Sermon 125

SERMO 125

AGAINST JOHN (CHAP. 5; 9):
"About the five porticoes, where a multitude of the sick lay;"
AND ABOUT THE POOL OF SILOAM

The same things are not repeated in vain by the expounder of the Scriptures.

Neither crude things are repeated for your ears nor for your hearts; however, they renew the affection of the listener and in a certain way, by being recalled, they renew us; nor do we tire of hearing the things that are known, because the things of the Lord are always sweet. The explanation of the divine Scriptures is like the divine Scriptures themselves; even if they are known, they are read nonetheless for the purpose of remembrance. Thus, their explanation, even if known, must still be repeated, so that those who have forgotten may be reminded, or those who perhaps have not heard may hear; and those who retain what they are accustomed to hearing, by repetition, may ensure they cannot forget. For we remember that we have already spoken about this chapter of the Gospel to your Charity. Nor is it wearisome, however, to recall the same things to you, just as it was not wearisome to repeat the same reading to you. The Apostle Paul says in one of his Epistles: "To write the same things to you is indeed not tedious for me, but for you it is necessary." Thus, for us also to say the same things to you is not tedious for us, but for you it is safe.

The five porches symbolized the law of Moses. The impotence of the law to heal. Why the law was given.

Five porticoes, in which the sick lay, signify the law, which was first given to the Jews and the people of Israel through God's servant Moses. For indeed, Moses himself, the minister of the law, made five books. Therefore, because of the number of books that he wrote, the five porticoes symbolized the law. But since the law was not given to heal the sick, but to reveal and show; for thus the Apostle says: "If there had been a law given which could have given life, verily righteousness should have been by the law; but the Scripture has concluded all under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe"; therefore, in those porticoes the sick lay, they were not healed. For what does he say? "If there had been a law given which could have given life." Therefore those porticoes, which symbolized the law, could not heal the sick. Someone says to me: Why then was it given? The Apostle Paul himself expounded it: "The scripture has concluded all under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe." For those who were sick thought themselves to be well. They received the law, which they could not fulfill; they learned in which sickness they were, and they implored the doctor's hands; they wanted to be healed, because they realized they were ill; which they would not realize unless they could not fulfill the given law. For an innocent man seemed to himself, and out of the same pride of false innocence, he became more insane. Therefore, to crush pride, and to expose it, the law was given; not to free the sick, but to convict the proud. Therefore, let Your Charity attend: the law was given to reveal illnesses, not to remove them. Therefore those sick ones, who could secretly be sick in their own homes, if those five porticoes did not exist, were exposed to the eyes of all in those porticoes, but they were not healed by the porticoes. Therefore, the law was useful to reveal sins, because a man, having become more guilty through the transgression of the law, could, with pride subdued, implore the help of the merciful one. Attend to the Apostle: "The law entered that the offense might abound; but where sin abounded, grace did much more abound." What is: "the law entered that the offense might abound"? As he says elsewhere: "For where there is no law, there is no transgression." A man can be called a sinner before the law, but cannot be called a transgressor. But when he has received the law and then sinned, he is found not only a sinner but also a transgressor. Therefore, when transgression is added to sin, the offense abounds. When the offense abounds, human pride finally learns to submit and confess to God, and say: "I am infirm." Also to say those words of the Psalm, which only a humbled soul says: "I said, Lord, be merciful unto me; heal my soul, for I have sinned against Thee." Therefore, let the infirm soul say this, at least convinced through transgression; and not healed, but shown by the law. Listen also to Paul himself showing you that the law is good, and yet without the grace of Christ it does not free from sin. For the law can prohibit and command; it cannot bring the medicine to heal what prevents man from fulfilling the law, but grace does that. For the Apostle says: "For I delight in the law of God after the inward man." That is, I now see that what the law reproves is evil, and what the law commands is good. "For I delight in the law of God after the inward man. But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin." This is from the punishment of sin, from the inheritance of death, from the condemnation of Adam, it opposes the law of the mind and captivates to the law of sin, which is in the members. He has been convicted; he received the law to be convicted; see how it profited him that he was convicted. Hear the following words: "O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me from the body of this death? I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord."

One sick person healed by the stirred water, what does it signify?

Pay attention therefore. Those porticoes symbolized the law, carrying the sick, not healing them; exposing, not curing. But who cured the sick? He who descended into the pool. When did the sick descend into the pool? When the Angel gave a sign by the stirring of the water. For that pool was sanctified in such a way that an Angel would come and stir the water. People saw the water; but from the stirring of the troubled water, they understood the presence of the Angel. If anyone then descended, he would be cured. Why then was that sick man not cured? Let us consider his words: "I have no man," he said, "to put me into the pool when the water is stirred; for while I am coming, another descends before me." Therefore, could you not descend afterward if another descends before you? It was signified here that only one was cured at the stirring of the water. Whoever descended first would alone be cured; whoever descended afterward at that movement of the water would not be healed; but would wait until it was stirred again. What does this sacrament mean then? For it is not without cause. Pay attention, beloved. The waters are set in the Apocalypse as a figure of peoples. For when John saw many waters, he inquired in the Apocalypse what it meant, and it was said to him that they were peoples. Therefore, that water signified the people of the Jews. For as that people was held by the five books of Moses in the law, so that water was also surrounded by five porticoes. When was the water stirred? When the people of the Jews were disturbed. And when was the people of the Jews disturbed, unless when the Lord Jesus Christ came? The passion of the Lord, the stirring of the water. For the Jews were disturbed when the Lord suffered. Behold, what was read just now pertains to this very disturbance. The Jews wanted to kill him, not only because he did these things on the Sabbath, but because he called himself the Son of God, making himself equal to God. For Christ called himself the Son of God in a different way than it was said to men: "I said: you are gods, and all of you are sons of the Most High." For if he made himself the Son of God in the same way as any man can be called a son of God (for by the grace of God men are called sons of God), the Jews would not be angry. But because they understood him to say he was the Son of God in a different way, according to that: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God"; and according to what the Apostle says: "Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God"; they saw a man and were angry because he made himself equal to God. But he knew he was equal, yet where they could not see. What they saw, they wanted to crucify; what they did not see, they were judged by it. What did the Jews see? What the apostles also saw when Philip said, "Show us the Father, and it is enough for us." But what did the Jews not see? What the apostles themselves did not see when the Lord replied, "Have I been so long with you, and you do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father." Therefore, what the Jews could not see in him, they considered him a proud and impious man, making himself equal to God. There was disturbance, the water was stirred, and the Angel had come. For the Lord was also called the Angel of great counsel, because he was the messenger of the Father's will. For "Angel" in Greek is "Messenger" in Latin. And you have the Lord saying that he announces to us the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, the Angel of great counsel had come, but the Lord of all angels. And because of this, he was called an Angel because he took on flesh; but he is the Lord of angels because all things were made by him, and without him, nothing was made. For if all things, then also the angels. And therefore, he himself was not made because all things were made by him. What was made was made by the operation of the Word. The flesh that was made, the mother of Christ, could not have been born except by the Word, which was afterward born of her, being created.

God's rest on the seventh day. The six ages of the world. How God rested, and always works.

The Jews were therefore troubled. What is this? Why is he doing these things on the Sabbaths? And especially at the very words of the Lord: My Father works even until now, and I work. It troubled them because they understood carnally, because God rested on the seventh day from all His works. For it is written in Genesis, and it is very well written, and it is reasonable why it is written. But they, thinking as if God had become tired and rested on the seventh day after everything, and therefore blessed it because He was refreshed from weariness, did not understand, being foolish, that He who made all things by the word could not be fatigued. Let them read and tell me how God could be made weary by saying: Let it be done; and it was done. Today, if a man were to do in this way as God did, who would be wearied? He said: Let there be light; and there was light. Again: Let there be a firmament; and it was so. Or if He said and it was not done, then He was fatigued. Elsewhere briefly: He said, and they were made; He commanded, and they were created. He therefore who makes thus, how does He labor? If He does not labor, how does He rest? But on that Sabbath, where it is said that God rested from all His works, in the rest of God, our rest was signified; because there will be a Sabbath of this world when the six ages have passed. The ages of the world pass like six days. One day passed from Adam to Noah; another passed from the flood to Abraham; a third from Abraham to David; a fourth from David to the Babylonian captivity; a fifth from the Babylonian captivity to the advent of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now the sixth day is being carried out. We are in the sixth age, in the sixth day. Therefore, let us be reformed to the image of God, because man was made in the image of God on the sixth day. What formation made there, reformation makes in us; and what creation made there, recreation makes in us. After this day in which we are now, after this age, rest is coming which is promised to the saints, which was prefigured in those days. Because indeed, after all that He made in the world, He made nothing new in creation afterwards. Those creations themselves will be converted and changed. For since creatures were established, nothing else has been added. Nevertheless, unless He who made it governs the world, what has been made would fall; He cannot but manage what He made. Because nothing was added to creation, He is said to have rested from all His works; because indeed He does not cease to govern what He made, the Lord rightly said: My Father works even until now. Let your Charity pay attention. He completed, He is said to have rested; for He completed works and added nothing. He governs what He made: therefore, He does not cease. But with as much ease as He made, with such ease He governs. Do not think, brothers, that He did not labor when creating, but He labors when governing; just as they labor on a ship who build the ship, and labor those who steer; for they are men. But He, with as much ease as He said, and they were done, with such ease and judgment, He governs all things through the Word.

God's providence in the ordination of evils.

Not because human affairs seem perverse to us should it appear that there is no governance of human affairs. For all men are ordered in their places: but it seems to each that they do not have order. You only see what you want to be: for how you want to be, the artist knows where to place you. Consider the painter. Various colors are placed before him, and he knows where to place each color. Certainly the sinner wished to be a black color; does the artist not know the order where to place him? How much order does he arrange out of the black color? How many ornaments does the painter make from it? He makes hair, he makes a beard, he makes eyebrows from it; he does not make a forehead except from white. You see what you want to be: do not worry where he will place you, who does not know how to err, he knows where to place you. For we see this happening in the world through these laws. Someone wanted to be a burglar: the law of the judge knows that he acted against the law; the law of the judge knows where to place him: it orders him very well. He indeed lived badly: but the law did not order badly. From a burglar he will be a miner: how much work is constructed from the labor of a miner? His punishment as a condemned man is the ornament of the city. So therefore, God knows where to place you. Do not think that you disturb God's plan if you want to be perverse. He who knew to create you does not know how to order you? It is good to strive so that you are placed in a good place. What was said about Judas by the Apostle? He went to his own place. Certainly working by divine providence, because through an evil will he wanted to be evil, God did not make evil by ordering. But since he himself wanted to be an evil sinner, he did what he wanted, but suffered what he did not want. In that he did what he wanted, his sin is found; in that he suffered what he did not want, God's order is praised.

The disturbance of the Jews from a twofold cause. The sick man cured by descending into the pool. Only one healed.

Why did I say this? So that you might understand, brothers, what was excellently said by the Lord Jesus Christ: My Father works even until now. Because He does not abandon the creature which He made. And He said: As He works, so do I work. There He already signified Himself as equal to God. My Father, He said, works even until now, and I work. That carnal sense was disturbed about the Sabbath. For they thought that the Lord, being tired, had rested and did not work. They hear: My Father works even until now, and are disturbed. And I work: He makes Himself equal to God, they are disturbed. But do not be dismayed now. The water is troubled, the sick person is about to be healed. What is this? Therefore they are disturbed so that the Lord may suffer. The Lord suffers, His precious blood is shed, the sinner is redeemed, grace is given to the one who sins and says: Wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from the body of this death? The grace of God through our Lord Jesus Christ. But how is he cured? If he descends. For so was that pool, where one descended, not ascended. For there could be such pools, so constructed, that one ascended to them. But why was that one made so, where one descended? Because the Lord’s passion seeks the humble. Let the humble descend, and let him not be proud, if he wishes to be healed. But why one? Because the Church is unique throughout the whole world, unity is saved. Therefore where one is saved, unity is signified. Through the "one" understand unity. Therefore do not depart from unity, if you do not wish to be excluded from this salvation.

Weakness of thirty years. The perfection of justice is signified by the number forty. Love of the world is not compatible with the love of God.

What does it mean that he had been infirm for thirty-eight years? I know, brothers, that I have already said these things; but those who read forget, how much more those who hear rarely? Therefore, let your Charity attend a little. In the number forty the completion of justice is figured. The completion of justice, because here we live in labor, in hardships, in continence, in fastings, in vigils, in tribulations; that is the exercise of justice, to endure this time, and to fast in a certain way from this age; not from the food of flesh, which we rarely do; but from the love of the world, which we must always do. He, therefore, fulfills the law, who abstains from this world. For he cannot love what is eternal, unless he ceases to love what is temporal. Consider the love of a man: think of it as the hand of the soul. If it holds something, it cannot hold another. But so that it can hold what is given, let it release what it holds. This I say, see that I say it openly: He who loves the world cannot love God; his hand is occupied. God says to him: Hold what I give. He does not want to release what he held: he cannot receive what is offered. Did I say: Let no one possess anything? If he can, if perfection demands this of him, let him possess nothing. If he cannot, hindered by some necessity, let him possess, but not be possessed; let him hold, but not be held; let him be lord of his belongings, not a servant; as the Apostle says: Furthermore, brothers, the time is short; it remains that those who have wives be as though they had none; and those who buy, as though they possessed not; and those who rejoice, as though they rejoiced not; and those who weep, as though they wept not; and those who use this world, as though they used it not: for the fashion of this world passes away. I want you to be without anxiety. What does it mean: Do not love what you possess in this world? Do not let your hand be held, where God is to be held. Let your love not be occupied, by which you can tend to God, and adhere to Him who created you.

The possession of temporal things whereby the innocent is recognized.

You say, and answer me: And God knows that I possess innocently. Temptation proves. What you possess is disturbed, and you blaspheme. We used to suffer such things now. What you possess is disturbed, and you are not found as you were, and you show different things in your voice now, and different things the day before in your voice. And would that you at least defend your own with a cry, and not try to usurp another's with audacity; and what is worse, to avoid blame, you say that what is another's is yours. But what is the need? I advise, I say this, brothers, and I advise brotherly; God commands, and I remind because I am reminded. He terrifies me, who does not allow me to be silent. He requires from me what he gave. For he gave to be distributed, not to be kept. But if I keep and hide it, he says to me: Wicked and lazy servant, why did you not give the money to the exchangers, and I coming would have collected it with interest? And what would it benefit me because I lost nothing from what I received? It is little to my Lord, he is greedy: but the greed of God is our salvation. He is greedy, he seeks his coins, he gathers his image. You would have given, he says, the money to the exchangers, and I coming would have collected it with interest. And if perhaps forgetfulness would make me not to remind you; or the trials and tribulations we suffer, would remind you. Certainly, you heard the word of God. Blessed be the Lord and his glory. For you are gathered, and are suspended on the word of God's steward. Do not look to our flesh, through which it is offered to you; because the hungry do not pay attention to the cheapness of the vessel, but to the dearness of the food. God proves you. You are gathered, praise the word of God; temptation will prove how you hear: you will have dealings in which it will be shown what you are like. For even he who shouts offensively today, listened gladly yesterday. Therefore, I warn, therefore I say, therefore I do not keep silent, my brothers, because the time of questioning will come. For the Lord questions the just and the unjust. Certainly, you sang this, certainly we sang together: The Lord questions the just and the unjust. And what follows? But he who loves iniquity hates his own soul. And in another place: In the thoughts of the wicked there will be interrogation. Not where I question you, there God questions. I question your tongue, God questions your thought. He knows how you hear, and he knows how to demand, who commands to give. He wanted me to be a distributor, he reserved the demand for himself. To admonish, to teach, to correct is ours; truly to save and to crown, or to condemn and to send into hell, is not ours. The judge will deliver to the minister, the minister into prison. Truly I say to you, you will not come out from there, until you pay the last penny.

The number forty in the fasting of Moses, Elijah, and Christ. Lent before Easter. Fifty days after Easter.

Let us return therefore to the matter. The perfection of righteousness is demonstrated by the number forty. What is it to fulfill the number forty? To abstain from the love of this world. Abstinence from temporal things, so they are not perniciously loved, is almost like fasting from this world. Therefore, the Lord fasted for forty days, and Moses, and Elijah. He who gave his servants the ability to fast for forty days, could he not have fasted for eighty or a hundred days? Why did he not wish to do more than he granted to his servants, unless because in that number forty there is the mystery of fasting, abstaining from this world? What does this mean? What the Apostle said: The world is crucified to me, and I to the world. He, therefore, fulfills the number forty. And what did the Lord show? Because Moses did this, Elijah did this, Christ did this, and the law, the Prophets, and the Gospel teach this; so that you might not think there is something different in the law, something different in the Prophets, and something different in the Gospel. All Scriptures teach you nothing else but abstinence from the love of the world, so that your love may run to God. It is signified that the law teaches this, for Moses fasted for forty days. It is signified that the Prophets teach this, for Elijah fasted for forty days. It is signified that the Gospel teaches this, for the Lord fasted for forty days. Therefore, those three appeared on the mountain, the Lord in the middle, Moses and Elijah on the sides. Why? Because the Gospel itself has testimony from the law and the Prophets. But why is the perfection of righteousness in the number forty? It is said in the Psalter: O God, I will sing a new song to you; on a psaltery of ten strings I will sing praises to you. Which signifies the ten commandments of the law, which the Lord did not come to destroy, but to fulfill. Now the law is understood to extend throughout the world, having four corners: East, West, South, and North, as Scripture says. Hence also the vessel which carried all depicted animals, which was shown to Peter when it was said: Kill and eat, so that the Gentiles who would believe and enter the body of the Church might be shown, just as what we eat enters our body, it being let down by four lines from heaven (these being the four parts of the world) shows that the whole world would believe. So, in the number forty is abstinence from the world. This is the fullness of the law: but the fullness of the law is love. Therefore, we fast for forty days before Easter. For it is a sign before our laborious life in this world, where in labors and hardships, and in abstinence, we fulfill the law. After Easter, that is, we celebrate the days of the Lord's Resurrection, signifying our resurrection. Therefore, fifty days are celebrated: for the denarius reward is added to forty, and it makes fifty. How is the denarius a reward? Have you not read that those who were hired for the vineyard, whether those who came at the first hour, or the sixth, or the last hour, could receive nothing but a denarius? When the reward is added to our righteousness, we will be in fifty. Then we will have nothing to do but to praise God. Therefore, during those days we say Alleluia. For Alleluia is the praise of God. In this fragility of mortality, in this number forty here, as before the resurrection, let us groan in prayers, so that then we may praise. Now is the time of longing, then will be the time of embracing and enjoying. Let us not fail in the time of forty, so that we may rejoice in the time of fifty.

The law is not fulfilled without love.

Who is it that fulfills the law, if not the one who has charity? Ask the Apostle: "Charity is the fulfillment of the law." For the whole law is fulfilled in one word, in that it is written: "Love your neighbor as yourself." But the commandment of charity is dual: "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind." This is the great commandment. The second is like it: "You shall love your neighbor as yourself." These are the words of the Lord in the Gospel: "On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets." Without this twofold love, the law cannot be fulfilled. As long as the law is not fulfilled, there is infirmity. Therefore, he who was sick for thirty-eight years lacked two things. What does it mean: "He lacked two things"? He did not fulfill those two commandments. What is the use of fulfilling other things if those are not fulfilled? Do you have thirty-eight? If you do not have those two, the rest will profit you nothing. You lack the two without which the others are worthless if you do not have the two commandments that lead to salvation. If I speak in the tongues of men and angels but do not have charity, I am a sounding brass or a clanging cymbal. And if I know all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so as to move mountains, but do not have charity, I am nothing. And if I distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I give my body to be burned, but do not have charity, it profits me nothing. These are the words of the Apostle. Therefore, all the things he mentioned are like the thirty-eight years, but because charity was not there, there was infirmity. Who then will heal from this infirmity, if not the one who came to give charity? "I give you a new commandment, that you love one another." And because he came to give charity, and charity fulfills the law; rightly he said: "I did not come to destroy the law, but to fulfill it." He healed the sick man and told him to carry his bed and go to his house. This he also told to the paralytic whom he healed. What does it mean to carry our bed? The desire of our flesh. Where we lie sick is like our bed. But those who have been healed contain and carry it, not being restrained by the flesh. Therefore, the healthy one contains the weakness of his flesh, that with the sign of the forty-day fast from this world, he may complete the number forty, who healed that sick man who came not to destroy the law but to fulfill it.

Temporal things must be dismissed from the mind. Temptation often does not make a sinner, but reveals one.

Having heard this, direct your heart to God. Do not deceive yourselves. Then ask yourselves, when it is well in the world; then ask yourselves, if you love this world, or if you do not love it; learn to let go, before you are let go. What does it mean: to let go? To not love in the heart. While you still have what you are going to lose, either alive or dying you let it go, it cannot be with you forever; therefore, while it is still with you, release your love; be ready in the will of God, suspend in God. Hold on to Him whom you do not lose against your will; so that if it happens that you lose these temporal things, you may say: The Lord gave, the Lord took away; as it pleased the Lord, so it was done; blessed be the name of the Lord. But if it happens, and God wills it, that those things you have remain with you until the end; released from this life, you receive the denarius of fifty, and in you is made the perfection of blessedness when you sing Alleluia. Keeping these things in memory which I have recalled, may they be strong so that you do not love the world. Its friendship is bad, it is deceitful, it makes God an enemy. Quickly in one temptation a man offends God, and becomes an enemy. Nay, he does not then become an enemy, but is then revealed to have been an enemy. For when he loved and praised, he was an enemy; but neither he knew it himself, nor others. Temptation comes, a vein is touched, and fever is revealed. Therefore, brothers, the love of the world, and the friendship of the world makes enemies of God. And it does not provide what it promised, it is deceitful, and it deceives. Therefore men do not cease to hope in this world, and who attains all that he hopes for? But to whatever he attains, immediately that to which he has attained becomes worthless to him. Other things begin to be desired, other dear things are hoped for; while they come, whatever comes to you, becomes worthless. Therefore hold on to God, because He never becomes worthless, because nothing is more beautiful. For this reason these things become worthless, because they cannot remain, because they are not what He is. For you, O soul, nothing else suffices, except He who created you. Whatever else you seize is wretched; because only He who made you in His likeness can suffice for you. This is said from that very voice: Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us. Only there can there be security, and where there can be security, there in a certain way will be an insatiable satisfaction. For neither will you be sated, so that you wish to depart; nor will anything be lacking, so that you suffer any want.