Reformed Covenanter
Cancelled Commissioner
What do you make of Gregory the Great’s comment on Song of Songs 1:4b?
The king has brought me into his bedchamber. We shall rejoice and be glad in you [Song 1:3cd]. The Church of God is like the house of a king. And this house has an entrance. It has a staircase. It has a banqueting hall. It has bedchambers. Everyone who has faith within the Church has already passed through the entrance of this house. For as an entrance gives access to the rest of the house, so faith is the gateway to the rest of the virtues.
Everyone who has hope within the Church has already reached the staircase of this house. For hope lifts the heart such that it pursues the lofty regions and abandons the lowly. Every resident of this house who has charity walks as if in the banquet halls. For vast is charity, which extends itself even to the love of enemies. Every resident of the Church who already scrutinizes God’s lofty secrets, who already ponders his hidden commandments, has entered as if into the bedchamber.
Gregory the Great, Exposition on the Song of Songs (594-98), 25, trans. Mark DelCogliano (Collegeville MN: Liturgical Press, 2012), p. 128.
The king has brought me into his bedchamber. We shall rejoice and be glad in you [Song 1:3cd]. The Church of God is like the house of a king. And this house has an entrance. It has a staircase. It has a banqueting hall. It has bedchambers. Everyone who has faith within the Church has already passed through the entrance of this house. For as an entrance gives access to the rest of the house, so faith is the gateway to the rest of the virtues.
Everyone who has hope within the Church has already reached the staircase of this house. For hope lifts the heart such that it pursues the lofty regions and abandons the lowly. Every resident of this house who has charity walks as if in the banquet halls. For vast is charity, which extends itself even to the love of enemies. Every resident of the Church who already scrutinizes God’s lofty secrets, who already ponders his hidden commandments, has entered as if into the bedchamber.
Gregory the Great, Exposition on the Song of Songs (594-98), 25, trans. Mark DelCogliano (Collegeville MN: Liturgical Press, 2012), p. 128.