Vigils Reading – Opening of General Chapter

A Commentary on the Book of Maccabees by St. Augustine ¹

When the astonishing martyrdom of the Maccabees is related, not merely do we hear the tale told, but we see it enacted, as it were, before us. It all happened before the incarnation, before the passion of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. In that ancient nation, where the prophets lived their lives, there had been those who foretold what was now happening. Let no one think that before there was a Christian people there were no people dedicated to God either. For indeed, if one may speak as the truth dictates, rather than as ordinary language dictates, the people we are thinking about were even then a Christian people. For not even Christ himself began to have a people of his own until after his passion: but yet these people of his were descended from Abraham. Abraham lobged to see my day; he saw it and rejoiced. This then is to be commended to your charity: that in your admiration for those martyrs you might think that they were not Christians; but Christians indeed they were, though the word “Christians”, current only later, must here be understood as preceding what was to happen later.

A Jew might object and say: How do you reckon these people of ours to be martyrs of yours? What an outrage for you to celebrate their memory! Take what they actually said and just see whether they confessed Christ! Well, what can we say to that? No, indeed, they did not confess Christ openly, or explicitly: for the mystery of Christ was still under a veil. The Old Testament is a veiled version of the New and the New Testament is the unveiled Old Testament. From it, Christ began to be preached most openly of all only after the resurrection. The prophetic sayings contained in it then began to be most manifestly fulfilled.

The Christian martyrs overtly confessed him whom the Maccabees have confessed covertly. Some martyrs died for the Christ revealed and unveiled in the gospels; but the Maccabees died for the name of Christ still veiled in the old law. Christ has both kinds in his service, like some great general making a conquest with his army of subjects, some far ahead and some following on behind. And that you may clearly understand how it is that those who die for the law of Moses die for Christ, here are Christ’s own words: If you had believed Moses you would believe me also. The Maccabees, then, are martyrs for Christ. We venerate their memory, we keep hold of it; their sufferings have been imitated by thousands of holy martyrs throughout the world. So let no one hesitate, dear brethren, to imitate the Maccabees, thinking that he would not thereby be imitating Christians. Let the will to imitate them be fervent and strong in our hearts. Let husbands learn to die for the truth. Let wives learn from that mother’s heroic patience, from that virtue beyond telling; for she knew well how she could have saved her sons. She knew how to keep them but feared not to lose them.

1A Word in Season – vol. VIII – Augustinian Press – 1999 – pg 232