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Those bars of the flaming gridiron were the pen with which the martyr's tongue wrote his testament; by which pen both hell was threatened against the impious judge, and a crown was written for Hippolytus who followed. The sparks of the fire hissed as the flames crackled, and the ministers of the persecutor groaned, because the angels of the Saviour rejoiced. Those same men persecuted Him as He rose again, whom the poor shall go before as He comes from the gridiron. From the gridiron they led him down to the city of Rome; from the tomb they lead him up to the everlasting homeland. Christ the Lord shall meet him in the air, who helped him in the fire — for He deigned to appear with the three children in the furnace (Dan. 3:92). He will give him a chariot of cloud after the gridiron of burning fire.
The gridiron had fiery wheels; the clouds shall have pleasant drops and cooling rains — that just as on the little bed of the gridiron, rejoicing, he fell asleep in the peace of the Lord, so in the Jerusalem of the Lord he may sing and say: This is my rest, here will I dwell, for I have chosen it (Ps. 131:14). And what were the angels singing at this triumph? Blessed are they who dwell in Thy house; unto ages of ages they shall praise Thee (Ps. 83:5). SERMON 61. On the man who fell among robbers. Let the ways of the world rejoice, for the Maker of heaven passes by, having before Him the angelic powers, that He may make the robbers cease in the gorge, and may raise up the innocent half-dead on the road. Behold, the laments of the journey are gone, the groans of the half-alive lying there.
The Physician passes by: he who mourned is silent, he who lay there rises up. Struck by robbers, he begins to be carried on the Lord's shoulders. He, he it is whom the Gospel showed us lying there, and whom the Lord in the heavens showed to the angels, breathing again upon His own shoulders. A certain man (Luke 10:30). His name is not recorded, because he had been blotted out of the book of the living. He had forsaken the vision of peace — for so Jerusalem, whence he had come down, is interpreted. He had forsaken the temple of peace, the seat of rest, the court of the angels, the Church of the firstborn (Heb. 12:23); and as he descended he began to lie open in the hands of robbers. O man, you who lie there, how well you had been stretched out, how well you used to enter in among the gates of pearls, and rejoice!
How well you were sheltered above the banks of that crystal river by the shade of the medicinal trees! Those leaves do not fall; why then have your footsteps fallen away from there? There was none there to terrify you: no lion snatching and roaring in the woods, no bear lying in wait there, no leopard on the road of the Assyrians — for there is the delight of the angels. There are no robbers there, for there is nothing unclean in it; no gorges there, for there is nothing hidden in it, but a light seven times as bright and shining. Everything in it is gentle. There is no sickness there, no plague, no poverty and want; why then did such a city displease you, where there is no slanderer, no impious usurer? There no strife of the tax-gatherer, nor does the clamour of the litigant resound:
for peace is in Thy strength, O Lord, and abundance in her towers (Ps. 121:7). Her streets speak a song of gladness, and all her lanes cry alleluia; why then did such a precious homeland displease you? You went down, you fell in with a band of robbers, you lie there — rise up, you who willed to go out, compelled by no necessity. No one drove you out; who then calls you back, save He who did not drive you out, but takes you in? How often, seeing the robbers lurking armed with swords of malice in the gorge, did you turn your face back to the fair summits of those towers, to the sweet entrances of the gates, and were displeased with yourself, and blamed yourself; and yet did not come to your own aid — unless the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, should come down? Come, come, Lord Jesus of Nazareth.
Come down to him who lies there, comfort him who mourns, revive him who sighs. Bow the heavens, and come down (Ps. 143:5). Thy dominion is upon Thy shoulders; let the wounded man be taken up again upon Thy neck; let him who is pierced through with the sword breathe again upon the wood. Thou didst dispose to heal, who didst permit him to be wounded, and didst not will him to die utterly, that half-alive he might mourn, and through penitence recognize himself, and not, dying that very day, have been without tears. There is none, O Lord, who may succour him, none who may bring medicine, none who may lift the wretched man from the road, save Thou alone, the way, the truth, and the life. A priest passes by in his course, and does not put his neck under the wretched man. A Levite passes; he grieved, and passed on by.
Thou, made obedient even unto the death of the cross, hang up on the wood the wounds of him who laments. This He did, who came down to see the groanings of the fettered, stood still, had mercy, lifted up the delicate one, and set the wounded man upon His own shoulders. He made Himself a beast of burden, like a brute, made like a dumb lamb; He set him upon His own beast, not another's; He soothed him with the chrism of His own name, and poured out wine from His own blood. And the merciful Samaritan began to walk with another's burden, for He Himself bore our infirmities and healed our wounds (Isa. 53:4). He brought the restored guest to the inn. He calls the innkeeper, the steward of His own inn, and commends to him the deposit which He was carrying. And He says, Take my pledge to yourself.
Guard my deposit. He has just now been cared for; he lay a long while, was long shut in by robbers. Cherish with your inward affection him whom I have carried to you on my own shoulders. I hand over the expenses; thus I commend him to be healed; out of my own outlay restore the inward parts of the hungering man. Behold, He said, you have two pennies — He did not say gold pieces, nor silver: because to the two Testaments no metals can be compared, not of gold nor of silver, nor of amber, for they are written by the finger of God and of the Holy Spirit. These are the expenses of our journey; medicines are furnished to the Lord; two denarii are entrusted. And it is said to the innkeeper, If you spend anything more, I will repay you when I return (Luke 10:35). What does he spend over who receives what he pays out?
This is charity, which spends more than is enjoined, for it does not seek its own (1 Cor. 13:5); charity has no limit. And the innkeeper says, spending something over what he received: But concerning virgins I have no commandment of our Lord; I give counsel (1 Cor. 7:25). Whence, when the Holy Spirit came, He led into all truth the man who lay there, that he might receive health from the present Physician, and that, with the Holy Spirit consenting, he might learn chastity, and returning to the Jerusalem which he had forsaken, might not desert the city. SERMON 62. On the only son of the widow of Nain. Where the heavenly life deigns to enter, there death the enemy has no power. Our life is Christ; let us all say, Where, O death, is thy sting (1 Cor.
15:55)? Christ by His own death has saved our death; let us say again, Where, O hell, is thy victory (1 Cor. 15:55)? Behold, our Physician enters the gates of the city; let the widowed mother cease from her tears. Whence and whither has He come, who by His own death comes to the aid of the dead? From a centurion to the wretched mother, from a servant to a son, from a rich man to an only child. There He is asked to come; here He deigns to come of His own accord. There was one to send, that he who was ill might not utterly perish. Here is only the mother and the only son, with whom alone her affection had departed, while the pitiable mother debates with herself, and turns over in her mind that the time of burial was already drawing near, and there was none to run to the Lord of healing. Whom shall I send, she cried, and who will go to my Lord?
Not a kinsman, not a neighbour, not a servant, nor another son. If I leave him, my dead one will accuse me. My Lord knows my funeral, wherever He is — how the mother has remained alone in her inward parts, alone in her griefs. Would that the gates of my womb had been closed, that I might not have brought forth him whom I bewail! Would that, like an untimely birth, he had been made within the secrets of my womb, that he might not have seen the light, from which a twofold blindness of grief is cast upon me! Neither husband, nor a son, only my Lord has remained to me. I know that He sees me weeping; but if He comes quickly with power, He will destroy neighbouring death. For behold, the pit of the tomb is prepared; where is my life? Do you think I shall bury this one, or shall I hope in my Lord?
Amid these things, as she weeps and weeps, and her tears are upon her cheeks, and there is none to comfort her (Lam. 1:2): behold, the emperor of life arrives; He was entering, she was going out. Death and Life meet each other. Angels go before with spiritual attendance, sharing in the griefs of the mother. Through them faith cries out. Say to the mother of the daughter of Zion: Let the apple of thine eye be still. Behold, the Saviour comes, having His reward with Him, and His work before His face (Isa. 62:11). What is His work? What is the Lord? The blind see, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the dead are raised (Matt. 11:5). Behold His work. What is His coming?
Behold, He comes with His holy companions, the emperor with His twelve apostles — not in a golden chariot to terrify the living, but in the toil of walking, that He might raise the dead. He draws near, He who was not far off; He comes to the gate, He finds a twofold misery: an only son and a widow. He is moved because of the only son, for He too is the Only-begotten; He is moved because of the widowed mother, He who makes the barren woman to dwell in a house, a joyful mother of children (Ps. 112:9). He beholds the wretched widow following the bier of her dead, tearing her cheeks, scattering her hair with her hand, she who was attending only to her son, who had no other on whom to look. She does not see the Lord, but He beholds her mourning.
He became a spectator of those who wept, a forbidder of those who bore the bier, a consoler of tears. He does not first address the mother, He does not first pour out words of consolation to her, for He knew that she was overwhelmed with tears. He admonishes the bearers of the bier to stand still. Set down, He says, your burden; behold, you also, my healing. This weight shall not return upon you any more. Hell shall remain fasting, and the bier shall be carried back empty. But you have laboured too much in carrying. Sweeter is the fruit of your labour: that him whom you were carrying dead, you may lead alive to his homeland. Those bearers of the bier make haste, that they might become spectators of the miracle. They obey Him who commands, they consult their own toil.
They set it down, they stood still, and all raised their eyes to the Lord. There was made a great theatre, a sweet spectacle of angels and of men. The din of tears fell silent; mourning remained with the dead in the midst of the peoples. He draws near who never withdraws, drawing close to the bier. Descending from heaven He cries out to the dead man, Young man, I say to thee, arise (Luke 7:14). To thee, I say, lying under death, not to the people perishing under a proud life. Young man, I say, arise. Let there be no delay — not so much for you who lie there, as for the mother who mourns. Behold, the hour comes, and now is, when they who are in the tombs shall hear the voice of the Son of Man, and shall come forth to life.
Receive hearing, receive again your spirit, break the knot of the tomb, and behold your weeping mother. He called, He raised up, He set upright, He restored to the mother, saying, Receive, mother, your son. Your dead one shall be a pledge of faith, not a fruit of hell. She received him as though new, this young man whom she had lost, feeling that she conceived a better offspring in the word of the Lord than she had received in her mother's womb. I give Thee thanks, O Lord; better have I received from Thee than I begot from myself. I know not how I conceived, how I bore him I do not know, even as I have received him again. Thou knowest how his body was framed together in the womb by Thy word alone. I did not give the spirit, I did not fit together the bones. Thou didst give, Thou didst take away, Thou hast restored.
Tenderness clung to tenderness; the new-made son embraces his mother. SERMON 63. On the paralytic. Behold the fountain, dearest brethren, drawing near to the pool; already medicine hastens to the wretched. Behold the fountain at the pool, that the pool may receive water from the fountain. Not that the fountain should receive from the pool, for the pool furnished healing to one man only, but the fountain watered the whole earth, and to the whole ailing world, without exception of person, offered free medicine. The pool is built, but the fountain is not fashioned by human hand. The fountain does not take its beginning from the pool, nor is Christ begotten by man, but He Himself regenerates the human race. The fountain does not receive water through a channel, for it Himself directs the water to its passage:
for He was not born through man and woman, but through the Holy Spirit and a virgin mother. The pool had a rim; the fountain has no end. The pool was enclosed by porticoes, but the fountain of life is neither enclosed by heaven nor hidden by earth — He who reaches mightily from one end to the other, and disposes all things sweetly (Wisd. 8:1). That a sick man of long standing might receive health, the fountain would come, would fill the pool. One only would receive the medicine. Whence the fountain flowed, no one knew the fountain. Not the North, not the South, not the East, not the West — a hidden fountain: one man became well, for God is known in Judah (Ps. 75:2). But when all flesh saw the salvation of God,
the world learned that the fountain did not flow out of the pool, but that the pool, filled from the fountain, shone forth, when the fountain stood beside the pool unasked, and healed without the pool. What sort of porticoes were those! It is delightful to gaze upon the columns, but piety is more moved to look upon the sick, who were to be the columns of the Church when they should receive health. Columns of porphyry: men who would drink the blood of Christ. Columns of Laconian marble: the insane to be freed from the demon, at whose presence he had no longer any power over men. Columns of Parian marble shining in their row: the lepers and paralytics who were to pass through the fountain, that they might lay aside their variegation and receive from the fountain their unity.
Columns of Carystian marble: men who labour under penalty, now under grace, that according to the name of the columns the healing of the sick might be free of charge. There limbs are twisted, men are lame. The joint was healed by its Craftsman, and the paralytic without a craftsman was being tormented. The Architect comes, and a temple is raised upright by the stability of its members. The Architect fits His own lying structure beside the pool, which received but scanty water. The fountain stood, filled by none, but Himself filling all things, for of His fullness we have all received, grace for grace (John 1:16). He does not look to the pool, but asked of the sick man, Wilt thou, He said, be made whole (John 5:6)? He answered, Lord, the length of the time bears witness to my longing.
Long have I been sick; do I wish to be well in a single hour? Lord, long have I desired it, wearied with lying, borne and carried about, and I have no porters, neither men nor even the angels themselves. I have no bearers to the pool, and ill am I borne on the bed under penalty. I know, Lord, when the pool is stirred; but I grieve when another anticipates the remedy, and I, feeble, return to my bed. I lift my head, and as yet I do not see the head. In the pool the play of the laughing water trembles in its bright light, and my mournful sense shudders: I see how another ascends from the pool, shining forth, and I go down into hell while living. If Thou art He who livest and quickenest the dead, I shall not die, but live, and I will declare Thy works (Ps. 117:17).
Not without cause hast Thou questioned me, save that Thou hast come to help me. Let the Lord succour, since the servant does not succour. And the Lord said, Arise, take up thy bed, and go into thy house (John 5:8). He rose up at once from the pool, and through the fountain of grace directed a path of gladness to his own dwelling. He carries back the bed of his infirmity to his house, that without the bed of languor he might enter the heavenly Church. The sick man, made whole, carries the bed, because the Physician of the world took away the sin. He carried His own burden upon His shoulders; but the Lamb of God bore upon His neck another's burden. And that bed was the cross. But the paralytic's bed was interwoven with the garments of his transgressions:
the cross, however, had no weaving of garments, because it had no bonds of sins. The healed man rejoices, and the Jew is jealous, that from the fountain the Christian may rejoice. What are you doing? cry the Jews; do you take up your bed on the sabbath? O open blasphemy! Better that I take up my bed on the sabbath than that my bed carried me on the sabbath. On the sabbath I always lay for thirty-eight years, and had no servile ministry. The Lord of the sabbath came, and I received the Lord's sacrament. O Jews, if you knew where you lie, you too would take up your pallets on the sabbath, for the sabbath was no hindrance to the Lord, nor did my Physician wait for the aid of the pool.
He dismissed his mourning, laid down his bed, bade farewell to his pallet, repaid it its turn, lest perhaps the ungrateful bed should accuse him. The Lord met him as he carried the pallet out. The rescuer met His rescued one, the paralytic made whole. The Saviour saw him rejoicing, and does not tolerate one who is careless: Behold, He said, thou art made whole (John 5:14). Rejoice in thy health, be anxious about infirmity, that the second death may have no power over thee. Do not think that without cause I amended thee, and for so long a time chastised thee: thou wast the guilty one, not I; thou didst not heal thyself, but I. See that thou sin no more, lest something worse befall thee (ibid.). This the Lord said, and not the angel — when, the pool being stirred, one man went down and the paralytic sighed.
For an angel used to move the water in the pool, and one only was saved. Christ came, did not look to the pool, and the nations flowed in. Now not one pool merely supports sinners, because throughout the whole world infants are reborn who were once catechumens. Now the reservoirs of the fountain are not enclosed by porticoes, but are surrounded by the prophetic and apostolic writings, that the thronging herds of thirsting stags may not suffer the heat. For the fountain Himself cries out, He that thirsts, let him come and drink (John 7:37). Nor is there now a time for an angel to move the water, because the Holy Spirit makes pleasant the fountain of grace, as it was said that the Spirit of God was borne over the water (Gen. 1:2).
Then He was borne above the water, but now He dwells in the sweet rest of the earth, in which within He is not seen, but is believed. Nor are bodies only saved, but souls are set free. All who are baptized are raised up to the kingdom of heaven in their course, so that, ever attending to the pallet, they may be zealous to shun the sins of their conduct, and, without the bed of infirmity, the just may live unto ages of ages. Amen. SERMON 64. On the man whose field brought forth abundant fruits. You have heard, brethren, how the blessed evangelist today set before us a parable, saying: The field of a certain rich man brought forth abundant fruits, and he thought within himself, saying, What shall I do, since I have nowhere to gather my fruits? And he said, This I will do:
I will pull down my barns, and build greater ones, and there I will gather my fruits; and I will say to my soul, Thou hast much goods laid up for many years; take thine ease, and be merry. But God said to him, Fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee; and whose shall those things be which thou hast prepared (Luke 12:16 ff.)? O the blindness of avarice, most beloved brethren! One night remained, and he was busy about the storing up for many years. He was rejoicing over as much as he saw being born to him, and did not know that he would carry nothing away with him, but here would diminish everything. The night denied him life, and he was thinking about the morrow. What he saw in others he did not expect in himself. Surely he had seen possessors, he had seen dying men.
He had seen that no one carries the earth away with him, but that all are rather consumed and swallowed up by the earth. How many are there even now who speak thus: So much have I, so much do I possess, so much do I accomplish? To whom it must be answered, according to the Gospel, Fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee; and whose shall those things be which thou hast prepared? However far greed may stretch its roots everywhere, however much it may snatch, it must needs in a single hour let all go. But you will say, I have sons for whom I toil, I have those for whom I would bear the greatest care. What care do you bear for your sons, that you may oppress them with the tears of the wretched? This is not to love your sons, but rather to slay them.
Do you not know that every tree is known by its fruit? Do you not know that what is hidden in the root is declared in the branches, and what lies concealed in the leaf shines forth in the apple? I do not want your sons to feel you such a father. I do not want you so to provide as rather to envy. O how many are born poor, and afterwards become rich! And how many are there to whom a great inheritance is left, and who afterwards are reduced to want! For neither does Holy Scripture lie, which says, God makes poor and enriches; He humbles and exalts (1 Sam. 2:7). If, then, it belongs to God to make poor and to enrich, why do you set yourself up as it were the provider of your sons? Why do you snatch what you can? If perhaps they should remain, you know not; for yourself you are nourishing perpetual punishment,
and leave the greatest grief to your sons? For Scripture says, He who gathers together the goods of others leaves grief to his sons. And again it says in the Psalms: Yet man walks about in an image; yet he is vainly disquieted. He lays up treasure, and knows not for whom he gathers it (Ps. 38:7). Why do you lay up treasure? Why do you store away talents of gold and silver? Why do you keep the sculpted image of the king in coins of gold, and detest the image of God the Creator in men? Let there be also for God the things that are God's. Our forefathers therefore abounded in all riches, because they both gave tithes to God and paid tribute to Caesar; but now, because devotion to God has withdrawn, the exaction of Caesar has increased. For the treasury takes away what Christ does not receive.
This is given to barbarians which is not bestowed upon the poor. You err greatly, O miser, who think to acquire possessions in this world: daily it slips away, daily it fails; the world threatens its own ruin and gives witness to its end. And does it delight you to persist there, to keep building there, from which the saints long to depart? Build what stands, not what falls. Build what abides, not what remains behind here; and purchase for yourself paradise, purchase for yourself heaven, where you may abide forever. But if you wish to purchase heaven, do what is commanded. 'Do not spare your treasures,' says Solomon. Alms, moreover, are to be given according to the measure and quantity of one's substance, as it is written: 'Son, according as you have substance, so make alms out of it.'
If you have abundance, give the more out of it; but if you have little, share even that little with the poor (Tob. 4:8-9). If the equity of the law be observed, man's tenacity ceases. In the work of almsgiving there is no distinction of persons. The two mites of that poor widow went before the great love-feasts of the rich. She who was sustained by the mercy of others herself performed mercy, and what ought to have been done for her, this she rather did herself. And though her whole substance was two coins, she did not give one and keep the other for herself, but sent all that she possessed into the offerings of God. This is she who took no thought for the morrow. And you also, brethren, have received the widow's work, a work so great;
if you cannot give the whole, out of the whole give at least a little. Know this, that he who sows sparingly shall also reap sparingly; but he who sows in blessing, from blessing shall reap eternal life (2 Cor. 9:6). SERMON 65. On the woman who had an issue of blood. Most beloved brethren, we perceive better by believing what we have well learned by reading, that Christ alone applied medicine to men, to whom the divine Majesty also gave power. For He heals not with drugs and the knife, but cures by His powers and by His word. Indeed, by power He healed the woman's ailment, and by a word He raised the centurion's servant. For twelve years the woman spent her substance upon physicians (Mark
5:25-26), longing to escape, but had Christ not come, she was bound to remain in her plight. So the woman laid aside the shame of modesty, that she might disclose to men the grief of her secret. The physicians promise health; the woman squanders her means; she gave away her substance, and drew out her illness the longer. The chief physicians dismissed her still begging, whom they did not restore rejoicing. Now in two ways the woman was worn out: she endured both poverty and pain. The physicians of the flesh had no power to restore with a remedy her whom by plundering they meant to leave failing in want. Burning therefore with destitution, and long pondering upon health, there was no lack of a counselor: faith, which drove away her need.
'Behold, all my substance has been squandered by the physicians, and it has profited me nothing, for I am not cured.' Silent faith found a counsel. She sees the physician, she sees also the crowd. Pain compelled her to seek the medicine, and shame hindered her, lest she should declare her case before men. 'I will put forth my hand,' she says, 'and touch the fringe of His garment, and I shall be made whole' (Matt. 9:21). She dared to receive what she dared not to ask. And so the disciples were standing, and the crowds together, and we too have heard Christ teaching. Yet those who heard were not without part in this deed that was done. 'I perceive,' says Jesus, 'that virtue has gone out from Me' (Luke 8:46). And the disciples: 'Lord, the crowds press upon You' (ibid., 45). 'Peter,' He says, 'I perceive that virtue has gone out from Me.'
'What do you say — the crowds press upon You?' The woman therefore, made whole by touching the fringe of His garment, feared to conceal the benefit she had received, lest she be condemned because she asked not; in silence she received what she readily requested. Touching the fringe with the tips of Christ's fingers, the woman deserved to be set free, she who, consumed by the physicians, could by no means be freed as a prey though she came with prayers. Divine Faithfulness provided a physician for the woman's care, that neither should He Himself seek out the cause, nor she disclose the secret of her modesty. Therefore, as Christ demonstrated to all the fruit of faith, then the woman also declared her case before men. To whom Jesus said, 'Go, daughter, your faith has made you whole.' And the woman was made whole from that hour (Matt. 9:22).