Augustine of Hippo

"How many are the days of Your servant? When will You be avenged of them that persecute me?" [Psalm 119:84]. In the Apocalypse, [Revelation 6:10-11] these are the words of the Martyrs, and long-suffering is enjoined them until the number of their brethren be fulfilled. The body of Christ then is asking concerning its days, what they are to be in this world, and that no man might suppose that the Church would cease to exist here before the end of the world came, and that some time would elapse in this world, while the Church was now no more on earth; therefore, when he had enquired concerning the days, he added also respecting the judgment, showing indeed that the Church would exist on earth until the judgment, when vengeance shall fall upon Her persecutors. But if any one wonder why he should ask that question, to which when asked by the disciples, their Master replied, "It is not for you to know the times and the seasons;" [Acts 1:7] why should we not believe that in this passage of the Psalm it was prophesied that they should ask this very question, and that the words of the Church, which were so long before uttered here, were fulfilled in their question?

What order does God impose on you? "Love me. You love gold, you will seek gold, and perhaps you will not find it. Whoever seeks me, I am with him. You will love honor, and perhaps you will not find it. Whoever seeks me, I am with him. Who has loved me and has not attained me?" God says to you, "You wish to make [someone] a patron or a powerful friend of yours; you solicit him through someone else inferior. Love me," God says to you, "there is no soliciting of me through anyone; love itself makes me present to you." What is sweeter than this love, brothers? Not without reason you just heard in the psalm, "The unjust have told me of delights, but not as your law, Lord." What is the law of God? The commandment of God. What is the commandment of God? That new commandment that is called new for the very reason that it renews: "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another." Hear that this is the law of God. The apostle says, "Bear one another's burdens, and so you will fulfill the law of Christ." This is the consummation of all our works, love. There is the end. Because of this we are running; to this we are running. When we come to it, we shall rest.

The true martyrs are those of whom the Lord says, "Blessed are they who suffer persecution for justice's sake." Therefore, it is not those who suffer for the sake of injustice and the impious division of Christian unity, but those who suffer persecution for justice's sake who are truly martyrs. Hagar suffered persecution from Sarah, yet the one who persecuted was holy and she who suffered was sinful. Is that any reason for comparing the persecution suffered by Hagar to that with which the wicked Saul afflicted holy David? Obviously, there is a very great difference, not because David suffered, but because he suffered for justice's sake. And the Lord himself was crucified among thieves. But, though they were alike in suffering, they were different in the reason for suffering. Therefore, in the psalm we must understand the voice of the true martyr wishing to be distinguished from false martyrs: "Judge me, O God, and distinguish my cause from the nation that is not holy." He does not say "distinguish my punishment" but "distinguish my cause." For the punishment of the wicked can be the same, but the cause of the martyrs is not the same, and their cry is, "They have persecuted me unjustly; help me." The psalmist thinks himself worthy of being justly helped because they persecuted unjustly, for, if they persecuted justly, he would not be worthy of help but of chastisement.

We answer them: You have Christ's baptism; come, in order to have Christ's Spirit as well. Be afraid of what is written: "But anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ, that person does not belong to him." You have put on Christ in the form of the sacrament; put him on by imitating his example, "since Christ suffered for us, leaving us an example, so that we might follow his footsteps." Do not be people who "have the form of piety but deny its power." What greater power could piety have than the love of unity? It says in the Psalms, "I have seen the end of every consummation; your commandment is exceedingly broad." Which commandment, if not the one about which it says, "A new commandment I give you, that you should love one another"? Why "broad," if not because "the love of God has been poured out in our hearts"? Why "an end of every" consummation, if not because "the fullness of the law is love; and the whole law is summed up in this" that is written: You shall love "your neighbor" as "yourself"? The way you people, though, love your neighbors as yourselves, is that while you do not want anything bad to be believed about you, which has neither been seen nor proved, you are happy to believe about the whole world what you have neither seen nor received any proof of.

We have frequently admonished you, that love was to be understood by that praiseworthy breadth, by means of which, while we do the commandments of God, we feel no straitness. On this account also after saying above in this great Psalm, "Your commandment is exceeding broad:" in the following verse he shows wherefore it is broad: "what love have I unto Your law, O Lord!" [Psalm 119:97]. Love is therefore the breadth of the commandment. For how can it be that what God commands to be loved, be loved, and yet the commandment itself be not loved? For this itself is the law; "in all the day," he says, "is my study in it." Behold how I have loved it, that in the whole day my study is in it; or rather, as the Greek has it, "all the day long," which more fully expresses the continuance of meditation. Now that is to be understood through all time; which is, for ever. By such love lust is driven out: lust, which repeatedly opposes our performing the commandments of the law, when "the flesh lusts against the spirit:" [Galatians 5:17] against which the spirit lusting, ought so to love the law of God, that it be its study during the whole day....

And he then adds: "You have made me to understand Your commandment above mine enemies; for it is ever with me" [Psalm 119:98]. For "they have indeed a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge," etc. [Romans 10:2-3] But the Psalmist, who understands the commandment of God above these his enemies, wishes to be found with the Apostle, "not having" his "own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is of the faith of Christ, which is of God;" [Philippians 3:9] not that the Law which his enemies read is not of God, but because they do not understand it, like him who understands it above his enemies, by clinging to the Stone upon which they stumbled. For "Christ is the end of the law," etc., [Romans 10:4] "that they may be justified freely through His grace;" [Romans 3:24] not like those who imagine that they obey the law of their own strength, and are therefore, though by God's law, yet still endeavouring to set up their own righteousness; but as the son of promise, who hungering and thirsty after it, [Matthew 5:6] by seeking, by asking, by knocking, [Matthew 7:7] as it were begs it of the Father, that being adopted he may receive it through His only-begotten Son....His enemies sought from the same commandment temporal rewards; and therefore it was not unto them for ever, as it was unto this man. For they who have translated "for ever" have rendered better than they who have written "for an age," since at the end of time there can be no longer a commandment of the law....