{"author":null,"canonical_references":[],"database_sha256":"8cfbe7284c6936871d57c02dc6aa63ebbdfd4722422d539dd9f716e46e91112e","date_end":null,"date_start":null,"edition_year":null,"id":"sermonindex-ecf-5732","native_reference":{"book_number":10,"chapter_from":18,"chapter_to":18,"system":"MyBible module coordinates (mapping unverified)","verse_from":20,"verse_to":20},"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>: The Lord therefore said: \"The outcry of Sodom and Gomorrah has been multiplied, and their sin has become very grave.\" He calls the outcry of Sodom the reputation or rather the infamy of their crimes, from which the Apostle, admonishing us, says: \"Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamor, and blasphemy, be put away from you, with all malice\" (Ephesians 4:31). To this clamor indeed is opposed the clamor of the elect, who confidently supplicating their Creator, individually say: \"Lord, hear my prayer, and let my cry come to you\" (Psalms 102:2). Indeed, great is their clamor, a sublime merit and the intention of faith seeking heavenly things alone, where Christ sits at the right hand of God; since they do not desire earthly riches, nor vain and perishable glory, nor the fleeting joys of the flesh, but only heavenly goods, everything they do is surely lofty and, as it were, resonates with a clamor. But with the multiplied outcry of sins, that is, their enormous crime, let us see what follows.<br/><i>— Commentary on Genesis (Hexaemeron)</i></p><p><b>Caesarius of Arles</b>: Now let us see what he means by saying, \"I descended to see whether they have done all that the outcry which has come to me indicates; if not, I will know.\" Because of this, pagans, and especially the exceedingly foul Manichaeans, are wont to assail us by saying, \"Behold, the God of the law did not know what was being done in Sodom.\" Now we reply with sound understanding and say that God knows the just in one way and sinners in another. What is said concerning the just? \"The Lord knows who are his.\" What is said about sinners? \"Depart from me, all you workers of iniquity; I do not know you.\" Moreover, the apostle Paul says, \"If anyone is the Lord's, he knows what I am saying; if anyone ignores this, he shall be ignored.\" What does it mean, then, \"I do not know you\"? \"I do not recognize you in my pattern; I do not recognize my image in you. My justice knows something to punish in you, but my mercy does not find anything to crown.\" For this reason if one's actions are unworthy of God, one is said to be unworthy of his knowledge also. \"I descended to see\"; not in order to know what they are doing but to make them worthy of my knowledge if I find any of them just, repentant, or such as I should know.<br/><i>— SERMON 83.6-7</i></p><p><b>Ephrem the Syrian</b>: It was not that God, who had just said, \"their sins were very grave,\" did not know that they had sinned. This was an example to judges not to prejudge a case, even based on very reliable hearsay. For if he who knows all set aside his knowledge lest he exact vengeance without full knowledge before the trial, how much more should they set aside their ignorance and not effect judgment before the case is heard.<br/><i>— COMMENTARY ON Genesis 16:1</i></p><p><b>John Chrysostom</b>: Then, to teach the whole human race that even if their sins are exceedingly great and confessed to be such, he does not pronounce sentence before proof is manifest, he says, \"I am going down to see if their deeds correspond to the outcry reaching me, so as to know if it is true or not.\" What is meant by the deliberation of the expression? \"I am going down to see if their deeds correspond to the outcry reaching me, so as to know if it is true or not.\" What is meant by the considerateness of the expression? \"I am going down to see.\" I mean, does the God of all move from place to place? No indeed! It doesn't mean this; instead, as I have often remarked, he wants to teach us by the concreteness of the expression that there is need to apply precision and that sinners are not condemned on hearsay nor is sentence pronounced without proof.<br/><i>— HOMILIES ON Genesis 42.12</i></p><p><b>Salvian the Presbyter</b>: The cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is multiplied, he said. Well did he say that sins can cry out. Great surely is the cry of sinners as it mounts from earth to heaven. But why does he say that the sins of people cry out? It is because God says his ears are assaulted by the cries of our sins that the punishment of sinners be not delayed. Truly is it a cry, and the cry is great when the love of God is overpowered by the cries of sins to the extent that he is forced to punish the sinners. The Lord shows how unwilling he is to punish even the gravest sinners when he said that the cry of Sodom ascended to him. This means: My mercy urges me to spare them, but the cry of their sins compels me to punish them.<br/><i>— THE GOVERNANCE OF GOD 1.8</i></p><p><b>Augustine of Hippo</b>: GOD, SPEAKING TO MANKIND, LOWERS HIMSELF TO THEIR LANGUAGE. — I will therefore go down and see, if they completely correspond with the cry which comes to me, and if not, that I may know . By taking these words as expression, not a doubt about what will happen, but of anger and threat, poses no problem at all; for God in the Scripture speaks to men in the manner of men; and men, who really could understand this mystery, knew how to understand the wrath of God without any disturbance in God. In fact, we too often speak in this way, threatening: \"Let's see if I do not do this\" or \"let's see if I will not do it\", and \"if I cannot or will not know how to do it\"; That is, I will try this to see if I cannot; Which, as it is said in a threatening tone, not because the thing is ignored, it appears that the person is affected by the anger. But God cannot be disturbed. It is therefore a human expression and a human way of speaking and that is consistent with human weakness, and God adapts his way of speaking to ours. [<br/><i>— QUESTIONS ON GENESIS, Q. 38 (tr. J. Litteral, draft)</i></p>","source_html_sha256":"595a1558a8b325bc2992de83a8a6035c56bbe69bfc9eb5cd6b295a8e1cf05193","source_module":"ECF","source_row_id":5732,"source_url":"https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/ecf/","text_sha256":"7f1270008934b03bdc31b63bbc427fe8185fea5a5337f10ece8242821886afd7","translator":null,"work":null}