He forecasts what would happen after the return, what would happen to them under the Macedonians and the destruction that would be inflicted on them by the Romans. He brings out that the first fate would happen to them owing to the impiety committed by Manasseh. Yet he is not an unjust judge, nor does he require an account of them for others’ faults. He submits them to the evils prophesied as sharers in impiety and enthusiastic supporters of their wicked king. ^[1] JEREMIAH SAW THE JUDGMENT OF THE WICKED. IRENAEUS. In that day, says the Lord, the sun shall go down at noon, and there shall be darkness over the earth in the clear day. I will turn your feast days into mourning, and all your songs into lamentation,^[1] plainly announced that obscuration of the sun that at the time of his crucifixion took place from the sixth hour onwards, and that after this event, those days that were their festivals according to the law, and their songs, should be changed into grief and lamentation when they were handed over to the Gentiles. Jeremiah too makes this point still clearer when he thus speaks concerning Jerusalem: She that has borne seven languishes. Her soul has become weary. Her sun has gone down while it was yet noon. She has been confounded and suffered reproach. The remainder of them will I give to the sword in the sight of their enemies. Those of them, again, who spoke of God’s having slumbered and taken sleep, and of his having risen again because the Lord sustained him,^[2] and who enjoined the principalities of heaven to set open the everlasting doors, that the King of glory might go in,^[3] proclaimed beforehand his resurrection from the dead through the Father’s power and his reception into heaven. ^[4]

The Scriptures prophesied that at noon in Christ’s passion there should be darkness. In Amos it says, And it shall come to pass in that day, says the Lord, the sun shall set at noon, and the day of light shall be darkened. I will turn your feast days into grief and all your songs into lamentation.^[1] Also in Jeremiah: She is frightened that has borne children, and her soul has grown weary. Her sun has gone down while as yet it was noon. She has been confounded and accursed. I will give the rest of them to the sword in the sight of their enemies. Also in the Gospel: Now from the sixth hour there was darkness over all the earth even to the ninth hour.^[2] TO QUIRINUS:

What more can now be said respecting the crime of the Jews, than that they were then blinded and seized with incurable madness, who read these things daily and yet neither understood them nor were able to be on their guard so as not to do them? Therefore, being lifted up and nailed to the cross, Jesus cried to the Lord with a loud voice and of his own accord gave up his spirit. At the same hour there was an earthquake. The veil of the temple, which separated the two tabernacles, was torn into two parts. The sun suddenly withdrew its light, and there was darkness from the sixth even to the ninth hour. Of this event the prophet Amos testifies, And it shall come to pass in that day, says the Lord that the sun shall go down at noon, and the daylight shall be darkened. I will turn your feasts into mourning and your songs into lamentation.^[1] Also Jeremiah: She who brings forth is afraid and vexed in spirit. Her sun is gone down while it was yet noon. She has been ashamed and confounded. The residue of them will I give to the sword in the sight of their enemies.

This synecdoche can be understood concerning Jeremiah, who shall be judged only in the land of Judea, out of the entire world. He corresponds to the true Lord our Savior, who says in the Gospel: I have come into this world for judgment, that those who do not see may see and those who see may be blinded,^[1] about whom it was also written: Behold, this child is set for the ruin and resurrection of many in Israel and for a sign of contradiction.^[2] For which of the philosophers and pagans and who among the heretics does not judge Christ by applying their laws to his birth and suffering and resurrection and substance? Nor is it strange for Christ to be saying, according to the truth of his assumed body, Woe is me, my mother, when, in another location, it is obviously a speaker who corresponds to his person who says, Woe is me, for I have become as one who gathers the stubble at harvest and as a cluster of the vine having no first fruit to eat.^[3] And lest we think that the weakness of these groans reflects on the Word of God, who is indeed the person that mourns, immediately he continues, Woe is me, my soul that perishes from the earth in reverence.^[4] It is not that we wish to divide Christ into two persons, like the impious do, but rather that one and the same Son of God sometimes speaks according to the flesh and sometimes according to the Word of God.

As what kind of man, judged and disputed over all of the earth, did you bear me? If you see with me those martyrs who are judged in every place, those who submit to judges in each district, you will see in what way Jesus Christ is judged in each of the martyrs. For he is the one who is judged in those who testify to the truth, and you will be persuaded, he says, to accept this when you see that you are not in prison when you are in prison, but himself, you are not punished when you are punished, but himself, you do not thirst, but himself. I was in prison and you visited me, hungry and you gave me something to eat, thirsty and you gave me drink.^[1] Hence, if a Christian is judged not for something else, not for his own sins but because he is a Christian, Christ is the one judged. Thus, over all the earth Jesus Christ is judged. And as often as a Christian then is judged, Christ is the one judged, not only before proceedings such as these. But suppose a Christian is slandered and accused unjustly for something, then too Christ is judged unjustly.

Jeremiah also bewails his birth in these words: Woe is me, my mother! Why have you borne me, a man of contention in all the earth? I have not benefited others, nor has anyone benefited me. My strength has failed.^[1] If, then, holy people shrink from life whose life, though profitable to us, they themselves consider unprofitable, what ought we to do who are not able to profit others and who feel that our lives, like money borrowed at interest, grow more heavily weighted every day with an increasing mass of sins? I die daily,^[2] says the apostle. Better certainly is this saying than those who say that meditation on death is true philosophy, for while they praise the study, he exercises the practice of death.

Such is our life, we whose existence is so transitory. Such is the game we play on earth. We do not exist, and we are born, and being born, we disintegrate and disappear. We are a fleeting dream,^[1] an apparition without substance, the flight of a bird that passes,^[2] a ship that leaves no trace on the sea.^[3] We are dust, a vapor, the morning dew, a flower growing but a moment and withering in a moment. A person’s days are as grass. As the flower of the field, so shall he flourish,^[4] beautifully, as described by holy David in meditating on our weakness. And again in these words: Declare to me the fewness of my days.^[5] And he defines the days of people as the measure of a span.^[6] What would you say to Jeremiah, who, complaining about his birth, even blames his mother, and that, too, for the failings of others. I have seen all things,^[7] says the Preacher, I have reviewed in thought all human things, wealth, pleasure, power, unstable glory, wisdom that evades us rather than is won; then pleasure again, wisdom again, often revolving the same objects, the pleasures of appetite, orchards, numbers of slaves, store of wealth, serving men and serving maids, singing men and singing women, arms, spearmen, subject nations, collected tributes, the pride of kings, all the necessaries and superfluities of life, in which I surpassed all the kings that were before me. And what does he say after all these things? Vanity of vanities.^[8] ON HIS BROTHER ST.

The saint does not look for rest but for tribulation. He knows tribulation works out endurance, and endurance, tried virtue, and tried virtue, hope. And hope does not disappoint.^[1] This is parallel to what Jeremiah says: I have called on tribulation and misery, for your bitter word was to me joy and gladness. In this world I desire nothing but tribulation that I may have happiness and repose in the next. That is why, he says, I now bear with bitterness, that afterwards I may have all sweetness. The people of the Lord coming out of Egypt came to Mara, which means bitter, and from Mara into Sinai, which means temptation. Again, Jeremiah says, I sat alone because I was filled with bitterness.^[2]

The wonderful apostles who were insulted many times for the truth say, I am content with weaknesses, with insults and hardships, persecutions and calamities for the sake of Christ.^[1] I know that the basis of hardships is Christ when I am insulted if I know that I am insulted only for nothing other than for Christ, when I am in hardships, when I am abused if I know that the cause of abuse is none other than that I am a champion for truth and an ambassador for the Scriptures so that everything happens according to the Word of God. For this I am blasphemed. And thus let all of us, as far as our ability allows, strive for the prophetic life, for the apostolic life, not avoiding what is troublesome. For if the athlete avoids what is troublesome about the contest, the sweetness of the crown will never be his.

This the Hebrews believe to be said in the person of Jerusalem, which sat alone and was filled with bitterness and whose pain was unending and the word of whose prophets passed through it deceitfully, like flowing water. But it is better that we receive these words of a holy person as spoken from the person of a prophet, one who did not sit in the council or cabal of fools because he feared the impending hand of God but instead would glory in not having complicity with the evil ones. I sat alone, he said, in accordance with what was written: I did not sit with the council of the boastful, and I did not enter into fellowship with evildoers; I hate the company of liars, and I will not sit with the impious,^[1] and, in another location: I am alone until I pass away.^[2] He also says, effectively, I sat alone in the presence of your hand, while fearing you and constantly expecting your impending hand to come on me. I refused to sit in the company of fools, but I swallowed my bitterness to prepare myself for future joy. Nor did I have any relief from my suffering, but I was being oppressed by the misery of this yoke, such that I would not have expected any remedy. For those who afflicted me prevailed, and my wound was made worse. Yet, in this I took consolation, that it was like deceitful and passing waters. For, just as flowing waters are seen once and then slip away, so also every attack of the enemy passes away with help from you. Would that the Lord also grant to us not to sit in the council of fools and of those who fail to think of the future! Would that he grant us the ability not to yield to adversities but instead always to dread the sentence of God and to say with the prophet, I sat alone, for I was filled with bitterness. Those who sit in the council of the wise, therefore, shall not rejoice at all during the present time, but only those in the secret and hidden council of fools, for it is good for me to cling to God, to put my hope in the Lord,^[3] to be filled with opprobrium and to await the sentence of the Judge, one that, when the end arrives, will reveal that every sorrow and bitterness was like the passing of flowing water.

How then can one who is baptized among them seem to have obtained remission of sins and the grace of the divine mercy by his faith, when he has not the truth of the faith itself? For if, as some suppose, one could receive anything abroad out of the church according to his faith, certainly he has received what he believed. If he believes what is false, he could not receive what is true. Rather, he has received things adulterous and profane, according to what he believed. Jeremiah, the prophet, censures in detail this subject of profane and adulterous baptism, saying, Why do those who grieve me prevail? My wound is incurable. When shall I be healed? When this is done, it is become for me as treacherous water not having faith. The Holy Spirit makes mention through the prophet of treacherous water also not having faith. What is this treacherous and faithless water? Assuredly it is that which asserts falsely the image of baptism and frustrates the grace of faith by its shadowy simulation.

Now the so-called gods of the Greeks, unworthy of the name, are faithful neither in their essence nor in their promises, because they are not everywhere. The local deities amount to nothing over the course of time and undergo a natural extinction. For these reasons, the Word cries out against them, that faith is not strong in them, that they are waters that fail and there is no faith in them.^[1] But the God of all, who is indeed truly faithful, who is ever the same, says, See now that I, even I am he,^[2] and I change not.^[3] Therefore, his Son is faithful, being ever the same and unchanging, deceiving neither in his essence nor in his promise, as is written by the apostle to the Thessalonians: Faithful is he who calls you, who also will do it.^[4] For in doing what he promises, he is faithful to his words.

Consider to what a dignity one exalts himself who esteems others’ salvation to be of great importance. Such a person is imitating God as far as lies within the power of humankind. Hear what God says speaking through his prophet: He who separates the worthy from the vile shall be as my mouth. What God says is that one who is eager to save a brother who has fallen into careless ways, one who hastens to snatch his brother from the jaws of the devil, that person imitates me as far as lies within human power. What could equal that? This is greater than all good deeds. This is the peak of all virtue.

Let us catch them, then, by our mode of life; and by these souls let us build up the church, and of these let us amass our wealth. There is nothing to weigh against a soul, not even the whole world. Thus, although one may give countless treasure to the poor, in so doing he will not do such work as one who converts one soul. For he who takes forth the precious from the vile shall be as my mouth, so God speaks. A great good it is, I grant, to have pity on the poor, but it is nothing equal to removing them from error.

Words full of gentleness and meekness, even as Jesus also used to speak, saying to those who were insulting him, I have not a devil,^[1] and again, If I have spoken wrongly, bear witness to the wrong.^[2] If you also speak in this way, if you speak for your neighbor’s betterment, you will obtain a tongue like that tongue. And these things God says: For he that brings out the precious from the vile shall be like my mouth; such are his words.

It is obvious that the text above was said not by Jerusalem but by a prophet. To him the Lord responds, If you turn from the sins of the people, I likewise will turn you from tribulation toward joyfulness, and you will stand before my face like the angels stand in the presence of God daily, beholding his face.^[1] Also, if you separate the precious from the vile, you will become like my mouth. Now should you think, he adds, that there is no reward for good works,^[2] if you distinguish my saints from the crowd of sinners in your speech, you will be as my mouth, and you will be united to my precepts. For sinners need to be imitators of you, not you of them. Nor should you fear and ask: ‘Why has my pain become perpetual and my wound worse (or incurable),’ such that I lose all hope of being healed? For I have made you like a bronze and impregnable wall, so that you can withstand all the strength of your adversaries. Moreover, you have me as a helper, and I will liberate you from the hand of the most evil (or pestilent), and I will redeem you with my blood (or with the presence of my help). May we consider just how great a reward the speech of the teacher will have if it is able to liberate from error and to rescue from among the number of sinners!