Interpretation of the prophet Zephaniah

“Interpretation of the Prophet Zephaniah” (3 chapters) was written by Bl. Jerome of Stridon in 393. He used a certain method when creating commentaries. First the translation is given from the Hebrew and from the LXX (except where the text is exactly the same), followed by an explanation of the literal meaning based on the Hebrew text, and a discussion of the differences between it and the Greek translation from Origen's Hexaplos. Blzh. Jerome gives a spiritual-typological interpretation in relation to Christ and the Church, based on the Septuagint. For example, to characterize the Church, he turns to its symbols and images from the Holy Scriptures: it is the “heavenly Jerusalem.” The author is not limited to the time in which certain historical events took place, but correlates them with similar events that occurred in later times. Thus, Blessed Jerome says that the destruction of Jerusalem dates back to both the reign of Nebuchadnezzar and the era of the rule of Rome: “During the time and on the day of the captivity of Jerusalem, either by the Babylonians, or by the Romans (for he abandoned the law of the Lord and acted wickedly against the Lord his Creator), the Lord will search with a lamp all the secrets of Jerusalem, and will not tolerate anyone escaping unavenged.” *The title of the work in Latin is Commentarius in Sophoniam prophetam. One book of commentaries on the prophet Zephaniah. Before I proceed to Zephaniah, the ninth in the series of twelve prophets, it seems necessary to me to answer those who consider it their duty to ridicule me for [or: how] I have neglected men and write mainly to you, O Paula and Eustochius! If they had known that Huldah prophesied while the men were silent, and Deborah, who was both a judge and a prophetess, defeated the enemies of Israel at a time when Barak was afraid, and Judith and Esther, transforming the church, killed both the enemies and freed Israel from the danger of perishing: then they would never have raised their hands back to me like the neck of a stork. I am silent about Anna and Elizabeth and other holy women, whose radiance, like the radiance of stars, eclipses the clear light of Mary. I will go over to the pagan women so that they can see that even among secular philosophers the question was raised about the difference between the soul and not the body. Thus Plato presents us with the judicious Aspasia, Sappho stands alongside Pindar and Alcaeus, Themista philosophizes among the wisest men of Greece; all the population of Rome, without exception, is surprised at Cornelia, the mother of the Gracchi, that is, yours; Carneades, the most eloquent of philosophers, the wittiest of rhetoricians, accustomed to receiving laudatory applause at the Academy and from government officials, did not blush to enter into philosophical competitions in a private house with one matron objecting to him. Why should I remember the daughter of Cato, the wife of Brutus, whose virtue makes us not even be surprised to such an extent by the strength of spirit of her father and husband? Both Greek and Roman history are full of women's virtues, the stories of which could require entire books. For me, since I have another matter to do, at the end of the preface it is enough to say that the Risen Lord first appeared to women (Matt. 28:1-10; Luke 23:55-24:10), and they were apostles of apostles, so that men would be ashamed that they could not find Him Whom the weaker sex had already found. Zeph.1:1. The word of the Lord, which came to Zephaniah the son of Hushai, the son of Gedaliah, the son of Amori, the son of Hezekiah, in the days of Josiah the son of Ammon, king of Judah. The word of the Lord, which came to Zephaniah the son of Huzi, the son of Gedaliah, the son of Amariah, the son of Hezekiah, in the days of Josiah the son of Ammon, king of Judah. LXX is also translated. Jews say that if the name of the father or grandfather of a prophet is indicated in the table of contents of a book, then the latter were also prophets. Therefore, Amos, one of the twelve prophets, who says: I am not a prophet, nor the son of a prophet, but a goat shepherd who gathers sycamores (Amos.7:14) does not have the name of his father in the table of contents of the book. If this tradition is true, then the prophet Zephaniah was born, so to speak, on behalf of the prophetic and from the glorious generation of his ancestors, for he had Huzi as his father, Gedaliah as his grandfather, Amariah as his great-grandfather, and Hezekiah as his great-great-grandfather, and he himself completed this kind of fourfold chariot, as if the charioteer who appeared after all. Some translated the name Zephaniah: a high place for observation, others: the secret of the Lord. However, whether this name is interpreted as a tower for observation, or as the secret of the Lord, both of them are equally suitable for the prophet. In fact, it is also said to Ezekiel: “Son of man! I have made you a watchman for the house of Israel” (Ezek. 3:17). And in another place: “The Lord will not do anything else except reveal His teaching to His servants the prophets”; and the table of contents of Psalm nine is translated with the words: about the mysteries of the Son. Thus, the prophet who was placed on guard in exalted places and knew the secrets of the Lord was the son of Huzi, which means humility or: my Ethiopian, (which we will have a discussion about later), and his grandfather was Gedaliah, which means the greatness of the Lord, and his great-grandfather was Amariah - [name] translated by the words: the word of the Lord, and his great-great-grandfather was Hezekiah, which means the strength of the Lord. So from the strength of the Lord was born the word of the Lord, and from the word of the Lord - the greatness of the Lord, and from the greatness of the Lord was born humility, so that when someone reaches perfection, he will say, “I am not worthy to be called an apostle” (1 Cor. 15:9), and these words of the Psalm: “Lord, my heart was not exalted, and my eyes were not lifted up” (Ps. 130:1). To this place we ran as if with a light movement and as if across a smooth plain, only to come across the fact that the name Khuzi is also translated by the words My Ethiopian. For how, after so many virtues, can the name Ethiopian serve to be praised? And indeed, if the Scripture said Hus, i.e. Ethiopian, then the question would be insoluble, because Hus was born from Ham. But to the name Huzi, which means my Ethiopian, the invisible mystery lies: for the one who was once an Ethiopian turned to repentance (according to what was said: “Ethiopia will stretch out her hands to God” (Ps. 67:32) and in another place: “Before Him the Ethiopians will fall” ( Ps. 71:9); he will say with the bride: “I, the daughter of Jerusalem, am black, but" [or: and] "beautiful" (Song. 1:4). And in the book of the prophet Jeremiah we read that Abdimelech, the Ethiopian eunuch, was pleasing to God (Jer. 38:7-11), and the Acts of the Apostles says that the Ethiopian, the eunuch of the queen of Candace, had such diligence to the word of God that he read in a chariot and came to Jerusalem to worship God in His church (Acts 8:27-31). Therefore, such faith is crowned with a worthy reward. The evangelist Philip is sent to him, and he immediately learns, receives baptism and is saved. And he is called not just a eunuch, but with the addition of a husband: “eunuch husband of an Ethiopian.” In fact, since he was a eunuch of Christ and became a eunuch for the sake of the kingdom of heaven, he did not lose the title of husband. It is also natural that Zephaniah, the son of Huzi, that is, an Ethiopian, writes in the following books about the repentance of the Ethiopians, saying: “Through the rivers of Ethiopia, from where they will offer sacrifices to Me.” This is about the origin of Zephaniah, who prophesied in the days of Josiah. But just as the days that were enlightened by Elijah are called the days of Elijah, so are the days of Josiah, who rose up to the Lord (for the word Josiah means the rising of the Lord) and was a righteous man; his praiseworthy deeds are written in the histories of Kings and Chronicles (2 Kings 21–23; 2 Chronicles 33–35). And his father was Ammon and his grandfather was Manasseh (2 Kings 21:18–24). We read that Manasseh, after many crimes and after captivity in Babylon, repented and, turning to something better, received merciful forgiveness from the Lord. Therefore, he called his son a name corresponding to his faith, with which he believed God, that is, Ammon, since ammon (אמון) means faith. At the same time, pay attention to the fact that the kings of the ten tribes, that is, the kings of Israel, are no longer listed here, as was above, but only the kings of Judah; because the ten tribes during the time of King Hezekiah, the father of Manasseh, were taken into captivity by the Assyrians (2 Kings 17:23). This consists in the attack and in the table of contents of Zephaniah regarding the origin [of it] and the time [of the prophecy]. Now let's see what is contained in the prophecy itself. Zeph.1:2–3. I will destroy everything from the face of the earth, says the Lord: I will destroy people and livestock, I will destroy the birds of the air and the fish of the sea, and temptations along with the wicked; I will destroy people from the face of the earth, says the Lord. Gathering, I will gather everything from the face of the earth, says the Lord, gathering man and beast, gathering the birds of the air and the fish of the seas: and the wicked will be ruined, and I will destroy people from the face of the earth, says the Lord. LXX: In the end they will become scarce from the face of the earth; Man and livestock will become poor, the birds of the air and the fish of the sea will become poor, and the wicked will be overwhelmed by the strength of the wicked, and I will destroy the wicked from the face of the earth, says the Lord. The words we introduced into the text of the Seventy: and the wicked will be overcome by strength were added from Theodotion’s translation. Symmachus instead translated: and temptations with the wicked, as if the words are implied: they will be collected or: they will become impoverished. So we must, following our custom, first reveal history, and then talk about more sublime things. There is no doubt that the last kingdom over the two tribes, which are called the tribes of Judah and Benjamin, was the kingdom of Josiah. In fact, after his murder, his sons, who reigned after him, and his grandsons should be revered not so much as kings, but as toys in the hands of the king of Egypt and the Chaldeans, subjected to painful torture in captivity and violent death. And so in view of the fact that the people could excuse themselves as bad kings and say: “We want to serve God, but we meet opposition from the kings,” and they are given a righteous king. But although he reveals the greatest zeal for the Lord, the people continue to remain in idolatry, God indicates the true reason for [His] anger and prophesies about the overthrow of Jerusalem, the captivity of Judah and the victories of Nebuchadnezzar. And the Lord says through the prophet: “I will no longer give you more time for repentance, but I will destroy everything from the face of the earth. There will be no man, no livestock, no birds, no sea fish left.” So even irrational animals experience the wrath of the Lord: for after the devastation of cities and the extermination of people there will be either complete destruction or a significant decrease in animals, fish and birds. Witnesses of this are Illyria, Thrace and the land in which I was born, where everything perished except heaven and earth, the ever-growing thorns and impenetrable forests. And this will happen, as the prophet says, because the multitude of the wicked is too great. So the wicked will fall, people will perish, and there will be a wilderness upon the face of the earth. But we can understand the same thing regarding the end of the world, namely: that people, and cattle, and birds, and fish of the sea, and everything will be destroyed, and the wicked will lose their strength, and iniquity will be removed from the face of the earth. But if we want (according to what was said in LXX: He will become completely impoverished from the face of the earth) to understand something higher, and to interpret weakening in a good sense (in view of the words: “And Abraham died weak in a good old age, an old man of many years, and was gathered to his people” (Gen. 25:8) and in view of what Scripture says about Isaac and Jacob), then we will see how, weakening, they disappeared from the face of the earth, but at the same time fulfilled this commandment: those who have their conversion in heaven, and who wage war in the flesh, but not according to the flesh, for they know that those who live according to the flesh cannot be pleasing to God - those, as far as it is in their power, do everything to ensure that they do not live according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit, and departing from the world they say: “He raised us up with Him and seated us in Christ in the heavenly places” (Eph. 2:6). If anyone objects to what we accept in the good sense of the word: He will be completely impoverished from the face of the earth even where it is written about Ishmael: “These years of Ishmael’s life were one hundred and thirty-seven, and he died faint and was joined to his family” (Gen. 25:17), to such we will answer, firstly, that this Ishmael is the son of Abraham and, according to his measure, received gifts and inheritance from [his] father; and, secondly, what is written [about him] simply: “he died exhausted,” without adding what is written about Abraham: “in a good old age, an old man full of days and was gathered to his people,” or about Isaac: “Now it came to pass that the days of Isaac, which he lived, were one hundred and eighty-five years, and Isaac died exhausted, and was gathered to his people as an old man, full of days” ( Gen. 35:28–29 ). As about Jacob: “And Jacob finished, giving commandments to his sons and lifting up his feet on his bed, died and was gathered to his people” (Gen. 49:33). From this we understand that one thing means only to weaken, and another means to have virtue along with weakening. And what he first said in general: “the earth will become completely impoverished,” Divine Scripture then divides into parts: man and livestock will become impoverished, the birds of the air and the fish of the sea will become impoverished. The four [kinds of creatures] are commanded to decrease; first, a reasonable man, and then three, subordinate to man: animals under the jugular, birds and fish, which, as I think, are also relied on in the eighth psalm: “Over the beasts of the field, the birds of the air and the fish of the sea, walking on the paths of the sea” (Ps. 8: 8-9). And in what was said before: all the sheep and oxen, he seemed to single out some special ones from among the livestock, and did not want to list them along with what was left. So, man will become impoverished, livestock will become impoverished, the birds of the air and the fish of the sea will become impoverished, but he did not say “the animals will become impoverished, the reptiles on the earth will become impoverished.” In fact, these latter should not only decrease in number, but will finally perish; in fact, what can be corrected will decrease, just as, after the end of Sarah’s characteristic of women, Abraham received the command to obey what Sarah commanded (Gen. 18:11,21:12). Someone becomes impoverished as a man if he despises human things, but he will not die like a man, completely, and will hear: “I said: you are gods” (Ps. 82:6). Another becomes impoverished, like cattle, when he, ascending to the highest [or: to the highest], does not fit the accusation of the prophetic word: “When a man was in honor, he did not understand, he was compared with foolish beasts and became like” [or: “became like”] “to them” (Ps. 48:21). He becomes poor like a bird of the air who arranges for himself the feathers of an eagle and returns rich to the house of his mentor, leaving behind all poverty (Prov. 23:4-5). He becomes poor like a fish who is caught in the net of the Lord and is separated along with the good fish (Matt. 13:48). When all this is fulfilled according to the word of the Lord, the wicked will weaken, not having as many honors as they had before. But the wicked will also be raised up; and did not say: they will be killed, but raised up, so that after turning to the better, that is, from untruth and wickedness to piety and truth, they begin to be what they were not before. - This is in a figurative sense. In fact, we must also present the interpretation of the ancestors. But [or: already] the freedom of the reader will be left to decide whether the words of the prophet incline towards severity or towards mercy. Zeph.1:4–6. And I will stretch out My hand against Judah and against all the inhabitants of Jerusalem: I will destroy from this place the remnant of Baal, the name of the priests and the priests, and those who on the housetops worship the host of heaven, and those worshipers who swear by the Lord and swear by their king, and those who have departed from the Lord and have not sought the Lord or inquired about Him. And I will stretch out My hand against Judah and against all the inhabitants of Jerusalem: and I will destroy from this place the remnant of Baal and the names of the keepers of the church with the priests, and those who worship the host of heaven on the housetops, and who worship and swear by the Lord and swear by Molech, and who turn away from walking in the footsteps of the Lord, and who did not seek the Lord or inquire about Him. LXX: And I will stretch out My hand against Judah and against all who dwell in Jerusalem: and I will destroy from this place the names of Baalim, and the names of the priests with the priests, and those who on the housetops worship the host of heaven, and those who swear by the Lord and swear by their king, and those who turn aside from the Lord, and who do not seek the Lord and do not hold fast to the Lord. After the destruction of the wicked and the removal of the unrighteous from the face of the earth, successively in the name of the Lord, speech is made against Judah and Jerusalem: “I will stretch out My hand against Judah and against all the inhabitants of Jerusalem” (but stretching out the hand signifies the movement of the slaying one) “and I will destroy from this place the remnants of Baal.” This does not mean, as the LXX says, that the names of the idols of Baal should be completely eradicated, but that, according to the Hebrew text, there is a threat of extermination of the worshipers of Baal from among the people who remained in Judea and Jerusalem in small numbers after being beaten by enemies. The names of the church guardians with the priests are also expected, because Judah and Benjamin reached such wickedness that (as Ezekiel writes and the fourth book of Kings) they erected a statue of Baal in the church of the Lord, which the Lord calls the image of Zel, and in the same sanctuary they gave equal worship to both the Lord and idols (Ezek. 8: 3-5, 10-11). Therefore, significantly, he called the priests of idols not priests, but τεμεν ί τας, i.e. church guards [or servants], or fanatics (2 Kings 10:19: ХVII), which in Hebrew is expressed by the word: “acchumarim” (חכמרים). So both the church guards, and those who were once priests of the Lord, and those who on the housetops worshiped the hosts of heaven: the sun, the moon and the rest of the luminaries, and who swore in the name of the Lord and in the name of the idol of the Ammonites Melchom (which is translated by the word king in the LXX), the Lord will remove from the place of Jerusalem or destroy, for this implies: from the state (ἀπὸ κοινοῦ), "and I will destroy from this place the remnant of Baal and I will destroy the names of the church servants with the priests, and I will destroy those who on the housetops worship the host of heaven and I will destroy those who worship and swear in the name of the Lord and in the name of Melchom, and I will destroy those who turn away or turn away from following the Lord and who do not seek Him" , or: they do not hold on [to Him]. Those who turn away from following the Lord of Israel are those who, abandoning His worship, swear in the name of Melchom and worship the heavenly host and worship Baal, the idol of the Sidonians. Up to this point the meaning of the story has been stated; Let's now look at the figurative meaning (ἀναγογ ή ν). In relation to the Lord, Who was born of the tribe of Judah, and in relation to Jerusalem, where Judah reigned, that is, the Lord and Savior, we must say that when unrighteousness increases and the love of many grows cold, and when, at the time of the Lord’s coming to earth, faith turns out to be so rare that even God’s elect will be tempted (Matt. 24:24; Luke 21:28–34): then To punish sinners, the Lord will stretch out His hand over Judah, who thinks of himself as if he confesses the name of the Lord, and over Jerusalem, the Church, which received its name from the word world, and will remove from the church the names of Baalim, which means: on the high places. The Lord will remove the names of empty exaltation and false astonishment that are addressed in the churches, where, according to the word of the Apostle James, the man who has a gold ring is revered and the poor are despised (James 2:2-3), when at the entrance of the judge and the senator and in general all the rich, all the common people stand up, and the holy poor man is not given a place even to stand in the crowd of powerful people, and during their meeting; The names of priests will also be destroyed along with those clergy who vainly call themselves episcopal names, or presbyteral dignity, and not deeds. Therefore, it is significant that he does not say: the affairs of the priests with the clergy, but: the names [of those] who prefer only false names of honors and dishonor their names with evil deeds, just as He will destroy those who on the housetops honor the armies of heaven, who rebel against the knowledge of God, and reduce everything that happens in the world to the appearance and disappearance of the heavenly bodies in the name of what is appropriated false knowledge, and follow the error of mathematicians, and those who worship the Lord and Melchom, who think that they can equally serve the Lord and the world and work for two masters: God and mammon; who, in warring with Christ, bind themselves to worldly actions and render God and Caesar the same form of reverence, and although they say that they are priests of Christ, they consecrate their sons to Melchom, that is, to their king (2 Tim. 4:3-4). For it is certain that those who have lost the Lord of the Lord, and through evil deeds turn away from the Lord and do not seek Him and hold back their sins, so that He moves away from them, have man as their king. If anyone, according to the interpretation of the names of Judah and Jerusalem, wants to attribute the same place to the soul of everyone, he will not fall into error, because what we have said above will be destroyed by the Lord either at the end of the world, or at the time of the death of individuals, when each of them hears: “You fool, this night your soul will be taken from you” (Luke 12:20). And he will stretch out his hand against the one who does not confess the Lord, and against the one who boasts that he has a sense of peace, in order to destroy or dispel from such a Jerusalem all pride, false reverence for God, the errors of various dogmas, the simultaneous service of God and the world, deviation from God and neglect of Him through daily falls. Zeph.1:7. Be silent before the face of the Lord God! for the day of the Lord is near: the Lord has already prepared the sacrificial slaughter, and has appointed whom to call. Be silent before the Lord God, for the day of the Lord is near, for the Lord has prepared a sacrifice: He has sanctified those who are called. LXX: Be afraid before the presence of the Lord God, for the day of the Lord is near, for the Lord has prepared his sacrificial animal: he has sanctified his called ones. Instead of what is translated in LXX: be afraid, and with us, be silent, in Hebrew there is an exclamation word of the one who commands to be silent, often used by comic writers; but silence in all things is emphatically commanded, for the day of the Lord will come. And by the day of the Lord we will understand the day of captivity and vengeance against the people who sinned, and by the sacrifice of destruction - Jerusalem, and by those who are sanctified - those whom the Lord prepared for destruction, according to what was said by the prophet Jeremiah: “Sanctify them in the day of their slaughter” (Jer. 12:3). And the meaning of the passage is this: The captivity predicted from ancient times has come against the wicked people, and it is already near. In fact, the prophecy is given during the reign of Josiah; After killing him, you will be afraid in the presence of the Lord God, for the day of the Lord is already near, for the Lord has already prepared a sacrifice for the slaughter, He has sanctified His called ones. Complete destruction is approaching, about which He speaks in the book of Ezekiel: “The end has come, the end has come” (Ezek. 7:2) and so on. This sacrifice is pleasing to Me, I have sanctified these sacrifices to Myself. But what was said: He sanctified His called ones can also apply to the Babylonians, whom He even calls slaves, serving to take revenge on the people for insulting Him. “I have called,” He says, “Nebuchadnezzar His servant” (Jer. 25:9). And in the same scroll he calls him not only his servant, but even a dove in the words: “From the face of the sword of a dove” (Jer. 46:16). - Then in a mysterious sense (the passage means); since the face of God rushes against those who do evil, in order to destroy their memory from the earth, and the day of judgment is near, - for in comparison with eternity, every time of this age is short, - as is the destruction of each individual: let them all fear, let them be silent, so that the Face of the Lord - about Whom the saint says: “The light of Your countenance is reflected upon us, O Lord” (Psalm 4:7), - does not destroy the hay, straw and wood. sinners. For the Lord has prepared His Sacrifice, all the mystery of the book of Leviticus, in which through fire and the shedding of blood and the true offering those who must be saved and those called to receive sanctification will be saved. Some of us, by the day of the Lord and His sacrifice and by the sanctification of those who are called, understand in the coming of the Savior that the Lamb was broken, and the apostles and others who were called through them were sanctified by His blood. Zeph.1:8–9. And it shall come to pass on the day of the Lord’s sacrifice: I will visit the princes and the king’s sons and all those who dress in the clothing of foreigners; I will visit on that day all those who jump over the threshold, who fill the house of their Lord with violence and deceit. And it shall come to pass on the day of the Lord’s sacrifice that I will visit the princes and the king’s sons and all those who are clothed in foreign clothing. And I will visit everyone who arrogantly enters the threshold on that day, and who fill the house of the Lord their God with unrighteousness and sorrow. LXX: And it shall come to pass on the day of the Lord’s sacrifice, that I will exact vengeance on the princes, and on the house of the king, and on all who dress in strange garments: and I will manifest vengeance on all those who on that day are in the outbuildings [of the church] and fill the house of the Lord their God with unrighteousness and sorrow. On the day of the Jewish captivity, when the entire nation was to be crushed, the Lord will rise up against the princes who were still drinking strong drink in the morning, and against the sons of the king, or all the persons of the royal family, and against everyone dressed in foreign clothing, i.e., instead of honoring God, who worshiped idols, and against everyone who arrogantly enters the threshold on that day, i.e., against the proud, who arrogantly and with a proud consciousness of their dignity ascend to the steps of the church and to the threshold of the sanctuary. Further, since in the words translated by us: who arrogantly step onto the threshold [of the church], according to the Hebrew text can be translated: who cross the threshold, then in historical terms this place should also be given the following meaning: I will take revenge on those who, according to the first book of Kings, do not trample with contempt the thresholds of idols, slavishly serving the superstitions that filled the house [or: church] of the Lord their God not only idolatry, but also untruth, crimes and all kinds of deception, so that to errors in faith there is also added injustice towards subordinates and deception of neighbors. But since we have already begun to explain the figurative meaning, [we will move on to it]: The visitation of the Lord will be at the coming and suffering of the Savior, that is, on the day of the sacrifice of His Son, against the high priests and priests of the people of Judah and against the royal house. For until this very time the kings of Judah continued from the tribe of David, according to the prophecy of Jacob: “The prince of Judah will not fail, nor the leader of His feet, until the appointed time for him comes, and He will be the expectation of the nations” (Gen. 49:10); Indeed, after the sacrifice of the Lord, the kingdom was taken away from the Jews. [Further] he says: And against all who have dressed themselves in foreign clothing, who have departed from the covering and garment of the Lord and are covered with their own delusions. And I will clearly take revenge on everyone who is in the outbuildings [of the church], that is, who came out of the church of God: and although they should have been inside it, because of their sins they went out and retreated from the church of God, filling the church of God with wickedness and sorrow. This should be understood in relation to the first coming of the Savior. And since we have already once interpreted this in relation to the end of the world and the day of judgment, which everyone calls the day [or: on the day] of the Lord, we must know that at that time there will be a visitation of the Lord against princes and shepherds who eat the milk of the sheep and, taking the wool, do not care about the diseases of the flock, just as against the sons of kings who boast that they are Christians and are vain that they are the sons of the King Christ, [finally] and against those who are dressed in strange clothes. The robe of the king's sons and the vestment of princes is Christ [or: Christ's], which we receive [or: received] in baptism, according to the words: “Put on Christ Jesus” (Rom. 13:14) and: “Put on endless mercy, kindness, humility, meekness, long-suffering” (Col. 3:12) and so on. These words command that we put on the new heavenly man in the likeness of our Creator and put off putting on the old man with his deeds (Eph. 4:22). So, although we had to put on such clothes, we put on cruelty instead of mercy, impatience instead of long-suffering, untruth instead of righteousness, and, as I already said once, vices instead of virtues, that is, Antichrist instead of Christ. Therefore, it is said about a person of this kind: “And he was clothed with slander as with a robe” (Ps. 109:18). So, the Lord will most clearly take revenge at the time of His coming, even on those who, although they should have been in the church with good deeds, have cast themselves out with their most wicked behavior and are devoted to Satan in the aisles of the church and not even in the aisles, but in front of the aisles, which is more clearly expressed in Greek: ἐπὶ τα πρότολα. Revenge will be directed at all those who fill the Church with various untruths and sins, wickedness and lies and mix blood with blood. If we wished to understand this passage in relation to the souls of individuals, then by princes and the king’s house we should understand thoughts (λυγισμού) and feelings (και αἱσθ ή εις) [as he adds in other places] and the soul itself, which should be the refuge of the king; and according to the above interpretation, we must attribute alien garments, etc., to each of the believers, who, although they should have put on Christ and always remain inside [the church], covered themselves with various garments of sins and withdrew from the Church, that is, the assembly of saints, and instead of virtues filled the church of their body with unrighteousness and sorrow. Zeph.1:10. And in that day, says the Lord, there will be a cry at the fish gate, and mourning at the other gate, and great destruction on the hills. And on that day, says the Lord, there will be a great cry from the fish gate, and mourning from the second gate, and great torment from the hills. LXX: And on that day, says the Lord, there will be a great cry from the piercing gate, and mourning from the second gate, and great torment from the hills. On the day of the Lord’s sacrifice, when He stretches out His hand against Judah and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and when the enemy’s army surrounds it on all sides, there will be a terrible cry from the side of the fish gate, and weeping from the side of the second gate, and great torment from the side of the hills. The fish gates were those that led to Diospolis and Joppa), among all the roads in Jerusalem it was the closest to the sea, as Ezra [Nehemiah?] also reports: “The fish gates were built by the sons of Asan, they covered them and put up doors with doors and made locks and bars” (Neh. 3:3). And his words: and the weeping from the second designates the gate of the second wall on the same side, about which it is written in the 4th book of Kings: “And Hilkiah the priest, and Ahikam, and Ahabor” [or: Ahabor], “and Zephan, and Asaiah, went in to the prophetess Huldam, the wife of Shellum, the son of Tekva, the son of Haras, the guardian of the garments, and she dwelt in Jerusalem in the second” [part] ( 2 Kings 22:14). Under the great torment from the hills it is said [about misfortunes] from Mount Zion and from the more elevated part of the city, because after taking the higher places and the fortress of the city, it will be much easier and more convenient for [the enemies] to attack. And if we wanted to understand this day, with which [we] are threatened by the Lord, as before, the day of judgment, the day when the Old Day has to sit on the judgment, when the books must be opened and the conscience of each individual must be laid bare; then it will be fulfilled [the prophecy] about the cry from the piercing gate (Dan.7). Indeed, the gate of the eyes will be the first through which our sins will be presented to us, and all the visible splendor and image of former crimes, vices and luxury will be exposed in the middle [before everyone]. Then, in truth, what is written will be fulfilled: “Here is a man, and his works are before him.” So, his conscience will torment him, and as a result of its pricks, he will cry out from the first gate, or from the gate of his eyes, and will even weep from the second gate, by which we can mean ears. For punishment [for crimes] will be felt primarily through those feelings through which vices penetrated [into the soul], when we see what we have done, taught by the word of accusation, and listening to the enumeration of the whole series of sins, and when we plunge into sobbing, and when everything in us that was exalted by pride, and which we were not aware of due to our blindness and deafness, turns to dust. Or undoubtedly [this means that] when the excellent words and teachings coming from the Most High will amaze and crush us, and when in reality what is said is fulfilled: “I roared like a lion because of the groaning of my heart” (Ps. 37:9), so that a broken spirit will be sacrificed to God (Ps. 50:19), in us - people who have not committed such great sins that they can be compared with the mountains, the hills will be crushed; and in the devil and his angels the tops of the mountains will be crushed. Many people think that, in historical terms, what we refer to the time of the Babylonians should be understood in relation to the first coming of the Savior, when, for excessive sins and frantic cries of the people: “His blood be on us and on our sons” (Matthew 27:25), Jerusalem was surrounded by an army and a crowd of slanderous children was devoured by two bears, namely Vespasian and Titus (cf. 2 Kings 2:23–24 ). True, such an understanding is more consistent with our faith, but at the same time we must know that the prophecy may correspond to previous historical events, or even that the first captivity is a prototype of the second captivity and the final destruction of Jerusalem. And since adagim (הדגים) in Hebrew undoubtedly does not mean: a piercing gate, but a fish gate, then in a figurative meaning it is necessary to note that in Jerusalem there is a fish gate, through which good fish are brought in, which are separated from the bad fish, and those who, when the rest enter, will remain outside, will weep bitterly. Undoubtedly that too. that in the end, when the world is destroyed, those who did not keep their baptism will lament from the first gates; from the second gate those who have not brought repentance for their sins will weep. And there will be great contrition on the hills, which, because of their sins, did not bow down to subdue their necks and mourn their crimes. In fact, through these two gates of baptism and repentance, either entry or return to Jerusalem is accomplished, that is, to the Church of God. Zeph.1:11. Wail, inhabitants of the lower part of the city, for all the trading people will disappear and those laden with silver will be destroyed. Weep, you inhabitants of the lower part of the crowd: all the people of Canaan have fallen silent. LXX: Weep, you who live in the smitten country: for all the people have become like Canaan. The word pila (crush), in Hebrew expressed by the word machthes (מכתש) and translated by Aquila εἰς τόν ὄλμον, should not be read with the first short syllable, i.e. we should not understand it in the meaning σφαῖρα (ball), but with a long syllable in order to know what is being said here about an object in which livestock is pounded, about an object that has emptiness and is suitable for use by doctors, in which barley grains are mainly pounded. Perhaps someone will say that he understands what the word pila means, but wants to know why it is used in the present place. Since the description of the captured city had already begun in the words: “A terrible cry from the fish gate and sobs from the second gate, and great torment from the hills,” then even now gradualism is maintained in the order of description and the sobs of those who inhabit the Siloe valley are spoken of. And it is remarkable that the Scripture does not say: “you who live in the valley,” “in a hut,” but “in a crowd,” because they are pushed together just as grain bread is pounded by a piece of wood from above. So the army will rush towards you, rushing from the fish gate, from the second gate and from the side of the hills. He called the people of Canaan the people of Judah, according to what we read in the book of Daniel: “The seed of Canaan, not of Judah” (Dan.13:56) and about Jerusalem: “Your father is an Amorite and your mother is a Hittite” (Ezek.16:3) and in another place: “Canaan, in your hand there is a wrong balance” (Hos.12:7). If, according to both translations, we would like to reveal the mysterious meaning, then of course we will see that those who, in the extreme degree of sinful filth and immersed in the very depths of their crimes, are aroused to cries and sobs, saying: “I am mired in deep filth and there is no” [for me] “support” (Ps. 68:3). Therefore, it is added: you who inhabit the country that has been cut off. that is, a soul struck by the wounds of many untruths, or a Church that is torn to pieces by heresies and schisms, and which at every blow mourns its slain sons. And the words: All the people fell silent or became like Canaan, meaning that on the day of judgment their slander will be silent, and the lips with which they were exalted, and the tongue that even reached to the earth, will be silent forever. And since Jerusalem sinned and therefore became indignant, the people call it Canaan, which means indignation. In fact, he cannot say: “I have set my feet on the rock” (Ps. 39:3), but is always in motion, as if unsteady and wavering like water. Therefore, the holy man Noah, upon awakening from sleep, cursed the name of Canaan in the words: “Cursed is the lad Canaan, he will be the servant of his brothers” (Gen. 9:25). But sinners are not only likened to Canaan, but in terms of the quality and difference of their sins, one is likened to Pharaoh, the other to the giant Nimrod. And vice versa, for good deeds and virtues, since the paths of virtues are different, one accepts the spirit of Abraham, this one - Moses, the other - Elijah, which is why the Apostle says: “let us zealously seek the best gifts” (1 Cor. 12:31). And whoever is actually perfect - at least even to the degree of perfection that is possible for human nature - is marked by God-likeness. All those wrapped in silver were destroyed. LXX: All those who exalted themselves with silver were destroyed. - Those who rely on riches, and have such wealth that they consider themselves as if wrapped and protected by their wealth, or - according to LXX - those who were exalted by pride and despised the poor, will be destroyed on the day of the coming of the wrath of God. At the same time, pay attention to what he did not say: Those who have become exalted in silver will perish; but now, before the day of punishment came to them, they were overthrown and died precisely because they are proud and always think about their riches and serve them. I think that the one who understands what has been said will no longer desire so much those riches in which only those who have been exalted [by them] will not perish, but have already perished. It should also not be thought that only those who have exalted themselves in silver will perish, but according to the above explanation, the one who boasts of the nobility of the family will also perish; He who boasts of honors will also perish; He who displays arrogance will also perish; He who is vainglorious in strength will also perish; The one who is pampered like women, grows hair on his head, plucks his arms, smoothes his skin, combs his hair in front of a mirror will also perish - which is mainly the passion and madness of women. But if anyone wants to be exalted and proud of sacred pride, let him exalt himself with the apostles, when he is worthy to endure reproach for the name of Jesus Christ, let him rejoice with the Apostle, who rejoiced in trials, knowing that “tribulation produces patience, patience produces hope, and hope does not deceive” (Rom. 5: 3-5). Zeph.1:12. And it will happen at that time: I will look around Jerusalem with a lamp and will punish those who sit on their lees and say in their hearts: “The Lord does neither good nor evil.” And it will happen on that day: I will search Jerusalem with lamps, and My visit will be against those people who sit firmly on their scum: who say in their hearts: “The Lord will not do good, neither will he do evil.” LXX: And it will come to pass on that day, I will search Jerusalem with a lamp and will take revenge on those men who do not take care of their guard and say in their hearts: “The Lord will not do good, neither will he do evil.” During and on the day of the captivity of Jerusalem, either by the Babylonians, or by the Romans (for he abandoned the law of the Lord and acted wickedly against the Lord his Creator), the Lord will search with a lamp all the secrets of Jerusalem, and will not tolerate anyone escaping unavenged. We will read the stories of Joseph, and there we will find a description of the fact that even from garbage pits, caves, animal dens and burial cavities, princes, kings, noble people and priests were extracted, who, under the influence of the fear of death, hid in these places. And My visit will be, he says, against those who rely on their bodies and on their strengths, which in a blasphemous sense (διασυρτικῶς) he calls scum, - or sins, in which those who, pushing aside Providence, said that God is not the author of either good or evil, that is, does not reward either good to good people, or evil to evil people, but all governed by the will of happiness and carried by an indefinite chance. - And at the time of the end of the world - since it is also called the day of the Lord - the Lord will search Jerusalem, that is, His Church with a lamp, and will direct His vengeance against careless people who did not want to keep their watch, i.e. despised the commandments of the Lord, and, in addition, claiming that they sin rationally, uttering blasphemy in their hearts, as if doing good is not at all useful, and doing evil is not at all harmful, because God allegedly established neither rewards for virtue nor punishments for atrocities. Jerusalem (formerly called Jebus, i.e. trampled), or the Church, which was once trampled by the pagans, and was a playground for demons, is correctly called Jebus; and after the world of God began to dwell in her, and her place became in the world, the name Jerusalem was attached [to her]. So, - we have often spoken about this before, - due to the fact that in the very last time, with the increase of iniquities, love will grow cold and the light of the sun will recede from Jerusalem, there will be such devastation that even God’s elect will barely be saved (Matthew 24:22-25): then the Lord, in the light of His Word and Reason, will examine all the vices in Jerusalem and expose them to sight, and even for every idle word there will be judgment and punishment, but not against sinners (for even sin can receive forgiveness), but against careless people, about whom Habakkuk says: “O scoffers! Look carefully and observe” (Hab. 1:5) and in another place: “Why do you not look at those who despise?” and then: “He who is arrogant and mocking is a proud man,” and so on. Revenge will be against those who did not keep the guard on which they were placed by the Lord and say in their hearts: “The Lord will not do good, neither will he do evil,” not in the sense that the Lord does evil, but in the sense that the punishment seems evil to the one who endures it. Otherwise, the doctor’s knife, which cuts off wounds and removes rotten flesh, will also turn out to be evil. A father who punishes his son in order to correct him from his vices will also be evil; the mentor who tames the student in order to educate him will also be evil: “For any punishment at the present time seems not to be joy, but sorrow; and then it gives the fruit of peace to those who have been taught through it” (Heb. 12:11). Zeph.1:13–14. And their wealth will be turned into spoil and their houses into desolation; they will build houses, but will not live in them; they will plant vineyards, but will not drink wine from them. The great day of the Lord is near, near, and hastens greatly: the voice of the day of the Lord is already heard; Then even the bravest will cry out bitterly! And their strength will be ruined and their house desolate. And they will build houses, but will not live in them, and will plant vineyards, but will not drink the wine from them. The great day of the Lord is near: it is near and too fast. LXX: And their fortress will be plundered, and their houses will be plundered. And they will build houses, but they will not dwell in them, and they will plant vineyards, but they will not drink wine from them. For the day of the Lord is near, near and too fast. It is clear that after both captivities, all their armies will be cut down, houses razed to the ground, and fields and vineyards devastated: and God’s long-suffering will no longer be towards them. But since they will begin to tell the prophets that this will only happen over time, after many days, then the great day of the Lord will come upon them and will come very soon. In a figurative meaning: when the day of judgment or death and departure from the world of each person comes, then all their power will decrease, so that what had the power of evil and rebelled against the Lord, weakened and broken, will turn to the better. This is similar to how if someone takes away the strength of a robber, a sea robber, a thief and makes them powerless: their weakened members, which they previously abused, will cease to act evilly. And then the following words: And their houses into the wilderness mean that there are many in the Church who are building Zion on blood and Jerusalem on iniquities, who will benefit if their houses are destroyed. Let's read the book of Leviticus, where it is ordered to destroy a house infected with leprosy (Lev.14:36–41); and since leprosy persists and spreads, its stones, wood, and all the rubbish are ordered to be taken out of the city and thrown into an unclean place. Something similar is contained in what is written at the beginning of the book of Jeremiah: “Behold, I have put my words in your mouth; behold, I have set you up today” [or without the word: now] “against nations and kingdoms, to uproot, to destroy, and to scatter, and to build and to plant” (Jer. 1:9–10). They destroy a very bad building in order to build a good one later. A bad plant is uprooted to make room for a good plant. That is why we read from Solomon: “It is better to live in the open air than in a new house at the end of a dispute with injustice” (Prov. 21:9). So God, being Good, destroys the houses of those who are stuck in their filth and say in their hearts: “God will not do good, nor will He do evil,” and does not allow them to live in the houses of lepers and the unclean, and does not allow them to drink wine from the vineyards that they have planted. Indeed, if they had planted the vineyard of Sorek, the truly chosen vineyard, they would have drunk their wine and been drunk with the patriarchs Noah and Joseph at noon (Gen. 9:20–21, 43:16); and since they said: “God will not do good, neither will he do evil, and since their grapes are from the vineyard of Sodom, and their shoots from Gomorrah, their grapes are grapes of gall and grapes” [theirs] - “a grape of bitterness for them, their wine is the wrath of dragons and the incurable wrath of asps” (Deut. 32:32-33), then although they planted vineyards, they will not drink wine from them. In a mysterious sense it says: “from Sodom and Gomorrah,” because every planting of them will perish. For if they had continued in what they began, so that they would have become as it were the paradise of God, and not ended in evil, so that they became as it were the land of Egypt, their planting would have remained. Similar to this is what the psalms say about the Egyptians: “They destroyed their vineyards with hail and their mulberry trees with ice” (Ps. 77:47). God, being the most merciful, killed and destroyed every plant of Egypt and the trees that, having grown in Egypt, produce bloody fruits, so that those who made the evil plant would not drink or eat from their fruits. The great day of the Lord is near and too soon, which no one can resist. He is close either because of [God’s] eternity, since nothing lasts long for him, or because of the magnitude of the punishment, since to the long-suffering one the punishment that must be sent never seems distant. Or, as we said above, he is close because we are moving away from the world, and the death of everyone will serve as the end of the world [for him]. And this day is only near, but it is also coming too quickly, so that the addition of the word too shows the suddenness of its approach. Zeph.1:15–16. The day of wrath is this day, a day of sorrow and distress, a day of desolation and ruin, a day of darkness and darkness, a day of clouds and darkness, a day of trumpets and shouts of abuse against fortified cities and high towers. The voice of the day of the Lord is bitter: the mighty will then be tormented; That day is a day of wrath, a day of sorrow and distress, a day of desolation and disaster, a day of darkness and gloom, a day of fog and whirlwind, a day of trumpets and war shouts against fortified cities and against high corner towers. LXX: The voice of the day of the Lord has become bitter and cruel; That day is a day of wrath, a day of sorrow and need, a day of disaster and destruction, a day of darkness and whirlwind, a day of fog and gloom, a day of trumpets and shouting against fortified cities and high corner towers. In accordance with the above, take this in relation either to the captivity of Babylon, or to the final captivity of Rome, in the foreknowledge of which the Lord mourned Jerusalem in the words: “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to you” (Matthew 23:37) and so on. And indeed, the punishment was appointed [for blood, starting] from the blood of Abel the righteous, to the blood of Zechariah, whom they killed between the church and the altar (Gen. 4:10 and 2 Chron. 24:20-21), and finally, shouting about the Son of God: “His blood be on us and on our children” (Matthew 27:25), they experienced a bitter day, for they challenged the Lord to bitterness [of suffering]: in day established by the Lord - on this day not just some weak men, but the strongest men will be humiliated, and wrath will break out over them to the end. And although before they often endured the wrath of the Lord, that anger was not wrath to the end and complete destruction. What is the need now to describe how great disasters they suffered during both captivities, and how those who rejected the light of the Lord walked in darkness and obscurity, and who did not want to listen to the trumpets of the solemn days, heard the terrible cries of the combatants? And regarding the fortified cities and high corner towers of Judea, which are destroyed to the ground, it is better, in my opinion, to judge with our own eyes than by hearing: we, who are currently in this region, can visually verify the truth of what is written. From the once great cities we now see barely noticeable traces of ruins. At Shiloh [Shilom], where the tabernacle and the Ark of the Covenant were, only the foundations of the altar are shown. Hawaii, the famous city of Saul, is destroyed to the ground (Judges 20:20). From Ramah and Bethhoron, and other famous cities built by Solomon, only remains are shown in small settlements. Let us read Joseph and the prophecy of Zephaniah, and we will find [or: we find] [in the latter] the history of the former. And this should say not only about the captivity, but even now the treacherous mercenaries, after beating the servants of God, and then even the Son of God, when they turned to sorrowful sobs, do not receive access to Jerusalem; and in order to have permission to mourn the ruins of their city, they pay a fee; so that those who once bought the blood of Christ are now buying their tears, so that even their crying will not be free for them. On the anniversary of the capture and destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans, you can see how the people come [there], extremely saddened, how elderly women and old men of many years flock, dressed in rags, clearly testifying to the wrath of God, both in their bodies and in their clothes. A crowd of unfortunate people gathers, and while the instrument of the Lord’s execution shines and spreads the rays of His resurrection, and from the Mount of Olives the sign of the cross flashes like lightning, the unfortunate people mourn the ruins of their church, and yet they do not arouse compassion: tears still flow down their cheeks, their hands are still covered with purple spots, and their hair is disheveled, and the soldier is already demanding payment to allow them to cry some more. And who, seeing this, doubts about the day of torment and oppression, about the day of desolation and disaster, about the day of darkness and darkness, about the day of fog and whirlwind, about the day of trumpets and the cry of war? Indeed, on the day of their sorrow they use trumpets, and, according to prophecy, the sounds of triumph turned into sobs. They weep over the ashes of the sanctuary, and over the destroyed altar, and over the cities once fortified, and over the high wings of the church, from which they once cast down Jacob, the brother of the Lord. This must be said regarding the captivity of the Jews. However, if, as above, we refer the day of the Lord to the end of the world, or in the death of every person, then the meaning will be obvious that the voice of the day of the Lord is bitter, full of inevitable disasters and anger, and that the mighty will be tormented then; because even the saints, although they will be saved, will be saved, as it were, through fire. That day is a day of torment and distress, desolation and disaster, on which they exclaim: “Woe to us, for we have become miserable.” Day of Darkness: “For he who does evil hates the light and does not come to the light” (John 3:20); and whoever hates the light will, of necessity, be followed by darkness. That day will be a day of fog and whirlwind, for the storm of the Lord will come upon it and the sound of a trumpet will be heard, which the Apostle points to in the words: “In the last trumpet” (1 Cor. 15:52); indeed, it will be a day of trumpet sounds and war cries against the fortified cities that they built for themselves together with Cain in the sins of many, and against the high corner towers, that is, the corrupt deeds that deviate (or: retreat) from the straight path of the Lord. Therefore, the hypocrites (υποκρὶται) Pharisees, who perform worship [or: pray] on the corners of the squares, are exposed by the Savior (Matthew 6:5). For the straight way that leads to heaven is narrow, and narrow is the way that leads to life. The path leading to death is crooked, has angles, tortuous, wide and spacious (Matthew 7:13). And at the same time, see mercy in the stern words of the Lord, precisely in the fact that this day is a day of bitterness and anger, torment, the sound of trumpets and war cries so that cities, poorly fortified and ruinous corners will be destroyed. Zeph.1:17–18. And I will afflict the people, and they will walk as blind, because they have sinned against the Lord, and their blood will be scattered as dust, and their flesh as dung. Neither their silver nor their gold can save them on the day of the wrath of the Lord, and the whole earth will be consumed by the fire of His jealousy, for He will bring about sudden destruction upon all the inhabitants of the earth. And I will oppress the people, and they will walk as blind, because they have sinned against the Lord, and their blood will be shed as dust, and their bodies as dung; but also their silver and gold [Vulg. adds: them ] will not be able to free them on the day of the wrath of the Lord, and in the fire of His jealousy the whole earth will be devoured: because with haste He will accomplish the destruction of all who inhabit the earth. LXX: And I will oppress the people, and they will walk as blind, because they have sinned against the Lord, and their blood will be shed like dust, and their bodies will be [scattered] like the dung of oxen [or: buffaloes]; and their silver and their gold will not be able to take them away in the day of the wrath of the Lord, and in the fire of His jealousy the whole earth will be destroyed, for He will quickly destroy all who inhabit the earth. According to the meaning indicated above, it is not difficult to assert that Jerusalem suffered all this, punished for the death of the Lord on the cross, for the appearances of the Lord ceased in it, and all the people throughout Judea were oppressed, and as a result of great oppression they walked like blind people, not knowing what to do. And they endured all this because they sinned against the Lord, that is, the Son of God. Since they shed the blood of the prophets and the blood of Christ, their blood was shed throughout the country like dust, and their bodies remained unburied, like droppings on the surface of the earth. Even their rich men, who collected gold and silver with great unrighteousness, could not free themselves from the day of the Lord’s wrath through their riches, for the fire of the Lord’s jealousy, which kindled against them, consumed their entire region. And the period of time was short, for only forty-two years after the Lord’s death on the cross, Jerusalem was surrounded by an army and the plunder of it, and not only it, but also all the inhabitants of Judea, began with speed. And at the end of both the world and each person, those who continued to remain people and died as people will be tormented. And they will walk like blind people, because they have lost the light of virtues, and will have no room for repentance. And they will endure all this because they have sinned against the Lord. Indeed, if the Lord [or: the Lord's] is righteousness, truth, holiness and other virtues, then everyone who has acted unjustly, lied or committed fornication and [other] vices has sinned before the Lord. But the following words: their blood will be shed like dust, and their bodies like the dung of bulls, seem incongruous if we assert that at the resurrection of the dead and at the end of the world, and during the judgment, blood will be shed, and their bodies will be thrown around like dung. The same applies to the words addressed to Noah: “And the blood of your souls I will require at the hand of all beasts, and at the hand of man, and at the hand of a brother. I will require the life of a man who sheds the blood of a man: his blood shall be shed for that blood” (Gen. 9:5-6) [it must be said] that it would be ridiculous to attribute them to the time of the resurrection, but it is not possible to apply them to real life. Indeed, how many people have shed blood, and yet their blood is not shed? And others killed a person by poison or by strangulation. And although the man died, his blood was not shed? How then will God shed the blood of such in vengeance when the murderer shed no blood? So, by the blood of a person we must understand the vital principle - τὸζωτιχὸν α ἶ τος - with which he feeds, holds on and lives; If anyone scatters it either through temptation or through false teaching, on the day of judgment he himself will be scattered, i.e. will be forced to lose what he considered to be the source of life. In accordance with the blood of this kind, one must understand that flesh about which Isaiah says: “All flesh is grass” (Is. 40:6), and the Lord in the book of Genesis: “My Spirit will not remain in people with them, for they are flesh” (Gen. 6:3); and the Apostle speaks of both together: “Flesh and blood cannot possess the kingdom of God, and corruption does not inherit the incorruption of God” [or without the word: God] (1 Cor. 15:50). So, on the day of the end, whether general or private, all shed blood will cry out to the Lord and come forward in the middle before everyone, and bloody and earthly deeds will be thrown away like dust and dung, and gold and silver will not be able to free the rich from the day of wrath, for the dying hears the words: “You fool, this night your soul will be taken away from you, and who will have what you have prepared” ( Luke 12:20)? This is not that we deny the salvation of the rich from death through gold and silver, “For the ransom of a man’s life is his riches” (Prov. 13:8), but that riches cannot be liberated when the rich are forced by necessity to leave them; for the earth and everything earthly will be destroyed by the zeal of God. And by jealousy, also understand a loving God, for if He did not love the human soul, He would never be jealous of it, and would not take revenge for the wife’s sin, like a husband who, if he does not love [his wife], is not angry for her adultery. And suddenly the Lord will do all this to all who inhabit the earth - to those who have almost given themselves over to the power of the earth, and were not strangers and strangers on it, like the righteous one who says: “I am a stranger on the earth and a stranger, like all my fathers” (Ps. 39:13), and again in another place, not wanting to live any longer in the hut of the body, with a tearful cry he declares this and the words: “Woe is me, for my wandering is continued” ( Ps.119:5). For we, who are in the refuge of this body, painfully mourn this: “Wretched man that I am, who will free me from this body of death” (Rom. 7:24)? Zeph.2:1. Examine yourselves carefully, search yourselves, unbridled people, before the decree comes - the day passes like chaff - before the fiery wrath of the Lord comes upon you, before the day of the wrath of the Lord comes upon you. Gather together, gather together, ye people unworthy of love, before the commandment [of the Lord] gives birth to a day that flies by like a cloud of dust, before the fiery wrath of the Lord comes upon you, before the wrath of indignation [Vulg.: day of wrath] of the Lord comes upon you. LXX: Gather together and unite closely, you unlearned people, before you become like a one-day flower, before the fiery wrath of the Lord comes upon you, before the day of the wrath of the Lord rushes upon you. After describing the disasters that will come on the day of the Lord - in accordance with the above interpretation of the prophecy in relation to the double captivity - the people are called to repentance, and they are told: Come together and gather together, or as it is written in LXX: be closely united, that is, be bound (as the Apostle says) by the bonds of love, you, a people unworthy of love, that is, a people unworthy of the love of God or: an unlearned people, - which is spoken of in Deuteronomy: “a foolish and foolish people” (Deut. 32:6) and in the book of Jeremiah: “I have struck your sons without profit; you have not received instruction” (Jer. 2:30) - before the prophecy is fulfilled, before the instruction is followed by action (for it will come as quickly as the lightly carried dust), before the wrath of God strikes you. At the same time, pay attention to God’s mercy: for the prudent it was enough to describe the rapid approach of the disasters that would come; in reality He does not want to impose punishment, but only wants to frighten those who have to suffer; Therefore, he himself calls for repentance, so as not to carry out the threats. In general, the entire community of believers and those who are called the people of God is called to gather in the Church, and it is said to them: Gather into the Church, unite with each other [or with us] in love and peace, you unlearned people, unwilling to accept the admonitions of God and have the knowledge of His commandments; and he who delights in wealth, the health of the body and the delights of this world, as well as the lust of the flesh, in that, like a flower, he withers in one day. And therefore I say to you: “Come together, unite! so that you will not want, when the day of judgment comes and all your glory has passed away, to bring repentance, when there will be no place for repentance, but only punishment.” Perhaps someone will ask: “How can this very thing be understood in relation to everyone departing from this life”? For this purpose, our speech addresses each individually: O you, busy with the affairs of this age, running around in different countries, turn to the Church of the saints, join the life and union of those who, as you see, are pleasing to God, and force the loose members of your soul, ununited with each other, to a single bond in wisdom, enclose yourself in its embrace and listen to the mysterious word: “Be comforted, weak hands, strengthened, weak knees” (Is. 35:3) and do not boast about the prosperity of the flesh and its flowering, which passes without a trace, For all flesh is grass, and all its glory is like a grass flower. The grass is dried up, and the flower is fallen: but the word of the Lord endures forever. If we ever see someone devoted [as some add] to the honors of this world, and busy collecting riches, but coming to the Church either very rarely, or never coming, then we can use the passage now explained according to the given case and say to such a person: “Gather yourself together, join yourself to the people of God, you who do not listen to the commandments of the Lord, before your glory passes by, and before the day of the fiery wrath of the Lord comes on you.” Zeph.2:3–4. Seek the Lord, all you humble of the earth, who keep His laws; seek truth, seek humility; perhaps you will be hidden in the day of the wrath of the Lord. For Gaza will be abandoned and Ascalon will be desolate, Azoth will be driven out in the middle of the day and Ekron will be uprooted. Seek the Lord, all you meek of the earth, who have executed His judgment; seek the righteous, seek the meek: perhaps in some way you will be hidden in the day of the fiery wrath of the Lord. For Gaza will be destroyed, and Ascalon will turn into a desert; They will leave Azot at noon, and Ekron will be razed to the ground. LXX: Seek the Lord, all you humble of the earth, do justice and seek righteousness, and be in agreement with it, so that you may be hidden in the day of the wrath of the Lord, for Gaza will be plundered, and Ascalon will be turned into a desert, and Azoth will be abandoned at noon, and Ekron will be razed to the ground. The humble person of the earth is not the one who is humbled by humility - one of the virtues - but the one who is humbled by sins and therefore can no longer say with Christ: “Learn from Me, for I am meek and lowly in heart” (Matthew 11:29); for everyone who humbles himself will be exalted. And in another place the speech turns to the saint: “The greater you become, the more you humble yourself, and you will find grace before God” (Sir.3:18). And the one who is humbled by sins and burdened with the consciousness of crimes, and says: “Like a heavy burden, they are heavy on me” (Ps.37:5), he should hear: “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest” ( Matthew 11:28). – We said this at the beginning according to the text of LXX. But according to the Hebrew text the meaning is different. Indeed, the holy people are told this: you who have kept My commandments, who are on earth and know that everyone who humbles himself will be exalted, you have imitated My meekness, you have done righteousness, seek the Lord in your meekness. And if you want to know who the Lord is, then seek the righteous, seek the meek, “For the Father has given all judgment to the Son” (John 5:22), who will judge righteously. And since you are meek, seek the meek, so that whatever is insufficient in your meekness may be replenished by Him who is the source of meekness. And this is what I say to you: “Perhaps you will somehow escape on the day of the fiery wrath of God,” that is, perhaps by chance, because you have sought the Lord and done His righteousness, you will be able to escape the wrath on the approaching day, and to avoid the captivity that will befall the people of Judah either from Nebuchadnezzar or from the Romans. If he doubts or doubts] even about those who did His righteousness, saying: Perhaps you will somehow hide in the day of the fiery wrath of the Lord, then what will happen to sinners? Indeed, the devastation of the land of Judah will be so great, and such a major victorious Babylonian army will achieve that the same captivity will befall the most powerful cities of the Philistines, which have always been your dangerous opponents in battles. Gaza will be destroyed, Ascalon will be turned into a desert, and Azoth will be taken into captivity not by stealth, but after a struggle, i.e. e after a victory in clear (daylight) light; and Ekron, which means uprooting, will suffer what its name means, that is, it will be razed to the ground. – This is according to the literal meaning and Jewish truth. And according to the Seventy Humbles of the earth, of whom it was said above, it is commanded that they should exercise judgment and seek righteousness, which, in my opinion, is none other than Christ. And since everyone who seeks will find (Matthew 7:8), then let them, for their part, pass on to others what they have found, that is, let them teach others: “For what profit is hidden wisdom and treasure that cannot be seen” (Sir.20:30). And I command you this so that you will be covered on the day of the wrath of the Lord, that is, at the end of the world, or at the departure of each of you from this life, for Gaza, and Ascalon, and Azoth, and Ekron will suffer various punishments. Indeed, Gaza means: my fortress. Consequently, those who are magnified by bodily strength, or worldly power, and together with the devil say: “I will do it with might,” will be destroyed and reduced to nothingness on the day of the Lord’s wrath. Ascalon, which means: weighed, or: murderous fire, - when the day of the Lord’s wrath comes, he will feel the extent of his crime and will be oppressed by the weight that he produced. And since he ardently sought to shed blood, and seduced many souls, and since the word was fulfilled on him: “The Lord abhors a bloodthirsty and cunning man” (Ps. 5:7), then he will not be destroyed, like Gaza, but will be turned into a desert, and burned to dust by the fire of Gehenna. Also Azoth, in Hebrew called esdod (אשדוד), and in our language: the fire of birth will be devastated in full light, for it burned with lust) and raged in the heat of procreation. And since all adulterers have hearts like a fiery furnace (Hos. 7:4), and they are, as it were, wounded by flaming arrows, then not in darkness, not by secret judgment, but at noon, when all the saints receive full radiance, they will be thrown into darkness and will not have the lot of saints. And Ekron, meaning: barrenness or: uprooting, will also be uprooted, because he did not have any fruits and with his perverse teaching he ultimately destroyed very many. Understand all these different shades also in relation to the vices and sins of souls and in the meaning that the fire will test the quality of each person’s work on the day of judgment (1 Cor. 3:13). Zeph.2:5–7. Woe to the inhabitants of the seaside country, the people of Crete! The word of the Lord is upon you, O Canaanites, land of the Philistines! I will destroy you, and you will have no inhabitants, and the coastal country will be a shepherd's fold and a fold for cattle. And this region will be given to the remnants of the house of Judah, and they will feed there, and in the houses of Ascalon they will rest in the evening, for the Lord their God will visit them and restore their captivity. Woe to you, inhabitants of the seashore, a perishing people! The word of the Lord is upon you, O Canaanites, land of the Philistines: And I will scatter you so that there will be no inhabitant [in you]. And the seashore will be a resting place for shepherds and a pen for livestock; and the shore of the sea will belong to the one who survives from the house of Judah. ​​There they will graze, and in the houses of Ascalon they will rest in the evening: for the Lord their God will visit them and turn away captivity from them. LXX: Woe to you, inhabitants of the seashore, Cretan aliens! The word of the Lord is upon you, Canaanites, land of foreigners! And I will destroy you in your home. And Crete will be a pasture for flocks and a fold for sheep, and the shore of the sea will be the property of those who remain from the house of Judah. Above themselves they will feed in the houses of Ascalon: in the afternoon they will turn away from the presence of the sons of Judah, because the Lord will visit them and turn away their captivity. In the historical sense, it is not difficult to understand the meaning, because in the above words he said: Gaza will be destroyed, and Ascalon will be turned into a desert, Azoth will be abandoned at noon and Ekron will be razed to the ground. By the name of the four great cities of Palestine, the word of the Lord generally addresses the region itself and predicts it as follows: “Woe to you inhabitants of the coastal country during the Babylonian invasion, for those who live near the sea will either perish or be taken [into captivity].” But no one doubts that the land of Palestine is Canaan; and I will scatter you, He says, so that not one inhabitant will remain; and you, who once rejoiced at the defeat of Judea, will reach such a degree of devastation that all your strongest cities will turn into folds of shepherds. And after the Lord visits His people and commands them to return under the leadership of Zerubbabel and Joshua, and they build the church and rebuild Jerusalem again, you will be so uncultivated, and so covered with thorns and nettles, that the shepherds from the remnant of the Jews will rest in the afternoon at Ascalon and will bring their flocks to rest in the once famous city. And this will be because the Lord will visit His people and turn away their captivity. Whether this has happened or not yet, God knows. Moreover, we now did not propose to present the historical truth, but only to report what we received from the Jews. – And according to the spiritual meaning and the LXX translation, understanding is difficult, and especially because they do not agree [with us] in the translation. In fact, where we translated the pernicious people, they used the expression: aliens of Crete, - namely: in the Hebrew words goi choretim (גףכרתי) instead of goi, i.e. people, tribe, they read gar, i.e. alien, and in the word choretim, which means: pernicious, they saw the name of the island of Crete. Finally, both Aquila and the Fifth Edition translated: ἔθνος ὀλεθριον - pernicious tribe, and Theodotion: ἔθνος ὀλεθρίας - pernicious tribe, also Symmachus: ἔθνος ὀλεθρευόμενον - a destroying tribe - they do all this [according to] our translation. Then, where we used the words: And the seashore will be a resting place for shepherds, and all interpreters are in agreement with this translation, the LXX writes: And Crete will be a pasture for flocks and a fold for sheep. So, comparing the spiritual with the spiritual and following the path of translation of the Vulgate [people's edition] that we have already begun, we ask: have we not read somewhere else in St. Scripture name of Crete? And, unless I’m being deceived, the following goes to the point: “The Cretans are always lying, evil beasts, lazy in their bellies: this testimony is true” (Titus 1:12-13). Those people who waver and are carried away by every wind of teaching in the deception of people, in the resourcefulness of errors, chose to be aliens of the Cretans, who from here and there are deafened by various waves of pestilence, sound like the brass of the Corybantes and, in the words of the Apostle, “like a clanking cymbal” (1 Cor. 13:1), - [chose to be aliens of the Cretans] when they should have lived in the land of confession, that is, in the land of Judea; and since they are aliens from the Cretans, the word of God, that is, the threat, addresses them; and they are called the land of Canaan, [which is] in constant flow and continuous movement, and the land of foreigners, for they, alienated from the Lord, are on the seashore, in the country of Crete. So, the word of God addresses them, either at the end of the world, or daily through people belonging to the Church, who, together with the Apostle, can say: “Are you seeking to test Christ who speaks in me” (2 Cor. 13:3), [with the threat] that they will be thrown out of Crete and expelled from their former dwellings; and that country, which previously contained a destructive flock, will be the sheepfold of Christ, and Judas, i.e. the true confession will dwell by the shore of the sea. And when the world begins to bow down in the evening, and of the many who are called, the chosen few, who are now called the remnants of Judah, will feed those who formerly fed in the midst of the sea, that is, in Crete, and in lies; then they will find rest for themselves in the houses of Ascalon, that is, where the fire of the devil previously spread and the blood of the slain [spread]; Indeed, the word Askalon means murderous fire. And this will be because the Lord will visit his people, and those who were previously easily caught by the cunning proofs of heretics, [now], as if returning from captivity, will defeat their opponents and will live in their tents. And the words of the text LXX: On behalf of the sons of Judah, we have marked with a special symbol, because these words are not in the Hebrew text, and are not included [in the text] by any of the translators, moreover, they confuse the connection and meaning of the passage; this is not because it will be difficult to find in any way a suitable meaning for this insertion, but because we have already decided to follow the truth of interpretation and the judgment of a more educated than a common reader. Zeph.2:8–11. I heard the reproach of Moab and the curses of the children of Ammon, how they mocked My people and boasted in their borders. Therefore, I live! says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Moab will be like Sodom, and the children of Ammon will be like Gomorrah, a land of nettles, a salt pit, a wilderness forever; the remnant of my people will take them as a spoil, and the survivors of my people will receive them as an inheritance. This is to them for their arrogance, for the fact that they mocked and magnified themselves over the people of the Lord of hosts. The Lord will be terrible for them, for he will destroy all the gods of the earth, and all the islands of nations will worship Him, each from his own place. I have heard the reproaches of Moab and the curses of the children of Ammon, with which they mocked my people and arrogantly boasted about the borders of their [land]. Therefore I live! The Lord God says: [Vulg. without: God] of armies, God of Israel: For Moab shall be as Sodom, and the children of Ammon as Gomorrah, [as] withered thorns, heaps of salt, and a wilderness forever; the remnant of my people will steal them, and the survivors of my tribe will possess them. This will be done to them for their arrogance, for they slandered and boasted majestically over the people of the Lord of hosts. And the Lord will be terrible over them: and He will turn into nothing all the gods of the earth, and men [or: man] from their place will worship Him, all the islands of the heathen nations. LXX: I have heard the reproach of Moab and the dishonor of the children of Ammon, with which they mocked My people and boasted majestically over My borders. Therefore as I live, says the Lord [or: the Lord God] of hosts, the God of Israel: for Moab will be like Sodom, and the children of Ammon like Gomorrah, and Damascus will be abandoned like a haystack on a threshing floor and laid waste forever, and those who are left of My people will plunder them, and those who are left of My tribe will take possession of them. This will be their reproach, for they cursed and boasted majestically before the Lord Almighty; and the Lord will appear over them and destroy all the gods of the nations of the earth, and all the islands of the heathen nations will worship Him, every one from his place. Like [other prophets], - with the exception of Daniel, who more often than [others] had visions of four kingdoms, and outlined their various features under one or another image (Dan. 8), - [namely:] Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel do so that after the vision of Judah they turn their prophetic word against other nations that are around Judah, and proclaim to them what will happen to them according to their special qualities ( ἱδι ώ ματα) of each of them, and pause more or less long to describe them; so the prophet Zephaniah now follows the same order, albeit briefly. Indeed, after the Philistines, against whom a terrible word was spoken before others, Gaza, he says, will be destroyed, Ascalon will be turned into a desert, Azoth will be abandoned at noon, and Ekron will be razed to the ground. And now a prophecy is revealed against Moab and the sons of Ammon, or, as added in LXX, against Damascus, which in Isaiah (Is. 17) is called Aram, [this] because, helping Nebuchadnezzar, they devastated Judah, trampled down its sanctuary and destroyed the church and, putting a yoke on the people of Israel, slandered the Lord. For Nebuchadnezzar and the Chaldeans, after the destruction of the cities of Judah, oppressed the rest of the tribes, and it so happened that those who attacked the people of God themselves also bore the brunt of the same disasters, and Judas, whom they themselves expected to have among their subjects, had a fellow slave. So, even in the kingdom of Josiah, before the captivity comes, and before Jerusalem and the church are destroyed, the prophecy turns against the attackers [on the people of God], so that the disasters of the people of God that are once coming will be alleviated by the disaster [or: disasters] of the rest of the nations. I heard, he says, the reproaches of Moab, which is now called Areopolis, and the curses of the sons of Ammon, which is also a city of Arabia, called Philadelphia and is the second city after Bostra, - [reproaches and curses] with which they dishonored My people and, pushing back the Jews, spread their borders in their land. Therefore, since they have reviled Me and dishonored My people, I, the Lord of hosts, who am able to carry out His threat, and the God of Israel, who in the person of His people Himself suffers injury, will cause Moab to be like Sodom, and the children of Ammon like Gomorrah. We will read similar visions in Isaiah and Jeremiah, and there we will also discover what we are now reading here. [They will be like] dried thorns, like piles of salt and a desert forever, instead of which LXX was transferred - I don’t know for what purpose - Damascus, completely destroyed and abandoned; If I am not mistaken, they were misled by the double meaning of the word, for the word dryness in Hebrew mamasac (םםשק) by changing the first letter mem into dalet has the remaining letters the same, as does the word damasec, meaning Damascus. But the question is, how are these cities, that is, Moab and the sons of Ammon, brought to the state of Sodom and Gomorrah, and how will they never be restored again, [remaining] heaps of dried thorns and blocks of salt? That they were really devastated, like Sodom and Gomorrah, is not at all difficult to show. But the following then tin: We will be abandoned forever or we will interpret it in the sense of the final end of their power (since after subjugating the Chaldeans they lost their kingdom, and then were under the rule of the Antiochians, then the Ptolemies and finally submitted to the yoke of the Roman Empire), or we must accept it as an exaggerated saying ( ὐπερβολικῶς), because the word lolam (לצולם) means both eternity and century, which is why it can be understood in the meaning of a century, and in the meaning of some time, and in the meaning of a generation. “And those who remain from the people of Israel will devastate them and take possession of the revilers [people] who once helped the Chaldeans. This will be for them because of their arrogance, for they spoke evil and boasted majestically before the people of the Lord of hosts, who, the Lord of hosts, will be terrible for them, but His wrath will not destroy the arrogant, will not shed the blood of the blasphemous, but will only crush and turn into nothing all their idols, so that those who were in error and did not feel the benefits of God, forced by the weight of disasters, would know that the idols did not help at all, and they worshiped God, each from his place, all the islands of the pagan peoples. – Up to this point according to the Hebrew text. Let us now turn to the LXX interpreters and encourage the Jews, who follow only history, to explain to us: when did Moab and the sons of Ammon become like Sodom and Gomorrah, like heaps of salt, and turned into a desert forever? They should show us sulfur rains, and the land with vineyards turned into smoking ashes, and, moreover, the sea that once came out of salt springs, covering everything and now called the Dead Sea. [Then] when did the Jews sack these [cities], and when did the survivors of the Israelite tribes take possession of them? Or what must be the indignation of the Lord in order to destroy and destroy them for reproach and dishonor? Not only Moab and Ammon, but also the whole world, so that every one from his own place all the islands of the heathen nations would worship him? He rather shows favor to those who detract, so that they turn from error to salvation. Therefore, if they say that after their return from Babylon these tribes were subject to the people of Israel, then we will first require [from them] solid proof from the Scriptures that this was so; and then, since they can prove very little, we will make them a concession at an early stage; we will say: “Let it happen as you say. But what kind of truth is it for God to repay distant descendants [for sin], when grandfathers were detractors and great-grandfathers were scolders? Because the idea, previously expressed in the Law, that “I have punished the sins of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation” (Exodus 20:5) is eliminated by Ezekiel: “As I live, says the Lord, this parable will no longer be spoken... but the soul that sinned will die” (Ezekiel 18:3–4). At the same time, note that what has been said is called a parable and does not have the meaning that the writings give from the outside. Therefore, if it is unfair to repay children for the crimes of their ancestors, how much more unfair it is to expect that this will happen at the end of the world, when it is not Christ who is coming, as the Jews think, but the Antichrist. Indeed, as soon as they are constrained by the boundaries of history, in order to assert that what has been said has already been fulfilled, they immediately run to the future times of Christ, and everything that they cannot explain, they promise themselves many centuries later and say that at that time Moab, and the sons of Ammon, and Egypt, and the Philistines, and Edomite, who are now attacking the Jews, must be punished. So let us ask them why God punishes mainly these nations, and not the whole world, throughout which the Jews have long been scattered everywhere. And indeed, if Moab, who attacks the Jews, deserves punishment, like the sons of Ammon and the rest of the tribes living around [them], then why is Gaul not punished? Why doesn’t he include Britain in the threats? Why do Spain remain a stranger to punishment? For what reason is nothing said about Italy? Why is Africa silent? Generally speaking, why did only the nations around the Jews allow so much dishonesty that they are the only ones who are primarily named, although the whole world holds the Jews as captives? This is the explanation against the Jews and against [their] general interpretation of all prophecies in which any prediction regarding pagan peoples is found. Now from the very order of speech of St. We will prove from the Scriptures that Damascus, as we said earlier, is not named either in the Hebrew text or in any other interpreter. In fact, to the words: I heard the reproach of Moab and the curses of the sons of Ammon added in conclusion: For Moab will be like Sodom, and the sons of Ammon like Gomorrah. In the same way, and the words: And Damascus will be abandoned, like a haystack on a threshing floor, he had to preface something; and just as about the two nations whose sins he listed before, he said: Moab will be like Sodom, and the sons of Ammon will be like Gomorrah, so he should have described either the reproaches or the curses of Damascus, so that the punishment sent [to him] would be deserved. And in the last words: Like a haystack on a threshing floor, which in Greek is expressed by the words: ὠ ςθημωνία ἁ λός; – LXX was translated, as we think, by the word: ἁ λός, i.e. salt; but inexperienced people assumed in the word θημωνία a pile of bread or fruit, instead of ἁ λός; [salt] in accordance with the concept of fruits, we added two letters ω and ν and used ἃ λωνος, i.e. threshing floor. Let this be said about the discrepancy and error in translation and about the difficulty regarding the historical meaning of [the passage]. - But the learned man, who compares the spiritual with the spiritual, who seeks not what is below, but what is on high, who rises from the dead with Christ, and after putting off the old man puts on the new, will attribute the reproach [or: reproach] of Moab and the blasphemy [or: dishonor] of the sons of Ammon to the preachers of doctrines contrary to the church, who themselves seem to be from the race of Abraham, who escaped the fire Sodom and Gomorrah and live in Little Zoar. But since they occur in darkness and cannot contemplate the light of truth (for they have deviated from God the Father, which can be seen from the names Lot and Moab) and have ceased to be the sons of God (which is expressed in the name My People) and were conceived in a dark cave, they arose from incest; then to this day, attacking the humble sons of Judah, they want to increase their possessions to the detriment of its borders, against which it is said in Proverbs: “Do not endure the everlasting borders that your fathers appointed” (Prov. 22:28) Look at the heretics, boasting of thoroughness, eloquence and all the intricacies in the teaching, how they despise the simplicity of the [language] of the church, arrogantly look at it as unworthy of their mysteries, which they have invented for themselves as idols, and consider him to be nothing; and you will not ask: what is this reproach of Moab and the dishonor of the sons of Ammon with which they mocked the people of God? So the Lord swore by Himself, saying: As I live, says the Lord, there is no doubt that to distinguish [Himself] from the dead gods called idols, the God of Israel, i.e. [God] of the people who see, calls Himself the living God, - [swore] that these blasphemers of the nations, i.e. Moab and the sons of Ammon, - about whom we said above: how Sodom and Gomorrah will be - although they think of themselves as having left Sodom and Gomorrah, because they are not pagans, but since they blaspheme the people of God, act against Israel, they will be equated with Sodom and Gomorrah will be destroyed just as these cities were once destroyed, so that they will not have the slightest signs of [former] prosperity [or: strength] and life. It is not surprising if we understand this about heretics - [precisely that] they will be punished in the same way as Sodom and Gomorrah, when even to men belonging to the church who did not keep the commandments of God and departed from His commandments, it is said through Isaiah: “Hear the word of the Lord, you princes of Sodom, and pay attention to the law of the Lord, you people of Gomorrah” (Is. 1:10); and to the elders [elders] who want to corrupt the purity of the church in the image of Susanna, let Daniel say: “This is the judgment of God: the tribe of Canaan, and not of Judah” (Dan. 13:56). But so that you know that no matter how many times Sodom, Gomorrah and Egypt are called, it is not about these countries that we see with our eyes, but about other spiritual ones that are threatened by the prophetic word, read in the Revelation of John: “The place where the Lord was nailed to the cross is spiritually called Sodom and Egypt” (Rev. 11:8). Therefore, if [even] Jerusalem is spiritually called Sodom and Egypt, then, on the contrary, why will not Egypt, Sodom and Gomorrah, if they did the works of Jerusalem and the land of Judah, become the land of the Lord's lot? Finally, David was not one of the priests, and it was not allowed for him to eat the showbread, but since he exalted himself in each of his deeds, and the persecution of Saul served to excel him in virtues, then during his flight, during his uncertainty, he suddenly becomes the leader and receives the showbread, but does not violate [this] the commandments of God (1 Samuel 21:1-6). We said all this because Moab will be like Sodom, and the sons of Ammon like Gomorrah. Likewise, Damascus, whose name means: he who drinks blood or the blood of the sack, will be left by the mercy of God, like a pile of salt. Indeed, since its prince is the king of Aref, and the inhabitants of Damascus wanted to kill Paul, so that he was lowered over the wall in a basket (Acts 9:25; 2 Cor. 11:32), then Damascus is not said: You are the salt of the world, and it is not called the salt that is always offered in sacrifices, but that which has lost its strength, and about which it is written in the Gospel: If the salt loses its strength, then what will you make it salty? It is no longer suitable for anything: neither on the ground, nor as a place for discarding all kinds of impurities; but they throw her out so that she can be trampled underfoot by people (Matthew 5:13). So, Moab and Ammon and Damascus, who rebelled against the knowledge of God, blasphemed the people of God, inflicted many dishonors on them and wanted to expand their borders on the land of the Church, and take possession of the people of God, will be abandoned and destroyed [or: deposed], and those who remain from the people of God, i.e. the men of the church, taught by the Scriptures of the Lord, will plunder them, and the survivors of the tribe of the Lord will take possession of them, and this will be [them] for reproach, since [or: which] they cursed and boasted majestically before the Lord Almighty. Pay attention to the meekness, look at the mercy of the Lord: He suffers dishonor, is subjected to blasphemy, His borders are plundered; and what does He do? He sends to His people those whom we mentioned above, so that [the people] divide the blasphemers among themselves and turn them into their own property. For it is much better for a fool to be in bondage to a wise man, to have his folly corrected by the wisdom of the Lord, than to be left to his own folly. So, the Lord Almighty, Whom they now do not know at all, will come and appear over them and will scatter their teachings, that is, their gods and idols of various nations, so that after the overthrow of the idols that the peoples created for themselves with the power of their imagination, they themselves will turn to the Lord, and so that everyone from his own place will worship the Lord, Whom he did not know before. Zeph.2:12–15. And you Ethiopians will be slain by My sword. And He will stretch out His hand to the north, and destroy Asshur, and turn Nineveh into ruins, into a dry place like a desert, and flocks and all kinds of animals will rest in its midst; the pelican and the hedgehog will spend the night in her carved decorations; their voice will be heard in the windows, destruction will be revealed on the doorposts, for the cedar paneling will no longer be on them. This is what a triumphant city will be, living carelessly, saying in its heart: “I, and there is no other besides me.” How it became a ruin, a den for animals! Everyone passing by him will whistle and wave his hand. But you also, O Ethiopians, will be beaten with My sword: and He will stretch out His hand to the north and destroy Assyrian, and turn beautiful [Nineveh] into a place uninhabited, impenetrable, as if deserted. In the midst of her the herds will rest: all the wild beasts of the nations, and the bittern [heron], and the hedgehog will huddle in her houses: the voice of a singer will [sound] in the window, the raven will [nest] on the doorpost [of the gate], for I will destroy all her strength. Here is this proud city, living arrogantly, saying in its heart: “I am, and there is no other [city] besides me.” How did it become the desolate lair of a wild beast? Everyone who passes [or: will pass] along it will whistle and wave his hand. LXX: And you, Ethiopians, will be wounded by My sword: and I will stretch out My hand to the North, and I will destroy Assyria, and I will turn Nineveh into a place uninhabited and waterless, as if deserted, and flocks will graze in its midst, and all the wild animals of the earth, and chameleons, and hedgehogs will nest in its chambers, and wild animals will scream in their ravines [or: her ], and ravens on her gates, for the cedar is her pride. This is a city given over to evil, living in hope [in itself], saying in its heart: “I am, and after me there is no more.” How did he turn into an uninhabited place, a pasture for wild animals? Everyone who walks along it will whistle and wave his hands. This entire passage and the two above - against the Philistines and against Moab and the sons of Ammon - the Jews attribute to the new coming of Christ, who, according to them, will come at the end of the world to rebuild Jerusalem and free His people from the hand of the nations that controls them. This is what the words seem to mean: And men from their place, all the islands of the pagan nations, will worship Him. But at that time, not only the above-mentioned peoples, but also the Ethiopians, and the Assyrians, and even Nineveh, the city of the Assyrians, was turned into an uninhabited place, and all the wild beasts of the earth, or, as it is written in the Hebrew text, all the wild beasts of the nations, which in their opinion matters in relation to all the tribes that had to take part in the overthrow of Nineveh, will have a resting place in it. And since in this passage [the word] ninive is translated [by the word]: beautiful, then they attribute the word beautiful to Babylon, and everything that follows: The bittern and the hedgehog will huddle in her houses, and so on. [in their opinion] is more suitable for Babylon, about the devastation of which the same thing is predicted in the book of Isaiah. Others, on the contrary, argue that [here] it is clearly spoken of the kingdom of Assyria, which has already been said before: And he will stretch out his hand to the North and destroy Asshur and turn Nineveh into an uninhabited place. Meaning [or: after] the Assyrians, it is more natural to refer the meaning to Nineveh than to Babylon, the city of the Chaldeans. And his words: “The bittern and the hedgehog in the gate, and the raven on the doorposts” testify [or: show] that there are no inhabitants; and there are two kinds of bitterns [herons], some aquatic, others living in desert places. In the words: The voice of the singer [or songs] in the window must be understood as either demons or the voices of various birds that usually live in devastated cities. In addition, what we and the LXX translate in the same words: Raven on the doorpost, in Hebrew is expressed by the word hareb (תרב), which, according to the difference in reading (ערכ), is understood either in the meaning: drought, or: sword, or: raven. Therefore Aquilla translated: sword, and others: drought. - After the destruction of Nineveh, the prophet’s speech, as if addressing its ruins, concludes as follows: Here is this proud city, living self-reliantly and saying in its heart: “I am, and there is no other besides me.” How did it become the desolate lair of a wild beast? Everyone who passes [or: will pass] along it will whistle and wave his hand. In accordance with what we said above, in a deserted city either really [or: real] wild animals will live, or maybe under the image of wild animals the diversity of many peoples is indicated. Therefore, if anyone asks how, in a historical sense, this prophecy relates to the times of Nebuchadnezzar, when it names the Ethiopians and Egyptians, to whom the Medes and Persians did nothing, let him read history and see that the Assyrians, like the Ethiopians, were conquered by the Medes, [he will see] the kingdom of Cambyses, and the power of Cyrus and everything that followed topics This should be said according to the Jewish interpretation. - However, if we pay attention to the fact that in all the Scriptures, Ethiopians are called those who are almost mired in vices, - according to what we read in Jeremiah: “If an Ethiopian changes his skin” (Jer. 13:23), then we can hope that after the Ethiopians turn to the better, none of them will be deprived of salvation if they wish to repent. Therefore, the defiled soul, stained with the filth of vices, first [of all] says, “I am black” (Song. 1:4); and then at the end of the Song of Songs about her, already cleansed and washed by repentance, it is written: “Who is she who rises up white” (Song.8:5); also Moses, that is, the spiritual Law of the Lord, took an Ethiopian wife from the pagans (Ex. 2:21), and [although] Mary, that is, the synagogue of Judea, and Aaron, that is, the carnal priesthood, and not the priesthood according to the order of Melchizedek, murmur against the Law, but in vain. For the synagogue is immediately covered with leprosy, and, being thrown out of the camp, returns to it when the time is fulfilled, and through the prayer of Moses; for the hand of Ethiopia has already warned God (Ps. 67:32). So, the word of God now threatens those who, clinging to sins and forgotten in the mud of vices, do not want to turn to the better and wash away the dark stain. And they are threatened by a sword, which, in my opinion, is written about in the book of Genesis: “He placed Cherubim and a flaming sword that turns to guard the way to the tree of life” (Gen. 3:24) and in the prophet Isaiah (according to the text of LXX): “He will bring a great and holy sword against the dragon, the writhing serpent, and will kill him on that day” (Is. 27:1). And he says that they must either be struck or wounded with the sword, so that, for fear of punishment, they can follow the example of Nineveh and repent (John 3:5-10) and not fall under what God threatens. The same idea is contained in the prophecy of Jeremiah. “I will speak,” he says, “about the people and the kingdom, and I will destroy and scatter them; and if they repent, then I will repent of all the disasters that I promised to bring on them” (Jer. 18:7-8). And so that you know why the Lord threatens the Ethiopians with the sword to convert them to the better, he points out a little lower about the Ethiopians in this same book “Because of the rivers of Ethiopia, from where are My worshipers, the sons of My scattered ones. They will bring Me gifts” (Zeph. 3:10) or, as it is in the LXX, “from the borders of the rivers of Ethiopia I will receive My scattered ones and they will offer sacrifices to Me. - After this, it is no longer the Lord who speaks, as above, but the prophetic spirit about him: And he will stretch out his hand to the north and destroy Assyria, - [stretch] to the north, about which Jeremiah wrote: “From the north will disasters flare up on all the inhabitants of the earth” (Jer. 1:14), about which Solomon mentions: “The north wind is strong: by name it is called” [the wind] “of the right side” (Prov. 25:23). The Lord will stretch out His hand, inflicting punishment so that both the North will feel the punishment and those living on its land, to which, according to Zechariah, the black horses are sent; it is said about them: “There were” [or: “In which there were”] “black horses, they went to the North Country” (Zech. 6:6). And, indeed, whoever lifts his feet and retreats from the East, about whom the same prophet says: “Behold, the Man, His name is East” (Zech. 6:12), and retreats to the West, he immediately rushes to the North, which is not really on the right side, but is only called by the name “right.” This, after all, is understandable even in a sensual meaning - namely: whoever stands in the East and turns his face to the West will have the north on his right side; right [i.e. e. favorable] those who have been refreshed by its breath call it; he is favorable only in name; on the contrary, in his affairs he is rather on the left side [i.e. e. unfavorable]. – After turning His hand against the North, the Lord will also destroy Assyria, which by name means εὑθύνων, that is, according to many, a ruler, but this is not true, εὑθύνων means one who exposes and convinces [or conqueror]. And since the devil is [at the same time] both an enemy and an avenger, he himself induces sins, and then he himself exposes sinners, that is why he is called εὑθύνων. In my opinion, this is the ruler of Assyria, living in the North, having Niveveh as his capital and speaking in the book of Isaiah, according to the text of LXX: “I will act by force, and by the wisdom of understanding I will destroy the borders of nations and will rule over their forces” (Is. 10:13). - All the following, said about the devastated Nineveh: And there will be flocks in it and all the wild animals of the earth, and chameleons, and hedgehogs will nest in its chambers, and wild animals will rest in its gates, and ravens in its windows, etc., should be understood, in my opinion, in accordance with what is written in Jonah or Nahum. In the book of interpretations on Jonah under Nineveh, that is, the beautiful one, which, as a result of the preaching of Jonah, that is, the dove, turned to repentance, we understood the Church gathered from pagan peoples. In the book of interpretations on Nahum, we retained understanding in relation to the world. And indeed, in relation to the world, it is not difficult to interpret and say that when the Ethiopians are struck by the sword of the Lord, and He stretches out His hand to the North and destroys the Assyrian ruler of the world, then the world itself will perish and turn into a complete desert, and it will no longer arouse compassion in anyone, but everyone will hang over its ruins and wave their hands. - And to assert regarding the church that it will be impenetrable, deserted, that wild animals will live in it, at first glance seems like blasphemy, as well as what will later be said regarding it with reproach: This is a city given over to evil, living arrogantly, and saying in its heart: I am and there is no more besides me. How did it turn into a desert, a pasture for wild animals? But whoever will carefully consider the Apostolic saying, which says: “In the very last days the most evil times will come, and people will be selfish, stingy, proud, arrogant, slanderous, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, evildoers, without a heart for others, unpeaceable, informers, intemperate, cruel, haters of good, traitors, impudent, haughty, loving pleasure more than God: having the appearance of godliness, but denying the power thereof” (2 Tim. 3:1-5), just as it is written in the Gospel that as unrighteousness increases, the love of many will grow cold, so that at that time [the word of Christ] will be fulfilled. But do you think that “he who is to come, the Son of man, will find faith on earth?” (Matthew 24:12; Luke 18:8), - he will not be amazed at the extreme devastation of the Church [and the fact that] it will be turned into the desert, given over to wild beasts and will endure everything now described by the prophet. Indeed, if God, for deception, did not spare the natural branches [of the fig tree], but crushed them, and [if] He turned the rivers into a desert, and the springs of water into thirst, and the fruitful land into a salt desert, for the wickedness of its inhabitants; then why, on the contrary, will it not change and lead to the original thirst of those about whom it is said: He turned the desert into collections of waters and the waterless land into springs of water and commanded to live there those who feel hunger, etc., and whom He grafted from the wild olive into the good olive - when they, forgetting about the good deeds, retreat from their Creator and worship the Assyrian. – Although this can generally be understood in relation to the coming of the Antichrist, or to the end of the world, it can also be applied daily to those who pretend to show that they belong to the Church, but deny this by their deeds and are not executors of the law, but [only] listeners of it; which in vain are extolled because they are beautiful, since flocks live in them, i.e. many vices and gross animals that serve the body, and all the beasts of the earth that devour their hearts, and chameleons that do not have a constant color, but change it every moment due to various sins, now stinginess, now luxury, now cruelty, now carnal lust, now despondency, now violent joy. And hedgehogs [nest] in their chambers - a prickly animal, having many thorns and wounding whoever it touches. But wild animals will also lie in their ravines, that is, in their hearts, and unclean birds, ravens, in their gates, that is, in their mouths or ears, with which they either speak or listen to evil. After this, it is said that the church has to endure or has already endured this because it fell into arrogance and, like a cedar, raised its head, abandoning itself to evil; but still expecting future bliss for herself, despising everyone in her heart and with the thought that there is no one else besides her, saying: I am, and there is no one else but me, how did she turn into the desert, into a pasture for wild animals? In fact, where the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit previously lived, and the angels stood in service, then wild animals will live, about which the prophet says with tears: “Do not deliver to the beasts the soul that confesses to You” (Ps. 73:19). Anyone who passes along it will whistle and wave his hands. If we understand this as what was said about angels, then we will interpret it this way: when the angels pass over it, they will not remain in it as they usually did before: they will be completely amazed and will not support it, will not strengthen the falling one with their hand, but will raise their hands and pass by; or, perhaps, they will raise their hands whistling and clasp them, as if crying in grief for the deceased. If we wish to understand this in relation to the devil and his angels, who devastated the vineyard transferred from Egypt, then we will say that in the soul from which Christ retreated, which formerly was, but has now ceased to be the church of God, [in such a soul] the serpent will walk, whistle in it and vomit the poison of his malice; and he will do not only this, but also perform his works, which in a figurative sense (πιχῶς) are called hands. And lest you think that we are doing violence to the meaning, understanding the works of the serpent under the hands of the serpent, take into account the testimony of Solomon: “Death and life are in the hands of the tongue” (Prov. 18:22). We have laid it out for allegorical interpretation, serving it as best we could. If someone discovers a meaning that is more plausible and has greater grounds than your reasoning, then let the reader prefer to be guided by his authority. Zeph.3:1–7. Woe to the unclean and defiled city, the oppressor! He does not listen to voices, does not accept instructions, does not trust in the Lord, does not draw closer to his God. Its princes in its midst are roaring lions, its judges are wolves of the evening, not leaving a single bone until the morning. His prophets are frivolous and treacherous people; its priests desecrate the shrine and trample the law. The Lord is righteous in the midst of it, He does no unrighteousness, He shows His judgment every morning without fail; but the wicked knows no shame. I have destroyed the nations, their strongholds have been destroyed; He made their streets empty, so that no one walked on them anymore; Their cities are devastated: there is not a single person, there are no inhabitants. I said: “Fear only Me, accept instruction!” and his habitation shall not be destroyed, nor shall the evil befall him, which I have decreed concerning him; and they diligently tried to spoil all their actions. Woe to the city, indignant and frenzied: the dove did not hear the voice and did not accept instruction, did not rely on the Lord, did not draw closer to its Lord [Vulg.: God]. The princes among him are like roaring lions: his judges are wolves of the evening, they did not leave [prey] until the morning. His prophets are mad; the men are unfaithful: his priests have defiled the sanctuary, they have acted unrighteously against the law. The righteous Lord will not do injustice in the midst of it. From morning to morning He will give His judgment in the light and will not hide; but the unrighteous did not know shame. I have destroyed nations; their cornerstone strongholds are scattered; I have made their roads desolate, because there is no [Vulg.: not yet] one who passes through. Their cities are devastated, for there is no man left, and not a single inhabitant. I said; however, you will fear Me, you will accept instruction, and his dwelling will not perish as a result of all that I visited him with. And yet they, rising at dawn, perverted all their thoughts. LXX: O glorious and redeemed city, the dove did not hear the voice, did not accept the instruction: did not trust in the Lord and did not draw near to her Lord. His princes were in him like roaring lions: his judges, like the wolves of Arabia, did not leave him until the morning; its prophets are bearers of the wind [in themselves], its men are mocking, its priests desecrate holy things and act wickedly against the law. The Lord is righteous in his midst, and will not commit unrighteousness. From morning to morning in the light He will give His judgment, and He does not hide, and in torment He does not know unrighteousness and does not [go into] eternal injustice. I have reduced [the number] of the proud, their cornerstone fortifications have been scattered: I have destroyed the roads so that they cannot pass at all; their cities were destroyed, because no one remained or lived in them. I said, however, you will fear Me and accept instruction and will not perish in His sight in all that I have taken vengeance on him. Get ready, get up at dawn, all their branches have perished. Many believe that due to the connection of the speech [here] it is said against Nineveh, about which it was said above: And Assyria will destroy and turn Nineveh into a desert. But Scripture never calls Nineveh a dove, although some think that the prophet Jeremiah said the words: “From the face of the sword of a dove” about Nebuchadnezzar (Jer. 46:15?). In addition, you should also know that some, on the contrary, argue that by the dove in this place one should understand Ελλάδα, i.e. Greece, so that the meaning will be as follows: On behalf of the sword of Jonah, i.e. On behalf of the sword of Greece, for the word Jonah means both the dove and Greece. Therefore, to this day the Greeks are called Ionians, and the sea is called Ionian, and the Jews retain their ancient name. Then the rulers of Rome, retaining their ancient name, are called Caesars by barbarian peoples. Thus, the whole speech is directed against Jerusalem: Woe to the city that was once a dove, always sinning, given over to captivities, but again delivered by the Lord [from them]. Woe to the perky city - which is more clearly expressed in Hebrew by the word: mara (מראה), i.e. παραπιχραίνουσα, and what we can express in words: he who grieves God, that is, by his vice he turns the merciful Lord to grief, so that he who wants to be merciful is prompted to punishment. He [the city] did not listen to the command of the Lord and in his corruption did not want to accept instruction, and did not rely on the Lord his God in the troubles that once oppressed him; did not follow after Him, and did not want to approach Him when He said: “I am the Lord who draws near and not from afar” (Jer. 23:23). - Its princes and judges, and prophets, and priests are also described, so that we understand by the princes in the city in the above words a part of the people by the name of [their] dignity. And so his princes, like lions, were always on the prey to shed the blood of their subordinates, his judges were predators, not leaving for others anything that could be plundered. His prophets do not have common sense, or lead to amazement - which is expressed in the Hebrew language by the word phoezim, and in Avila it is translated: θαμβευταί - they spoke as if on behalf of God, but preached everything contrary to the Lord. The priests at the site of the sanctuary committed sacrilege and, acting against the law, made sacrifices according to the requirements of the law. And since they acted unrighteously, the righteous Lord will not commit unrighteousness, but will reward the most wicked city according to its deserts. In the morning, in the morning, that is, completely openly and without any relaxation, He will carry out righteous judgment on him and nothing will be hidden from Him. The Lord will do this so that the corrupt city will turn to the better. But wicked Israel did not feel the confusion, did not understand the plagues inflicted on them to such an extent as to bring repentance. “I avenged you,” He then says about the pagans, “and destroyed their states, so that you, who did not call Me in troubles, would know Me as a result of good deeds. – But, of course, one can also understand it this way: O Judas! I destroyed all your cities and destroyed all your subordinate settlements, tribes and various neighbors; and there was such a slaughter of people that there was no man left to live in your cities; and after that I sent My prophets hastily [or: rising early] with a call to repentance and said: “True, I did this to you, O Jerusalem, but I did it so that you would fear Me and accept instruction, and so that your abode, that is, the Church, would not perish for all your crimes. And the inhabitants of Jerusalem, on the contrary, when I called them to repentance, as if prompted by diligence and good intentions, they rose at dawn to fulfill all their desires with such haste as they should have turned to Me, and in fact showed what was arising in [their] soul.” This is according to the Hebrew text. - On the other hand, under the glorious city - the city redeemed by the blood of Christ - according to the above, there is obviously a church, which is also called the dove for the simplicity of the many believers [located] in it. She did not listen to the voice of the Lord and did not want to accept instructions, did not rely on the Lord, because she did not want to approach the Lord her God in order to earn the forgiveness of sins. For he who says that he listens to the voice of the Lord his God and trusts in the Lord, in vain thinks that he can fight [at the same time] for God and for the world, when he destroys faith by deeds and cleaves more to mammon than to the Lord his God. Its rulers are like roaring lions. For us there can be no doubt about the roaring and swiftness of lions when we pay attention to the fact that the princes of the people shout so menacingly at the subordinate people and with the voice of cruel rulers and pacify the people with such furious curses that it seems as if the lion is gnashing his teeth among the meek sheep, and not a shepherd [is] among the flock. Likewise are his judges: like the wolves of Arabia, they kill in the evening and leave nothing until the morning; they do not look at the east of the sun, but always spend time in darkness, turning into their own profit the small possessions of the Church and what is collected in the treasury of God, so that in the morning there is nothing left for the poor to eat: thus, as if at night, they devastate everything without witnesses; tearing everything apart like wolves, they do not leave even a small share of food for the poor. Likewise, the prophets - that is, teachers who think that they instruct the people and speak [supposedly] from the Scriptures, πνευματοφόροι, i.e. bearers of the spirit, or: spiritual (which should be read in the sense of mockery - είρωνιχῶς), - are full contempt: for in the church it is necessary not [only] to teach, but also to do, and by actions not to destroy the meaning of the teaching. Moreover, when you teach another, but do not do so yourself, you should be called not so much a teacher as a despiser [of teaching], which is why it is written in the book of the prophet Habakkuk: “O mockers! Look carefully and observe, and be amazed at the wonders and be scattered” (Hab. 1:5). Finally, the priests who celebrate the Eucharist and distribute the blood of the Lord to His people act wickedly against the law of Christ when they think that the Eucharist (εὐχαριστίαν) is celebrated by the words of the person praying, and not by the life, and that only solemn prayer is necessary, and not by the merits of the priests, although it is said about them: “And the priest on whom there is impurity, let him not approach, so that offer sacrifices to God” (Lev. 21:3–4 according to the text of LXX). And although the princes, judges, prophets and priests of Jerusalem do this, yet the Lord is merciful and righteous. He is merciful in that he does not depart from His church; righteous in that he gives to everyone according to his deserts. For after He comes in the morning, after the night of this world has passed, He will give His judgment in the light, and when He begins to demand from each individual the silver that He entrusted to them, He will not be unjust and will not endure His injustice forever; but the proud princes whom God opposes will cast down from their thrones and from the height that they had in their power, and their cornerstone fortifications will be scattered, i.e. corrupt and deviating desires, with which the Pharisees used to pray, despising the Cornerstone. I, however, think that it is good for the proud to be distracted from their arrogance, and for their cornerstone fortifications and crossroads to be destroyed, so that after that they can follow the right path. After this it follows: And I will make the roads desolate, because there will be no one to pass [on them], as it is written in the first psalm: “And the way of the wicked will perish” (Ps. 1:6). Likewise, the prophet Hosea, who speaks of the fornicating Jerusalem: “Behold, I will block her roads with thorns and block up her paths, and she will not find the path and will rush after her lovers, and will not reach them, she will seek them, and will not find them, and will say: “I will go and return to my former husband, for then I was better off than now”” (Hosea 2:6-7). Pay attention to the fact that if the paths had not been locked, and the roads had not been blocked, and if the Lord had not upset the ways of the prodigal soul, she would never have said: “I will go and return to my former husband.” So the ways of the proud and their cornerstone strongholds are destroyed, so that they do not walk in pride and corruption, and their cities, poorly built in vanity and pride, are ruined, so that they cannot support and protect the most wicked inhabitants. And lest anyone think that we are treating Scripture forcefully, let him learn from what follows: “I did this,” he says, “in order to tell them: “Behold, the ways of wickedness have been destroyed; Therefore, fear Me, learn [or: accept instruction], so that My instruction does not perish without bearing the fruits of turning to Me [to Me], and so that everything with which I wanted to correct you does not turn out to be invalid, and so that it will not be possible to apply to you the word that is written in Jeremiah: “I struck your sons without benefit: you did not receive instruction” (Jer. 2:30).” Or this [understand]: “Fear Me and accept instruction, lest everything in sight of Jerusalem perish, and lest it itself be turned into a complete desert as a result of the disasters with which I threatened it.” – Let no one be confused (as I have already said many times) that I interpreted this as being said against the church, because it is known that in the Holy Scriptures Jerusalem always serves as an image of the church. Whoever among its members sins is either taken to Babylon, or, if he wants to leave it without permission, he is wounded by robbers in Jericho. Indeed, who is more glorious than the Church founded throughout the world? [Who] is so redeemed by the blood of Christ and is a dove by the grace of the Holy Spirit, if not the Church, gathered from the nations? There are very many in it who say that they believe in Christ, but who did not listen to His voice, who did not accept [His] instruction, and who did not want to be in agreement with Him. I know that I will offend very many by interpreting the words: Her princes, like lions roaring in her, in relation to bishops and presbyters, although the evil presbyters [elders], who wanted to commit violence against Susanna, do not condemn those who lived virtuously; just as the bad princes described in the prophetic speech do not serve to dishonor the good princes: “For through the scourging of a fool, the foolish becomes wiser” (Prov. 19:25) and if the foolish becomes wiser, then how much more wise? And its judges and princes, who accept gifts and sell justice, are not rightly called the wolves of Arabia, or the wolves of the evening, as Symmachus translated. Indeed, they do not deserve to be called the wolves of Benjamin, who seize prey in the morning, and in the evening give food [to others] (Gen. 49:27); but they are called evening wolves, (which eat at night), leaving nothing for the morning. And the fact that the following words are the prophets of her πνευματοφόροι, i.e. Bearing the spirit, we have interpreted mocking men about teachers and say that they are both prophets and mockers; let them not lead anyone into confusion, for the Apostle also commands: “Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption” (Eph. 4:30). And David in the fiftieth Psalm says: “Do not take Your Holy Spirit from me” (Ps. 50:13). For if the Holy Spirit, being saddened, had not left his former dwelling and had not run away from His habitation, then Paul would never have commanded what I said above, and David, after adultery, would not have been afraid of losing what he received, as is said in the Epistle to the Hebrews: “How much more severe punishment in your opinion deserves the one who tramples on the Son of God and considers the blood of the covenant unclean, in which was sanctified, and dishonors the Spirit of grace" (Heb. 10:29)? But already in the third book of Kings it is written that [one] man of God is undoubtedly a prophet who addressed the altar in Samaria with the words: “Altar, altar! This says the Lord: “Behold, a son will be born to David” (1 Kings 13:2), etc., - he was killed by a lion because he despised the words of the Lord and ate food from the false prophet (this is how Joseph interpreted it when presenting this passage). And what should not be seen as an accident in this event, but precisely the judgment of God, [this can be seen from the fact that] the false prophet, who deceived him, predicted that this would happen, and even the lion that served the punishment kept the donkey intact. So, if teachers who were filled with the Holy Spirit can be contemptuous, then it is not surprising that among people who are careless and do not guard their hearts with all diligence, the same reason often causes pride and contempt, so that they know about God, they know His many goodness, appointed for those who fear Him, but they despise the riches of goodness, storing up wrath for themselves on the day of wrath and revelation. The priests for their part (those who perform baptism, when celebrating the Eucharist, who pray for the coming of the Lord, who administer the anointing oil, who lay on hands, who instruct the catechumens, who supply the Levites and other priests), instead of being indignant against our interpretations and against the prophets who speak the word, let them pray to the Lord and work [to Him] diligently, so as not to deserve association with the priests who defile the holiness of the Lord. In fact, what saves princes, judges, prophets, and priests is not their rank and not their high names, but the service associated with the rank: “Whoever,” he says, “desires the episcopacy, desires a good work” (1 Tim. 3:1). Notice what he said: he wants a good deed. Deeds, not honors. If, having despised the matter, he only has in mind the honors [of dignity], then the tower of Siloam will soon collapse, the high parts of the cedar will be struck by lightning, the high raised brow will be crushed, and the swan, with its neck stretched out, soaring into the heights, will be counted among the unclean birds. – Then the following words, translated by us according to the Hebrew text: Nevertheless, they, rising at dawn, perverted all their thoughts, instead of which the Seventy write: Get ready, get up early, all their dense foliage is scattered, we will explain further, since these words in many ways do not agree with the Hebrew and, as it seems, are more consistent with further words in the text of the Seventy. Zeph.3:8–9. Wait therefore for Me, says the Lord, until the day when I arise to desolate, for I have determined to gather the nations, to call together kingdoms, to pour out on them My indignation, all the fury of My wrath; for the whole earth will be consumed by the fire of My jealousy. Then again I will give clean lips to the nations, so that everyone will call on the name of the Lord and serve Him with one accord. Therefore wait for Me, says the Lord, on the day of My rising in the future. For My judgment [is] to gather the nations and unite the Kingdoms, in order [Vulg.: and] to pour out My indignation on them, all the wrath of My wrath. For in the fire of My jealousy the whole earth will be consumed: for then I will give to the nations a chosen mouth, that they may all call upon them [Vulg.: in the name] of the Lord, and serve Him with one hand. LXX: Therefore wait for Me, says the Lord, in the day of My rising as a testimony, for My judgment is upon the assemblies of nations, to receive kings, to pour out on them all My wrath, even the wrath of My wrath: for in the fire of My jealousy the whole earth will be destroyed. For then will I turn it against the nations? The tongue is in its revival, so that everyone calls on the name of the Lord, so that they serve Him under a single yoke. The Jews interpret these words in relation to the coming of Jesus Christ, which, according to their expectations, will happen, and they say that after the gathering of all nations and after the wrath of the Lord was poured out on them, the whole earth should be devoured in the fire of His jealousy. And just as it was before the pandemonium, when all nations spoke one language, so after everyone has turned to the worship of the true God, everyone will speak Hebrew and the whole world will serve the Lord. And we, who follow not the letter that kills, but the life-giving spirit, and not Jewish fables, hear from the Lord: “Get ready, rise with the dawn: all their branches are scattered,” and having prepared we say: “My heart is ready, O God! My heart is ready” (Ps. 56:8); We also hear what is commanded in Proverbs: “Prepare the end of your work” (Prov. 24:27); [we hear] what is said mysteriously in the book of Leviticus (Lev.16:10–29) - [namely]; that in the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month, Aaron brings a scapegoat for the people, and alive, after laying hands on his head and transferring to him all the sins of the people of Israel, he hands it over into the hands of a specially appointed man and sends him into the wilderness - we take this to ourselves and, having prepared ourselves at the command of the true high priest, we throw out evil from the midst of the church. When we do this, the night passes, the day approaches, and we, as those who walk gracefully in the days, say: “O God, my God! Before You I have been awake since the morning” (Ps. 62:2). And then we immediately add: “Early in the morning You will hear my prayer, in the morning I will appear before You and see You” (Ps. 5:4-5). Indeed, if we are not prepared, the sun of righteousness will not rise on us; and when the sun rises, all the branches from the vineyard of Sodom will be scattered and perish, so that not only the large clusters of grapes will perish, but even what seems to be insignificant in us will be scattered in the bright light of the lamp of Christ. And now, promising us a reward for all this, God says: Wait for Me on the day of My rising as a testimony. Indeed, God will rise in us after vices and sins; and according to what He says in another place: “Be ye witnesses to Me, and I am a witness, says the Lord God, and the child whom I have chosen” (Is. 43:10), for us the witness is the Father with the Son and the Holy Spirit, so that “every word becomes through the mouth of two or three witnesses” (Deut. 17:6), and, in my opinion, in this way the opinion is confirmed and with three witnesses the truth is established even more than through writing. Indeed, there were two witnesses against Susanna (Dan. 13) and against the Lord himself, but the word [of truth] did not stand in their mouth. Almost the entire city also testified against Naboth (Naboth); but the mutual agreement of the wicked witnesses did not lead to the establishment of the truth, but to a criminal conspiracy (1 Kings 21:10–15) [against him]. “For My judgment,” they say further, “is for a gathering of nations, to gather kings to the place of their punishment, to pour out on them all My wrath, the wrath of My wrath.” The smaller one soon deserves forgiveness and is very close to mercy; “But the mighty will suffer great torment” (Wis.6:6). Therefore, nations and multitudes of nations will be gathered for judgment, and kings, that is, leaders in the teachings of the corrupt, will be brought to punishment, so that all the wrath of the wrath of the Lord will be poured out on them. And this will not be due to any cruelty, as the bloodthirsty Jews think, but due to mercy and for the purpose of healing; for the following words follow: In the fire of my jealousy the whole earth will perish. In fact, after the gathering of nations for judgment and kings - for punishment, so that wrath would be poured out on them and not only in part, but in its entirety - combined with rage - [after all this] everything earthly will be destroyed throughout the entire earth - everything related to the affairs of the earth, that is, the flesh; The flames of My jealousy will finally devour all its thorns and thorny bushes. And then I will turn my tongue against the nations to revive it, so that everyone, putting aside error, will return to the original way of confessing the Lord; and then “at the name of Jesus every knee will bow: those in heaven, those on earth, and those in the grave, and every tongue will confess Jesus as Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Phil. 2:10-11). And having thrown away the bricks and dirt, which we had instead of stones and clay and which served to strengthen the pride of our delusion against the Lord, we will accept the language we have previously lost and will [work] under the yoke of Christ, who says: “My yoke is pleasant, and my burden is light” (Matthew 11:30). It is necessary, however, to note that in the place where we translated: I will return the chosen language to the nations, Seventy instead of: chosen was translated: in its revival, so it is implied: earth. The error arose from the fact that the Hebrew word barura (ברורה), translated by Aquila and Theodotion: chosen, and by Symmachus: pure, the Seventy read badura (ברורח), mistaking the letter res for dalet due to the very greater similarity of their constituent parts, distinguished only by a small hook at the top. Also where we translated: On the day of my rising in the future, all others translated: as a testimony. The Jew who helped me in the study of the Scriptures argued that the word laed (לעד) in this place should be understood rather in the sense of εἰς ἔτι, that is, for the future, than as a testimony, for the word ed, which is written through the letters ayin and dalet, means both ἔτι and μαρτύριον; i.e. both future and evidence. – We can also explain this passage in relation to the first coming of Christ, when, having destroyed all error, trampled down demons and destroyed earthly affairs, the Apostles began to speak in all languages ​​(Acts 2:4-12) and when, after the ancient confusion [of languages] was eliminated, one mouth was given for confession. And by kings who are deposed and destroyed by divine wrath we must understand the main representatives of perverted teachings. Zeph.3:10–13. From the countries beyond the rivers of Ethiopia, My worshipers, the children of My scattered ones, will bring Me gifts. On that day you will not disgrace yourself by all your deeds with which you have sinned against Me, for then I will remove from among you those who are vain of your nobility, and you will no longer exalt yourself on My holy mountain. But I will leave among you a humble and simple people, and they will trust in the name of the Lord. The remnant of Israel will not commit iniquity, they will not speak lies, and no deceitful tongue will be found in their mouth, for they themselves will feed and rest, and no one will disturb them. From beyond the rivers of Ethiopia, from there My worshipers, the sons [or daughter] of My scattered ones, will bring Me a gift. On that day you will not be embarrassed by all your evil undertakings with which you have betrayed Me, for at that time I will remove from among you those who boast of your exaltation, and you will no longer be proud of yourself on My holy mountain. And I will leave among you a poor people in need, and they will trust in the name of the Lord. The remnant of Israel will not commit iniquity, and will not speak lies, and no deceitful tongue will be found in their mouth, for of their own accord they will feed and come to rest, and no one will bring fear upon them. LXX: From the borders of the rivers of Ethiopia I will receive My scattered ones: they will sacrifice to Me. On that day you will not be embarrassed by all your evil tricks with which you acted wickedly against Me, for then I will remove from you the reproaches of your dishonor, and you will no longer exalt yourself on My holy mountain; And I will leave with you a meek and humble people, and those who remain from Israel will reverently honor the name of the Lord, and they will not do unrighteousness and will not speak in vain, and no cunning tongue will be found in their mouth, for they will feed of their own accord and go to rest, and no one will bring fear upon them. When the Lord gives the believing nations a chosen language, and everyone calls on the name of the Lord and bears His yoke, then even from beyond the rivers of Ethiopia, from where Queen Saba [Sheba] came to listen to the wisdom of Solomon (1 Kings 10:4), they will offer sacrifices to the Lord: And “Ethiopia will stretch out her hands to God” (Ps. 67:32), and the Ethiopian woman will marry the true Lawgiver, Who smote Egypt with ten plagues (Ex. 2:21-22), although the Jewish synagogue will be jealous. And in the words: From there My worshipers, the daughter of My scattered ones, will bring Me gifts contains the following meaning: O Israel, O synagogue, who was once a daughter, whom I scattered throughout the whole world, although you envy, although you are tormented by jealousy, yet sacrifices will be brought to Me from Ethiopia, that is, from the nations of the pagans. On that day, that is, when many pagans believe, even you will not be in confusion because of all your errors with which you betrayed me, choosing Barabbas and crucifying the Son of God (John 18:40). Then I will remove from among you the scribes, priests and Pharisees who boast of your exaltation, and you will no longer be magnified in My holy mountain; but you will have a poor people, unlearned people and fishermen, who will put their hope in the name of the Lord. The remnants of Israel, that is, not the multitude that cried: Crucify, crucify Him! (John 19:6), not the high priests and the nobles, but the remnant will not commit unrighteousness; Believing the truth, they will not speak a lie against Christ, and no deceitful tongue will be found among them, for they know that every lie is from the devil (John 8:44). Since they will graze by themselves and say: “The Lord feeds me, and I will lack nothing, in a place of abundant pasture,” he set me there and raised me on the water of the dead. He turned my soul" (Ps. 23:1-2); then no one will bring fear to them when the faith of the believers triumphs over the exaltation of the persecutors. Let this be understood in relation to the first coming of Jesus Christ, which the Jews still expect at the end, and hope that they will live in Jerusalem, where, like the herds of animals, they will have an abundance of the gifts of the body and the riches of Judah and will be fed with fresh grass, and there will no longer be anyone to frighten them, since all nations will be humiliated and subject to them. - And we, having received the opportunity from this fable to establish the true history, say [or: we will say] that when we are given a pure, or chosen, or clear (as Symmachus translated) language, we leave in the rivers of Ethiopia all the blackness of the soul and the dirty color, and the poison of the dragon, which stained us with either sins or vices, we leave together with the teachers of the perverse dogmas that watered us before, and we will bring Gifts to Christ along with the once scattered Israel. On that day the day of Christ will rise for us, and each of us will be told: “You will not be troubled by all your evil tricks,” i.e. from the most wicked thoughts with which we previously acted against the Lord, and all pride and everything dishonest with which we rebelled against the Lord and against His holy Mountain, our Lord and Savior, will be discarded, and instead of high, but meaningless names [titles], we will have a meek and humble people, so that we will not think about anything arrogant and arrogant, or about what is not pleasing to God. At the same time, pay attention to the fact that on the day of judgment and at the end of the world, all names of honors will be destroyed, and one people and [one] flock will remain under the control of one meek and humble Shepherd. Then, upon the entry [into the kingdom of God] of the fullness of nations (for God has shut all under sin, that He might have mercy on all (Rom. 11:32), the people of Israel will fear the name of God. And the remnant of Israel will no longer commit the injustice in which they denied the Lord, and will not speak in vain, comforting themselves with absurd fables; no lying tongue will be found among them, when Christ, Who is the truth, speaks through them. In fact, then they themselves will graze in the same flock and will find peace in the Church, and they will no longer be afraid of the attacks of the true Nebuchadnezzar. Seeing this and reading about such great mysteries, we will exclaim with the Apostle and say: “O depth of wealth, wisdom and knowledge of God! How untestable are His judgments, and how unsearchable are His ways” (Rom. 11:33); Feeling this and reflecting on this, the prophet predicts regarding the judgments of God: “At night I pondered in my heart and was tormented in my spirit and said: “Will God reject him forever and no longer continue to show mercy, and will he withhold His mercy in His anger?” and said: “Today I have begun: this is the change of the right hand of the Most High”” (Ps. 77:7-8,11). And the meaning of this place is this: my thought that the Lord has forsaken sinners forever and that His mercy is held back by the wrath that takes its place, I came to the following conclusion: this was so that by changing His right hand, the right hand of the Most High, He would change everything and have mercy on those whom He had previously forsaken. So, both we and the remnant of Israel, knowing that we have “to repay every idle word” (Matthew 12:36) and that the Lord will scatter all flattering lips, let us no longer speak vain things. “For vanity of vanities, and all is vanity” (Eccl. 1:2) and: “Every living person is perfect vanity” (Ps. 39:6). And let us not utter lies with our lips; but, having received the power to trample under foot snakes and scorpions and all the power of the enemy (Luke 10:19), we will no longer be afraid of any monster, we will not be afraid of the ambush of wolves, since Christ is the guardian; but let us say: “The Lord is my enlightenment and my Savior: whom will I fear?” (Ps.27:1) and other things contained in the twenty-sixth Psalm. Zeph.3:14–20. Rejoice, daughter of Zion! rejoice, Israel! rejoice and rejoice with all your heart, daughter of Jerusalem! The Lord has canceled the sentence over you and driven away your enemy! The Lord, the king of Israel, is in your midst: you will see no more evil. On that day they will say to Jerusalem, “Do not be afraid,” and to Zion, “Let not your hands fail!” The Lord your God is in your midst, He is able to save you; He will rejoice over you with joy, He will be merciful in His love, He will triumph over you with jubilation. I will gather those who mourn the solemn festivals: they are yours, reproach is upon them. Behold, I will afflict all your oppressors at that time, and I will save what is lame, and I will gather what is scattered, and I will bring them into honor and eminence in all this land of their reproach. At that time I will bring you and then I will gather you, for I will make you famous and honored among all the nations of the earth, when I bring back your captivity before your eyes, says the Lord. Send praise, daughter of Zion! Triumph [Vulg.: Triumph], O Israel! Rejoice and rejoice with all your heart, daughter of Jerusalem! The Lord has canceled your judgment and turned away your enemies. The Lord, the king of Israel, is in your midst: you will no longer fear evil. On that day it will be said: “Jerusalem! don't be afraid! Zion! Let not your hands weaken!” The Lord your God is strong in your midst: He Himself will save you, He will rejoice over you with joy, He will be silent in your love [Vulg.: His], He will triumph over you in praise. I will collect the empty complaints [Vulg.: idle talkers] that have departed from the law, since they were from among you, so that you will no longer have reproach because of them. LXX: Hail, daughter of Zion! Preach, daughter of Jerusalem, rejoice and rejoice with all your heart, daughter of Jerusalem! The Lord has taken away your iniquities, and has redeemed you from the hand of your enemies. The Lord the king of Israel is in your midst: you will see no more evil. On that day the Lord says to Jerusalem: “Zion! Be in firm hope, let not your hands become weak!” The Lord your God, the Mighty One, is in your midst, will save you, bring joy to you, and renew you in His mercy, and will rejoice in you with delight, as if on a solemn day. I will gather your afflicted ones. Woe to him who curses him. Let it not seem surprising, as we have repeatedly said, that the passages of the Hebrew text end differently, and the Greek, i.e. LXX, and Latin passages end differently. In fact, where the translation differs in meaning, the beginning or the end are necessarily different. The Jews, who are still awaiting the coming of Christ, have the hope of receiving for themselves what we, who have accepted Christ, have already achieved in everything together with Him. So, if any of the Christians, especially of the new sages - whose names I am keeping silent, so as not to think that I mean to offend anyone - thinks that the prophecy has not yet been fulfilled, let him know that he falsely bears the name of Christ, that his soul is Jewish, and that he does not have only carnal circumcision. Indeed, if this has not yet happened, but only has to happen, then we have believed in vain in the coming of the Savior, and if we do not believe, then in vain we recognize as fulfilled in us the mystery hidden from eternal times, but now made clear through the prophetic writings and the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ (Col. 1:26). Finally, let us pay attention to the sequence of reading and see that what has been said does not apply to To the Jews, but to the Church of Christ. For after what was ahead (My judgment in the assembly of nations.... to the words: So that everyone would call on the name of the Lord and serve Him under one yoke: and: Because of the rivers of Ethiopia I will receive... and after the remnant of Israel who believe in Christ, about which it is said: And those who remain from Israel will fear the name of the Lord, and there will be no one to fear them), the Holy Spirit, predicting the general end of the world, says: Rejoice, daughter of Zion! preach, daughter of Jerusalem! Rejoice and be glad with all your heart, daughter of Jerusalem. For every soul that belongs to the Church and is placed on guard rejoices and is glad that all its iniquities have been taken away from it and redeemed by Him who redeemed everyone with His precious blood. “For Christ has become unto us wisdom, righteousness, holiness, and redemption through God” (1 Cor. 1:30). And the king of Israel, who dwells among us, redeemed us, saying: “I and My Father will come and make us abide with him” (John 14:23) and: “I will dwell and walk in them” (Lev. 26:12), and we will no longer see evil, thinking about only virtues and doing them. On that day, - [i.e. e.] when we see the world and are placed on high, let not your hands weaken, says the Lord, who also said through Isaiah: “Strengthen your weak hands, and let your works be strong” (Is. 35:3). For the Lord is mighty, whom no one can resist. Your Savior Himself will restore to you the joy you have lost; when you cast off the old man, He will make you walk in the new man and will do it out of His love: not because of your merit, but according to His mercy. He will rejoice and rejoice over you, as if accepting your fattest sacrifice on the day of the solemn holiday, and He Himself will say to you: I will gather your afflicted ones, for: “God will not despise a broken and humble heart” (Ps. 50:19) and: “A bruised reed He will not break” (Is. 42:3). - This is [the explanation] if we want to take this place in relation to the second coming of the Savior. Then, since the prophet Zechariah calls for similar joy in Zion and Jerusalem, and Matthew says that this prophecy was fulfilled at the first coming of Christ (Matthew 21:5), then necessity prompts us, and the very order of true events leads us to relate the words of the prophet Zephaniah not to what is about to happen, but to what has already happened. In fact, the prophet Zechariah writes: “Rejoice greatly, daughter of Zion, preach, daughter of Jerusalem: behold, your King comes to you, righteous and saving: He is meek and sits on a colt and a colt” (Zechariah 9:9) This is according to the text of the Seventy. – And according to the Hebrew text, the Church is commanded to sing praises, and for Israel to triumph, seeing God in their thoughts, to rejoice and rejoice with all their hearts in the place of peace, about which it is said: “My peace I give to you, My peace I leave with you” (John 14:27). For at the final destruction of the world He did not apply His judgment and acted no longer in judgment and correction, but in saving, and turned away its enemies [i.e. e.] crowds of demons. The Lord, the King of Israel, will be in his midst: he will fear no more evil. On that day, free Jerusalem - not the one who was in bondage with her sons, but the one who is the mother of the saints (Gal. 4:25-26) - will be told: “Fear not, O Zion (for she is also Jerusalem), and do not let your works fail, and do not do anything that you will regret [or: regretted]; The Lord your God, who will save you, is mighty and mighty; He himself will dwell in your midst, will rejoice over you with joy and gladness, and will keep silent about your sins in the mercy [or: in peace] with which he loved you, and will rejoice over you in praise, either because you are worthy of praise, or because you will sing your praises.” Empty complaints or, as Aquila translated, those carried away, who retreated from you, I will collect, for they were from you, i.e.: those who, by their vices or sins, withdrew from your depths and became under the power of demons, after everyone returns to their previous state, they will come to you, and you will no longer tolerate reproach over your lost children. The word nugas (נוגי), as we know, was taken into Latin from Hebrew and therefore we left it as it was in Hebrew, so that we could know that the Hebrew language is the original language for all languages, which, however, will not be the subject of this discussion. I am surprised at Aquila and the Seventy that the word conveyed by us with the word: were in the expression: I will gather, for they were from you, instead of: they wanted to translate the word grief (οἵ)!, which Aquila always uses not in the sense of a complaint, but in the sense of an appeal or exclamation. In fact, haia (היו), the beginning of which means I am, in the plural past tense means: were. I know that this will be unpleasant for the reader, who - if you pay attention to the fact that I do not write about controversial issues, and do not [compose] elegant exercises in oratory and do not find pleasure in places of agreement among everyone, but write interpretations, and, moreover, interpretations of the Prophets - it is better to scold me for the fact that I supposedly want to play [with words] following the example of rhetoricians, than to denounce me - as I should - if I stop in difficulty before such dark places. Zeph.3:19–20. Behold, I will afflict all your oppressors at that time, and I will save what is lame, and I will gather what is scattered, and I will bring them into honor and eminence in all this land of their reproach. At that time I will bring you and then I will gather you, for I will make you famous and honored among all the nations of the earth, when I bring back your captivity before your eyes, says the Lord. Behold, I will destroy all those who upset you at that time, and I will save the one who is limping, and I will gather the one who was thrown out, and I will make them glorious and famous throughout the whole land of their oppression. At the time that I bring you, and at the time that I gather you, I will make you honorable and renowned among all the nations of the earth, when I bring back your captivity before your eyes, says the Lord. LXX: Behold, I will do in you for your sake at that time, and I will save the oppressed, and I will accept the rejected, and I will ordain them for glory and [make them] renowned throughout all the earth. And they will be troubled at the time when I do good to you and at the time when I receive you, for I will make you famous and predestine you for glory among all the nations of the earth, when I restore your captivity before you, says the Lord. The synagogue, not only limping, but having both legs circumcised, expects that this [prophecy] will be fulfilled over it at the time of the coming of Christ, whom it expects, and thinks that all the nations that once grieved Israel should be destroyed by the Lord, and the synagogue will be saved, and the one that received the book of divorce will be gathered again, and they will be praised and made famous throughout the whole land of their captivity, in which before they were in turmoil; and this will happen at the time when she is returned to Jerusalem, when the temple is rebuilt and the rest of the rites are observed. [The synagogue] promises itself this, and therefore does not repent, but, hoping for something unrealistic, loses its true salvation. And I am not surprised that the synagogue, which hurts its eyes because it did not accept Christ, suffers along with Leah, does not meet the love of Jacob and remains neglected, giving way to Rachel (Gen. 29:16ff.); but I am surprised at Christians, especially half-Jews, who, apparently being in the Church, say this and confess this; and if this is true, then in vain we believe in Christ, and all our sacrament is destroyed, and we turn out to be more pitiful than all [other] people, since we believe that He has already come who has not yet come. But since our faith is undoubted, and the desires of the Jews, on the contrary, are completely vain, we will explain this passage, and the last one [in the book of the prophet Zephaniah], in accordance with our previously acquired understanding of the meaning [of his prophecies] and will begin with testimony from [the book of] Jesus son of Sirach: “Whoever throws a stone up throws it on his own head” (Sir. 27:28). In fact, since Zion and Jerusalem are placed on high, the one who reviles Zion and Jerusalem and throws stones of dishonor at them, throws them on his own head, and his reproach will turn on his head: “And his anger and his unrighteousness will enter upon his crown” (Ps. 7:17). How many today revile the soul that diligently seeks the mysteries of God and desires to see His world, and say: “This is a crazy man, drunk from drinking too much young wine: he flees the company of people, despises fun, considers gold dirt, loves only poverty.” But the infidels even put the cross of Christ to shame, and if they ever see it in trials and tribulations, they say: “Where is your mercy and the justice that you showed in your deeds?” But why should I talk about infidels, when some rulers of the Churches scold people in the same way, consider their life to be madness, and do not praise their present behavior, but only blame their past sins? They do not hear what is commanded: “Do not rebuke a person who turns from his sins” (Sir.8:6). So, woe to the man who brought dishonor and zealously took up the task of reviling Zion and the city of God, for for such an insult to His city the Lord will be an avenger and will say to Zion: This is what I will do in you for your sake, that is, I will avenge you and save the afflicted, or, as they say in Greek, the oppressed. Therefore, the meaning is this: I will save the one who is currently so oppressed and tormented by trials and hardships, like a grape or an olive in a vice from a tree that has yielded oil and wine; and Jesus will drink wine in His Father's kingdom, and will be anointed with oil more than those who have His inheritance. I think that as a result of squeezing out such wine and oil, Job also suffered a lot; and after he had created the oil and wine, he heard from the Lord: “Do you think that I answered you for anything other than that you might appear righteous?” (Job.40:3 according to text LXX). As if it were being said to the grapes and the olive tree: “Do you think that I oppressed, grieved and crushed you for any other purpose than to squeeze wine and oil out of you?” - Then the words follow: And I will accept the one who was expelled. When God exposes us to temptation, it seems as if He is rejecting us. Therefore, Job says: “The visitation of the Lord has despised” [or: “despised”] “me” (Job 10:12). And not only the righteous say: “Now You have rejected and put us to shame” (Ps. 43:10), but even the Lord and Savior himself, on behalf of the person He accepted, says: But You have rejected and despised, alienated Your Anointed One and destroyed the covenant with Your Servant. And what the forty-third psalm says on behalf of the righteous: Now You have rejected and put us to shame, this follows from what follows: “All this came upon us, but we did not forget You and did not act unjustly against Your covenant, and our heart did not turn back” (Ps. 43:18-19). So, in the end the Lord will accept the one who seemed rejected in her trials; and will make them, namely, the sons of the rejected and expelled, that is, the Church, glorious and renowned throughout the entire earth. Who else can we understand by the eminent sons of the church if not the apostles. Look at Peter and Paul, Matthew and John, and think about how the promise to Abraham was actually fulfilled in them: I will magnify your name. In the Church their name is called daily, their name is proclaimed daily. This is not because it is useful for them to be named in the Church, but because we who honor them and read their writings inherit salvation. At that time, he says, when the oppressed and rejected will be accepted, when her sons will be appointed to glory (for the Lord will be glorified [or: will be glorified] in His ascetics when He sees them crowned, as He was glorified by Job despite the wiles of the devil; therefore, the Apostle, rejoicing over the perfection of his disciples, says: And also through your glory), - [at that time] they will those who were your enemies and reviled you are put to shame; then they will see that those whom they considered unfortunate are blessed; and those whom they considered poor and outcast became powerful and glorious. Then they will see that their captivity, through which they were under power in this difficult life, is taken to the heavenly Jerusalem, and they themselves will arise to be an eternal shame and confusion [for others]. O Christ Jesus! Grant that we, oppressed, saddened and rejected in this life, may be accepted and destined for glory; let the reptiles become confused, let the hissing stop, let the poison lose its power, and let its shame serve as salvation. – This is according to the text of the Seventy. The Hebrew text, with the exception of the first words that we talked about at the beginning of the previous passage, only slightly disagrees with their translation, and, in my opinion, does not need [special] explanation.