10:9–24
CHAPTER 10
Ver. 17.And the seventy returned with joy (great joy, Syriac), saying, Lord, even the devils are subject to us through Thy name. They as much as say, We have not only healed the sick according to Thy word,
ver. 9; but have even cast out devils through the power of Thy name. See, says Theophylact, their humility, for they say through Thy name, not by our own power or virtue. Yet a certain amount of vain glorying seems to have crept in unawares, because Christ had chosen them in preference to others to work such wonders; but their offence was a venial one, such as the Master would soon absolve.
Ver. 18.And He said unto them, I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven. Like lightning.
1. Unexpectedly: because as the lightning bursts forth unexpectedly from a tranquil sky, so were the devils suddenly cast down from heaven.
2. Violently, by the power of Michael and his angels, Rev_13:7.
3. Swiftly, in a moment of time.
4. Openly, in the presence of all the inhabitants of heaven.
Christ took example from the lightning to show how great and swift was the fall of Satan. Euthymius. Many think that Christ here speaks literally of the fall of Satan from heaven, i.e. from the power of which he possessed over the world before the coming of the Saviour.
Ye tell me no new thing, 0 my disciples, for when I sent you forth I saw the devil deprived of power, falling as it were from heaven, and about to be yet more discomfited by your ministry. Christ saith this as if to magnify the power which He had given to the disciples. See how mighty a foe is subject to you through My name. So Nazianzen, S. Basil, and well-nigh all the Fathers.
Hear Theophylact. Some understand by the word heaven the honour and glory which Satan possessed, for before the coming of Christ he was worshipped as a god.
Euthymius also: Before the incarnation Satan was had in honour, and exercised kingly power, but he fell, not from heaven, because he had already fallen from it, but from all his glory and power when Christ was made man. So also Vatablus: When I sent you forth to preach I saw, saith Christ, that the power of Satan would be broken. "For" says S. Cyril, "Satan then fell from the heights of power to the extreme of weakness." He was venerated by men before the coming of Christ. He is now trodden under by the feet of the faithful
Hence it is written, "I give you power to tread upon serpents."
But this allusion to the fall of Satan is mystical and symbolical rather than literal. Literally Christ speaks of Satan's fall from heaven, i.e. of the time when he and his angels were cast into the abyss, because through pride he sought to make himself equal with God, or because, as others think, he endeavoured to hinder the purpose of God in the incarnation of Christ.
Because, therefore, he envied the Divinity of Christ, he was cast out of heaven. The Greek word πεσόντα is in the past tense, and should therefore be translated as in the Arabic, "fallen." The whole passage, therefore, may be rendered thus, "Wonder not, 0 My disciples, that through My name ye have cast out devils; for I long since cast out of heaven Lucifer and his angels, because of their pride and discontent. But beware lest ye give way to pride, because the devils are subject unto you, and lest ye also for this cause incur a like punishment." So S. Jerome, and all the Fathers.*
But very appropriately is Lucifer compared to lightning.
1. Because by the brilliancy of lightning is very aptly shown the pre-eminence and fiery nature of Lucifer.
2. And also his excessive power to do hurt. For as the lightning shatters the hardest rock, so Satan overpowers all opposition.
3. Because of the shortness of his reign. For as the flash is quickly gone, so the dominion of Satan lasts but for this life, which is but as a moment compared with eternity.
Hence, figuratively, lightning, is an emblem of this world's glory. For as it flashes, and is quickly gone, "so passes away the glory of this world."
Furthermore, as the brilliant lightning loses itself in the earth, so Lucifer, a bright angel, became through pride a foul fiend, and thus pride makes the best of men to become devils, whilst humility makes angels of the worst. See Isa. xiv. ii. "Thy pomp is brought down to the grave, the worm is spread under thee, and the worms cover thee."
4. Because of his outward appearance, "for he transforms himself into an angel of light," 2Co_11:14.
The full meaning of this verse is as follows:I, saith Christ, as God saw the fall of Satan when he was cast out from heaven, and in like manner, I now, as the Son of man, see him cast out of the temples in which he was worshipped, because I teach, and in My name ye also teach, the nations to break up their idols and to worship God alone. Hence, as I cast him out of heaven, so now I deprive him of his power over men. "How art thou fallen, 0 Lucifer, son of the morning. How is the light which was in thee become darkness." See Isa_14:12.
Moraliter. S. Bernard, in his sermon, on 1Co_3:12, says, "There is no security in heaven or in paradise, much less in the world. In heaven the angels fell in the very presence of God; in the garden of Eden, Adam; in the world, Judas, a disciple of Christ. I have said this, that no man lull himself into false security because 'a place is holy ground.' For it is not the place which sanctifies the men, but the men who sanctify the place."
Mystically. S. Jerome, Psa_124:8, says, "Many earthly things became heavenly, and many heavenly things earthly." The traitor Judas was offered heaven, but chose earth. The apostle Paul, when persecuting the Church, was the enemy of Christ; but converted, he became meet for the kingdom of heaven. Let him, whose conversation is in heaven, beware of false security; and let not him who yet loves the world, despair of salvation.
Ver. 19.Behold, I give you power to tread on serpents and scorpions. Power ε̉ξουσίαν, i.e. authority. We may take the words literally, for to Adam was given dominion over every living thing. Christ then gives His disciples power over the wild animals as well as over devils. "They shall take up serpents, and if they drink any deadly thing it shall not hurt them." S. Mar_16:17. And so S. Paul shook off the viper which had fastened on his hand, and felt no harm. Act_27:5. Jansenius, Maldonatus, and others.
And over all the power of the enemy, δύναμιν rendered in the Vulgate "virtutem," whether wild animal, or poison, or Satan himself. For by all the power of the enemy we may understand every thing hostile to men.
But mystically, the passage has reference to the devils, who are described as serpents and scorpions, and called the power of the enemy, i.e. the army of Satan. S. Athanasius, Theophylact and others.
Hence Euthymius takes these serpents and scorpions as influencing the senses, or, as Bede says, "representing every kind of unclean spirit." He adds, "There is this difference between serpents which wound with their fangs, and scorpions whose sting is in their tail, that the serpents signify men or spirits raging openly, scorpions signify them plotting in secret. Thus by the serpent which deceived Eve, we must understand the devil in the serpent's form. See Gen iii
Ver. 20.Notwithstanding in this rejoice not, that the spirits are subject unto you. He does not forbid them altogether from rejoicing in that the spirits were subject unto them, for this was a lawful joy, but he exhorts them to rejoice rather at their election to eternal life.
1. Because power over the devils is a grace given to the Church, and sometimes bestowed upon the unworthy, as Judas. S. Mat_7:22. But predestination brings men into favour with God, and ends in everlasting happiness.
2. Because, as Euthymius says, "The one joy is productive of pride and vainglory, but the other of good works, and a desire to please God."
3. Again, because the casting out of devils and the working of miracles is due to the power of God, and is independent of human merit. But they whose names are written in heaven, at some time present or future are made meet for so great a reward. Bede.
4. Lastly, because to cast out devils affects others, but it is for our own profit that our names are written in heaven. Theophylact.
Are written in heaven, "in the book of life," not by pen and ink, says Titus, but by the foreknowledge and election of God. Ye are citizens inscribed on the roll of an eternal city, not after the manner of men, but written down in the remembrances of God. Euthymius. Not, says Bede, because God can forget, but that His purpose may stand fast for ever.
Hence, as the foreknowledge and election of God are twofold, so is the book of life. The one perfect and complete, in which are the names of those who are predestinated to eternal life. The other imperfect and incomplete, because they whose names are written in it may fall away, and forfeit their promised reward. So the Apostle salutes Clement and his fellow-labourers, "whose names are written in the book of life " (Phil iv.) meaning thereby that they, like the Ephesian converts, were called by God and predestinated by Christ to believe on Him, but that their final salvation was conditional on their perseverance and faith. Eph. i. And again, Eph_2:19, "Ye are fellow citizens with the saints, and of the household of God:" by grace here and in the glory hereafter, if ye depart not from the grace which is given you. So the Church in the "Secreta" for Lent prays, that the names of all believers may be retained in the book of God's predestination. These then can forfeit their election, and therefore their salvation is conditional on their perseverance in well doing. For this is the interpretation of Jansenius, Francis Lucas, and others, though Maldonatus doubts whether it be the right one, and Toletus refuses to accept it.
For it is clear from
ver. 18 that Christ did not give the seventy disciples to understand that they were absolutely and unconditionally predestinated to glory, for He would have them mindful of condemnation. As Satan fell from heaven, so take heed lest ye also come short of the glory prepared for you in heaven. So all the apostles were called by Christ, and yet one of them was a reprobate.
"Have I not chosen you twelve, and one of you is a devil?" S. Joh_6:70. And also among the deacons, who were chosen from the seventy was Nicolas, a man of impure life and the author of the heresy of the Nicolaitanes. S. Jerome, Epist. 48.
Hence we must understand the promise of Christ (S. Matt. xix. 28), "Ye which have followed me, shall sit on twelve thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel," to be conditional, i.e. to be fulfilled only if they continued to follow Him to their life's end.
Ver. 21.In that hour Jesus rejoiced in spirit (Spiritu Sancto, Vulgate), because the Holy Spirit had, according to His promise, granted the disciples, though weak and unlearned men, the power of working wonders, and had thus led others to believe in Christ and to glorify God.
And hast revealed them unto babes, i.e. that thou hast revealed to my humble and unlearned disciples the truth, so that they might acknowledge Thee, the one true God, and Me whom Thou hast sent, and might be predestinated to eternal life; and that many others also, whom they have healed of their diseases, and from whom they have cast out devils, might be brought to the knowledge of God, and believe to the salvation of their soul.
Ver. 22.All things are delivered to Me of My Father. As all things were created by My Father, so all things are created anew by Me, and redeemed from the curse of sin. That thus I might raise up those who had fallen away, and might sanctify them, and might renew all the other creatures which had become corrupt through the sin of man.
"For," says S. Athanasius (Serm. iv. contra Arianos), "after the fall of man, all things were made partakers of his transgression. And so death reigned over all from Adam even unto Christ. The earth was given over to the curse, hell was opened, paradise shut, heaven became an enemy, and mankind being corrupted and lost, the devil triumphed over us."
"Then He gave Him a human nature, that the Word Himself might take upon Him our flesh, and might renew in all the nature He had taken.
"All things were delivered unto Him as the physician who could heal the serpent's bite, as the life which could restore the dead, as the light which could illuminate the darkness, as the understanding which could renew the Powers of the mind."
And in explanation, he adds, "After all things were delivered to Him, and he was made man, all things were renewed and made perfect again. The earth received a blessing instead of a curse, paradise was unlocked. Hell drew back from fear, the graves gave up their dead, and the gates were thrown open that He might enter from Eden."
Christ does not speak here of the essence and attributes which were communicated to Him from the Father by His divine generation, as S. Chrysostom, Hilary, and S. Ambrose explain, but of the plenary power which was given to Him as man, to effect the salvation of men.
The Douay leaves the daughters' names half-translated — Dies, Cassia, Cornustibii — and Haydock, who wishes the practice were consistent, gives the Hebrew: Yemima, Ketsiah, Keren-happuch, that is Day, cassia, and horn of antimony. The last is the strangest. Puc names the paint used to blacken the eyelids, or else a precious stone; the Chaldean renders the girl "brilliant as an emerald," Pagnin hears a "horn of change," which Menochius refers to Job's reversed fortunes, and the Septuagint writes "horn of Amalthea" — a horn of plenty, which Nicetas insists is no endorsement of the fable but a way of registering the abundance Job now had. Menochius and Tirinus catch what is most human in the list: a man who had been sitting in his own stench named a daughter after a perfume.
The naming comes after a retraction whose exact content the commentators contest. The text itself is unstable at v. 2, where the Hebrew reads "thou knowest" and the Keri, with all the ancient versions, orders "I know"; Kennicott thinks the unemended reading hardly sense. What Job takes back at v. 6 depends on how much he was wrong about. Du Hamel keeps it narrow: he recalls the obscure expression that led his friends to mistake him. Houbigant keeps it narrower still and argues the stakes: Job accuses himself of no sin and no false assertion, only of not having understood sooner, and since the sacred author never says which statements were untrue, admitting any would ruin his authority wholesale — where God explicitly exculpates his servant a few verses later. On that reading the thing Job now sees is not his guilt but the design: that he was not afflicted but handed over to the enemy, as others of great virtue would be after him, so that their patience might shine the brighter. Calmet notes a corresponding modesty about the vision in v. 5 — Eusebius thought God appeared out of the cloud, but the agreed view is that he only enlightened Job's understanding. Worthington puts the change in one line: having defended the truth against men, Job is now content to suffer, and does penance for himself and for them.
Which is why the fourteen thousand sheep at the end are the most misreadable verse in the book. Taken as the moral, they say that patience is repaid in livestock, and the friends were right after all, only premature. Calmet quietly disturbs that reading elsewhere in the chapter by noting that Job breaks the custom recorded in Numbers and gives his daughters an inheritance among their brothers — a man restored is not a man reverted. The commentators show a similar reluctance to tidy the ending: the length of his life is disputed at 140, 210, 248 and even 740 years, and Haydock argues for the lowest on the plain ground that in the days of Moses men rarely passed 120. Ambrose locates the real victory well before the sheep are counted, in Job's conduct on the dunghill, which condemned satan more thoroughly than anything else could, since satan fell from a far greater favour by pride. The reward is not the point of the ordeal; it is what a man does with the reward. Job spent his on daughters, and named one of them Cassia.