Homepage

Excerpt from the new Pelplin sermons of St Augustine

Sermo sancti Augustini de Phitonissa et resuscitatione Samuelis

1,1. Intentissimam fuisse caritatem vestram divinis lectionibus cum recitarentur advertimus. Ea vero vestra intentio et nunc vestra expectatio, nisi dominus iuvet, multum nos terret. Profundissimam quippe quaestionem proposuit nobis lectio prima Regnorum, quam sic attente audistis ut nihil aliud quam de illa me audire cupiatis. Sed ego fateor caritati vestrae, profundior est quam ut a me possit forsitan explicari; certe tamen hodie non potest. Dico causam proponens eam et interim profunditatem eius ostendens, ut et quam sit eius solutio difficilis videatis et, ut vobis possim aliquid inde dicere, et pro me et pro vobis oretis. Sed antequam profunditatem eius exponam – non ipsam dixi, sed profunditatem eius exponam, id est non eruam, quod in alto habet, sed quam sit alta demonstrem – antequam ergo id agam, purgare me volo. Forte enim plerique vestrum dicunt: ‘Si non eam fuerat hodie expositurus, quare illam voluit recitari?’ Testis est ipse qui legit, quod ego non voluerim, non ego lectionem dederim, non ego mandaverim; credo et vos credere mihi. Non essem enim tam impudens, ut non vererer de mendacii conscientia coram adolescente erubescere. Sicut autem comperi, nec a domino fratre meo episcopo caritatis vestrae hoc ut legeretur praeceptum est. Non enim me vellet tam subito proposita tanta quaestione turbari. Sed hoc solent facere studiosi iuvenes filii nostri lectores, ut quando futurus est debitus sermo, aliquid excogitent recitandum, unde adolescentes nostram exerceant senectutem. Et quoniam bene eis saepe provenit, ut quod nobis vel non esset vel non multum difficile esset continuo tractaremus, putaverunt etiam in hac quaestione hoc esse faciendum. Audiant ergo et ipsi et vos, ne amplius de me expectando quam possum et vos fallamini et nos perturbetis.

1,2. Audite iam profunditatem quaestionis. Illud mirum non est, quod Saul desertus a deo, ut sciret quid sibi esset venturum vel quo uteretur salutis suae temporalis consilio vel auxilio, ad magicas artes confugit. Utinam hoc non faciant Christiani! Hoc ergo, ut dixi, mirum non est. Quid ergo mirum est, quid profundum? potuisse pythonissam magam operante spiritu immundo excitare animam sancti et iusti viri. Breviter quaestionis profunditatem proposui. Quicquid est, quod movet, hoc in ea movet omnem animum pium et religiosum, quando hoc vel audit vel legit; hoc movet, hoc perturbat. constat, quod lectio apostolica, quae lecta est, demonstravit immundum pythonis esse spiritum. Quem cum haberet ancilla quaedam et divinando dominis suis lucra conferret, sequebatur apostolum et eos, qui cum illo erant, et dicebat: Hi servi dei sunt magni, qui annuntiant vobis viam salutis. Et quid consequenter scriptura dicit? Cum hoc saepius faceret, misertus est eius Paulus. Unde misertus est, nisi quia misera erat et tanto infelicior, quanto divinior putabatur possessa daemonio et habens utique non spiritum sanctum, sed inmundum? Quia ergo talis erat ancilla, quid est, ut iste spiritus animam tanti viri, tam iusti fidelis dei servi, tanti postremo prophetae posset quasi a mortuis resuscitare? Etiam hinc intellegitur, quia malus fuisset ille spiritus, quia non eum Saul quaesivit nisi desertus a deo. Iste autem Saul, antequam desereretur a deo, cum melioris mentis esset, in regno suo secundum dei praecepta omnes ventriloquos seu ventriloquas interfici iussit; ad eos est versus a deo desertus et eis, quos voluerat finire, subiectus.

St. Augustine’s Sermon on the Fortune-Teller and the Raising of Samuel

1. I have noticed, dear brothers, that you were paying the utmost attention while the sacred readings were being recited. Yet it is precisely this attentiveness of yours—and now your expectation as well—that fills me with great fear, unless the Lord stands by me. For the first reading from the Book of Kingdoms has presented us with an exceedingly profound problem; you have listened to it with such concentration that you wish to hear nothing else but my commenting on it. But I must admit, dear brothers: it is probably too profound for me to explain; at least it is not feasible today. I will tell you the reason by introducing it and, for now, merely pointing out its depth, so that you may see how difficult a solution is; and pray—both for me and for yourselves—that I may be able to say something about it. But before I explain its depth—I mean, not before I explain the problem itself but its depth, that is, I will not bring out what it holds in its depth but just show how deep it is—before I do that, I want to justify myself. For perhaps many of you are saying, “If he didn’t want to explain it today, why did he have this text read?” The reader is my witness that I did not have it read, that I did not prescribe the reading or ordered it; I believe you believe me on this as well. For I would not be so insolent as not to fear blushing before the young man, knowing in my conscience that I had lied. As I have learned, however, this reading was not arranged by my lord and brother, your bishop, either. He would not have wanted me to be put in a difficult position by such a major problem, presented to me so unexpectedly. But this is the sort of thing that inquisitive young men—my sons, the readers—do: When a sermon is due, they consider reading something, with which the young men challenge my advanced age. And since it often works out well for them—that we deliver an impromptu interpretation of a passage that is not, or not particularly, difficult for us—they thought they could do the same with this problem. So let them listen, and you as well, so that you do not expect more from me than I am capable of, thereby deceiving yourselves and putting us in a difficult position.

2. Now listen to the depth of the problem. It is not surprising that Saul, forsaken by God, resorted to magical practices to learn what lay ahead for him and to what plan or what help he should turn to attain his salvation in this life. May Christians never do such a thing! So, as I said, that is not what gives cause for thought. What, then, gives cause for thought? Where does the depth lie? In the fact that the fortune-teller and sorceress was able, through the work of an unclean spirit, to stir the soul of this holy, righteous man. With that, I have briefly outlined the depth of the problem. Whatever exactly it is that gives one pause: this aspect certainly gives every devout, religious person pause when they hear or read about it. It gives one pause; it weighs heavily on the mind. It is clear that the reading from the Apostle that was read showed that the spirit of the fortune-teller is unclean. Since a slave-girl possessed it and brought profit to her masters through fortune-telling, she followed the Apostle and those who were with him, saying, “These men are servants of the Most High God, who proclaim to you the way of salvation.” And what does Scripture say then? “As she kept doing this, Paul took pity on her.” Why did he take pity on her if not because she was pitiful and all the more wretched the more divine she was considered to be, since she was possessed by a demon, not by a holy spirit but by an unclean one? Since, then, the maid was like this: What is the reason that this spirit was able to raise the soul of such a significant man—a righteous, faithful servant of God, and ultimately such a great prophet—from the dead, so to speak? The fact that Saul sought out this spirit only after he had been forsaken by God also shows that it was an evil spirit. But before Saul was forsaken by God, when he was still in his right mind, he had all necromancers—both men and women—killed in his kingdom in accordance with God’s commandments; he did not turn to them until he had been forsaken by God and had submitted himself to those whom he had intended to destroy.