Homilies on Titus 5

'For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly and righteously and godly in this present age;'

'looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ;'

'who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.'

Having required great virtue of household servants (for it is indeed a great thing to adorn the teaching of God our Savior in all respects, and to give no handle to their masters, not even in the least matter), he adds also the just cause for which the servants ought to be such.

And what is this cause? 'For,' he says, 'the grace of God has appeared.'

Those who have God for their teacher, how should they not fittingly be such as I just now described, having found remission of countless sins? For you know that, among other things, this too abashes and humbles the soul in no ordinary way: that being liable for countless sins, it did not pay the penalty, but obtained pardon and countless good things.

For if someone, tell me, having taken a servant who had offended countless times, should not stretch him with the scourge, but for those things should grant pardon, yet for the future should require an accounting of him, and charge him to be on his guard so as not to fall into the same faults, and moreover should honor him with great gifts—

whom do you not think would be abashed on hearing of such great grace? But do not suppose that the grace stops at the forgiveness of past sins; rather, it secures us also for the future;

for this too belongs to grace.

Since if it were always going to leave the evildoers unpunished, the thing would no longer be grace, but a kind of incitement to ruin and corruption.

'For the grace of God,' he says, 'has appeared, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly and righteously and godly in this present age, looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ.'

See how, together with the rewards, he sets virtue as well.

This too belongs to grace: to deliver us from the affairs of this life, to lead us up toward heaven.

He shows here two appearings;

for there are indeed two: the former of grace, the latter of recompense and of justice.

'That, denying,' he says, 'ungodliness and worldly lusts.'

Behold the foundation of all virtue.

He did not say, 'That we should flee,' but, 'That, denying.'

The denial shows a great separation, much hatred, much turning away;

with as great a disposition, with as great earnestness as they turned away from the idols, with just so great must they turn away also from wickedness itself and from worldly lusts, he says.

For these too are idols—worldly desire and covetousness—and this he names idolatry.

And whatever serves us for the present life belongs to the worldly desires.

All things that come to an end together with the present life are worldly desire.

Let us therefore hold nothing in common with these.

Christ came that we might renounce ungodliness.

By ungodliness he means false doctrines, and by worldly desires the polluted manner of life.

Let us live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present age.

Do you see that—as I always say—sobriety is not only this, to abstain from fornication, but also to be free from the rest of the passions? Therefore he too who loves money is not sober.

For as the one is enslaved to bodies, so this one is enslaved to money.

Or rather, this one is the more intemperate, inasmuch as he does not even have so great a force driving him on.

For indeed that charioteer would most of all be called unrestrained, not who fails to hold in a rough and hard-mouthed horse, but who cannot subdue the gentler and more tractable one.

But what, one says? Is the desire for money less than the desire for bodies? It is surely clear to everyone, and is shown from many considerations.

And first, that the desire for bodies came to be from necessity.

And that which came to be from necessity is plainly also mastered with much labor, since it was also sown into our nature.

Second, that among the ancients there was no great account made of money, but much of women for the sake of sobriety.

And no one would blame a man for consorting lawfully with a woman even into old age, but all would blame him for money-getting.

And among the pagan philosophers many despised money, but women no longer.

So much more tyrannical is this than that.

But since our discourse is addressed to the Church, let us not bring our examples from those outside, but from the Scriptures.

This, then, this blessed one sets down almost by way of a command, saying thus: Having...

having food and covering, with these we shall be content.

But concerning wives: Do not deprive one another, except perhaps by mutual agreement.

And again: Come together again in the same place.

And you may often see him legislating concerning lawful intercourse.

And this desire he permits one to enjoy, and to enter into a second marriage, and he takes much care over the matter, and nowhere does he punish on account of this.

But the one who reaches after money he everywhere condemns.

And concerning money Christ gave many directions, that we might flee the ruin that comes thence.

But concerning abstinence from a wife, not so.

For hear what he says concerning money:

Unless someone renounces all his possessions...

Nowhere did he say, Unless someone renounces his wife.

For he knows what a tyranny he implanted.

And this blessed one says:

Marriage is honorable, and the bed undefiled.

Nowhere does he call the care for money honorable, but the contrary.

But those who wish to be rich fall into temptation and a snare and many foolish and hurtful lusts.

He did not say, To be covetous, but, To be rich.

But that you may learn this also from common notions, it is necessary to bring this argument too into the midst.

For one who has once for all been stripped of his money would no longer be troubled by the desire for it.

For nothing makes one desire money so much as the very having of money.

But in the case of the desire for bodies it is not so; rather, even many who have been made eunuchs have not cast off the fire that burns within them.

For the desire lies in other organs, being laid up within, in nature itself.

For what purpose, then, have these things been said by us? That the covetous are more intemperate than fornicators, inasmuch as they are troubled by a lesser desire.

Or rather, the matter is not even one of desire, but of slothfulness.

For here the desire is so natural that even if one does not approach a woman, nature does and works out its own.

But there nothing of the kind occurs.

And godly, he says, let us live in the present age.

And what is the hope? What is the prize of these labors? Looking, he says, for the blessed hope and appearing.

For truly nothing is more blessed than that, nothing more to be desired.

And these things words cannot set forth.

For indeed the good things of that time surpass understanding.

Looking, he says, for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior.

Where are those who say the Son is less than the Father? Of the great God, he says, and Savior.

He who saved His enemies, what will He not then do when He receives them approved? Of the great God, he says.

When he says great of God, he does not mean great in relation to something, but absolutely great, than whom there could be none greater, since to be great in relation to something is relative.

But if in relation to something, then great by comparison, and not great by nature.

Who gave Himself for us, he says, that He might redeem us from all iniquity and purify unto Himself a peculiar people—that is, a chosen one, having nothing in common with the rest.

Do you see that there is need also of what comes from us?

Not simply of works, but zealous—that is, coming to virtue itself with much eagerness, with the fervor that befits it.

Now to deliver those weighed down with evils and incurably diseased belonged to His lovingkindness.

But what comes after this belongs both to us and to Him.

These things speak and exhort, and rebuke with all authority.

These things speak and exhort.

Do you see how to Timothy he gives command and says, Reprove, rebuke, exhort;

but here, These things speak and exhort, and rebuke with all authority? Since the character of these was harsher, on this account he commands to rebuke both sharply and with all authority.

For there are certain of the sins which it is necessary to restrain even by commands;

for instance, those who exhort to despise money must persuade them, and to be reasonable, and such things;

but the adulterer, the fornicator, the covetous, with a command...

the one who takes omens, the one who uses divination, the one who does other such things—not simply with a command, but with all authority.

Do you see how he wishes him to enjoin these things with authority and with much power? Let no one despise you, but, Put them in mind to be subject to principalities and powers, to obey, to be ready for every good work, to speak evil of no one, to be peaceable.

What then? Are we not even to revile those who do evil, nor to heap abuse upon such men? Rather, we are 'to be ready for every good work, and to speak evil of no one.'

Let us give heed to this exhortation.

Our mouth must be kept clean from all reviling.

For if the reproaches are true, it is not for us to say these things, but for the Judge to examine them.

'For who art thou,' he says, 'that judgest thy brother?' And if they are not true, see how great a fire this is.

Hear the thief who spoke to the other thief:

'For we ourselves are under the same condemnation'; we are running the same race.

If you reproach others, you too will quickly fall into the very same things.

For this reason this blessed man exhorts, saying:

'Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall.'

'Gentle, showing all meekness toward all men'—toward both Greeks and Jews, toward both the base and the wicked.

For there he strikes fear from things to come, saying:

'So that he that thinketh he standeth, let him take heed lest he fall.'

But here he brings men to a sense of shame not from things to come, but from things past, doing the same thing by what he adds: 'For we ourselves also were once foolish.'

This is what he does also in the Epistle to the Galatians, when he writes:

'When we were children, we were held in bondage under the elements of the world.'

'Therefore reproach no one,' he says.

'For we too,' he says, 'were once foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving various lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, and hating one another.'

So then, toward all such men we ought to be of this disposition, and to bear ourselves with gentleness.

For he who was formerly such a man, and has been delivered from it, ought not to reproach those who are such, but rather to pray, and to give thanks to Him who granted both to himself and to them deliverance from their former evils.

Whenever, then, you are minded to reproach someone while you yourself are living uprightly, call to mind both your former life and the uncertainty of what is to come, and rein in your anger.

For even if you have lived virtuously from your earliest years, still you may well have many sins;

and if you have none, as you suppose, consider that this came to pass not from your own virtue, but from the grace of God.

For if He had not called your forefathers, you too would have been disobedient.

See how he has run through every kind of wickedness.

Did not God in ten thousand ways make provision through the prophets, through all means? Did we not hear? 'For we too,' he says, 'were once going astray.'

'But when the kindness and love toward man of our Saviour God appeared'—

How? 'Not by works done in righteousness which we ourselves did, but according to His own mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit.'

Alas! how deeply were we baptized in wickedness, so that we could not be cleansed, but needed to be born anew!

For this is regeneration.

For just as with a house that has become decayed, no one puts a prop under it, nor patches it onto the old structures, but tears it down to its very foundations, and so raises it up anew and renews it;

so He did not merely repair us, but built us anew from the foundation.

For this is the meaning of, 'And renewing of the Holy Spirit.'

And again, showing this in another way, he adds:

'Which He poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Saviour.'

So great is our need of mercy.

'That being justified by His grace,'

'We should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.'

This is at once both an exhortation to humility, and a hope concerning things to come.

For as He saved us when we were to be born from above, to be saved by grace, having no good thing of our own, much more will He accomplish this in the age to come.

For nothing was worse than the brutality of mankind before the coming of Christ.

For all were disposed toward one another as enemies and foes;

fathers slaughtered their own children, and mothers raged madly against their children;

nothing stood firm—neither natural law nor written law—but all things had been overturned;

adulteries without end, murders, and—what is more grievous than murders—thefts (indeed one of the pagan writers says that the deed was even reckoned a virtue;

and reasonably so, seeing that they even worshipped such a god), oracles continually bidding that this man and that be put to death.

Shall I relate something of those times? A certain Androgeos, son of Minos, came to Athens and won a wrestling match, and was made to pay the penalty, and was slain.

So Apollo, curing one evil with another, commanded that twice seven youths be led away in payment for this.

What could be more savage than this tyranny? And this came to pass; and when a man came to break the madness of the demon, he slew those youths, because among the people the deceit still held sway;

but once they roused themselves and defended their own, it held sway no longer.

Now if the thing were being done justly, it ought not to have been hindered;

but if unjustly—as indeed it was unjustly—then it ought not to have been commanded from the very beginning.

They worshipped boxers and wrestlers.

Wars continual and one upon another—city against city, village against village, house against house.

And among them a certain philosopher enacted a law that a slave should be permitted neither to love boys nor to anoint himself with oil, as though the practice were something virtuous and holding great honour.

For this reason they even stood openly in the brothel doing this thing without concealment.

And if one were to go through all that pertained to them, he would find plainly that they did outrage even to nature itself, and there was no one to hinder it;

but all their plays are full of these things—of adultery, of licentiousness, of corruption.

Foul all-night festivals took place, and women were summoned to the spectacle;

at night, in the theatre, there was an all-night revel, and a virgin sat in the midst of frenzied youths and a drunken mob.

The darkness was their festal assembly, and the abominable deeds performed by them.

'We too were once foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving various lusts and pleasures.'

'Such a one fell in love with his stepmother,' it is said, 'and such a woman with her stepson, and hanged herself.'

For as to the loves of boys, which it is their custom to call 'favourites' (paidika), one cannot even bring oneself to speak of them.

But what of it? Would you see marriages with mothers? This too is found among them; and, what is truly dreadful, the thing came to pass through ignorance, and their god did not hinder it, but looked on while nature was outraged—and that in persons of distinction. But if those who might reasonably be expected—if for no other reason, then at least for the sake of the opinion of the many—to cling fast to virtue, if these were borne headlong into wickedness in this manner,

what is it likely that the many, who live in secret, were doing? What is more manifold than this pleasure? Such a woman fell in love with such a man;

and when her husband returned, she slew him by the hand of the adulterer.

Most of you perhaps know the story.

The son of the murdered man slew the adulterer, and sacrificed her as well;

and after this he himself went mad, and was driven on by the Furies.

Then this very man, thus driven to madness, went off and slew another, and takes that man's wife for himself.

What could be worse than these calamities? It is for this reason that I speak of these things drawn from those outside the faith, that I may persuade the Greeks how many evils held the whole world in their grip.

But, if you wish, let us also demonstrate this from our own Scriptures.

'They sacrificed,' it says, 'their sons and their daughters to demons.'

And again, those who dwelt in Sodom perished for no other reason than that they raged with lust after boys.

But again, at the very outset of Christ's coming, did not the king's daughter dance in the midst of the banquets, among men who were drunk? Did she not ask for a murder, and for the head of the prophet as the reward of her dancing? Who shall declare the mighty acts of the Lord? 'Hateful,' it says.

For it is altogether inevitable that, when we let loose upon the soul all its pleasures, much hatred should arise.

Why so? Because where love is joined with virtue, no one takes advantage of another.

'Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, nor covetous, nor revilers, nor drunkards shall inherit the kingdom of God.'

Do you see how every kind of vice was rife, and how great was the gloom, and how justice was corrupted? For if those who enjoyed the gift of prophecy, and who saw so many evils occurring both among their enemies and among themselves, nevertheless would not endure it, but wrought countless novel wickednesses,

what then of the rest? But again, among them a certain man commanded naked virgins to wrestle before the eyes of men.

Many good things be yours, in that you cannot even bear to hear the word spoken!

But the philosophers were not ashamed of the very deed itself.

And another philosopher, the chief among them, even leads women out to wars, and commands that they be held in common, as though he were some pander and procurer.

'Living,' it says, 'in malice and envy.'

For if those who practised philosophy among them enacted such laws, what should we say of those who did not practise philosophy? If those who had a long beard and wore the philosopher's cloak said such things, what should we say of others? The woman was not made for this, O man, that she should be set out in common for all!

O you who overturn all things!

You who mingle with males as though with females, and lead forth females as men into war;

for this is the work of the devil, to confound and overturn all things, and to shake and remove the boundaries laid down from the beginning, which God established for nature.

For to the woman God gave only the keeping of the house, but to the man the management of public affairs;

but you drag the head down to the feet, and raise the feet up to the head.

You arm women, and are you not ashamed? But why do I speak of these things? Among them they bring on stage a certain woman who has slain her own children, and they are neither ashamed nor abashed to cast such abominable tales into the ears of men.

'But when the kindness,' it says, 'and the love toward man of God our Saviour appeared, not by works of righteousness which we did, but according to his own mercy he saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, which he poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Saviour, that being justified by his grace we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.'

What does 'according to hope' mean? That is: Just as we hoped, so shall we enjoy;

or that you are already heirs.

For since he had discoursed concerning things to come and not yet present, he added that which makes it worthy of belief.

'These things are true,' he says, 'and it is evident from what has already gone before.'

For he who delivered us from so great a lawlessness and from so many evils, it is quite plain that he will assuredly also impart to us the things to come, if we persevere in his grace;

for all things proceed from the same tender care.

Let us therefore give thanks to God, and let us reproach others in nothing, accuse them in nothing, but rather exhort them, pray on their behalf, counsel and admonish them, even if they insult us, even if they spurn us;

for such are those who are sick.

But those who are eager for the health of the sick endure everything, do everything, even if they accomplish nothing, that they may not blame themselves as having been negligent.

Or do you not know that often, when the physician has given up the sufferer, some one of his relatives says to him:

'Apply the treatment once more, and leave nothing undone, that I may reproach myself in nothing, that I may find no fault with myself, that I may have nothing to accuse myself of?' Do you not see how much forethought relatives take for their dear ones? How much they do for this cause, both entreating the physicians and keeping constant vigil at the bedside? Let us at least imitate these;

and yet the concern is not for equal things.

But now, when a child's body is sick, no one would decline even

to undertake a long journey abroad, in order to dispel the disease;

but when the soul is in an evil state, no one takes any account of anyone;

but we have all sunk down, we are all slothful, we are all negligent, overlooking both children and wives and our own selves as we are caught up by this grievous disease.

But afterwards we come to a sense of it.

Consider how shameful and utterly ridiculous it is to say afterwards, 'We did not expect it, we did not hope that this would come to pass';

and not only shameful, but also perilous.

For if, in the present life, it is the mark of fools not to foresee things to come, much more is it so in the life to come, when even now we hear many counselling and telling us what must be done and what must not be done.

Let us therefore cling to that hope, let us be careful for our own salvation, let us in all things entreat God to stretch out his hand.

How long will you be slothful? How long will you be negligent? How long shall we despise ourselves and our fellow servants? He himself richly poured out upon us the grace of the Spirit.

Let us therefore consider how great a grace he has shown toward us, and let us likewise show forth an equal zeal;

or rather, so great is not possible, yet at least let us show a lesser one.

For if, even after this grace, we remain insensible, our punishment will be the greater.

'For if I had not come,' he says, 'and spoken to them, they would not have had sin;

but now they have no excuse.'

But may it never be that these things should be said concerning us; rather, may it be that we all be counted worthy of the good things promised to those who have loved him, in Christ Jesus our Lord, and so forth.