Commentaria in Genesim
AND PUTTING IT UNDER HIS HEAD.—Morally: Note here that Jacob makes for himself a hard bed and pillow, namely a stone; because for the courtiers of heaven a hard bed, hard fare, all hard things are fitting. “See, says St. Chrysostom, the strength of the lad, who uses stones for a pillow; see the manly spirit: he sleeps on the pavement.” But by this stone (which was a type of Christ) he is refreshed and strengthened. Whence St. Jerome on Psalm cxxxiii calls this stone of Jacob the stone of help: He who had such a pillow, he says, in which he cooled the heat of persecution, sees a ladder, by which, if need were, he would be received into heaven. Christ therefore is the pillow of the labouring, in which they sweetly rest and take the refreshments of heaven. On the contrary, golden and soft beds are as it were sepulchres of sleep, softness, torpor and sloth, while hard and stony ones are gymnasia and wrestling-schools of strength and virtue. Wherefore St. Ambrose, book III De Jacob: “Jacob, he says, is a good workman in sleep, since he accomplished more business with God by sleeping than by waking.” For in dreams he received the magnificent consolations, visions, blessings and promises of God; according to that of Cant. chap. v, 2: “I sleep, and my heart watcheth.” Whence Clement of Alexandria, book II of the Pedagogue, chap. ix, thus makes those who sleep soberly equal to the angels ever watching, while they receive the eternity of life from meditation of vigilance. Where he signifies that the soul as it were dies, if it ceases from meditation, but lives and becomes eternal, if it exercises itself in continual meditation.
12. AND HE SAW IN HIS SLEEP.—This vision therefore was imaginary and symbolic.
A LADDER STANDING.—Septuagint, “a fixed ladder.” Alcazar, on Apoc. chap. iv, verse 4, holds that God stood at this ladder, not in heaven, but on earth, at the lowest steps of the ladder, to hold and steady it; because He spoke with Jacob, sleeping on earth by the ladder; He was therefore near him. But Josephus and Cajetan more fittingly hold that God stood in heaven, and leaned on the topmost steps of the ladder. For to God by this ladder angels ascended, to bring His commands to earth; nor is it wonderful that God spoke from heaven to Jacob on earth, because this speaking, like the vision, was not sensible, but imaginary or intellectual, which can occur between the most distant persons, and often occurs, not only from God, but also from angels.
You will ask first, what does this ladder of Jacob signify literally? Philo and Origen answer, in St. Jerome, epistle 161, that this ladder is the transmigration, or migration of the soul of man from body to body. For they hold that the soul of each man existed before the body, and as often as it then sinned and descended from heaven as it were to earth, so often it now changes bodies, migrating from one into another, until through them, as through certain steps (like a ladder) of penance, it ascends again into heaven. Again, in this descent of the soul Origen assigns these steps. First, he says, the soul is let down into subtler bodies; then, if it continues to sin, into grosser; and at last is thrust down into earthly bodies. Further Philo, book De Plantatione Noe, writes that by this ladder the descent of souls into bodies, when they are born, is signified, or actually takes place. For explaining these words, Jacob saw a ladder, he says: “The air, like a populous city, has immortal citizens, namely souls, which are equal in number to the stars; of these some descend to be bound to mortal bodies,” etc. Hence Origen too feigned that the souls of men had been angels, who for sins committed in heaven were thrust down, and by this ladder descended step by step into other and other bodies, ever more vile. Hear St. Jerome to Pammachius against the errors of John of Jerusalem: “Origen teaches that by the ladder of Jacob rational creatures descend little by little to the last step, that is to flesh and blood, and that it cannot be that from a hundred number anyone is suddenly cast down to one number, unless through single numbers, as by the steps of a ladder, he come to the last, and change as many bodies as they have changed mansions from heaven to earth.” He gives an example: “Suppose someone of tribunician rank degraded by his own fault, brought down through the several offices of the cavalry service to the name of recruit: does he become a recruit straight from a tribune? No, but first primicerius, then senator, ducenarius, biarchus, circitor, horseman, then recruit.” But these are the ravings of Pythagoras and Origen. I say therefore with Theodoret, Aben Ezra, the Hebrews and Pererius, that this ladder is, first, a symbol of divine providence and divine government; whence God leans on the ladder as the first cause and first mover of all, He bids all things go, and himself abiding steady gives all to be moved.
Second, the angels ascend and descend as ministers and executors of God’s providence, to whom God distributes severally each one’s duties.
Third, this ladder reaches from heaven to earth, because God governs lower things by higher, men by angels.
Fourth, the two sides of the ladder are sweetness and strength; for God, governing the world by His wisdom, reacheth from end to end mightily, and ordereth all things sweetly.
Fifth, the various steps of the ladder are the various modes of God’s providence, and the various kinds and perfections of things flowing thence. So Homer, Iliad book IX, describes and represents the providence of God by a golden chain, let down from heaven to earth by Jove, by which Jupiter draws.
Second, more properly and particularly, Diodorus of Tarsus teaches that by the angels descending is signified Jacob’s happy departure into Mesopotamia, but by those ascending his happy return into Palestine. For God willed by this vision to console and encourage Jacob, who, leaving his parents, and hateful to his brother, a fugitive, exile and solitary, sad and anxious, lay here on hard rock, as if to say: Be not sad, fear not, O Jacob. I know three things weigh on and distress thee: country, parents, brother; against these three I set what may console thee, the ladder, God, the angels. First, thou hast abandoned thy country, a stranger thou goest into a foreign land: but see the ladder, which opens heaven to thee, which shows the way prepared for thee into heaven; second, thou hast left thy parents, and as a fugitive goest to unknown people in Mesopotamia: but know that God directs this thy journey, is with thee, leads and protects thee, who likewise by His help will bless thee and enrich thee; third, thou art hateful to thy brother, and journeyest alone: but know that the angels are thy companions and guides, who will lead thee safe into Mesopotamia, and bring thee back unharmed to thy parents in Chanaan. That this is the literal sense is clear from what follows, which relate that these things befell Jacob exactly so.
Morally: Note here that God takes care of His own, especially those distinguished in virtue and heroes, such as Jacob was, with such care, through Himself and through angels, as if He gave Himself wholly to them, nor cared about anything else in the whole world, according to that of Cant. ii, 16: “My beloved to me, and I to him.” Where St. Bernard, sermon 68 on the Canticle: “Is that majesty then so intent on this one, on which rests the government of the universe, and is the care of the ages transferred to the business, nay the leisure, of love alone? So plainly. For all things are for the elect. We do not therefore deny providence to the other creatures; but the care of God the bride alone claims for herself.” Such was the Blessed Virgin, who in this ladder is the highest step, on which God leans, as I shall presently say. Whence St. Thomas, II–II, Question CIII, art. 4, reply 2, teaches that she is honoured with hyperdulia beyond other Saints, because by her operation, he says, she touched the confines of divinity more nearly; for in the incarnation of Christ she did all that the power of nature can extend itself to, which failing, divinity succeeded, that it alone might then perfect the very substance of the work.
You will ask secondly, what does this ladder of Jacob signify allegorically?