Homilies 1 part 10/11

It is necessary, then, to say to the one who raises this thought against us: 'O most wise one, the examiner of the readings must have both a sound mind and a strong memory, so that he may thus be able to grasp all that is written at once.'

For if you seek the presence of the Spirit, go back a little above the stones and the bloodshed, and you will find, before the vision, the Spirit spoken of and present with Stephen and preparing beforehand the contestant.

For straightway, at the beginning of the narrative, it proclaimed to us in advance this word:

'Stephen, full of grace and truth and power, worked signs and great wonders among the people.'

'And there rose up some from the synagogue called that of the Libertines, and of the Cyrenians and Alexandrians, and of those from Cilicia and Asia, disputing with Stephen, and they were not able to withstand the wisdom and the spirit by which he spoke.'

Behold, then, the account has also clearly established for us the person of the Spirit.

And if this is written first, and the Father and the Son last, the departure from order does no harm at all to the faith.

For it is the custom of Scripture to do this:

sometimes to name the Son alone, sometimes the Spirit together with the Son, or even to begin from the Father and end with the Spirit;

and, conversely, with the beginning made from the Spirit, to proceed in discourse through the Son to the Father.

And one can see this peculiarity of custom occurring without any special guardedness, especially in the great Paul.

And the debt has been paid, both by us and by Stephen;

since he sufficiently declares the meaning, saying:

'To our God be glory forever and ever.'

Of Asterius, Bishop of Amasea, an exhortation concerning repentance. A Pharisee, as we have just heard Luke relate, invites the Lord to a feast, brings him under his roof, and sets before him a common table.

But he neither refuses the invitation nor shuns the man, though he was neither a disciple nor a believer, but was bound to the letter of the law and had not yet opened his eyes to the knowledge of the truth, and was seeing with difficulty and dimness the promises of the prophets.

Why then did Luke record this chapter for us? Was it so that we might have knowledge of what Jesus accomplished while living his life in the body, and so that we might receive knowledge of a beneficial history? Or does the text contain some beneficial and instructive purport, regulating our life toward what is right and undistorted? I, for my part, think it is so, and it is fitting that you too should be persuaded of this.

For there are many among those who justify themselves who are self-loving and self-satisfied, puffed up in their own estimation by empty conceit, calling those who draw near sinners, and, before the true tribunal has come, separating themselves like lambs from the goats, and looking toward the door of the kingdom as if it stood open to them, deeming those who share the multitude's lot worthy neither of shelter nor of food, and abhorring all who walk not the extreme, but the middle path of life.

Luke, then, physician more of souls than of bodies, wrote the narrative now in hand not as a mere account, but as a medicine for those sick with self-conceit, showing us our very God and Savior—the incomparably pure and only righteous one—associating most forgivingly with those condemned, and dwelling together with those not yet purified, not that he might take on anything of their wickedness, but that he might impart something of his own righteousness, after the manner of this visible working of the sun, insofar as it is possible from a created thing to represent the providence of the Creator.

For we know that the sun too shines not only upon the open, level regions, but also upon those that are hollow and have obtained a cavernous position.

Let us cease, then, if any of us think in the way the argument just given describes;

and let us imitate the Master's gracious mercy and love for mankind, condescending for this reason to the lowly—not that we may abase ourselves along with those who lie fallen, but that we may raise them up also, like divers skilled in the water, drawing up those who are drowning to this life-giving air.

But since the text of the Gospel leads us by the hand toward the best understanding, come, let us direct ourselves to the purpose that has presented itself.

I greatly marvel at those who, though clothed in this passible and pleasure-loving flesh, and daily overcome by sleep and by the belly, and not without experience, either, of the other incitements which are familiar to all of us who share one and the same nature—how they are harsh judges of sinners and forgiving toward themselves;

weak contestants yet inexorable lawgivers, so as even to destroy the hope of God's love for mankind, and to stop up, as they suppose, the unfailing fountain of mercy, and with great presumption of authority to shut off, for those who have gone astray, the entrance of the kingdom.

But this is in no way a matter of good stewardship—to work despair into souls that are seeking healing,

to inflict such a thing as grace does not bestow as a gift, and pardon does not cure.

And who is so deaf and so unhearing of the words of Job, who cries out plainly to all: 'No one is clean of defilement, not even if his life be but one day'? And what sober-minded person would think it right—being himself subject to a reckoning, and that too in the tribunal of God—to consider forgiveness superfluous and mercy needless? But even if they had attained to the very summit of righteousness and exactness, and had truly, according to what is written, trodden upon serpents and scorpions, and had been proclaimed victors and crowned conquerors over sin, not even so ought they to regulate the life of all others by their own valor, but rather to confess to God, who gave the grace, the credit for their own good repute—since they governed their nature masterfully and were not overcome by satanic temptations—while extending to those who have grown weak the right hand of brotherly love, and raising them up out of the mire, and cleansing them from their defilements.

For thus they would win a twofold praise, receiving together the rewards both of their own manly virtue and of their brotherly and kindly compassion.

But now, though being men who come and go upon the earth, and living a life not angelic and close to the incorporeal beings, but such as anyone might call to account and mock, they judge sternly, and with great presumption of authority they pronounce the condemning sentence—so that I, often choked by their conceit and arrogance, am moved to say to them the words of the Gospel: 'Not seeing the beams in your own eyes, you blow away the splinters from the eyes of others.'

And binding the heaviest burdens for others, you go about, weighty judges and feeble porters, anticipating the judgment-seat of Christ and snatching in advance the verdict of the Judge—servants who despise, and are inexorable judges of your fellow servants.

If you emulate God, as having been created according to his image, imitate your archetype:

O Christians—name of love for mankind—emulate the love of Christ, look upon the wealth of his loving-kindness.

For when he was about to appear to men through a man, he sent before him John, a herald of repentance, an introducer of a change of heart—and indeed all the prophets before John, teachers of conversion.

Then, having himself appeared shortly after, he cries out in his own voice, in his own person:

'Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.'

And how did he receive those who were persuaded by the call? He gave, without toil, the remission of sins, an instantaneous and swift deliverance from the things that grieved them;

the Word sanctified, the Spirit sealed;

the old man was buried in the water, the new man was born, renewed in youth by grace.

What follows? The man becomes a member of the household instead of a stranger, a son instead of an alien, an initiate instead of a profane person, a holy one instead of one of the impious.

The man, then, who has been enriched with gifts so magnificent and unsurpassed, if he sins against his munificent and good benefactor, would—before you, harsh and implacable judges—straightway, without even being granted a hearing, certainly be led to destruction, both cut off from life here and punished in the life to come.

But since the Lord of the verdict is other than you—he who shows mercy to thousands and tens of thousands, and does not desire the death of the sinner, but awaits his conversion—not even so were those who insulted the former grace punished; but again a second mercy follows upon the first, and pardon is joined to amnesty, and a falling tear is equal in worth to the washing of baptism, and a laborious groan brings back the grace that had withdrawn for a little while.

If you disbelieve my word, ask Peter, sitting in the house of the high priest, and he will tell you how, having bitterly lamented the transgression of his denial, he was cleansed, and did not revert to being Simon, but remained Peter the apostle.

...had he asked, he would not have failed to obtain the compassion that overflows upon the whole world.

And the proof of this statement: all the Hebrews who believed after the cross and washed both their souls and their hands together in that washing.

And if those who crucified him were shown mercy, how would not the one who betrayed him also have enjoyed amnesty? Paul too once bound Christians in chains, but afterward, by bearing chains himself for Christ's sake, he loosed the charges against him through this like suffering;

he sinned in stoning Stephen and consenting to those who slew him, but by being stoned himself he blotted out the offense.

Matthew and Zacchaeus were once tax-collectors, but by their contempt for money they trod tax-collecting underfoot; and the one received Jesus in his house, and still more in his soul, while the other was shown to be the evangelist and recorder of his wondrous deeds.

The tax-collector who prayed with the Pharisee deserves to be called to mind, as does the woman who lost the drachma and found it.

And if one should reckon up mankind of the whole span of life, from beginning to end, throughout the successive ages, he will find that the majority were at first entangled in sins, and then, by an inclination toward what is better, changed their mind.

For it belongs to God alone, and is his exclusive prerogative, to do all things rightly without fault.

But man, being subject to generation and corruption, and being receptive of so many passions, could never be shown blameless, if forgiveness were cut away.

Look upon David, king of Israel, whom God appointed by his own choice, and adorned with the praises of his testimony, saying:

'I have found a man after my own heart, David the son of Jesse.'

This man, after that splendid proclamation of praises, when he was overcome by the passion of unchaste desire and fell into those things which we all know, came, after the prophet's rebuke, to a due reckoning of his evil, and left on record, for those who would come after, the labor of repentance.

And we behold, as in an image, the man in the Psalter—now wasting away in body with grief, and again making the night, the common rest from labors, a time for lamentation;

and the tears flowing down upon his bed as from fountains of his eyelids, and again composing for us the fiftieth psalm, a pattern for propitiating God.

Nor was his lamentation labored in vain; rather, his heavy groans drew down mercy, and he received back both the authority of his royal power and the boldness of supplication toward God.

Likewise also that king who was allotted to reign over Nineveh was, by the multitude of his sins, being driven toward destruction together with the peoples he ruled, and the exposure of that sin proclaimed that the appointed term of punishment was drawing near in a little while.

But since, by wisely afflicting themselves, they escaped the experience of the calamity, he grieved that the prophet of evils did not prove true, and behaved churlishly and harshly toward the mercy of God.

But he who everywhere, both by words and by deeds, makes known to us how great is his benevolence toward mankind, made a gourd grow up over the prophet's head as a shelter from the painful heat of the sun, and then, while he lay sleeping beneath its shade, suddenly withered it.

Then, since he was greatly displeased on waking to what had happened, he reproaches and finds fault.

If he was so passionately grieved over the withered plant, would not God have been moved to pity for so great a city that had come near to danger? Learn then, you who are hard and implacable, the goodness of him who created us, and do not become bitter and heavy judges of your fellow servants, until he comes who reveals the hidden things of hearts and, by his master's authority, allots to each the condition of the life that is expected.

Do not pronounce harsh verdicts, lest you be subjected to the like, and be pierced by the words of your own mouths as by the sharpest teeth.

For it seems to me that the gospel's precept, too, is a safeguard against this very fault, when it says:

"Judge not, that you be not judged."

Make the weight light, then, if you please, if indeed you wish that your own deeds too not be drawn down toward the condemning scale-pan, when our life is weighed, as on a balance, in the judgment of God.

Since you are clothed with a body and live your life in the flesh, never banish from your life the therapy that comes from medicine.

For even if you live for as long as possible in good condition and health, still you will not remain so free of illness as never to need the care of one who heals.

And since you have a soul inclined toward earthly things, whenever, forgetting itself, it becomes filled with the passions of the body, do not do away with mercy, lest you be deprived of pardon when you yourself stand in need of it.

Suppose there is a certain priest, and he has been allotted to govern the people:

let him look with compassion on the falls of his subjects, knowing that even if his rank in life differs from that of the many, yet in nature he is no different from those he shepherds, and since he shares their nature, he will perhaps also come to share their fault.

Knowing this—Moses too, for he was a man and understood human nature—he ordained that the calf be sacrificed on behalf of the priest, since the priest also assuredly sins and needs purification, and indeed a greater measure of it.

What the fleshly calf was then, that now is the incorporeal repentance and the bloodless supplication; let us not, by speaking loftily and boasting greatly, undo this benefit—knowing that even Aaron, the most approved of priests, was carried along with the people when they sought after gods, and together with his sister Miriam was caught in murmuring, and had not the one against whom they murmured interceded for him, he would not have escaped punishment.

Suppose there is another who is not a priest, but one of the many: let him fear to lay on a heavy yoke.

For if the one appointed to purify the people himself needs purification at times, what would happen to the one who does not even possess the authority of ordination? Let us imitate the shepherding of the Master:

let us bend close over the gospels and, as in a mirror, learn well the pattern of his care and goodness.

For there I see, in parables and in words cast in shadow, a man who is shepherd of a hundred sheep:

who, when one animal had been split off from the flock and gone astray, did not remain with those that had grazed in order and without wandering, but setting out in search of it traversed many hollows and ravines, passed over great and lofty crags, and toiled steadfastly through the deserts, until he tracked down the wandering one.

And having found it, he did not strike it, nor indeed did he drive it violently, hurrying it toward the flock; but placing it upon his neck and carrying it with tenderness, he restored it to its fellow grazers, rejoicing over it more than over the multitude of the rest.

Let us, then, understand the matter concealed within these riddles.

For the sheep is not really a sheep, and the shepherd is assuredly something else, not the herdsman of dumb beasts; rather these are instructive examples for priests, so that we may neither rashly despair of men nor grow negligent when they are in danger.

Let us seek out the one overcome by passion and bring him back into order, and let us rejoice over those who turn back, and mingle them with the full company of those who live rightly.

So far ought the priest to practice loving-kindness instead of severity, that even if the Master commands someone to be cut down as a useless plant, he, like the gardener, must ask for mercy and postponement.

This is the very sense that the word sets before us in the parable of the unfruitful fig tree: when the Lord wished to cut it down for its unfruitfulness, the vinedresser besought him and asked for a delay and postponement, holding out good hopes for it through his own care.

Do not, then, cut it down rashly, you who ought to forestall the cutting brought by the Lord, nor be quick to condemn it as useless, but labor diligently at its care.

Dig around it with reproofs; warm it, as with manure, by exhortations; water it with the flow of your teachings; fence it about with the protective wall of your precepts, as with a palisade.

Let entreaty for pardon be yours; let judging belong to the Judge.

Let us strive to be called by that title which the Lord himself is called:

he is so named because he propitiates the Father on behalf of the race of men;

and likewise the Spirit of truth also received his name from his zeal on our behalf.

For he too is called Paraclete:

and intercession and advocacy are assuredly exercised on behalf of those who have sinned, not indeed on behalf of those who are blameless and beyond reproach.

Emulate, O priest, the solicitous care of Moses:

imitate his disposition toward those under his charge, who, when he was beseeching God not to be ill-disposed toward the people that had sinned, and perceived that his favor was for a little being withheld, entreated at least this—that he might depart before the people, so that he might not have to witness the destruction of those he shepherded.

Nothing is better than to call to mind his very words:

"I beseech you, this people has sinned a great sin, and they have made for themselves gods of gold."

"And now, if you will forgive them their sin, forgive it;"

"but if not, blot me out of the book which you have written."

Do you see how he sets the salvation of the multitude above his own, and asks to be blotted out if he does not obtain pardon for the common people? But those now who grow bitter against sinners drive away those who approach, pass by those who prostrate themselves, disregard those who seek to be healed, and do not soften their countenance toward those who weep.

Why then did Luke—or rather the Holy Spirit—record for me the prodigal son, who first insulted the father who begot him by departing, and then, given over in bacchic frenzy to pleasures and drunkenness and become a lover of women, emptied out all his father's wealth? But when, after a time, having toiled sufficiently in hardships—so that he even became a hired swineherd and shared the very food of the swine—he returned to his father's hearth, brought to his senses, the father did not turn away from him nor shut the doors against him on his return; but, quite the contrary, he ran to meet him as he drew near, and fell upon his neck, and let tears fall with compassion upon his neck, and made him blessed once more instead of wretched, clothing him in a robe fit for a freeman and putting a ring upon his hand, and keeping that day as a festival, and preparing a splendid banquet.

All this is a parabolic discourse opening up the church to those who repent, as a father's hearth, and receiving them kindly, so that they may no longer be table-companions of the swine, that is, of the demons, but may be born again as sons out of those who were once estranged, in order that they may live together according to the will of God as with the mind of a father, and with the holy men as with brothers.

But you, do not emulate the disposition of the elder brother, nor murmur against the father's loving-kindness, because he has taken back into the house even the prodigal and insolent son.

Rather, marvel at the goodness, and imitate the graciousness, of God, and embrace and enfold in your arms those who turn back from error;

for thus you will be a guide of the blind and a teacher of those who wander.

To those, then, who are harsher in disposition and practice severity before compassion, enough has been said by us, and there is no need for further length;

but now hear also, you who stand in need of conversion, how it behooves you to be grieved over your sins and to lament the trespasses of your heart with mourning:

or rather, if you please, consider the sinful woman in Luke, who has just now been read to us.

Emulate her humility and good understanding, and take from her a rule of exact repentance.

For when she came to the Pharisee's house, she neither blushed at the multitude of the guests reclining at table, nor did she avoid the hour of the banquet as unsuitable for confession; but, held fast by grief and having a vehement mourning for her offenses, she would not let go of the physician of sins even for the briefest moment.

She begged for the mercy of his compassion;

and she poured herself out so abundantly that she wet his feet, and then wiping away the moisture with her own hair, displayed every mark of humble devotion.

To put it briefly, with all her senses and with the members that had sinned, the woman labored out her repentance;

and she who mourned her sins thus publicly and openly—one may well conjecture and perceive what she did in private, at leisure, by herself.

But as for us, our profession announces repentance;

yet our practice shows nothing laborious, but we maintain the very same condition of life which we lived even before our sin.

For our cheerfulness is the same, our clothing is the same, our enjoyment of the table is lavish as ever, and our sleep is long and relaxed to the point of satiety, while our occupations and cares follow one upon another, producing in the soul forgetfulness of its own proper care.

We only inscribe upon ourselves the name of repentance, fruitless and inoperative as it is;

cutting ourselves off from the mysteries and from communion in the ineffable sanctified rites, yet making no effort at all toward returning to them, but despising the enjoyment of them as though it were something cheap.

Consider, O man, how great things you were once accounted worthy of, and yet have cut yourself off from partaking in them.

If you had been a partaker of a royal table, and then, having given offense, were cast out from that honor, for how much money would you not buy back becoming a friend and table-companion once more? Whose doors would you not have besieged, beseeching, at a loss, groaning, thinking life not worth living, showing forth in the wasting and set expression of your face the pain of the grief hidden deep within—

leaving, as the saying goes, no stone unturned, until you had set right your misfortune? But you, who have been cut off from intimacy with God and have fallen from an honor that is truly exalted—what great and notable thing have you done to display the humility of an afflicted soul? It does not follow that one who says he is sick should pursue the very same manner of life as those who are healthy.

For the regimen of the sick man is one thing, and the life of the healthy man is another.

You see how great is the difference between the way of life of one in good condition and the manner of living of one who is ill:

for the latter, perceiving the sickness of his condition, lies down in a small chamber, having withdrawn from all his customary cares;

he neglects his farming, even though he is very much a farmer;

the businessman and lover of trade lets go his concern for wealth;

he sustains himself on water and a morsel of bread, even though before he used to set out a table full of luxury, fit for a Sybarite.

he takes no delight in his children as usual, being separated from his wife;

he keeps company with his physicians night and day, and at great expense presses on toward the beloved gain of health.

Such is the one who is sick in body.

But he who is ill-disposed in soul, though he has led his incorporeal soul the rounds to the physician, confessing in pretense and displaying his sickness, leaves the affliction to spread and fester, so that it may diffuse throughout the whole mass. But come to your senses, know yourself:

You have grieved God, you have angered your Creator, who has authority over the present life, and is Lord and judge of the life to come.

Have you been harmed by luxury? Heal that indulgence with fasting.

Has licentiousness harmed your soul? Let temperance become the remedy for the sickness.

Has greed, laden with much matter, wrought the fever of the mind? Let almsgiving empty out the surfeit, for sharing is the purgative of those who are overfull.

Has the seizing of others' goods harmed us? Let the plunder return to its rightful owner.

Has falsehood led us near to destruction — for, as it is said, "You will destroy those who speak falsehood" — let truth, once practiced, arrest the danger.

Has a broken oath brought on the flying sickle of Zechariah coursing through the air, threatening its cut? Let us put on the whole armor of repentance, that we may beat back the edge of the sickle.

Has someone impiously been enslaved to heretical doctrines? Let him banish that superstition by the mind of right belief.

For this is repentance:

the dissolution and effacement of former things, whether wrought in deed or conceived in disposition.

...profitable to repentance; yet he who continually wallows in the mire of lawlessness proves like a slave who knows his master's wrath, but does evil in his very sight and triples his sin.

Be sensitive to the sickness that besets you.

Crush yourself as much as you can; seek also the mourning of brethren of one mind to help you toward freedom; show me your bitter and abundant tear, that I may mingle mine with it; take also the priest, as a father, to share your affliction.

For who is so falsely called a father, or so adamantine in soul, as not to grieve together with children who sorrow, or again rejoice together with those who rejoice? The priest mourns the sin of a son in the faith just as Jacob mourned the bloodied tunic of Joseph, as David mourned the destruction of Absalom, as Eli mourned Hophni and Phinehas fallen in battle, as Moses mourned the people when they devised the godless making of the calf.

Before your bodily fathers, confide boldly in him who begot you according to God; show him without blushing the things that are hidden; lay bare the secrets of your soul, as one showing a physician a covered wound:

he himself will see to both propriety and healing:

for the shame of parents touches their own suffering children all the more.

For the glory of children belongs to those who begot them, and likewise the shame.

Uncertain, brethren, is the appointed term of life.

Let us forestall our departure by our diligence.

For it is absurd that those who take rational forethought for the flesh should purge themselves of humors before the rising of the star called the Dog, lest the moisture, corrupted by excessive heat, produce disease-bearing putrefaction, while those who need attention regarding the mind should not forestall the uncertainty of death, and the boiling of the punishing fire that burns unceasingly and is never quenched.

You had the evangelical drachma, and were rightly rich in that wealth; then, through negligence, you lost it.

Light the lamp that comes from repentance, stoop down carefully, seek the treasure hidden amid earthly passions.

Having found it, take it up and preserve it, so that we, your neighbors, may rejoice with you the joy that is in Christ, to whom belongs glory, now and always, and unto the ages of ages.

Discourse of Asterius, Bishop of Amasea, on the entrance of the holy fasts. Man is a composite creature, having received his being, from a visible body and a rational, incorporeal soul, to be what he is.

Now of these two aforementioned elements, the nature and worth are not of equal honor; rather, the one was fashioned as an instrument, moved for the service of the one that governs, while the other was appointed to rule and reign, as being superior to the inferior.