Augustine, Sermones 364-375 (Classis V, Sermones dubii)

CLASS V. DOUBTFUL SERMONS. Among them, those which seemed less to resemble Augustine are presented in smaller type.

SERMON CCCLXIV. On Samson. Judges, chapters XIII–XVI.

1. Samson's strength from the Spirit of God. Samson had his strength from grace, not from nature. For if he had been strong by nature, his strength would not have been taken away when he was deprived of his hair. And where was that most mighty strength, if not in what Scripture said, The Spirit of the Lord went with him? That strength belonged to the Spirit of the Lord. In Samson was the vessel; in the Spirit was the fullness. A vessel can be filled and emptied. But every vessel has its filling from elsewhere. That is why in Paul grace itself was commended, when he was called a vessel of election (Acts 9:15). Let us see, then, what kind of riddle Samson set before the Philistines. Out of the eater, he said, came forth food, and out of the strong went forth sweetness. This riddle was betrayed, carried to his companions, solved; Samson was beaten. If this man is just, it is hidden: the justice of this man lies very deep. For both that he is read to have been overcome by a woman's blandishments, and that he went in to a harlot, make his merit seem to waver to those who understand too little the secrets of the truth. For a prophet too is commanded by the precept of the Lord to take a harlot to wife (Hos. 1:2). Perhaps we shall be able to say that in the Old Testament these things were not criminal or damnable, since what he said or did was prophecy. Let us therefore ask what was signified by the one beaten, what by the victor, what by him who yielded to a woman's blandishments, what by him who betrayed the secret of the riddle, what by him who went in to a harlot, what by him who caught foxes and, through the foxes' tails, to which he bound fire, burned the crops of his enemies. Those crops he could have burned by a short way, had he not had a mystery in mind in the foxes. For could the dry stubble not have burned unless foxes carried the fire through it? Let us understand, then, that great mysteries lie hidden here.

2. Christ prefigured in Samson. Samson's wife. His riddle. What was Samson? If I say he signified Christ, I seem to myself to speak the truth; but at once it occurs to those who reflect: Is Christ too overcome by a woman's blandishments? And how is Christ understood to have been able to go in to a harlot? Then again: is Christ too stripped of His head's covering, shorn of His hair, despoiled of His strength, bound, blinded, mocked? Awake, faith; consider what Christ is, not only what Christ did, but also what Christ suffered. What did He do? He wrought as one strong: He suffered as one weak. In one Person I understand both. I see the strength of the Son of God, I see the weakness of the son of man. Something else is added too: that the whole Christ, as Scripture commends Him, is both head and body. As Christ is the head of the Church, so the Church is the body of Christ (Eph. 4:15, and Col. 1:18). And so that she may not be alone, with her head she is the whole Christ. The Church, therefore, has in herself the strong, has the weak; she has those who feed on solid bread, she has those who are still to be nourished with milk. I add something else that must be confessed: in the very fellowship of the Sacraments, in the communion of Baptism, in partaking of the Altar, she has the just, she has the unjust. For now the body of Christ, as you know, is on the threshing-floor; afterwards it will be in the barn. Yet while it is on the threshing-floor, it does not refuse to bear the chaff: when the time for storing comes, He will separate the wheat from the chaff (Matt. 3:12). Samson, then, did some things in the person of the head, some in the person of the body, yet all in the person of Christ. For in working mighty deeds and wonders Samson signified Christ, the head of the Church: in acting prudently he bore the image of those who live justly in the Church: where perhaps he was taken unawares and acted incautiously, he figured those in the Church who are sinners. The harlot whom Samson takes in marriage is the Church, which before the knowledge of the one God committed fornication with idols, and which Christ afterwards joined to Himself. But after, enlightened by Him, she received the faith, she was also found worthy to know through Him the sacraments of salvation, and to have the mysteries of heavenly secrets revealed to her by the same. For the riddle itself, which contains, Out of the eater came forth food, and out of the strong went forth sweetness, what else does it signify than Christ rising from the dead? Out of the eater, surely, that is, out of death, which devours and consumes all things, came forth that food which said, I am the living bread, Who came down from heaven (John 6:41). Him whom human iniquity embittered, and to Whom it gave the bitterness of vinegar and gall to drink, from Him the people of the Gentiles, once converted, received the sweetness of life. And thus

from the mouth of the dead lion, that is, from the death of Christ, Who lying down slept as a lion, there came forth a swarm of bees, that is, of Christians. And as for his saying, You would not have found out my riddle, had you not ploughed with my heifer: this heifer is the Church, which, through the teaching and preaching of the Apostles and the saints, has published to the ends of the earth the mysteries of the faith, of the Trinity, of the resurrection, of the judgement and likewise of the kingdom, and has promised the rewards of eternal life to those who understand and know them.

3. The companion taking his wife a figure of the heretics. The foxes dragging fire in their tails. Then follows, Samson was angry, because his companion took his wife. This companion bore the figure of all the heretics. A great secret, my brothers. For the heretics, who divided the Church, wished to take and to carry off the wife of their Lord. For they went out from the Church and from the Gospels, who through the adultery of impiety try to invade the Church, that is, the body of Christ, for their own part. Hence that faithful servant and friend of the Lord's bride speaks, saying: For I have betrothed you to one husband, to present a chaste virgin to Christ. And with faithful zeal and rebuke he touches the person of the corrupted companion. And I fear, he says, lest, as the serpent seduced Eve, so your minds too be corrupted from the truth which is in Christ Jesus (2 Cor. 11:2–3). And who are the companions, that is, the deserting heretics, who wished to invade the Lord's bride, if not Donatus, Arius, Manichaeus, and the other vessels of error and perdition? Of such the Apostle says: I hear, he says, that there are divisions among you: for one says, I indeed am of Paul; but another, I of Apollo; and another, I of Cephas (1 Cor. 1:11–12). Let us see, then, what this mystical Samson did when offended by a stranger in the matter of his wife. For he caught foxes, that is, the adulterous companions, of whom it is said in the Song of Songs, Catch us the little foxes that destroy the vineyards (Song 2:15). What is, Catch? That is, seize, convict, refute them, lest the vineyards of the Church be destroyed. What else is it to catch foxes, but to refute the heretics by the authority of the divine law, and to bind and constrain them with the testimonies of the holy Scriptures as with certain chains? He catches the foxes, he puts fire to their tied tails. What do the tied-together tails of the foxes mean? What are the tails of the foxes, but the hinder parts of the heretics, who have front parts that are flattering and deceitful: tied, that is, condemned, and dragging fire at the end, so as to consume the fruits and works of those who acquiesce in their seductions? One says to a man nowadays, Do not listen to heretics, do not acquiesce in heretics. He replies, Why? Did not this man and that man listen to heretics? Has not any other Christian you like committed such great evils, done so many adulteries, practised so many robberies? And what evil has befallen him? The front parts are the foxes', which those who are seduced attend to; and behind is the fire. Nothing, he says, has befallen him. Because he goes in front, does he drag nothing behind him? He is going to come to the hinder fire. And do you suppose that because the heretics drag fire with which the fruits of their enemies may burn, they themselves will not burn? For without doubt the foxes, where they set the harvests on fire, certainly burned themselves as well. See, then, the judgement

for the heretics behind, in that they do not see behind themselves. They have blandishments with which to soothe, they show their front parts free: in the judgement of God, with tails tied, that is, in their hind parts, they drag fire, because wickedness goes before its punishments.

4. The going in to the harlot. The gates of the city, when he had risen from sleep, carried off onto the mountain. Now as for his going in to the harlot: if he did it without cause, whoever did it is unclean; but if a prophet did it, it is a sacrament. If he did not go in so as to lie with her, perhaps he went in for the sake of a mystery. And we do not read that he lay with her. There follows: But the enemies were waiting at the gates of the city to seize him when he had come out from the harlot to whom he had gone in. But he was sleeping. See how it is not written that he had intercourse with the harlot; rather it is written that he was sleeping. When he rose, it says, he went out at midnight, and took away the gates of that city with their bars, and lifted those same gates onto the top of the mountain, and he could not be held by the Allophyli. The gates of the city, by which he had gone in to the harlot, he took away and lifted onto the mountain. What is this? Hell and the love of a woman: Scripture joins the two together. The harlot's house bore the image of hell. Rightly is it set for the underworld, because it repels no one, and draws to itself everyone who enters (Prov. 30:16). We recognize in this passage the works of our Redeemer: after the Synagogue, to which He had come, was separated from Him by the devil, after it had shaved Him bald, that is, crucified Him in the place of Calvary, He descended to the underworld; and the enemies were guarding the place of the sleeper, that is, the tomb; and they wished to seize Him Whom they could not see. But He was sleeping there. I have said this because it was a true death. As for what was said, He rose at midnight, this signifies that He rose in secret. For He suffered openly; but when He rose He was made manifest only to the disciples and to certain others. So His going in all saw; His rising few came to know, held and handled. Yet He takes away the gates of the city, that is, He removes the gates of hell. What is it to take away the gates of hell, but to remove the dominion of death? For it used to receive and not send back. But what did our Lord Jesus Christ do? Having taken away the gates of death, He ascended to the top of the mountain. For we know that He both rose again and ascended into the heavens.

5. Strength in the hair. The blinding and death of Samson. But what does it mean that he had his strength in his hair? Pay careful attention to this too, brothers. He did not have strength in his hand, nor in his foot, nor in his breast, nor in his head itself, but in his hair, in his locks. What is hair? What are tresses? We too see it, and the Apostle, when questioned, answers us: Hair is a covering (1 Cor. 11:15). And Christ had strength in a covering, when the shadows of the old Law covered Him. Samson's hair, then, was in a covering; because in Christ one thing was seen and another understood. But what does it mean that the secret was betrayed and Samson was shaved bald? The Law was despised, and Christ suffered. For they would not have killed Christ if they had not despised the Law. For they themselves knew that to them Christ