While almost all of the works in this vault use Victorian translations, due to the only English translation of this commentary being in copyright, it was machine-translated (by Claude, 2026) from the public-domain Latin. It has not been checked by a human translator.
Hilary, bishop of Poitiers, Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew, written about 353–356, before his exile to the East. Chapter 27: On the faithful servant whom his lord set over his household, on the ten virgins, and on the man travelling into a far country, who delivered his goods to his servants.
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Who then is a faithful and wise servant, whom his lord hath made ruler over his household? and so on. Although He urges us all together to an unwearied care of watchfulness, yet He lays a special charge on the rulers of the people, that is, on the bishops, as they wait for His coming. For He signifies that this faithful and wise servant is the one set over the household, caring for the good and the profit of the people entrusted to him. If he is attentive to the word and obedient to the commandments — that is, if by the fitness and truth of his teaching he strengthens what is weak, binds up what is broken, turns back what is perverted, and spends the word of life for the eternal food of the household he is to feed — and if he is found doing these things and dwelling on them, he will obtain glory from the Lord as a faithful steward and a profitable bailiff, and will be made ruler over all His goods, that is, will be set in the glory of God, beyond which there is nothing better.
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But if, seeing the long patience of God, which is drawn out for the advance of man’s salvation, he grows insolent towards his fellow-servants, and gives himself up to the evils and vices of the world, exercising care only for present things in serving his belly, the Lord will come on a day he has given up looking for, and will cut him off from the goods He had promised, and appoint him his portion with the hypocrites in the eternity of punishment: because he gave up looking for His coming, because he did not obey the commandments, because he was zealous for present things, because he lived the life of the Gentiles, because, despairing of the judgment, he harassed the household entrusted to him with hunger, thirst and slaughter.
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Then shall the kingdom of heaven be likened unto ten virgins, and the rest. The meaning of this discourse too can be understood from what was said before. For the whole discourse is about the great day of the Lord, in which the hidden things of human thoughts will be brought out by the knowledge of the divine judgment, and the true faith of those who looked for God will obtain the reward of a hope that was not doubtful. For in the five wise and the five foolish the division of the faithful and the unfaithful is plainly set: after the example of which Moses received the ten words written on two tables. For all of them had to be written on both; and the double page, between the proper places of the right hand and the left, marked the division of the good and the bad, though under one covenant.
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The bridegroom and the bride are our Lord, God in the body. For as the Spirit is the bridegroom of the flesh, so the flesh is the bride of the Spirit. And so, when the trumpet rouses them, they go out to meet the bridegroom only; for the two were already one, because the lowliness of the flesh had passed over into spiritual glory. But by the first going forth, by the duties of this life, we are made ready to go to meet Him in the resurrection from the dead. The lamps, then, are the light of shining souls, which have shone with the sacrament of baptism. The oil is the fruit of good works. The vessels are human bodies, within whose inward parts the treasure of a good conscience is to be laid up. Those who sell are those who, needing the mercy of the faithful, give back from themselves the merchandise asked of them: that is, by the satisfying of their want they sell us the consciousness of our good work. For this is the abundant fuel of an unfailing light, which is both to be bought and laid up with the fruits of mercy. The marriage is the taking on of immortality, and the joining, in a new fellowship, of corruption and incorruption. The tarrying of the bridegroom is the time of repentance. The sleep of those who wait is the rest of believers, and, in the time of repentance, the temporary death of all. The cry at midnight, while all are unaware, is the voice of the trumpet, announcing the coming of the Lord as He goes forth, and rousing all to go out to meet the bridegroom. The taking up of the lamps is the return of souls into bodies: and their light is the conscience of good works shining out, which is held in the vessels of the bodies.
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The wise virgins are those who, embracing the fitting time for working while in the body, have made themselves ready for the first meeting at the Lord’s coming. And the foolish are those who, loose and careless, have had care only for present things, and, forgetting the promises of God, have not stretched themselves out to any hope of the resurrection. And because the foolish cannot go out to meet Him with their lamps gone out, they beg those who were wise to lend them oil. They answered that they could not give it, because perhaps there would not be enough for all: that is, that no one is to be helped by the works and merits of others, because each must buy oil for his own lamp. They urge them to go back and buy, if, even late, by obeying the commandments of God, they may be made worthy, with the light of their lamps, to meet the bridegroom. While they delay, the bridegroom has gone in; and together with Him the wise, who were waiting with the light of their lamps made ready, go in to the marriage: that is, they enter heavenly glory at the very moment of the coming of the Lord’s brightness. And because there is now no time for repentance, the foolish run up and ask that the entrance be opened to them. To them the bridegroom answers, I know you not. For they had not been present at the service of His coming, nor had they run to the voice of the trumpet that roused them, nor had they kept with the company of those going in: but, delaying and unworthy, they had lost the time for entering the marriage.
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For the kingdom of heaven is as a man travelling into a far country, who called his own servants, and delivered unto them his goods, and the rest. The division of the money is unequal; but the difference is not to be put down to the one who divides it: for He says that each received according to his own ability. So each received as much as he was able to hold: and what lay in the right of the one receiving is outside the decision of the one who apportions. He signifies that He Himself is the householder. The time of His being abroad is the space for repentance, in which, sitting in heaven at the right hand of God, He has granted to the whole human race the power of faith and of the Gospel’s working. So each has received the talent, that is, the preaching of the Gospel from the one who preaches it, according to the measure of his faith. For this is the incorruptible substance, this the patrimony of Christ kept for His servants as heirs.
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The servant who received five talents is the people of those who believe out of the Law: setting out from it, he has doubled its worth by performing rightly and well the working of the Gospel’s faith. And the rendering of the account is the trial of the judgment, in which the use of the heavenly word and the return on the talent given out are required. So he to whom five had been entrusted, when the Lord returned, brought ten out of five: found, that is, as faithful in the faith as in the Law, he who fulfilled, through the grace of the Gospel’s justification, obedience to the commandments of the ten words in the five books of Moses. So he is bidden enter into the joy of his Lord, that is, he is received into the honour of Christ’s glory.
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And the servant to whom two talents were entrusted is the people of the Gentiles, justified by faith in and confession of both the Son and the Father, and confessing our Lord Jesus Christ as God and man, in Spirit and in flesh. For with the heart there is faith, and with the mouth confession. These, then, are the two talents entrusted to him. But as the former had known the whole mystery in five talents, that is, in the Law, and had doubled it by the faith of the Gospel, so this one too earned it by the increase of two talents, and by working. With a different account and return, yet the reward of both from the Lord is equal: so that we might know that the faith of the Gentiles was made equal to the knowledge of those who believe out of the Law. For with the same praise he is bidden enter into the joy of his Lord. And the doubling of the money received is to have added the working of faith, and to have carried out in deeds and acts what they had believed in thought.
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But he who received one talent and hid it in the earth is the people that persists in the Law, wholly carnal and dull and understanding nothing spiritual; into which the power of the Gospel’s preaching does not enter, but which, out of envy at the Gentiles being saved, has hidden in the earth the talent it received; neither using it itself nor giving it out for others to use, but thinking the Law enough for its salvation. And so, when an account was required of him, he says, I was afraid: as though, out of reverence and fear for the old commandments, he kept back from using the Gospel’s freedom; and he says, Lo, there thou hast that is thine, as though he had kept to the things commanded by the Lord.
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And to hide the talent in the earth is this: to hide the glory of the new preaching under disparagement of the bodily Passion. For though he cannot deny that Christ the Lord was sent for the salvation of the Gentiles — for both His coming and His Passion are from the Law — yet he himself would not obey the Gospels. For he says, I knew thee that thou art an hard man, reaping where thou hast not sown, and gathering where thou hast not strawed. The nature of present things does not allow a harvest without seed, nor the gathering of what was not strewn: but this saying is wholly spiritual. For we have said that this people is of the Law, not ignorant of the Lord’s coming and of the salvation of the Gentiles, but unbelieving: since it knows that the fruits of righteousness are to be reaped there, where the Law has not been sown, and to be gathered from among the Gentiles those who were not scattered from the stock of Abraham: and that for this reason He is a hard man, since He will justify without the Law, gather without scattering, and reap without sowing.
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And so it will be the more without pardon that he hid the preaching and buried the talent entrusted to him, when he knew that He would reap without seed and gather what He had not strewn: but rather he ought to have given it to the exchangers, that is, to have shared the use of the talent entrusted to him with the whole race of men, which is busied with the business of the world, the Lord being about to require of each the return on it. For this fault the talent is taken from him — not so much the talent of the Gospel, which he had buried, as that of the Law — and given to him who doubled the five, the Lord saying, For unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance: but from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath. He that has can indeed abound: for it is easy for the rich to grow richer by the increase either of generosity or of labour; but how will he that has not have something to lose? It is so for this reason: that to those who have the use of the Gospels the honour of the Law also is given back; but from him who has not the faith of Christ even that honour which he seemed to have from the Law is taken away.