{"author":null,"canonical_references":[],"database_sha256":"8cfbe7284c6936871d57c02dc6aa63ebbdfd4722422d539dd9f716e46e91112e","date_end":null,"date_start":null,"edition_year":null,"id":"sermonindex-ecf-1193","native_reference":{"book_number":90,"chapter_from":2,"chapter_to":2,"system":"MyBible module coordinates (mapping unverified)","verse_from":29,"verse_to":29},"public_import_allowed":false,"record_kind":"verse-keyed-module-record","review_required":["English edition and exact text","author/work attribution","dating","verse mapping and citation kind","reuse and attribution","split author quotations and deduplicate"],"review_status":"unreviewed","source_html":"<p><b>Bede</b>: And you honored your sons above me, etc. Not content with the portion that I granted you, you also tried to take the firstfruits which were due to me; which can be understood both of the time and of the portion of the sacrifices; because before the fat was burned, they presumed to take for themselves the best parts to be eaten from the victims, as was read above.<br/><i>— Commentary on Samuel</i></p><p><b>Gregory the Dialogist</b>: And yet sometimes there is more grievous delinquency, if among perverse persons equality is kept up more than discipline. For Eli, because, overcome by false affection, he would not punish his delinquent sons, smote himself along with his sons before the strict judge with a cruel doom. For on this account it is said to him by the divine voice, \"Thou hast honoured thy sons more than Me.\"<br/><i>— The Book of Pastoral Rule, Part 2, Chapter 6</i></p><p><b>Gregory the Dialogist</b>: 26. For \"why\" is not said except by a judge who urgently investigates. And he who is rebuked for having kicked away the victim of God and His gifts is judged to have done injury without the counsel of reason. It should be noted that he speaks in the plural number: \"Why have you kicked away my victim,\" so that what is said may seem to pertain not only to Eli but also to his sons. For wild animals are accustomed to kick away things clinging to them. For what other victims did the faithful have than to persist in the praises of their Redeemer, to proclaim that Christ Jesus died for the salvation of the world, and that by rising again He restored the life of the human race? And what other offerings were theirs, except to ceaselessly offer thanksgivings to Almighty God for such great benefits bestowed upon them? These indeed the sons of Eli kicked away, because in their rejection of the new preaching, they did not follow the counsel of reason through the sacred Scriptures, but the impulse of savagery. For the Truth desired to call them back from irrational cruelty to the intention of rational counsel, saying: \"Search the Scriptures, for you think that in them you have eternal life; and they bear witness of me\" (John 5:39). Whence here also it is said: \"Which I commanded to be offered in the temple.\" For in the law, the psalms, and the prophets, it had been written concerning the passion, the resurrection of the Lord, and the state of the universal Church. Therefore the leaders of the Synagogue kicked away with their heel the victim and the gifts of the Lord commanded to be offered in the temple of the Lord, because indeed they strove not to examine the preaching of the holy Church by the authority of Holy Scripture, but to reject and cast it away by the sole impulse of their savagery. For if they consulted the commandments of God in sacred Scripture with an enlightened mind, they would have received the holy preachers, whom they fiercely cast out, as though divinely sent to them. But He who rebukes the sons of Eli, that is, the old teachers of the lesser order, for their irrational savagery, also accuses the father himself of negligence, saying: (Verse 29) \"You have honored your sons more than me.\"</p><p>27. As if openly rebuking, he says: They have driven others away, and you have honored those who drive them away. He honored his sons more than God, because while he despised their openly wicked deeds, he provided them with temporal gains. Hence he also adds: (Verse 29.) That you might eat the firstfruits of every sacrifice of mine.</p><p>28. By which words indeed he seems to reproach the greater order of teachers, who for this reason consented to the Redeemer's death, because they feared losing the profits of the old offerings. Whence also, having taken counsel with the Pharisees, they said: What do we do, because this man performs many signs? If we let him go on like this, all will believe in him, and the Romans will come and take away our place and nation (John 11:47, 48). And again: See that you are gaining nothing; behold, the whole world has gone after him (Ibid. 12:19). He therefore honored his sons so that they might eat, because he fell silent from the intention of preaching, lest while he asserted the truth of the new offering, he would no longer be able to have the old things for the indulgence of his own pleasure. Since therefore he has set forth the greatness and character of the guilt, let us now see with how great an equity of examination he suggests the measure of punishment. For adding he says: (Verse 30.) Therefore the Lord God of Israel says: Speaking I spoke, that your house and the house of your father would minister in my presence, henceforth and forever. But now far be this from me.<br/><i>— Commentary on 1 Kings, Book 2, Chapter 2</i></p><p><b>Gregory the Dialogist</b>: Now a man of God is described as having come to Eli, who, being about to bring forth the severity of the divine sentence, carefully enumerated how many gifts He had bestowed upon him. And because he finally announces the punishment of the vengeance that he deserved, what does this give us to understand, except that the faults of pastors are judged more strictly? And not only do their sins increase the punishment of retribution, but also the gifts that were granted. Likewise, because he recounts those same gifts one by one, he indicates something more serious: that each individual gift comes to be a torment, when it is proved to have been poorly preserved. For he poorly guards in himself the gifts of almighty God who defiles the splendor of the pastoral summit through the stains of wicked conduct. Whence also the house of Eli is fittingly rebuked for having kicked away the gifts and sacrifices of the Lord with the heel. The heel indeed is that part of the body by which we touch the ground. In this lower part of the body, therefore, is shown that disposition of the soul by which earthly things are desired.</p><p>And because, as it has seemed to some, victims were customarily offered for a victory obtained or to be obtained, and gifts given to friends, what is signified by victims and gifts except the vows of those still advancing and the devotions of the perfect in the praises of almighty God? For we who advance through the temptations of hidden enemies, when we prepare virtue for the conflict against them, surely hold victims in the praises of almighty God. But when the battles that are thrust upon us have now been conquered, when we give thanks to almighty God for the victory obtained, we undoubtedly sacrifice victims to the same Lord. But those who offer him the affection of intimate love bestow gifts as if upon a friend. Gifts, therefore, are the affections of charity, by which the hearts of the elect burn with desire for their Creator. And because when a ruler pursues earthly things, he harms many who are engaged in spiritual conflict and many also who are now beginning to aspire upward, he indeed kicks aside the victims and gifts of God with his heel, because by the example of his depravity he drives away the endeavors of both groups. And so the victims are cast aside, because often the labor of spiritual warfare is abandoned by the untrained soldiers of Christ, when the leaders of the Christian campaign are seen to pursue bodily leisure in the repose of earthly pleasures. The gifts are kicked aside, because the affections of charity grow cold in the minds of many who already love heavenly things, while they see their prelates seeking the heavenly homeland through no desires of love, but lying bound by the coldness of the body in the lowest pleasures. Among whom indeed there are some who bestow spiritual honors in a carnal manner, and attribute to kinship what is owed to merits. Who would surely tremble at the guilt of their presumption, if they carefully considered what the Lord complains about concerning Eli the priest. (Verse 29.) \"You have honored your sons more than me,\" He says, \"so that you might eat the first portions of every sacrifice of my people Israel.\"</p><p>For he honors his sons and relatives more than the Lord, who chooses persons for sacred orders not from the integrity of their conduct, but from love of kinship. Therefore the sons are said to have been honored, so that they might eat the firstfruits of the sacrifice, because carnal prelates bestow the heights of spiritual honor upon their carnal relatives for this reason: that they may be enriched with ecclesiastical resources and heaped with an abundance of plenty in the loftiness of their office. Nor do they care what sort of persons come to the spiritual ministry, but only that they may advance in temporal dignity those whom they embrace with carnal affection. He is therefore accused of having honored his sons—but wicked ones, who ought not even to be held as close by carnal kinship, if they in no way shine forth in the conduct of ecclesiastical teaching. But those who promote the reprobate are shown to confound the very order of promotion, since it says he honored his sons so that they might eat the firstfruits of the sacrifice. For the priest does not preach in order to eat, but rather he ought to eat in order to preach. This Paul also suggests, saying: \"Let him who preaches the Gospel live from the Gospel\" (1 Cor. 9:14). Hence he says again: \"Do not muzzle the ox that treads the grain\" (1 Cor. 9:9; 1 Tim. 5:18; Deut. 25:4), so that, namely, the preacher of the holy Church may supply nourishment to his body for this reason: that he may be able to bear the labor of preaching. Therefore those who promote their relatives are proven to pervert the right order of promotion—not for the purpose of ministry, but for the pursuit of dignity. This they certainly would not do if they did not love themselves and their relatives in a carnal manner while in a spiritual position. But if they understand the rejection of Eli, let them also fear the judgments of their own guilt. For by the divine voice it is said: \"You have honored your sons more than me, so that you might all eat the firstfruits of my people Israel.\" (Verse 30.) \"Therefore the Lord God of Israel says: I spoke and declared that your house and the house of your father would minister in my sight forever. But now, far be this from me.\"<br/><i>— Commentary on 1 Kings, Book 2, Chapter 3</i></p>","source_html_sha256":"dcac0c4b5b58a683d3186b7b3fde246a74838d30c2d3ea4e8b636f8f1ba7d16a","source_module":"ECF","source_row_id":1193,"source_url":"https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/ecf/","text_sha256":"7e1834517c65338d756420174ff3e305c9e54132d9f4447391d38a12adb040cd","translator":null,"work":null}