Sermons on the Song of Songs

But whilst the prophets were thus predicting peace, and the Author of peace still deferred His coming, the people’s faith began to waver, “because there was none to redeem or to save.” And so they began to complain of the delay. They complained that the Prince of Peace, so often announced, had not yet arrived amongst them, “as He spoke by the mouths of His holy prophets who are from the beginning.” Hence they came to doubt the consoling predictions, and demanded the sign or pledge of the promised reconciliation, that is, a kiss. It was as if one of the people should thus address the messengers of peace: “‘How long do you hold our souls in suspense?’ You have now been predicting peace for a great length of time, and lo! it has not yet appeared. You have promised good things and still there is only confusion. Behold this very grace, ‘at sundry times and in divers manners,’ was announced to the fathers by angels and to us by the fathers, who cried ‘Peace, peace,’ and there was no peace. If God would reassure us as to the sincerity of His good will, so often proclaimed by His legates, but not yet proved by the event, ‘let Him kiss me with the kiss of His Mouth,’ and thus, by the token of peace, confirm me in my hope of peace. For how can I any longer have faith in mere words? The verbal promise requires confirmation by deeds. Let God prove His envoys truthful—if His envoys they are indeed—by following them Himself, as they promised He would do, because without Him they can do nothing. He has sent His servant, He has sent His staff, but as yet there is no return of either voice or feeling. I will not arise, I will not awake, I will not shake off the dust, I will not admit hope until the Prophet Himself come down and ‘kiss me with the kiss of His Mouth.’ Besides, He Who proclaims Himself to be our Mediator with God, is God’s own Son, and Himself true God. And ‘what is man that He should be made known to him? Or the son of man that He should make account of him?’ On the other hand, what is my confidence that I should dare to entrust myself to so awful a Majesty? How, I ask, can I, who am but dust and ashes, presume to think that God hath care of me? Moreover, He loves His Father, but of me or of ‘my goods He hath no need.’ How, then, can I be sure that He, my Mediator, will not take part against me? Yet if, indeed, as you prophets say, God has resolved to show mercy and is ‘thinking of becoming more favourable again,’ let him establish a testament of peace, let Him make an everlasting covenant with me by the ‘kiss of His Mouth.’ In order that He may not ‘make void the words that proceed from His Lips,’ let Him ‘empty Himself,’ let Him humble Himself, let Him stoop down and ‘kiss me with the kiss of His Mouth.’ If, as Mediator, He would be equally trusted by both parties (God and the sinner) and an object of suspicion to neither, let Him, the Son of God, become man, let Him become the Son of man, and by this kiss establish my confidence. Securely shall I accept the mediation of the Son of God, in Whom I recognise a Brother. As my Brother and my flesh I can no longer regard Him with suspicion. Nor shall He any longer have it in His power to despise me, being bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh.”

Thus, therefore, the saints of the old time querulously demanded this holy kiss, that is, the Incarnation of the Word, whilst with the long and weary waiting, faith got tired and was ready to faint, and the fickle people, yielding to impatience, were murmuring against the promises of God. This interpretation, my brethren, I will confess to be but a baseless fancy of my own, if you also do not find it suggested to your minds by the words of Scripture. But surely it was this disappointment, due to the Messias’s delay in coming, that called forth cries like the following, expressive of impatience and discontent, “Command, command again! Expect, expect again! A little here, a little there!” And prayers like these, anxious, indeed, but full of fervour: “Give, O Lord, a reward to those who hope in Thee, that Thy prophets may be found faithful.” Also, “Stir up, O Lord, the prophecies which the former prophets have spoken in Thy name.” To the same delay must be attributed the joyous and consoling promises: “Behold” the Lord “will appear and will not lie; if He should delay, expect Him, because He shall surely come and shall not be slack”; “Her time (viz., Israel’s time of deliverance) is near and her days shall not be lengthened.” The next is spoken in the person of the Messias Himself: “Behold, I will bring upon her as it were a river of peace, and as an overflowing torrent the glory of the gentiles.” Such expressions reveal clearly to us both the insistence of the preachers and the distrust of the people. Thus, then, the Israelites murmured and their faith was staggered, and, in the words of Isaias, “the angels of peace were weeping bitterly.” Hence, as Christ still delayed His advent, lest the whole human race should perish in despair, suspecting that the infirmity of its mortal condition was despised, and lest it should abandon all hope of receiving the promised grace of reconciliation with the Lord, the saints, who had assurance from God in the Spirit, demanded a further assurance from Him present in the flesh; and for the sake of the weak and incredulous, they solicited a kiss with all importunity as the sign of a peace re-established.