Church Fathers Commentary Matthew 4:1-2

"Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil. And when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he afterward hungered." — Matthew 4:1-2 (ASV)

Pseudo-Chrysostom: The Lord, having been baptized by John with water, is led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be baptized by the fire of temptation. "Then," meaning, when the voice of the Father had been given from heaven.

St. John Chrysostom: Whoever you are, then, who suffers grievous trials after your baptism, do not be troubled by it. You received your arms for this purpose: to fight, not to sit idle.

God does not withhold all trials from us for several reasons. First, so that we may feel that we have become stronger; second, so that we may not be puffed up by the greatness of the gifts we have received; third, so that the Devil may have proof that we have entirely renounced him; fourth, so that through trial we may be made even stronger; and fifth, so that we may receive a sign of the treasure entrusted to us. For the Devil would not come to tempt us if he did not see us advanced to greater honors.¹

St. Hilary of Poitiers: The Devil's snares are chiefly spread for the sanctified, because a victory over the saints is more desirable to him than one over others.

St. Gregory the Great: Some doubt which Spirit it was that led Jesus into the desert, because it is said later, "The Devil took him into the holy city." But the received opinion—which is true and unquestionably agrees with the context—is that it was the Holy Spirit. His own Spirit would lead Him to the place where the evil spirit would find and test Him.²

St. Augustine of Hippo: Why did He offer Himself to temptation? So that He might be our mediator in vanquishing temptation, not only by His aid but also by His example.³

Pseudo-Chrysostom: He was led by the Holy Spirit, not as an inferior at the bidding of a superior. For we use the word "led" not only for someone who is constrained by a stronger person, but also for someone who is persuaded by reason, just as Andrew "found his brother Simon, and brought him to Jesus."

St. Jerome: He was "led," not against His will or as a prisoner, but as one moved by a desire for the conflict.

Pseudo-Chrysostom: The Devil comes against men to tempt them, but since he could not come against Christ, Christ came against the Devil.

St. Gregory the Great: We should know that there are three modes of temptation: suggestion, delight, and consent. When we are tempted, we commonly fall into delight or consent because, being born of the sin of the flesh, we carry within us the very source that gives the contest its strength.

But God, who became incarnate in the Virgin's womb and came into the world without sin, carried nothing of a contrary nature within Himself. He could, therefore, be tempted by suggestion, but the delight of sin never gnawed at His soul. For this reason, all the Devil's temptation was external to Him, not internal.

St. John Chrysostom: The Devil is accustomed to be most urgent with temptation when he sees us alone. Thus, in the beginning, he tempted the woman when he found her without the man. Now, too, an opportunity is offered to the Devil by the Savior's being led into the desert.

Glossa Ordinaria: This desert is the one between Jerusalem and Jericho, where robbers used to gather. It is called Hammaim, meaning "of blood," from the bloodshed these robbers caused there. This is why the man in the parable was said to have fallen among robbers as he went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, representing a figure of Adam, who was overcome by demons. It was therefore fitting that the place where Christ overcame the Devil should be the same one in which the Devil, in the parable, overcomes man.⁴

Pseudo-Chrysostom: Not only Christ is led into the desert by the Spirit, but also all the sons of God who have the Holy Spirit. For they are not content to sit idle; instead, the Holy Spirit stirs them to take up some great work—that is, to go out into the desert where they will encounter the Devil, for there is no righteousness with which the Devil is pleased.

For all that is good is outside the flesh and the world, because it is not according to the will of the flesh and the world. To such a desert, then, all the sons of God go out so that they may be tempted.

For example, if you are unmarried, the Holy Spirit has led you into the desert—that is, beyond the limits of the flesh and the world—so that you may be tempted by lust. A person who is married, however, is unmoved by such a temptation.

Let us learn from this that the sons of God are tempted only when they have gone out into the desert. In contrast, the children of the Devil, whose lives are in the flesh and the world, are overcome there and obey temptation. The good man who has a wife is content; the bad man, though he has a wife, is not content with her, and so it is in all other things.

The children of the Devil do not go out to meet the Devil to be tempted. For why should someone seek the struggle who does not desire the victory? But the sons of God, having more confidence and desiring victory, go out against him beyond the boundaries of the flesh. For this reason, Christ also went out to the Devil, so that He might be tempted by him.

St. John Chrysostom: So that you may learn how great a good fasting is, what a mighty shield it is against the Devil, and that after baptism you ought to give attention to fasting and not to self-indulgence, Christ fasted—not because He needed it Himself, but to teach us by His example.

Pseudo-Chrysostom: And to establish the measure of our Lenten fast, He fasted forty days and forty nights.

St. John Chrysostom: But He did not exceed the measure of Moses and Elijah, so that it would not bring into doubt the reality of His assumption of the flesh.

St. Gregory the Great: The Creator of all things took no food whatsoever for forty days. We also, during the season of Lent, afflict our flesh by abstinence as much as we are able. The number forty is preserved because the virtue of the Decalogue is fulfilled in the books of the holy Gospel, and ten taken four times amounts to forty.⁵

Or, it is because in this mortal body we consist of four elements, and through their delights we go against the Lord's precepts received in the Decalogue. And since we transgress the Decalogue through the desires of this flesh, it is fitting that we afflict the flesh forty-fold.

Alternatively, just as by the Law we offer a tenth of our goods, so we strive to offer a tenth of our time. From the first Sunday of Lent to the celebration of the Paschal festival is a period of six weeks, or forty-two days. If we subtract the six Sundays, which are not fast days, thirty-six days remain. Now, since the year consists of 365 days, by the affliction of these thirty-six days we give a tenth of our year to God.

St. Augustine of Hippo: Here is another way to understand it: The sum of all wisdom is to be acquainted with the Creator and the creature. The Creator is the Trinity—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The creature is partly invisible, like the soul (to which we assign a threefold nature, as in the command to love God with the whole heart, mind, and soul), and partly visible, like the body, which we divide into four elements: the hot, the cold, the liquid, and the solid.

The number ten, which stands for the whole law of life, taken four times—that is, multiplied by the number we assign to the body, because the law is obeyed or disobeyed through the body—makes the number forty. Furthermore, all the aliquot parts of forty (namely: 1, 2, 4, 5, 8, 10, and 20) add up to fifty.

Thus, the time of our sorrow and affliction is fixed at forty days, while the state of blessed joy that is to come is figured in the Quinquagesimal festival—that is, the fifty days from Easter to Pentecost.⁶

However, we should not suppose that because Christ fasted immediately after receiving baptism, He established a rule that we must fast immediately after our own baptism. Rather, when the conflict with the tempter is severe, then we ought to fast, so that the body may fulfill its warfare through discipline and the soul may obtain victory through humiliation.⁷

Pseudo-Chrysostom: The Lord knew the Devil's thoughts—that he sought to tempt Him. The Devil had heard that Christ had been born into this world, accompanied by the preaching of angels, the witness of shepherds, the inquiry of the Magi, and the testimony of John. Thus, the Lord proceeded against him not as God, but as man—or rather, as both God and man.

For to not have been hungry after forty days of fasting was not human; yet to be hungry at all was not divine. He was hungry, then, so that His divinity might not be fully revealed, which would have extinguished the Devil's hope in tempting Him and thus hindered His own victory.

St. Hilary of Poitiers: He was hungry not during the forty days, but after them. Therefore, when the Lord became hungry, it was not that the effects of abstinence first came upon Him then, but that His humanity was left to its own strength. For the Devil was to be overcome not by the God, but by the flesh.

This prefigured that after the forty days He was to remain on earth following His passion were accomplished, He would hunger for the salvation of humanity. At that time, He carried back to God the Father the expected gift: the humanity He had taken upon Himself.

1. Hom. 13
2. Hom. in Ev., 16, 1
3. de Trin., 4, 13
4. ap. Anselm
5. Hom. in Ev., 16, 5
6. Lib. 83. Quest. q. 81
7. Serm. 210, 2