Commentaria in Isaiam
22. And I will lay the key of the house of David upon his shoulder.—First, Arias and Pradus on Ezechiel 17:23 expound thus: as if to say: I will set him over the royal house. But the house of David, as of Solomon, is called the temple, because it was built at the expense prepared by David on Sion, which was the city and house of David. Again, it may be that king Ezechias, a pious man, seeing the holiness of Eliakim the pontiff, honoured him as a father, and likewise set him over the king’s house. The sense therefore is: I will give Eliakim the pontificate and supreme power in the temple. For the symbol of this is the key; for he who has the key of a house can open and shut it at will, go out and in, admit and exclude whom he will. Hence to kings, when they take possession of cities, the keys of them are given, and by this symbol they become their lords. So St. Jerome. Again, the key denotes industry, dexterity and wisdom in governing, which ought to be in the Pontiff and Prince; for the key must be put in, fitted and turned with a dexterous hand, that the door may be opened. So the art of arts is the government of souls, says St. Gregory.
Allegorically, Eliakim is Christ, to whom Cyril and Theodoret hold that by these words of Isaias pontifical and royal dignity together are given by the Father. Nay, Castrius says that this is to be taken literally of Christ, but not rightly. Wherefore St. John, alluding to it allegorically, says of Christ, Apocalypse 3:7: “He that hath the key of David... who openeth, and no man shutteth.” These keys of the Pontiff Christ promised to resign to Peter, Matthew 16:19: “To thee I will give the keys of the kingdom of heaven.” The origin, therefore, of the keys of the Church, of Christ the Lord and of St. Peter, is in these keys of the Synagogue and of Eliakim: so elsewhere in many places the writings of the New Testament allude to the Old and are drawn from it.
Upon his shoulder.—Scripture passes, as is its way, from the metaphor of the key to the metaphor of the sceptre or rod; for a key is carried not on the shoulders but in the hand; a sceptre, however, on the shoulders, as if to say: To Eliakim I will give the sceptre and the rod or pastoral crook, which the shepherd bears on his shoulder when he leads the sheep out to pasture. So some. But the words before and after stand in the way of this explanation. For it is said: “I will lay the key (not the sceptre) of the house of David upon his shoulder; and he shall open, and none shall shut,” etc.
Secondly, then, Forerius gives a fitter account: Great keys, he says, such as those of cities, the keepers of keys are wont to carry upon the shoulder, just as lictors bear the rods before judges on their shoulder, and sceptres are borne before kings.
Allegorically, Procopius says: This key is the cross of Christ, which he himself bore upon his shoulder. Hence it was said of him, chapter 9, verse 6: “And the government is upon his shoulder.” For Christ by his cross and passion merited that the cross should be to him as a key, with which he opened heaven, and as an instrument of the omnipotence of Christ, which is his royal key, by which all things can be shut and opened by him: wherein there is an allusion to the best iron keys, which are seen made in the figure of a cross, says Alcazar on Apocalypse 3:7.
Whatever Eliakim shall ordain, and allegorically Christ, this shall be ratified, and there shall be none to break it. He notes that this key, that is the supreme power, is one; for where there are several, it ceases to be a key; since, in order that he who has shut a door may be sure that no one will open it, he alone must have the key. Here, then, is the origin of the pontificate and of ecclesiastical monarchy.
23. And I will fasten him as a peg in a sure place.—He signified pontifical power by keys; now he signifies it by a peg, in Hebrew yated, that is, a nail, whether of iron or of wood, from which bowls and vessels of every sort, and instruments of music and of the kitchen, and all furniture are hung, so that from Eliakim there hang the highest, the middle and the lowest, and especially the singers and musicians of the temple, and the whole Church and Commonwealth.
Wherefore some wrongly think that here is compared the Pontiff to a peg, that is, a very tall and firm pole, which sustains by cords and ropes the whole weight of a tent, as its ridge-pole and support.
In a sure place,—that is, in a strong and firm wall, from which it cannot fall or be torn out. For the Hebrew neeman signifies faithful, stable, firm. He notes that Eliakim will not fall from the pontificate as Sobna fell, but that his lot and rank will be stable.
And he shall be for a throne of glory to the house of his father.—As if to say: Eliakim will make his paternal family most noble and most splendid by his throne and pontifical dignity.
24. Divers kinds of vessels.—The interpreter continues in the metaphor of the peg: in Hebrew it is tsetsaim, which Symmachus, says St. Jerome, renders grandsons; Vatablus, offshoots and posterity, or sons and daughters; others, progeny and offspring. For the root yatsa signifies to go forth and to be propagated from someone. Hence Vatablus renders this verse thus: and there shall hang from him (Eliakim) all the glory of his father, offshoots and posterity.
Mystically, Hieronymus Prado on Ezechiel, page 227: From the peg, he says, that is, from Eliakim, that is, from God sustaining, hang all the vessels of musicians, that is, all the just, who by assiduous praises are a solace to God himself; and the cups, that is, those who are spent in temporal ministries and cares. Or the vessels of music are Angels, whose proper office is to sing praises to God; the cups are holy men, who unwillingly serve the necessities of the body.
25. The peg (Sobna) shall be removed, that was fixed in a sure place,—namely in a place that seemed sure and firm to Sobna, but was in truth unsure and weak; for from it he fell. So Vatablus. Hence, he falling, the vessels fell also, that is, sons, friends, and as many as hung from him.
Otherwise St. Jerome, St. Thomas and Haymo: The peg, they say, shall be removed, that is, the pontificate of the Jews in the Babylonian captivity. But the peg is here commonly called not the pontificate but Sobna, who fell from it; or Eliakim, who was not led away to Babylon, but died before that disaster; whence he was a firm pontiff up to his death.
Morally, let Pontiffs learn here from the example of God, who put the worthy Eliakim in the place of the unworthy Sobna, to substitute pious and upright men for scandalous Clerics and Pastors, who may edify the people by word and example.
So did St. Dunstan: hear the author of his Life: In the time of the Emperor Otto, the second of that name, about the eighth year of his reign, around the year of the Redeemer 970, the clerical order was greatly corrupted and given more than was fitting to the pleasures of the flesh. St. Dunstan, Bishop of Canterbury, desiring to correct this evil, obtained from the king, by the authority of John, Prelate of the Apostolic See, that the Canons who would not live chastely should be driven out of the Churches which they held, and monks be brought in in their place. But when the Clerics cried out against St. Dunstan, a Synod was convened at Calne; where, when the matter was being treated in an upper room, the king being absent, all the senators of the whole kingdom sitting together, with great conflict of those pleading on this side and on that, and when the darts of many reproaches assailed Dunstan as the wall of the Church, and yet did not conquer, the whole upper floor on which they sat suddenly gave way with its supports and beams, and all being meanwhile cruelly crushed, Dunstan alone, standing upon one beam which remained, escaped without hurt. But all of the adverse party were either killed or held by perpetual languor. This miracle brought peace to the blessed Dunstan and the monks from the onslaught of the Clerics and others, divine grace working this and like things. So has the Life of St. Dunstan, from which take another in the author’s words.
In the same period there presided over the Church of Winchester Ethelwold, a man of eminent holiness, and distinguished by the training of Father Dunstan. He, when the matter was known, admonished the Canons of his Church, who were too secular, by the will of Dunstan, once and often to change their ways and acts, and to take up the paths of a more correct life, leaving women. They, denying for the present that this was possible to them, with a raven’s voice always promised amendment on the morrow. Which he, knowing it, did not long endure. Having therefore prepared very many monks’ cowls, on the day on which the Communion “Serve ye the Lord with fear” was sung, he entered the choir, causing the garments he had prepared to be carried with him; and throwing them into the midst, he said to the Canons: “Have you noticed what you have just sung?” “We have noticed,” they say. “Therefore,” he said, “if you will serve the Lord in fear, and rejoice unto him with trembling, embrace discipline, that is, the monastic habit, lest you perish (as you have sung) from the just way.” At which they, stupefied, as was their wont, ask for delay and promise to do it in the future. Then he said: “Believe me, I will no longer believe this raven-like answer of yours; but either you will take up discipline now, or you will at once give way, removed from the benefices and the life of this place.” So some of them at once cast off the clerical habit and became monks, the rest being expelled from the Church at the Pontiff’s word. But because those newly converted could not keep the rule of regular discipline without the teaching of others, monks of Abingdon were brought there by the same Pontiff to teach there the path of monastic institution.