Exodus 34

What does it mean that the Lord now says through Moses, "You visit the iniquity of fathers on their sons and grandsons"? In these two passages a different sense is found, but the mind of the hearer is taught to inquire subtly along the path of discernment. We inherit original sin from our parents, and unless we are washed by the grace of baptism, we bear even our parents' sins, because up to that point we are one with them. So God will visit the iniquity of the fathers upon their sons, for, through original sin, the soul of the offspring is stained by the guilt of the parent. But then God does not visit the iniquity of fathers on their sons, because, when we are freed from original guilt through baptism, we no longer have our parents' guilt but only the guilt for sins we ourselves committed. This passage can also be understood in another way, because when each one imitates the iniquity of his sinful parent, he is rendered guilty through his parent's fault. But whoever does not imitate the iniquity of his parent is not burdened with his sin. Thus it happens that the sinful son of a sinful father pays the penalty not only for his own sins, which he committed, but also for his father's sins. For he does not fear to add his own malice to his father's vices, even though he knows that the Lord is angered by them. It is just that a man who does not fear to imitate the ways of his wicked father before a busy judge is forced in this present life to pay the penalty for the faults of his wicked father. So Scripture says, "The soul of my father is mine; … the soul that sins, that one will die." For in the flesh sons sometimes perish for their father's sin. But when the original sin that comes from the parents' iniquity is forgiven, it is no longer kept in the soul. What does it mean that small children are often snatched away by demons, unless the son's flesh suffers to punish the father? For the wicked father is struck at in his very self and refuses to sense the force of the blow. Generally he is struck in his sons, so that he burns painfully, and the father's sorrow is visited on the son's flesh, insofar as the father's evil heart is punished by the son's suffering. But when the sons who are punished for their fathers' guilt are not little children but already grown, what else should we understand except that they are suffering the punishments of those people whose deeds they imitated? Thus Scripture says rightly, "To the third and fourth generation." For the sons can see the lives of the parents they imitate up to the third and fourth generation. Punishment extends up to them, for they saw what they would imitate sinfully. Exposition of the Old and New Testament, Exodus

What does it mean that the Lord now says through Moses, "You visit the iniquity of fathers on their sons and grandsons"? In these two passages a different sense is found, but the mind of the hearer is taught to inquire subtly along the path of discernment. We inherit original sin from our parents, and unless we are washed by the grace of baptism, we bear even our parents' sins, because up to that point we are one with them. So God will visit the iniquity of the fathers upon their sons, for, through original sin, the soul of the offspring is stained by the guilt of the parent. But then God does not visit the iniquity of fathers on their sons, because, when we are freed from original guilt through baptism, we no longer have our parents' guilt but only the guilt for sins we ourselves committed. This passage can also be understood in another way, because when each one imitates the iniquity of his sinful parent, he is rendered guilty through his parent's fault. But whoever does not imitate the iniquity of his parent is not burdened with his sin. Thus it happens that the sinful son of a sinful father pays the penalty not only for his own sins, which he committed, but also for his father's sins. For he does not fear to add his own malice to his father's vices, even though he knows that the Lord is angered by them. It is just that a man who does not fear to imitate the ways of his wicked father before a busy judge is forced in this present life to pay the penalty for the faults of his wicked father. So Scripture says, "The soul of my father is mine; … the soul that sins, that one will die." For in the flesh sons sometimes perish for their father's sin. But when the original sin that comes from the parents' iniquity is forgiven, it is no longer kept in the soul. What does it mean that small children are often snatched away by demons, unless the son's flesh suffers to punish the father? For the wicked father is struck at in his very self and refuses to sense the force of the blow. Generally he is struck in his sons, so that he burns painfully, and the father's sorrow is visited on the son's flesh, insofar as the father's evil heart is punished by the son's suffering. But when the sons who are punished for their fathers' guilt are not little children but already grown, what else should we understand except that they are suffering the punishments of those people whose deeds they imitated? Thus Scripture says rightly, "To the third and fourth generation." For the sons can see the lives of the parents they imitate up to the third and fourth generation. Punishment extends up to them, for they saw what they would imitate sinfully.

When the Lord handed over to you the land of the Canaanites, he said, "Take care, therefore, not to make a covenant with these inhabitants of the land that you are to enter; else they will immediately become a snare among you." Now we believe that by the grace of baptism all sins and offenses have been banished from us. If we afterward make a covenant with those same sins and vices, doubtless this covenant will become a snare for us because of our consent to avarice or dissipation.

"You shall make for yourself no molten gods." You see that he forbids the making of images because of idolatry and that it is impossible to make an image of the bodiless, invisible and uncircumscribed God. "You saw no form on the day that the Lord spoke.…" And St. Paul, standing in the midst of the Areopagus, says, "Being therefore God's offspring, we ought not to think that the Deity is like gold, or silver or stone, a representation by the art and imagination of man."

All the heretics have gone astray by not understanding the mystery of his nativity. The statement "He who opens the womb shall be called holy to the Lord" is more applicable to the special nativity of the Savior than to that of all humanity. For Christ alone opened the closed doors of the womb of virginity, which nevertheless remained permanently closed. This is the closed east door, through which only the high priest enters and leaves, and nevertheless it is always closed.

The forty-day fast of Lent draws its authority from the Old Testament, from the fasts of Moses and Elijah, and from the gospel, because the Lord fasted that many days, showing that the gospel is not at variance with the Law and the Prophets. The Law is personified by Moses, the Prophets by Elijah, between whom the Lord appeared transfigured on the mountain.

And like this holy man the blessed Moses also was twice deemed worthy to go unto the thick darkness and to receive the law upon the tablets; and he was made pure by fasting like unto this, and then he was deemed worthy of the terrible sight.

Every soul is beautiful which is considered by the standard of its own virtues. But most beautiful, true and lovely, which can be contemplated by him alone who has purified his mind, is that of the divine and blessed nature. He who gazes steadfastly at the splendor and graces of it receives some share from it, as if from an immersion, tinging his own face with a sort of brilliant radiance. Whence Moses also was made resplendent in face by receiving some share of beauty when he held converse with God. Therefore he who is conscious of his own beauty utters this act of thanksgiving: "O Lord, in your favor, you gave strength to my beauty."

In Moses he depicted for you a parable: his cheeks, ashen with age, became shining and fair, a symbol of old age that in Eden again becomes young.

The shadows bring forth the truth, even if they are not at all the truth themselves. Because of this, the divinely inspired Moses placed a veil upon his face and spoke thus to the children of Israel, all but shouting by this act that a person might behold the beauty of the utterances made through him, not in outwardly appearing figures but in meditations hidden within us.

For so long as a man does not attend to the spiritual meaning "a veil lies upon his heart," in consequence of which veil, in other words his duller understanding, the Scripture itself is said or thought to be veiled. This is the explanation of the veil which is said to have covered the face of Moses when he was speaking to the people, that is, when the law is read in public. But if we turn to the Lord, where also the Word of God is and where the Holy Spirit reveals spiritual knowledge, the veil will be taken away, and we shall then with unveiled face behold in the holy Scriptures the glory of the Lord.

But the preacher should know how to avoid drawing the mind of his hearer beyond its strength, lest, so to speak, the string of the soul, when stretched more than it can bear, should be broken. For all deep things should be covered up before a multitude of hearers, and scarcely opened to a few. For hence the Truth in person says, "Who, thinkest thou, is the faithful and wise steward, whom his Lord has appointed over his household, to give them their measure of wheat in due season?" Now by a measure of wheat is expressed a portion of the Word, lest, when anything is given to a narrow heart beyond its capacity, it be spill. Hence Paul says, "I could not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal. As it were to babes in Christ, I have given you milk to drink, and not meat." Hence Moses, when he comes on from the sanctuary of God, veils his shining face before the people; because in truth He shews not to multitudes the secrets of inmost brightness. Hence it is enjoined on him by the Divine voice that if any one should dig a cistern, and not cover it, and an ox or ass should fall into it, he should pay the price, because when one who has arrived at the deep streams of knowledge covers them not up before the brutish hearts of his hearers, he is adjudged as liable to penalty, if through his words a soul, whether clean or unclean, be caught on a stumbling-stone. Hence it is said to the blessed Job, "Who hath given understanding unto the cock?"