1 Reis 13
Augustine of Hippo · Comentário Patrístico (catena)
1 Reis 13:22
Yet from that love of the human heart, because of which "no one ever hated his own flesh," if people believe that anything would be lacking to their bodies after death that in their own people or country the solemnity of burial demands, they become sad ..., and before death they fear for their bodies that which has no effect on them after death. Thus we read in the book of Kings that God through a prophet threatens another prophet who transgressed his word, that his body should not be returned to the sepulcher of his ancestors. Scripture records it in these words: "Thus says the Lord: Because you have not been obedient to the Lord and have not kept the commandment that the Lord your God commanded you, and [you] have returned and eaten bread and drunk water in the place where he commanded you that you should not eat bread or drink water, your dead shall not be brought in the sepulcher of your ancestors." If we consider the extent of this punishment according to the Evangelist, where we learn that after the body has been slain there is no occasion to fear that the lifeless members will suffer, it should not be called punishment. But, if we consider it in relation to the love of a person for his own flesh, then he might have been frightened and saddened while living at what he was not to feel when dead. This, then, was the nature of the punishment: The soul grieved that something would happen to its body, although, when it did happen, the soul did not grieve. Only to this extent did the Lord wish to punish his servant, for it was not from his own obstinacy that he refused to carry out the command, but, because of the deceit of another person who was deceiving him, he thought he obeyed when he did not obey. — On the Care of the Dead 7.9
1 Reis 13:24-28
It is not to be imagined that one has been so annihilated by the teeth of a beast that his soul has then been snatched away to infernal punishment, since the same lion who killed his very body guarded it. Even the beast of burden on which the man had been riding was unhurt and with great courage stood in the presence of the wild beast at the destruction of his master. By this miraculous sign it is made clear that the man of God was corrected temporarily even at the point of death rather than that he was punished after death. On this subject the apostle Paul, when he had made mention of certain unpleasant infirmities and death experienced by many, said, "But if we judged ourselves, we should not thus be judged by the Lord. But when we are judged, we are being chastised by the Lord, that we may not be condemned with the world." — On the Care of the Dead 7.9
1 Reis 13:31
Well did the man who had deceived the man of God bury him with honor in his own tomb and give orders that he himself should be buried next to his bones, hoping thus to spare his own bones. He knew that the time would come according to the prophecy of that man of God when Josiah, king of the Jews, would dig up in the land the bones of many dead and with them defile the sacrilegious altars that had been set up for graven images. He spared that tomb where the prophet lay who more than three hundred years before had predicted these things. And because of him the burying place of the man who deceived him was not violated. By that love because of which no one ever hated his own flesh, he provided for his own corpse, while he had slain his soul by deceit. From this fact, then, because each one naturally loves his own flesh, it was punishment for him to learn that he would not be in the tomb of his fathers. So he took care that his bones be spared by burying them next to him whose tomb no one would violate. — On the Care of the Dead 7.9