Bernard of Clairvaux

In his own words on Matthew

• Matthew 1:18

  We read of Mary that "she was found to be with child of the Holy Spirit" (Mt 1:18). But I think the bride of the Lord has something similar in this respect to his mother. For unless she also had been found as having from the Holy Spirit, she would by no means have so familiarly inquired from those who found her concerning him whose Spirit that is. She did not wait for them to declare for what purpose they had come; she herself spoke, and indeed from the abundance of the heart: "Have you seen him whom my soul loves?" She knew that blessed were the eyes that had seen, and marveling at those who had seen, she was saying: Are you those to whom it was given to see him whom so many kings and prophets wished to see and did not see? Are you those who merited to behold Wisdom in the flesh, Truth in a body, God in a man?

  Sermons on the Song of Songs, Sermon 78

• Matthew 7:2

  It is not, I think, that such a soul should any longer be afraid to say: "My beloved to me"; for from the fact that it feels itself loving, and loving vehemently, it does not doubt that it is loved no less vehemently in return; and from its own singular intention, solicitude, care, effort, diligence, and zeal, with which it incessantly and ardently watches over how to please God, it recognizes without doubt all these same things equally in him, remembering his promise: "In what measure you shall have measured, it shall be measured to you again"; except that the prudent Bride is more cautious in drawing the requital of grace to her own side, knowing that she was rather preceded by the beloved. Hence it is that she puts forward his work first: "My beloved," she says, "to me, and I to him." Therefore from her own dispositions she recognizes what is in God; nor does she doubt that she is loved, she who loves.

  Sermons on the Song of Songs, Sermon 69

• Matthew 7:12

  So it is necessary that you also receive in this way the command that you love your neighbor as yourself (Mt 22:39), even if it is not so openly expressed. Or do you not finally judge it sufficient for fulfilling this commandment concerning love of neighbor, if you perfectly observe that which is rightly prescribed to every man by the law of nature: "What you do not wish done to you, do not do to another"? (Tob 4:16.) And likewise: "Whatever you wish that men should do to you, do also to them" (Mt 7:12).

  Sermons on the Song of Songs, Sermon 50

• Matthew 9:15

  For while each holy soul was sighing for the presence of Christ, bearing with difficulty the delay of the kingdom, greeting from afar the desired homeland with groans and sighs: does it not seem to you that any soul that had so acted on earth was fulfilling the role of the groaning and most chaste turtledove? From that time therefore and henceforth the voice of the turtledove has been heard in our land. Why should not the absence of Christ move me to frequent tears and daily groaning! "Lord, before you is all my desire, and my groaning is not hidden from you" (Ps 37:10). "I have labored in my groaning," you know; but blessed is he who was able to say: "I will wash my bed every night, with my tears I will drench my couch" (Ps 6:7). And not only for me, but also for all who love his coming, these groanings have been experienced. For this is what he himself was saying. "Can the sons of the bridegroom mourn," he says, "as long as the bridegroom is with them? But the days will come, when the bridegroom shall be taken from them, and then they will mourn" (Mt 9:15); as if he were saying: And then the voice of the turtledove will be heard.

  Sermons on the Song of Songs, Sermon 59

• Matthew 10:37

  The measure of such love is this: its sweetness seizes the whole heart, and draws it completely from the love of all flesh and every sensual pleasure. Really this is what it means to love with the whole heart. If I prefer to the humanity of my Lord someone joined to me by ties of blood, or some sensual pleasure, this would obviously prove that I do not love with my whole heart since it is divided between its own interests and the love of the one who taught me as a man, both by his words and examples. Would I not seem to give my love partly to him and partly to my own? As he once said: "Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me." To put it briefly, to love with the whole heart means to put the love of his sacred humanity before everything that tempts us, from within or without. Among these temptations we must also count the glory of the world, because its glory is that of the flesh, and those who delight in it without a doubt are men of the flesh.

  Sermons on the Song of Songs, Sermon 20

• Matthew 10:39

  Everyone who is perfect will be able to say: "My own vineyard I have not kept"; in that sense, indeed, in which the Savior speaks in the Gospel, "Whoever loses his soul for my sake will find it" (Mt 10:39). Fit indeed and worthy to be set as keeper in the vineyards is he whom the care of his own vineyard does not impede or delay from the diligence and solicitude of those committed to him; while he does not seek the things that are his own, nor what is useful to himself, but what is useful to many. For this reason indeed that care was entrusted to Peter in so many vineyards which were of the circumcision, because the man was prepared to go both "to prison and to death" (Lk 22:33), to such a degree was he not held back by love of his own vineyard, that is, of his own soul, from attending to the care of those entrusted to him. Deservedly also to Paul among the Gentiles was entrusted so vast a forest of vineyards, because he too was found to be by no means anxious in the custody of his own vineyard; so that he was prepared not only to be bound, but also to die in Jerusalem "for the name of the Lord Jesus Christ" (Acts 21:13). Finally: "I fear none of these things," he says, "nor do I make my soul more precious than myself" (Acts 20:24). An excellent appraiser of things, who judges that nothing of his own should be preferred to himself.

  Sermons on the Song of Songs, Sermon 30

• Matthew 16:19

  Peter therefore shall enter, who received the keys. Yet not alone: for he will also introduce me, if he shall have willed it, and will exclude another whom perhaps he shall have willed, in the knowledge and power given to him from above. And what are these keys? The power of opening and closing, and the discernment between those to be excluded and those to be admitted. And the treasures are not in the serpent, but in Christ. And therefore the serpent could not give the knowledge which he did not have; but he who had it, gave it. Nor indeed could the serpent have the power which he did not receive; but he who received it, had it. Christ gave, Peter received, and was neither puffed up by the knowledge, nor to be cast down on account of the power. Why? Because in neither does he exalt himself against the knowledge of God, who desired none of these things apart from the knowledge of God.

  Sermons on the Song of Songs, Sermon 69

• Matthew 16:23

  When he was speaking about his approaching death, Peter who loved him so dearly, tried to stand in the way. When, as you remember, he rebuked him, what was it but his imprudence that he was correcting? Finally what did he mean in saying: "You do not mind the things of God," except: you do not love wisely, you are following your human feeling in opposition to the divine plan. He even called him Satan because although it was in ignorance, he was impeding salvation in trying to prevent the Savior's death.

  Sermons on the Song of Songs, Sermon 20

• Matthew 16:25

  And indeed more prudently do you lose it in order to keep it, than keep it in order to lose it. "For whoever would save his soul, shall lose it" (Mt 16:25). What do you say here, you observers of foods, neglecters of character? Hippocrates and his followers teach to save souls in this world; Christ and his disciples, to lose them. Which of the two do you choose to follow as master? But he makes himself obvious who argues thus: this harms the eyes, this harms the head, and that harms the chest or the stomach. Certainly each one brings forth into the open what he has learned from his own master. Have you read these distinctions in the Gospel, or in the prophets, or in the letters of the apostles? "Flesh and blood have surely revealed this wisdom to you, not the Spirit of the Father"; for this is "the wisdom of the flesh." But hear what our physicians think of it. "The wisdom of the flesh," they say, "is death"; likewise: "The wisdom of the flesh is hostile to God" (Rom 8:6-7). Ought I to have set before you the opinion of Hippocrates or Galen, or surely from the school of Epicurus? I am a disciple of Christ; I speak to disciples of Christ: if I introduce a foreign doctrine, I myself have sinned. Epicurus and Hippocrates, the one puts forward the pleasure of the body, the other good physical condition; my Master preaches contempt for both. The life of the soul in the body, which the one with utmost zeal inquires whence to sustain, the other whence even to delight, and teaches others to inquire, the Savior counsels even to lose.

  Sermons on the Song of Songs, Sermon 30

• Matthew 19:12

  From these things it is gathered that the voice of the turtledove is also the preaching of chastity. For in the beginning this voice was not heard on earth, but rather that one: "Increase and multiply and fill the earth" (Gen 1:28). In vain indeed would the voice of chastity have sounded, when the homeland of those rising again had not yet been revealed: in which far more happily "men will neither marry nor be given in marriage, but are as the angels of God in heaven" (Lk 20:35-36). You would say that there was a time for that voice, when every barren woman in Israel was subject to a curse, when the Patriarchs themselves had several wives at the same time, when a brother was compelled by the law to raise up offspring for a brother who had died without children. But when the commendation of those eunuchs "who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of God" (Mt 19:12) sounded from the mouth of the heavenly turtledove; and likewise the counsel of another, that same most chaste turtledove, concerning virgins everywhere prevailed (1 Cor 7:25), then for the first time it could be truly said, that "the voice of the turtledove has been heard in our land."

  Sermons on the Song of Songs, Sermon 59

• Matthew 19:27

  Notice that the love of the heart is, in a certain sense, carnal, because our hearts are attracted most toward the humanity of Christ and the things he did or commanded while in the flesh. The heart that is filled with this love is quickly touched by every word on this subject. Nothing else is as pleasant to listen to, or is read with as much interest, nothing is as frequently in remembrance or as sweet in reflection. I think this is the principal reason why the invisible God willed to be seen in the flesh and to converse with men as a man. He wanted to recapture the affections of carnal men who were unable to love in any other way, by first drawing them to the salutary love of his own humanity, and then gradually to raise them to a spiritual love. Were they not at just this level when they said: "See, we have left everything and have followed you"? It was only by the love of his physical presence that they had left everything.

  Sermons on the Song of Songs, Sermon 20

• Matthew 20:16

  For actual charity prefers inferior things, affectual prefers superior things. For indeed in a well-affected mind there is no doubt, for example, that the love of God is set before the love of man; and among men themselves, the more perfect before the weaker, heaven before earth, eternity before time, the soul before the flesh. Yet in a well-ordered action, the opposite order is often, or even always, found. For concerning care for our neighbor we are both more urgently pressed and more frequently occupied; and we attend to weaker brethren with more diligent care; and to the peace of earth rather than the glory of heaven we attend by the right of humanity and by necessity itself; and by the restlessness of temporal cares we are scarcely permitted to perceive anything of eternal things; and to the ailments of our body, with care of the soul set aside, we attend almost continuously; and indeed to our very weaker members we assign the more abundant honor, according to the judgment of the Apostle (1 Cor 12:23): by this in a certain way fulfilling the word of the Lord, concerning which you have: "The last shall be first, and the first last" (Mt 20:16). Finally, who doubts that one who prays speaks with God? Yet how often are we thence led away and torn away at the command of charity, on account of those who are in need of our work or word? How often does pious quiet piously yield to the tumult of business? How often is a book put down with good conscience, so that one may sweat at the work of the hands? How often, for the sake of administering earthly things, do we most justly abstain from celebrating the very solemnities of the Mass? The order is reversed: but necessity has no law. Actual charity therefore follows its own order according to the command of the head of the household, beginning from the last (Mt 20:8). Surely it is pious and just, for it is no respecter of persons; nor does it consider the value of things, but the necessities of men.

  Sermons on the Song of Songs, Sermon 50

• Matthew 22:37

  But affectual charity is not so: for it draws its order from the first things. For it is wisdom, through which certainly each thing savors as it is: so that, for example, what is of greater value by nature, the affection itself also feels to be of greater value; lesser things less, the least things least. And that order of charity truth makes; but this order the charity of truth claims for itself. For charity is true in this also, that those who are in greater need receive first: and in turn in this truth appears dear, if we hold in affection the order which truth holds by reason. If therefore you love the Lord your God with your whole heart, your whole soul, and your whole strength (Mt 22:37); and leaping beyond that love of love, with which actual charity is content, by a more fervent affection, you receive at close range the divine love itself, toward which that is a step, having received the Spirit in fullness, and wholly catch fire: God surely savors to you, even if not altogether worthily as he is (which indeed is impossible for every creature), yet certainly as your capacity for savoring is. Then you will also savor to yourself as you are, when you perceive that you have absolutely nothing for which you may love yourself except insofar as you are God's: since you have poured out the whole of that for which you love, into him. You will savor, I say, to yourself as you are, when by the very experience of your love, and the affection which you will have toward yourself, you find that you are worthy of nothing that might be loved by you yourself, except on account of him, without whom you yourself are nothing.

  Sermons on the Song of Songs, Sermon 50

• Matthew 22:39

  So it is necessary that you also receive in this way the command that you love your neighbor as yourself (Mt 22:39), even if it is not so openly expressed. Or do you not finally judge it sufficient for fulfilling this commandment concerning love of neighbor, if you perfectly observe that which is rightly prescribed to every man by the law of nature: "What you do not wish done to you, do not do to another"? (Tob 4:16.) And likewise: "Whatever you wish that men should do to you, do also to them" (Mt 7:12).

  Sermons on the Song of Songs, Sermon 50