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Cyprian
In Isaiah: “He was led as a sheep to the slaughter, and as a lamb before his shearer is dumb, so He opened not His mouth. In His humiliation His judgment was taken away: who shall relate His nativity? Because His life shall be taken away from the earth. By the transgressions of my people He was led to death; and I will give the wicked for His burial, and the rich themselves for His death; because He did no wickedness, nor deceits with His mouth. Wherefore He shall gain many, and shall divide the spoils of the strong; because His soul was delivered up to death, and He was counted among transgressors. And He bare the sins of many, and was delivered for their offences.”[4030] Also in Jeremiah: “Lord, give me knowledge, and I shall know it: then I saw their meditations. I was led like a lamb without malice to the slaughter; against me they devised a device, saying, Come, let us cast the tree into His bread,[4031] and let us erase His life from the earth, and His name shall no more be a remembrance.”[4032] Also in Exodus God said to Moses: “Let them take to themselves each man a sheep, through the houses of the tribes, a sheep without blemish, perfect, male, of a year old it shall be to you. Ye shall take it from the lambs and from the goats, and all the congregation of the synagogue of the children of Israel shall kill it in the evening; and they shall take of its blood, and shall place it upon the two posts,[4033] and upon the threshold in the houses, in the very houses in which they shall eat it. And they shall eat the flesh on the same night, roasted with fire; and they shall eat unleavened bread with bitter herbs.[4034] Ye shall not eat of them raw nor dressed in water, but roasted with fire; the head with the feet and the inward parts. Ye shall leave nothing of them to the morning; and ye shall not break a bone of it. But what of it shall be left to the morning shall be burnt with fire. But thus ye shall eat it; your loins girt, and your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hands; and ye shall eat it in haste: for it is the Lord’s passover.”[4035] Also in the Apocalypse: “And I saw in the midst of the throne, and of the four living creatures, and in the midst of the elders, a Lamb standing as if slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God sent forth throughout all the earth. And He came and took the book from the right hand of God, who sate on the throne. And when He had taken the book, the four living creatures and the four and twenty elders cast themselves before the Lamb, having every one of them harps and golden cups[4036] full of odours of supplications, which are the prayers of the saints; and they sang a new song, saying, Worthy art Thou, O Lord, to take the book, and to open its seals: for Thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us with Thy blood from every tribe, and tongue, and people, and nation; and Thou hast made us a kingdom unto our God, and hast made us priests, and they shall reign upon the earth.”[4037] Also in the Gospel: “On the next day John saw Jesus coming to him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, and behold Him that taketh away the sins of the world!”[4038]
In Isaiah: “Thus saith the Lord, Behold, I place on the foundations of Sion a precious stone, elect, chief, a corner stone, honourable; and he who trusteth in Him shall not be confounded.”[4039] Also in the cxviith Psalm: “The stone which the builders rejected, the same is become the head of the corner. This is done by the Lord, and it is wonderful in our eyes. This is the day which the Lord hath made; let us rejoice and be glad in it. O Lord, save therefore, O Lord, direct therefore. Blessed is He who cometh in the name of the Lord.”[4040] Also in Zechariah: “Behold, I bring forth my servant. The Orient is his name, because the stone which I have placed before the face of Jesus; upon that one stone are seven eyes.”[4041] Also in Deuteronomy: “And thou shalt write upon the stone all this law, very plainly.”[4042] Also in Jesus the son of Nave: “And he took a great stone, and placed it there before the Lord; and Jesus said unto the people, Behold, this stone shall be to you for a testimony, because it hath heard all the things which were spoken by the Lord, which He hath spoken to you to-day; and it shall be for a testimony to you in the last of the days, when ye shall have departed from your God.”[4043] Also in the Acts of the Apostles, Peter: “Ye princes of the people, and elders of Israel, hearken: Behold, we are this day interrogated by you about the good deed done to the impotent man, by means of which he is made whole. Be it known unto you all, and to all the people of Israel, that in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom ye have crucified, whom God hath raised up from the dead, by Him he stands whole in your presence, but by none other. This is the stone which was despised by you builders, which has become the head of the corner. For there is no other name given to men under heaven in which we must be saved.”[4044] This is the stone in Genesis, which Jacob places at his head, because the head of the man is Christ; and as he slept he saw a ladder reaching to heaven, on which the Lord was placed, and angels were ascending and descending.[4045] And this stone he designating Christ consecrated and anointed with the sacrament of unction. This is the stone in Exodus upon which Moses sate on the top of a hill when Jesus the son of Nave fought against Amalek; and by the sacrament of the stone, and the stedfastness of his sitting, Amalek was overcome by Jesus, that is, the devil was overcome by Christ. This is the great stone in the first book of Kings, upon which was placed the ark of the covenant when the oxen brought it back in the cart, sent back and returned by the strangers. Also, this is the stone in the first book of Kings, with which David smote the forehead of Goliath and slew him; signifying that the devil and his servants are thereby thrown down—that part of the head, namely, being conquered[4046] which they have not had sealed. And by this seal we also are always safe and live. This is the stone which, when Israel had conquered the aliens, Samuel set up and called its name Ebenezer; that is, the stone that helpeth.
In Daniel: “And behold a very great image; and the aspect of this image was fearful, and it stood erect before thee; whose head was of fine gold, its breast and arms were silver, its belly and thighs were of brass, and its feet were partly indeed of iron, and partly of clay, until that a stone was cut[4047] out of the mountain, without the hands of those that should cut it, and struck the image upon the feet of iron and clay, and brake them into small fragments. And the iron, and the clay, and the brass, and the silver, and the gold, was made altogether; and they became small as chaff, or dust in the threshing-floor in summer; and the wind blew them away, so that nothing remained of them. And the stone which struck the image became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth.”[4048]
In Isaiah: “In the last times the mountain of the Lord shall be revealed, and the house of God upon the tops of the mountains; and it shall be exalted above the hills, and all nations shall come upon it, and many shall walk and say, Come, and let us go up into the mountain of the Lord, and into the house of the God of Jacob; and He will tell us His way, and we will walk in it. For from Sion shall proceed the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem; and He shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke much people; and they shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks, and they shall no more learn to fight.”[4049] Also in the twenty-third Psalm: “Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord, or who shall stand in His holy place? He that is innocent in his hands, and of a clean heart; who hath not received his life in vanity, and hath not sworn craftily to his neighbour. He shall receive the blessing from the Lord, and mercy[4050] from the God that saveth him. This is the generation of those who seek Him, that seek the face of the God of Jacob.”[4051]
In Joel: “Blow with the trumpet in Sion; sanctify a fast, and call a healing; assemble the people, sanctify the Church, gather the elders, collect the little ones that suck the breast; let the Bridegroom go forth of His chamber, and the bride out of her closet.”[4052] Also in Jeremiah: “And I will take away from the cities of Judah, and from the streets of Jerusalem, the voice of the joyous, and the voice of the glad; the voice of the bridegroom, and the voice of the bride.”[4053] Also in the eighteenth Psalm: “And he is as a bridegroom going forth from his chamber; he exulted as a giant to run his course. From the height of heaven is his going forth, and his circuit even to the end of it; and there is nothing which is hid from his heat.”[4054] Also in the Apocalypse: “Come, I will show thee the new bride, the Lamb’s wife. And he took me in the Spirit to a great mountain, and he showed me the holy city Jerusalem descending out of heaven from God, having the glory of God.”[4055] Also in the Gospel according to John: “Ye are my witnesses, that I said to them who were sent from Jerusalem to me, that I am not the Christ, but that I am sent before Him. For he who has the bride is the bridegroom; but the friend of the bridegroom is he who standeth and heareth him with joy, and rejoiceth because of the voice of the bridegroom.”[4056] The mystery of this matter was shown in Jesus the son of Nave, when he was bidden to put his shoes from off him, doubtless because he himself was not the bridegroom. For it was in the law, that whoever should refuse marriage should put off his shoe, but that he should be shod who was to be the bridegroom: “And it happened, when Jesus was in Jericho, he looked around with his eyes, and saw a man standing before his face, and holding a javelin[4057] in his hand, and said, Art thou for us or for our enemies? And he said, I am the leader of the host of the Lord; now draw near. And Jesus fell on his face to the earth, and said to him, Lord, what dost Thou command unto Thy servant. And the leader of the Lord’s host said, Loose thy shoe from thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground.”[4058] Also, in Exodus, Moses is bidden to put off his shoe, because he, too, was not the bridegroom: “And there appeared unto him the angel of the Lord in a flame of fire out of a bush; and he saw that the bush burned with fire, but the bush was not consumed. And Moses said, I will pass over and see this great sight, why the bush is not consumed. But when He saw that he drew near to see, the Lord God called him from the bush, saying, Moses, Moses. And he said, What is it? And He said, Draw not nigh hither, unless thou hast loosed thy shoe from off thy feet; for the place on which thou standest is holy ground. And He said unto him, I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.”[4059] This was also made plain in the Gospel according to John: “And John answered them, I indeed baptize with water, but there standeth One in the midst of you whom ye know not: He it is of whom I said, The man that cometh after me is made before me, the latchet of whose shoe I am not worthy to unloose.”[4060] Also according to Luke: “Let your loins be girt, and your lamps burning, and ye like to men that wait for their master when he shall come from the wedding, that when he cometh and knocketh, they may open unto him. Blessed are those servants whom their Lord, when He cometh, shall find watching.”[4061] Also in the Apocalypse: “The Lord God omnipotent reigneth: let us be glad and rejoice, and let us give to Him the honour of glory; for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and His wife hath made herself ready.”[4062]
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