[Officium]
Die Octava SSmi Cordis Jesu

[Lectio1]
Lesson from the first book of Samuel
!1 Sam 15:1-3
1 And Samuel said to Saul: The Lord sent me to anoint thee king over his People Israel: now therefore hearken thou unto the voice of the Lord:
2 Thus saith the Lord of hosts: I have reckoned up all that Amalec hath done to Israel: I how he opposed them in the way when they came up out of Egypt.
3 Now therefore go, and smite Amalec, and utterly destroy all that he hath: spare him not, nor covet any thing that is his: but slay both man and woman, child and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass.

[Lectio2]
!1 Sam 15:4-8
4 So Saul commanded the people, and numbered them as lambs: two hundred thousand footmen, and ten thousand of the men of Juda.
5 And when Saul was come to the city of Amalec, he laid ambushes in the torrent.
6 And Saul said to the Cinite: Go, depart and get ye down from Amalec: lest I destroy thee with him. For thou hast shown kindness to all the children of Israel, when they came up out of Egypt. And the Cinite departed from the midst of Amalec.
7 And Saul smote Amalec from Hevila, until thou comest to Sur, which is over against Egypt.
8 And he took Agag the king of Amalec alive: but all the common people he slew with the edge of the sword

[Lectio3]
!1 Sam 15:9-11
9 And Saul and the people spared Agag and the best of the flocks of sheep and of the herds, and the garments and the rams, and all that was beautiful, and would not destroy them: but every thing that was vile and good for nothing, that they destroyed.
10 And the word of the Lord came to Samuel, saying:
11 It repenteth me that I have made Saul king: for he hath forsaken me, and hath not executed my commandments. And Samuel was grieved, and he cried unto the Lord all night.

[Lectio4]
From a Sermon by St. Bernard the Abbot
!Sermo 61 in Cantica Canticorum, nn. 3-5
For us who are so frail and weak, where is to be found a sure and certain place of abiding safety, or of everlasting rest? Where except in the Wounds of the Saviour? There alone I may dwell safely. There alone I may find a safety as great as his mighty power to save. The world may rage around me; the body may weigh me down; the devil may lay snares for me; but if I hide me there I cannot fall, for I am founded on the firm Rock. If I have committed a great sin; if my conscience is sore troubled; I will not despair, for I have always in remembrance the Wounds of the Lord. For in all truth: He was wounded for our transgressions. And there is no sin so deadly that it cannot be remítted through Christ's death. If then I keep in remembrance a remedy so powerful and efficacious, I cannot in this present life be terrified by any evil, no matter how malignant.

[Lectio5]
But as for me, since mercies thus abound, I take unto myself whatever is lacking in me; yea, I take it unto myself with confidence; I take it unto myself from the compassion of the Lord, with whom every kind of mercy aboundeth. For openings are not wanting, through which these mercies may flow forth. They have pierced his hands and his feet; ye, and his side too they have pierced with a spear. It is though these clefts that I am permitted to suck honey from the Rock, and oil out of the flinty Rock, and to taste and see how gracious the Lord is. His thoughts are thoughts of peace, and I knew it not. For who hath known the mind of the Lord? or who hath been his counsellor? But the nail which did pierce hath become unto me a key which doth unlock, so that the will of the Lord is set open unto me. How could I, with such an opening, do other than to see his will? For the nails cry aloud, and the Wounds speak, saying the truth: To wit, that God is in Christ reconciling the world unto himself.

[Lectio6]
The iron entered into his soul, and came nigh unto his Heart, that he might truly know compassion for mine infirmities. The secrets of his Heart lie open, through the Wounds of his body. Thus is that great mystery of love laid open, there lie open the bowels of the mercy of our God, whereby the Day-Spring from on high hath visited us. But why should not the bowels of mercy lie open through the wounds? For in what hath it appeared more clearly than in thy wounds, that thou, O Lord, art sweet and gentle, and of great mercy? For greater pity hath no man, than that a man lay down his life for those who were doomed and condemned to death. From this pity of the Lord is all my merit. I am not entirely destitute of merit, so long as he is not wanting in compassion. And if the mercies of the Lord are from eternity unto eternity, I also will sing the mercies of the Lord forever.

[Lectio7]
From the Holy Gospel according to John
!John 19:31-37
At that time: The Jews, because it was the Preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the Sabbath Day, for that Sabbath Day was an high day, besought Pilate that their legs might broken, and that they might be taken away. And so on.
_
A Homily by St. Augustine the Bishop
!Tractatus 120 in Joannem, nn. 2-3
But when they came to Jesus, and saw that he was dead already, they brake not his legs: but one of the soldiers with a spear opened his side, and forthwith came there out blood and water. Note that the Evangelist maketh use of a word of special significance. He saith not: Penetrated his side: nor yet: Wounded: nor any other thing; but rather: Opened: that thereby in a sense the door of life might be thrown open, from whence the Sacraments of the Church have flowed forth, without which there is no entrance into the life which is the only true life. For that blood was shed for the remission of sins; and that water hath brought into being the life-giving flagon, which same is both the laver of Baptism and the cup that giveth refreshment to them that thirst. All this was announced long before, to wit, when Noah was commanded to make a door in the side of the ark, through which might enter all living creatures which were not destined to perish in the flood; and this same is a figure of the Church.

[Lectio8]
Another figure is also to be found in the first woman. For she was made out of the side of the first man whilst he slept a deep sleep; and she was called: Life: or as it may be interpreted: The Mother of all living. Thus was indicated the great good which was later to come to pass, even before the great evil of transgression had come into being. Here, in the Gospel, the second Adam is shewn as bowing his head, and sleeping his deep sleep upon the Cross, that a bride might be formed for him out of that which came forth from his side as he slept. What a death, whereby the dead are raised anew to life! How clean and cleansing is this blood! What is more healthgiving than this wound! And he that saw it, saith he, bare record, and his record is true: and he knoweth that he saith true, that ye might believe. He said not: That ye might know; but: That ye might believe. For he knoweth, who hath seen, that he, who hath not seen, might believe his record. And believing belongeth more to the nature of faith than doth seeing.

[Lectio9]
From the Scriptures he giveth two testimonies, one for each of the things which he hath recorded as having been done. To the words: When they came to Jesus, and saw that he was dead already, they brake not his legs: belongeth the testimony: A bone of him shall not be broken: which same cometh from the Mosaic injunction laid upon the Jews, who were commanded by the Old Law to celebrate the Passover by the sacrifice of a lamb, which same was a foreshadowing of the passing of Christ, whence we have the passage: Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us: concerning which the Prophet Isaiah also foretold: He is brought as a lamb to the slaughter. To the words: One of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side: belongeth the other testimony: They shall look on him whom they pierced: which same is a promise of the coming of Christ in that selfsame flesh wherein he was afterwards crucified.
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