1 Understanding for Asaph. Attend, O my people, to my law: incline your ears to the words of my mouth.
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VERS. 1.-- *Understanding.* Because these things narrated, etc., *as far as* the things that seem open are parables and riddles. *Attend.* First the Lord himself speaks, that reverence may grow. *My people,* who obey me. The mouth of God is Asaph, who spoke these things below: *How great things we have heard from the beginning.* Of the Old Testament: or, the faithful Synagogue reproaches the wicked.
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VERS. 1.-- *A psalm of Asaph.* The second psalm of lamentation. He prays Christ to come to the help of the nation which for its hardness is to be grievously afflicted. We are admonished to rejoice at the good things of our neighbours, and to be afflicted at their calamities. *O God, the nations are come.* The first thing is the complaint, and there are numbered how great things Jerusalem bore in the times of Antiochus, when it was not destroyed, and by these the persecution of the Church is signified. *They are come.* He does not speak as to one that knows not, etc., *as far as* but now they are plainly fulfilled. *Into thy inheritance.* Of the people of Israel; the inheritance of God are the elect, but not the blinded; therefore these things can be said of the times after the ascension of Christ; but also before Christ had come, for then too there was an inheritance, where the Prophets were, and the saints led away into Babylon; or most of all under Antiochus. But if any man, etc., *as far as* whose circuit is through the whole world, where the persecution also is.
2 I will open my mouth in parables: I will utter propositions from the beginning.
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VERS. 2.-- *In parables.* Parables are likenesses of things. *Propositions.* Which in Greek are *problemata,* questions having something to be resolved.
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VERS. 2.-- *The dead bodies.* Carcases, as though they raged not only against the living. To bury belongs to piety, to cast forth belongs to cruelty. *They have poured out.* He heightens it, that he may move the judge.
3 How great things have we heard and known, and our fathers have told us.
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VERS. 3.-- *How great things.* He tells summarily what God did for the Jews: yet for men ungrateful to him, and thus, if not to them, it profits the sons nevertheless, lest they become as their fathers. First God spoke in a man, now the man himself: *How great things we have heard.* That foretold word God spoke from himself, lest his speech be despised.
4 They have not been hidden from their children, in another generation. Declaring the praises of the Lord, and his powers, and his wonders which he hath done.
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VERS. 4.-- *We are become.* The glory of Jerusalem, wonderful in the whole world, is turned into *a reproach to our neighbours,* which is heavier than if it were to men far off, because these are always at hand. Or, the neighbours are the affections, the kinsfolk being now willing to believe, so that the martyrs say this.
5 And he set up a testimony in Jacob: and made a law in Israel. How great things he commanded our fathers, that they should make the same known to their children:
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VERS. 5.-- *And he raised up,* etc. This testimony. *The beginning,* whence above: *I will utter propositions from the beginning.* The beginning is the Old Testament, the end the New. There is fear, which is the beginning: but here is Christ, *the end of the law unto righteousness to every one that believeth*, who gives the Spirit, whence: *Charity, which drives out fear*. The old law is called the testimony of this New Testament, because it has testimony from the law and the Prophets: whence that was called the tabernacle of testimony which prefigured so many mystical things: *Testimony* therefore the Old Testament is called in so far as it proves and testifies, law in so far as it commands. *He raised up* the testimony as though dead in Adam, that is, the law; or, while it is written down it is raised up, having been lulled asleep before by ignorance. *A testimony in Jacob,* this perhaps is that Jacob, having wrestled with the angel, went halt when his thigh was touched: which signifies that the Jews partly stand fast in faith, partly depart from salvation: and so what befell Jacob was a testimony of this thing. Behold a parable. *To their sons.* And these same sons are another generation, namely the people of grace.
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VERS. 5.-- *How long, O Lord?* A prayer on his own behalf against enemies and insulting neighbours; as though they rage thus: But, O Lord, how long? He asks that he be not angry unto the end, that is, that that laying waste may not continue, but that he temper his correction. By the name of *wrath* is understood the vengeance upon iniquity, by the name of *jealousy,* the exacting of chastity, that the soul may not commit fornication away from God. Note that this befalls men for their sins, though they be just, as the three children and the Prophets in the captivity bear witness. *As fire.* Burn so long, until the gold of the virtues be perfectly purged, and the wood, that is the vices, be turned to ashes.
6 That another generation might know them. The children that should be born and should rise up, and declare them to their children.
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VERS. 6.-- *Another generation.* Through the generations the commandments of God were handed on, lest any think them given to one only.
7 That they may put their hope in God and may not forget the works of God: and may seek his commandments.
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VERS. 7.-- *That they may set.* This is the profit of the fathers' preaching. *Let them seek out.* Those who were said above to have known, now *let them seek out,* that hoping in God they may be helped by him to fulfil it.
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VERS. 7.-- *They have devoured.* By delivering them to the teeth of wild beasts. *They have laid waste,* by the overthrow of the city, which was stripped of its own citizens, or because they slew those put in the place of the citizens who had been slain; Jacob for the man, the man, that is, for the nation which offended. The patriarch is pleasing, that the memory of him may soften the sins of the people. *Jacob.* This is the inheritance spoken of above. *The place.* The city, where the temple was, to which they were gathered for the feasts.
8 That they may not become like their fathers, a perverse and exasperating generation. A generation that set not their heart aright: and whose spirit was not faithful to God.
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VERS. 8.-- *Froward.* Which does not receive the truth, and is therefore twisted, *provoking* beyond all bitternesses, so that they were armed against the Saviour. Whence by Ezechiel the Lord says: *Go and speak to the provoking house*. *It set not its heart aright.* He has a twisted heart who does not correct what he has ill understood, and does not perform what nature teaches: *His spirit was not trusted with God*, that is, and if reason persuaded him well, he yielded to it. *It was not trusted.* When the spirit of man works together with the Spirit of God working, that is done which God commands: and this is not save by believing in him who justifies the ungodly, which faith the froward and embittering generation has not. He speaks much more expressly, etc., *as far as* but that generation, although it believed God, yet not in God.
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VERS. 8.-- *Of our iniquities.* That is, those which we have contracted from our fathers, to whom, that is to say, correction is no longer owed, but damnation, unless the compassion of thy grace be at hand. For it is written: *The soul that shall sin, the same shall die.* And, *I will visit the sins of the fathers upon the children, unto the third and fourth generation Of old.* (CASS.) He does not speak of past ones only, since in this time also certain Jews were following idols; but of the like of the ancient ones, in which they sinned through countless years. *Let them prevent us.* Before the judgment which every man fears, because unless indulgence go before in the judgment, the guilty man is not acquitted. *Exceedingly.* Lest any man presume upon his deeds.
9 The sons of Ephraim who bend and shoot with the bow: they have turned back in the day of battle.
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VERS. 9.-- *Shooting the bow.* He speaks figuratively, etc., *as far as* David to his brethren, so the Christian people to the people of the Jews. Or, *The sons of Ephrem.* *Bending and shooting the bow,* that is, shooting something with a bow. Or, *bending the bow,* and shooting arrows, that is, promising to keep the law, saying openly: *All things whatsoever the Lord shall say to us, we will do and we will hear*. *They were turned* and failed *in the day of battle,* that is, of temptation; whence Osee the prophet says: *Ephraim is become a dove without understanding, not having a heart*, because not hearing, but temptation proves the promise of obedience. *Of his benefits.* Of the benefits which he conferred upon the people of Israel, as, that he led them through the Red Sea unwetted. *Of his wonders* however he says, because he had turned the rivers of the Egyptians into blood. But as to his saying that God showed these things to them, he does not say it as though they themselves had seen them with their own eyes, but because they received them so from their elders.
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VERS. 9.-- *Help us.* In the war for the defence of the laws, because they trust not in their own powers, but in the powers of God. *For the glory.* Not for our merit; that, being delivered, we may render honour to thy name. *For the glory of thy name.* Let it be ascribed to the goodness of the holy name, not to us, since it cannot be had by our own deeds. *Help us, O God.* By this he is neither ungrateful to grace, nor does he take away free choice. For he who is helped does something also through himself. *Deliver us.* He delivers, that is, he rescues from evils, since he both helps us to do righteousness, and is propitious to the sins without which there is no living here.
10 They kept not the covenant of God: and in his law they would not walk.
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VERS. 10.-- *Lest perhaps.* That word customary with the faithless: Where is he? Either he is not, or he cannot; an insult not to be borne. *Let it be made known.* Either here iniquity is destroyed in those converted, which he had wished for before, or, at the end they perish, which he says here not by wishing it, but by prophesying. Because the just man is not delighted at the punishment of his enemy, since he does not hate him, but at the divine justice, since he loves God; the unjust man does the contrary.
11 And they forgot his benefits, and his wonders that he had shewn them.
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VERS. 11.-- *Of them that are in fetters.* By the corruptibility of the flesh, which weighs down the soul, and through which the persecutor sometimes prevails: these fetters none feel save those who groan being burdened; from these the Apostle desired to be loosed, and to be with Christ. Or, the fetters are the commandments of God, by which the saints are bound together, which, patiently borne, are turned into ornaments, whence: *Put thy foot into her fetters*. *Of them that are in fetters,* he speaks according to the letter of those whom the Gentiles bound: who pray with groaning that the Church may not fail in her brethren, and so the punishment consumes them. *According to the greatness.* For a thing so great followed among Christians as the enemies would never have believed. *The children,* because they were kindled by the example, not terrified. *Possess the children of them that have been put to death.* This the holy martyrs always prayed, that their blood might not be unfruitful to those that came after, that the crop might grow from that whence it was thought that it would perish. A godly prayer, that he cast not away the children of those who were punished for him. *Possess,* that they be stained by no error.
12 Wonderful things did he do in the sight of their fathers, in the land of Egypt, in the field of Tanis.
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VERS. 12.-- *Before their fathers,* etc. He begins now to tell what he did for them from the leading out of Egypt: and yet they did not cease from murmuring and from temptation. *Before the fathers.* Who the fathers are, etc., *as far as* the wood of the cross coming to it as the rod of Moses. *In the land of Egypt.* That he may take away all doubt, he names both the province and the place of the deeds. So Christ, set upon the earth, knew before the fathers, and taught the humble commandment: *Learn of me, for I am meek and humble of heart.*
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VERS. 12.-- *And render.* Although he renders it bodily, yet it is the salvation of their souls. *Sevenfold,* it signifies the perfection of the heavenly gift, when we are filled with the Holy Spirit. *Into their bosom.* In the secret place of the mind, where conversion takes place. *Their reproach,* let them render praises for injuries: a glorious vindication, when God is praised by the mouth of his enemies. Or *sevenfold.* By the sevenfold retribution he signifies the perfection of the punishment, as also of good things, when it is said that he shall receive sevenfold in this world: which is set down for all good things, as having nothing, and possessing all things; because in this number fulness is signified. Or *sevenfold,* for what is without end. *Their reproach,* Render this, that is, for that reproach give them up to a reprobate sense. For man, when he is given up to a reprobate sense, that is, in his inward sense, receives the desert of the punishments to come.
13 He divided the sea and brought them through: and he made the waters to stand as in a vessel.
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VERS. 13.-- *But we.* A conclusion of exultation, not of conquerors, but of sufferers. And a sweet conclusion of the lamentation. *But we.* These are the remnant gathered by Matathias. Or, generally, it is to be taken of every kind of the godly and of true Christians, so that the Christian people also is mingled there; this is the flock for which he prayed, that he might not be angry any longer. Or, *in the generation,* that is, in the world to come we shall declare it, not for the instruction of others, but for the honour that is due.
14 And he conducted them with a cloud by day: and all the night with a light of fire.
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VERS. 14.-- *In a cloud.* This they judged to be future. *The day* is Christ, yet he is hidden from the faithless by the *cloud* of the flesh; and as for them the *cloud* against the heat of the sun, so for us Christ through the incarnation gives refreshment against the heat of vices. *All the night,* all the time of life. *In the light of fire.* The fire of the Holy Spirit keeps Christians in this world by the brightness of his name.
15 He struck the rock in the wilderness: and gave them to drink, as out of the great deep.
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VERS. 15.-- *The rock.* *In the wilderness.* Before, the water of the sea was as a rock, now the rock is a fountain. *In the wilderness,* where the gift must needs be the more welcome. *He gave them drink.* As cattle, not as men, because they gave no thanks.
16 He brought forth water out of the rock: and made streams run down as rivers.
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VERS. 16.-- *As.* The water which comes forth from Christ fails by no diminishing, but becomes a fountain of water springing up unto life everlasting.
17 And they added yet more sin against him: they provoked the most High to wrath in the place without water.
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VERS. 17.-- *To sin yet more.* They added this, that amid so many benefits they did not believe: and that this might be understood as the greatest sin, when the Lord had said in the Gospel: *The Spirit shall convince the world of sin,* he added by way of exposition: *Of sin indeed, because they believe not in me*. As therefore he there calls sin *not to believe,* so here by *to sin* he means, not to believe. *Unto wrath.* Not believing that God could do hard things for them, which is most grievous in the sight of God; so we too, washed by baptism, provoke God to wrath. *In the waterless place.* Either in another wilderness according to the letter, or rather in themselves, because although the skins were full of water from the rock, their minds nevertheless were dry.
18 And they tempted God in their hearts, by asking meat for their desires.
19 And they spoke ill of God: they said: Can God furnish a table in the wilderness?
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VERS. 19.-- *A table.* Mystically, the refreshment of wisdom, or the body of Christ.
20 Because he struck the rock, and the waters gushed out, and the streams overflowed. Can he also give bread, or provide a table for his people?
21 Therefore the Lord heard, and was angry: and a fire was kindled against Jacob, and wrath came up against Israel.
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VERS. 21.-- *Therefore he heard.* In that, vengeance being deferred, he gave first what they were asking, lest he should seem not to be able. *He deferred.* The punishment; giving first what it was asking, though by way of tempting, lest he should seem not to be able: and after he had given, fire, that is wrath, went up upon Israel. And this is what he said before: *A fire was kindled in Jacob.*
22 Because they believed not in God: and trusted not in his salvation.
23 And he had commanded the clouds from above, and had opened the doors of heaven.
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VERS. 23.-- *And he commanded.* Both were set down briefly, namely that he heard, and that wrath went up; here he begins to tell it openly. And first he follows out how he heard, afterwards in the following part how he took vengeance. *And the gates of heaven.* The gates are the preachers themselves, by whom entry is made into heaven; or the Scriptures. *He opened.* Because he gave his Spirit to his own, that they might understand the Scriptures.
24 And had rained down manna upon them to eat, and had given them the bread of heaven.
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VERS. 24.-- *Manna to eat.* It signifies the bread which came down from heaven, which is the food of angels: which, that man might eat it, *the Word was made flesh*, who is rained upon the whole world through the evangelical clouds, and, their hearts being opened as heavenly gates, is preached to the believing Church, not to the tempting Synagogue. *Manna, what is this?* because this food is sought after with wonder, and is known to be the body of Christ. *The bread of heaven.* No other than Christ, by whom the heavenly ones, that is the angels, are refreshed in the contemplation of him; and this bread, that is the Word, on which great food the angels are fed, made milk through the flesh, man eats.
25 Man ate the bread of angels: he sent them provisions in abundance.
26 He removed the south wind from heaven: and by his power brought in the southwest wind.
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VERS. 26.-- *The south-west wind.* Because the quails are there.
27 And he rained upon them flesh as dust: and feathered fowls like as the sand of the sea.
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VERS. 27.-- *And he rained upon them,* etc. So also a little faith, etc., *as far as* whence: *If I have told you earthly things, and you believe me not, how, if I tell you heavenly things?* etc. *As dust.* *Dust* here signifies the subtlety of understanding, which climbs to the things above. *Sand,* the countless abundance of prudence seasoned with the savour of salt. *Feathered fowls.* Heavenly desires, on which the soul is fed and grows fat: these we can receive within the enclosures of the Church, whence he adds:
28 And they fell in the midst of their camp, round about their pavilions.
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VERS. 28.-- *And they fell in the midst of their camp.* Signifying by this that the winds come of their own accord to men, and carry to them the words divinely sent, that they may hear them in their own seats, and about their tents: because their sound went out into all the earth.
29 So they did eat, and were filled exceedingly, and he gave them their desire:
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VERS. 29.-- *And they did eat.* They were convicted, who had thought this impossible to God.
30 they were not defrauded of that which they craved. As yet their meat was in their mouth:
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VERS. 30.-- *As yet their meats,* etc., *and the wrath of God,* etc. Of the punishments, and of their feigned returnings, through fear of penalties: and yet the sentence of God is tempered by mercy. *Their meats.* The manna, the quails. *He hindered the chosen of Israel.* That is, he hindered them from profiting those whom they desired to counsel with a father's affection. Or rather, he fettered them, that the chosen might bear troubles together with them for an example, not of righteousness only, but of patience also. *He hindered.* By their murmuring, as Moses, who said: *Can we bring forth water for you out of the rock?*
31 And the wrath of God came upon them. And he slew the fat ones amongst them, and brought down the chosen men of Israel.
32 In all these things they sinned still: and they behaved not for his wondrous works.
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VERS. 32.-- *In all these things they sinned still, and they believed not in his wondrous works.* Corrected after all these things, the sins are the graver, which ever increase.
33 And their days were consumed in vanity, and their years in haste.
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VERS. 33.-- *And they failed,* etc. Whereas they might, by believing, have had their days in truth without failing. *Their days in vanity and their years.* From the likeness of him who dies at his rising: he was born in vain. *With haste.* And the life which seems the longer passes quickly.
34 When he slew them, then they sought him: and they returned, and came to him early in the morning.
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VERS. 34.-- *They sought him.* Not those slain, but those left. Yet he speaks thus because they are one people, as of one body. *Early they came to him,* etc. Diligently, or before the light; whence: *It is vain for you to rise before the light.* The godly man prays in the light, the ungodly before the light. *They sought.* They returned, they came. All these things for the sake of gaining temporal goods and of avoiding evils: and so not God, but those things were worshipped.
35 And they remembered that God was their helper: and the most high God their redeemer.
36 And they loved him with their mouth: and with their tongue they lied unto him:
37 But their heart was not right with him: nor were they counted faithful in his covenant.
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VERS. 37.-- *Neither were they counted faithful in the covenant,* etc. He who truly believes does works: whence faith is so called because the things said are done; whence he says: *Nor faithful in his precepts.*
38 But he is merciful, and will forgive their sins: and will not destroy them. And many a time did he turn away his anger: and did not kindle all his wrath.
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VERS. 38.-- *But he is merciful, and will be propitious.* Here the wicked promise themselves impunity, but there is mercy even for the wicked, yet before the judgment, because he makes the sun to rise upon the good and the evil. So he spared that nation also, that he might not root it out utterly, but it abides in the succession of those that come after, as Cain when he had received the sign, that none should slay him. *Their sins,* etc. Of the people, which is the same in the succession of the sons; as also afterwards *he took them away out of Egypt, and brought them into the mountain of his sanctification*, whereas not them, save in the succession. So here too, when it is said: *he will be propitious to their sins,* we understand that also to be fulfilled which is said by the Apostle: *The remnant shall be saved*, which shall believe in Christ, and this he foresaw here, when he adds: *And he scattered them not. And he abounded that he might turn away,* etc., because: *He kindled not all his wrath,* etc. That is, he did not punish them as much as they deserved: because he forgave even this, that they slew the Son.
39 And he remembered that they are flesh: a wind that goeth and returneth not.
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VERS. 39.-- *A spirit that goeth and returneth not,* etc. Therefore he calls them back by grace, because by themselves they cannot return: whence in the Proverbs it is said of the way of iniquity: *All that walk in it shall not return*, namely by themselves, but by grace they shall be called back. This is the wandering sheep, which was brought back to the flock upon the shoulders of the loving shepherd.
40 How often did they provoke him in the desert: and move him to wrath in the place without water?
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VERS. 40.-- *How often.* Being about to tell the plagues of Egypt, wrought for their sake, by comparing their evils with the benefits of God, he says that they forgot, and that they tempted God. Because they are flesh, or a spirit that goes, how often then? as though to say, they provoked him many times.
41 And they turned back and tempted God: and grieved the holy one of Israel.
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VERS. 41.-- *And they turned back,* etc. He repeats their unbelief, that he may call to mind what plagues God brought upon the Egyptians for their sake, whence they ought to have been not ungrateful.
42 They remembered not his hand, in the day that he redeemed them from the hand of him that afflicted them:
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VERS. 42.-- *From the hand of tribulation.* Tribulation is wont to be kept in memory, but not by them. Beautifully he sets the hand of God against the hand of Pharao, saying: *His hand and from the hand of;* which differ greatly. Mystical interpretations from this place.
43 How he wrought his signs in Egypt, and his wonders in the field of Tanis.
44 And he turned their rivers into blood, and their showers that they might not drink.
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VERS. 44, 45.-- *And he turned,* etc. *He sent upon them wrath,* etc. Here he begins to set forth the plagues wrought in Egypt for the deliverance of the Jews, and he sets down ten plagues, as in Exodus ten. Yet certain things are set down here which are not in Exodus, which we cannot interpret save figuratively, where also the things that were done are called parables, as he is often wont not to follow the order of the history, but to add other things, or to change certain things for the sake of the signification. *Water* therefore *into blood* signifies to think carnally of the causes of things. *The dog-fly.* They are dog-like manners. *The frog.* Talkative vanity.
45 He sent amongst them divers sorts of flies, which devoured them: and frogs which destroyed them.
46 And he gave up their fruits to the blast, and their labours to the locust.
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VERS. 46, 47.-- *Blight.* Which others interpret as rust, harms in secret, and is likened to a vice that hardly appears, such as to trust much in oneself. For a noxious breath works this in the fruits unseen: so in manners does hidden pride, when he thinks himself to be something who is nothing. *The locust.* Malice hurting with the mouth, namely by faithless testimony. *Hail.* It is iniquity carrying off the goods of another; whence thefts, robberies, plunderings. But the waster himself is more wasted by his own vice. *Frost.* The vice by which charity toward one's neighbour freezes in the darkness of folly as with the cold of night.
47 And he destroyed their vineyards with hail, and their mulberry trees with hoarfrost.
48 And he gave up their cattle to the hail, and their stock to the fire.
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VERS. 48.-- *Fire.* Which in Exodus is not taken save with the hail in the lightnings, that it might hurt the fruits: which nevertheless is not read to have burned the possessions, signifies the monstrousness of anger, by which murder also is done. By the death of the cattle the loss of chastity is signified. Concupiscence, from which offspring arises, is common to us with the beasts: to have this tamed and ordered is the virtue of chastity. *The death of the firstborn.* It is the loss of the righteousness by which each man is sociable to the human race. The Egyptians were smitten with ten plagues against the ten commandments written on the tables. And here are ten plagues, though they be not set down in that order, but in place of three which are in Exodus, that is the sciniphs, the boils, the darkness, which are not here. Three others are here which are not there, rust, frost, and fire. For such things are frequently varied for a fitting understanding. *Signs.* They are, upon hard hearts, as it were the traces of a stamp impressed. *Wonders,* which betokened certain things to come. *Thanis,* a city, the humble commandment, which is necessary for us here, that in the time to come we may be raised up. *And he gave to the blight.* These things are not read in Exodus, therefore let them be expounded only by a mystical interpretation. *The locust.* Devouring one another, it signifies detractors, who out of envy gnaw the fruits of others. *Their mulberry trees with frost.* The mulberry is of a warm nature, by which charity is understood, which is killed by the frost. *To the hail* The things the hail could not hurt, that is the soft ones, Exodus afterwards says were eaten by the locusts. *He delivered up.* By the death of the cattle the fall of fools is shown. *To fire. Fire* is covetousness, which lays waste the possession, that is, the state of the mind.
49 And he sent upon them the wrath of his indignation: indignation and wrath and trouble, which he sent by evil angels.
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VERS. 49.-- *The wrath of his indignation,* etc. The order of vengeance: first God is angry at their sins, and when they are not pricked in heart, then he abandons the malice of man in his own indignation, wrath and tribulation, that they may be afflicted by their own adversities who do not obey God, as it is said there: *Therefore he delivered them up unto a reprobate sense*. The indignation of man belongs to swollen pride; wrath, to unspeakable audacity; tribulation, to confounded despair: then through the devil they are hurled headlong into unlawful assaults, stripped of the defence of God. *By evil angels.* By the judgment of God these things were done, etc., *as far as* by evil angels therefore God punishes both good and evil men, but the good with bodily punishments only, the evil with punishments both bodily and spiritual.
50 He made a way for a path to his anger: he spared not their souls from death, and their cattle he shut up in death.
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VERS. 50.-- *Of his wrath.* There was a path of the wrath of God, by which with hidden equity he might punish the Egyptians; and for it God made a way, that he might bring them forth as out of hidden places, through evil angels, into open crimes, and so punish them openly.
51 And he killed all the firstborn in the land of Egypt: the firstfruits of all their labour in the tabernacles of Cham.
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VERS. 51.-- *The firstborn in Egypt.* The firstborn are the highest commandments, as: Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart; and when these are not kept we are bereaved of the offspring of reason.
52 And he took away his own people as sheep: and guided them in the wilderness like a flock.
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VERS. 52.-- *And he took away his people as sheep, and he led them like a flock in the desert.* Mystically. This is done within us also, where, being taught, we are carried over in mind out of the power of darkness into the kingdom of God, sheep in spiritual pastures. *And he took away.* In that he led those brought out of bondage into the land of promise; and again they offend.
53 And he brought them out in hope and they feared not: and the sea overwhelmed their enemies.
54 And he brought them into the mountain of his sanctuary: the mountain which his right hand had purchased. And he cast out the Gentiles before them: and by lot divided to them their land by a line of distribution.
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VERS. 54.-- *And he brought them into the mountain of his sanctification.* Not the same men whom he took away, but those of the same name and nation; yet it signifies that many were converted to the Church, which he would rather have understood; she is the mountain which Christ purchased. *And he cast out the nations from before them,* etc. Or the malignant spirits. All which things Christ cast out from before the faithful; *and he divided them the land by lot.* By this it is signified that one and the same Spirit works all things in us, dividing to every one according as he will.
55 And he made the tribes of Israel to dwell in their tabernacles.
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VERS. 55.-- *In their tents.* In which sins reigned, he made virtues to reign.
56 Yet they tempted, and provoked the most high God: and they kept not his testimonies.
57 And they turned away, and kept not the covenant: even like their fathers they were turned aside as a crooked bow.
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VERS. 57.-- *Even as their fathers were turned,* etc. Throughout he speaks as though of the same men: yet now of those in the land of promise, whose fathers they were who embittered him in the desert. *A crooked bow,* etc. The perverse intention of the mind, as against God, who had said: *Thou shalt not have strange gods*, which he opens more fully. *Provoked unto wrath,* or, *into a crooked bow,* which is unbent with difficulty, and they themselves easily went back. Or, *a crooked bow,* which does not shoot from afar, but turns its darts upon itself, that is, the malice of the deceitful.
58 They provoked him to anger on their hills: and moved him to jealousy with their graven things.
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VERS. 58.-- *To jealousy.* Or they were jealous; another reading, when they give the honour of God to another.
59 God heard, and despised them, and he reduced Israel exceedingly as it were to nothing.
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VERS. 59.-- *God heard.* Of the vengeance in the land of promise, which was turned back also upon the very men through whom he punished.
60 And he put away the tabernacle of Silo, his tabernacle where he dwelt among men.
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VERS. 60.-- *And he put away the tabernacle.* At that time of Eli the priest, when they were overcome by the Allophyli, and the ark of the Lord was taken, and they themselves laid waste with a great slaughter. For it is read in the book of Kings that there fell then of the people thirty thousand footmen. *He put away the tabernacle of Silo.* Which was in Silo, etc., *as far as* but because they did not attend to it, nor made a tabernacle for God: therefore the Lord deservedly put it away. *He dwelt among men.* Since therefore there was nothing worthy in which he might dwell, he put away that which he had appointed not for his own sake, but for theirs. So he forsakes our bodies, which the Holy Spirit inhabits while they are well treated.
61 And he delivered their strength into captivity: and their beauty into the hands of the enemy.
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VERS. 61.-- *And he delivered up.* For if the good too are delivered into captivity along with sinners, it is a discipline; they are not captives in mind. Or, delivered to the enemy, but free and joined to God. *Of their virtues.* He diminished the liberty of choice, and took away the virtues in the wicked, which is not so in the good, although at times they are taken captive bodily along with the wicked.
62 And he shut up his people under the sword: and he despised his inheritance.
63 Fire consumed their young men: and their maidens were not lamented.
64 Their priests fell by the sword: and their widows did not mourn.
65 And the Lord was awaked as one out of sleep, and like a mighty man that hath been surfeited with wine.
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VERS. 65.-- *And he was awakened.* He ascribes the manners of men to the Lord, for the sake of explaining the matter. *As one asleep.* This is said in the person of the mad, who think thus, when he does not come to the aid of those in peril, that he is drunk with wine, when he does not come to their aid so quickly. And in truth he does sleep for those who so madly think, and is a stranger, both to the negligent and to the unbelieving, who rouse him by no voice of praise or of work. But he is roused to vengeance by evil deeds, as here by the sins of those who set the ark among the idols. *As a mighty man,* because men are then quick to wrath, and mighty for feats of strength, when after a debauch they rise from sleep. *And he was awakened.* Christ, drunk with the wine of the passion, sleeping in the sepulchre, was awakened from death, as a mighty man in the resurrection. *As one asleep.* He seemed to sleep when he gave his people into the hands of those whom he hates: where it is said to them: *Where is thy God?*
66 And he smote his enemies on the hinder parts: he put them to an everlasting reproach.
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VERS. 66.-- *And he smote iniquity.* He shall be tormented with this punishment, etc., *as far as: reproach* indeed *everlasting he gave to them.*
67 And he rejected the tabernacle of Joseph: and chose not the tribe of Ephraim:
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VERS. 67.-- *And he put away.* Of king David, and of the seat of the kingdom. He did not say, etc., *as far as* thus he proceeds from the beginning of the election of the Hebrew nation down to Christ.
68 But he chose the tribe of Juda, mount Sion which he loved.
69 And he built his sanctuary as of unicorns, in the land which he founded for ever.
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VERS. 69.-- *As,* etc. Unicorns are they whose firm hope is raised up unto that one thing, of which it is said: *One thing I have asked of the Lord, this will I seek after. His sanctuary.* It is the holy people, a royal priesthood.
70 And he chose his servant David, and took him from the flocks of sheep: he brought him from following the ewes great with young,
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VERS. 70.-- *David his servant.* Who of Juda, etc., *as far as: the teeth* of the Church are they through whom she speaks, or through whom she passes the rest into her own body as though by eating. *A flock of shorn sheep* it is called, because it laid down the burdens of the world as fleeces, and laid at the feet of the Apostles the prices of the goods it had sold; *coming up from the washing* of baptism, it brings forth twins, that is, the works of the twofold charity; whence: *there was not a barren one among them;* from these Christ was carried over, but he feeds among the Gentiles the flocks which are Jacob and Israel.
71 To feed Jacob his servant and Israel his inheritance.
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VERS. 71.-- *Jacob. Israel his inheritance.* He repeats it: Unless it be said that now, according to this present state, Jacob is a *servant:* when he shall see face to face, an *inheritance.* Whence also he received the name: for Israel is so called from the contemplation of God. He carried him over to this end, that he might feed him, and so he did.
72 And he fed them in the innocence of his heart: and conducted them by the skilfulness of his hands.
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VERS. 72.-- *And he fed them,* etc. It seems perhaps, etc., *as far as* and he taught this which he did. ## PSAL. LXXVIII.