The Tenth Sunday after Trinity
Athanasius as to touching the Gospel
Tenth Sunday after Trinity
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LET thy merciful ears, O Lord, be open to the prayers of thy humble servants; and, that they may obtain their petitions, make them to ask such things as shall please thee; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
Seige of Jerusalem
1 Corinthians xii. 1 & St. Luke xix. 41
Chapter 40 of the Incarnation of the Word by Athanasius [ca. 400]
So the Jews are trifling, and the time in question, which they refer to the future, is actually
come. For when did prophet and vision cease from Israel, save when Christ came, the Holy of
Holies? For it is a sign, and an important proof, of the coming of the Word of God, that Jerusalem
no longer stands, nor is any prophet raised up nor vision revealed to them,—and that very naturally.
2. For when He that was signified was come, what need was there any longer of any to signify
Him? When the truth was there, what need any more of the shadow? For this was the reason of
their prophesying at all,—namely, till the true Righteousness should come, and He that was to
ransom the sins of all. And this was why Jerusalem stood till then—namely, that there they might
be exercised in the types as a preparation for the reality.
3. So when the Holy of Holies was come,
naturally vision and prophecy were sealed and the kingdom of Jerusalem ceased. For kings were
to be anointed among them only until the Holy of Holies should have been anointed; and Jacob
prophesies that the kingdom of the Jews should be established until Him, as follows:—“The ruler
shall not fail from Juda, nor the Prince from his loins, until that which is laid up for him shall come;
and he is the expectation of the nations.”
4. Whence the Saviour also Himself cried aloud and said:
“The law and the prophets prophesied until John.” If then there is now among the Jews king or
prophet or vision, they do well to deny the Christ that is come. But if there is neither king nor vision,
but from that time forth all prophecy is sealed and the city and temple taken, why are they so
irreligious and so perverse as to see what has happened, and yet to deny Christ, Who has brought
it all to pass? Or why, when they see even heathens deserting their idols, and placing their hope,
through Christ, on the God of Israel, do they deny Christ, Who was born of the root of Jesse after
the flesh and henceforth is King? For if the nations were worshipping some other God, and not
confessing the God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and Moses, then, once more, they would be
doing well in alleging that God had not come.
5. But if the Gentiles are honouring the same God
that gave the law to Moses and made the promise to Abraham, and Whose word the Jews
dishonoured,—why are they ignorant, or rather why do they choose to ignore, that the Lord foretold
by the Scriptures has shone forth upon the world, and appeared to it in bodily form, as the Scripture
said: “The Lord God hath shined upon us;” and again: “He sent His Word and healed them;”
and again: “Not a messenger, not an angel, but the Lord Himself saved them?”
6. Their state may
be compared to that of one out of his right mind, who sees the earth illumined by the sun, but denies
the sun that illumines it. For what more is there for him whom they expect to do, when he is come?
To call the heathen? But they are called already. To make prophecy, and king, and vision to cease?
This too has already come to pass. To expose the godlessness of idolatry? It is already exposed and
condemned. Or to destroy death? He is already destroyed.
7. What then has not come to pass, that
the Christ must do? What is left unfulfilled, that the Jews should now disbelieve with impunity?
For if, I say,—which is just what we actually see,—there is no longer king nor prophet nor Jerusalem
nor sacrifice nor vision among them, but even the whole earth is filled with the knowledge of God,
and Gentiles, leaving their godlessness, are now taking refuge with the God of Abraham, through
the Word, even our Lord Jesus Christ, then it must be plain, even to those who are exceedingly
obstinate, that the Christ is come, and that He has illumined absolutely all with His light, and given
them the true and divine teaching concerning His Father.
8. So one can fairly refute the Jews by
these and by other arguments from the Divine Scriptures.
Finis-End of Chapter 40.
[Read it all at ccel.org]
1 Corinthians xii. 1.
CONCERNING spiritual gifts, brethren, I would not have you ignorant. Ye know that ye were Gentiles, carried away unto these dumb idols, even as ye were led. Wherefore I give you to understand, that no man speaking by the Spirit of God calleth Jesus accursed: and that no man can say that Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy Ghost. Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit. And there are differences of administrations, but the same Lord. And there are diversities of operations, but it is the same God which worketh all in all. But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal. For to one is given by the Spirit the word of wisdom; to another the word of knowledge by the same Spirit; to another faith by the same Spirit; to another the gifts of healing by the same Spirit; to another the working of miracles; to another prophecy; to another discerning of spirits; to another divers kinds of tongues; to an other the interpretation of tongues: but all these worketh that one and the selfsame Spirit, dividing to every man severally as he will.St. Luke xix. 41
AND when he was come near, he beheld the city, and wept over it, saying, If thou hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the things which belong unto thy peace! but now they are hid from thine eyes. For the days shall come upon thee, that thine enemies shall cast a trench about thee, and compass thee round, and keep thee in on every side, and shall lay thee even with the ground, and thy children within thee; and they shall not leave in thee one stone upon another; because thou knewest not the time of thy visitation. And he went into the temple, and began to cast out them that sold therein, and them that bought; saying unto them, It is written, My house is the house of prayer: but ye have made it a den of thieves.Scripture from 1928 Book of Common Prayer
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