Commentaria in Leviticum
The deacon Benjamin, kept two years in prison, when he was released on condition that he should no more preach the Gospel of God, mindful of his vocation said: “I neither can nor ought to hide in the earth the talent of faith committed to me”; Theodoret is witness, book 5, chap. 26.
St. Francis asked his brethren: “What seems to you more advisable, that I give myself to prayer, or rather to preaching?” Having enumerated the advantages of each, he concluded at length: “Yet our Redeemer wished the office of preaching to be especially commended to his own, when he himself conversed with sinners; and since we are to follow his footsteps, it will be more useful and more pleasing to God if, leaving our quiet, we go forth abroad to labour”; and this he did. So Bonaventure in his Life, book 1, chap. 12.
Hence St. Thomas, part 3, Quest. 67, art. 1: “To preach,” he says, “is the principal act, and proper to a Bishop, and more worthy than to baptize.”
The same on 1 Cor. chap. 9: The preacher, he says, in Scripture has eight names, namely Soldier, Vinedresser, Shepherd, Ox, Ploughman, Thresher, Sower and Builder of the temple.
Hence also Isaias, chap. 52, says: “How beautiful are the feet of them that preach peace, of them that bring glad tidings of good things!” St. Augustine calls the preacher an Angel. St. Gregory, hom. 3 on Ezech.: “The life of preachers,” he says, “both sounds and burns. It burns with desire, it sounds with the word. Preaching is therefore glowing brass; but from glowing brass sparks go forth, because from their exhortations flaming words proceed to the ears of the hearers. Rightly, then, the words of preachers are called sparks, because they set on fire those whom they have touched in the heart.” The same, book 30 of the Morals, explaining that of Job 39:1: Hast thou known the time when the wild goats bring forth among the rocks? “It behoves,” he says, “that preachers be strong in precepts, compassionate to the weak, terrible in threats, gentle in exhortations, humble in showing their teaching, masters in contempt of temporal things, firm in enduring adversities.” St. Clement, book 8 of the Recognitions, compares preachers to the rays of the sun, which illuminate the world and make all see.
Moreover what this trumpet and sermon ought to be Ecclesiastes himself teaches, chap. 12:11: “The words of the wise are as goads, and as nails deeply fastened in”; where Olympiodorus: “As goads,” he says, “prick oxen and urge them to break up the furrow with the plough, so also the words of Theologians rouse us, who plough with good hope, to break up the spiritual furrow, that when the field of our heart has been cleansed, we may plant in it fair shoots of virtue. They are like also to nails heated red-hot, which are driven deeper and more easily into wood: for so also the words of the wise are driven deeper into the inmost recesses of our understanding.” And St. Jerome: “The words of the wise,” he says, “are said to prick, not to caress, nor with a soft hand to draw forth tears; but to inflict upon the slowly erring the sorrows and wound of penance. If anyone’s speech, then, does not prick but gives delight to the hearers, that speech is not wise.” The same to Nepotian: “When thou teachest in the Church,” he says, “let not the clamour of the people but their groaning be roused: let the tears of the hearers be thy praises.” And elsewhere: “He is the ecclesiastical teacher who moves tears, not laughter; who rebukes sinners; who calls no one blessed, no one happy.”
Whoever you are, therefore, a preacher, whoever you are, a trumpet, nay the mouth of God, “cry, cease not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet, and show my people their wicked doings, and the house of Jacob their sins,” Isai. 58:1.
27. ON THE TENTH DAY OF THIS SEVENTH MONTH SHALL BE THE DAY OF ATONEMENT.
This is the fifth feast, Kippurim, that is, of expiation or propitiation, on which was made the expiation of the sins of the people committed throughout the year, by fasting and sacrifices, and therefore the pontiff expiated not only the people, but also the Holy itself and the Holy of Holies, with the ceremonies that were prescribed in chap. 16. See what is said there. This was the holiest day: hence it was not lawful on it, as not on the sabbath, to cook food, as is gathered from verse 30.
YE SHALL AFFLICT YOUR SOULS,—by fasts and the other things said in chap. 16:29.
32. IT IS A SABBATH OF REST,—as if to say: It is a feast, and of every kind of rest, on which one must cease altogether from every work, even not servile, such as cooking food.
YOU SHALL AFFLICT YOUR SOULS ON THE NINTH DAY OF THE MONTH.—That is, from the evening, or sunset of the ninth day, to the evening of the tenth day; for, as follows:
32. FROM EVENING UNTIL EVENING YOU SHALL CELEBRATE YOUR SABBATHS (feasts),—namely from one sunset to the other, when the star of Venus begins to appear (as the Hebrews relate), which is called Vesper, Vesperugo and Hesperus. Whence also evening received its name from this star, says Isidore, book 5 Etymolog. chap. 3, as if to say: Lest this affliction on the day of expiation, as ungrateful and troublesome, be thought to be deferred to the tenth day itself, hence I proclaim and command that you begin it, as the other feasts also, from the evening of the preceding ninth day.
This the Hebrew, Chaldee and Septuagint signify more clearly, in which there is a plainer distinction, as also in the Roman and other more correct Latin copies. Hence also the Christian Church, as to the ecclesiastical office, celebrates feasts from evening to evening; for this is what is ordained chap. 1 On Holy Days, in the Decretals: “We decree that all Lord’s days be observed with all veneration from evening to evening”; but to the people feasts are appointed to be celebrated from midnight to midnight.
34. FROM THE FIFTEENTH DAY OF THIS SEVENTH MONTH SHALL BE THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES SEVEN DAYS TO THE LORD.—This is the sixth feast, namely of Tabernacles, for seven days, which in Greek is called scenopegia, from the pitching of tents; for scene is a tent, pegia a fixing or fastening. It is ridiculous what Abulensis and Radulphus think, that scenopegia is so called from esis, that is, eating, and koinon, that is, common, because on this feast the Jews ate in public or in a common place. This feast was instituted in memory of the divine protection, which so protected the Hebrews in the desert that without houses they lived in tents for forty years winter and summer. Wherefore in the desert this feast was never celebrated, because there the very reality was being enacted, and a continual feast of tabernacles, as it were; but afterwards in memory of it it was celebrated every year in Chanaan, so that partly in the city, namely in courts, forums, streets, gardens, and also on housetops, that is, the roofs of houses, as is plain Nehem. 8:16, partly outside the city, when it was a long way off, they built tents of timber or stakes, round which some put branches, others skins and linen, as is done in military tents, and dwelt in them for seven days. For since the Hebrews from all Judaea assembled at Jerusalem for this feast, and each family built its own tent, as Josephus says, book 3 Antiq., chap. 10, by no means could so many be built in the city as would suffice for all. And it is likely that the tents were so disposed that they made as it were a city, and each family dwelt separately, and all distinctly and in order through the lanes and streets; for so they did when they journeyed through the desert, the memory of which they then recalled.
Secondly, this feast was instituted at the end of the year, namely in September, after all the fruits were gathered in, that they might give thanks to the Lord for them, and therefore all males had to come to the temple at this feast and offer their gifts, as is prescribed Exod. 23:14 and following. For the holocausts and victims which were slain on each of these seven days, see Numbers 29:12. Finally the Hebrews on the seventh day of this feast go round the altar seven times, carrying branches, in memory of the capture of Jericho by Josue by the sevenfold circuit of the city, Josue 6:10.
36. THE EIGHTH DAY ALSO SHALL BE MOST SOLEMN: FOR IT IS THE DAY OF ASSEMBLY AND COLLECTION.—This is the seventh feast, of the Assembly and Collection, which was as it were the octave of the feast of Tabernacles. This feast was solemn, whence by St. John, chap. 7:37, it is called “the great day of the festivity.”