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5 Mar 2018

Making Enemies and Deliverance

Eripe me de inimicis meis Deus, et ab insurgentibus in me libera me. Eripe me de operantibus iniquitatem, et de viris sanguinum libera me.

Vitiorum humanorum causas profectus complexus est: ut unde orta est et quo evaderet impietus, nosceremus. Et idcirco iras et simulatates et inimicitias Evangelium compressit, cum irasci sine causa fratri reatus gehennae sit, et oblatio muneris nisi post reconciliationem non concessa sit simultatis, et inimicos non solum diligendos, sed et pro his orandum esse decerniot, quia ex his ad virum sanguinum pervenitur. Nam primum inimici sunt: dehinc insurgunt in eum cujus inimici sunt: insurgentes autem, iniquitatis operarii sunt: postremo iniquitatis operarii usque ad viros sanguinum profecerunt. Viros autem sanguinum non solum admissa caedes, sed et cogitata consummat.


Sanctus Hilarius Pictaviensis,Tractatus super Psalmos, Tractatus in Psalmum LVIII
Seize me from me enemies Lord, and from those rise up against me, deliver me. Seize me from the workers of iniquity, and from men of blood deliver me. 1

The cause and progress of human vices is understood. Whence it rises and where it goes, we have learned, is lack of piety. And therefore, the Gospel suppresses anger and quarrels and hostility, where to be angry without cause with one's brother makes one liable to hell, and one may not offer a gift unless one has forgiven a quarrel, and our enemies we not only must love but we are also commanded to pray for them, 2 because from neglect of these things they become men of blood. First they are enemies, by which they rise against the one of whom they are the enemy, and rising they become workers of iniquity, and then the workers of iniquity proceed to become men of blood. And men of blood are not only those who have taken to killing, but even the thought of it have perfected.

Saint Hilary of Poitiers, Homilies on the Psalms, Psalm 58


1 Ps 58 2-3
2 Mt 5.22-23, 44

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