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In illud: Exeuntes pharisaei

On the text, "The Pharisees went out and took counsel."

61.705 As many of you as are disciples of Elijah, who did not despise the poor table of the widow, lodge with us 61.706. For such a modest table of words has been prepared among us, having one bread upon it; not one 61.707 which the mill ground, and hands kneaded, and fire perfected, but one which a virgin field brought forth without plow or seed, and the cross ripened, and the Father perfected, and the twelve baskets of the apostles harvested. This bread Mary indeed bore, but the Church received it, and it is eaten by us each day, and remains unconsumed. Placing this bread for you upon my modest table, I wished to constrain the organ of my tongue with silence; but the treacherous ambush being plotted by the God-fighting Jews against our Savior compels even the stones to speak.

For what did we just hear being read? And the Pharisees went out, it says, and took counsel against Jesus, how they might destroy him. And what is the reason for which they conspire to destroy the Lord? Because on the sabbath day he healed a man, and on a day of rest stretched forth to work a hand that was idle and withered. O the insensibility of the Jews who do not understand that it was necessary for the right hand of Adam in paradise, which touched the tree and was withered by the transgression, to be formed anew by its own potter! or that it was necessary for the right hand, defiled by the devil through the bloodshed for godless idols, to be stretched out again bright toward heaven by its own creator! But they are grieved at the good deed for a man and the salvation of a soul, and they teach the idleness of the sabbath, but are ignorant of the wonder-working of Jesus. For why, O Pharisees, were you not grieved, or did you not plot such things against Manasseh, when he sawed Isaiah in two, when he sacrificed your sons and daughters to demons, and established the houses of God as precincts of idols? why did you not take such counsel against Herod, when he unjustly slaughtered the infants, and made mothers childless? when one could see the infants lying like unripe ears of grain from a single cut of iron, not yet having the kernel of the heart firm, nor yet the beards of their hair grown, but being in the tenderest nourishment of milk, being slain by Herod with the violent fury of hail? when the wailings and lamentations of men and women were heard in the city's broad streets and alleys, there of fathers losing their minds, and of mothers tearing their hair, grievously lamenting over the unjust slaughter of their untimely children? when Bethlehem was reddened with the blood of infants, and the unripened new wine of unripe grape clusters was mixed with the warm tears of the parents? when the faces of fathers were contorted with wailing, and the bowels of mothers were twisted with pains, and the milk-bearing springs of breasts were unseasonably dried up? when in the breasts of mothers the breath, being narrowly constricted, was borne erratically about their nostrils? when the eyes of fathers and mothers imitated springs of water, and cast silvery drops of gushing tears from their cheeks to the ground? when the hair of women was torn out with their own nails by much folly in their tearing, and the tresses which they should have hidden, these they paraded in the drunkenness of their grief?

But thinking the opposite, you also do the opposite; and you release the murderers and those liable to death, but you punish the innocent and the just, of the law

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In illud: Exeuntes pharisaei

Εἰς τὸ, "Ἐξελθόντες οἱ Φαρισαῖοι συμβούλιον ἔλαβον."

61.705 Ὅσοι τοῦ Ἠλία μαθηταὶ τυγχάνετε, τοῦ τὴν πενιχρὰν τράπεζαν τῆς χήρας μὴ

ἐξουθενήσαντος, παρ' ἡμῖν 61.706 αὐλίσθητε. Τοιαύτη γὰρ καὶ παρ' ἡμῖν λόγων μετρία ἡτοίμασται τράπεζα, ἕνα ἄρτον ἔχουσα ἐπ' αὐτῆς· οὐχ 61.707 ὃν ὁ μύλος ἐλέπτυνε, καὶ χεῖρες ἐμάλαξαν καὶ πῦρ ἐτελείωσεν, ἀλλ' ὃν παρθένος ἄρουρα ἄνευ ἀρότρου καὶ σπέρματος ἤνθησε, καὶ σταυρὸς ὡρίμασε, καὶ Πατὴρ ἐτελείωσε, καὶ δώδεκα κόφινοι τῶν ἀποστόλων ἐτρύγησαν. Τοῦτον τὸν ἄρτον Μαρία μὲν ἐγέννησεν, ἡ Ἐκκλησία δὲ ὑπεδέξατο, καὶ καθ' ἑκάστην ἡμέραν ὑφ' ἡμῶν ἐσθίεται, καὶ ἀδαπάνητος μένει. Τοῦτον ὑμῖν τὸν ἄρτον ἐπὶ τῆς μετρίας μου τραπέζης ἐπιθεὶς, ἠβουλόμην τῇ σιωπῇ τὸ τῆς γλώττης μου ὄργανον περισφίγξαι· ἀλλ' ἡ τῶν θεομάχων Ἰουδαίων κατὰ τοῦ Σωτῆρος ἡμῶν ῥαπτομένη ἐπίβουλος ἐνέδρα καὶ τοὺς λίθους λαλεῖν ἀναγκάζει.

Τί γὰρ ἠκούομεν ἀρτίως ἀναγινωσκόμενον; Καὶ ἐξελθόντες, φησὶν, οἱ Φαρισαῖοι, συμβούλιον ἔλαβον κατὰ τοῦ Ἰησοῦ, ὅπως αὐτὸν ἀπολέσωσι. Καὶ τίς ἡ αἰτία, δι' ἣν βουλεύονται ἀπολέσαι τὸν Κύριον; Ὅτι ἐν ἡμέρᾳ σαββάτων ἄνθρωπον ἐθεράπευσε, καὶ τὴν ἀργὴν καὶ ξηρὰν χεῖρα ἐν ἡμέρᾳ ἀργίας πρὸς ἔργον ἐξέτεινεν. Ὢ ἀναισθησία Ἰουδαίων τῶν μὴ νοούντων, ὅτι ἔδει τὴν ἐν τῷ παραδείσῳ δεξιὰν χεῖρα τοῦ Ἀδὰμ, ἁψαμένην τοῦ ξύλου καὶ ξηρανθεῖσαν τῇ παραβάσει, ταύτην πάλιν ὑπὸ τοῦ ἰδίου κεραμέως ἀναπλασθῆναι! ἢ ὅτι ἔδει τὴν ὑπὸ τοῦ διαβόλου διὰ τὴν τῶν ἀθέων εἰδώλων αἱμοχυσίαν δεξιὰν σπιλωθεῖσαν, διὰ τοῦ ἰδίου δημιουργοῦ πάλιν λαμπρὰν πρὸς οὐρανὸν ἐκταθῆναι! Ἀλλὰ λυποῦνται ἐπὶ εὐεργεσίᾳ ἀνθρώπου καὶ σωτηρίᾳ ψυχῆς, καὶ τὴν μὲν ἀργίαν τοῦ σαββάτου ἐκδιδάσκουσι, τὴν δὲ θαυματουργίαν τοῦ Ἰησοῦ ἀγνοοῦσι. ∆ιὰ τί γὰρ, ὦ Φαρισαῖοι, οὐκ ἐλυπήθητε, ἢ τοιαῦτα οὐκ ἐμελετήσατε κατὰ τοῦ Μανασσῆ, ὅτε τὸν Ἡσαΐαν συνέπριζεν, ὅτε τοὺς υἱοὺς ὑμῶν καὶ τὰς θυγατέρας ἐθυσίαζε τοῖς δαιμονίοις, καὶ τοὺς οἴκους τοῦ Θεοῦ τεμένη τῶν εἰδώλων καθίδρυσε; διὰ τί τοιαύτην βουλὴν οὐκ ἠγάγετε κατὰ τοῦ Ἡρώδου, ὅτε τοὺς νηπίους ἀδίκως ἀπέσφαξε, καὶ μητέρας ἠτέκνωσεν; ὅτε ἦν ἰδεῖν δίκην ἀσταχύων ἀώρων τοὺς νηπίους κατακειμένους ἐν μιᾷ τομῇ σιδήρου, μήπω τὸν κόκκον τῆς καρδίας στερεὸν ἔχοντας, μήτε μὴν τοὺς ἀνθέρικας τῶν τριχῶν ἡβήσαντας, ἀλλ' ἐν αὐτῇ τῇ ἁπαλωτάτῃ τοῦ γάλακτος τροφῇ τυγχάνοντας, βιαίῳ θυμῷ χαλάζης ὑπὸ Ἡρώδου φονευομένους; ὅτε οἰμωγαὶ καὶ κοπετοὶ ἀνδρογύνων ἐν ταῖς τῆς πόλεως πλατείαις καὶ ῥύμαις ἠκούοντο, ἐκεῖ πατέρων λυσιφρένων, καὶ μητέρων λυσικόμων δεινῶς ὀλοφυρομένων ἐπὶ τῇ τῶν ἀώρων τέκνων ἀδίκῳ σφαγῇ; ὅτε τοῖς τῶν νηπίων αἵμασιν ἡ Βηθλεὲμ ἐφοινίσσετο, καὶ ἀώρων βοτρύων γλεῦκος ἄωρον τοῖς τῶν γονέων θερμοῖς δάκρυσι συνεκιρνᾶτο; ὅτε ὄψις πατέρων ὀλολυγμῷ διεστρέφετο, καὶ μητέρων σπλάγχνα τοῖς πόνοις εἱλίσσετο, καὶ γαλακτοφόροι πηγαὶ μαστῶν παρὰ καιρὸν ἐξηραίνοντο; ὅτε ἐν τοῖς τῶν μητέρων στέρνοις τὸ πνεῦμα στενοχώρως εἱλούμενον, περὶ τοὺς μυκτῆρας ἀτάκτως ἐφέρετο; ὅτε πατέρων καὶ μητέρων ὀφθαλμοὶ πηγὰς ὑδάτων ἐμιμοῦντο, καὶ ἀργυροχρόους σταγόνας δακρύων καχλαζόντων ἀπὸ παρειῶν ἐπὶ ἔδαφος ἔῤῥιπτον; ὅτε τρίχωμα γυναικῶν τοῖς αὐτῶν ὄνυξιν ὑπὸ πολλῆς ἀνοίας τῷ σπαραγμῷ κατεξαίνετο, καὶ οὓς ἔδει κρύπτειν πλοκάμους, τούτους τῇ μέθῃ τῆς λύπης ἐπόμπευον;

Ἀλλὰ τοὐναντίον φρονοῦντες, τοὐναντίον καὶ ποιεῖτε· καὶ τοὺς μὲν φονεῖς καὶ ὑπευθύνους θανάτου ἀφίετε, τοὺς δὲ ἀθώους καὶ δικαίους κολάζετε, τοῦ νόμου