1Sam 2:36

“42. Then indeed Judea asks that the Lord be prayed for on her behalf, when, with the elect already gathered from the nations, she does not ignore the darkness of her own blindness, when she desires that offering be made to her through the priests of almighty God by the confession of the Holy Trinity, because in her former old state she does not presume to merit heavenly joys, but also bestows the faith of the Redeemer, which she received upon her conversion, by preaching it to others who are yet to be converted. It is also well added: (Verse 33.) That he might offer a piece of silver money. For by silver the divine utterances are signified, because it is said through the Prophet: The words of the Lord are words tested by fire, silver tried by fire (Psalm 11:7). And indeed Judea then spends this silver in the praises of God, when she openly preaches our faith, which she previously contradicted while established in unbelief. And because she also imitates through compassion the same Redeemer whom she preaches through love, it is added: (Verse 33.) And a cake of bread. 43. For by the name of bread, He is expressed who says of Himself: "I am the living bread which came down from heaven" (John 6:51). The cake of bread, therefore, is the flesh of the Redeemer, afflicted with sufferings. For the prophet, beholding this cake of bread, said: "Truly He has borne our griefs, and He Himself has carried our sorrows" (Isaiah 53:4). And because it is said by a certain wise man: "If you sit down at the table of a powerful man, wisely consider what is set before you, for you must prepare similar things" (Proverbs 23:1–2, according to the LXX), Judea then offers a cake of bread and a piece of silver when she proclaims our Redeemer with open confession, and for the love of Him whom she proclaims, does not refuse to endure torments from the faithless. And because she is greatly delighted in this imitation of the Passion and refreshment of sweetness, there follows: (Verse 33.) "And let her say: 'Send me, I beseech you, to one of the priestly portions.'" 44. "Dismiss me," she says, as if to say: Do not reject me as infamous and stained with the blood of the Redeemer's death. She also begs that one priestly portion be granted to her, because she desires to be joined to the true priests, so that she may be able to share in the joys of those whose offerings she desires to imitate by offering herself. Hence, setting forth the desire of her refreshment, she says: (Verse 33) "That I may eat a morsel of bread." In this matter it should be noted that she is foretold as having a cake of bread in the devotion of offering, and a morsel in the appetite of eating. Why then is not a cake of bread, but a morsel desired for eating? And why is not a morsel, but a cake said to be offered? But because a morsel is made in roundness, and roundness itself is in a certain way recognized as having neither beginning nor end, rightly by the morsel of bread the eternity of the Redeemer is signified. A cake of bread therefore can be offered by us, and not a morsel, because we who can imitate the Lord's passion by dying or by afflicting the flesh do not have eternity in ourselves which we might present before His sight. And a morsel, not a cake of bread, ought to be for us in the perfection of desire, because we who follow the Redeemer of the human race by suffering temporally with Him desire to possess Him in the heavenly homeland no longer as mortal or suffering, but as eternal and reigning. Therefore she who desires to offer a cake of bread says: "That I may eat a morsel of bread," because those converted from Judea desire to possess our Redeemer in the eternity of refreshment, whose passion they imitated here for the vigor of warfare, not for the reward of recompense.”

“For someone is said to be about to remain from his house, because a great part of it is declared to be about to die. For from the house of the wicked pastor, he remains whom the consciousness of sin does not extinguish from the hope of obtaining pardon. He remains, therefore, because the weight of conscience is lightened through the resolution of repentance by the hope of obtaining life. He indeed comes so that prayer may be offered for him, and hastens through repentance to God, from whom he departed by sinning. He comes, therefore, so that prayer may be offered for him, because he who has made himself unworthy of God requires a worthy intercessor, so that he who is recognized as unable to be cleansed by his own prayers may be expiated by the prayers of others. Whence James also devoutly admonishes, saying: Confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be saved (James 5:16). Hence again: The persistent prayer of a righteous man avails much. But prayer avails for him who, while he restrains himself from the uncleanness of sin, restores himself to the likeness of God, of which he stripped himself by sinning. Whence here also it is added: (Verse 36.) That he may offer a piece of silver. On the coin, therefore, the image of the Lord is engraved, so that it may be recognized as belonging to him by whom it is commanded to be formed. The coin is accordingly understood as his likeness to God. Whence he speaks in Genesis, saying: 'Let us make man in our image and likeness' (Gen. 1:26). And because from sacred Scripture we recognize the image and likeness of God to which we are to be restored, it is declared to be a silver coin. He therefore who comes from the way of sin so that prayer may be offered for him ought to offer a silver coin, because it profits him nothing that he is pricked with compunction in repenting, nor that he confesses with weeping, if, unamended and uncorrected, he is recognized as in no way shining inwardly with the beauty of good will and the light of God's image. For the image and likeness of God is to hate evil with noble hatred and to love God with perfect love. Whence the Prophet also, seeing that the brightness of the divine likeness had perished from the human race, looks to him who came from heaven with the glorious light of our restoration, saying: 'You have loved justice and hated iniquity' (Ps. 44:8). Hence, considering himself now renewed through contemplation of him into the form of perfection, he says: 'I have hated the unjust, and I have loved your law' (Ps. 118:113). He therefore who comes from the house of the reprobate through confession, who through humility asks the Lord that prayer be made for him, must take care entirely to offer a silver coin, so that, having taken on the splendor of good will, he may perfectly hate the evil he has done and love with whole love the good he has neglected. Whence also by the examination of the just Judge, decrees of propitiation are proclaimed. 'On whatever day or hour', he says, 'the sinner is converted, he shall live with life and shall not die' (Ezek. 18:21, 27). But the conversion of the sinner does not consist in the humility of confession, but in the renewal of the inner man, when to the sinner, now corrected by divine inspiration, the evil he loved displeases him, and the good he hated pleases him. For there are some who accuse themselves of the wickedness of their crime and yet do not correct the depravity of their will. These are certainly not believed to be converted to the Lord, because true conversion is not received in the mouth but in the heart. For to be converted is to be completely turned around. The true conversion of the sinner, therefore, is when both our inner and outer man is brought back to the good pleasure of our Creator, when both our flesh is restrained from the perpetration of crime through hatred of iniquity, and through love of justice our mind extends itself to the intention of good works. But because there are some within the Church who come to the satisfaction of penance only at the end of their life, and it is said by the judgment of Truth, 'At whatever hour the sinner is converted, he lives', it is often greatly asked by some whether those who commit sins during the great span of their life and only at the end of life accuse themselves of having acted wickedly immediately find life after the death of the flesh. To which it must be said that by the power of conversion the magnitude of the crime is blotted out. But the power of conversion is the affection of charity infused into the heart by the visitation of the Holy Spirit. And it is written of the same Spirit: 'That he himself is the remission of sins.' For when he graciously visits the hearts of the elect, he powerfully purges them from all uncleanness of sins, because as soon as he pours himself into the mind, he immediately and ineffably stirs it into hatred of sins and vices and into love of virtues. He makes it immediately hate what it loved and ardently love what it had hated, and greatly groan at both, because it recalls that it damnably loved the evils it now hates and hated the good things it now loves. For who would dare to say, even though one is weighed down by every kind of burden of sins, that anyone visited by the grace of the Holy Spirit can perish? Since therefore the sinner is converted at no hour except that in which he is illuminated by the Holy Spirit, what remains except that, just as he abandons the death of sin by execrating it, so he lives by the life of justice to which he longingly turns? He is received into life immediately after death, if he receives such a fire of love in his conversion as can consume in his soul all the accumulated rust of sin. Whence it is also said of the sinful woman: 'Her many sins are forgiven her, because she loved much' (Luke 7:47). Hence by the same Truth hanging on the cross it is said: 'Amen I say to you, today you shall be with me in paradise' (Luke 23:43). At the end of life, therefore, only those come wholesomely to their senses who both through internal visitation perfectly love good things and hate the evils they had loved. Yet if they cannot grieve sufficiently for the iniquities they have committed, nevertheless even these live in the hour in which they are converted. For those who had the perfection of good will in the confession of sin pass through to life after death by the purgatorial punishment of sin, if they did not at all have sufficient power of love for blotting out their sins. Whence Paul also says: 'So they shall be saved, yet as through fire' (1 Cor. 3:15). But let the sinner who has merited to be saved there through fire fulfill here through the affliction of the flesh what he recognizes is lacking to him in the power of love. (Verse 36.) 'And a cake of bread.' For by the name of bread, the refreshment of earthly delight is sometimes designated. Wherefore the prophet Jeremiah also, recalling the people of corrupted Judea in their worldly appetite, says: 'All her people groan' (Lam. 1:11), 'and seek bread.' The converted sinner therefore twists bread when he torments his past delight through the affliction of repentance. For to twist bread is to afflict the flesh for the delight that was committed. He therefore who desires to pass to salvation without the torment of fire, let him offer a cake of bread with a silver coin, so that he who abandons sins through good will may utterly extinguish them by vigorous affliction of the flesh. For he was offering a silver coin who, having already received the likeness of God, by confessing execrated what he had done, saying: 'My wounds have festered because of my foolishness' (Ps. 38:5). And again: 'I am bowed down and humbled exceedingly.' But he who feared that a silver coin would not suffice for his offering took care to add a cake of bread. For he confesses and says: 'I roared from the groaning of my heart' (Ibid., 9). For roaring suggests the weeping of great sorrow in the affliction of the penitent. Joining this cake of bread to the silver coin, he himself speaks, saying: 'For I will declare my iniquity, and I will think upon my sin' (Ibid., 19). For to think upon one's sin is to set before oneself a fitting affliction of the flesh for past delight. He was therefore twisting bread to be offered, who, while declaring the shameful deeds he had committed, was thinking about how he might blot them out. And because the desire for praise is wont sometimes to creep upon penitents from the austerity of their way of life, the intention of the truly converted sinner is indicated by what is added next: (Verse 36.) 'And let him say: Send me, I beseech you, to one of the priestly portions.' For the priestly portion of each one is the reward of the elect in eternal life. For all His elect are priests of God, because they never cease to offer sacred gifts to Him whom they unceasingly serve through the offering of their ministry. Whence also those rejoicing in the kingdom say: 'You have redeemed us to God in your blood, and have made us a kingdom and priests to our God' (Rev. 5:9, 10). Therefore, for the converted sinner to say: 'Let me go, I beseech you, to one priestly portion', is from the austerity of life and penance to await only a portion of eternal blessedness, so that he may find the security of delight, which he may possess in perpetual enjoyment, and never drag behind him the torments of penance. Wherefore it is also added: (Verse 36.) 'That I may eat a morsel of bread.' For if bread in sacred Scripture is taken to mean delight, a morsel of bread is the unfailing delight of eternal life. Concerning which delight, indeed, it is said through the prophet: 'Joy and gladness shall be found in it, thanksgiving and the voice of praise' (Isa. 51:3). Hence likewise, now looking upon the guests invited to the table not of a cake of bread but of a morsel, he says: 'Everlasting joy shall be upon their heads; they shall obtain joy and exultation' (Isa. 35:10). Hence the Psalmist, speaking in the voice of the corrected penitent, says: 'You have made known to me the ways of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence, delights at your right hand forever' (Ps. 15:10). For the ways of life are the afflictions of penance, by which indeed the sinner is led from the abyss of his damnation to the heavenly homeland, while he is voluntarily tormented for the iniquities he has committed. Whence also, when he indicates that he is a corrected sinner, he presumes to say: 'You are, O Lord, who have restored my inheritance to me' (Ps. 15:5). And likewise trusting, he says: 'For you will not abandon my soul in hell' (Ps. 15:10). For the ways of life become known to the sinner when the afflictions of penance are divinely impressed upon him—when, that is, with enlightened mind he considers what bitterness of life he should set against each pleasure of his past sin. He indeed glories in being filled with joyful gladness in the presence of Almighty God, because he is refreshed by the manifest fullness of divine contemplation; and he who on the left hand of the present life is pierced with compunction for a time through penance, on the right hand of eternal life is satisfied with delights forever. He therefore who offered a cake of bread is brought to the eating of a morsel, because he who for love of the heavenly life crucifies harmful pleasures prepares for himself perpetual refreshment at the banquet of eternal joy. There follows:”

“It will happen, however, that whoever remains in your house, etc. And some daily not only from the priestly, but also from every tribe of Israel, and all at the end of the world the remnants of that nation, so that they may be reconciled to God, come to the church; and, rejecting the flesh of the sacrifices, they offer the word consummating and shortening of the life-giving confession, and the bread of spiritual sacrifice. For indeed silver signifies the word of the confession of faith, and the coin expresses the brevity of the same confession, which is contained in the Creed. And this man of God, who is shown to be a prophet by his office, said: Whoever remains in your house, which is what Isaiah said: The remnant shall be saved. (Rom. XII). And the apostle, recalling the words of Elijah: So therefore, he says, also at this time there is a remnant according to the election of grace that has been saved (Isa. XI).”

“And let him say, Let me go, I pray, to one of the priestly parts. It signifies to the very people, illustrious to Christ the priest; to whom Peter says: But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood (I Pet. II). And as he adds: That I may eat a morsel of bread, he also elegantly expressed the very kind of that sacrifice, concerning which the priest himself says: The bread which I will give is my flesh for the life of the world (John VI). For since he had said above, giving food to the house of Aaron from the sacrifices of the Old Testament, which were the sacrifices of the Jews, therefore he said here: One must ask to eat a morsel of bread, which is the sacrifice of Christians in the New Testament.”