"Amicus (friend) is Christ, as in Canticles: 'He is my friend, daughters of Jerusalem,' for He loved His Church so much that He would die for her.…
"Ancilla (handmaid) is the Church, as in the Psalms: 'Make safe the son of thine handmaid,' that is me, who am a member of the Church. Ancilla, corruptible flesh, as in Genesis: 'Cast out the handmaid and her son,' that is, despise the flesh and its carnal fruit. Ancilla, preachers of the Church, as in Job: 'He will bind her with his handmaids,[1] because the Lord through His preachers conquered the devil. Ancilla, the effeminate minds of the Jews, as in Job: 'Thy handmaids hold me as a stranger,' because the effeminate minds of the Jews knew me through faith.[2] Ancilla, the lowly, as in Genesis, 'and meal for his handmaids,' because Holy Church affords spiritual refection to the lowly.
Aqua is the Holy Spirit, Christ, subtle wisdom, loquacity, temporal greed, baptism, the hidden speech of the prophets, the holy preaching of Christ, compunction, temporal prosperity, adversity, human knowledge, this world's wealth, the literal meaning, carnal pleasure, eternal reflection, holy angels, souls of the blessed, saints, humility's lament, the devotions of the saints, sins of the elect which God condones, knowledge of the heretics, persecutions, unstable thoughts, the blandishments of temptations, the pleasures of the wicked, the punishments of hell.
Mons, mountain (in the singular) the Virgin Mary, montes (in the plural) angels, apostles, sublime precepts, the two Testaments, inner meditations, proud men, the Gentiles, evil spirits.[3]
Thus Rabanus dragged into his compilation every meaning that had ever been ascribed to the words defined. In him and his contemporaries, the allegorical material, apart
- ↑ Raban's Latin is "Ligabit eam ancillis suis"—the verse in Job xl. 24 reads "Ligabis eam ancillis tuis?" In the English version the verse is Job xli. 5, "Wilt thou bind him for thy maidens?"
- ↑ "Per fidem me cognoverunt"; I surmise a non is omitted.
- ↑ The Scriptural citations are omitted. Rabanus wrote an allegorical De laudibus sanctae crucis (Migne 107, col. 133-294), composed in metre with prose explanations, which explain very little. The metrical portion is a puzzle consisting of twenty-eight "figures," or lineal delineations interwoven in hexameter verses; the words and letters contained within each figure "make sense" when read by themselves, and form verses in metres other than hexameters. The whole is as incomprehensible in meaning as it is indescribable in form. Angels, cherubim and seraphim, tetragons, the virtues, months, winds, elements, signs of the Zodiac, and other twelvefold mysteries, the days of the year, the number seven, the five books of Moses, the four evangelists, the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, the eight beatitudes, the mystery of the number forty, the sacrament shown by the number fifty,—all these and much besides contribute to the glory of the Cross, and are delineated and arranged in cruciform manner, so as to be included within the scope of the cross's symbolical significance.
