Let us then speak first, beginning at the very name itself: for what reason this most exalted and blessed pursuit was called 'virginity' (parthenia), what sort of thing it can be and what power it possesses, and afterward what fruits it brings forth. For nearly everyone is in danger of being ignorant of it, though it surpasses by countless measures the other advantages of virtue—all the things we labor at for the cleansing and adorning of the soul. For 'virginity' (parthenia) is so named by the change of a single letter from 'nearness to God' (partheïa), since it alone likens the one who possesses it and has been perfected in its undefiled rites to God, than whom no greater good can be found, one removed from pleasure and pain; by it the wing of the soul, truly watered, both grows and is lightened, accustoming itself daily to fly away from human concerns. For since the sons of the wise have said that our life is a great festal assembly, and that we have come, as into a theater, to display righteousness—the drama of truth—while the devil and the demons contrive against us and oppose us, we must look upward and, soaring aloft, be raised on high, and flee the allurements of their fair-sounding voices and their poses, painted on the outside with an outward appearance of sober self-control—worse than the Homeric Sirens. For, charmed by the pleasures of error, many shed their plumage and are weighed down, sinking into the life we lead, when the sinews are slackened and relaxed by which the nature of the wings of self-control is held together, lightening what bends downward toward the corruption of bodies. Wherefore, O Virtue, whether for your own sake, or because you also lift souls up toward heaven, you have received this name, ever treading upon the purest minds: come now and join in supporting the discourse which you yourself commanded me to deliver.
For those who have shed their plumage and fallen into the pleasures do not cease from grief and toil so long as, fulfilling the necessity of their incontinence by the desire of passion, they remain uninitiated and unperfected in the drama of truth, raging with savage pleasures of lust instead of begetting children with modesty and self-control. But the souls that are well-feathered and light, soaring up above the world of this life and seeing from afar what no other human has beheld—the very meadows of incorruption, bearing and filled with beauties and flowers impossible to describe—are ever turned toward them, recalling the sights of that place, and on that account they reckon as small the things here counted beautiful: riches and honors and noble birth and marriages, and they value none of those things any longer. Indeed, even if someone should wish to hand over their bodies to wild beasts or fire and to punish them, they are ready to disregard the pains for the longing for those things and their astonishment at them, so that they seem, even while in the world, not to be in the world, but already, in mind and in the impulse of desire, to be in the assembly of those in the heavens. For it is not lawful that the wing of virginity should, by its own nature, weigh down toward earth, but rather bear upward into the pure ether and the life that neighbors the angels. Wherefore, first of all others, after the summons and their departure from here, those who have rightly and faithfully kept their virginity for Christ carry off the victory-prizes of the contests, crowned by him with the flowers of incorruption; for the account is that, as soon as the souls leave the world, angels meet the virgins and with much acclaim usher them into the aforementioned meadows, to which they longed to come even before, having then beheld them from afar in vision, when, still dwelling in their bodies, divine things appeared to them.
When they have come here, then, they behold certain wondrous, radiant, and blessed beauties, of a kind hard to declare to men. For there is Righteousness itself and Self-control itself, there is Love itself and Truth and Prudence and likewise the other resplendent flowers and plants of Wisdom, of which we here, dreaming as it were, suppose that mere phantom shadows are composed from human actions—for there is no visible image of them down here, but only formless representations, which themselves we often perceive only dimly when we picture them. For no one has ever beheld with the eyes the magnitude or shape or beauty of righteousness itself, or of understanding, or of peace; but there, in reality, as they are, they are seen whole and clear. For there is a tree of self-control itself, of love, of understanding, just as the plants here bear fruits—such as the grape or pomegranate or apple. So too the fruits of those are seen and eaten, yet they do not perish or waste away, but increase those who gather them unto immortality and divinity; just as that man from whom we all are, before he fell and his sight was maimed, while he was in Paradise, gathered fruit, when God decreed that man should be set as worker and guardian of the plants of wisdom. For such fruits the first Adam too was entrusted to cultivate. And Jeremiah likewise knows that these things exist in a particular place, set apart at a great distance from our inhabited world, where, lamenting those who have slipped away from the eternal goods, he says: 'Learn where is prudence, where is strength, where is the understanding to know; likewise where is length of days and life, where is the light of the eyes and peace. Who has found her place, or who has entered into their treasuries?' These then, when they have passed through into the treasuries, the virgins gather the fruits of the virtues, watered with well-ordered and abundant lights, which God pours forth for them like a fountain, illuminating that age with unfailing lights. And they dance in harmony, glorifying God; for a pure air is poured around them, not ridden over by the sun.
Now then, O virgins, daughters of undefiled self-control, our zeal is for ungrudging life and the kingdom of the heavens. Into the same glory of chastity may you too eagerly aspire together with those before you, taking little thought of this life; for chastity is no small thing toward incorruption, lifting the flesh upward toward the height and drying up its moisture and clay-like heaviness by a greater pull. Let not the filth of hearing weigh us down, sinking us toward the earth, nor let grief mingle in to spoil our joy, melting away the hopes set on better things; but unweariedly shake off the misfortunes that befall you, not muddying your reason with lamentations. For let faith conquer in every way, and let its light thrust aside the phantoms of the evil one that are borne about the heart. For just as, when the moon, shining out with brilliance, has filled the sky, and all the air has become clear, but suddenly malicious clouds running up from somewhere in the west overshadow her light for a little while—yet do not take it away, since they are at once thrust off by the rush of the wind—so too you, shining your chastity in the world, when troubled by afflictions and toils, O virgins, do not give way regarding your hopes. For the clouds from the evil one are thrust off by the Spirit, if you, like your mother, the virgin who bears the male in heaven, do not fear the serpent lying in wait and ambushing; concerning whom I will somehow set forth a clear account for you, for now is the time. — And 'a great sign appeared in heaven,' John says, expounding the Apocalypse: 'a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon beneath her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars; and being with child she cried out, in travail and tormented to give birth. And another sign appeared in heaven: and behold, a great fiery dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and on his heads seven diadems; and his tail drags the third part of the stars of heaven, and he cast them to the earth; and the dragon stood before the woman who was about to give birth, that when she bore her child he might devour it. And she bore a male son, who is to shepherd all the nations with a rod of iron; and her child was caught up to God and to his throne; and the woman fled into the wilderness, where she has a place prepared by God, that there they might nourish her a thousand two hundred days.' Now then, the things narrated about the woman and the dragon have, in summary, their end; but to find out and tell their interpretation is greater than is in our power. Nevertheless, we must venture, trusting him who commanded us to search the Scriptures. If, then, what is said seems good to you both, there is now nothing hard in passing through it; for you will surely pardon me if I am unable to suffice for the exactness of the Scripture.
The woman who appeared in heaven clothed with the sun and crowned with twelve stars, whose footstool was the moon, in travail and tormented to give birth—she, strictly speaking and by the exact account, is our mother, O virgins. She is a certain power in herself, distinct from her children, whom the prophets, according to the aspect of what is brought to bear, have at one time called Jerusalem, at another the Bride, at another Mount Zion, and at another the temple and tabernacle of God. For she is the power urged to be enlightened in the Prophet, when the Spirit cries out to her, 'Be enlightened, be enlightened, O Jerusalem, for your light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon you. Behold, darkness and gloom shall cover the earth, it shall cover the nations; but upon you the Lord shall appear, and the glory of the Lord shall be seen upon you. And kings shall walk in your light, and nations in your brightness. Lift up your eyes round about and see your children gathered together. All your sons have come from afar, and your daughters shall be carried upon shoulders.' This is the Church, whose children shall come to her in throngs from every quarter in baptism after the resurrection, running together to her; and she rejoices, receiving the unwaning light, clothed in the splendor of a robe in the fashion of the Word. For with what other costlier or more honorable adornment was it fitting that the queen should be adorned and led as bride to the Lord, having taken light as a garment, for which reason she too was summoned by the Spirit? For go up in the Word and behold, like virgins going to a wedding, a great woman, gleaming with a pure and undefiled beauty, whole and abiding and in no way inferior to the splendor of the lights, and clothed with light itself instead of a robe, and adorned upon her head with bright stars instead of precious stones. For what is a garment to us, that is light to her; and what is gold or transparent stones to us, that to her are the stars—stars not such as these that lie in the visible region, but certain ones better and more brightly shining, so that these here are rather to be regarded as images and copies of those.
And she stands upon the moon—by 'moon' I think faith is figuratively meant, the faith of those who are cleansed from corruption by the laver, because her light resembles rather tepid water, and all the moist substance depends on her. The Church, then, stands upon our faith and reception, according to the figure of the moon, until the fullness of the nations comes in, being in travail and regenerating the psychic into the spiritual, in which respect she is also a mother. For just as a woman, having received the unformed seed of a man, brings forth over periods of time a complete human being, so too one might say that the Church, ever conceiving those who flee to the Word and forming them according to the likeness and shape of Christ, makes them, over periods of time, citizens of those blessed ages. Whence by necessity she must stand over the laver, bearing those who are washed; for in this way the activity she exercises about the laver is called 'moon,' since the regenerated, renewed with a new radiance, shine—that is, a new light—wherefore also they are called 'neophotists' (the newly enlightened) by a circumlocution, since the spiritual full moon ever shows itself anew to them in the cycle of the Passion and the commemoration, until the dawn and the perfect light of the great day shall arise.
But if someone (for there is now nothing hard in speaking out plainly), being indignant, should say in reply to what has been stated, 'And how, O virgins, does your interpretation still accord with the sense of the Scripture, when the Apocalypse defines the Church as bearing a male, but you have understood that her fruitful birth-pangs are fulfilled in those being washed, as they are bathed?'—we shall say: 'But, O fault-finder, neither is it in your power to demonstrate that Christ himself is the one being born; for long before the Apocalypse the mystery of the incarnation of the Word had been fulfilled, whereas John prophesies of things present and to come. And Christ, having long since been conceived, was not, when he was born, caught up to the throne of God for fear lest the serpent harm him; rather, for this very reason he was begotten and himself came down from the thrones of the Father, in order that, remaining in the flesh, he might overpower the dragon that was running against it.' So that it is necessary to confess that the Church too is the one in travail and bearing those who are redeemed, just as somewhere in Isaiah the Spirit says: 'Before she that travailed brought forth, and before the pain of the pangs came, she escaped and bore a male. Who has heard such a thing, and who has seen it thus? If the earth travailed in one day, and if a nation were brought forth at once, because Zion travailed and bore a male.' Whom did she escape but the dragon, in every case, that the noetic Zion might bring forth the people, the male, the one who, from womanish passions and dissolution, has attained to unity with the Lord and been made manly through zeal?
Let us then speak again from the beginning, going back over it, until in due order we come to the end, expounding what has been said. Consider then whether the account seems to you too to be fulfilled toward a good reputation. For I think the Church is said to bear the male in this sense: because those who are enlightened receive in purity the characteristics and the impress and the manliness of Christ, the form according to his likeness being stamped in them, the Word being born in them according to exact knowledge and faith, so that in each one Christ is born noetically. And on this account the Church swells and travails until Christ is formed and born in us, so that each of the saints, by partaking of Christ, may be born a Christ; in which sense it is said in a certain Scripture, 'Touch not my anointed ones (christs), and do my prophets no harm'—as though those who, by participation in the Spirit, have been baptized into Christ have become anointed ones (christs), the clarification in the Word and the transformation of the Church contributing to this here. And Paul confirms this, teaching plainly where he says: 'For this cause I bow my knees to the God and Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that he may grant you, according to the riches of his goodness, to be mightily strengthened through his Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell through faith in your hearts.' For into the souls of those being regenerated the Word of truth must necessarily be wiped off and imprinted.
And it seems that this above all closely resembles and accords with what has been said: the oracle uttered from on high by the Father himself to Christ when he came to the purification of the water in the Jordan: 'You are my son; this day have I begotten you.' For it must be observed that he declared him to be his son indefinitely and timelessly; for he said 'You are my son,' and not 'You have become,' indicating that he had neither recently obtained the adoption, nor having pre-existed afterward acquired it, but being begotten beforehand, he both will be and is the same. But 'this day have I begotten you' means: 'You who already pre-exist before the ages, I willed to beget also in the heavens and to the world'—that is, to make known what was formerly unknown. Indeed, to those of men who have not yet perceived the manifold wisdom of God, Christ has been begotten, that is, has not yet been known, has not yet been manifested, has not yet appeared. But if these too should perceive the mystery of grace, then indeed to them also, when they have turned and believed, he is begotten according to knowledge and understanding. Wherefore fittingly the Church is here said ever to form and bear the male Word in those being purified. — And the things concerning her travail have been stated to the best of our ability; but the things concerning the dragon and the rest must here be taken up. Let us therefore try again to make it somehow clear, O virgins, in no way shrinking in cowardice before the magnitude of the riddles of the Scripture; and if anything difficult should fall into the discourse, I will again ferry you across as over a river.
The great dragon, the fiery one, the wily, the many-cleft, the seven-headed, the horned, who drags the third part of the stars, who stands lying in wait to devour the child of the travailing woman—this is the devil who lies in ambush, who lurks to harm the Christ-possessed mind of the enlightened and the impress and clarification of the Word brought forth in them. But he misses and is foiled of his prey, since the regenerated are caught up on high to the throne of God; that is, the mind of those who have been renewed is raised up above, around the divine seat and the unstumbling foundation of truth, being trained to look at the things there and to imagine the things there, lest it be deceived by the dragon that weighs downward; for it is not lawful for him to do away with those who incline upward and look upward. And the stars are those which he, touching with the tip of his tail down upon their crown, drags down to the earth—the conspiracies of the heresies; for the gatherings of the heterodox must be called dark, dim, and groveling stars, since they too wish to be considered knowers of the heavenly things and to have believed in Christ and to have the seat of their soul in the heavens and to draw near the stars as children of light. But they are dragged down, shaken off by the coils of the dragon, because they did not stand within the triangles of piety, having stumbled regarding its orthodox worship; whence also they were called the third part of the stars, as having gone astray concerning one of the numbers of the Trinity—at one time concerning that of the Father, as Sabellius, who said that the Almighty himself had suffered; at another concerning that of the Son, as Artemas and those who declared that he had appeared only in seeming; at another concerning that of the Spirit, as the Ebionites, contending that the prophets had spoken of their own motion. As for Marcion and Valentinus and the followers of Elchasai and the others, it is well not even to mention them.
But she who has begotten and begets the manly Word in the hearts of the believers, and who, undefiled and unharmed from the beast of wrath, has come into the wilderness, is our mother, as we have explained—the Church. And the wilderness into which she comes and is nourished the thousand two hundred and sixty days, is the true wilderness of evils, barren and sterile of corruption, hard of access and hard to traverse for the many, but fruitful and well-pastured and flourishing and easy to enter for the saints, and full of wisdom and sprouting life—this very thing is Virtue's most beautiful and beautifully-treed and beautifully-fragrant region, where the south wind has been roused and the north wind has breathed, and the spices flow, and all is filled with ambrosial dews, garlanded with the unfading shoots of immortal life—into which we are now gathering flowers and weaving for the queen the purple and resplendent crown of virginity with untouched fingers; for with the fruits of Virtue is the bride of the Word adorned. And the thousand two hundred and sixty days, during which we are here on sojourn, are, O virgins, the exact and best understanding, directed straight, concerning the Father and the Son and the Spirit, in which our mother rejoices and exults as she grows during this present time, until, having come to the assembly of the restoration of the new ages throughout the heavens, she may no longer survey what is through science, but may clearly contemplate it, having entered in together with Christ. For the thousand, multiplied tenfold in hundreds, contains a perfect and full number, which is a symbol of the Father himself, who created from himself and holds together in himself the All; and the two hundred is that which is conjoined from two perfect numbers, which is a symbol of the Holy Spirit, inasmuch as he is the giver of the knowledge of the Son and of the Father. And the sixty has the number six in tens, which is a symbol of Christ, since the number six, proceeding from the monad, is composed of its own parts, so that nothing is lacking in it nor superfluous; for being resolved into its own parts it is fulfilled, just as when six is cut into equal parts from equal divisions, the same quantity is necessarily filled up again from the divided sections. For first, divided in the middle, it makes three; then, divided into three parts, it makes two; then, divided into six, it makes one; and it is filled up again into itself: for divided into twice three, thrice two, and six times one, when the three and the two and the one are added together, it again completes the six. And everything perfect is necessarily that which neither requires another for its completion nor ever exceeds itself. But of the other numbers some are superabundant, like twelve (for its equal part is six, its third part four, its fourth part three, its sixth part two, and its twelfth part one—the parts into which it can be divided—and when added together they exceed twelve, since it did not keep itself equal to its own parts, as six does); and others are deficient, like eight. For its half is four, its quarter two, and its eighth one—the parts into which it is cut—and when added together they make seven, and it requires a monad for its completion, not being, as six is, in every way concordant with itself. Wherefore it has also received its reference to the Son of God, who came from the fullness of the Godhead into life; for having emptied himself and taken the form of a servant, he was again filled up to his own perfection and dignity. For having been diminished in himself, and resolved into his own parts, out of his own smallness and his own parts he came again into his own completion and magnitude, never being diminished from being perfect. But the creation of the world too appears to be wholly composed of this number and of harmony, God having made in six days the heaven and the earth and the things in them, the creative power of the Word containing the number six, according to which the triad is productive of bodies; for length and breadth and depth make a body, and the six is composed of the triangles. — And concerning these things it is not the fitting time at present to go through with exactness, lest, leaving the matter at hand, we examine the digression.
Now therefore, having come here into this wilderness barren of evils, as we said before, the Church is nourished, feathered with the heaven-traversing wings of virginity, which the Word called the wings of a great eagle, having conquered the serpent and thrust off the stormy clouds from her own full moon. For the sake of these things all these intervening discourses have been brought forward, teaching you, O fair virgins, with all your might to imitate your mother, and not to be troubled by the burdens and reverses and afflictions of life, that you may enter in proudly together with her into the bridal chamber, displaying your lamps. Do not therefore shrink in cowardice before the wiles and slanders of the beast, but arm yourselves stoutly for the battle, equipped with the helmet of salvation and the breastplate and the greaves. For you will strike untold terror into him as you advance with much gain and good courage, nor will the many-headed and many-faced beast stand at all when he sees, from your superior position, his adversaries arrayed against him; but at once the beast—'in front a lion, behind a dragon, and in the middle a Chimaera, breathing forth the dread might of blazing fire'—will yield to you the prizes of valor from the seven wrestling-bouts. And that Chimaera Christ the King slew, trusting in the portents of the Father; for she destroyed many, and none endured her belching the deadly foam from her jaws, unless Christ first loosed her strength and overpowered her and made her wholly weak and contemptible to us.