'But you, unjust ones, pass into just flames, and forever scorch your malignant mind with punishments, which the Father has prepared in the dreadful depths through the pools of the pit for the dreadful Demon, for his companions, and for himself. For when I once suffered thirst, you offered me no cups, nor little pity of bread in the punishment of hunger, nor were the foreign coverings of a roof or of garment given to me for a brief while, from your great store, even for a slender part; nor in prison, hedged in by bars, or lying in sickness, were there ever any solaces of your visiting.' To these words the condemned faction then replies:
'Never does any of us remember to have visited you, or that thirst or savage hunger afflicted you, weary in sickness, or that you wandered as a stranger through the towns, worn down in your affairs, or that you were sunk in the pains of prison or burdened with disease, so that just pity might be shown you in your distress.' To these things the Lord will say: 'When your ferocity swelled with proud heart in your straitened circumstances, and trampled the humble and the least, in them it scorned me.' When he shall have given these words, he shall render to each his rewards according to merits. The wretched, unjust ones shall be dug down to eternal punishment, and salvation, granted to the just, shall remain eternal.' While he speaks such things, a sister, anxious with just cares, her hair torn and lacerated for her brother's sickness, urges the young man to run with rapid step, that in such peril Christ might save his friend.
For the woman had been received with kindly favours for her merits, by whose devotion Christ embraced and held with full love both the brother and the deserving household. The messenger, arriving, brings word that the young man beloved by Christ lies at his last, holding amid the sorrows of sickness the utmost confines both of death and of life. Lazarus was his name, but Christ, struck with bitter words, said: 'This violence of sickness, if you believe, does not lead to death, but is so that God may be celebrated with worthy honour by the just, and that the Son of Man may shine bright with holy power.' Then to his disciples: 'Lazarus now sleeps,' he said, 'but I will make the dear young man rise again.' The disciples say:
'Full health will be able to follow upon sleep and to return;' nor did they grasp in mind that Christ had spoken of death under the name of sleep. He removed their error with such discourse: 'Lazarus has fallen into death, but joys come to my mind from this, and they arm your faith more strongly for me, since you perceive that, though absent and far off, I see all things. But let us hasten,' he said. Then Didymus speaks thus: 'Let us go and all alike be forced to fall in death, as the Jewish nation so often threatens.' And now Christ was at hand, but by chance it was the fourth day for the one buried, and the sisters, plunged into the dark shadows of death, held mourning and tearful dwellings. There gathered the leaders of the Jewish nation and dear kinsfolk, giving the solaces due.
But Martha, having heard that Christ had come, ran to meet him and left the house and her sorrowful sister, and from afar: 'O, would that your power were present here with us and had snatched my brother from bitter death. For whatever you ask, it is certain that it can come to you.' Whom the Lord consoles, as she laments, with such a voice: 'Take up again a robust mind, woman, with courage. Lazarus shall rise to these renewed lights of life.' And the woman: 'Surely all mortals shall rise to the gifts of life, when the end comes for the world.' Christ in turn draws forth a voice from his holy breast: 'Behold, I am for you the restoration of bright life. He who believes in me shall be able to lay aside the death he has taken on and to join his life to the perpetual age.'
'And whoever shall take up faith in a living breast shall never touch the dread thresholds of death; do you believe this from a pure breast, Martha?' She thereupon: 'This one faith shall hold my heart: that the venerable, sublime One of God has come in you, the heavenly offspring under the lofty name of Christ.' This she said, and, about to summon Mary her sister by running, she seeks the inner rooms; with a silent nod, marking all things, she warned that the holy Master had come and called her sister, oppressed by grief, in like manner. That one leaps forth out of doors at the name of Christ heard; and at the same time the believing crowd of Jerusalem follows the lamenting woman, the sisters bringing weeping to the tomb. After she beheld the salvation-bringing Jesus, she fell down before his feet and broke forth this voice from her breast:
'If you could have come to see my brother alive, Lazarus could not have succumbed to harsh death.' Christ, joining grief from his heart to these weepings, inquires the seat of the tomb, where the limbs lately buried lay, stripped of the warmth of the fleeting soul. Without delay they show the sepulchre to him as he weeps and mourns, beneath a hewn rock; and when the Holy One saw it closed with the weight of a stone, he soon orders it to be moved with much leverage. But Martha's voice strikes the air thus: 'Behold, four days and as many nights in order pass by, since the limbs, laid in the ground, rest. I should believe that the body, the warmth fleeing in its motion, gives back a wretched stench from its dissolved limbs.' To these words Christ in reply draws forth such things:
'It has already been said so many times that the faith of believers consists in great things by power; but the glory of the supreme Father is now present, if you have the strength of faith.' When he had given these words, and the huge stone, its barriers torn away, lay open, his power, soon conscious, looks up to heaven and entreats the Father with such a voice: 'We confess surpassing thanks to you, holy Father; you always hear me in pity with your venerable ears, but let the present people learn to believe that I have been sent.' When he had given these words, he soon halted at the very threshold of the tomb, and, facing it, filled the hollow rocks with a cry:
'Lazarus, take back your soul that returns to your sleeping limbs; and you yourself, come forth from the tomb.' Without delay, with hands and feet bound together, he suddenly steps forth from the grave, his face covered with a cloth and a slender wrapping binding his whole body. Then He commanded him to be loosed and sent him rejoicing back to his home. When the Jews who had followed Mary and Martha in such numbers beheld this venerable deed, some part of them, believing, follow the honor of so great a power; but others go back to the city and recount all the miraculous works to the haughty Pharisees among the chief men. Therefore a now weightier crowd of scribes and of the people is summoned to the council, where high up the fair halls of Caiaphas the high priest's seat gleam.
There it was resolved to put Christ to death, yet to avoid the days of the Passover, lest amid a thronging multitude the discordant peoples should kindle their fury into war. He was in the house of Simon, from whom His power had driven away a sallow leprosy. Behold, a woman draws nearer to Him as He reclines, and from an alabaster jar, in which there were precious ointments of widely fragrant oil, she pours over Christ from the very crown of His head. The disciples rebuke her, declaring that the bodies of the wretched poor could have been helped by the price of the ointment. But the Lord forbade these words and approved the deed: 'Cease to hinder this righteous girl in her devotion. There will always be given a time to aid the poor, but it will not always be granted to you to behold Me.
What she does, much to be praised, ministers to the service of My burial, and such deeds shall fill the world.' Then one of the disciples, out of his mind, withdraws himself—Judas—and ran to the chief men with such words: 'What reward may I hope to receive, if I can betray to you and point out the master who has long been sought?' At once they fixed thirty pieces of silver; for these Judas gave himself over to a deep crime. And now the day of Passover had advanced at its first dawning: the disciples ask where He wished to take the Passover meal; but He bade that a certain unnamed man be sought out, who should receive the Lord's final instructions. Soon at the first evening, as the twice-six disciples reclined together, the master foretells with these words:
'Behold, the time presses on, when one of you, with wicked heart, is plotting to betray Christ to death.' At once all ask who, with such daring, had taken so great a poison into his frenzied heart. He then said: 'He who now eats with Me at the feast. But the Son of Man shall in due time undergo the sufferings long foretold. Wretched forever is that man who betrays the Righteous One; how much happier he would be, if he had never touched the light of life upon the earth!' And then Judas, his guilty breast heavily oppressed, said, 'Surely such a suspicion does not touch Judas?' The Lord answered: 'I see that you say it of yourself.' When He had spoken these words, He broke the bread with His own hands, and then handed it divided, and having prayed in holy manner, He taught the disciples thus to eat His own body.
Then the Lord takes the cup, and filled with wine He sanctifies it with grace-bearing words, and ministers the drink, and taught that He had given out His own blood. And He said: 'This blood has redeemed the sins of the people; drink this, which is Mine. For believe My true words: after this I shall never taste the juice of the vine, until the Father's kingdom, by the gift of a better life, shall grant Me again to rise in new wine.' Then, having sung a hymn in holy harmonies, they all ascend the heights of the Mount of Olives. There Christ brings forth such words from His breast: 'In this present hour of night, terror shall scatter you all far apart, miserably, when the leader is forsaken. For thus it is written: At the fall of the shepherd, all the sheep shall take to flight in different directions through the fields.
But afterward, when life shall restore to Me the new honors of heaven, I will go before you, and fluttering through the native fields of pleasant Galilee, I will teach in the country places.' Peter answered: 'Though all, if it be right to believe it, should be able waveringly to deny Your precepts, yet no misfortune shall ever change my heart.' He then said: 'This night, which brings the shining stars to the earth and now, pressing back the light, broods over the waves, shall hear how you, terrified, will speak lies in three sayings and, most valiant Peter, will deny Christ, and that before the roofs of the houses resound with the birds.' But Peter: 'I would rather take upon myself a harsh death, than that this tongue, forgetful, should deny its master.' All persist in promising these strengths of heart. The Hebrew name of the place is Gethsemane.
Thither goes the Author of light and life; around Him the disciples follow, while Judas flees. And there He bade the rest of His servants remain. But He Himself, having taken Peter and likewise the sons of Zebedee, advances far off through pathless ways. Then, sorrowful with heavy anguish, He speaks thus aloud: 'Now My soul, turning over sad thoughts, troubles My breast even unto death; but now drive sluggish sleep from you, and pass the anxious night together in watching.' This He said, and going forward a little, He bows His body to the earth, and cast down He prays with these words: 'If it be permitted, Father, let this cup pass from Me, whose violence presses upon us with a mighty pull.
But now let Your will rather come to pass than ours—the resolve which has been decreed by You for so great matters.' Then He goes back to the disciples, but sleep had unstrung them all, stretched upon the ground with panting limbs. Then He says to Peter: 'Have I not the strength to keep a single watchful hour amid such great trials? But watch, I pray, lest temptation, seizing you, should hurl you down headlong, dreadful, over the slippery paths of cruel death. This spirit is strong, but the body, feeble, totters.' Again He withdrew to the summit of the secluded mountain and prayed to the Father:
'Most gentle Ruler of all things, since there is no power for this cup to pass away, now let Your will come forth concerning our lot.' Again He finds the disciples weighed down beneath the burden of sleep, and again, having prayed to the Father, He speaks to them, bound fast by weary languor of rest: 'Now you may sleep and revisit your companions, for behold, he comes who will betray My body to all things, which the faction will lay defiled upon My limbs.' At that word, Judas arrives, hemmed in by a throng of a crowd, by command of the chief men and of the ferocious people. Part of them, with drawn swords, part trusting in the weight of the club, followed the signs promised by raging Judas. For he had agreed to touch Christ with a kiss, so that the wretched mob might easily seize Him whom they did not know.
When he, dissembling, greets Him with a flattering voice and touched with his lips the venerable face of the Righteous One, at once Christ said: 'You may accomplish the whole of it—whatever the cause is for which you have come with your preparation.' The crowds laid their hands on and seize Christ. Then one of the disciples ran up with a flashing sword, roused to wrath, and tore off the ear of the high priest's servant, struck off by the force of the wound. To him Christ says: 'Put up your sword, friend; for whoever, fierce, trusts in the avenging iron, upon him there shall await the vengeance of the iron, like to that of the righteous. Could I not summon the heavenly armies and lead the Father's innumerable squadrons into battle? But the Scripture owed to My affairs must be fulfilled.
But you, who run together with drawn iron, with clubs and swords, to seize Me—behold, I will meet you, I who, ever sitting with you in the midst of the temple's height, taught; nor did anyone dare such things while so many barked round about in the place alone.' The disciples everywhere fled, leaving Christ behind. And now the Savior had stood in the hall of Caiaphas, when all the summoned scribes and chief men came. But Peter, keeping his steps far off, alone and sorrowful, sat secretly with the serving people, awaiting the final end amid so great a storm. Behold, the priests bend their efforts to seek out false witnesses and wish to weave together fabricated charges, by which they might lay death upon innocent Christ. But none seemed sufficient for so great a fury.
At last witnesses leap forth, who said they had heard Jesus declare that He alone could overthrow the temple and rebuild it once overthrown in three days. The high priest himself insists on pressing Him as He keeps silent, gnashing in his furies, and speaks thus: 'Why do you now dare to answer nothing to such great complaints, convicted under the true witnesses of the chief men? Yet I will adjure you by the kingdom of the Most High Thunderer, that you confess openly, whether it is right to believe you to be Christ.' He then addresses the proud man with this voice: 'These words alone proceed true from your heart;
the Majesty of the Son of Man shall come to you, to be seen through the air, when He sits at the right hand of the holy Power beneath the fire-colored clouds.' When these things were heard, the priest, exulting in his furies and with blind heart, tears the garment from his breast and says: 'You have heard the foul words of one warring against God in his profanity; let religion, defiled, rise up the more into wrath, and do you all now lay open your minds.' All cry out together and strive to condemn Him to death. Then shameless spittle covers the holy face of Christ, and palms upon His cheeks and frequent blows upon His head insult Him, and all strive to mock Him with words:
'Christ, prophesy whose palm has struck you!' But a woman within, because she had seen Peter looking sad, said: 'Were you too, young man, joined as a companion to that man whom the verdict of the chief men condemns at their pleasure?' He denies it and tries to take himself away into the fierce dwellings. But behold, another, catching sight of him as he went out at the first threshold, was betraying him with a like voice to the servants. Again he says, swearing, denying that he knew that man. Then many of the bystanders came up to question him, and they say they recognize him from the sound of his voice, because all his words rang out with the Galilean dialect. And Peter, swearing with devoted words, affirms that he knows nothing of it all, denying whoever that man might be.
This voice the bird, beating its applauding wings beneath the rooftop, follows with its song, and the forebodings of Christ surround Simon's sad mind with their words; and going out thereafter he wept bitter tears. Now the stars give way to the daylight, and the swift sun advances, filling the trembling lands with its rays. And now from the council they were dragging Christ, His hands bound behind His back, with a great clamor to the bosom of the governor. Meanwhile the Lord Jesus, standing before the lofty tribunal, received Pilate's words thus: 'Are you, as is said, the king of the Jewish nation?' Christ answered: 'These things I hear from your own words.' Thereupon a terrible accusation of the Righteous One arises and roars, and a wicked eloquence presses the Holy One. Jesus deigns to answer nothing to the fierce men.
Pilate asks what then is the reason for His silence. He, persisting all the more, keeps a wondrous silence. But as it chanced, on the solemn day the laws bade one condemned man be released according to custom; and there was in chains a robber of notorious name, whom the people, hostile to Christ, burned to set free unto life. But Pilate's wife, terrified by sleep with savage visions, begged her husband with entreaties and commands, anxious that the punishment of the Righteous One be withdrawn. Then the judge tries again to probe the mind of the chief men, and inquires by law, according to the people's choice, whom they would wish to be loosed from the pressing penalty. But the chief men, with spread ambition, kept urging the people to seek the robber by law and to deny Christ.
But after the chief men's resolve had inflamed the crowd, and it sought rather that the robber's life be granted to it, the governor consulted the people as to what they wished for Jesus. The mob, kindled to evil, to stir up savage tumults, kept demanding again and again the punishment of the cross—for one who desired the name of king, who confessing himself an enemy of Caesar had condemned himself by his own mouth. At last, overcome by force and detesting the bloody office, rebuking it, he declared that he kept his own heart free of this blood, and before them all he washed his hands of the crime, that the stain should remain upon the nation alone. At this they cry out the more: 'Upon us, upon us let this blood come, and let this crime and guilt overflow upon our race.' Pilate gives Barabbas to the people and the law, and overcome, yields Jesus to the punishment of the cross.
But Judas the betrayer, after he sees that he, having received the price of crime, had marked himself as a madman, condemning his own deeds with true laments, then, in detestation, flung the silver down in the temple. And beginning to take his own punishment by the noose, he snatched a shapeless death from the top of a fig tree. Thereupon the priests, saying it was unlawful to bring into the recesses of the temple money which was the price of blood—which they believed lawful to give only when blood was being sold—bought a field in the true name of Blood, and they mark their wicked deeds with a horrible act. This true voice of the prophet, once veiling its meaning in song, laid open the outcome of events in the order of the age: the profane set down thirty minas of silver, establishing this as the price of the precious Body, which is soon transferred again to the potter's little field.
The Righteous One was delivered to the fierce soldiers, the ministers of crime: He offers His body to wicked mockeries. They clothe Him with a purple tunic and a red cloak, and bound His head with a bloody crown of thorns, and in place of a scepter a reed accompanies His right hand. Then, bending their knees, they salute Him as king and lord of the Jewish nation, and washed His face with spittle, and on the holy crown of His head they sported with abominable blows. When the maddened soldier had carried through these mockeries, he led Him clothed in the garments of His own robe, and dragged the Holy and Righteous One to the punishment of the cross. But behold, those going out caught a certain Simon, born of Cyrene, and bade him bring the wood, with which the unchangeable order of the age, pressing on, was urging that the Lord of light be fastened by cruel commands.
But after they came to the place which bears the country name of Golgotha, they give Christ cups of wine mingled with gall. But He, having merely tasted it on the surface, refuses it; so that by such things the ancient sayings might be fulfilled, yet the insulting fury of men does not demand everything. And now His body, fixed to the cross, hung upon the tree, and He gave His untorn tunic to the lot among them all, so that the possession of a single soldier preserved the woven cloth. And they set up the written title of the cause and of His merit, that He had been king of the Jewish people and nation. It happened that on either side two robbers bore the partnership of the same punishment; but the blind frenzy of the raging mob insults Christ as He is fixed: 'This is He who alone could destroy the temple, this is He who could restore it in the threefold passage of light.
But now let the venerable offspring of the Thunderer come down and free both body and soul from the punishment of the cross.' The chief men follow these words of the senseless crowd; and the Pharisees and scribes and the mad faction mock Him, and with insane sayings shake their heads and tongues for the bonds of eternal punishment: 'Was He not wont once to save others from the cruel chains of diseases? Why is He not able to free Himself from punishment? Behold the king of our nation, whom we ought to have believed: let Him free His body from the hardwood of the tree! Then we shall be able worthily to believe in the holy signs. He trusts in God His Father: why does the venerable power not wish to release its own offspring from punishment?' No less do the robbers, groaning, fixed to the crosses on right and left for the lot of their crimes, also revile Him.
Now the course of day had climbed the middle of its orbit, when suddenly it fled from sight, and is clothed in dusky darkness, and the sun hides the trembling day in night. But when, troubled, it had passed the ninth hour, the dismayed lights returned to their world. And Christ called upon His Father with a loud voice, after the manner of the Hebrew tongue; but the ignorant people thinks He is calling upon Elijah. Then one, roused, forced upon His lips a sour taste pressed from a foul sponge bound to a reed. The rest of the raging crowd cackles with this voice: 'Let us watch together, lest perchance Elijah, sent back from heaven, should come—he who rests in his lofty seat—and free the king fastened to the wretched stake.' Then the Lord's cry, sent forth with great effort, mingled His soul as a companion with the breezes of the air.
Likewise the veils of the holy temple are torn, and the linen curtains, rent into two parts, gape open, and the trembling earth was shaken with all its weight, and the cliffs, broken from their own mass, leap apart. Then the monuments of men of old lay open, the barriers thrust back, and righteous souls returned through their members; and unless they had wandered far and wide here and there among the people through the city's walls—so do all these things terrify the world—the hearts of the foremost soldiers are shaken with dread, those who guarded the bodies given over to cruel punishment, and they declared Him the offspring of God and confess Him to be Christ. From the watchtowers all the mothers, who were wont to render service to Christ, behold such great miracles. Now evening had begun to follow the departing sun, and one alone, more righteous among the chief men, dares to demand the body of Christ for its final office.
This man bore the name Joseph of Arimathea, who once had lent his ears to the words of Jesus. He then asks Pilate that the limbs be yielded to him, from which lately the dreadful force of punishment had taken life. The governor granted it, and they cover the body with shining woven linen, and it is laid in a new cave of rock. Immense masses of stone close the threshold; from the watchtowers the mothers keep guard and behold all things. And now the day was filling the lands with ruddy light, the day which ever commanded ancient rest by the old law; but no rest does the harsh fury of the chief men keep. They gather and at once thus burden the ears of the judge: 'A most just punishment has loosed the snares of error. Now it is fitting to remember;
for that deceiver was wont, boasting, always to promise the common people that, with the threefold returning course of the sun, he would likewise come back from the darkness of death to the light of life. This we ask: let a guard of soldiers watch the new burial, lest the fierce audacity of the disciples to steal the body should arise and a fresh madness should disturb the people.' And Pilate to this: 'A soldier is granted you,' he said, 'to guard, as you wish, the body buried in the earth.' They gather and roll huge weights of stone, and guard the threshold with seals and the stone with a soldier. Now the stars of night begin to give way to the coming sun, when the mothers run together to visit the enclosure of the tomb; but at once a trembling shakes the whole earth, and a messenger, gliding down, descends from the opened heaven and rolls the stone from the threshold of the tomb.
His face shines like the fire of lightning, and the coverings of his garment gleam like the appearance of snow. Terror had closed off all sense from the soldiers, and they lay together like corpses poured out in death. But he speaks to the mothers with this voice: 'Let no fear, shaking your hearts, now weary them; for your faith is manifest, that you seek the holy body which wicked madness fixed upon the wood of the cross. Christ has risen, and has received the eternal lights of life together with His holy body, death being vanquished. It is now permitted you to behold that no limbs which had been buried lie there in the seat of the tomb.
Tell the disciples besides, with swift and hasty return, that Christ has come back to the shores of light, and goes joyful before them into the land of Galilee.' At these words and sights, a burning gladness had flooded their astonished minds, with amazement and wavering dread. At last, celebrating their joys with headlong haste, they report such things to the disciples and leave the tomb. Behold, in the midst of the way Jesus shows Himself, radiant, and graciously bade the faithful mothers be of good cheer. They run to meet Him, and clasping His knees and feet, in fear they venerate the conqueror of death, Jesus. He then strengthens their hearts with such precepts: 'Let every fear of faith depart from your minds, and behold, carry these commands speedily to our brethren.
If there is care to see Me, go willingly and speedily cross over into the land of Galilee.' Meanwhile, the hearts of the guards at the tomb, terrified, send a part of their number to report such great miracles of events to the Jews. But the senseless band, already once thoroughly devoted to insane fury, eagerly pays great rewards to the soldiers, and redeems reputation with silver—namely, that the threshold being broken, the daring of the disciples had stealthily carried off the body, secretly seizing it under cover of darkness. And now the anxious crowd of His own, running together at the commands of Christ, had climbed the Galilean mountains: behold, the venerable offspring of the Thunderer is seen by His own. Falling down, the whole assembly holily adores Him; yet not equally in all hearts did firm-founded virtue remain, for a part of them doubted.
Then radiant Jesus thus addresses the disciples: 'In heaven and on earth the Father has subjected all things to Me; the Father has deigned to send Me as light to you. In no other way have I now resolved to send you to all the nations; it is yours to join all the nations to Me. Go forth, and the men who have been washed with cleansing waters, baptize under the holy name of Father and of Son; let the breathings of the life-giving Spirit run together likewise. And to those washed thereafter, instill, teaching, our precepts, that they may be able to live the everlasting life; nor shall our presence ever be lacking to you, until the consuming end shall dissolve the ages.'
These strengths of faith and of holy fear my mind has received, and so greatly does the grace of Christ shine upon me, that in our verses the glory of the divine law might gladly take up the earthly ornaments of the tongue. This the peace of Christ has granted me, this peace of the age, which the indulgent ruler of the open earth, Constantine, cherishes—he to whom is present the grace worthy of his merit, who alone shrinks from having the burden of the sacred name's reign laid upon himself, whereby, more worthy through righteous deeds, he may receive eternal life unto the divine ages, through the Lord of light, Christ, who reigns unto the ages.