Psalms 132:6

Then it is said: Behold, we heard of it in Ephrata, we found it in the fields of the wood. Let us read the holy Scriptures, and both by day and by night let us sift each single syllable and letter. Let someone say concerning Ephrata: here he said Bethlehem. For we read in Genesis: "He came into Bethlehem, this is Ephrata." This is said of Jacob, when his wife Rachel died, that is, in Ephrata. But let us see why Ephrata received its name. For it is written in Chronicles that Miriam, the sister of Moses and Aaron, had for her husband Hur — not Ur, but Hur. And afterward the lineage is described, and it is said: "Miriam, the sister of Moses and Aaron, this is Ephrata." This is written in the books of Chronicles: seek and you will find. And so this Ephrata too received its name from that Ephrata. Perhaps it seems to someone not to be true, because it is new: but I refer him to the authority of the book.

Behold, we heard of it in Ephrata. In the Hebrew it does not have "it," but has "him": that is, that one who is to be born of the seed of David. We heard of him in Ephrata: which the sense is about Mary. But we can also understand it simply, since Ephrata is called Bethlehem, and Christ was born in Bethlehem. Happy therefore the place, which so long a time before was sung by the voice of the prophets. All holy places indeed are venerable, both where he was born, and where he was crucified, and where he rose again, and where he ascended a victor to the heavens; but this place is properly more venerable. See how great is the mercy of God. Here a little one is born, an infant is laid in a manger: "for there was no room for them in the inn." O monk, the Lord is born on earth, and has no cell of his own: there was no room for him in the inn. The whole human race had a place: and the Lord, who was to be born on earth, had no place. He found no place among men, he found none in Plato, none in Aristotle; but in a manger, among the beasts of burden and the dumb animals, and among all who are simple and innocent. Whence the Lord also says in the Gospel: "The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air nests where they may rest: but the Son of man has nowhere to lay his head."

"Lo, we heard of the same at Ephrata" [Psalm 132:6]. What? A place for the Lord. "We heard of it at Ephrata: and found it in the plains of the forests." Did he hear it where he found it? Or did he hear it in one place, find it in another? Let us therefore enquire what Ephrata is, where he heard it; let us also enquire what mean the plains of the forests, where he found it. Ephrata, a Hebrew word, is rendered in Latin by Speculum, as the translators of Hebrew words in the Scriptures have handed down to us, that we might understand them. They have translated from Hebrew into Greek, and from Greek we have versions into Latin. For there have been who watched in the Scriptures. If therefore Ephrata means a mirror, that house which was found in the woodland plains, was heard of in a mirror. A mirror has an image: all prophecy is an image of things future. The future house of God, therefore, was declared in the image of prophecy. "We have found it in the plains of the forests." What are the "plains of the forests"? Saltus is not here used in its common sense, as a plot of ground of so many hundred acres; saltus properly signifies a spot as yet untilled and woody. For some copies read, in the plains of the wood. What then were the woodland plains, save nations yet untilled? What were they, save regions yet covered with the thorns of idolatry? Thus, though there were thorns of idolatry there, still we find a place for the Lord there, a tabernacle for the God of Jacob. What was declared in the image to the Jews, was manifested in the faith of the Gentiles.