Слово 34

I will say greetings to those who came from Egypt (which will be fair, because they gathered willingly, overcoming envy with desire), who came from that Egypt, which enriches, it is true, the river (I will express myself, imitating somewhat generous expressions of this kind), the river that rains from the earth, like the sea, flooding the surroundings, but more enriches my Christ, who previously fled to Egypt, and now supplies from Egypt; then fleeing from Herod’s infanticide, and now distributing according to the love of the fathers, is Christ, new food for the beautifully hungry, wheat distributed more generously than ever according to the known and reliable stories of history, “the bread that comes down from heaven and gives life to the world,” undying and endless (John 6:33). About him (as I think I hear now) the Father says: “Out of Egypt he called my Son” (Hos. 11:1). “For from you the word has spread” (1 Thessalonians 1:8) to all people, soundly confessed and preached, you are the best fruit workers of all, especially now the right of believers, as far as I know, not only a lover, but also a dispenser of such food, and a dispenser not only in your own fatherland, but already outside it. Just as you physically nourish the peoples and cities to which your love for humanity extends, so you spiritually nourish not just one people, and not this or that city that occupies a small space, although it is considered very famous, but almost the entire Universe; you satisfy “not the hunger of bread, nor the thirst of water,” in which it is not important to endure hunger, and it is not convenient to endure, “but I thirst to hear the words of the Lord” (Mic. 8:11), which is very painful to endure, and it is difficult to satisfy at the present time, for lawlessness has increased, and I find few people who really heal it. This is Joseph - your, and one might say, ours, who, thanks to his wisdom, was able to foresee famine and help in famine with house-building orders, through beautiful and fat cows, healing ugly and skinny ones. And by the name Joseph, understand whomever you want, either the one named by immortality, the lover and creator of immortality 240, or the successor to his throne, teaching and gray hair, our new Peter - Peter as much in virtue as in name. They cut and crushed the middle itself, although it still produces small and weak tremors of life, like the tail of a cut serpent. One of them, having retired from life in a good old age, after many struggles and exploits, from the heavenly world (of this I am absolutely sure) now looks at our deeds, and extends a helping hand to those who strive for good, all the more conveniently because he is free from bonds. Another hurries to the same resolution, or liberation, and after the same feats; and although he is already close to those above, he has not yet renounced the flesh to such an extent that he can provide the last help to the word and collect the most abundant parting words for embarking on the journey. You are the pets and offspring of these great mentors, and devotees of truth, and conquerors, of whom neither time, nor a ruler, nor a word, nor envy, nor fear, nor an accuser, nor a slanderer, nor an open enemy, nor a secret slanderer, nor one who seems to be ours, nor a stranger, nor gold - this invisibly acting tormentor, by which much is now scattered and rearranged - - neither affection, nor threat, nor expulsion and long-lasting and repeated (they could not be subjected to one deprivation of property because of their great wealth - non-covetousness), and finally, not everything else, both absent, present, and expected, inspired or convinced them to become worse, to change the Trinity in any way and to damage the doctrine of the Divinity. On the contrary, they were strengthened by dangers and strove more and more for piety. This is what it means to suffer for Christ - it strengthens love and for men of high spirit it serves as a guarantee of subsequent exploits! Such are your stories and wonders now, O Egypt. But you praised to me the goats of Mendis and the Memphis Apis - some well-fed and tall calf, and the mysteries of Isis, and the torn apart of Osiris, and your venerable Serapis - a tree to which, according to fable, from ancient times and from the madness of those who bowed, they bowed as an unknown and heavenly substance, but still as a substance, although a lie was taken to help. You also praised (which is even more shameful) various images of sea monsters and reptiles. But Christ triumphed over all this, Christ’s preachers triumphed, like others, in other times, and each on his own, who shone forth, as well as the now mentioned fathers, through whom you, an amazing country, have now become more famous than all other countries, glorified by all both ancient and new stories. Therefore, I embrace and greet you, the best of nations, the most Christ-loving people, ardent with piety, worthy of their leaders. I can say nothing more, and I have nothing else to offer you as a treat. And although I offer little with my lips, I keep a lot for you in my heart. My people! For I call mine a people of one mind and the same faith, who learned from the same fathers, who worship the same Trinity. My people! For truly mine, although envious people don’t like it; and let those suffering from this illness suffer even more! So I give the hand of communication in front of so many witnesses, visible and invisible, and I reflect the ancient slander with new goodwill. My people! For indeed, although I appropriate to myself a very great people, I, the least man, for such is the grace of the Spirit, makes those of the same mind equal in honor! My people! For truly mine, although distant from me; because we are connected divinely, differently than brute beings. Bodies are united by place, and souls are united by spirit. My people, whose wisdom formerly consisted in suffering for Christ, and now, if you listen to me, should consist in not acting, but considering the power to act as a sufficient acquisition, and recognizing service to Christ, as in former times - patience, so in the present - righteousness! A people to whom “the Lord has determined to do good, just as he has determined to punish” those who are contrary (Zechariah 8:14–15)! The people whom the Lord “chose for himself” from all those called by Him (Ps. 134:4)! The people written on the hands of the Lord (Is. 49:16), to whom the Lord says: “You are my delight” (Is. 62:4), “your gates are glory” (Is. 60:18), and what else is said to those who are being saved! People! Do not be surprised at my immoderation, if I turn to you many times, I delight in the incessant repetition of your name, like others who indulge in looking or listening without measure. But God's people are ours too! Although your recent celebration that you performed at sea was wonderful, and I don’t know if a sight could be more pleasant than when I saw the sea covered with trees and a man-made cloud, I saw the beauty and speed of the ships, as if equipped for a celebration, and the light wind that, blowing in the stern, as if deliberately accompanies and sends this floating city to the capital, however, what is visible now is both more beautiful and majestic! You did not intervene in the crowd of people, you did not measure piety by numbers, you did not agree to be more like the rebellious mob than like God’s people, purified by the word; on the contrary, having rendered as much as was due to “Caesar what is Caesar’s,” you inscribed “the things of God to God” (Matthew 22:21), tribute to Caesar, and fear to God, and having fed the people with your excesses, you yourself came to feed from us. For we also distribute wheat, and our distribution is perhaps no worse than yours. “Come, eat my bread and drink my mixed wine,” together with wisdom I invite you to my table (Prov. 9:5). I praise your sincerity and greet you with zeal, because, having come to this, you entered, as it were, into your own pier, honored the affinity of the Faith and recognized it as indecent for those who scold over heavenly things to be of one mind and agree with each other and think to correct their individual shortcomings with the consent of the whole, just as thin ropes become strong by being woven together - you recognized, I say, it is indecent for yourself not to know this and not to enter into an alliance with like-minded people, which is much more fitting for you, because we confess unity in the Divine. And so that you know that you did not come to us in vain, that you did not enter among strangers and foreigners, but among your own, and that the Spirit guided you beautifully, let us briefly discuss God with you. Find out that we are yours, just as we recognize our own by the marks of our weapons. I find two main differences in creatures: domination and slavery; not that domination and slavery, which in our country was either separated by violence, or poverty separated, but which are distinguished by nature (if anyone wants to call it that; for the First is higher than nature). And one thing is something creative, commanding and immovable; and the other is something created, subordinated and destroyed, and even more briefly to say: One is above time, the other is below time. Dominion is called God, although it consists of the Three Highest: the Author, the Creator and the Perfector, that is, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. These Three are not so separated from each other that they are divided by nature, and not so compressed that they are included in one Person (the former is taught by Arian violence, and the latter by Sabelli’s atheism), on the contrary, They are both more singular than those who are completely separated, and more plural than those who are completely individual. But slavery is with us, and is called a creature, although one creature is superior to another, in proportion to its proximity to God. But if so, then let everyone whose heart is turned to the Lord unite with us, and let us worship the one Godhead in the Trinity, not assigning any humiliating name to the unapproachable Glory, but always having “praises in the mouth” (Ps. 149:6) of the one God in the Trinity. For how can we attribute anything humiliating to such a Nature, whose greatness, due to its boundlessness and infinity, cannot be expressed by its own name? And whoever is alienated from God, and therefore the one Essence, Which is above all things, dissects into inequality of natures, in his reasoning it is surprising if he is not cut by the sword, and part of him does not suffer the same fate as the unbelievers (Luke 12:46), it is surprising if he does not reap the bad fruit of evil wisdom, both now and hereafter. But is it necessary to say anything about the Father, Whom, by common consent, all those guided by natural meaning do not touch, although He was the first and for the first time to suffer reproach, when the old innovators divided him into the Good and the Creator? And about the Son and the Holy Spirit, look how simply and briefly we will discuss. If anyone were to say that in the Son and in the Spirit there is something transformable, or changeable, or measurable in relation to time, place, strength and action, or not good by nature, or not self-satisfied, or not free, or service, or hymns, or fearful, or liberated, or innumerable 241, then let him prove it, and we will be content, glorying in the honor of our fellow servants, although we will suffer damage, having lost God 242. If to the Son belongs everything that the Father has, except guilt; and everything that belongs to the Son belongs to the Spirit, except sonship and what is said about the Son bodily, for the sake of my man and my salvation (for He accepted mine in order to give me His through this new co-dissolution), then stop, although it is too late, being crazy, you inventors of vain expressions that disintegrate by themselves! And “why should you die, O house of Israel” (Ezek.18:31)! I will mourn you with the words of Scripture. And I, how much I revere the numerous, lofty and great names of the Word, of which even the demons were ashamed; I am so in awe of the equality of the Spirit, but I am afraid of the threat defined by those who blaspheme Him. And blasphemy is not theology, but alienation from the Divine, and it should be noted that the Lord was blasphemed, but vengeance was declared for the Holy Spirit, obviously, as for the Lord. I do not want to be unenlightened by enlightenment, perverting the concept of One of the Three in Which I was baptized, and actually be buried in water, baptized not for rebirth, but for mortification. I dare say something about the Trinity! (Forgive my madness, because my soul is in danger!) I am the very image of the heavenly glory of God, although I am placed below; That’s why I don’t believe in the possibility of being saved through someone who is equally honest with me. If the Holy Spirit is not God; then let him first become God himself, and then he will deify me, who is equal in honor to Him. And now what a deception in grace, or, better said, in those who give grace - to believe in God, and to go to the godless to confess one thing and learn another! What tangles of words, what seductions, by asking about one thing and confessing one thing leading to another! Oh, my pitiful enlightenment, if after washing I become blacker, if I see that the unpurified are brighter than me, if I am the playground of the evil faith of the baptized; if I'm looking for a better spirit and can't find it! Give me another font and then speak ill of the first one. Why do you envy me in my perfect rebirth? Why do you make me, who has become the church of the Spirit as God, the abode of creation? Why do you honor some things from me and dishonor others, speaking wickedly about God, in order to cut off my gift, or, better said, to cut me off from the gift? Either honor everything, new theologian, or dishonor everything, so that you, although ungodly, agree with yourself, and do not talk differently about incorporeal nature. But I will say the main thing: glory with the Cherubim, who unite the three Holiness into a single Dominion, and reveal as much of the First Essence as the hardworking can see from under their wings. Enlighten yourself with David, who says to the Light: “In Your light we see light” (Ps. 35:10), that is, as if in the Spirit of the Son, Whom can anything be more luminous? Raise up with John, the son of thunder, declaring about God not something low and earthly, but one high and lofty, who exists at the very beginning, who exists with God, and recognizing God the Word as God and the true God, from the true Father, and not a good fellow servant, who is honored only by the name of the Son, and recognizing another Comforter undoubtedly as another from the Speaker, who is God’s Word. And when you read: “I and the Father are one” (John 10:30), concentrate your thought on the unity of the Essence. And when you read: “Let us come to Him and make our abode with Him” (John 14:23), then imagine the separateness of the Hypostases. When you find “the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit” (Matthew 28:19), imagine three personal properties. Be filled with the Spirit with Luke as you carefully read the Acts of the Apostles. Why do you put yourself along with Ananias and Sapphira - these new “covetous people” (if the theft of your property is truly something new), and you put yourself along with not appropriating silver and other things of low value and unimportance, for example, an “ingot of gold”, or “clothing”, or a didrachm, like the once selfish warrior (Josh. 7:21), but you are robbing the Divinity itself, and you are not lying to “man” , but “to God,” as I heard (Acts 5:4). Why do you not respect the power of the Spirit, Who breathes on whom, when and as much as He pleases (John 3:8)? He descends on the household of Cornelius before baptism, and on others after baptism through the apostles, so that in both cases - both by what descends masterfully and not slavishly, and by what is sought for accomplishment, the divinity of the Spirit is evidenced. Theologize with Paul, exalted to the third heaven. Sometimes he lists all three Hypostases and, moreover, in different ways, not observing the same order, but naming the same Hypostasis first at the very beginning, then in the middle, then at the end (and for what? to show the equality of nature), and sometimes he mentions three, then two, then one Hypostasis, as if implying others in those mentioned; sometimes he attributes the actions of God to the Spirit, as if there were no difference in this; sometimes he puts Christ instead of the Spirit, and when he distinguishes the Hypostases, he says: “one God, from whom are all things, and we are to Him, and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we to them” (1 Cor. 8:6); and when he brings them together into one Godhead, he says: “For all things are from him, by him, and to him” (Rom. 11:36), - “by him,” that is, by the Holy Spirit, as can be seen from many places of Scripture. To him be glory forever. Amen. That is, God the Son, or God the Spirit, when it is proven that any of Them is not God equal to God the Father. You might be interested in: