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| Passages from the Psalms of David Which Predict the End of the World and the Last Judgment.
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Chapter 24.—Passages from the
Psalms of David Which Predict the End of the World and the Last
Judgment.
There are many allusions to the
last judgment in the Psalms, but for the most part only casual and
slight. I cannot, however, omit
to mention what is said there
in express terms of the end of this world: “In the beginning
hast Thou laid the foundations of the earth, O Lord; and the
heavens are the work of Thy hands. They shall perish, but Thou
shall endure; yea, all of them shall wax old like a garment; and as
a vesture Thou shall change them, and they shall be changed: but
Thou art the same, and Thy years shall not fail.”1440
Why is
it that Porphyry, while he lauds the piety of the Hebrews in
worshipping a God great and true, and terrible to the gods
themselves, follows the oracles of these gods in accusing the
Christians of extreme folly because they say that this world shall
perish? For here we find it said in the sacred books of the
Hebrews, to that God whom this great philosopher acknowledges to be
terrible even to the gods themselves, “The heavens are the work
of Thy hands; they shall perish.” When the heavens, the higher
and more secure part of the world, perish, shall the world itself
be preserved? If this idea is not relished by Jupiter, whose
oracle is quoted by this philosopher as an unquestionable authority
in rebuke of the credulity of the Christians, why does he not
similarly rebuke the wisdom of the Hebrews as folly, seeing that
the prediction is found in their most holy books? But if this
Hebrew wisdom, with which Porphyry is so captivated that he extols
it through the utterances of his own gods, proclaims that the
heavens are to perish, how is he so infatuated as to detest the
faith of the Christians partly, if not chiefly, on this account,
that they believe the world is to perish?—though how the heavens
are to perish if the world does not is not easy to see. And,
indeed, in the sacred writings which are peculiar to ourselves, and
not common to the Hebrews and us,—I mean the evangelic and
apostolic books,—the following expressions are used: “The
figure of this world passeth away;”1441
“The world passeth away;”1442
“Heaven
and earth shall pass away,”1443
—expressions which are, I fancy,
somewhat milder than “They shall perish.” In the
Epistle of the Apostle Peter, too, where the world which then was
is said to have perished, being overflowed with water, it is
sufficiently obvious what part of the world is signified by the
whole, and in what sense the word perished is to be taken,
and what heavens were kept in store, reserved unto fire against the
day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.1444
And when he says a little
afterwards, “The day of the Lord will come as a thief; in the
which the heavens shall pass away with a great rush, and the
elements shall melt with burning heat, and the earth and the works
which are in it shall be burned up and then adds, “Seeing, then,
that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons
ought ye to be?”1445
—these heavens which are to
perish may be understood to be the same which he said were kept in
store reserved for fire; and the elements which are to be burned
are those which are full of storm and disturbance in this lowest
part of the world in which he said that these heavens were kept in
store; for the higher heavens in whose firmament are set the stars
are safe, and remain in their integrity. For even the expression
of Scripture, that “the stars shall fall from heaven,”1446
not to
mention that a different interpretation is much preferable, rather
shows that the heavens themselves shall remain, if the stars are to
fall from them. This expression, then, is either figurative, as
is more credible, or this phenomenon will take place in this lowest
heaven, like that mentioned by Virgil,—
“A meteor with a train of
light
Athwart the sky gleamed dazzling
bright,
Then in Idæan woods was lost.”1447
But the passage I have quoted from the psalm
seems to except none of the heavens from the destiny of
destruction; for he says, “The heavens are the works of Thy
hands: they shall perish;” so that, as none of them are
excepted from the category of God’s works, none of them are
excepted from destruction. For our opponents will not condescend
to defend the Hebrew piety, which has won the approbation of their
gods, by the words of the Apostle Peter, whom they vehemently
detest; nor will they argue that, as the apostle in his epistle
understands a part when he speaks of the whole world perishing in
the flood, though only the lowest part of it, and the corresponding
heavens were destroyed, so in the psalm the whole is used for a
part, and it is said “They shall perish,” though only the
lowest heavens are to perish. But since, as I said, they will not
condescend to reason thus, lest they should seem to approve of
Peter’s meaning, or ascribe as much importance to the final
conflagration as we ascribe to the deluge, whereas they contend
that no waters or flames could destroy the whole human race, it
only remains to them to maintain that their gods lauded the wisdom
of the Hebrews because they had not read this psalm.
It is the last judgment of God
which is re
ferred to also in the 50th Psalm in the words, “God
shall come manifestly, our God, and shall not keep silence: fire
shall devour before Him, and it shall be very tempestuous round
about Him. He shall call the heaven above, and the earth, to
judge His people. Gather His saints together to Him; they who
make a covenant with Him over sacrifices.”1448
This we understand of our Lord
Jesus Christ, whom we look for from heaven to judge the quick and
the dead. For He shall come manifestly to judge justly the just
and the unjust, who before came hiddenly to be unjustly judged by
the unjust. He, I say, shall come manifestly, and shall not keep
silence, that is, shall make Himself known by His voice of
judgment, who before, when he came hiddenly, was silent before His
judge when He was led as a sheep to the slaughter, and, as a lamb
before the shearer, opened not His mouth as we read that it was
prophesied of Him by Isaiah,1449
and as we see it fulfilled in the
Gospel.1450
As for
the fire and tempest, we have already said how these
are to be interpreted when we were explaining a similar passage in
Isaiah.1451
As to
the expression, “He shall call the heaven above,” as the saints
and the righteous are rightly called heaven, no doubt this
means what the apostle says, “We shall be caught up together with
them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air.”1452
For if
we take the bare literal sense, how is it possible to call the
heaven above, as if the heaven could be anywhere else than above?
And the following expression, “And the earth to judge His
people,” if we supply only the words, “He shall call,” that
is to say, “He shall call the earth also,” and do not supply
“above,” seems to give us a meaning in accordance with sound
doctrine, the heaven symbolizing those who will judge along with
Christ, and the earth those who shall be judged; and thus the
words, “He shall call the heaven above,” would not mean, “He
shall catch up into the air,” but “He shall lift up to seats of
judgment.” Possibly, too, “He shall call the heaven,” may
mean, He shall call the angels in the high and lofty places, that
He may descend with them to do judgment; and “He shall call the
earth also” would then mean, He shall call the men on the earth
to judgment. But if with the words “and the earth” we
understand not only “He shall call,” but also “above,” so
as to make the full sense be, He shall call the heaven above, and
He shall call the earth above, then I think it is best understood
of the men who shall be caught up to meet Christ in the air, and
that they are called the heaven with reference to their
souls, and the earth with reference to their bodies. Then
what is “to judge His people,” but to separate by judgment the
good from the bad, as the sheep from the goats? Then he turns to
address the angels: “Gather His saints together unto Him.”
For certainly a matter so important must be accomplished by the
ministry of angels. And if we ask who the saints are who are
gathered unto Him by the angels, we are told, “They who make a
covenant with Him over sacrifices.” This is the whole life of
the saints, to make a covenant with God over sacrifices. For
“over sacrifices” either refers to works of mercy, which are
preferable to sacrifices in the judgment of God, who says, “I
desire mercy more than sacrifices,”1453
or if “over sacrifices” means
in sacrifices, then these very works of mercy are the sacrifices
with which God is pleased, as I remember to have stated in the
tenth book of this work;1454
and in these works the saints make
a covenant with God, because they do them for the sake of the
promises which are contained in His new testament or covenant.
And hence, when His saints have been gathered to Him and set at His
right hand in the last judgment, Christ shall say, “Come, ye
blessed of my Father, take possession of the kingdom prepared for
you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry, and ye
gave me to eat,”1455
and so on, mentioning the good
works of the good, and their eternal rewards assigned by the last
sentence of the Judge.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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