About Saint Thomas the Apostle

And against the Arians, and about the one who seized power in Thrace and was captured, and that he was an Arian Obeying the law of the Church, I gathered my strength and ascended to this seat. But the greatness of the subject overwhelms me: I am perplexed and completely at a loss as to how I should get down to business and in what manner of speaking. Should we preach about Thomas as if he were alive? But his tomb announces his death. Should we talk about him as if he were dead? But then his deeds testify against me. He is both dead and immortal; he died as a man, and flows around the world like an angel; and suffered suffering, and struggles with passions; and lies below, and rejoices above. Nothing could hide it, no place could hide it: it enlightens the universe. He received burial, but everywhere he shines like the sun; the remains of the righteous conquered the earth and turned out to be more spacious than creation; grace has sown it throughout the world. All tribes are involved in Thomas: he filled the whole world and remains whole everywhere; His glory spread throughout the whole earth and signs of victory were erected by him at the ends of the universe. What should I call it? The sun? But there is no night for him. A star? But it does not fade during the day. At every time he illuminates creation, every darkness conquers in the universe. The night is no longer with him, the darkness does not take possession of him, the river does not hold him back, the sea cannot swallow him, the ocean knows him, the barbarians honor Thomas. All nations celebrate today and his words, as if some gift, are brought to the Lord. “My Lord and my God” (John 20:28)! My relative and my Creator, my Savior and my King! This is what Thomas taught us, this is what he left us as an inheritance as children! The human race treasures his words like a treasure, all people hold on to them tightly. These words are also known to the angels: and for them this confession serves as an anchor. The whole creation is adorned with his teaching, like a crown. Only Arius is alien to this word, he alone is deprived of this heritage, he alone does not share with Thomas the faith in Christ as Lord, does not recognize Him with him as God, calls him a slave the Master, a creature the radiance, an illegitimate one the lawful, a creature the Creator; does not call the Lord Lord and God, does not tolerate the truth, does not agree with Thomas, does not follow the righteous man. Meanwhile, he also honors his real day and celebrates it along with the entire universe, counting himself among the friends of Thomas. But the vice of virtue does not deceive, the one who is mistaken does not agree with the guide of truth. The shepherd knows the beast, the hunter knows the wolf, the helmsman knows the wave, the harbor knows the storm, the enemy commander knows, Thomas Arius knows, he knows - and pursues him. The apostle does not accept honor from a blasphemer, does not enter the den of murderers, does not agree with them, turns away from the assembly of the lawless, abhors the voice that opposes him, hates the mouth that speaks untruth against God (Ps. 75:6), rejects the tongue that does not call Christ Lord, and calls out to him from the whole universe: Arius, why do you glorify me? Why do you fatten my head with oil? Why are you celebrating my day, lawless one? I do not accept your praise, I do not agree with your vain faith, I do not recognize your lawless teaching. Do not honor me by dishonoring the Creator; I do not accept honor that gives rise to dishonor. If you insult the Master, why do you honor me, a slave? If you don’t share my faith, why are you celebrating my memory? If you do not agree with me, why do you enter into communication with my coffin? I have been taught (to confess) Christ as Lord and God; I touched with my hand and found the truth, I confirmed with my own fingers; I do not preach from hearsay, I do not speak about a miracle by ear, I did not believe those who told me: “We have seen the Lord” (John 20:25); I did not agree with the apostles, I dismissed Peter, who tried to teach me; I said to him: man, why are you confusing me, why do I need a word when there is no action, why do you demand that I take my word for it? If I don't see it, I won't believe it. You have seen, let me see too; you are convinced, let me be convinced too; You learned, I want to learn too. Let me see what I have to preach - and I will preach. No one preaches by ear, no one offers teaching by word of mouth, no one will listen to me speak from your words. If they ask me: is it true that Christ has risen? – what should I say? If I say: Peter says that he has risen, who will believe me? Let me see, and then I will preach; let me learn and teach; let me make sure, and then I will believe. Then I could say about myself: Thomas the Apostle is not from people and not through people. And so, as I was saying this, the Lord appeared and immediately resolved the dispute. He told me, what's wrong with you, Thomas? Why are you arguing with Peter? Why are you bickering with your friends? Come here, experience the miracle by experience, learn the resurrection by doing it yourself; extend your hand and examine the body. If you can fit it, hold it; if you have clean fingers, touch the wounds; if you believe, you will have success, but if you just contradict, you will not find it; if you don’t believe, you won’t know; if you doubt, you will not accept what you suffered; If you are led by passion, you will not understand the dispassionate. Hearing this, I cleansed my soul of unbelief, resolved doubtful thoughts, and assumed a convinced mind. I touched the body with joy and trepidation, along with my fingers I satisfied the inner heart and felt double strength. I touched and saw, I touched the body with my hand, and I saw God with my soul, and I found the external astonishing, and the internal terrible, what was visible was great, but what was comprehended by the mind was wonderful. Then, amazed by all that I perceived, I exclaimed: “My Lord and my God” (John 20:28). Indeed, I did not find anything slavish in him, I did not see humiliation in anything; and that which is of the same nature with us shone with Him, and the divine sparkled; and what was worn was exalted, and what was worn was glorified; and while two objects were conceivable, the worshiped person was one. This I have comprehended by experience, this I have obtained with my finger, this I have understood with my soul. But you, Arius, where did you learn your blasphemy, where did you know what you preach? Have you felt Christ as I have felt it? Did you stretch out your hand to Him? Did you examine his wounds? Can you refer to your fingers as confirmation? Have you hugged the Lord? With what hand? Isn't it the one with whom he robbed the apostles? Was it not the one who took the barbarian's spoils? Was it not the one from whom he received the bribe of wickedness? Wasn't it the one with which he melted the vessels? Did you touch Christ with it? It won't happen! The Master is not so unjust, Christ is not so unreasonable, that you should be entrusted with your own flesh. You did not embrace the One whom you rejected; He did not touch Him whom he hated; did not examine the One whom he disparaged. If you had examined, you would not have humiliated; If I had looked at it carefully, I would not have interpreted it so badly. Away with your wickedness, cast down with your allies! Now I have already overthrown one of your strongholds, now I have freed Thrace from your power; a little more and I will destroy you everywhere, a little more and I will expel you from the entire universe. Now I have struck you at the head, and now I will free the West from your madness. Oh, blessed Thomas! Fulfill your words in practice, justify their good beginning, back it up with the same ending. Liberate the West, as you liberated Thrace. Let the robber be beheaded like the rebel. Crown the king with victory, grant peace to the world, reward the zeal of those praying, accept the prayers of the entire city: after all, all ages of the city population have their representatives before you. Old men and young men fall to your coffin, girls and youths hug your body, babies, like chicks, turn their open mouths to you. Do not neglect this spectacle, do not leave our work in vain, give us a reward worthy of our efforts! We don’t demand anything special from you; ask for what you have; we seek what you give; We wish you what you yourself want. We wish that the enemy be defeated, Arius deposed, the king crowned, and the world turned to Christ; so that Christ would be glorified and the entire universe would proclaim to Him: “My Lord and my God” (John 20:28)! To him be glory, honor and power forever and ever. Amen. 1. I have come to pay you, friends, a debt. My debt is of such a kind that it enriches me, the giver, and benefits you, the receiver. So I want, fulfilling my promise, to talk with you again about Thomas, about how at first he did not believe the resurrection of the Savior, and then, after he saw and touched it, he believed in Christ and called Him Lord and God. So, I call your attention. And I ask you to beg Saint Thomas, so that by placing his holy right hand on my lips, touching the ribs of the Master, he will strengthen my tongue to explain what you so desire. Accept my weak words in peace and quiet so that you can derive at least some benefit from them. When our Savior dissolved the all-consuming womb of hell and became the firstborn from the dead and appeared to His disciples through closed doors, then “Thomas, one of the twelve, who is called the Twin, was not here with them” (John 20:24). Oh, what a miracle! The object of desire appeared, but the desirer himself was not there; The good shepherd appeared to His flock, and the sheep wandered outside the flock, or better yet, outside the fence; The king of heaven came in person, and the warrior was far from the divine camp. What happened was that Thomas was absent then, by a mysterious divine arrangement. If he had been present, he would not have doubted; and if I had not doubted, I would not have touched it; If I had not touched it, I would not have believed so much; if he had not believed so, he could not have taught us to believe. Thus, the student’s unbelief becomes the mother of our faith. After all, we, who have not seen Christ, worship Him precisely because Thomas saw Him and worshiped Him; not having touched the intangible, we sing of Him, because he, having embraced the Master with his own hands, sang to Him: “My Lord and my God” (John 20:28). So, the rest of the disciples said to Thomas, who was late to appear on time: “we have seen the Lord,” - we saw the One who said: “After three days I will rise again” (John 20:25; Matt. 27:63), and we are witnesses that His Words have been borne out in practice; we have seen the One who said: “I am the way and the truth and the life” (John 11:25, 14:6), and we received Him as the resurrection, and the truth, and the life from life; we saw the One who said: “I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again” (John 10:18), and we knew this power of Him in practice. Suddenly the Savior stood in the midst of us, without opening the doors of the room, and we, as is easy to imagine, struck by His miraculous appearance, could not come to our senses from this new miracle. But now we hear - He says to us: “Peace be with you!” (John 20:21) and the storm of sadness was replaced in our hearts by quiet joy. Then, we saw His hands pierced with sharp nails and blotting out the sins of the people; they saw His hands with which He crushed death and granted resurrection to all people; We also saw His holy side, pierced for us and flowing out blood and water, these two sources of our salvation; and from His divine lips they received a divine breath, a breath of the Spirit, a breath that sends down all grace. From our Master we are invested with the power to forgive sins and execute judgment on sinners, having received from Him the following covenant: “Whose sins you forgive, they will be forgiven; on whomever you leave it, it will remain on him” (John 20:23). These are the words we enjoyed, these are the gifts we were awarded from the Savior (after all, it was impossible for us not to be enriched in communication with the Lord of all)! You were the only one who was late, and now you are left poor. And immediately in response Thomas began to say to them: have you seen the Lord? Am I the only one unworthy to see Him? Am I called differently than you are called? Am I not honored by Him as you are? Didn’t I see Him crucified with you? Just like you, I have experienced the days of sadness; just like you, I want to know joy. Just as I saw the death of Christ, so I want to see His resurrection. “Unless I see in His hands the mark of the nails, and put my finger into the mark of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe” (John 20:25). After all, you would not have believed if you had not first seen Him; Likewise, if I don’t see it, I won’t believe it. Hold on, Thomas, hold on in this good disbelief! Stand firm until you have established yourself on the rock of faith; stay with your desire until you see what you want! I welcome your incredulity as dispelling all incredulity; I praise your contentiousness, born from devotion to Christ and striking all the contentiousness of heretics. Don’t believe, don’t believe again and again, so that I can believe all the more firmly. Seek the Lord and demand His presence, so that through your efforts and perseverance I may embrace my Redeemer. Be persistent in calling on the One who said: “Seek and you will find” (Matthew 7:7)! Keep searching until you find the treasure you are looking for. Do not stop knocking on the door of knowledge that is alien to contradictions until the One who said: “Knock and it will be opened to you” (Matthew 7:7) opens it for you! I listen with pleasure to the frequent repetition of your words: “If I don’t see the wounds of the nails in His hands, I won’t believe it.” Your unbelief teaches me faith; as if with a plow - with your tongue you explode the arable land of the divine body, and I easily reap the fruit and assimilate it to myself. If I do not see with my own eyes the furrows that the wicked made on His holy hands, I will under no circumstances believe your words; If I do not put my own finger into the wounds pierced by nails, I will not accept your gospel; If with this hand of mine I do not touch His side, the true witness of the resurrection, your testimony will not shake me at all. 2. I will consider with my own eyes what you preach (since the eyes are more reliable than the ears), and only then will I agree with your statements. After all, any statement becomes firm and reliable only when it is confirmed by deeds; and words devoid of factual evidence are frivolous and wastefully shake the air. I have to preach to people about the miracles of the Teacher: how can I talk about what I have not seen with my own eyes? How can you convince infidels to believe something you haven’t researched? How will I tell the Jews and pagans that I saw my Master crucified, but I did not see him risen, but only heard that He was risen? Who wouldn't dare to talk like this? Who wouldn't treat such preaching with contempt? After all, it is another thing to hear, and completely different to see; another is verbal transmission, and something completely different is observation and experience. At the very time when Thomas was talking in this spirit with the apostles, Jesus appeared again among the disciples - behind closed doors. Through closed doors the Door of life entered; how it penetrated is known only to God the Word himself. Just as at His birth He did not damage the doors of virginity, so He appeared inside the house without breaking the shutters. And again: just as He came out of a closed and sealed tomb, so He entered here through closed doors. He entered with his flesh where he was a deity, and did not open the doors. He wanted to - and nothing delayed Him; He wanted - and everything obeyed Him; wanted - and the creature obeyed: everything submitted to the single will of the One who was and is the true God. So His birth overcomes every mind, and His rising from the grave surpasses every thought, and His appearance to His disciples remains inexplicable and incomprehensible. That He appeared to the disciples - this is what I was taught; but how he appeared - I no longer know, and what I don’t know, I don’t even dare talk about. I glorify Him who has appeared, but I do not question the manner of His appearance; I preach mystery, but I do not explain the inexplicable; I am amazed at the miracle that happened, but I don’t find out how it happened; I believe what is written without hesitation - and I am saved. I only heard about the miracles of the Lord through hearing, but I myself did not inherit His divine actions. And if any of the Jews tell me: it is extremely strange and simply incredible what you preach! How could a tangible body really get through closed doors? – then I ask him: how could an angel bring Habakkuk down into the lions’ den and bring him back out from there, leaving the seals placed at the entrance intact and unharmed (Dan. 14:33–38)? The slave did what he wanted, but the Master could not do what he favored? Of course, just as this happened according to the will of God, so this was done according to the will of God the Word made man. So, the Savior appeared, as He pleased, to His disciples and stood in the midst of them, so as to be equally visible to everyone, and said to them: “Peace be with you” (John 20:26)! I myself am Peace, and I give peace to you. What I am is what I give. This world will put all enemies under your feet; this world will make the principalities and powers your servants; this world will give you victory over the universe. The disciples rejoiced, again seeing the Lord with pleasure and hearing His words, and they began to push Thomas and show him with their eyes; didn’t their eyes just say to him: didn’t we assure you earlier: “we saw the Lord,” and you didn’t believe our words? This is He Whom you desire; do whatever you want, approach Him, who came to us for your salvation, and try to find the answer to your questions. And Thomas himself stood, looking with his own eyes at all the members of the Savior and carefully examining each one individually to make sure whether in what had appeared and risen he really saw the One who died. And what does the only good, the only compassionate and lover of mankind say to him, “who wants all people to be saved and to attain the knowledge of the truth” (1 Tim. 2:4)? “Put your finger here and see my hands” (John 20:27). Oh, the unattainable height of philanthropy! Oh, the abyss of boundless condescension! He does not wait for the student to approach, does not wait for him to turn to him with a request for what he wanted; He does not delay the fulfillment of his desire for a single moment; on the contrary, He himself draws him to Himself, He himself draws his fingers to Himself, and with His Master’s tongue He lifts up the hand of the slave, saying to him: “Put your finger here and look at My hands.” After all, for your sake I came to you; for your sake I again appeared here, from where I never retreated as a deity; For your sake these hands of Mine are pierced with nails, to ensure your sure salvation. Come closer to Me in body, spirit, and faith, and know with all clarity what you wanted to know; do whatever you please - explore, examine, touch; as an infant, read on My hands these writings of My voluntary sufferings - wounds. I present all My members to you for study. I am not ashamed of the scars that cover My body, I am not ashamed of the wounds that I accepted to heal your wounds; I do not hide these signs of My victory and glorification; I reveal them to everyone and make them known to all creation. The sun also saw them (that’s why it disappeared and turned day into night); the earth saw them (at the sight of them it shook); their rocks know (because of them they fell apart, mourning My suffering); the dead know them (because for their sake they rose from their graves); The church veil also knows them, because for their sake it was torn, mourning in advance the death of the Jews. “Look at my hands” as you wanted; penetrate with your finger into the depths of My wounds. And do you want to explore My rib? So I expose him too. Give here your inquisitive hand and touch My side; touch My body, which came into being without human seed; touch My body, received from the Virgin Mary, Virgin and abiding; touch My body, related to you; touch My body, which suffered according to My own will; touch My body, which was mortified for your sake, but did not succumb to the corruption of death; touch My body, terrible for ethereal forces; touch My body, before which the cherubim tremble and the seraphim revere, and learn from your own experience what is known by touch and what is not known, what was subjected to suffering and what is impassive, what is mortal and what is immortal, what was killed for your sake and what was not destroyed by corruption, what is now under your fingers and what is inaccessible to your hand. “And do not be an unbeliever, but a believer” (John 20:27). 3. I, Thomas, absent as a man, but present as God, heard what you said to your brothers; removed from you by humanity, I was among you by divinity. Do you want me to remind you of what you said before? Didn’t you say: “Unless I see the marks of the nails in His hands, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe”? Were these thoughts born in your mind? Were these the words that escaped your tongue? And now your doubt prompted Me to come here again; I am here for the second time, as you wished. Do not be ashamed to find out what you wanted, do not hesitate to examine what you demanded, do not refuse to bring your finger closer to these hands of Mine. I will endure the touch of a finger, just as I endured nails; I will endure curiosity from a friend, just as I endured mockery from my enemies during the crucifixion. The insults of enemies did not arouse anger in Me: will a friend’s request really annoy Me? Give here your finger and see My hands, wounded for your sake, to heal the wounds of your souls; look at My hands and judge with yourself - Am I the one who freely gave Himself up to be crucified, or someone else instead of Him? Look at My hands, on which - by My permission - these signs remained, as if in memory of the madness of the Jews, so that when the Jews, shameless in their habit, on the day of judgment begin to say to Me: We did not crucify You, Lord, - I could show My enemies these hands in this form and thereby shame the ungodly synagogue - make them look at Him “Whom they pierced” ( John 19:37), and worship Him with tears. And so Thomas, touching the Master’s hands and the divine rib and being filled with both fear and joy at the sight of what appeared to his eyes, immediately sings to the Lord and exclaims: “My Lord and my God” (John 20:28)! You are Lord and God, You are a man and a lover of humanity! You are a doctor of nature - wonderful and extraordinary! You do not cut suffering with iron, do not cauterize wounds with fire, do not make herbal medicines, do not apply visible bandages to suffering members. You have invisible bonds of compassion that invisibly bind everything that is relaxed. Your thought is sharper than iron; Your word is stronger than fire; Your opinion is more effective than any medicine. As the Creator, You sanctify creation without difficulty; as the Creator, you effortlessly transform creation. “My Lord and my God”! By Your will, lepers were cleansed, the lame began to walk, the paralytic were able to carry their beds, those born blind received their sight from washing, demons fled; but You allowed yourself to be captured by Your enemies and voluntarily endured everything from the Jews according to the flesh for my sake. “My Lord and my God”! You are my God and Lord, You are eternal and at the same time temporary, You are heavenly and at the same time earthly, You are invisible and visible; You have no image and have taken my image, You have no body and are clothed with this body; You are God in truth and man in truth; You are in the womb of the Virgin, but You are also in the bosom of the Father; You are with the Father in heaven and for us on the cross; You have sat on the royal throne for centuries, but You are nailed to the tree; You are passionless in spirit, but you have endured passion in the flesh; You are immortal, as being of one essence with the Father, but also mortal, as being of one essence with us; You are in the tomb, but you are also on the cherubim; Even in death you appeared as the giver of life, and with the dead you are imputed to free the dead; You remain dead for three days and remain coeternal with Him who gives birth to You; You have restored the church of Your body, and You have risen up in Your own power as God; You are with us in the flesh and before all ages with the Father; You are mountain in heaven, You are on earth, You watch over all creation as God; You are everywhere, You fill everything; You are now in my arms, but Your hand contains everything. I look at You with bodily eyes, but I also contemplate You with the eyes of faith; I find in You what You received from me, but I also recognize what You have from the Father - Your ineffable divinity. I confess You as the only Lord and God. I am convinced that You alone exist one way and another, but I do not recognize You as one way or another. I do not divide the inseparable, I do not separate the inseparable, I do not slash the inseparable; and what I see, and what I embrace, and what I think - I express everything with one exclamation: “My Lord and my God”! By Your condescension You brought my soul out of the abyss of unbelief; You made enslaved people free; Thou hast condemned sin in Thy sinless flesh; You trampled the devil when you wanted; You have crushed all his kindled arrows; You put death to death by death; By Your incorruption You have destroyed corruption; By Your resurrection You have restored resurrection for us; You left your three-day tomb on earth as a guarantee of the resurrection of the dead; You have made people heavenly; You made the earth brighter than the sky; You - in a word - changed everything for the better; being God, You became man, in order to make man God; You are “my Lord and my God”! The Lord says to him: “You believed because you saw Me” (John 20:29), but be careful that when I ascend with flesh to where I came from without flesh, unbelief does not awaken in you again and you do not begin to say: if I do not see the wounds of the nails in His hands again, I will not believe. You have already declared your unbelief, felt it and believed forever: now all you have to do is preach what you are convinced of. Blessed are those who have seen Me and believed, but much more blessed are those who have not seen Me and believed. This blessing, brothers, applies to us, who were not worthy to see Him, but who believed in Him. And indeed, blessed are those who contemplate the Invisible by faith! Blessed are you who see Him at each of our meetings here, when you see Him with your eyes, and kiss Him with your lips, and eat with your teeth, and He Whom you eat is not eaten and does not become scarce. Oh, an extraordinary mystery! Oh, terrible mystery! He who sits at the right hand of the Father rests in the right hands of sinners. He who is sung by the angels is embraced by unclean hands and allows himself to be carried around by his sinful slaves. He does not disdain our sinful hands, He does not disdain our condemnable fingers. Our Creator does not strike us, mortals, but he himself motivates us, he himself says: “Take, eat” (Matthew 26:26; Mark 14:22); “take”, “drink” (Luke 22:17; Matt. 26:27). Come to Me and touch My side with your hands, all of you enjoy My Body. Whatever particle of Mine you take, I am entirely in it, the One Who was tangible by Thomas. Let us all approach the pure in purity, but let us approach with due reverence, without any haste, which would be here a sign of our disrespect for our Master. As we each approach individually and converse privately with the Redeemer, we will say to Him: Lord, we are not worthy for You to enter under the roof of our souls (Matthew 8:8). But since You yourself want to be in us, since You, as a lover of mankind, desire to dwell in us, we boldly approach You and confess to You; if You, Master, command, we open the gates of our mouths, which You alone created. Come to us with your usual love for mankind, come in and resolve the bonds of our nonsense, come in and enlighten our darkened minds. We believe, Lord, that you will do this. After all, You did not push away the harlot who fell to You with tears, nor did You reject the repentant publican, nor did You drive away the thief who confessed Your kingdom, nor did You leave the repentant persecutor as what he was - but You counted all of them, brought to You by repentance, among Your friends. With such prayer and a pure soul, may we be worthy of the heavenly sacraments, may we protect ourselves with a chaste life, and may no shameful word come from our lips, having received Christ, the Lord our God. Learn this too, you, newly enlightened children of the church! Honor the painless birth pangs of the font and do not reject its divine womb, lest God say about you: “I raised and exalted sons, but they rebelled against Me” (Is. 1:2). Your names are written in heaven. Do not defile yourselves again with the filth of pleasure, lest you incur the censure of the Lord’s Apostle Paul: “You walked well: who stopped you from obeying the truth” (Gal. 5:7)? You have just taken off your white clothes, but may not the whiteness of your souls be taken off with them! If you do not take off these clothes yourself, no one else will be able to undress you. So, remain always newly enlightened in order to be worthy to hear these blessed words: “Come, you blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the creation of the world” (Matthew 25:34)! May we all be worthy of him by the grace and love of our Lord Jesus Christ, with whom to the Father be glory, power, honor and worship, with the Holy Spirit, forever and ever. Amen. Creations attributed to St. John Chrysostom and classified in the Minya edition as Spuria.