Quod rex propinquis suis perverse agentibus affectu carnali parcere non debeat
Holy Hatred and the Cost of Discipleship
A king must not spare perverse kin out of carnal affection, for Christ commands even loving one's enemies through a holy hatred that breaks carnal desire and truly hates one's own soul.
Because a king, on account of his royal ministry, ought not to spare even those bound to him by whatever ties of kinship, when they act perversely against God, the holy Church, and the commonwealth, out of carnal affection — as the Lord says: Whoever does not hate his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, and even his own soul, cannot be my disciple (Luke 14:26), as blessed Gregory shows in his homily on the Gospel, saying (hom. 36).✦ XIV, 26); in a homily on the Gospel blessed Gregory demonstrates, saying (hom. 36): "If we weigh the force of the precept, we are able to do both through discretion: to hate those who are joined to us by the kinship of the flesh, whom we know as neighbors, and whom we suffer as adversaries in the way of God — by hating and fleeing, we may not know them. For as if through hatred he is loved, the one who, wise in a carnal way, presses evils upon us while he is not heard. But so that the Lord might show that this hatred toward neighbors proceeds not from a lack of affection but from charity, he immediately added, saying, 'and even his own soul.'✦ We are therefore commanded to hate neighbors, and to hate our own soul. It is clear, therefore, that by loving he ought to hate his neighbor who hates him just as he hates himself. For then we truly hate our own soul when we do not yield to its carnal desires, when we break its appetite, when we resist its pleasures.
Loving Persons, Opposing Their Sin
Hatred must be rightly ordered: we love neighbors for their sake but oppose them when they hinder God's way, since carnal affection darkens the mind and must be restrained.
And so, things that are despised are guided toward what is better, as if they are loved through hatred. In this way, then, we ought to show this discretion in hatred toward our neighbors: we love them for what they are, and we hold them in hatred because of the ways they stand against us in God's path.1 . From this discretion in our hatred, then, let us draw the measure for hating our neighbor. Let anyone who is an adversary in this world be loved, but let anyone who is opposed to the way of God not be loved — even a close relative. For whoever now longs for eternal things must, in pursuing the cause he has undertaken for God, become beyond father, beyond mother, beyond wife, beyond children, beyond relatives, beyond himself — so that he may thereby know God more truly, since in that cause he acknowledges no one.✦ It is a great thing, how carnal affections batter the mind's intention and darken its keen sight. Yet these affections wouldn't harm us at all if we held them back by restraining them.
Ordered Love Within the Church
Faithful Christians must love all neighbors yet never stray from God's path, and Chrysostom's figurative reading of Matthew 5:29 shows that the 'right eye' signifies close attachments.
So then, your neighbors are to be loved — love is owed to everyone, to relatives and to strangers alike — yet not in such a way that it bends you away from the love of God, no matter how great that love may be. . This is surely how those who are faithful ought to live within the holy Church: they should show compassion to their neighbors through love, and yet not stray from God's path through that same compassion. From this, Saint John Chrysostom (Homily 17) on the words of the Gospel according to Matthew: If your right eye causes you to stumble, tear it out and throw it away from you (Matt. V, 29): 'If he were speaking about literal members, he would not have said it about only one eye, or specified the right one, but would have spoken of both without distinction. For whoever is scandalized by the right eye will without doubt suffer the same from the left as well. For what reason, then, and why the eye of the right side in particular?
Cutting Off What Leads to Destruction
Christ's command to cut off the offending hand is not about body parts but about severing harmful attachments, and Paul's willingness to be accursed for his kindred shows the same charitable severity.
You should learn from this that the point isn't about body parts, but about those who are joined to us by close ties. And if you were to love someone so much that you regarded him as the apple of your eye, or considered someone so useful to you that you'd count him as your right hand, yet these very people may be a source of harm to your soul — cut them off from yourself, he says, and examine the full force of his words more carefully. He didn't say, withdraw from the company of such people — no, he was pointing to the most radical separation: 'Root it out,' he says, 'and throw it away.' Then, because his command was severe enough, he shows the profit to be gained from that severity in both directions — preserving the application of the word whether it concerns the good or the wicked. It is better for you, he says, that one of your members perish than that your whole body be thrown into hell (Matt.✦ V, 29). Why did Paul wish to be made accursed?✦ (Rom.
Throwing Away What Harmfully Entangles
The Lord says 'throw it away' so that harmful attachments are never taken back, and it is better to lose one member than to perish entirely with all one's attachments.
IX). Not so that you'd gain nothing from it, but so that you might gain others for their salvation. Here, you see, the very same point applies — and understand it even in the case of a brother who is lost. Both are harmful; and so he doesn't say 'just cut it off,' but, he says, 'throw it away from you,' so that you never take it back again, if it persists as it was. For in this way you'll free him from the greater fault, and save yourself from ruin. But so that you might see the benefit of this rule more clearly, let's also look for what was said in the body of the case, if you will. For if you were given a choice, and one of two things were necessary — namely, either to rush into the pit with both eyes and perish there together, or to save the rest of the body without one eye — don't you think you'd prefer the second of the two?✦ But this is clear to everyone beyond any doubt. For this would not be hating the eye, but cherishing the rest of the body.
Priestly Singleness of Heart
Jerome interprets the right eye and hand as affection for kin, and the Levitical priest must not be defiled for family, knowing no affection except for the Lord's worship.
And Saint Jerome, in his Commentary on Matthew, discussing the same words of the Lord — 'If your right eye or hand causes you to stumble, tear it out or cut it off, and throw it away from you' — says: 'By the right eye and the right hand is meant the affection we feel for brothers, wives, children, relatives, and close friends: if we see that these are hindrances to our contemplating the true light, we must cut off such attachments, lest in wanting to gain others for ourselves, we ourselves perish forever.'✦ Hence it is said also of the great priest whose soul is dedicated to the worship of the Lord: He shall not be defiled for his father, or for his mother, or for his sons (Lev. 21:11).✦ That is, he shall know no affection except for the one to whose worship he is dedicated. ”
Read the original Latin
Quod rex propter ministerium regium, etiam nec quibuscunque propinquitatis necessitudinibus, contra Deum, sanctamque Ecclesiam, atque rempublicam perverse agentibus, affectu carnali parcere debeat, ex verbis Domini dicentis: Qui non odit patrem suum, et matrem, et uxorem, et filios, et fratres, et sorores, adhuc autem et animam suam, non potest meus esse discipulus (Luc. XIV, 26), in homilia Evangelii beatus Gregorius demonstrat dicens (hom. 36): « Si vim praecepti perpendimus, utrumque agere per discretionem valemus, ut eos qui nobis carnis cognatione conjuncti sunt, et quos proximos noverimus, et quos adversarios in via Dei patimur, odiendo et fugiendo nesciamus. Quasi enim per odium diligitur, qui carnaliter sapiens dum prava nobis ingerit, non auditur. Ut autem Dominus demonstraret hoc erga proximos odium non de inaffectione procedere, sed de charitate, addidit protinus dicens, adhuc autem animam suam. Odisse itaque praecipimur proximos, odisse et animam nostram. Constat ergo quia amando debet odisse proximum, qui sic eum odit sicut semetipsum. Tunc etenim bene nostram animam odimus, cum ejus carnalibus desideriis non acquiescimus, cum ejus appetitum frangimus, ejus voluptatibus reluctamur.
Quae ergo contempta ad melius ducitur, quasi per odium amatur. Sic sic nimirum exhibere proximis nostris odii discretionem debemus, ut in eis et diligamus quod sunt, et habeamus odio quod in Dei nobis itinere obsistunt (ibid.) . Ab hac ergo discretione odii nostri, trahamus formam ad odium proximi. Ametur quilibet in hoc mundo adversarius, sed in via Dei contrarius non ametur, etiam propinquus. Quisquis enim jam aeterna concupiscit, in ea quam aggreditur causa Dei, extra patrem, extra matrem, extra uxorem, extra filios, extra cognatos, extra semetipsum fieri debet, ut eo verius cognoscat Deum, quo in ejus causa neminem recognoscit. Multum namque est, quod carnales affectus intentionem mentis diverberant, ejusque aciem obscurant. Quos tamen nequaquam noxios patimur, si eos premendo teneamus.
Amandi ergo sunt proximi, impendenda charitas omnibus, et propinquis, et extraneis, nec tamen pro eadem charitate a Dei amore flectendum (ibid.) . Sic nimirum fideles quique esse intra sanctam Ecclesiam debent, ut compatiantur proximis per charitatem, et tamen de via Dei non exorbitent per compassionem. » Hinc sanctus Joannes Chrysostomus (hom. 17) de verbis Evangelii secundum Matthaeum: Si oculus tuus dexter scandalizat te, ejice eum et projice abs te (Matth. V, 29): « Quod si de membris ista loqueretur, nequaquam de uno, vel de dextro id oculo, sed indifferenter de utroque dixisset. Qui enim dextro scandalizatur oculo, haud dubium quin idipsum patiatur etiam de sinistro. Quam igitur ob causam et oculum dextrae partis?
Ut scilicet disceres, non de membris esse sermonem, sed de his potius qui nobis familiaritate junguntur. Et si igitur tantum aliquem diligas, ut eo oculi utaris vice, aut ita tibi quempiam esse utilem putes, ut illum dextrae manus ducas loco, et hi tamen animae tuae fortassis incommodant, etiam istos, inquit, a te abscide: et diligentius vim ipsam sermonis examina. Non enim dixit, a talium societate discede, sed maximam separationem indicans: Erue, inquit, ac projice. Deinde quia satis severa praeceperat, lucrum ex utroque ipsius severitatis ostendit, translationem verbi tam in bonorum quam in malorum etiam parte servando. Expedit enim tibi, inquit, ut pereat unum membrorum tuorum, quam totum corpus tuum mittatur in gehennam (Matth. V, 29). Cur enim Paulus optabat anathema fieri? (Rom.
IX). Non utique ut nihil inde lucri caperet, sed ut alios acquireret in salutem. Hic vero, id ipsum enim, etiam de causa reprobi fratris intellige. Utrique noxius est, et idcirco non ait, erue tantummodo, sed et projice, inquit, abs te, ut eum nunquam recipias ulterius, si qualis fuerat perseverat. Hoc enim modo et illum majore crimine liberabis, et te a perditione salvabis Ut autem manifestius commodum istius legis aspicias, si placet etiam in corpore juxta causam id quod dictum est requiramus. Si enim daretur electio, unumque esset necessarium de duobus, videlilicet aut cum ambobus oculis in foveam ruere atque ibidem deperire, aut absque uno oculo reliquum salvare corpus, putasne e duobus suscipere non malles secundum? At istud omnibus absque ambiguitate perspicuum est. Non enim hoc esset odientis oculum, sed corpus reliquum diligentis.
» Et sanctus Hieronymus in Commentario Matthaei, de eisdem verbis Domini dicentis: Si oculus tuus dexter vel manus scandalizat te, erue vel abscide, et projice abs te: « In dextro, inquit, oculo, et dextera manu, fratrum, et uxorum, et liberorum, atque affinium, et propinquorum monstratur affectus: quos si ad contemplandam veram lucem nobis impedimento cernimus, debemus truncare istiusmodi actiones, ne dum volumus lucri caeteros facere, ipsi in aeternum pereamus. Unde dicitur et de sacerdote magno, cujus anima Domini cultui dedicata est: Supra patre, et matre, et filiis non polluetur (Lev. XXI, 11), id est nullum affectum sciet, nisi ejus cujus cultui dedicatus est. »
Scripture echoes
- ↩Luke.14.26 — If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters — yes, even his own life — he cannot be my disciple.
- ↩Luke.14.26 — If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters — yes, even his own life — he cannot be my disciple.
- ↩Luke.14.26 — If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters — yes, even his own life — he cannot be my disciple.
- ↩Matt.5.29 — If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better that one of your members perish than that your whole body be thrown into Gehenna.
- ↩Rom.9.3 — For I could wish that I myself were accursed, separated from Christ, for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen according to the flesh.
- ↩Matt.5.29 — If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better that one of your members perish than that your whole body be thrown into Gehenna.
- ↩Matt.5.29 — If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better that one of your members perish than that your whole body be thrown into Gehenna.
- ↩Lev.21.11 — And over any dead person he shall not go in; to his father or to his mother he shall not defile himself.
Notes
- 1 ↩Odii discretionem: a 'discrimination of hatred' — we are to distinguish in our hatred, hating in neighbors only what opposes God, not their God-given being.
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