Holy Thursday Catena

This is an extended meditation of the Fathers on our Lord's example of humility and Peter's pivotal role in clarifying the lesson.

The PDF file may be found here.

Wednesday of the Third Week of Lent: "Not one iota or dot"

This weekday's Gospel includes our Lord's teaching that He has come to fulfill the Law and Prophets, not to annul them. Of course, the objection arises, "Why then don't Christians follow the Judaic observances?" What's particularly interesting is that St. Thomas introduces a Manichaean to propose this question. What follows in this part of the Catena Aurea is a very enlightening dialogue between Faustus the Manichaean and St. Augustine about scriptural exegesis and the essence of both old and new laws. It makes for fascinating and edifying reading.

Here is the PDF file. Enjoy!

First Sunday in Lent, Year A: Temptations of the Lord

The PDF file for this Sunday's Catena can be downloaded here.

As always, St. Thomas arranges the Fathers' insights into sections of literal, moral, allegorical and anagogical (eschatological) interpretations.

I have retained the traditional usage of pinnacle to translate the Greek ptereugion, which after all means the same thing as pinnaculum: little wing. It seems to refer to a smaller tower that juts above the main roof. There was one of these on the southeast corner of the temple's outer wall, where, tradition claims, the Apostle James (the less), Jerusalem's first bishop, was thrown to his death. Remigius and the Gloss both describe this as the place where the teachers sat and thus was a status symbol.

Ash Wednesday

The Catena for this day may be found in PDF format by clicking here.

This is an excellent example of St. Thomas's genius for selecting from a great variety of Fathers from both East and West and then stringing them together in one running commentary. There is, however, an interesting section where St. Augustine notes a difference between Latin and Greek editions of St. Matthew's Gospel. I haven't checked this yet myself, but according to Augustine the Greek editions are missing a phrase contained in the Latin editions. But right along St. Augustine's comments, St. Thomas brings in a Greek Father commenting on the phrase!

Baptism of the Lord

A beautiful catena for this feast of our Lord. It includes, as it were, a discussion among the Fathers about the need for Christ to be baptized, not of course on account of any sin of His. As Ambrose puts it: "Like a wise master teaching His doctrines as much by His own deeds as by His words, He Himself did what He commanded all His disciples to do." And the Fathers, both of the East and West, are all of one mind that Christ in hearing "You are my Son, the beloved," did not learn of His divinity then. As Augustine puts it, "Not that Christ was taught what He knew before, but they who stood by heard it, for whose sake the voice came."

Epiphany

This Catena is the longest yet by far and probably the richest in literal exegesis. Questions raised in the course of the commentary include, Were there only three in the Magis' company or is that a symbolic number? Where were they from? How did they get to Bethlehem so quickly if they were from far away? And many more.

3rd Sunday of Advent

In this Sunday's Catena St. Thomas shows us what first appear to be contradictory interpretations of the Fathers on the passage about John the Baptist wanting to know if Christ was "the one who was to come". The apparent argument is over whether John was asking out of ignorance or a kind of Petrine disbelief or from some hidden purpose, or even whether John was referring to Christ's descent into hell. Through the confusion of interpretation Chrysostom shines consistently.

There is a story that when St. Thomas and some companions were approaching Paris and came to an overlook, one of the companions asked him if he too admired the obvious wealth and beauty of the city. St. Thomas replied that while Paris was indeed beautiful, he'd give it all away for a volume of Chrysostom on Matthew's Gospel.

Today we share a glimpse with St. Thomas of that grander view St. John Chrysostom offers us into the heavenly city.