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| Of the Things Pertaining to Christ and the Church, Said Either Openly or Tropically in the 45th Psalm.
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Chapter 16.—Of the Things
Pertaining to Christ and the Church, Said Either Openly or
Tropically in the 45th Psalm.
For whatever direct and manifest
prophetic utterances there may be about anything, it is necessary
that those which are tropical should be mingled with them; which,
chiefly on account of those of slower understanding, thrust upon
the more learned the laborious task of clearing up and expounding
them. Some of them, indeed, on the very first blush, as soon as
they are spoken, exhibit Christ and the Church, although some
things in them that are less intelligible remain to be expounded at
leisure. We have an example of this in that same Book of
Psalms: “My heart bubbled up a good matter: I utter my words
to the king. My tongue is the pen of a scribe, writing swiftly.
Thy form is beautiful beyond the sons of men; grace is poured out
in Thy lips: therefore God hath blessed Thee for evermore. Gird
Thy sword about Thy thigh, O Most Mighty. With Thy goodliness and
Thy beauty go forward, proceed prosperously, and reign, because of
Thy truth, and meekness, and righteousness; and Thy right hand
shall lead Thee forth wonderfully. Thy sharp arrows are most
powerful: in the heart of the king’s enemies. The people
shall fall under Thee. Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever:
a rod of direction is the rod of Thy kingdom. Thou hast loved
righteousness, and hast hated iniquity: therefore God, Thy God,
hath anointed Thee with the oil of exultation above Thy fellows.
Myrrh and drops, and cassia from Thy vestments, from the houses of
ivory: out of which the daughters of kings have delighted Thee in
Thine honor.”1083
Who is
there, no matter how slow,
but must here recognize Christ
whom we preach, and in whom we believe, if he hears that He is God,
whose throne is for ever and ever, and that He is anointed by God,
as God indeed anoints, not with a visible, but with a spiritual and
intelligible chrism? For who is so untaught in this religion, or
so deaf to its far and wide spread fame, as not to know that Christ
is named from this chrism, that is, from this anointing? But when
it is acknowledged that this King is Christ, let each one who is
already subject to Him who reigns because of truth, meekness, and
righteousness, inquire at his leisure into these other things that
are here said tropically: how His form is beautiful beyond the
sons of men, with a certain beauty that is the more to be loved and
admired the less it is corporeal; and what His sword, arrows, and
other things of that kind may be, which are set down, not properly,
but tropically.
Then let him look upon His Church,
joined to her so great Husband in spiritual marriage and divine
love, of which it is said in these words which follow, “The queen
stood upon Thy right hand in gold-embroidered vestments, girded
about with variety. Hearken, O daughter, and look, and incline
thine ear; forget also thy people, and thy father’s house.
Because the King hath greatly desired thy beauty; for He is the
Lord thy God. And the daughters of Tyre shall worship Him with
gifts; the rich among the people shall entreat Thy face. The
daughter of the King has all her glory within, in golden fringes,
girded about with variety. The virgins shall be brought after her
to the King: her neighbors shall be brought to Thee. They shall
be brought with gladness and exultation: they shall be led into
the temple of the King. Instead of thy fathers, sons shall be
born to thee: thou shalt establish them as princes over all the
earth. They shall be mindful of thy name in every generation and
descent. Therefore shall the people acknowledge thee for
evermore, even for ever and ever.”1084
I do not think any one is so
stupid as to believe that some poor woman is here praised and
described, as the spouse, to wit, of Him to whom it is said, “Thy
throne, O God, is for ever and ever: a rod of direction is the
rod of Thy kingdom. Thou hast loved righteousness and hated
iniquity: therefore God, Thy God, hath anointed Thee with the oil
of exultation above Thy fellows;”1085
that is, plainly, Christ above
Christians. For these are His fellows, out of the unity and
concord of whom in all nations that queen is formed, as it is said
of her in another psalm, “The city of the great King.”1086
The same
is Sion spiritually, which name in Latin is interpreted
speculatio (discovery); for she descries the great good of the
world to come, because her attention is directed thither. In the
same way she is also Jerusalem spiritually, of which we have
already said many things. Her enemy is the city of the devil,
Babylon, which is interpreted “confusion.” Yet out of this
Babylon this queen is in all nations set free by regeneration, and
passes from the worst to the best King,—that is, from the devil
to Christ. Wherefore it is said to her, “Forget thy people and
thy father’s house.” Of this impious city those also are a
portion who are Israelites only in the flesh and not by faith,
enemies also of this great King Himself, and of His queen. For
Christ, having come to them, and been slain by them, has the more
become the King of others, whom He did not see in the flesh.
Whence our King Himself says through the prophecy of a certain
psalm, “Thou wilt deliver me from the contradictions of the
people; Thou wilt make me head of the nations. A people whom I
have not known hath served me: in the hearing of the ear it hath
obeyed me.”1087
Therefore this people of the nations, which Christ did not know in
His bodily presence, yet has believed in that Christ as announced
to it; so that it might be said of it with good reason, “In the
hearing of the ear it hath obeyed me,” for “faith is by
hearing.”1088
This
people, I say, added to those who are the true Israelites both by
the flesh and by faith, is the city of God, which has brought forth
Christ Himself according to the flesh, since He was in these
Israelites only. For thence came the Virgin Mary, in whom Christ
assumed flesh that He might be man. Of which city another psalm
says, “Mother Sion, shall a man say, and the man is made in her,
and the Highest Himself hath founded her.”1089
Who is this Highest, save God?
And thus Christ, who is God, before He became man through Mary in
that city, Himself founded it by the patriarchs and prophets. As
therefore was said by prophecy so long before to this queen, the
city of God, what we already can see fulfilled, “Instead of thy
fathers, sons are born to thee; thou shall make them princes over
all the earth;”1090
so out of her sons truly are set
up even her fathers [princes] through all the earth, when the
people, coming together to her, confess to her with the confession
of eternal praise for ever and ever. Beyond doubt,
whatever
interpretation is put on what is here expressed somewhat
darkly in figurative language, ought to be in agreement with these
most manifest things.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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