That which I am now about to say with great trembling, that which you are now to hear with terror, nay, to utter with terror, the angels stand amazed at, the powers dread, the highest heaven does not contain, the sun does not behold, the earth does not sustain, the whole creation does not attain. What can the mortal breast do before these things? What can the feeble mind of man before these things? What can the narrowness of human sense before these things? What can the breath of the human voice before these things? What can the human tongue, soon to fall silent, before this? This Paul, when he had invisibly seen it, disclosed by not disclosing, saying: 'Neither has eye seen, nor ear heard, nor has it entered into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for those who love Him' (1 Cor. 2).
When Isaiah had begun to hear this with his hearing, he doubts whether even the faith of men could attain to it, saying: 'Lord, who has believed our report?' (Isa. 53). When Jeremiah had conceived this by divine hearing, he could not bear the birth of the supernal senses, crying out: 'My belly, my belly, I am in pain, and the senses of my heart are troubled' (Jer. 4). This Habakkuk pleaded forth by the inspiration of the divine Spirit, when he says: 'I have kept watch, and my belly trembled at the voice of the prayer of my lips; and trembling entered into my bones, and my strength was troubled beneath me' (Hab. 3). Lifted up by the power of God, he felt his own strength give way beneath him. It would be long to pursue this awe-inspiring mystery, and to number the examples of the saints:
time does not allow me to linger long in this fear, the force of the heavenly birth cannot delay those who are being born. I speak therefore, and I summon you, still in the womb, with an inmost voice, and with provident exhortation I forewarn you; that before you see your mother, you may call also upon your Father; before the caresses of a mother, you may reach and hasten toward the Father's kingdom; before you cling to a mother's breasts, you may come first to the Father's bread. Let neither the necessity of a mother nor the seasons of your age claim anything for themselves in you: but in you let all things answer and run to meet the divine Father, the heavenly Author (Matt. 6). 'Our Father who art in heaven.'
This is what I feared to say, this is what I trembled to utter, this is what the condition of his own servitude allowed none, whether of heavenly or of earthly beings, to suspect: that so great a commerce between heaven and earth, between flesh and God, could suddenly arise, that God should be turned into man, man into God; the Lord into a servant, the servant into a son, and that there should come to be, in an ineffable manner, one and everlasting kinship of divinity and humanity. And indeed the condescension of the Godhead toward us is so great that the creature cannot know what it ought most of all to marvel at: whether that God laid Himself down to our servitude, or that He snatched us up to the dignity of His own divinity. Hence it is, O man, that He divinely exhorts you, He who now is inflamed with so great a love for you:
that while still in the womb, by your own voice God adopts you into a son; that He wills you not only to be made free, but to be born; that for your sake He sets free the very nature, lest the origin of the former servitude should impose any blemish, any stain. O blessed are you, to whom it was given to have dominion before being born, to reign before living, to attain to the glory of God the Father before recognizing the lineage of your own baseness. Happy the Church, the mother, who looks upon you such as you are, who, while she remains a virgin, we marvel that she has borne such and so great sons in such a way. Long ago this birth was prefigured by preceding examples. Hence it is that Jacob wrestles with his brother in his mother's womb (Gen. 25), and seizes the triumphs beforehand.
Hence it is that in the womb of Tamar the twins contend for the honor of primacy, they delay the birth, nor do they desire to see the light before conquering (Gen. 38). Hence it is that John exults beforehand, and beforehand runs to meet his Author from his mother's womb before he comes forth (Luke 1). And if human pledges thus wage war for God before they are born, before they live to the world, what wonder if the divine germs of the Church, if his offspring to God, while still in the womb, already confess that they are of the supernal germ? 'Our Father who art in heaven.' Amazement arises: Christ from the bosom of God the Father calls upon a mother and confesses her on earth; and man from a mother's womb calls upon the Father and confesses Him in heaven. 'Our Father who art in heaven.' To what, O man, has grace suddenly raised you?
To what has the heavenly nature snatched you? that while still set in flesh and on earth, you may already not know either flesh or earth, in saying: 'Our Father who art in heaven.' He therefore who confesses and believes himself to be the son of so great a Father, let him answer his lineage by his life, his father by his morals, and by mind and deed let him lay claim to the heavenly one which he has obtained by nature. 'Hallowed be Thy name.' Whose lineage we have begun to be, by His name too are we reckoned: and therefore we ask that the hallowing of that name may persevere in us, the honor and prerogative of the name which the sublimity of so great a Begetter has thus exalted. 'Thy kingdom come.' We do not ask for Him to whom a kingdom was never lacking, nay who is Himself the kingdom, and contains in Himself the whole power of the kingdom;
but because He wills us to attain to the promised glory of the kingdom, He admonishes us to seek this with all our prayers, in this He wills us to yearn with our whole minds. For as much as he is rash who disputes about lineage, so much is he slothful who does not rejoice, glow, and pant when he strains toward the promised kingdom and reaches out to it. 'Thy will be done, as in heaven, so on earth.' As in heaven, so also on earth; then already the whole is heaven, then the one mind of God moves all, then Christ is in all and Christ in all things, when all are wise unto God alone, and do His wills; then all are one, nay rather one is all, when the one Spirit of God lives in all. 'Give us this day our daily bread.' As in the psalm: 'Blessed be the Lord day by day' (Ps. 67);
so here, 'Give us this day our daily bread.' By 'daily' we mean 'perpetual'; that is the perpetual bread which came down from heaven: 'I am the bread which came down from heaven' (John 6). This bread therefore is of perfect blessedness; today, that is, in the present, we already begin to live by the food of that bread, by whose perpetuity, which is 'daily,' we shall be fattened in the future. 'And forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors.' From the breast of the suppliant the fountain of pardon flows forth, and it flows back to pardon: whatever of piety overflows and pours out upon another, since He indulges to a man only as much as he has bestowed upon another. 'And forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors.'
The merciful man has power enough, he who contends with God about piety, since he desires as much to be given to him as he has given, as much to be granted to him as he has granted. O man, let pardon be always in your breast, if you wish not to fear your crimes. 'And lead us not into temptation.' These words need interpretation, because the temptation of the devil is his forerunner and his bitter handmaid: but so long as we are held in this frail body, we necessarily pray that no access to temptation may lie open against us, nor any approach be granted to the devil. 'But deliver us from evil.' May the Lord our God Himself deliver us from evil, and lead us through to every good, He who lives and reigns as God now and always, and through infinite ages of ages. Amen.
Today's festival, beloved brethren, does not link old things to us, nor keep the flesh of the lamb until the morrow: but while by solemn devotion it makes things past share in things present, and joins our Pasch to the returning Pasch, it weans the infancy of the new regeneration, because, according to the Apostle, 'Old things have passed away, and behold, all things are made new' (2 Cor. 5). The year of the Lord is completed by its seasons; it does not grow old, running back in its own circle for as long as it may bring us to the day of retribution. Today's paschal solemnity now weans from the breast those whom it before begot, that by the nourishment of more solid food they may be strengthened into the perfect man of Christ.
That Abraham made a great feast, and stirred up the joy of his whole household when Isaac was weaned, we have learned from the divine history's account (Gen. 21). And if the offspring of old age, the only son of a barren woman, drew and moved the hearts of the whole family into joy, with dancing choruses, with lyre and timbrel, and with the whole harmony of the psaltery resounding, how much more does it befit us today to exult in spiritual hymns and canticles, when in the offspring of the Virgin the whole fruitfulness is weaned?
If Hannah, as barren as Sarah, who so long moistened the dryness of her body and nature with the tears of her prayers, as long as posterity had been denied her through a long span of life, when Samuel had been received by a divine gift, straightway poured back the weaned child into a divine gift, and heaped up her joy to the fullness of deliverance with the victims of sacrifices (1 Sam. 1); how much more does it behoove us to immolate the sacrifice of praise, to pay our vows, to burn the incense of sweetness, and with the whole fatness of burnt offerings to sacrifice victims to God the Father, when the Virgin mother, having nursed and weaned pledges as many in number as the stars of heaven, presents them to the Father throughout the whole world, that the prophetic word may be fulfilled: 'Thou shalt bless the crown of the year of Thy goodness, and Thy fields shall be filled with plenty' (Ps. 64);
'The lines have fallen unto me' (Ps. 15). Let no one believe this saving mystery of our festival to be idle, nor think that we are sewing a new patch onto an old garment, where we join nothing of Jewish antiquity to Christian newness: knowing, as the Apostle says, that a wholly new creature has emerged for us in Christ; but we advance the divine knowledge of supernal power unto profit (2 Cor. 5),
that while at once the newly born are instructed in what they owe, and those begotten before are taught how great a grace they owe to God for their perfection, those who have just been born may be hung upon the neck and, with all filial devotion, be occupied beneath the breasts of Mother Church, may draw with tender throats the nourishment of innocence, may practice to stretch out their arms in holy work, may strive in the race of faith to make firm their trembling footsteps. Are those already nurtured to be so abandoned that they are not governed by a father's care, a father's hand, a father's judgment? and so fortified by a mother's counsel, a mother's faith, that they may perceive and seize beforehand the things of salvation not only by human but also by divine prudence?
Thus Jacob, all too timid of himself, but bold enough by his mother's counsel, in order to seize beforehand his father's blessing, went forward more mystical than deceitful (Gen. 27); for he did not falsely claim himself to be the firstborn, because he is first whom heavenly grace begets, not mortal nature; he prefigured us under the skins of goats, we who, that we may die to sin, at the exhortation of Mother Church are clothed with the garment of the mortified body, and by the labor of the field are fragrant with the continual fruits and abundance of confessions, until, healthfully mocking the blindness of Israel, we may seize beforehand the paternal blessing by the whole secret of faith, as the Apostle says: 'Blindness in part has happened to Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles should come in' (Rom. 11:25).
The labor of the vigils, dearest brethren, has made and compelled us to be silent for a little while, and the weariness of the fast has constrained us; and therefore today we render a sermon on the Lord's Resurrection, in which, if it is divine that Christ is born of a Virgin, how much more divine is it that Christ rises from the dead? What is therefore divine, let it not be received by human hearing. 'In the evening,' he says, 'of the sabbath, which dawns toward the first day of the week' (Matt. 28). The evening of the sabbath: this the day of the world knows not, this the usage of the world does not have. Evening ends, it does not begin a day; the evening grows dark, it does not dawn; it is not turned into the dawn, because it knows not the rising of light. But this evening, a mother, brings forth the learned day; it changes the order, while it acknowledges its Author;
the mystery shines forth from newness, it pants to serve the Creator, not time. 'In the evening,' he says, 'of the sabbath, which dawns toward the first day of the week, came Mary Magdalene and the other Mary to see the sepulchre.' At evening the woman runs to pardon, she who early ran to fault. At evening she seeks Christ, she who in the morning had known that she lost herself in Adam. 'Came Mary and the other Mary to see the sepulchre.' She who had taken perfidy from paradise, hastens to take faith from the sepulchre: she strives to snatch life from death, she who had snatched death from life. 'Mary came.'
This is the name of the mother of Christ. A mother, therefore, came in the name; a woman came, that she might become the mother of the living, she who had become the mother of the dying, so that what is written might be fulfilled: 'This is the mother of all the living' (Gen. 3). Mary came, and the other Mary. He did not say 'they came,' but 'she came'; under one name two came, by mystery, not by chance. Mary came, and the other Mary. She herself came, yet another; another, yet she herself, so that the woman might be changed in life, not in name; in virtue, not in sex; and that she might become the herald of the resurrection who had once been the go-between of the fall and the ruin. Mary came to see the sepulchre, that the sight of the sepulchre might repair her whom the sight of the tree had deceived; and that a saving gaze might raise up her whom the alluring gaze had cast down.
'Behold,' he says, 'a great earthquake occurred, for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven.' The earth trembled, not because an angel came down from heaven, but because the Ruler ascended from the depths below. Behold, a great earthquake occurred. Chaos is stirred, the lowest depths of the earth burst asunder, the earth trembles, the masses of the mountains tremble, the foundations of the world are shaken, Tartarus is seized, the nether regions are stopped short; death is condemned, which, rushing upon the guilty, ran headlong into the Judge; which, lording it over the servants, blazed up against the Lord, and raging against men, leapt out against God.
Rightly, therefore, does the law of Tartarus perish, the rights of hell are removed, the power of death is taken away, and as punishment for its rashness it raised up the dead. In short, by the wrong done to its Author, the bodies are given back, man is restored, life is repaired, and the whole matter now stands secure regarding pardon, because the sentence soon passed over into the Author of life. Behold, a great earthquake occurred. Only now a great earthquake: O, if then even a slight whirlwind had cast down that death-bearing tree! O, if the smoke of a cloud had darkened the sight of that woman! O, if a foul cloud had dimmed the beauty of the deadly fruit! O, if the hand touching the forbidden thing had trembled! O, if unjust night had darkened the day of sin, and had then borne away the laments of the world, the increases of death, and the wrong done to the Creator!
But flatteries always serve the vices, sweet things pander to sins, whereas stern and strong things are friends to the virtues. For an angel of the Lord descended from heaven. When Christ rose again and death perished, heavenly commerce was restored to earthly things; and for the woman who had once had deadly counsel with the devil, converse with an angel becomes life-giving. For an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and rolled back the stone. He did not say 'rolled,' but 'rolled back' the stone, which, being rolled on, had confirmed death, and, being rolled back, stood forth as the witness of the resurrection. Blessed the stone that deserved both to reveal and to veil Christ; blessed the stone that opens hearts no less than the sepulchre; blessed the stone that gives the faith of resurrection, and the resurrection to me, which testifies that the divine flesh has risen again.
Here the order of things is changed: this sepulchre devours death, not the dead man; the house of death becomes a dwelling of life; by a new manner the womb conceives one dead and brings forth one living. For an angel of the Lord descended from heaven, and coming near he rolled back the stone and was sitting upon it. And what cause was there for the angel to sit, in whom there was no weariness! But he was sitting as a teacher of God, as a master of the resurrection; he was sitting upon the rock, that the solidity of the seat might give firmness to those who believe. The angel was laying upon the rock the foundations of the faith, upon which Christ was to found His Church, He who said: 'Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church' (Matt. 16:18). 'His appearance,' it says, 'was like lightning, and his garments like snow' (Matt. 28:2-3).
For the glory of the angel, brightness is not enough; but what did clothing do for a heavenly nature? Yet by such splendour he was portraying the appearance and form of our resurrection, because those who rise again through Christ are changed by Christ into glory. 'And for fear of him the guards were terrified, and became as dead men.' Wretched are they whom the dread of death then strikes, when the security of life is being restored: but the ministers of cruelty, the executors of another's treachery, how could they take confidence from things above? They were besieging the sepulchre, they were blocking the doors against the resurrection, and lest any life might enter or death perish, they kept watch: rightly did the angel's coming strike them down and lay them low.
Wretched mortality, ever an enemy to itself, grieves that it dies, and fights lest it might rise again: it had been fitting to open the sepulchre, and to bring whatever ease there was to rising again, that there might be a miracle from the deed, hope from the example, reality from the return, credence from living. Great madness it is, for a man to be unwilling to believe what he desires to come to himself. Let it suffice to have said this today concerning these guards; but what our faith holds, lest today grow too long, we shall tell afterward, by the aid of our Lord Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with the Father as God unto the ages of ages. Amen.