復活節講道集 第 1 章 第 17/28 段

Or else know that you are grossly insulting the divine nature, attributing to it the properties of bodies, and dragging down its exalted transcendence above everything created into a baser condition than would be fitting for it, or than could be believed to belong to it.

For since the Father is always Father, and has not advanced in time from potentiality to actuality in begetting, the one because of whom he is Father must exist together with him always.

For 'In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was God,' according to the Scriptures.

But since the word 'was' is used of him, with nothing set forth as prior, where will the course of our thought come to rest, and to what end will it arrive for us, if the mind should choose to pursue the 'was' amid such faint imaginings? Therefore he has indeed been begotten, and the Word was God;

and he has been begotten, not according to the nature of a body, so that one should think there to be, in every respect, otherness between the begotten and the begetter.

We have of necessity employed the term 'begetting' drawn from what pertains to us, signifying that the Only-begotten shone forth from the substance of God the Father after the manner of light;

and he indeed subsists distinctly, and is conceived as existing in an existence proper to himself.

But the account concerning this matter is altogether ineffable.

For he has not departed from the substance of the one who begot him into anything else, but rather, existing himself in the Father, and displaying the begetter in his own nature, he is worshiped together with him and glorified together with him.

And since he is consubstantial and of equal glory, he is of necessity also equal in operation and equal in power.

And since the Holy Spirit thus co-subsists with them, being together numbered as God with them and together flowing forth with them, our faith concerning the Holy Trinity will thereby be rightly and blamelessly constituted.

He, then, who is so exceedingly distinguished by the dignities of God and Father, through whom all things were brought forth into being, 'did not consider being equal to God a thing to be grasped,' as it is written, 'but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men;'

and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, becoming obedient unto death, even death on a cross. And yet, though it was in his power to remain established gloriously in his own preeminences, and to revel richly in his equality with the Father, and to be resplendent upon the thrones of the Godhead, he willingly came down to the form that is ours, suffering no wrong at all to his own nature by the assumption of what is inferior, but rather adding to himself nothing that had been lacking to him.

For it was not fitting—rather it was most perilous—to think and to say that human nature might, as it were, get the better of the divine and ineffable nature, and force it into its own unseemliness, and bring it down from its proper preeminence.

But it is wise, I think, rather to reason that what pertains to us will yield to the nature of the Godhead,

and will pass over to what is incomparably better, being overcome by the glory of that which excels.

For indeed it is among the most absurd things, that in what has been made by God we see even things not exceedingly beautiful adorned through the mingling and juxtaposition of better things,

yet to suppose that God, having communed with human nature in the manner he himself knows, would not rather impress upon it something of his own, but that he himself should instead sustain some unworthy injury in his own nature—

The sun, for instance, even when it casts the touch of its ray upon mire and marshes themselves, keeps its radiance altogether undefiled;

how then could it suffer anything of the things that customarily cause defilement? Being altogether unshaken, how could it be wronged by its contact with what is inferior? How does it not rather overleap the nature of the worse and, brightening it with its own excellences, carry it over to what is incomparably better? It is for this very reason, then, that some, having failed to marvel as they ought at things so venerable, put on airs of arrogance, and are afflicted with the disease of haughtiness;

and they suppose that they are pleading on behalf of the divine glory, while they mark out as unseemly what belongs to so excellent a dispensation.

For they do not accept the mystery;

but laughing broadly, they consider the matter altogether senseless, and say that we have taken confidence in vain follies.

They do not consider that, toward their own teachers, whenever these choose to think or say something, they sometimes keep their trust unexamined, granting them the 'He himself said it'; yet toward the divine judgments they set up their own private notions in opposition, thereby pouring down upon their own heads something altogether inescapable;

nor do they even accord to the divine nature those things which men have learned to honor.

But they suppose that some very clever argument, as they think, has been devised for them:

'For how,' they say, 'could the incorruptible mind, wholly free of quantity and circumscription, have found room within the body of a single man?' As for me, insofar as they exempt the Divine from the quantity of bodies, I commend them for it;

yet I say this, nevertheless, to those who have chosen to think in this way:

We do not say that the nature of the Word has been circumscribed, even though it is said to have dwelt, as in a holy temple, in the body derived from the holy Virgin;

but as God he filled the heavens, and the earth, and the regions below, and he was absent from none of all things whatsoever.

And together with this, he was also man.

But as for the 'how' or the manner of it, if you are unable to comprehend it, yield to what is beyond mind, and grant to what is beyond speech the silence that necessity demands.

You will confess that you are ignorant of many other things besides these.

For upon what is the earth fixed? What foundation does the heaven have? And in what manner was the chorus of the stars made, which traverses its path on high and above? But indeed, if one should choose to speak of each particular, he will, I think, spend long discourses in composing for you the accounts.

But indeed they say that it was a small thing for God, who is over all things, to become as we are.

You accuse him, then, of having made his care for us, being loving toward mankind and good by nature, more pressing than what was fitting.

For admittedly it was a small thing for him to become as we are;

but the very argument of his gentleness toward us will overturn the indictment.

And is it not altogether impious to subject to accusations that which was surely worthy of admiration? Tell me this, then, and answer one who is eager to learn:

Do you mean to say that it would have been better, and more conducive to his glory, to disregard what concerns us, and to take no account whatsoever of man, who had slipped into every kind of monstrous act? Or is this not so at all, but rather that it was better to save him, and to deem him worthy of due care? How, then, could anyone accustomed to right thinking hesitate to say that it was better and more fitting for him who is truly good by nature to distribute the goods of his own gentleness to those made by him? How, then, is this matter still grounds for indictment? And how do some babble nonsense against the blamelessness of this dispensation? But we shall concede to physicians the knowledge of how they themselves know to tame the savagery of diseases;

'For my counsels are not as your counsels;'

'nor are my ways as your ways;'

'but as the heaven is far from the earth, so are my ways far from your ways, and your thoughts far from my thoughts.' For by as much as what pertains to us is surpassed in nature, by that much, surely, will it also be surpassed in wisdom and in what is better; and seeing, without any deliberation, the path proper to each thing that must be done,

having grasped it by his own thoughts alone, he brings to completion what seems good to him.

For it belongs to God to err in nothing, nothing at all, and to accomplish all things rightly, according to what is written and was sung of old by the ancients.

But if it is dear to you, and a matter of earnest concern, to learn thoroughly the cause of the incarnation as well, I will make my account overcome hesitation, and will speak briefly.

For it is necessary that corruption be a sickness for things subject to becoming, and whatever has received a beginning of being made must surely, in its whole course, come at last to the end it must reach.

then, by granting him the power to do whatever he might choose, he bestowed upon him the dignity befitting free beings.

For it was necessary, indeed necessary, that virtue be seen in us as a matter of free choice.

Then, having slipped into sin through the deceptions of the devil, and having disregarded the laws given to him, man was condemned to death, and along with his transgressions corruption grew ever stronger in him.

And since it seemed good to the Maker to refashion this living creature back to its original state, and he desired to deliver it at once from corruption and to restore it to sinlessness, he ordained the law given through Moses;

and he also spoke through the holy prophets.

But nonetheless our condition remained beset by exceedingly many troubles.

Therefore they at last besought him to come from heaven himself, saying:

'Lord, bow your heavens and come down.' How then ought God to have become manifest to those upon the earth? Was it to be with naked glory, having no covering shadow at all? And who could have endured so awesome and unbearable a sight? And yet I hear a certain one of the poets among the Greeks—those carried away into the delusion of polytheism—saying:

'Hard it is for the gods to appear in manifest, visible form.'

That it lies beyond the measures of humanity to see clearly the glory of the incorruptible nature, you will know from this as well:

He came down in the form of fire upon the mountain called Sinai.

Then he spoke to the sons of Israel, with the all-wise Moses acting as mediator.

But Israel, unable to bear the sight, entreated earnestly, saying:

'You speak to us, and do not let God speak to us, lest we die.' Since, then, the sons of Israel had shuddered with dread, and had openly declared that the need of a mediator would be most necessary for those under instruction, the lawgiver added this reflection:

and having set forth Moses' ministry to the men of old as a kind of type of that which was to come through Christ, he promised that in due season he would clearly reveal him to us, saying:

'Rightly [have they spoken], all that they have said... I will raise up for them a prophet from among their brethren, like you;'

In order, then, that he might become like Moses—that is, a man, and a mediator between God and what pertains to us—he bore the human body;

and he took hold of the seed of Abraham, according to the Scriptures, so that he who is by nature life itself might drive out the corruption that had settled upon human bodies as a result of the curse, and might transform all things into the knowledge of God, into self-control, into courage, into endurance, and into the choosing to do and to think those things which render men worthy of emulation, and fill us with divine gifts.

But Israel failed to recognize this dispensation, even though the holy prophets had cried aloud clearly the mystery concerning him.

'Be strong, you feeble hands, and you enfeebled knees;'

'take courage, you who are faint-hearted in mind;'

'be strong, do not fear.' And elsewhere:

'Behold, the Lord comes with strength, and his arm with dominion;'

'As a shepherd he will shepherd his flock, he will gather the lambs.' And another, moreover—Ezekiel, this most excellent of the prophets—says:

'Thus says the Lord God:'

Behold, I will judge between the strong sheep and the weak sheep;

you squeezed every failing one, but I will save my sheep, and they shall no longer be for plunder;

for it had died long ago, from ages far distant and long past.

But just as it is the custom of divine Scripture to call those descended from Jacob 'Jacob,' and likewise those descended from Israel 'Israel,'

So then, it was in ignorance that they crucified him.

Yet he, although it was possible for him to escape suffering — for God could not have been forced — delivered himself into the hands of the murderers,

so that, being raised from the dead, he might give clear assurance — to those who had crucified him before all others — that God is Life by nature.

He came down into our condition, that he might show us to be stronger than death, and already victorious over corruption.

Since, then, Christ suffered on our behalf, abolishing death and banishing inglorious and profane sin,

and having been raised and having ascended into the heavens, and being soon to come again —

for he will come down and judge the world in righteousness, according to what is written:

let us wipe away every stain of sin, let us cherish self-control, bringing forth through patience the fruit of love for one another, and let us cultivate mercy toward those in need, love for the poor.

Let us share in the suffering of those in chains, and of those who are ill-treated, since we ourselves also exist in bodies.

And before all else, let us keep the faith upright and blameless within ourselves.

For then — then indeed — shall we fast purely;

beginning the holy season of the Forty Days on the twenty-seventh of the month of Mechir;

and the week of the saving Pascha from the second of the month of Pharmouthi, bringing the fasts to an end on the seventh of the same month of Pharmouthi, at deep evening, according to the apostolic traditions;

and we shall celebrate on the following Lord's Day at dawn, the eighth of the same month, and thereafter joining to it the seven weeks of the holy Pentecost,

for thus, thus again shall we delight in the divine words, in Christ Jesus our Lord;

through whom and with whom, be glory, honor, and dominion to the Father, together with the Holy Spirit, unto the ages of ages.

The season has gathered us here together.

We come forward now, not promising any broad and worthy display of eloquence;

in this we are very modest;

but rather, having resolved to follow the ancestral custom, established as it was out of necessity.

For as to excelling in these matters, I would reasonably attribute it not at all to myself, but would say that it belongs rather to these good and wise teachers.

The law gave to those of old the signal that they must observe the feasts, which were then still in types and, as it were, in shadows.

That it was necessary to give these matters the attention they deserved, and that carelessness in them was not without fault but subject to adverse judgment, the God of all made clear, speaking through the voice of Zechariah:

for since it is fitting to take delight in ordinances so venerable and so rightly established, no one ought to hold their observance as worth nothing.

And if anyone should dare to treat with contempt matters of such excellence, which have attained no ignoble renown, relegating their observance to sloth and neglect, the condemnation he incurs would be just, and the charges against him would not exceed what is fitting.

Therefore, as though marking out a well-trodden path, we shall proclaim it, remembering him who says:

'Priests, hear, and bear witness to the house of Israel, says the Lord Almighty.' It would be fitting for us also, exercising the utmost zeal and casting aside slackness — assigning it to the lot of the most shameful — to hasten to fulfill what is customarily prescribed.

For long ago the God of all, signifying to the divinely inspired Moses the season of our holy feast, and showing, as it were in a figure, how it should be kept by us in a manner befitting its sanctity and without blame, addressed him, saying:

'And let the children of Israel also keep the Passover at its appointed time, on the fourteenth day of the first month, at evening;

you shall keep it at its appointed times, according to its law, and according to its ordinance you shall keep it.' But it is necessary for us, who are bound to the sacred ministries, to employ a clear and resounding proclamation, and to cry out to those justified in Christ:

'Let my soul rejoice in the Lord;

for he has clothed me with a garment of salvation, and a robe of gladness.' It would be, as it seems to me, among the most shameful things, that merchants should be overcome by wretched profits, and count this a delight;

and that this should be reckoned their most urgent concern, even though it takes them through so long a span of time, and their gains are not gathered without sweat; and that farmers should exult over their fields, when they see them weighed down with ripe fruit —

while we, who gain things far beyond earthly things — indeed incomparably better — should fail to regard this pursuit as altogether worthy of consideration, and as the source of a joy that has no end.

And yet the affairs of merchants, even should they turn out as those who have labored for them would wish, would hold nothing marvelous, at least in the eyes of those who have chosen to live the best life;

while farmers who have prospered will have, at most, some modest delight left to them — not in anything that could benefit a man toward incorruption, that is, toward being able henceforth to prevail over the power of death and corruption, but only in having the means to live, and in tending to the body's temporary needs.

But the things prepared for the saints are beyond all understanding. For their hope is full of immortality, according to what is written:

What then is the season at which it is fitting for the Passover to be kept, and how it should be observed, has been clearly stated by us.

For he has commanded it to be observed on the fourteenth day of the first month, at evening, according to its season and according to its law;

and I consider it necessary, skillfully discerning each of the things thus decreed and subjecting them to the closest scrutiny, to be diligent in inquiring into the reasons why the lawgiver said it must fall in spring, and in the first month.

It would not be without profit to speak briefly on these matters;

and this, I think, is what God said through the voice of the prophet:

'Seek diligently, and dwell with me.' For that it is fitting for us to try, so far as we are able, to track down the things written through fitting investigation, the sacred Scripture has thereby signified to us; yet it charges us never to love straying from rightness of understanding, in saying, 'Dwell with me.' For all rightness is with God, both from him and in him.

Therefore the season of spring would be especially fitting for the Passover, above all other seasons, depicting, as it were on a tablet, through the things that occur within it, the power of the achievements wrought through Christ,

warming the earth with its rays, and, as it were, crying out against the assaults of winter:

'And now let the lily take its pride of place in the meadows, and let the sweetest-scented flowers smile in the gardens; let the bee set forth from its hive and hum about the fields, with no violent storms to trouble it;

with no rain falling to hinder its flight.'

For their wing is fragile and unused to hardship.

And now let the flocks be released from their folds;

and indeed let the lambs, skipping about their mothers on tender, newly-steadied feet, dance upon the many-colored grass.

And if my discourse should, as it were, ascribe to the seasons themselves a voice like our own, let no one reprove me for it.

For we have been taught to do this also from the sacred Scriptures.

And indeed the divinely inspired Psalmist says:

'The heavens,' he says, 'declare the glory of God;

and the firmament proclaims the work of his hands.'

'Day unto day utters speech, and night unto night declares knowledge.' And the prophet Isaiah, too, has somewhere granted that the very seas speak eloquently, and seem, as it were, to pour forth an unerring word.

'Be ashamed, Sidon,' said the sea;

and the strength of the sea said:

'I have not travailed, nor given birth, nor raised up young men, nor nourished virgins.' And indeed we do not, of course, mean to say that the seasons and the sea partake of reason.

For that would be sheer nonsense, and nothing else.

But being eager to pursue what is both pleasing and necessary for the benefit of our hearers, we clothe with the garb of speech even things that by nature are devoid of speech.

Come, then, let us proceed directly to what is fitting, and, drawing out the force of these thoughts, let us show that the achievements wrought through the coming of our Savior correspond to the good things that come with spring.

Let us behold, all but painted before our very senses, the beauty of divine grace.

For all things had been seized by mist and darkness;

and, as it were, a wintry gloom the many-headed dragon — that is, Satan — poured down, so to speak, upon everything beneath heaven;

and, chilling every man's mind into deadness, he made those upon earth willing practitioners of unholy deeds.

But winter is gone, and the darkness, once deep and joyless, has been driven away.

Pure rays now rise for us, and the sun of righteousness—that is, Christ—shines round about all things with beams of spiritual light, and benefits us in yet another way:

no longer allowing us to grow cold toward sin, but rather making us fervent in spirit, even as the divinely inspired apostle Paul himself says—

And indeed we, who were like tree-stumps stricken with barrenness, deprived even of blossom, have bloomed again unto life;

and, like fields rich in pasture and crowned with many-colored verdure, we have grown rich in the evangelical proclamations;

the writings of the holy apostles; the images of the truth in shadows and types—I mean the writings of Moses; and the prior utterances of the holy prophets concerning Christ;

through which we are very thoroughly instructed unto the comprehension of the mystery.

Let the intelligible and most industrious bee fly about this fertile and fruitful land of ours;

that is, let the wise and most industrious soul gather in some manner what serves its need—I mean, so far as it is able—and, like sweet honeycomb, collect within itself the true and blameless knowledge of God.

In this good and rich pasture, according to the voice of the prophet, let the flocks of the rational sheep come;

and together with the ewes the lambs—that is, along with those more mature in habit, those still as infants in their longing for virtue and spiritual vigor—nourishing their own understanding, let them strive to grow up into a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. And I would say that the lilies, as it were, laugh in the gardens;

made radiant, and breathing forth the fragrance of Christ's glory.

And now the season of harvest has come. But that one might behold, quite without labor, the achievements of Christ in what I have just said, there will be need, I think, of no other witnesses to prove it;

it suffices that he himself speaks to the Church gathered from the nations, saying:

'Rise up, come, my companion, my beautiful dove;'

'for behold, the winter has passed;'

'the rain is over and gone its way;'

'the flowers have appeared in our land, the time of harvest has come.' Now God said that the Passover must be observed in the first month; yet in the second year of the exodus of the sons of Israel—

And why, then, did they not ordain the laws concerning the feasts right from the beginning?

Why does a kind of necessary pause and postponement intervene, and delay hold sway even over rites so sacred? Is it not worth seeing what the matter of this dispensation is, and toward what the lawgiver's purpose looks?

It was necessary, then, that the mystery of Christ should yield its season to the prior incursions of the law.

For it was necessary that the types of the truth should be manifested beforehand, and that the exercises undertaken for the sake of the contests should be seen as prior to the contests themselves.

A soldier gains renown if, before the sweat of battle, he has practiced the tactics of formation.

And the skilled contestant in the wrestling-ring could not become distinguished, if he has had no practiced endurance of hardship in it.

For is not, for us ourselves as well, the learning of the rudiments a kind of beginning and, as it were, a door to the disciplines that lead unto wisdom and understanding? But, I think, the reasoning is both clear and exact.

And the divinely inspired Paul, too, will lend support to this, as it were by way of examples:

saying that milk is most fitting for those who are still infants, while the more solid forms of food ought to be brought to those who are more mature.

It was necessary, then, that milk should be given beforehand to those of an earlier age—who had not yet grown up into a perfect man of the fullness of Christ, but rather had a mind still befitting infants—before the more solid food.

It was necessary that the rudimentary teachings should first take up dwelling in mind and heart, in advance of the perfect teachings;

and that the life under the law should be interposed before the life understood to be in Christ.

For the law is a tutor, leading us back, through enigmas, unto the better and higher understanding.

That the deferral of the evangelical decrees was, then, necessary for our benefit might be suggested—albeit rather subtly—by the fact that God ordained the Passover to be observed not, as it happened, in the first year, but in the second.

And that other point too, I think, will lend support to the argument.

For the God of all commanded the divinely inspired Moses to construct and set up that ancient tabernacle—not fashioned in whatever manner he himself might wish, but exactly as he was commanded by God to have it made:

'See,' He says, 'that you make it according to the pattern that was shown to you on the mountain.' And since the divine ordinance was being carried straight forward to completion, and the work being fashioned was of the most perfect order, God again said:

'On the first day of the first month, at the new moon of the month, you shall set up the tabernacle.' And to this the sacred Scripture further adds:

'And it came to pass in the first month, in the second year, as they were coming out of Egypt, that the tabernacle was set up at the new moon.' Do you hear that it was in the second year, and at the new moon of the first month, that he set up the tabernacle? For it was then, then indeed, that the lamb was also slain, signifying in itself the truly holy and unblemished victim, that is, Christ;

who offered himself to God the Father for a fragrant aroma, transforming our condition into a new age.

And the new moon might well be understood as a type of the new age, and a very clear one at that;

for the things that are in Christ are a new creation;

and the old things have passed away, according to the Scriptures.

Therefore in the first month, and on the first day of the month, that is, at the new moon, the divinely inspired Moses set up the holy tabernacle.

But outwardly he depicts the pattern of that truly real tabernacle, the manifestation of the more true and holy one—that is, of the Church, which our Savior himself established, once those ancient times had passed away, during which death held sway, and sin had made those on earth grow old, and the inventor of lawlessness threatened to seize the whole world under heaven by force, saying:

'and I will gather it as eggs that are left behind;'

'and there shall be none to escape me, or to gainsay me.' But these were mere boasts of his, and his words were charges of arrogance born of his greed against us.

And having failed of his hope, he was refuted by the facts themselves.

For we have been saved in Christ, as I just said, the holy tabernacle having been manifested to us at the fitting seasons, in which we are transformed into newness of life, casting off the old man together with his passions and desires.

The very manner of the construction of that ancient tabernacle would also very well demonstrate that the season of the law usefully ran ahead of the ordinances given through Christ, after which it was fitting that the better and holier order should henceforth be seen, having a more perfect kinship with God.

Since Paul, then, was learned in the law and trained with precision, as he himself somewhere says, let him describe for us the pattern of the ancient tabernacle, speaking thus:

'For a first tabernacle was constructed, in which were the lampstand, and the table, and the setting forth of the loaves; this is called the Holy Place.'

'And behind the second veil, there is a tabernacle called the Holy of Holies, having the golden altar, and the ark covered on every side with gold, in which was the golden urn holding the manna, and Aaron's rod that budded, and the tablets of the covenant.' You see that the tabernacle of the first approach was placed before the second and innermost tabernacle—the one in which the priestly line was accustomed to make offerings through blood, and to bring to completion the types belonging to the worship prescribed by the law.

But the second was holier than the first;

and for that reason it was also named the Holy of Holies.

What, then, is the reason that the first was placed before the second, and that the outer tabernacle was appointed as a kind of preliminary approach to the innermost one? The most wise Paul will again make this clear.

'Now these things having been thus prepared, into the first tabernacle the priests enter continually, performing the acts of worship;'