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| Christ's Sermon on the Mount. In Manner and Contents It So Resembles the Creator's Dispensational Words and Deeds. It Suggests Therefore the Conclusion that Jesus is the Creator's Christ. The Beatitudes.
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Chapter
XIV.—Christ’s Sermon on the Mount. In Manner and Contents
It So Resembles the Creator’s Dispensational Words and Deeds. It
Suggests Therefore the Conclusion that Jesus is the Creator’s
Christ. The Beatitudes.
I now come to those ordinary precepts of His, by
means of which He adapts the peculiarity3935
of
His doctrine to what I may call His official proclamation as the
Christ.3936
| 3936 The original runs
thus: “Venio nunc ad ordinarias sententias ejus, per quas
proprietatem doctrinæ suæ inducit ad edictum, ut ita dixerim,
Christi.” There is here an allusion to the edict of
the Roman prætor, that is, his public announcement, in
which he states (when entering on his office) the rules by which he
will be guided in the administration of the same (see White and Riddle,
Latin Dict. s. v. Edictum). | “Blessed are
the needy” (for no less than this is required for interpreting
the word in the Greek,3937
| 3937 οί πτωχοι, not
πένητες | “because
theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”3938
Now this very fact, that He begins with beatitudes, is characteristic
of the Creator, who used no other voice than that of blessing either in
the first fiat or the final dedication of the universe: for “my
heart,” says He, “hath indited a very good
word.”3939
This will be that
“very good word” of blessing which is admitted to be the
initiating principle of the New Testament, after the example of the
Old. What is there, then, to wonder at, if He entered on His
ministry with the very attributes3940
of
the Creator, who ever in language of the same sort loved, consoled,
protected, and avenged the beggar, and the poor, and the humble,
and the widow, and the orphan? So that you may believe this private
bounty as it were of Christ to be a rivulet streaming from the springs
of salvation. Indeed, I hardly know which way to turn amidst so vast a
wealth of good words like these; as if I were in a forest, or a
meadow, or an orchard of apples. I must therefore look out for such
matter as chance may present to me.3941
In the psalm he exclaims: “Defend the
fatherless and the needy; do justice to the humble and the poor;
deliver the poor, and rid the needy out of the hand of the
wicked.”3942
Similarly in the seventy-first Psalm:
“In righteousness shall He judge the needy amongst the people,
and shall save the children of the poor.”3943
And in the following words he says of Christ: “All nations shall
serve Him.”3944
Now David only
reigned over the Jewish nation, so that nobody can suppose that this
was spoken of David; whereas He had taken upon Himself the
condition of the poor, and such as were oppressed with want,
“Because He should deliver the needy out of the hand of the
mighty man; He shall spare the needy and the poor, and shall deliver
the souls of the poor. From usury and injustice shall He redeem
their souls, and in His sight shall their name be
honoured.”3945
Again:
“The wicked shall be turned into hell, even all the nations that
forget God; because the needy shall not alway be forgotten; the
endurance of the poor shall not perish for ever.”3946
Again: “Who is like unto the
Lord our God, who dwelleth on high, and yet looketh on the humble
things that are in heaven and on earth!—who raiseth up the needy
from off the ground, and out of the dunghill exalteth the poor; that He
may set him with the princes of His people,”3947
that is, in His own kingdom. And likewise
earlier, in the book of Kings,3948
| 3948 The books of
“Samuel” were also called the books of
“Kings.” | Hannah the mother
of Samuel gives glory to God in these words: “He raiseth the poor
man from the ground, and the beggar, that He may set him amongst the
princes of His people (that is, in His own kingdom), and on thrones of
glory” (even royal ones).3949
And by Isaiah
how He inveighs against the oppressors of the needy! “What mean
ye that ye set fire to my vineyard, and that the spoil of the poor is
in your houses? Wherefore do ye beat my people to pieces, and grind the
face of the needy?”3950
And again:
“Woe unto them that decree unrighteous decrees; for in their
decrees they decree wickedness, turning aside the needy from judgment,
and taking away their rights from the poor of my
people.”3951
These righteous
judgments He requires for the fatherless also, and the widows, as well
as for consolation3952
to the very needy
themselves. “Do justice to the fatherless, and deal justly with
the widow; and come, let us be reconciled,3953
| 3953 Tertullian seems to
have read διαλλαχθῶμεν
instead of διαλεχθῶμεν, let us reason together, in his LXX. |
saith the Lord.”3954
To him, for whom in
every stage of lowliness there is provided so much of the
Creator’s compassionate regard, shall be given that kingdom also
which is promised by Christ, to whose merciful compassion belong, and
for a great while have belonged,3955
those to whom
the promise is made. For even if you suppose that the promises of the
Creator were earthly, but that Christ’s are heavenly, it is quite
clear that heaven has been as yet the property of no other God
whatever, than Him who owns the earth also; quite clear that the
Creator has given even the lesser promises (of earthly blessing), in
order that I may more readily believe Him concerning His greater
promises (of heavenly blessings) also, than (Marcion’s god), who
has never given proof of his liberality by any preceding bestowal of
minor blessings. “Blessed are they that hunger, for they shall be
filled.”3956
I might connect
this clause with the former one, because none but the poor and needy
suffer hunger, if the Creator had not specially designed that the
promise of a similar blessing should serve as a preparation for the
gospel, that so men might know it to be His.3957
| 3957 In evangelii scilicet
sui præstructionem. |
For thus does He say, by Isaiah, concerning those whom He was about to
call from the ends of the earth—that is, the Gentiles:
“Behold, they shall come swiftly with speed:”3958
swiftly, because hastening towards
the fulness of the times; with speed, because unclogged by the
weights of the ancient law. They shall neither hunger nor thirst.
Therefore they shall be filled,—a promise which is made to
none but those who hunger and thirst. And again He says: “Behold,
my servants shall be filled, but ye shall be hungry; behold, my
servants shall drink, but ye shall be thirsty.”3959
As for these oppositions, we shall see
whether they are not premonitors of Christ.3960
| 3960 An Christo
præministrentur. |
Meanwhile the promise of fulness to the hungry is a provision of God
the Creator. “Blessed are they that weep, for they shall
laugh.”3961
Turn again to the
passage of Isaiah: “Behold, my servants shall exult with joy, but
ye shall be ashamed; behold, my servants shall be glad, but ye shall
cry for sorrow of heart.”3962
And recognise
these oppositions also in the dispensation of Christ. Surely gladness
and joyous exultation is promised to those who are in an opposite
condition—to the sorrowful, and sad, and anxious. Just as
it is said in the 125th Psalm: “They who sow in tears shall
reap in joy.”3963
Moreover, laughter
is as much an accessory to the exulting and glad, as
weeping is to the sorrowful and grieving. Therefore the Creator, in
foretelling matters for laughter and tears, was the first who said that
those who mourned should laugh. Accordingly, He who began (His course)
with consolation for the poor, and the humble, and the hungry, and the
weeping, was at once eager3964
to represent
Himself as Him whom He had pointed out by the mouth of Isaiah:
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because He hath anointed me
to preach good tidings unto the poor.”3965
“Blessed are the needy, because theirs is the kingdom of
heaven.”3966
“He hath sent
me to bind up the broken-hearted.”3967
“Blessed are they that hunger, for they shall be
filled.”3968
“To comfort
all that mourn.”3969
“Blessed are
they that weep, for they shall laugh.”3970
“To give unto them that mourn in Sion, beauty (or glory) for
ashes, and the oil of joy for mourning, and the garment of praise for
the spirit of heaviness.”3971
Now since
Christ, as soon as He entered on His course,3972
fulfilled such a ministration as this, He is either, Himself, He who
predicted His own coming to do all this; or else if he is not yet come
who predicted this, the charge to Marcion’s Christ must be a
ridiculous one (although I should perhaps add a necessary3973
| 3973 Said in irony, as if
Marcion’s Christ deserved the rejection. | one), which bade him say, “Blessed
shall ye be, when men shall hate you, and shall reproach you, and shall
cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man’s
sake.”3974
In this declaration
there is, no doubt, an exhortation to patience. Well, what did the
Creator say otherwise by Isaiah? “Fear ye not the reproach
of men, nor be diminished by their contempt.”3975
What reproach? what contempt? That which was
to be incurred for the sake of the Son of man. What Son of man? He who
(is come) according to the Creator’s will. Whence shall we get
our proof? From the very cutting off, which was predicted against Him;
as when He says by Isaiah to the Jews, who were the instigators of
hatred against Him: “Because of you, my name is blasphemed
amongst the Gentiles;”3976
and in another
passage: “Lay the penalty on3977
Him who
surrenders3978
His own life, who
is held in contempt by the Gentiles, whether servants or
magistrates.”3979
| 3979 Famulis et
magistratibus. It is uncertain what passage this quotation represents.
It sounds like some of the clauses of Isa. liii. | Now, since hatred
was predicted against that Son of man who has His mission from the
Creator, whilst the Gospel testifies that the name of Christians, as
derived from Christ, was to be hated for the Son of man’s sake,
because He is Christ, it determines the point that that was the Son of
man in the matter of hatred who came according to the Creator’s
purpose, and against whom the hatred was predicted. And even if He had
not yet come, the hatred of His name which exists at the present day
could not in any case have possibly preceded Him who was to bear the
name.3980
But He has both suffered the
penalty3981
in our presence,
and surrendered His life, laying it down for our sakes, and is held in
contempt by the Gentiles. And He who was born (into the world) will be
that very Son of man on whose account our name also is
rejected.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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