Commentariorum in apocalypsim Johannis

Balak desires that the wicked openly rule over the Christians.
The Roman See.

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And crushing modest souls as much as he can, those who do not consent to him. He sends, I say, across the Jordan, and calls out some transgressor of sacred baptism, and appoints for himself a priest prone to greed, observing vanities according to the name of Balaam Vain People; for Balaam is indeed interpreted as "vain people." Kings also and emperors, who call themselves Christians, follow a vanity of this kind, and against Aaron the high priest, they have sometimes intruded some soothsayer like Balaam: against Peter, they set Simon Magus: against some legitimate bishop of the Roman See, they have sometimes intruded some adulterer to pronounce curses. Nevertheless, let us speak of the universal Balaam, that is, of all those who, anywhere in the world, under the name or office of the priesthood, follow greed and love the rewards of iniquity.

How evil priests act like Balaam.

Whoever it is, therefore, who approaches the priesthood in such a way, is indeed brought there to curse, and in his heart he detests Israel: because he loves vices and hates virtues, but in public he does not dare to detest them, he does not dare to openly vow to curse, so that he might teach differently in the church than the rule of faith itself holds. Thus, surely, that Balaam, when he desired to curse Israel because of the gifts promised to him, did not dare to do so because the Lord forbade it: but on the contrary, he blessed them, pronouncing those same things concerning the happiness of that people and concerning Christ which Moses and other holy prophets piously and faithfully announce.

Numbers 24.

A star, he says, shall rise out of Jacob, and a scepter shall rise out of Israel, and shall strike the leaders of Moab, etc. original: "duces Moab". There is no time now to speak of these things in detail according to their mystical senses. Thus, these men do not dare, even when they wish, to cross the rule of faith, and although they desire in their hearts to remove the fear of future judgment from the people, so that they may have many favorers of their iniquity and many companions of their destruction: nevertheless they recite the lessons and sing the testimonies of the Lord’s passion, resurrection, and ascension, and of the day of the last judgment, and in this faith they bless, baptize, and consecrate. Furthermore, when they have done these things publicly, in secret they turn to counsel, to evil conversations, which corrupt good morals.

1 Corinthians 15. Whom the daughters of Midian designate.

The suborned daughters of Midian go forth, playing and walking with a studied step to deceive Israel. This surely happens as often as those who are tender and soft, overflowing with vices and having no manly strength for constancy of life, receive honors; though they are obscure in their character, they become prominent in the church under the Christian name. This is the counsel or suggestion of Balaam, that is, of all who, following his way, love the rewards of iniquity.

Against the Simonists.

For they do not promote the sons of the church for their virtues, but the daughters, that is, soft and vicious souls, to ecclesiastical honors in exchange for gifts. Do not those who have been promoted in this way hold the doctrine of the Nicolaitans?

The doctrine of the Nicolaitans.

For Clement reports that Nicolaus, having been rebuked for his jealousy of his very beautiful wife, replied that whoever wanted her might take her as a wife: and he taught this to the unfaithful, saying that the apostles permitted promiscuous and common sharing of women to everyone. Is it not close to that doctrine that these men, being unable to have a legitimate marriage as it is forbidden by ecclesiastical laws, so that they might be holy and purified because they carry the vessels of the Lord, are nonetheless incontinent? Indeed, they rush into something worse, imitating marriages as often as they wish, and since they have no lawful bed, while they wander about in this way, they feel no confidence that they have broken the bond of marriage? Moreover, they commit fornication with them and are initiated into Beelphegor Lord of the Opening, a pagan deity associated with licentiousness: whoever from such a people becomes more bold toward incest or adultery.

Fornicating clerics are similar to the Nicolaitans.
Leviticus 20. 1 Chronicles 15. Ezekiel 44. Numbers 22. The grumbling of the people is like the speech of the donkey.

¶ And then indeed it was a miracle when the Lord opened the mouth of the beast of burden: and the animal, speaking with a human voice, rebuked the foolishness of the prophet who gave such counsel: but even now something similar happens, when the common crowd rebukes and scolds the rulers of the church with their outcries, because such a pestilence, so great a stain on the sacred orders, has happened because of their greed. He says, therefore: But I have a few things against you: because you have those there holding the doctrine of Balaam, who taught Balak to place a stumbling block before the children of Israel, to eat and to commit fornication. And explaining what that doctrine of Balaam is, he immediately adds, So you also have those holding the doctrine of the Nicolaitans.

Ecclesiastical purity.
A hired priest.

Therefore, the fornications which Nicolaus is said to have introduced, as has already been said, he calls the doctrine of Balaam against ecclesiastical purity: and he confirms that this is the scandal of the church of God, to eat and to commit fornication. And rightly so: for wherever a priest or a hired bishop, after the example of Balaam, loves the rewards of iniquity, immediately, as if from a bad root of all vices, evil fruits sprout up, and first the chastity of the church and all the beauty of religion perishes: there is no care for knowledge, no honor, almost no fervor for sacred study: but greed, which is the service of idols, a whirlpool, submerges all good things.

The threat of the sword for repentance.
Numbers 22.

¶ Likewise, do you repent. But if not, I am coming to you, and I will fight against them with the sword of my mouth. This is a sufficiently fitting and timely threat from him who said he has a sword sharp on both sides. For even where that hired Balaam was going:

the angel of the Lord stood in the way, holding a drawn sword in his hand, and said to Balaam: I came to be an adversary to you. And unless the donkey had turned aside from the way, giving place to the one resisting, I would have killed you, and she would have lived.

The death of Balaam by the sword.
Numbers 31.

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And because he did not repent, teaching Balak to place a stumbling block before the children of Israel, to eat and to commit fornication, the vengeance was fulfilled upon him, which the angel of the Lord signified by appearing in such a form, namely holding a drawn sword in his hand. For in that vengeance which was taken upon the Midianites: the scripture says they also killed Balaam the son of Beor with the sword. Rightly, therefore, he says, I am coming, and I will fight against them with the sword of my mouth: namely, according to the likeness of that angelic vision, and of that vengeance upon the Midianites and upon Balaam himself. For that sword in the hand of the angel, that vengeance upon the Midianites, signifies that judgment of which the Apostle says: But God will judge fornicators and adulterers.

Hebrews 13.
Against those who adulterate the word of God.
Knowledge must be used against false doctrines.
Luke 11.

¶ For he will judge not only fornicators, such as the Midianites were with whom Israel committed fornication: but also those adulterers who adulterate the word of God: such as was that Balaam, who adulterated the words of blessing by submitting evil counsel, and by teaching Balak to place that stumbling block before the children of Israel.

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He who has ears, let him hear what the spirit says to the churches. In this place, to hear what the spirit says is to not cease from sound doctrine in order to destroy that doctrine of Balaam, and to exercise holy knowledge, and to always keep that evangelical sentence of the Lord in memory. Woe to you legal experts, because you have taken away the key of knowledge: you yourselves did not enter, and you hindered those who were entering. For those who nurture sins under the Christian name, or permit them to be nurtured, thinking that the divine name alone is sufficient for salvation, just as those who, trusting in lying words, said: The temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord it is: and they had made it a den of thieves: they certainly have not entered into true knowledge. For if they had entered into it, if they had vigilantly noticed or wished to notice the voices of the holy scriptures, they would know that the profession of the divine name is worth nothing when the wicked doctrine of eating and fornicating supplants it in that Balaam. Moreover, if they had known and observed these things, they would not have been cast out of the temple by the whip of God's wrath, as the prophetic spirit says of them. Therefore my people were led captive, because they did not have knowledge. Let him who has ears hear this, because like a brute victim, that heart in which there is no knowledge because of willful blindness will be cut by the sword.

Jeremiah 7.
Matthew 21.
Against unlearned prelates.
John 2.
Isaiah 5.

¶ To him who overcomes I will give the hidden manna. To overcome at this stage is to destroy the doctrine of Balaam, that is, fornications first in oneself through the virtue of continence, then in others through the virtue of knowledge. Furthermore, he who overcomes in this way receives the sacrament of the body and blood of the Lord: just as, on the contrary, he who neglects to overcome, when he approaches this sacrament, eats and drinks judgment unto himself. Rightly, therefore, he says, to the one who overcomes I will give hidden manna, that is, to the one who guards the purity of heart and body, I will give the true bread, the living bread, of which the manna that the children of Israel ate was a sign or figure. Moreover, this manna is called "hidden" because in this sacrament, one thing is seen with the eyes, and another is understood by faith. And what benefit follows the one who receives this hidden manna? He says.

1 Corinthians 11.
Hidden manna, the sacrament of the Eucharist.

¶ And I will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name written, which no one knows except him who receives it. For he who worthily receives this sacrament will so rise again on the last day that he may have a solid, eternal brightness in a new body, and his body will be like a calculus a small white stone or pebble, that is, made solid by a splendid transformation. Concerning which the Apostle says: The dead shall rise incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For to be changed belongs only to the saints, and it is as if he were saying, we shall die no more, we shall be beyond suffering.

The white stone in the resurrection of the righteous.
1 Corinthians 15.

To have a new name written in such a stone is to be named and to be children of God. This new name, certainly, is given from the new man, Christ, to those redeemed through his blood. For our old name was hereditary to us from the old man, namely, that we were called and were by nature children of wrath. Why, however, does no one know this name except him who receives it? Clearly because the knowledge of this name is not an external teaching for another, but it produces an internal experience of one's own. Those who are inflated and puffed up, where they seem to know as much as they want or as much as they can, nevertheless cannot attain the knowledge of this name.

The new name is to be a child of God.
Ephesians 2.
The wicked and the inflated do not know the new name.
Wisdom 2.

For it is written: They thought these things and they erred, for their own malice blinded them, and they did not know the sacraments of God. No one, therefore, knows the dignity or the nobility of this name, by which we are called or are children of God, no matter how much he knows or how much he shouts to those who desire it, like that Aristotle or all the Aristotelians, concerning the relation of the father to the son, or the son to the father, unless the spirit of adoption by regeneration makes him a child of God the father, and by that same regeneration makes him knowing of this matter and learned by his own deed.