430
A.D.
Augustine of Hippo
Patristic
A.D. 354–430
“"Let us prevent His face by confession" [Psalm 95:2]. Confession has a double meaning in Scripture. There is a confession of him who praises, there is that of him who groans. The confession of praise pertains to the honour of Him who is praised: the confession of groaning to the repentance of him who confesses. For men confess when they praise God: they confess when they accuse themselves; and the tongue has no more worthy use. Truly, I believe these to be the very vows, of which he speaks in another Psalm: "I will pay You my vows, which I distinguished with my lips." Nothing is more elevated than that distinguishing, nothing is so necessary both to understand and to do. How then do you distinguish the vows which you pay unto God? By praising Him, by accusing yourself; because it is His mercy, to forgive us our sins. For if He chose to deal with us after our deserts, He would find cause only to condemn. "O come," he said therefore, that we may at last go back from our sins, and that He may not cast up with us our accounts for the past; but that as it were a new account may be commenced, all the bonds of our debts having been burnt....The more therefore you despaired of yourself on account of your iniquities, do thou confess your sins; for so much greater is the praise of Him who forgives, as is the fullness of the penitent's confession more abundant. Let us not therefore imagine that we have receded from the song of praise, in understanding here that confession by which we acknowledge our transgressions: this is even a part of the song of praise; for when we confess our sins, we praise the glory of God.”
“"And make a joyful noise unto Him with Psalms." We have already said what it is "to make a joyful noise:" the word is repeated, that it may be confirmed by the act: the very repetition is an exhortation. For we have not forgotten, so as to wish to be again admonished what was said above, that we should make a joyful noise: but usually in passages of strong feeling a well-known word is repeated, not to make it more familiar, but that the very repetition may strengthen the impression made: for it is repeated that we may understand the feeling of the speaker. ...Hear now: "For the Lord is a great God, and a great King above all gods" (ver. 3) "For the Lord will not cast off His people." Praise be unto Him, and shouts of joy be unto Him! What people shall He not cast off? we have no right to make our own explanation here: for the Apostle hath prescribed this unto us, he hath explained whereof it is said. For this was the Jewish people, the people where were the prophets, the people where were the patriarchs, the people begotten according to the flesh from the seed of Abraham; the people in which all the mysteries which promised our Saviour preceded us; the people among whom was instituted the temple, the anointing, the Priest for a figure, that when all these shadows were past, the Light itself might come; this therefore was the people of God; to it were the prophets sent, in it those who were sent were born; to it were delivered and entrusted the revelations of God. What then? is the whole of that people condemned? far be it. It is called the good olive-tree by the Apostle, for it commenced with the patriarchs. ...This then is the tree itself: though some of its boughs have been broken, yet all have not. For if all the boughs were broken, whence is Peter? whence John? whence Thomas? whence Matthew? whence Andrew? whence are all those Apostles? whence that very Apostle Paul who was speaking to us but now, and by his own fruit bearing witness to the good olive? Were not all these of that people? Whence also those five hundred brethren to whom our Lord appeared after His resurrection? Whence were so many thousands at the words of Peter (when the Apostles, filled with the Holy Spirit, spoke with the tongues of all nations) converted with such zeal for the honour of God and their own accusation, that they who first shed the Lord's blood in their rage, learnt how to drink it now that they believed? And all these five thousand were so converted that they sold their own property, and laid the price of it at the Apostles' feet. That which one rich man did not do, when he heard from the Lord's mouth, and sorrowfully departed from Him, this so many thousands of those men by whose hands Christ had been crucified, did on a sudden. In proportion as the wound was deeper in their own hearts, with the greater eagerness did they seek for a physician. Since therefore all these were from thence, the Psalm saith of them, "For the Lord will not cast off His people." ...”