Слово 38. На Богоявление, или на Рождество Спасителя

1. Christ is born: praise! Christ from heaven: come out to the meeting! Christ on earth: ascend! Sing to the Lord, all the earth (Ps. 95:1)! And I will say to both together: let the heavens rejoice, and the earth rejoice (Ps. 95:11) for the sake of the Heavenly and then the Earthly! Christ in the flesh; Rejoice with trembling and joy: with trembling because of sin, with joy because of hope. Christ from the Virgin; keep your virginity, wives, so that you may become mothers of Christ! Who does not worship Jehovah from the beginning? Who does not glorify the Last One? 2. Again darkness dissipates, light appears again; again Egypt is punished with darkness, again Israel is illuminated by a pillar. Let those who sit in the darkness of ignorance see the great light of knowledge (Matthew 5:16). The ancient mimoidosha was all new (2 Cor. 5:17). The letter yields, the spirit prevails; the shadows pass and truth takes their place. Melchizedek comes; one born without a mother is born without a father: the first time - without a mother, the second - without a father. The laws of nature are violated; the heavenly world must be filled. Christ commands, let us not resist. Clap all the nations with your hands (Ps. 47:2); For from a child was born unto us a Son, and was given unto us, whose rulership is upon his frame, for he is lifted up with the cross, and his name is called: great is the counsel - the counsel of the Father is the angel (Isa. 9:6). Let John proclaim: prepare the way of the Lord (Matthew 3:3)! And I will proclaim the power of the day. The incorporeal becomes incarnate, the Word hardens, the invisible becomes visible, the intangible becomes tangible, the flightless begins. The Son of God becomes the son of man; Jesus Christ is yesterday and today, the same and forever (Heb. 13:8). Let the Jews be tempted, the Greeks laugh, the heretics dull their tongues! Then they will believe when they see Him ascending into heaven; if not then, then certainly when they see Him coming from heaven and sitting down to judge. 3. But this will happen later; and now is the feast of Epiphany, or Christmas, for this day is called one way or another and two names are given to one celebration, because God appeared to people through birth. He is God, as the Existing and Ever-Sustaining of the Ever-Sustaining, superior to guilt and words (because there is no word that is higher than the Word); and He appears for our sake, having been born subsequently, so that He who bestowed existence would also bestow well-being, or better yet, so that we, who fell from good-being through sin, would be returned to it again through the incarnation. And from the appearance the name Epiphany and from birth - Christmas. 4. Such is our triumph; We celebrate this now - the coming of God to men, so that we may be reborn or (more precisely) return to God, so that, having put aside the old man, we will put on the new (Eph. 4:22-23) and, as we died in Adam, so we will live in Christ (1 Cor. 15:22), being born with Christ, crucified, buried and raised together. For I need to undergo this saving change, so that just as from the pleasant the sorrowful may come, and from the sorrowful the pleasant will again come forth. Wherever sin abounds, grace abounds (Rom. 5:20). And if eating was the cause of condemnation, then wasn’t Christ’s suffering all the more justified? So, let us celebrate not magnificently, but divinely, not in a worldly way, but in a worldly manner, not our holiday, but the holiday of Him who became ours, or better yet, the holiday of our Master, not the holiday of infirmity, but the holiday of healing, not the holiday of creation, but the holiday of re-creation. 5. How can this be accomplished? Let us not crown the entrances of houses, create faces, decorate the streets, satiate the eyesight, fill the ears with pipes, undead the sense of smell, defile the taste, delight the sense of touch - these short paths to vice, these gates of sin. Let us not be like women, neither with soft and flowing clothes, whose entire grace is in uselessness, nor with the play of stones, nor with the glitter of gold, nor with the art of tinting, which brings into suspicion natural beauty and is invented to desecrate the image of God. Let us not go into goat-talking and drunkenness, with which, as I know, fornication and adultery are associated (Rom. 13:13), for bad teachers have bad lessons, or, better to say, bad seeds and fields are bad. Let us not cover high beds with tree branches, arranging sumptuous meals to please the belly; Let us not highly value the fragrance of wines, cooking seasonings and the value of ointments. Let neither the earth nor the sea bring us the gift of expensive dirt - this is how I learned to call luxury items! Let us not try to outdo each other with intemperance (and everything that is unnecessary and beyond need, in my opinion, is intemperance), especially when others, created from the same clay and composition with us, are hungry and in need. 6. On the contrary, let us leave all this to the pagans, to pagan pomp and pagan celebrations. They even call those who enjoy fatness gods, and accordingly they serve the deity through gluttony, like crafty inventors, priests and worshipers of crafty demons. But if we, who worship the Word, should enjoy anything, then let us enjoy the word, and God’s law, and the legends both about other things and about the reasons for the present triumph, so that our enjoyment is actually our own and not alien to the One who created us. Or, if you wish, I, who is now the manager of the feast, will offer you, the good participants in the feast, a word about this as much as I can, abundantly and generously, so that you know how a stranger can treat the natural inhabitants, a villager - city dwellers, not familiar with luxury - luxurious, a poor person and a homeless person - famous for their abundance. Let me begin with this: let those who want to enjoy what is offered purify their minds, their ears, and their hearts, because I have a word about God and God, let them purify them so that they can go away from here, having truly enjoyed not something vain. The word itself will be both very full and at the same time very short, so that it will neither upset you with its poverty, nor will it bore you with its excess. 7. God always was, is and will be, or, better said, always is, for the words “was” and “will be” mean the divisions of our time and are characteristic of a transitory nature, but the One who exists is always. And He calls Himself by this name when talking with Moses on the mountain, because He concentrates in Himself the entire existence that has not begun and will not cease. Like a kind of sea of essence, indefinable and endless, stretching beyond any idea of time and nature, with one mind (and this is very unclear and insufficient, not in reasoning what is in Himself, but in reasoning what is around Him), through the sketching of certain outlines, He is shaded into one kind of shape of reality, escaping before it is caught, and escaping before it is imagined, just as much illuminating the sovereign in us, if it is purified, as quickly as the speed of flying lightning illuminates the gaze. And this, it seems to me, is in order to attract the comprehensible to Oneself (for the completely incomprehensible is hopeless and inaccessible), and to surprise the incomprehensible, and through surprise to arouse a greater desire, and through the desire to purify, and through purification to make God-like; and when we become like this, we will already talk as with our friends (the word dares to say something bold) - talk to God, who has entered into unity with the gods and is known by them, perhaps as much as He knows those known by Him (1 Cor. 13:12). 8. So, the Divinity is limitless and inconceivable. In Him this one thing is completely comprehensible - His infinity; although others consider it part of nature to be either completely incomprehensible or completely comprehensible. But let us examine what constitutes the essence of simple nature; because simplicity does not yet constitute his nature, just as complexity alone does not constitute the nature of complex beings. Reason, considering the infinite in two respects - in relation to the beginning and in relation to the end (for the infinite extends beyond the beginning and the end and does not lie between them), when it directs its gaze into the mountain abyss and does not find anything to stop at and where to set a limit to its ideas about God, then the infinite and unsearchable is called beginningless; and when, rushing into the deep abyss, he experiences the same as before, then he calls Him immortal and incorruptible; when it brings both into unity, then it calls it eternal; for eternity is neither time nor a part of time, because it is immeasurable. But what is time for us, measured by the course of the sun, is for the eternal, eternity, something extended with eternal beings and, as it were, some temporary movement and distance. Let our philosophy about God now be limited to this, because there is no time to expand further and the subject of my word is not theology, but God’s Economy. When I name God, I mean the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, just as not spreading the Divinity beyond this number of Persons, so as not to introduce a plurality of gods, so not limiting us to a smaller number, so as not to condemn us in the poverty of the Divinity when we fall either into Judaism, defending unity of command, or into paganism, defending plurality. In both cases the evil is equal, although from opposite causes. Such is the Holy of Holies, hidden from the Seraphim themselves and glorified by the three Shrines, which converge into a single Dominion and Divinity, about which someone else spoke beautifully and very highly before us. 9. But since for Goodness it was not enough to exercise only in contemplation of Itself, but it was necessary that the good spread, go further and further, so that the number of those benefited was as large as possible (for this is the property of the highest Goodness), then God invents, firstly, angelic and heavenly Powers. And the thought became a deed, which was filled with the Word and accomplished by the Spirit. This is how the second lordships arose, the servants of the first lordship, whether by them we mean either intelligent spirits, or a kind of immaterial and incorporeal fire, or some other nature closest to what has been said. I would like to say that they are motionless towards evil and have one movement towards good, as existing around God and directly illuminated by God (for earthly things use secondary illumination), but Dennitsa convinces me to recognize and call them not motionless, but unmovable by his lordship, and for exaltation he became and is called darkness, with the god-apostate forces subordinate to him, which, through their removal from good, became the perpetrators of evil and us in it is involved. 10. So, for such reasons, God created the intelligent world, as much as I can philosophize about this, weighing the great with a small mind. Since the first creatures were pleasing to Him, He invents another world - material and visible; and this is the harmonious composition of heaven, earth and what is between them, amazing for the beautiful qualities of each thing, and even more worthy of surprise for the harmony and harmony of the whole, in which one thing to another, and everything is in excellent relation to everything, serving to the completeness of a single world. And by this God showed that He is able to create not only a nature akin to Himself, but also a completely alien nature. Natures that are intelligent and comprehended by the mind alone are akin to the Divine, but creatures that are subject to feelings are completely alien, and of these, creatures that are completely inanimate and immovable are even further removed from the Divine nature. But what do we care about this? - perhaps some overly zealous holiday lover will say. Drive your horse to the goal - think wisely about what relates to the holiday and why we have gathered today. I will do so, although I began somewhat distantly, to which I was forced by diligence and words. 11. So, the mind and feeling, so different from each other, became within their limits and expressed the greatness of the Creative Word, like silent guardians and the first preachers of splendor. But there has not yet been a mixture of mind and feeling, a combination of opposites - this experience of the highest Wisdom, this generosity in the formation of natures, and not all the wealth of Goodness has yet been discovered. Having desired to show this too, the Artistic Word creates a living being in which both are brought into unity, that is, the invisible and the visible nature; creates, I say, man and, taking a body from already created matter, and putting life from Himself (which in the word of God is known under the name of the rational soul and the image of God), creates, as it were, some kind of second world - great in small things; places on earth another angel, a worshiper composed of different natures, a spectator of the visible creation, the secret of the intuited creation, a king over what is on earth, subordinate to the heavenly kingdom, earthly and heavenly, temporal and immortal, visible and intuited, an angel who occupies the middle between greatness and baseness, one and the same is spirit and flesh - spirit for the sake of grace, flesh for the sake of exaltation, the spirit to abide and glorify the Benefactor, the flesh to suffer and, suffering, remember and learn how much it has been disadvantaged by greatness; creates a living being, here prepared and transferred to another world and (which is the end of the mystery) through the desire for God achieving deification. For the moderate light of truth here serves for me to see and bear the lordship of God, worthy of Him who binds and looses and unites again in the most excellent way. 12. This man, having honored with freedom, so that good belonged no less to the one who chooses than to the one who puts in its seeds, God placed him in paradise (whatever this paradise means) as a maker of immortal plants - perhaps divine thoughts, both simple and more perfect; He placed him naked in simplicity and unartificial life, without any cover or fencing, for this was how the primordial should have been. It also gives a law for the exercise of freedom. The law was a commandment: what plants should he use and what plants should he not touch. And the last was the tree of knowledge, and it was not planted at first with malicious intent, and it was not forbidden out of envy (let not the atheists open their mouths at this and let them not imitate the serpent!); on the contrary, it was good for those who use it in a timely manner (because this tree, in my opinion, was contemplation, which only those who have experienced perfection can safely approach), but not good for the simple and also for those immoderate in their desire; just as perfect food is not good for the weak and those who require milk. When, through the envy of the devil and through the seduction of the wife, to which she herself was subjected as the weakest and which she produced as skillful in persuasion (oh, my weakness! for the weakness of the forefather is also my own), a man forgot the commandment given to him and was overcome by a bitter taste: then through sin he becomes an exile, removed at the same time from the tree of life, and from paradise, and from God; puts on leather vestments (perhaps the coarsest, mortal and warring flesh), for the first time knows his own shame and hides from God. However, even here something is gained, namely death in the suppression of sin, so that evil does not become immortal. Thus, the punishment itself is done by philanthropy. For this, as I am sure, is how God punishes. 13. But in order to prevent many sins, which the root of damage grew from different causes and at different times, man was admonished in many different ways: by word, by the Law, by prophets, by blessings, by threats, by punishments, by floods, by fires, by wars, by victories, by defeats, by signs from heaven, by signs in the air, on earth, at sea, by unexpected upheavals in the fate of people, cities, nations (all this had the purpose make amends for the damage); Finally, the strongest healing became necessary due to the most severe illnesses: murder, adultery, perjury, masculinity, and this last and first of all evils - idolatry and worship of the creature instead of the Creator. Since all this required the strongest assistance, the strongest was given. And it was as follows: The Word of God itself, the eternal, invisible, incomprehensible, incorporeal, the beginning from the beginning, light from light, the source of life and immortality, the imprint of primordial Beauty, the unbearable seal, the unchangeable image, the definition and word of the Father, comes to His image, bears flesh for the sake of flesh, unites with the rational soul for the sake of my soul, purifying like with like, becomes man in everything except sin. Although the Virgin bears the womb, in Whose soul and body were purified by the Spirit (for it was necessary to honor both birth and virginity), yet He who came into being is God and with what was received from Him 271 is one of two opposites, flesh and Spirit, of which One deified, and the other deified. Oh, a new mixture! Oh, wonderful dissolution! Sy begins being; The uncreated is created; The incomprehensible is embraced through the rational soul, which mediates between the Divine and the gross flesh; He who is rich becomes poor—he becomes poor in my flesh, so that I may become rich in His Divinity; He who is fulfilled is exhausted - exhausted for a short time in His glory, so that I may be a partaker of His fullness. What a wealth of goodness! What is this mystery about me? I received the image of God and did not keep It; He perceives my flesh in order to save both the image and the flesh to immortalize. He enters into a second communication with us, which is much more wonderful than the first, since then he gave us the best, but now he perceives the worst; but this is more divine than the first, this is higher for those who have intelligence! 14. What will the slanderers, the evil connoisseurs of the Divine, the detractors of the praiseworthy, enveloped in darkness in the very Light, the ignorant in the very Wisdom, those for whom Christ died in vain, the ungrateful creatures, the creatures of the evil one, tell us about this? Are you blaming God for His good deed? Is it because He is small that He humbled Himself for you? That the Good Shepherd came to the lost sheep, laying down his life for the sheep (John 10:11); came to those mountains and hills on which you offered sacrifices, and that you found the lost one, and accepted the one found on the same shoulders (Luke 15:4-5), on which you carried the tree of the cross, and brought the one taken up again to the heavenly life, and counted the one brought among those who are in his rank? That he lit a lamp - His flesh, and swept the church - cleansing the world from sin, and found a drachma - the Royal image, littered with passions; after acquiring the drachma, he convenes those who are in love with His Powers, makes participants in the joy of those whom he has made the mysteries of His Economy (Luke 15:8–9)? That the most radiant Light follows the lamp that came before, the Word - the voice, the Bridegroom - the leader of the bride, preparing the Lord's chosen people (Titus 2:14) and purifying with water for the Spirit? Do you blame God for this? For this reason do you consider Him inferior, because He girds Himself with ribbon (John 13:4–5), and washes the feet of His disciples, and points out the most perfect path to exaltation—humility? What humbles himself for the sake of a soul that has bowed down to the ground, in order to lift up with Himself that which has been brought down by sin? How can you not blame the fact that He eats with tax collectors and from tax collectors, that He has tax collectors as disciples, and that He Himself will gain something? What will he gain? Salvation of sinners. Would anyone blame a doctor for bending down to wounds and enduring the stench just to give health to the sick? Will he also accuse the one who, out of compassion, bent down to the pit in order, according to the law (Ex. 23:2; Luke 14:5), to save the cattle that had fallen into it? 15. It is true that He was sent, but as a man (because He had two natures; thus, He was tired, and hungry, and thirsty, and was in agony, and wept according to the law of bodily nature); and if he was sent as God, what of this? By embassy, ​​understand the favor of the Father, to Whom He refers His deeds, in order to honor the flightless beginning and not seem to be an enemy to God. It is said of Him that He was betrayed (Rom. 4:25), but it is also written that He also betrayed Himself (Eph. 5:2, 25). It is said that He was resurrected by the Father and ascended (Acts 3:15; Acts 1:11), but it is also written that He raised Himself and ascended again into heaven (1 Thess. 1:14; Eph. 4:10), the first by good will, the second by authority. But you present what is derogatory, and pass by silence to elevate it. You argue that He suffered, but do not add that He suffered voluntarily. How much the Word suffers even now! Some honor Him as God and merge Him, others dishonor Him as flesh and separate Him. With whom will He be more angry, or, better said, with whom He will forgive their sin? Is it those who drain, or those who dissect wickedly? For both the first had to be divided, and the last had to be united: the first in relation to number, the last in relation to the Divinity. Are you tempted by the flesh? And the Jews were also tempted. Wouldn't you also call Him a Samaritan? I won’t say anything about what comes next. Do you not believe in His Divinity? But the demons also believed in Him; O you, who are more unfaithful than demons and more ignorant than the Jews! Some recognized the name of the Son as meaning equality, while others recognized God in the exile, for they were convinced of this by what He endured. But you neither accept equality nor confess the Divinity in Him. It would be better for you to be circumcised and become possessed (say something funny), than to have evil and ungodly thoughts while uncircumcised and in a healthy state. 16. Soon afterwards you will see Jesus cleansing himself in the Jordan - my cleansing, or, better to say, through this cleansing making the waters pure, for He Himself did not need cleansing - He takes away the sin of the world (John 1:29); you will also see the heavens parting (Mark 1:10); you will see how Jesus receives testimony from the Spirit kindred to Him, and is tempted, and overcomes, and is surrounded by angels serving Him, and heals every ailment and every disease (Matthew 4:23), and gives life to the dead (oh, that He would also give life to you, who died by evil faith!), and casts out demons, sometimes Himself, sometimes through the disciples, and feeds thousands with not many loaves, and walks around the world. to the sea, and is betrayed, and crucified, and co-crucified with my sin, brought as a lamb and brought as a Priest, as a man is buried and rises as God, and then ascends to heaven and comes with His glory. How many triumphs each mystery of Christ brings me! In all of them, the main thing is one thing - my completion, reconstruction and return to the first Adam! 17. And now almost the womb and gallop, if not like John in the womb, then like David at the repose of the Icon; respect the census according to which you too are inscribed in heaven; worship Christmas, through which you were freed from the bonds of birth; give honor to little Bethlehem, which again led you to paradise; bow before the manger through which you, who have become dumb, are raised by the Word. Know (Isaiah commands you) the manger of your Master as an ox and the manger of your Master as an ox (Isaiah 1:3). Whether you belong to the number of the pure, and lawful, and regurgitate the word (Lev. 11:41), and are fit for sacrifice, or to the number of the still unclean, not used either as food or as a sacrifice, and constitute the property of paganism - go with the star, bring gifts with the Magi - gold, and frankincense, and myrrh - as to the King, and as God, and as to one who died for you; glorify with the shepherds, rejoice with the Angels, sing with the Archangels, may there be a common triumph of the heavenly and earthly powers. For I am sure that the heavenly powers rejoice and triumph with us today, because they are lovers of mankind and lovers of God, just as David imagines them ascending with Christ after His passion, meeting and commanding each other to take the gates (Ps. 23:7). There is only one thing you can hate that happened at the Nativity of Christ - this is Herod’s infanticide; It’s better to say, and in it there is almost a sacrifice of the same age with Christ, which preceded a new slaughter. If Christ flees to Egypt, you too will willingly flee with Him. It is good to flee with Christ when you are persecuted. If He tarries in Egypt, call Him out of Egypt, giving Him good worship there. Walk blamelessly through all the ages and powers of Christ. As a disciple of Christ, cleanse yourself, be circumcised, take away the veil that has been on you since birth; then teach in the church, drive out those who sell the shrine. Suffer, if necessary, stoning; I know very well that you will hide from those who throw stones and you will walk among them like God, because the word is not stoned. If you are brought to Herod, answer him no more. He will respect your silence more than the long speeches of others. Will you be whipped, harassed and so on, taste the bile for the first taste, drink the otset, look for spitting, take the stress on the cheek and blows. Be crowned with thorns - the severity of life according to God; put on a scarlet robe, take up a reed; let those who curse the truth bow before you. Finally, willingly be crucified, die and accept burial with Christ, so that with Him you will be resurrected, and glorified, and reign, in vain of God in all His greatness and visible by Him, - God in the Trinity, worshiped and glorified, Whom we pray, may even now, as far as this is possible for prisoners of the flesh, be revealed to us, in Christ Jesus our Lord. To him be glory forever. Amen.