Homilies on the Song of Songs 1 part 19/20

for such men have no sight as the criterion of the good, the good is not tested by taste, nor by smell and touch, nor is the judgment of the good entrusted to any other sense-organ, but with every sense deadened, through the soul alone they lay hold of and reach out toward the goods that appear according to thought, and thus they glorify the woman, the Church—neither puffed up by honors nor contracted by faintheartedness in the face of things grievous, but even if they must be cut in pieces for the faith in Christ, or be cast to wild beasts or to fire, or endure some other of the grievous things, they enact in the experience of painful things the insensibility of the hairs.

Such was Elijah, who arose from Gilead with a rough and squalid body, covered with the skins of a goat, remaining undaunted in the face of every threat of the tyrant.

As many, then, as in imitation of the prophet's greatness of nature raise themselves above the whole world—being in want, afflicted, ill-treated, in mountains and caves and the holes of the earth, of whom the world is not worthy—these, being contemplated in flocks about the head of the universe, become the glory of the Church, ascending together with the Gileadite unto the heavenly grace.

And the goat as an animal was taken up into the praise of the hairs, perhaps because the nature of such an animal is also constituted suitably for the production of hair, so that the animal naturally shaggy with hair becomes a riddle of the adornment that is through the hairs; or because it walks over the rocks without slipping and turns about the peaks of the mountains, making its way courageously through hard and precipitous places, which will aptly be fitted to those who accomplish the rough road of virtue.

But rather one might say that, because this animal was taken over by the Lawgiver for many purposes of the legal sacred ministry, it contributes to the head for a eulogy.

And I know that also in the riddles of the Proverb, among the four things that go well, this too is numbered among the things that pass through nobly—the he-goat that leads the herd of goats.

And what we conjecture by way of surmise concerning this is of the following sort:

Every pursuit, beginning through one person, is passed on to many;

as in the case of the smith's craft, when the Scripture, having said that Tubal was the inventor of the art, traces back to him the knowledge of all who after him have handled the working of iron.

So too Abel led the way in shepherding, and Cain in husbandry; and it calls Nimrod the founder of the hunter's craft, and Noah of viticulture, and it says that Enosh began the hope in God;

and many such things may be learned from the Holy Scripture, namely that, when one person has practiced something, the pursuit has entered into life by way of imitation.

Since, then, Elijah, in every excellence, led the way in divine zeal beyond all others, as many as after him imitated his zeal and followed in the same footsteps of the prophet's boldness have become the herd of the one who led the way in such a life;

such men become the glory and praise of the Church, being ranked in the adornment of the hairs—those from whom the life of sensation has been separated and estranged.

And through similar means He fulfills the praise also for the teeth.

These would be those who nourish by themselves the body of the Church, whom He wishes always to be seen clean as from the washing, and unencumbered throughout as from a fresh shearing, and, according to the offspring of the virtues, bearing twins—becoming fathers of the double purity, that which is contemplated according to the soul and that according to the body—so that everything unfruitful in what is better is banished from these teeth.

This the prophet named both a watch and a door of enclosure, for the mouth to be opened to the word in season and to be shut in season.

And that the cord is the name of a measure we have learned from the prophecy of Zechariah, namely that the angel who spoke in him had a measuring cord in his hands.

And the word most attains to the measure especially when it happens to be dyed round about with the ruddy color, which becomes a riddle of the blood of Him who redeemed us.

If, then, anyone, according to Paul who spoke, has within himself Christ who redeemed us by His own blood, this one has the measuring cord upon his mouth, adorned with the blood-red dye.

The words that follow are an interpretation of the riddle;

for by 'a comely speech' he names the scarlet thread, whereby again he signifies that which is seasonable and well-measured;

for that which is truly comely, appearing in the proper season of its prime, is neither unripe nor overripe.

And by making the cheek beautiful like the rind of the pomegranate, he bears witness to a great perfection in the bride with respect to good things;

for he signifies that her treasure has not been stored up in anything else, but that she herself is her own treasure, containing within herself the provision of every good.

For just as the edible part of the pomegranate is enclosed within the rind, so he shows that within the visible beauty of her life is contained the treasure that lies within her.

This, then, is the hidden treasure of hopes, the proper fruit of the soul, which by a virtuous life is held fast, as it were, within the rind of a pomegranate.

As for the phrase 'Besides thy silence,' I think it bears this meaning: that the praise consists not so much in the things that appear, whatever is disclosed by speech, but rather in whatever is hidden beneath silence and escapes the disclosure of speech;

for just as silence is understood to be that which lies beyond speech, so too one will not err in understanding that which lies beyond silence to be speech.

For we keep silence about that which we are unable to declare through words.

If, then, silence is understood to be that which lies beyond that thing, it follows entirely that one should reckon speech to be that which lies beyond silence.

Therefore he who said 'Besides thy silence' clearly presents this to us by his words: that the things capable of being manifested by speech, which lie beyond silence, are indeed good and great; but the things beyond speech, those covered by silence, the ineffable and unutterable, are altogether greater and more wonderful than those that are spoken aloud.

Let us also listen to the praises that follow, whose meaning resembles that well of the narrative, upon whose mouth a heavy stone lay and made it impossible for the shepherdesses to have a share of the water.

But Jacob, coming upon it, levered the stone from the mouth, and having filled the troughs, gave the water to the flocks that they might freely delight in the stream.

What, then, are the things we liken to such a well? 'There are threescore queens and fourscore concubines and maidens without number.

My dove, my perfect one, is but one;

she is the only one of her mother, she is the choice one of her that bore her.'

Who, then, will roll away for us the stone of this obscurity? Who will draw out the water of the meanings that lie so deep as to be unattainable by our discourse? Yet it seems well to me to declare this to your ears: that to know these things belongs only to those of whom the Apostle says, 'In everything ye were enriched, in all utterance and in all knowledge.'

But our poverty is unable to lay hold of the treasures of meaning here set before us.

Nevertheless, that we may not fall under the condemnation of idleness, for the sake of him who gave us the law to search the Scriptures, we shall not shrink from adding at least some small labour to these matters as well.

We say, then, that a certain more elegant doctrine is set before us in these sayings through the philosophy contained in the praises of the bride.

And the doctrine is of this kind:

existing things are not created and re-created according to the same sequence and order;

and one of the things created is human nature, which itself did not, like the others, advance to perfection by a process of gradual progress, but was fashioned in perfection from its very first existence;

for 'man,' it says, 'came into being according to the image and likeness of God.'

This indicates the very summit and utmost perfection of good things.

For what could be found higher than likeness to God? In the first creation, then, the end appeared together with the beginning without any interval, and nature took its start of being from perfection.

But since, through its relation to evil, nature became familiar with death and slipped away from its abiding in the good, it does not recover its perfection all at once after the likeness of its first constitution, but proceeds along a certain path to what is greater, being stripped little by little, through a certain sequence and order, of its attachment to the contrary things;

for in the first formation there was nothing to hinder nature's perfection from concurring with its coming into being, since evil did not exist; but in the second re-forming, the interval of temporal extension necessarily accompanies those who run back toward the first good.

This is because, our understanding having been bound through evil to a material attachment, it is by degrees, as though scraped clean of some enveloping husk through a more elegant manner of life, that it sheds its inbred union with the worse.

For this reason we have learned that there are many mansions with the Father, according to the proportion of each one's relation to the good and his departure from the worse, since a recompense is prepared for all;

for one man is at the beginning of the allotment of the better, having just now, as it were, swum up from some depth of the life lived in evil toward participation in the truth; another has already, through diligence, come to an increase of the better; another has grown yet more through desire for good things; another stands midway in the ascent to lofty things; another has run past the middle; and there are some who have raised themselves above even these; others have outstripped those; and beyond these still others strain toward the upward course.

And in general, according to the varied difference of choices, God receives each one in his own rank, allotting to all things according to their worth, gathering the rewards of good things for the loftier ones and measuring them out to the lesser.

These things we have supposed the discourse to philosophize through the sayings set before us, distinguishing in what has been said to us the difference of souls that look toward the Bridegroom;

for some he names 'maidens,' surpassing the nature of number by their multitude; others he says are 'concubines,' and others 'queens,' fixing the number of the concubines at fourscore, and saying that the queens amount to threescore; and above all of them he sets the perfect dove that is contemplated in unity, whom he declares to be also the only one to her mother and the choice one to her that bore her.

By these divine oracles, then, we are led to understand this: that some, having just now come out of the deceit that lies in the depths as of some womb, being as it were newborn and not yet having received within themselves the reason fully articulated, contemplating amid an infinite multitude by a rather irrational assent of faith, have indeed believed the word of the mystery to be saving, yet do not have the truth firmly established within themselves in any exact knowledge and in the full assurance that comes through reason.

These are they who were named 'maidens,' because they still lead a young spiritual age; who, having been begotten by the word of faith, have not yet through fitting growth become such as to advance to the prime of marriage and to attain unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the marriageable age, so as to be able, in the fear of the Lord, to conceive and to give birth to a spirit of salvation, but still live together with a disposition somewhat irrational, in the infancy and imperfection of their understanding.

Yet even these belong to those who are saved, as the prophet says: 'Thou shalt save man and beast, O Lord,' calling 'beast' the more irrational portion of those who are saved.

We are taught by the discourse a twofold difference of infancy;

(neither life, nor death, nor things present, nor things to come, nor any other of existing things); but others flee from the experiences of adultery through fear of punishment;

for these too abide in incorruption and in sanctification, but being trained rather by fear than by longing alone, they do not admit evil.

Those, then, who through the more perfect disposition have been mingled by their longing for incorruption with the purity of God, are named 'queens' on account of their fellowship in the kingdom; but those who work out virtue through the fear of the threat, the discourse names 'concubines';

for none of them is yet able to become the mother of a king and a partner in the dignity.

For how could she who has not yet taken up within herself the masterless and self-governing character of the virtuous mind be able, but withdraws from fellowship with evils by a servile fear? And there are illustrations of what has been said: on the part of the queens, the case of those deemed worthy to stand at the right hand, to whom the King says;

and of the second and lower rank would be those to whom the Lord says;

'Fear him who, after he hath killed, hath power to cast into the gehenna of fire.'

This distinction of the two ranks, it seems to me, the difference in the numbers indicates through a riddle.

How do I mean this? There are six commandments through which the kingdom is prepared for those on the right.

Let us reckon each of these to be the Master's talent, which is fitting to be increased tenfold by the good and faithful servant through his labour, so that thus he may enter into the joy of his lord, being found faithful in a few things and set over many.

Thus, then, the one is divided into threescore queens, being distinguished and numbered according to the kinds of the commandments, and the bride becomes a partner in the kingdom of Christ, the one having become a people of queens, numbered through so many dignities that accord with the commandments.

But if we have supposed, not beyond likelihood, that the sixfold set of commandments cultivated tenfold in one soul is signified through the threescore queens by a riddle, then consistently we say that through the fourscore also the mystery of the eighth is indicated by a like riddle, toward which those who are trained by fear look and are kept back from fellowship with evils;

for so we have learned in the psalmody, in which the eighth is set forth beforehand by the superscription, and there are plainly the voices of those being scourged, who by their fear of the things hoped for bend the hearing toward mercy.

For he who looks toward the eighth says to the fearsome Judge;

'O Lord, rebuke me not in thy wrath, neither chasten me in thine anger.

Have mercy upon me, O Lord, for I am weak;'

and having put this forward, he who feared the eighth comes to a perception of participation in mercy, saying: 'The Lord hath heard the voice of my weeping.'

And since many blessed fears are declared by the holy Scripture, there would also in these cases be, analogously to the six commandments, the tenfold increase, so that he who has been taught by the psalmody how the fear of the Lord is rightly accomplished by turning away from evil and doing good, may increase tenfold, as it were some mina or talent, the possession of fear through his labour; and thus the soul that holds the second place after the queen, which works out the good through fear and not through love, may be broadened out to the number of fourscore, showing forth on the field of its own life, without confusion and distinctly, each kind of the things rightly accomplished through fear, so that in this one too the account of the eighth may be broadened out along with the tenfold increase, and thus she may become one who, in servile fear and not in bridal love, draws near to the good, a concubine instead of a queen, on account of the fear of the eighth, which she has increased tenfold in her right accomplishments, adding up to the number of fourscore.

Her also the word of the narrative commands, having served for a season by a spurious and not a noble birth, not to dwell together with the queen unto the end, since the servile offspring has no equal share of the royal inheritance with the freeborn birth;

for 'Cast out,' it says, 'the bondwoman and her son;

for the son of the bondwoman shall not inherit with the son of the freewoman.'

But if to anyone the contemplation directed at the number set forth in the sayings appears rather forced, let him call to mind that at the outset we testified to our inability to attain the truth in these matters, having touched upon it only so far as not to pass by the riddles altogether untried.

Yet if love should perfectly cast out fear, according to what is written, and fear, being transformed, should become love, then the thing that is saved is found to be a unity, in the union with the one and only good, when all have been united to one another through the perfection that accords with the dove.

For something of this kind we understand from the word that follows, which says: 'My dove, my perfect one, is but one;

she is the only one of her mother, she is the choice one of her that bore her.'

This is more clearly interpreted for us in the Gospel through the voice of the Lord;

for depositing in his disciples through the blessing every power, he bestows upon the saints the other good things through his words to the Father, and adds the chief of good things, namely, that they should no longer be split apart in many ways by any difference of choices in their judgment concerning the good, but that all should become one, having grown together into the one and only good, so that through the unity of the Holy Spirit, as the Apostle says, being bound tightly by the bond of peace, all should become one body and one spirit through the one hope unto which they were called.

But it would be better to set forth the divine words of the Gospel themselves verbatim;

'That they all may be one, as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us.'

And the binding force of this unity is the glory;

and that the glory is said to be the Holy Spirit, none of those who have considered the matter would gainsay, looking to the very words of the Lord.

'For the glory,' He says, 'which Thou gavest Me, I have given unto them.'

For He truly gave such glory to His disciples, He who said to them these words:

And He who had clothed Himself in human nature received this glory which He always possessed before the world was; and when that nature was glorified through the Spirit, the imparting of the Spirit's glory extends to all that is akin to it, beginning from the disciples.

'The glory which Thou gavest Me, I have given unto them, that they may be one, even as We are one;'

'I in them, and Thou in Me, that they may be made perfect in one.'

This is the perfect dove upon whom the Bridegroom gazes, saying, 'My dove is one, my perfect one; she is the only one of her mother, she is the chosen one of her that bore her.'

Who then will roll away for us the stone of this obscurity? Who will draw out the water of these thoughts, lying so deep that it is unreachable by our discourse? Yet it seems good to me to testify this to your hearing: that to know these things belongs only to those to whom the Apostle says, 'In everything ye were enriched, in all utterance and in all knowledge.'

But our poverty is unable to lay hold of the treasures of the Word here set before us.

Nevertheless, that we may not fall under the condemnation of idleness, for the sake of Him who has given us the law to search the Scriptures, we will not shrink from adding even a little sweat to these matters.

We say, then, that the philosophy contained in these sayings sets before us, through the praises of the bride, a certain teaching of the more refined sort.

And the teaching is of this kind:

Beings are not created and re-created with the same sequence and order;

For when at the beginning the nature of creation was brought into being through the divine power, in the case of each of the beings the end was completed together with the beginning without interval, since for all things brought from non-being into being perfection arose simultaneously with the beginning.

And one of the things created is also human nature, which did not, like the others, come to perfection by way of gradual advance, but was fashioned together with perfection from its first existence;

for man, it says, was made 'according to the image of God and after His likeness,'

which indicates the very highest and most perfect of good things.

For what could be found higher than likeness to God? In the first creation, therefore, the end appeared together with the beginning without interval, and nature took its beginning of existence from perfection.

But since, by being made akin to death through its inclination toward evil, it flowed away from abiding in the good, it does not recover perfection all at once after the likeness of its first constitution, but advances by a certain path toward the greater, through a sequence and order gradually putting off its affinity for the contrary.

For in the first formation there was nothing to hinder the perfection of nature from concurring with its coming-into-being, since evil did not exist; but in the second re-fashioning the extension in interval necessarily accompanies those who run back toward the first good.

This is because our understanding, bound to material affection through our evil, is little by little, as though by the stripping of some enveloping rind, scraped clean of its congenital attachment to the worse through the more refined manner of life.

For this reason we have learned that there are many mansions with the Father, according to the analogy of each one's relation to the good and its distance from the worse, since the recompense is prepared for all;

for one is at the beginning of his allotment of the better, having just now swum up as it were from some deep of the life lived in evil toward participation in the truth; another has already, through diligence, become an addition of the better; another has grown further through desire of good things; another holds the middle of the ascent to lofty things; another has run past even the middle; and there are some who have raised themselves above these too; others have surpassed even those; and yet others beyond these strain toward the upward course.

And in general, according to the manifold difference of choices, God receives each one in his own rank, allotting to all things what is according to worth, and gathering the rewards of good things to the higher, and measuring them out to the lesser.

We have surmised that the Word philosophizes on these things through the sayings before us, distinguishing in what has been said to us the difference of souls that gaze toward the Bridegroom;

the dove, whom He declares to be also the only one of her mother and the chosen one of her that bore her.

By these divine oracles, then, we are led to understand this: that those who have just now come forth as it were from a womb of deceit lying deep within, being newborn as it were, and not yet having received within themselves an articulated reason, are beheld in an infinite multitude, holding to faith by a less rational assent; they have indeed believed that the word of the mystery is salvific, yet they do not possess the truth established within themselves in any knowledge or in the full assurance that comes through reason.

These are the maidens so named, because they still lead a young spiritual age; having been begotten by the word of faith, they have not yet, through fitting growth, become such as to advance to the prime of marriage and attain to a perfect man, to the measure of nuptial age, so as to be able, in the fear of the Lord, to conceive and bring forth a spirit of salvation; but they still live together with a disposition somehow less rational, in the infant and imperfect state of understanding.

Nevertheless, these too are among the saved, as the prophet says: 'Men and beasts Thou wilt save, O Lord,' calling 'beasts' the more irrational portion of the saved.

But of those who through fitting diligence have grown in understanding and have already left behind infancy, we are taught by the Word a twofold difference;

some [cling to the good through love, from which nothing can separate them—] neither life nor death, nor the present nor the future, nor anything else of the things that are; while others flee the trials of adultery through fear of punishment;

for these too remain in incorruption and sanctification, but being led rather by fear than by longing alone, they do not admit evil.

Those, then, who through the more perfect disposition, by longing for incorruption, have been blended with the purity of God, are called 'queens' because of their sharing in the kingdom; but those who work out virtue through fear of the threat the Word names 'concubines;'

for none of these is yet able to become the mother of a king and a sharer in the dignity.

For how could she who has not yet taken up within herself the masterless and self-governing quality of a virtuous mind, but withdraws from fellowship with evils by a slavish fear, [attain to that]? And examples of what has been said are, in the case of the queens, that concerning those counted worthy of the standing at the right hand, to whom the King says:

And of the second and lower rank would be those to whom the Lord says:

'Fear Him who, after He hath killed, hath authority to cast into the hell of fire.'

And it seems to me that the difference according to the numbers indicates this distinction of the two ranks by way of a riddle.

How do I say this? There are six commandments through which the kingdom is prepared for those on the right.

Let us reckon each of these to be the master's talent, which it is fitting should be increased tenfold by the good and faithful servant through his labor, that so, being found faithful in a few things, he may enter into the joy of his lord and be set over many things.

of the queens, the one that has come to be [is] she who is numbered by so many, that is, by the dignities according to the commandments.

And if we have surmised, not beyond likelihood, that the sixfold set of commandments, cultivated tenfold in one soul, is signified by way of a riddle through the sixty queens, then consistently we say that through the eighty also the mystery of the eighth is indicated by the like riddle, toward which those who are trained by fear look and are kept away from fellowship with evils;

for so we have learned in the psalmody, in which the eighth is set forth by way of the title, and directly opposite are the voices of those being scourged, who by the fear of things hoped for bend the hearing toward mercy.

For he who looks toward the eighth says to the fearsome Judge:

'O Lord, rebuke me not in Thy wrath, neither chasten me in Thine anger.'

'Have mercy upon me, O Lord, for I am weak;'

'Heal me, O Lord, for my bones are troubled,'—and all that follows in his supplication set forth to the incorruptible Judge, in which he also laments that there is no remembrance of God in death (for how could it be possible for those condemned to weeping and gnashing of teeth to have the gladness that comes from the remembrance of God to arise in them, since the prophet says elsewhere that 'the remembrance of God produces gladness'?); and having set forth these and certain other such things, he who fears the eighth comes to the perception of participation in mercy, saying: 'The Lord hath heard the voice of my weeping.'