4 Prov. xxiii. 1, 2, according to the Septuagint, whose reading of verse 2 must have been somewhat different from that of the present Hebrew text, with which our English version pretty closely agrees: "And thou shalt put a knife to thy throat, if thou art a man of appetite" (or perhaps, "if thou hast control over thy appetite," ht@/)/ penlt/ lcak@-M)i
). So somewhat similarly the Vulgate, which makes the last clause, "if thou hast power over thy life."-Tr.
5 This clause, "for the edification," etc., is wanting in many of the Mss.
12 Of Christ's footprints on Mount Olivet, impressed on the ground, there is mention made in the works of Jerome, in the book on "Hebrew places," and in Bede, in the names of places in the Acts of the Apostles; as likewise in the sacred history of Sulpitius Severus, Book ii.-Migne. The text is somewhat uncertain, but indicates the existence of "holy places" in Augustin's day, and certain acts of worship performed in their honor.-Tr.
17 Migne says that "there is, perhaps, in this passage something either superfluous or lacking." But there does not seem any real cause for such a supposition.-Tr.
19 Ps. iii. 5. It need scarcely be said that this psalm cannot bear the Messianic interpretation attached to it by Augustin, any more than Prov. xxiii. 1, 2, similarly applied in Sec. 2 of this lecture; and frequently elsewhere. But the accommodation at the will of the writer of all Old Testament Scripture equally to such a purpose was characteristic of the age.-Tr.
22 Matt. x. 28, and Luke xii. 4, 5.
24 The word anima, according to Augustin's explanation of it above, may be rendered in these sections either "soul" or "life." The original also is yu/xh.-Tr.
25 From Apollinaris, bishop of Alexandria, who held that the body which Christ assumed had only a sensitive, and not a rational soul, and that His divine nature supplied the place of the latter. His doctrines were condemned by the Council of Alexandria, A.D. 362, and he himself was deposed by the Council of Rome, A.D. 378.-Tr.
26 Sine deo: which, however, is wanting in all the Mss.
1 Desudat, struggles to sweating.
2 Encaenia, e0gkoi/nia, from e0n and kaino/j, new.
3 It was a feast, however, instituted by Judas Maccabaeus, to commemorate his purification of the temple, after its profanation by Antiochus.-Tr.
9 The pasture, and the going in and out, refer rather to Christ's guidance and nourishment of His people in this present life.-Tr.
10 There is a considerable difference in these words, as rendered by Augustin, from that which is found in our English version: "My Father who gave them me is greater than all." The latter is certainly the more intelligible and suitable to the context. But the variation of the Mss. between the two readings, "o#...mei=zon" and "o#j...mei/zwn," is somewhat remarkable. The far larger number are certainly in favor of the latter, as followed by our English Bibles, but the former is countenanced by some of the more important; while others which have o#j have at the same time mei=zon (neut.) and vice versa. Thus the Sinaitic reads o# (neut.), and mei=zwn (masc.); while the Alexandrian has o#j (masc.), and mei=zon (neut.). The Vulgate, and some of the other early versions, have Augustin's reading; but the Peshito (Syriac), which is the earliest of them all, supports the other, its literal rendering being, "For my Father, who gave to me, than all greater [is] He." Modern critics have generally adopted the masc. reading,-Griesbach, Bengel, and others, almost ignoring the other, and Stier dismissing it as wholly inadmissible; while Alford, in a very strange and unsatisfactory way, gives the neuter in his Greek text, and not a syllable of explanation in his notes. It seems to us that the transcriber had first let o# creep into the text, perhaps from the previous similar expression in chap. vi. 39; and then mei=zon was made neuter by some other to agree with it. This is more likely than the reverse; and our English reading is every way more satisfactory than Augustin's.-Tr.