Homilies on the Psalms — Homily 19 — Psalm 77 (LXX; MT 78), Homily II: vv. 9–12 (the sins of the sons of Ephraim)
Greek source: Origen's homilies on the Psalms, preserved in a single manuscript (Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Cod. graec. 314, 12th century), from the reading text of L. Perrone et al. (eds.), Die neuen Psalmenhomilien. Eine kritische Edition des Codex Monacensis Graecus 314, Origenes Werke XIII (GCS NF 19; Berlin, 2015), pp. 367–383. Psalms are numbered as in the Septuagint. This English translation is released into the public domain.On the 77th Psalm, Homily 2
1. It is worth considering why Scripture now draws up the catalogue of sins, and refers the sinning not to the whole people but only to the sons of Ephraim. For it says: "The sons of Ephraim, bending bows, turned back in the day of war; they did not keep the covenant of God", the covenant made with David. Rehoboam, son of Solomon, ruled them rather harshly, so that the sons of Israel sent to him asking for relief. He put off his answer, and first took as counselors the elders and those who had been brought up with him. The elders advised him to relax his harshness toward the people, so that they might remain willingly under Rehoboam's rule; but the younger men, saying what would please the king, advised the opposite. Following their counsel, he answered those who had been sent in this way: "My littleness is thicker than my father's loins. My father disciplined you with whips, but I will discipline you with scorpions". And because of this harshness ten tribes revolted, led by Jeroboam son of Nebat, "who made Israel sin".
And as they revolted they said: "We have no portion in David, nor inheritance in the son of Jesse". Those men, then, did wrong: as far as it lay in them they broke the unity of the people, fell into schism and revolted from Jerusalem. But the cause of this evil was Rehoboam, who ruled the people badly. Yet those acted blessedly who, even though Rehoboam was so harsh, bore with him and remained, because of God's covenant with David. For they did not also say: "We have no portion in David, nor inheritance in the son of Jesse". Therefore they kept the temple and the altar. Moreover, the Levites scattered among the remaining tribes of Israel did not remain in the schism, but came over to the two tribes that were left, in concord with the harsh Rehoboam.
2. These narratives and these words in the readings can benefit our moral character; and if we are able to ascend as well, they will also be able to teach us divine mysteries. First, then, let us see how this narrative benefits moral character. Suppose that some man who is a bishop is rather harsh, as long ago, elsewhere, a father of those subject to him was. If, then, there should ever happen to be such a one, the factious imitate the ten tribes and choose Jeroboam son of Nebat, "who made Israel sin". But the peaceable bear with Rehoboam and endure his severity because of David, because of the lineage, because of the succession, and they wait until divine providence either heals him or arranges what it wills.
You see, then, that the narrative is beneficial according to the letter. And if ever schisms have arisen in churches, some have certainly come about on the pretext of the sins of a Rehoboam. For the schismatics made their schism because they imagined harshness; the schismatics made their schism because they imagined severity. And those who led others away from the church, in leading them away, imitated that Jeroboam. Such sins have been the beginning not only of schisms but also of heresies. But let us, like the tribe of Judah, like the tribe of Benjamin, not depart from the church and not go outside the people, but let us show their long-suffering. For we know that if we conduct ourselves too faint-heartedly, we are in effect saying what those men said then: "We have no portion in David, nor inheritance in the son of Jesse". For he who said "We have no portion in David" once seemed to be speaking about David, that son of Jesse; but now he speaks about Christ, of whom it is written: "I will raise up for them David my servant, who will shepherd them". And of him it is written, of him the prophecy says: "A rod shall come forth from the root of Jesse, and a flower shall come up from the root, and the Spirit of God rests upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding", and what follows.
And just as we are taught not to commit fornication, not to commit adultery and not to steal, and all the other things we are always learning in the churches so that sins may be put away, so let us learn never to say: "We have no portion in David"; let us learn never to be in schism. Suppose two men are set before us: the one who does not hold to the schism seems the greater sinner, and the one who makes the schism seems no sinner. Even so, it is far preferable to be with the greater sinner than with him who, under a semblance of righteousness, sends away and splits the people of God. Do you see, at any rate, that because of Jeroboam Scripture has referred all the sins of the people to the "sons of Ephraim", and because of Jeroboam has called all these sinners sons of Ephraim? And just as we call those who have acted rightly sons of Abraham (for the Savior taught this), so we shall say that those in schisms, those who sin, those who forget the commandments of God and his mighty works, are all Jeroboam and the sons of Ephraim.
3. We might find what is said about Ephraim in many places in the prophecies, but especially in Hosea the prophet. About the rest of his words, as being hard to grasp and not easy for everyone to grasp, it is said: "Who is wise and will understand these things, or prudent and will know them?" And it is not amiss to recall a few of Hosea's prophecies that name Ephraim, so that we may see to what the name Ephraim is applied, especially there. There, then, the Lord says: "When I turn back the captivity of my people, when I heal Israel. And the injustice of Ephraim will be revealed, and the wickedness of Samaria, for they have wrought falsehoods; and a thief will come in to him, a robber stripping in his way, so that they may sing together as those singing in their hearts". What, then, do these words about Ephraim in Hosea mean, so that we may understand in a loftier way than what has been said the words "The sons of Ephraim, bending and shooting bows"? When Jeroboam, who was from the tribe of Ephraim, had led the ten tribes into revolt, he was not content with having made the revolt. Fearing that they might go back to Rehoboam because of the temple and their kinship, he devised out of his own heart feasts other than the feasts of God; he also made two golden heifers and set them up in the inheritance of the ten tribes.
What, then, does Scripture mean by this? That as a rule those who make schisms suffer this from love of rule. Not content with having split off, they wish to introduce some innovation in teaching, so that by overthrowing through innovation what belongs to the church they may hold on to those who have been deceived by a semblance of truth. The feast fashioned out of Jeroboam's heart, then, is a symbol of innovation. For those who innovate and introduce another teaching besides that of the church fashion festivities and feasts for themselves, as it were. And they make golden heifers, as it were: a farming animal, busy about the earth, and golden, since gold is a symbol of mind. For out of their own mind they fashion myths, aeons and syzygies, or different gods (one the God of the Law, another the God of the Gospel), and abortions and transmigrations of souls and various denials, and whatever else they fashion.
Those, then, who at that time revolted from the people and gave heed to the feasts fashioned by Jeroboam are a symbol of those in the heresies who depart from the church. For attend to the letter, and see that the prophecy refers to such people: "When I turn back the captivity of my people, when I heal Israel. And the injustice of Ephraim will be revealed". I mean the injustice of the heresies, when they introduce their teaching and hide it under a semblance of secret doctrines. It lies hidden so long as the true Israel has not been turned back, so long as the souls of those who speak, of those who listen, have not been healed. But when they are healed and learn what is true, then the secret doctrines of the heresies are made manifest as fabrications and as alien to salvation.
4. And this we know from experience. For in our early youth the heresies were in full flower, and those gathered in them seemed to be many. All who were eager for the teachings of Christ but were not well supplied in the church with competent teachers were driven by famine to imitate those who eat human flesh in a famine. Departing from the sound word, they gave heed to words of any kind whatever, and the heretics' schools were thronged. But when the grace of God made more teaching shine forth, the heresies were dissolved day by day, and their supposed secret doctrines are made an example of and are shown to be blasphemies and impious and godless words. Therefore it is said in the prophecy: "When I turn back the captivity of my people, when I heal Israel. And the injustice of Ephraim will be revealed, and the injustice of Samaria".
Samaria, figuratively, was the metropolis of the heresies, the metropolis where Jeroboam son of Nebat dwelt, "who made Israel sin". And to see that the discourse concerns heresies, attend to the words "for they have wrought falsehoods". But what follows makes it still clearer that the words refer to heresies: "and a thief will come in to him". You have it in John, in the Gospel, that those who take up the divine oracles not lawfully, but make bad use of them, are thieves and robbers. For "all", he says, "who came before me are thieves and robbers, and the sheep did not hear them". "And a thief", then, "will come in to him". If you hear in the heresies what the Apostle has said, what the Gospel has said, know that the texts are with them as with thieves. If you recognize your own things in a thief's keeping, you know that a thief has your things, for you held them lawfully. In the same way, if you see the texts among the heretics, hear them, by comparing the words, as being in the hands of thieves.
A thief, then, comes in to Ephraim, according to what was said: "a thief will come in to him", and "a robber stripping" does not come in; but truly it is to the heresies that "a robber stripping" comes in, to clothe himself in the Lord Jesus Christ. By him, who is Christ in semblance but not truly Christ, you are stripped of Christ. For he gives you an antichrist, once he has stripped Christ from you. Or is he not an antichrist who is named Christ but is not with the truth about Christ? And the truth about Christ is this: he was born of a virgin. The antichrist: he was not born at all. The truth about Christ: he had a body like ours, so that he might save us. The antichrist: his body was spiritual. Christ is prophesied by the prophets. The antichrist: no longer. Our Lord Jesus, proclaimed beforehand by the prophets, is again Christ Jesus of the one who created heaven and earth, and not of some higher and good God. "A thief", then, "will come in to him, a robber stripping". Therefore take heed that the robber does not strip you. And if you wish not to be stripped by the robber, do not go down from Jerusalem to Jericho. For if you go out from Jerusalem and go down to Jericho, a robber finds you and strips you.
"A thief", then, "will come in to him, and a robber stripping in his way". Do not be in the robber's way! For in your way there is no robber: "I am the way and the truth and the life". Walk this way, and no robber touches you. For "three things are impossible for me to understand": "the ways of a serpent upon a rock". For the way of a serpent upon a rock cannot be understood: the way of the serpent, the adversary, upon the rock, Christ ("and the rock was Christ"). It is impossible, then, to understand the way of a serpent upon a rock. "Stripping", then, "a robber in his way, so that they may sing together as those singing together in their heart": how unintelligible these words are before they are unlocked! But pray that we may understand them! For this reason "stripping", for this reason a thief also comes in to him: "so that they may sing together as those singing". It is not that they may sing, but that they may imitate those who sing. For they imitate those who hymn God, not hymning him but speaking "injustice on high".
5. But suppose, as someone hearing such explanations might suspect, that we have forced this text in referring it and adapting it to those from the heresies. Then accept a second one as well: "In their hearts they gladdened kings, and in their lies rulers". The sons of Ephraim, he says, "in their hearts gladdened kings". Which kings? Or are they those of whom it is written: "The kings of the earth stood by, and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord and against his Christ"? "And in their lies rulers": in the earlier text "they wrought falsehoods", but here they gladdened "and in their lies rulers". For with their lies they gladden the rulers of this age, whose wisdom is the one being brought to nothing. And just as we grieve the rulers of this age if we champion the truth, so if we lie in our hearts we gladden the kings and, in our own lies, the rulers.
Suppose too that we forced the second text in referring it to those from the heresies; what of the third? Let us hear it: "Ephraim became a cake hidden in the ashes (ἐγκρυφίας), not turned over". Hear the heretics: "Those from the church are children; they are foolish and impious. These are the ones of whom it is written: 'I gave you milk to drink, not solid food'. But with us are the secret and hidden things of God, all that Jesus taught the disciples privately." For this reason, then, it is said: "Ephraim became a cake hidden in the ashes, not turned over". The "cake hidden in the ashes" indicates the promise of the hidden doctrines they have, and "not turned over" stands for "not repenting".
"Strangers devoured his strength, and he did not know it". No stranger eats what belongs to Ephraim; rather, those who are strangers to the truth make use of that bread. But let us pray, hearing him who says: "I am the living bread that came down from heaven; he who eats this bread will live for ever". Let us pray not to eat any bread but the church's bread of truth, which God has given to the saints. In their case it can be said: "My God who nourishes me from my youth".
And in our prayers let us indeed say: "If the Lord God is with me and gives me the bread to eat". For Jacob did not say "Give me bread (ἄρτον) to eat", meaning the bread that all men eat, but the bread that God gives. For God gives Christ, who is bread, as nourishment to those who are worthy, just as he gave it to that Jacob.
6. Let us look at another text about Ephraim too: "And Ephraim was a mindless dove, having no heart; he called upon Egypt, and they went to the Assyrians". The Holy Spirit is a dove that has a mind. But the spirit that corresponds to the antichrist is not holy, though it professes to be holy; it is a mindless dove without a heart. And just as the antichrist speaks the name of Christ without having Christ, so he who does not have the Holy Spirit says "Thus says the Lord" in an evil spirit. He says, then, about the spirit in those people: "And Ephraim was a mindless dove, having no heart".
And what does it call upon? For us, he calls Jerusalem a dove; but "the mindless dove", Ephraim, "called upon Egypt", the nations hostile to the people of God. But God threatens them: for "just as they go, I will cast my net over them and bring them down like the birds of heaven". They may travel through the air and say "Fly!" But one must know that, just as under the law of Moses some birds are clean and others unclean, so too according to the mystical sense the clean birds are the dove of the church and whatever else in the church travels on high. The unclean birds are carrion-eating vultures and whatever is like them, "the high things lifted up against the knowledge of God". It is the unclean birds, at any rate, that God brings down: for "as the birds of heaven I will bring them down, I will discipline them in the hearing of their affliction". God loves mankind, and he wishes to cleanse and discipline those from the heresies too. How many we have who were brought down from the heresies and caught in the nets of Christ! For "I will cast my net over them; as the birds of heaven I will bring them down, I will discipline them in the hearing of their affliction".
Then the word threatens those who are being disciplined: "Woe to them, for they have leapt away from me"; for they have leapt away from the church and from the truth. "They are wretched, for they have acted impiously against me; I redeemed them, but they spoke falsehoods against me". Do you still hesitate to call the heterodox sons of Ephraim? "They spoke falsehoods against me". See, then, what they say: "The Creator is savage, the Creator is inhuman, but there is some other, higher, good God." So they utter slander in all the countless things they say: "but they spoke falsehoods against me". Hear still more about the sons of Ephraim from Hosea: "They devised evil things against me; they turned to nothing". They left what is and went off to what is nothing. For a God above the Creator is nothing; a Christ not prophesied by the prophets is nothing; a Christ not born of a virgin in his coming into this life is nothing. This is "they turned to nothing".
Then see what he threatens against their bishops, and against those very men who spread the heresies abroad: and "their rulers will fall by the sword because of the lack of discipline of their tongue". "They will fall by the sword": what sword? "For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged blade". About the same people he says further: and they became "like an eagle upon the house of the Lord". Just as rapacious eagles come down on flocks to snatch kids or lambs, in the same way those from the heresies come down on the house of the Lord, the church, like eagles wishing to snatch someone. About them, then, he says: "And they transgressed my covenant and acted impiously against my law". You will find nearly all the heretics agreeing in impiety toward the law of Moses and toward the God who gave the law. We could also set forth other texts, but from what you have received you will find countless things about Ephraim when you read Hosea. Still, these have been adequately taken up, because of the verse "The sons of Ephraim, bending and shooting bows, turned back in the day of war".
7. The narrative does not say that those sons of Ephraim of Jeroboam's time were bending and shooting bows. But if you see how the words of the heterodox themselves are "a wounding dart", and understand also what is said in the Psalms, you will see that they have become "sons of Ephraim bending and shooting bows". "Behold, the sinners bent a bow and made ready arrows for the quiver, to shoot in the moonless night"; for in the light they cannot shoot at "the upright in heart".
But they "turned back": when? "In the day of war". Now, the whole day of this age is "in the day of war", for the war in this life is no ordinary one. Above all, in the day of war the things of peace will cease in their souls. For then they turn back and bend and shoot bows.
And "they did not keep the covenant of God". These "sons of Ephraim" alone (for all who give heed to the words outside the church are sons of Ephraim), these too "did not keep the covenant" that is his. Instead they walk outside the old covenant, from which our Lord Jesus Christ is prophesied, as he himself teaches when he says: "If you believed Moses, you would believe me; for he wrote about me". He himself teaches it when he says in the parable of the Gospel: "They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them". And the Gospel has come about according to what was spoken "from the mouth of the holy prophets of God from of old".
"They did not keep", then (the sons of Ephraim, those in schisms, those in heresies), "the covenant of God", "and in his law they would not walk". We walk in the law of God, the true one, not the figurative one. So let the Jews have the figurative law, although they cannot even keep that. Where is the worship? But we have the law ("we know that the law of God is spiritual"), and we walk in the law of God: "for he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, and circumcision is of the heart, in the spirit, not the letter, whose praise is not from men but from God".
"And they forgot his benefits". See whether the words "they forgot his benefits" do not fit the heretics exactly: that we, who are men in the world, who enjoy heaven and earth and see such great spectacles, should speak ill of the Creator and of the world and turn "to nothing", according to what was said in the prophet to those people. We ought instead to look at the things "from the creation of the world understood through the things made", which are clearly seen, to ascend from these and to say: "If these things are so in what is temporary and short-lived, how great must be the things 'which God has prepared for those who love him', the eternal things?" "They forgot", then, "his benefits and his wonders which he showed them". The wonders of God are not only those in the Scriptures, but also these. But through familiarity we no longer wonder at them, since all things are wonders to a reason that resolves to contemplate them.
Or is it not wonderful that every day the sun rises from the eastern regions, travels round so great a heaven in twelve hours, and comes to the west? And how is it not wonderful that the moon in its course at times flees from the sun and at other times runs toward the sun? Its end lies in its conjunction with the sun and its beginning in its departure from the sun, so that the two lights, separated and united, govern the plants and the animals upon the earth. And how is it not wonderful that the sun keeps the lengths of days and nights, and at times makes the days longer, at other times shorter? It makes them shorter at the season when we need more of the night's refreshment, and longer at the season when we are able to enjoy more light (for the light of a summer day is greater). I am not yet speaking of all that concerns the Bear, which he set in heaven so that pilots may travel through the sea, which has no path, no tracks and no road. They look at heaven, and by observing the stars they see where they are, where they have come from, where they must go and how, so that the stars always show them the way. And those skilled in these matters, who have studied most of the positions of the stars well, are able to contemplate them and see that all the works of God are wonders.
I have not yet come down to the earth in my discourse, to examine the wonders here too. A grain of wheat is sown, and within so many months an ear rises up; and so it is with the other seeds. Or is this not wonderful? Suppose we had never seen it, and someone showed us a grain of wheat and said: "Look at this. One day it will rise up and become a hundredfold, become sixtyfold, or thirtyfold." We would not have believed that this one grain could produce so many grains of wheat. Nevertheless God always shows his wonders, so that we may believe concerning the resurrection too, and not think that we are believing in impossible things. If someone says: "How are the dead raised, and with what kind of body do they come?" the Apostle answers him and will say: "Fool, what you sow will not be made alive unless it dies; and what you sow, you do not sow the body that is to be, but a bare grain, perhaps of wheat or of some one of the rest; but God gives it a body as he willed, and to each of the seeds its own body".
But the sons of Ephraim did not keep the "wonders which he did before their fathers". For you will find them saying of the law and the covenant: "'The old things have passed away; behold, new things have come to be'. What have I still to do with Moses?" And I know of someone who once heard Deuteronomy being read in the church and said: "This is a synagogue of the Jews; it is being read as though there were no Gospels!" But that man did not see that the Savior and Lord gave Deuteronomy great commendation. When, then, he wrestled with the devil, did he not say these words from Deuteronomy, namely "You shall worship the Lord your God and him alone shall you serve", and "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds through the mouth of God shall man live"? And he took "You shall not tempt the Lord your God" from Deuteronomy. Since, then, the Savior commends the old things, and the Apostle teaches that the veil is to be removed and that we are to read them with unveiled face, am I going to reject the old things?
I, then, remember "what, before the fathers", he did, "wonders in the land of Egypt, in the plain of Tanis", and I seek to understand Egypt, so that I may see the signs that are always taking place in Egypt. For when does God not rescue the people out of the land of Egypt? When does he not say: "I am the one who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage"? When does he not rescue souls "out of the iron furnace", the furnace of sin, in order to bring them in? He brings them through many exercises, through many wonders, through heavenly bread, through water from the rock ("and the rock is Christ"), to the holy promise in Christ Jesus, to whom belong the glory and the might to the ages of ages. Amen.