PREFACE. Nothing immortal is held within the frame of the world — not the globe, not the kingdoms of men, not golden Rome, not the sea, not the earth, not the fiery stars of heaven. For the Father of things has fixed an irrevocable time, when the final flame, blazing, shall sweep away the whole world. Yet sublime deeds and the honour of valour keep countless men in remembrance through long ages, men whose fame and praises the poets heap high. These the lofty songs flowing from the fountain of Smyrna celebrate; those, the sweetness of Maro of Mincius. Nor does the lesser glory of the bards themselves run its course, glory which abides like the eternal, while the ages fly, and the wheeling of the pole rolls the starry heaven around the lands and seas by appointed governance.
But if songs that weave falsehoods around the deeds of men of old have earned so long a fame, for us sure faith in eternal praise throughout the ages shall grant immortal honour and repay our merit. For my song shall be the life-giving deeds of Christ, a divine gift to the peoples, free from the guilt of falsehood. Nor is there fear that the world's burnings should sweep this work away with them; for this perhaps shall withdraw me from the fire then, when, flashing amid a flame-vomiting cloud, the Judge shall descend — the glory of the high-throned Father, Christ. Come then! May the sanctifying Spirit, author of song, be present with me, and may sweet Jordan water with its pure stream the mind of the one who sings, that we may speak things worthy of Christ. BOOK ONE.
There was a king, Herod, cruel in the nation of Judaea, under whom there lived a keeper of righteousness and a priest of the temple, Zacharias, whose care it was by turns to guard the temple — he stood at his appointed task in due course among the chosen seers. To his marriage-chamber clung a most worthy wife. For both of them there was an equal care of fair and balanced conduct; the precepts of the law held them both, joined together. Yet they had no offspring, though their years were now already declining, so that the gift might be the more welcome to those now despairing of it. But when by chance Zacharias was bearing incense to the inner shrine and altars, a messenger was seen to descend from open heaven and to deliver to him alone the words commanded (for the rest of the people, prostrate at the doors, were then praying): 'What terror has the dread sight shaken in your heart, when the grace of joyful speech soothes you?
For me the one only Father of all has sent down from heaven's high seat to come now into speech with you, and He commands me to promise that soon a son shall be born to you from the wife dear to you, for whom great glory in things awaits, who shall by his birth seek out abundant joys for the peoples; sober for ever, whom the Spirit, while yet shut within his mother's very inward parts, shall fill with bright divine power. The greater part of this people he shall, by teaching, turn back to the true way, and continually, the first, he shall know the Lord and God, and shall renew the people. Remember to call this one by the name John.' To him the priest replied with troubled mind: 'My rival age stands in the way of such promises, nor can offspring befall worn-out old folk, which God, turning it aside, denied us in our prime.' Thus the seer, trembling; to whom the messenger added such words:
'If any mortal had promised you offspring, perhaps a hesitation of mind, clinging to slow words, ought rightly to have persisted in despair. But now I, whom the Lord of heaven and Maker of earth willed to stand before His own face as His minister, received by the ungrateful ears and sight of a man, have carried out the commands of the most high God, which you scorn. Wherefore the gift remains irrevocable through these promises; but the voice that carries the swift message of your mind shall be shut up for you, until all the gifts of God be made sure to you.' This he said, and mingled himself with the soft breezes. Meanwhile the people kept up a long marvelling — why the priest should so long delay in the temple. Coming forth, he made known in his fear, by gestures, that he had seen the supernal Power, and the loss of his wretched voice.
Then the seer returns home, his service completed in due order, and the promises ease his lost speech; nor were the gifts of offspring long delayed. But the anxious wife concealed the joys of her womb, until five moons should fill the hollow orb. Then thereafter the same minister brought down greater commands, sent to the ears of the Virgin Mary. She, betrothed at the appointed time to her kinsman, growing chastely to womanhood, hidden in maidenly chambers, was permitted to keep the day according to her parents' bidding. To her the messenger begins his tranquil discourse: 'Hail, you who shall help the lands with a saving offspring; cease to trouble your mind with awe at the sight. For your womb shall conceive, by heavenly command, a Son whom God both rejoices and commands to reign through all the ages and to be believed His own offspring.
When you have brought Him forth into the light, let His name be Jesus.' To whom then the virgin thus begins with fearful lips: 'They say no conceptions come to pass without a husband; whence then shall I hope offspring to come to me?' The messenger speaks these words in reply with swift speech: 'The lofty power of God shall fly about you, overshadowing, and the pure Spirit shall come, most chosen virgin — and shall soon command for you, by chaste utterance, that a magnificent boy be born for the peoples, whom it is necessary to believe holy and to call the Son of the most high God. Thus your kinswoman, believed barren by all, the wife of Zacharias, by mortal seed has lately drawn forth a marvel with limbs worn out by age. The sixth month is at hand: thus all things obey the commands.' The virgin thereupon:
'Behold now the handmaid of the Lord who commands; as your words sound, you see me ready to serve.' The messenger, departing, hid himself in the empty breezes. She thereafter with swift steps enters the city of Judaea and the house of Zacharias, and greets Elizabeth heavy with her hidden offspring, when at once the anxious limbs of the enclosed child leap up in the lap of the womb with a greater motion. And at the same time the mother, shaken, sprang up with trembling, was filled with the holy breath of the divine voice, and crying out loudly: 'O happy woman, hail, bearing a happy offspring in the curve of your womb. Whence has the just God willed to honour my house with so great a dignity, that the mother of the high Godhead should visit it? Behold, in my womb the offspring, rejoicing, leaps for joy, when it perceived the first greeting of Mary.
Happy is she who believes that the end shall soon come to the words which God, deigning to honour, speaks to His servants greatly!' She, drawing forth her spirit through joys mingled with modesty, turns over the trembling words of her suppressed voice: 'My spirit renders magnificent praises and thanks to the Lord of the boundless world. Scarcely can that spirit contain such joys, because, deeming me worthy, He raises me on high from lowliness, lofty and blessed, and the just God has willed me to be held so by all nations and ages. Behold, He has cast down the throne from the savage and broken the proud, He has enriched the lowly poor with overflowing riches.' Then she remained there three months in due course, and now retraces her way to her own house, sure of what is to come. And now the time was at hand when the rolling day should compel Elizabeth, into the shores of light, to pour forth the bidden birth.
At the report of the birth a crowd of kinsfolk gathered and came running; then in great numbers they celebrate the wondrous joys and bid the child bear the name of its father. The mother refused this, but repeats again that he should be called John. It then pleased them to consult the commands of the mute parent, and by writing they ask him to declare the name. But — O wondrous faith! — when he tries to write on the tablets, by sounding words he loosens his entangled tongue. Soon too the inspiration penetrates his accustomed mind, and, filled, he sings words foreknowing the future: 'Let all together celebrate praises and frequent their thanks to the Parent of the stars and the earth, of the sea and of men, because He has willed to visit and to redeem His own people. Lo, He blesses the ancient nation, and, the horn of salvation being raised, He grants a light from the line of David.
This is what the ancient seers sang in due course, this is that salvation by which He snatches us from our black enemies, that we may serve the Just One justly. But you, little boy, holy and worthy prophet, shall be called, and soon you shall go before the Lord in the way, and shall lead His people through the open light: through you all who follow your precepts shall spurn error and break asunder the shadows of death.' Thence in secret valleys the boy's life was ever hidden, until, as the years demanded, he should grow to maturity in full age for the office of a seer. Meanwhile the marvels trouble the mind of Mary's betrothed, because he saw the plain weight of the womb, and he turned over within himself by what means he might conceal the oppressed disgrace of his near one and refuse the marriage-bed.
As he turned over such thoughts, his limbs grew numb with sleep, and amid awful dreams he heard the voice of God above: 'Receive in marriage one bound by no fault, the betrothed whose inward parts the Holy Spirit has filled with holy offspring. This is the one whom the seer sang would come, and the offspring from a virgin, whose name is GOD WITH US.' Forthwith he, following these precepts, keeps the marriage-covenant. But then by chance a counting of heads by a new census of Caesar Augustus, by his commands, was being recorded throughout many lands; Quirinus then ruled Syria by lawful right, to whom throughout all the towns the peoples set forth their own bounds, their strength and name and lineage. There is a city of Judaea, Bethlehem, which gave birth to David the tuneful, which by right sought the census of its kindred.
Here Joseph presented Mary, of David's line, betrothed to himself, registering her and declaring her with child. For the lodging of them both, under the walls of the city of Bethlehem, there were tiny dwellings of a poor field. There the virgin, her womb fulfilled in the new time, is delivered, and they wrap the boy in old swaddling-cloth, and a hard manger is given for his cradle. Round about, the watching over the flocks in the anxious night held shepherds wakeful through the glad pastures. Lo, at God's bidding a messenger was seen to descend from heaven, but a sudden terror laid low the shepherds' bodies, trembling with fear, upon the green earth. And to the astonished men such a voice sent from heaven ran abroad: 'Put away the terror of your mind, take up my words, shepherds, for whom I bear these mighty joys.
For a boy has been born of the bright line of David, who shall soon spread light and gladness to the peoples. This sign I will tell: that you may even now behold the boy filling the manger with his slender voice.' As he speaks such things, thousands of the heavenly host are joined to him, and all praise and beseech God, and the voice of the united company fills the air: 'Due glory attends the most high Father; on the earth fitting peace shall follow righteous men.' And with these words at once they revisit heaven's secret places. The shepherds come in haste and behold the boy lying in the lap of the manger; thence afterward, thronging, they scatter far and wide the wandering seeds of swift report. Marvelling they praise, rejoicing they stood amazed, that all things turned out true according to the nightly admonitions.
The boy had seen the eighth light; lo, it is needful to return to the custom of the law and to fit a name to him. And there was imposed on him, what the voice of Mary sent to God had once commanded by heavenly admonitions, the name Jesus. Moses had written the rules of the ancient law, among which he gave command to observe, of the firstborn from the old blood of the seers, to offer the offspring to be hallowed, and likewise to bring unfledged doves to the shrines.
When these things were borne to the temple, kept by Mary, lo, an aged man, Simeon, worthy to comprehend in his understanding the heavenly voices, to whom the foreknowing Power had once revealed that, the prison of his sick body being laid aside, he should see death free, and rest, when first he should have beheld borne to the temple the solemn doves — the praise of heaven and the salvation of earth, whom all the oracles of the seers pledge to be the Christ. And he, weary, with body bent, now more burdened, enters the temple, as the author Spirit had admonished; lo, at the same time he perceived that little Jesus had come to the temple in the lap of His mother; with trembling arms he received the boy and, glad, utters these words: 'Now, now the Lord frees me His servant from the black bonds of the body, and deigns to set an end to my words with peace for His own.
Behold, your splendid Light surrounds our eyes and shines with rays, which, all the nations of men being illumined, the heaped-up glory of the people of Israel adds.' Why were the breasts of Mary the mother so amazed? 'This boy is given for the fall of the people; this one shall grant peoples to be born again; a sign foretold shall come for contrary things; passing through deserved by death, it shall pierce the soul of the mother also with a flashing sword of iron, that the dark scrolls of the hidden heart may lie open.' These things God speaks in Simeon; soon, lo, He fills with holy breath the womanly mind of a prophetess. Anna there was, weighty in age, whom in the flower of her youth the untimely death of her husband left a widow. But chaste in the temple ever, instead of a husband, her life and the worship of God ran their course;
and she, commanded by the divine power, knew Christ, and spoke with like words. Thence, when the mother had fulfilled the solemn law for the boy's name, and Joseph wondering at all things, they joyfully return to their homeland and carry the boy back. There is a nation, further toward the rising sun, skilled to mark the risings and settings of the stars; the chief men of this nation held the name of Magi. Then thence, chosen, they come through long ways to Jerusalem, and approach the king and pray to be taught in what region the land of Judaea held the boy born to dominion: that they had been admonished by the rising of a shining star to come on their way, by which they might adore with suppliant right hand the venerable Godhead risen upon the earth.
Herod, terrified, commands to be summoned by his authority the chief seers of Jerusalem and those who recite the predictions of the ancient prophets, and to search out all things of the law: where it may be plain what are the birth-walls for Christ, whom all the oracles of the seers pledge shall come. Then it is made manifest that it remains for Him to be brought forth within the walls of Bethlehem, for whom it is necessary, by holy power, to lead the sacred people of Israel. Hence Herod bids the Persians press on their step, and to point out to him the boy, found, to be worshipped. Lo, in the midst of their journey they behold a star running before them, furrowing the breezes with flames, which stood still at the highest peak and pointed out the dwelling of the boy when it was searched out.
Great joys the Magi rejoice and hail the star, and after they had seen the boy at his mother's breast, casting themselves down they strewed the earth with prone body, and bowing down they at once made supplication; then they offered threefold gifts — frankincense, gold, myrrh — gifts to the King and the Man and the God. Soon dread dreams trouble the whole night through and bid them avoid the savage tyrant. Then by the diverse byways of Herod's court the Magi flee apart and returned to their homeland secretly. The boy Himself too Joseph, driven by heavenly admonitions, carries off into Egypt together with His mother. But fierce Herod believes that He whom the careful zeal of the Magi, skilled in the stars, had sought, would succeed to himself. Troubled by their forewarned departure, he ordered a horrible slaughter through the crossroads of Bethlehem.
He tears away with the sword all the infants and the tender little ones at the breast, under no charge of guilt. This slaughter too had once remained foretold, which good Jeremiah, commanded by the divine power, bewails: that mothers, over the wretched funeral of their offspring, should beat heaven heavily with horrendous laments. But when the frenzy was lulled and the savage cruelty of the tyrant was sated with the horrible blood of the infants, he thinks he has destroyed all whom one year and another had crushed, wretched ones of death-bringing age. Bound again in his limbs by a wondrous sleep, Joseph is urged by admonitions to carry Mary and the boy back from Egypt to the homeland, where happy Nazareth once gave to be added the foretold name to the boy. And the voice, once the forerunner-prophecy of another seer, inspired by God, had said:
'There shall come, there shall come my offspring from lofty Egypt — to the lands a light and a salvation.' The infant grew with the swift steps of the years, running ahead of his age; wisdom forestalled his time, and venerable grace shone in his face and words. And now he had reached twelve years of age, when, keeping the rite of the Passover according to custom, his parents were wont, at every yearly return, by custom to lead the boy to the temple amid joyful festivals. So they were present at the Passover; and when all the days of the festivals were fulfilled and they were preparing to return to their homeland, the boy among the people deserted the footsteps of his attendant mother and gladly sought the secret places of the temple. Through the streets of the city and through hidden dwellings, and through the paved roads of the journey, among acquaintances and among kinsfolk, the mother sought him;
but when the third light came, she hastens back to the temple and finds him inserted among the choirs of the seers, handling the obscure things of the laws in the company of the aged. Scarcely was admiration worthy enough at the words of the boy among the old men; but the pious mother: 'Son,' she said, 'with tears poured forth I have sought you, lost, anxious and groaning with your father. What cause divides you by your step from your parents and detains you in the seat of the temple?' But he: 'Why do you seek me so much, why?' he said. 'Do you not yet perceive, mother, that by right it is necessary for the Son to dwell in the seats and houses of His Father?' These things he said, and joins his step and revisits the homeland; nor did the mother fully grasp the weight of so great a word, yet in due order they keep all the secret things in her heart.
But the boy, with sweet obedience, ever binding both of them, drew them to his own love. Meanwhile, running through all the debts of the ancient writing, the series of the ages drew on the promises. The offspring of Zacharias was calling all, in the deserted valleys, with a cry to lay aside their stains, that they might receive the wondrous washings of the clear river, by which the virtue of the soul, cleansed of its filth, might shine; even as Isaiah the seer sang, commanded by the divine power: 'A voice resounds far and wide in the desert valleys; build broad roads, let every path of the ways be straight, which may worthily bear the footsteps of the Lord. The hills shall sink, every valley shall be filled;
the good line of the straight road shall correct the windings, and the Father and Lord of salvation grants to all to handle the serene light with bodily eyes.' So the peoples were present, and rushing from here and there on every side they filled the banks and eagerly sought the washings. His coverings had been woven of camels' bristles, and a belt of hide girded the prophet's middle, and woodland honey furnishes his slender sustenance. And when he beholds so many peoples, sprung from diverse seats, rushing to the river, he thus begins with his mouth: 'O offspring of the viperous race, who shows you how to escape the punishments due to you and the pressing wraths? But make, O wretched ones, fruit fitting for repentance, if you repent, nor let confidence in your race lift up your minds.
For easily, even from stones, a people shall succeed to your name, since your degenerate offspring goes astray. Already, already the axe, raised before the eyes of all, presses upon the nearest roots of the oaks. The barren forests shall be felled and shall feed the fire. Now I have set out to wash away past stains in the pure river; but there shall come another, mightier, the thongs of whose feet I am not worthy to touch. He shall wash the mind of man with holy breath, and with masses of flames shall purge guilty hearts. And in His hands is held the rural winnowing-fan, and His own threshing-floor of grain shall be cleansed, and the secret abundance of the hidden corn shall fill the barns, and the eternal fire shall lay waste the light chaff.' This he said, and with hurried steps through the wood he beholds Him seeking the venerable washings of Jordan itself.
But the seer, rebuking, forbids and speaks thus: 'Do you deign to be dipped in the waves by my hands, when Your washings could better cleanse me?' So said John, to whom Jesus gives such reply: 'Now permit it, for this is fitting; thus through all holy things the order of righteousness, to be pursued by us, shall be fulfilled.' Recording these words, He entered the glassy waves of the river. To Him as He rises the manifest presence of God shines clear. The golden-coloured upper air of the sevenfold heaven is cleft, and, bearing a bodily appearance, the Spirit descends from on high, fashioning from a cloud an aerial dove, and with holy breath He bathed the body of Jesus. Then a voice sent from God ran through the long void, and addresses Christ, washed in the waves and anointed with the breath:
'You, my Son, this day I testify, are begotten of me amid joys; this glory of My offspring pleases me.' Then He seeks the shadowy mountains and the lairs of wild beasts, and the attendant ministers of the Father strove eagerly to render obedience to Him; soon the envy of the demon snatches His mind into blackness with terror — nor was the cunning deceit of tempting Christ absent meanwhile from the sick one. Forty suns had passed in due order, in which no nourishments of food or drink were given, but the fasting, woven together with a firm heart, held the secret things of His mind unto the kingdom of the lands. Then at last the body warned Him to seek out a meal. Meanwhile, attempting the deceit of a dreadful crime:
'If God for certain begot You,' he said, 'You shall be able, by a strong word, to bid all these stones take on the use and form of wheaten bread.' To these things Christ replies: 'Such things now in no way terrify me; for I remember it is written that the easy substance of bread shall not alone hold the life of the believer, but that holy power fills pious breasts with the word of God.' Again the tempter, fitting deceits with cunning arts, hastens to weave them. For he perceived He would soon set foot within the walls of the city; the livid force made Christ stand upon the marble pinnacle of the temple. Then thus he approaches with the beguiling poison of his voice: 'If God truly is your Father, from the pinnacle of the temple you shall hurl your body through the empty air in a leap.
The scripture shall be a witness to you, which openly pledges such a command of the most high Father to His ministers, that they should be eager to defend your body from a fall by mischance; and with their attendant hands they shall run to lift your limbs, lest the striking of a stone hurt the soles of your feet.' To these sayings Christ rendered contrary words: 'It behoves me rather to remember the heavenly writing, lest a trusting audacity tempt the Lord's powers.' Again on the lofty ridges of a precipitous mountain the soon-furious deceit perceived Christ to stand, showing Him the gleaming kingdoms throughout the world: 'You behold,' he said, 'what is the glory of such great things? All these I can even now yield to your kingdom, if, worshipping me as I bestow such things, you adore.' Then Jesus thus repulsed him as he pressed with words:
'Flee, O mad fury of pestilent poison, that the unmovable command may ever cling to us: that the righteous, devoted, should adore the Lord of heaven and, serving the One, should venerate His name unto the age.' Shaken off by such words, the demon flees through trackless ways. He, when He learned that John was plunged into the shadows of prison, pressed down the grief in His sorrowful heart, and determined to set His abode in the borders of Zebulun, that the saying of Isaiah might concur in long order:
'The land of Zebulun and the name of the region Naphtali, and the way beyond the sea, far off, through the fields of Galilee, and beyond the Jordan — the nations and the peoples shut in darkness shall see a great and sudden light, and upon them, dwelling in the shadow of death, a kindly will of faith arises, shining again with light.' Therefore Christ announces, rebuking, that the gifts of God the reigning One press near, the generous heralds of salvation. And passing by, He sees along the shores of the sea brothers — most solid Simon, worthy of the surname Peter, and Andrew together — arranging the sinuous coils of their nets as snares for the fishes in the waves of the sea.
'Now,' He said, 'you catch fish in the deep tides of the sea; but if it please you to follow me, mighty gains of men shall come forth for you in a most beautiful catch.' They at once, with strengthened breast, sure, casting away their nets, alike follow His precepts. After these brothers, James and John, weaving snares for the marine flocks with their meshed fabric — when He saw them, and gave from the shore a like call — they leave their father Zebedee in the stern and forthwith follow the most beautiful commands of salvation. Thereafter through the land of Galilee Christ sowed holy things, instilling into the peoples the heralds of the kingdom, and granted swift healing to the weak and sick; and soon frequent fame held Syria far off, sounding with a thousand words the present gifts of Christ.
At length, vying with one another, they showed to Christ those eaten away by the wasting of disease and bound by diverse evils, those whose long wasting had with grief consumed the ravaged strength of their limbs; but by an easy gift He swiftly rendered all of them sound for wondrous joys. And now the diseases of the soul itself and savage furies, and the madness of mind that accompanied the course of the moon, departed, commanded by the heavy weight of His word. Mixed throngs follow Him as He works great miracles, thronging Him — the people of Jerusalem and of Syria, and Judaea crowded with peoples, and the Galilean folk, whom too the Jordan with its standing flood divides. Beholding these peoples, He sat down on a lofty crag, and thus, His disciples girding His bosom, He begins:
'Happy the humble, whom a poor spirit encompasses, for the lofty kingdom of heaven receives them; like to these are the meek, whom gentleness crowns, to whose right belongs the most beautiful earth. In this way great consolations shall follow those who mourn. Those who now seek the food and drink of righteousness — a full abundance of the table awaits them to be satisfied. Happy is he who has grieved in his heart over the lot of the wretched, for him the Lord's generous mercy shall await. Happy are those who behold heaven with a pure heart; to these the visible God shall lie open through all the ages. The peacemakers God adopts into the number of His offspring. Exceedingly happy are those whom gnashing persecution presses on for the sake of righteousness; to these soon the royal court of heaven shall be opened. Rejoice, you whom, holding the just things of your works, headlong injury shall urge on with savage goads;
for very great is the reward kept for you in heaven, for such was the persecution of the prophets. Learn that you are to be the savour of salt in this earth. If this savour, its virtue now lost, grows stale, what substance shall sharpen the spent tastes of the salt? Nor is there any use of vain salt remaining thereafter, save that, cast far off, all feet should trample it. You are the bright light of the world (do not hide it). For who could conceal a city set upon lofty crags? Thus let your light reach to all, and let the beauty of things be set forth under serene light. Let the glory of your Father be praised by all, whose royal court of high heaven is His throne. I have not now come to dissolve the ancient laws, nor to overturn the commands which the old prophets laid down;
For all things shall remain to be fulfilled for you through me. I speak the truth: until the destruction of heaven and earth and sea shall come, not even the smallest letter of the Law, nor the slender stroke of a tiny mark, shall be wanting, but rather all things shall come to pass in the appointed order of the age. For if anyone shall dare to loose the least part of the commandment, and by his daring shall likewise teach men to do so, he shall hold the name of the least in the heavenly seat. But whoever, keeping the governance of his own work, shall hand down inviolate the precepts of those before him, he shall be great, and shall bear a great name beyond the stars. You have heard the command under the governance of the ancient Law: if anyone shall stain his hands with human blood, that guilty one shall pay the penalty by the avenging sword.
But I shall enjoin this: let no one dare to rise up into wrath, nor be moved by the seething hatred of his brother. For this man too pays the penalty before a just judge. And no lesser flame shall pursue the revilings of those who provoke a brother under the name of 'fool' or 'wretch.' But if you wish to offer, while honouring the altars, your gift, and if then the inner sanctuary of your silent mind touches you, because a quarrel has been taken up with your brother at home, leave there all the gifts brought near the holy entrances, and hastening first to peace, run out to seek it. At last, now reconciled to brotherly love, offer your welcome gifts to God with a tranquil breast. Moreover, you have ever a virtue opposed to the body; let this be cured by the swift love of chastity, while the road of headlong life walks with you through the crossways.