Fragmenda

Scripture

Ezechiel 35–37

Ezechiel 35

The judgment of mount Seir, for their hatred of Israel.

1 

And the word of the Lord came to me, saying:

2 

Son of man, set thy face against mount Seir, and prophesy concerning it, and say to it:

3 

Thus saith the Lord God: Behold I come against thee, mount Seir, and I will stretch forth my hand upon thee, and I will make thee desolate and waste.

4 

I will destroy thy cities, and thou shalt be desolate: and thou shalt know that I am the Lord.

5 

Because thou hast been an everlasting enemy, and hast shut up the children of Israel in the hands of the sword in the time of their affliction, in the time of their last iniquity.

6 

Therefore as I live, saith the Lord God, I will deliver thee up to blood, and blood shall pursue thee: and whereas thou hast hated blood, blood shall pursue thee.

7 

And I will make mount Seir waste and desolate: and I will take away from it him that goeth and him that returneth.

8 

And I will fill his mountains with his men that are slain: in thy hills, and in thy valleys, and in thy torrents they shall fall that are slain with the sword.

9 

I will make thee everlasting desolations, and thy cities shall not be inhabited: and thou shalt know that I am the Lord God.

10 

Because thou hast said: The two nations, and the two lands shall be mine, and I will possess them by inheritance: whereas the Lord was there.

11 

Therefore as I live, saith the Lord God, I will do according to thy wrath, and according to thy envy, which thou hast exercised in hatred to them: and I will be made known by them, when I shall have judged thee.

12 

And thou shalt know that I the Lord have heard all thy reproaches, that thou hast spoken against the mountains of Israel, saying. They are desolate, they are given to us to consume.

13 

And you rose up against me with your mouth, and have derogated from me by your words: I have heard them.

14 

Thus saith the Lord God: When the whole earth shall rejoice, I will make thee a wilderness.

15 

As thou hast rejoiced over the inheritance of the house of Israel, because it was laid waste, so will I do to thee: thou shalt be laid waste, O mount Seir, and all Idumea: and they shall know that I am the Lord.


Ezechiel 36

The restoration of Israel, not for their merits, but by God’s special grace. Christ’s baptism.

1 

And thou son of man, prophesy to the mountains of Israel, and say: Ye mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord:

2 

Thus saith the Lord God: Because the enemy hath said of you: Aha, the everlasting heights are given to us for an inheritance.

3 

Therefore prophesy, and say: Thus saith the Lord God: Because you have been desolate, and trodden under foot on every side, and made an inheritance to the rest of the nations, and are become the subject of the talk, and the reproach of the people:

4 

Therefore, ye mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord God: Thus saith the Lord God to the mountains, and to the hills, to the brooks, and to the valleys, and to desolate places, and ruinous walls, and to the cities that are forsaken, that are spoiled, and derided by the rest of the nations round about.

5 

Therefore thus saith the Lord God: In the fire of my zeal I have spoken of the rest of the nations, and of all Edom, who have taken my land to themselves, for an inheritance with joy, and with all the heart, and with the mind: and have cast it out to lay it waste.

6 

Prophesy therefore concerning the land of Israel, and say to the mountains, and to the hills, to the ridges, and to the valleys: Thus saith the Lord God: Behold I have spoken in my zeal, and in my indignation, because you have borne the shame of the Gentiles.

7 

Therefore thus saith the Lord God: I have lifted up my hand, that the Gentiles who are round about you, shall themselves bear their shame.

8 

But as for you, O mountains of Israel, shoot ye forth your branches, and yield your fruit to my people of Israel: for they are at hand to come.

9 

For lo I am for you, and I will turn to you, and you shall be ploughed and sown.

10 

And I will multiply men upon you, and all the house of Israel: and the cities shall be inhabited, and the ruinous places shall be repaired.

11 

And I will make you abound with men and with beasts: and they shall be multiplied, and increased: and I will settle you as from the beginning, and will give you greater gifts, than you had from the beginning: and you shall know that I am the Lord.

12 

And I will bring men upon you, my people Israel, and they shall possess thee for their inheritance: and thou shalt be their inheritance, and shalt no more henceforth be without them.

13 

Thus saith the Lord God: Because they say of you: Thou art a devourer of men, and one that suffocatest thy nation:

14 

Therefore thou shalt devour men no more nor destroy thy nation any more, saith the Lord God.

15 

Neither will I cause men to hear in thee the shame of the nations any more, nor shalt thou bear the reproach of the people, nor lose thy nation any more, saith the Lord God.

16 

And the word of the Lord came to me, saying:

17 

Son of man, when the house of Israel dwelt in their own land, they defiled it with their ways, and with their doings: their way was before me like the uncleanness of a menstruous woman.

18 

And I poured out my indignation upon them for the blood which they had shed upon the land, and with their idols they defiled it.

19 

And I scattered them among the nations, and they are dispersed through the countries: I have judged them according to their ways, and their devices.

20 

And when they entered among the nations whither they went, they profaned my holy name, when it was said of them: This is the people of the Lord, and they are come forth out of his land.

21 

And I have regarded my own holy name, which the house of Israel hath profaned among the nations to which they went in.

22 

Therefore thou shalt say to the house of Israel: Thus saith the Lord God: It is not for your sake that I will do this, O house of Israel, but for my holy name’s sake, which you have profaned among the nations whither you went.

23 

And I will sanctify my great name, which was profaned among the Gentiles, which you have profaned in the midst of them: that the Gentiles may know that I am the Lord, saith the Lord of hosts, when I shall be sanctified in you before their eyes.

24 

For I will take you from among the Gentiles, and will gather you together out of all the countries, and will bring you into your own land.

25 

And I will pour upon you clean water, and you shall be cleansed from all your filthiness, and I will cleanse you from all your idols.

26 

And I will give you a new heart, and put a new spirit within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and will give you a heart of flesh.

27 

And I will put my spirit in the midst of you: and I will cause you to walk in my commandments, and to keep my judgments, and do them.

28 

And you shall dwell in the land which I gave to your fathers, and you shall be my people, and I will be your God.

29 

And I will save you from all your uncleannesses: and I will call for corn, and will multiply it, and will lay no famine upon you.

30 

And I will multiply the fruit of the tree, and the increase of the field, that you bear no more the reproach of famine among the nations.

31 

And you shall remember your wicked ways, and your doings that were not good: and your iniquities, and your wicked deeds shall displease you.

32 

It is not for your sakes that I will do this, saith the Lord God, be it known to you: be confounded, and ashamed at your own ways, O house of Israel.

33 

Thus saith the Lord God: In the day that I shall cleanse you from all your iniquities, and shall cause the cities to be inhabited, and shall repair the ruinous places,

34 

And the desolate land shall be tilled, which before was waste in the sight of all that passed by,

35 

They shall say: This land that was untilled is become as a garden of pleasure: and the cities that were abandoned, and desolate, and destroyed, are peopled and fenced.

36 

And the nations, that shall be left round about you, shall know that I the Lord have built up what was destroyed, and planted what was desolate, that I the Lord have spoken and done it.

37 

Thus saith the Lord God: Moreover in this shall the house of Israel find me, that I will do it for them: I will multiply them as a flock of men,

38 

As a holy flock, as the flock of Jerusalem in her solemn feasts: so shall the waste cities be full of flocks of men: and they shall know that I am the Lord.


Ezechiel 37

A vision of the resurrection of dry bones, foreshewing the deliverance of the people from their captivity. Juda and Israel shall be all one kingdom under Christ. God’s everlasting covenant with the church.

1 

The hand of the Lord was upon me, and brought me forth in the spirit of the Lord: and set me down in the midst of a plain that was full of bones.

2 

And he led me about through them on every side: now they were very many upon the face of the plain, and they were exceeding dry.

3 

And he said to me: Son of man, dost thou think these bones shall live? And I answered: O Lord God, thou knowest.

4 

And he said to me: Prophesy concerning these bones; and say to them: Ye dry bones, hear the word of the Lord.

5 

Thus saith the Lord God to these bones: Behold, I will send spirit into you, and you shall live.

6 

And I will lay sinews upon you, and will cause flesh to grow over you, and will cover you with skin: and I will give you spirit and you shall live, and you shall know that I am the Lord.

7 

And I prophesied as he had commanded me: and as I prophesied there was a noise, and behold a commotion: and the bones came together, each one, its joint.

8 

And I saw, and behold the sinews, and the flesh came up upon them: and the skin was stretched out over them, but there was no spirit in them.

9 

And he said to me: Prophesy to the spirit, prophesy, O son of man, and say to the spirit: Thus saith the Lord God: Come, spirit, from the four winds, and blow upon these slain, and let them live again.

10 

And I prophesied as he had commanded me: and the spirit came into them, and they lived: and they stood up upon their feet, an exceeding great army.

11 

And he said to me: Son of man: All these bones are the house of Israel: they say: Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost, and we are cut off.

12 

Therefore prophesy, and say to them: Thus saith the Lord God: Behold I will open your graves, and will bring you out of your sepulchres, O my people: and will bring you into the land of Israel.

13 

And you shall know that I am the Lord, when I shall have opened your sepulchres, and shall have brought you out of your graves, O my people:

14 

And shall have put my spirit in you, and you shall live, and I shall make you rest upon your own land: and you shall know that I the Lord have spoken, and done it, saith the Lord God:

15 

And the word of the Lord came to me, saying:

16 

And thou son of man, take thee a stick: and write upon it: Of Juda, and of the children of Israel his associates: and take another stick and write upon it: For Joseph the stick of Ephraim, and for all the house of Israel, and of his associates.

17 

And join them one to the other into one stick, and they shall become one in thy hand.

18 

And when the children of thy people shall speak to thee, saying: Wilt thou not tell us what thou meanest by this?

19 

Say to them: Thus saith the Lord God: Behold, I will take the stick of Joseph, which is in the hand of Ephraim, and the tribes of Israel that are associated with him, and I will put them together with the stick of Juda, and will make them one stick: and they shall be one in his hand.

20 

And the sticks whereon thou hast written, shall be in thy hand, before their eyes.

21 

And thou shalt say to them: Thus saith the Lord God: Behold, I will take the children of Israel from the midst of the nations whither they are gone: and I will gather them on every side, and will bring them to their own land.

22 

And I will make them one nation in the land on the mountains of Israel, and one king shall be king over them all: and they shall no more be two nations, neither shall they be divided any more into two kingdoms.

23 

Nor shall they be defiled any more with their idols, nor with their abominations, nor with all their iniquities: and I will save them out of all the places in which they have sinned, and I will cleanse them: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God.

24 

And my servant David shall be king over them, and they shall have one shepherd: they shall walk in my judgments, and shall keep my commandments, and shall do them.

25 

And they shall dwell in the land which I gave to my servant Jacob, wherein your fathers dwelt, and they shall dwell in it, they and their children, and their children’s children, for ever: and David my servant shall be their prince for ever.

26 

And I will make a covenant of peace with them, it shall be an everlasting covenant with them: and I will establish them, and will multiply them, and will set my sanctuary in the midst of them for ever.

27 

And my tabernacle shall be with them: and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.

28 

And the nations shall know that I am the Lord the sanctifier of Israel, when my sanctuary shall be in the midst of them for ever.

Catechism

Catechism of the Council of Trent, Part 3, Introduction, Sections 4-5

The Commandments Were Proclaimed With Great Solemnity

If the pastor explain the circumstances which accompanied the promulgation of the Law, as recorded in Scripture, the faithful will easily understand with what piety and humility they should receive and reverence the Law received from God.

All were commanded by God that for three days before the promulgation of the Law they should wash their garments and abstain from conjugal intercourse, in order that they might be more holy and better prepared to receive the Law, and that on the third day they should be in readiness When they had reached the mountain from which the Lord was to deliver the Law by Moses, Moses alone was commanded to ascend the mountain. Thither came God with great majesty, filling the place with thunder and lightning, with fire and dense clouds, and began to speak to Moses, and delivered to him the Commandments

In this the divine wisdom had solely for object to admonish us that the law of the Lord should be received with pure and humble minds, and that over the neglect of His commands impend the heaviest chastisements of the divine justice.

The Observance Of The Commandments Is Not Difficult

The pastor should also teach that the Commandments of God are not difficult, as these words of St Augustine are alone sufficient to show: How, I ask, is it said to be impossible for man to love ­­ to love, I say, a beneficent Creator, a most loving Father, and also, in the persons of his , brethren to love his own flesh? Yet, "he who loveth has fulfilled the law." Hence the Apostle St. John expressly says that the commandments of God are not heavy; for as St. Bernard observes, nothing more just could be exacted from man, nothing that could confer on him a more exalted dignity, nothing more advantageous. Hence St. Augustine, filled with admiration of God's infinite goodness, thus addresses God : What is man that Thou wouldst be loved by him ? And if he loves Thee not, Thou threatenest t him with heavy punishment. Is it not punishment enough that I love Thee not ?

But should anyone plead human infirmity to excuse himself for not loving God, it should be explained that He who demands our love pours into our hearts by the Holy Ghost the fervour of His love; and this good Spirit our heavenly Father gives to those that ask him with reason, therefore, did St. Augustine pray: Give what thou commandest and command what thou pleasest. As, then, God is ever ready to help us, especially since the death of Christ the Lord, by which the prince of this world was cast out, there is no reason why anyone should be disheartened by the difficulty of the undertaking. To him who loves, nothing is difficult.