the crucified orator 686 manner: “The Word of the Eternal Father is Jesus Christ, about Whom this same Father openly said: ‘Listen to [H]im’ [Lk 9:35] andWho clearly stated about Himself: ‘You have one master, the Christ’ [Mt 23:10]. In order to fulfill His office to the end, He not only never ceased teaching while He was alive, but even while dying, He preached few words from the cathedra of the Cross, but these were the most fiery, most useful, and most efficacious words. Clearly, they are utterly worthy of being received into the depths of the hearts of all Christians and to be safeguarded, examined, and in fact, put into action by deeds.”4 In order that I might be of some help to those hearts devoted to Christ, I resolved to explain more clearly, in a more pious rather than sophisticated manner of speaking, the teaching of our Master which He delivered from the pulpit of the Cross, as well as to adapt [this teaching] to the salvation of souls in such a way, that it might both bring forth repentance and produce amendment of life. So, I begin with the first word, which Luke the Evangelist received and which he placed in Chapter 23 of the book of the deeds and words of our Lord: “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.” It must be learned from this [statement] that we should love our enemies and forgive wrongs, so that we might in this most certain way receive the forgiveness and remission of our sins. I will now develop this teaching further. The prophet Daniel recorded in Chapter Four that Nebuchadnezzar, the King of the Assyrians [Babylonians], a man characterized by great pride, innocent neither of other faults nor criminal acts, once saw in a dream quite a branchy and towering tree, whose tip touched the sky and whose width stretched to the ends of the earth. The tree also had the most beautiful leaves and abundant fruit. Furthermore, different creatures and wild animals lived underneath it and the birds of the air nested in its branches, and from it all flesh received their food (cf. Dan 4 Bellarminus, Robertus, De septem verbis a Christo in Cruce prolatis (BDS), Ratisbonae 1925, Liber I, c. 1, p. 1.
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