Commentaria in Scripturam Sacram, Vol. 11: Prolegomena (prefaces and canons)
Daniel
I. Chap. iii, ver. 16. “We have no need to answer thee concerning this matter. For behold our God, whom we worship, is able to save us from the furnace of burning fire, and to deliver us out of thy hands, O king. And if he will not, be it known to thee, O king, that we worship not thy gods, nor do we adore the golden statue which thou hast set up.”
of rams, and as in thousands of fat lambs: … so let our sacrifice be made in thy sight this day, that it may please thee: for there is no confusion to them that trust in thee.”
III. Chap. vi, ver. 22. “My God hath sent his angel, and hath shut up the lions’ mouths, and they have not hurt me: forasmuch as before him justice hath been found in me.”
IV. Chap. ix, ver. 7. “To thee, O Lord, justice: but to us confusion of face, as at this day.”
V. Chap. xiii, ver. 22. “I am straitened on every side: for if I do this thing, it is death to me: and if I do it not, I shall not escape your hands. But it is better for me to fall into your hands without doing it, than to sin in the sight of the Lord.” This is the golden voice of Susanna, …
VI. Ver. 56. “Seed of Chanaan, and not of Juda, beauty hath deceived thee, and lust hath subverted thy heart: thus did you do to the daughters of Israel, and they for fear spoke to you: but a daughter of Juda would not abide your iniquity.”
VII. Ver. 59. “Rightly hast thou also lied against thy own head: for behold the angel of the Lord, with a sword, is to cut thee in two.”
I. Chap. x, ver. 22. “The consumption abridged shall overflow with justice,” as if to say: The fewness of the Jews, abridged by God so much as to seem a consummation, that is a consumption and destruction of them, will cause the justice and salvation of God to spread and diffuse itself through all nations, and as it were overflow them: see what is said on Isaias x.
II. Ver. 27. “The yoke shall putrefy at the presence of the oil,” as if to say: All servitude shall vanish at the face of the grace and consolation of God.
III. Chap. xi, ver. 1. “A rod shall come forth out of the root of Jesse, and a flower shall rise up out of his root. And the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him.” The rod of Jesse is the Blessed Virgin, from whom sprang the flower Christ, upon whom rested the sevenfold spirit of the Lord.
IV. Ver. 6. “The wolf shall dwell with the lamb: and the leopard shall lie down with the kid: the calf and the lion, and the sheep shall abide together, and a little child shall lead them.” The wolves, leopards and lions are barbarous nations, who, converted to the faith of Christ, have laid aside their ferocity, and live peaceably and amicably with the calf and sheep, that is, with faithful Christians, and suffer themselves to be ruled by a child, that is a simple pastor.
V. Ver. 10. “In that day the root of Jesse,” namely glorious Christ, “who standeth for an ensign, that is a banner, of the people, him the Gentiles shall beseech, and his sepulchre shall be glorious.”
VI. Chap. xii, ver. 3. “You shall draw waters with joy out of the Saviour’s fountains,” as if to say: As the Jews of old, thirsting, drank from the rock as from a fountain, so Christians shall drink from the fountains of Christ the waters of doctrine and grace to the full.
VII. Chap. xiii, ver. 1. “The burden of Babylon,” as if to say: Threats and sad oracles against Babylon. “Upon the dark mountain,” as if to say: Against Babylon, which is covered with the mist of the vapors of the Euphrates and the smoke rising from so many of its houses and hearths: you, O Persians, lift up a sign, that is a military standard. “I have commanded my sanctified ones,” namely the Persians, who like soldiers and priests are consecrated to me, to slay and sacrifice the impious Babylonians to my justice.
VIII. Chap. xiv, ver. 12. “How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, who didst rise in the morning? how art thou fallen to the earth, that didst wound the nations? And thou saidst in thy heart: I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God, I will sit in the mount of the covenant, in the sides of the north. I will ascend above the height of the clouds, I will be like the Most High. But yet thou shalt be brought down to hell, into the depth of the pit.” The king of Babylon seemed in splendor and glory like the star Lucifer, and in pride like Lucifer, once prince of the Angels; he fell from the throne of his monarchy as from heaven, and was cast down in his life …
… and his seed shall swallow up the bird,” as if to say: From David and Ozias shall be born Ezechias, who will afflict you, O Philistines, more grievously than they, so that he will seem to you a basilisk, which with its look and breath kills and swallows even flying birds.
X. Chap. xvi, ver. 14. “In three years, as the years of a hireling, the glory of Moab shall be taken away,” as if to say: After three years Moab will be laid waste by the Chaldeans, who will receive its wealth from God as a reward, because they served him in the capture of Jerusalem and the punishment of other nations.
XI. Chap. xviii, ver. 1. “Woe to the land shadowing with wings, which is beyond the rivers of Ethiopia, that sendeth ambassadors by the sea, and in vessels of bulrushes upon the waters. Go, ye swift angels, to a nation rent and torn in pieces, to a terrible people, after which there is no other; to a nation expecting, expecting and trodden under foot, whose land the rivers have spoiled,” as if to say: Woe to Ethiopia, which proudly parades its forces; though it has nothing but empty show, noise, and as it were the clanging of a cymbal; which lies beyond the Nile, and by it in boats of papyrus sends its envoys and soldiers into Egypt: for it will be laid waste by Sennacherib, and afterwards by Nabuchodonosor. Go therefore, O Sennacherib and Nabuchodonosor, as my angels, and lay waste the Ethiopians, who are a nation rent, that is to be rent and torn by me through you, though they seem terrible.
XII. Chap. xix, ver. 18. “In that day there shall be five cities in the land of Egypt speaking the language of Chanaan, and swearing by the Lord of hosts: one shall be called the city of the sun,” as if to say: Five metropolises of Egypt, that is, all Egypt, shall receive the faith of Christ, and worship and praise the true God.
XIII. Ver. 19. “In that day there shall be an altar of the Lord in the midst of the land of Egypt, and a monument of the Lord at the borders thereof, for a sign and for a testimony to the Lord.” By monument he means the cross, statues, columns and temples, which the Egyptians converted to Christ themselves erected.
XIV. Ver. 24. “In that day shall Israel be the third to the Egyptians and to the Assyrians, a blessing in the midst of the land, which the Lord of hosts hath blessed, saying: Blessed be my people of Egypt, and the work of the hands of the Assyrians: but Israel is my inheritance,” as if to say: The Egyptians and Assyrians, now enemies to each other, will under Christ unite in one Church, and with the Israelites worship the true God, and therefore be blessed by him: for God’s inheritance is Israel, that is the Christian people sprung from Israel.
XV. Chap. xxi, ver. 1. The burden of the desert of the sea, as if to say: A threatening prophecy against Babylon, which having been a sea of nations, will now be made desolate by God through Cyrus, and reduced to a desert. “As whirlwinds come from the south,” so “from the desert it cometh” the host and whirlwind of the Persians and Medes against Babylon.
XVI. Ver. 6. “Go, and set a watchman. And he saw” the watchman “a chariot with two horsemen, a rider upon an ass, and a rider upon a camel.” The rider upon an ass, that is the king of the vile and servile Persians, is Cyrus; the rider upon a camel, that is the king of the noble Medes, is Darius: these two Isaias here beheld, and saw them with joined chariots and forces invade Babylon.
XVII. Ver. 8. “And the lion cried out: I am upon the watch-tower of the Lord, standing continually by day,” as if to say: I, Isaias, like a watchful lion, keep guard continually, that I may learn from the revelation of God things to come and foretell them to others.
XVIII. Ver. 10. “O my thrashing, and the children of my floor, what I have heard of the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, I have declared unto you,” as if to say: O Jews, who have been in Babylon as in a thrashing, I will announce to you what I have heard from God of the destruction of Babylon, and your deliverance.