Caput XIII
The Frailty of the Daughters of Zion
Odo challenges delicate religious souls who excuse their laxity by citing fragility, pressing them instead toward humility and trust in God's temperate providence.
But let us return to the delicate daughters of Zion, whom in Isaiah, on account of their softness, are called not sons but daughters, and are noted for walking with neck erect and step composed: "What is commanded is hard," they say. "We are fragile — pressed by the incursions of pagans and distressed by many other hardships — and we are by no means strong enough to keep our resolve. But if we are fragile, it is fitting that through this very thing we be humble."✦ For what has earth and ashes to boast of? If they are oppressed, where do their feasts and precious garments come from? Or can a garment, to which God gave its natural color, not ward off the cold unless it is dyed? Or can a man not live without sleeping with a woman? But perhaps someone complains that the heat is unbearable. And where is that promise? He will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you can bear.✦
Jerome on the Habit of Sin and Early Formation
Drawing on Jerome's letter to Demetrias, Odo explains how long habit of sin enslaves the will and argues for early consecration to spiritual discipline before vice takes root.
(1 Cor.✦ 10:13.)✦ Let Saint Jerome answer our excuses in sin. For he says in his letter to Demetrias: For no other cause makes it difficult to see clearly than a long habit of sinning, which holds us so enslaved that it seems to have a certain force of nature. We wonder — since we aren't lazy, since holiness is conferred on us without labor, as if by another — that we who have formed no habit of good should receive it so. For an old evil attacks a new will; whatever you first establish in yourself, that will remain. For this reason it became the custom that boys or girls be devoted to spiritual studies before they could be enticed by the allurements of the world. But alas — what grief!
Accusing God Over Human Frailty
Odo rebukes those who cloak vice in the name of human weakness, thereby accusing the just and merciful God of imposing commands beyond human power.
Now that injustice abounds, the whole thing has been turned on its head: the school of virtues has become an amphitheater of vices. That's where vices are learned most eagerly — in the very place where they should have been unlearned. What are we doing? We dodge and evade, and we throw our natural frailty back in God's face — as if he didn't know what sort of people he made us, and as if, having forgotten our human weakness, he laid commands on us that we simply cannot bear. O blind madness and profane recklessness! In two ways, then, we seem to accuse God. For a just God who gave us the ability to obey cannot command something impossible; nor would a merciful God condemn a person for failing to avoid what that person simply cannot avoid. And how could what he himself declares hold true: My yoke is sweet?✦ (Matthew
A Final Plea for Divine Goodness
Odo concludes by forbidding any attribution of wickedness or cruelty to God, who is both just and merciful.
(Matt. 11:30)✦ So let us not attribute this wickedness to the One who is just, nor cruelty to the One who is merciful.
Read the original Latin
Sed ut ad filias Sion delicatas redeamus, quae in Isaia propter mollitiem non filii, sed filiae nominantur, et erecto collo compositoque gradu incedere notantur: Durum est, inquiunt, quod jubetur, fragiles sumus, qui et paganorum irruptionibus, et multis aliis angustati pressuris, nequaquam valemus servare propositum: sed si fragiles sumus, humiles per hoc esse decet. Nam quid superbit terra et cinis? Si oppressi, comessationes et indumenta pretiosa unde suppetunt? An vestis, cui Deus nativum dedit colorem, non valet frigus arcere nisi tingatur? Aut sine concubitu non potest vivere homo? sed forte intolerabilem quis causatur ardorem. Et ubi est illud? Non patietur vos tentari super id quod potestis?
(I Cor. X, 13.) Respondeat sanctus Hieronymus excusationibus in peccatis. Dicit enim in epistola ad Demetriadem: Neque enim alia causa facit difficultatem bene videndi, quam longa consuetudo peccandi quae nos ita tenet addictos, ut quamdam vim naturae videatur habere. Miramur cum non nobis desidiosis, sine labore, quasi ab alio sanctitas conferatur, qui nullam boni consuetudinem fecimus. Malum namque vetus impugnat voluntatem novam; quidquid primum in te institueris, hoc manebit. Quapropter usus inolevit ut pueri vel puellae spiritalibus studiis manciparentur, priusquam saecularibus blanditiis illicerentur. Sed proh dolor!
iniquitate jam superabundante, res in contrarium versa est: schola virtutum facta est amphitheatrum vitiorum. Ibi vitia discuntur magis, ubi dissuesci debuerant. Quid, quod tergiversamur, et naturae fragilitatem opponimus Deo, quasi nesciat ille quales nos fecit, et oblitus nostrae humanae fragilitatis imposuerit homini mandata quae ferre non possit? O caecam insaniam et profanam temeritatem! Dupliciter quippe Deum videmur incusare. Neque enim justus qui posse dedit, impossibile aliquid imperare potest; neque qui pius est, hominem condemnaret pro his quae vitare non potest. Et quomodo staret quod ipse perhibet: Jugum meum suave est? (Matth.
XI, 30.) Hanc itaque justo iniquitatem, nec pio crudelitatem ascribamus.
Scripture echoes
- ↩Isa.3.16 — And the LORD said, Because the daughters of Zion are haughty and walk with outstretched necks and wanton eyes, walking and mincing as they go, and making a tinkling with their feet,
- ↩1Cor.10.13 — No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to humanity. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear, but with the temptation he will also provide the way out, so that you may be able to endure it.
- ↩1Cor.10.13 — No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to humanity. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear, but with the temptation he will also provide the way out, so that you may be able to endure it.
- ↩1Cor.10.13 — No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to humanity. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear, but with the temptation he will also provide the way out, so that you may be able to endure it.
- ↩Matt.11.30 — For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.
- ↩Matt.11.30 — For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.
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