{"author":null,"canonical_references":[],"database_sha256":"8cfbe7284c6936871d57c02dc6aa63ebbdfd4722422d539dd9f716e46e91112e","date_end":null,"date_start":null,"edition_year":null,"id":"sermonindex-ecf-6314","native_reference":{"book_number":10,"chapter_from":50,"chapter_to":50,"system":"MyBible module coordinates (mapping unverified)","verse_from":3,"verse_to":3},"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>Augustine of Hippo</b>: OVER THE FORTY DAYS DEVOTED TO BURIAL. — The forty days spent in the tomb, which Scripture recalls, may mean something relative to the penance through which sins are buried. For this reason, the forty days of fasting that Moses (Cf. Exodus 34:28), Elijah (Cf. 1Kgs. 19:8), and Our Lord Himself (Cf. Mt. 4:2), lasted forty days, And the Church calls Lent to the special observance of fasting. Even the translation of the Hebrew of the prophet Jonah thus says of the Ninevites: “Forty days, and Nineveh shall be destroyed (Jon. 3:4).” In this way we understand that during those days, certainly accommodated to the humiliation of the penitents, the Ninevites wept their sins in the midst of the fasts and attained the mercy of God. But we must not believe that this number only suits the crying of the penitents, because in this case the Lord would not have spent forty days with his disciples after the resurrection, going in and out, eating and drinking with them. And these days, of course, were for joy. And it is not necessary to think either that the version of the Septuagint, which the Church uses in her reading, is wrong, not saying: forty days, but three days, and Nineveh will be destroyed. Adorned, indeed, these Seventy men of an authority greater than the simple office of translators, possessed the prophetic spirit. That is why their versions were as close to each other as if they had spoken with one mouth. And this was a great miracle. Well, these men put three days, but they did not ignore that the Hebrew codices said forty days. And this they did so that it be understood that sins are blotted out and disappear in the glorification of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom it was said: “He who was delivered for our sins and rose again for our justification (Rom. 4:25).” Well, the glorification of the Lord is known in his resurrection and ascension to the heavens. That is why he gave twice the Holy Spirit, although he is one and the same. The first time, after the resurrection. The second, after the ascent to the heavens. And since he rose again on the third day, and ascended to heaven after forty days, one of these two things, which happened in the second place, signifies the Hebrew codices with the number of days. The other thing, which refers to the three days, which relates to the same subject, the Seventy wanted to remember, not by the literalness of translation, but by the authority of prophecy. Let us not say, then, that one of these two things is false and we fought to defend some translators against others, since those who translate from Hebrew show us that what they translate is written. And the authority of the Septuagint, who recommends even divine authority with such a remarkable miracle, is supported in the churches by a very great antiquity. [<br/><i>— QUESTIONS ON GENESIS, Q. 168 (tr. J. Litteral, draft)</i></p>","source_html_sha256":"8de39a63366a8514e754b8865832e99fe5aff98ee7c1b4e66a83f7a245d88376","source_module":"ECF","source_row_id":6314,"source_url":"https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/ecf/","text_sha256":"f5b5e9338d9360644b71a710e245bc1c04adf39e2b85b9c45cd2a3103f224dd9","translator":null,"work":null}