Why is it that I admire Ezekiel? Because the order was given him to make known to Jerusalem its abominations, and he did not place before his eyes any danger that would result from his preaching, but in order to keep only the precepts of God, he spoke whatever he was told. Let us realize that there was a mystery, that there was the revelation of a mysterious kind on the subject of Jerusalem and all that is said against it. Nevertheless, he prophesied, and accused it of fornication.

What do you say, prophet? God punishes, and shall I grieve for those whom he is punishing? Certainly. For God, who punishes, wants us to grieve, since he does not want to punish us, and he grieves when carrying out punishment. Do not rejoice at this. One will say, If they are justly punished, we ought not to grieve. What we ought to grieve for is this, that they were found worthy of punishment. When you see your son undergoing medical or surgical treatment, do you not grieve? You do not say to yourself, What is this? This cutting is for health, to speed his recovery; it is for his deliverance, this burning? But for all that, when you hear him crying out and unable to bear the pain, you grieve, and the hope of health being restored is not enough to carry off the shock to nature.

Which of the cities in the world were so elevated and so deep in knowledge as the city of God?

If so many things are said in Jerusalem about which such great and wonderful things are written that have been promised to her, what future is there for unhappy me, if I sin? Who will I have for a father, who will I have for a mother?

If we are on the alert, these evils that came into life as a result of the sins of our forebears will in no way be able to harm us, because in fact they go no further than the level of terminology. It was the first formed human being who through the fall brought on the punishment of death and was responsible for spending his life in pain and distress, and it was he who was the cause of servitude. But Christ the Lord came and permitted all these evils to occur only at the level of terminology, provided we are of the right mind. You see, death is now not death but only carries the name of death—or, rather, even the very name has been abolished.

Not everyone is washed for salvation. We who have received the grace of baptism in the name of Christ are washed, but I do not know who is washed for salvation.

It is quite difficult that he who is washed should be washed in order to be saved. Listen, catechumens, listen, and from what is said, prepare yourselves, while you are catechumens, while you are not yet baptized, and come to the bath and be baptized for salvation. Do not be so baptized that you are washed but not for salvation.

It is a great work to be rubbed with salt. If we are seasoned with salt, we are full of grace.

The soul that is reborn is barely out of the bath before being enveloped with towels.

To take an example from human relationships, if the Holy Spirit gives, then I travel on to Jesus Christ and God the Father.

That you were washed in water means washing not only from heretics but also from ecclesiastics who do not receive saving baptism with a full faith, about whom it is said that they will have received the water but not the Spirit.

But see the mercy of God, see his extraordinary goodness. Even though Jerusalem was thrown into the open field, he does not look down on it as thrown out forever, he does not leave it in a state of perversion as entirely forgotten, as not in the end to lift up the fallen. You were thrown out, but I still return to you; my visit is not lacking after your ruin.

When she is ready for marriage and her body is becoming beautiful, she did not have clothes to cover her, and she was not protected by the help of God. If people do not have clothing that Christ gives, they are naked; if people are not clothed inwardly with mercy, goodness, humility, chastity, gentleness and patience, they are cast on the earth, and their beauty is defiled in disorder and nudity.

When we are of a greater age and can therefore sin, angels look for a chance to influence us, and that is as true of the angels of God as it is of the angels of Satan.

Let us pray that the mercy of God will come on us and wash away the blood from our souls.

As far as Jerusalem is concerned, let us compare it with our soul, which as long as it is in infancy is unable to sin; but when it comes to that age, many are the lovers of demons and heretics and perverse teachings, which desire to turn aside to it; they are driven away by the protection of the Lord, so that the soul receives not the attendance of the devil but the ministers of a savior.

Do not infer from these things that it is about punishment only, but also about the boundless longsuffering of God.

Our Lord is anointed with another oil, which is not supposed to soften the grief caused by wounds but nonetheless brings with it joy.

Untie the donkey and bring it to me.^[1]

He began with a manger and finished with a donkey, in Bethlehem with a manger, in Jerusalem with a donkey. This is like, Rejoice, daughter of Zion, for behold, your king is coming to you, just and lowly and seated on a donkey.^[2]

But the daughter of Zion saw him and was troubled. She looked at him and became sad. He the merciful One, and the Son of the merciful One, had spread his benevolence over her like a father, but she conducted herself as perversely toward him as she had done toward the One who had sent him. Not being able to abuse the Father, she displayed her hatred against his Only Begotten. The daughter of Zion repaid him with evil for the immensity of his grace. The Father had washed her from her blood, but she defiled his Son with her spitting.^[3]

The Father had clothed her with fine linen and purple, but she clothed him with garments of mockery.^[4]

He had placed a crown of glory on her head, but she plaited a crown of thorns for him.^[5]

He had nourished her with choicest food and honey, but she gave him gall.^[6]

He had given her pure wine, but she offered him vinegar and soaked it with blood.^[7]

The One who had introduced her into cities, she drove out into the desert. The One who had put shoes on her feet, she made hasten barefoot toward Golgotha.^[8]

The One who had girded her loins with sapphire, she pierced in the side with a lance.^[9]

When she had outraged the servants of God and killed the prophets, she was led into captivity to Babylon, and when the time of her punishment was completed, her return from captivity took place.

Our loins are girded with fine linen whenever the enticing incentives of lust have to be held back, and nothing of a heavy humor is left, and we are filled with the teaching of the apostle, when he says, stand therefore, having girded your loins with truth.^[1]

When God has given us good works, he surrounds our hands with bracelets.

It is true that a festival such as the birthday of Peter should be seasoned with more gladness than usual; still our merriment must not forget the limit set by Scripture, and we must not stray too far from the boundary of our wrestling ground.^[1] Your presents, indeed, remind me of the sacred volume, for in it Ezekiel decks Jerusalem with bracelets.

The priests are anointed with holy oil and are clothed with embroidered cloth and with silk. It means riches, which the people gained as a result of his providence, as much in spirit as in body.

Almighty God, grant to us to be worthy of the crown and glory on our head.

We are not only anointed with this oil, but we also live.

We have frequently said that gold relates to the mind and silver to eloquence.

After clothing, she shows what she has of food, so that Jerusalem may eat fine flour and honey and oil. This can be either individually or in a mixture of the three, which is a sweeter bread, the bread that comes down from heaven. The three names, as several think, indicate the mystery of the Trinity, not each within a separate substance but diversely, like fine flour and honey and oil, so that the single sweetness of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit can be made manifest.

In Ezekiel, God speaks to Jerusalem: You were perfect through my beauty. And this is the meaning of the text: You were not perfect through your own works or through your own knowledge and the boasting of your heart but through my beauty, which I had put on you freely through my mercy.

Since it often happens when preaching is abundantly poured forth in fitting ways that the mind of the speaker is elevated in itself by a hidden delight in self-display, the preacher may exercise great care, lest he who prescribes remedies for the diseases of others should himself succumb through neglect of his own health, lest in helping others he desert himself, lest in lifting up others he fall. For to some the greatness of their virtue has often been the occasion of their perdition, causing them, while inordinately secure in their own strength, to die unexpectedly through negligence. For as virtue strives with vices, the mind flatters itself with a certain delight in it. And it comes to pass that the soul of a well-doer casts aside cautious circumspection and rests secure in self-confidence. And now while the well-doer is in a lazy state, the cunning seducer enumerates all things that it has done well and encourages him in his pride to think himself superior in all beside….

The mind is lifted up by confidence in its beauty, when, glad for the merits of its virtues, it glories within itself in security. But through this same confidence it is led to play the harlot, because, when the soul is deceived by its own thoughts, malignant spirits, which take possession of it, defile it through the seduction of innumerable vices.

The golden and silver vase, the censers, the cups and the rest of that kind we have in the holy Scriptures. But when we turn the meaning of Scripture into another that is contrary to the truth, we kindle the divine words and turn the things of God into other images.

We do this whenever we surround our first heresy with prudence . . . and all the virtues.

These various clothes and beautiful garments that God has bestowed on us, if we cut them up and rip them and surround them with false teaching to deceive human beings, there is no doubt that we are covering idols with different clothing.

To me who preaches the gospel in the church, the devil always stretches out a noose, in order to confuse the whole church with my conduct.

We do not imitate anyone, but if we want to imitate anyone, we should imitate Jesus Christ.

Incense and oil are the prayer that is offered to God with understanding and in which God delights.

Whoever is born in the teaching of heretics and has taken these principles for his own faith is a child of Jerusalem the fornicator and sinner.

By the name of such adulterers we are to understand every kind of carnal and lustful concupiscence. Indeed, since the Scriptures so constantly give to idolatry the name of fornication, and since the apostle Paul calls avarice idolatry,^[1]who can doubt that every evil concupiscence may be rightly called fornication?

When the soul disregards the higher law by which it is governed and prostitutes itself as though for a price, then it corrupts itself.

If our Jerusalem were tripped up by the lies of heresy, she would take her own sons who were stronger in the faith and her own daughters who were not as strong in the faith—whether they were sons who knew certain mystical things, or whether the daughters accepted straight history—to be handed over to be devoured by demons, and when she had killed them, she believed that she had made them live and please images and be satisfied by their massacre.

Their bodies are corrupted, and the soul is wounded.

I do marvel. You behave in the same way to me, who have been hitherto unknown to you, when even to the Father, of whom you have so much experience, you have done the very same. You have forsaken him, you have run to the devils, drawing to yourselves wicked lovers. With this Ezekiel too was continually upbraiding them.

Possessing these things, she is of great beauty, but she is corrupted by the divisions of heretics and foreign religious systems.

What then has persuaded you to contradict each other and to procure to yourselves so great a disgrace? You cannot give any good account of it; this supposition only remains, that all you do is but outward profession and pretense. . . . And you make nothing of accusing the Fathers, and you complain outright of the expressions as being unscriptural; and, as it is written, opened your legs to every one that passed by;^[1] so as to change as often as they wish, in whose pay and keep you are. Yet, though a person uses terms not in Scripture, it makes no difference, so that his meaning is religious. But the heretic, though he uses scriptural terms, because he is equally dangerous and depraved, will be asked in the words of the Spirit, Why do you preach my laws and take my covenant in your mouth?^[2]

She will sit by the waters of loneliness, her pitcher laid aside, and open her legs to every one who passes by and be polluted to the crown of her head. It would have been better for her to have submitted to the yoke of marriage, to have walked in level places, than to aspire to loftier heights and fall into the depths of hell.

A noble alternative only to be embraced in preference to Satan! In the old days even Jerusalem went whoring and opened her legs to everyone that passed by. It was in Egypt that she was first deflowered and there that her teats were bruised.

Our Zion, in which at times there are Philistines and Tyre and Ethiopia; that watchtower, that meretrix, that harlot, that Rahab, that Babylon, that one who, according to Ezekiel, has prostituted herself to everyone on the crossroads; that meretrix, if she wills it, suddenly becomes a virgin. A virgin she becomes, conceives the Son of God and brings him forth. From your fear, O Lord, we conceived and suffered the pangs of childbirth, bringing forth the spirit of your salvation on the earth.^[1] Understand, therefore, that [Jerusalem], who was a prostitute, conceives of God and is in labor and brings forth the Savior.

You see that she is handed over to the souls of strangers, she who is unworthy to practice the law and the words of God.

If we have promised God purity, may we never be found in fornication, of which there are several forms. It is said that they prostituted themselves in a number of ways. My brothers, may no one ever catch us in deeds of this kind. May no one ever find us fallen below every other person.

When God makes covenants with us and we consent to them, we are blessed. But when we prostitute ourselves to the spirits of evil, then we turn the covenants of God into the land of Canaan, and we make a pact with her.

As the law is not made for the just but for the lawless and those who are not subjected to God, so the teaching that warns us away from fornication does not become chaste but is for the lawless and the fornicators and the disobedient.

If you understand fornication of the flesh and the soul and the spirit, and if you see someone fornicating in them, you will also see Jerusalem fornicating herself three times.

There is no doubt that the word of the orator provokes the hero to worse things when a heretic builds up his hero in the perversions of heresy by what he says.

Those who have not completely gone away from religion but are conquered by sin and who want their sin to be hidden behave exactly like a prostitute who has been insulted.

We can compare this with every single Christian soul who deserts the worship of God, indulges in vices and luxury and follows secular life, lest it does anything fruitful, and goes so far as destroying the riches of religion and does not even accept the riches of the world. There is no difficulty in her debauchery, for she herself rushes to her lovers.

Ecclesiastics who are leaders in the church build the house of God, the church, in their own way of life as well as those of their faithful, and their work is the building of God.

These Gentile peoples through their desire of worldly eloquence, through the brothels of the schools, through senseless disputation at the meeting places of the philosophical sects, dissipated the property of God the Father. By their conjectures they exhausted everything there was in the line of speech, knowledge, reason and judgment. But, even after that, these poor wretches still suffered the greatest need and most intense hunger to know the truth. Philosophy enjoined the task of seeking God, but of that truth to be learned it gathered no fruit.

A heretical congregation is an adulterous woman; for the Catholic congregation from the very beginning never left the marriage couch and nuptial chamber of her spouse or ardently desired unsuitable and strange lovers. You have painted a banished form with new colors; you have withdrawn your marriage couch from a long-standing marriage; you have left the body of a mother, the wife of one husband, adorning yourselves with new techniques of pleasing, new allurements of seduction.

When all fornicating women are accustomed to receive pay from their lovers, Jerusalem does the opposite, so that she may give more than she receives and so that she may show the abundance of her price; she burdened them, in order that they might come to her in a roundabout way, in case there was anyone near her who was not tainted by disgrace.

The husband of the soul is the word of God, a spouse truly loving, who has given her chastity, justice and all the other gifts.

Like a skillful physician, who has tried all saving cures and sees there is no remedy left which can be applied to their disease, the Lord is, as it were, overcome by their iniquities and is obliged to desist from his kindly chastisement. And so he denounces them saying: I will no longer be angry with you, and my jealousy has departed from you.

Mighty is the wrath of the Lord when he is not angry with us here, for, then, he reserves us like a calf for slaughter. In fact, he says to Jerusalem, Many are your sins and many your iniquities, but I will not be vexed with you. In other words, when you were only an adulteress, I loved you with a jealous love; but when you had many lovers, I despised you, and I will not be vexed with you. In this same way, a man is jealous of his wife when he loves her; but if he is not jealous, he hates her and does not imitate the words of him who says, I will punish their crime with a rod^[1] but, I will not punish your daughters for their harlotry.^[2]

It is when God shows no anger to sinners that his anger is great. So in the case of Ezekiel he said to Jerusalem, Now I shall not be angry with you, my jealousy has left you. . . . So that I may not go too far and overrun the length of a letter by piling up instances from the Old Testament, I shall tell you a brief story that happened in the days of my childhood. When the blessed Antony was summoned by Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria, to the city of Alexandria to confute heretics, and Didymus, a most learned and blessed man, had a meeting with him, they had a discussion about the holy Scriptures. Antony admired the other’s brain and praised his mental sharpness. Then he asked, I imagine that your blindness does not depress you? Didymus in his shame said nothing. But when Antony asked a second and third time, he finally succeeded in eliciting from Didymus a simple expression of grief. Antony said to him, I am surprised at a wise man grieving at the loss of what ants, flies and gnats have rather than rejoicing at having what only the saints and apostles have deserved to get. From this you can realize that it is much better to see with the spirit than with the flesh and to possess the eyes that the mote of sin cannot enter.

If you do not recover your senses when you have been chastised, if you are not corrected when you have been reproved, if you despise when you are beaten, you must realize that if you go on continually sinning his jealousy will depart from you and that which is said to Jerusalem by the prophet Ezekiel will be said to you: Therefore my jealousy will depart from you, and I will no longer be angry with you. Behold the mercy and piety of the good God. . . . This is terrible! This is the end when we are no longer reproached for sins, when we offend and are no longer corrected. For then, when we have exceeded the measure of sinning the jealous God turns his jealousy away from us, as he said above, or my jealousy will be removed from you, and I will no longer be angry over you.