Dragged Off To Hell

Verutamen ad infernum detraheris in profundum laci. LXX: Nunc autem in infernum descendes, et ad fundamenta terrae. Non ad infernum sponte descendes, hoc enim Domini Salvatoris est, ut vinctos de inferis liberet, sed ad infernum detraheris invitus, ut qui per virtutes poteras ad excelsa conscendere, per vitia detraharis ad poenas. Sancti pennas habent aquilae, et pennas columbae, et possunt dicere: Volabo et requiescam. Impii autem et Aegyptiorum similes, dermersi sunt quasi plumbum in aquis vehementissimis, et demersi sunt in profundum sicut lapis. Unde et iniquitas, sive ut melius habetur in Hebraeo, impietas super talentum plumbi sedere conspicitur. Ergo illud quod alibi legimus: Omnis qui se exltat, humiliabitur, etiam rex confusionis passus est, ut detraheretur in fundamenta terrae, sive ut verius in Hebraeo habetur, in profundum laci. De fundamentis terrae in Deuteronomio scribitur: Ignus succensus est in furore meo, ardebit usque ad infernum novissimum. Devorabit terram, et fundamenta ejus, eos videlict qui terreni sunt. De lacu quoque, quod per eum profunda significentur inferni, illa sunt testimonis: Assimlatus sum cum descendentibus in lacum. Et Posuerunt me in lacum novissimum. Sicut enim lacus aquas ad se descendentes, ita infernus animas suscipit: ad quem lacum descendit Banaias tempore nivis et frigoris et interfecti in eo leonem. Unde et haeretici relinquunt fontem aquae viventis Dominum, et fodiunt sibi lacus contritos qui aquam non valeant continere. De his lacis, qui fervorem non habent Spiritus sancti; nec Jeremiae prophetae similes sunt, qui juxta Septuaginta interpretes loquebatur: Inveni aquam calidam in deserto; sed refrigescente charitate, calorem Sancti Spiritus perdiderunt: ille est lacus, de quo idem Jeremias loquitur: Sicut refrigerat lacus aquam, sic refrigerat malitia habentes se. Qui utinam, juxta Apocalypsim Joannis, aut calidi essent, aut frigidi, id est, aut crederent, aut omnino non crederent, ne per teporem, et simulationem fidei a Domino rejicerentur. Sanctus Hieronymus, Commentariorum In Isaiam Prophetam, Lib VI, Cap XIV Source Migne PL 24.221b-222a

'But you are dragged off to hell, into the depths of the pit.' The Septuagint reads: 'But now you have fallen into hell, and to the foundations of the earth.' 1 Not willingly do you descend to hell, as indeed did the Lord our Saviour, so that He liberate those captive from hell, but you have been dragged off unwillingly, you who by virtue were able to climb to the heights, so by vice are dragged off to punishment. The holy have the wings of the eagle, and the wings of the dove, and they are able to say, 'I shall fly away and rest.' 2 But the impious are like the Egyptians: they have sunk down utterly like lead in the waters. 3 Whence iniquity, or better, as it in the Hebrew, impiety, is seen to sit upon the talent of lead. 4 Therefore, that which elsewhere we read: 'All who exalt themselves shall be humbled,' even a king suffering confusion as he is dragged away to the foundations of the earth, or more accurately, as it reads in the Hebrew: 'into the depths of the pit.' Concerning the foundations of the earth it is written in Deuteronomy: 'Fire has been kindled in my fury, it burns even to the furthest reaches of hell. It shall devour the earth and its foundations,' 5 that is, those who are worldly. And concerning the pit, by which the depths of hell are signified, there are these testimonies: 'I am made one with those who have fallen into the pit.' And: 'They placed me in the furthest reaches of the pit.' 6 As a pit receives the waters falling into it, so hell receives souls, to which pit Banaiah descended in a time of snow and cold, and in it he killed a lion. 7 Whence even the heretics who abandon the Lord, the fount of living waters, dig for themselves ragged pits which are not able to hold water. Like these pits are those who do not have the fervour of the Holy Spirit, who are not like those of the prophet Jeremiah, who according to the translation of the Septuagint, said: 'I found cold water in the desert,' 8 but they are cold in love, having lost the heat of the Holy Spirit, which is that pit of which Jeremiah says: 'As a pit keeps water fresh, so in them evil is kept fresh.' 9 They who should be, according to the Apocalypse of John, either warm or cold, that is, they should either believe or not, lest because of tepidity and a pretence of faith they are cast out by the Lord. 10 Saint Jerome, Commentary On The Prophet Isaiah, Book 6, Chapter 14 1 Isai 14.15 2 Ps 54.6 3 Exod 15.5 4 Zach 5.8 5 Deut 32.22 6 Ps 87.5,7 7 2 Kings 33.20, 1 Par 11.22 8 Jerem 2.6 9 Jerem 6.7 10 Apoc 3.15-16, Mt 7.21-23