Summa I-II q.102 a.5 (replies 5–9): The red heifer, the Day of Atonement and scapegoat, cleansing lepers, and consecrating priests

Orientation #

He picks up exactly where the last class stopped, at the reply to the fifth objection (prev. lecture), and works straight through replies 6, 7, and 8–9 taken together, stopping only when time runs out (“now, mercy, we’re going to stop here”). He notes several times how long the article is (“he’s writing just about as much as Moses did”).

The class, in order #

1. Two uncleannesses and two remedies (“twofold is the uncleanliness in the law”) #

• Greater uncleanness: from corruption of mind or body; expiated by a sacrifice for sin, since every corruption proceeds from sin and signifies sin.
• Lesser: from mere contact with an unclean thing; expiated by the easier rite, the sprinkling of water only.

2. The red cow: literal reason (“in memory of the sin… the golden calf”) #

• The water-expiation is described in Numbers 19. A red cow (vacca, not a calf) is taken, in memory of the sin of adoring the golden calf, and because the Lord was accustomed to call the synagogue a cow — Hosea 4, sicut vacca lasciviens Israel declinavit; and perhaps because they worshipped cows in the custom of Egypt (Hosea 10, Bethaven).
• Why outside the camp: in detestation of idolatry; and generally sacrifices for a multitude of sins were burnt outside the whole camp, signifying the people cleansed from universal sins.
• Blood: the priest dips his finger and sprinkles toward the sanctuary seven times, seven signifying universality. The sprinkling detests idolatry, in whose rites the blood was not spilled but collected and eaten in honour of the idols.
• Burning in fire: because God appeared to Moses in fire and in fire the law was given; or to signify that idolatry is wholly to be cast out — hence skin, flesh, blood and dung all burnt.
• Additions to the fire: cedar wood (does not easily corrupt), coccus bis tinctus, scarlet twice dyed (does not lose its colour), hyssop (keeps its odour when dried) — signifying the conservation of the people, their honesty and devotion. Hence the ashes were kept “in the custody” of the sons of Israel.
• Or, per Josephus’s Antiquities: the four elements — fire itself, cedar for earth (earthiness), hyssop for air (odour), the twice-dyed scarlet for water (the dyes are taken from water) — the sacrifice offered to the Creator of the four elements. Aside: “you don’t have to deal with 98 elements or something in this symbolism.”
• Why all the handlers become unclean: because the sacrifice is for idolatry, whatever pertains to idolatry is reckoned unclean. They are purified by washing the garments only, not by sprinkling — otherwise a process to infinity, since the sprinkler himself became unclean, and his sprinkler, and so on. Student: “had to break the cycle.”
• Aside on Cecil B. DeMille’s film: the long intermission, the working man in the men’s room saying “it really makes you think” — “I wasn’t going to disturb his faith.”

3. The red cow: figurative reason (“through the red cow was signified Christ”) #

• Cow = Christ in his infirmity (designated by the feminine sex); the red colour = the blood of his passion; of integral age because every operation of Christ is perfect; without stain, never bore the yoke — the yoke of sin.
• Brought to Moses: because he was charged with transgressing the law of Moses (violation of the Sabbath). Handed to Eleazar the priest: Christ killed at the hands of the priests. Offered outside the camp: “outside the gate Christ suffered.”
• The priest’s finger dipped in the blood: by discretion, which the finger signifies, the mystery of the passion is to be considered and imitated. Student aside: in the Ethiopian liturgy the priest dips his finger in the chalice, says “Behold the Lamb of God,” and signs the host with the precious blood.
• Sprinkled toward the tent = the synagogue: either condemnation of the unbelieving Jews or purification of believers; seven times = the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, or the seven days in which all time is understood.
• All burnt: to be understood spiritually — skin and flesh = Christ’s exterior operation; blood = the subtle inward power vivifying the outside; dung = weariness, hunger, and all that pertains to infirmity.
• Three additions: cedar = height of hope or contemplation; hyssop = humility or faith; twice-dyed scarlet = charity — by which we adhere to Christ’s passion.
• Ashes collected by a clean man: the fruits of the passion come to the Gentiles, not culpable in Christ’s death. Ashes put in the water: baptism gets its cleansing power from the passion. Those who handle it are unclean: the Jews made unclean by killing Christ, through which our sins are expiated — and unclean “until vespers,” i.e. until the end of the world, when the remnant of Israel will be converted, as St Paul says. Or (Gregory): those who treat sacred things for others’ cleansing contract some uncleanness — “until vespers,” the end of the present life.
• Student joke: “accused Thomas of being anti-Semitic.”

4. Reply 6: the yearly expiation (“once in a year, on the tenth day of the seventh month”) #

• Special sacrifices existed for individuals’ sins, but many neglected them through ignorance; hence a yearly sacrifice of expiation for the whole people.
• The priest offers first for himself, since (Hebrews) the law constitutes as priests men having weakness: a calf for sin, in commemoration of Aaron’s sin in making the golden calf; and a ram in holocaust, the ram being leader of the flock, signifying that the priest’s prelacy is ordered to God’s honour.
• Discussion of Aaron: Moses’ brother, who collected the earrings and made the calf to pacify the people when Moses did not come down; they wanted pagan gods as in Egypt. Aside: there is a character named Aaron in Shakespeare, “pretty nasty.”
• For the people, two goats. One immolated for the sin of the multitude: the hircus is a fetid animal and its skins are pungent and biting, signifying the odour, uncleanness and sharpness of sin. Its blood is carried into the Holy of Holies and thence through the sanctuary, to signify the tabernacle cleansed from the uncleannesses of Israel. The bodies of goat and calf burnt outside the camp, since nothing holy was burnt except the holocaust — this whenever sacrifice was for a grave sin or a multitude of sins.
• Vocabulary exchange: hircus = he-goat, capra = she-goat; compared to hart and hind (he first says the hind is male, then the pairing is left as hart/hind, male/female). Student notes that the he-goat stinks when rutting — “that’s the sign of his lust”; the goat is associated with sins of the flesh. He jokes about Capricorn: “I’m born the son of the goat.”
• Aside: Luke 15 — the elder brother complains, “You never even killed a goat for me… for my merry-making, for my friends.”
• The scapegoat sent into the desert: not offered to the demons the Gentiles worshipped in the desert, since nothing might lawfully be offered to them, but to designate the effect of the sacrifice. The priest lays his hand on its head confessing Israel’s sins; it is deported into the desert to be eaten by beasts, carrying the people’s punishment; its sending forth signified remission, or a schedule of the written sins was set on its head.
• Figurative reason: Christ signified by the calf (his virtue), the ram (leader of the faithful), and the goat (likeness of the flesh of sin, sin to be punished) — offered for the sins of priests and of people, since by his passion both greater and lesser are cleansed. Blood into the Holy of Holies: by the blood of the passion entry into heaven lies open. Bodies burnt outside: “outside the gate Christ suffered” (Hebrews). The goat sent out = either Christ’s divinity, which went away into solitude while the man Christ suffered, not changing place but withholding its power; or the evil to be cast away from us while we offer our virtuous motions to the Lord. The uncleanness of those who burnt them: same reason as in the red cow. Student aside: the Litany of the Precious Blood.

5. Reply 7: the cleansing of the leper (“the leper is not cleansed from the stain of leprosy”) #

• The rite does not cure leprosy; it shows that the man has been cleansed — Leviticus 14, “when you find that a leper has been cleansed.” He is purified in that he is restored by the priest’s judgment to the company of men and to divine worship. Yet sometimes by a divine miracle leprosy is cleansed through the corporeal rite when the priest is deceived in his judgment. (“Strange.”)
• Two stages: first he is judged clean; second, after seven days, admitted to human society and worship.
• First purification: two sparrows, cedar wood, scarlet and hyssop. Extended exchange over vermiculum — “a little worm,” and the translations before them do not render it; later text speaks of a scarlet thread, used to bind the bird, so the word stands for the thread (the usual word for thread being filum). The cedar wood serves as the handle of an aspergillum; hyssop and the living sparrow, bound with the thread, are dipped in the blood of the other sparrow immolated over living (flowing) water.
• These four answer the four defects of leprosy: cedar (incorruptible wood) against putrid corruption; hyssop (fragrant herb) against the odour; the living bird against insensibility; the worm/scarlet, having a living colour, against the ugliness of colour. The living bird is let fly into the field because the leper is restored to his pristine liberty.
• Eighth day: shaving all the hair of the body and washing the garments, since leprosy corrupts the hairs and stains and befouls the clothes; then a sacrifice for his defect, since leprosy is often induced for sin. Blood of the pure sacrifice touches the tip of the right ear, the thumb (pollex) of the right hand and the great toe of the foot, because leprosy is first diagnosed and felt in these parts. Three liquids applied: blood against the corruption of the blood, oil to designate the healing of the sickness, living water to wash away the filth.
• Asides: “Wow — God didn’t have leprosy in those days”; “the cure is almost as bad as the disease.”

6. The leper: figurative reason (“it signified the divinity and humanity of Christ”) #

• The two sparrows = the divinity and humanity of Christ. The one offered (humanity) is killed over the clay vessel of living water, because by Christ’s passion the waters of baptism are consecrated; the other, the impassible divinity, remains alive and flies away, since the divinity cannot die nor be restricted by the passion.
• The living sparrow with cedar, scarlet and hyssop = faith, hope and charity, as said above; put into the sprinkling water because we are baptized in the faith of God and man. The man is washed by the water of baptism and by tears; his garments = his works; all his hairs = his thoughts (aside: “all the hairs of your head are numbered” — all your thoughts are known to God).
• Tip of the right ear anointed with blood and oil, that his hearing be guarded against corrupting words; thumb of the right hand and the foot, that his action be holy. The remaining details, pertaining to other purifications, have nothing special beyond the sacrifices for sins or crimes.
• Students joke that they hope not to be examined on all this on judgment day.

7. Replies 8 and 9: the institution of priests and Levites (“three things came about”) #

• As the people were instituted for God’s worship by circumcision, so the ministers by a special purification or consecration; they were commanded to be separated from the rest as specially deputed to the ministry, and all done in their consecration shows their prerogative of purity, virtue and dignity.
• Three steps: (1) purified; (2) adorned and consecrated; (3) applied to the use of the ministry.
• (1) All purified commonly by washing with water and by certain sacrifices; the Levites in a special way by shaving off all their hair (“poor guys”).
• (2) Consecration of high priest and priests: first washed, then clothed in vestments of their office; the high priest especially anointed with oil on the head, to designate that from him the power of consecrating is spread to others, as oil runs from the head to the lower parts — Psalm 132 [Vulgate], the oil on the beard of Aaron. Aside: bishops are still anointed with oil poured literally on the head; a famous photograph of John Paul II at his episcopal consecration with a linen tied round his head so the oil would not run down — “it looks like he’s been wounded… no wonder they canonized him.”
• The Levites had no further consecration than being offered to the Lord by the sons of Israel through the hands of the high priest, who prayed for them. Only the hands of the lesser priests were consecrated, since they were applied to the sacrifices.
• They were touched with the blood of the offered animals on the tip of the right ear (that they be obedient to God’s law in offering sacrifice) and on the thumb and toe of the right hand and foot (that they be solicitous and prompt in carrying out the sacrifices); and sprinkled on their vestments with blood, in memory of the blood of the lamb by which they were freed in Egypt. Aside: “I’m glad they didn’t do that in my ordination.”
• Sacrifices at their consecration: a calf for sin, in memory of the remission of Aaron’s sin in casting the golden calf; a lamb in holocaust, in memory of Abraham’s offering, whose obedience the priest ought to imitate; the ram of consecration, a peace offering, in memory of the liberation from Egypt by the blood of the lamb; and a basket of bread, in memory of the manna bestowed on the people.
• (3) Application to the ministry: the fat of the ram, one roll of bread, and the right shoulder are imposed on their hands, to show that they receive the power of offering these to the Lord. The Levites are applied by being introduced to the tabernacle of the covenant, to administer the vessels of the sanctuary.
• Figurative reason: those consecrated to Christ’s spiritual service must first be purified by the water of baptism and by tears, in faith of Christ’s passion, which is the expiating and purging sacrifice; they ought to shave all the hairs of the flesh, that is, all bad thoughts; they are adorned with virtues, consecrated by the oil of the Holy Spirit and the sprinkling of Christ’s blood, and so ought to be intent on carrying out the spiritual services.

His words #

• “uncleanliness” — the Latin immunditia, twofold: from corruption of mind or body (greater), or from contact only (lesser).
• “aspersion” / “sprinkling” — the water rite of the lesser expiation.
• vacca — cow, distinguished from a calf; the red cow of Numbers 19.
• coccus bis tinctus — “scarlet twice dyed,” twice dipped.
• “a process in infinitum” — his objection-answer against sprinkling the sprinkler.
• “discretion, which the finger signifies” — the sense of the priest dipping his finger.
• usque ad vesperum — “until vespers,” read both as the end of the world and the end of the present life.
• hircus / capra — he-goat / she-goat.
• vermiculum — “a little worm”; here taken as the scarlet thread that bound the bird.
• pollex — thumb; with “the great toe” of the foot.
• “holocaust” — the whole-burnt offering, the only holy thing burnt.

Texts #

Read in class

• Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I-II, q. 102, a. 5, replies 5, 6, 7, and 8–9 together (inferred; he says only “to the fifth,” “to the sixth,” etc., and names the Leonine edition).

Mentioned (within the text or by him)

• Numbers 19 — the red cow.
• Hosea 4, sicut vacca lasciviens; Hosea 10, Bethaven.
• Leviticus 14 — the cleansed leper.
• Hebrews — priests having weakness; “outside the gate Christ suffered.”
• Luke 15 — the elder brother’s goat.
• Psalm 132 [Vulgate] — oil on Aaron’s beard.
• Josephus, Antiquities — the four elements.
• Gregory — those who handle sacred things contract uncleanness.
• St Paul on the conversion of the remnant of Israel.
• Cecil B. DeMille’s film; Shakespeare’s character Aaron; the Litany of the Precious Blood; the Ethiopian liturgy.

His questions #

• Why a red cow rather than a calf? In memory of the golden calf, because Scripture calls the synagogue a cow, and because the Egyptians worshipped cows.
• Why was the sacrifice burnt outside the camp? In detestation of idolatry, and because sacrifices for a multitude of sins were burnt outside the whole camp.
• Why sprinkle seven times? Seven signifies universality; figuratively, the seven gifts or the seven days in which all time is understood.
• Why was the sprinkler of the water not himself sprinkled? Because then there would be a process to infinity; washing the garments sufficed.
• “The blood of this goat is carried into the Holy of Holies — what do they do that for?” To signify the tabernacle cleansed of Israel’s uncleannesses; figuratively, that by Christ’s blood heaven lies open.
• Was the scapegoat offered to the demons of the desert? No — nothing might lawfully be offered to them; it designates the effect of the sacrifice, the carrying away of sins.
• Does the rite of the law cleanse the leprosy? No; it declares him cleansed by the priest’s judgment — though sometimes God works a miracle when the priest judges wrongly.
• What does vermiculum mean here? Literally a little worm; from the later mention of the scarlet thread, it stands for the thread that bound the bird.
• “Why did the two sparrows signify in the cleansing of the leper?” The divinity and humanity of Christ: the one slain over living water, the other flying away alive, since the divinity cannot die.
• Why was oil poured on the high priest’s head? Because from him the power of consecrating others flows down, as oil from the head to the lower parts.