Homily IX.
Matt. II. 16.
“Then Herod, when he saw that he was mocked of the
wise men, was exceeding wroth.”
surely it was a case not
for anger, but for fear and awe: he ought to have perceived that he was
attempting impossible things. But he is not refrained. For when a soul
is insensible and incurable, it yields to none of the medicines given
by God. See for example this man following up his former efforts,and adding many murders to one, and hurried down the steep any whither. For driven wild by this anger, and envy, as by some demon, he takes account of nothing, but rages even against nature herself, and his anger against the wise men who had mocked him he vents upon the children that had done no wrong: venturing then in Palestine upon a deed akin to the things that had been done in Egypt. For he “sent forth,” it is said, “and slew all the children that were in Bethlehem, and in all the coasts thereof, from two years old and under, according to the time which he had diligently inquired of the wise men.”
Here attend to me carefully. Because many things are
uttered by many very idly touching these children, and the course of
events is charged with injustice, and some of these express their
perplexity about it in a more moderate way, others with more of
audaciousness and frenzy. In order then that we may free these of their
madness and those of their perplexity, suffer us to discourse a little
upon this topic. Plainly, then, if this be their charge, that the
children were left to be slain, they should find fault likewise with
the slaughter of the soldiers that kept Peter. For as here, when the young child had fled, other children are massacred in the place of Him who was sought; even so then, too, Peter having been delivered from his prison and chains by the angel, one of like name with this tyrant, and like temper too, when he had sought him, and found him not, slew instead of him the soldiers that kept him.
“But what is this?” it may be said; “why this is not a solution, but an enhancement of our difficulty.” I know it too, and for this intent I bring forward all such cases, that to all I may adduce one and the same solution. What then is the solution of these things? or what fair account of them can we give? That Christ was not the cause of their slaughter, but the king’s cruelty; as indeed neither was Peter to those others, but the madness of Herod. For if he had seen the wall broken through, or the doors overthrown, he might, perhaps, have had ground to accuse the soldiers that kept the apostle, of neglect; but now when all things continued in due form,and the doors were thrown wide open,
and the chains fastened to the hands of them that kept him
(for in fact they were bound unto him), he might have inferred from
these things (that is, if he had been strictly doing a judge’s
office on the matters before him), that the event was not of human
power or craft, but of some divine and wonder-working power; he might
have adored the doer of these things, instead of waging war with the
sentinels. For God had so done all that He did, that so far from
exposing the keepers, He was by their means leading the king unto the
truth. But if he proved senseless, what signifies tothe skillful Physician of Souls, managing all things to do good, the insubordination of him that is diseased?
And just this one may say in the present case likewise. For, wherefore art thou wroth, O Herod, at being mocked of the wise men? didst thou not know that the birth was divine? didst thou not summon the chief priests? didst thou not gather together the scribes? did not they, being called, bring the prophet also with them into thy court of judgment, proclaiming these things beforehand from of old? Didst thou not see how the old things agreed with the new? Didst thou not hear that a star also ministered to these men? Didst thou not reverence the zeal of the barbarians? Didst thou not marvel at their boldness? Wast thou not horror-struck at the truth of the prophet? Didst thou not from the former things perceive the very last also? Wherefore didst thou not reason with thyself from all these things, that this event was not of the craft of the wise men, but of a Divine Power, duly dispensing all things? And even if thou wert deceived by the wise men, what is that tothe young children, who have done no wrong?