Salmos 49
Basil of Caesarea · Comentário Patrístico (catena)
Salmos 49:1
He who is assembling and summoning all by the proclamation is the Paraclete, the Spirit of truth, who brings together through prophets and apostles those who are saved.… The sharing of the summons is a uniting in peace, so that those who were, up to this time, opposed to each other because of customs might, through gathering together, become habituated to each other in love. — HOMILIES ON THE PSALMS 19:1 (PS 49)
Salmos 49:4
The things that I teach, he says, from the Spirit, these I proclaim to you, saying nothing of my own, nothing human; but, since I have been listening to the propositions of the Spirit, who hands down in mystery to us the wisdom of God, I am opening for you and am making manifest the proposition; moreover, I am opening not otherwise than through psaltery. The psaltery is a musical instrument that gives out its sounds harmoniously with the melody of the voice. Accordingly, the rational psaltery is opened especially at that time when actions in harmony with the words are displayed. And he is a spiritual psaltery who has acted and has taught. He it is who opens the proposition in the psalms, setting forth the possibility of the teaching from his own example.… There is nothing incongruous or out of tune in his life. — HOMILIES ON THE PSALMS 19:2 (PS 49)
Salmos 49:6
Even if he seems to be one of the very powerful people in this life, even if he is surrounded with a great number of possessions, these words teach him to descend from such a notion and to humble himself under the mighty hand of God. … Not even the soul is complete in itself for salvation.… Every human soul has bowed down under the evil yoke of slavery imposed by the common enemy of all and, being deprived of the very freedom that it received from the Creator, has been led captive through sin. Every captive has need of ransoms for his freedom. Now, neither a brother can ransom his brother, nor can anyone ransom himself, because he who is ransoming must be much better than he who has been overcome and is now a slave. But, actually, no one has the power with respect to God to make atonement for a sinner, since he himself is liable for sin. "All have sinned and have need of the glory of God. They are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus" our Lord. — HOMILIES ON THE PSALMS 19:3 (PS 49)
Salmos 49:7
In fact, what can one find great enough that he may give it for the ransom of his soul? But one thing was found worth as much as all people together. This was given for the price of ransom for our souls, the holy and highly honored blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, which he poured out for all of us; therefore, we were bought at a great price. If, then, a brother does not redeem, will a man redeem? But if man cannot redeem us, he who redeems us is not a man. Now, do not assume, because he sojourned with us "in the likeness of sinful flesh," that our Lord is only man, failing to discern the power of the divinity, who had no need to give God a ransom for himself or to redeem his own soul because "he did no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth." No one is sufficient to redeem himself, unless he comes who turns away the captivity of the people, not with ransoms or with gifts, as it is written in Isaiah, but in his own blood.… He does not need a ransom, but he himself is the propitiation. — HOMILY ON PSALMS 19:4 (PS 49)
Salmos 49:11
One who is dead through sins does not dwell in a house but a sepulcher, since his soul is dead.… The thoroughly depraved person dwells in a sepulcher and does not even lay down a foundation of penance because of his dead works, but he is "like a whited sepulcher, which outwardly is very conspicuous but inwardly is full of dead men's bones and of all uncleanness." Therefore, when such a one speaks, he does not open his mouth in the word of God, but he has an open sepulcher as his throat. — HOMILIES ON THE PSALMS 19:6 (PS 49)
Salmos 49:12
Humankind, then, having been advanced above other created things in honor, did not understand and neglected to follow God and to become like the Creator. Becoming a slave of the passions of the flesh, "he is compared with senseless beasts and is become like them": now he is like an amorous horse that neighs after his neighbor's wife, now like a ravenous wolf, lying in wait for strangers, but at another time, because of his deceit toward his brother, he makes himself like the villainous fox. Truly, there is excessive folly and beast-like lack of reason, that he, made according to the image of the Creator, neither perceives his own constitution from the beginning, nor even wishes to understand such great dispensations that were made for his sake, at least, to learn his own dignity from them, but that he is unmindful of the fact that, throwing aside the image of the heavenly, he has taken up the image of the earthly. In order that he might not remain in sin, for his sake "The Word was made flesh and dwelled among us," and he humbled himself to such an extent as to become "obedient to death, even to death on a cross." — HOMILIES ON THE PSALMS 19:8 (PS 49)
Salmos 49:16
When you see the unjust becoming rich and the just poor, do not fear for yourself; do not be dismayed in mind, as if the providence of God is nowhere looking on human affairs, or perhaps, somewhere there is a divine watchfulness, but it does not reach to places near the earth, so as to watch over our affairs; for, if there were a providence, it would be apportioning to each person what is proper to him, so that the just, who understand how to use wealth, would be rich, but the wicked, who have wealth as the instrument of their wickedness, would be poor.… Now, since there are many who have such notions and who, because of the apparent inconsistency of the distribution of the fortunes of life, assume that the world is not the work of providence, the Scripture addresses these to calm their uninstructed emotion.… Do not be faint about present affairs, but await that blessed and everlasting life. Then you will see that poverty and contempt and the lack of luxuries befall the just person for his good. And do not be troubled now about imagined good things, as though they were unjustly divided. You will hear how it will be said to a certain rich man, "You in your lifetime have received good things," but to the poor person that he receives evils in his life. As a consequence, therefore, the latter is consoled, but the former suffers pain. — HOMILIES ON THE PSALMS 19:10 (PS 49)