Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary: Matthew
Ver. 12. Whilst the Jews, who glory in descending from the patriarchs, and who, on this title, are children and heirs of the celestial kingdom which had been promised them, shall be excluded for having rendered themselves unworthy by their unbelief. (Bible de Vence) --- Shall be cast out into exterior darkness. This is spoken so as to imply a comparison to a supper in a great room, with a number of lights, when they who are turned out in the night, stand without, starving, weeping, and gnashing their teeth. (Witham)
Ver. 14. Into Peter's house. That is, which had been Peter's house; for now he had quitted house, and all things to follow Christ. (Witham) --- According to St. Mark, (i. 29,) and St. Luke, (iv. 38,) the cure of Peter's mother-in-law seems to have been performed previously to the sermon on the mount, of which St. Luke makes mention in chap. vi. We may suppose that St. Matthew mentions it in this order, on occasion of the miracle performed in the same place on the centurion's servant. (Bible de Vence)
Ver. 17. In the Greek of the seventy-two interpreters, for infirmities we have amartias, sins; but the evangelist refers this to our bodily infirmities, because, as St. Chrysostom observes, diseases are the punishment of sins, and frequently arrive from the diseases of the soul. (Menochius) --- The text of Isaias here quoted, regards the Messias literally. (Bible de Vence) --- He took our infirmities. The words signify both the distempers of the body and the infirmities of the soul, for Christ cured both. (Witham)
Ver. 20. By the fox is meant craft and cunning, by the birds pride. Thus then our blessed Lord answered him; pride and deceit dwell in your heart, but you have left no place for the Son of Man to rest his head, who can rest only in the meek and humble. (St. Augustine) --- Jesus Christ rejected this scribe, because he wished to follow Jesus rather through the desire of glory and wealth, hoping to be great in his kingdom, than with the design of perfecting himself in virtue; so that our Saviour answers him: You cannot expect riches from me; who am poorer than the beasts of the field, or birds of the air; they have a place of rest, whereas I have none. (Menochius)
Ver. 22. Let the dead bury their dead. The first words, let the dead, cannot mean those that were dead by a corporal death; and therefore must needs be understood of those who were spiritually dead in sin. (Witham) --- Two similar answers are mentioned in Luke ix. 57, 60. Jesus Christ may have given the same answers on two different occasions. (Bible de Vence) --- God will not suffer us to go and bury a deceased parent, when he calls us to other employments. (St. Chrysostom)
Ver. 23. This bark is the Catholic Church. The sea denotes the world, the winds and tempests shew the attempts of the wicked spirits to overturn the Church. The Lord seems to sleep, when he permits his Church to suffer persecution and other trials, which he permits, that he may prove her faith, and reward her virtue and merits. (St. Chrysostom, hom. xxiii. in Mat. viii.) The apostles had followed their divine Master. They were with him, and executing his orders, and it is under these circumstances they are overtaken with a storm. If their obedience to Jesus Christ, if his presence did not free them from danger, to what frightful storms do those persons expose themselves, who undertake the voyage of the present life without him? What can they expect but to be tossed to and fro for a time, and at last miserably to founder? Faithful souls ought, from the example here offered them, to rise superior to every storm and tempest, by invoking the all-powerful and ever ready assistance of heaven, and by always calling in God to their help before they undertake any thing of moment. (Haydock)
Ver. 25. Should God appear to sleep, with the apostles, we should approach nearer to him, and awaken him with our repeated prayers, saying: "Lord, save us, or we perish." (Haydock) --- Had our Saviour been awake, the disciples would have been less afraid, or less sensible of the want of his assistance: he therefore slept, that they might be better prepared for the miracle he was about to work. (St. Chrysostom, hom. xxviii.)
Ver. 26. Why are you fearful, having me with you? Do you suppose that sleep can take from me the knowledge of your danger, or the power of relieving you? (Haydock) --- He commanded the winds. Christ shewed himself Lord and Master of the sea and winds. His words in St. Mark (iv. 39,) demonstrate his authority: Rising up he rebuked the wind, and said to the sea: Peace, be still. (Witham) --- As before our Lord restored Peter's mother-in-law on the spot, not only to health, but to her former strength; so here he shews himself supreme Lord of all things, not only by commanding the winds to cease, but, moreover, by commanding a perfect calm to succeed. (St. Chrysostom, hom. xxix.) How many times has he preserved his Catholic Church, when (to all human appearance, and abstracting from his infallible promises) she has been in the most imminent danger of perishing? How many times by a miracle, or interposition of his omnipotence, less sensible indeed, but not less real, has he rescued our souls, on the point of being swallowed up in the infernal abyss? (Haydock) --- He commands the mute elements to be subservient to his wish. He commands the sea, and it obeys him; he speaks to the winds and tempests, and they are hushed; he commands every creature, and they obey. Man, and man only, man honoured in a special manner by being made after the image and likeness of his Creator, to whom speech and reason are given, dares to disobey and despise his Creator. (St. Augustine, hom. in Mat.)
From this allegory of the ship and the storm, we may take occasion to speak of the various senses in which the words of Scripture may be occasionally taken. ... The sense of Scripture is twofold, literal and spiritual. The literal is that which the words immediately signify. The spiritual or mystic sense is that which things expressed by words mean, as in Genesis xxii, what is literally said of the immolation of Isaac, is spiritually understood of Christ; and in Colossians ii. 12, by the baptism of Christ, St. Paul means his burial. The spiritual sense in its various acceptations, is briefly and accurately given in the following distich:
Littera gesta docet, quid credas allegoria,
Moralis quid agas, quo tendas anagogia.
[The Letter speaks of deeds; Allegory to faith;
The Moral how to act; Anagogy our destiny.]
Ver. 28. Two that were possessed with devils. St. Mark (chap. v.) and St. Luke (chap. viii.), in the same passage, mentions but one man, who is also said to be possessed with a legion of devils. Those evangelists seem to make mention only of one of them, because he might be much more fierce and famous than the other. (Witham) --- These sepulchres were caverns excavated in the rocks, which served them as places of retreat. (Bible de Vence)
Ver. 29. Before the time which God has marked to drive us from the world, and to bury us for ever in the prison of hell. (Bible de Vence) --- What have we to do with thee? Or what hast thou to do with us? what harm have we done thee? Art thou come hither to torment us before the time? That is, before the time and day of judgment, after which the torments and punishments of the devils will be increased. (Witham)
Ver. 30. And not far from them.[1] In all Greek copies at present we read, There was afar off. Beza himself here owns, that the Latin Vulgate is to be preferred before all Greek copies and manuscripts. (Witham) --- The Greco-Latin manuscript of Cambridge has not the word non in the Latin; but in the Latin of the ancient Vulgate it occurs. (Bible de Vence)