerning the restoration of Jerusalem, which took place under Haggai and Zechariah.
Praise the Lord, O my soul. He did not say, praise the body, but, praise, O my soul; not that he condemned the body, but he condemned the works of the flesh. Praise the Lord, O my soul. The soul exhorts itself. Just as if David were to say, Praise the Lord, O David; so too the soul itself says to itself, Praise the Lord, O my soul. I will praise the Lord in my life. See what it says: it exhorts itself, and it itself answers. What does it say? It says to me, Praise the Lord, O my soul: I myself answer, I will praise the Lord in my life. At present I cannot praise, I am weighed down by sins. As often as I open my lips in the praises of God, so often does the consciousness of my sins glue them shut. I will praise the Lord in my life. Beautifully he said, I will praise, not I praise. When I shall have been with my Lord, then I will praise my Lord in my life. Now I am in death, I cannot praise. I will praise in my life. Our life is Christ: let us praise the Lord in life. I will sing to my God as long as I shall be. See what it says. When we do something righteously, we are: but when we sin, we cease to be. There are many things that might be said, but the discourse hastens to its end.
Put not your trust in princes, nor in the sons of men, in whom there is no salvation. This he says generally to all: Put not your trust in princes, not in the emperor, not in prefects, not in the judges of the world. Put not your trust in princes. Who are the princes? The sons of men. Who are the sons of men? Those in whom there is no salvation.
His spirit shall go forth, and he shall return into his earth. But when he shall have returned into his earth, what will happen? In that day all his thoughts shall perish: all the confidence of princes. All their thoughts shall perish. Put not your trust in princes. Many have trusted in princes. Today he was, tomorrow he is not. Today the army goes before him, and in the evening he lies in the tomb. After such great magnitude, such great glory, no intervals of time intervene: in the same moment is the working of Christ. In the sons of men, in whom there is no salvation. Who are the princes? The sons of men. If the men themselves are nothing, what are their sons? His spirit shall go forth. Whose? Man's. His spirit shall go forth. Here he puts spirit for soul. Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit. His spirit shall go forth, and he shall return into his earth. It is not the spirit that shall return into his earth, for the spirit is not of the earth: but the spirit shall go forth, and the man shall return into his earth. In that day all their thoughts shall perish. We ourselves, who are not princes, how many things do we daily ponder, and say: Tomorrow I will do this, I will pull down my barns, and again tomorrow I will build them. It is said to me: Fool, this night thy soul shall be snatched away: and the things which thou hast prepared, whose shall they be? This is said concerning those who trust in princes. But concerning the holy man, what is said?
Blessed is he whose helper is the God of Jacob. These trust in chariots, and these in horses: but we will call upon the name of the Lord our God. They have more helpers: but they are princes, but they are men, but they collapse. We have one, who is able to save. His hope is in the Lord his God. Let us see what the three young men say in the Babylonian furnace, when Nebuchadnezzar summons them, and compels them to worship Bel: what do they answer Nebuchadnezzar? O king, we have no need to answer thee concerning this word. God indeed is able to deliver us from the burning furnace: but even if he shall not deliver us, know, O king, that we do not worship the image which thou hast set up. See their faith. We believe, they say, that he is able to deliver us: but if perchance our sins should hinder it, nevertheless we believe also in him who is unwilling to deliver. For we do not believe in this life, but in the life to come: we do not believe in him so that we may not burn here, but so that through these fires we may not pass over to other fires. Set us aflame therefore, prepare the furnace: this burning, this consuming, is our purgation. Blessed is he whose helper is the God of Jacob. See the significance of the words. His helper. And he could not work any sign there because of their unbelief. God is our helper. He delivers and labors alongside those who are willing and who labor: those who sleep and lie idle and are unwilling he does not deliver. His hope is in the Lord his God. Excellently he said, hope: even if in the present he does not deliver, nevertheless there is hope concerning the future. Who made heaven and earth. This God who made heaven and earth, the sea and all the things that are in them. In comparison with heaven and earth and the sea, we men, according to the condition of the flesh, are as if ants and fleas. He therefore who made heaven and earth, can he not deliver the man whom he made?
Who keepeth truth forever. If a lie oppresses us, let us not be saddened: the Lord keepeth truth forever. Someone or other has lied against us, and the one lying is believed more than we who speak the truth. We ought not to despair: the Lord keepeth truth forever. Beautifully he said, keepeth. He keeps it, and holds it in his treasury: he will give back to us what he has preserved. Who keepeth truth forever. Christ is truth: let us speak truth, and truth preserves truth for us. He executeth judgment for them that suffer wrong. Even if it comes late, do not despair: coming he shall come, and shall save. He executeth judgment for them that suffer wrong. Let this alone be in our conscience, that we suffer unjustly. Let us hold this in our conscience, that we do not suffer on account of our sins, and that we do not do that of which we are accused. He giveth food to the hungry. And according to the letter it is profitable; and even if it be understood simply, it edifies the hearer. Behold the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap, and your heavenly Father feedeth them. He giveth food to the hungry. To the hungry he gives, not to those who belch. He therefore who as a monk has nothing, let him confidently receive: he who has and is belching, let him not receive. You know that you are hungry, you know that you have nothing: if you are hungry and have nothing, you rather confer a benefit, if you receive, than is bestowed on you. But if you have and are not hungry, you ought not to take away the food of the hungry, so that you, being sated, may receive. Receive what you may put into your belly, not what goes into your purse: receive a tunic that may cover your body, not one that may fill your chests. He giveth food to the hungry. This according to the letter. Let us speak also in another way. Let us hunger for Christ, and he himself gives us the heavenly bread. Give us this day our daily bread. Those who say this, hunger: those who desire bread, hunger. He who says, Give us this day our daily bread, surely speaks as one hungering. He giveth food to the hungry. Someone supposes that he speaks of the heavenly bread from the mysteries. And this indeed we receive, since it is truly the flesh of Christ, and truly the blood of Christ. But let us speak also in another way. The bread of Christ and his flesh is the divine word and the heavenly teaching. Whoever shall have received this bread and been sated, what will happen? What?
The Lord looseth them that are fettered. If this bread shall have refreshed our soul, that is, the divine word and the heavenly teaching, at once our feet, which had been bound, are loosed. The Lord looseth them that are fettered. Lazarus too was bound; and he said: Loose him. The Lord looseth them that are fettered. And the daughter of Abraham had been bent over and bound for eighteen years; she is loosed, and looks up to heaven. See what is said there in the Gospel. And behold, it says, there was a certain woman, who had a spirit of infirmity for eighteen years: and she could not, it says, lift up her neck. Because she had a spirit of infirmity, she could not lift her neck upward. The Lord looseth them that are fettered. These same fetters are also works: since indeed the same sins, which take our necks captive, also bind our feet. Whoever is fettered cannot run. Whoever is fettered cannot run in the stadium of Christ: for the feet are weighed down by fetters, and are pressed to the ground, and fasten us to the earth. The Lord looseth them that are fettered. See the order. He giveth food to the hungry: first we hunger, then we receive food. But when we shall have been sated, our feet, which had been fettered, are loosed. And when they shall have begun to walk freely, what follows? The Lord enlighteneth the blind. See what it says. If he were speaking of these blind men, he ought to have said, The Lord enlighteneth the blind. But he did not say this: but according to the Hebrew and Greek truth, what did he say? The Lord maketh the blind wise. If he were speaking of these eyes of the flesh, he ought to have said, The Lord enlighteneth the blind: but now indeed he says, The Lord maketh the blind wise. If ye were blind, he says, ye should have no sin. Our heart has been blinded by the darkness of sins. Foolishness and stupidity are the darkness of our eyes. When therefore we hungering shall have been refreshed, and our feet shall have been freed, then also the eye of our heart will begin to see the light which it had once lost, and to have wisdom. If one shall have been made wise, what follows?
The Lord raiseth up them that are cast down. And if you were lying down, be secure: the Lord stretches out his hand. The Lord loveth the just. I see two things: he loves, and he guards. He who loves, loves it as his own: but he who guards, guards him who is set in danger. The Lord loveth the just. Whoever is just and perfect, he is loved; but whoever is a stranger, and has not come to the servitude of the Lord, he is preserved.
The Lord keepeth the strangers: he will take up the orphan and the widow. And according to the letter it is profitable. He will take up the orphan and the widow. O martyr, you who are held fast to shed your blood for me, do not be anxious about your children, do not be anxious about your wife: they have me in your place. Let us speak also according to the spirit. He will take up the orphan and the widow. He will take up the orphan, who had lost God his father through sins. And he will take up the widow. The widow, that is, that soul which had lost Christ her husband. But see what it says. The orphan and the widow: he did not say, he will guard: he did not say, he will save: but, he will take up, if she return to the father, if she come back to the husband. And the way of sinners he will destroy. He did not say, sinners he will destroy: according to the first psalm, And the way of the ungodly shall perish. If the way of the just is Christ, the way of sinners is the devil. And the way of sinners he will destroy. The way, therefore, of all sinners is the devil, him he will destroy: but us he will save, who walk along it, and are unlearning to walk.
The Lord shall reign forever. When the way of sinners shall have perished, then the Lord shall reign forever. He did not say, unto the age: but, unto the ages. As long as the way does not perish, Christ does not reign in us: as long as the way of sinners does not perish, Christ does not reign in us. As long as our feet walk in the way of the devil, Christ does not reign in us. I grow angry without cause with my brother: I walk in the way of the devil, Christ does not reign in me. I disparage my brother: I walk in the way of the devil, Christ does not reign in me. In whatever sin I shall have walked, I walk in the way of the devil, Christ does not reign in me. My mind is empty, and is dragged off in different directions. I am in one place, and my mind wanders through the whole world. It holds angels in the world, it holds kings, it holds armies, it holds the world: one monk it cannot hold. Why do I say all this? Because of those who wander through the whole world, and cannot sit in one place. Thy God, O Sion, unto generation and generation. Thy God, O Sion. We have frequently said that Sion is interpreted as a watchtower, or the Church, or the soul contemplating God. Thy God, O Sion, unto generation and generation. In the first generation, of the Jews; in the second, from the Gentiles. In all the scriptures and in all the psalms, generation and generation is said, so as to signify two peoples. But we can also say it in another way: The Lord shall reign forever, thy God, O Sion, in this generation and in the generation to come. Let Christ reign in us: let not sin reign in our body. The heart of the king is in the hand of God. Let us be kings: let us rule over our body, and subject it, and let our heart be in the hand of Christ. To whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.