Paschal Homilies 1 part 5/28

This, indeed, is what the blessed Baptist seems to me to be saying expressly to those who were born of Israel, when, boasting of their fleshly kinship alone, they put forward Abraham as the founder of their race:

'Bring forth, therefore,' he says, 'fruits worthy of repentance, and do not presume to say within yourselves, "We have Abraham as our father."'

But if anyone should carefully examine those from the nations, he will find that they are precisely such and no other—those who were raised up through faith and became children to Abraham;

and they were shown to be fellow-heirs with Isaac, and became partakers of the blessing given to him.

And of this, Paul will be present as a witness, crying out:

'And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the nations by faith, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, "In you shall all the nations be blessed."'

So those of faith are blessed together with the faithful Abraham. That Isaac, who was born of Abraham, is fashioned as a type of our Lord Jesus Christ himself, one could demonstrate from every side, and very easily.

And I think that even the one most difficult to teach could be persuaded, from what the blessed Paul cries out in writing to the Galatians:

'Brothers, I speak according to man:'

'yet though it is only a man's covenant, once ratified, no one annuls it or adds a codicil to it.'

'Now to Abraham were the promises spoken, and to his seed after him.'

'And it does not say, "and to seeds," as of many, but as of one:'

'And to your seed,' which is Christ. And that the promise made to Abraham is again brought to completion in those who believe in Christ, and that we are not obliged to transfer the promise to the race according to the flesh, forcing the grace elsewhere, Paul himself will fully assure us, saying:

'For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ:'

'there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free:'

'For you are all one in Jesus Christ.'

'Therefore you are Abraham's, and heirs according to the promise.' I suppose, then, that the abundance of what has been said is sufficient to demonstrate the purpose set forth for this discourse.

But if I seem to you, O Jew, to have said too little, and you will hold right thinking to be worth no account at all, and will still by no means agree with us that these things must stand in this way, then, my friend, the fault is not mine but that of your own disobedience.

For to those who have earnestly striven to say the best things, the inability to persuade their hearers would, I think, bring them no blame whatsoever.

For having done, with the utmost readiness, what lay within their power, they would reasonably be free of all blame.

But for those who hear the best of things, this very unwillingness alone to assent to what is rightly spoken will bear witness to the most shameful disposition:

But since, looking to the experience of physicians, I perceive in some measure that their pursuit of the art is a wise one,

and that their remedies for the sick do not fall outside sound reasoning, come, then, let us emulate the same manner as they do, and, so to speak, heal the one who is hard to teach with the very same remedies.

For physicians, when restoring the diet of one who has fallen into sickness, if they see that his appetite at table has somehow been overtaken by the illness, set before him a great abundance of various dishes, and bid him—doing very well indeed—to gather for himself what suffices from every quarter.

We, in turn, whose aim is to imitate their practice, in addition to what we have already said before, let us now take up other considerations as well:

let the Jew, who is sick with great folly, be summoned from every side to obedience.

Let him see again our Lord Jesus Christ, foreshadowed of old in Isaac.

Therefore (for I shall now take up the discourse concerning this), let the all-renowned Abraham come forward again, to whom God once said:

'Take your beloved son, whom you have loved, Isaac, and go to the high land, and offer him up as a whole burnt-offering on one of the mountains which I shall tell you.' And perhaps to some this command will appear paradoxical, and reasonably harsh.

For if he was an only son, and beloved, and late-born—the son scarcely given to him even in his old age—how could God counsel that he must sacrifice him? And tell me, how would it not be full of every absurdity for a righteous man to become a child-slayer? Who is so hard-hearted, and so schooled in a cruelty befitting wild beasts, as to arm his own right hand against his child, and to treat his own offspring as though he were one of his enemies? What, then, was the patriarch being taught through such a command? This, at last, must be stated as clearly as possible.

For surely it is evident to everyone that, by burying in silence the dispensation contained in what has been narrated, we would, as it were, be condemning that most gentle nature of God's for inhumanity.

Therefore, since it was not possible in any other way for the promise given concerning Isaac to be fulfilled by God, except through the cross of Christ sending the blessing upon all the nations, God, necessarily wishing to demonstrate how great and how precious a grace He grants him for the salvation of his seed—by delivering up His own Son to death—said to him, and most emphatically:

'Take your son'; and, as though rekindling in him the natural affection befitting a father toward his one and only child, He adds, with amplification and repetition:

'The beloved one, whom you loved, Isaac:'

'and offer him up on one of the mountains which I shall tell you'—saying this, well-nigh as if to say:

'that you may learn through what you suffer, just as the Father of all will likewise afterward endure, offering up unto the transcendent substance the Son whom He loved.'

At which the Savior Himself, marveling exceedingly, once indicated, saying:

'For God so loved the world, that He gave His only-begotten Son:'

'that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life.' When, then, God commanded such things, the patriarch obeyed without delay, and, having made the divine command prevail over his affection for his child, 'rising early in the morning,' as it is written, 'he saddled his donkey, and took with him two servants, and Isaac his son,'

'and having split wood for the burnt offering, he arose and went, and came to the place which God had told him, on the third day.'

'And Abraham lifted up his eyes and saw the place from afar, and said to his servants:'

'Sit here with the donkey, and I and the boy will go over there, and having worshiped, we will return to you.'

'And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering, and laid it on Isaac his son,'

'and he himself took in his hand the fire and the knife, and the two of them went together.'

'And the two of them, going on, came to the place which God had told him:'

'he laid him on the altar upon the wood, and Abraham stretched out his hand and took the knife to slay his son.'

'And the angel of the Lord called to him, and said:'

'Do not lay your hand upon the boy, nor do anything at all to him.'

'For now I know that you fear God, since you have not spared your beloved son for my sake.'

'And Abraham lifted up his eyes and saw:'

'and behold, a ram caught by its horns in a Sabek thicket:'

'and Abraham went, and took the ram, and offered it up as a burnt offering instead of Isaac his son.' [7]

Thus, then, stands the oracle of the divine Scripture, wholly and entirely portraying the mystery concerning the Savior.

But it is necessary for us to apply the beauty of the truth to the things that came to pass in type, and to unfold clearly each of the things that have been said.

For thus the profound mystery of piety will be easy for the hearers to grasp.

So, then, the thrice-blessed Abraham takes the boy, and hastens to the place shown to him by God.

And he arrives there only with difficulty, on the third day itself, having ordered two servants also to follow.

Now the fact that the boy is brought up to the sacrifice by the father signifies, through symbol and figure, that it was neither human power nor the greed of those who plotted against Him that led our Lord Jesus Christ up to the cross, but the will, so to speak, of the Father, who by dispensation permitted Him to undergo death on behalf of all.

This the Savior Himself also declared, at one time speaking with Pilate:

'You would have no authority at all over me, unless it had been given you from above.' And at another time again, addressing His words to the Father in the heavens, He said:

'Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me;'

'nevertheless, not as I will, but as You will.' The boy does not contradict his father:

'I do not disobey, nor do I contradict.' And the fact that he arrives at the place only with difficulty on the third day signifies the last time, in which the Savior sojourned among us.

For when a first and a middle have gone before, the third will certainly be the one at the end.

And the pair of servants, who were ordered to follow, again indicated, through a figure, that when Christ went up to the saving Passion, the two peoples were destined to follow.

And the fact that the blessed Abraham beheld the place from afar signifies the pre-eternal foreknowledge of the Father, which He is seen to hold concerning His own offspring, that is, Christ:

for thus Paul also speaks concerning the Savior, that He was 'foreknown indeed before the foundation of the world, but manifested in the last times.' Then again, after this, the blessed Abraham says to the servants, 'Sit here,' and this, 'with the donkey':

'but I and the boy will go over there.' And what is further indicated to us by this, I shall see again as best I am able.

He who has just now been called to believe, and who has indeed willed to follow the Savior Christ:

yet still lies in slavish subjection to sins, and has not yet been called to the freedom of righteousness through holy baptism, but still dwells with irrationality and ignorance—which is signified by the donkey—will not see the saving Passion clearly, nor will he immediately partake of the sacrifice of the true Lamb.

Rather, he will remain below somewhere, and will persevere in the humble word of catechesis, until, by the mercy of God, having shaken off the burden that comes from sin, he is able to ascend—as if to some most radiant mountain peak—to the loftiest comprehension of the divine mystery, according to what has been said by some:

'but I and the boy will go over there.'

For they were going to return:

but he, as a wise man, is silent, and does not disclose the mystery to those still uninitiated:

in this too setting himself before us as a type, in accordance with what the Savior Himself also says somewhere:

'Do not give what is holy to the dogs.'

'Neither cast your pearls before swine.' By 'pearls' he means the resplendent and translucent sayings of the Spirit.

Then again it says that Abraham laid the wood of the whole burnt offering upon his child. For it was by a permission according to the divine economy — with the Father, so to speak, almost cooperating in it — and not by violently compelling the divine power against its will, that the Jews laid the cross upon the Savior.

And the prophet Isaiah will be found to be for us a truthful witness to this, speaking concerning him:

'The chastisement of our peace was upon him; by his wound we were healed.'

'All of us, like sheep, have gone astray;'

'each man has strayed in his own way, and the Lord delivered him up for our sins.' Now when Abraham had already arrived and come to the places foretold, the patriarch built the altar exceedingly well and rightly;

so that through this we might again understand that, in human eyes, what was seen upon our Savior was a cross and a piece of wood;

but in the eyes of the Father of all, it was in truth a great and lofty altar, raised up for the salvation of the world, smoking with a holy and all-pure sacrifice.

The fact that Isaac was laid upon the wood, but the ram in his place endured the slaughter, most clearly shows that God the Word indeed went up upon the cross, and was within the temple that was hung there;

yet it was the Lord who suffered, though he himself is by nature impassible.

For the knife was not brought against Isaac, that is, against the Word who proceeded from the substance of the Father; but in his place, as though he himself were being led to slaughter, it was brought against the temple from the holy Virgin, which is signified by the sheep.

And the Word appropriates the suffering to himself, and quite reasonably so;

for the body was his own, and not that of anyone else.

Hence also, when the body was again being scourged, and no less spat upon by the reckless Jews, he himself says through the prophet Isaiah:

'I gave my back to the scourges, and my cheeks to blows.' For there is one God the Father, and one Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed forever.

who, for our salvation, despised the shame, as it is written, and having become obedient to the Father, humbled himself unto death, that having died on our account and on our behalf, he might again raise us from the dead unto himself, having made us alive through the Holy Spirit;

and that he might open to us the gates of heaven, and lead us up into them, and present before the eyes of the Father the nature of man, which had long ago fled away because of sin.

For such great achievements, beloved, of our Savior, let every mouth be opened in praise, and let hymnody to him be the work of every tongue, and let it cry out as though sending forth a clear-sounding melody:

'God has gone up with a shout, the Lord with the sound of a trumpet.' For he has gone up, having fulfilled the economy concerning us;

and he did not simply go up, but 'having led captivity captive, and having given gifts among men.' For having snatched all of us, who remained captives, out of the hands of the devil, he redeemed us, and he has filled us with good teachings.

For manifold are the gifts that have come over to us through the Spirit.

Being filled, then, with every blessing from Christ, let us keep the feast, beloved, not scowling at the profitable labors;

nor considering the sweat of fasting as some burden, but going to the contests with a cheerful disposition;

and rejoicing in hope, as Paul says, and from this exulting in the good things that are anticipated.

But before all else, let us hold fast to love for one another;

let the bitter demon of slander be driven away;

let envy be evicted from our souls;

let wickedness and deceit flee;

let falsehood go into exile, and perjury, which is preeminent among evils.

but let our 'yes' be 'yes,' according to the word of the Savior, and our 'no,' 'no.'

Let us visit those who wrestle with that most grievous beast — I mean those in poverty;

let us take up the cause of the orphan and the widow;

let us give rest to the maimed with fitting care;

let us be found affectionate and compassionate toward those in bonds.

For then, then indeed shall we accomplish for Christ the truly genuine and most pure fast;

beginning the holy Forty Days from the sixteenth of the month Phamenoth;

and the week of the saving Pascha, from the eleventh of the month Pharmouthi;

ending the fasts on the twenty-sixth of the same month Pharmouthi, on the evening of the Sabbath;

and keeping the feast on the following dawning Lord's Day, the twenty-seventh of the same month Pharmouthi;

joining thereafter the seven weeks of the holy Pentecost.

For thus shall we inherit the kingdom of heaven in Christ Jesus our Lord, through whom and with whom, to the Father together with the Holy Spirit, be glory and dominion, both now and always and unto the ages of ages.

'All you nations, clap your hands;'

'shout to God with a voice of triumph.' For one might justly incur censure for hesitation and delay in the pursuit of better things, on account of being unable, as it were in discharge of a debt, to render to the Savior thank-offerings — to him who adorned human nature with a countless abundance of good things, and who by ineffable power transformed the whole of it back to that ancient glory;

and who caused to vanish the most unlovely form that came from sin;

and reconstituted us according to the archetypal image and after the marks of his own nature, so that as many as recognize him would say, in the words of that most wise disciple:

'My Lord and my God.' Now to that blessed prophet Isaiah it was sounded through the Spirit:

'Cry aloud with strength, do not spare;'

'lift up your voice like a trumpet.' Since, then, for us too the ordinance of the priesthood, and the ancestral inheritance handed down from above, together with a custom drawn from long ages, gives us to understand that this ought indeed to be exacted from us with great eagerness — come, let us again, more clearly than a trumpet, sound forth through this very proclamation, that, according to what is written in the Psalms, 'It is time to act for the Lord.' But that the time is indeed present to act for the Lord, perhaps no one will contradict;

but what it is fitting to do, one of the more studious among us might justly ask us.

And I, greatly admiring the one who inquires and who has thought it right to ask thoroughly what must be thought concerning these things, shall rightly make use of the words of the holy prophets.

Let him, then, hear Isaiah saying:

'Let us make peace with him, let us who are coming make peace.' But since, as one might conjecture, what has been said is not altogether very clear, come — imitating those who are accustomed to cleanse away obscurities, let us, by attending to similar cases now hidden from ancient time, render the meaning of what is said more evident.

There is implanted, then, in the members of our flesh a certain natural and, so to speak, connatural law, which arms us against the God who made us, and sets its own mind in opposition to the desires of the Spirit.

an innumerable swarm of desires, rising up against the impulses that draw toward what is better, and, as it were, arraying itself like a multitude of enemies against the impulses toward what is beneficial.

This law of the flesh, so self-willed and having tyrannized within us, the blessed Paul also somewhere makes evident, crying out:

'For I delight in the law of God according to the inner man;'

'but I see another law warring against the law of my mind, and taking me captive to the law of sin that is in my members.' So then, as long as such a law prevails in us, and grows bold against the desires of the Spirit, and leads out its own will in opposition, and indeed forces us to do what seems good to it, it makes us most hostile to God, and shuts out peace from the right hand, and walls off from the loving-kindness of him who made us those in whom it appears to hold sway.

But when it grows weak, and is overpowered by the vigor tending toward piety, and resembles those defeated in battle array, showing itself at once as one who has thrown away his shield and fled, to those who have rightly chosen to live according to the divine law, it makes the road of friendship toward God broad and easy as for chariots.

Then, when the occasion of those things standing in between has thereby been dissolved, we shall thenceforth agree to whatever the Spirit commands us;

and, having nothing that resists, we who come to salvation through faith in him shall consider that we must love the peace toward God, kept safe.

'Let us put to death the members that are upon the earth: fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and besides these, covetousness.' Let the law of the flesh die to the desires toward the good, as though struck by a sharp iron.

Let the earthly and unclean mind within us fall.

But let the law of God prevail;

and let it rather pursue, than appear as a fugitive.

For when it excels, and is found superior to the strength of the one warring against it, it roots in us every virtue;

But if, being pushed back by fleshly movements, as by certain contrary blasts of wind, it retreats, then, then indeed, all our security walks away to nothing, sin being given sinew within us by our own will;

and, according to what is written, we shall become 'portions for foxes,' giving over our own comeliness as a gift to cunning and unclean demons;

and, like a vineyard bereft alike of its hedge and of the vigilance of its keepers, we shall lie exposed as the readiest food for plunderers.

But if it is sweet to each one not to come into the experience of any of these things, let him readily receive fasting, the mother of all dignity; let him buffet the body and bring it into subjection, and, by being willing to labor, let him fence about his own possession with thorns, just as one of the wise among us has said.

To those, then, who are more perfect in disposition, and who are able to taste of more solid teachings, I think that even these things will suffice to enable them, and quite easily so.

...to set out in pursuit of what is needful, and to gather in from every quarter whatever appears profitable to them.

For zeal alone suffices to bring about success, like the current of a river which ever sweeps away, as it were, the banks that oppose it, and with a resistless onrush makes vanish whatever stands against it.

But it remains necessary now to add that which is the greatest turn of events in what has been said.

For to those who are thus disposed, God himself, who conquers all things, comes to their aid.

and he becomes the strength and power of all, their staff and their sinews.

And the most wise Psalmist will bear witness, saying:

'Your rod and your staff, they have comforted me.' That the fruits of peace with God are splendid and worthy of admiration, everyone, I think, who is rightly minded will agree.

as I examine, so far as possible, the natures of things, I think it fitting not only for those just now spoken of by our discourse—namely, that they must cultivate the things that make for peace and take counsel unto God—but now yet another multitude of men comes into view before me.

Just as the tender and newborn shoots of young plants scarcely rise above the yielding earth, and are pressed onward toward growth by the skill of gardeners and the provision of water,

in the same way those, too, who have but newly and scarcely taken root in the gardens of the Church, summon to themselves, as though it were a spring beneath them, the skill that comes from teachers.

To these, I suppose, it is especially fitting to utter that beautiful word of the prophet:

'Let us who are coming make peace.' But it is worth considering, coming from where, or to what place they are about to take up abode?

But it is clear to everyone that the nations proceed, through faith, from ignorance to instruction;

from thoughtlessness to sound reasoning;

from long-standing and deeply ingrained error to a truer apprehension of reality, to knowledge of God, to reverence, to a manner of life altogether changed from what it was before, to freedom, to renewal, and, in a word, to a virtue and mode of life befitting a human being;

and by 'human being' I mean, of course, one who is rational and made according to the image of his Creator.

For those whose minds have been driven to distraction by the devil's cunning devices, and who have been infatuated with the playthings of idols, and who say to a piece of wood:

'You are my god,' according to the prophet—

'You have begotten me'—such people would rightly be filled with all manner of folly;

and they call down upon themselves this very verdict from those whose task it is to judge rightly.

And they seem—for I will say what is truer to say—so far as the nature of the body is concerned, still to preserve the human form;

and to be recognized as rational beings solely by these outward features and forms;

but as regards the mind and its contents, to vie all the more eagerly with the senselessness of irrational beasts.

But lest I should seem to be reviling them rather than attempting to refute them, as men who have strayed far from what is fitting, and wandered off into the utmost exile—

'Know that their heart is ashes, and they go astray.' For indeed they truly go astray, having departed, so to speak, from the straight path of the knowledge of God;

and, dragged down by certain senseless deviations and by the deceits of perverted reasonings into every sort of folly, so far as even to squander riotously upon wood and stone the glory belonging to that ineffable substance which transcends all things, and to make superior to human nature those very things which were brought into being for its sake, and to inscribe as masters what they themselves have been made lords over.

What, then, could appear more irrational to those who examine rightly than such things?

But indeed, having set forth this argument concerning these matters, the following point does not escape me either, in addition to what has been said:

namely, that some depart from so base and grovelling a worship, but, as though cultivating a loftier error, suppose they must take refuge in the more conspicuous of created things.

And, arching their eyebrows up close to their temples, puffing out some broad and weighty utterance, and stroking their long beards with their hand, they marvel greatly at the heaven, declaring that it has been set round about the whole world beneath the sun, and, as it were, holds all things within its bosom, poured over what lies within it like a kind of tent.

Then they busy themselves curiously with the positions of the stars within it, and are struck with wonder at the courses of the sun and moon;

and they set forth fire, water, air, and earth as the first principles of all existing things, and fable that the root of all things that come into being has been discovered in the union of the elements.

Then, though they ought to seek out the commander and leader of the things just mentioned, and to ascend from the beauty of created things to God, the giver of their beauty, they bestow the whole of their wonder upon the works themselves;

This, I think, is most evident to everyone: that if a person should behold a house, or a ship, or some other such thing constructed with the greatest skill, he does not spend his wonder without discernment, but having praised the design, the construction, and the beauty of what he sees, he immediately pictures to himself the architect, and ponders in his mind who and how great must be the maker of things so beautiful.

But these men, busied only with the twists and turns of rhetoric, and, as they suppose, skilled in a variety of learning, having confined their understanding to the things merely seen, and having curtailed the mind's further reach, do not see God, the maker and craftsman of all things;

nor, ascribing the glory to him as Lord and maker of all things, do they rightly interpret the order found in his works, so as to be, as some intelligent people suppose themselves, truly wise.

But now, having fallen into this depth of folly, they do not perceive that, even if they had exerted every effort on behalf of their father [the devil] to attain the utmost extreme of unreason, they could not, I think, have more completely accomplished what they irrationally desire.

But let Paul come to my aid, and, crying aloud, bear witness in support of what I have said concerning this:

'The wisdom of this world is foolishness with God.' And that the saint's word is true, we learn as we proceed with the examination of the facts.

For, in the first place, they introduce into human life a whole crowd of gods, unknown even to their own worshippers, of whom some do not even preserve the common human form, but, having mixed in a portion of swine or dog, present to us a nature that is, as it were, adulterated, and by certain illegitimate alterations of features they mar the most beautiful image on earth.

But why should I spend many words on things so ripe for ridicule? Let us rather turn to what is necessary.