Theological Orations 27-30 1-1

And, that I may begin from the Scripture:

"Behold, I am against thee, O insolent one"—

for there are, indeed there are, certain people whose ears and tongues itch for our words—and now, as I see, their hands as well—people who delight in profane and empty chatter, in the antitheses of so-called knowledge, and in disputes of words that lead to nothing useful.

For so Paul calls all that is superfluous and over-curious in speech—he, the herald and confirmer of the abridged word, the disciple and teacher of the fishermen.

Would that these people of whom I speak, just as they have a tongue that is nimble and clever at assailing nobler and more approved discourses, were likewise even a little occupied with deeds—then perhaps they would be less the absurd and paradoxical sophists and acrobats of words, that I may say something laughable about a laughable matter.

But since they have demolished every path of piety and look to this one thing only—how they may bind or loose any of the questions put forward—like those who stage wrestling-matches in the theatres, and that not such holds as lead to victory by the rules of the contest, but such as steal the eyes of the ignorant onlookers and carry off the applause;

and so every marketplace must buzz with their talk, every banquet be wearied with their nonsense and tastelessness, every feast be made joyless and full of gloom, every mourning be "comforted" by a greater calamity—their disputes; every women's quarter, bred in simplicity, be disturbed, and the flower of its modesty be stripped away by their glibness of speech;

since these things are so, and the evil is unrestrained and unbearable, and our great mystery is in danger of becoming a paltry craft—

come then, let these spies at least bear with us—who are moved with a father's heart and, as the divine Jeremiah says, whose senses are torn—enough not to receive our word about these matters harshly; and, restraining their tongue a little, if indeed they can, let them lend us their ear.

In any case you will lose nothing.

For either we have spoken into the ears of those who hear, and the word has borne some fruit—your benefit (since the sower sows the word upon every mind, but it is the good and fertile soil that bears fruit)—or you have departed, having spurned this too of ours, and having taken more matter for contradiction and for railing against us, that you may feast yourselves all the more.

But do not be amazed if I say a paradoxical word, contrary to your law—you who very boldly and high-handedly profess to know and to teach everything—that I may not grieve you by saying "ignorantly and rashly."

Not to everyone, my friends, does it belong to philosophize about God—not to everyone.

The matter is not so cheap, nor for those who creep along the ground.

I will add: not at all times, nor before all, nor concerning all things; but there is a time, and there are persons, and there is a measure.

Not before all, because it belongs only to those who have been tested and have made progress in contemplation, and who before this have been purified—or are being purified—in soul and body.

For to touch what is pure with what is not pure is perhaps not even safe, just as it is not safe for a weak eye to gaze at the sun's ray.

And when? Whenever we have leisure from the outer mire and turmoil, and our ruling faculty is not confounded by base and wandering impressions—as when one mixes beautiful letters with bad ones, or the fragrance of perfume with filth.

For one must truly be at leisure, and "know God."

And when we have found the right moment, then we may judge the straightness of theology.

Nonsense is talked with pleasure, after the horse-races, the theatres, the songs, the belly, and what is below the belly;

for to these people this too is a part of luxury—their trifling and dandyism over these antitheses.

And what should one philosophize about, and to what extent? As much as is within our reach, and as far as the condition and capacity of the hearer attains;

lest, just as excessive sounds or foods harm the hearing or the body—or, if you will, as burdens beyond one's strength harm those who bear them, or as violent rains harm the earth—so these people too, weighed down and burdened, so to speak, by the solid parts of discourse, suffer loss even of their original strength.

And I do not say this—that one ought not to remember God at all times.

Let not those who are facile and hasty in all things again fasten upon me.

For one ought to remember God more often than one breathes;

and, if it may be said, one ought to do nothing else but this.

And I am among those who praise the word that bids us "meditate day and night," and "at evening, and morning, and noonday declare," and "bless the Lord at all times";

and, if one must also cite the saying of Moses, to be "stamped" by remembrance toward purity—lying down, rising up, journeying, or doing whatever else.

So it is not the remembering continually that I forbid, but the theologizing;

nor theology itself, as though it were impious, but the ill-timing;

nor the teaching, but the want of measure.

Or shall the surfeit and glut of honey work vomiting, honey though it be—and is there a season for every matter, as it seems both to Solomon and to me, and is the good not good when it is not done well, like a flower altogether out of season in winter, or manly attire on women, or womanly on men, or geometry in mourning, or a tear at a drinking-party—and shall we here alone dishonor the right occasion, where the timeliness most of all ought to be honored? By no means, friends and brothers;

for I still call you brothers, even though you do not behave as brothers;

let us not think so, nor, like hot and hard-to-restrain horses, throwing off the rider Reason and spitting out the reverence that nobly curbs us, run far past the post;

but let us philosophize within our own bounds, and not be carried off into Egypt, nor swept down to the Assyrians, nor "sing the Lord's song in a foreign land"—I mean before any hearing, strange or our own, hostile or friendly, well-disposed or ill-disposed—a hearing which watches our affairs very carefully, and would wish the spark of the evils within us to become a flame, kindling and fanning it and raising it to heaven by its own breezes unawares, and making it higher than the Babylonian flame that consumed all around it.

For since they do not have their strength in their own doctrines, they hunt for it in our weak points; and on this account, just as flies settle on wounds, so they fasten upon our misfortunes—whether one should call them misfortunes or sins.

But let us at least not be ignorant of ourselves to too great an extent, nor dishonor the seemliness in these matters;

but if it is not possible to dissolve the enmity, let us at least agree on this with one another: to speak mystical things mystically, and holy things in a holy way, and not to cast into profane ears what may not be uttered, nor to make those who worship demons and serve shameful myths and practices appear more reverent than ourselves—men who would sooner share their blood than certain of their words with the uninitiated.

But let us know that, just as there is a certain seemliness in dress and diet and laughter and gait, so also in speech and silence—since we honor the Word along with the other titles and powers of God.

Let our love of contention too be lawful.

[Consider] the discourse about these things, or with what sort of mind it is held, by him who praises adulteries and the corruption of boys, and worships the passions, and is unable to think of anything beyond the body; who yesterday and the day before set up gods for himself, and these recognized by the most shameful deeds—will he not [do so] in a material way? shamefully? ignorantly? ignorantly? as is his wont? Will he not make your theology an advocate of his own gods and passions? For if we ourselves abuse [the truth] with these utterances, hardly shall we persuade them to philosophize within our bounds;

and if they are of themselves inventors of evils, when would they refrain from what is handed to them? These things our war against one another [brings about].

These things [are wrought by] those who fight for the Word more than is pleasing to the Word, and who suffer the same as madmen who set fire to their own houses, or tear their own children, or thrust away their parents, regarding them as strangers.

But now that we have rid the discourse of what is alien to it, and have sent off into the herd of swine the great legion that rushed down into the deeps—which is the second [task]—let us look to ourselves, and polish into beauty, like a statue, the theologian.

But let us first consider this: what is this great ambition and garrulity about discourse? What is this strange and insatiable disease? Why have we bound our hands and armed our tongues? Do we not praise hospitality? Do we not admire brotherly love, conjugal love, virginity, care for the poor? Do we not admire psalmody, the all-night standing in prayer, the tear? Do we not subdue the body with fastings? Do we not journey to God through prayer? Do we not yoke the worse to the better—the dust, I mean, to the spirit—as those who judge the mixture rightly? Do we not make our life a meditation on death? Do we not make ourselves masters of the passions, mindful of our nobility from above? Do we not tame anger when it swells and grows savage? nor pride that casts down, nor irrational grief, nor undisciplined pleasure, nor harlot's laughter, nor unruly looking, nor insatiable hearing, nor measureless talk, nor strange thinking, nor whatever the evil one takes from us against us, bringing in death through the windows, as the Scripture says, that is, through the senses? On the contrary, indeed, we have given liberty to the passions of others—as kings grant amnesties after victory—provided only that they incline toward us and bear themselves more boldly against God; and we give an evil reward, not of a good deed: the license of impiety.

And yet, O dialectician and chatterer, I will ask you a little something.

"And answer thou," says to Job He who utters oracles through whirlwind and clouds.

Are there many mansions in the Father's house, as you hear, or one? Many, you will of course grant, and not one.

But must all of them be filled, or some yes, some no—so that they are empty and prepared in vain? Yes, all;

for nothing of the things made by God is in vain.

But this mansion—whatever you take it to be—could you say [what it is]? Is it the rest and glory there laid up for the blessed, or something else? Nothing other than this.

Since we have agreed on this, let us also examine that further point.

Is there something that procures these mansions, as my reasoning [holds], or nothing? There certainly is.

What is it? That there are different ways of life and choices, and that one leads one way, another another, according to the analogy of faith—which we also call "ways."

Must one then travel all, or some of these ways? If it were possible for the same person, all;

but if not even this, then it is a great thing if [one travels] even one in an excellent manner, as it seems to me.

What then? When you hear that there is one way, and that a narrow one, what do you think the saying means? One, on account of virtue;

for it is one, even though it is split into many;

and "narrow" because of the sweat and because it is not passable by many, in comparison with the multitude of those who go the opposite way and travel through vice.

Is this the way you press on and push—the way through reasoning and contemplation, as you suppose, but as I say, through idle babbling and quackery? Let Paul rebuke you, reproaching this bitterly after the enumeration of the gifts, in which he says:

"Are all apostles? Are all prophets?" and what follows.

You are exalted, and beyond the exalted, and above the clouds, if you will—the beholder of things unseen, the hearer of things unspeakable, the one caught up after Elijah, deemed worthy of theophany after Moses, heavenly after Paul.

Why do you also fashion others into saints in a single day, and ordain theologians, and as it were breathe instruction into them, and have made many councils of ignorant orators? Why do you bind the weaker in spider-web fabrics, as though it were something wise and great? Why do you stir up wasps'-nests against the faith? Why do you improvise for us a crop of dialecticians, as the myths of old [bred] the giants? Why, having gathered into one ravine all that is light-minded and unmanly among men, like so much rubble, and having softened them yet more with flattery, have you constructed a new workshop of impiety, not unwisely reaping the harvest of their folly? Do you contradict even these things? And have you no place for the rest? Must your tongue absolutely hold sway, and can you not restrain the birth-pang of speech? You have many other subjects, both numerous and ambitious.

Turn your disease there, along with [some] usefulness.

Attack for me the silence of Pythagoras, and the Orphic beans, and the newfangled boasting about the "He himself said it."

Attack for me the Ideas of Plato, and the transmigrations and cycles of our souls, and the recollections, and the not-noble loves [that pass] through noble bodies to the soul;

the atheism of Epicurus, and the atoms, and the unphilosophical pleasure;

the petty providence of Aristotle, and his artificiality, and his mortal doctrines about the soul, and the all-too-human character of his teachings;

the haughtiness of the Stoa, the greed and vulgarity of the Cynics.

Attack for me the void, the fullness of follies—all the nonsense they spin about gods or sacrifices, about idols, about good and malevolent demons, all that they fabricate about divination, conjuring of gods, raising of spirits, and the power of the stars.

But if you deem these unworthy of discussion, as petty and often refuted, and turn instead to your own concerns, and seek the field for ambition in them—

even here I will offer you broad highways.

Philosophize for me about the world or worlds, about matter, about the soul, about rational natures both better and worse, about resurrection, judgment, recompense, the sufferings of Christ.

For in these matters even to hit the mark is not useless, and to miss it is not dangerous.

But with God we shall hold converse—now a little, but a little later perhaps more perfectly—in Christ Jesus Himself our Lord, to whom be glory unto the ages. Amen.