The name of Apollo they fashioned from human misfortunes, in the Greek tongue, as though he either loses or destroys all things committed to him. Some also call the sun Apollo, because, daily set in its setting, it loses (perdat) the brightness of its light: for the Greeks call 'to destroy' apollyein. You see how a turbulent error has contrived your lying and fictitious gods, so that by old wives' superstitions both the forms and the names of the gods have been handed down to you. But truth has uncovered all these things, and the reasoning of a sound mind has discovered them, so that, when all has been investigated and uncovered which sacrilegious error had hidden, truth might shine in life.
For all these things, since they had been ill-composed, were at first a terror to mortals; then, when the novelty had been consumed, as among men recovering from a long illness, a certain contempt was born out of wonder. Thus little by little the mind, which had been struck dumb, dared diligently to inquire, and at once it sent its keen intelligence into the secrets of these feigned and empty superstitions. Then, the reckoning of hidden things being gathered by reason from constant examinations, it came to the causes, so that the human race first learned, then despised, and thirdly rejected the pitiable fictions of profane religions. It now pleases me to explain by what signs or by what symbols the pitiable crowd of men recognizes itself in these very superstitions.
For they have their own signs, their own responses, which in the assemblies of these sacrileges the teaching of the devil handed down to them. In a certain temple, in order that a man about to enter may be admitted into the inner parts, he says: 'I have eaten from the drum, I have drunk from the cymbal, and I have learned thoroughly the secrets of the religion' — which in the Greek tongue is said: 'ek tympanou bebroka, ek kymbalou pepoka, gegona mystes Attis.' Wickedly, wretched man, do you confess the crime you have committed: you have drained the pestilent venom of poison, and at the prompting of an unspeakable madness you have licked the deadly cup: death and punishment always follow that food; this which you proclaim that you have drunk binds the vein of life unto death, defiles the seat of the soul, and throws it into confusion by the unbroken succession of evils.
There is another food, which bestows welfare and life; there is another food, which both commends a man to the most high God and restores him; there is another food, which relieves the languishing, recalls the wandering, raises up the fallen, which bestows upon the dying the insignia of eternal immortality. Seek the bread of Christ, the cup of Christ, that, earthly frailty being despised, the substance of man may be nourished with immortal food. But what is this bread or what is the cup which Wisdom proclaims with a great voice in the books of Solomon? For it says: 'Come, eat of my loaves and drink the wine which I have mingled.' And Melchizedek, king of Salem and priest of the most high God, offered to Abraham, on his return, the grace of blessing with bread and wine.
Isaac too, when he had blessed Jacob, when Esau humbly demanded this same blessing from his father, the father answered him: 'I have made him,' he said, 'your lord, and all his brethren I have made his servants; with corn and wine I have confirmed him.' Then Esau bewailed his misfortunes with wretched lamentation, because he had lost the grace of the corn and the wine, that is, of future felicity. And that this divine bread is granted by God to consecrated men, the Holy Spirit says through Isaiah: 'Thus says the Lord: behold, those who serve me shall eat, but you shall hunger:'
'behold, those who serve me shall rejoice, but you shall be confounded; you the Lord shall slay.' Not only is this bread denied by the most high God to the sacrilegious and impious, but a penalty also is promised and the destruction of bitter death is decreed, so that to their hungering throats may be brought the outcome of divine retribution. There follow, too, on this same theme, the venerable responses of the thirty-third psalm; for through David the Holy Spirit says: 'Taste and see that the Lord is sweet.' Sweet is the heavenly food, sweet is the food of God: nor does it have in it the sad torment of wretched hunger, and it shuts out the venom of the poison proceeding from the marrow of men. And that these things are so, the following responses of the oracle declare; for it says:
'Fear the Lord, you his saints, for there is no want to those who fear him. The rich have been in want and have hungered, but those who seek the Lord shall not be deprived of any good thing.' You who thus walk robed in the temple, who shine in purple, whose head is pressed with either gold or laurel, foul destitution pursues your error, and the burdensome weight of poverty hangs over your neck. That poor man whom you despise is bountiful and rich; Abraham prepares a seat for him in his bosom. Then you, through the intervening spaces of the flames, to soothe the wounds of your conscience, will beg from him a thin little drop of trickling water, and Lazarus, though willing, will neither be able to give nor to obtain for you the relief of your pain. For the merits of each are weighed with equal grace:
to that one life is granted on account of the evils of this world, to you on account of the goods of this world the perpetual punishment of torments is decreed. But that it might be learned more plainly who that bread was, through which the destructions of wretched death are overcome, the Lord himself marked it out with his holy and venerable mouth, lest through diverse interpretations the hopes of men should be deceived by perverse readings. For he says in the Gospel according to John: 'I am the bread of life: he who comes to me shall not hunger, he who believes in me shall never thirst.' Likewise in what follows he signifies this same thing in a similar manner; for he says: 'If anyone thirsts, let him come and drink who believes in me.' And again he himself, that he might hand over to believers the substance of his majesty, says:
'Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you.' Therefore let there be nothing for you with the food of the drum, O wretched mortals: seek the grace of the saving food and drink the immortal cup. Christ recalls you by his banquets to the light, and quickens your limbs heavy with grievous poison and your numbed members. With heavenly food renew the lost man, that whatever in you is dead may be reborn by divine benefits. You have learned what it befits you to do; choose what you will: from there death is born, from here immortal life is given. *** Hail, bridegroom; hail, new light. Why, ruinous persuasion, do you thus hurl wretched man over the precipices? Why do you promise him the insignia of a false hope?
There is no light in you, nor is there any who deserves to be heard as bridegroom: there is one light, there is one bridegroom: the grace of these names Christ has received. You cannot transfer to yourself the glory of another's felicity, nor can you be adorned with the splendor of the heavenly light. You have been cast into darkness and squalor: there are filth, squalor, gloom, darkness, and the horror of perpetual night holds dominion. If you wish that at least a thin splendor of light may shine for you, lift up your face and open your downcast eyes, and forsaking these things betake yourself to him who said: 'I am the light of the world,' by whose divine precepts it is contained that in this earthly converse our work should shine through each single day:
But it cannot shine unless the unstained adornments of a good conscience protect us, unless an unblemished and uncorrupted life commends us: then the grace of the true light will rise upon us, then the author of light will make himself known to us, then we shall be able both to receive and to see the true light. But, that the wickedness of the sacrilegious voice may be suppressed, who truly is the bridegroom I shall prove from the oracles of the sacred readings, so that it may be proven that Christ is the bridegroom and the Church the bride, from whom for the venerable Father spiritual sons are begotten through each single day. In this proof let the venerable secrets of the prophets be opened, let the faith of the holy oracles stand by us. Joel, at the prompting of the divine Spirit, says thus:
'Blow the trumpet in Zion, sanctify a fast, proclaim a healing, gather the people, sanctify the church, take up the elders, gather the suckling infants; let the bridegroom go forth from his chamber and the bride from her bridal room.' This same thing Jeremiah signifies in like manner; for he says, when he threatens Jerusalem with a grim oracle: 'And I will take away from the cities of Judah and from the crossroads of Jerusalem the voice of those who rejoice, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride.' The going-forth of the bridegroom the Holy Spirit also proclaims through the psalms: in the eighteenth psalm this oracle is found; for it says: 'And he, as a bridegroom coming forth from his bridal chamber, will rejoice as a giant to run his course;'
'his going forth is from the height of heaven, and his circuit even to its height, and there is none who is hidden from his heat.' Let more hidden secrets be opened: in the Apocalypse we find who the bridegroom is. For it is written thus: 'Come, I will show you the new bride, the wife of the Lamb. And he led me in the spirit into a great mountain and showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven.' It must be made known what too the evangelical teaching hands down to us concerning this very matter. For we find in the Gospel according to John that it is marked thus: 'You are my witnesses that I said to those who were sent to me from Jerusalem, that I am not the Christ, but that I was sent before him:'
'For he who has the bride is the bridegroom; but the friend of the bridegroom is he who stands and hears him and rejoices with joy because of the bridegroom's voice.' The mystery of this matter has been shown; the coming of this bridegroom the chorus of wise virgins awaits; for him holy virginity bears its lamps with watchful care: to the servants awaiting the bridegroom is promised the gift of happy rewards. For we find in the Gospel according to Luke: 'Let your loins be girded and your lamps burning, and you yourselves be like men waiting for their lord when he shall return from the wedding, that when he comes and knocks they may open to him. Happy are those servants whom the lord, when he comes, shall find watching.' Behold, by the oracles of venerable responses the bridegroom has been shown.
Why, set as you are amid bitter misfortunes, do you impose upon yourself a blessed name? If you wish, being set free, to follow the light of the bridegroom, cast away your errors, and, watchful with sleepless care, chastise with religious devotion the crimes of your former life. Then, when the bridegroom shall find you watching in his name, when he shall have recognized the merits of your faith, he will give the greatest reward, he will give an entire gift: you will enter with him the bridal chamber of heaven, you will see the palace of the world, and, that you may be a true partaker, the grace of immortality will be conferred upon you by the most holy and most just Lord. Of another profane sacrament the sign is 'theos ek petras' (a god from a rock). Why do you transfer this holy and venerable secret, by adulterated profession, to profane deeds?
There is another stone, which God promised that he would send for the establishing of the foundations of the promised Jerusalem: Christ is shown to us under the signification of the venerable stone. Why do you, by stealthy fraud, transfer to defiled superstitions the dignity of the venerable name? Your stone is followed by ruin and the deadly collapse of falling roofs: our stone, founded by the hand of God, builds up, confirms, raises, fortifies, and adorns the grace of the restored work with the splendor of perpetual immortality. For Isaiah, at the command of the Holy Spirit, says of this stone: 'Thus says the Lord: behold, I lay in the foundations of Zion a precious stone, chosen, supreme, a cornerstone, honored, and he who believes in it shall not be confounded.'
In the psalms also there is a like response: for the Holy Spirit says in the one hundred and seventeenth psalm: 'The stone which the builders rejected has become the head of the corner: this was done by the Lord and is marvelous in our eyes.' Through very many prophets the Holy Spirit shows the order of this name; for the prophet Zechariah says: 'Behold, I bring forth my servant; the Branch (Orient) is his name, for the stone which I have set before the face of Jesus: upon that one stone are seven eyes.' But that it may stand more plainly, let us open the more ancient secrets of the venerable readings. In Deuteronomy it is thus comprised:
'And you shall write all this law upon the stone.' Joshua too, son of Nun, by the command of the Deity comprised this especially; for he says: 'And he took a great stone and set it up before the Lord. And Joshua said to the people: behold, this stone shall be to me for a testimony, for it has heard all things which were said by the Lord, when he spoke to you, and it shall be to you a testimony in the last of days, when you shall have departed from your Lord.' And that through this stone, that is, through our Lord Jesus Christ, both these gods are to fall and the multitude of temples, Daniel openly set forth by venerable oracles; for he says, when he was interpreting the king's dream:
'And behold an image, an image exceedingly great, and the aspect of that image was fearful, and it stood, lifted up, over against you: its head was of fine gold, its breast and arms of silver, its belly and thighs of bronze, but its feet partly of iron, partly of clay: until a stone was cut from the mountain without the hands of those cutting, and it struck the image upon its feet of iron and clay and broke them into small pieces; and at once the iron, the potsherd, the bronze, the silver, and the gold were made small like chaff, as dust on a threshing-floor in summer, and the wind carried them off so that nothing remained of them:'
'and the stone which struck the image became a great mountain and filled the whole earth.' What place is there on earth which the name of Christ has not possessed? Where the sun rises, where it sets, where the north is raised up, where the south inclines, the majesty of the venerable Godhead will fill the whole; and although in certain regions the dying limbs of idolatry still quiver, yet the matter stands so, that from all Christian lands this pestilent evil is to be utterly cut away. Concerning the stone of the idolaters, of which they say 'theos ek petras' (a god from a rock), what has the oracle of the prophets answered? Whom has this stone withstood, or whom does it spare?
But this holy stone, that is, Christ, either sustains the foundations of faith, or, set in the corner, joins together with equal moderation the members of two walls — that is, it gathers the nations into one out of the Old and the New Testament; or surely it associates the diversity of body and soul... it unites man with immortality, or promulgates the law, or bears testimony against sinners, or — what is rather the case — it strikes the image of the devil, so that, he being overcome and laid low and turned into cinders and ashes, with the head of its sublimity raised up there may be the pure command of dominion.
You now, Constantius and Constans, most sacred emperors, and the virtue of your venerable faith must be implored — a virtue which is raised above men and separated from earthly frailty, which joins itself to the fellowship of heavenly things, which in all its acts, as far as it can, follows the will of the most high God: only a little now remains, that by your laws the devil, utterly laid low, may lie prostrate, that the deadly contagion of extinguished idolatry may perish. The venom of this poison has vanished, and through each single day the substance of profane desire breathes its last. Raise the banner of faith; for you the Deity has reserved this: by his favor you are the eminent overthrowers of all your enemies, by whose works the Roman empire was being weakened.
Raise the standard of the venerable law; sanction, promulgate what is profitable. Let it be fortunate and happy for the commonwealth that, amid the heaps of slaughtered enemy victims, you have laid low their army. Happy too are you: God has made you partakers of his glory and of his will; propitious Christ has reserved, by your hands, for his people the overthrow of idolatry and the ruin of profane shrines. He, with spiritual arms, has conquered the evil spirits; you have conquered the earthly evils. Raise the trophies of victory and let a mighty title of triumphs be borne before you: rejoicing in the overthrow of profane things, exult more strongly, exult confidently. Your felicity is joined with the virtue of God; for the welfare of men, with Christ fighting, you have conquered.
Let all the symbols of profane religion be brought forward in order, that we may prove that the most wicked enemy of the human race transferred these from the holy and venerable oracles of the prophets to the defiled crimes of his own madness. For we find it said thus: 'euoi, dikeros dimorphe' (hail, two-horned, two-formed one). This god of yours is not two-formed but multiform: for into many shapes the form of his venomous mouth is changed. He himself is the basilisk and the scorpion, which is trodden underfoot by the safe footsteps of the faithful; he is the malicious serpent, whose head deceived mortality seeks; he is the twisting dragon, which is led by the hook, which is shut up captive: this god of yours is adorned with the locks of the Lernaean serpent. Do you see how, when the lord is struck, a throng of dying serpents succeeds?
Why do you thus sprout with reborn hydras? Why do you make yourself with a fertile offspring of crimes? We have learned the way of your death; we know by what remedies the poisons of your art are overcome. We drink the immortal blood of Christ; the blood of Christ has been joined to our blood: this is the saving remedy of your crimes; this, daily, from the people of God that has been wounded, shuts out the deadly venom. Who has seen this god of yours, whom they bewail, with horns? What are these horns which he boasts that he has? There are other horns, which the prophet, at the command of the Holy Spirit, recalls, which you, devil, think you can transfer to your defiled face. Whence do you seek for yourself adornments and glory? The horns show nothing other than the venerable sign of the cross:
By the one extended and straight horn of this sign the world is sustained, the earth is bound together, and from the joining of the two which go out along the side the east is touched, the west is lifted up; so that the whole globe is made firm with a threefold stability, and the foundations of the fixed work are held by immortal roots. This venerable secret a prophet's oracle has handed down to us; for we find in Habakkuk that it is thus written: 'His power covered the heavens, and the earth is full of his praise, and his splendor shall be as light: horns shall be in his hands, and there his power is established, the power of his glory, and he has set his love: the Word shall go forth and shall go before, according to his steps.'
Behold the venerable horns of the cross, behold the immortal summit of holy power, behold the divine framework of the glorious work. You, Christ, with hands extended, sustain the world and the earth; you sustain the heavenly empire; to your immortal shoulders our salvation clings; you, Lord, bear the sign of eternal life; you, by venerable prompting, announce this to us through the prophets: for Isaiah says: 'Behold, a son has been born to us, the government upon his shoulders, and his name has been called: Messenger of great counsel.' These are the horns of the cross, by which all things are alike both lifted up and held together; with these horns the life of men makes good use.
That Amalek might be conquered, Moses with hands extended imitated these horns, so that he might more easily obtain what he greatly besought; he made a cross for himself out of his staff. To these horns hasten with swift speed, to these horns flee with humble veneration; to these horns let justice, equity, chastity, mercy, patience, faith fasten you, so that, bearing before you the venerable insignia, rejoicing in the majesty of a consecrated brow, you may be partakers both of the burial of Christ and of his life. Yet another symbol we bring forward, that the crimes of defiled thought may be revealed, the whole order of which must be told, so that it may be agreed by all that the law of divine ordinance has been corrupted by the perverse imitation of the devil.
On a certain night an image is laid supine upon a bier and bewailed with weepings arranged in measured numbers; then, when they have sated themselves with feigned lamentation, a light is brought in: then by the priest the throats of all who were weeping are anointed, and when these have been anointed the priest whispers this in a slow murmur: 'tharreite mystai tou theou sesosmenou: estai gar hemin ek ponon soteria' (be of good courage, initiates of the saved god, for from our toils there shall be salvation for us). Why do you exhort the wretched to rejoice? Why do you compel deceived men to be glad? What hope, what salvation do you promise them by your deadly persuasion? Why do you allure them with a false promise?
The death of your god is well known, his life does not appear, nor concerning his resurrection has any divine oracle ever answered, nor did he show himself to men after death, that he might be believed; he set forth no documents of this work, nor did he prove by preceding examples that he would do this. You bury an idol, you bewail an idol, you bring an idol forth from burial, and, wretched man, when you have done these things, you rejoice. You free your god, you compose the lying limbs of a stone, you set right the insensible rock: let your god render thanks to you, let him repay you with like gifts, let him will you to be a partaker of himself, may you die as he dies, may you live as he lives. For as to the throats being anointed with a scent, who would not, when its vanity is seen through, despise this crime?
The devil therefore has his own anointed ones (christs), and, because he himself is antichrist, to the infamy of his name he leads wretched men by a wicked fellowship. This unguent reserve for the dead, reserve for the dying, so that those whom you have taken in your snares you may, smeared with poisoned unguent, ever plunge into mournful and deadly destruction. There is another unguent, which God the Father handed over to his only Son, which the Son bestows upon believers by the divine majesty of his Godhead. The unguent of Christ is compounded with an immortal composition and is tempered with the spiritual scents of pigments: this unguent strips off from the mortal snares the rotting limbs of men, so that, the first man being buried, from that same man another man may at once more happily be born:
and that this may be more plainly explained, the secrets of the sacred readings must be opened. For David says, that he might hand over the grace of this unguent: 'Beautiful in form beyond the sons of men, grace is poured out upon your lips: therefore God has blessed you forever. Gird your sword upon your thigh, O most mighty, in your beauty and loveliness: bend your bow, prosperously go forth and reign, on account of virtue and meekness and justice, and your right hand shall lead you wondrously. Your arrows are sharp, O most mighty: the peoples shall fall beneath you, into the heart of the king's enemies. Your throne, O God, is for ever and ever: the rod of your kingdom is a straight rod. You have loved justice, you have hated iniquity:'
'therefore God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness above your fellows: myrrh and aloes and cassia perfume your garments, from the ivory palaces out of which they have made you glad.' We have surveyed the secrets of the immortal unguent, and the order of the divine ordinance has been shown to us: the perpetual kingdom and the diadem of heaven have been conferred upon our Lord together with the majesty of the unguent. But who is this who has received the power of ruling the world, who is adorned with the majesty of the venerable name, another oracle shows us; for this same David says: 'Why have the nations raged, and the peoples meditated vain things? The kings of the earth stood up, and the princes came together as one, against the Lord and against his Christ.' Why do you thus exalt yourself, sacrilegious persuasion?
Why do you, with unbridled rashness, ensnare wretched men? The unguent of Christ bestows the empire of heaven; your unguent kindles the flames of Gehenna. But what that priest, with impure mouth and with the polluted defilement of words, composes, it pleases me to examine with diligent inquiry. He persuades his fellows to be of good cheer over their freed god, to have the confidence of a good hope. Oh, with what wretched, with what woeful snares does perishable cunning entangle them! Who frees your god? To whom has he granted that for which he labors? Learn, learn what you do not know, learn what you do not see:
Christ the Son of God, in order to free the human race from the snares of death, truly endured all these things: that He might lift the yoke of harsh captivity, that He might restore man to the Father, that with the offense softened He might reconcile man to God in a favorable reconciliation, and that He might show by His own example the fruit of the promised resurrection. The Son of God did what He had promised beforehand: He mocked the gates of the infernal abode, and trampling death underfoot He overthrew the necessity of the harsh law. For three days the throng of the just was reviewed and gathered by Him, lest the wickedness of death should any longer rule over them; and lest the merit of the just should collapse through long despair, He shattered the perpetual barriers, and at Christ's command the iron gates fell down.
Behold, the earth trembled and, shaken in the stability of its own foundations, acknowledged the divine power of Christ present. Before the appointed time the whirling rotation of the world hurled down the day, and the sun, with its course hastened though the span of the daylight hours was not complete, sank into night. Behold, the highest summits of the veil were rent, and with darker shadows the gloom of night hid the world from view. All the elements were thrown into turmoil while Christ did battle, namely at the very time when He first armed a human body against the tyranny of death. For three days this combat was fought, until death, its powers of malice overcome, should be broken. Why, with your usual impatience, O religious man, O man of Christ, do you despair and fail? Can you not bear a delay of three days?
Do you confess your anxiety and despair with new prayers? The Holy Spirit signifies with venerable voice that you would do this on that day, when He says through David: 'We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter. Arise, why do you sleep, O Lord? Arise and cast us not off unto the end. Why do you turn away your face? Do you forget our want and our tribulation? For our soul is humbled down to the dust, our belly has cleaved to the earth. Arise, O Lord, help us and deliver us for your name's sake.' Behold, after three days a day brighter than usual arises, and the grace of past light is restored to the sun: the almighty God, Christ, is adored with the more splendid rays of the sun.