389. Слово в великий пяток

(Said in the Holy Trinity Alexander Nevsky Lavra; printed separately). Jesus went out, wearing a crown of thorns and a scarlet robe. And the verb to them: behold the man! (John 19:5). The Gospel and the Church now accompany us, Christians, throughout the final journey of the Great Sufferer of Gethsemane and Calvary. Where shall we stand to consider at least some of the mysteries and wonders that will fill eternity with wonder and glory? If the deep secrets of Gethsemane are still impenetrable to us, where only a few chosen mysteries are allowed, who already know the secret of Tabor, Peter, James and John, but their wakeful spirit is sanctified by weak flesh, and their eyes, raised to prayerful contemplation, are burdened with involuntary sleep; if the lofty miracles of Golgotha are still unapproachable for us, where also the beloved disciple and the Divine Mother, with a few imitators of her example, can stand unshakably on the shaking earth, and partake at the same time of love and suffering, life and death of the suffering and dying Life-Giver, and where Jesus, stretched out between heaven, earth and hell, is approached only for those who are not attracted by the earth, not hell fears and does not reflect heaven: - let us stand in the middle between these great boundaries, where the suffering Jesus appears and is indicated to everyone who wants to see him: “Jesus came out, wearing a crown of thorns and a scarlet robe, and Pilate said to the people: “Behold a man!” Let us look attentively at what everyone who does not stubbornly close their eyes can see in this incomprehensible Sufferer—the suffering man in the God-Man: “Behold a man!” Let us see that this man must be revealed in each of us: “this... let him be wise in you, even as he also is in Christ Jesus” (Phil. 2:5). Let us look at Him with faith, so that we will not be forced to look at Him with despair: for “behold, he is coming from the clouds, and every eye will see Him, and those who are like Him will weep, and all the tribes of the earth will mourn for Him” (Rev. 1:7). But, before we follow further this significant indication of the “man” in Jesus, let us focus a little on who, and how, finds and gives this indication. The face of Jesus, lofty and holy not only in Divinity, but also in humanity, was covered with the darkest slander when He appeared before Pilate. The slanderers wanted to point out to Pilate in Jesus, a disturber of public peace, an opponent of power, a thief of the name of the Son of God, someone whom neither heaven nor earth could tolerate among men. But Pilate was not in such a disposition that would be conducive to the discovery of pure truth. Apparently he is looking for her; for he asks about it: “What is truth” (John 18:38)? But either impatience or frivolity presents him with an idle question about the truth in the trial of the Truth, and does not allow him to wait for an answer to it. Soon the silence of the questioned person will irritate the pride of the judge: “Do you not speak to me” (John 19:10)? and the threat of informers: “If you let this go, bring it to Caesar’s friend” (John 19:12), will take away the courage of the defender of innocence. Jesus himself, foreseeing this disposition, and not wanting to waste the treasures of truth, does not satisfy Pilate’s research, either remaining silent before him, or uttering certain verbs in the language of the mysteries, which those outside cannot hear. However, the true and essential in Jesus shone with such power through all the varied veils, especially during His suffering, that even the eye, half darkened by passions, was still able to collect some rays of light: and the judge, who does not have a single witness in his favor, is not satisfied with the answers of himself, bowed by his passions to the side of his enemies, with all this feels the presence of the truth, and, embraced by its power, hurries out of the house to the people to proclaim the innocence of Jesus. - Oh, unfortunate rottenness! Pilate leaves Jesus in order to reveal the self-found truth to others, and loses it even for himself; he himself becomes infected with the spirit of malice and bitterness that prevailed among the people, and returns to torment the one whom he only now declared innocent of anything: “then Pilate would drink Jesus, and beat Him” (John 19:1). But of course, the multiplying sufferings more and more revealed what was pure and holy in this Sufferer; of course, every wound inflicted on Him was a new opening of the light hidden in it: for soon his tormentor again becomes his protector; and in order to stop the mouths of slanderers, to enlighten those deceived by slanderers, to change the opinion of almost an entire people, he does not look for means of persuasion anywhere other than the very face of Jesus. He again proclaims His innocence, and when proof of this innocence is expected, the judge only points to the accused: “Behold a man!” Behold the one whom your false witnesses represent as unworthy to live among men! The truest evidence of him is found in himself. Watch and judge! Look at what state He is in, how He looks at His enemies, how He accepts His suffering. “Behold the man!” Let us think here, Christians, was Pilate alone, a pagan and a judge possessed of passions, who could see so much light in the face of Jesus? - No! No! A much greater light, already enlightened by the Christian eye, must shine from the humanity of Him, “Who is the radiance of the glory of God the Father and the image of His Person” (Heb. 1:3). So, if any of us does not know this light, does not follow this light, does not accept this light into himself: then no matter how much we humiliate those guilty of the suffering and death of the Crucified One, will it be more joyful for us on the day of judgment than for Pilate and others like him? Now let us leave the pagan court and the Jewish rebellion and with a sweating Christian eye consider what the pagan indicates, and what the Jews do not want to see. “Behold the man!” Pilate said in these words more than he himself understood. Don't be surprised. If “Saul” was once “a prophet” (1 Sam. 19:24) and Caiaphas, thinking of telling his fellow conspirators the secret of wickedness, revealed the secret of piety, “for there is no one... that he may die... for the people” (John 18:14), and the most disastrous deed of the Jewish people was serving the most holy cause of human salvation: then the Lord of destinies is also He also had the power to ensure that the judge and condemner of Jesus was His preacher, although he himself did not understand everything that he preached, and what he understood, he did not follow. The destinies placed the suffering Jesus before the Bishops, elders and people, before Jews and pagans, not in order to multiply crimes, blasphemies and sins of temptation; but to show the Jews their salvation, and the pagans their hope, as much as their eyes could bear. Someone had to preach about this intention of fate. But there was no John then who would indicate Jesus being baptized with blood, as he had once indicated Him being baptized with water: “Behold, the lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world” (John 1:29); nor Peter, who would have confessed “Christ the Son of the living God” (Matthew 16:16). So, the word of God, not restrained by any obstacles or lack of weapons, like lightning through a cloud, broke through the darkened soul and through the mouth of a man of unrighteousness preached to the man of holiness: “Behold, man!” In order to draw from this saying, apparently only earthly, the light of pure heavenly knowledge hidden in it, let us learn, listeners, the knowledge of man from a man, whom “the man Christ Jesus” himself taught in this (1 Tim. 2:5), showing him his Divine humanity from heaven and confirming him with his own word in the truth of this revelation: “I am Jesus” (Acts 9:5). The Apostle Paul counts only two people in the whole world, of whom he calls one first, and the other second and last. He says: “The first man from the earth has a ring; the second man is the Lord from heaven" (1 Cor. 15:47); “The first man Adam became a living soul, the last Adam a life-giving spirit” (1 Cor. 15:45). All other people belong to these two, like branches to a tree and a root, or, according to the exact saying of the second man Jesus Christ himself, like generation to the vine: “I am the vine, but you are generation” (John 15:5). Where is the first man now? - having been torn away from God by disobeying the commandment, he was torn out from the holy land of paradise, cast down to this land stricken with a curse, where this once glorious tree in vain multiplies countless leaves and branches, constantly withering, and cannot produce any fruit into eternal life. All those who, by descent from the first Adam, are called “sons of men” (Ps. 4:3), according to the true dignity of their deeds and nature itself, in the Word of God are called “the seed of the serpent” (Gen. 3:15) of the ancient one, who deceived people, “an evil tree” (Matt. 7:17), “at the root of which lies the ax” ( Matt.3:10) eternal condemnation, “flesh”, in which “the Spirit of God does not... abide” (Gen.6:3) and “are likened to foolish cattle” (Ps.49:13). And where is the man? Have centuries and millennia produced it? Have societies put it together into one composition? Have the laws painted His image? Did the sages breathe a living soul into him? – If the race of Adam could feel itself with a single common sensation, it would be the feeling of the helpless Jerusalem paralytic, and very naturally would be depicted by his own words: “man is not imam” (John 5:7)! But finally, the long-awaited man came, who was supposed to heal the paralytic or, better to say, from death, which could only be called life because it was felt, to raise him to true life, exceeding the aspirations and desires of the paralytic. The second man, the Lord, appeared from heaven, so that the first man, earthy, who was returned “to the earth from which he was taken” (Gen. 3:19), was led to “a new and living way” (Acts 2:28) of returning to God, “who breathed into his nostrils the breath of life” (Gen. 2:7). The true Vine has sprung up, destined to unite the fallen generation with itself, to make the withered green, to fertilize the wonder, so that it may be in it, and “bring forth much fruit” (John 15:5). There was the last Adam, who alone with his life-giving spirit was able to penetrate and, having penetrated, destroy the kingdom of death, based on the destruction of the first Adam, “to rule over all things for himself” (Eph. 1:10) and combine the end with the beginning. This heavenly and Divine man, in the high name of the Only Begotten Son of God and in the mysterious name of the God-Man, presented by the Gospel to our belief and contemplation, is also indicated in the simple name of man to our imitation: “Behold a man!” and although in this way in every state, in every action, in every moment of the most holy life of Jesus we can see the purest images of true human perfection, yet destinies especially indicate Him at the moment when He “went out” from the house of judges to the people, “wearing a crown of thorns and a scarlet robe” (John 19:5). This moment is great and truly requires special indication, so that in its abbreviated greatness it does not hide from our lack of insight! Jesus is in a state into which he was brought by the will of others; in someone else's clothes; no action is visible; no word of Him is heard; It's as if he doesn't exist. What is being shown to us here about Him? - the same thing that Jesus appears without will, without action, without words. This silence that He maintains between the exclamations of the defender, and between the cries of slanderers and slanderers, this deep gaze, through human turmoil immersed in the fate of God, these motionless limbs, so to speak, resting in suffering - all this presents us with the image of a man of the highest patience, courageous, meek, humble, invincible in love by any universal enmity, unshakable in peace with everyone, a dispassionate, pure, holy person, and - to combine these traits into one that embraces them - a person completely devoted to God. This very trait describes the image of “one who is red in kindness more than the sons of men” (Ps. 44:3) and in all His states. He himself describes his deeds with it: “As the Father commanded me, so do I” (John 14:31); and my own verbs: “As I have spoken, as the Father has spoken to Me, so I have spoken” (John 12:50); and my own will: “I do not seek My will, but the will of the Father who sent Me” (John 5:30). By this unlimited devotion to God the Father, Jesus is similar to himself even when bloody sweat hides most of His image: “Father, ... not My will, but Thine be done” (Luke 22:42). She is the last living feature in the face of Jesus dying on the cross: “Father, into Your hands I commend My spirit” (Luke 23:46). And, finally, this same feature will shine on the glorious face of the risen Jesus, for even then, when “all power in heaven and on earth is given to Him” (Matthew 28:18), will they ask Him about “times and years”? – He will not touch them, as “those placed in the power of the Father” (Acts 1:7); will He promise the Holy Spirit? - He will command you to wait for Him as “the promise of the Father.” (Acts 1:4). This is one of the human properties of Jesus Christ, although, however, it is also one of His Divine properties, now pointed out to us for imitation: “Behold a man! this... let us also be wise” (Phil. 2:5). Christians! Having now been called by the Church to look with both mental and sensory eye on the image of Jesus Christ, in life and death devoted to God his Father with love and obedience, let us remember that when He himself appeared to the Jews in this image, the embittered children of wrath were not captivated by the red kindness more than the sons of men, but removed His image from themselves and wanted to consume Him. Let us diligently listen to our heart, born in the ugliness of the first Adam, with what voice it responds to the image of the second Adam, into which we must be transformed. But does it say that this image has too sad and terrible features; that it would like to wear only pleasant and joyful things, and leave the crucifixion of the will to the one crucified in the flesh for us; what should exclude from a child's devotion to God the God-sanctioned rights of reason and freedom? - Know that these, or similar feelings and desires are, although quiet and distant echoes of that cry of Jerusalem against Jesus: “Take, take, crucify Him” (John 19:15), - there is no middle state between the imitators and enemies of the crucified Jesus: “whatever is not with me,” He says, “is upon me” (Matthew 12:30). One must certainly take one of two lots: either the lot of the Crucified One, or the lot of the crucifiers. May the Crucified Himself, for our salvation, by His grace grant to all of us by faith “to understand Him, and the power of His resurrection and the communication of His passion,” by imitation, “being conformed to His death” (Phil. 3:10), in the mortification of our will and self-surrender to the will of God, so that we too “will attain to the resurrection of the dead” (Phil. 3:11). Amen. You might be interested in: