Chapter X.

36. But the distinction among these seven petitions is to be considered and commended. For inasmuch as our temporal life is being spent now, and that which is eternal hoped for, and inasmuch as eternal things are superior in point of dignity, albeit it is only when we have done with temporal things that we pass to the other; although the three first petitions begin to be answered in this life, which is being spent in the present world (for both the hallowing of God’s name begins to be carried on just with the coming of the lord of humility; and the coming of His kingdom, to which He will come in splendour, will be manifested, not after the end of the world, but in the end of the world; and the perfect doing of His will in earth as in heaven, whether you understand by heaven and earth the righteous and sinners, or spirit and flesh, or the Lord and the Church, or all these things together, will be brought to completion just with the perfecting of our blessedness, and therefore at the close of the world), yet all three will remain to eternity. For both the hallowing of God’s name will go on for ever, and there is no end of His kingdom, and eternal life is promised to our perfected blessedness. Hence those three things will remain consummated and thoroughly completed in that life which is promised us.

37. But the other four things which we ask seem to me to belong to this temporal life.333    “With all their care, they had not understood the true spirit of the law” (Schaff). The rest of the Sermon is largely a comment on this verse, Christ giving His interpretation of the law, and the righteousness following upon its observance; showing that the purport goes beyond the external act of obedience to the purpose of the heart, and that in the external act of obedience the real purport might be ignored.    Or, as he expresses it in another place (Sermon lvii. 7), “to this life of our pilgrimage” (“ista vita peregrinationis nostræ”). And the first of them is, “Give us this day our daily bread.” For whether by this same thing which is called daily bread be meant spiritual bread, or that which is visible in the sacrament or in this sustenance of ours, it belongs to the present time, which He has called “to-day,” not because spiritual food is not everlasting, but because that which is called daily food in the Scriptures is represented to the soul either by the sound of the expression or by temporal signs of any kind: things all of which will certainly no more have existence when all shall be taught of God,334    Sine causa. The weight of critical evidence is against this clause, which is omitted by Tischendorf, Westcott, and Hort, the Vulgate and the Revised Version.    Isa. liv. 13; John vi. 45. and thus shall no longer be making known to others by movement of their bodies, but drinking in each one for himself by the purity of his mind the ineffable light of truth itself. For perhaps for this reason also it is called bread, not drink, because bread is converted into aliment by breaking and masticating it, just as the Scriptures feed the soul by being opened up and made the subject of discourse; but drink, when prepared, passes as it is into the body: so that at present the truth is bread, when it is called daily bread; but then it will be drink, when there will be no need of the labour of discussing and discoursing, as it were of breaking and masticating, but merely of drinking unmingled and transparent truth. And sins are at present forgiven us, and at present we forgive them; which is the second petition of these four that remain: but then there will be no pardon of sins, because there will be no sins. And temptations molest this temporal life; but they will have no existence when these words shall be fully realized, “Thou shall hide them in the secret of Thy presence.”335    The “judgment” (κρίσις) was the local court of seven, which every community was enjoined to have (Deut. xvi. 18). The “council” was the Sanhedrin, consisting of seventy-two members, sitting in Jerusalem. The “gehenna” was the vale of Hinnom, on the confines of Jerusalem, where sacrifices were offered to Moloch, and which became the place for refuse and the burning of dead bodies. In the New Testament it is equivalent to “hell.”    Ps. xxxi. 20. And the evil from which we wish to be delivered, and the deliverance from evil itself, belong certainly to this life, which as being mortal we have deserved at the hand of God’s justice, and from which we are delivered by His mercy.

CAPUT X.---36. Sed harum septem petitionum consideranda et commendanda distinctio est. Nam cum vita nostra temporaliter nunc agatur, atque speretur aeterna, et cum aeterna priora sint dignitate, quamvis temporalibus prius actis ad illa transeatur; trium primarum petitionum impetrationes quanquam in hac vita, quae isto saeculo agitur, exordium capiant (nam et sanctificatio nominis Dei ab ipso humilitatis Domini adventu agi coepit; et adventus regni ejus, quo in claritate venturus est, non jam finito saeculo, sed in fine saeculi manifestabitur; et perfectio voluntatis ejus, sicut in coelo et in terra, sive justos et peccatores coelum et terram intelligas, sive spiritum et carnem, sive Dominum et Ecclesiam, sive omnia simul, ipsa perfectione nostrae beatitudinis, et ideo saeculi terminatione complebitur), tamen omnia tria in aeternum manebunt. Nam et sanctificatio nominis Dei sempiterna erit, et regni ejus nullus est finis, et perfectae nostrae beatitudini aeterna vita promittitur. Permanebunt ergo ista tria consummata atque cumulata in illa vita quae nobis promittitur.

37. Reliqua vero quatuor quae petimus, ad temporalem istam vitam pertinere mihi videntur. Quorum primum est, Panem nostrum quotidianum da nobis hodie. Hoc ipso enim quod dictus est quotidianus panis, sive spiritualis significetur, sive in Sacramento aut in victu isto visibilis, ad hoc tempus pertinet, quod appellavit hodie: non quia spiritualis cibus non est sempiternus; sed quia iste qui quotidianus dictus est in Scripturis, sive in strepitu sermonis, sive quibusque temporalibus signis exhibetur animae: quae omnia tunc utique non erunt, cum omnes erunt docibiles Deo (Isai. LIV, 13; Joan. VI, 45), et ipsam ineffabilem lucem veritatis non motu corporum significantes, sed puritate mentis haurientes. Nam fortasse et propterea panis dictus est, non potus, quia panis frangendo atque mandendo, in alimentum convertitur, sicut Scripturae aperiendo et disserendo animam pascunt; potus vero paratus, sicuti est, transit in corpus: ut isto tempore panis sit veritas, cum quotidianus panis dicitur; tunc autem potus, cum nullo labore disputandi et sermocinandi, quasi frangendi atque mandendi, opus erit, sed solo haustu sincerae et perspicuae 1286 veritatis. Et peccata nunc nobis dimittuntur, et nunc dimittimus; quae harum quatuor reliquarum secunda petitio est: tunc autem nulla erit venia peccatorum, quia nulla peccata. Et tentationes temporalem istam vitam infestant; non autem erunt, cum perfectum erit quod dictum est, Abscondes eos in abscondito vultus tui (Psal. XXX, 21). Et malum, a quo liberari optamus, et ipsa liberatio a malo ad hanc utique vitam pertinet, quam et justitia Dei mortalem meruimus, et unde ipsius misericordia liberamur.