Awe

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

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• From Buddenbrooks: The Decline of a Family (1901)

  and Bach himself, my God, he was accused of lack of euphony and clarity!... You speak of morality... but what do you understand you under morality in art? If I'm not mistaken, is it the antithesis of all hedonism? Well, there you have it. As good as Bach. Greater, more conscious, deeper than with Bach. Believe me, Pfühl, this music is less alien to your innermost being than you think!” "Juggle tricks and sophisms - pardon me," grumbled Mr. Pfühl. But she was right: this music was basically less alien to him than he initially believed. He was never completely reconciled with Tristan, although he finally fulfilled Gerda's request to set Liebestod for violin and pianoforte with great skill. It was certain parts of »Meistersinger« for which he first found a word or two of recognition ... and now his love for this art began to stir in him, growing irresistibly. He did not confess it, he was almost frightened and denied it with grumbling. But his partner no longer had to press him, so that, if the old masters had their right, he would complicate his grips and, with that expression of shameful and almost angry happiness in his eyes, into the life and weaving of the leitmotifs. After the game, however, a discussion about the relationship between this artistic style and that of the strict typesetting might arise, and one day Mr. Pfühl declared that, although the subject did not affect him personally, he now felt it was his duty to unify his book on church style Add appendix "on the use of the old keys in Richard Wagner's church and folk music". Hanno sat very still, small hands clasped around his knees and, as was his habit, rubbing his tongue on a molar, which made his mouth twist a little. He watched his mother and Mr. Pfühl with wide, unblinking eyes. He listened to their playing and to their conversations, and so it happened that after the first steps he had taken on his path in life, he became aware of music as an extraordinarily serious, important and profound thing. Here and there he hardly understood a word of what was being said, and what was heard usually went far beyond his childlike understanding. If he kept coming back, hour after hour, and not getting bored, he stood motionless in his place, it was faith, love, and reverence that enabled him to do so. He was only seven years old when he began trying to repeat certain combinations of sounds that had impressed him on his own hand on the grand piano. His mother watched him with a smile, improved the fingerings he had collected with silent zeal and instructed him why this particular note should not be missing so that the other chord could result from this. And his hearing confirmed what she told him. After Gerda Buddenbrook had let him have his way a little, she decided that he should have piano lessons.

• From The Principles of Psychology (Volume 1 of 2) (1890)

  Just so the world of each of us, howsoever different our several views of it may be, all lay embedded in the primordial chaos of sensations, which gave the mere matter to the thought of all of us indifferently. We may, if we like, by our reasonings unwind things back to that black and jointless continuity of space and moving clouds of swarming atoms which science calls the only real world. But all the while the world we feel and live in will be that which our ancestors and we, by slowly cumulative strokes of choice, have extricated out of this, like sculptors, by simply rejecting certain portions of the given stuff. Other sculptors, other statues from the same stone! Other minds, other worlds from the same monotonous and inexpressive chaos! My world is but one in a million alike embedded, alike real to those who may abstract them. How different must be the worlds in the consciousness of ant, cuttle-fish, or crab! But in my mind and your mind the rejected portions and the selected portions of the original world-stuff are to a great extent the same. The human race as a whole largely agrees as to what it shall notice and name, and what not. And among the noticed parts we select in much the same way for accentuation and preference or subordination and dislike. There is, however, one entirely extraordinary case in which no two men ever are known to choose alike. One great splitting of the whole universe into two halves is made by each of us; and for each of us almost all of the interest attaches to one of the halves; but we all draw the line of division between them in a different place. When I say that we all call the two halves by the same names, and that those names are 'me ' and 'not -me ' respectively, it will at once be seen what I mean. The altogether unique kind of interest which each human mind feels in those parts of creation which it can call me or mine may be a moral riddle, but it is a fundamental psychological fact. No mind can take the same interest in his neighbor's me as in his own. The neighbor's me falls together with all the rest of things in one foreign mass, against which his own me stands out in startling relief. Even the trodden worm, as Lotze somewhere says, contrasts his own suffering self with the whole remaining universe, though he have no clear conception either of himself or of what the universe may be. He is for me a mere part of the world; for him it is I who am the mere part. Each of us dichotomizes the Kosmos in a different place. Descending now to finer work than this first general sketch, let us in the next chapter try to trace the psychology of this fact of self-consciousness to which we have thus once more been led.

• From Blue Like Jazz (2003)

  “But after a while they stop sliding, and they get around in a big circle and start making noises. And what they are doing is looking for a mate. It’s crazy. It’s like a penguin nightclub or something—like a disco. They waddle around on the dance floor till they find a mate.” “Then what?” Tony asked, sort of laughing. “Penguin sex,” I said. “Penguin sex?” “Yes. Penguin sex. Right there on television. I felt like I was watching animal porn.” “What was it like?” he asked. “Less than exciting,” I told him. “Sort of a letdown.” “So what does penguins having sex have to do with belief in God?” Tony asked. “Well, I am getting to that. But let me tell you what else they do. First, the females lay eggs. They do that standing up. The eggs fall down between their legs, which are about an inch or something long, and the females rest the eggs on their feet. Then, the males go over to the females and the females give the males the eggs. Then, and this is the cool part, the females leave. They travel for days back to the ocean and jump in and go fishing.” “The females just take off and leave the men with the eggs?” Tony asked. “Yes. The males take care of the eggs. They sit on them. They have this little pocket between their legs where the egg goes. They gather around in an enormous circle to keep each other warm. The penguins on the inside of the circle very slowly move to the outside, and then back to the inside. They do this to take turns on the outside of the circle because it is really cold. They do this for an entire month.” “A month!” “Yes. The males sit out there on the eggs for a month. They don’t even eat. They just watch the eggs. Then the females come back, and right when they do, almost to the day, the eggs are hatched. The females somehow know, even though they have never had babies before, the exact day to go back to the males. And that is how baby penguins are made.” “Very interesting.” Tony clapped for me. “So what is the analogy here?” “I don’t know, really. It’s just that I identified with them. I know it sounds crazy, but as I watched I felt like I was one of those penguins. They have this radar inside them that told them when and where to go and none of it made any sense, but they show up on the very day their babies are being born, and the radar always turns out to be right. I have a radar inside me that says to believe in Jesus. Somehow, penguin radar leads them perfectly well. Maybe it isn’t so foolish that I follow the radar that is inside of me.” Tony smiled at my answer. He lifted his glass of beer. “Here’s to penguins,” he said.

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  BEDE. (ubi sup.) He then whose preaching, as Moses foretold, every soul that wished to be saved should hear when He came in the flesh, He now come in the flesh is proclaimed by God the Father to the disciples as the one whom they were to hear. There follows, And suddenly, when they had looked round about, they saw no man any more, save Jesus only with themselves; for as soon as the Son was proclaimed, at once the servants disappeared, lest the voice of the Father should seem to have been sent forth to them. THEOPHYLACT. Again mystically; after the end of this world, which was made in six days, Jesus will take us up (if we be His disciples) into an high mountain, that is, into heaven, where we shall see His exceeding glory. BEDE. (ubi sup.) And by the garments of the Lord are meant His saints, who will shine with a new whiteness. By the fuller we must understand Him, to whom the Psalmist says, (Ps. 51) Wash me throughly from my wickedness, and cleanse me from my sin; for He cannot give to His faithful ones upon earth that glory which remains laid up for them in heaven. REMIGIUS. Or else, by the fuller are meant holy preachers and purifiers of the soul, none of whom in this life can so live as not to be stained with some spots of sin; but in the coming resurrection all the saints shall be purged from every stain of sin. Therefore the Lord will make them such as neither they themselves by taking vengeance on their own members, nor any preacher by his example and doctrine, can make. CHRYSOSTOM. Or else, white garments are the writings of Evangelists and Apostles, the like to which no interpreter can frame. ORIGEN. (in Matt. tom. xii. 39) Or else, fullers upon earth may by a moral interpretation be considered to be the wise of this world, who are thought to adorn even their foul understandings and doctrines with a false whitening drawn from their own minds. But their skill as fullers cannot produce any thing like a discourse which shews forth the brightness of spiritual conceptions in the unpolished words of Scripture, which by many are despised. BEDE. (ubi. sup.) Moses and Elias, of whom one, as we read, died, the other was carried away to heaven, signify the coming glory of all the Saints, that is, of all who in the judgment-time are either to be found alive in the flesh, or to be raised up from that death of which they tasted, and who are all equally to reign with Him.

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  CHRYSOSTOM. As He had above described in what guise Antichrist should come, so here He describes how He Himself shall come. For as the lightning needeth none to herald or announce it, but is in an instant of time visible throughout the whole world, even to those that are sitting in their chambers, so the coming of Christ shall be seen every where at once, because of the brightness of His glory. Another sign He adds of His coming, Wheresoever the body is, thither will the eagles be gathered together. The eagles denote the company of the Angels, Martyrs, and Saints. JEROME. By an instance from nature, which we daily see, we are instructed in a sacrament of Christ. Eagles and vultures are said to scent dead bodies even beyond sea, and to flock to feed upon them. If then birds, not having the gift of reason, by instinct alone find out where lays a dead body, separated by so great space of country, how much more ought the whole multitude of believers to hasten to Christ, whose lightning goeth forth out of the east, and shines even to the west? We may understand by the carcase here, or corpse1, which in the Latin is more expressively ‘cadaver,’ an allusion to the passion of Christ’s death. HILARY. That we might not be ignorant of the place in which He should come, He adds this, Wheresoever the carcase, &c. He calls the Saints eagles, from the spiritual flight of their bodies, and shews that their gathering shall be to the place of His passion, the Angels guiding them thither; and rightly should we look for His coming in glory there, where He wrought for us eternal glory by the suffering of His bodily humiliation. ORIGEN. And observe, He says not vultures or crows, but eagles, shewing the lordliness and royalty of all who have believed in the Lord’s passion. JEROME. They are called eagles whose youth is renewed as the eagle’s, and who take to themselves wings that they may come to Christ’s passion. (Ps. 103:5. Is. 40:31.) GREGORY. (Mor. xxxi. 53.) We may understand this, Wheresoever the carcase is, as meaning, I who incarnate sit on the throne of heaven, as soon as I shall have loosed the souls of the elect from the flesh, will exalt them to heavenly places. JEROME. Or otherwise; This may be understood of the false prophets. At the time of the Jewish captivity, there were many leaders who declared themselves to be Christs, (Joseph B.J. v. 1) so that while the Romans were actually besieging them, there were three factions within. But it is better taken as we expounded it above, of the end of the world. Thirdly, it may be understood of the warfare of the heretics against the Church, and of those Antichrists, who under pretext of false science, fight against Christ.

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  3. About the union of God and man Jeremias uses very strong words, saying that God has glued to Himself the whole house of Israel; that is, He has joined inseparably to Himself the whole nature of man, soul, body, and blood. As man has soul and flesh and blood, the Son of God, in being incarnate for his salvation, assumed the soul and body and blood of man to Himself, and so united them to Himself and so glorified them that they are truly called the Soul and Flesh and Blood of God. The Blood of Jesus, therefore, being the Blood of God, is so precious that one drop has more power than the whole world. (2) The next thing about the Precious Blood is the reason for paying so great a price for the redemption of men; and this is threefold: 1, the necessity of paying so great a debt; 2, the proof of great love; 3, the recovery of the great good that had been lost. 1. The first reason for paying so great a price for man, that is, the Precious Blood of God, was the necessity of paying this great debt. The first man bound himself with the chain of a great debt; for he was bound to make satisfaction to God for himself and the whole human race, because he had robbed and slain by eating the forbidden fruit, and so justly might have been cast with all his offspring into hell, till by a sufficient victim he should pay what was owed. For it is just that satisfaction should be made according to the greatness of the sin and the dignity of the offended majesty; and this is seen by three steps: a, for a less fault, there is less satisfaction needed; b, for a greater fault, a greater satisfaction; c, for the greatest fault, the greatest satisfaction. Hence, in the law for the breaking of some commandments, it was decreed that some kind of animal should be offered or slain, and its blood poured forth; whereas for a greater sin, or for manslaughter itself, the man who did it had to be slain and his blood poured forth. Hence, because of so many manslaughters of our first parent, who slew all men—for in him all die—and for the majesty of our most High Maker, which was hurt by this, it follows that there must be offered to God and slain, and its blood poured forth, a victim so precious, that at least it should be equal to all who were slain. Now, as such a one could not be found among creatures, it was needful for paying so great a debt and freeing man from the prison of hell that one better than every creature, that is, the Son of God Himself, should become man, and be slain, and pour forth His Blood.

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  AMBROSE. Or, when you read all things, you acknowledge the Almighty, not the Son lower than the Father; when you read delivered, you confess the Son, to whom by the nature of one substance all things rightly belong, not conferred as a gift by grace. CYRIL OF ALEXANDRIA. Now having said that all things were given Him by His Father, He rises to His own glory and excellence, shewing that in nothing He is surpassed by His Father. Hence He adds, And no one knoweth who the Son is but the Father, &c. For the mind of the creatures is not able to comprehend the manner of the Divine substance, which passes all understanding, and His glory transcends our highest contemplations. By Itself only is known what the Divine nature is. Therefore the Father, by that which He is, knoweth the Son; the Son, by that which He is, knoweth the Father, no difference intervening as regards the Divine nature. And in another place. For that God is, we believe, but what He is by nature, is incomprehensible. But if the Son was created, how could He alone know the Father, or how could He be known only by the Father. For to know the Divine nature is impossible to any creature, but to know each created thing what it is, does not surpass every understanding, though it is far beyond our senses. ATHANASIUS. (Orat. 1. cont. Arian.) But though our Lord says this, it is plain that the Arians object to Him, saying, that the Father is not seen by the Son. But their folly is manifest, as if the Word did not know Itself which reveals to all men the knowledge of the Father and Itself; for it follows, And to whomsoever the Son will reveal him. TITUS BOSTRENSIS. Now a revelation is the communication of knowledge in proportion to each man’s nature and capacity; and when indeed the nature is congenial, there is knowledge without teaching; but here the instruction is by revelation.

• From Love & Sex: A Christian Guide to Healthy Intimacy (2018)

  Have you ever wondered why your sexuality is important or if it has a purpose? God designed us as sexual creatures with a purpose in mind. He meant it for good: as a way to know Him more fully. Our sexuality is a window into our Creator; He loves passionately, He designed us to be His beloved bride, and He wanted a way for humans to reproduce and to express their love for the one they have committed their lives to in a unique and special way. God wanted married love to have a sexual expression, which separates it from all other love. He designed our bodies with hormones and a sexual nervous system with sexual body parts. He decided to give men a body part to fit within the female body and a female organ that has the capacity to not only give birth to another human being but to receive a man with pleasure. Attraction, sexual urges, and desire are all part of our wiring. When you really think about how our bodies fit together and are drawn toward one another, it is some sort of miracle. Only God could have come up with this master plan. We learn of God’s wondrous story in Genesis 2: God formed man out of dirt from the ground and blew into his nostrils the breath of life. The man came alive—a living soul! Then God planted a garden in Eden, in the east He put the Man he had just made in it. God made all kinds of trees grow from the ground, trees beautiful to look at and good to eat. The Tree-of-Life was in the middle of the garden, also the Tree-of-Knowledge-of-Good- and-Evil (Gen. 2:7–9). God took the Man and set him down in the Garden of Eden to work the ground and keep it in order. God commanded the Man, “You can eat from any tree in the garden, except from the Tree-of-Knowledge-of-Good-and-Evil. Don’t eat from it. The moment you eat from that tree, you’re dead” (Gen. 2:15–17). God said, “It’s not good for the Man to be alone; I’ll make him a helper, a companion” (Gen. 2:18). In other texts it says God will make him a helpmeet, God uses this term several times to describe a woman and many more times to describe Himself. God calls Himself our HelpMeet. This shows the female is not less than male, but equal to and different from the male. So God formed from the dirt of the ground all the animals of the field and all the birds of the air. He brought them to Man to see what he would name them. (God empowered Man to influence, name, create and act.) Whatever the Man called each living creature, that was its name. The Man named the cattle, named the birds of the air, named the wild animals; but he didn’t find a suitable companion (Gen. 2:19–20).

• From New Testament Words (1964)

  And it is used of the way in which the people looked at Moses when he came down from the mount, or rather of the way in which it was impossible for them to look at him because of the divine glory that shone from him (II Cor. 3.7, 13). It can, therefore, be seen that this word atenizein expresses a look of astonishment and amazement, a look of scrutiny ending in recognition, a look of wonder, a look of expectation and hope, and a look of sheer, piercing authority. Now the interesting thing is that when we come to the writings of Clement of Rome, who wrote towards the very end of the first Christian century, and who was the first of the apostolic fathers and one of the great leaders of the Church, we find that he does not use apoblepein or aphoran, but that he is notably fond of this word atenizein. We find that he uses it in three notable connections. (i) First of all in his first letter to the Corinthians, chapter 36, he urges the Christian to gaze steadfastly (atenizein) at the heights of the heavens. In a tempting and a hostile world the Christian’s gaze must be fixed on heaven. (ii) Second, he uses it of God. In the same letter in chapter 19, he says, ‘Let us fix our gaze (atenizein) on the Father and Creator of the whole universe.’ God must be the object of the Christian’s thought and contemplation. (iii) Third, he uses it of Jesus Christ. In the same letter in chapter 7, he says, ‘Let us fix our gaze (atenizein) upon the blood of Christ, and let us know how costly it is to his Father, because it was poured out for our salvation.’ The Christian must fix his eyes upon the wounded and the crucified Christ. The word is different from apoblepein and aphoran, but the thought is precisely the same. In a word where it was hard to be a Christian, a world where the tainting pollutions sought to infect the Christians on every side, a world where Christians had already died terribly for their faith, the one thing necessary was the steadfast gaze upon heaven and God and Jesus Christ. That alone could enable a Christian man to remain a Christian—and it is still so. ARRABŌN THE FORETASTE OF WHAT IS TO COME The word arrabōn has one of the most human and interesting backgrounds of all NT words. It is used only by Paul, and it was a favourite word of his because he uses it three times, always in the same connexion. In II Cor. 1.22 he says that God has given us the arrabōn of the Holy Spirit in our hearts. In II Cor. 5.5 he again talks about the arrabōn of the Holy Spirit. And in Eph. 1.14 he speaks about the Holy Spirit being the arrabōn of our inheritance.

• From New Testament Words (1964)

  Eumenides means The Gracious Ones, and the Greeks called the Erinyes, the Furies, by that name in order to please them and to avert their wrath. There the chorus of the avengers says: ‘No wrath from us creeps up on him who has clean hands, but unharmed he passes the age of his life; but whosoever sins, as this man has done, and seeks to hide the hands in murder dipped, to him we appear, true witnesses to the dead, come as the avengers of blood, avengers who cannot fail in their task’ (Aeschylus, The Eumenides 313-320). There is all the majesty of the divine in this word semnos, and it is the word which describes the characteristic quality of the Christian. But these words have still other and illuminating uses. (i) They are words which have to do with royalty and with kingliness. Herodotus tells how the Egyptians disapproved of the lax and drunken conduct of their king, and how they said: ‘We would have you sit aloft upon a throne of pride’ (Herodotus, 2.173). Euripides speaks of a ‘proud despot’ (The Suppliant Women 384). Plato uses semnos to describe the ‘most important and influential men in our cities’ (Plato, Phcedrus 257d). Aristophanes in his skit The Ecclesiazusce, in which the women take over the government and wipe out social distinctions, says, as Rogers translates it into English verse: ‘By the side of the beauty so stately and grand The dwarf, the deformed and the ugly shall stand.’ Xenophon uses the word semnotes to describe the magnificence of the appearance of Cyrus, the Persian king, as he drove forth in state. Semnos and semnotēs have in them all the majesty of kingship and of royalty. (ii) They are words which are very commonly used to express that which is stately and dignified in language and in expression. Aristotle says that the metre of poetry which was called the heroic metre is semnos, dignified (Aristotle, Rhetoric 1408b 35). Plato speaks of stately and wonderful tragic poetry (Plato, Gorgias 502b). Pindar speaks of untruths which are dressed in great language, and says, ‘His falsehoods through winged artifice wear a flower of dignity’ (Pindar, Nem. 7.22). Herodotus speaks of using high language in the presence of a king (Herodotus, 7.6). When Aristotle is discussing literary style, he writes: ‘The merit of diction is to be clear without being common-place. The clearest diction is that made up of ordinary words, but it is commonplace.... That which employs unfamiliar words is dignified, semnos and outside the common usage’ (Aristotle, Poetics 1458a 21).

• From New Testament Words (1964)

  AIŌNIOS THE WORD OF ETERNITY We do well to search out the true meaning of the word aiōnios, for in the NT this is the word which is usually translated eternal or everlasting, and it is applied to the eternal life and the eternal glory, which are the Christian’s highest reward, and to the eternal judgment and the eternal punishment, which must be the Christian’s greatest dread. Even in classical and in secular Greek aiōnios is a strange word, with a sense of mystery in it. Itself it is an adjective formed from the noun aiōn. In classical Greek this word aiōn has three main meanings. (i) It means a life-time. Herodotus can speak of ending our aiōn (Herodotus, 1.32); Aeschylus, of depriving a man of his aiōn (Aeschylus, Prometheus 862); and Euripides of breathing away one’s aiōn (Euripides, fragment 801). (ii) Then it comes to mean an age, a generation, or an epoch. So the Greeks could speak of this present aiōn, and of the aiōn which is to come, this present age and the age which is to come. (iii) But then the word comes to mean a very long space of time. The prepositional phrase ap’aiōnos means from of old; and di’aiōnos means perpetually and for ever. It is just here that the first mystery begins to enter in. In the papyri we read how at a public meeting the crowd shout ‘The Emperor eis ton aiōna, The Emperor for ever.’ The adjective aiōnios becomes in Hellenistic Greek times the standing adjective to describe the Emperor’s power. The royal power of Rome is a power which is to last for ever. And so, as Milligan well puts it, the word aiōnios comes to describe ‘a state wherein the horizon is not in view’. Aiōnios becomes the word of far distances, the word of eternities, the word which transcends time. But it was Plato who took this word aiōnios—he may even have coined it—and gave it its special mysterious meaning. To put it briefly, for Plato aiōnios is the word of eternity in contrast with time. Plato uses it, as it has been said, ‘to denote that which has neither beginning nor end, and that is subject to neither change nor decay, that which is above time, but of which time is a moving image’. Plato does not mean by this word simply indefinite continuance—this is a point to which we must later return —but that which is above and beyond time.

• From New Testament Words (1964)

  From all this there emerges a wonderful picture of the way in which the true Christian looks at the blessedness of God and the wonder of Jesus Christ. He looks with an utter fixity of concentration; he looks with wondering amazement; he looks as one who looks to a champion and a saviour; he looks as one who looks at the master plan and pattern of life; he looks as a loved one looks with adoration at his lover; he looks as a man looks at his familiar friend; he looks as a man looks to God when God has become for him the only reality in the world. Aphoran and apoblepein describe the look of the soul which is ‘lost in wonder, love and praise’. There is another NT word which implies a fixity of gaze. It is the word atenizein, which means ‘to gaze intently at’. It is a favourite word of Luke. It occurs fourteen times in the NT; of these fourteen instances two are in II Cor. (3.7, 13), two are in the Gospel according to St Luke, and the remaining ten are in Acts. It is used of the people in the Synagogue of Nazareth gazing with intent bewilderment at Jesus (Luke 4.20). It is used of the close scrutiny of the servant in the courtyard of the High Priest’s house when Peter was recognized (Luke 22.56). It is used of the disciples gazing after Jesus when the ascension had taken place (Acts 1.10). It is used of Peter’s and John’s gaze at the lame man at the Temple gate (Acts 3.4), and of the astonished gaze of the people at them after the miracle had taken place (Acts 3.12). It is used of the Sanhedrin gazing at Stephen as he spoke with eloquence and debated with power (Acts 6.15) and of Stephen’s own gaze up into heaven as he died beneath the stones of the mob (Acts 7.55). It is used of Peter’s astonished gaze at the angel who warned him of the coming of Cornelius (Acts 10.4), and of his gaze at the vision of the creatures on the sheet (Acts 11.6). It is used of Paul’s penetrating look at Elymas, the hostile sorcerer (Acts 13.9). It is used of the look of dawning hope in the eyes of the lame man at Lystra (Acts 14.9). It is used of Paul’s piercing look at the Sanhedrin (Acts 23.1). And it is used of the way in which the people looked at Moses when he came down from the mount, or rather of the way in which it was impossible for them to look at him because of the divine glory that shone from him (II Cor. 3.7, 13).

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  ORIGEN. Therefore shall they see with the bodily eyes the Son of Man, coming in human shape, in the clouds of heaven, that is, on high. As at the transfiguration, a voice came out of the cloud, so when He shall come again transformed into His glorious appearance, it shall be not on one cloud, but upon many, which shall be His chariot. And if when the Son of God went up to Jerusalem, they who loved Him spread their garments in the way, not willing that even the ass that carried Him should tread upon the earth; what wonder, if the Father and God of all should spread the clouds of heaven under the body of the Son, when He comes to the work of the consummation? And one may say, that as in the creation of man, God took clay from the earth and made man; so to manifest the glory of Christ, the Lord taking of the heaven, and of its substance, gave it a body of a bright cloud in the Transfiguration, and of bright clouds at the Consummation; wherefore it is here said, in the clouds of heaven, as it was there said, of the clay of the ground. (Gen. 2:7.) And it behoves the Father to give all such admirable gifts to the Son, because He humbled Himself; and He has also exalted Him, not only spiritually, but bodily, that He should come upon such clouds; and perhaps upon rational clouds, that even the chariot of the glorified Son of Man should not be irrational. At the first, Jesus came with that power with which He wrought signs and wonders in the people; yet was that power little in comparison of that great power with which He shall come in the end; for that was the power of one emptying Himself of power. And also, it is fitting that He should be transformed into greater glory than at the transfiguration on the mount; for then He was transfigured for the sake of three only, but in the consummation of the whole world, He shall appear in great glory, that all may see Him in glory.

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  CHRYSOSTOM. (in Matt. Hom. 67) How is it that He was hungry in the morning, as Matthew says, if it were not that by an economy He permitted it to His flesh? There follows, And seeing a fig tree afar off having leaves, he came, if haply he might find any thing thereon. Now it is evident that this expresses a conjecture of the disciples, who thought that it was for this reason that Christ came to the fig tree, and that it was cursed, because He found no fruit upon it. For it goes on: And when he came to it, he found nothing but leaves; for the time of figs was not yet. And Jesus answered and said unto it, No man eat fruit of thee hereafter for ever. He therefore curses the fig tree for His disciples sake, that they might have faith in Him. For He every where distributed blessings, and punished no one, yet at the same time, it was right to give them a proof of His chastising power, that they might learn that He could even cause the persecuting Jews to wither away; He was however unwilling to give this proof on men, wherefore He shewed them on a plant a sign of His power of punishing. This proves that He came to the fig tree principally for this reason, and not on account of His hunger, for who is so silly as to suppose that in the morning He felt so greatly the pains of hunger, or what prevented the Lord from eating before He left Bethany? Nor can it be said that the sight of the figs excited His appetite to hunger, for it was not the season of figs; and if He were hungry, why did He not seek food elsewhere, rather than from a fig-tree which could not yield fruit before its time? What punishment also did a fig tree deserve for not having fruit before its time? From all this then we may infer, that He wished to shew His power, that their minds might not be broken by His Passion. THEOPHYLACT. Wishing to shew His disciples that if He chose He could in a moment exterminate those who were about to crucify Him. In a mystical sense, however, the Lord entered into the temple, but came out of it again, to shew that He left it desolate, and open to the spoiler. BEDE. (ubi sup.) Farther, He looks round about upon the hearts of all, and when in those who opposed the truth, He found no place to lay His head, He retires to the faithful, and takes up His abode with those who obey Him. For Bethany means the house of obedience. PSEUDO-JEROME. He went in the morning to the Jews, and visits us in the eventide of the world.

• From Blue Like Jazz (2003)

  I love this because by being true I am allowing people to get to know the real me, and it feels better to have people love the real me than the me I invented. [image "9780785263708_0150_004" file=Image00049.jpg] So one of the things I had to do after God provided a church for me was to let go of any bad attitude I had against the other churches I’d gone to. In the end, I was just different, you know. It wasn’t that they were bad, they just didn’t do it for me. I read through the book of Ephesians four times one night in Eugene Peterson’s The Message, and it seemed to me that Paul did not want Christians to fight with one another. He seemed to care a great deal about this, so, in my mind, I had to tell my heart to love the people at the churches I used to go to, the people who were different from me. This was entirely freeing because when I told my heart to do this, my heart did it, and now I think very fondly of those wacko Republican fundamentalists, and I know that they love me, too, and I know that we will eat together, we will break bread together in heaven, and we will love each other so purely it will hurt because we are a family in Christ. So here is a step-by-step formula for how you, too, can go to church without getting angry: [image "Bullet" file=Image00050.jpg] Pray that God will show you a church filled with people who share your interests and values. [image "Bullet" file=Image00050.jpg] Go to the church God shows you. [image "Bullet" file=Image00050.jpg] Don’t hold grudges against any other churches. God loves those churches almost as much as He loves yours.13 Romance Meeting Girls Is Easy MY FRIEND KURT USED TO SAY FINDING A WIFE IS a percentage game. He said you have to have two or three relationships going at once, never letting the one girl know about the others, always “moving in to close the deal.” One of them, he said, is bound to work out, and if you lose one, you just pick up another. Kurt believed you had to date about twenty girls before you found the one you were going to marry. He just believed it was easier to date them all at once. Kurt ended up marrying a girl from Dallas, and everybody says he married her for her money. He is very happy. Elsewhere in the quandary is my friend Josh. When I first moved to Oregon I was befriended by this vibrant kid who read a lot of the Bible. Josh was good-looking and obsessed with dating, philosophies of dating, social rituals, and that sort of thing. He was homeschooled and raised to believe traditional dating was a bad idea. I traveled with him around the country and introduced him at seminars he would conduct on the pitfalls of dating.

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  HILARY. (ii. de Trin. c. 15) Thou wilt say, that a word is the sound of the voice, the enunciation of a thing, the expression of a thought: this Word was in the beginning with God, because the utterance of thought is eternal, when He who thinketh is eternal. But how was that in the beginning, which exists no time either before, or after, I doubt even whether in time at all? For speech is neither in existence before one speaks, nor after; in the very act of speaking it vanishes; for by the time a speech is ended, that from which it began does not exist. But even if the first sentence, in the beginning was the Word, was through thy inattention lost upon thee, why disputest thou about the next; and the Word was with God? Didst thou hear it said, “In God,” so that thou shouldest understand this Word to be only the expression of hidden thoughts? Or did John say with by mistake, and was not aware of the distinction between being in, and being with, when he said, that what was in the beginning, was not in God, but with God? Hear then the nature and name of the Word; and the Word was God. No more then of the sound of the voice, of the expression of the thought. The Word here is a Substance, not a sound; a Nature, not an expression; God, not a nonentity. HILARY. (vii. de Trin. c. 9, 10, 11.) But the title is absolute, and free from the offence of an extraneous subject. To Moses it is said, I have given1 thee for a god to Pharaoh: (Exod. 7:1) but is not the reason for the name added, when it is said, to Pharaoh? Moses is given for a god to Pharaoh, when he is feared, when he is entreated, when he punishes, when he heals. And it is one thing to be given for a God, another thing to be God. I remember too another application of the name in the Psalms, I have said, ye are gods. (Ps. 82) But there too it is implied that the title was but bestowed; and the introduction of, I said, makes it rather the phrase of the Speaker, than the name of the thing. But when I hear the Word was God, I not only hear the Word said to be, but perceive It proved to be, God. BASIL. (Hom. i. in princ. Joan. c. 4) Thus cutting off the cavils of blasphemers, and those who ask what the Word is, he replies, and the Word was God. THEOPHYLACT. Or combine it thus. From the Word being with God, it follows plainly that there are two Persons. But these two are of one Nature; and therefore it proceeds, In the Word was God: to shew that Father and Son are of One Nature, being of One Godhead.

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  THE SEVENTH THING TO BE CHIEFLY NOTED ABOUT THE SACRAMENT OF THE BODY OF JESUS IS THE PRECIOUS BLOOD XXVII About the consideration of the Blood of Jesus in three ways; and here about the first way, as that Blood was shed on the CrossOUR Lord ever calls us to His life-giving banquet, in which He has made ready for us very precious meat and drink, that is, His own Body and Blood. We have already meditated on the Body of Jesus; we now go on to meditate on His Blood. We can do this in three ways: A, as that Blood is shed on the Cross for the salvation of all; B, as it is drunk by the faithful in the Holy Sacrament; C, as it is drunk spiritually apart from the Sacrament by the saved. The first way is considered in this Meditation and the next; the second way in the Twenty-ninth and Thirtieth Meditations; the third way in the last Meditation but one. In the first way it is commended to us by its preciousness beyond all price; in the second way by its manifold usefulness; in the third way by its spiritual sweetness. As to the first way it is ever to be kept in mind; in the second way it is ever to be adored; in the third way it is ever to be desired. Now we consider it as commended to us by its priceless worth. A. About this preciousness four things have to be noted: (1) the proof of its pricelessness; (2) the reason for paying so great a price; (3) the greatness of the power of this Blood; (4) the countless gathering of those that are redeemed by it. The first two points we consider in this Meditation, and the other two in the next Meditation. (1) There is the proof of the pricelessness of this Blood. This is shown in three ways: 1, by its virginal origin; 2, by the great worth of its innocence; 3, by its union with God. 1. The fruit of the vine, that is, of the Blessed Virgin, is grapes and wine, that is, the Body and Blood of Jesus. The wine of honour, therefore, born of the flower of the vine, is the Precious Blood of Jesus, drawn from a virginal source. Greatly indeed does it show us the worth and preciousness of the Blood of Jesus, that it took its beginning not as other blood from corruption, but from a virginal flower. 2. The more innocent that Blood is, the dearer it is and more precious. St. Peter contrasts the worthlessness of silver and gold with the preciousness of the Blood of Jesus, the sinless Lamb of God.

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  PSEUDO-JEROME. But they looked from afar off for Him, whom though near they cannot see, as Isaac from the blindness of his eyes does not know Jacob who was under his hands, but prophesies long before things which were to come to him. It goes on, Jesus said, I am; namely, that they might be inexcusable. THEOPHYLACT. For He knew that they would not believe, nevertheless He answered them, lest they should afterwards say, If we had heard any thing from Him, we would have believed on Him; but this is their condemnation, that they heard and did not believe. AUGUSTINE. (de Con. iii. 6) Matthew, however, does not say that Jesus answered I am, but, Thou hast said. But Mark shews, that the words I am were equivalent to Thou hast said. There follows, And ye shall see the Son of Man silting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven. (Matt. 26:64) THEOPHYLACT. As if He had said, Ye shall see Me as the Son of Man sitting on the right hand of the Father, for He here calls the Father power. He will not however come without a body, but as He appeared to those who crucified Him, so will He appear in the judgment. BEDE. (ubi sup.) If therefore to thee, O Jew, O Pagan, and heretic, the contempt, weakness, and cross in Christ are a subject of scorn, see how by this the Son of Man is to sit at the right hand of the Father, and to come in His majesty on the clouds of heaven. PSEUDO-JEROME. The High Priest indeed asks the Son of God, but Jesus in His answer speaks of the Son of Man, that we may by this understand that the Son of God is also the Son of Man; and let us not make a quaternityx in the Trinity, but let man be in God and God in man. And He said, Sitting on the right hand of power, that is, reigning in life everlasting, and in the Divine power. He says, And coming with the clouds of heaven. He ascended in a cloud, He will come with a cloud; that is, He ascended in that body alone, which He took of the Virgin, and He will come to judgment with the whole Church, which is His body and His fulness. LEO. (Serm. 5. de Pass.) But Caiaphas, to increase the odiousness of what they had heard rent his clothes, and without knowing what his frantic action meant, by his madness, deprived himself of the honour of the priesthood, forgetting that command, by which it is said of the High Priest, He shall not uncover his head or rend his clothes. For there follows: Then the High Priest rent his clothes, and saith, What need we any further witnesses? Ye have heard the blasphemy: what think ye?

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  THAT THERE IS NO LIGHTMINDEDNESS IN ASSENTING TO TRUTHS OF FAITH, ALTHOUGH THEY ARE ABOVE REASONTHE Divine Wisdom, that knows all things most fully, has deigned to reveal these her secrets to men, and in proof of them has displayed works beyond the competence of all natural powers, in the wonderful cure of diseases, in the raising of the dead, and what is more wonderful still, in such inspiration of human minds as that simple and ignorant persons, filled with the gift of the Holy Ghost, have gained in an instant the height of wisdom and eloquence. By force of the aforesaid proof, without violence of arms, without promise of pleasures, and, most wonderful thing of all, in the midst of the violence of persecutors, a countless multitude, not only of the uneducated but of the wisest men, flocked to the Christian faith, wherein doctrines are preached that transcend all human understanding, pleasures of sense are restrained, and a contempt is taught of all worldly possessions. That mortal minds should assent to such teaching is the greatest of miracles, and a manifest work of divine inspiration leading men to despise the visible and desire only invisible goods. Nor did this happen suddenly nor by chance, but by a divine disposition, as is manifest from the fact that God foretold by many oracles of His prophets that He intended to do this. The books of those prophets are still venerated amongst us, as bearing testimony to our faith. This argument is touched upon in the text: Which (salvation) having begun to be uttered by the Lord, was confirmed by them that heard him even unto us, God joining in the testimony by signs and portents and various distributions of the Holy Spirit (Heb. ii, 3, 4). This so wonderful conversion of the world to the Christian faith is so certain a sign of past miracles, that they need no further reiteration, since they appear evidently in their effects. It would be more wonderful than all other miracles, if without miraculous signs the world had been induced by simple and low-born men to believe truths so arduous, to do works so difficult, to hope for reward so high. And yet even in our times God ceases not through His saints to work miracles for the confirmation of the faith. CHAPTER VII THAT THE TRUTH OF REASON IS NOT CONTRARY TO THE TRUTH OF CHRISTIAN FAITHTHE natural dictates of reason must certainly be quite true: it is impossible to think of their being otherwise. Nor a gain is it permissible to believe that the tenets of faith are false, being so evidently confirmed by God. Since therefore falsehood alone is contrary to truth, it is impossible for the truth of faith to be contrary to principles known by natural reason.

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  GREGORY OF NYSSA. When Christ commanded to let down the nets, the multitude of the fishes taken was just as great as the Lord of the sea and land willed. For the voice of the Word is the voice of power, at whose bidding at the beginning of the world light and the other creatures came forth. At these things Peter wonders, for he was astonished, and all that were with him, &c. AUGUSTINE. (de con. Ev. lib. ii. 17.) He does not mention Andrew by name, who however is thought to have been in that ship, according to the accounts of Matthew and Mark. It follows, And Jesus said unto Simon, Fear not. AMBROSE. Say thou also, Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord, that God may answer, Fear not. Confess thy sin, and the Lord will pardon thee. See how good the Lord is, who gives so much to men, that they have the power of making alive. As it follows, From henceforth thou shalt catch men. BEDE. This especially belongs to Peter himself, for the Lord explains to him what this taking of fish means; that in fact as now he takes fishes by the net, so hereafter he will catch men by words. And the whole order of this event shews what is daily going on in the Church, of which Peter is the type. CHRYSOSTOM. (Hom. 14. in Matt.) But mark their faith and obedience. For though they were eagerly engaged in the employment of fishing, yet when they heard the command of Jesus, they delayed not, but forsook all and followed Him. Such is the obedience which Christ demands of us; we must not forego it, even though some great necessity urges us. Hence it follows, And having brought their ships to land.