The Feast in the House of Levi – Paolo Veronese (1528–1588) (cropped)
Gospel Reading : Luke 5:33-39
And they said to him, “The disciples of John fast often and offer prayers, and so do the disciples of the Pharisees, but yours eat and drink.”
And Jesus said to them, “Can you make wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them? The days will come, when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in those days.”
He told them a parable also: “No one tears a piece from a new garment and puts it upon an old garment; if he does, he will tear the new, and the piece from the new will not match the old. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins; if he does, the new wine will burst the skins and it will be spilled, and the skins will be destroyed. But new wine must be put into fresh wineskins. And no one after drinking old wine desires new; for he says, ‘The old is good.’”
What do the Fathers say?
St CYRIL OF ALEXANDRIA. As soon as they have received the first answer from Christ, they proceed from one thing to another, with the intent to show that the holy disciples, and Jesus Himself with them, cared very little for the law.
As if they said, You eat with publicans and sinners, whereas the law forbids us to have any fellowship with the unclean, but compassion comes in as an excuse for your transgression; why then do you not fast, as they are wont to do who wish to live according to the law?
But holy men indeed fast, that by the mortification of their body they may quell its passions. Christ needed not fasting for the perfecting of virtue, since as God He was free from every yoke of passion.
Nor did His companions need fasting, but being made partakers of His grace without fasting they were strengthened in all holy and godly living.
For when Christ fasted for forty days, it was not to mortify His passions, but to manifest to carnal men the rule of abstinence.
For the showing forth of our Saviour in this world was nothing else but a great festival, spiritually uniting our nature to Him as His bride, that she who was formerly barren might become fruitful.
The children of the Bridegroom then are those who have been called by Him through a new and evangelical discipline, but not the Scribes and Pharisees, who observe only the shadow of the law.
Having granted to the children of the Bridegroom that it was not fitting that they should be troubled, as they were keeping a spiritual feast, but that fasting should be abolished among them, He adds as a direction, But the days shall come when the Bridegroom shall be taken from them, and then shall they fast in those days.
St AUGUSTINE. As if He said, Then shall they be desolate, and in sorrow and lamentation, until the joy of consolation shall be restored to them by the Holy Spirit.
The Apostles are compared to old skins, who are more easily burst with new wine, i. e. with new spiritual precepts. Hence it follows, Else the new wine will burst the skins, and the wine will be spilled.
But they were new skins at that time, when after the ascension of the Lord they received the Holy Spirit, when from desire of His consolation they were renewed by prayer and hope.
The Venerable BEDE. Inasmuch as wine refreshes us within, but garments cover us without, the garments are the good works which we do abroad, by which we shine before men; wine, the fervour of faith, hope, and charity. Or,
The old skins are the Scribes and Pharisees, the new piece and the new wine the precepts of the Gospel.
But to every soul which is not yet renewed, but goes on still in the old way of wickedness, the sacraments of new mysteries ought not to be given.
They also who wish to mix the precepts of the Law with the Gospel, as the Galatians did, put new wine into old skins. It follows, And no one after drinking old wine desires new; for he says, ‘The old is good.’” For the Jews, imbued with the taste of their old life, despised the precepts of the new grace, and being defiled with the traditions of their ancestors, were not able to perceive the sweetness of spiritual words.
Sources:
Bible readings from the Revised Standard Version of the Bible, Second Catholic Edition, copyright © 2006 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA
Quotes of the Fathers from :
Thomas Aquinas’ Catena Aurea Translated by St John Henry Newman
Artwork ex Wikimedia Commons