As her children press on through their Lenten observance, Mother Church continues to meditate on the various aspects of Her Lord’s Passion. This feast, the Feast of the Spear and the Nails, was instituted by Pope Innocent VI (from whose decree the entire second set of lessons in Matins comes) and was celebrated in Germany and Bohemia before spreading to other places. Fittingly, the day of the feast was set as the Friday after the First Sunday of Lent, placing it after the Sunday commemorating Our Lord’s combat in the desert with Satan, and the day before the Lenten Ember Saturday, where on His clergy would receive Holy Orders, commissioning them as officers in the Church Militant.
The Spear, also known as the Lance of St. Longinus (the soldier who pierced Our Lord’s side) and as the Spear of Destiny, has disappeared and reappeared many times in the historical record. It’s most famous reappearance was at Antioch in 1098 A.D., when the Crusaders discovered in beneath the Cathedral of St. Peter, and, inspired by it’s finding, fought off a Muslim army attempting to retake the city. The Lance currently resides in the Vatican Basilica. As for the Nails, iron shavings from these nails were given as relics to many places, while the nails themselves were kept at Saint Chapelle in France, along with a pierce of the Holy Lance and the entire Crown of Thorns. Unfortunately, these relics were lost during the French Revolution, and only the Crown of Thorns was recovered.
The Spear and Nails are often called the Arma Christi, the weapons of Christ. It is no new thing for a god to have a special weapon. Apollo had his silver bow, Poseidon/Neptune his trident, Zeus/Jupiter his lighting bolts, Odin his spear, Thor his hammer. Likewise, the Lord in the Old Testament is described many times wielding weapons of war. Genesis mentions His flaming sword, and his bow, and the Psalms and Prophets mention his fiery arrows and glittering spear. My favorite of these in the canticle in the second chapter of the Prophet Habakkuk, read sometimes at Lauds on Friday, which describes the Lord charging through the heavens atop a war chariot, driving the devil before Him and decapitating the evil one. Indeed, it is the devil, and his angels (the gods of the nations), and his earthly followers on whom the Lord turns these fearsome arms. (Another frequent opponent is the great sea serpent, called Leviathan or Rahab, whom later tradition has identified with Satan.)
And yet, these weapons venerated on this feast are not weapons that the Lord wielded, but the weapons He was slain by. Yet it was that Holy Death that once and for all destroyed the reign of the devil and set us free. Such is the warfare we all called to. Though various members of the Church Militant may have to take up physical arms, all of us are called to embrace this kind of combat. The entire army of the Lord, from the Officers (Bishops and Clergy) to Cavalry (Active Religious) to Artillery (Contemplative Religious) to Foot soldiers (the Laity) arms themselves with the blades of Prayer, Fasting, and Almsgiving, taking Charity for armor and Faith for an invincible shield. Thus shall we, with Our Lord commanding us and fighting for us, destroy the Prince of Pride.
Lessons at Matins
First Lesson
The Lesson is taken from the Book of the Prophet Zechariah (xii. 10.)
Thus saith the Lord: I will pour out upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace, and of prayers: and they shall look upon me, whom they have pierced: and they shall mourn for him as one mourneth for an only son, and they shall grieve over him, as the manner is to grieve for the death of the firstborn. In that day there shall be a great lamentation in Jerusalem like the lamentation of Adadremmon in the plain of Mageddon. And the land shall mourn: families and families apart: the families of the house of David apart, and their women apart: The families of the house of Nathan apart, and their women apart: the families of the house of Levi apart, and their women apart: the families of Semei apart, and their women apart. All the rest of the families that remain apart, and their women apart.
Second Lesson
In that day there shall be a fountain open to the house of David, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem: for the washing of the sinner, and of the unclean woman. And it shall come to pass in that day, saith the Lord of hosts, that I will destroy the names of idols out of the earth, and they shall be remembered no more: and I will take away the false prophets, and the unclean spirit out of the earth. And it shall come to pass, that when any man shall prophesy any more, his father and his mother that brought him into the world, shall say to him: Thou shalt not live: because thou hast spoken a lie in the name of the Lord. And his father, and his mother, his parents, shall thrust him through, when he shall prophesy. And it shall come to pass in that day, that the prophets shall be confounded, every one by his own vision, when he shall prophesy, neither shall they be clad with a garment of sackcloth, to deceive: But he shall say: I am no prophet, I am a husbandman: for Adam is my example from my youth.
Third Lesson
And they shall say to him: What are these wounds in the midst of thy hands? And he shall say: With these I was wounded in the house of them that loved me. Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, and against the man that cleaveth to me, saith the Lord of hosts: strike the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered: and I will turn my hand to the little ones. And there shall be in all the earth, saith the Lord, two parts in it shall be scattered, and shall perish: but the third part shall be left therein. And I will bring the third part through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined: and I will try them as gold is tried. They shall call on my name, and I will hear them. I will say: Thou art my people: and they shall say: The Lord is my God.
Fourth Lesson
The Lesson is taken from a Sermon by Pope Innocent VI. (Decree concerning the Feast of the Spear and the Nails.)
We are behooven so to glory in the most holy sufferings of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, as to count out one by one all the mysteries and merits of His Suffering, and even to glory in every one of their soul saving instruments. Among such mysteries is notable the fact that the Savior on the Cross, after that He had given up the Ghost, bore that His Side should be pierced with a spear, to the end that in the stream of Blood and Water which forthwith came thereout, there might spring forth, one, and stainless, and virgin, His Bride, and our holy mother, the Church. O how blessed is that gap in the Sacred Side, whence have rushed for us so many and so great streams of mercy! Happy for us was the lance whose work was to do us such good, and to ass such another glory to such a victory!
Fifth Lesson
In the opening of that Side, the lance opened for us the gates of the kingdom of heaven. In wounding Him who was dead already, (John xix. 33,34,) the lance closed our wounds, and gave us life and health. In piercing Him Who was harmless, (Heb. vii. 26,) the lance, by His Blood, purged our sins of their harmfulness; in trickling down with that most holy Water, it flooded away from our eye the beam which had made us blind, and washed us clean in the waves of God’s mercy. For us are also sweet the nails wherewith the Savior was fastened upon the Cross. We must clearly remember that theirs it was not only to be smeared with the sinless Blood, not only to bear up the weight of the Great Victim of Atonement, but to open for us, in the salvation-bringing Wounds, sweet wells of the goodness of God; by going through His Hands, to free our hands from the manacles of sin, and, by boring His Feet, to draw our feet out of the snares of death.
Sixth Lesson
Than the Cleft in that Side, and the Wounds in those Hands and Feet what is there holier? What is there more lifegiving? – out of them floweth salvation, and in them the souls of believers may for ever find health. The Lance and Nails heretofore mentioned, and other instruments employed in the life-giving Sufferings of Christ, are everywhere to be held in reverence of all His faithful people, and solemn Offices concerning His Sufferings themselves are held and kept in the Church; but We, nevertheless, hold it meet and convenient that a special Festal Office should be held and kept concerning these things in particular, especially in those places where the instruments themselves are asserted to be still preserved; and We desire by these Offices and Indulgences more particularly to provoke the earnestness in godliness of such of the faithful as please themselves with the belief that they have any such Relique in their possession.
Seventh Lesson
The Lesson is taken from the Holy Gospel according to John (xix. 28.)
At that time: Jesus, knowing that all things were now accomplished, that the Scripture might be fulfilled, saith: I thirst. And so on.
Homily by St. Augustine, Bishop of Hippo. (120th Tract upon John.)
“One of the soldiers with a spear pierced His Side, and forthwith came thereout Blood and Water.” The Evangelist speaketh carefully. He saith not that he smote the Side, nor yet that he wounded It, nor yet anything else, but “pierced” – “pierced” It, to fling wide the entrance unto life, whence flow the Sacraments of the Church, those Sacraments without which there is no entrance into the life which is life indeed. That Blood, Which was shed there, was shed for the remission of sins, that Water is the Water that mantleth in the cup of salvation. Therein are we washed, and thereof do we drink. Of this was it a type when it was said unto Noah: “The door of the ark shalt thou set in the side thereof… and of every living thing of all flesh shalt thou bring into the ark… to keep them alive.” (Gen. vi. 16, 19.) This is a figure of the Church.
Eighth Lesson
Thus it was that the first woman was made from the side of her husband while he slept, and she was called Eve, which is, being interpreted, “Life,” “because she was the mother of all living.” (Gen. iii. 20.) This name set forth a great good, before it became associated with the bitter fruit of a great evil. And here we have the second Adam bowing His Head, and the deep sleep of death falling upon Him upon the Cross, and He sleepeth that the Lod God may take a thing out of His Side, and make thereof a wife for Him. O what a death was His, which quickeneth the dead! What is cleaner than His Blood? What more health-giving than His wounding? “For these things were done, that the Scripture might be fulfilled: ‘Not a Bone of Him shall be broken,’ – and again, another Scripture saith: ‘They shall look on Him Whom they pierced.’”
Ninth Lesson (Homily of the Lenten Feria)
Continuation of the Holy Gospel according to John (v. 1-15)
In that time was a festival day of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. And so on.
Homily of St. Augustine, Bishop of Hippo (17th Tract on John)
Let us see what is mystically signified by that one infirm man whom alone the Lord, keeping to a mysterious unity, chose out of so many sufferers, to be the subject of His healing power. He found in him a certain number of years of sickness. He had had an infirmity thirty and eight years. How this number is proper rather to weakness than to health, will now be the subject of a few careful remarks. I bespeak your attention; the Lord will be present, that I may speak fitly, and you may understand. The number forty is put before us as hallowed, and, in a way, perfect. I think that your love knoweth this God's Scriptures often and; often witness it. Ye well know that a Fast of this number of days is hallowed. Moses fasted forty days. Elias did the same. And our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ Himself fasted this number of days complete. Moses representeth the Law, Elias the Prophets, and the Lord the Gospel. And therefore these three appeared on the Mount of the Transfiguration. There the Lord showed Himself to His disciples with His Face shining as the sun, and His raiment glistering; and He stood between Moses and Elias; as it were, the Gospel receiving testimony, on the one hand from the Law, and, on the other, from the Prophets.
Whether, therefore, it be in the Law, or in the Prophets, or in the Gospel, the number of forty is recommended to us for Fast-days. The great and general Fast is this to abstain from the iniquity of the world, and her forbidden pleasures. This is the perfect Fast, that, denying ungodliness, and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world. After such a Fast, what is the Feast that followeth? Hear what the Apostle saith in continuation Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ. (Titus ii. 12, 13.) We, then, make our pilgrimage in this world a Lent, by living good lives, and abstaining from her iniquities and her forbidden pleasures. But at the end of this life-long Lent there will be an Easter indeed. We look for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ When that hope is realized, when that faith is swallowed up in knowledge, then indeed shall we receive every man a penny. In good sooth, it is true that every labourer in the vineyard will get his wages witness that Gospel which I believe ye have not forgotten, (Matth. xx. 16) and which it is not my business to quote again as if ye were ignorant children. Now, the word used in the original for this penny which the labourers received is denarion. And the derivation of the word denarion is the numeral decem, ten. There are forty days in Lent, and if we add ten, we get fifty. So do we toil in fasting for the forty days of Lent before Easter, and then, when we have, as it were, received our reward, we keep holiday for the fifty days of Eastertide.
Remember how I remarked that the man healed by our Lord at the pool of Bethesda had had an infirmity thirty and eight years. I wish to explain why this number of thirty-eight is proper rather to weakness than to health. Love is the fulfilling of the law (Rom. xiii. 10;) to the fulfilling of the law belongeth in every work the number forty. But in love we have given us two precepts Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets. (Matth. xxii. 37-40.) When the widow gave all she had for an offering to God she gave two mites (Mark xii. 42;) the inn-keeper received two pence wherewith to cure him that had fallen among thieves (Luke x. 35;) Jesus abode for two days among the Samaritans (John iv. 40), that He might establish them in love. When, then, anything good is spoken of as two, the two great divisions of love are the chief mystic interpretation. If, then, the law is fulfilled in the number forty, and it is not fulfilled if there be lacking the two precepts of love, what wonder is it that he was infirm who lacked two of forty?
The Mass
Introit They have pierced my hands and my feet: they have numbered all my bones, and I am poured out like water. (Ps. 21) My heart is become like wax melting in the midst of my bowels.
Collect O God, who in the weakness of that flesh which thou hadst taken, wast pleased to be pierced with nails, and with a spear to be wounded for the salvation of the world; mercifully grant that we, who keep the solemnity of the same spear and nails on earth, may rejoice in the glorious triumph of thy victory in heaven.
Be merciful to Your people, O Lord, and as You give them the grace to serve You, make them new by Your loving help.
Lesson (Zach. xii. 10, xiii. 6-7.) Thus saith the Lord: I will pour out upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace, and of prayers: and they shall look upon me, whom they have pierced: and they shall mourn for him as one mourneth for an only son, and they shall grieve over him as the manner is to grieve for the death of the first-born. In that day there shall be a great lamentation in Jerusalem, and it shall be said: What are these wounds in the midst of thy hands? And he shall say: With these I was wounded in the house of them that loved me. Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, and against the man that cleaveth to me, saith the Lord of Hosts: strike the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered, saith the Lord Almighty.
Gradual (Ps. 68) My heart hath expected reproach and misery: and I looked for one that would grieve together with me, and there was none: I sought one that would comfort me, and I found none.
V. They gave me gall for my food, and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink.
Tract (Is. 53) Surely he hath born our infirmities, and carried our sorrows.
V. And we have thought him as it were a leper, and as one struck by God and afflicted.
V. But he was wounded for our iniquities, he was bruised for our sins.
V. The chastisement of our peace was upon him: and by his bruises we are healed.
Gospel (John xix, 28-35) At that time, Jesus, knowing that all things were now accomplished, that the Scriptures might be fulfilled, said: I thirst. Now there was a vessel set there full of vinegar. And they putting a sponge full of vinegar about hyssop, put it to his mouth. Jesus therefore when he had taken the vinegar, said: It is consummated. And bowing his head, he gave up the ghost. Then the Jews (because it was the Parasceve, that the bodies might not remain upon the cross on the sabbath-day (for that was a great sabbath-day), besought Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away. The soldiers, therefore, came: and they broke the legs of the first, and of the other that was crucified with him. But after they were come to Jesus, when they saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. But one of the soldiers with a spear opened his side, and immediately there came out blood and water. And he that saw it hath given testimony, and his testimony is true.
Credo
Offertory Wicked me rose up against me: without mercy they sought to kill me: and they did not spare to spit in my face: they wounded me with their spears, and all my bones were shaken.
Secret
May this holy and immaculate evening sacrifice sanctify us, O Lord, we beseech thee, which thy only-begotten Son offered upon the cross for the salvation of the world.
II. of the Feria
Accept, we beseech You, O Lord, the offerings which we, Your servants, bring You, and graciously hallow the gifts which are Yours.
Communion
They shall look o him whom they pierced, when the foundations of the earth were moved.
Postcommunion O Lord Jesus Christ, who didst offer thyself upon the cross an immaculate and voluntary holocaust to God the Father: we beseech that the adorable oblation of the same sacrifice may obtain for us pardon and glory everlasting.
II. of the Feria
By the working of this sacrament, O Lord, may our sins be erased, and our just desires fulfilled.
Last Gospel (of the Lenten Feria)
Continuation of the Holy Gospel according to John(v:1-15)
At that time, there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. Now there is at Jerusalem, by the Sheepgate, a pool called in Hebrew Bethsaida, having five porticoes. In these were lying a great multitude of the sick, blind, lame, and those with shriveled limbs, waiting for the moving of the water. For an angel of the Lord used to come down at certain times into the pool, and the water was troubled. And the first to go down into the pool after the troubling of the water was cured of whatever infirmity he had. Now a certain man was there who had been thirty-eight years under his infirmity. When Jesus saw him lying there, and knew that he had been in this state a long time, He said to him, Do you want to get well? The sick man answered Him, Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred; for while I am coming, another steps down before me. Jesus said to him, Rise, take up your pallet and walk. And at once the man was cured. And he took up his pallet and began to walk. Now that day was a Sabbath. The Jews therefore said to him who had been healed, It is the Sabbath; you are not allowed to take up your pallet. He answered them, He who made me well said to me, ‘Take up your pallet and walk.’ They asked him then, Who is the man who said to you, ‘Take up your pallet and walk’? But the man who had been healed did not know who it was, for Jesus had quietly gone away, since there was a crowd in the place. Afterwards Jesus found him in the temple, and said to him, Behold, you are cured. Sin no more, lest something worse befall you. The man went away and told the Jews that it was Jesus Who had healed him.
