Demonstration of the Gospel — Book X

Eusebius of Caesarea · a new plain-English translation from the Greek

praef.1| After the predictions already set out concerning the arrival among human beings of the God who was proclaimed beforehand, the time now calls us to go through also what concerns his departure from life among human beings, and to observe once more what sort of things were foretold, from the prophetic times of long ago, as about to befall him.

praef.2| First I shall go through what concerns those who contrived his death, which is no small part of the subject before us. But before the discussion we must keep in view what we have often said about the dispensation concerning him: that some things are understood of him with respect to his divinity, and others with respect to his becoming man.

praef.3| For in some places he is presented as being the Word of God, God's power and God's wisdom, and the Angel of Great Counsel, and a great and eternal high priest, consecrated for the bringing into being and the salvation of all things that have come to be, and propitiating the Father; in others as the Lamb of God who removes the world's sin, and a sheep led to the slaughter. This was the human tabernacle, which he took up from our flock like a lamb and a sheep, as a high priest would, and, offering in sacrifice the first-fruits of the human race, brought to the Father. Through it he also held converse with human nature, which could not otherwise become a hearer of an incorporeal and intellectual power, nor conceive through eyes of flesh anything greater than flesh and bodies.

praef.4| Whatever, then, in the passages before us might seem to be said of him in a humbler sense, these things prompt us to see the Lamb of God who removes the sin of the world, and to think of the human tabernacle. For he was the Lamb who bears away the world's sin, according to John the Baptist, who says, “Look, the Lamb of God, who removes the sin of the world”; and the Lamb was also the one led to the slaughter, according to the oracle in Isaiah that says, “Like a sheep he was brought to slaughter, and like a lamb silent before its shearer.”

praef.5| Of the same one, as of a lamb, it was also said, “He was led to death because of the sins of my people.” For the Lamb of God, taken up by the great high priest for the sake of the other lambs of his kind and of the whole human flock, had to be brought to God as a sacrifice.

praef.6| “For since death is through a man, the resurrection from the dead is also through a man,” says the apostle, “and as through one trespass the result was condemnation for all men, so also through one act of righteousness the result is justification of life for all men.”

praef.7| Hence he himself taught his own disciples that he was life, light and truth, along with the other conceptions of the theology concerning him; but to those uninitiated in his secrets he said, “Why do you seek to kill me, a man who has spoken the truth to you?” Just as, then, the distinctive features of his theology were set out earlier, so in the same way the human sufferings of the Lamb will be presented here, while the events before his passion stand between the two and take in at once both what belongs to him as God and what belongs to him as man.

praef.8| With these points usefully observed beforehand, let us now take up the oracles themselves, concerning the plot formed against Christ by Judas the traitor and those with him, and concerning what happened around the time of his passion.

1.1| From Psalm 40. “Blessed is he who considers the poor and needy; on the evil day the Lord will deliver him. May the Lord preserve him and give him life and make him blessed on the earth, and not deliver him into the hands of his enemy. The Lord will help him on the bed of his pain; you have turned all his bed in his sickness. I said, Lord, show me mercy, heal my soul, because I have sinned against you. My enemies spoke evil of me: When will he die, and his name perish? And if he came in to see, his heart spoke emptily; he gathered lawlessness for himself. He went out, and spoke together.

1.2| All my enemies whispered against me; they devised evils against me. They set down a lawless word against me: Will he who sleeps not rise again? For even the man at peace with me, in whom I hoped, who ate my bread, lifted his heel high against me. But you, Lord, have mercy on me, and raise me up, that I may repay them. By this I know that you have wanted me, that my enemy will not rejoice over me. But because of my innocence you took hold of me, and you established me before you for ever.”

1.3| Since some have supposed that the book of Psalms contains only hymns to God and theological songs, and not also foreknowledge or prophecies of what is to come, this must be observed first: that countless things are foretold in them, which it would be long to gather here; it is enough, as testimony for the statement, to use two Psalms, entitled to Asaph, but spoken in the times of David.

1.4| For at that time Asaph, who was one of the sacred singers, as is recorded in the book of Chronicles, uttered by divine spirit the Psalms entitled in his name.

1.5| What, then, do the Psalms contain? Predictions of the siege of the royal city of the Jewish nation, which took place about five hundred years after the prediction.

1.6| The seventy-third, entitled “Of understanding, to Asaph,” says: “Why, O God, have you cast off to the end? Your anger is kindled against the sheep of your pasture. Remember your congregation, which you acquired from the beginning; you redeemed the rod of your inheritance. This Mount Zion, in which you have dwelt, lift up your hands against their pride to the end. All that the enemy did wickedly in your holy places, and those who hate you boasted in the midst of your feast.

1.7| They set up their signs as signs, and did not know it, as at the entrance above. As in a thicket of trees they cut down its doors together with axes; with ax and hatchet they brought it down. They burned your sanctuary with fire; they profaned to the ground the dwelling of your name.” So much the seventy-third Psalm.

1.8| And the seventy-eighth, which is also Asaph's, contains this: “O God, nations have come into your inheritance; they have defiled your holy temple. They have made Jerusalem like a fruit-keeper's hut; they have given the corpses of your servants as food to the birds of heaven, the flesh of your holy ones to the beasts of the earth.”

1.9| Of these, the first, I mean those from the seventy-third Psalm, were spoken while David was still king, before the temple was built by Solomon; and they came to their end at no other time than, first, in the siege by the Babylonians, and second, in the Roman war against the Jews.

1.10| For each of the things said was fulfilled in the first and second razing of the temple, having been foreknown and proclaimed by Asaph in the Psalms mentioned. The second set, from the seventy-eighth, was fulfilled in the times of Antiochus, called Epiphanes, who, reigning over Syria, brought Jerusalem under his hand, defiled the temple, and pulled down the altar; then, compelling the Jews to adopt Greek ways, he put to death very many of them, men and women, for the sake of their own law and ancestral piety, having first abused them with various punishments.

1.11| To that time, therefore, and to those after it who did the same as Antiochus, Asaph speaks out in the words from the seventy-eighth Psalm. The writing of the so-called Maccabees bears witness to the account, reading in this way: “And there was gathered together to Jakeimos and Bacchides a company of scribes seeking what is just.”

1.12| And next it adds: “And he swore to them, saying, We will not seek evil against you and your friends; and they trusted him. And he seized sixty of them and killed them in a single day, as in the word of Asaph that he wrote: They gave the corpses of your servants as food to the birds of heaven, the flesh of your holy ones to the beasts of the earth; they poured out their blood around Jerusalem, and there was no one to bury them.”

1.13| Since these things were thus foretold and brought to pass, it is no wonder if in the same way the oracles of the fortieth Psalm set out above signify what was to happen at the time of the plot against our Savior. Not everyone understands how, being the Word of God and wisdom and life and true light, and holding all the wealth of good things, he became poor for our sake by taking flesh, and was made like mortal and poor human beings, having taken the form of a servant and a pauper, above all at the time when he was fulfilling the prophecy from the Psalm. Naturally, then, at the beginning of the Psalm the one who understands these things about him is pronounced blessed, as obtaining the promise written there; then next, from here on, in the person of the needy and poor man, that is, of our Savior himself who became poor for our sake, it is added, “I said, Lord, have mercy on me.” That it is in the person of the Savior that the Psalm prophesies, the evangelist John is a sufficient witness.

1.14| For he relates that “on one occasion Jesus took a towel and girded himself, and after washing the feet of his disciples said, I know those whom I selected. But in order that the Scripture be fulfilled: He who eats the bread with me has lifted up his heel against me.”

1.15| For what Scripture was he indicating as fulfilled in these words, if not that of the Psalm now in hand, where it says, “For indeed the man of my peace, he in whom I hoped, who ate my bread, lifted his heel high against me”? So at its beginning it says, “I said, O Lord, show me mercy, heal my soul, because I have sinned against you,” and so through the whole Psalm.

1.16| Symmachus rendered this more clearly in the following way: “When I say, Lord, show pity to me, heal my soul, even though I have sinned against you, my enemies spoke evil about me: When will he die, and his name perish? And when he came to visit, his heart spoke vain things; it gathered injustice for itself, and going out he slandered. All who hate me whispered together against me, devising evils for me.

1.17| A lawless word was poured out within them, and having fallen he will not rise again. And even the man who lived in peace with me, he in whom I had put my trust, who ate my bread with me, was magnified against me in turn. But you, Lord, pity me and raise me up, that I may repay them. By this I shall know that you are pleased, if my enemy does not slander me. But because of my simplicity you held me, and you will set me before you for ever.”

1.18| The words of Aquila are equivalent to those of Symmachus. First, then, regarding the appearance that the words “heal my soul, since I have sinned against you” are spoken in the person of our Savior, you will notice that in Symmachus it is not so, but “heal my soul, even though I have sinned against you.” And he says it this way because he makes our sins common to himself.

1.19| This is why it was said, “And the Lord gave him over to our sins,” and “He himself bears our sins.”

1.20| The Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world, became a curse for us; God made him, who did not know sin, to be sin on our behalf, he having given himself as a ransom for the life of all of us, “so that we might become God's righteousness in him.” And since, having come in the likeness of flesh of sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, it is natural that the words set before us are put forward.

1.21| That he says these things taking our sins as his own because of his love and kindness toward us, he shows by adding, a little further down in the Psalm itself, “But because of my innocence you took hold of me,” plainly presenting the guilelessness of God. And how does he make our sins his own, and how is he said to bear our iniquities, except in that we are called his body, according to the apostle who said, “You are the body of Christ, and members individually”?

1.22| And just as when one member suffers all the members suffer with it, so, as the many members both suffer and sin, he too, according to the principles of fellow-feeling (since, being the Word of God, he was pleased to take a servant's form and to be joined to the dwelling common to all of us), takes up into himself the labors of the suffering members, makes our diseases his own, and grieves and labors for all of us according to the laws of love for humanity.

1.23| And not only did the Lamb of God do this, but being punished for us and undergoing a penalty which he himself did not owe, but we did because of the multitude of our offenses, he became for us the cause of the forgiveness of sins. He took upon himself the death due on our behalf, transferring to himself the scourgings and insults and dishonors owed by us, and drew upon himself the curse laid up for us, becoming a curse for us; and what else is this but a ransom of life for life? This is why the oracle speaks in our person, “By his bruise we were healed, and the Lord gave him over to our sins,” so that, naturally, uniting himself with us and us with himself, and making our sufferings his own, he says, “I said, O Lord, show mercy to me; heal my soul, since I have sinned against you.”

1.24| Naturally, too, those who plotted against him, not only human beings but also powers, seeing the overwhelming strength of his divine title and of the name through which, a little later, he filled the whole inhabited world with Christians, supposed that they could extinguish it if they plotted his death.

1.25| He refutes this very thing, saying, “My enemies uttered evils against me: When will he die, and his name be destroyed?” And because they came to him pretending, testing him in order to trap him, as the divine Scripture bears witness, recording that at different times they contrived various pretexts and accusations against him, for this reason it adds, “And if he came in to see, his heart spoke emptily; he gathered iniquity for himself; he went out and spoke together against me.”

1.26| Next after these words it now plainly points to that most impious betrayer himself, since it happened that, after the agreement he had made with the rulers of the Jews about the betrayal of his teacher, he no longer attended as usual the teaching of the divine lessons, nor frequented him as a pupil goes to a teacher, nor joined the others in the Savior's company, but spent his time spying and hunting for an occasion when he might fall upon him.

1.27| And this the holy evangelists charge him with doing. Of these Matthew says: “Then one of the twelve, the one called Judas Iscariot, went to the chief priests and spoke to them: What are you willing to give me, and I will hand him over to you? And they weighed out for him thirty pieces of silver. And from then on he sought an opportunity to hand him over.” And Mark: “And Judas Iscariot, who was one of the twelve, went off to the chief priests, to hand him over to them.

1.28| And they were glad on hearing it, and undertook to give him money; and he was seeking how to hand him over at a good moment.” And Luke writes, saying: “Then Satan entered into Judas, called Iscariot, who was numbered among the twelve; and he went away and conferred with the chief priests, the scribes, and the captains of the temple, to hand him over to them; and they rejoiced, and agreed to give him money. And he sought an opportunity to hand him over to them apart from the crowd.”

1.29| The prediction before us, prophesying these very things, adds: “And if he came in to see, his heart spoke emptily; he gathered iniquity for himself. He went out and spoke together. All my enemies whispered against me.

1.30| Symmachus, at any rate, says, “When he came in to look over, his heart spoke vain things; it gathered injustice for itself, and going out he slandered. All who hate me whispered together against me.” On his own, then, as an acquaintance and disciple going in to a teacher, he looked around and took note, hiding the plot inwardly in his own heart.

1.31| But going out with a larger company, he spoke against him in concert and together, betraying the Savior to his enemies and secretly making arrangements with the Jewish rulers about other matters, and in particular about the money for which he promised to hand him over, about which he whispered with them. This is why it says, “He went out and spoke together. All my enemies were whispering against me; against me they devised evils for me.

1.32| They set down a lawless word against me.” It seems that through the prophecy it calls the agreement about the silver pieces a lawless word, or else because they were devising impious and lawless things against him, as one who would be extinguished and perish after death and no longer be reckoned among the living.

1.33| Such is the meaning of “Will he who sleeps not rise again?”, which Symmachus made clearer in saying, “and having fallen he will not rise again.” Aquila says, “and whoever sleeps will not rise again.” And this was said still in common of all who plotted against him at the time of the passion; but specially, again, of the betrayer, as of one who had been his disciple, it goes on to say: “For even my man of peace, in whom I hoped, who ate my bread, lifted his heel high against me.”

1.34| In place of which Symmachus again says, “and the man at peace with me, he in whom I trusted, who ate my bread with me, was magnified against me.” For truly the worst of all, and most accursed, is the man who, after sharing a table and the nourishment of the teacher's words, turned to worse things and repaid his benefactor with the opposite.

1.35| But since his enemies in their plotting said, “When will he die, and his name perish?”, and supposed that once he had fallen asleep he would not rise again, for this reason our Savior and Lord himself, praying the opposite and asking the Father that he obtain the resurrection without hindrance, says, “But you, Lord, have mercy on me; raise me up, and I will repay them. By this I know that you have wanted me, that my enemy will not rejoice over me.”

1.36| And it is clear how, once he had risen from the dead, the recompense came immediately, not after a long interval, upon those who had plotted against him, and how his enemy, death, was put to shame when he attained life, so that those who taunt it say, “Where, O death, is your sting? Where, O death, is your victory?” Anyone who reads the histories of the times after the resurrection of our Savior written by Josephus will learn the calamities that overtook the Jewish nation and their rulers, into which they naturally fell, receiving the wages of what they had done to him.

1.37| And all this was fulfilled upon them according to the prediction; and the resurrection of our Savior from the dead showed to all that the Father was pleased with him, which he himself teaches, saying, “Have mercy on me, raise me up, and I will repay them. By this I know that you have wanted me, that my enemy will not rejoice over me.” To this he adds, “But because of my innocence you took hold of me.”

1.38| And observe how, sending up the prayer to God, his own Father, he has such boldness that he bears witness to his own innocence, although he said above, “Heal my soul, because I have sinned against you.”

1.39| But we have already explained the sense in which “I have sinned against you” is meant, and Symmachus set it forth more clearly, saying, “Heal my soul, even though I have sinned against you,” which too may be said concerning our sins, which our Savior and Lord took upon himself.

1.40| The words “But because of my innocence you took hold of me” show the complete purity of his nature, and because of this, teaching also the steadfast and unshaken character of his life and of the salvation after his resurrection, he adds, “and you established me before you for ever,” or, according to Symmachus, “and you will set me before you for ever.” From Psalm 54.

2.1| “Give ear, O God, to my prayer, and do not overlook my supplication; attend to me and hear me. I was grieved in my musing, and disturbed at the enemy's voice and at the sinner's affliction. For they brought lawlessness down on me, and in wrath they bore enmity to me. In me my heart was troubled, and the fear of death fell on me. Fear and trembling came over me, and darkness covered me,” and so on.

2.2| And to these: “Swallow them up, O Lord, and sunder their tongues, because I have seen lawlessness and strife in the city. By day and night it will surround it upon its walls, and lawlessness and toil are in the midst of it, and injustice; and interest and deceit have not departed from its streets. For if an enemy had taunted me, I would have endured it; and if he who hates me had spoken boastfully against me, I would have hidden from him. But you, a man of like soul, my leader and my familiar friend, who together with me took sweet food, in the house of God we walked in concord.”

2.3| The words “If an enemy had taunted me, I would have endured it, and if he who hates me had spoken boastfully against me, I would have hidden from him. But you, a man of like soul, my leader and my familiar friend, who together with me took sweet food” are like “For even the man of my own peace, in whom I hoped, who ate my bread, lifted his heel high against me,” which stands in the prophecy before this one and concerns Judas.

2.4| Just as in that passage he was shown to be one who had once been a man of peace, when he was a disciple of the Savior, being himself counted one of the number of the apostles, so in the present one he is called of like soul, a leader and a familiar friend.

2.5| And again, as in that passage it was said of him, “who ate my bread, lifted his heel high against me,” in the same way in the present passage the words “who together with me took sweet food” are said in his person; for he too was one of those counted worthy of our Savior's secret conversation with his disciples and of his spiritual nourishment.

2.6| For to the multitudes outside and to the crowds he spoke in parables, but to his own disciples alone, among whom Judas was also reckoned, he explained everything. This is why it is said, “who ate my bread, lifted his heel high against me,” and “who together with me took sweet food.”

2.7| Aquila made this clearer, saying, “we who together took sweet counsel in secret,” and Symmachus: “we who exchanged sweet conversation.” And in place of “But you, a man of like soul, my leader and my familiar friend,” Symmachus says, “But you, a man of like manner with me, and my leader and my familiar friend.” Since he had been counted worthy of so much and was among the closest friends of the Savior, it is natural that he says of him, “If an enemy had taunted me, I would have endured it,” and what follows.

2.8| Having prophesied these things about Judas, he accordingly foretells, in the words that follow, his own salvation and escape from death, saying, “I cried out to God, and the Lord saved me. Evening and morning; and I will tell and declare, and he will hear my voice, he will redeem my soul in peace.”

2.9| As in a prayer, this indicates the time before the death, during which Judas also arranged the betrayal against him.

2.10| Then, therefore, our Savior and Lord, distressed as though at the destruction and ruin of his acquaintance, and still more at the casting away of the whole Jewish nation, sharing their suffering as with kinsmen gone mad, as with those most dear, calls all his dealings and teaching with them “musing,” because they had gained nothing from it, saying, “I was grieved in my musing, and disturbed by the enemy's voice and by the sinner's affliction, for they turned,” he says, “lawlessness against me, and in anger they were hostile to me.”

2.11| These words can be referred to the rulers of the circumcision who tried to ambush him with hostile and treacherous intent, but they can also be said of invisible powers attacking him from outside and working the scheme through human beings.

2.12| These words seem to me to harmonize with what he says in the Gospel at the hour of the passion, saying to his disciples, “My soul is deeply grieved, even to death; remain here and keep watch with me,” and again, “Now my soul is troubled.” The words in the Psalm, where it is said, “My heart was disturbed within me, and a dread of death fell on me; fear and trembling came over me, and darkness covered me,” are similar to these, and through them he indicates the onslaughts of the opposing powers against him.

2.13| Just as, then, in the prophecies a certain spirit of fornication is named, as in “they were led astray by a spirit of fornication,” and another spirit of deception in the desert, in the same way there would be a spirit of death, productive of cowardice, just as there is a spirit of strength and power and courage that works according to God.

2.14| In this way a spirit of fear and trembling may be spoken of, and again, besides these, another spirit of fear and confusion; and these, one may almost say, are accustomed to rush upon all who accept death in martyrdom for the sake of piety, but they set upon much more, and more intensely, the one who endured death for the sake of all.

2.15| Nevertheless, whether a spirit of cowardice and death, or of fear and trembling, or some other power of that kind fell upon him, it did not strike him down; for like a noble athlete he shook off the cowardice of death and flung it far away, in the confidence of life (for he himself is the life). In the same way he hurled to the farthest distance the spirit that had come upon him to produce fear or trembling, with a spirit of courage, power and strength.

2.16| For according to Isaiah, "there rested upon him, along with the other spirits, also a spirit of counsel and of strength." So too he scattered the spirit of darkness by the might of his own light, since "the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overtake it." You could find things similar to these in the twenty-first Psalm also, where again it is said in the same person: "Many calves have encircled me, fat bulls have surrounded me. They have opened their mouth against me, like a lion that seizes and roars."

2.17| And again: "For many dogs have encircled me, a gathering of evildoers has surrounded me." And once more: "Deliver my soul from the sword, and from the hand of the dog my only-begotten one. Save me out of the lion's mouth, and my lowliness from the unicorns' horns."

2.18| For in these words he plainly calls evil powers bulls and calves and lions and dogs and unicorns; they surrounded him and encircled him at the time of his passion, yet were not able to accomplish anything against him.

2.19| These things, then, if [….] these parts of the Psalm also are to be referred to our Savior and Lord; but if not to him, but to another person, you yourself will consider how the matter in this passage may be smoothed out. But further, concerning the mother city of the Jews, Jerusalem itself, he goes on to say, following upon his prediction against those who plotted against him: "I saw lawlessness and contention in the city," and what follows these words; what sense these hold it is not now the time to relate. From Psalm 108.

3.1| "O God, do not keep silent over my praise, for the mouth of a sinner and the mouth of a deceitful man has been opened against me. They spoke against me with a deceitful tongue, surrounded me with words of hatred, and made war on me for no reason. In return for my loving them they accused me falsely, but I kept praying; and they set evils against me in place of good things, and hatred in place of my love. Set a sinner over him, and let the devil stand on his right. When he is being judged, let him come out condemned, and let his prayer become sin. Let his days be few, and let another take his office of oversight."

3.2| And a trustworthy witness that these words refer to the traitor Judas is the apostle Peter, who, after the ascension of our Savior, when all the apostles and many other brothers besides were gathered, stood up in their midst and said this: "Men, brothers, the scripture had to be fulfilled which the Holy Spirit foretold through the mouth of David about Judas, who became a guide to those who seized Jesus, because he was numbered among us and obtained his share in this ministry."

3.3| "This man, then, acquired a field with the wages of his injustice, and falling headlong he burst open in the middle, and all his bowels poured out; and it became known to all who live in Jerusalem, so that the field was called in their own language Akeldama, that is, Field of Blood. For in the book of Psalms it stands written: 'Let his dwelling become desolate, and let there be no one living in it,' and, 'Let another take his office of oversight.'"

3.4| After saying this, Peter proposes that another must take the place of Judas to fill the number of the twelve apostles that was lacking, in order that the prophecy be fulfilled; and when lots were cast, "the lot fell on Matthias, and he was counted along with the twelve apostles." Since these things were thus accomplished, it follows that the person speaking in the Psalm must be understood to be no other than our Savior, who, anticipating the prayer he sent up to the Father at the time of the passion, deemed it worthy of being recorded through the Holy Spirit, foretelling what was going to happen concerning him.

3.5| He says, then, "O God, do not keep silent over my praise," asking that the teaching delivered by him to his disciples, together with the praise of the new covenant, not be silenced, but remain in human life for all the age to come.

3.6| And "the mouth of a sinner and the mouth of a deceitful man" would properly be said of Judas, who went to the high priests and said to them: "What are you willing to give me, and I will betray him to you?" And they fixed for him thirty staters. And from then on he looked for a convenient moment to hand him over to them.

3.7| Having agreed to such things against him, he was one of those who afterward reclined with him at the Passover meal, when our Savior himself "was reclining with the twelve, and while they were eating he said: 'Amen, amen, I tell you, one of you will betray me.

3.8| And grieving greatly, each of them began to say, 'Surely it is not I, Lord?'" Among them was Judas, who, opening a mouth full of every kind of deceit and feigning, answered and said: "Surely it is not I, Rabbi?" A deceitful mouth indeed, through which he was also giving the sign to those who plotted against our Savior, saying: "The one I kiss, he is the one; seize him."

3.9| And having said this, he fulfilled the deceit in deed, when "he came up to Jesus and said to him, 'Greetings, Rabbi,' and kissed him. But Jesus said to him, 'Friend, why are you here?'" And again: "Judas, do you betray the Son of Man with a kiss?" It is for these reasons, then, that he says beforehand through the Psalm: "For the mouth of a sinner and the mouth of a deceitful man has been opened against me; they have spoken against me with a deceitful tongue and have surrounded me with words of hatred, and have waged war on me without cause." Here, together with Judas, he makes mention of the rest of those who plotted against him

3.10| And the gospel says that, as our Savior "was yet speaking to his disciples, behold, there came Judas, one of the twelve, accompanied by a great crowd with swords and clubs, from the high priests and elders of the people."

3.11| To these the Lord also said: "Have you come out as against a robber, with swords and clubs to seize me? Day by day I sat among you in the temple teaching, and you did not seize me. But all this has happened in order that the scriptures of the prophets may be fulfilled." And further in the Psalm he says: "In return for my loving them they accused me falsely, but I kept praying."

3.12| This too was then brought to its end, when our Savior was praying with the eleven apostles at the place called Gethsemane, and, having withdrawn a little from them and fallen down before the Father, prayed a second time and a third; Judas, together with the rulers of the Jews, was preparing the plot against him, gathering and procuring the crowd of those equipped with swords and clubs to seize him. "And they set evils against him in place of good things, and hatred in place of his love": they devised wicked things against the Savior, benefactor and teacher, who had given them countless healings and cures, and teachings of words, and benefits of every kind.

3.13| In return for these things, then, since they set evils against him in place of good things and hatred in place of his love, he fittingly adds: "Appoint a sinner over him, and let the devil stand on his right hand. When he is tried, let him come out condemned, and let his prayer become sin. Let his days be few, and let another take his office of oversight."

3.14| How these words, too, were brought to their outcome, the holy apostle Peter made clear beforehand, by applying the scripture to the traitor himself. And you yourself can see whether a sinner has not been set over the nation of the Jews as ruler and leader, to whom, after what they dared against our Savior, they were handed over, forced to serve foreigners and idolaters instead of their former rulers of their own people, beloved of God.

3.15| And who would not marvel at the fulfillment of the prediction? For when the word of prophecy said, "Let his days be few," it is clear how brief the whole time was that went by after their plot against our Savior, during which they seemed to remain; after that they endured the final siege and complete destruction, upon which "another took their office of oversight," the people assembled through Christ.

3.16| And you will understand the remainder of the Psalm in keeping with these same words. But the lines that follow, which are said as if about certain sons of Judas, in "Let his sons be orphans" and the like, may be applied primarily to Judas himself, and after him to all who are like him in betraying the Savior. In the same way you will understand his wife as well, and the sins of his fathers and of his so-called mother, the synagogue of the nation of the Jews. For I take it that it is about her that this is said: "And let the sin of his mother not be wiped out."

3.17| However, just as in the prophecy before this one our Savior and Lord was called poor and needy, as we showed in the words "Blessed is he who considers the poor and needy," so also in the present Psalm he is given these names.

3.18| For he says that such and such things are to happen to Judas and to those who have emulated him, because of what he dared. And what are these things? He adds, saying: "Because he did not remember to show mercy, and pursued a man who was poor and needy and pierced in heart, to put him to death, and he loved a curse, and it will come upon him, and he did not wish blessing, and it will be far from him."

3.19| Descending next after these words, he again calls himself poor and needy, saying: "And you, Lord, Lord, deal with me in mercy, for the sake of your name, because your mercy is good. Deliver me, for I am poor and needy." After other things he adds to these words: "My knees have grown weak from fasting, and my flesh has changed because of oil, and I have become a reproach to them.

3.20| They saw me, they shook their heads." This too reached its end when those passing by blasphemed him, shaking their heads and saying: "He saved others; he cannot save himself." And since even now those of the circumcision, drawing down upon themselves the curse of their fathers, are accustomed to anathematize with blasphemous and impious words our Savior and Lord and all who have believed in him, for this reason he adds next: "They will curse, but you will bless.

3.21| Let those who rise up against me be put to shame, but your servant will be glad. Let those who accuse me falsely be clothed with disgrace, and let them wrap themselves in their shame as in a double cloak. But I will give thanks to the Lord greatly with my mouth, and in the midst of many I will praise him, because he stood at the poor man's right hand, to save my soul from those who pursue it."

3.22| And it is plain with how many evils those who make curses against him in their synagogues are still wrestling even now, never having been able, from those same times, to recover at all; and how he himself prepares the praise to the Father in the midst of many nations, through his new covenant, having the Father as his fellow worker and as the one who sits beside him at his right hand. Therefore he says: "In the midst of many I will praise him, because he stood at the poor man's right hand."

3.23| And he teaches the salvation that came after his death, saying: "to save my soul from those who pursue it."

3.24| Above, then, having said, "he pursued a man who was poor and needy and pierced in heart, to put him to death," and having made plain his own death by marking out the prophecy, he hinted at his salvation after his death by saying: "because he stood at the poor man's right hand, to save my soul from those who pursue it." From Zechariah.

4.1| "And I will take for myself two staves; one of which I named Beauty, and the other I named Cord, and I will shepherd my sheep, and I will remove the three shepherds in one month, and my soul will be weighed down against them. For their souls also were roaring against me, and I said: I will not shepherd you; let what is dying die, and let what is failing fail, and let the rest eat, each the flesh of his neighbor. And I will take the staff, the beautiful one, and cast it away, to break my covenant which I made with all the peoples. And it will be broken in that day, and the Canaanites will know the sheep that are kept for me, that it is the word of the Lord. And I will say to them: If it is good in your sight, give me my wage, or refuse it. And they fixed my wage at thirty pieces of silver. Then the Lord said to me: Put them into the smelting furnace, and see whether it is approved, in the way I was approved on their behalf. And I took the thirty pieces of silver and threw them into the Lord's house, into the smelting furnace, and I cast away the second staff, the Cord, to break the covenant between Judah and between Israel."

4.2| And these things reached their end when, as Luke has it, "Judas went away and conferred with the high priests and scribes and captains of the temple about how he might betray him to them; and they were glad, and agreed to give him silver"; and according to Mark, "At that time he went away to the high priests to betray him. They rejoiced and promised to give him silver."

4.3| But in these passages the silver is named simply, whereas in Matthew the number is also mentioned, in agreement with the passage quoted from Zechariah.

4.4| Matthew says, then: "Then one of the twelve, the one called Judas Iscariot, went to the high priests and said to them: What are you willing to give me, and I will betray him to you? And they fixed for him thirty staters." This agrees, then, with "And they fixed my wage at thirty pieces of silver," said in the prophecy by the Lord.

4.5| Where this reads so, Symmachus has made it: "and they weighed out my wage, thirty pieces of silver"; and Aquila: "and they fixed my wage, thirty pieces of silver." To this is added: "Then the Lord said to me: Put them into the smelting furnace, and see whether it is approved, in the way I was approved on their behalf."

4.6| Where this reads so, Aquila again says: "Then the Lord said to me: Put them into the smelting furnace, throw them to the potter; I was valued on their behalf at a price exceedingly great." And observe how the Lord himself acknowledges that the thirty pieces of silver were given as his own price.

4.7| The sense of the wording seems to bring out roughly this: I, the Lord, from the first day, did not cease to give you of the circumcision proofs of my own goodness, doing you countless benefits, not only those through the prophets from of old, but also those through my own presence, in exhortatory teachings and rational lessons, in signs and wonders and the other marvelous works, in healings and cures; and you, who have been thought worthy of such great benefaction, give me my wage or refuse it, asking from them, as is reasonable, fruits of piety and a proof of faith in him.

4.8| But they, as was said in the preceding quotation, "In return for my loving them they accused me falsely, and set evils against me in place of good things and hatred in place of my love," fixed thirty pieces of silver, as though he were being sold for so much [….] the fire itself will test it; and he fittingly commands that they be dropped into the smelting furnace, adding: "in the way I was approved on their behalf."

4.9| Here he seems to call the house of the Lord the smelting furnace. For when the Lord said, according to the Seventy, "Drop them into the smelting furnace," it adds: "And they cast them into the Lord's house, into the smelting furnace."

4.10| And according to Aquila, when the Lord said "to the potter," it adds: "and I flung it into the Lord's house, to the potter."

4.11| And according to Symmachus, when the Lord said "Cast it into the smelting furnace," it adds: "And I cast it into the Lord's house, into the smelting furnace." Perhaps this too was fulfilled when Judas, who betrayed the Lord, "seeing that he had been condemned, repented and brought back the silver to the high priests and elders, saying: I have sinned, betraying innocent blood. But they replied: What does that matter to us? You will see to it. And throwing down the silver in the temple he departed, and going away he hanged himself.

4.12| And the high priests took the silver and said: It is unlawful to put it into the treasury, since it is the price of blood. And after taking counsel they bought with it the potter's field, as a burial place for strangers. Therefore that field was called the Field of Blood to this very day. Then was fulfilled what was spoken through the prophet Jeremiah, who said: And they took the thirty silver pieces, the price of the one who was priced, whom they priced from the sons of Israel, and they gave them for the potter's field, just as the Lord commanded me."

4.13| Here you will also consider, since these words are not found in the prophecy of Jeremiah, whether we should suspect that they were removed from it by some trickery, or else that a scribal error occurred, when someone among those who had made the copies of the sacred gospels rather carelessly slipped, and put Jeremiah in place of Zechariah (since it ought to have been written thus: "Then was fulfilled what was spoken through Zechariah the prophet"), and in place of "and they threw them into the Lord's house, into the smelting furnace," mistakenly wrote "and they gave them for the potter's field."

4.14| For plainly, according to the prophecy the silver is said to have been thrown into the temple of the Lord, and according to the gospel itself also into the temple: "Throwing down the silver in the temple," it says, "Judas departed."

4.15| And it is likely that through that silver the temple became profane, and that this was fulfilled: "Behold, your house is left to you desolate." And consider whether the house of the Lord has been called a smelting furnace for this reason, that souls in the house of God are remolded, as in a casting, by the firing of the divine words, or else are exposed as impure, being fired and tested as in a furnace.

4.16| Hence Aquila, saying "I flung the silver into the Lord's house, to the potter," teaches plainly that the divine Word, after the manner of a potter, dwells in the house of the Lord, forming and renewing the souls of those who approach. But since the price of the one who was priced, having been transferred to that house, made it profane, fittingly there follows immediately: "And I cast away the second staff, the Cord, to break the covenant between Judah and between Israel."

4.17| For from that time the multitude of the nation was cast away from the oversight of God which formerly watched over them. And I take the second staff to signify here the whole nation of the Jews together. He calls it the Cord, saying: "The one I called Beauty, and the second I called Cord." And plainly he adds about the second, saying: "And I cast away the second staff, the Cord, to break the covenant between Judah and between Israel."

4.18| For these were the Cord and the second staff. And the first, which was named Beauty, could be nothing other than Jerusalem itself, and the worship according to Moses, and the whole of the old covenant.

4.19| And this is established from the prophecy itself, which says: "And I will take my beautiful staff and throw it away, so as to break my covenant." You see how he said that his covenant is the first staff, and the second staff is the Cord, yet threatens to cast away both staffs, having said earlier: "And I will take for myself two staves; the one I called Beauty, and the second I called Cord."

4.20| Where this reads so, Aquila says: "The one I called Comeliness, and the other I called Cord"; and Symmachus: "the one I called Comeliness, but the one I called Cord." So he fittingly named the divine law, and the covenant contained in it, the beauty and comeliness of the whole nation.

4.21| For the august things of Jerusalem and of the high-priestly service, and everything that in former times was conducted among them according to the divine laws and according to the old covenant, was a comely adornment to those who were adorned by them. And the multitude of the nation has also been called a cord by Moses, who says: "The Lord's portion became his people Jacob, Israel the cord of his inheritance."

4.22| But he prophesies that a sudden change of these two staves will take place at the times indicated, so that both the old covenant that once existed in her and the beauty that once was in her will vanish, and the cord and the whole nation will be scattered, when, having priced the price of the one who was priced at thirty pieces of silver, they will undergo the dishonor fitting for their impiety.

4.23| He says, then: "And I will take my beautiful staff, and cast it away, to break my covenant." And again: "And I cast away the second staff, the Cord." Beyond these, when the prophecy says, "And I will remove the three shepherds in one month," I think it hints at three orders of those who in ancient times stood at the head of the people of God: king, high priest and prophet, since through these three shepherds everything in former times was administered.

4.24| But since these three shepherds too suffered perversion at one time, the time of our Savior (for the king ruled them lawlessly, being a foreigner and not of the nation's own; the high priest, appointed by the Romans to the service, did not come to the office by the succession of the family nor by the lawful ordinances; and the prophet, having ceased until John, no longer worked among them, but in his place there was some impious false prophet leading the people astray), fittingly he threatens to take away at one time the three gifts that formerly adorned the whole nation with beauty above all the world, saying: "And I will remove the three shepherds in one month, and my soul will be weighed down against them."

4.25| Where this reads so, Aquila says: "and my soul was cut short in [….]"; and Symmachus: "and I lost heart among them"; and Theodotion: "and my soul lost heart over them." And he teaches the cause of the faintheartedness by adding: "For their souls also were roaring against me." Where this reads so, Aquila again says: "Their soul too grew dark within me";

4.26| and Symmachus: "and their soul was at its peak within me." And similar to what the Seventy say, "For their souls were roaring against me," is what is found in Jeremiah, set down in the person of the Lord: "I have forsaken my house, I have abandoned my inheritance, I have handed my beloved soul over into her enemies' hands; my inheritance has become to me like a lion in a thicket, she has given her voice against me. Is my inheritance to me a cave of a hyena?"

4.27| Fittingly, then, for these reasons he goes on to say next: "And I said: I will not shepherd you; let what is dying die, and let what is failing fail, and let the rest eat, each the flesh of his neighbor." After which he adds: "And I will take my beautiful staff, and cast it away."

4.28| Where this reads so, Aquila says: "And I took my staff, the comeliness, and cut it off," that is, the worship according to Moses. The first staff, then, the first one mentioned at the opening of the passage, is said to be broken and cast away.

4.29| And when the price of the one who was priced, and the silver given for him to the traitor, was thrown into the Lord's house as into a smelting furnace, then in turn what the second staff, that is, the whole nation, will suffer is prophesied in sequence by this saying: "And I cast away the second staff, the Cord, to break the covenant between Judah and between Israel."

4.30| And since the passage has plainly indicated their rejection through these words, it fittingly says next that it is no longer they who will recognize the power of the things prophesied, but the Canaanites, saying: "And the Canaanites will know the sheep that are kept for me, that it is the word of the Lord."

4.31| And who could the Canaanites be if not we, formerly foreigners, preserved for Christ as sheep out of all the nations once godless and impious? We who through his grace have been changed, and, understanding the things prophesied, have received a true knowledge of the Lord's word; we, the Canaanites, have known and understood what is made plain, whereas those who boast of Israel and exalt themselves in the seed of Abraham have neither known nor understood. From Jeremiah.

5.1| "The sin of Judah is written with an iron pen, with a diamond point, engraved on the breast of his heart, and on the horns of our altars. When their sons remember their altars and their groves on leafy wood and on lofty hills, I will give your strength and all your treasures for plunder, and your high places for sin throughout all your borders. And you will be stripped, and brought low from the inheritance that I gave you, and I will bring you up among your enemies, into a land that you did not know, for a fire has been kindled in my wrath, and until the age it will burn."

5.2| Even if these words are not found in the Seventy, yet since we found them in the Hebrew and also in the editions by the other translators, and further, marked with asterisks, in the accurate copies of the Seventy, we have quoted them out of necessity, inasmuch as they indicate the traitor Judas by name and teach that the sin he committed cannot be wiped out. For this, it seems to me, is what is hinted in "the sin of Judah is written with an iron pen, with a diamond point."

5.3| It may also be referred to the whole nation of the Jews, against whom, following upon their ineradicable impiety, he next threatens the final destruction that overtook them; to interpret these words phrase by phrase is not suited to the present occasion. But now that so much has been foretold about the one who would betray our Savior and Lord and about the others who plotted against him, it is time to see the things prophesied about what was to happen concerning his passion. From Amos.

6.1| "The Lord swears against the pride of Jacob: Surely all your works will not be forgotten forever; and will not the land be troubled over these things, and everyone who lives in it mourn? And the consummation will rise like a river, and will go down like the river of Egypt. And it will be in that day, says the Lord, the sun will set at midday, and the light will grow dark over the earth in the day.

6.2| And I will change your feasts into mourning, and all your songs into a lament; and I will bring sackcloth upon every loin and baldness upon every head; and I will make it like the mourning for a beloved, and those with him like a day of pain. Behold, days are coming, says the Lord, and I will send out a famine upon the land, not a famine for bread, nor thirst for water, but a famine for hearing the Lord's word. And waters will be shaken from sea to sea, and from the north to the east they will run to and fro seeking the word of the Lord, and they will by no means find it."

6.3| The present prophecy, foretelling the insult, pride and uprising which those of the circumcision raised against our Savior, says that the Lord swears against the pride of Jacob that there will be no forgetting of what they dared against him; that their land, together with its inhabitants, will suffer things worthy of mourning; and that they will not, as before, be disciplined for a short time and then restored again, but their affairs will come to a consummation. "Their consummation," he says, "will rise like a river," hinting that the wrath that came upon them at no other time than under the Roman empire would rise as a river against them, as against those who had before been on a height.

6.4| And after the wrath from God against them that has been indicated, he says again that their affairs "will go down like the river of Egypt." By this I think it is shown that the advantages of the nation of the Jews, once lofty and honored by God and lying as if on a height, will be brought to the same level as the fleeting affairs of the unbelieving nations, which run past like a river, and from a height they will be turned down to lowliness.

6.5| Then, next after these, making plain the very events that happened at the time of the saving passion, he says: "In that day, says the Lord, the sun will set at midday, and the light will grow dark over the earth in the day." This took a clear fulfillment when our Savior was lifted up, according to the evangelist: "From the sixth hour darkness came over the whole earth until the ninth hour, and around the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a great voice, saying: Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani."

6.6| When these things had been accomplished in this way, he adds next: "And I will change your feasts into mourning and all your songs into a lament. And I will bring sackcloth upon every loin and baldness upon every head; and I will make it like the mourning for a beloved, and those with him like a day of pain. Behold, days are coming, says the Lord, and I will send out a famine upon the land, not a famine for bread, nor thirst for water, but a famine for hearing the Lord's word," and what follows.

6.7| All these things, prophesied to come because of their pride against Christ, showed the outcome of the prediction plainly after their plot against our Savior.

6.8| Not before, then, but from that time to this day God has turned their feasts into mourning and their songs into lamentation, having deprived them of their celebrated mother city and razed the august sanctuary in it under the rule of the Roman emperors Titus and Vespasian, so that even if they come they cannot celebrate the lawful feasts and festivals there. Why need I say how the famine of hearing the Lord's word has come upon them all, in return for their having driven out from themselves the Word of God, with one accord denying him and being denied by him? From Zechariah.

7.1| "And the Lord my God will come, and all the holy ones with him. In that day there will be no light, and there will be cold and frost for one day. And that day will be known to the Lord, and it will not be day and not night; toward evening there will be light. And in that day living water will go out from Jerusalem, half of it to the first sea and half of it to the last sea. In summer and in spring it will be so. And the Lord will be king over all the earth. In that day the Lord will be one, and his name one, encompassing all the earth and the desert."

7.2| And these things were fulfilled at the coming of our Savior, which he made either with his holy apostles and disciples, or with his holy ones, certain divine powers and bodiless spirits, his angels and ministers, of whom it is said in the holy gospels that "angels came to him and served him."

7.3| And on that day (for thus holy scripture is fond of calling the whole time of his stay among human beings), along with the other predictions, the words at hand were also fulfilled, when at the moment of his passion "from the sixth hour darkness came over the whole earth until the ninth hour." Hence the prophecy says: "In that day there will be no light." And again: "And it will not be day and not night; toward evening there will be."

7.4| By these words I think he most clearly describes the state of the time in which, when the Savior was lifted up, though it was day, night held the surrounding air from the sixth hour until the ninth, after which, the darkness ceasing again, day and light returned, and after that night came on again as usual. These are the things the word of the prophecy hinted at, saying: "And that day will be known to the Lord, and it will not be day and not night; toward evening there will be light."

7.5| For day it was not, because of the darkness at midday; and again it was not night, because of the day that followed, which he made plain by marking it with the words "toward evening there will be." And who would not marvel also at the mention of the wintry season? The word of prophecy foretold this too, saying: "and there will be cold and frost." The testimony of [….] confirms this also, when Peter, following Jesus, was warming himself with the others, they having kindled a fire in the courtyard of Caiaphas.

7.6| John, then, mentions the cold outright, saying: "The servants and the attendants were standing there, having made a charcoal fire because it was cold, and they were warming themselves."

7.7| As to the wording, then, what was foretold reached such an end; but as to the sense, the whole nation of the Jews, when the saving light had shone upon them, and when they chose darkness rather than light, was overtaken by the very thing they chose: the light withdrew from them, and a lightless night took hold of them, their understanding was darkened so that the illumination of the gospel did not shine through in their hearts, and their love for God grew cold. The tokens of these things were fittingly accomplished, and what the prediction says next was fulfilled: on such a day of the saving appearing, living water went out from Jerusalem, the fruitful and life-giving word of the gospel teaching going forth to all the nations, beginning from Judea and from Jerusalem itself, and spread over all the earth and to all the ends of the inhabited world.

7.8| Of this water our Savior and Lord himself also makes mention, saying to the Samaritan woman: "If you knew who it is who asks you for a drink, you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water." And how great a benefit came to those who tasted of the living and rational stream he shows next, teaching that those who drink of it, renouncing the many evil demons who formerly ruled them, will confess the one Lord and king of themselves; and that the Lord, who had formerly been known to the Hebrews alone, will become king of all the nations that from every land have believed in him, and his name will be one, encompassing all the earth and the desert.

7.9| And who would not be struck with amazement at this, seeing it? From the title of Christ (for the Lord himself was the Christ) the name of Christians has encircled every place and city and country, and even the nations dwelling in the deserts and at the farthest edges of the earth, in accordance with the oracles of the prophecy. From Psalm 21.

8.1| "O God, my God, attend to me; why have you forsaken me? The words of my transgressions are far from my salvation. My God, I will cry out by day to you, and you will not hear, and by night, and not for lack of understanding on my part. But you dwell among the holy ones, the praise of Israel. In you our fathers hoped, they hoped, and you delivered them. To you they cried out and were saved; in you our fathers hoped, and were not put to shame. But I am a worm and not a man, a reproach of men and despised by the people. All who see me have mocked me, they have spoken with their lips, they have shaken the head: He hoped in the Lord: let him rescue him, let him save him, because he delights in him.

8.2| For you are the one who drew me out of the womb, my hope from my mother's breasts. Upon you I was cast from the womb; from my mother's belly you are my God. Do not stand away from me, because affliction is near, for there is no one to help.

8.3| Many calves have encircled me, fat bulls have surrounded me. They have opened their mouth against me, like a lion that seizes and roars. I was poured out as water, and all my bones were scattered. My heart became like melting wax in the midst of my belly. My strength was dried up as a potsherd, and my tongue has clung to my throat, and you have brought me down to the dust of death. For many dogs came round me, a gathering of evildoers has surrounded me.

8.4| They dug my hands and my feet, they counted all my bones. They themselves looked and stared at me; they divided my garments among themselves, and for my clothing they cast a lot. But you, Lord, do not remove my help far away; attend to my aid. Deliver my soul from the sword, and from the hand of the dog my only-begotten. Rescue me out of a lion's mouth, and my lowliness from the horns of unicorns.

8.5| I will declare your name to my brothers; in the church's midst I will sing hymns to you. You who fear the Lord, praise him; all the seed of Jacob, glorify him. Let all the seed of Israel fear him, because he has not despised nor been angered at the petition of the poor man, nor turned his face away from me, and when I cried out to him he heard me. From you is my praise in a great church; I will pay my vows before those who fear him.

8.6| The poor will eat and be filled, and those who seek him will praise the Lord.

8.7| Their hearts will live forever and ever; all the ends of the earth will remember and be turned to the Lord, and all the families of the nations will bow down before him; for the Lord's is the kingdom, and he rules the nations. All the rich of the earth have eaten and bowed down; before him will fall all who go down to the earth. And my soul lives for him, and my seed will serve him. The coming generation will be proclaimed to the Lord, and they will proclaim his righteousness to a people yet to be born, whom the Lord made.

8.8| The words "My God, attend to me, why have you forsaken me?" said at the beginning of the Psalm, are spoken by our Savior at the time of the passion, according to Matthew, as follows: "And when the sixth hour came, there was darkness over all the land until the ninth hour, and in the ninth hour Jesus shouted in a great voice: Eloeim, Eloeim, lama sabachthani, which means, translated: My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" The Hebrew expression has been taken from the prophecy at hand.

8.9| In exactly these syllables, then, the opening of the Psalm contains "Elei, Elei, lama sabachthani," which Aquila translated in this way: "My strong one, my strong one, why have you forsaken me?" And that these words are equivalent to what was said by our Savior at the time of the passion, anyone would agree.

8.10| It is time, then, to refer the Psalm without dispute to no one other than him alone, since what it contains fits him alone and no other. Plainly, then, the rest is shown to have been fulfilled in him, and indeed also what the Psalm says: "They divided my garments among themselves, and for my clothing they cast a lot."

8.11| And the piercing of the nails, driven through his hands and feet as he was nailed to the cross, it expressly makes plain, saying: "They dug my hands and my feet, they counted all my bones." And the rest could be applied to him alone, as the argument will show as it proceeds; or let anyone who wishes, taking it over to another person, whether a king or a prophet or any of those who were ever beloved of God among the Jews, show whether he is able to fit the written words to him.

8.12| For which of those ever carried in the womb possessed such excellence and power that, with settled reasoning, an unconfused soul and a sober mind, he took up the knowledge of God and hung all his hope upon God, so as to say: "For you are the one who drew me out of the womb of my mother, my hope from my mother's breasts. Upon you I was cast from the womb; from my mother's belly you are my God"?

8.13| And who, being so cared for by God, has become "a reproach of men and despised by the people"? By what kind of calves and bulls must we understand such a man to have been encircled? And what did the man indicated suffer, that he "was poured out like water"? And how were his bones scattered? How was he "brought down into the dust of death," and, having been brought down into the dust of death, still speaks such words and lives and utters sounds? And who are the dogs that encircled him, being others besides the bulls and calves named before? What gathering of evildoers dug not only the hands but also the feet of so great a person, and stripping him, divided some of his garments among themselves and took others by drawing lots? What is the sword, and the dog, and the lion? Who are those called unicorns, surrounding the man indicated? And how, after the struggle with so many, after being brought down into the dust of death, does he promise to declare the name of the Father, not to all, but only to his own brothers? And who are the brothers, and what is the church of which the one who suffered such things says, "I will sing hymns to you in the midst of the church"? To these words he adds that the nation of the Jews is not the only one, but all the ends of the earth will perceive it and will turn to the Lord, and "all the families of the nations will bow down before him." And you yourself, testing each phrase of the Psalm for yourself, consider whether it is possible to refer the things prophesied to just anyone.

8.14| But you will not find that they fit anyone else than our Savior alone, who would be the most trustworthy and truthful of all, having taken up in his own person the voice from the Psalm, as the evangelists testified: Matthew in the words of his that we have quoted, and Mark in the words in which he too relates it somewhat as follows: "And when the sixth hour came, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour. And in the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying: Elei, Elei, lama sabachthani, which means, translated: My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? And some of those who heard it said: He is calling Elijah."

8.15| Come then, following these things, let us see how what the Psalm indicates will be referred to him. And first let us consider the heading that says "For the end," or, in Aquila's version, "To the victory-giver," or according to Symmachus "A victory song for the aid."

8.16| This occurs to us: that the saving passion, as the words of the evangelists showed, "darkness having come from the sixth hour until the ninth hour," was completed about the ninth hour, when he also uttered the loud cry, saying the words indicated a little earlier, so that it is plainly agreed that his passion took place toward evening, as night was coming on.

8.17| But the resurrection from the dead, which was the aid of the Father, who took hold and drew him to himself out of the regions of death and received him, took place about dawn, as again is shown by the testimony of the evangelists.

8.18| Luke, for instance, says: "On the week's first day, at deep dawn, they came to the tomb carrying the spices that they had prepared," that is, the women, together with certain others. "And the stone they found rolled away from the tomb. And on entering they did not find the body," since our Savior had already been raised from the dead.

8.19| Mark makes this same point plain, saying: "And on the first day of the week, very early, they come to the tomb, the sun having just risen, and they were saying to one another: Who will roll away the stone for us from the door of the tomb? For it was very large." They come, and find it rolled away. And he had already been raised. You have the same testimony in John too, who says: "Mary Magdalene comes early, on the first day of the week, to the tomb, while it was still dark, and sees the stone taken away from the tomb."

8.20| And Matthew, although he said "late on the sabbath," goes on to say: "As it was dawning toward the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary came to look at the grave, and behold, there was a great earthquake.

8.21| For an angel of the Lord, descending from heaven and coming up, rolled the stone away from the door of the tomb." I quoted these things out of necessity, to establish the aid at dawn prophesied in the Psalm.

8.22| For since the Psalm signifies the events of the passion of our Savior, yet his dispensation did not end in the passion, but the end of the passion was the resurrection from the dead and the aid at dawn, the text fittingly ascribes the writing to the marvelous end, as the whole subject, together with the sufferings before the end, came about for the sake of the resurrection from the dead and the aid at dawn.

8.23| Our Savior and Lord, then, having said "My God, my God, attend to me, why have you forsaken me?" and next adding "But I am a worm and not a man, a reproach of men and despised by the people," and further putting in "Many calves have encircled me, fat bulls have surrounded me," and plainly bearing witness beforehand to his own death through "you have brought me down to the dust of death; since many dogs have encircled me, a gathering of evildoers has surrounded me, they dug my hands and my feet," and further indicating what befell him in the passion through "they divided my garments among themselves, and for my clothing they cast a lot,"

8.24| having foretold these things and others like them, did not stop there, but adds: "You who fear the Lord, praise him, because he has not despised nor been angered at the petition of the poor man, nor turned his face away from me, and when I cried out to him he heard me."

8.25| How could he say that he had been heard, if he had not altogether obtained the prayers and requests he had made earlier, when he said: "You have brought me down into the dust of death. Deliver my soul from the sword, and from the hand of the dog my only-begotten"?

8.26| For having prayed these things and asked to be delivered and saved from them, and having obtained what he prayed for, he adds: "He has not despised nor been angered at the petition of the poor man, nor turned his face away from me, and when I cried out to him he heard me," plainly indicating his coming back to life after death, which took place at the aid at dawn, which the Psalm as it proceeded made plain by saying: "But you, Lord, do not remove my help far away; attend to my aid." What aid, then, if not the one the heading of the Psalm hinted at?

8.27| But let this suffice for us on the heading of the Psalm. As for "Elei, lama sabachthani," spoken by our Savior in these very Hebrew words at the time of the passion, and set down also in the Psalm, consider whether there lies in it some deeper insight among the Hebrews; for "Eloeim" is the name for God.

8.28| And this you would find throughout almost the whole of scripture, since properly so among the Seventy [….] even now it is named in the tongue of the Hebrews. Among them, however, certain other utterances are also current for the divine name, such as Saddai and Iao and El and others like these.

8.29| The Psalm at hand, then, contains "Elei, Elei, lama sabachthani," formed from "El," which our Lord also used, and not from "Eloeim."

8.30| Aquila, then, knowing the difference in the Hebrew name of God signified by "Eloeim," did not think fit to render what is signified here in "Elei, Elei" as "my God, my God," as the others do, but said "my strong one, my strong one"; the exact sense is "my strength, my strength." So that, according to the sense of this, our Savior, the lamb of God, saying "Elei, Elei" to the Father, says "My strong one, my strong one, why have you forsaken me?"

8.31| And perhaps, since his strong one forsook him, for this reason he was crucified, as the apostle says: "For indeed he was crucified out of weakness, and lives by the power of God." He would not have been crucified, if his strong one had not left him.

8.32| And consider whether it was not fitting that the lamb of God, who was led like a sheep to the slaughter and, like a lamb before its shearer, was silent, should ascribe his own powers to God, and regard nothing as his own but the Father alone. Therefore he also calls his Father strong, as in the seventeenth Psalm he names the Father his strength and stronghold and refuge, saying: "I will love you, Lord, my strength, the Lord is my firm support, and my refuge, and my deliverer.

8.33| My God is my helper, and I will hope in him; my defender, and the horn of my salvation, and my upholder." His strong one, then, forsook him, since he willed that he go down "to death, even death on a cross," and be shown to be the ransom and substitute for the whole world, and become an expiation for the life of those who believe in him.

8.34| And he, perceiving at once the divine and paternal purpose, and discerning, as no one else could, the reasons why he had been forsaken by the Father, humbled himself still much further, and with great eagerness embraced the death on our behalf: "the all-holy and blessed one became a curse for us, and the one who did not know sin became sin, in order that in him we might become God's righteousness."

8.35| And furthermore, taking our sins upon himself like a stain, he was crucified, enduring what we, formerly impious, ought to have suffered, having become our substitute and ransom, so that we may reasonably say the prophetic words: "He himself bears our sins, and is pained on our account, and he himself was wounded because of our sins, and has been made weak because of our lawless deeds, so that by his bruise we might be healed. For the Lord handed him over to our sins."

8.36| Therefore, as one handed over by the Father, made weak, and having taken up our lawless deeds, he was led like a sheep to the slaughter. The apostle agrees with these words, saying: "who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all."

8.37| Stirring us to inquire into the cause for which the Father left him, he says, "Why have you forsaken me?" And this cause was the redemption of the whole race of human beings, ransomed by precious blood from the grievous slavery in which they had been enslaved to invisible masters, unclean demons, and wicked rulers and spirits.

8.38| And in another way too the Father forsook him, that the disposition of Christ himself toward human beings might be demonstrated. Therefore, though no one had power over his soul, he laid it down of his own will for human beings, just as he teaches, saying: "No one removes my soul from me; I have authority to set it down, and authority again to take it back."

8.39| Next after these words he says: "The words of my transgressions are far from my salvation." Where this reads so, Aquila has put out: "Far from my salvation the words of my roaring"; and Symmachus: "The words of my laments have stood away from my salvation"; and according to another version, current as the fifth, it is said: "The words of my petitions are far from my salvation."

8.40| Observe, then, that in neither of these is "of my transgressions" said, so that sometimes through a scribal error such variations are produced. From the version of the majority it must be understood, unless someone were to say that here too he appropriated our transgressions and said these words.

8.41| After these words he adds: "My God, I will cry out by day, and you will not hear, and by night, and not for lack of understanding on my part." Where this reads so, Symmachus again says: "My God, I will cry aloud by day, and you will not hear, and by night, and silence there is none." In these words, then, he wonders that the Father does not hear him, seeing in this something strange and contrary to custom; but the Father was keeping his hearing for him for the fitting time to be heard.

8.42| And this was the time of the aid at dawn and of the resurrection from the dead, at which, if it was ever said to anyone, it would justly have been said to him as well: "At an acceptable time I listened to you, and on a day of salvation I came to your aid. Behold, now is a very acceptable time; behold, now is a day of salvation."

8.43| But these words may also be spoken by our Savior in another way, as one who was always and at every time accustomed to be heard by the Father, and now believes he will be heard, as if he said more plainly: Is it possible, Father, that I, your only-begotten and beloved Son, go unheard as I shout and cry out to you, my own Father? He teaches this very thing, then, in the gospel according to John, in the case of Lazarus, when, after saying "Take away the stone from the tomb," he lifted up his eyes to heaven and said: "Father, I thank you that you heard me. And I knew that you always hear me."

8.44| If, then, the Father always hears him, he says, not in doubt but knowing exactly that he will hear him now also, since it is impossible that he not be heard, in the form of a question: "My God, I will cry out by day, and will you not hear?" We put a mark of punctuation at "will you not hear," and understand the opposite by the question.

8.45| He teaches this, then, a little later, as the Psalm proceeds, saying: "He has not despised nor been angered at the petition of the poor man, nor turned his face away from me, and when I cried out to him he heard me." How then could he speak in denial, "My God, I will cry out by day, and you will not hear," if not according to the interpretation we have given? I think he himself hints at it, saying: "My God, I will cry out by day, and will you not hear? And by night, and not for lack of understanding on my part."

8.46| For it is not in folly on my part, he says, that "you will hear" is said; for I myself know how I say this, being persuaded that it is your nature to come to the aid of and hear not only me but all your holy ones. For always and continually you dwell among your holy ones, and you are the praise of every man beloved of God, who is called Israel.

8.47| For because of you, no ordinary praise attaches to everyone who honors you, and in you our fathers hoped, and having hoped they were delivered from the evils that rose against them; and to you they cried out, and were saved. In you they hoped, and were not put to shame.

8.48| Since, then, all the holy ones obtained these things from you, and when they cried out were heard and were not put to shame, how much more will you hear me, your beloved child, crying out more than all and more readily? And if I say with wonder, "I will cry out and you will not hear?" the word is not brought forth by me in folly. For I know how I offer the prayer, not boasting or exulting, but as one humble in mind.

8.49| For since I am gentle and humble in heart, humbly and in keeping with my own gentleness I utter humble things about myself, naming myself even a worm. For what could be more humble than a worm? Hence I would not even call myself a man, having come down from my own greatness to such humiliation that I seem no different from a worm, because I have reached even death and the corruption of the body. For from what else would a worm be born than from the corruption of bodies? Having come down into this, I rightly know myself to be a worm and not a man.

8.50| Therefore I have also become "a reproach of men and despised by the people," and would not have become a reproach of men or despised if I had not come down to the level of a worm at the time of the passion. Then, indeed, seeing me hung upon the cross, "they mocked, and spoke with their lips, and shook the head, saying: He set his hope on the Lord; let him rescue him, let him save him, because he takes pleasure in him."

8.51| All these things were plainly prophesied through the Psalm about what would happen long afterward, and they reached their end when, according to Matthew, two robbers were crucified with him, one at the right and one at the left of the Savior, and "those passing by blasphemed him, shaking their heads and saying: Aha, you who destroy the temple and build it in three days, save yourself, if you are God's Son, come down off the cross.

8.52| In the same way the high priests also, mocking together with the elders and scribes, declared: He saved others; he cannot save himself. If he is king of Israel, let him come down now from the cross, and we will believe in him. If he has put his trust in God, let God rescue him now, if he delights in him; he did say, I am the Son of God." And in Luke's account, "the people stood watching, while the rulers jeered at him together with them, saying: Others he saved; let him save himself, if this is the Christ, God's Son, the chosen one."

8.53| According to Mark: "And those passing by blasphemed him, shaking their heads and saying: Aha, you who destroy the temple and build it in three days, save yourself, and come down from the cross. In the same way the high priests also, mocking one another with the scribes, said: He saved others, he cannot save himself. Let the Christ, the king of Israel, come down from the cross now, so that we may see and believe him."

8.54| How would these words differ from what was proclaimed beforehand in the Psalm in the words: "But I am a worm and not a man, a reproach of men and despised by the people. All who see me have mocked me, they have spoken with their lips, they have shaken the head: He hoped in the Lord; let him rescue him, let him save him, because he delights in him"?

8.55| And do not marvel that these things were both said and fulfilled at the passion of our Savior, when even down to now, among all people who have not yet accepted faith in him, he is regarded as a reproach of men. For what is more shameful than to be crucified, and worse than any reproach? But he is also despised by the people of the circumcision, the whole of whose nation to this very day is accustomed to jeer at him, despise him and spit on him. Hence the apostle too fittingly says: "We preach Christ crucified, to Jews a stumbling block, and to the nations foolishness."

8.56| And the words said next in the Psalm you could find, even now, spoken of him by the many. So he prayed these things concerning the circumstance that then surrounded him. But knowing that his first binding into flesh, and his birth from a woman and a virgin, was no worse than the misfortune of death, he fittingly mentions the things of his birth amid those concerning death, saying to [….]: "For you are the one who drew me out of the womb, my hope from my mother's breasts. Upon you I was cast from the womb; from my mother's belly you are my God."

8.57| He fittingly brings up the memory of these things as a consolation for his deliverance from the present troubles. For just as, he says, you became my helper when I took up a human body, when from the very womb that bore me you yourself, my God and my Father, as if acting as midwife, drew out the flesh prepared for me from the Holy Spirit, stretching out your own power, so that no ambush or plot might arise from the opposing powers and evil spirits who begrudged my coming among human beings; since at the first conception too you again overshadowed what was in the womb, so that the holy virgin's conception by the Holy Spirit might escape the notice of the rulers of this age.

8.58| This great mystery your archangel Gabriel made plain, saying to Mary: "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you." Just as, then, your power, the power of the Most High, overshadowed me when I was conceived, and drew me out from my mother's belly when I was born, so I have much consolation that you will draw me up out of death much more.

8.59| And hoping for this I trust in you, my own God and Lord and Father, and I trust not as one who has only now begun to hope in you, but even when, taking infant nourishment from my mother's breasts, I was thought to be, like the babies of human beings, imperfect and without reason; for I was not such, even if I had a body like that of human beings, but did not resemble the many in my power or my essence, being free and unbound, as your lamb, O God, even from that age when I was being nursed, I mean from my mother's breasts.

8.60| And no one will yet think this great, if he learns that even earlier: "Upon you I was cast from the womb, and from my mother's belly you are my God." For while I was still carried inside in the chamber of her who bore me, I saw you, my God, remaining unconfused and unclouded in so great a communion with flesh, or rather being even then bodiless and free from all bonds. So I was cast upon you from the womb, and from my mother's belly you were my God, so that my forerunner John, himself carried in the belly of Elizabeth, perceived my power while it was still being carried by the holy virgin, and, moved by my divinity, leaped in exultation and was filled with the Holy Spirit.

8.61| Bringing up the memory, then, of all these things, and keeping my God and Father always before my eyes, fittingly also at the present time of the suffering that surrounds me, when, having become obedient to you, the Father, of my own choice and willingly, "I have become a worm and not a man, a reproach of men and despised by the people"; and now when all who look on my body being nailed to the cross, thinking it an abominable thing to see, have mocked me, pouring out such scorn and derision against me that they not only reckon and imagine impious things about me in their minds, but also utter them fearlessly and speak them openly: "They spoke with their lips, they shook the head, saying: He hoped in the Lord, let him deliver him."

8.62| And now, then, when such things stand around me, you, my Father, who drew me forth from my mother's belly, upon whom I was cast from the womb, in whom I hoped from the breasts, who from my mother's belly were known to me and recognized as God, I beseech and entreat: do not stand away from me, for affliction is near.

8.63| For there is about to come, he says, and all but present and drawing near, already holding and pressing upon me, the last of all clouds of my surpassing affliction. For I do not yet call affliction this one that now surrounds me, neither the cross, nor the reproaches from human beings, nor the mockeries, nor indeed what happened to me before the cross, the scourgings, the insults, and whatever else the sons of men did in their drunken rage against me; but I see the separation from the body at death itself, and the descent into Hades drawing near, and the uprising of the opposing powers hostile to God. Therefore I say that affliction is near, for there is no one to help.

8.64| For how would that not be a surpassing and the greatest affliction, in which there is no one to help? For he was coming for the salvation of the souls in Hades, which had awaited his arrival through a long age, and he was going down to shatter doors of bronze, to crush bars of iron, and to set free those formerly bound in Hades. And this took place when many bodies of the holy ones who had fallen asleep arose and went in with him into the truly holy city of God.

8.65| But the opposing powers, in addition to the evils of human beings, waged war against him, causing him no small grief and affliction, while he wept over them too out of the excess of his goodness. But observe in what way all this has been said, as from the person of him who was carried in a womb and born from a mother's belly, whom we were saying is the lamb of God.

8.66| For to him the events of the passion happen just as the things of the birth in flesh befitted him. What is born also dies; and what dies obtains death in no other way than by having first traveled through birth.

8.67| Our Savior and Lord, then, recounts these things, not in respect of being by nature without flesh and without body, nor in respect of being conceived as the Word of God and God, but in respect of being able to say in his prayer to the Father: "For you are the one who drew me out of the womb, my hope from my mother's breasts. Upon you I was cast from the womb; from my mother's belly you are my God."

8.68| He, then, having come to the passion, prays what has been set before us to the Father, and says: With so many hostile energies about to surround me, unclean demons and spirits of wickedness, and over all the worst of all, the ruler of this age himself, whom on account of their evil it is fitting to call wicked beasts, whether wild bulls, calves, lions, or dogs; and being about to stand against them all, and to accomplish nothing good for them, since they receive none of my good things through the extreme state of their wickedness, and not even obtaining a helper or fellow worker among any of those named before for the struggle for the souls in Hades, how could I not reasonably say also that affliction is near, for there is no one to help? That the wicked and opposing powers should not work with him or help him as he went on a good errand was nothing to wonder at; but the greatest of all in the affliction that pressed him most was this: that none of the auspicious and right-hand angels, nor indeed of the divine powers, dared to set foot in the palace of death, or to work with him to help the souls there.

8.69| For this was untroubled for him alone, since to him alone the gates of death were opened, and when the gatekeepers of Hades saw him alone they cowered, and he himself who holds the power of death, stepping down from his royal thrones, since he recognized him alone as his lord, spoke to him gently with entreaty and supplication, according to what is made plain in Job about these things.

8.70| Yet seeing the impious domination of the tyrant so strong that no one else of those in heaven dared to be present with him in those regions and work with him for the salvation of the souls there, he fittingly says, "for affliction is near, for there is no one to help," since the only one who could help him even there had left him, so that the brilliant and distinguished quality of his own choice and of his victory over all might be proclaimed to everyone.

8.71| And since the only one able to help him was not at that time his helper, he fittingly began by saying "Elei lama sabachthani, which means, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" When the one indicated was being conceived and carried by the holy virgin, then, the power of the Father was present with him at the moment the Holy Spirit came over the virgin and the power of the Most High overshadowed her, and the Father in person, as the passage showed, drew the one being born out of the womb; but when he was stripping for the wrestling match against death at the time of the passion, he was no longer present as his helper.

8.72| I believe him as he bears witness to this. For the "Elei, Elei, lama sabachthani" spoken by him on the cross, and proclaimed beforehand prophetically by the Psalm, and "for affliction is near, for there is no one to help," what else did it make plain than that, like a great athlete, he had been set forth against so many opponents, with God over all presiding over the contest and awarding the prize for what took place? He called upon the Father, as overseer of what was done, and as one seated beside him, to be present with him like a skilled trainer, especially at the time when he had no other helper, but only the one who awards the prize for what takes place.

8.73| Therefore he says in his prayer: "Do not depart from me, because affliction is near, because there is no one to help." And seeing with divinely inspired eyes, while his body was still fastened to the stake, the powers outside about this air, fleshless and invisible to human beings, crawling around him in the manner of flesh-eating birds and wild beasts, and, with a view to what was about to be his body's death, the rulers and authorities of the air, the spirit now working in the sons of disobedience, flowing together from every side, and still more the demons flying about the earth over the whole inhabited world of human beings, and probably also the wild and fearful beasts of the underworld and of Tartarus itself, of whom Isaiah spoke when mocking the morning star fallen from heaven: "Hades below was embittered at meeting you; all the giants were raised up together with you"; seeing all these together encircling the impaled body from outside and preparing themselves against him, he sketches their company, saying: "Many calves have encircled me, fat bulls have surrounded me. They have opened their mouth against me, like a lion that seizes and roars."

8.74| For supposing, as is likely, that the soul dwelling in the body of Jesus was a human soul like those of the many, and nothing more, those mentioned opened their mouth, as though about to swallow it too, as they do the other souls of human beings. Therefore he says: "They have opened their mouth against me, like a lion that seizes and roars."

8.75| After these words he adds: "I was poured out like water." One might say that this was fulfilled in sensible terms and according to the history, when, according to the evangelist John, one of the soldiers "stabbed with a spear the side of the lamb of God, and at once water and blood came out."

8.76| But he also seems to indicate the complete deadening of his spiritual nature by what he says: "I was poured out as water, and all my bones were scattered. My heart became like melting wax in the midst of my belly. My strength was dried up as a potsherd, and my tongue has stuck to my throat."

8.77| For what else could all these things signify than the condition of a dead body? Immediately he adds, saying: "And you have brought me down into the dust of death." He said these things as foreseeing what had not yet happened, but as already standing near and close and encircling him.

8.78| Taking up again what had already been done, as a consolation for what was to come, he teaches what he endured when plotted against, saying: "For many dogs have encircled me, a gathering of evildoers has surrounded me." By these words he evidently indicates both the soldiers and those of the circumcision who rose up against him. For the soldiers of Pilate, taking Jesus into the praetorium, gathered the whole cohort against him, and stripping him they put a scarlet cloak around him, and plaiting a crown of thorns they placed it on his head, and a reed in his hand, and kneeling before him they mocked him, saying: "Greetings, king of the Jews," and spitting on him they took the reed and struck him on the head.

8.79| And when they had mocked him, they took off the cloak, and put his own clothes on him, and led him off to crucify him." They all but fulfilled in deed the words "For many dogs have encircled me, a gathering of evildoers has surrounded me." But also the words "They dug my hands and my feet, they counted all my bones," and further "They themselves looked and stared at me," and "They divided my garments among themselves, and for my clothing they cast a lot" were fulfilled again, when they pierced his hands and feet with nails to the cross, and when they took hold of his garments and divided them among themselves.

8.80| John, then, relates it, saying: "When the soldiers crucified Jesus, they took his garments and made four parts, a part for each soldier. But the tunic, because it was seamless, woven from the top throughout, they said to one another: Let us not tear it, but cast lots for it to see whose it will be, so that the scripture might be fulfilled which says: They divided my garments among themselves, and for my clothing they cast a lot." The soldiers, then, did these things.

8.81| And Matthew also bears witness to what happened in this manner, saying: "And having crucified him, they divided his garments, casting a lot, that what was spoken through the prophet might be fulfilled: They divided my garments among themselves, and for my clothing they cast a lot. And sitting down they kept watch over him."

8.82| But the dogs who encircled him and the gathering of evildoers were the rulers of the Jews of the circumcision, the scribes and the high priests and the Pharisees, who stirred up the whole multitude to demand his blood upon themselves and upon their own children.

8.83| Isaiah plainly calls them dogs, saying: "All are dumb dogs, unable to bark." For they ought, even if they had not taken on the manner of shepherds, at least like good dogs guarding the rational flock of the master and the sheep of Israel's house, to bark knowingly, fawning on and recognizing their own master and chief shepherd, guarding with all vigilance the flock entrusted to them, and barking only if need be against those outside who plotted against the flock; but they brought forth barkings in the manner of truly dumb and maddened dogs, making the sheep of the shepherd wild, so that "Many dogs have encircled me, a gathering of evildoers has surrounded me" fittingly applies to them.

8.84| And all who down to now act in the same way as they, in blaspheming and barking at the Christ of God, would not be thought foreign to them; and those too who, like the impious soldiers of that time, crucify the Son of God again and make a public example of him would not be far from their disposition.

8.85| All, then, who even now maul the body of Christ, which is the church, handle his hands and feet and further his bones, if indeed we are all "one body in Christ, and individually members one of another," and "the head cannot say to the feet, I do not need you," nor the eyes to the hands.

8.86| In the times of the persecutions, then, if ever anything was done against the members of Christ by enemies and adversaries, one might say concerning him too, not out of season: "They dug my hands and my feet, they counted all my bones. They themselves looked and stared at me."

8.87| And then too they divide his garments among themselves and cast a lot for his clothing, when each one, corrupting the adornment of the Word, that is, the words of the divine scriptures, drags them off now one way, now another, and when they take the opinions about him in perverse teachings, as the godless heretics are accustomed to do. After all these things, stretching out his prayer to his own God and Lord and Father, he adds, saying: "But you, Lord, do not remove my help far away."

8.88| For since he was left alone for a short time for the display of the contest, and stripped alone for death without a helper, knowing well that the help from the Father would come to him in no other way than through the resurrection from the dead, he fittingly prays in the present to obtain an escape from the battle array of his adversaries. Therefore he says: "But you, Lord, do not remove my help far away; attend to my aid."

8.89| For through your help the aid will come to me, because of which aid the whole Psalm is fittingly headed "for the aid at dawn." Attend, then, to the aid, granting me the aid at the dawn of the resurrection from the dead, which is all but here, and which I hope to obtain when, not removing it far from me, you "deliver from the sword my soul, and from the hand of the dog my only-begotten," when you "save me out of the lion's mouth, and my lowliness from the unicorns' horns."

8.90| By these words I think he hints at the powers beneath the earth, which it is not for us to distinguish and divide by kind, how one of them, being a sword, was stretched out against the soul of our Savior, and another, being a dog, held out its death-bringing hand to lay hold of it for death.

8.91| Therefore he says: "Deliver from the sword my soul, and from the hand of the dog my only-begotten." And another wicked power, leader of the beasts there, called the lion, having opened the broad and gaping mouth of death, was rushing to swallow his soul too, along with the others descending to Hades, just as in earlier times death prevailed and swallowed, being none other than the lion here, who opened his mouth against our Savior; and it is from him that he asks the Father to save him, saying: "Save me out of the lion's mouth."

8.92| There may be also certain other wicked, god-fighting powers working against the unicorn of God and trying to march out in battle against him, from whom also the unicorn of God, our Lord himself, having only the Father as his horn, asks that his lowliness be delivered, saying: "and my lowliness from the unicorns' horns."

8.93| And what lowliness is this if not that very one in which "being in God's form he humbled himself and emptied himself, becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross"? But he went down so far, and reached as far as this, I mean as far as the sword in Hades and the hand of the one there called the dog (whence it is likely that the children of the Greeks, having overheard of some such dog of death, also paint him three-headed); and having come even to the throats of the lion mentioned before, and having laid his lowliness beneath the adversaries and god-fighters, the unicorns, and having brought the whole dispensation of his emptying and lowering of himself to this end, and then having prayed that he might now at last obtain the help and the aid from the Father, he adds: "But you, Lord, do not remove my help far away; attend to my aid."

8.94| And having said this, he is not long in finding the Father ready to hear: the Father did not stay far off, and did not put it off even the slightest, but all but said to him in the very deeds: "While you are still speaking, I will say: Behold, I am here." And perceiving this, and having obtained the Father's help as he had prayed, from here on he begins the victory hymn, making the Psalm for the aid at dawn, in the words: "I will declare your name to my brothers, I will sing hymns to you in the midst of the church."

8.95| First, then, to his own disciples and apostles he promises to bring the good news of the joy and exultation in him, calling them brothers.

8.96| Matthew teaches things in keeping with this, and says: "And behold, Jesus met them" (that is, the women with Mary Magdalene), "saying: Greetings. And they came up and took hold of his feet and worshiped him. Then Jesus said to them: Do not be afraid; go, tell my brothers to go away to Galilee, and there they will see me."

8.97| John likewise, after the resurrection from the dead, presents Jesus as saying to Mary: "Do not touch me, for I have not yet ascended to my Father; but go to my brothers and say to them: I am ascending to my Father and your Father, and my God and your God."

8.98| First, then, to his apostles, whom he calls his own brothers, he says he will declare the name of the Father; and after them, in order and in sequence, he promises to teach the paternal hymn to the church that was to be established over the whole inhabited world in his name.

8.99| For just as a teacher distinguished for wisdom might go through his discourses in the midst of disciples, so that those who heard might also assent to them, in the same way he himself says: "I will sing hymns to you in the midst of the church," so that the church, having learned and heard from him in the fitting manner, may no longer, as before, hymn the demons, but hymn him alone, the God of all, through the one who proclaimed him.

8.100| Having promised to do this, he quite consistently now commands the church and his brothers to hymn the Father. Therefore he says: "You who fear the Lord, praise him; all the seed of Jacob, glorify him.

8.101| And let all the seed of Israel fear him, because he has not despised nor been angered at the petition of the poor man, nor turned his face away from me, and when I cried out to him he heard me." By these words he plainly showed his deliverance from the evils named before.

8.102| For if, when he cried out to him, he heard him, and he had prayed that his soul be delivered from the sword, his only-begotten from the dog, and further his lowliness from the lion's mouth and from the horns of the unicorns, it follows that we understand the one who said, "because God was not angered at his petition, nor turned his face away from him, but heard him when he cried out," to have found deliverance from these.

8.103| Therefore it was possible for him, delivered from so many things and having escaped from death, to spend time with his disciples, at once his brothers, and to hymn the Father in the midst of the church. Notice again how he calls himself poor once more, in agreement with the prophecies quoted earlier, in which he was named needy and poor.

8.104| But since he also set forth his resurrection through these words, turning his speech again to the Father he says: "From you is my praise in a great church," making mention of the church gathered from the nations over the whole inhabited world in his name, in which the praise of our Savior is sung continually, by the nod and cooperation of his Father.

8.105| Therefore he says: "From you is my praise in a great church." For this church is truly great, composed of every race of human beings, and the nation of the Jews and the synagogue of those of the circumcision, diminished by every poverty of word and of life and of mind and of every other opinion about God, is not worthy even to be compared with it, because of the august and superhuman character of its life and the greatness of its doctrines.

8.106| He adds next: "I will pay my vows to the Lord before all who fear him," calling those who fear him the great church named before, to whom he said: "You who fear the Lord, praise him." And which vows does he say he will pay, if not those he promised? And what did he promise, if not those things in which he said, "I will declare your name to my brothers, in the church's midst I will sing hymns to you"? For the promises are vows, which, having promised to give them in the midst of the church, he affirmed.

8.107| After these words he adds: "The poor will eat and be filled, and those who seek him will praise the Lord; their hearts will live forever and ever. All the ends of the earth will remember and return to the Lord, and all the families of the nations will bow down before him, because the kingdom belongs to the Lord, and he rules the nations."

8.108| By these words he proclaims, quite consistently, the accomplishments after his resurrection, which have been fulfilled through the calling from all the nations, and through the choice of human beings at the ends of the inhabited world; and the outcomes of these, seen with the eyes, would demonstrate everything said in the Psalm.

8.109| We, in turn, are the poor. We are poor in God's way, and the saving Word nourishes us with the bread of the mind and of reason, the life-giving food of souls, and so gives us eternal life. That is why the Psalm declares: "The poor shall eat and be filled, and those who seek him shall praise the Lord; their hearts shall live for ever and ever."

8.110| And the close of the whole prophecy, coming after all the rest, adds: "The generation that is coming shall be proclaimed to the Lord, and they shall proclaim his righteousness to a people yet to be born, whom the Lord has made." Here it plainly foretells the people from the nations, and the generation that has been established on earth through our Savior Jesus Christ.

8.111| For who could the people be that is said to be born to God after these things, a people that did not exist of old and had no standing among men but came into being later? And what is the generation that did not exist then but is said to be coming, if not this church established through our Savior throughout the whole world, and the new people from the nations? Of that people the Holy Spirit also spoke in wonder through Isaiah: "Who has heard such things, and who has seen the like? Has the earth travailed in a single day, and has a nation been born all at once?"

8.112| We have run through these things only lightly, since the occasion presses us on to other matters. But anyone who cares about the charge of our Savior, who said, "Search the scriptures, in which you think you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me," may sink his mind deep into each word of the Psalm and so hunt down the exact sense of the truth contained in what has been said.

Cite a passage by its number: every paragraph here has its own anchor (for example https://openscriptorium.com/read/eusebius/099-demonstration-of-the-gospel-book-x#p1), and the bracketed reference numbers link the same way.

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