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In the treatise “The Great Catechetical Word” (about 385) St. Gregory of Nyssa sets out the main tenets of Christian doctrine and defends them in the face of pagans, Jews and heretics. This work, most important for the subsequent theological tradition, represents one of the first systematic presentations of Christian dogma. The treatise consists of a preface and 40 chapters, which can be divided into three parts according to their content. In the first part of St. Gregory expounds the doctrine of God (theology), in the second - about the economy of our salvation (oikonomia), in the third - he teaches about the sacraments. In the preface, the saint addresses catechists (“leaders in the sacrament of piety”) with advice on how dogmatic truths should be taught to various groups of catechumens. Evidence of the existence of God and His unity is also provided here. The first part (chap. 1–4) speaks of the one God in three Persons, the consubstantiality of the Son with the Father and the Divinity of the Holy Spirit. The second part (chap. 5–32) sets out the doctrine of the creation of angels and man, the origin and essence of evil, and discusses the soteriological mission of Christ. St. Gregory presents his teaching about Christ as the Doctor of human nature: the Savior came to redeem people from the power of the devil. Also discussed are the questions of why God did not save people by His omnipotence alone, and why redemption was accomplished so late. The third part (chap. 33–40) talks about man’s assimilation of the grace of redemption through the sacraments of Baptism and the Eucharist. Participation in these sacraments and faith in the Holy Trinity are the main conditions for the salvation of every person. “Great Catechetical Word” by St. Gregory of Nyssa already during his lifetime enjoyed enormous popularity and was considered one of the best expositions of Christian soteriology. *The title of the work in Greek is Λόϒος κατηχητικός. *The title of the work in Latin is Oratio catechetica magna. Leaders of a godly life need a catechumen word, so that the Church can increase from the increase in the number of those being saved, when the taught word of faith reaches the ears of the unbelievers. But not the same method of teaching is suitable for everyone who approaches the word. On the contrary, it is necessary to consider the announcement with differences in beliefs, having in mind the same goal of the word, but using the means leading to it in different ways. For the Judaizer is preoccupied with other concepts, and the one living in Hellenism is preoccupied with others; Anomeus, Manichaeans, the followers of Marcion, Valentinus, Basilides and the rest of the list of those who are mistaken in various heresies, since each of them is preoccupied with their own concepts, make it necessary to enter into a struggle with their own prejudices. For the method of healing must also be taken into account with the type of illness: you cannot cure polytheism in the Greeks and in the Jews the lack of faith in the only begotten God with the same thing; and those misled by heresies cannot be turned away by the same thing from the deceptive concepts they have formed about dogmas. The way another would correct Sabelli's follower would do no good to Anomaeus; an argument with a Manichaean will not be useful to a Jew. But, according to what has been said, it is necessary to look at the prejudices in people and speak in accordance with the error of each during any interview, first setting out certain principles and reasonable requirements, so that from what is recognized according to both sides, the thought is consistently revealed by itself. Therefore, when there is an interview with one of the Hellenistic people, it is good to start the speech like this: ask whether he assumes that there is a Deity, or does he agree with the teachings of atheists? If he claims that there is no God, then let those who skillfully and wisely manage the world be brought to the recognition that there is a certain power, showing by this about itself that it is above all. If he has no doubt that God exists, but is inclined to accept the proposals of the plurality of the deity, then we will reason with him in the following order: does he recognize the Divinity as perfect or insufficient? And since he will probably attribute perfection to the nature of God, I will demand from him perfection in everything that is mentally represented in the Divinity so that it does not appear to be a mixture of opposites, of insufficient and perfect. But will it be subject to speculation in relation to power, or in relation to the concept of good, or in relation to wisdom, incorruptibility and eternity, and any other godly idea? Based on this reasoning, we agree with the nature of God that perfection is seen in everything. When this is conceded to us, then it will not be difficult for the mind, entertained by the multitude of gods, to lead to the confession of a single Divinity. For if he agrees about the subject to recognize it as perfect in everything, but affirms that there are many perfect ones, whose distinctive features are the same, then by all necessity it will be necessary for those who do not differ in any modification, but are represented in the same features, either to indicate the peculiarity, or, if the thought does not find anything special, not to invent differences in that in which there is no distinguishing feature. For if he does not find such a difference that one is greater and the other is less, since the concept of perfection does not allow for a minority; nor such that one is worse and the other is preferable, because no one will assume the Divinity in something that is not at all alien to the name of worse; nor such that one is old and the other is new, for what does not always exist does not fit the concept of the Divine; on the contrary, the very concept of Divinity is one, because, according to reason, no peculiarity is found in anything: then the erroneous idea of ​​a plurality of gods is necessarily forced to limit itself to the confession of a single Divinity. If goodness and justice, wisdom and power are equally attributed, incorruptibility and eternity are recognized in the same way, as well as every pious idea of ​​the mind, then by eliminating any difference in every respect, the thought of a plurality of gods is necessarily eliminated from dogma, since identity in everything elevates faith to a single dogma. But just as the word of piety and in the unity of nature sees a certain difference in hypostases, so that by the dispute with the Hellenes our teaching is not carried away into Judaism, some skillful distinction of concepts must again correct the errors in this too. And those who do not recognize our dogma do not admit that the Deity is wordless. What they admit is sufficient to confirm our teaching. For whoever admits that God is not dumb will, without a doubt, agree that he who is not dumb has a word. But the human word is also called a word. Therefore, if he says that he understands God’s word like our words, then he will be raised to a higher concept in the following way. By all necessity, one must believe that the word, like everything else, is in accordance with nature. For in humanity a certain strength, life, and wisdom are seen; but because of this similarity, no one will imagine that life, power, and wisdom are the same in God; on the contrary, as our nature grows, the significance of such names diminishes along with it. Since our nature is perishable and weak, life is therefore perishable, and strength is not independent, and the word is volatile. In the consideration of the Supreme Nature, with the greatness contemplated in It, everything that is affirmed about It is exalted. Therefore, about the Word of God it will be recognized that, although It is called the Word, it nevertheless has no resemblance to our word, which passes into something unrealized, and His entire hypostasis is not pronounced in one impulse. On the contrary, just as our nature, being fleeting, has a fleeting Word, so the incorruptible and always existing Nature has an eternal and independent Word. If, as a result of this, it is recognized that the Word of God exists eternally, then by all necessity it will be necessary to recognize that the hypostasis of the Word is in life. For it is impermissible to think that the Word, like stones, exists inanimate. And if something exists as rational and incorporeal, then, of course, it lives. If separated from life, then, without a doubt, it is no longer a hypostasis. On the contrary, it has been proven that it is impious to recognize God’s Word as non-hypostatic. Therefore, as a result of this, it has also been proven that this Word must be imagined in life. Since, in all likelihood, everyone is sure that the nature of the Word is simple and does not show any duality or complexity, then no one will imagine the Word in life through the communion of life. For if one asserts that one thing consists of another, then such an assumption does not exclude complexity; On the contrary, when the simplicity of the Word is recognized, it is necessary to think that the Word is not a part of life, but life itself. Therefore, if the Word lives, being life itself, then, of course, it has the power of free will, because nothing that does not have will belongs to the number of living things. As a result of what has been said, it is pious to conclude that this will is powerful. For if someone does not recognize him as powerful, then this, of course, conveys the idea of ​​powerlessness. But the concept of powerlessness is far from the concept of the Divine, because nothing incongruous appears in the Divine nature. Of all necessity, the power of the Word must be recognized as the same as the intention, so that in the simple there does not appear to be any confusion and confluence of opposites - powerlessness and strength, seen in the same intention, if only He has enough strength for one, and for the other It is powerless. It is also necessary to recognize that the will of the Word, having power for everything, has no inclination towards anything bad, because any desire for evil is alien to the nature of God. On the contrary, what is good wants everything, and what he wants is, without a doubt, possible for Him; It does not leave what is possible unfulfilled, but brings every will to do good into effectiveness; good is the world and everything that is wise and skillful in it. So, everything is the work of the living and independent Word, because It is the Word of God - the Word that freely chooses, because it lives, the Word that is able to do everything that it chooses, the Word that chooses, without a doubt, what is good, wise and only what is best in meaning. So, since the world, as recognized, is something good, in the previous words it has been proven that the world is the work of the Word, freely choosing and having the power to do good; and this Word is different from Him whose Word it is (because this naming is in some way relative), and in the name “Word” it is necessary to imply the Father of the Word; without being anyone's word, It would not be the Word. So, if the understanding of those who hear, by the relative meaning of the names, distinguishes both the Word itself and the One from whom It is, then there is no danger that our sacrament, being in confrontation with Hellenic concepts, will yield to those who prefer the Jewish opinion; on the contrary, it will equally avoid the inconsistency in the teaching of both the Greeks and the Jews, confessing that there is a living, active and creative Word of God, which the Jew does not allow, and that both the Word itself and the One from whom It is indistinguishable in nature. As we say about our word, it is from the mind, but is not completely the same with the mind and not completely different from it, since it is from the mind, i.e. something other than the mind; and since the mind itself brings into discovery, it cannot be imagined as different from the mind. On the contrary, being one with him by nature, which is the subject; so the Word of God, in its independence, differs from the One from whom it has hypostasis, and since it shows in itself the same thing that is seen in God, then by nature it is one and the same with Him, found according to the same signs. For whether goodness, power, wisdom, eternity of being, non-involvement in vice, death and corruption, perfection in everything, or something completely similar to this becomes a sign that enters into the concept of the Father, then by the same signs you will find the Word existing from Him. But just as we recognize the Word in a higher Nature by its similarity to our word, in the same way we will be brought to the concept of the Spirit, seeing in our nature some shadows and similarities of ineffable power. But our breathing is the attraction of air, a substance alien to us, which is necessarily drawn in and infused into the composition of our body, and it is during the pronunciation of a word that it becomes a voice, which reveals the power of the word. It is pious to think that in the nature of God there is God’s Spirit, since it is recognized that there is God’s Word, because the Word of God should not be insufficient than our word, which would follow if, when our word is presented to us together with the spirit, God’s Word, according to our belief, was presented without the Spirit. The thought is also divine that what is not alien, like our breath, from the outside, flows into God and becomes the Spirit in Him. On the contrary, just as, having heard about God’s Word, we recognized the Word not as something non-hypostatic, originating from teaching, pronounced with the help of the voice and dissipated upon utterance, nothing other than undergoing something similar to what, as we see, happens to our word, but self-existent, free, active and omnipotent - so we were taught about the Spirit of God accompanying the Word and revealing It effectiveness, we do not mean the breath of breath. For, without a doubt, the greatness of God’s power would be destroyed if we assumed the Spirit in God to be something similar to our breath. On the contrary, we understand self-existent power, which in itself appears in a special hypostasis, is inseparable from God, in whom it is, and from the Word of God, which accompanies, not poured into oblivion, but, like the Word of God, hypostatically exists, free, self-moving, active, always chooses what is good, and for every undertaking has the power that accompanies will. Chapter 3 The Incomprehensibility of the Trinity Therefore, whoever delves into the depths of the sacrament with precision, although his soul embraces a certain modest in its incomprehensibility concept of the teaching of theology, cannot, however, understand in words this ineffable depth of the sacrament: how the same thing is both numerable and avoids counting; and seems separate, and is contained in one; and differs in hypostasis, and is not divided in the subject; and again another thing is He Who has the Word and the Spirit. But when you understand what is distinguished in Them, the unity of nature does not allow division again, so that the power of unity of command is not divided, cut into different Deities, and the teaching does not agree with the Jewish dogma, but between the two assumptions the truth passes, overthrowing each of the heresies, and from each borrowing what is useful for itself. For the dogma of the Jew is overthrown by the confession of the Word and faith in the Spirit, and the polytheistic error of the Hellenists is destroyed by unity by nature, which rejects the thought of plurality. But again, after the proper correction of the wicked assumption in both, let there remain from the Jewish concept the unity of nature, and from Hellenism - one difference in hypostases. For, as if by some kind of correction, those who sin about oneness are the number of the Trinity, and those who go into multitudes, the doctrine of unity. Chapter 4 Answer to the Jewish Objection But if a Jew contradicts this, then our answer to him will not be difficult for us according to his own teaching. For the discovery of truth is exhausted in the dogmas in which he was brought up. That the Word of God and the Spirit of God are self-existent powers by which everything that came into being was created and all beings are contained, this is clearly proven by the inspired Scriptures. But it is enough to mention one piece of evidence, and leave the search for many to the more industrious. It is said: “By the Word of the Lord the heavens were established, and by the Spirit of His mouth all their strength” (Ps. 33:6). By what Word and what Spirit? The Word is not speech, and the Spirit is not breath. For will they really imagine the Divinity to be similar to our human nature and begin to teach that the Creator of the Universe acts in the same way as we do, in word and in the same spirit? But will such power come from utterances and from breath, sufficient to constitute the heavens and the powers of heaven? For if God’s Word is like our speech and the Spirit of God is like our spirit, then those like us, without a doubt, have similar power, and God’s Word has as much power as ours. But the breaths emanating along with the utterances are neither effective nor hypostatic. Of course, those who reduce God to similarity with our word make them out to be ineffective and non-hypostatic. If, as David says, the heavens were established by the Word of the Lord and their powers took their composition in the Divine Spirit, then the sacrament of truth is solid, teaching us to confess the Word in essence and the Spirit in hypostasis. Chapter 5 Transition to the doctrine of the Incarnation. The Creation of Man and His Freedom But, although the existence of God’s Word and Spirit will not be disputed by a Greek from general concepts, or a Jew on the basis of the Scriptures, however, each of them will not approve of the economy of God the Word according to humanity, finding it incredible and indecent to assert this about God. Therefore, we will convince those who argue from another beginning to believe this too. Do they believe that everything was brought into existence by the Word and wisdom of the Creator of the Universe, or is this position incredible for them? But if they do not agree that the creation of beings was controlled by the Word and wisdom, then dumbness and lack of art will be considered the beginning of the Universe. If this is absurd and impious, then, without a doubt, they agree that, according to their confession, the Word and wisdom govern beings. But in what preceded this, it was proven that the Word is not this very saying, or originated from some knowledge or from wisdom, but some essentially existing power, freely choosing all that is good and, in accordance with the election, having the opportunity to do this. And since the world is good, its cause is the power that desires and creates good. If the independence of the whole world depends on the power of the Word, as the sequence of speech showed, then, by all necessity, for the parts of the world no other reason for their composition should be imagined, except for the same Word, by which everything came into being. But whether anyone wishes to call Him Word, or wisdom, or power, or God, or anything else high and venerable, let us not worry about it. For whatever saying or name is found that indicates the subject denoted by these sounds, there is one thing - the eternal power of God, creating beings, inventing the hitherto unrealized, containing what has been brought into being, providing for the future. So, this God, Word, Wisdom, Power, as it turns out, by the connection of speech, is the Creator of human nature, not brought by any necessity to the structure of man, but by an abundance of love, brought such a living being into existence. For His light should not have remained invisible, His glory unattested, His goodness unknown, and everything else that is seen in the nature of God, idle, if there had not been a participant enjoying it. Therefore, if a person comes into being in order to become a partaker of divine blessings, then, of necessity, he is arranged in such a way that he is capable of participating in blessings. Just as the eye, due to the ray naturally hidden in it, is in communication with light, attracting with its innate power what is akin to it, so it was necessary in human nature to merge with something akin to the Divine, in order to, in accordance with this, desire what is characteristic of it. For even in the nature of the dumb, what was assigned to live in water and in the air is arranged in accordance with each type of life, so that, according to a certain composition of the body, in both of the dumb, air is characteristic and akin to one, and water to the other. Likewise, a person brought into existence to enjoy divine blessings must have had in his nature something akin to what he participated in. That is why he is adorned with life, and with words, and with wisdom and with all divine blessings, so that, because of each of these gifts, he may have a desire for what is proper to him. Since eternity is also among the blessings inherent in the nature of God, it was necessary, without a doubt, for our nature, by its structure, not to be deprived of its share in it and to have immortality in itself, so that, by its innate power, it could cognize the Supreme Being and desire the eternity of God. The book of the world expressed this in a comprehensive word in one saying when it says that man was created in the image of God. For in this likeness in image lies, of course, the calculation of the distinctive features of the Divinity, and close to such a teaching is what Moses historically tells about this, in the form of a narrative offering us dogmas. This paradise, this distinctive property of fruits, the eating of which does not serve to fill the stomach, but gives to those who tasted knowledge and eternity of life - all this is in accordance with what we saw about man before, namely, that his nature was originally good and abounded in goods. But perhaps what has been said will be challenged by someone who looks at the present and thinks of denouncing this teaching as untrue, because he now sees a person in the wrong state, but, apparently, in almost the opposite state. For where is the godlikeness of the soul? Where is the body that is not subject to suffering? Where is the eternity of life? Man is mortal, passionate, perishing, in soul and body disposed to every kind of passion. By asserting this and similar things about nature and attacking it, the objector will assume that the proposed doctrine of man has been refuted by him. But so that the speech does not deviate in the least from the natural connection, let us briefly discuss this too. The real incongruity of human life does not serve as sufficient evidence that a person has never been in a good state. Since he is God’s work and God brought this living being into existence through goodness, no one has the right to think like that about the reason for which goodness was the reason for creation. On the contrary, it is another fault that in this state we are now deprived of what is most preferable. The beginning is with us and for this again the words are not outside of what those objecting to agree. Whoever created man to be a partaker of His own blessings and in human nature prepared a reason for all perfections for him, so that with each desire he would strive for the same, he would not deprive him of the best and most precious of blessings - I mean the gift of non-enslavement and freedom. For if any necessity prevailed over human life, then from this side the image would become incorrect, due to this dissimilarity it would become far from the Prototype. For a nature subordinated and enslaved to some necessities, could it be called an image of a royal nature? According to such likeness in everything to the Divine, man should, without a doubt, have in his nature autocracy and non-enslavement, so that the participation of goods would be the reward of virtue. So, you ask: why did he, who was respected in everything with the best gifts, exchange blessings for worse? But the answer to this is clear. Every origin of evil had its beginning not in God’s will, because vice would not be subject to blame, attributing to itself God as its creator and father. On the contrary, evil arises somehow inside, composed of free will, when there is some removal of the soul from the good. For, just as vision is an activity of nature, and blindness is a deprivation of natural activity, so virtue is the opposite of vice. It is impossible to imagine any other origin for vice other than the absence of virtue. Just as darkness will follow the withdrawal of light, but with light there is no darkness, so while there is goodness in nature, vice in itself is not realizable; The removal of the best is done by the origin of the opposite. So, since this is the distinctive property of freedom, to choose freely what you want, then the culprit for you of real evils is not God, who created a non-slave and independent nature, but unreason, which chose bad instead of good. Chapter 6 How the Fall of Man Occurred But you may also ask about the cause of arbitrary sin, for this is where the connection of speech leads. So, again we will find some solid beginning from which this question will also be explained. This is a certain teaching that we received from our fathers. And this teaching is not a fabulous tale, but derives its probability from our very nature. Something twofold is noticeable in creatures, since the view of them is divided into mental and sensory. And, besides, nothing can remain in the nature of beings that does not fit this division. These types of beings differ from each other by a great abyss, so that neither the sensory has mental characteristics, nor the mental - sensory, but, on the contrary, each is distinguished by opposite traits. For mental nature is something ethereal, intangible, and without form, while sensual nature, by its very name, is subject to observation by the senses. But just as in the sensory world itself, with the great mutual opposition of the elements, a certain harmony is noticeable, established from the opposite by that Wisdom That rules the Universe, and thus, in all creation there is agreement with itself and the union of unanimity is in no way dissolved by natural opposition - so, like this, according to God’s wisdom, a certain mixture and merging of the sensory with the mental takes place, so that everything equally participates in the beautiful and no creature is left without an inheritance in the best nature. Therefore, the area corresponding to the mental nature is a subtle, intelligent, easily mobile essence, which, by a premium lot in its own nature, has great affinity with the mental. But according to the best providence, and with the sensory nature, there is a certain dissolution of the mental, so that in creation, as the apostle says, “nothing” is “marked out” (1 Tim. 4:4) and deprived of Divine communion. That is why the mixture of mental and sensory is shown by the nature of God in man, as the book of the world teaches. For it is said: “I took away the dust from the earth, God created man” (Gen. 2:7) and with His own inspiration imparted life to the creation, so that the earthly would be exalted with the divine and a single grace would equally pass through the entire creation during the dissolution of the earthly nature with the premium nature. So, since the intelligent creature was realized before and each of the angelic forces, according to the Power that rules everything, is equipped with some kind of activity to compose the Universe, then there was a certain force assigned to maintain the supermundane country and to possess it, for this purpose strengthened by that Power that builds the economy in the Universe. Then the earthly creature is prepared, the image of the heavenly power (and this living being is man, in whom the god-like beauty of mental nature is merged with some indescribable power); and the one who is given the task of overseeing everything supermundane recognizes it as dangerous and unbearable for himself if from the nature at hand there turns out to be any essence that resembles a higher dignity. But how someone who was not created for evil by the Creator of the Universe out of goodness fell into the passion of envy, it is not the scope of this work to describe this in detail, and for non-believers it will be possible to briefly offer a word about it. The difference between virtue and vice is not presented as a difference between any two hypostatic phenomena. On the contrary, just as what does not exist is opposed to what exists, and it cannot be said that what does not exist is hypostatically different from what exists, (we affirm that non-existence is the opposite of being; in the same way, vice is opposed to the concept of virtue, not as something existing in itself, but as something understood by the absence of something better. And, as we say that blindness is the opposite of sight, by blindness we do not mean something in itself existing, but deprived of a previous ability, so we affirm that vice is seen in the deprivation of good, as if a kind of shadow appears when the ray is removed. Therefore, since the uncreated nature does not allow movement accompanied by transformation, transformation, change, yet it is carried out by creation in affinity with change, because the very hypostasis of the creature began with change, by the fact that by Divine power the non-existent was transformed into the existing, and the said power was also created, choosing with free movement what is pleasing to it; then, since she closed her understanding to the good and alien to envy, like someone covering his eyes with his hands and seeing darkness in the sun, by the very fact that she did not want to understand the good, she understood the opposite of the good - and this is envy. It is undeniable that the beginning of every thing is the cause of what happens immediately behind it. For example, health is followed by prosperity, activity, and a life of pleasure; behind illness there is weakness, inactivity, boring life, and everything else immediately follows its beginning. Therefore, just as dispassion serves as the beginning and foundation of a virtuous life, so the inclination to vice that arose from envy became the path to any evil that followed it. For whoever has once developed an inclination towards evil, having generated envy in himself through aversion from grace, is like a stone that, being torn away from the top of a mountain, is driven down the slope by its own weight, and having severed natural ties with good, having become burdened and bowing to vice, willfully, as if carried away by some burden, reaches the extreme limit of wickedness, and after the power of understanding he had some from the Creator to assist in the communion of the best, made it an accomplice in the invention of evil fabrications, insidiously and deceitfully approaches a person, convincing him to inflict death on himself and become a suicide. And, as a man strengthened by God's blessing, he was great in dignity, because he was appointed to reign over the earth and over everything that is on it; had a beautiful appearance, because he became an image of primitive beauty; he was dispassionate by nature, because he was in the likeness of the Dispassionate; filled with boldness, enjoying the very manifestation of God face to face; This also inflamed the passion of envy in the enemy, and it was impossible for him by any effort or coercion to do what he wanted, because the power of God's blessing overcame his compulsion - then he manages to make a person an apostate from the power that strengthens him, so that he becomes susceptible to his malice. And, just as in a lamp, when the wick is engulfed in fire, if someone, not having the strength to extinguish the flame with a breath, mixes water into the oil, then with this invention he will weaken the flame, so the opponent, by deceitfully mixing vice into human will, made it so that the blessing began to fade and weaken, with the impoverishment of which the opposite necessarily enters. Just as the opposite of life is death, strength is weakness, so blessing is curse, boldness is shame, and the opposite of every good thing. That is why now, when such a beginning served as the reason for such an end, we see humanity among the real evils. Chapter 7 Why God is not the author of evil And no one asks: did God, foreseeing the human calamity that would befall people through imprudence, begin to create, while perhaps it would have been more beneficial for man not to come into existence rather than to remain in evil. For those involved in the deception of Manichaean dogmas believe this to be the basis of their delusion, as if thereby proving that the Creator of human nature is not good. If, although God knows nothing about what exists, man is nevertheless in evil, then the concept of God’s goodness will not stand, unless God brought into life a man who had to live in evil. For if a good nature and activity are certainly good, then this sorrowful and perishing life, say opponents, cannot be recognized as the creation of the Good. On the contrary, the culprit of such a life must be assumed to be someone else who has a nature inclined to evil. All this and the like for those who have deeply accepted into themselves, like some kind of deceptive paint, this heretical seduction, due to visible probability, seems to have some power; but for those who are more penetrating into the truth, it is clearly seen how unsteady this is and how it serves as an indication of deception. And it seems to me that it would be good to present the apostle as the defender of this apology. For in the Epistle to the Corinthians he distinguishes between the carnal and spiritual states of souls, showing, I think, in his words that good or bad should not be assessed by feeling, but by placing the mind outside of bodily phenomena, the nature of good and its opposite should be discussed in itself. For “he who is spiritual,” the apostle says, “strives... everything” (1 Cor. 2:15). For those who spread teachings similar to those mentioned above, the reason for their invention could, I think, be that, limiting good to the pleasantness of bodily pleasure (since the nature of the body, being complex and close to decay, is necessarily subject to suffering and illness, and these sufferings will be followed by the same painful feeling), they think that the creation of man is the work of evil; so that if their mental gaze stretched higher and, turning their minds away from the disposition to pleasures, they looked dispassionately at the nature of beings, they would recognize that evil is nothing other than vice. Every vice, not as something that exists in itself and turns out to be independent, has the distinctive feature that it is a lack of good. For outside of free will there is no original evil; but evil is called evil because it is not good; the non-existent did not take place; and the creator of the failed is not the Creator of the accomplished beings. Therefore, God is not the cause of evil - the Creator of beings, and not of what does not exist; Who created sight, not blindness; virtue, and not deprivation, indicated as a feat of will; He presupposed a good end for those who live virtuously, and for that which pleases Himself, subjugating human nature not by any necessary coercion, like an animate vessel, involuntarily attracting it to the good. But if, when the light shines purely in clear weather, someone voluntarily obscures his vision with his eyelids, then it is not the sun that is the reason that a person does not see. Chapter 8 The Meaning of Disease and Death But, of course, those who have in mind the destruction of the body are indignant, and it is hard for them that our life is crushed by death. So, in this sorrowful event, let him see the abundance of God’s good deeds, for this, perhaps, will most likely lead him to amazement at God’s merciful care for man. It is advisable to live a life of participation in the enjoyment of what one desires. And if someone spends his life in torment, then he recognizes that it is more preferable for himself not to exist than to exist and suffer. Therefore, let us examine whether the Giver of life has anything else in mind other than that our life should be as best as possible for us? Since by free movement we have drawn ourselves into communion with evil, with some kind of pleasure, as if some kind of poison seasoned with honey, mixing evil into nature, and through this, having been deprived of bliss, which, as we imagine, consists in not suffering, have been transformed into vice, then for this reason man, like some meager vessel, again decomposes into the earth, so that after the separation of the filth he has perceived, he can be resurrected restored to its original form. Moses expounds to us the same dogma historically and in riddles. However, even in riddles the teaching contained is clear. For he says that when the first people touched the forbidden and exposed themselves from this bliss, then the Lord imposed on the first-born “robes of skins” (Gen. 3:21), as it seems to me, not directing the meaning of the speech to these skins (for from which slaughtered animals were the skins removed and clothing invented for people?). But since any skin separated from an animal is dead, I think that after this the Healer of our depravity, so that it would not remain in us forever, of course providentially, imposed on people the ability to die, which was the difference of the dumb nature. For a robe is something imposed on us from the outside, serving the body for temporary use, not akin to nature. Therefore, according to a special view, deadness was transferred from the nature of the dumb to the nature created for immortality, covers its exterior, not its interior, embraces the sensory part of man, but does not touch the very image of God. Yes, and the sensory decomposes, and is not destroyed, for destruction is transformation into nothing, and decomposition is a resolution again to those elements of the world from which the thing was made up. But what is in these elements did not perish, although it escaped the comprehension of our feelings. The reason for the decomposition is clear from the example we have given. Since sensuality is in common with the buxom and earthly, the best and highest assessment of the beautiful by the approval of the senses has become sinful, and the error in the assessment of the beautiful has produced the opposite state, then the part of ourselves that has become obscene, disintegrates from the acceptance of the opposite. The example is expressed as follows: suppose that a certain vessel is made of clay and, for some purpose, is filled with melted lead. The lead poured into it has hardened and remains so that it cannot be poured out, but the owner of the vessel wants to make it suitable for himself; Knowing the meager art, he knocks shards off the lead, and then again makes the vessel for his own use in its previous form, unfilled with the mixed substance. Likewise, the Creator of our vessel, since vice was mixed with the sensory part, I mean the body, having decomposed all the substance that had received evil into itself, and again recreated in resurrection without any admixture of the opposite, restores the vessel to its original beauty. But some connection and communication of sinful passions occurs in the soul and body, i.e. there is some similarity between bodily death and spiritual death, for just as in the flesh we call the removal of sensory life death, so in the soul we call the separation of true life death. Therefore, since, according to what was said before, one thing is the communion of evil, seen in the soul and body (because evil comes into action through the soul and through the body), then the death of decomposition due to the application of dead skins does not concern the soul, for how can something that is not complex be decomposed? And since there is a need for some kind of healing to take away from the soul the filth that has grown into it, therefore in real life the healing of virtue has been proposed to heal such wounds; if the soul remains unhealed, then healing is reserved for it in the future life. But just as there are some differences in bodily suffering: some of them are comfortable, while others find it difficult to accept treatment, and cutting, cauterization and bitter medicines are used to end the suffering that has taken root in the body, so the future judgment promises something similar to the healing of mental illnesses. For weak people, this is a threat and an uprising of sorrows, so that through the fear of painful retribution we may become wise until we avoid vice, but according to the faith of more meaningful people, this is healing and healing from God, elevating His creation to original grace. Just as those who, by cutting or cauterizing, remove unnaturally grown calluses and warts from the body, not without torment, heal the beneficent, but do not cut to the harm of the sufferer, so all the material excesses that harden our souls, hardened by communication with passions, are cut off and erased during the judgment by this ineffable wisdom and the power of the healer of the sick, as says the Gospel, according to what was said: “They do not require the health of a doctor, but the sick one” (Matthew 9:12). Since a great affinity with evil has occurred in the soul, then, just as cutting off an itchy wart pricks the surface of the body (for beyond nature, what has grown together with nature by some kind of sympathy is connected with the subject and a strange kind of merging of the alien with ours occurs, so that the feeling, being separated from the unnatural, is wounded and painful), so when the soul is exhausted and, as he says, there is nowhere prophecy, “disappears... in denunciations” (Ps. 39:12) about sin, then, due to the deeply penetrating nature of evil, certain unspeakable and inexpressible diseases will necessarily follow, the description of which cannot be expressed in words to the same extent as the nature of the desired benefits. For both of them are not subject to the power of words and are inaccessible to the divination of reason. Therefore, whoever looks at the goal of the wisdom of the House-Builder in the Universe will in no way find any reason to call the Creator of people, out of cowardice, the author of evil, saying that He either does not know the future, or does know, but created man not without an inclination towards evil, because even knowing the future did not stop the desire for what is being done. For the fact that humanity would deviate from good was known by the One who contains everything through the power of clairvoyance and sees the future along with the past. But just as He saw the deviation, He also understood the man’s appeal again to goodness. So which was better? Should we not bring our kind into existence at all, since I foresaw that in the future we would sin against the beautiful, or, having brought into being, and bring our sick kind back into the original grace? Because of bodily suffering, which necessarily befalls us due to the transience of nature, to call God the creator of evil or not to recognize Him at all as the creator of man, so as not to be considered the culprit of what causes us torment, is a sign of extreme cowardice in those who evaluate good and evil by feeling, who do not know that by nature good is only that which is not touched by feeling, and evil is only alienation from good. Distinguishing between good and evil according to labor and pleasure is characteristic of dumb nature; Among the dumb, the comprehension of truly good things does not take place, because they are not involved in mind and thought. And that man is a beautiful work of God and brought into being for something even more beautiful, this is obvious not only from what has been said, but also from a thousand other testimonies, many of which, due to their countlessness, we will pass over in silence. Having called God the Creator of man, we have not forgotten what we discussed at the beginning, turning to the Hellenes, where we proved that the Word of God, as self-existent and hypostatic, is both God and the Word, embracing all creative power; better to say, It is this power itself, has a desire for every good deed, brings into reality everything it desires, because His will is accompanied by power; His purpose and work is the life of creatures; He brought into life a man, divinely adorned with all virtues. Since by nature only that which has existence not as a created thing is changeable, but that which is produced by an uncreated nature from a non-existent, then, having directly begun being by transformation, it always continues to change, whether it acts in accordance with nature, when the change is constantly directed for the better, or deviates from the straight path, when a movement in the opposite direction follows. So, since man also belongs to the created ones, the changeability of his nature crept in the opposite direction. And just as a one-time departure from goods consistently introduces all types of evils, so that death was introduced by aversion from life, darkness arose with the impoverishment of light, in the absence of virtue it was replaced by vice, and in the absence of any of the goods its place in the list was taken by the opposite, then a person who fell into such and similar disasters due to unreason (it was impossible for someone who turned away from prudence to preserve prudence and to desire anything wise who moved away from prudence). wisdom), to whom was it necessary to appeal again to the original grace? To whom was it due to correct the fallen, or to appeal to the lost, or to guide the lost? Who else, of course, if not the Lord of nature?! For only He who gave life in the beginning was possible and at the same time it was fitting to call upon the life that was perishing. This is what we hear in the sacrament of truth, those who are taught that God created man in the beginning and saved him when he fell. Chapter 9 Is what is said about Christ worthy of God? But regarding what has been stated so far, the objector, looking at the connection of the speech, will perhaps agree with the teaching, because in what has been said, apparently, there is nothing alien to the divine way of thinking. But it is not with this disposition that he will accept what follows and how the mystery of truth is most intensified. Human birth, growth from infancy to adulthood, eating, drinking, fatigue, sleep, sadness, tears, slander, judgment, cross, death, placing in the grave - all this, being part of the sacrament, somehow weakens the faith of people of a low way of thinking, so that, due to what was said before, they do not accept what is said later. The godly thought of the resurrection from the dead is not allowed due to the indecent concept of death. But I think that, having freed our thoughts somewhat from carnal fatness, we must first understand about good and bad, what they are in themselves and by what signs one and the other are understood. For none of the sensible people, of course, will contradict that by nature only one thing is shameful, namely vicious passion; Where there is no vice, then all shame is alien. And, to which nothing of the opposite is mixed, then, without a doubt, it belongs to the ranks of good, and truly good has no admixture of the opposite. However, everything that is seen in the realm of good is divine. Therefore, let them either prove that birth, upbringing, growth, gradual improvement of nature, the experience of death, return from death are vices; or if they agree that what is counted does not belong to the vices, then of necessity they admit that what is alien to vice is not at all shameful. When it has been proven that, without a doubt, it is good, are not those who, in their foolishness, are pathetic when they claim that what is good is not divine? Chapter 10 How could the Deity be limited to the body? But they will say: human nature is small and limited, but the Divine is infinite - how can the infinite be embraced by an atom? But who says that the infinity of the Divine is embraced by the limitations of the flesh as if by a vessel? And during our life, the spiritual nature is not contained within the confines of the flesh. On the contrary, the bodily volume is limited to its own parts, and the soul, through the movements of thought, freely extends throughout creation, ascending to heaven, plunging into abysses, passing through the entire breadth of the Universe, penetrating dungeons with an inquisitive mind, and often touches with thought the heavenly wonders, without being burdened by the burden of the body. If the soul of man, united by the necessity of nature with the body, is freely everywhere, then what is the need to assert that the Divinity is constrained by the nature of the flesh, and from examples accessible to our understanding not to form some decent guess about the Divine economy? Just as in a lamp one sees fire, which manifests itself as the substance placed there, and the Word distinguishes fire on the substance and the substance that ignites the fire, but in reality it is impossible, separating one from the other, to show the flame in itself, apart from the substance; on the contrary, both the flame and the substance are one: so (in this example, let no one take into account the destructive power of fire, but on the contrary, taking in the image one thing that is proper, let him reject unusual and inappropriate), just as the flame, as we see, depends on the substance placed and is not contained in the substance, which prevents, imagining the unity and rapprochement of the Divine nature with humanity, and at this rapprochement, preserve a divine thought, believing that the Divinity, although it was in man, was not subject to any limitation? Chapter 11 How did the Divine unite with humanity? If you ask: how does the Divinity unite with humanity? - then look, first you should ask: what affinity does the soul have with the flesh? If the method of connecting your soul with your body is unknown, then, of course, you should not think that even that would become accessible to your comprehension. But just as here we are sure that the soul is something different from the body, because the flesh, separated from the soul, becomes dead and inactive and we do not know the method of union, so there, although we recognize that the Divine nature is magnificently different from the mortal and fleeting nature, it is nevertheless inconceivable for us to understand the way in which the Divinity is united with humanity. On the contrary, we do not doubt that God was born in human nature because of the miracles reported, but we refuse to investigate how he was born, because this is beyond what can be imagined. For, believing that every bodily and mental existence is realized by an incorporeal and uncreated nature, together with faith in this we do not enter into the study of what and how it was realized. But accepting what has been brought into being, we leave unknown the way in which the Universe was composed, as completely unspeakable and inexplicable. Chapter 12 What evidence is there that God has appeared in the flesh? And whoever demands proof that God has appeared to us in the flesh, let him look to power. For in general, that there is a God, hardly anyone has any other proof of this from the testimony of works. Therefore, just as, looking at the Universe, considering the laws of economy in the world, the blessings shown to our lives from above, we understand that above all there is a certain power that creates what happens and protects beings, so in considering the God who appeared to us in the flesh as sufficient proof of the Divine Coming, we recognize multi-functional miracles, in the deeds described, revealing everything that distinguishes the nature of God. God's business is to revive people; God's business is to protect creatures by providence; God’s work is to provide food and drink to those who have received carnal life as their inheritance; God’s business is to do good to those in need; It is God’s business to restore the nature exhausted by weakness to health again; God’s work is to equally possess all creation: earth, sea, air, space above the air; God’s work is to have overwhelming power in everything, and, above all, to be stronger than death and corruption. Therefore, if the legend about God incarnate lacked any of this, then those alien to our faith would rightfully reject our sacrament. And if everything that makes up the concept of God is seen in the legends about Him, what prevents faith? Chapter 13 How can God be born and die? But they say: birth and death are characteristic of carnal nature. And I say the same. But what is before birth and what is after death has nothing in common with our nature. For, looking at both limits of human life, where do we begin and where do we end? Man, having begun existence with suffering, completes it with suffering. And there, birth did not begin with passion, and death did not end with suffering, for birth was not preceded by a feeling of pleasure, and death was not followed by corruption. Don't you believe the miracle? I rejoice in this disbelief. By the fact that you consider what is being told to you to exceed faith, you admit, of course, that these miracles are supernatural. Therefore, let it be a proof of the divinity of the One who appeared to you that the sermon does not report natural events. And if what is told about Christ were contained within the limits of nature, then where would the Divine be? If the word exceeds nature, the very thing that you do not believe is proof for you that what is being preached is God. A person is born from a married couple, and upon death he is given over to decay. If the sermon contained this, then, of course, you would not think that the one in whom the distinctive properties of our nature are attested is God. Since you hear that, although He was born, yet by the way of birth, and by the fact that He did not allow Himself to be changed through corruption, He came out from the limits common to our nature, then as a result of this it will be good to turn disbelief to something else: not to consider Him one of those visible in nature to man. Whoever does not believe that such a person exists will, by all necessity, be led to the belief that He is God. For he who narrated that He was born narrated at the same time that He was born that way. Therefore, if, as a result of what has been said, it is true that He was born, then by the same token, of course, it is also probable that He was born in exactly this way. For the one who spoke about the birth added that he was born of a Virgin. And he who mentioned death also testified about the resurrection after death. Therefore, if, based on what you hear, you assume that He was born and died, then by the same token you will assume, of course, that His birth and death were removed from suffering. But this is above nature, therefore, not within the limits of nature, of course, is He who turns out to be born supernaturally. Chapter 14 What is the reason for such humiliation of the Divine? Therefore, they say, what was the reason for the Divine to condescend to such humiliation, in which faith wavers, wondering whether God, an inconceivable, unthinkable, unspeakable being, exceeding all glory and all greatness, is united with the low-value shell of human nature, so that His lofty actions are degraded by this connection with the insignificant? Chapter 15 The answer to the above question and the beginning of the answer to the next one: why didn’t He save man with one command? We do not find it difficult to give a divine answer to this. Are you asking about the reason why God was born among people? If you take away from life the blessings given from above, you will not be able to say why you come to know the Divine. For from what we experience, we recognize the Benefactor; Having before our eyes what is happening, we conclude from it about the nature of the actor. Therefore, if a special sign of God’s nature is love for mankind, then you have the answer to the question you proposed, you have the reason for the appearance of God among people. Our weak nature had a need for a healer; a person who had fallen had a need for something uplifting; he who has deviated from life has a need for a life-giving one; he who has withdrawn from the communion of good has a need for one who leads him to good; the prisoner in darkness began to need the coming of light; the captive felt the need for a redeemer, the prisoner for a protector, and the one held under the yoke of slavery for a liberator. Was this really not enough and unworthy of bowing down to God to visit human nature when humanity was in such a pitiful situation?! But it was possible, they say, to show a benefit to man, and to God to remain unsuffering, for by His will He created the Universe and by a single movement of the will brought into existence the non-existent, why He does not introduce man by some kind of authorized and Divine power, stealing from a resistive force, into the original state, if He pleases, but goes by long detours, putting on bodily nature, entering life through birth, passing through all ages in order, then tasting death and thus achieving the goal by the Resurrection of His own body, as if it were impossible for Him, being at the height of Divine glory, to save a person by His command, leaving aside such circumstance? Therefore, it is necessary that we counter such objections with the truth, and nothing should hinder the faith of those who inquisitively study the mysterious teaching. So, let us first consider (which has already been partly explored above) what stands in opposition to virtue. Just as there is darkness to light and death to life, so, obviously, vice is the opposite of virtue, and nothing else other than it. Just as of the many creatures seen in creation, nothing else is in opposition to light and life: neither stone, nor tree, nor water, nor man, nor any other creature, except for what is actually considered to be the opposite, which are darkness and death, so in the discussion of virtue no one will say that any creature, except the concept of vice, is understood to be its opposite. Therefore, if our teaching asserted that the Divinity was born viciously, then the objector would have the opportunity to attack our faith, since we think incongruous and dissimilar things about God’s nature. For it is impermissible to assert that true wisdom, goodness, incorruptibility (and if there is any other high concept and name) falls into the opposite. So, if true virtue is God, and the opposite of virtue is not some kind of nature, but vice, God is born not in vice, but in human nature; and only one thing is indecent and shameful - a vicious passion, in which God was not and cannot be by His nature, then why are they ashamed of this confession that God has united with human nature, when nothing contrary to virtue is seen in the composition of man? For neither the gift of speech, nor the gift of reason, nor the ability to acquire knowledge, nor anything else similar to this, which constitutes the peculiarity of human essence, is contrary to the concept of virtue. Chapter 16 Did the Deity undergo suffering? But the very changeability of our body, they say, is a passive state, and whoever is in the body is in suffering, but the Divinity is impassive. Therefore, this concept of God is strange if they only assert that he who is dispassionate by nature enters into communion with suffering. But to this, we will again use the same answer that something is called a passive state in the proper sense, and another - due to imprecise usage of words. As for free will and turns from virtue to vice, then there truly is suffering; nevertheless, what is seen in nature as transitional, occurring in a special sequence, then in a more proper sense can be called deed rather than suffering. Such are, for example, birth, growth, maintenance of the body through inflowing and ejected food, the confluence of elements in the body and again the decomposition of what has formed and the transition into the akin. What, according to our sacrament, did the Divinity touch? Is it actually the so-called passive state, which is a vice, or a natural movement? If the teaching asserted that the Divinity allowed itself to be prohibited, it would have to flee from such an absurd dogma, as it does not offer anything sensible about God’s nature. If he says that God touched our nature, and the first being and special existence of which originated from God, then what is the sin of preaching against a godly way of thinking, when in the concepts of God no passive disposition is included in faith? For we do not say that the doctor is exposed to suffering when he heals the suffering; on the contrary, the person caring for the sick, although he touches the illness, himself remains free from suffering. If birth in itself is not suffering, then no one will call life suffering. On the contrary, voluptuousness and the desire of the living for vice lead to human birth - this is an illness of nature. But the sacrament says that the Divinity is pure from both. Therefore, if birth is alien to voluptuousness and life is alien to vice, then what kind of suffering remains in which, according to the sacrament of piety, God had communion? But if someone calls the separation of body and soul suffering, then it would be fair to first call the union of both so. For if the dissolution of those united is suffering, then the conjugation of those separated can be suffering, because in both the combination of the separate and in the separation of those who were in connection, a certain movement appears. Therefore, whatever the last movement is called, the previous one should also be called. If the first movement, which we call birth, is called suffering, then the one that allows the union of body and soul should also be called suffering. But we say about God that He was in this and that movement of our nature - both in the one by which the soul is united with the body, and in the one by which the body is separated from the soul. And regarding the human composition, due to the ineffable and inexpressible nature of this dissolution, mixed in the reasoning of both, that is, the sensory and the spiritual, it is provided that the unity of those once united, I mean soul and body, continues forever. For when our nature, following its inherent order and in the Incarnate, was moved to separate soul and body as if by some sticky composition, I mean Divine power, He again united what was divided, bringing what had been dissolved into indissoluble unity. And this is the resurrection of that which was previously united and, after decomposition, is mutually united, a return to an indecomposable unity, so that the original grace returns to humanity and we again enter into eternal life, when the vice mixed with nature due to the decomposition of our composition disappears in us, as happens with a liquid, which, when the vessel with it is broken, without being protected by anything, spills and disappears. But just as the beginning of death, having occurred in one, spread to the entire human race, in the same way the beginning of resurrection through the One spreads to all humanity. Whoever again united the soul He had received with His own body by that power which, at the first formation, was dissolved with both body and soul, He in some more general way united the spiritual essence with the sensory, successfully bringing the beginning into order with the end. For when, in the human composition that He had assumed upon Himself, the soul returned again to the body upon permission, then the union of the divided, as from some beginning, potentially equally passes on to the entire human race. And this is the mystery of God’s economy for man and the resurrection from the dead. Although by death the soul is separated from the body and the necessary order of nature is not violated, yet God by the resurrection again brings them together in order to serve for them as the demarcating limit of both, death and life, when, just as in Himself He forms the nature divided by death, so He Himself becomes the beginning of the union of the divided. Chapter 17 Renewal of the question: why didn’t you save a person by one command, but such a roundabout path was needed? But the objection made to us has not yet been resolved, another will say, but in what has been said, what is being proposed to us by the infidels finds great strength. For if, as the word showed, there is so much power in Christ that the overthrow of death and the entry of life are in His power, then why does He not produce what we want by will alone, but rather accomplish our salvation in a roundabout way: He is born, raised, and through the trial of death saves a person? It was possible for Him not to be subjected to this and save us. To such a remark, it is enough for well-meaning people to say in response that patients do not prescribe to doctors how to care for them, and do not enter into competition with benefactors about the type of treatment, they do not say why the doctor touched the suffering member and came up with such a remedy to stop the disease when another was needed; on the contrary, looking at the end of the good deed, they gratefully accept the good deed. But since, as the Prophet says, the “multitude of goodness” of God delivers hidden benefits (Ps. 30:20) and is not yet clearly seen in this life (and if what was expected was before the eyes, then all that is said contrary to the infidels would not have power; now what is seen now by faith alone awaits the coming centuries to become revealed to them), then it is necessary, by some kind of inference, to find, if possible, a solution to the proposed question, similar to the previous ones. Chapter 18 Historical proof of the coming of God into the world: idolaters and Jews For those who believed that God came into the world, it is perhaps in vain to condemn this coming, as if it was not done wisely and in the best way. For for those who are not too stubborn against the truth, an important proof of God’s coming is what was revealed before the future life in the present century, I mean the evidence of the events themselves. Who does not know how demonic charm filled all parts of the Universe, taking over human life through idolatry, how all peoples in the world became a law in idols to serve demons by sacrificing animals and sacrificing abominations on altars? But since, according to the words of the Apostle, “the grace of God to save all men appeared” (Tit. 2, 11), which came in human nature, everything, like smoke, turned into nothing, which is why the furies of prophecies and prophecies ceased, the annual festivals and bloody defilements of hecatombs were destroyed; Many nations no longer have churches, porches, churches, altars and everything else that the servants of idols directed to deceive themselves and those who use it, so that in many places they do not remember whether this ever happened; throughout the entire Universe, instead, churches and altars were erected in the name of Christ, everywhere honorable and bloodless sacred acts and high wisdom, more in deed than in word, neglect of bodily life and contempt for death, which was clearly shown by those forced by persecutors to apostatize from the faith, counting bodily wounds and condemnation to death as nothing, to which, of course, they would not have subjected themselves if they had not had clear and undoubted evidence about God's coming. It is enough to tell the Jews the same thing as a sign that the one who came is the One in whom they do not believe, because before Christ’s Epiphany the capital of the kings in Jerusalem was famous for them, its church was famous, annual sacrifices were lawful, and everything that for the mysteries, capable of understanding, was described in detail by law in riddles, in accordance with the service of piety that was legalized from them from the beginning, was hitherto not forbidden. But when they saw the One who was Expected, about Whom they had been taught in advance by the prophets and the law, and they preferred to faith in the One who had appeared, a superstition filled with errors, which they badly rejected, they kept the words of the law, serving more according to custom than according to reason - then after this they did not accept the grace that appeared, and what was worthy in their worship remained in stories about it alone; You won’t recognize the church even by its footprints; this glorious city was left in ruins; The Jews do not have anything left that was legalized in ancient times - on the contrary, the very place they revered in Jerusalem, by order of the rulers, became inaccessible to them. Chapter 19 It is still necessary to convince non-believers However, since all this does not seem to be part of the signs of God’s coming either to the Hellenists or to the main teachers of Jewish teachings, it would be good to especially talk about the objections made, why the nature of God unites with ours, saving humanity by itself, and not by command accomplishing what was supposed? Therefore, what kind of beginning can we have that would consistently lead our speech to our goal? What other way to briefly outline pious concepts about God? Chapter 20 Goodness and justice must be revealed together in God's actions So, according to the recognition of everyone, one must believe that God is not only powerful, but also just, good, wise, and has everything that reason considers best. Therefore, in real house-building, one should not want one of the divine properties to be revealed in what is happening, but not the other. For in general, none of these lofty names in itself, alone, separately from others, is a virtue. And the good, if it is not associated with the just, the wise, the powerful, is not really good, because the unjust, the unwise or the powerless is not good. And power, separated from the just and wise, does not seem to be a virtue, because this kind of power is brutal and violent. And we should also say about other things: if the wise goes beyond the limits of the just, or if the just is not together with the powerful and good, then others would rather call something like this a vice in the proper sense. For why would anyone classify as good that which lacks perfection? If all perfections should converge in opinions about God, then let us see whether God’s economy about man lacks any of the divine concepts? In God, of course, we look for signs of goodness. Is it possible to have any more clear evidence of kindness than this - to make one who has fled to the opposite side, and for a constant nature, unchangeable in goodness, not to be consistent in actions with the variability of human will? God would not have come, as David says, “to save us” (Ps. 79:3), if goodness had not placed such an intention. But even the goodness of this intention would not bring any benefit if it were not for wisdom that made philanthropy effective. For as for those who are in a sick state, many, perhaps, would like the sick person not to suffer. But they only carry out this good will on the sick, who are assisted by some kind of art in healing the patient. So, with goodness, without any doubt, wisdom must be associated. How then does wisdom appear along with goodness in what has happened? Such that we see goodness not only in intention. For how could intention become manifest without being revealed by events? Actions that consistently occur in some connection and in order show the wisdom and art of God's economy. And since, according to what was said before, wisdom, coupled with justice, undoubtedly becomes a virtue (taken separately, it will not remain goodness in itself), then in the doctrine of the economy of human salvation it will be good to consider two properties in mutual connection - I mean wisdom and justice. Chapter 21 The beginning of an explanation of the justice of the economy of salvation: man freely deviated from the good So what is justice? We remember, without a doubt, what was said, as it should be, at the beginning of the word, namely, that man is made in the likeness of God’s nature, retaining in himself this likeness to the Divine in other good qualities and in freedom of will, but being, of necessity, a changeable nature. For whoever has the beginning of existence through change, it is, of course, impossible for him not to be changeable, because the very transition from non-existence to being is a kind of change in which what was not realized by God’s power is transformed into essence. And for another reason, there is necessarily variability in man for the very fact that man was the likeness of the nature of God, and what is being likened, if it did not have any otherness, of course, would be identical with what it is being likened to. Therefore, since the otherness with the Proto-Image of what is created in the image consists in the fact that the Proto-Image is by nature unchangeable, but the image is not like that, on the contrary, for the reason stated, it was realized through change, and changes, of course, by the very fact that there is similarity, and change is a movement that constantly extends from one state in which a thing is to another - then there are two types of such movement: one is always accomplished towards good, in it the act forward has no stop because the limit of the path is not reached; the other is opposite, and that is its consistency, that it cannot be consistent, because opposition to good, as was said before, is different from good in the same sense in which we call the non-existent different from the existing and non-existence from being. So, since it is impossible for nature to remain motionless in itself due to its highly perverse and changeable striving and movement, will will certainly rush towards something, naturally drawn into movement by the desire for the best. But some things are truly good by nature, while others are not and are embellished with some sign of goodness. The mind is set within us to decide this, and we have to either take advantage of what is really good, or, turning away from it, through some deception by appearance, be carried away into the opposite, as something similar, according to a folk fable, happened to a dog who, seeing in the water the reflection of what he was carrying in his mouth, threw away real food, opening his mouth to grab a semblance of food, and remained hungry. Chapter 22 The justice of the economy of salvation is in non-violence against the devil So, since the mind, having erred in the desire for true good, has deviated to that which does not exist, convinced by the flattery of a bad adviser and the inventor of vice that what is opposite to good is good, for flattery would not have worked if the ghost of good had not been attached like bait to the oud of vice - therefore, since man voluntarily subjected himself to this calamity, out of voluptuousness subjugating himself to the enemy of life, then demand from me a little of everything that befits the concepts of God: goodness, truth, power, incorruptibility, and if anything else signifies perfection. God, as a good one, is filled with mercy towards the fallen and, as a wise one, knows the way to return; the work of wisdom was also the judgment of justice, for no one will attribute true justice to imprudence. So what is fair about this? The fact that no violent sovereignty was used against the one who took possession of us, and due to the excess of power, He who captured us from the owner did not leave the person who enslaved the person with voluptuousness any reason for justification. Thus, those who gave up their freedom for money are the slaves of those who bought them, who became sellers of themselves, and neither they themselves nor anyone else is allowed to proclaim their freedom, even if those who sold themselves to this disaster were people of noble birth. And if someone, caring about what was sold, uses violence against the buyer, then, by autocratically taking away what was acquired legally, he will be considered unfair. But, if you like, no law prohibits you from buying something like this again. Chapter 23 The wisdom of the economy of salvation is in the concealment of the Divine Since we voluntarily sold ourselves in the same way, then the one who freed us, out of goodness, again had to invent a not violent, but a fair way of returning. And this method is this: enter into a transaction with the owner so that he can take whatever price he wishes for the property he owns. Therefore, what was it probably better for the owner to choose and take? Along the way, we can make some guesses about his wishes, and then the signs of what we are looking for will be clear to us. So, whoever, for the reason presented at the beginning of this work, through envy of the prosperous, closed his eyes to the good and gave birth to the darkness of vice in himself and became ill with the beginning and foundation of the inclination towards evil and, as it were, the mother of other vices - lust, would he exchange what he possesses for anything other than something obviously higher and greater, in order to more fully satisfy the passions of arrogance, receiving a greater reward for less? But in what was narrated from the ages, I did not know anything similar to what I saw in what was visible then, in unmarried womb-bearing and uncorrupted birth, in virgin breasts, in the voices of invisible beings, testifying from above to supernatural dignity, in the healing of natural ailments, performed by Him without any means, but with one word and aspiration of the will, in the return of the dead to life, in intimidation demons, in power over air disturbances, in walking on the sea, while the abyss is not divided into two parts and does not expose the bottom to those passing by, like what happened in the miracles of Moses, but the surface of the water from above turns into dry land under the foot and with reliable elasticity supports the trail, in the distribution of food of any quantity, in abundant treats in the middle of the desert for many thousands of those established, for whom heaven will not rain manna, It is not the earth, preparing food from its own nature, that supplies what satisfies needs, but from the mysterious treasuries of God’s power comes generosity, ready-made bread, cultivated by the hands of those who serve and multiplied by the satiation of those who eat, and the delight of fish, not brought by the sea for their needs, but by Him who sowed the very species of fish into the sea. And who will describe in order one after another the gospel miracles? Seeing this power in Him, the enemy saw that what was offered to him in exchange was more than what he possessed. Therefore He is chosen to become the price for those kept in the custody of death. But it was impossible for the enemy to look at the uncovered image of God without seeing in it some part of the flesh that he had already subjugated to himself through sin. Therefore, the Divinity covers itself with flesh so that the enemy, looking at what is familiar and akin to him, is not horrified by the approach of overwhelming power and, noticing that power is imperceptibly more and more manifested in miracles, recognizes what has appeared for himself as more desirable than terrible. You see how goodness is combined with justice and wisdom is not separated from them. To imagine that the Divine power would become accessible because of the bodily covering, and the construction of our affairs would not be hindered by the fear of a lofty manifestation - this, without a doubt, serves as proof of goodness, wisdom, and justice. For to desire to save is evidence of goodness; to become a redemptive price for what is possessed by another shows justice, and by inventing what is inaccessible to the enemy to make accessible is proof of the highest wisdom. Chapter 24 How the power of the Divine was manifested But for someone who has carefully followed the order of what was said, it is natural to ask, where is the power of the Divine seen in what has been said, where is the incorruptibility of the Divine power? Therefore, in order for this to become clear, let us consider the consequences of the sacrament, in which the power fused with philanthropy is most clearly shown. So, firstly, the very fact that omnipotent nature was able to stoop to the baseness of humanity serves as a greater proof of power than great and supernatural miracles. If something great and lofty is accomplished by Divine power, then it is somehow natural and consistent. And it does not seem at all strange to the ear if we say that every creature in the world and everything that is mentally imagined outside the visible is composed of Divine power, carried out by God’s will, as it pleases. And condescension towards the humiliated is a certain excess of power that does not meet the slightest obstacle in the supernatural. For just as the essence of fire tends upward and no one would consider it worthy of surprise what happens naturally to a flame, and if someone sees that a flame flows downwards like heavy bodies, then something like this is considered a miracle, how fire remains fire and in the form of movement retreats from nature, tending downwards - so the Divine, all-surpassing power does not so much show the greatness of the heavens, the radiance of the luminaries, the improvement of the Universe, the unceasing economy of beings, as much as condescension to the weakness of our nature. How is the high seen in the lowly and the height is not humiliated? How does the Divinity, united with human nature, become both the last and the first to remain? For, according to what was said before, the opposing force did not have the opportunity to enter into communion with the clearly present God and endure His undisguised appearance. Therefore, so that the one demanding a ransom for us could take one, the Divinity hid under the veil of our nature, and the enemy, like a greedy fish, together with the bait of the flesh, swallowed the hook of the Divinity, and thus, after the installation of life in the place of death and after the appearance of light in the place of darkness, that which seemed opposite to light and life was destroyed. For it is not possible for darkness to remain in the presence of light and to be death when life acts. So, briefly repeating the entire course of the sacrament, we will completely justify the Divine economy before those who accuse us for the fact that the Divine does not by itself accomplish human salvation. For in everything about the Divinity they must have divine concepts, not understand anything else highly about it and not degrade others from their divine dignity, but believe that in the reasoning of God every high and pious thought certainly takes place, depending on each other in connection. So, it has been proven that goodness, wisdom, justice, power, inaccessibility to corruption - everything is revealed in the concept of economy about us. Goodness is realized in the will to save the lost. Wisdom and justice are shown in the manner of our salvation. And the power is visible in the fact that He became in human likeness, in the humiliated form of our nature and death, He gave hope for Himself, as if it were able to take possession of Him in the likeness of people; but, being in her power, he did what was characteristic of Him in Divinity; characteristic of light is the destruction of darkness, and of life the destruction of death. So, since, having turned away from the right path, we at the very beginning turned away from life and were involved in death, do we learn anything incredible from the sacrament if purity is comprehended for those defiled by sin, for those who have died to live, for those who have gone astray, guidance, so that the defilement is cleansed, and error is corrected, and the dead returns to life? Chapter 25 Answer to those who wonder that the Divinity was in human nature And the fact that the Divine abided in our nature does not give the extremely faint-hearted observers of existence any reason to find it strange. For who is a child at heart who, looking at the Universe, does not believe that in every thing there is a Divinity, penetrating and embracing it and abiding in it? For everything depends on the Existing, and nothing can be if it does not exist in the Existing. Therefore, if everything is in the Divine and He is in everything, then why are they ashamed in the economy of the sacrament that teaches that God dwelt among people, about whom they believe that He is not outside people now? For, although the manner of God’s presence in us is not the same, yet that God is in us is equally recognized both now and then. Just as now the One who contains nature in being dwells in us, so then He entered into unity with ours, so that by union with the Divine it would become Divine, removed from death, delivered from the torment of the opponent. For His return from death and for the mortal race becomes the beginning of the return to immortal life. Chapter 26 Justification of the Wisdom of the Economy But others, perhaps, when studying this justice seen in this economy and wisdom, come to the idea that in this way God has invented some kind of deception for us. For that God, unrecognized by the enemy, not the revealed Divinity, but hidden under human nature, enters into the possessor, this, in a way, is a kind of deception and seduction, since it is common for those who deceive to turn the hopes of those against whom they are malicious to one thing, and to do something other than what they hoped for. But he who has the truth before his eyes will agree that this is what is most characteristic of justice and wisdom. For the work of justice is to give each one his due, and the work of wisdom is not to violate justice, and not to separate the good goal of love for mankind from fair judgment, but to skillfully combine both with each other, rewarding with justice what is worthy of what, and with goodness, without deviating from the goal of love for mankind. So, let's see if both of these qualities are visible in what happened. For reward according to merit, by which the deceiver is deceived, shows justice. And the purpose of what is done becomes evidence of the goodness of the actor. Justice tends to reward everyone with what he first laid the foundation and causes for, just as the earth rewards fruits according to the type of seeds planted in it. And it is characteristic of wisdom not to deviate from the best in the way of rewarding like. For just as someone who is plotting against life and healing someone who has been abused equally mixes a compound into food, only one mixes poison, and the other a cure for poison, and the method of healing does not in the least harm the purpose of the good deed, and although both mix the compound into food, but, paying attention to the goal, we praise one, and are indignant at the other - so here, according to the law of justice, the deceiver perceives what the seeds of his own free will were put in, because that he who deceives a person with the lure of pleasure is himself deceived by the human form. There is a change for the better in the purpose of what has been done. For one used deception to corrupt nature, and the just, at the same time good and wise, used the invention of deception to save the corrupted, thereby benefiting not only the lost, but also the one who caused our destruction. For from the approach of death to life, darkness to light, corruption to incorruption, destruction occurs and transformation into nothing worse, but the benefit from this is for the one being purified. For, just as those who process it through the admixture of a low-value substance to gold, destroying everything alien and unsuitable by turning it into food for fire, the most precious substance is again brought to its natural luster, and not without difficulty, however, this separation is accomplished, because over the course of some time the destructive force of fire destroys the admixture, at least the depletion of what was in it to the detriment of its goodness serves as a kind of healing for gold, in exactly the same way when death, corruption, darkness and, if there is any other product of vice, arose from the inventor of evil, the approach of Divine power, like fire, having carried out the destruction of the unnatural, provides a benefit to nature through incorruption, although such a division is difficult. Therefore, even to the enemy himself, if he felt the good deed, it would not seem doubtful that what was done was just and salutary. Just as now those who are cut and cauterized during treatment are indignant with doctors, tormented by the pain of cutting, but if they recover from this and the painful sensation of cauterization passes, they will give thanks to those who performed this healing on them - in the same way, when, after a long time, the evil that is now mixed with them and akin to them will be removed from nature, since the restoration of those who are now in evil in the original state, unanimous thanksgiving will be given to all creation and to all who endured torment during the purification, and even those who did not need to begin the purification. This and similar things are taught by the great mystery of God’s incarnation. For by the very fact that He joined humanity, taking upon Himself everything characteristic of nature: birth, upbringing, growth, and even reaching death, He accomplished everything that was said before, freeing man from vice, and healing the very inventor of vice. For cleansing the disease, although it is difficult, is the healing of the disease. Chapter 27 The birth of the God-man does not contradict the concept of God And whoever entered into unity with our nature, of course, should accept communication with us in all its properties. For just as those who wash away uncleanness from clothing do not do so in such a way as to leave some stains and remove others, but cleanse the entire fabric from one end to the other from contamination, so that the clothing becomes of the same value in all its parts, receiving equal cleanliness from washing - so, since human life is defiled by sin at the beginning and end and in all the middle parts, the washing power must touch everything and not make one thing healed by cleansing and another left without treatment. Therefore, since our life is separated by two limits, here and there, I mean the beginning and the end, then on both limits the power that corrects nature turns out to touch the beginning, and extend its action to the end, and declare everything that is in the middle between the beginning and the end. And since the entrance to this life is the same for all people, then whoever comes to us should move into this life from where? From heaven, perhaps, he who abhors human existence will say as something shameful and inglorious. But humanity was not in heaven; no disease of sin settled in the premium life. And He who entered into union with man accomplished this union for the purpose of benefit. Therefore, where there was no evil, and they did not live a human life, why would anyone demand that there God clothe himself in man, or better yet, not in man, but in some kind of idol and likeness of man? But what kind of correction would there be for our nature if, when an earthly living being was sick, some other, heavenly being received a Divine visit? For it is impossible for a sick person to be healed if the suffering member has not been healed. Therefore, if there was a sick person on earth, but the Divine power did not touch the sick person, meaning what was proper for himself, then the work of Divine power on something that has nothing in common with us would be useless for man. For it is equally indecent for the Divine (if in general it is permissible to understand by indecent anything other than vice, and the dishonor is no more diminished, at least for one who, out of stupidity, believes in Divine greatness in not allowing communication with the properties of our nature) if the Divinity is clothed with a heavenly body, and not an earthly one. For before the Almighty and Unapproachable, in terms of the height of nature, all creation is equally distant from Him and everything is equally lower than Him. The completely inaccessible is not something that is approachable for another, but another cannot approach it - on the contrary, It is equally above all beings. Therefore, the earth is no further in dignity, and the sky is no closer, and the creatures living in each element do not differ from each other in this respect, so that some touch the inaccessible nature, while others are separated from It; Shall we suppose that the power that possesses everything does not equally penetrate all beings, but in some it is abundant, and in others it is insufficient, and as a result of this it seems that the Divinity, due to the difference in the greater and the lesser, the higher and the lower, is complex, dissimilar from itself, if only by nature it appears distant from us, and to someone else - close and by proximity becomes comprehensible. But the true teaching neither before nor without sees anything to compare with high dignity, because everything is equally lower than the power that controls everything, so that if earthly nature is considered unworthy of unity with the Divine, then there will be no other one who has this dignity. If everything is equally devoid of this dignity, then it is fitting for God to do good to those who need it. So, confessing that the healing power appeared where there was illness, have we believed in something alien to the divine concept? Chapter 28 That our birth and the corresponding members of the body are not evil, but, on the contrary, should be held in high esteem But they laugh at our nature and disgrace the way of our birth, and through this they think to make the sacrament ridiculous, as if it were indecent for God to enter into communion with human life in this way. But this has already been said before, namely, that only one thing is vile by nature - evil, and if anything else consists of a property with vice. And the order of nature, established by God's will and law, is far from a reproach for vice. Otherwise, the accusation will fall on the Creator of nature, if nature is rooted in something vile and indecent. So, if the Divinity is alien to one vice, and vice by nature does not exist, the sacrament says that God was in man, and not in vice, and if the path for man in the world by which what is born enters into life is one, then by what law do they establish another way for God to enter into life, although they recognize as true that the nature, exhausted by vice, is visited by Divine power, but with displeasure They look at the method of visiting out of ignorance that every structure of the body in itself has equal value and nothing that contributes to the maintenance of life in it deserves condemnation as something dishonest or bad. For the entire structure of organic members is directed towards one goal; This goal is for a person to remain in life. Therefore, just as other organs support present life in a person, each being divided for a special action, and they keep the sensory and active forces in order, so the generative organs have an industry for the future, introducing succession into nature. Therefore, if you look at the benefit, then after which of those recognized as noble will they be second and after which in justice cannot be recognized as preferable? For it is not with the eye, not with the ear, not with the tongue, not with any other sensory organ that our race continues uninterruptedly; all this, as has been said, serves for real use, and in those organs immortality is preserved for humanity, so that death, which always acts against us, is in some way inactive and unsuccessful, because nature renews itself, rewarding the lack with those born. So, what indecent does our sacrament contain, if God entered into unity with human life through the means by which nature fights death? Chapter 29 Why did God delay coming? But leaving this behind, they again attempt to discredit the teaching with others and say: “If what God has done is beautiful and divine, then why did you delay the good deed? Why, although the vice was there from the beginning, did you not stop its growth to a greater extent? To this we have a short word that the delay in benefiting us was a matter of wisdom and providence about what is beneficial to nature. For even in bodily diseases, when some spoiled juice penetrates into the wells of the body, until everything that has unnaturally entered inside is revealed on the surface, skillfully following the course of the disease do not give medicines that compress the body, but wait for everything hidden inside to come out, and then they use medicine against the discovered disease. So, after a sinful disease once wounded the nature of mankind, the common Physician expected that no kind of wickedness would remain hidden in nature. Therefore, it is not immediately after Cain’s envy and fratricide that the healing of man begins, because the vice of those who were corrupt under Noah had not yet become visible, and the cruel disease of Sodom’s iniquity, and the atheism of the Egyptians, and the pride of the Assyrians, and Herod’s lawless infanticide, and everything else mentioned by history, and what was done outside of history in subsequent generations, when the root of evil sprouted in mankind in various ways, was not revealed. arbitrariness. So, since vice had reached the highest level, there was no longer a single type of wickedness that people would not dare to engage in, so that healing could act on every illness, therefore it heals an illness that has not just begun, but has come in full force. Chapter 30 Why did sin not disappear immediately after the coming of Christ? Why didn't everyone believe? If anyone thinks to convict our teaching by the fact that even after the use of healing, human life is still defiled by sins, then let one of the similarities familiar to him guide him to the truth. Like a snake, if it receives a fatal blow to the head, the part of the body dragged from behind does not immediately die along with the head, but although the head is dead, the tail is still animated by its own irritability and is not deprived of vitality - so one can see that a vice struck by a fatal blow still disturbs life with its remnants. But, having ceased to condemn the teaching of the sacrament for this, they accuse it of the fact that not all people are penetrated by faith. And they say: “Why did grace not extend to everyone - on the contrary, some began to teach, but not a small part remains unapproached, no doubt, because God either did not want or could not for the benefit to be generous for everyone? And both do not exempt from censure. For it is indecent for God not to want and not to be able to do good.” “Therefore, if faith is something good, then why,” they ask, “isn’t grace for everyone?” So, if we also affirmed this in the word, that faith by God’s will is given to people and some are called, while others do not have a part in the calling, then it would be appropriate to raise such an accusation against the sacrament. If the calling is equal for everyone, does not distinguish between merits, ages, and differences among nations (for for this purpose, at the very beginning of preaching, the ministers of the word, by the inspiration of God, suddenly became one-lingual with all nations, so that no one was deprived of the opportunity to participate in the benefits), then is God still thoroughly accused of the fact that the word did not prevail among all? For he who has power over the Universe due to the excess of honor given to man, has given others power over ours, and over this each one is the only master. And this is will, something not slavish, but autocratic, consisting in freedom of thought. So, it is more fair to lay such a charge on those who were not brought to faith, and not on the one who called for agreement. For when Peter at the beginning preached the word in a crowded assembly of Jews and at one time three thousand accepted the faith, there were more who did not believe than those who believed, but the apostle was not blamed for those who did not believe. For with a general offer of grace to those who voluntarily rejected it, it was unfair to blame not oneself, but another, for this misfortune. Chapter 31 Why doesn't God lead everyone to faith if He wants to? But they have no shortage of cunning objections to the like. For they say: “God, if He wanted, could force those who stubbornly resist to accept the sermon. But where will their freedom be? Where is the praise for those who succeed? Some inanimate and dumb people can be led to anything by someone else's will; the verbal and rational nature, if it ceased to act freely, lost at the same time the gift of rationality. For what will reason be used for if the power to choose what one pleases rests with someone else? If the will remains ineffective, then virtue is necessarily destroyed, having encountered an obstacle in the immobility of the will. If there is no virtue, then life loses its value, the mind gives way to fate, praise is taken away from the successful, sin is invincible, the difference in life is not defined. For who else will have the right to condemn the intemperate or praise the chaste, when everyone has this answer ready: “Of all that happens to us, nothing is in our will, but human wills are brought by the most powerful dominion to whatever pleases the possessor.” So, it is not the fault of God’s goodness that not everyone has faith, but the disposition of those who receive the sermon. Chapter 32 Why was death necessary, and such a shameful one at that - on the cross? What else do the objectors say beyond this? The most important thing is that the highest nature should not at all have to go through the ordeal of death, but even without this, due to the excess of power, it was possible to comfortably accomplish anything. And if this was certainly required for some mysterious reason, then one should not have been subjected to the shame of a dishonorable manner of death. For what death, they say, would be more dishonorable than that of the cross? So what can we say to this? That birth makes death necessary. For Whoever once recognized himself as a participant in humanity had to take upon himself all the distinctive properties of nature. Therefore, since human life is distinguished by two limits, and if the one who crossed one limit did not touch the next one, the intention would remain half perfect, because it did not touch another distinctive property in our nature. But perhaps someone else, having more accurately studied the sacrament, will say with greater right that death did not follow because of birth - on the contrary, birth was accepted for the sake of death. For the Ever-living One takes upon Himself bodily birth, not having need of life, but returning us from death to life. So, since the return from death of our entire nature was about to take place, then, as if stretching out his hand to someone lying down and for this purpose, touching our corpse, he came so close to death that he touched the deadness and with His own body gives nature the beginning of resurrection, restoring the whole man with His power. Since not from anything else, but from our mixture was the God-receiving flesh, exalted in resurrection along with the Divinity, just as in our body the effectiveness of one of the sensory organs brings into sympathy everything connected with this member, so, since the whole nature is, as it were, one kind of living being, the resurrection of the part extends to the whole, being transmitted from the part to the whole by the continuity and unity of nature. Therefore, what incredible thing do we learn from the sacrament, if the standing one bends towards the fallen one in order to restore the lying one? As for the cross, whether it does not contain another, deeper concept, let the examiners of the hidden find out. And what has reached us according to legend is as follows. In the Gospel everything is said and done in accordance with the higher and divine life, and there is nothing in which there would not necessarily be some mixture of the Divine with the human, and when a word or deed is done in a human way, what is understood in a hidden sense points to the Divine. And in this regard, it will be consistent not to pay attention to one thing and lose sight of the other, but to see the human in the immortal, so to discover the Divine in man. For, since the Divinity tends to penetrate into everything and spread itself with the nature of beings in every part (nothing can remain in being without being in being, and in fact, what originally exists is God’s nature, which necessarily forces us to believe that It is in all beings, the very existence of beings), then from the cross, in its outer appearance it is divided into four parts, so that from the middle in which it is united with ourselves, the four ends are numbered, we learn that during the mortal economy, He was stretched out on it, Who connects and conforms everything to Himself, bringing the various natures of beings into one harmony and harmony. For in beings something else appears either above or below, or the thought goes to what is on external boundaries. Therefore, whether we survey with our minds the composition of either the heavenly or the underground, or on both sides of the Universe, the Divinity is encountered everywhere in our thoughts, alone contemplated in beings, in every part of them and containing everything in being. But whether this nature should be called Divinity, or Word, or Power, or Wisdom, or something else that is high and most capable of showing what is subject, our teaching does not argue in the least about the word, or the name, or the manner of speech. So, since all creation turns its gaze to Him, around Him it consists and through Him it becomes connected with itself, because through Him everything above is connected with what is below and with each other what is on the sides, then it was necessary not only for us to be guided by hearing to understand the Divinity, but also to make sight a teacher of higher concepts, which, having advanced, and the great Paul secretly guides the people of Ephesus, teaching them the power to know what is “depth, and height, and breadth, and longitude” (Eph. 3:18). For each end of the cross is called by its own name, calling the height that is above, the depth that is below, and the transverse extents by latitude and longitude. And in another place, I think, a similar concept is presented more clearly to the Philippians, to whom he says that “in the name of Jesus Christ every knee will worship those in heaven and on earth and under the earth” (Phil. 2:10). Here, under one name, he embraces the middle and the earthly, calling earthly everything that is in the middle between the heavenly and the underworld. This is what we learned about the sacrament of the cross. And what after this in order contains in teaching itself, then it is such that even the infidels do not recognize in this anything alien to the divine concept. For the fact that he did not remain in the dominion of death, that the ulcers produced on the body by iron did not become the slightest obstacle to the Resurrection, that he freely appears to the disciples after the Resurrection whenever he wants; abides with them, being invisible, stands in the middle, not having to enter through doors, strengthens the disciples with the breath of the Spirit, promises to be with them, is not limited in any way by space, visibly ascends to heaven, but spiritually abides everywhere, and what else is similar to this in history, has no need at all for the help of inferences to prove that this is divine and is the work of the highest and all-overpowering power. I don’t think we should talk about this in detail, because the teaching itself shows supernaturalism. But, since some part of the mysterious teachings is the construction of the font (whether anyone wants to call this baptism, or enlightenment, or rebirth, we will not argue about the name), then it is good to speak briefly about this. Chapter 33 Baptism - birth into incorruptible life. The answer to the puzzle of how water can regenerate When they hear from us something like the following: since what is dead passes on to life, it follows that instead of the first birth, which introduces mortal life, another birth should be invented, which does not begin with corruption and does not end with corruption, but introduces the born into immortal life. For just as that which is born from mortal birth is necessarily mortal, so that which is born by a birth that does not admit of corruption is not subject to the corruption of death. When they hear this and similar things and first learn the method, namely that prayer to God, the invocation of heavenly grace, water, faith are needed to perform the sacrament of rebirth, then, looking at what is visible, they find it difficult to believe, finding that what is being done physically does not correspond to the promise. Why, they say, prayer and the invocation of Divine power, performed over water, become the main reason for life for the initiates? For them, if they are not extremely stubborn, a simple word is enough to bring them to agree to this dogma. For I ask: since everyone knows the method of carnal birth, how is it done by man, what is the basis for the composition of a living being? But it is impossible to say anything about this that, by any inference, could be considered probable. For what has human seed to do with the quality seen in man? A fully developed person is a verbal and meaningful being, gifted with intelligence and knowledge, and the seed is distinguished by some kind of wet quality, and the concept of it does not contain anything more discernible by feeling. Therefore, whatever answer those who asked how to believe that man was formed from a seed will probably give us, this is the answer we will give to those who ask about the rebirth accomplished by water. For even there, anyone asked can first of all say that man is formed by Divine power, without whose presence the seed would remain motionless and inactive. So, if there it is not the subject that produces man, but the Divine power transforms the visible into human nature, then there will be extreme lack of appreciation there, testifying to such great power in God, to think that in this matter the Divine is powerless to fulfill His will. They say: “What do water and life have in common?” What, we ask, is common between humidity and the image of God? But it is not at all strange if, by the will of God, moisture turns into the noblest living creature. In the same way, we will say about this: there is nothing surprising if, by the presence of Divine power, what is born in corruptible nature is transformed into incorruptibility. Chapter 34 How do we know that the grace of God works in baptism? But they require proof that the invoked Deity is present during the consecrations performed. Let him who requires this read again what has been studied before. For the argument is, that the Divine power manifested to us in the flesh is a confirmation of the present doctrine. If it is proven that He who appeared in the flesh, who showed His nature by the miracles He accomplished, is God, then it is also proven that during the entire time of invocation He remains with what He does. Just as every being has a certain characteristic that introduces nature, so the special property of the Divine nature is truth. But God promised to always remain co-present with those who call upon Him, to be among the believers, to abide in all and to be co-present with everyone, therefore, we have no need for any other proof of the presence of God in what is happening, as we are convinced by the miracles themselves that God exists, and without doubting that, due to the truthfulness of the promise, the promised is fulfilled. And that the prayerful invocation precedes in the Divine economy, this serves as a kind of excess in proof that what is being done is carried out by God. For if in another method of bringing into the world of people the aspirations of those who give birth, even if they did not invoke the Divine in prayer, as stated above, what is born is produced by God’s power, after the removal of which their effort is ineffective and useless, then even more so in the spiritual method of birth, where God, as we believe, promised to be present at what was being done and gave His power to the work, and where our will has a desire for the desired, if properly added the help of prayer that is acceptable will be accomplished more successfully. But just as those who pray to God that the sun may shine upon them do not in the least delay what must surely happen, and no one will say that the zeal of those praying is useless if they ask God for what will certainly happen, so those who believe that, according to the not false promise of the One who proclaimed, grace is certainly inherent in those reborn through this mysterious economy, either acquire an increase in some kind of grace, or do not turn away from myself as I already am. That God is necessarily present is assured by the fact that the One who promised is God, and miracles are evidence of the Divinity, so there is no doubt that God is present in everything. Chapter 35 The meaning of triple immersion at Baptism A person’s descent into water and his three-time stay in it contains another sacrament. Since the method of our salvation became valid not so much as a result of the instruction given, but from the very thing that He who entered into communion with man did, having himself accomplished life by deed, so that by Him assumed and deified by the flesh, everything akin to it and homogeneous with it would be saved, then it became necessary to come up with a certain method in which there would be a certain affinity and similarity in what happens between what follows and what precedes it. Therefore, we must see in what way the Leader of our life turns out to be active, so that, as the apostle says, according to the Leader (Heb. 12:2) of our salvation, imitation in those who follow will succeed. Just as those who study orderly movement in armament, according to what they notice from those who have learned military order, achieve military experience, and whoever does not carry out in practice what was previously shown to him remains deprived of such experience: in the same way and with equal care about good, it is certainly equally necessary to follow and imitate the Principle of the Leader of our salvation, putting into action what was previously shown to Him. For it is impossible to guide those who follow unequal paths to an equal limit. Just as those who find it difficult to navigate the convolutions of labyrinths, if they meet someone experienced in this, following behind him, they pass through the various and deceptive twists of buildings where they would not be able to pass if they were not following in the footsteps of the leader, so understand that the labyrinth of this life is inextricable for human nature, unless someone follows the same path by which the One in this labyrinth placed Himself outside its fence. I allegorically call the labyrinth the inexorable corruption of death, in which the pitiful human race is imprisoned. What did we see in the Chief of Salvation? Three days of deadness and life again. Therefore, it was necessary that some kind of similarity should be invented in us. Therefore, what kind of invention is this, by which the imitation of what He accomplished is fulfilled in us? Everything that has died has its own and natural place - the earth, on which it leans and in which it is hidden. But earth and water have a great affinity with each other, the only elements that are heavy, tend downward, reside in one another and are held together by one another. Therefore, since the death of the Beginning of the Leader of our life was accompanied by burial underground and occurred according to the general law of nature, the imitation of death that we perform is depicted in the element closest to the earth. And just as that Man from above, having taken upon himself death along with his position in the earth, rose again to life after three days, so everyone who is in unity with Him by the nature of the body, intending to succeed in the same thing, that is, to reach this limit of life, by pouring water instead of earth and plunging into this element, imitates the three-day grace of resurrection by threefold repetition. But something similar to this was said before, namely, that according to the economy of God, death was sent to human nature, so that, after cleansing from vice during the resolution of body and soul, man would again be recreated by resurrection healthy, dispassionate, pure and free from any admixture of vice. But in the Beginning of the Leader of our salvation, the dispensation of the accepted death achieved final perfection, completely fulfilled for a special purpose; for by death the united was separated and the divided were brought together again, so that, after the purification of nature by the decomposition of what was in unity - I mean soul and body, the return of what was resolved into one again became pure from foreign admixture. And since in subsequent Beginnings their nature does not accommodate exact imitation in everything, but, having accepted into itself now, as much as possible, the rest is left to the time that follows, then why is there imitation here? Because in the image of killing, represented by water, the destruction of the mixed vice is carried out, though not a complete destruction, but some suppression of the continuity of evil, with the confluence of two aids to the destruction of evil, the repentance of the sinner and the imitation of death, by which a person renounces somewhat the union with evil, by repentance being brought into hatred of vice and into alienation from it, and by death bringing about the destruction of evil. And if it were possible for the imitator to take upon himself perfect death, then what he did would not be imitation, but identification, and evil would be destroyed in the integrity of our nature, so that, as the apostle says, man would die to sin once and for all (Rom. 6:2). But since, according to what has been said, we imitate the highest power to the extent that the poverty of our nature accommodates it, then, pouring water on ourselves three times and rising again from the water, we imitate the saving burial and resurrection that took place within three days, imagining in our minds that, just as water is in our power, and staying in water, and emerging from it, so it was in the power of Him who rules over the Universe, having plunged into death, as we do into water, to again enter into His own bliss. Therefore, if anyone takes into account that it is more in accordance with reason, if he judges what is done according to the strength of each, then he will not find any disagreement in what is done by both, as far as is possible according to nature. For just as a person, if he wants, can safely touch water, so it is infinitely easier for Divine power to die and to accept it and not undergo suffering. That is why it is necessary for us to mentally see in the water the grace of resurrection and through this to know that it is equally convenient for us to be baptized in water and to rise again from death. But, as in everyday affairs, one is more important than the other, and although the matter would not be successful without this other, however, if someone compares the beginning with the end, then the beginning of the matter compared with the end will seem like nothing (for what is equal between a person and what is put into the composition of this living being; however, if the latter does not exist, the first will not happen); so that which is naturally more important in the great resurrection here has its beginnings and causes; for it is impossible for this to happen if it had not preceded it. It is impossible, I say, for a person to achieve resurrection without rebirth in the bath of baptism, meaning not just the revival and change of our nature (for, without a doubt, nature must move towards this according to the dispensation of the Creator, prompted even by its own needs, although a person will receive grace in the bath of baptism or will remain uninvolved in this sanctification), but restoration to a state of blissful, divine and far from all sorrows. For not everything that by resurrection returns into being again enters into the same life, but there is a great gulf between those who have been purified and those who need purification. For those who in this life were preceded by cleansing by the baths of baptism, there will be an outcome to the akin, and the pure will acquire dispassion, and that in dispassion there is bliss is certain. But in whom passions have become coarsened and no cleansing of defilement has been carried out either by mysterious water, or by invoking Divine power, or by correction through repentance, then, of all necessity, must be in a state corresponding to this. And it is proper for counterfeit gold to be burned so that after the admixture of vice has been destroyed, their nature will subsequently remain pure before God for many centuries. Therefore, since there is a certain cleansing power in fire and water, those who are washed from the filth of evil by the mysterious water have no need for any other kind of cleansing, and those who are not sanctified by this cleansing are necessarily cleansed by fire. Chapter 36 Faith and water lay the foundation for eternal salvation Both the general meaning and the teaching of Scripture show that it is impossible for one who has not been washed clean from all the impurities of vice to enter into the divine countenance. This, being small in itself, serves as the beginning and foundation of great blessings. I call it small because of the ease of prosperity. For what work is there in this - to believe that God is omnipresent, that, as existing in all, the life-giving power is also inherent in those who call on Him, and as inherent, He creates what is characteristic of Him? A special property of God’s activity is the salvation of those who need Him, and salvation is actually accomplished by purification in water, and the one who is purified becomes a partaker of purity; what is truly pure is Divinity. You see that something small at first, that is, faith and water, is so successful; faith is left to our will, and water is closely connected with human life; but how great and important is the good that comes from them, when the Divinity is also associated with it! Chapter 37 The Sacrament of Communion But since the human being is something dual, dissolved from soul and body, then those who are saved must follow the One who guides them to life. Therefore, the soul, having united with Him by faith, in this has the basis of salvation, for in union with life there is communion with life. And the body in a different way enters into communion and unity with the Savior. For just as, having taken poison into oneself through someone’s malice, its pernicious power is weakened by another composition; and the antidote, just like a destructive substance, must enter into the insides of a person so that they impart healing power to the whole body: thus, having tasted the destroyer of our nature, we necessarily had the need for what was being destroyed to combine again together so that such an antidote, being accepted by us, by its counteraction would reflect the harmfulness of the poison previously communicated to the body. What kind of opposition is this? Nothing other than that Body, which turned out to be stronger than death and served as the beginning of our life. For just as, according to the words of the Apostle, “little leaven makes all the mixture like unto itself” (1 Cor. 5, 6), so the Body, given over to death by God, entering our body, changes the whole and transforms it into itself. Just as when the corruptible was mixed with the healthy, the whole dissolution became useless, so the immortal Body, when it is in the one who has accepted It, transforms everything into Its nature. But it is impossible for anything to become inside the body except by entering the insides by eating and drinking. Therefore, it is necessary to accept into oneself the life-giving power of the Spirit in a way possible for nature. Since this God-receiving Body alone has received this grace into Itself, and it has been proven that it is impossible for our body to achieve immortality otherwise than through communion with the immortal by becoming a participant in incorruption, then it is necessary to consider how it became possible that this one Body, in the whole Universe always shared by so many thousands of faithful, in each part becomes whole and in itself also remains whole. Therefore, so that our faith, paying attention to the sequence of speech, does not have any doubt in the reasoning of the proposed thought, it is necessary to study a little in the word the natural science of the body. Who does not know that the nature of our body in itself, in its own hypostasis, does not have life, but with the help of an inflowing force from outside, it supports itself and remains in being, by constant movement attracting into itself what is missing and rejecting from itself what is superfluous. And, like some kind of fur filled with some kind of moisture, if what is poured comes out at the bottom, it will not retain its appearance in volume unless something else is poured into the resulting emptiness from above; therefore, whoever looks at the voluminous surface of such a vessel knows that it does not actually belong to the visible, but that what is poured into the skin gives appearance to its external volume; Likewise, the structure of our body for its composition, as far as we know, has nothing of its own, but remains in existence by the force that comes into it, and this force is and is called “food” and is not the same for all feeding bodies, but some decent one is given to everyone as an inheritance by the Steward of nature. For some animals eat by digging out their roots, others eat grass, and others eat meat. For a person, bread is primarily food, and to maintain and maintain moisture, drink is not water alone, but often sweetened with wine to help the warmth that is in us. Therefore, whoever looks at this, if possible, has in mind the volume of our body. For when this happens in me, according to its property it becomes blood and body, after the transformation of food into the form of a body by transforming power. After examining this in the explained way, one must again return in thought to what was proposed. For the question was asked how this one Body of Christ revives the entire human race of those in whom there is faith, being shared by all and not being diminished. So, maybe we are already close to a plausible answer. For if the hypostasis of every body comes from food, and food is food and drink; and for food there is bread and for drink - water sweetened with wine; The Word of God, as explained in the first Chapters, as God and the Word, entered into unity with human nature and, being in our body, created no other new composition for human nature, but by ordinary and decent means continued the existence of His Body, supporting its hypostasis with food and drink; the food was bread, therefore, as in relation to us, as has been said several times, whoever sees bread, in some way sees the human body, because bread, being in the body, becomes a body, so there the God-receiving Body of the One who took bread for food was in some respect the same with Him, for the reason, as has been said, in the nature of the body of the food that was given. For what is characteristic of all flesh is also recognized about this Flesh, namely, that this Body was supported by bread. But that Body, by the indwelling of God the Word, was transformed into elevated to Divine dignity, therefore, not without reason, I believe that the bread, sanctified by God’s Word, is now being transformed into the Body of God the Word. For even that Body was in reality bread, and was sanctified by the indwelling of the Word, who dwelt in the flesh. Therefore, from what the bread, being transformed into that Body, received Divine power, from the same thing, something equal to this happens now. For there the grace of the Word made holy the Body, the composition of which was from bread, and which in a way was itself Bread; and here, too, bread, according to the word of the Apostle, “is sanctified... by the Word of God and prayer” (1 Tim. 4:5), not by eating and drinking entering into the Body of the Word, but directly being transformed into the Body of the Word, as the Word says: “This is My Body” (Matthew 26:26). And since all flesh also feeds on moisture (for without combining with it, the earthy in us cannot continue life; just as we reinforce the solid in the body with solid and strong food, so we provide moisture with an increase from a substance homogeneous with it, which, having passed into us, turns into blood by transmuting power, especially if it borrows from wine the power to transform into heat), then therefore the God-receiving Flesh of God the Word also accepted this part into its composition. And for this purpose, the appeared Word was united with the mortal nature of man, so that through communion with the Divine, humanity would also be deified; therefore, through the economy of grace, through the flesh He communicates Himself to all those who believe, who have a composition of wine and bread, dissolving with their bodies, so that by union with the immortal, man also becomes a partaker of incorruptibility. He gives this, by the power of blessing, transforming the visible nature into Body and Blood. Chapter 38 It is still necessary to briefly outline the baptismal faith In what has been said, I think there is not the slightest omission regarding what requires research about the sacrament, except for the doctrine of faith, which we will briefly outline in this essay. And for those who require a more perfect explanation, we have already proposed it in our other works, revealing this teaching with the greatest possible care. These are our essays in which we entered into competition with opponents and, on our own, engaged in research regarding the questions proposed to us. In the present word, we decided to say as much about faith as the gospel word contains, so that the one born of spiritual rebirth knows from whom he is born and what kind of living being he becomes. For this only type of birth is in the power of man - to become what he chooses. Chapter 39 A necessary condition for being born again is faith in the Trinity Others who are born are born from the lust of those who give birth; the one being born spiritually depends on the freedom of the one being born. So, since the danger is that, due to the freedom of choice given to everyone, not to make a mistake in what is truly useful, I say that it would be good for the one striving for his own birth to foreknow with his intellect which father will benefit him and from whom it is better for his nature to be formed, for it is said that parents are freely chosen by such offspring. So, since everything that exists is divided into two kinds - into the created and the uncreated - and the nature of the uncreated has immutability and immutability, but the creation is changeable by its vicissitudes, then, according to reason, the one who chooses the useful, which nature will he rather choose to become a child of, whether it appears perverse or possesses immutability, constancy and always the same presence in the good? And as in the Gospel it is taught about three Persons and three Names, from which the birth of believers occurs, and the one who is born of the Trinity is equally born of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, for the Gospel says this about the Spirit: “That which is born of the Spirit is spirit” (John 3:6), and Paul gives birth in Christ (1 Cor. 4:6), and the Father is the father of all (Phil. 1:2), then yes At the same time, the listener’s thought is sobered, so as not to become a product of an impermanent nature, when it is possible to make his own nature immutable and unchangeable. For according to the disposition of the heart of the one who begins house-building, what is done has power, so that he who confesses the Holy Trinity as uncreated enters into an immutable and unchangeable life, and whoever, according to a false concept, sees in the Trinity a created nature even after that. is baptized into Her, he is born again into a changeable and changeable life, for what is born is necessarily homogeneous with the nature of those who give birth. Therefore, what is more useful: to enter into an unchangeable life, or to wallow again in an impermanent and changeable life? So, since it is obvious to everyone who has any intelligence that the constant is incomparably preferable to the impermanent, the perfect - the insufficient, the needless - the needy, that which has nowhere to go higher and that always remains in the perfection of good, extending forward with progress, then he who has the intelligence must choose one of two things: either to believe that the Holy Trinity is an uncreated nature, and thus make Her in spiritual birth the leader of his own life, or, if anyone recognizes that the Son and the Holy Spirit are outside the nature of the first, true and good God, I mean the Father, and during the rebirth did not accept faith in the Trinity, then let him not remain ignorant that, by betraying himself to an insufficient nature, which has a need for the good, and by rejecting faith in a superior being, in some way he brings himself back into being homogeneous with himself. For, having submitted to something created, without noticing it, the hope of salvation does not lie in God. For every creature has kinship with itself and other creatures by the same thing that, equally with them, comes into being from non-existence. And just as in the structure of the body all members have mutual affinities, although some of them are lower in dignity and others are higher, so created nature is united with each other according to a general law for the creature, and the difference in us in advantage and insufficiency does not deprive the creature of affinity with itself. For in what equally appears to us as previously non-existent, although in other respects there would be a difference, on this side we do not find any difference in nature. Therefore, if a person, being a creature, thinks that creatures are both the Spirit and the Only Begotten God, then, on the contrary, he will have to free himself from the hopelessness of transitioning to a better state. For what is happening in him is similar to the concepts of Nicodemus, who, having learned from the Lord that he must be born again, but not yet incorporating in his mind the teaching of the sacrament, was carried away by his thoughts towards his mother’s womb (John 3:4). Therefore, if a person turns not to the uncreated Nature, but to a related and, like himself, a service creature, then his birth is longer, and not from above. The Gospel says that those who are saved are born from above (John 3:3). Chapter 40 Without which Baptism is useless But it seems to me that this catechetical word in what has been said so far does not yet contain sufficient teaching. For, I think, we should also pay attention to what follows and what many of those who approach the grace of baptism leave in negligence, deceiving themselves and considering themselves only regenerate, and not really becoming such. For the transformation of our life accomplished by rebirth will not be transformation if we remain in the same state as we are now. Whoever is in the same state, I don’t know why one would think that he has become someone else, when not a single distinctive feature has changed in him. For that saving rebirth is accepted for the renewal and transformation of our nature is obvious to everyone, but humanity itself does not accept change from baptism; neither reason, nor understanding, nor cognitive ability, nor anything else that actually serves as a distinctive feature of human nature comes into change, for the change would be for the worse if any of these distinctive properties of nature were to change. So, if being born again is done by re-creating a person, and this does not allow for change, then we must consider with the implementation of which the grace of regeneration is completed. It is obvious that with the eradication of bad signs in our nature, a transition to the best occurs. So, if, according to the word of the Prophet, having washed ourselves in this mysterious bath, we became pure by will, having washed away “the wickedness from our souls” (Isa. 1:16), then we have become better and have been transformed into the best. If the bath served the body, and the soul did not cast off passionate impurities - on the contrary, life in the secret action is similar to life before the secret action, then, although it would be bold to say, I will say and will not refuse that for such water remains water, because in the one who is born there is not at all the gift of the Holy Spirit, when not only vile irritability, the passion of covetousness, dissolute and indecent thoughts, arrogance, envy and pride serve as a desecration of God’s image, but the gains of unrighteousness remain with him, and the wife acquired through adultery, even after this, continues to serve his voluptuousness. If this and similar things happen in the same way both before and after baptism in the life of the baptized person, then it is impossible to determine what has changed in him, seeing him as the same as he was before. The offended, slandered, deprived of property do not perceive any change in what was said. Nor do they hear Zacchaeus’ words from him: “Whoever I have offended, I will return in fours” (Luke 19:8). What they said about him before baptism is what they say now; They are called by the same names - selfish, greedy for the things of others, rejoicing in human misfortune. So, whoever remains the same as he was, and then divulges about the change in him for the better, brought about by baptism, let him hear Paul’s word: “If ... whoever imagines himself to be something, he is worthless, with his mind he flatters himself” (Gal. 6:3), for in order for you to “be something”, you must become it. “The little ones... received Him,” the Gospel says about the reborn, “he gave them the realm to become children of God” (John 1:12). And whoever becomes someone’s child is, of course, homogeneous with the one who gave birth. Therefore, if you have accepted God and become a child of God, show by your will that God is in you, show Him who gave birth in you. By whatever signs we recognize God, by the same signs he who has become the son of God must prove his closeness to God. “He opens his hand... and performs every living good pleasure” (Ps. 144:16), “forsakes iniquities” (Mic. 7:18), “repents... of evil” (Jon. 3:10), “the Lord is good to everyone” (Ps. 144:9), “and do not bring wrath on every day” (Ps. 7:12), “the Lord God is righteous... and there is no iniquity in Him" (Ps. 91:16) and everything similar to this that we learn about God from various places of Scripture. If you are like that, then you have truly become a child of God. And if you remain with the same signs of vice, then it is in vain that you proclaim your birth from above. Prophecy will tell you that you are a son of man, and not a son of the Most High, you love vanity, you seek lies (Ps. 4:3). Don’t you know that a person becomes a son of God in no other way than when he becomes a saint? To this it is necessary to add the rest, that the benefits, according to the promises, prepared for those who lived well, are such that they cannot be depicted in words. For how to depict, “Whose eye has not seen, and ear has not heard, and the heart of man has not sighed” (1 Cor. 2:9)? And the painful life of sinners has no comparison with what upsets the feeling for life here - on the contrary, no matter what names you call the punishments there, there will be no small difference. For when you hear the word “fire,” you are taught to mentally imagine something else from the fire here, because that fire is given over to something that is not in this fire. For that fire does not go out, for this same fire many extinguishing means have been discovered by experience, and there is a great difference between the fire that is extinguished and the one that does not allow extinguishing. Therefore, the latter is something different, and not the same as the first. And again you hear about the worm; do not mentally refer by name to the worm of the earth. For the addition that the worm does not die suggests the idea of ​​understanding some other nature beyond what is known to us. So, since the hope of a future life is given, so that according to the righteous judgment of God, from the will of each, what is in accordance with him will be born, then the work of the chaste will be to look not at the present, but at what will happen after, but during this short and temporary life to lay the foundations of ineffable bliss, and with good will to make the trial of evils alien to oneself, both now, in this life, and after everything, in eternal reward.