Theological and Ethical Discourses 1 part 10/27

the same One will also be a garment for all, such as each one ought, already from this present life, to put on with diligence, since no one who enters the mystical marriage without wearing this unapproachable robe shall be admitted;

and if anyone, having slipped himself in among the others unnoticed, should enter — though this is impossible — he would nevertheless likewise be cast out again.

For wishing to show us that no one wearing black shall enter there, the Master made this known through the parable, saying:

'Friend, how did you come in here without a wedding garment?' Then:

'Bind him hand and foot, and cast him into the outer darkness.'

I do not think he said this as though he had gone unnoticed by the One who cannot be deceived, but because the time had not yet come to reveal such mysteries.

For not wishing to say more openly at that time that:

'No one shall enter there who is not wearing the garment of my divinity,' he intimated the matter in this indirect way.

And Paul too, taught by Christ who spoke in him, said this:

'And just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly man.'

Since, he says, 'as is the man of dust, so also are those who are of dust; and as is the heavenly man, so also are those who are heavenly.'

Who, then, is the image of the heavenly man?

Hear the divine Paul himself saying:

'Who, being the radiance of glory and the exact imprint of his hypostasis, and the unchanging image of God the Father.'

Therefore the Son is the image of the Father, and the Holy Spirit is the image of the Son;

he who has seen the Son has seen the Father; he who has seen the Holy Spirit has seen the Son;

'The Lord is the Spirit,' and again:

'The Spirit itself intercedes for us with unutterable groanings,' crying, 'Abba, Father.'

Rightly, then, he said that the Spirit is the Lord, in that it cries 'Abba, Father' — not as though the Spirit were the Son, God forbid, but because the Son of God is seen and beheld in the Holy Spirit, and the Son is never revealed to anyone apart from the Spirit, nor the Spirit apart from the Son, but rather the Son is beheld in the Spirit itself, and it is he who, through the Spirit, cries 'Abba, Father.'

If, then, you do not know these things, beloved, do not cast yourself into despair by saying:

'I neither know these things nor am able to learn them;'

'nor shall I ever be able to reach and ascend to the height of this knowledge and vision and purity.'

'Since, if one does not become such as this, and does not, already from this present life, put on Christ as God, and behold him wholly, and acquire him as an indwelling guest within oneself, one does not enter into his kingdom — what benefit is there for me even to strive at all, or to be deprived of the enjoyment of present things?' Do not say this, do not think it —

First of all, then, believe with your whole soul that all these things which we have said are true, according to the divine and God-inspired Scriptures, and that it must come to pass in this way for everyone who believes in the Son of God, since he has given us authority to become children of God, and if we are willing, nothing hinders us; and that for this very reason the whole economy and condescension of the Son of God took place, that through faith in him and the keeping of his commandments he might make us partakers of his divinity and of his kingdom.

For indeed, if you do not believe that these things truly come to pass in this way, you certainly will not even seek them;

and if you do not seek, neither will you receive;

'Ask, and it shall be given to you.'

But believing, follow the divine Scriptures and do whatever they tell you, and you will find all things without deficiency, just as it is written — or rather, even far more than what is in the divine Scriptures.

'Things which eye has not seen, and ear has not heard, and which have not entered into the heart of man — the good things which God has prepared for those who love him.'

If you firmly believe these things, as has been said, you too, without any doubt, shall behold them just as Paul did;

and not only that, but you will also hear ineffable words, having evidently been caught up beforehand into paradise —

where the thief entered together with Christ, and is now there.

But do you wish that I tell you in another way what those good things are which eye has not seen, and ear has not heard, and which have not entered into the heart of man?

I know that you altogether long to hear what even he who saw it did not say or interpret.

So that, as I suppose, it might not be disbelieved by those who heard it.

If, then, you too are about to disbelieve what is going to be said, stop right here;

for it is better for you not to approach with the eye of your mind what lies ahead at all, since, if you reject what is said to you and refuse to heed my words — or rather the words of God himself, since both we and our words belong to him — this very Word will judge you on the day of judgment, because, having heard, you disbelieved.

But listen without doubting to our words, or rather, as has been said, to the words of God;

The ineffable words spoken to Paul in paradise — these very same, I say, are the eternal good things which eye has not seen, and ear has not heard, and which have not entered into the heart of man, which God has prepared for those who love him; they are not contained by any height, nor bounded by any place, nor hidden away in any depth, nor kept at the ends of earth or sea, but they are before you and right before your eyes.

Along with the good things laid up in the heavens, the very Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, which we see and eat and drink every day — these, admittedly, are those very good things;

but apart from these, you will not be able to find even one of the things spoken of anywhere, even should you traverse the whole of creation.

But if you wish to know that what is said is true, become holy through the practice of God's commandments, and thus partake of the holy things;

But indeed, for further confirmation, hear also the very words of that Lord himself, speaking thus to the Jews and to his own disciples:

It was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven.

For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.

Lord, give us this bread always.

Then Jesus said to them:

I am the bread of life;

he who comes to me shall never hunger, and he who believes in me shall never thirst at all.

The Jews then murmured about him, because he said:

'I am the bread that came down from heaven,' and they said:

Is this not the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know?

How then does he say, 'I have come down from heaven'?

Do not, then, become like the Jews yourself, murmuring and saying:

Is this not the bread that is on the paten, and the wine in the cup, which we see every day and both eat and drink?

How can he say that these are those good things which eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor has entered into the heart of man? But hear what the Lord said in reply to those who spoke such things:

No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him;

and I will raise him up on the last day.

No one can come to know my divinity — for this is what it means to come to me — unless my Father draws him.

In speaking of 'drawing,' he did not signify any kind of compulsion, but rather that he called through revelation those whom he foreknew and predestined, drawing them evidently through the love of the one revealed to them.

And what follows makes this even clearer:

He, then, who has been taught by God is able to believe in the Son of God, and having learned from the Father, comes to me — not as one who has beheld the Father;

for only he who is from God, he has seen the Father.

He who believes in me has eternal life.

I am the bread of life.

Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and died;

but this is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die.

I am the living bread that came down from heaven;

if anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever;

and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.

The Jews therefore quarreled among themselves, saying:

How can this man give us his flesh to eat?

Jesus then said to them:

Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in yourselves.

He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day;

for my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink.

Have you heard how the communion of the divine and immaculate mysteries is eternal life, and that it is those who have eternal life whom the Lord says he will raise up on the last day — not as though the rest were altogether abandoned in their tombs, but in the sense that those who have life are raised by that life into eternal life, while the rest are raised into the eternal death of punishment?

And that this is true, hear what follows:

He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him.

As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so he who eats me shall likewise live because of me.

Do you see how the Son of God expressly proclaims that our union with him, through this communion, becomes of the very same kind as the union and life which he himself has with the Father?

For just as he is united by nature to his own God and Father, so also he says that we, by grace, through eating his flesh and drinking his blood, are united to him and live in him.

But lest we should suppose that the whole of it consists in the bread that is seen, for this reason he spoke of it in many ways:

'I am the bread that comes down from heaven,'

for this indicates a coming down that happens once.

'He who comes down,' he says, evidently signifies one who continually and always comes down upon the worthy, and even now arrives hour by hour.

Moreover, drawing our mind away from the things that are seen — or rather, leading us up through them to the invisible glory of his hypostatic divinity — he said:

'I am the bread of life,' and again:

bread not from earth, but from heaven, the true bread.

By calling the one from heaven 'true,' he showed that the one from earth is false, profiting nothing.

And that he might make this yet clearer:

'For the bread of God,' he says, 'is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.'

So that you may suspect nothing bodily, nor conceive anything earthly, but may see even that small bread — the little portion that has been deified — with the eyes of the mind, and behold it as having become wholly like the bread that comes down from heaven, which is true God, and both bread and drink of immortal life; lest, remaining in unbelief and clinging with all your senses to the bread alone that is seen, you should eat bread that is not the heavenly one but only the earthly, and be deprived of life, as one who has not eaten the heavenly bread spiritually, just as Christ himself says:

It is the Spirit that gives life; the flesh profits nothing.

He says this concerning those who claim that this one is a mere man, and not God.

Therefore, if even you yourself, the believer, partake as of bread only and not of a deified body — not as one receiving that whole Christ himself — how do you hope to receive life from it and to have it perceptibly within yourself, when the Lord says:

'He who eats the bread that comes down from heaven will live forever,' and again:

'It is the Spirit that gives life'?

Truly the Spirit is the true food and drink;

it is the Spirit that transforms the bread into the body of the Lord;

truly it is the Spirit that purifies us and makes us worthy to partake of the body of the Lord.

For those who partake of this unworthily, as the Apostle says, eat and drink judgment to themselves, not discerning the body of the Lord.

Come, then, therefore, as many as are faithful, as many as understand the power of the mysteries that has been spoken and declared, as many as have eaten the heavenly bread, as many as have acquired from it and through it and in it and with it the eternal life — let us also, in that true life, be caught up in the Spirit to the third heaven, or rather, spiritually, to that very heaven of the Holy Trinity, so that, beholding together and hearing all that has been spoken and all that remains unspeakable, and tasting and smelling them, and touching them well with the hands of the soul, we may send up a thanksgiving hymn to the God who loves mankind, saying thus:

Glory to you, who have appeared, and have deigned to be revealed and to be seen by us.

Let us also speak, in common, to all our brothers:

O fathers, O brothers — both monks and those who live in the worldly life alike, rich, poor, slaves, free, young and old, every age and every race — hear:

Is he perhaps not a liar, yet powerless, so that he would be unable to do what he promised?

Will he delay to visit all the nations?

Will anyone be able to hide from his eyes?

Will man be able to endure the revelation of his glory?

For how, when the heavens shall be dissolved with a roaring noise and the elements shall be destroyed by burning, as the Apostle says, will man then endure the day of the entrance of the unapproachable God, who dwells in unapproachable light — who, coming into the world in it and with it, is about to be seen by all flesh?

But as for those who believe these things and long to be saved, hear what the Holy Spirit says:

Turn back, each of you, from his evil way;

seek the Lord, and your soul shall live;

turn away from evil and do good.

Are you not friends of God — nay, sons, nay, gods by adoption, being manifestly like to God by nature according to the grace given us from on high? Depart from your thrones, and having gone, first admonish yourselves from the divine Scriptures;

but if not, then when it is revealed you will know that our God is a consuming fire — not to his friends, nor to those who loved him, but to those who did not receive him when he came as light.

You rulers and rich men, become rather subjects and poor, since it is hard for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of heaven;

but if it is hard for the rich man, how then for the ruler?

For the Lord says to his own disciples:

'The rulers of the nations lord it over them;'

'but it shall not be so among you; rather, whoever wishes to be first among you must by all means be last, and slave of all, and servant of all.'

But whom, then, does Scripture call a ruler?

It calls him who seeks his own honor, him who through his rule fulfills his own will.

But if our Lord and God, having come upon the earth for our sake and giving us a type and pattern of salvation, said:

'I came not to do my own will, but the will of the Father who sent me' — what other one of those who believe in him, not doing his will but fulfilling his own, will ever be able to be saved?

And why do I speak of his being saved, when such a one cannot even be faithful, or a perfect Christian?

And making this clear, Christ and God said:

'How can you believe in me' — evidently, since you do not seek the glory that comes from the only God? Therefore everyone who seeks the glory of God and is zealous in every way and in every matter to do his will would never think of ruling anyone, or of being at all superior to small or great; but the more the stewardship and care of many is entrusted to him, the more he will hold himself to be the lowest and the slave of those many peoples, coming to a true perception of it.

But those who have not become such in disposition, but altogether retain a sense of human glory and have acquired a desire for wealth and luxury — I truly hesitate to say that such men are heathen, and not true Christians, according to the divine word of Jesus and God:

'for all these things the nations of the world seek after.'

'But you,' he says, 'seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.'

But do you understand, then, what kingdom he says we ought to seek?

Is he saying we should seek the one in the height of the heavens, the one that is to be after the resurrection, or, as though it were far away somewhere, this kingdom?

What sort, then, does he command us to seek?

Attend closely to what sort of kingdom it is that ought to be sought by us.

but even over the things not yet come to be, as though already come to be, he himself reigns within himself, because through him they shall come to be, and whatever else after these is to come to be; and he reigns no less also over each one of us, in righteousness and knowledge and truth.

This, then, is the kingdom he says you should seek: that just as God reigned over the nations, as it is written, he might also reign over us, since we are from among the nations.

As one mounted upon us as upon some chariot, and holding as reins in his hand the wills of our souls, he will lead us wherever he wishes, having found us tractable, and will make use of our wills, submitting readily to his laws and commandments, as of horses for his own will.

Thus men also become cherubim, bearing upon the back of their souls, in this present world, the God who is over all.

Who, then, is so foolish and senseless as to desire rule or glory or riches before both seeing and experiencing this glory?

Or rather, who is so desperate and wretched as to suspect that some other glory, or kingdom, or riches, or honor, or rule, or luxury, or anything else called and reckoned good on earth or in heaven, is greater than the kingdom and glory of God, so as to choose those things instead of this?

Truly, for those who have understanding, there is nothing else more to be desired than this.

Therefore, as Christ goes about seeking to reign over us all, let no one foolishly repel him;

let no one, I beg, deprive himself of this great and welcome gift;

let no one make himself fallen from the true glory;

let no one, through desire of the flesh, be deprived of the sweetness of the true life;

But come, all of you, if it be possible, gathering together as one, let us long for and seek that he who is above every rule and authority and every name that is named should come upon us and reign over each one of us, so that each of us, having taken him wholly to himself, may have him inseparable by day and night, shining with unapproachable light — the light which shall then consume the adversaries, when he comes on account of the unbelieving, those who now do not receive him nor wish him to reign over them;

likewise he will have him coming with him into the house, and reclining together with him upon the bed, and being embraced by the unbearable light, and together being ineffably kissed by it; comforting sicknesses, driving away sorrows and afflictions, expelling demons, providing hour by hour joy and tears sweeter than honey and the honeycomb, healing the passions of soul and body, abolishing death, causing life to spring up inexpressibly, and after the departure from the body raising each of us up into the heavens of heavens, each one bearing him mounted upon his own shoulders, he being taken up to the place from which he was never separated.

You must experience and learn these things, beloved, with the full perception of your soul, so that you may have God — now indeed raising you up together with himself apart from the body, but afterward also raising up this body of yours and granting it to you as spiritual — he who will also be reigning over you unto the boundless ages, always bearing you up into the air and always being borne by you, the God who is over all, to whom is due all thanksgiving, honor, and worship, together with his Father without beginning and his all-holy, good, and life-giving Spirit, now and ever and unto the ages of ages.

Concerning dispassion, and the gifts and graces given by degrees of progress within it;

and what is the perfection of spiritual maturity according to Christ,

of its energies and gifts.

For if with a troubled mind and an impure heart one begins to speak of its contemplations and subject matter, being unable to set forth its energies clearly with free discourse, he will fall away even from the goods which he perhaps received in part from it, since by so doing he in effect despises and dishonors it, and as it were dims its glory;

'To everyone who has, it shall be given, and he will have abundance; but from him who has not, even what he seems to have shall be taken away from him.'

As many, then, as have dispassion evidently love it, and are greatly loved by it in return;

and speaking of its insatiable [sweetness], they become still more dispassionate through it, being set aflame with longing for it.

But as many as are still bound even to some small and incidental desire of the world and its affairs, or to some passion of body or of soul, are far off and distant from its harbor;

hence, even if they begin to speak concerning dispassion and attempt to lift their mind to its height, being dragged like slaves and lured by the desire of the passion to which they are bound, they are deprived even of the peace of thought which they previously seemed to have;

'for by whatever a man is overcome, by this he is enslaved,' it says.

Therefore, being filled with darkness from that source, they do not attribute the cause of what happens to themselves, but they dare to attach weakness to all-powerful dispassion.

This happens to them because they have no experience whatsoever of the noetic perception and contemplation and its all-effective energy, but, reasoning about the matters concerning it merely by conjecture and in various and manifold notions, and being in different ways puffed up by falsely-named knowledge, they engage in mere talk and affirm to those who inquire concerning things which they themselves do not know.

For this very reason they are never persuaded either to perceive or to confess the weakness that has come upon them and remains in them from unbelief, prejudice, long habit, and negligence; but they even insist that all other men are like themselves, and testify that these too are enslaved by such passions;

for they are not permitted, by their own conceit and envy, ever to bear witness that anyone is greater than themselves in virtue and self-control.

But may it never be that we, who are lowly and unworthy to speak, playing the hypocrite in such matters, should falsify the truth and affirm concerning things we have not known — desiring rather, by experience more than by mere words, to draw upon ourselves beforehand the energy of the things about to be spoken;

but the things we have been deemed worthy to grasp and to learn from those whose mind has been illumined by blessed dispassion, and the things which, though speaking as if beside ourselves, we speak from it, having heard them mystically in the ear — these, though we be as cast-off men and worth nothing, we shall proclaim upon the housetops, in accordance with the grace that commands from on high, lest we be condemned like the servant who hid his talent.

Just as, then, you have heard the Master saying:

'Many are called, but few are chosen,' and 'In my Father's house are many mansions' — so too I wish you all to know that many are holy, but few are dispassionate;

And attend closely to the force and precision of what is said.

Dispassion of the soul is one thing, and dispassion of the body is another;

for the former also sanctifies the body, whereas the latter alone, by itself, profits him who possesses it nothing.

The immobility of the members of the body and of the passions of the soul is one thing, and the acquisition of virtues is another;

Not desiring any of the pleasant and delightful things of the world is one thing, and longing for the eternal and heavenly goods is another, since of the former, many, for one reason or another, have shown contempt, but of the latter, altogether few have taken thought.

So not seeking glory from men is one thing, and hanging upon the glory of God and unceasingly seeking after it is another;

for the former, even those mastered by other passions, very many have rejected; but the latter, only very few, with much toil and great labor, have been deemed worthy to receive.

Being content with cheap clothing and not desiring a splendid robe is one thing, and being clothed with the light of God is another;

Speaking humbly is one thing, and being humble-minded is another;

and humility is one thing, and the flower of humility is another, and its fruit is another, and the beauty of this fruit and its sweetness is another, and the energies arising from this are another.

Of these things, some are in our power, and some are not in our power;

and the things in our power are: in all things, to think, to be minded, to reason, to speak, and to do whatever leads us toward humility;

but holy humility itself, and its other properties and graces, and its energies, are a gift of God, and are not among the things in our power, so that no one may boast even in this;

and no one will ever be deemed worthy to attain these, unless he first sows well the seeds that are within his own power.

It is one thing not to be stung or angered amid dishonors and insults, and amid trials and afflictions, and it is another to take delight in them.

It is one thing to pray for those who do such things to us, and another to forgive them; it is one thing to love them from the soul as benefactors, and another to form in one's mind the face of each of them and to embrace them dispassionately as genuine friends, with tears of sincere love, no trace whatsoever of any displeasure lurking in the soul.

But greater than these things we have mentioned is when, even at the very time of trials, one possesses the same and like disposition unchangingly toward those who revile him and slander him to his face, and toward all others who condemn or insult or sentence him or spit in his face, but also toward those who are outwardly disposed under a pretense of friendship, yet secretly do the same things against him as those already mentioned, without, however, remaining undetected.

But higher than these again, incomparably so, I have supposed it to be, when one comes into complete forgetfulness of whatever he may have suffered, and never remembers those who grieved him or otherwise insulted him, whether they are absent or present, but treats them just the same as friends, without any other reflection, both in conversation and at shared meals.

All these things, then, are the works and deeds of men who walk in the light;

but as many as perceive themselves to be outside these things and the like, let them not be deceived nor delude themselves, but let them know for certain that they walk in darkness.

And besides these, it is one thing to fear God, and another to keep his commandments, as it is written:

'Fear the Lord, all you his holy ones'; and again:

'Turn away from evil and do good.'

Idleness is one thing, stillness another, and silence yet another;

and further, withdrawal and the moving from place to place are one thing, while sojourning as a stranger is another.

Sinlessness is one thing, and the practice of the commandments is another.

And in addition to all these, it is one thing to resist and wage war against one's enemies, and another to defeat them completely, subject them, and put them to death;