The proper and fitting title of this homily is not the one which Mabillon, its first editor in the Museum Italicum, part 2, no. 5, copied from the Sangallensis codex, namely On the Kalends of January, and Gallandius after him; but it ought to have been copied from the Ambrosian codex, in which it is this: On the Kalends of the Gentiles; because in this homily St. Maximus treats against the Saturnalian games, the beginning of which was on the 17th of December according to the ancient institution of the Romans, and which were celebrated for three or five days according to the differing opinion of writers. But the whole homily On the Kalends of January contains a vehement rebuke against the obscenities of that day and against men masked and transformed into beasts;
but in this one, indeed, the intemperance and baseness of the banquets, to which the pagans gave themselves at the time of the Saturnalia, is condemned, and the avarice of the wealthier is reproved, who accepted New Year gifts and presents from their slaves and clients. But the chief argument of this homily, and that which certainly proves it to have been delivered by St. Maximus before the Nativity of the Lord, is drawn from its very beginning; for it commends the providence of God, that he arranged that Christ the Lord should be born in the midst of the gentiles' festivities, and should scatter with the light of his divinity the shadowy superstitions, and by his coming bring true joy and felicity to the world.
Festivals of this sort of heathenism, then, had been instituted in the months of December and January, and were carried out with the greatest, not so much noise as vice, from which Christians, heaped with more joyful gladnesses and holier gifts, ought to shrink. Having therefore restored to the homily its own true title, for its particular commendation I will say that other Fathers—namely Ambrose, Augustine, Leo the Great, and Peter Chrysologus—delivered orations against the superstition of the January Kalends, but that Maximus alone learnedly and vehemently held forth to turn the faithful away from the Saturnalian games.
這類異教的節慶，是在十二月和一月設立的，其舉行與其說是喧鬧，不如說是充滿惡行，基督徒既得了更喜樂的歡欣與更聖潔的恩賜，就理當厭棄這些。因此，既已把這篇講道恢復它自己真正的標題，為特別稱許它，我要說，其他教父——即安波羅修、奧古斯丁、大良（Leo the Great）以及彼得·屈梭羅格（Peter Chrysologus）——都曾針對一月朔日的迷信發表講論，但唯有馬克西穆斯博學而猛烈地講道，勸使信徒離棄農神節的遊樂。
Well was it in a certain way disposed by God's providence, that in the midst of the gentiles' festivities Christ the Lord should be born, and that amid the very shadowy superstitions of errors the splendour of the true light should shine forth: so that men, perceiving that the righteousness of pure Godhead had flashed out amid their various superstitions, should forget their past sacrileges and not worship the things to come. For what wise man, who honours the sacrament of the Lord's Nativity, would not condemn the drunkenness of the Saturnalia, would not turn aside from the lasciviousness of the Kalends; and, desiring to have a part with Christ, would be unwilling to be a partaker with the world? For this is the reason of divine worship, that whoever has had fellowship with the vanity of the gentiles cannot have union with the truth of the saints.
The blessed Apostle says: 'What fellowship hath righteousness with iniquity? or what communion hath light with darkness?' (2 Cor. 6). This is to practise at one and the same time the wantonness of iniquity as Christians and yet to suppose that the God of righteousness is appeased. For there are very many who, dragging along a custom from the old superstition of vanity, keep the day of the Kalends as if it were the highest festival; and they wish to have their merriments in such a way that there is rather sorrow in them. For they behave so licentiously, they so glut themselves with wine and feasting, that a man who has been chaste and temperate the whole year through is on that day drunken and defiled; and unless he acts so, he thinks he has lost the holidays, because he does not understand that through such holidays he has lost his salvation.
And how base is this: that men rise early and go out in public each with his little gift, that is, with New Year's presents; and about to greet his friends, he greets them first with a reward before a kiss? He offers lips to lips and puts hand into hand, not to render the affection of love, but to pay off the homage of greed, and by one and the same courtesy he both embraces his friend and defrauds him. Judge for yourselves what sort of kiss that is which is for sale: for the more dearly it is bought, the more cheaply it is esteemed. How many worthier men, before the gold appears, are judged unworthy of a kiss? After the gold has gleamed in the right hand, the plunder—not the grace—makes them worthy. And this in the very injustice: how unjust it is that the inferior is expected to give a gift to the superior;
and one is compelled to lavish gifts upon the rich man—a man who perhaps borrows the very thing he lavishes. And still they call this very largesse 'New Year's gifts' (strenae), when it is rather 'strenuous' (strenuum)—the thing that is extorted, I say, when the wretch is forced to give what he does not have, and to offer a present for which he leaves his own sons bound as pledges. Yet the rich too are liberal with this largesse: but not even they seem free of sin. For the rich man lavishes only on whoever is wealthy; and while he has scorned to give a coin to a beggar, on the Kalends he hastens laden with gold to a friend's house—the same man who at the Lord's Nativity came to the church empty and void. You see then that with very many the present flattery counts for more than the future recompense. He would rather have the kiss of a superior than the glory of the Saviour.
That kiss ought not to be called a kiss, because it is for sale. For Judas Iscariot too kissed the Lord with such a kiss, yet by it he was trying to betray Him. And what sort of thing is this: that when a day has intervened, with such an empty beginning, as though they were just starting to live, they gather omens and inquire into all things; and from thence they measure out for themselves either the prosperity or the sadness of the whole year? Since these things are foolish and ridiculous, they are also either useless or harmful to those very people. For they do not have prosperity, while they are deceived by auguries; they always have sadness, while they are anxious with the recollection of all things, lest they befall them.
And to their evils they add this: that, as though returning home from taking auspices, they carry little branches in their hands—namely for an omen, so that they may return to their lodging laden; not understanding, the wretched ones, that they return laden indeed, not with a burden of gifts, but with a heap of sins. The end.