After Moses, prophets were sent to heal Israel. But in their exercise of healing they deplored the fact that they could not overcome evil, so that one of them says, The faithful are gone from the earth, among men the upright are no more,^[1] and again, All alike have gone astray; they have become perverse; there is not one who does good, not even one.^[2] And again, Cursing, and theft, and adultery, and killing have overflowed upon the land. They sacrificed their sons and daughters to demons.^[3] They engaged themselves in auguries and enchantments and divinations; and again, they fastened their garments with cords and hung veils next to the altar.^[4]

My people are like a priest who is compromised. He has fallen from his previous dignity and does not appear worthy for any reason, just as a priest who falls into controversy would be set aside and dishonored by everyone. And he will be weak by day. To the greatest extent he will become weak because of the upcoming evils.

Of the ones who first made use of false predictions to deceive you, most will also themselves become weak because of the calamity that holds them back. As if they were wrapped up in some kind of night darkness, they see the pursuit of deceit, which was useless for them.

One says that Israel will be weak not forever but for days. For it has been reserved for her a time of salvation and a return to faith.

For us too, you see, once the night of this age is done, there will be a resurrection of the flesh for the kingdom; it’s the model or sample of this that has already occurred in our head. That, indeed, is why the Lord wished to rise again at night; because, in the apostle’s words, God, who commanded the light to shine out of the darkness, has shone in our hearts.^[1] So the Lord represented light shining out of darkness by being born at night and also by rising at night. Light out of darkness, in fact, is Christ out of the Jews, to whom it was said, I have likened your mother to night. But in that nation, as it were in that night, the virgin Mary was not night but somehow or other a star of the night; which is why a star also signaled her childbearing, guiding a far distant night, that is the magi from the east, to worship the light. Thus in them too would be realized the command to the light to shine out of darkness.

Day continues according to your ordinance.^[1] For all these things are day: and this is the day which the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it^[2] and let us walk honestly as in the day.^[3] For all things serve you. He said all things of some, all which belong to this day serve you. For the ungodly, of whom it is said, I have compared thy mother unto the night, do not serve you.

The mother of the people is the synagogue, which—since it is covered by the darkness of ignorance and did not receive the radiance of God’s knowledge—may be compared to the night.

They used to sacrifice goats for sin; for this reason the sacrifice was called sin. By offering a goat on the altar, the priests at the right time used to bring the intestines and the lard, and they ate the rest. This was ordered by the divine law.^[1] . . . They eat the sins of my people means they eat the offerings brought for sins.

[The priests] are feasting on the sins of my people, approving the crimes of the sinners. For when they behold them sinning, not only do they not argue but they praise and extol them, calling them fortunate.

The text wants you to make a more daring assertion if your hearing will still follow. What is the sacrifice that is offered for sin and is very holy except the only begotten Son of God,^[1] Jesus Christ my Lord? He alone is the sacrifice for sins, and he is a very holy offering. But since it added that the priest who offers it will eat it,^[2] it seems to be hard to understand. For that which it says must be eaten seems to be referring to the sin, just as in another place the prophet says concerning the priests that they will eat the sins of my people. This also shows that the priest ought to eat the sin of the one who is offering. We frequently show from holy Scripture that Christ is also the sacrifice that is offered for the sin of the world and the priest who brings the offering.

We do not seek to gain souls; we devote ourselves daily to our own pursuits, we attend to earthly matters, we strive for human praise with all our will. From being set over others we have greater freedom to do anything we like, and so we turn the ministry we have received into an occasion for display. We abandon God’s cause, and we devote ourselves to earthly business; we accept a place of holiness and involve ourselves in earthly deeds. What is written in Hosea is truly fulfilled in us: And so it will be, like people, like priest. A priest does not differ from the people when he does not surpass their deeds by any merit of his own.

Seemingly he calls ways the walking in works and counsels the faults from outrageous thoughts. Then, he says, she [Israel] did not go rightly, having turned aside from the straight road. As if marching the footpath of all profanity, they devised the most shameful and absurd things, dishonoring the God of all while turning toward idolatry.

By calling the deeds ways he says that I will bring over them all the judgment and punishment for their deeds. And I will punish not the deeds only but also ‘his’ counsels, namely, of the people. For we will suffer punishment not only for the deeds but for the outrageous thoughts.

When, he says, the avenging judgment begins to work, these measures of griefs that they [Israel] made in sins will be filled, so that they may experience in punishments what they have achieved in desires.

A remnant from Israel has been preserved. Since the judgment does not go entirely to the priest, he adds, They eat, but they are not satisfied. This means either emigration and captivity for those leaders of Israel or, because of Christ, desolation of Judea by the hands of Romans. . . . For among those Israelites brought then by Shalmaneser and Tiglath-pileser III to Assyria and Media, very few could offer to the priests the things prescribed by the law.

Desire is insatiable, and the more it is felt, the more it creates in those who enjoy it a greater hunger. On the contrary: Blessed are the ones who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be satisfied.^[1] For righteousness satisfies, while wickedness—because it has no substance—deceives by fraud those who feed on vain things and leaves empty the stomachs of those who hunger. They played the whore continually. In fornication they run out of strength, yet the ardent desire of the fornication does not make a pause. The ten tribes played the whore with the idols of Jeroboam son of Naboth.

They kept the whoredom means that they [Israel’s leaders] got ready to preserve the error for those who were under their authority. Yet they should rather have removed and thrown it from their midst. For it is the vigilance of the teachers which should eagerly remove what hurts the people and turn down without delay what is hateful to God. By refusing to do this, they allow the works of error to stay somehow and to keep. Yet they confirm rather the contrary, when the minds of those who teach receive nothing but wine and drunkenness. For how will the disciples keep vigil, and how will they be able to point the eye of the understanding to God in nature and in truth, if the instructors and the teachers of useful things will still encourage them to err?

Anthony then asked, Who are you who say such things to me? And at once he [the demonic voice] uttered a contemptible speech: ‘I am a lover of fornication; I have undertaken to ensnare the young and to entice them to it, and I am called the spirit of fornication. How many I have deceived who wished to be chaste! How many who practiced self-restraint have I by my seductions persuaded to change! I am he on whose account the prophet reproaches the fallen, saying, You have been deceived by the spirit of fornication, for through me they were tripped up. I am he who often troubled you but whom you as often overthrew.’ LIFE OF ST.

It is written in the law: ‘You shall not commit fornication.’^[1] This is kept in a beneficial way according to the simple sound of the letter by the person who is still entangled in the passions of fleshly impurity. It is necessarily observed in spiritual fashion, however, by one who has already left behind this filthy behavior and impure disposition. This person also rejects not only all idolatrous ceremonies but also every superstition of the Gentiles and the observance of auguries and omens, and of all signs and days and times, and is certainly not engaged in the divination of particular words or names. [This] befouls the wholesomeness of our faith. Jerusalem is said to have been debauched by this fornication, having fornicated on every high hill and under every green tree.^[2] And the Lord, rebuking [Jerusalem], says by the prophet: Let the astrologers stand and save you, who gazed on the stars and counted the months, so that from them they might announce the things that are to happen to you.^[3] Concerning this fornication the Lord reproaches them elsewhere when he says, The spirit of fornication has deceived them, and they went fornicating away from their God.

The unclean spirit before had been in the synagogue and had led them into idolatry. Of him it is written, The spirit of harlotry has led them astray. The spirit had gone out of a man and was roaming in the dry places in search of a resting place and could find none. He took with him seven other demons and returned to his former dwelling place.^[1] All these spirits were in the synagogue and could not bear the presence of the Savior. Indeed, what harmony is there between Christ and Belial?^[2] Christ and Belial could not abide in the same assembly. Now in their synagogue there was a man with an unclean spirit, and he cried out, saying, ‘What have we to do with you?’ Who is asking, What have we to do with you? He is only one, but he cries out the recognition of many. He is aware that in his own defeat, his devils have been vanquished with him.

And when these things occur, he says, I will remain calm, and I will not lay charges. Because of the misfortunes of the war and the troubles of the captivity, it seems right that all that will happen be predicted to the sinners. For they who once captured and overcame others will do with the captives as they like, making use of power without bridle and shamelessly attacking whomever they please, neither taking into account the law or considering what is likely or proper. But hardened and extremely wild in soul, they refuse to refrain from any kind of wretchedness. Therefore he clearly showed that the young children will be exposed to enemies because of the insult and shameless conduct of the fornicators.

Hear what he says through the prophet. When he had enumerated abominable things that the people had committed, he adds these words also: And for this reason I will not visit your daughters when they fornicate, nor your daughters-in-law when they commit adultery. This is terrible! This is the outcome 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, For my jealousy will be removed from you, and I will no longer be angry over you.^[1] I have said these things about the statement God is jealous.

But what is the source of this hardness? It comes from gluttony and drunkenness. Who says so? Moses himself. Israel ate and was filled, and the darling grew fat and frisky.^[1] When brute animals feed from a full manger, they grow plump and become more obstinate and hard to hold in check; they endure neither the yoke, the reins, nor the hand of the charioteer. Just so, the Jewish people were driven by their drunkenness and plumpness to ultimate evil. They kicked about and failed to accept the yoke of Christ. And they failed to pull the plow of his teaching. Another prophet hinted at this when he said, Israel is as obstinate as a stubborn heifer. And still another called the Jews an untamed calf.^{[2] [3]} KISSING THE CALF. ISHO‘DAD OF MERV: The words I will not visit your daughters when they prostitute themselves, that is, when a woman is accused of being adulterous and there is no witness, she will make, Scripture says, her offering of barley flour and will not pour any oil or incense.^[1] And since she is in her sorrow, the appearance of her offering will be equally sad. And the priest, Scripture says, will take some water from a vase of clay, and will throw some dust of the soil into the water, and will place the woman before the Lord and will make her swear.^[2] If she is innocent, she will remain unscathed and will still be fertile and will conceive; otherwise she will be torn. But in the meantime God threatens, I will ravage Jerusalem, and there will be no one of your establishments which you cared for, and so on, because everything in the temple will be bound and delivered. A nation that does not understand has kissed the woman of whoredom, that is, these people, who are blind and do not realize who God is, who lives and abides among them, prefer to worship idols rather than God. They foolishly kiss the calves and give themselves over to the prostitution with demons. ^[3]