Held 1516.
Matth. 6, 24-34.
No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate one and love the other, or he will cling to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon. Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; neither for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not life more than food? and the body more than raiment? Look at the birds of the air: they do not sow, they do not reap, they do not gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more than they? Who is there among you that can add a cubit to his length, though he care for it? And why do you care for clothing? Look at the lilies of the field, how they grow; they do not work, nor do they spin. I tell you that even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed as one. If God so clothes the grass of the field, which today stands and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, shall he not much more do it to you, O ye of little faith? Therefore shall ye not be anxious, saying, What shall we eat? what shall we drink? wherewith shall we be clothed? The heathen seek after all these things. For your heavenly Father knows that you have need of all these things. Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness: and all these things shall be added unto you. Therefore do not worry about the morrow, for the morrow will take care of its own. It is enough for every day to have its own plague.
Here Augustine poses a question: Whether one should not work for what belongs to the body's food and need, both for oneself and for others? And answers, driven by various reasons, that such must indeed be, since otherwise all pro-.
phets, patriarchs, saints and apostles, especially Paul, who worked with their hands, had done evil; yes, God would also contradict Himself, who commanded Adam (Gen. 3, 19.): "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat thy bread"; and who said in the third commandment: "Six days shalt thou labor, and on the seventh day shalt thou rest." Is therefore the meaning and understanding of the whole Gospel in the words, "No man can serve two masters," this: He who wants to serve God,
He cannot serve Him if he serves Him for the sake of mammon or any other thing. For then he does not serve God, but rather mammon, because he uses God and enjoys mammon. Therefore this gospel goes against the Jews and all works saints; for those serve God for the sake of the promised land, but these serve God for the honor and salvation they expect from God; but he who serves mammon for the sake of God does not serve a mammon, but God, because he draws everything on God, just as the latter draws God from everything. Of such enjoyment and custom all examples are known, in the first Distinction of the first book of the Sentences.
The other question is: To what extent is this true, that to those who first seek the kingdom of God, the rest all falls, since many saints, Heb. 11:36 ff, have walked, are walking, and will walk in the future, in thirst, hunger, and nakedness? See St. Augustine on this passage, where he says: "God does this, not to leave us, but to heal us.
(3) Then we may see what a great folly avarice is, whether it be spiritual or bodily. First, since we are more highly esteemed than the birds of the air, we are thereby made inferior, because the birds of the air do not so distrust God as we do. Second, for the same reason the lilies of the field surpass us. Thirdly, our body also, that we cannot do so and so.
(4) And if someone thinks it over, how can he believe that a man has no trust in God, who does not have his body, life and mind under his control? Afterwards, he must overburden his grain to God for the longest time, and trust in the remaining little, and not believe in God. He trusts God when it is outside in the field, and yet is afraid when he has it in the barn and in the house. So he trusts God with his goods in a wide and spacious place, but when they are brought into the house, as into a narrower place, he does not do so; as if God, who has had it in such a long time and in such a spacious place, would not trust him.
The one who has not only preserved places, but also given them, could not preserve what has been given and preserved. Thus God will overburden it if it is outside, under much danger of the weather and the air, of thunder, of men and wild animals: but if it is inside, mistrust arises; not as if it could not be preserved, but because avarice, care and love of the proper thing so despairs of God and trusts in the proper thing; since man could not thus hope and trust, as such should first attain to his possession and become his own.
5 But this proves even more the most foolish suspicion that we live several times of life and in several places without taking care of ourselves. Do we not sleep half of the life? and who takes care of himself by sleeping? Next, we are also without this care in most places, businesses, people, things and dangers. For who, in all works, with all men, in all danger, thinks how he may preserve himself? Since one also does not know how great the number of dangers is, and a thousand coincidences occur everywhere. Moreover, if one considers the time of childhood, youth and other occasions in which we are either careless or busy. Behold, if one considers all these things rightly, he will find that, in view of his whole life, he has hardly provided for himself the tenth or twentieth part: and yet he who has had to leave the greater part undone, in the lesser part of his care contends all the time against God, who sustains him in the greater, even in everything. If, therefore, one asks in how many dangers he has preserved himself, one will find that he has not taken care of himself even in the thousandth part. So if he counts both, the oerters and persons, he will not find it otherwise. And yet our unfathomable foolishness and ingratitude are not ashamed to contend against God; and as if there were no God, or if we knew nothing about Him, we bring together only wealth and goods, and fear that we will perish in time to come through hunger and poverty, since we feel that we are not the only ones who have been able to keep ourselves alive.
have not perished in so long a time. This guilt would be less if we heard such things only from others; but in this way each one finds out for himself that it is so. Therefore the Lord says rightly, "O ye of little faith!" and again the Scripture says (Ps. 40:18), "The Lord careth for me." And Peter says (1 Ep. 5, 7.), "Cast all your care upon him, for he careth for you"; and Ps. 37, 5. (Ps. 55, 23.) it is said, "Cast thy care upon the Lord, and he shall provide for thee."
(6) But look still further at this hardness and thickness of heart. Who is there among men who would care for the sake of the whole world all the days of his life? I do not believe that anyone will be so foolish. Let us explain this: A rich merchant is in danger among murderers; how much anxiety and fear does not torment him by taking care of himself? Would such a man want to lead his whole life in this way, even if he had to expect a very great reward for it? Would not death be better than such a life? But now, behold, as soon as the danger is over, his fear ceases, and he becomes cheerful and joyful. Where does this come from? Is it because the danger is over? Indeed. But this is little and almost no danger; yet now he ceases to care for himself, and God cares for him again, therefore he becomes calm. For our care is a cross; God's care is peace and tranquility. For though this danger ceases, yet innumerable dangers, great and small, and as it were creeping, remain: nevertheless why does he not fear in such? Because he does not care for himself, but for God. See therefore, in the little danger he is afraid, who is nevertheless happy in infinite danger. This happens for no other reason than because in the little danger he is his own provider, but in the infinite danger it is God. Therefore, there is no one who considers it right, who would take care of himself for only one day. For even God, in order to prove how faithfully he cares for us in infinite danger, which we do not see, sometimes lets a danger pass, but a small one, so that we become aware of it; as if he wanted to say: Behold, I
care for yourself in infinite danger; let see, care for yourself only in this one danger, let see what your care is able to do; as it says Deut. 32, 37. 38.: "Where are their gods" etc. Since man cannot take care of himself in this one danger, he should lift up his heart and say: Oh Lord God, take care and be concerned for me. What would I do if I should see all my danger, since this one causes me such great anxiety?
(7) This is what the Lord preaches emphatically in this gospel: because in the little danger we do not believe, nor do we abandon ourselves to him, to whom we are abandoned and commanded, even ignorantly, in the most danger; and for this most danger we not only do not give thanks and do not command him the little, but we also offend and anger him about it. For if we trusted him firmly, we would be as safe in the danger and worry we see as in that of which we know nothing. He therefore instructs us and stimulates us by the little danger that we trust in him; but we flee to our worry, seek salvation in and with ourselves; thus we become an idol, and are afflicted with many troubles, because we find nothing of help; and nevertheless, when the danger is over, we rejoice and boast, do not give thanks, nor do we become any better, as if the danger had been conquered by our worry. For here man should go into himself, and thus think, as I have said: Dear God, how great fear this worry of mine has caused me; what should not other danger do, which I do not see? yes, what should it not do, if I had to remain constantly in such worry? Now I see how we rightly call you our father. For "where the Lord buildeth not the house, they labor in vain that build it: where the Lord keepeth not the city, the watchman watcheth in vain." (Ps. 127, 1.)
8 Now this is a palpable Egyptian darkness, that we see such things and yet do not see them. For where is there a greater ignorance than this, that one knows that he is commanded by God and handed over in much danger, and yet despairs in less danger? Therefore he says: "Seek on
first according to the kingdom of God and his righteousness," that is, that you may be in his kingdom and righteous before him.
For the "righteousness of God" is when we are righteous from God, who justifies and imputes righteousness; which righteousness does not consist in works, but in faith, hope and love. For he is not righteous who acts righteously, as Aristotle says; nor are we called righteous by practicing what is righteous: but by faith and hope, so directed to God. This is what we sometimes call a surrender and denial of oneself. For no one surrenders himself to God except the one who believes and hopes and trusts completely in God.
(10) Therefore, Peter Lombard's description of hope as a certain expectation of blessedness that comes from merit is not only conceited, but also misunderstood by most. For shall one hold and think that one should hope because there is merit? Does this mean hope in God, if one does not look at what is before us, namely, in God, but at what is behind us, that is, at the merit that has gone before? No one has hope who hopes in this way; indeed, he only imagines it and worships the idol of his merits.
(11) Let us therefore proceed to that from which Peter Lombardus took this description. It is taken from the apostle Rom. 5, 3: "Affliction produces patience, patience produces experience, experience produces hope, but hope does not bring to shame. Does the apostle mean here that one should hope in experience for patience under tribulation? Who
is so foolish that he should teach that one must hope for the tribulation? If then it is not to be done in tribulation, neither is it to be done in patience, nor in experience, because in the same way the apostle ascribes to all these that they work hope. Has Peter Lombardus been deceived by the word operatur (works), or rather those who follow Peter Lombardus and misunderstand him; since he would have understood the same thing by the word proveniens that Paul would have understood by the word operatur, namely, hope comes from merit, that is, from works and from sufferings, that is, it springs from them, as it were from matter, but is not directed to the same as to its object. Just as when you say: The cup is made from the fire of the furnace, but for this reason it should not always contain fire, but wine. Yes, every work has a different origin and a different use; nor is the origin or cause of a thing the same as the use of it. Hope is a work of works and sufferings: but its use is to trust only in God, whom it does not see; for how can one hope for what one sees? but the merit one does see. And why does not patience always have tribulation with it, and experience patience, and hope experience? So tribulation, patience, and experience will endure forever in this life: but the work of tribulation is experience, not use; and the work of patience is experience, not use; but hope, which is not put to shame, works nothing but the certain glory.