論愛貧(第14講) 第 1 章 第 1/2 段

Men, brothers, and fellow-poor — for we are all poor and in need of divine grace, even if one seems to surpass another, being measured by small measures — receive this discourse on love of the poor, not meagerly, but generously, that you may grow rich in the kingdom.

And pray also that we may richly supply this to you, and nourish your souls with the word, and break the spiritual bread for those who hunger.

whether raining food from heaven, as that Moses of old, and bestowing the bread of angels;

or feeding tens of thousands in the wilderness to the full with a few loaves, as Jesus did later, the true bread, and the cause of true life.

It is, then, not at all easy to find which of the virtues is victorious, and to give to it the primacy and the prize of victory;

just as, in a meadow rich with many flowers and fragrant, it is not easy to say which flower is the fairest and most fragrant, when now one and now another draws the sense of smell and sight to itself, and persuades one to pluck it first.

As for me, then, I must consider how to distinguish among these in this way:

Good are faith, hope, love — these three;

and the witness of faith is Abraham, who was justified by faith;

the witness of hope is Enosh, who first hoped to call upon the Lord, and all the righteous who suffer affliction because of hope;

the witness of love is the divine Apostle, who dared to utter something even against himself for the sake of Israel;

and God himself, who is called love.

And among the righteous the witness is Lot the Sodomite — Sodomite in dwelling, but not in character;

and among sinners, Rahab the harlot — harlot in name, but not a harlot in her purpose — who was praised and saved because of her hospitality.

Good is brotherly love, and its witness is Jesus, who not only was called our brother, but also endured to suffer on our behalf.

And the same Jesus is witness, who not only made man for good works, joining the image to the clay as a guide to the noblest things and a mediator of what is above, but also himself became man for our sake.

Good is longsuffering, and the same one is witness — who not only refused the legions of angels against those who rose up and tyrannized him, nor only rebuked Peter for raising the sword, but also restored the ear to the man who had been struck.

The same thing also Stephen did afterward, the disciple of Christ, praying for those who were stoning him.

Good is zeal, and Phinehas bears witness, who pierced together the Midianite woman and the Israelite, that he might remove reproach from the sons of Israel, and was named for his purpose;

and after him, those who say:

and, 'For I am jealous over you with a godly jealousy';

and, 'The zeal of your house has consumed me';

and not only saying this, but also suffering it.

Good is the mortification of the body;

and let Paul persuade you, still disciplining himself, and, through the example of Israel, striking fear into those who trust in themselves and indulge the body;

and Jesus himself, fasting, and being tempted, and conquering the tempter.

Good are prayer and vigilance;

and let God persuade you, who kept watch before his passion, and prayed.

Good are chastity and virginity;

let Paul persuade you, who legislates concerning these matters, and rightly awards the prize between marriage and celibacy; and Jesus himself, being born of a Virgin, that he might both honor birth and prefer virginity above it.

And Elijah's Carmel teaches me, or John's wilderness, or Jesus' mountain, to which he is often seen withdrawing, and communing with himself in quiet.

And Elijah teaches me, resting beside a widow; John, clothed with camel's hair; Peter, feeding on lupine-seeds worth an assarion.

Good is non-possession and contempt for wealth;

and Zacchaeus bears witness, and Christ himself;

the one, at the entrance of Christ, giving away almost all he had as fruit;

the other, defining perfection for the rich man precisely in this.

And, to speak yet more concisely concerning these matters: good is contemplation, and good is action;

the one raising us up from here, and passing into the Holy of Holies, and leading our mind back to that which is akin to it;

the other, receiving Christ, and serving him, and proving its love through works.

Each of these is a certain path of salvation, leading assuredly to one of the eternal and blessed dwelling-places;

since, just as there are various choices of ways of life, so also there are many dwelling-places with God, apportioned and divided to each according to his worth;

and let one man perfect this virtue, another that one, another several, another all of them, if it be possible;

only let him journey on, and reach forward to what lies ahead, and follow close behind the one who guides well and directs rightly, and who leads through the narrow way and gate to the breadth of the blessedness that is there.

But if, obeying both Paul and Christ himself, one must regard love as the first and greatest of the commandments, the sum of the Law and the Prophets, then I find that the mightiest part of love is love of the poor, and the compassion and fellow-feeling for one's own kin.

For by nothing among all things is God so served as by mercy, since nothing else is more proper to him — he before whom mercy and truth go — and to whom mercy must be offered before judgment;

nor is anything given back in exchange for love of humankind more than love of humankind itself, by him who justly measures back in return, and who sets mercy in the balance and the scale.

To all the poor, then, our hearts must be opened, and to all who suffer affliction for whatever cause, according to the commandment that bids us rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep;

and, being men ourselves toward men, we must contribute in advance the collection of kindness — whether they need it because of widowhood, or orphanhood, or exile from their homeland, or the cruelty of masters, or the insolence of rulers, or the inhumanity of tax-collectors, or the bloodthirstiness of robbers, or the insatiability of thieves, or confiscation, or shipwreck;

for all alike are pitiable, and they look to our hands just as we look to the hands of God for whatever we may need;

and among these very ones, those who suffer beyond their desert are more pitiable than those who are accustomed to misfortune;

but especially to those who have been ravaged by the sacred disease, and eaten away even to the flesh, the bones, and the marrow — as the threat against certain men declares — and betrayed by this wretched, base, and treacherous body;

with which I know not how I was yoked together;

nor how I am both the image of God, and yet am mingled with clay;

which, when it flourishes, makes war on me, and when it is warred upon, causes me grief;

which I love as a fellow-servant, and yet turn away from as an enemy;

and I flee from it as a chain, and yet am ashamed of it as a fellow-heir;

I am eager to wear it down, and yet I have no other fellow-worker to employ for the noblest ends — knowing for what purpose I was made, and that I must ascend to God through my deeds.

I spare it as a fellow-worker, and yet I know not how to escape its rebellion, or how not to fall away from God, weighed down by fetters that drag me down or hold me fast to the ground.

It is an enemy that is kindly, and a friend that plots against me.

O this union, and this estrangement!

What I fear, I attend to with care; and what I love, I dread.

Before waging war, I am reconciled;

and before making peace, I stand apart in strife.

What is this wisdom concerning me? And what is this great mystery? Is it that God wills, since we are a portion of himself and have flowed from above, that — lest, being lifted up and exalted on account of our worth, we should despise our Creator — in our wrestling and struggle against the body we should always look toward him; and that the weakness yoked to us should be a discipline for our dignity?

That we, who are at once the greatest and the lowliest, earthly and heavenly, temporal and immortal, heirs of light or of fire — or rather of darkness — according to whichever way we incline, might know ourselves? Such is our mixture; and for this reason, as it appears to me at least, so that when we are exalted because of the image, we may be humbled because of the clay.

Let whoever wishes, then, philosophize on these matters; and we too shall philosophize together on them at a more fitting time.

But now, that which my discourse has set out to say — grieving deeply over my own flesh, and over my own weakness present in the sufferings of others — is this: brothers, we must care for what is akin to us and our fellow-servant.

For even though I have accused it as an enemy on account of its suffering, yet I also embrace it as a friend, because of him who bound us together;

and we must care for the concerns of our neighbor no less than each cares for his own — both those who are healthy, and those who are being consumed by this same disease.

For we are all one in the Lord, whether rich or poor, whether slave or free, whether in health or in bodily distress.

And there is one head of all, from whom are all things, Christ:

and what the members are to one another, that each one is to each, and all are to all:

therefore we must not look away from, nor neglect, those who have already fallen into our common weakness:

nor must we love ourselves more, because it is well with our own bodies, than we must mourn, because it goes wretchedly with our brothers:

and we must consider that the one security of our flesh and souls is the love of humankind shown toward them:

For others there is only one thing pitiable, that of poverty:

which perhaps time, or labor, or a friend, or a relative, or a change of circumstance might resolve.

But for these it is no less than for anyone, if not even more, inasmuch as they have no ability to labor and help themselves; along with their flesh they have been deprived of the necessities of life, and for them fear is always greater than the hope of health:

so that they are helped but a little by hope, which alone is a remedy for the unfortunate.

And in addition to poverty, disease too is a second evil, the most dreaded of evils, and the heaviest, and the one most readily called down as a curse by many.

And third, that they are not approachable, nor even to be looked upon by most people, but are to be shunned, and abhorred, and, as it were, regarded as omens to be averted:

which is even heavier for them than the disease itself, when they perceive that on account of their misfortune they are also hated.

I myself cannot bear their suffering without tears, and I am thrown into confusion by the mere memory of it:

may you also feel the same, so that by these tears you may escape other tears:

and indeed I know that those present who are lovers of Christ and lovers of the poor do feel this, having from God, and after the pattern of God, the disposition to show mercy:

and you yourselves also are witnesses of this suffering.

Set before our eyes is a terrible and pitiable sight, incredible to all except those who know it: human beings both dead and living, mutilated in most parts of their body, scarcely to be recognized either as to who they once were or where they are from:

or rather, the wretched remains of what were once human beings:

and they name places as the marks of their own identity:

'I am the son of so-and-so, and so-and-so was my mother, and this is my name, and you were once my friend and acquaintance.'

And this they do, because they can no longer be recognized by their former features:

human beings cut about, and stripped of wealth, kinship, friends, and their very bodies:

human beings, alone of all, who both pity themselves and likewise hate themselves:

not knowing which they should lament more, the parts of their body that no longer exist, or those that remain:

those which the disease has already consumed, or those which are left to the disease.

For the one part has been consumed miserably, while the other is preserved even more miserably:

the one part has departed even before reaching the grave, while for the other there is no one who will consign it to burial.

For even the one who is exceedingly kind and humane proves most unfeeling toward these:

and here alone we forget that we are flesh, and that we are clothed with the body of humiliation:

and we are so far from tending our own kin that we even reckon fleeing from them to be the safeguard of our own bodies.

And someone has already approached even an old corpse, one perhaps already putrid, and has carried the stinking bodies of irrational animals, and, covered in filth, has endured it:

yet from these we flee with all our might (oh, the inhumanity!), all but resenting that we breathe the same air as they do.

What is more genuinely devoted than a father? And what is more compassionate than a mother? But even nature itself has been shut out from these:

and a father laments his own child — whom he begot, whom he raised, whom he considered the sole light of his life, for whom he prayed much and often to God — this child he laments, yet drives away: the one willingly, the other under compulsion.

And a mother remembers her birth pangs, and her innermost being is torn apart, and she cries out most piteously, and, laying him out before her, laments the living child as though he were dead:

'My child,' she says, 'unfortunate child of a wretched mother, whom this disease has cruelly divided from me:

pitiable child, child no longer recognized, child whom I reared, only for cliffs and mountains and desert places to receive you:

you will dwell with wild beasts, and a rock will be your shelter, and of men only the most devout will look upon you.'

And then she utters those pitiable words of Job:

'Why then were you formed in your mother's womb, and why did you come forth from the belly, and not perish at once, that death might have run its course together with your birth? And why did you not depart untimely, before tasting the evils of life? Why did knees receive you? And why did you suck at breasts, you who were destined to live wretchedly, and a life more grievous than death?' And these things she says, and lets loose fountains of tears, and the unhappy woman wishes to embrace him, yet fears her child's flesh as an enemy.

And public outcries and expulsions arise, not against wrongdoers, but against the unfortunate.

And someone has already made a home with a murderer, and shared with an adulterer not only a roof but also a table, and has chosen a temple-robber as a companion of life, and has made peace with those who have done him some wrong:

yet he has turned away from the one whose suffering, though it has done no wrong, is treated as though it were a crime.

And wickedness receives more indulgence than disease:

and we have embraced inhumanity as though it were noble-minded, while we have dishonored compassion as though it were shameful.

They are driven away from cities, driven away from houses, from the marketplace, from assemblies, from roads, from festivals, from banquets — oh, the suffering! — from water itself:

neither do flowing springs stand shared between these and other people, nor are rivers trusted not to carry off any of the contagion:

and, most paradoxical of all, though we drive them away as pollutions, we nevertheless turn them back toward ourselves again as though they did us no harm — allotting them no lodging, no necessary food, no treatment for their wounds, no shelter to cover their disease as far as lies in our power.

To them, one counts as a lover of humankind not because he has sufficiently met their need, but merely because he has not driven them away harshly.

And most of them do not even shrink from the public festivals out of shame; on the contrary, they are pushed into them by need:

I mean those public and sacred festivals which we have devised for the healing of souls, whether gathering for some mystery, or celebrating in honor of the martyrs of the truth, so that in honoring their contests we may also imitate their piety.

And, being human beings, they are ashamed before other human beings because of their misfortune, and would wish to be hidden by mountains, or cliffs, or forests, or, finally, by night and darkness:

yet nevertheless they are cast out into the midst — a pitiable burden, and worthy of tears.

This is perhaps even reasonable, that they may serve as reminders to us of our own weakness, and may persuade us to place our trust in none of the things present and visible, as though they were stable.

And they are cast out — some from desire for a human voice, others for the sight of a human face, others so that they may gather a few provisions of life from those who live in luxury, but all of them so that, by making their laments public, they may taste some measure of gentleness.

Who is not broken by their wailing, as they blend a pitiful harmony together? What ear can bear the sound? What sight can take in the spectacle? Some lie together with one another, cruelly yoked together by disease, each contributing some different portion of the misfortune toward the sum of pitifulness:

and they are, to one another, an addition to their suffering — pitiable because of their infirmity, yet more pitiable still because of their fellow-suffering.

And around them stands a mixed audience, of those who share their pain, but only for a moment.

And they roll about at the feet of men, in sun and in dust:

and at times, worn down also by fierce frosts, and rains, and the turmoil of winds, they escape being trampled underfoot only to the same degree that we abhor even touching them.

And the lament of their petitions sings in counterpoint to the sacred hymns within, and a pitiable dirge rises up in response to the mystical voices of the liturgy.

Why should I set forth all their misfortune before people who are celebrating a festival? Perhaps I might even stir up lamentation in you, if I were to recount every tragic detail with care, and the suffering would overwhelm the feast.

For I say these things because I am not yet able to persuade you that there is sometimes a grief more precious than pleasure, a dejection more precious than a festival, and a tear more praiseworthy than laughter that is not good.

These, then, endure these things, and things far more wretched than what I have said — these who are, according to God, our brothers, whether you wish it or not: who have received the same nature as we, who have been fashioned from the same clay from which we were first made, who are knit together with sinews and bones just as we are, who are clothed with skin and flesh in the same way as all of us, as the divine Job somewhere says, philosophizing amid his sufferings and disdaining our outward appearance:

or rather, if I must say the greater thing, they too have received the being made according to the image just as we have, and perhaps guard it even better than we do, even though their bodies have been ruined:

who have put on the same Christ according to the inward man, and who have been entrusted with the same pledge of the Spirit as we have:

who share with us in the same laws, oracles, covenants, assemblies, mysteries, and hopes:

for whom Christ likewise died, he who takes away the sin of the whole world:

who are fellow-heirs of the life above, even if they have fallen far short of the life here below:

who are buried together with Christ, and raised together with him.

if indeed they suffer with him, that they may also be glorified with him

shall we be enriched with divinity? What then are we to think, we who have received so great an example of tender-heartedness and fellow-suffering—

what shall we think concerning these things, and what shall we do? Shall we look away? Shall we pass them by? Shall we abandon them as dead, as detestable, as the most vile of creeping things and wild beasts? By no means, brothers;

this does not befit us, the flock of Christ, the good Shepherd, who turns back the straying, and seeks out the lost, and strengthens the weak;

nor does it befit human nature, which has made compassion a law, having learned piety and love of humankind from its own equal weakness

But shall they suffer hardship under the open sky, while we dwell in houses most splendid, adorned with stones of every kind, and flashing with gold and silver, and with the arrangement of fine mosaic tesserae, and the variety of painting — deceptive baits for the eyes? And shall we dwell in some, and build others — for whom? Not, perhaps, even for our own heirs, but for strangers and aliens; and of these, perhaps, not even for those who love us, but for our bitterest enemies and the most envious — which is the very worst of evils

And shall they shiver with cold in threadbare and torn rags, or rather, perhaps, not even have the good fortune to possess these;

while we pamper ourselves with soft, flowing garments, and with the airy fabrics of linen and silk — by which we shall rather disgrace ourselves than adorn ourselves (for so I call everything superfluous and overwrought) — while other garments are laid up within, stored as a useless and profitless concern, food for moths and for time, which consumes all things;

And shall they not even have enough of the bare necessities of food (O my luxury, and their misery!), but lie before our doors, fainting and starving, having from their own bodies not even the means to beg — deprived of voices with which to lament, of hands with which to stretch out in supplication, of feet with which to approach those who have, of breath with which to give strength to their wailing — judging the heaviest of evils the lightest, and grateful only for their eyes, because they do not see their own disfigurement? XVII

while we recline, splendid in splendor, upon a couch both high and lofty, and upon superfluous, untouched coverlets — and if we hear the voice of their entreaties, we are vexed

and slave-boys stand in attendance, arranged in order and in fine array, with unbound hair, effeminate, elaborately groomed as to the trimming of their faces, adorned more than is fitting, for eyes greedy for such sights;

others holding the cups on the tips of their fingers, as gracefully and as securely as possible;

and others, above our heads, artfully producing a breeze with their fans, cooling the abundance of our flesh with currents of air from their hands;

and, beyond these things, the table overflowing with meats, all the elements supplying us richly — air, earth, and water;

and the table crowded with the contrivances of cooks and confectioners, and a contest among them all as to who shall best flatter our greedy and thankless belly — that heavy burden and beginning of evils, that most insatiable and most faithless beast, which is soon to be abolished together with the foods that are abolished

And to them even a full measure of water is a great thing, while for us the bowls of wine flow even to the point of drunkenness — or rather, beyond drunkenness, for the more licentious among us;

and we shall reject one wine, approve another as fragrant, and philosophize about a third — and it is reckoned a loss if, alongside the local vintage, there is not present also one of the so-called foreign wines, like some tyrant

we strive to be, or to be reckoned, more extravagant, as though ashamed if we were not thought base, and slaves of the belly, and of what lies beneath the belly

Why do we do these things, O friends and brothers? Why do we ourselves suffer disease in our souls, a disease far more grievous than that of the body? Inasmuch as I know that the one is involuntary, while the other comes by choice;

and the one is dissolved together with this present life, while the other departs together with us when we pass on;

and the one is pitied, while the other is hated, by those at least who have understanding

Why do we not help nature while we have the opportunity? Why, being flesh ourselves, do we not clothe the humiliation of the flesh? Why do we live in luxury amid the misfortunes of our brothers? God forbid that I should be rich while these are in want;

or that I should be in good health, if I do not come to the aid of their wounds;

God forbid that I should have sufficient food, or covering, or rest beneath a roof, unless I also offer bread, and share clothing to the extent of my power, and give rest beneath a roof

But rather, we must lay down all things for Christ's sake, that we may follow him genuinely, taking up the cross, and fly upward, light, toward the world above, unencumbered and dragged down by nothing, and gain Christ in place of all things, exalted through humility, and enriched through poverty;

or else we must share our possessions with Christ, so that, through using them well, our very having may be sanctified — through sharing with those who have not

But if indeed I should sow for myself alone, then let me sow, and let others eat;

and, to say again the word of Job:

instead of wheat, let there come forth for me nettles, and instead of barley, thorns;

and let a scorching wind seize them, and let a whirlwind snatch away my labors, that I may toil in vain

And if I should also build barns, storing up treasure out of mammon, and serving mammon, may my soul be required of me this very night, and I be made to give account for what I have wickedly hoarded

Shall we not, then, at last come to our senses? Shall we not cast off our callousness — not to call it pettiness? Shall we not reckon with what is human? Shall we not, from the misfortunes of others, set our own affairs in order? For by nature nothing human is stable, or level, or self-sufficient, or fixed upon the same footing;

but a kind of wheel runs its course through our affairs, bringing about changes now this way, now that, often even within a single day, and sometimes even within an hour;

and it is more possible to trust in breezes that never stand still, and in the wake left by a ship crossing the sea, and in the deceptive dreams of night, whose charm lasts but a little while, and in whatever shapes children mold in the sand as they play, than in the prosperity of men;

prudent, rather, are those who, because they do not trust in present things, store up for themselves what is to come;

and who, because of the instability and unevenness of human prosperity, love instead that goodness which does not fall, so that they may gain, at all events, at least one of three things;

either never to have done wrong at all, since even through such earthly goods the divine often welcomes the pious, calling forth compassion by kindness;

or to have confidence within themselves before God, as those who have suffered hardship not on account of wickedness, but through some providential dispensation;

or, finally, to be able to claim as a debt owed the kindness of those who fare well, which they themselves, while prospering, had earlier bestowed upon those in need

Let not the wise man, it is said, boast in his wisdom, nor the rich man boast in his riches, nor the powerful man boast in his strength;

even should they have arrived at the very summit, the one of wisdom, the other of abundance, the other of power

But I shall add also what follows upon these;

let not the man admired by all boast in his glory, nor the man in good health boast in his soundness of body, nor the handsome man in his youthful bloom, nor the young man in his youth, nor, if I must sum it up, anyone puffed up by any other of the things praised here;

but let him who boasts, boast only in this: in understanding and seeking after God, and in suffering together with those who suffer, and in laying up for himself some goodness against the future

For the former things are fluid and transient, and, as in a game of counters, are tossed now to one, now to another, and pass from hand to hand;

destined either to be brought to an end by time, or to be transferred by envy;

while the latter things stand firm and remain, and never withdraw, nor shift, nor disappoint the hopes of those who have trusted in them

But it seems to me, for this very reason, that none of the good things here below is trustworthy for men, nor long-lasting;

but that this too, if anything else, has been well contrived by the artificer Word and by the Wisdom that surpasses every understanding: that we should be, as it were, played with amid the things that are seen — things that are themselves ever changing and causing change, borne now up, now down, and overturned, and that vanish and flee before they can be grasped;

so that, having observed the instability and unevenness in these things, we might move our anchorage toward what is to come

For what would we have done, if our prosperity stood firm, seeing that even now, when it does not remain, we are so bound to it, and the pleasure and deception connected with it hold us so enslaved, that we are unable to conceive of anything better or higher than present things — and this though we hear and believe that we have been made according to the image of God, an image which is above and draws toward itself? XXI

where the serpent no longer bites by the way, nor lies in wait for the heel while his own head is watched

And perhaps it was this very thing that the blessed Micah had in mind, rising up above the goods that come upon the earth and merely seem good, when he says: 'Draw near to the everlasting mountains';

arise and go forth, for this is not your rest

this, then, already accords almost word for word with what our Lord and Savior himself commands, saying what? 'Arise, let us go hence';

not moving only those disciples at that time from that one place alone, as one might suppose, but forever drawing all his own disciples away from earth and from the things of earth toward the heavens and the things of heaven

Therefore, let us now follow the Word, let us seek the rest that comes from there, let us cast away the abundance that belongs here;

let us gain only whatever is good in it; let us possess our own souls through acts of mercy; let us share our substance with the poor, that we may become rich in the things that are there

give a portion also to God, not to the world alone;

take away something from the belly, and consecrate it to the spirit;