The Mediator between God and men, the man
Christ Jesus
who had come down to earth from to suffer for the salvation of the human race,
as the hour of his passion was drawing near, willed to draw near the place of
his passion. Even by this it was to become apparent that he would not be
suffering unwillingly but of his own volition. He willed to come [riding] upon
a donkey, and be called 'king' and praised by the crowd, so that everyone,
guided again by this, might recognize that the Christ whom once upon a time the
promise of the prophecy had designated
the one who would come in this manner. He willed to come five days before the
Passover, we have learned from the gospel of John, that by this again he might
show that he was the stainless lamb who would take away the sins of the world.
It was commanded that the paschal lamb, by whose immolation
the people of Israel were freed from slavery in Egypt should be selected five
days before the [feast of] the Passover, that is, on the tenth [day of the
lunar] at sundown. This signified the one who was going to redeem us by his
blood, since five days before the [feast of] Passover (that is, today),
accompanied by the great joy and praise of people going ahead and following, he
came into God's temple, and he was there teaching daily. At last, after five
days, having observed up to that point the sacraments of the old Passover, he
brought them to perfection, and he handed over the new sacraments to his
disciples to be observed henceforth. [Then], having gone out to the Mount of
Olives, he was seized by the Jews and crucified [the next] morning. He redeemed
us from the sway of the devil on that very day when the ancient people of the
Hebrews cast aside the yoke of slavery under the Egyptians by the immolation of
a lamb.
Our Lord, the counterpart of the paschal lamb,
five days before he entered upon his suffering, came to the place of his
passion, to teach that he was the one concerning whom Isaiah had predicted, Like
a sheep he was led to the slaughter, and like a lamb he became silent
before his shearers and opened not his mouth; and a little before that, But
he was wounded for our iniquities, and by his stripes we were healed. But
the hearts of the envious leaders preferred to persecute him in everything that
he providentially carried out rather than to believe in him. The wretched men
strove mightily to hand over to death the author of life rather than to be
themselves brought to life by him. Let us, avoiding the blindness of these
faithless ones, follow the example rather of those who faithfully praised our
Lord, and let us investigate thoroughly his mystical path by our mystical
interpretation, as is proper.
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