Paschal Homilies 1 part 6/28

A deep darkness of ignorance is poured about the children of the Greeks, and, spread like a mist over the minds of all, it does not allow them to look up toward the door of what is truly beneficial, but rather, by untested and deceptive reasonings, banishes them from the household of true doctrines.

For what indeed do these madmen do? They deprive man of what is most excellent, and, stripping him of the great prerogative of his nature, they obliterate it.

For they neither say nor wish that man is in possession of his own free choice;

nor that he exercises free choice in the things he does, but rather that the impulse behind each of his actions does not lie in his own will, but has been allotted by the decree of others.

For a certain Fate and horoscope of birth, as they say, weighs out the life of each person according to its own pleasure;

and to some it assigns the fairest things, those with which one might justly pray to be blessed;

but to others, again, it extends things which no one would choose to have come to pass;

so that man walks of his own accord in nothing, having authority neither over good things nor, indeed, over their opposite;

but is drawn, as it were by cords—by ropes of necessity, so to speak—toward both alike;

so that he who from above has been allotted dominion over all things no longer differs in any way from irrational animals.

And it seems to me that those who subscribe to such opinions do something quite similar—as if, having set up a charioteer and mounted him upon the chariot, they should then entrust the actual driving of the horses to someone else.

But such a man will neither carry off the glory of victory, nor, if he falls and is dashed to pieces, will he be believed to have been the cause of his own disaster.

For both belong to the deeds of others—of those who hold the reins—not to the one who stands vainly upon the chariot-box, whose mounting there serves no purpose.

For of things over which a person has no control, how could he reasonably be called to account? But that which lies within the free choice of the agent—to whatever result it may come, or however it may be done—will clearly not ascribe its causes to others.

To deny that he walks by his own judgment toward whatever he wills brings the charge of the utmost folly upon those who hold it. I shall now call to mind a few examples, as I have already said I would.

Their own accounts make mention of a certain Tantalus, and Tityus, and Ixion, and the misery of Sisyphus, and they insist that these men are paying penalties—and quite justly so—penalties which, presumably, they themselves had willed upon themselves.

For they say that Tantalus is punished by a most exceedingly heavy stone suspended over his head, and by the constant fear of dangers ever expected.

Then, should anyone ask the cause of this evil, he will hear men crying out that Tantalus had an unbridled tongue, branding his affliction with the name of a most shameful malady.

As for the one called Tityus, they stretch him out over nine whole plethra of ground;

and they say that his liver is being torn apart by a pair of vultures let loose upon him, and they insist that a certain form of licentiousness became for him the occasion of this incurable calamity.

As for Ixion and Sisyphus: the one is bound beneath the ever-turning revolutions and circular motions of a wheel;

and they say that the other is punished with unending toil and sweat.

and then, in order that these two might appear to be justly punished, they subject them to various indictments of wrongdoing.

But if, indeed, according to their own understanding and notion, we are to suppose that man is subject to the compulsions of Fate, then, as it seems to me, the offenses for which those just named have suffered would not be their own, but rather those of the Fate that summoned them to such deeds, and which, being able to overpower each person's judgment, has brought that judgment under its own control.

Therefore, let those men be released from their irremediable punishments and undying misery, and let the overpowering Fate instead be accused, and let it be handed over to its punishers, if there are any who have resolved to do so;

Or, if anyone will indeed say that those men are justly punished, let him present to us man stripped bare of necessity, and let him remove the tyranny that comes from Fate, so that the charges against Tantalus and Sisyphus may appear to be truly their own.

For if even among us the ordinance of justice recognizes it as one of the most absurd things not to exact penalties rather from the guilty themselves, but from others in their place, how will it not be plain to everyone that, of all the gods believed in by them, none could reasonably be judged more wretched—seeing that the distributors and stewards of all things, though entrusted with the power to judge, do not exercise it rightly?

And how are our own judges not better, who render an upright judgment in every case, having determined that the just man ought to be honored as is fitting;

while, as for those who have been shown guilty of shameful deeds, judging that they ought to be held in hatred...

and rebuking, in proportion, those who are convicted of having transgressed the law? But this, indeed, my good fellow, is what your poets and men of learning think concerning these matters.

But hear also something of what our wise men say.

'The folly of a man ruins his way, yet his heart blames God.' So then, if anyone were free from folly, he would not have had his way ruined, nor would he at all have blamed the divine nature, as though it were calling him to the very thing which it has also forbidden by law.

For some, having set up their own mind as guide and teacher, and as it were the best judge for themselves, are always eager to excel in whatever things are judged to be most excellent;

but whatever things banish them from the best counsel and conduct, these they avoid with great earnestness.

Therefore it is not fate and the horoscope, awarding to each according to what seems good to them, that make a man either a doer of base deeds or a lover of good deeds;

but all walk voluntarily toward both alternatives;

and whichever way seems good to each, there is nothing that necessarily prevents him from directing his own affairs accordingly.

But if it is necessary to add something further to what has been said, and to point out the author of the Greeks' lack of instruction, and whence it happened that they fell into this folly, I will say it, and very readily.

And having taken man in hand as one of his spoils of war, and having through deceit set himself up as a tyrant over us, he feared the return of that free nature to what it originally was —

man, who by the reproaches of conscience is always hastening to flee back to what is better;

who hates sin as something foreign and imported, and is always downcast in transgressing, even if he should somehow be stolen away toward it by some small pleasure.

But lest, by exercising his own self-rule, he should, by the force drawing him toward freedom, do away with the pleasure that had tyrannized him,

and having bidden his sins a long farewell, should rise again to the advantages he had from the beginning, and, dwelling in the works of righteousness, should already be found unconquerable by the help from above —

he devised another manner of deceit: always making this a weapon of his own wickedness, and as it were stealing away the greater part of the grief over sins, always fighting by guile against the reproaches of conscience, he says, 'You yourselves are not the cause of your inability to do what is better;

nor has God placed self-control within your own power.

He has driven a necessary yoke upon you:

fate and the horoscope rule, and it is necessary to do what seems good to them.'

By such deceits the evil one subdues man, and having driven him like straying cattle away from the doctrines of truth, renders him more readily disposed toward every sin;

for attributing the outcome of his own affairs to fate, and saying that he is subject to the inescapable bonds of the horoscope, he would suppose that he will undergo no punishment for whatever he may appear to have transgressed.

But in these matters, they, having cast aside sound-mindedness...

But let the heralds of the Church speak, who have put on Christ and who bear the mind of truth.

For we are not ignorant of his devices.

But lest those who are guilty of the deceits just described, and who set their own understanding against the will of the Lawgiver, should for so long suffer thus from this folly and wage war against him whom they least of all ought, let them hear what we said from the beginning:

Let us make peace with him; let us do away with the enmity;

let strife and war depart; let us give our right hands to the Savior.

Let us ask for peace through faith;

let us also say, together with the prophet:

'O Lord our God, give us peace.'

'O Lord, possess us; besides you we know no other; we call upon your name.'

To the children of the Greeks, then, and to those who have but recently entered the gates of the Church, these words too will suffice for their benefit.

But since another people also presents itself to me — one armed with the weapons of ignorance as a most ill-counseled soldier, setting its judgment against the Savior by means of shadow and type and letter, and having, as it is written, the outward form of knowledge in the law — it supposes that it must war against the truth of the realities;

come, then, let us also cry out to them, on account of our mutual love:

'Let us make peace with him.' How long, O Jew, fused as you are into the types of the letter, will you drive past the power of the truth? When will the end of your ignorance be seen? When will you remove your mind from the shadow that is in the law? Or what length of time will show you to us as more sober-minded? And when will you offer the worship in spirit to God, the King of all things? 'God is spirit,' as it is written, 'and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.' But you, having abandoned worship in spirit, and having made the inclination toward what is worse sweeter than that toward what is better, take pride in the grossness of the letter;

then you suppose that through this you honor God, and, shaking off the most precise understanding of the law, as though you possessed the full knowledge of what is written, you do not perceive that you are talking nonsense.

Come then, let us discuss briefly with you, point by point, each of the things honored among you.

For you will understand, I think, quite easily from this, if indeed you have it in you to wish to be sober-minded, that you have spent long ages in error.

For you accept, as a great matter, and as the most essential thing for worship, circumcision in the flesh;

you greatly admire the rest on the Sabbath, and you gladly slaughter sheep;

and you think that God rejoices greatly over you when you appear before him sacrificing oxen; and concerning foods and the distinctions among them, you have much and precise reasoning, taking your boast in these things;

these are, for you, the birth-pangs of the loftiest virtue's exercises;

in these you have set for yourself the boundaries of what is approved.

But I declare that the wisdom and understanding of the Lawgiver is greater than all speech and all wonder;

yet I would justly, and very reasonably, censure the follies of the Jews.

For they do not understand readily;

and they flee from learning, erring in another respect, being led by their own ignorance alone to the enjoyment of none of the good things.

But let them also hear, through the prophetic voice:

'Awake, you drunkards, from your wine!' Come then, let us examine what indeed is the benefit of being circumcised,

or what benefit the Lawgiver would thereby introduce for us.

For that circumcision should be applied to the parts of the body by which nature is served toward procreation, if it did not carry within itself some most excellent rationale, would not lack ridiculousness;

rather, it would be indicting the skill of the Creator, as though the form of the body were burdened with certain random excesses.

Then how, if the force of what has been said stands and is understood by us in this way, shall we not judge the divine mind to have erred from what is fitting? For if, by being circumcised, what is more fitting is better preserved for the nature of the body, how was this not altogether better and preferable from the beginning? Who then, tell me, in saying that the unerring and undefiled nature came into being with a fault against what is fitting, will not appear to everyone to be talking nonsense? For the God over all created many kinds of irrational animals;

but nothing appears to be present in their formation, either lacking or superfluous, with regard to the most exact beauty.

It is entirely free from censure on both counts, and has escaped accusation in either respect.

How could God, so consummate a craftsman, who exercised such great providence even in the lesser creatures, have erred concerning the most precious of all things? And in bringing the one made according to his image into the midst of the irrational creatures, did he arrange for him to appear more disgraceful, if in the case of those animals nothing at all, but in this one's case something, has gone amiss? But I think that the Jews themselves would agree that, if nothing good were signified through circumcision according to the flesh, it would be laughable that those in whom the Savior lodges, and in whom the Holy Spirit dwells, should appear only superior to the ignorance of those creatures;

Come then, let us again, by applying the fitting reasoning to the ordinances of the Lawgiver, demonstrate that the meaning contained in them is most worthy of notice;

then it is time, at last, to uncover and set forth as clearly as possible what principle circumcision in the flesh is meant to disclose to us;

and how one might best suppose the reasoning concerning it to have been examined.

The mind, then, that is in us is by nature the most fertile of all things, having within itself the seeds of every virtue, and being ever supplied, as though from the earth, out of its own inner movements, with desires for each of the most excellent things;

for it has been made thus by the Creator.

But there runs over it, like a covering, a forgetfulness that creeps forth as though from an inborn root, which is also the nurse of every uncleanness;

and the desire for what is better, like a mist, it either spreads over or grazes away;

and, overshadowing the memory of the duty to do what is best, it works in us an earthly disposition in place of the spiritual one, and thus shows man to be full of every uncleanness.

And indeed, to those to whom this happened, it is said through the prophetic voice:

'Remember, you who are far from the Lord, and let Jerusalem come up upon your heart.' For it was necessary, it was necessary, that the remembrance of good things be poured out, like water upon fire, upon the evils that come from forgetfulness;

and that henceforth they be blotted out through the opposite remedies.

...are we accounted before God? But repelling the forgetfulness of what is better, and cutting off, as it were, the resulting faults like some outflow of superfluous waste, we shall preserve within ourselves the mind that is virile and most fecund, free from all baseness and stripped of the evils that come from wickedness.

Thus, then, having banished from our own soul the oldness that comes from sin, and being transformed into the infancy that comes from innocence, we shall present ourselves with boldness before God;

yet we shall by no means present ourselves entirely on our own, just as indeed a newborn infant did not bring itself to God;

but Christ, who has regenerated us through faith, will present us, offering himself as a sacrifice on our behalf to the Father.

And he shall offer it on the eighth day, that is, after the sabbath-rest prescribed by the law.

For this is the time of the coming of our Savior;

since Christ is also the end of the law and the prophets,

bringing in for us the beginning of the Lord's times, in which all things have become new.

Just as, indeed, Paul also says:

'So that if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old things have passed away — behold, all things have become new.' We must suppose that circumcision according to the flesh brings in for us this type of the contemplated realities: performed, as I said, on the eighth day, and bringing the newborn into the sight of God.

Let the most wise Paul, the steward of the Savior's mysteries, also bear witness to what has been said, coming forward and crying out:

'For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly;'

'nor is circumcision that which is outward, in the flesh; but he is a Jew who is one inwardly, and circumcision is that of the heart, by the Spirit, not the letter — whose praise is not from men, but from God.' And again let him write to others concerning the same things, saying thus:

'Beware of the dogs, beware of the evil workers, beware of the mutilation.'

'For we are the circumcision, who worship God in the Spirit and glory in Christ Jesus, and put no confidence in the flesh.' For the boast of circumcision according to the flesh, if it be understood alone, lacking the beauty that comes from contemplation, would, I think, never be found of any worth among those of sound mind.

But when it introduces the type of circumcision in the spirit, and appears to signify the cleansing of the heart, then indeed one will perhaps praise it as most excellently shaping that which lies in subtle contemplation;

but he will clearly be released from having to undergo it, once he has practiced the purification that is in the heart.

And it is this very thing that the prophetic word urged the Jews to hasten to do, saying thus:

'Break up your fallow ground, and do not sow among thorns.'

'Be circumcised to God, and circumcise the hardness of your heart, you men of Judah who dwell in Jerusalem' — so that, if anyone is circumcised in the flesh, he will by no means thereby have done this unto God;

and that the power of true circumcision is fulfilled, not in the bodily experience according to the flesh, but in willing to do what God commands, hear Paul saying most clearly:

'...uncircumcision is nothing.' But lest he seem to us to be putting forward mere bare words, saying that what has been honored through the law is nothing, he explains more clearly, and says:

'For circumcision indeed profits, if you keep the law;'

'but if you are a transgressor of the law, your circumcision has become uncircumcision.'

'If, then, the uncircumcision keeps the requirements of the law, will not his uncircumcision be reckoned as circumcision? And the uncircumcision which by nature fulfills the law will judge you, who through the letter and circumcision are a transgressor of the law.' Since, then, he says that circumcision is seen to be of no benefit to those who have undergone it, whenever it does not bring them to be well-approved through their deeds

as a boast, I would gladly inquire of the most senseless among the Jews:

But if it is necessary to add something to what has been said, Paul also firmly affirms that circumcision was given as yet another sign,

and, as it were, a seal of the faith held in uncircumcision, given to Abraham, the forefather of the race;

that he might be the father of many nations — not only, he says, of those of the circumcision, but also of those who walk in the footsteps of the faith which our father Abraham had in uncircumcision.

For he believed God, and was justified, not yet having received circumcision;

but after the faith, and the justification that came from it, circumcision became for him the sign of the matter.

For indeed it is worth seeing what the lawgiver himself says concerning this.

He commands abstaining from works, and being released from bodily labors, on the Sabbath.

He does not wish anyone to go out from Jerusalem, nor to journey far along the roads.

And he requires that they use not the food prepared on the spot that day, but that which had already been made ready beforehand.

And he entirely forbids carrying loads, and altogether prevents being burdened down, saying most plainly through the voice of Jeremiah:

'And you shall not go out through the gate of Jerusalem on the day of the Sabbaths;'

'and you shall not carry burdens out of your houses.' In these things the law defines for you the honors due to the Sabbath.

But let him come forward again into our midst who has trained himself to plead only for the letter, and let one of those of the Jewish persuasion tell us whether some wise reasoning has been fitted to the things ordained by God, or whether the power of the divine mysteries lies for us in bare words alone and in the naked letter.

If, then, he confesses — acting most sensibly — that the grossness arising from the letter is smeared over the contemplated truths as a kind of veil, let him seek out the meaning, and not, by lingering over what is spoken in figure, deprive himself of the finest things;

but if he insists that it is proper to attend to the letter alone and to reckon nothing further beyond it, and both practices this himself with zeal and moreover contends to teach it to others, he will hear, according to the voice of the Savior:

'Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you have taken away the key of knowledge:'

'you yourselves do not enter, nor do you allow those who are entering to go in.' Come, then, let us also examine, concerning the matter of the Sabbath, what its nature really is, and, scrutinizing more minutely the force of the reasoning, let us see whether the mind of the Jews is not again found here too, full of folly.

For tell me, what was it that persuaded the Creator of all things, besides all the other things which he judged fitting to have, also to legislate rest on the Sabbath — although the rest of all creation acts by its natural movements unhindered on the Sabbath, and each of the things that exist does not cease from doing what it has been appointed to do, because of the Sabbath? For the sun rises, and does not cease unwinding its accustomed course;

and the earth, luxuriant with various plants and adorned with manifold shoots, is not made barren because of the Sabbath, nor has it belied its nourishing power toward the things that spring from it;

and likewise the springs, the mothers of cool waters — have they ever checked the flow from their own breasts, and ceased to bring forth their accustomed supply?

But if, as you suppose, it was according to his purpose merely that the Sabbath be honored by rest, with no other benefit accruing to us through such legislation, why did he not lay down the same law for all things alike? Tell me, what is the harm if someone cooks for himself, as we do, or grinds grain on the Sabbath? Or what is it that forbids the improvising of other food for the body? But as it is, the law, introducing this to us as though it were something great and highly esteemed, restrains us from all work;

and it does not allow one to carry out a burden from the hearth;

nor even to go anywhere far, crossing the threshold of the gate in Jerusalem; and it commands that, using food not procured on the spot but prepared beforehand through forethought, one go to feasting and table — and it punishes with death the one who transgresses;

and yet none of the things thus prescribed, if done at some other time, would bring the charge of sin upon the one who did it;

and no one of sound mind would say that these things too are reckoned by the law among the offenses, just as the other things are;

those other things, from which it plainly declares that one ought entirely to keep away.

For 'You shall not murder,' 'You shall not commit adultery,' 'You shall not steal,' 'You shall not bear false witness,' and whatever else is joined with these, looking to one and the same purport — these are not to be guarded against only on the Sabbath by a man who hates being punished, but are to be avoided at every time.

Whence, indeed, I suppose it will become quite clearly evident to those who listen, that the things forbidden on the Sabbath are not sins, but rather bring forth for us a most graceful image of realities;

and this I shall not shrink from setting forth, as best I am able, for your benefit.

The discussion of rest shall be set before the others, introducing a twofold consideration.

For since those of Israel, having departed from their native land, settled in the land of the Egyptians, prolonging a long time there, it is likely that they no longer preserved, even in bare memory alone, the fact that they were Hebrews by race and had sprung from the root of Abraham;

and having forgotten their ancestral customs, and having renounced the piety of their forefathers, they turned to the false worship of the local inhabitants.

And supposing, as it were, that they would be doing no small wrong to those who had received the migrant people into their land, if they did not also share in the same error as they did, they thought it necessary to worship the sun;

and heaven and earth, moon and stars — indeed, to which of the elements did they not think it necessary to render the glory befitting God? For deep was the darkness of their ignorance;

and, just as Paul says, they worshiped the creation rather than the Creator.

But since the lawgiver was eager to free them from the cruelty of the Egyptians and from that bitter slavery, and indeed was calling them into the land of promise, he commanded that they cast off the error of Egypt entirely, without any partial half-measure;

saying: 'Take heed, lest, looking up to heaven, and seeing the sun, and the moon, and the stars, and all the host of heaven, you go astray and worship them.'

'The Lord your God, the Lord is one.' But since it was somehow necessary also, through a manifest fact, to compel them, as it were even against their will, to confess that heaven indeed has been made [i.e. is a created thing];

and, as they rest on the Sabbath, he wishes them to know the reason for the feast;

and that the servitude of the visible elements should not be unknown to them.

This, then, is one reason for the rest on the Sabbath.

For solid food of teachings is not to be set before those who are still infants;

but before those whose senses have been trained by practice, as Paul says.

The rest on the Sabbath, then, and the laying aside of works, signifies the rest of the saints that is to come at the end;

no longer engaging in works and labors;

but having the merits of their past life as provisions for salvation, they will nourish their own souls unto immortal life.

For this, I think, is what is signified by the requirement that the food for the Sabbath be prepared beforehand.

And the rule that it is not permitted for anyone to weigh himself down with burdens, that is, with loads, on the Sabbath, seems to signify this, at least in our understanding: that after the resurrection from the dead, in the sabbath-keeping of the city above, the burden of sin will no longer lie upon us;

nor will the evil one again crush us, enticing us into transgression;

he himself undergoing in Hades the penalty of everlasting fire;

while the sin now at work in us is altogether abolished.

Moreover, the command to remain within the gates of Jerusalem on the Sabbath likewise seems, in the same way, to signify an abiding within.

For those who have once taken their place among the choirs of the saints, and have entered the assembly of the firstborn, will never depart from that secure state of gladness;

nor will they go forth from the gift given to them;

but they will abide in it forever, their minds fortified as by a tower through the grace of the Spirit.

Everlasting gladness shall be upon their head.

For upon their head shall be praise and rejoicing;

pain and sorrow and sighing have fled away. And they will forget their former affliction, and it shall not come up upon their heart.

That the Sabbath, in turn, signifies the rest that is to come for the saints at the consummation of the ages, let Paul himself enter as our witness, and let him speak to the Hebrews, writing concerning the men of old:

Let us fear therefore, lest, while a promise remains of entering into his rest, any one of you should seem to have come short of it.

For we too have had the gospel preached to us, just as they did. But since it seemed, to those who did not know how to understand, that here he was calling 'rest' the entrance into the land of promise which was accomplished through the leadership of Joshua —

I mean Joshua, called the son of Nun;

showing more clearly that he had no regard whatsoever for that rest, but looks to the one still expected, and that the aim of his reasoning is directed toward that, he says again next:

For if Joshua had given them rest, he would not afterward have spoken of another day.

There remains, therefore, a sabbath rest for the people of God — by 'sabbath rest' here he most clearly means the repose of the saints at the end of the age.

And indeed, next he gives a precise indication of his meaning, adding as follows: