Your prayers, daughter Eustochium, have conquered my fear in explaining the temple in Ezekiel, even my determination to be quiet on the matter, and so have the promises of the Lord when he says, Ask and you will receive, seek and you will find, knock and the door will be open to you.^[1]

If [Ezekiel] told his first vision in the fifth year of the first captivity and describes this last vision as occurring in the twenty-fifth year, it is surely clear that he extended the space of his speech for twenty years until the account of his last vision.

In holy Scripture those things that can be accepted according to the history are very frequently to be understood spiritually so that faith in the truth of history is retained and spiritual understanding is derived from the mysteries of allegory.

The hand expresses the virtue of power, but the visions express the actual revelation that he had received. The hand is surely in the visions, the virtue in the contemplation.

He who is said to be a mountain on the top of the mountain is here proclaimed as a very high mountain.

Clearly this city has here already its great building in the conduct of the saints. As in a building, stone carries stone because stone is placed on stone, and the stone that bears another is itself borne by a third.

If I neglect to support you in your ways and you disdain to tolerate me in mine, from where does the building of charity rise between us, whom love of neighbor does not join in patience?

Those who are learned in holy scripture recall that the south wind is usually to be presented as a symbol of the holy Scripture.

Ezekiel was caught away supranaturally by the action of revelation, and he came to Jerusalem; and in a divine revelation he was a beholder the renewal that was to come. It is likewise with purity of soul. Some, going by the well-trodden road of the law through keeping the commandments in a life of many labours, enter into purity of soul by sweat and blood; and there are others who are vouchsafed purity of soul by the gift of grace. It is a marvellous thing that we are not permitted to ask in prayer for the purity that is granted us by grace and so to reject the active and laborious manner of life.

He enters the building of the heavenly city who meditates by imitating the ways of the good in holy church.

Why is it that his very incarnation is likened to sounding metal, except that by this same assumption of our humanity he resounded to all with the glory of his majesty?

The translators of the Septuagint do not have a line of flax but a builders’ line. If in this verse we use their translation for exposition, what shall we take as builders but holy teachers who by speaking spiritual words arrange living stones, that is, the souls of the elect, into a heavenly building? Then whatever the early fathers, the prophets, the apostles, the successors of the apostles said, what was it but the arrangement of stones in this building of the saints, a building that is constructed daily?

What must we understand by the line of flax if not fine, that is, spiritual, preaching?

By the inward stewardship of hidden judgment is led the line and measuring reed by which the one is dragged along and the other is left behind. The heavenly building is not constructed without pious and righteous scrutiny.

His eyes always gaze on his building because he unceasingly considers how much progress each is making in the virtues.

He who already stands at the door of his cave and hears the words of God in the ears of his heart must veil his face, because when we are led through heavenly grace to understanding of higher things, the more subtly we are lifted, the more often we should through humility restrain ourselves in our understanding, lest we try to be more wise than is right for us, but to be wise to the point of sobriety.^[1]

As far as the measuring line is concerned, these are the angels who minister at the command of God, or Moses and all the prophets and the apostles who built the city of God and the assistants or ministers at the will of the Lord.

This man spoke to the prophet. In his hand was the measuring stick, and his face was like the sky, and he held in his hand a reed. The man who spoke to Ezekiel was a true master builder, whom Paul the apostle imitated, when he said, like a skilled master builder I will lay the foundation.^[1]

Not with the eyes of the flesh but with the spirit, not with the ears of the body but of the soul.

It is no use to see and hear, unless what you see and hear you place in the treasure of your memory.

In case by any chance some people censure me in silent thought because I presume to discuss the profound mysteries of Ezekiel the prophet, which are untouched by the great interpreters, let them know with what mind I so do.

By wondrous stewardship the soul is balanced midpoint, so that it neither takes pride in its good deeds nor falls amid evil acts.

We liken this to the church of Christ, and each day I can see it being built in the saints.

Very often in holy Scripture, through the rampart of his protection, the incarnate Lord is himself used to being called a wall, as it is said of holy church through the prophet: a wall and a bulwark shall be set therein.^[1]

It is a measuring reed because by the hands of the scribes the life of the hearers is measured.

The active life is signified by the six cubits and the contemplative by the hand breadth, because we complete the former by works, but even when we strive concerning the latter we hardly avail to attain too little.

The contemplative life, which is said to be as it were half an hour, is in Ezekiel the prophet not described as a cubit but a hand breadth.

Almighty God, who is neither stretched by the great nor narrowed by the least, speaks in this way of the whole church at the same time as he speaks of a single soul.

Each preacher can be understood under the name gate because whoever opens for us the door of the heavenly kingdom through his speech is a gate.

We must not be surprised if the steps are from virtue to virtue, when each very virtue is, as it were, increased by certain steps and thereby led through increases of merits to the heights.

If the gate is the Lord, who is the threshold of this gate but those ancient ancestors from whose ancestry the Lord deigned to be incarnate?

The apostle Paul, wanting the Ephesians to understand the more holy things, prayed for them to be filled with the wisdom and love of the Lord; being so rooted, they might be able to know and understand the breadth and length and height and depth of the riches of God.^[1]

Truly the length pertains to the longsuffering of expectation and the breadth to the ampli-tude of charity.

Ten is a perfect number and comprises the Decalogue.

The outer threshold of holy Scripture is history, and the inner is allegory. Scripture leads through history to allegory, as if we come from the threshold that is outside to that which is inside.

If the gate in this passage is interpreted as being each preacher, the outer threshold in the gate is the active life, but the inner is the contemplative.

What then is meant by the inner porch but the breadth of eternal life, which now in the limits of our present life is only conceived in the mind through hope?

The front of the gate measures two cubits because whoever is zealous to preserve the love of God and of his neighbor himself arrives at the court of eternity.

The chambers beside the eastward way are the hearts of those inflamed with love for God.

The measure of the front is on both parts, because our fathers, coming either before from the Old, or now from the New Testament, agree in one faith in the Mediator [Christ].

So with grace supervening through the New Testament, every faithful people knows the one God to be the Trinity, and by their recognition of him they have fulfilled the virtue of the Decalogue.

As we have often said, the chambers are the hearts of the elect burning with love for almighty God. What is expressed by the border before the chambers if not faith? For if this is not first held it does not attain to spiritual love. So charity does not precede faith but faith charity. No one can love what he has not believed.

Certain faithful so love almighty God that they are both perfect in works and suspended in contemplation.

Some things are closed so that when we do not understand them and recognize the weakness of our blindness, we may advance to humility rather than to intelligence.

We are still on the way, we hear many reports of that heavenly country, we already understand some through reason and the spirit and reverence others without comprehending them.

What you have already learned from holy Scripture, and how much you secretly love your neighbor, you demonstrate in the breadth of your good works.

Let the breadth be great from the roof of the chamber to the roof of the gate. This means that from the secrets of charity on our neighbor’s behalf to the point of humility of knowledge, we may always do good—insofar as we understand and can for the sake of God.

The gate can also be understood as the very entry to the heavenly kingdom.

In the knowledge of almighty God our first door is faith and the second his appearance to which we attain by walking in faith. For in this life we enter the latter so that we may later be led to the former.

Why should we who perceive the footprints of his virtue even among his creatures wonder so much at the power of the Creator?

The spiritual tasks we impose on an unaccustomed spirit are hard. Yet the burden of God is light when we have begun to bear it so that even persecution pleases us through our love of him. Every affliction for his sake comes in sweetness of mind, for the holy apostles too rejoiced when they endured the whip for the Lord.

The hope for the heavenly strengthens the mind lest it be shaken by the turbulence of earthly tumults.

The first day of the eight is the day of the resurrection, and it leads us to the entrance of the temple, for when we have done everything and repented of the sins we have committed, then we are brought close to God.

This space signified our hope, which leads the mind to the porch of the inner gate when it seeks eternal rest.

Let faith be held in the gate that leads to understanding, charity in the court that stretches the mind to love, hope in the place that is described by fifty cubits, because by yearning and sighs it leads the spirit to the hidden joys of peace.

Let no one reckon that he has the gift of the true light as his own, because he thinks he is superior. It is often the case that another to whom he does not attribute any good gift is richer.

The pavement is spread wide with stone, to stop the footsteps of the sinners who live there being made dirty with mire and earth and dust.

What is meant by these treasure chambers if not the knowledge of the teachers?

Those who contain within themselves true riches are rightly called treasure chambers.

The number ten is always taken to mean perfection because the custody of the law is contained within ten precepts. The active and the contemplative life are simultaneously united in the commandments of the Decalogue because the observance of love of God and love of neighbor are enjoined in them.

If we ponder the deeds and words of our preachers that we read, we recognize the height to which the gates will rise.

There were some who said that the second epistle of Peter, in which the letters of Paul were praised, was not written by him. But if they had been willing to ponder the words of this same epistle, they could have had a far different perception.

The holy preachers are rightly called clouds because they rain with words and flash with miracles. They are also said to fly like clouds because when living on earth they were above the earth through all that they did.

If in these words we take the gate to be the door through which we enter into knowledge of the Lord, the lower gate is faith and the inner court is surely contemplation.

Let us recall the darkness from which we came, so that we may give thanks for the light that we have received. No one understands divine mercy who is not mindful of his own wretchedness.

When the prophet spoke at length about a single gate, faith is rightly understood because the faith of all the elect is one. When other gates are mentioned, the mouths of the preachers may be understood, where the true life is recognized, and through which lies ascent to the knowledge of spiritual mysteries.

The gate looks northward when each preacher examines the life of a sinner and opens to him the inner life through the word of preaching.

There are three orders of those who lead virtuous lives, that is, good spouses, celibates and preachers. Some who are married strive in love for the heavenly kingdom, but others in hope of eternal joy torment their flesh, flee all earthly activities and disdain to be involved in the care of this age. Others again despise earthly goods and proclaim the heavenly joys that they know. What are all these but chambers in the spiritual building, in whose thoughts and meditation the soul is joined to her heavenly groom?

This gate also has a front because there are in the life of the preacher open works that are seen.

The curtains of the tabernacle are all the saints who contribute with various colors of virtues to the adornment of holy church.

After seven weeks, there are fifty days designated for eternal respite, stretching from the day of the resurrection to the kingdom of heaven, in which there is true respite.

We need to note that the gate looking northward is said to have all the features that the gate to the east has, that is, windows of contemplation, a porch of humility and engravings of good deeds.

The gate is approached by seven steps because the entrance of the heavenly life is opened to us through the sevenfold grace of the Holy Spirit.

It is also possible to understand the porch as faith. For it is before the steps and the gate, because we come first to faith and afterward, via the steps of spiritual gifts, we enter the door of the heavenly life.

The inner gate does not only face the gate of the east but also that of the north: the joys of the inner court are opened to those who remain in innocence, but they are also opened to condemned sinners by their repentance of their sins. They then recognize the unspeakable mystery of the heavenly kingdom, by recognizing them they thirst for them, by thirsting for them they hasten and by hastening they arrive.

We must observe that in the spiritual building one entrance lies open to the east, another to the north and another to the south. Just as the cold of the north denotes sinners, so the southern way stands for the fervent in spirit who, kindled by the heat of the Holy Spirit, grow up in virtues as in the noonday light. Then let the gate lie open to the east so that those who, after the beginning of heat and light, have relapsed in the coldness and darkness of their sins may through the work of penitence return to pardon and recognize what is the true rejoicing on inward recompense. Let the gate lie open to the south so that those who burn in virtues with holy desires may daily penetrate the mysteries of inward joy with spiritual understanding.

We strive the more freely towards the kingdom because, as it were, we travel light.

Desire seeks more than need.

The excellent preacher has a palm on this side and on that, because abundance does not lead him astray to pride, nor does need lead him to avarice.