Catena Aurea by St. Thomas Aguinas
11:20–24
20. Then began he to upbraid the cities wherein most of his mighty works were done, because they repented not:
21. Woe unto thee, Chorazin! woe unto thee, Bethsaida! for if the mighty works, which were done in you, had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes.
22. But I say unto you, It shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the day of judgment, than for you.
23. And thou, Capernaum, which art exalted unto heaven, shalt be brought down to hell: for if the mighty works, which have been done in thee, had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day.
24. But I say unto you, That it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment, than for thee.
GLOSS. (ap. Anselm.) Thus far He had brought His accusation against the Jews in common; now against certain towns by name, in which he had specially preached, and yet they would not be converted; whence it is said, Then began he to upbraid the cities in which most of his mighty works were done, because they had not repented.
JEROME. His upbraiding of the towns of Corozaim, Bethsaida, and Capharnaum, is set forth in this chapter, because He therefore upbraided them, because after He had such mighty works and wonders in them they had not done penitence. Whence He adds, Wo for thee, Corozaim! wo for thee, Bethsaida!
CHRYSOSTOM. That you should not say that they were by nature evil, He names Bethsaida, a town from which the Apostles had come, namely, Philip, and two pair of the chief of the Apostles, Peter and Andrew, James and John.
JEROME. In this word Wo, these towns of Galilee are mourned for by the Saviour, that after so many signs and mighty works, they had not done penitence.
RABANUS. Corozaim, which is interpreted ‘my mystery,’ and Bethsaida, ‘the house of fruits’ or, ‘the house of hunters,’ are towns of Galilee situated on the shore of the sea of Galilee. The Lord therefore mourns for towns which once had the mystery of God, and which ought to have brought forth the fruit of virtues, and into which spiritual hunters had been sent.
JEROME. And to these are preferred Tyre and Sidon, cities given up to idolatry and vices; For if the mighty works which have been done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have long ago done penitence in sackcloth and ashes.
GREGORY. (Mor. xxxv. 6.) In sackcloth is the roughness which denotes the pricking of the conscience for sin, ashes denote the dust of the dead; and both are wont to be employed in penitence, that the pricking of the sackcloth may remind us of our sins, and the dust of the ash may cause us to reflect what we have become by judgment.
RABANUS. Tyre and Sidon axe cities of Phœnicia. Tyre is interpreted ‘narrowness,’ and Sidon ‘hunting;’ and denote the Gentiles whom the Devil as a hunter drives into the straits of sin; but Jesus the Saviour sets them free by the Gospel.
JEROME. We ask where it is written that the Lord did wonders in Corozaim and Bethsaida? We read above, And he went about the towns and villages, healing all sicknesses, &c. (ch., 9:35.) among the rest, therefore, we may suppose that He wrought signs in Corozaim and Bethsaida.
AUGUSTINE. (De Don. Pers. 9.) It is not then true that His Gospel was not preached in those times and places, in which He foreknew that all would be such, as were many in His actual presence, who would not even believe on Him when He raised men from the dead. For the Lord Himself bears witness that they of Tyre and Sidon would have done penitence in great humility, had the wonders of the Divine power been done in them. Moreover, if the dead are judged according to those deeds which they would have done had they lived, then because these would have believed had the Gospel been preached to them with so great miracles, surely they should not be punished at all, and yet in the day of judgment they shall be punished; for it follows, But I say unto you, It shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the day of judgment, than for you. Those then shall be punished with more, these with less severity.
JEROME. This is because Tyre and Sidon had trodden under foot the law of nature only, but these towns after they had transgressed the natural and the written Law, also made light of those wonders which had been wrought among them.
RABANUS. We at this day see the words of the Saviour fulfilled; Corozaim and Bethsaida would not believe when the Lord came to them in person; but Tyre and Sidon have afterwards believed on the preaching of the Apostles.
REMIGIUS. Capharnaum was the metropolis of Galilee, and a noted town of that province, and therefore the Lord mentions it particularly, saying, And thou, Capharnaum, shalt thou indeed be exalted to heaven. Thou shalt go down even to hell.
JEROME. In other copies we find, And thou, Capharnaum, that art exalted to heaven, shalt be brought down to hell; and it may be understood in two different ways. Either, thou shalt go down to hell because thou hast proudly resisted my preaching; or, thou that hast been exalted to heaven by entertaining me, and having my mighty wonders done in thee, shalt be visited with the heavier punishment, because thou wouldest not believe even these.
REMIGIUS. And they have made the sins not of Sodom only and Gomorrah, but of Tyre and Sidon light in comparison, and therefore it follows, For if the mighty works which have been done in thee had been done in Sodom, it would perhaps have remained unto this day.
CHRYSOSTOM. This makes the accusation heavier, for it is a proof of extreme wickedness, that they are worse, not only than any then living, but than the wickedest of all past time.
JEROME. In Capharnaum, which is interpreted ‘the most fair town,’ Jerusalem is condemned, to which it is said by Ezekiel, Sodom is justified by thee. (Ezek. 16:52)
REMIGIUS. The Lord, who knows all things, here uses a word expressing uncertainty—perhaps, to shew that freedom of choice is left to men. But I say unto you, it shall be easier for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment than for you. And be it known, that in speaking of the city or country, the Lord does not chide with the buildings and walls, but with the men that inhabit there, by the figure metonymy, putting the thing containing for the thing contained. The words, It shall be easier in the day of judgment, clearly prove that there are divers punishments in hell, as there are divers mansions in the kingdom of heaven.
JEROME. The careful reader will hesitate here; If Tyre and Sidon could have done penitence at the preaching of the Saviour, and His miracles, they are not in fault that they believed not; the sin is his who would not preach to bring them to penitence. To this there is a ready answer, that we know not God’s judgments, and are ignorant of the sacraments of His peculiar dispensations. It was determined by the Lord not to pass the borders of Judæa, that He might not give the Pharisees and Priests a just occasion of persecuting Him, as also He gave commandment to the Apostles, Go not into the way of the Gentiles. Corozaim and Bethsaida are condemned because they would not believe, though Christ Himself was among them—Tyre and Sidon are justified, because they believed His Apostles. You should not enquire into times when you see the salvation of those that believe.
REMIGIUS. We may also answer in another way. There were many in Corozaim and Bethsaida who would believe, and many in Tyre and Sidon who would not believe, and therefore were not worthy of the Gospel. The Lord therefore preached to the dwellers in Corozaim and Bethsaida, that they who were to believe, might be able; and preached not in Tyre and Sidon, lest perhaps they who were not to believe, being made worse by contempt of the Gospel, should be punished more heavily.
AUGUSTINE. (De Don. Pers. 10.) A certain Catholic disputant of some note expounded this place of the Gospel in the following way; That the Lord foreknew that they of Tyre and Sidon would fall from the faith after they had believed the miracles done among them; and that therefore in mercy He did not His miracles there; because they would have incurred the heavier penalty had they lapsed from the faith after having held it, than if they had never held it at all. Or otherwise, The Lord surely foreknew His mercies with which He deigns to deliver us. And this is the predestination of the saints, namely, the foreknowledge and making ready the mercies of God, by which they are most certainly saved, whosoever are saved. The rest are left to the just judgment of God in the general body of the condemned, where they of Tyre and Sidon are left, who might have believed had they seen Christ’s many miracles; but since it was not given them that they should believe, therefore that through which they might have believed was also withheld. From which it appears, that there are certain who have in their dispositions by nature a divine gift of understanding by which they would be moved to faith, if they should either hear words or see signs adapted to their minds. But if they be not by the high sentence of God set apart from the mass of perdition through the predestination of grace, then neither words nor works are set before them by God, which yet, could they have seen or heard them, would have stirred them to believe. In this general mass of perdition are the Jews also left, who could not believe so great and manifest wonders wrought before their eyes. And the cause wherefore they could not believe, the Gospel hath not hidden, speaking thus; Though he did so great miracles before them, yet could they not believe, as Esaias said, I have blinded their eyes, and hardened their heart. (John 12:37) Not in this way then were the eyes of they of Tyre and Sidon blinded, or their heart hardened, for they would have believed had they seen such wonders as these saw. But it profited those not that they could have believed, for that they were not predestinated; neither would it have been any hindrance to these that they had not power to believe, had they been so predestined that God should have enlightened their blindness, and taken away the heart of stone from within them.
AUGUSTINE. (De Cons. Ev. ii. 32.) Luke also gives this as spoken in continuation of some other of the Lord’s discourses; from which it appears that he has rather followed the actual order of events; Matthew to have followed his recollection. Or the words of Matthew, Then began he to upbraid the towns, must be taken, as some think, as expressing some particular time by the word then, but not referring generally to that time in which the many other things here told were done and said. Whoever, therefore, thinks thus must suppose that this was spoken twice. And when we find in the same Evangelist some things spoken by the Lord at two different times—like that in Luke concerning the not taking a scrip for their journey,—what wonder is it if any thing else, which was twice spoken, is found once severally in two several Gospels in the actual connexion in which it was spoken, which connexion is different, because they are two different occasions on which it is related to have been spoken?
Catena Aurea Matthew 11
NAVARRE BIBLE COMMENTARY (RSV)
Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam (To the Greater Glory of God)
From: Exodus 2:1-15a
The Birth and Early Years of Moses
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[1] Now a man from the house of Levi went and took to wife a daughter of Levi. [2] The woman conceived and bore a son; and when she saw that he was a goodly child, she hid him three months. [3] And when she could hide him no longer she took for him a basket made of bulrushes, and daubed it with bitumen and pitch; and she put the child in it and placed it among the reeds at the river's brink. [4] And his sister stood at a distance, to know what would be done to him. [5] Now the daughter of Pharaoh came down to bathe at the river, and her maidens walked beside the river; she saw the basket among the reeds and sent her maid to fetch it. [6] When she opened it she saw the child; and Io, the babe was crying. She took pity on him and said, "This is one of the Hebrews' children." [7] Then his sister said to Pharaoh's daughter, "Shall I go and call you a nurse from the Hebrew women to nurse the child for you?" [8] And Pharaoh's daughter said to her, "Go." So the girl went and called the child's mother. [9] And Pharaoh's daughter said to her, "Take this child away, and nurse him for me, and I will give you your wages." So the woman took the child and nursed him. [10] And the child grew, and she brought him to Pharaoh's daughter, and he became her son; and she named him Moses, for she said, "Because I drew him out of the water."
Moses in Midian
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[11] One day, when Moses had grown up, he went out to his people and looked on their burdens; and he saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his people. [12] He looked this way and that, and seeing no one he killed the Egyptian and hid him in the sand. [13] When he went out the next day, behold, two Hebrews were struggling together; and he said to the man that did the wrong, "Why do you strike your fellow?" [14] He answered, "Who made you a prince and a judge over us? Do you mean to kill me as you killed the Egyptian?" Then Moses was afraid, and thought, "Surely the thing is known." [15] When Pharaoh heard of it, he sought to kill Moses. But Moses fled from Pharaoh, and stayed in the land of Midian.
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Commentary:
2:1-10. With lots of detail and good psychological insight, the sacred text recounts the birth and upbringing of Moses, the man whom divine providence had chosen to be the liberator and leader of the chosen people. What we have here is not so much chronological or topographical data as information which profiles the religious personality of the man who was both the guide and the prototype of the people.
In a masterly way the sacred writer highlights those aspects of his life and personality which most clearly show Moses to resemble the people and show divine intervention to be at work. Moses grew up during a period of severe persecution, but thanks to the good offices of three women (his mother, his sister and the pharaoh's daughter) he is received into the Egyptian court and shown every honor. His tranquil childhood reflects the pleasant lifestyle of the sons of Israel in Egypt prior to the onset of oppression and persecution.
In this entire account of Moses' birth there is no mention of the names of his parents (Amram, according to Ex 6:20 his father, and Jochebed, his mother: Num 26:59) or his sister, Miriam (Ex 15:20). The sacred writer prefers to concentrate on Moses, making it clear that God takes care of him in birth and infancy, as he will also do of the people. Even the popular etymology of Moses' name ("taken from the waters") is an indication of God's intervention. The name in fact is Egyptian, meaning "son" or "born", as can be deduced from the names of some pharaohs Tut-mosis (son of the god Tut) or Ra-meses (son of the god Ra)--but that does not matter: the important thing is that Moses is "the first to be saved", just as the Hebrew people is the first people to be saved, and that God is taking great care of him with a view to the important mission he has planned for him.
2:1-3. The Hebrew term translated here as "basket" is the same one as used for the Noah's "ark" (cf. Gen 6: 14-9, 18, where it occurs 27 times). What we are told about the basket links Moses to Noah and his salvation from the waves of the flood Which occurred so much earlier and in such dramatic circumstances. After the flood, mankind was reborn; now a new people is being born.
2:10. According to Egyptian law an adopted son had the same status as any other son. The text stresses that the pharaoh's daughter made him her son. In this paradox we can once again see God's providence at work: the child whom the Egyptians should have put to death is raised to great dignity, given the best of educations and thereby groomed for his future mission. Extra-biblical documents show that during this period the pharaohs trained select foreign youths for posts in their civil service. However, although Moses spent his early years in the pharaoh's palace, he received from his true mother not only physical nourishment but also the faith of his ancestors and love for his people.
Origen, whom many Fathers follow, interprets this wonderful story in an allegorical sense: Moses is the law of the Old Testament, the pharaoh's daughter is the Church of Gentile background, because her father was wicked and unjust; the water of the Nile is Baptism. The Church of the pagans leaves her father's house, that is, leaves sin behind, to receive cleansing water, that is Baptism, and in the water she finds the law of Moses, that is the Commandments. Only in the Church, in the royal palace of Wisdom, does the Law acquire complete maturity. "So," the ancient Christian writer concludes "even if the pharaoh were our father, even if the prince of this world had begotten us in works of evil, by coming to the waters we receive the divine law, [...] We have a Moses great and strong. Let us not see anything mean in him..., for everything in him is greatness, sublimity and beauty. [...] And let us ask our Lord Jesus Christ to show us and make known to us this greatness and sublimity of Moses" ("Homiliae In Exodum", 2,4).
2:11-15. This is Act One in the calling of Moses. Because he carries out God's will he has to leave the pharaoh's palace, where he had a comfortable and easy life arid go out into the unknown. In this he is doing what the patriarchs did: first Abraham and then his descendants had to leave their homeland and their family (cf. Gen 12:1ff). The leader-to-be of Israel kills an Egyptian who is beating a Hebrew; and later he tries to make peace between two Hebrews. Freeing his people from oppression and slavery, and bringing about peace and unity among them are two of the goals of Moses mission. Here again the sacred writer, over and above the details of events (about which he makes no moral judgments) is building up his theological profile Moses and indicating the scope of his mission.
The same points are made when Moses is referred to in the New Testament. For example, according Stephen's reconstruction of these events in the Acts of the Apostles, Moses forty years of age at this time and "mighty in his words and deeds"; his intervention on behalf of a member his people was, presumably, inspired by high ideals: "He supposed that his brethren understood that God was giving them deliverance by his hand" (Heb 7:25). The Letter to the Hebrews adds that "by faith Moses [...] refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter, choosing rather to share ill-treatment with the people of God than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin. He considered abuse suffered for the Christ greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, for he looked to the reward" (Heb 11:24-26). However, his own people rejected him, and the pharaoh condemned him to death, furious at the killing of one of his overseers and fearful lest it signal an uprising of Hebrew slaves. Another forty years had to pass before Moses was actually given his mission (cf. Acts 7:30). On the basis of all these testimonies, St Cyril of Alexandria goes as far as to compare this episode of Moses' life with the Incarnation of Christ: "Do we not say that the Word of God the Father, who took on our condition, that is, became man, in some way went away from himself and became anonymous? [...] He, left therefore to see his brothers, that is, the sons of Israel. For to them belong the promises and the patriarchs to whom the promises were made. And so he said, 'I have been sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.' But, on seeing that they were subject to a heavy and intolerable tyranny, he chose to set them free and to make them see that they could hope for deliverance from pain of any kind" ("Glaphyra In Exodum", 1,7).
2:15 It is not at all clear where Midian was. The Bible often refers to Midianites, who were descendants of Abraham (cf. Gen 25:1-4) and were therefore related to the Israelites; we meet them as traders who used to travel from one place to another (cf. Gen 37:36; Num 10:29-32); who engage the Hebrews in battle (Num 25:6-18 31:1-9) and are roundly defeated by Gideon (Judg 6-8). At the end of time, as the third part of the book of Isaiah announces, they will come to do homage before the Lord (Is 60:6). But none of this information tells us where exactly this place Midian was. Modern scholars are inclined to situate it somewhere in the Sinai peninsula, a desert region where people sought refuge who wanted to evade the Egyptian authorities.
Moses' flight into the wilderness is also part of his God-given mission, according to the interpretation in the Letter to the Hebrews: "By faith he left Egypt, not being afraid of the anger of the king; for he endured as seeing him who is invisible" (Heb 11:27).
