You have turned justice into wrath and the fruits of righteousness into bitterness, you who do not find joy in any good word, declaring, "Have we not, by our own might, acquired power?" Behold, I, says the Lord God of Hosts, will raise a fierce nation against you, O house of Israel, and will crush you so that you do not reach Emath or the river in the West. Because you have descended into such madness that even in times of death and impending doom, you have refused to invoke the name of the Lord, the Sovereign will command and will devastate the larger house while fracturing the smaller house. If He commands, how does He bring destruction, and if He brings destruction, how does He command? Since He commands and sends His servants to execute His decrees, He Himself administers the punishment. Thus, although it is the Father who commands and the Son who acts, the one who commands is indeed the one who performs, as stated, "He spake, and it was done; He commanded, and it stood fast" (Psalm 148:5). For "all things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made” (John 1:3). When it is mentioned that the firstborn in Egypt were slain, the Lord is referred to as the one who inflicted that punishment (Ex. 12). Similarly, here too, the Lord gives the command and through His servants punishes the greater house, the ten tribes known as Israel, with destruction, while the lesser house, the two tribes governed by the lineage of David, suffers fractures. Note the differences in their treatment: Israel, having sinned greatly, is condemned to utter ruin and everlasting captivity. In contrast, the house of Judah, with the temple within it and having sinned in part, is held captive for seventy years, suffering not destruction but fractures. A house that has merely fractured can be mended, but one that is destroyed requires a complete reconstruction. The devastation and fractures of both houses are likened to horses and buffaloes; the former cannot traverse rocky terrain, while the latter are so fierce that they will not submit to the yoke and, like bulls dwelling in forests, do not wish to till the earth with a plow. Yet, while horses and buffaloes remain unchanged in nature, you have distorted the nature of God, turning sweetness into bitterness and the fruit of His truth into something bitter, the most bitter herb. You delight in emptiness — in either idols and molten images, which amount to nothing, as expressed in Esther's words: "Thou shalt not give Thy scepter to those that are not" (Esther 4:17), or in deceit and vanity. You believe you have gained power and strength through your own might to scatter your foes. Because you, the great house and the lesser house destined for destruction and fracturing, which encompasses the house of Israel and all twelve tribes, have acted thus, behold, I will raise a ruthless nation against you, the Assyrians and Chaldeans, who will crush you mercilessly from one end to the other, from the borders of your land to the river in the wilderness, or to the West, as the LXX interprets it, spanning the region from Emath to Rinokorura, through which the Nile and its tributary flow into the sea. Emath, known as Epiphania, received its name from Antiochus, dubbed Epiphanes. Those who interpret the house of Israel here as the ten tribes cannot justly explain why the threat refers solely to them, considering the borders encompass not just the ten but all twelve tribes, including Judah and Benjamin. Some suggest that the greater and lesser houses allegorically represent the Jewish nation and the church formed from the Gentiles. The former are regarded as great due to their ancestral heritage, the law, and the prophets, while we are seen as lesser since we lack the covenant and commandments of God, as noted in the Song: "My sister is small, and has no children" (Song 8:8). If this large and small house, unified as one family of God, does not adhere to the teachings and fulfill God's commandments, it will face destruction and fractures. Thus, whenever the house of God, or the Church, faces a collapse due to persecution or is rent by heresies and schisms, it signifies the corrective hand of God, and to avoid such fate, we should heed the lessons provided. Horses cannot chase upon stones. The stone is Christ (1 Cor. 10), and He deemed it fitting for His apostles to be called rocks: "Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build My Church" (Matt. 16:18). Those who stand upon these stones will not be pursued by the opposing forces depicted as horses, which, as previously mentioned, will stumble in their path and fall at every stone. Let us consider yet another comparison, examining the LXX translation: if we were to focus solely on the Hebrew text, it might seem as if we were misleading the curious reader and neglecting a common version. "Or shall be silent," it states, "before the females," no doubt referring to the horses mentioned prior — those opposing forces that burn with desire for women. If they encounter a man empowered by God, they do not dare approach. Conversely, awakening to the softness associated with pleasures, a feminine spirit that grows languid and indifferent provokes them to frenzy and unrestrained desire. Thus, "For you have turned judgment into rage." It is those who transform judgment into fury who issue decrees in anger, forgetting the instruction of the Lord: "Look not upon the appearance in judgment" (Deut. 16:19), and in another verse, “Thou shalt not show favoritism to the poor in judgment" (Ex. 23:3), for "the judgment of God is" (Deut. 1:17), thus proceeding to judge in irritation, completely unaware of the situation at hand, pre-selecting a judgment without discerning the truth, converting the sweetest fruit of truth into bitterness. This principle should apply equally to other virtues — prudence, courage, temperance — whose fruits cannot be received by someone consumed by anger, and if received, will turn bitter. Indeed, Isaiah cries out: "Woe to those who call sweet bitter and bitter sweet" (Isaiah 5:20). This warning is meant for those who fail to see the essence of matters and instead judge by externals, bitterly altering the sweet fruit of Christ's truth. Thus anyone whose judgment is swayed by kinship or enmity distorts the judgment of Christ, which is truth, corrupting its fruits into bitterness. Those who act in this manner do not take delight in any good word, or revel “in vain," as Simmachus translates, suggesting an empty glory, and boastfully declare, “Have we not by our own strength gained power?" The righteous, in stark contrast, will extol the Lord, saying, “In You, our enemies will we unleash power" (Psalms 43:6), and elsewhere proclaim, “I will not trust in my bow, nor will my sword save me” (ibid. v. 7). Similarly, in Exodus, according to both the Hebrew text and the Avila edition, we read: "And Moses did not realize that the skin of his face shone" (Ex. 34:29), and he could rightly say, "By You, I will deliver my foes with power." Additionally, we read: "He shall exalt the strength of His people" (Psalms 148:14), and, "He shall lift up the strength of His anointed" (1 Kings 2:10). We also speak of the strength of the altar and clean animals with horns offered to God; however, this is not the time to elaborate on such matters. Because of these grave sins and profound pride, speaking wickedly against God and lifting their voices to the heavens (Psalm 73), the Lord God Almighty declares that He will raise a ruthless people to crush and annihilate them, preventing them from reaching Emath and the river in the West. Emath signifies "a wall" or "fortified place." Thus, this cruel nation, tasked with executing punishment, will block their escape to the fortified city, symbolizing the heavenly Jerusalem, preventing their entry into safety, as we read in Genesis where God placed a cherubim with a flaming sword to guard the way to the tree of life (Gen. 3), so that those who have been cast out of paradise may not enter unworthily. The subsequent phrase, "to the flood in the West," can be interpreted alongside the sixty-seventh Psalm: “Sing unto the Lord, sing praises to His name, make way for Him who ascends into the West: the Lord is His name” (Psalm 67:5). For if our wicked deeds do not cease, Christ will not rise above us; yet when they do, we will have Christ leading us, and by thriving in goodness, we shall hear the command from that same psalm: “Sing to God, sing to the Lord, who has ascended into the heavens” (Psalm 67:33-34). Therefore, in the sacraments, we must first renounce that which belongs to the West and perishes with our sins, and then, turning to the East, we enter into unity with the Sun of righteousness and pledge to serve Him. Instead of "the stream in the West," Simmachus translated it as "the valley of the field," Theodotion as "the stream in Arabia," and Aquila as "the stream in the plain." These translations suggest that those removed from the fortified city cannot allow their sins to die, and so they are unable to reach the stream in the field, the plain, or the wilderness, which is referred to as the stream of sweetness according to the Psalm: "Out of the stream of Thy sweetness, Thou shalt nourish them" (Psalm 35:9).
THEOSIS