St. Robert Bellarmine: The Seven Words on the Cross

[Stone]

CHAPTER XXIV: The fifth fruit to be drawn from the consideration of the seventh Word spoken by Christ upon the Cross.

The last fruit is drawn from the consideration of the obedience shown by Christ in His last words and in His Death upon the Cross. The words of the Apostle: “He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even the death of the Cross,”[1] received their complete fulfilment when our Lord expired with these words upon His lips: “Father, into Thy hands I commend My Spirit.” In order to gather the most precious fruit from the tree of the holy Cross it must be our endeavour to examine everything that can be said about the obedience of Christ. He, the Master and the Pattern of every virtue, tendered to His heavenly Father an obedience so ready and so perfect as to render it impossible to imagine or conceive anything greater.

In the first place, the obedience of Christ to His Father began with His Conception and continued uninterruptedly to His Death. The life of our Lord Jesus Christ was one perpetual act of obedience. The Soul of Christ from the moment of its creation enjoyed the exercise of its free will, was full of grace and wisdom, and consequently, even when inclosed in His Mother’s womb, was capable of practising the virtue of obedience. The Psalmist speaking in the Person of Christ says: “In the head of the book it is written of Me that I should do Thy will. O My God, I have desired it, and Thy law in the midst of My Heart.”[2] These words may be thus simplified: ” In the head of the book”–that is from the beginning to the end of the inspired writings of Scripture–it is shown that I was chosen and sent into the world “to do Thy will. O My God, I have desired it,” and freely accepted it. I have placed “Thy law,” Thy commandment, Thy desire, “in the midst of My Heart,” to ponder upon it constantly, to obey it accurately and promptly. The very words of Christ Himself mean the same. “My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me, that I may perfect His work.”[3] For as a man does not take food now and again and at distant intervals during life, but daily eats and takes a pleasure in it, so Christ our Lord was intent upon being obedient to His Father every day of His life. It was His joy and His pleasure. “I came down from Heaven not to do My own will, but the will of Him that sent Me.”[4] And again. “He that sent Me is with Me, and He hath not left Me alone; for I do always the things that please Him.”[5] And since obedience is the most excellent of all sacrifices, as Samuel told Saul,[6] so every action which Christ performed during His life was a sacrifice most pleasing to the Divine Majesty. The first prerogative then of our Lord’s obedience is that it lasted from the moment of His Conception to His Death upon the Cross.

In the second place, the obedience of Christ was not confined to one particular kind of duty, as is sometimes the case with other men, but it extended to everything which it pleased the Eternal Father to order. From this arose the many vicissitudes in our Lord’s life. At one time we see Him in the desert neither eating nor drinking, perhaps even depriving Himself of sleep, and living “with the beasts.”[7] At another time we see Him mixing up with men, eating and drinking with them. Now He is living in obscurity and silence at Nazareth. Now He appears before the world endowed with eloquence and wisdom, and working miracles. On one occasion He exerts His authority and drives those from the temple who were defiling it by bartering within its precincts. On another occasion He hides Himself, and like a weak powerless man withdraws from the crowd. All these different actions required a soul devoid of self, and devoted to the will of another. Unless He had previously set the example of renouncing everything which human nature cherishes, He would not have said to His disciples: “If any man will come after Me let him deny himself,”[8] let him give up his own will, renounce his own judgment. Unless He had been prepared to lay down His life with such willingness as to make it appear He really hated it, He would not have encouraged His disciples with such words as, “If any man come to Me, and hate not his father and mother, and wife and children, and brethren and sisters, yea and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple.”[9] This renunciation of self, which was so conspicuous in our Lord’s character, is the true root and, as it were, mother of obedience, and those who are not prepared for this self-sacrifice will never acquire the perfection of obedience. How can a man promptly obey the will of another if he prefers his own will and judgment to that of another? The vast orbs of heaven obey the laws of nature both in their rising and in their setting. The Angels are obedient to the will of God. They have no will of their own in opposition to that of God, but are happily united with God, and are one spirit with Him. And so the Psalmist sings: “Bless the Lord, all ye His Angels: you that are mighty in strength and execute His word, hearkening to the voice of His orders.”[10]

In the third place, the obedience of Christ was not only infinite in its length and breadth, but in proportion as by suffering it was humble in the lowest degree, so as to its reward is it exalted. The third characteristic then of the obedience of Christ is that it was tried by suffering and humiliations. To accomplish the Will of His heavenly Father, the Infant Christ, with the full use of every faculty, consented to be inclosed for nine months in the dark prison of His Mother’s womb. Other infants feel not this privation as they have not the use of reason, but Christ had the use of reason and must have dreaded the confinement in the narrow womb, even of her whom He had chosen to be His Mother. Through obedience to His Father, and from the love He bore to man, He overcame this dread, and the Church says: “When Thou didst take upon Thee to deliver Man, Thou didst not abhor the Virgin’s womb.” Again, our dear Lord needed no small amount of patience and humility, to assume the manners and the weaknesses of a child, when He was not only wiser than Solomon, but was the Man ” in Whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.”

Consider, moreover, what must have been His forbearance and meekness, His patience and humility, to have remained for eighteen years, from His twelfth to His thirtieth year, hidden in an obscure house at Nazareth, to have been regarded as the son of a carpenter, to have been called a carpenter, to have been thought an ignorant uneducated man, when at the same time His wisdom surpassed that of all Angels and men together. During His public life He acquired great renown by His preaching and miracles, but He suffered great wants and endured many hardships. “The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air nests, but the Son of Man hath not where to lay His Head.”[12] Footsore and fatigued He would sit Himself down at the side of a well. And yet He could easily have surrounded Himself with an abundance of all things by the ministry of men or Angels, had He not been restrained by the obedience He owed His Father. Shall I dwell on the contradictions He suffered, on the insults He endured, on the calumnies which were spoken against Him, on the scourges and the crown of thorns of His Passion, on the ignominy of the Cross itself? His humble obedience has taken such deep root that we can only wonder at it and admire it; we cannot perfectly imitate it.

There is yet a deeper depth to His obedience. The obedience of Christ finally reached this stage, that with a loud voice He cried out: “Father into Thy hands I commend My Spirit. And saying this He gave up the ghost.”[13] It would appear that the Son of God wished to address His Father in this wise: “This commandment have I received of you, My Father,”[14] to lay down My life in order to receive it again from Your hands. The time has now come for Me to execute this last commandment of Yours. And although the separation of My Soul and Body will be a bitter separation, because from the moment of their creation they have remained united in great peace and love, and although death found an entrance into this world through the malice of the devil, and human nature rebels against death, nevertheless Thy commandment is fixed deep in the inmost recesses of My Heart, and shall prevail even over death itself. Therefore am I prepared to taste the bitterness of death, and drink to the dregs the chalice you have prepared for Me. But as it is your wish that I should lay down My life in such a manner as to receive it back again from You, so “into Your hands I commend My Spirit,” in order that You may restore it to Me at Your pleasure. And then, having received His Father’s permission to die, He bowed down His Head in token of His obedience, and gave up the ghost. His obedience conquered and prevailed. Not only did it receive its reward in the Person of Christ, Who, because He humbled Himself beneath all, and obeyed all for the sake of His Father, has been assumed into heaven, and from His throne there governs and rules all, but it has its reward also in this, that all who imitate Christ shall ascend the highest heavens, shall be placed as masters over all the goods of their Lord, and shall be sharers of His royal dignity and possessors of His kingdom for ever. On the other hand, the virtue of obedience has gained such a signal victory over rebellious, disobedient, and proud spirits, as to make them tremble and fly from the sight of the Cross of Christ.

Whosoever desires to attain to the glory of heaven, and to find true peace and rest for his soul, must imitate the example of Christ. Not only religious who have bound themselves by a vow of obedience to their Superior, who holds the place of God in their regard, but all men who wish to be the disciples and brothers of Christ must aspire to gain this spiritual victory over themselves, otherwise they will be miserable for ever with the proud demons of hell. Inasmuch as obedience is a Divine precept, and has been imposed upon all, it is necessary for all. To all without exception were the words of Christ addressed: “Take up My yoke upon you.”[15] To all preachers of the Gospel does He say; “Obey your prelates and be subject to them.”[16] To all kings does Samuel say: “Doth the Lord desire holocausts and victims, and not rather that the Voice of the Lord should be obeyed? For obedience is better than sacrifices.”[17] And to show the enormity of the sin of disobedience he added: “Because it is like the sin of witchcraft to rebel “against the commands of the Lord, or the commands of those who hold the place of the Lord.

For the sake of those who voluntarily devote themselves to the practice of obedience, and submit their wills to that of their Superior, I will say a few words on their happy state of life. The prophet Jeremias, inspired by the Holy Ghost, says: “It is good for a man, when he hath borne the yoke from his youth. He shall sit solitary and hold his peace, because he hath taken it up upon himself.”[18] How great is the happiness contained in these words: “It is good!” From the rest of the sentence we may conclude that they embrace everything that is useful, honourable, agreeable, in fact, everything in which happiness may consist. The man that has been accustomed from his youth to the yoke of obedience, will be free throughout life from the crushing yoke of carnal desires. St. Augustine, in the eighth book of his Confessions, acknowledges the difficulty which a soul, that for years had obeyed the concupiscence of the flesh, must experience in shaking off the yoke, and on the other hand he speaks of the facility and of the bliss we experience in carrying the yoke of the Lord if the snares of vice have not entrapped the soul. Moreover, it is no inconsiderable gain to obtain merit for every action in the sight of God. The man who performs no action of his own free will, but does everything through obedience to his Superior, offers to God in each action a sacrifice most pleasing to Him, because as Samuel says: “Obedience is better than sacrifices.”[19] St. Gregory gives a reason for this. “In offering victims,” he says, “we sacrifice the flesh of another; by obedience our own will is sacrificed.”[20] And what is still more admirable in this is, that even if a Superior commits a sin in giving any order, a subject not only does not sin, but even obtains merit by his obedience provided the command itself is not manifestly against the law of God. The Prophet goes on to say; “He shall sit solitary and hold his peace.” The words mean that the solitary or the obedient man is at rest because he has found peace for his soul. He who has renounced his own will, and has devoted himself entirely to accomplish the Divine will which is manifested to him by the voice of his Superior, desires nothing, seeks for nothing, thinks of nothing, longs for nothing, but is free from all anxious cares, and “with Mary sits at the Lord’s feet hearing His word.”[21] The solitary sits down, both because he dwells with those who “have but one heart and one soul,”[22] and because he loves none with a private, individual love, but all in Christ and for the sake of Christ. He is silent because he quarrels with no one, disputes with no one, has litigation with no one. The reason of this great tranquillity is “because he hath taken it up upon himself” and is translated from the ranks of men to the ranks of Angels. There are many who busy themselves about themselves, and act like animals devoid of reason. They seek after the things of this world, esteem only those things which delight the senses, feed their carnal desires, and are avaricious, impure, gluttonous, and intemperate. Others lead a purely human life, and remain entirely shut up within themselves, such as those who endeavour to peer into the secrets of nature, or rest satisfied with delivering precepts of morals. Others, again, raise themselves above themselves, and with the special help and assistance of God lead a life that is rather angelical than human. These abandon all they possess in this world, and by denying their own wills can say with the Apostle: “Our conversation is in heaven.”[23] Emulating the purity, the contemplation, and the obedience of the Angels, they lead the life of Angels in this world. The Angels are never sullied with the stain of sin, “always see the face of My Father, Who is in heaven,”[24] and, disengaged from all things else, are wholly intent on accomplishing the will of God. “Bless the Lord, all ye His Angels, you that are mighty in strength, and execute His word, hearkening to the voice of His orders.”[25] This is the happiness of religious life. Those who on earth imitate as far as possible the purity and obedience of the Angels, shall undoubtedly become partakers of their glory in Heaven, especially if they follow Christ, their Lord and Master, Who “humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even the death of the Cross:”[26] and “whereas indeed He was the Son of God, He learned obedience by the things which He suffered:”[27] that is, He learned by His own experience that genuine obedience is tried by suffering, and consequently His example not only teaches us obedience, but teaches us that the foundation of true and perfect obedience is humility and patience. It is no proof that we are truly and perfectly obedient in obeying in things that are honourable and pleasant. Such commands do not prove whether it is the virtue of obedience or some other motive that impels us to act. But a man who shows a promptitude and alacrity in obeying in all things that are humiliating and laborious, proves that he is a true disciple of Christ, and has learnt the meaning of true and perfect obedience.

St. Gregory skilfully shows what is necessary to the perfection of obedience in different circumstances. He says: “Sometimes we may receive agreeable, at other times disagreeable commands. It is of the greatest importance to remember that in some circumstances, if anything of self-love creeps into our obedience, our obedience is null; in other circumstances our obedience is less virtuous in proportion as there is less self- sacrifice. For example: a religious is placed in some honourable post, is appointed Superior of a monastery; now if he undertakes this office through the mere human motive of liking it, he will be altogether wanting in obedience. That man is not directed by obedience, who in undertaking agreeable duties is the slave of his own ambition. Again, a religious receives some humiliating order, if, for example, when his self-love urges him to aspire to superiority he is ordered to fulfil some office to which neither distinction nor dignity is attached, he will lessen the merit of his obedience in proportion as he fails in forcing his will to desire the post, because unwillingly and by constraint he obeys in a matter which he considers unworthy of his talents or his experience. Obedience invariably loses some of its perfection if the desire for lowly and humble occupations does not in some manner or another accompany the forced obligation of undertaking them. In commands, therefore, which are repugnant to nature, there must be some self-sacrifice, and in commands which are agreeable to nature there must be no self-love. In the former case obedience will be the more meritorious the closer it is united to the Divine will by desires; in the latter case obedience will be the more perfect the more it is separated from any longing for worldly renown. We shall better understand the different marks of true obedience by considering the actions of two saints who are now in Heaven.[28] When Moses was pasturing sheep in the desert, he was called by the Lord, Who spoke to him through the mouth of an Angel from the burning bush, to command the Jewish people in their exodus from the land of Egypt. In his humility Moses hesitated about accepting so glorious a command. ‘I beseech Thee, Lord,’ he said, ‘I am not eloquent from yesterday and the day before, and since Thou hast spoken to Thy servant I have more impediment and slowness of tongue.'[29] He wished to decline the office himself, and begged that it might be given to another. ‘I beseech Thee, Lord, send Whom Thou wilt send.'[30] Behold! he urges his want of eloquence as an excuse to the Author and Giver of speech, to be exonerated from an employment which was honourable and authoritative. St. Paul, as he tells the Galatians,[31] was Divinely admonished to go up to Jerusalem. On his journey he meets the Prophet Agabus, and learns from him what he will have to suffer in Jerusalem. ‘Agabus, when he was come to us, took Paul’s girdle, and binding his own feet and hands he said: Thus saith the Holy Ghost: The man whose girdle this is, the Jews shall bind in this manner in Jerusalem, and shall deliver him into the hands of the Gentiles.'[32] Whereupon St. Paul immediately answered, ‘I am ready not only to be bound, but to die also in Jerusalem for the Name of the Lord Jesus.'[33] Undaunted by the revelation he received of the sufferings in store for him, he proceeded to Jerusalem. He really longed to suffer, yet as a man he must have felt some dread; but this very dread was overcome, and rendered him more courageous. Self-love, then did not find a place in the honourable duty which was imposed upon Moses, because he had to overcome himself in order to assume the command of the Jewish people. Voluntarily did St. Paul set out to meet adversity. He was aware of the persecutions which awaited him, and his fervour made him long for still heavier crosses. The one wished to decline the renown and glory of being the leader of a nation, even when God visibly called him; the other was prepared and willing to embrace hardships and tribulations for the love of God. With the example of these two saints before us, we must resolve, if we desire to obtain the perfection of obedience, to allow the will of our Superior only to impose honourable employments upon us, and to force our own will to embrace difficult and humiliating offices.”[34] Thus far St. Gregory. Christ our Lord, the Master of all, had previously approved by His conduct the doctrine which St. Gregory here lays down. When He knew the people were coming to take Him away by force and make Him their King, “He fled into the mountains Himself alone.”[35] But when He knew that the Jews and soldiers with Judas at their head were coming to make Him a prisoner and to crucify Him, according to the command which He had received from His Father, He willingly went forth to meet them, and allowed Himself to be captured and bound. Christ, therefore, our good Master, has given us an example of the perfection of obedience, not by His preaching and words only, but by His deeds and in truth. He reverenced His Father by an obedience which was founded on suffering and humiliations. The Passion of Christ exhibits the most brilliant example of the most exalted and ennobling of virtues. It is a model which they should ever have before their eyes, who have been called by God to aspire to the perfection of obedience and the imitation of Christ.


ENDNOTES

1. Philipp. ii. 8.
2. Psalm xxxix. 8, 9.
3. St. John iv. 34.
4. St. John vi. 38.
5. St. John viii. 29.
6. 1 Kings xv. 22. 7. St. Mark i. 13.
8. St. Matt. xvi. 24.
9. St. Luke xiv. 26.
10. Psalm cii. 20.
11. Coloss. ii. 3.
12. St. Luke ix. 58.
13. St. Luke xxiii. 46.
14. St. John x. 18.
15. St. Matt. xi. 29.
16. Heb. xiii. 17.
17. 1 Kings xv. 22, 23.
18. Lament. iii. 27, 28.
19. 1 Kings xv. 23.
20. “Lib. Mor.” xxxv. c. x.
21. St. Luke x. 39.
22. Acts iv. 32.
23. Philipp. iii. 20.
24. St. Matt. xviii. 10.
25. Psalm cii. 20.
26. Philipp. ii. 8.
27. Heb. v. 8.
28. Exod iii.
29. Exod. iv. 10.
30. Exod. iv. 13.
31. Gal. ii. 2.
32. Acts xxi. 11.
33. Acts xxi. 13.
34. “Lib. Mor.” xxxv. c. x.
35. St. John vi. 15.