Patristic Wisdom: Looking to Palm Sunday

O Lord, save us now;
O Lord, prosper us now.
Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord;
We blessed you from the house of the Lord.
God is the Lord, and He revealed Himself to us;
Appoint a feast for yourselves, decked with branches,
Even to the horns of the altar.
You are my God, and I will give thanks to You;
You are my God, and I shall exalt You;
I will give thanks to You, for You heard me;
And You became my salvation.
Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good;
For His mercy endures forever. (Psalm 118:25-29 LXX)

The next day a great multitude that had come to the feast, when they heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem, took branches of palm trees and went out to meet Him, and cried out: “Hosanna! ‘Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!’ The King of Israel!” Then Jesus, when He had found a young donkey, sat on it; as it is written: “Fear not, daughter of Zion; Behold, your King is coming, Sitting on a donkey’s colt.” (John 12:12–15)

“In the name of the Lord” signifies “in the name of God the Father,” just as Himself said elsewhere to the unbelieving Jews, “I have come in the name of my Father, and you do not receive me; another will come in his own name, him you will receive.” Christ came in the name of God the Father, because in everything that he did and said he was concerned with glorifying his Father and with proclaiming to human beings that he is to be glorified. The antichrist will come in his own name, and although he may be the most wicked person of all and a convivial companion of the devil, he will see fit to call himself the Son of God while “being opposed to and raised above everything that is said to be God and is worshiped.” The crowd took this verse of praise from Ps 117 [LXX], and there is no one who doubts that it is sung about the Lord. Hence it is appropriate that there is previously sung of him in the same psalm, “The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.” For Christ, whom the Jews rejected as they were building the decrees of their own traditions, became a memorial for believers from among both peoples, namely, the Jews and the Gentiles. For as to the fact that Christ is called the cornerstone in this psalm, this is what was being chanted in high praise in the gospel by the voice of those who followed and those who went ahead.

Bede, Homilies on the Gospels 2.3

Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord. The children also offered this cry to the Lord as an accusation against those who professed to teach the divine sayings but were unwilling to understand their true meaning. Since the Scribes and Pharisees called the Lord a Samaritan, the children called him the one who is coming and blessed; and the term Hosanna likewise occurs in the prophecy, as we find the phrase Please save occurring as Hosanna in the Hebrew. Hence blessed John the Baptist, to guide his own disciples to the truth, asked the Lord through them, “Are you the one who is to come, or should we wait for someone else?” Being Lord, he has come in the name of the Lord; thus he said to Jews, “I have come in my Father’s name, and you did not receive me; another comes in his own name, and him you will receive.” And being blessed, he is son of the Blessed One; thus the high priest also asked, “Are you the son of the Blessed One?” We blessed you from the house of the Lord. The victors say this to their friends, We offer you the blessing of this stone, which became a house for God the Word in it: “The Word was made flesh,” Scripture says, “and dwelt among us”; and the Lord said to Jews, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I shall raise it up.”

The Lord is God, and he has appeared to us. Here he has clearly declared the divinity of Christ the Lord: the one he called stone above and later blessed and coming in the name of the Lord he named Lord and God, who made his particular appearance and regaled the believers with salvation. Observe a festival with the garlands as far as the horns of the altar: assemble, therefore, all, and conduct a very great festal assembly in celebration of your own salvation so that a massed gathering arrives at the very altar.

Theodoret of Cyrus, Commentary on Psalm 118.11–12

Sing the "Mean" Psalms

Peter Leithart has written a post reminding Christians of the benefit of imprecatory psalms in worship. Consider the following:

As Laurence points out, this cry for justice and for deliverance from satanic powers embraces the entire Psalter. Psalm 1 shows Yahweh blowing away the wicked as chaff, and Psalm 2 introduces Yahweh’s royal Son who shatters nations and kings like pottery. Near the end of the Psalter, Psalm 149 promises that the saints will do the shattering, binding kings and executing justice. The Psalter hands the Son’s rod of iron over to us, because the Psalter is a rod of iron. Singing psalms, we break teeth, blunt arrows, disable unjust hands, silence lying tongues.

Singing the “mean” psalms is thus part of the church’s mission.…

Amen!

Patristic Wisdom: Looking to the Fifth Sunday in Lent

But Jesus called them to Himself and said to them, “You know that those who are considered rulers over the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. Yet it shall not be so among you, but whoever desires to become great among you shall be your servant. And whoever of you desires to be first shall be slave of all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.” (Mark 10:42–45)

Moreover, he is called Light as being the Brightness of souls cleansed by word and life. For if ignorance and sin be darkness, knowledge and a godly life will be Light. … And He is called Life because He is Light, and is the constituting and creating Power of every reasonable soul. For in Him we live and move and have our being, according to the double power of that Breathing into us; for we were all inspired by Him with breath, and as many of us as were capable of it, and in so far as we open the mouth of our mind, with God the Holy Spirit. He is Righteousness because He distributes according to that which we deserve, and is a righteous Arbiter both for those who are under the Law and for those who are under Grace, for soul and body, so that the former should rule, and the latter obey, and the higher have supremacy over the lower; that the worse may not rise in rebellion against the better. He is Sanctification, as being Purity, that the Pure may be contained by Purity. And Redemption, because He sets us free, who were held captive under sin, giving Himself a Ransom for us, the Sacrifice to make expiation for the world. And Resurrection, because He raises up from hence, and brings to life again us, who were slain by sin.

Gregory of Nazianzus, Oration 30.20

Patristic Wisdom: Looking to the Fourth Sunday in Lent

Then the people came to Moses, and were saying, “We sinned, for we spoke against the Lord and against you; therefore, pray to the Lord, and let Him take away the serpent from us.” So Moses prayed for the people. Then the Lord said to Moses, “Make a serpent for yourself and put it on a signal pole; and it shall be if a serpent should bite someone, when the one bitten looks at it, he shall live.” So Moses made a copper serpent and put it on a signal pole; and it happened, when a serpent bit anyone, and he looked at the copper serpent, he lived. (Num 21:7–9)

And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so, must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. (John 3:14–17)

This was the figure which Moses completed by fixing the serpent to a cross, that whoever had been bitten by the living serpent, and looked to the brazen serpent, might be saved by believing. Does then the brazen serpent save when crucified, and shall not the Son of God incarnate save when crucified also? On each occasion, life comes by means of wood. For in the time of Noah the preservation of life was by an ark of wood. In the time of Moses, the sea, on beholding the emblematical rod, was abashed at him who smote it; is then Moses’ rod mighty, and is the Cross of the Saviour powerless? But I pass by the greater part of the types, to keep within measure. The wood in Moses’ case sweetened the water; and from the side of Jesus, the water flowed upon the wood.

Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lectures 13.20

On what principle did the Blood of His Only-begotten Son delight the Father, Who would not receive even Isaac, when he was being offered by his father, but changed the sacrifice, putting a ram in the place of the human victim? Is it not evident that the Father accepts Him, but neither asked for Him nor demanded Him; but on account of the Incarnation, and because Humanity must be sanctified by the Humanity of God, that He might deliver us Himself, and overcome the tyrant, and draw us to Himself by the mediation of His Son, Who also arranged this to the honor of the Father, Whom it is manifest that He obeys in all things? So much we have said of Christ; the greater part of what we might say shall be reverenced with silence. But that brazen serpent was hung up as a remedy for the biting serpents, not as a type of Him that suffered for us, but as a contrast; and it saved those that looked upon it, not because they believed it to live, but because it was killed, and killed with it the powers that were subject to it, being destroyed as it deserved. And what is the fitting epitaph for it from us? “O death, where is your sting? O grave, where is your victory?” You are overthrown by the Cross; you are slain by Him who is the Giver of life; you are without breath, dead, without motion, even though you keep the form of a serpent lifted up on high on a pole.

Gregory Nazianzen, Oration 45.22 

Coming Unworthily

Therefore such people must learn that it is the highest art to know that our Sacrament does not depend upon our worthiness. For we are not baptized because we are worthy and holy, nor do we go to confession because we are pure and without sin, but the contrary, because we are poor miserable men, and just because we are unworthy; unless it is someone who desires no grace and absolution nor intends to reform.

But whoever would gladly obtain grace and consolation should impel himself, and allow no one to frighten him away, but say: I, indeed, would like to be worthy; but I come, not upon any worthiness, but upon Your Word, because You have commanded it, as one who would gladly be Your disciple, no matter what becomes of my worthiness.

Large Catechism, V.61–62

Patristic Wisdom: Looking to the Third Sunday in Lent

Now the Passover of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. And He found in the temple those who sold oxen and sheep and doves, and the money changers doing business. When He had made a whip of cords, He drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and the oxen, and poured out the changers’ money and overturned the tables. And He said to those who sold doves, “Take these things away! Do not make My Father’s house a house of merchandise!” Then His disciples remembered that it was written, “Zeal for Your house has eaten Me up.”

So the Jews answered and said to Him, “What sign do You show to us since You do these things?” Jesus answered and said to them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” Then the Jews said, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will You raise it up in three days?” But He was speaking of the temple of His body. Therefore, when He had risen from the dead, His disciples remembered that He had said this to them; and they believed the Scripture and the word which Jesus had said. (John 2:13–22)

Jesus goes up to Jerusalem after he has helped those in Cana of Galilee, and after He has gone down to Capernaum, that He might perform the works which are recorded among those in Jerusalem. He found in the temple, which is also said to be the house of the Savior’s Father, that is, in the church or in the proclamation of the sound message of the church, some who were making His Father’s house a house of merchandise. Jesus always finds some such in the temple. For when, in what we call the church, which is the house “of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth,” are there not some money-changers sitting, needing stripes from the whip Jesus made from ropes, and money-changers needing their coins poured out and their tables overturned? And when are there not those who are selling oxen commercially? These ought to be kept for the plow, that by putting their hands to it and not turning back they might become fit for the kingdom of God? And when are there not those who prefer the mammon of iniquity to the sheep which provide them the material to adorn themselves? There are always many, too, who despise what is honest and pure and devoid of all bitterness and gall. For the sake of miserable gain, they abandon the care of those who are figuratively called doves. …

Therefore, whenever the Savior finds in the temple, the house of the Father, those who are selling oxen and sheep and doves, and the money-changers sitting, He drives them out, together with their commercial sheep and oxen, using the whip He has made from ropes. He also pours out the coins as not worth keeping, since He has shown their uselessness. And He overturns the tables in the souls of those fond of money, saying also to those selling doves, “Take these hence,” that they might no longer trade in the temple of God. What I have said is not unrelated to the temple and those who were driven out by the Savior who says of the event, “The zeal of your house will devour me.” Nor are my words unrelated to the Jews who ask for a sign to be shown to them, and the Lord’s response to them, when he joins a word about the temple with one about his own body, and declares, “Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up.” For these irrational and commercial things must be driven away from this temple which is the body of Christ, that it might no longer be a house of merchandise. This temple, too, must be destroyed by those who plot against the Word of God, and after it has been destroyed, be raised up on the third day which we mentioned previously. At this time also the disciples will remember what God’s Word said before the temple of God was destroyed, and will believe, not in the Scripture only, but also in the word which Jesus spoke, their faith also being perfected with their knowledge at that time.

Origen, Commentary on the Gospel According to John 10.133–137, 239–241

A House Divided

I am reading A Short History of the Confederate States of America by Jefferson Davis giving me an understanding of what prompted the secession of states and the ensuing war. Especially interesting in the account is the legality of secession derived from the United States constitution.

The governments of the States were instituted to secure certain unalienable rights of the citizens with which they were endowed by their Creator. Where must the American citizen look for the security of these rights? To his State Government.

The powers which a State Government possesses for the security of his life, his liberty, his property, his safety, and his happiness are “just powers.” They have been derived from the unconstrained consent of the governed, and they have been organized in such form as seems most likely to effect these objects.

The entire order of the State Government is founded on the free consent of the governed. From this it springs; from this, it receives its force and life. It is this consent alone from which “just powers” are derived. They can come from no other source, and their exercise secures a true republican government. All else are usurpations, their exercise is a tyranny, and their end is the safety and security of the usurper, to obtain which the safety and security of the people are sacrificed. The “just powers” thus derived are organized in such form as seems most likely to effect safety and happiness. It is the governed who determine the form of the government, and not the ruler or his military force, unless he comes as a conqueror to make the subjugated do his will.

What, then, is the Government of the United States? It is an organization of a few years’ duration. It might cease to exist and yet the States and the people continue prosperous, peaceful, and happy. Unlike the governments of the States, which find their origin deep in the nature of man, it sprang from certain circumstances which existed in the course of human affairs. Unlike the governments of the States and of separate nations, which have a divine sanction, it has no warrant for its authority but the ratification of the sovereign States. Unlike the governments of the States, which were instituted to secure generally the unalienable rights of man, it has only the enumerated objects, and is restrained from passing beyond them by the express reservation of all undelegated functions. It keeps no record of property, and guarantees to no one the possession of his estate. Marriage, it can neither confirm nor annul. It is an anomaly among governments, and arose out of the articles of agreement made by certain friendly States which proposed to form a society of States, and invest a common agent with specified functions of sovereignty. Its duration was intended to be permanent, as it was hoped thus to promote the peaceful ends for which it was established; but to have declared it perpetual would have been to deny the right of the people to alter or abolish their government when it should cease to answer the ends for which it was instituted.

The objects which its creation was designed to secure to the States and their people were of a truly peaceful nature, and commended themselves to the approbation of men: “To form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity.”

Notice the flow of authority: first, the state, then the federal. This is how our constitution was conceived and written. As years went by, the federal government took for itself increasing authority over the states, yet states could leave the union if they determined that the decisions or actions of the federal government had overstepped enumerated powers. The most well-known occasion being in 1861 when several southern states seceded for multiple reasons. To thwart this independent action, the federal government took an elitist stance with the guise of national unity in order to force Southern subjugation. Davis describes it this way concerning the state of Tennesse:

Mankind must contemplate with horror the fact that an organization established for such peaceful and benign ends did, within the first century of its existence, lead the assault in a civil war that brought nearly four million soldiers into the field, and destroyed thousands and thousands of millions of treasure, trampled the unalienable rights of the people underfoot, subverted the governments of the States, and ended by establishing itself as supreme and sovereign over all. Now let us proceed to notice the acts of the Federal Government which subjugated the State Governments. In the case of Tennessee, already noted, the Government of the State — which derived its powers from the consent of the governed, so that they were “just powers” — found, in the discharge of its duty to protect the institutions of its people, that there were no means by which it could fulfill that duty but by a withdrawal from the Union, so as to be rid of the Government of the United States, and thus escape the threatened dangers of usurpation and sectional hostility. It, therefore, resolved to withdraw from the Union, and the people gave their assent to that resolution; so that the State no longer considered itself a member of the Union, nor recognized the laws and authority of its Government.

The Government of the United States then, with a powerful military force, planted itself at Nashville, the State capital. It refused to recognize the laws and authority of its Government, or any organization under it, as having any existence, or to recognize the people otherwise than as a hostile community. It said to them, in effect, “I am the sovereign, and you are the subjects. If you are stronger than I am, then drive me out of the State; if I am stronger than you are, then I command an unconditioned surrender to my sovereignty.” It is evident that the Government of the United States was not there by the consent of those who were to be governed. It had not, therefore, any “just powers” of government within the State of Tennessee. “For,” says the Declaration of Independence of our fathers, “governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed.” By this action, therefore, the Federal Government not only subverted the State Government but annihilated it. It proceeded to establish a new order of affairs, founded on the assumption of Federal sovereignty. It appointed its military governor to be the head of the new order, and recognized no civil or political existence in any man except some of its notorious adherents, until, by betraying the State, he had taken an oath of allegiance to the sovereignty of the United States. Then unalienable rights were systematically denied, freedom of speech was suppressed, freedom of the press was suspended, personal liberty was destroyed. Citizens were arrested, imprisoned, and exiled without the process of law.

I mention the above because the current national rancor is similarly fueled as elitist politicians, media, and corporate executives demonstrate the same attitude of sovereignty trying to build oligarchal structures. As a result, discussions of secession have been fueled—most notably in Texas.

Many have asked if secession is now legal. Those espousing the negative cite Chief Justice Salmon Chase who wrote in his 1869 Texas v. White decision: “The union between Texas and the other states was as complete, as perpetual, and as indissoluble as the union between the original states. There was no place for reconsideration or revocation, except through revolution or through consent of the States.” Should a state, or group of states, secede anyway? I fear that the federal response would result in carnage sufficient to pale that of the Civil War. But if this drastic action is not seriously attempted, I fear that Washington, D.C., etc. will run roughshod over our civil rights in their desire to be overlords of the masses. Let’s hope neither will come about.

The best solution is to recognize state sovereignty as originally intended, but I will not hold my breath waiting for the federal government to cede back what has been taken.