VI. O Signor mio, ben fu l'amor tuo forte
The Strength of Divine Love
The speaker reflects on the sacrificial nature of Christ's love, which led Him to the cross to rectify human failings.
O my Lord, how powerful your love was, that it led you to such a cruel death! Who brought you to that cruel wood, with your limbs firmly nailed? Love brought you there, not scorn; your charity brought you.1 Once taken, you had no pity for yourself at all, so long as you set our crooked works straight.2
Contemplating the Wounded Savior
A vivid meditation on the physical suffering of Christ, focusing on His face and the life-giving wound in His side.
When I look at your holy face—beaten and bloody, your eyes veiled; when I see you dead and mocked, your head pierced and unable to rest, your mouth dry—how cruel it is to see you brought to such a fate!✦✦✦ I look upon that wound in your side, which pours out so much blood and water together that the whole world has been refreshed by it, and this seed of yours has grown from it too.✦✦3 O my Lord, peace and kindness seep out from every side to comfort us.4 –5
The Call to Eternal Life
Christ speaks directly to the soul, explaining the purpose of His death and offering the gates of His kingdom.
I have suffered many pains and great torment to save you from eternal pain. So that you might live, I chose to die—and you have been your own murderer. It remains for you to make yourself heavenly: I have opened the gates of my kingdom to you.✦67 –
Read the original Latin
– O Signor mio, ben fu l’ amor tuo forte, Che ti condusse a così crudel morte!
Chi t’ à condotto in su quel crudel legno Con le tuo membra, forte conficcate? E’ t’ à condotto amore e non isdegno, E’ t’ à condotto la tua caritate. Di te preso non ài punto piatate, Pur che dirizzi nostre opere torte.
Quando risguardo in quel tuo santo viso Alla faccia battuta e sanguinosa, Gli occhi velati; e se’ morto e deriso, E la testa forata e non si posa, La bocca asciutta; com’ è cruda cosa A vederti condotto a cotal sorte!
Contemplo quella piaga del costato, Che gitta tanto sangue ed acqua insieme, Che tutto el mondo se n’ è rinfrescato, E cresciuto n’ è pur questo tuo seme. O Signor mio, da tutti e’ lati geme Pace e benignità che ci conforte. –
– Patito ho molte pene e gran martìre Per campar te dalle pene eternale, Perchè tu viva, ho voluto morire, E tu se’ stato di te micidiale: Da te rimane el farti celestiale: Aperto t’ ò del regno mio le porte. –
Scripture echoes
- ↩John.19.2 — And the soldiers, having woven a crown of thorns, placed it on his head, and they clothed him in a purple robe.
- ↩John.19.28 — After this, Jesus, knowing that all things were now accomplished, said, in order that the Scripture might be fulfilled, 'I thirst.'
- ↩Isa.50.6 — I gave my back to those who struck me, and my cheeks to those who pulled out my beard; I did not hide my face from disgrace and spitting.
- ↩John.19.34 — But one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and immediately blood and water came out.
- ↩John.12.24 — Truly, truly, I say to you, unless the grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.
- ↩Rev.21.25 — And its gates will not be shut by day, for there will be no night there.
Notes
- 1 ↩caritate rendered as charity (theological love) to preserve the virtue-term force alongside amore; isdegno as scorn/indignation rather than mere anger.
- 2 ↩Di te preso: 'once taken/seized' (arrest/capture for the Passion). Pur che: purpose/condition—'provided that / so long as.' opere torte: crooked/twisted works (disordered deeds).
- 3 ↩seme: likely the faithful/Church as Christ's spiritual offspring (seed), grown from the side-wound's outpouring; not agricultural seed in a purely literal sense.
- 4 ↩geme: taken as liquid seepage (drip/ooze) from the wounded body, parallel to the blood and water of s1; not 'groan' in this context.
- 5 ↩Speaker-change dash only; next section begins Christ's reply. Preserved as structural dialogue marker, not prose content.
- 6 ↩Italian micidiale with di te: the soul is charged as self-murderous through sin, not as having killed Christ.
- 7 ↩Da te rimane el farti celestiale is elliptical; rendered as the remaining task left to the soul: to cooperate by becoming heavenly/celestial.
Sacred Narratives (Storie Sacre) and Laude of Lucrezia Tornabuoni de' Medici companion
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