About the soul and resurrection. Dialogue with Sister Macrina

Treatise “On the soul and resurrection. Dialogue with Sister Macrina" is of particular interest for the psychology and eschatology of St. Gregory of Nyssa. The dialogue was written shortly after the conversation that took place between St. Gregory and his sister Macrina on the eve of her death in late December 379 or early January 380. The saint visited Macrina at the family estate on the Iris River in Pontus. Finding her close to death, St. Gregory began to complain bitterly, remembering his recent loss and St. Vasily, and this gave rise to a conversation about the soul, death, immortality, the afterlife, resurrection and the final general restoration. The basic doctrinal truths are enshrined in St. Gregory of Nyssa into the mouth of Macrina, whom he calls “mentor.” There is no doubt that the opinions she expresses here about the soul, death, immortality, the afterlife, resurrection and the final “universal restoration” reflect the views of St. himself. Gregory of Nyssa. In this dialogue, the influence of Origen’s ideas on the theological thought of St. is most noticeable. Gregory of Nyssa. *The title of the work in Greek is Λόϒος περὶ ψυχῆς καὶ ἀναστάσεως. *The title of the work in Latin is Dialogus de anima et resurrectione. When Basil, the great saint among the saints, moved from human life to God and became a common cause of mourning for the churches, but his sister and mentor remained in life, I hastened to go to share with her the grief about my brother. My soul ached, greatly grieving over such a loss, and in my tears I looked for a person who would bear the same burden of sorrow as me as an accomplice. But, as soon as we saw each other, the teacher who appeared before my eyes aroused my suffering even more, because she herself was sick, almost dying; She, like those skilled in the art of driving horses, having allowed me to be carried away for a short time by a gust of passion, then begins to restrain me with a word, as if with some kind of bridle, calming the indignant soul with her reasoning, and she uttered this apostolic saying: “one should not mourn for those who have died” (1 Thessalonians 4:13), because this grief is characteristic only of those who have no hope. And since my heart was still boiling with sadness, I said: Grigory. Is it possible for people to accomplish this when everyone has some kind of natural aversion to death? Those who see dying people can hardly bear this sight, and those who are approaching death, those who run away from it as much as possible. Yes, and the prevailing laws recognize it as the extreme of crimes and the extreme of punishments, so what is the possibility of honoring the death of even one of the strangers, not only of those close to them, for nothing, when they end their lives? Moreover, we see, I continued, that all human efforts are aimed at extending your life, which is why your houses were designed for habitation so that the bodies in the air surrounding them would not suffer from cold or heat. And what is agriculture other than the preparation of necessities for life? Concern for life, of course, comes from the fear of a mortal. What is medical art? Why is it respected by people? Is it not because, apparently, he is fighting death somewhat with his own means? And armor, and shields, and military shoes, and helmets, and defensive weapons, and wall fences and forged iron gates, and ditches that provide security, and the like, for what other reason is all this done, if not for the fear of death? Since death is naturally so terrible, is it easy to obey someone who tells the survivor not to indulge in grief for the deceased? Macrina. Well, the teacher asks, what do you find particularly regrettable about death in itself? For the custom of the foolish is not enough to create a bad opinion about her. Grigory. What then? Is it really not worth grieving, I answered her, when we see that a person, hitherto alive and talking, suddenly becomes lifeless, silent, motionless; all natural senses in him go out, neither vision, nor hearing, nor everything else that contributes to sensations work? Whether you bring fire or iron to it, whether you cut the body with a sword, whether you give it to carnivorous animals, whether you bury it in the ground - in all this, it lies the same. Therefore, when a change is seen in this, and that vital reason that was once in the body suddenly becomes invisible and inconspicuous, just as in an extinguished lamp the previously burning flame does not remain on the lamp and does not go anywhere else, but completely disappears - how then will it be possible to endure such a change without sorrow for someone who does not have any obvious support? For, having heard about the exodus of the soul, although we see what was left, we do not know about what was left, what it was like before by its nature and what it passed into, since neither earth, nor air, nor water, nor any other element shows in itself this power that has migrated from the body, after which what it left behind is dead and ready for decay. Macrina. As soon as I spoke like this, the teacher, waving her hand, began to speak: isn’t this kind of fear that confuses you and overwhelms your thoughts, as if the soul does not endure forever, but with the destruction of the body it itself ceases to exist? Grigory. And since, due to suffering, I had not yet collected my reason, I answered somewhat boldly, without strictly analyzing what I was saying. For he said: These divine sayings are like orders, by which we are forced to be convinced that the soul must remain forever, although we are not led to such a teaching by any proof, but, on the contrary, within us the mind, apparently, slavishly, out of fear, accepts what is commanded, and not out of any arbitrary attraction agrees with what is said. This is why our sorrows for the dead become more severe, because we do not know for sure whether this life-giving cause itself still exists, and where, and how it exists, or whether it does not exist anywhere else. For the unknown of what actually exists makes assumptions about both equal; and just as one thing seems fair to many, so many think the opposite, and others among the Hellenes, who acquired considerable fame in philosophy, held this opinion and confirmed it. Macrina. Leave all kinds of nonsense, she says, in them the acquirer of lies, to the detriment of the truth, makes assumptions in the form of probabilities. But pay attention to the fact that to think this way about the soul means nothing more than to become alien to virtue and to have in mind only real pleasantness, and to put aside hope for a life imagined in eternity, according to which only virtue has the advantage. Grigory. But how, I asked, will the opinion about the eternal existence of the soul become firm and immutable for us? For I myself feel that human life will be deprived of its most beautiful property, I mean virtue, if our undoubted faith in this does not prevail. For can virtue take place in those who recognize present life as the limit of existence and who after it have nothing more to hope for? Macrina. Therefore, it is necessary to find, says the teacher, what our speech about this can take for ourselves as a proper beginning, and, if you wish, let the defense of opposing teachings remain behind you, for I see that your thought is ready for such a competition. Let the foundation of truth be found in this way - through opposition. Grigory. After this order, asking her not to think that we were actually arguing against the truth, for on the contrary we were trying to give firmness to the doctrine of the soul by resolving the objections made for this purpose, I said: defenders of the contrary opinion will say, perhaps, that the body, being complex, of course, is decomposed into that of which it is composed. After the dissolution of the affinity of the elements in the body, in each of them there probably occurs a desire for the property that is in common with it, since the very nature of the elements, by some necessary attraction, returns to the homogeneous what is characteristic of it. For what is warm in us will again be united with the warm, and what is earthy in us with the solid, and with each of the other qualities there will be a transition to the akin. Therefore, where will the soul be after this? For if anyone says that it is in the elements, then of necessity they will agree that it is identical with them, because there could not be any confusion of foreign with alien. And if this happens, then the soul, of course, will turn out to be somehow diverse, as if mixed with opposite qualities. And the diverse is not simple, but is certainly represented in the mind in composition, yet complex by necessity and decomposed, and decomposition is the disintegration of composition, but the disintegration is not immortal. Otherwise, flesh could also be called immortal if it decomposes into that of which it is composed. If the soul is something different from the elements, then where does reason presuppose its existence, when it is not found in the elements due to its heterogeneity, and there is nothing else in the world in which the soul could dwell in accordance with its nature? And what is not there, then, of course, does not exist. Macrina. And the teacher, sighing slightly at these words, says: this and something similar to this, perhaps, was once offered to the apostle in Athens by the gathered Stoics and Epicureans. For, as I hear, Epicurus is most inclined in his assumptions, that some kind of random and self-propelled nature of beings was invented, while no providence enters into affairs, why, as a result of this, human life was imagined in the likeness of a bursting bubble, when our body is filled with some kind of spirit, and this spirit is contained in the one that embraces it, and when the inflatedness subsides, what is contained inside also fades away. For for Epicurus, the limit of the nature of beings was the visible, and he believed that the measure of comprehension of the Universe was sensation, completely closing the senses of the soul and not being able to turn his gaze to anything mental and incorporeal, just as a prisoner in some hut remains blind to the heavenly wonders, because the walls and ceiling prevent him from seeing what is outside the hut. For everything sensual that can only be seen in the Universe is truly some kind of earthen wall, which blocks the path to the view of the mental for people of weak minds. Such a person sees only earth, water, air and fire, and where each of these elements comes from, or what it consists of, or what is contained in its place, cannot see this due to the baseness of the mind. And although someone, seeing clothes, concludes about the weaver, from the ship he understands the shipbuilder and, together with a look at the building, the hand of the creator appears in the minds of the spectators, yet they, looking at the world, remain blind to the discretion of the One indicated by him. That is why those who teach about the non-existence of the soul pronounce these cunning and witty propositions: the body is from the elements, the elements are from the body, and the soul cannot be by itself unless it is one of them or in them. For if opponents think that the soul, since it is not homogeneous with the elements, does not exist at all, let them first recognize as the truth that life in the flesh is soulless, for the body is nothing more than a confluence of elements. Therefore, let them not assert that in the elements there is a soul, which animates the bodily composition, unless, in their opinion, it is then impossible for a soul to exist with the existence of the elements, so that for them our life turns out to be nothing other than dead. If there is no doubt that now there is a soul in the body, then why do they teach its destruction after the body decomposes into the elements? But after this they will dare to say the same about the Divine nature itself. For on what basis will they say that rational, immaterial and formless nature, penetrating that moist, soft, warm and hard, contains beings in being, having no affinity for what it is, and being unable to be in this due to heterogeneity? So, from their teaching let the Divinity itself, by which beings are contained in being, be completely excluded. Grigory. But how, I asked, will it become undeniable for those objecting that everything is from God and that beings are contained by Him, or in general, that there is something Divine that exceeds the nature of beings? Macrina. She says: it would be more decent to remain silent about something like this and not deign to answer stupid and impious proposals. Just as a certain Divine word commands not to answer a madman because of his madness (Prov. 26:4), he is mad, of course, according to the word of the Prophet, who says: “There is no God” (Ps. 13:1). But since it is necessary to say this too, I will tell you, the teacher continues, a word, however, not mine or any other person (because everyone is small, no matter what he is), but the same one that the creation expresses about creatures through the miracles performed in it, and the eye of which becomes a listener, when through the visible the wise and artistic word is announced in the heart. For the creation clearly proclaims the Creator, because the heavens themselves, as the Prophet says, will tell the glory of God with unspoken messages (Ps. 18:2). For whoever sees the harmony of the Universe of heavenly and earthly miracles, like elements, which by nature are opposite to each other, by some ineffable communication they are all united to achieve the same goal, and each brings from itself strength to the existence of the whole, what is incompatible and incommunicable with each other due to the peculiarity of their quality is not separated from one another, and one is not destroyed by the other, mutually dissolved by opposite qualities - on the contrary, the elements, whose nature tends upward, sinks to the bottom, the warmth of the sun is poured out in the rays, and heavy bodies become light, being thinned by evaporation, so that water, contrary to its nature, becomes tending upward when it is carried through the air by the winds, and the ethereal fire draws close to the earth, so that the depth receives its share of heat, and the moisture poured into the rains on the earth, being one in nature, gives rise to thousands of differences in plants, in accordance with every property of what it enters, also, seeing the fastest rotation of the sky and the reverse movement of the inner circles, the rapprochement, connection and harmonious separation of the stars, seeing this with the rational eye of the soul, does not clearly learn from the visible that the artistic and wise power of God, revealed in creatures and penetrating everything, brings the parts into harmony with the whole, and the whole is replenished in the parts, and that the Universe is it contained by a single force, remaining in itself and rotating around itself, and never stopping its movement, and from the place in which it is, without moving to any other? Grigory. And how, I said, does faith that there is a God prove at the same time that there is a human soul? For the soul is not one and the same with God, so that if the existence of one is recognized, the other should also be undoubtedly recognized? Macrina. She says: the sages claim that man is a kind of small world containing the same elements with which the Universe is filled. If this position is true (which is probable), then we may not have the need for another aid to confirm what we have recognized about the soul. We recognized that the soul exists on its own, with a special nature, different from bodily plumpness. For, just as we cognize the whole world with the help of the senses, by the same activity of our senses we are guided to the understanding of that which, in fact and in concept, above the senses and the eye, becomes for us an interpreter of omnipotent wisdom and contemplated in the Universe, and indicating the One who wisely contains the Universe in His hand. So, looking at the world that is in us, we have many reasons to guess from the visible and about the hidden. What is hidden is that which, in itself being mental and without form, avoids sensory understanding. Grigory. And I said: but the wisdom that exceeds the world can be inferred from the wise and artistic laws of this harmonious world government seen in the nature of beings: what kind of knowledge about the soul can there be from what is indicated in the body for those who follow the invisible even with the visible? Macrina. And for those, says the virgin, who, according to this wise lesson, want to know themselves, the most sufficient teacher in what they think about the soul is the soul itself, and precisely that it is immaterial and incorporeal, acts and moves in accordance with its nature and reveals the movements characteristic of it with bodily organs, because the organic structure of the body is completely the same in the dead, but remains motionless and inactive due to the lack of spiritual strength in it. Then it moves when there is sensitivity in the organs and a mental force operates in it, which, with its own aspirations, moves the sensory organs as it pleases. Grigory. Therefore, I said, what is the soul, if only nature can be described by some word, so that from this description we can form some concept of an object? Macrina. And the teacher says: different people presented the doctrine of the soul in different ways, and each made a definition as he pleased, and our opinion about it is this: the soul is a created essence, a living, intelligent essence, imparting vital and receptive sensual power to the organic and sensory body until the nature capable of perceiving this turns out to be consistent. And, saying this, she points her hand at the doctor who was sitting with her to heal her body, and says: here is the evidence of what was said not far from us. For why does this doctor, putting his fingers to a vein and feeling the pulse, with the sense of touch hears in some way what nature is telling him, and how he is recounting his sufferings, namely, that a bodily ailment comes into force and the disease originates from such and such parts in the insides and how long the inflammatory disease will last? And the eye teaches him something similar to this when it looks at how I lie, how emaciated the body is and what internal disposition is meant by the pale and bilious color of the exterior and the look of the eyes, which are naturally disposed to express sadness and sorrow. But in the same way, hearing becomes a teacher in something similar to this, by rapid breathing and the groan produced when breathing, recognizing suffering. Another will say that even the knowledgeable sense of smell does not remain unaware of suffering - on the contrary, by the well-known special quality of breathing it recognizes the illness hidden in the insides. Therefore, what if there were not some intelligent force inherent in each of the senses? What would her hand itself teach us if it were not for thought that guided the sense of touch to the knowledge of the subject? How would hearing, not coupled with understanding, or an eye, or a nose, or some other sensory organ contribute to the knowledge of what is sought, if each of them were alone in action? But what is most true is what is beautifully said, as one of the learned pagans mentions, that the mind sees and the mind hears. For if anyone does not agree that this is true, then tell me why, looking at the sun, as you were taught to look by your mentor, you say that in terms of the size of its circumference it is not the same as it seems to many, but is many times larger in size than the entire earth? Is it not because, based on a certain movement, based on temporary and local distances, and based on the causes of eclipses, having drawn a conclusion from what is visible with your mind, you dare to assert that this is real. And seeing the decline and growth of the moon, you learn something else from this visible outline of its composition, namely, that the moon by its own nature is not light, that it describes the circle closest to the earth, but shines with the rays of the sun, as is usually the case with mirrors, which, receiving the sun, emit a radiance that is not their own, from the sunlight reflected by a smooth and shiny body. And this, if viewed without examination, seems to be the light of the moon itself. And that in reality this is not so is proven by the fact that when it is directly opposite to the sun, the entire circle of the moon facing us is illuminated; but in the smaller space allocated to it, rather going around the circle it describes, before the sun once completes its course, it flows its path more than twelve times. Because of this, it happens that its composition is not always full of light, because with more frequent revolutions the moon, which travels its path many times in less time, does not remain constantly opposite to the one making its revolution for a long time; but, as being directly opposite to the sun, the position of the moon makes the whole part facing us illuminated by the sun's rays. Thus, when it comes to an indirect position relative to the sun, since the hemisphere of the moon facing the sun is always surrounded by a stream of rays, the side facing us is necessarily darkened, since the lightness passes from the side that cannot look towards the sun to the side that is always facing it and continues with it until, coming directly under the solar circle, it begins to receive the ray from behind, and thus, due to the illumination of the upper hemisphere, facing makes the side invisible to us, because the moon, by its own nature, does not emit rays at all and is not bright; and this is called complete damage to the elements. If the moon, continuing to move on its path, again passes the sun and comes into an indirect position to the ray, then shortly before this the part that was unlit begins to brighten, because the path from the illuminated place passes to one that has not emitted light before. Do you see what sight teaches you, which in itself would not give you such a look, if there were not something that sees through sight, which, like certain guides, using the knowledge acquired by the senses through the visible, penetrates into the invisible? Should we add to this geometric methods, which through sensory outlines guide us to the supersensible, and, in addition, thousands of other Proofs that through what happens in us bodily, the rational essence hidden in our nature is comprehended? Grigory. What then? - I said. If, as in the sensual nature of the elements, what is common to all is that they are material, but there is a great difference in each type of substance, taken separately, because their movement is opposite, some rush upward, others gravitate downwards, and the type is not the same, and the quality is different; If anyone says that with the elements, according to the same law, a force is closely connected, producing these mental ideas and movements according to a natural property and according to a natural ability, how much of the same, we see, is produced by the builders of machines, in whom in an artificially arranged substance there is an imitation of nature, not in appearance alone showing similarity, but, on the contrary, it consists in movement, and is counterfeited under another word, while the machine makes sounds in the vocal part of its, but in what is being done, We do not see any mental force producing each of these phenomena, shape, appearance, sound, movement. If we say that the same thing happens in this mechanical organ of our nature without any admixture of a special mysterious essence, but as a result of a certain driving force embedded in the nature of those elements that are in us, and such activity is its product, and nothing more than a certain rapid movement directed towards the knowledge of what occupies us; in this case, what will be proven more by this - either that this mental and incorporeal essence of the soul exists in itself or that it does not exist at all? Macrina. To this she replies: an example will help our word, and the entire structure of the objection presented to us will greatly contribute to confirming what we think. Grigory. What do you mean by this? Macrina. The fact, she says, that she is able to take in her hands and arrange inanimate matter so that the substance is almost replaced by the soul of the art put into machines that imitatively produce movement, sound, shapes and the like - this itself can serve as proof that there is something in a person that, with the intellective and inventive power, understands this in himself and prepares the machines with thought, and then puts it into action with art and expresses the thought with substance. For first, man noticed that a breath was needed to produce a voice, then, in order to come up with a breath for a machine, he considered the nature of the elements, exploring with his intellect that there is nothing empty in creatures, but the light is considered empty in comparison with the heavy, because the air itself, in its essential composition, is thick and full; and a vessel, due to incorrect usage, is called empty when there is no liquid in it, but a learned person will nevertheless say about it that it is full of air. And the sign that a jug, lowered into a reservoir, does not immediately fill with water, but first floats, because the air contained in its interior lifts it up until the jug with the hand of the scooper is pressed into the depths and then accepts water into the throat, thereby proving that before the water it was not empty, because in the throat of the jug a certain struggle of two elements is seen: water from the depths is squeezed out and flows into the inside, and the air contained in the inside is compressed by water through the same throat and flows in the opposite direction, so that the water is retained by this and bubbles, compressed by the power of the spirit. Therefore, man understood this and figured out how to put spirit into the machine in accordance with the nature of the elements. Having made a certain cavity from an impenetrable substance and initially enclosing air in it from everywhere, he introduces water into the cavity with his throat, the amount of water commensurate with the need; then it allows the air to move in the opposite direction to the attached tube, and the air, strongly pressed by the water, becomes a blow, which, entering the structure of the tube, produces sound. Is it not clearly demonstrated by the visible that in man there is some kind of mind - another something with the visible, and he, by what is invisible and spiritual in his own nature, prepares this in himself by industry and then brings the thought thus formed inside with the help of matter into visibility? For if, according to the objection made to us above, such miraculous effects could be attributed to the nature of the elements, then, of course, our machines would be composed of themselves, copper would not wait for art to become like a human, but would be directly so by nature itself, neither the air would have the need of a tube to produce sound, but would always sound by itself, without any reason making a flow, and the movement and tendency of water upward in a tube would not be forced when the art of pressure sets it into an unnatural movement, but, on the contrary, the water, of course, would naturally flow in the machine, rushing upward by its own nature. If all this is not produced by itself by the nature of the elements, but by art, whatever is acquired from each substance, and art is a certain solid thought, brought into execution for some purpose with the help of a substance; Thought is a certain proper movement and action of the mind, then the objection presented to us, as a result of what has been said, proves that the mind is something different from the visible. Grigory. To this I answer that I myself adhere to the same thought, namely that the invisible is not the same as the visible, but in this word I will connect what is sought. For it is not yet clear to me what this invisible must finally be recognized as - on the contrary, by your answer I was taught that it is not something material, without having yet learned what is proper to say about it. And most of all, I would need to know not what it is not, but what it is. Macrina. She says to this: we learn a lot and about a lot in this way; Having said: this is not something, we explain the very existence of what we are looking for, what it is. For having said: “I am not bad,” we show that he is kind; by calling him “uncourageous,” we let him know that he is timid, and many things can be expressed in a similar way, and either through the denial of the bad, we get a better opinion, or, on the contrary, we assume the worst in our thoughts, by denying good qualities, showing the bad. Therefore, whoever has understood the real object in this way will not err in the proper concept of what is sought. The question is, what should be considered the mind in its very essence? Therefore, whoever does not doubt the existence of what we are talking about, since the action of this proves it to us, wants to know what it is, he will find it sufficient for himself to know that it is not something comprehended by the senses, not color, not outline, not persistence, not heaviness, not quantity, not extension in three dimensions, not local position, and in general not anything that is perceived in a substance, if there is anything in it other than what is calculated. Grigory. While she was still listing this, I said: I don’t know if it is possible that by denying all this, what is sought will not be erased at the same time, for without this someone would be left with an inquisitive inquiry, according to my assumption, this is not visible. When examining creatures, touching everywhere with an inquisitive mind what we are looking for, like some blind men, feeling along the walls to the door, we certainly get to one of the things that have been said, finding either a color, or an outline, or a quantity, or something else from what you have now calculated; when they say that there is nothing of this kind, then through foolishness we are led to the idea that there is nothing at all. Macrina. She, expressing indignation during this speech, said: what absurdity! This is the end to which this low-to-the-ground, non-rising judgment about creatures turns! For if everything that exists is taken away that is not cognizable by sense, then the one who asserts this, of course, does not recognize the very power that rules the Universe and embraces beings in his hand, but he who has been taught about God’s nature that it is incorporeal and has no form, due to such a way of thinking will conclude, without a doubt, that He does not exist at all. If there this non-existence is not made an exception to existence, then why is the human mind, lost along with the removal of bodily properties, displaced from the existing? Grigory. Therefore, I said, in this study of thoughts we exchange one absurdity for another, because our speech is aimed at recognizing our mind as one and the same with the nature of God, if both are understood through the abstraction of what is found by feeling. Macrina. Don’t say: call with the same thing, the mentor notes; because this speech is wicked, but, as taught by the Divine word, say: recognize one as similar to another. For what was created in the image, of course, in everything is likened to the Prototype, the mental - to the mental, and the incorporeal - to the incorporeal, free from any burden, like the Prototype, like it avoids any spatial dimension, but according to the property of nature there is something different from it, because there would not be an image if in everything it was the same with the Prototype - on the contrary, with what features in uncreated nature the Prototype differs, with the same the most created nature shows us an image, and just as often in a small fragment of glass, when it happens to lie under the ray, we see the whole circle of the sun, appearing in it not in its own size, but in the volume of its circle that contains the smallness of the fragment, so in the smallness of our nature images of these inexpressible properties of the Divine shine, so that the mind guided by them does not shy away from representing the mind in its essence when examining an object cleared of its corporeal properties, and again does not bring the small and temporary nature into equality with the invisible and pure nature, but, although he recognizes the essence as intelligent, because it is the image of the intelligent essence, he does not call the image identical with the Prototype. Therefore, just as, due to the ineffable wisdom of God, which is revealed in the Universe, there is no doubt that God’s nature and God’s power are in all creatures, so that they all remain in being, and although (if this requires a word about nature) the essence of God is very far from what is revealed and mentally represented separately in creation, however, what is distant by nature is recognized as existing in creatures, so there is nothing incredible in the fact that the essence of the soul, being in itself something other than what we sometimes liken it to, does not encounter obstacles to being if what is represented in the world as fundamental by nature is dissimilar to it. For, as has already been said before, even in living bodies, the essential composition of which is from the dissolution of the elements, in relation to the essence there is no communication between the simplicity and invisibility of the soul and between the corporeal plumpness, however, there is no doubt that in them there is the vital activity of the soul, co-dissolved with them according to some law that exceeds human understanding. Therefore, even after the decomposition of the elements in the body into themselves, what connects them with vital activity does not perish, but, as if the connection of the elements is still preserved, each of them is animated, because the soul equally and similarly penetrates all the parts that make up the body, and no one will say that it, as co-dissolved with the earthly, is hard and stubborn, that it is a wet or cold quality, or the opposite of cold, a quality that exists in all the elements and imparts vital activity to each; Thus, when the composition decomposes and returns again to what was characteristic of it, there is not the slightest improbability in the idea that this simple and uncomplicated nature remains in each of the parts even after decomposition, but, on the contrary, once, by some inexplicable law, it is associated with the composition of the elements and always remains in that with which it is co-dissolved, in no way being dissolved with that with which it was once brought into conjugation. That is why, when the complex decomposes, the uncomplicated is not in danger of decomposing along with the complex. Grigory. To this I said: but no one will contradict the fact that the elements converge with each other and separate from one another, and this is the composition and decomposition of the body. But then, as the mind imagines the great distance of each of them, both in local position and in the difference and properties of the qualities of one another, heterogeneous elements that have converged with each other in the subject, this spiritual and non-extended nature, which we call the soul, should be conjugate with what it is connected. And if they separate one from the other and each will be where nature leads, what will befall the soul when its chariot falls into many parts? Like a swimmer, when a ship is wrecked, not being able to swim at the same time on all parts of the ship, both here and there scattered across the sea, of course, grabbing hold of what happened, he leaves the rest to be carried by the waves; in the same way, the soul, not having the ability to divide into parts with the division of elements, if it is inseparable from the body, then, of course, having been coupled with one element, it will separate from the others, and the sequence of the word will lead to the idea that it is no more immortal, because it lives in one element, than mortal, because it is not in many. Macrina. But the mental and unextended, she says, neither contracts nor expands (because compression and expansion are characteristic only of bodies), but by its own nature, which has no form and incorporeal, is equally present both when the elements are united into a body, and when they are separated, without being embarrassed when the elements are compressed into one composition, and not remaining inactive when they diverge into something akin and similar to them in nature, although the distance seen in the otherness of the elements seems great. For there is a great difference between what is upward and light, as well as heavy and earthy, between warm and cold, between wet and also its opposite. However, there is no difficulty for spiritual nature to be with each of the elements with which it once entered into conjugation during co-dissolution, without being divided into parts by the opposition of the elements. For, when, by local distance and a certain property of the elements, they are considered distant from one another, the unextended nature does not suffer from this, coming into contact with those that have a local distance, because even now it is possible at the same time to survey the sky in thought, and to extend curiosity to the limits of the world, and the speculative power of our soul, extending to such latitudes, is not dissolved. Therefore, there is no obstacle for the soul to be equally in the elements of the body and in those co-dissolved by the mutual confluence of those decomposed by co-dissolution. For, just as in fused gold and silver, a certain artificial force is seen that merged these substances, and if through a new melting the substances are separated from one another, nevertheless the law of art remains in force in both, and, although the substance was divided, yet art did not fall apart with the substance into parts (for how can the indivisible be divided?) and is seen in the confluence of elements, and after their decomposition it is not separated, but remains in them, and by their separation, what is expanded is not dissected and is not crushed according to the number of elements into parts and pieces, because this is characteristic of corporeal and extended nature; the spiritual and unextended nature does not tolerate the consequences of distance. Therefore, the soul remains in the very elements in which it once began to be, since no necessity separates it from conjugation with them. Therefore, what is regrettable in this, if the visible is exchanged for the invisible, and why do you think in such a discord with death? Grigory. And I, mentally repeating the definition that was made to the soul in the previous words, said that the powers seen in the soul were not sufficiently shown to me in the word according to which it is a spiritual essence and imparts vital force to the organic body for the activity of the senses, because our soul is active, not only with the cognitive and contemplative mind performing such actions with the spiritual side of the essence, and not only the senses directs to natural activity - on the contrary, in nature one sees a great movement of concupiscence and the great movement of the irritable, and the other acts in us in its generic form, we see that this movement in the activity of both forces passes into many and varied forms. For one can see that much is governed by lust, and again much is caused by irritability, and all this is not the body; and the incorporeal is, without a doubt, spiritual; the definition called the soul something spiritual, so that by the very connection of speech one of two incongruities arises: either to admit that irritation and desire are new souls in us, and instead of one we see many souls, or not to recognize the rational power in us as a soul, because the word “spiritual” is equally applicable to everything, or it will show that all these forces are souls, or equally deprive each of them of the distinctive property of the soul. Macrina. She says: in the footsteps of many others who have already searched about this subject, you yourself have been searching for how these forces, lustful and irritable, should finally be recognized, whether they essentially belong to the soul and appeared in it at first immediately after its creation, or as something else, existing outside the soul and given to our soul subsequently. For what they are seen in the soul is equally recognized by everyone, but what one should think about them, the mind has not exactly acquired this in order to have a firm understanding of these powers - on the contrary, many still waver among different and erroneous opinions about this. For us, if external philosophy, skillfully reasoning about it, was enough to prove the truth, it would perhaps become unnecessary to offer a word about the soul for consideration. But since outsiders, by apparent consistency, have gained power in their view of the soul, and we have not been given this power, I mean the power to affirm anything; we, as a rule and law in every dogma, use the Holy Scriptures - then it is necessary, looking at this, to accept only that which may be consistent with the purpose of what is written. So, leaving Plato’s chariot and a pair of young horses harnessed to it, unequally charging each other, and the charioteer who rules them (similarly, in all this, Plato allegorically talks about the soul), - leaving also everything that another philosopher according to Plato, skillfully deducing from the visible and carefully examining what is now subject to our consideration, on the basis of this asserted that the soul is mortal, - leaving both everyone before and after those who philosophize in speech smoothly or presented with any kind of structure and size, let us make the guardian of the word the Inspired Scripture, which makes it a law not to recognize as valiant in the soul anything unusual for the Divine nature. For he who said that the soul is the likeness of God, thereby affirmed that everything alien to God is not included in the definition of the soul, because similar things cannot be preserved in different things. So, since nothing of this kind is seen in the Divine nature, no one with reason would suggest that this could happen in the soul. Therefore, we will refuse to confirm our dogmas, according to the rules of dialectical art, on inferences and the decomposition of concepts with constructed knowledge, since this kind of presentation is unreliable and suspicious in proving the truth. For it is clear to everyone that dialectical refinement has equal power for both: both for the overthrow of truth and for the condemnation of lies. That is why we often leave the truth itself, when offered with any art similar to this, in suspicion, as if the subtlety in it deceives our mind and turns it away from the truth. But if anyone accepts a word that is unsophisticated and stripped of all cover, then we will tell him our opinion, as much as possible, presenting a view of this in accordance with the instructions of Scripture. So what are we saying? That man - this verbal living being - has intelligence and information, as is attested even by those who do not accept our teaching. This definition would not depict our nature in such a way if it were seen that irritability, lust and all the like constitute the essence of nature, for in anything else no one would define the subject by expressing the general instead of the particular. So, since the lustful and irritable are equally seen in the dumb and verbal nature, no one has reason to depict the particular in general features. And what is superfluous in the depiction of nature and does not suit it, then, as part of nature, can it be valid in refuting the definition? For every definition of essence has in mind the peculiarity of the subject. And what does not belong to the particularity, as alien, is left without attention in the definition. But the power of irritability and desire is recognized as common to all verbal and non-verbal nature. However, what is common is not the same thing as what is specific. Based on this, it is necessary to conclude that there are no identical traits among those that primarily distinguish human nature. But just as, seeing in us a sensitive, nutritious and vegetative force, no one, for these reasons, will refute the definition of the soul given above (from the fact that one thing is in the soul, it does not follow that there is no other), so who has noticed the irritable and concupiscible movements of our nature has no reason to challenge the definition, as if it does not sufficiently show the nature. Grigory. Therefore, what should I know about this, I asked my mentor? For I am not yet able to see how it is possible to reject what is in us as alien to our nature. Macrina. You see, he says that the mind has a certain struggle with this, and trying as much as possible will free the soul from this. Some succeeded in this effort, as we hear about Moses, that he was above irritation and lust, because history testifies to both of them, namely, that he was meek above all people (Num. 12:3); meekness shows non-anger and alienation from irritability, and also that he had no lust for anything, to which, as we see, the lustful power is directed in many and which would not have happened to him if irritation and lust belonged to nature and entered into the basis of essence, for it is impossible for someone who has become outside of nature to remain in existence. On the contrary, if Moses preserved being and did not have this in himself, it means that this is something else with nature, and not nature: for nature in reality is that in which the existence of essence lies. Alienation from this is in our will, so the destruction of these qualities is not only not harmful, but even beneficial to nature. Therefore, it is clear that they belong to the number of things seen outside, as weaknesses, and not the essence of nature. For the essence of a thing is the very thing that constitutes the thing, and irritation, according to many, is the boiling of the blood near the heart; others call it the desire to repay with insult the one who began to insult, but as we would think, irritation is the desire to do harm to the one who has offended. None of this goes towards defining the soul. And if we begin to define lust as it is in itself, then we will call it a desire for what is lacking in us, or an increase in the enjoyment of pleasures, or sadness that what we want is not in our power, or some kind of attachment to something pleasant when enjoying it is impossible, for all this and the like indicate lust, but do not concern the definition of the soul. But that other things are seen in the soul, appearing to be one opposite to the other, for example, fear and courage, sadness and pleasure, fear and contempt, and any similar movement, each of which, apparently, has an affinity with the concupiscible and irritable properties of the soul, in a special definition depicts its own special nature. For courage and contempt suggest a certain manifestation of irritable striving; the belittlement and weakening of some of the same things show what is happening in the soul from fear and fear. Sadness remains both, for the powerlessness of irritability, due to the inability to take revenge on those who saddened, becomes sadness, and despair in getting what you want and the deprivation of what you desire produces a gloomy disposition in the mind. And what appears to be the opposite of sadness, I mean a thought filled with pleasure, is similarly divided between irritation and lust, because both are equally ruled by pleasure. All this is close to the soul, but not the soul, but, as it were, itching growths that arise in the mental part of the soul, and they, as if attached to the soul, are considered parts of it, but they are not the same as the soul in essence. Grigory. And we definitely see, I tell the virgin, that they also serve as a considerable aid to the improvement of the valiant, for Daniel’s desire turned into praise (Dan. 9:23; 10:11-19) and Phinehas, with irritability, propitiated God (Num. 25:11); We also learned that the beginning of wisdom is fear (Prov. 9:10), and from Paul we heard that sorrow, even according to God, the end is salvation (1 Cor. 7:10), and the Gospel commands us not to be embarrassed by terrible events (Luke 21:9), and not to be afraid of terrible things is nothing other than a sign of courage, which wisdom ranks among good qualities. And in places like these, Scripture shows that such movements should not be considered passionate, because passionate movements would not be used to advance in virtue. Macrina. And the teacher says to this: apparently I myself am the cause of such a confusion of concepts, without dividing the words about this into parts so that a certain consistent order is attached to the review. Therefore, now, if possible, let some order be invented in our reasoning, so that when the review takes place consistently, such objections will no longer have place. For we say that the soul, by its very nature, is characterized by the power of contemplation, observing and serving beings, and through this it retains in itself the image of God-like grace, because the Divine, as much as the mind guesses about its nature, is capable of observing everything and distinguishing good from bad. And what in the soul is contiguous to one and the other from the opposite, tends towards one and the other by its own nature, and from which, when used in a certain way, the outcome of a matter leads to good or to the opposite, such as irritation, or fear, or any of the similar movements in the soul, without which it is impossible to imagine human nature - all this, as we reason, came into the soul from the outside, because in primitive beauty not a single such feature is seen. Let the word about this be presented to us for now, as in school, so that through this he may avoid attacks from those listening with the intention of slander. Scripture tells that the Divine, in a certain way and in a consistent order, began to create man. For when the Universe came into being, man, as history says, did not suddenly appear on earth, but he was preceded by the nature of the dumb, and before them plants appeared. But by this, I think, Scripture shows that the life force in a certain sequence joins the corporeal nature, first penetrating insensible creatures, after that entering the sentient, and then ascending to the rational and verbal. Therefore, one of the beings, of course, is corporeal, and the other is rational; Of the corporeal, one is animate, the other inanimate, but I call animate that which participates in life. And among living beings, some are gifted with feeling, while others are devoid of feeling. Again, of those gifted with feeling, some are verbal, others are dumb. So, since sensual life could not have taken place without matter, and the rational could not exist in the body otherwise than in connection with the sensual, therefore, in the final narrative the creation of man is presented as having declared himself every type of life, seen both in plants and in dumb things. For what feeds and grows, he has from plant life, because something similar can be seen in plants: they attract food to themselves with roots, and spew it out of themselves in fruits and leaves, and what is governed by feeling comes from the dumb. The gift of understanding and speech, considered in itself, is not shared with other beings and constitutes a feature of human nature. But just as nature has within itself an attraction to what is necessary for material life, and this attraction, when it occurs in us, is called desire, this is also called the plant form of life, because in plants one can see, as it were, some naturally occurring desires to be filled with what is inherent and to throw off shoots, so what belongs to the actually dumb nature is mixed with the rational part of the soul. Thus, irritation belongs to the dumb, fear is characteristic to them, and everything else that happens in us in contrast to this, except for verbal and rational power, which alone serves as an advantage of our life, having in itself, as it is said, the likeness of the Divine image. But since, on the basis of what has already been stated above, rational force can have no other place in bodily life than under the condition of sensory force, and feeling precedes the dumb in nature, then through the mediation of one thing our soul necessarily communicates with that which is connected with this one thing. And this is the essence of the movements that, occurring in us, are called passions and which are not at all given to human life for any evil (for the Creator would be guilty of evil if He had implanted in nature the necessary incentives for errors). On the contrary, according to a certain will, with the tools of either virtue or vice, similar mental movements are made, like iron, forged at the will of an artist, whatever type the forger’s thought wants to impart to him is transformed into that, becoming either a sword or some kind of agricultural tool. So, if reason - this advantage of our nature - gains dominion over what has come into us from without, as the word of Scripture made it clear, expressing it mysteriously, when it commanded us to rule over all the dumb, then not one of these movements will assist us in serving vice, because fear produces obedience in us, irritation - courage, fear - bringing oneself to safety, and the desire for lust will bring we have divine and pure pleasure. If the mind throws down the reins and, like some charioteer tied to a chariot, drags behind it, carried away wherever the unreasonable movement of the harnessed horses carries it, then the aspirations turn into passion, as can be seen in the dumb. Since the movement, naturally excited in them, is not controlled by reason, irritable animals, controlled by irritability, destroy each other; and the tall and strong do not use force for their own good, foolishly becoming the property of a rational being; lustful and voluptuous activities do not engage in anything sublime, and nothing else seen in them is carried out by any calculation for the useful. So in us, if the passions are not directed by reason, as they should be, but take precedence over the dominion of the mind, then a person, transformed into a beast by the desire of such passionate movements, passes from a rational and god-like state into an unreasonable and dumb one. Grigory. What was said had a strong effect on me, and I answered: for anyone who has intelligence, it is enough for the word to be so simply and artlessly presented in order to recognize it as thorough and not sinning anywhere against the truth. But since to those who strive for artificial methods of proof, a syllogism seems sufficient for confirmation, and among us, of all artificial conclusions, what is confirmed by the sacred teachings of Scripture is recognized as the most reliable, then I think that we should find out about what was said: is the inspired teaching consistent with this? Macrina. The teacher says to this: who will argue that the truth lies in that one thing on which lies the seal of the testimony of Scripture? Therefore, if in defense of this teaching it is necessary to borrow something from the teaching of the Gospel, then it would not be untimely for us to look at the parable of the tares (Matthew 13:24). There the Lord of the House sows good seed (we are, without a doubt, the house), and the enemy, having discovered that people are sleeping, sows what is good for food into the midst of the wheat itself, mixing tares into the middle of the wheat itself. And the seeds grow together, one with the other, because it was impossible for the seed mixed into the wheat itself not to grow along with it. Since the opposite seeds have grown together at the root, the supervisor of the work forbids the servants to pull out what is unsuitable, so as not to pull out what is good for food along with what is foreign. For we think that the word calls such aspirations of the soul good seeds, each of which, if only cultivated for something good, would certainly increase the fruit of virtue for us. But since the non-sinful judgment about the good is added to this and what is really and uniquely good in its own nature, it is obscured by the past of deception that has grown together (for the lust not of what is good by nature, which is why it was sown in us, and gave birth and grew, but the bestial and dumb thing turned into growth, because the inability to distinguish what is good turned the desires of lust to this, as well as the seed irritability was not strengthened in courage, but armed to fight against fellow tribesmen, the power of love left the mental with immeasurable luxury, indulging in sensual pleasure, and thus other seeds instead of good shoots sent out bad ones), - therefore, the all-wise Worker allows the vegetation grown from the seed to remain with him, taking care not to deprive us of the best, along with the unsuitable shoot altogether eradicating lust. For if human nature tolerated this, what would delight us to union with the heavenly? By taking away love, what would be the way to bind us to the Divine? After the irritation subsided, what weapons would we have against those fighting us? Therefore, the Maker leaves counterfeit seeds in us not so that they will forever prevail over the most worthy sowing, but so that the field itself (as the heart allegorically calls) with the natural force invested in it (and this is reason) dries up some shoots, and makes others fruitful and always blooming. If this does not happen, then fire will bring judgment on the cultivated field. Therefore, if someone uses these aspirations in the proper way, accepting them into himself, but not being carried away by them himself, then, like a certain king, using the assistance of the many hands of his subjects, he will conveniently succeed in virtue at will. If he becomes carried away by them, as if in an uprising against the owner of some slaves, is enslaved by them, ignoblely succumbing to slavish insolence, and becomes the property of his subordinates by nature, then, of necessity, he will turn into what the overwhelming force of those in power forces him to do. If this happens in this way, we will not argue that these aspirations in themselves are either a virtue or a vice; Since these are movements of the soul, it is in the power of those who use them that they are either good or not. But when there is a movement for the better in them, they become a subject of praise, like Daniel’s desire (Dan. 10:11), Phinehas’s anger (Num. 25:11) and the one who weeps well (John 10:20), but if there is an inclination towards the worse, then they become and are called passions. Grigory. And I, since having stated this, she stopped speaking and let the word fall silent for a while, collected in my thoughts what was said and returned again to the previous connection of the conversation, when it was proven that the soul of a decomposed body cannot be in the elements, and the following was said to the mentor, where this often repeated name of hell is very common in life, very common in pagan and our writings, where, in the opinion of everyone, as if in some kind of repository, souls move from here, for the elements do not would you call it hell? Macrina. And the teacher says to this: apparently, you were not very attentive to the word, for, speaking about the transmigration of the soul from the visible to the invisible, as I thought, I did not avoid the question of hell. And it seems to me that the name of hell, in which, as they say, souls are, both among the pagans and in the Divine Scriptures, means nothing more than transmigration into the dark and invisible. Grigory. And why, I asked, do others think that the underground region is called hell and that it, like a hotel, contains souls, like some kind of container capable of receiving such a nature and attracting souls already raptured from human life. Macrina. But from this opinion, says the teacher, the dogma will not suffer any harm. For if your word is true and the vault of heaven is something solid and continuous, enveloping everything in its circumference, and in the middle the earth and its surroundings are suspended, and the movement of all circling bodies takes place around the motionless and solid, then by all necessity, she continues, what happens to each element in that part of it that is above the earth must also happen in the opposite part, since one and the same essence goes around the whole earthly composition. And just as when the sun appears above the earth, its shadow turns in the opposite direction, because a spherical surface cannot at the same time be encircled by a ray, but according to all necessity, on what part of the earth the sun casts its rays, no doubt becoming a certain concentration of the ball, at the other end of the straight diameter there will be darkness, and thus at the directly opposite end along the straight line of the moving ray darkness incessantly accompanies the solar flow, so that the above-ground and underground places are in turn equally in light and in darkness; So with everything else that is seen in the form of elements on our earthly hemisphere, it is natural to have no doubt that the same thing happens with this and on the other hemisphere. Since every part of the earth has the same elemental cover, then, I think, one should neither dispute nor support those who object to the idea that either this upper or underground side is assigned to souls who have renounced their bodies. For, as long as the objection does not shake the main dogma about the existence of souls after life in the flesh, our word will not argue about the place, recognizing that the local position is characteristic of only bodies, and that the soul, as incorporeal by nature, has no need to be contained in any places. Grigory. So what? – I asked. If the objector refers to the apostle, who says that during the general restoration every rational creature will turn its gaze to the Ruler of the Universe, and among the creatures in the Epistle to the Philippians he mentions some of the underworlds, saying: Every tribe of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth will worship Him (Phil. 2:10)? Macrina. Although we hear those who say this, says the teacher, we will remain with the dogma regarding the existence of the soul, having the objector agree with us, and regarding the place, as said above, without entering into a dispute. Grigory. Therefore, I said, to those who are looking for apostolic thought in this saying, what can anyone say if the meaning of place is removed from the expression? Macrina. She says: it seems to me that the divine apostle, not distinguishing the spiritual essence by place, calls one thing heavenly, another earthly, and another underworld. But since there are three states of rational nature: one - at first receiving disembodied life, which we call angelic, another - associated with the flesh, which we call human, and another - detached from bodies through death, as seen in souls - then I think that the divine apostle, looking at this in the depths of wisdom, means that agreement in the good of all rational nature, which will once happen, and calls angelic and heavenly incorporeal, earthly - associated with the body, and underworld - already separated from the body, or if among the rational natures we see any other than those named, which anyone would call demons, or spirits, or anything else similar, we will not contradict this. For, on the basis of general opinion and Tradition, Scripture is accepted by faith that outside such bodies there is a certain nature, hostile to good and harmful to human life, which voluntarily set itself aside from a better lot and, by apostasy from good, realized in itself the opposite of what is meant, and this, they say, the Apostle ranks among the underworlds, with this word meaning that finally, after long centuries-old periods, vice will disappear and nothing will remain outside. good - on the contrary, the Lordship of Christ will be unanimously confessed by the underworld. Therefore, if this is really so, then no one will force us to understand the underground region under the name of the underworld, because the earth is equally surrounded by air from everywhere and not a single part of it remains naked from the air cover. Grigory. When the mentor said this, after a short silence, I told her: I am not satisfied with what I have found about the subject of research - on the contrary, my thought still doubts a little about what was said, and I have the need to return to the previous connection of speech, leaving only what we have already agreed with each other. For those who are not too stubborn, I think, are convinced by what has been said not to turn the soul after the decomposition of bodies into non-existence and destruction and not to assert that it cannot in any way belong to the number of beings, because it has an essence dissimilar from the elements. Even if the spiritual and immaterial nature is not similar to them, then there is no obstacle to being in them, because this opinion is confirmed for us from two sides and by the fact that now, in this life, the soul resides in bodies, being in essence something different from the body, and by the fact that the Divine nature, as proven in the word, being something completely different from the essence of the sensual and material, nevertheless penetrates with itself each of the beings and the dissolution of power Its own in the Universe contains beings in being. Why, therefore, should we not think of the soul as if, having moved from visible to invisible life, it consists of beings outside of beings? But how, I continued? When, during the unification of the elements, from mutual mixing with each other they take on a different form, different from the one with which the soul has become accustomed (because after the decomposition of the elements, this type will probably disappear), then what sign will the soul follow if there is no longer that which was familiar to it? Macrina. She, after hesitating for a while, says: may I be allowed to freely put together a certain word in the form of an example to clarify our subject, although what I said will seem impossible. Let them agree that the art of painting has the ability to mix not only nasty colors, as is the custom of painters to do this in order to depict the likeness of what is being written off, but also to decompose what is mixed, and return each paint to its natural color. Therefore, to resemble the depicted object, white and black paint, or red and golden-colored, or some other color are mixed together; if each is again separated from mixing with the other and taken on its own, then we affirm that nevertheless the artist knows the same type of paint and no oblivion of either red or black will occur in him, if from mutual mixing what has taken on a different color again returns to its natural paint. Remembering the way in which colors are made from one to another through dissolution, he knows which paint and with which one produced a certain color and how, after washing, the other will again come into its own; and if he again needs to do the same thing by mixing, it will be easier for him to do the work that he has already learned in the previous production. If in the example presented, our speech, she continues, has any consistency, then it remains to examine the subject itself: instead of pictorial art, let the soul be represented in the word, instead of artificial colors, let the nature of the elements be understood, and a multi-colored mixture of paints of unequal colors and the supposed return of the colors to their characteristic colors again, let us depict the union and separation of the elements. Therefore, as in the example, we affirm that the artist does not know that paint of a known color, which after mixing again returns to its characteristic color, but recognizes red, and black, and any other color, if any known communication with a foreign one produced the image, and precisely recognizes what it was like in the mixture, what it is now, having come to its natural form, and what it will be like again if the paints are again mixed with each other in the same way as before - so the soul is a natural property of the elements flowing into the composition knows the body with which it was connected also by their decomposition. And even though the nature of the elements, due to the opposing qualities embedded in them, has distracted one far from the other, keeping each of them from being mixed with the opposite, nevertheless the soul will be with each element, touching with cognitive power and holding on to what is peculiar to it, until the confluence of the separated elements again occurs into one totality for the restoration of the decomposed, which in the proper sense is resurrection and is called by it. Grigory. And I said: wonderful, it seems to me, in passing you defended the doctrine of the resurrection. For by this those who oppose faith can gradually be led to the idea that it is not impossible for the elements to come together again and form the same person. Macrina. Yes, the mentor answers, you are right in saying this. For one can hear those who rebel against this teaching say: since the decomposition of the elements in the Universe has taken place by affinity, what is the possibility that the heat contained in one thing, after being united with the heat in the Universe, having become unalloyed, again separated from what is related to make up the recreated person? For if what is returned is not exactly what is own, but instead of what actually belonged something homogeneous is borrowed, then one thing will be replaced by another, and such an action will no longer be a resurrection, but the creation of a new man. If it is necessary for the same one to return to himself again, then he must be completely the same with himself, having accepted the original nature in all parts of the elements. Grigory. Therefore, as I said, in order to answer this objection, the following opinion about the soul is sufficient for us: with which elements it is initially united, it remains in those after destruction, as if placed as a guardian of its property, and due to the subtlety of the mobility of spiritual power, it does not leave what actually belongs to it when it is dissolved with something homogeneous, it does not undergo any error when fragmented into small parts of the elements, but penetrates its own, mixed with the homogeneous, and does not weaken in strength, passing with them, when they spill out into the Universe, it forever remains in them, no matter where and no matter how their nature arranges them. If the force controlling the Universe gives a sign to the disintegrated elements to unite again, then, just as different ropes attached to one beginning all together and at the same time follow what is attracted, so due to the attraction by the same force of the soul of various elements, with a sudden confluence of what actually belongs, then the chain of our body will be woven by the soul, and each part will be woven again, in accordance with its original and usual state, and clothed in a form familiar to it. Macrina. But here is another example, says the teacher, which can rightly be added to those considered as proof that the soul has little difficulty in distinguishing its own from someone else’s in the elements. Suppose that clay is placed in front of the potter, and a large amount of it: some has already been used for making vessels, and some has been prepared for this. Let the vessels not all be made of the same type, but one will be a barrel, another a bucket, the third a dish, or a bowl, or anything else fit for use. And let not one person own all this, but let us assume in the word that each vessel has its own owner. So, as long as the vessels are intact, they are known to the owners, and even if they are broken, then the owners will nevertheless again have a sign in the shards that this shard is from a barrel, and this one is from a cup. If they mix it with clay that has not been used, then the recognition from it of what has already been done will become all the more unmistakable. Thus, each individual person is, as it were, a kind of vessel, at the confluence of elements, made from a common substance and, despite its special appearance, certainly has a great difference from the homogeneous; nevertheless, after the destruction of the vessel, the soul that possessed it recognizes its property by the remains and does not leave this property, whether it will be in a heap of shards or mixed with the substance of the elements that was not used, but always knows its own, what it was like when it retained its external appearance, and after destruction, by the signs preserved in the remains, it is not mistaken in its own. Grigory. Having approved what was said, as something that was invented opportunely and befitting of the purpose we had assumed, I asked: it is wonderful to talk about this and believe it, but if someone compares what is said in the Lord’s Gospel about those in hell and finds that it does not agree with what has been examined, then how should one prepare for an answer? Macrina. She says: the word of God sets out what is narrated somewhat sensually, but it gives many reasons by which the listener is carefully called to a more refined view. For whoever, with a great abyss, separated the evil from the good, presenting the sufferer in torment as needing some drop given from the finger, and presenting the patriarchal womb as a solace to the one who suffered all his life, and before that, telling that they died and were buried, does not, without the understanding of those who follow what is said, take him far from the meaning that appears at first glance. For what eyes does the rich man lift up in hell, leaving his fleshly ones in the tomb? How does the ethereal feel the flame? What tongue wants to cool with a drop, when it does not have a carnal tongue? What kind of finger is that giving him a drop? What is the womb itself? For when the bodies are in coffins, and the soul is not in the body, and does not consist of parts, it will be difficult for the narrative, understood in the literal sense, to agree with the truth, unless someone accepts all the particulars in a spiritual sense, so that the abyss that prevents the communication of the incompatible is not considered an earthly distance. For what a work it is for the incorporeal and the spiritual to fly over an abyss, even the widest one, because the spiritual by nature, wherever it wishes to be, appears there without wasting time on it. Grigory. So, what, I ask, is this fire, or this abyss, or anything else in what has been said, if it is not what it is called? Macrina. It seems to me, she says, that the details of this Gospel narrative indicate certain dogmas concerning questions about the soul. The Patriarch, having first said to the rich man, “In your carnal life you have received a portion of the good things,” said the same about the poor man, and he fulfilled his service by partaking of the evils in life: then, continuing about the abyss by which they are separated from each other, through this, apparently, a great dogma is revealed in the word. This dogma, in my opinion, is this: in the beginning, human life was homogeneous. I call homogeneous that which appears in one good and to which evil is inviolable. This concept is evidenced by the first law of God, which allows a person to fully participate in every good thing in paradise, while prohibiting the one thing that by nature was mixed from opposites from the dissolution of evil with good in him, and punishing the criminal with death. But man, voluntarily, with free movement, leaving a share inaccessible to the worst, delighted with life, dissolved from opposites. However, God’s Providence did not leave our foolishness uncorrectable. But since the one who transgressed the law necessarily followed the death sentenced by law, then, dividing human life into two parts - into the present life in the flesh and into life after it outside the body - not continuing them in equal measure, but limiting one to a very short certain limit of time, and continuing the other into eternity - out of love for mankind, he gave the power to anyone to choose from this and that, I mean good and evil, either in this short and fleeting life, or in those endless centuries, the limit of which is infinity. Since both good and evil are called the same and each of them is divided according to a twofold concept, I mean in relation to the mind and feeling, and some classify as a good share that which seems pleasant to the feeling, while others are sure that what is comprehended only by thought is and is called good, those whose reason is not trained and is not able to see the best, those in the carnal life greedily wait for the share of good that follows nature, saving nothing. for the next life, and those who manage their lives with a discriminating and chaste mind, exhausted in this short life by an insulting feeling, save the good things for the future life, so that the best lot will extend for them to eternal life. So, this is what, according to my concept, the abyss means, which is not formed by the opening of the earth, but which is produced by judgment, divided in life into opposing wills. For, having once chosen what is pleasant in this life and not cured unreason through repentance, he then makes the area of ​​good inaccessible to himself, having dug this inevitable necessity before him, like some kind of yawning and impassable abyss. That is why it seems to me that the good state of the soul, in which the word of God rests the ascetic of patience, is called Abraham’s bosom. For this first Patriarch who ever was, as it is narrated, exchanged the pleasure of the present for the hope of future blessings: having stripped himself of everything that he originally had in life, he had to stay with strangers, redeeming the desired bliss with real suffering. Therefore, just as the well-known outline of the sea, due to some incorrect usage of words, is called a bosom, so, it seems to me, the word of God designates the indication of those immeasurable blessings by the name of the bosom, where all those who virtuously swim across the present life, when they depart from here, rest their souls as if in an untroubled pier and in a good bosom. For others, the deprivation of the blessings they see becomes a flame that scorches the soul, which, to console itself, needs some drop from the sea of ​​blessings surrounding the righteous, and does not receive it. Seeing the names of the tongue, eye, finger and other bodily members in the conversation of those who have taken off their bodies, if you carefully delve into the meaning of the sayings, you will recognize them as agreeing with the concept that we have already formulated about the soul. For just as the confluence of elements constitutes the essence of the whole body, so, probably for the same reason, the nature of the parts in the body is replenished. So, if the soul is present in the elements that made up the body and mixed in the Universe, then not only will it know the totality of the elements that were united in the whole body, and will remain in them, but it will not remain ignorant of the special composition of each part, namely what elemental particles our members consisted of. Therefore, there is no improbability - that which is present in the entirety of the elements can also be in the elements taken separately; and in this case, whoever, having in mind those elements in which the individual members of the body are contained in their potential, implies in the words of Scripture such a meaning that the soul, even after the decomposition of the bodily composition, has a finger, and an eye, and a tongue, and everything else, he will not sin against probability. And if in this narrative everything taken in detail takes the mind away from the understanding of the sensory, then about the hell now mentioned, we should think that it is not some place so named, but some invisible and incorporeal state of life, in which, as Scripture teaches us, the soul resides. But from the story of the rich and the poor we learn another dogma, which will be in great proximity to what has been studied. This passionate and carnal rich man, when he saw the inevitability of his disaster, the narrative presented as caring for those close to him in his family on earth; and, since Abraham said that life in the flesh of those living is not left without providence, but their freedom is given the guidance of the law and the prophets, the rich man continues to beg that the sermon may become convincing for them due to its extraordinary nature, being proclaimed by someone who has come back from the dead. Grigory. What dogma is this? – I asked. Macrina. When the soul is illuminated, she says, occupied with the present and does not turn to anything left behind, the rich man, after death, is, as if by some kind of compound, welded to carnal life, which even after his death he has not completely abandoned - on the contrary, the object of concern is his flesh and blood, for from the fact that he asks for deliverance from evils for those in a family union with him, it is obvious that he has not yet freed himself from carnal addiction. And therefore we believe, she continues, that the Lord teaches the following with these stories: those who live in the flesh should most of all distance themselves through a virtuous life and renounce attachment to the carnal, so that after death we again do not need another death, cleansing us from the remnants of the flesh, but so that the flow of the soul towards good, as if by breaking its bonds, becomes easy and free, when no bodily sorrow will distract it to itself. If someone has become completely and completely fleshed out with the mind, every movement and action of the soul occupied with the fulfillment of the desires of the flesh, he, having become outside the flesh, does not part with carnal passions, but, like those who have lived for a long time in fetid places, who, when they move to where the air is fresh, are not cleansed of the unpleasant smell that they accumulated during their long stay in it - so it is impossible for carnal lovers, after the transition to the invisible and subtlest life has been completed, to attract with them some kind of carnal stench, from which the torment becomes even more severe for them, because the soul from this circumstance becomes more coarsely reified. With this opinion, it seems to me, there is some agreement with what others say, as if near the places where bodies are laid, vague ghosts of the dead are often visible. For, if this really happens, then this exposes the soul’s now excessive addiction to carnal life, so that even the one torn from the flesh does not want to completely fly away from it, does not agree for the complete transformation of the shell into the invisible, but even after the decomposition of the visible remains with the visible, even having already become outside it, wanders with love in places full of matter and revolves around us. Grigory. And I, after hesitating a little and returning to the thought contained in what was said, noticed: in these words, it seems to me, there appears some contradiction to what was found before about passions. For if it is recognized that, due to affinity with the dumb, all such mental movements occur in us, which were enumerated in the previous word, such as irritability, fear, desire, pleasure and the like, then it is said that the good use of such movements is virtue, and vice comes from the use of sinful ones, moreover, it was added in the word what exactly is added to a virtuous life by each of the other movements, about lust It is said that by them we are brought to God, as if by a chain drawn to Him from the earth. And this speech, it seems, I said, somehow contradicts the goal. Macrina. Why are you saying this? Grigory. Because, I answered, that when, after purification, every unreasonable movement in us ceases, then, without a doubt, there will be no lustful movement; and when it is not there, there cannot be a desire for anything better, since there is not a single such movement left in the soul that arouses the feeling of the need for goods. Macrina. But to this, she answers, let’s say that the godlikeness of the soul is characterized by contemplative and rational powers, because with them we comprehend the Divinity. Therefore, if, as a result of either present care or purification after this life, our soul becomes free from connection with the unreasonable side of passions, then nothing will prevent the contemplation of the beautiful. And the beautiful by its nature is somehow attractive to everyone who sees it. Therefore, if the soul is cleansed of all vice, then, without a doubt, it will be in beauty. Beautiful in its nature is the Divinity, with which, by purity, the soul enters into communication, united with what is characteristic of it. Therefore, if this happens, there will no longer be a need for a concupiscible movement that would lead us to the beautiful. For he who is in darkness longs for the light, but if he is in the light, then pleasure will take the place of lust. The complete right to enjoyment makes lust inactive and inappropriate. Therefore, there will be no loss from this in the participation of good, if the soul becomes free from such movements, enters into itself again and sees itself exactly as it is by nature, and in its own beauty, as if in a mirror or in an image, sees the Prototype. For it can rightly be said that this is the exact likeness of God, so that our soul is likened to some higher Nature, because the nature, which is above every concept, stands far from what is seen in us, and in some other way conducts its own life, and not as we live now. We are people because our nature is always in motion, we rush wherever the desire of arbitrariness occurs, since the soul, one might say differently, is unequally disposed towards what is behind it. The movement forward is controlled by hope, but the place of the movement towards hope is taken by memory. If hope leads the soul to what is beautiful by nature, then the movement of arbitrariness is indicated in the memory as a bright trace, but if it is deceived in the concept of the best by what it has done, it seduces the soul with some false invention of beauty, then the memory that follows the event turns into shame. And in this case, this internecine warfare arises in the soul, memory enters into a struggle with hope, which poorly controlled arbitrariness. Such a certain thought clearly expresses the feeling of shame when the soul is remorseful at the consequences of the deed, as if tormented by some kind of scourge with remorse for an unreasonable desire and, as an aid against the one who causes it grief, takes up arms with oblivion. But with us, due to the scarcity of the beautiful, nature always thirsts for what it needs, and this desire for what is missing is the very desireful disposition of our nature, either due to illegibility, mistaken in what is truly beautiful, or achieving what is good for us to achieve. And a nature that exceeds any concept of good and surpasses any power, as having no lack in what we imagine to be good, but itself constituting the fullness of goods and not being made beautiful by the participation of something beautiful, but existing by the very nature of the beautiful, which only by the assumption of the mind can something beautiful be when it does not allow in itself the movement of hope (for hope is aroused only in the reasoning of what is not: Hedgehog for whoever sees and hopes (Rom. 8:24), says the apostle), does not need the activity of memory to know what exists (for what is visible has no need to remember it). And therefore, since the nature of God is above all that is good, and the good is certainly friendly with the good, then, looking at Itself, it desires what it has, and has what it desires, not accepting anything from the outside into itself. Outside of Him there is nothing except one vice, which, although it is strange, has its existence in non-existence, because the origin of vice is nothing other than the deprivation of what exists; in its proper sense, what exists is the nature of good. Therefore, what is not in the existing is, of course, in non-existence. Therefore, the soul, when, having ceased all the various movements of nature, becomes godlike, then, having become higher than desire, it will achieve that for which it was previously delighted with desire, and will no longer give any activity to hope or memory. For she has what she hoped for, and, having given herself up to the enjoyment of goods, removes memory from thought and thus imitates a higher life, depicting in herself the distinctive features of God's nature, so that nothing remains in her except the disposition of love, naturally attached to goodness, for this is love - internal attachment to what is desired. Therefore, when the soul, having become simple, uniform, and exactly God-like, acquires that truly simple and immaterial good, which alone is in reality desired and worthy of love, then it becomes attached to it and enters into unity with it with love-filled disposition and activity, conforming itself to what it always acquires and accepts, and through assimilation to the good, becoming similar to the nature of that which it partakes of. But just as there is no desire in this, because there is no lack of any of the goods in it, it will follow that the soul, having reached the point of having no needs, rejects from itself every concupiscible movement and disposition, which occurs only when there is no longer what is desired. In this teaching, the divine apostle was our leader, foretelling the cessation and repose in us of all real worries, even about the best, without finding the limit of love alone, for he says: Prophecies will be abolished, and knowledge will fall silent, and love will no longer disappear (1 Cor. 13:8), and this means the same thing as saying: love always remains the same. But saying that with love both faith and hope abide together, and love again rightly places them higher. For hope is in motion until the enjoyment of the hoped-for has come, and faith also serves as a support in the uncertainty of the hoped-for. For this is how the apostle defined it, saying: Now this is the faith of those who trust (Heb. 11:1). When the hoped-for comes, then, while everything else is immobile, the activity of love continues, not finding a successor. That is why it takes precedence in all the achievements of virtue and in the prescriptions of the law. Therefore, if the soul ever reaches this end, it will have no need for anything other than having declared the fullness of existence, and will find itself as the only one who has somehow observed the signs of God’s very bliss, for the life of the highest nature is love, because the beautiful is certainly kind to those who know, the Divine knows Itself, and knowledge is made by love, because what is known is beautiful by nature. Truly beautiful things are not touched by arrogant satiety. But just as saturation does not intersect the connection of love with the beautiful, divine life will always be accomplished by love, and it, beautiful by nature, is naturally filled with love for the beautiful, has no limit to acting out of love, since in the beautiful it is impossible to achieve any end, so that with the end of the beautiful love will cease along with it, for the beautiful ends only with what is opposite to it. And whose nature is not susceptible to the worst, will not stop moving towards endless and limitless good. Therefore, since every nature is attracted by what is characteristic of it, and humanity is also in some property with God, as bearing within itself the likeness of the Prototype, then, by all necessity, the soul is drawn to the Divine and related. For what is characteristic of God must be completely and certainly preserved. But if the soul is light and simple, because no bodily sorrow disturbs it, then approaching what attracts will become pleasant and convenient for it. If, in connection with the material, it is affirmed, as it were, by the nails of passion, as naturally happens with bodies covered with earth during earthquakes (add presumably that the bodies are not only crushed by landslides, but ulcerated by some kind of knitting needles or wooden rods found in the collapsed earth), then in what form is it natural for bodies to remain in this position when relatives for burial remove them from under ruins (of course, they will be broken, torn, and will experience the most severe damage, with the effort of pulling out the tormented lumps of earth and knitting needles); A similar kind of suffering, it seems to me, happens to the soul when God’s power, through love for mankind, extracts its property from under unreasonable and material ruins. For it is not out of hatred and without taking revenge for a bad life, as I argue, that God leads those who have sinned into painful dispositions - God, who appropriates and draws to Himself everything that only by His grace has come into existence. And just as He, the Source of all bliss, attracts the soul to Himself for the best purpose, so in the one attracted, out of necessity, a painful disposition occurs. For, just as those who purify gold in fire from the substance mixed with it, they do not only melt the mixture with fire, but, of all necessity, melt the pure together with the impure, and after the destruction of the latter, only the former remains, so when vice is destroyed in the purifying fire, it is quite necessary for the soul that has entered into unity with it to be in the fire, until the impurity, substance and impurity that have been scattered into it are destroyed, being consumed by the fire. And, just as if the stickiest dirt sticks to any rope along its entire length, then the upper end of the rope is inserted into some narrow hole, and someone from above strongly pulls the rope through the hole, then the dragged rope necessarily follows the dragging one, and the dirt that is attached to it, erased from the rope by strong attraction, will remain outside the hole, as the reason that the rope is not free goes its own way, but suffers a violent pull from the attracting - something similar, it seems to me, should be understood about the soul, that, entangled in material and earthly attachments, it suffers and is in a tense state, when God attracts His own to Himself, and the foreign, as if somewhat fused with it, erases with effort and causes it painful and unbearable suffering. Grigory. Therefore, I said, God’s judgment, as can be seen, does not impose punishment on those who have especially sinned, but, as the word showed, it only produces the separation of good from evil; attracting to communication in bliss, but rejection of what has grown becomes torment for the attracted one. Macrina. So, says the mentor, and my thought is that the measure of suffering in everyone is the amount of vice. For it is unfair for someone who has been in evil, which is forbidden, for a long time, and for someone who is involved in some unimportant errors, to suffer equally during cleansing from a bad habit - on the contrary, according to a greater or lesser amount of the substance, that painful flame will ignite for as long as there is nourishment for it. Therefore, on whom the material burden is great, for that the destructive flame must become greater and longer lasting, and in whom the food suitable for fire is mixed to a lesser extent, the punishment is reduced as much in the strength and torment of the action as the measure of vice in the punished is diminished. For evil must once be completely and certainly removed from existing things, and what, according to what was said above, exists in reality, will not exist at all. For vice does not have the property of being outside arbitrariness, and when all will is in God, then vice will come to complete destruction, because there will be no container left for it. Grigory. But what is the benefit, I asked, in the goodness of this hope for someone who ponders what evil to endure and only one year of suffering? If this unbearable torment lasts for centuries, some continuation of time, then what consolation of hope will remain in the end for those for whom the punishment is commensurate with an entire eternity? Macrina. Let him take care, said the teacher, either to keep the soul pure and not associated with the defilements of vice, or if this is completely impossible, because our nature is passionate, let at least her shortcomings of virtue be in something insignificant and easily correctable. For the Gospel teaching knows a certain debtor to me for a talent (Matthew 18:24), and another five hundred denarii, and another fifty (Luke 7:41), and some other coin (Matthew 5:26), and this is the very last coin; The righteous judgment of God extends to everything, balances the need for recovery with the severity of the debt and does not leave even the smallest thing unattended. The repayment of debts, according to the Gospel, does not consist in the payment of money, but in the fact that, as it is said, the debtor is betrayed by the tormentor, until he repays his entire debt (Matthew 18:34), and this means nothing more than that the necessary debt is to be paid by suffering torment, i.e. the duty to partake of sorrows, which he became guilty of during the continuation of his life, by foolishly choosing one pure pleasure and not dissolved by anything contrary, and thus, putting aside everything alien to himself, that is, sin, and, putting off the shame of being in debt, a person achieves freedom and boldness. Freedom is an assimilation to the uncontrollable and self-righteous, originally given to us by God, but closed by the shame of debt. Every freedom by nature is somehow united and related to itself. Therefore, as a result of this, everything free will be in accordance with its like. But virtue is not subject to control, therefore everything free will be in it, since the free is not subject to control. And since the nature of God is the source of all virtue, it follows that in Him there will be those freed from vice, so that, as the apostle says, God will be all in all (1 Cor. 15:28), for this saying, expressing that God will be all and in all, clearly, it seems to me, confirms the thought previously explored. Since we live our lives in different and varied ways in the present, there are many things in which we take part, such as time, air, place, food, drink, clothes, sun, lamp and much more that satisfy the needs of life, and of all this nothing is God. The expected bliss has no need for any of this; all this, instead of everything, will be for us the nature of God, giving itself in proportion to every need of that life - and this is clear from the Divine words, namely, that God for the worthy is a place, and a dwelling, and clothing, and food, and drink, and light and wealth, and the kingdom, and everything that, by concept and by name, helps us to good life. But He who happens to be everything, He also happens to be in everyone. By this, it seems to me, Scripture teaches the complete destruction of vice, for if there is God in all beings, then, without a doubt, there will be no vice in beings. And if someone assumes that there will be vice, then how will what has been said, that God is in all, be preserved in its force? Because the exclusion of vice makes the concept of the word “all” insufficient. On the contrary, He who has to be in all will not be in that which does not exist. Grigory. Therefore, I asked, what should I say to those who look faint-heartedly at disasters? Macrina. Let us say to them, says the teacher: in vain, you people are indignant and look with displeasure at this chain of necessary sequence of things, not knowing to what purpose everything individually taken in the economy of the Universe is directed, because everything needs, in a certain order and sequence, according to the artistic wisdom of the manager, to come into agreement with the nature of God. For this is why verbal nature was brought into being, so that the wealth of divine blessings would not be ineffective; But the wisdom that has arranged everything has prepared, as it were, certain vessels, and the successors of souls have been endowed with will, so that there will be a certain container that receives good things, and with the addition of what is poured in, it always becomes larger. For such is the participation of the divine good that, in whom it occurs, it makes him larger and more receptive, being perceived by him in an increase in strength and weight, so that the one who is nourished always grows and never stops growing. Since the source of goods exudes them continuously, the nature of the communicant, since there is nothing superfluous and useless in what is acceptable, turns everything that flows into a gain of its own magnitude, becomes more powerfully attracting the best and more accommodating with the mutual increase of the other and the power fed, with the abundance of goods increasing more and more, in the supply of nutrients, increasing the addition of strength in those being returned. Therefore, it is natural for those in which no aisle intersects the increase to come to such a magnitude. Then, when so many great things are laid before us, are you really indignant at the fact that nature moves forward towards its own goal along the path established for us? For it is impossible for us to make our way there otherwise than by shaking off from our souls what oppresses us, I mean this heavy and earthly burden, and by caring for the best, cleansing ourselves of the addiction to this burden that we had in this life, so that the pure could assimilate something like this. But if you have some attachment to this body and the severance of your connection with your loved one saddens you, then in this you are not without hope. For you will see this bodily veil, now destroyed by death, again woven from the same, but not in this rough and heavy composition, but in such a way that the thread folds into something lightest and airiest, which is why your loved one will be with you and will be restored again in the best and most desirable beauty. Grigory. But, as you can see, I said, due to the connection of speech, the dogma of the resurrection has come into our word, which, it seems to me, according to the teaching of the Scriptures, should be true and reliable and not subject to doubt. But since the weakness of human understanding is somehow confirmed in such faith by conclusions that are understandable to us, it would be good not to leave this part unexamined. So let's see what needs to be said. Macrina. And the teacher says: those who are alien to our wisdom, holding different assumptions, one in one way, the other in another, touched upon the dogma of the resurrection in some part, not agreeing exactly with ours and not completely depriving themselves of such hope. Others offend humanity, not making it a special kind, but claiming that the same soul is alternately in man, now in the dumb, changing into bodies, and always passes into whatever it pleases, becoming from a person some kind of animal, or flying, or aquatic, or living on land, and from them returning again to human nature. Others extend similar idle talk to plants, so that arboreal life is considered to be in keeping with and proper to the soul; and to others it seems that another person always borrows a soul from a person, so that human life is constantly spent with the same souls, because the same souls are constantly in some people, then again in others. But we affirm that it is good, starting with church dogmas, to borrow such opinions only to the extent that it can be shown that they in some way agree with the dogma of the resurrection, for what they say, that the soul, after separation from the body, again enters into some bodies, is not too dissimilar from the return to life we ​​hope for. And our teaching believes that our body is now made up, and will be made up again, from the elements of the world. The same thought also appears to those outside, for they could not imagine any other nature for the body other than a confluence of elements. But the difference is that, as we say, for the same soul the same body is composed again, combined from the same elements - they think that the soul passes into some other bodies, both verbal, wordless and insensible, about which they agree that their composition is from worldly parts, but they disagree in that they do not consider it to consist of the same thing that was originally united with the soul during carnal life. Therefore, let it be witnessed by external wisdom that it is not beyond the possibility of the soul becoming again in the body. It will be timely to consider the inconsistency of their teaching and by the very sequence that is revealed to us in accordance with reason, as far as possible, discover the truth. So what can we say about this? Those who transmigrate the soul into different natures, in my opinion, merge the properties of nature, mix and confuse all things with each other: the wordless, the verbal, the feeling, the insensible - if only they are in each other, not separated from each other to the point of immobility by any natural cohesion. For to assert that the same soul now becomes verbal and rational due to such and such a cover of the body, then again hides in holes with reptiles, or joins a flock of birds, or carries weights on itself, or becomes carnivorous, or lives under water, or turns into an insensitive, rooty and woody one, sending out shoots of branches from itself and growing on them either color, or a needle, or something nutritious or poisonous - this means nothing more than to regard everything as one and the same and to recognize in beings one nature, mixed by some kind of fused and inseparable community with itself, because no property distinguishes one from the other. Whoever says that the same thing happens in everything does not want to say anything else, but that everything is one, and the visible difference in beings does not in the least prevent the mixing of the incommunicable, so that if he sees something poisonous and carnivorous, he must recognize what he sees as fellow tribesman and akin to himself; Such a person will not look at hemlock as alien to his own nature, even if he sees humanity in plants, but the very bunch grown for the needs of life will not remain unsuspicious to him, because it is also one of the plants; We also have plants and the grains in the ears that we eat. Therefore, how can the sickle be used to cut the ears? How can he harvest a bunch, or dig up a thorn in the field, or pick a flower, or catch birds, or light a fire of wood, when it is not known whether the hand is raised against relatives, or ancestors, or fellow tribesmen, and whether it is not their bodies that ignite the fire or fill the cup, or whether the food will be made from them? When thinking about each of these things, that the human soul becomes a plant or an animal, there are no signs given what kind of plant or animal it is if it is from a person, and what it is like if it is from something else; he who is preoccupied with such an assumption will be equally disposed towards everything, so that, of necessity, he will either become cruel to those very people who still enjoy life in the prophet, or if in the reasoning of his fellow tribesmen he is inclined by nature towards love of mankind, he will come to the same disposition towards everything animate, even if it were from reptiles or from among the animals, but even if there is one who accepts this teaching in the forest among the trees, then he will regard the trees as a crowd of people. Therefore, what kind of life is such a person? Either he reveres everything because of his fellow tribe, or he is cruel to people because of their indifference to everything else. Therefore, such a teaching, and according to what has been said, must be rejected, while many other things, for good reasons, do not allow us to accept such an opinion. For I have heard from those who teach this, as if they suggest certain tribes of the soul, before life in the body, constituting a special kind of citizenship, due to the lightness and mobility of their nature, rotating along with the circulation of the Universe; but due to a certain inclination towards vice, the souls, as if having lost their featheredness, are first in human bodies, then through communication with unreasonable passions after leaving human life they reach such bestiality that they descend even to this plant and insensible life, so that by nature the light and easily mobile, such as the soul, becomes at first heavy and rushing downwards due to the depravity that takes root in human bodies; then, after the loss of rational strength, they choose dumb people to live in, and from there, after the gift of feelings is taken away, they pass into this insensible life, such as in plants, but from here they again ascend through the same degrees and are restored to the celestial region. For those who know how to judge to some extent, such a teaching is self-convicting, without having any firmness in itself. For if the soul is drawn from the heavenly life by vice into the arboreal life, and from the arboreal virtue it ascends again to the heavenly, then their teaching turns out to be doubtful and that therefore it is recognized as preferable whether the arboreal or the heavenly life, for some kind of circle similar to the previous one is repeated, while the soul never stops where it was. If from the incorporeal life it descends into the corporeal, and from this into the insensible, and from there it ascends again into the incorporeal, then those who teach this teaching imagine nothing other than an indifferent fusion of evil and good, because the heavenly life will not remain in bliss if those who live there are affected by vice, and the trees will not remain deprived of virtue if it is recognized that from here the soul returns to good, and there a vicious life begins. For if the soul, circling in the sky, becomes entangled in vice and, drawn into material life by it, again ascends from here to living on high, then they lead to the opposite idea that material life is cleansing from vice, and the infallible completion of the path becomes the beginning and guilt of evil for souls, if here, feathered with virtue, they soar upward, and there, having lost their feathers for depravity, they become lying low and reptiles on the ground from a mixture with the whiteness of material nature. And the absurdity of such teachings is not limited to the fact that assumptions lead to the opposite, but the thought itself does not remain firm in them forever. For if heavenly things are considered unchangeable, then how does passion take place in the unchangeable? And if the lower nature is passionate, then how does dispassion succeed in the passionate? But they confuse the unmixable and unite the incommunicable, seeing immutability in passion and again dispassion in the changeable, and they do not hold on to this forever, but from where they removed the soul due to its depravity, they resettle it there again from material life, as a safe and pure life, as if forgetting that there, burdened with vice, it interfered with nature for a longer time. Thus, with them, condemnation of present life and praise of heavenly things merge and mix with each other, because what is condemned, in their opinion, leads to the beautiful, and what is considered better gives rise in the soul to an inclination towards the worse. Therefore, every erroneous and untenable opinion on such subjects must be thrown out of the dogmas of truth. But, since we have not comprehended the truth, we will not follow all those, according to whom souls pass from women’s bodies into men’s lives, or, conversely, in women there are souls that are separated from men’s bodies, or from husbands they pass into husbands, and from wives they become wives again. For the first opinion does not deserve approval, not only because it is untenable and deceptive, automatically turning into opposite assumptions, but also because it wickedly teaches that no being is brought into being unless vice begins the nature of each. If neither people, nor plants, nor animals are born until the soul falls on them from above, and the fall occurs due to vice, then, according to those who assert this, the beginning of the composition of beings is vice. And why does one thing converge at the same time and a person is born from marriage and the fall of the soul coincides with the fervor of marriage? And what is even more absurd than this: if in the spring many dumb animals come together in pairs, can it therefore be said that in the mountainous rotation spring also produces the birth of vice, so that souls full of evil have to fall together and dumb wombs become fertilized? What will anyone say about a farmer who sticks branches torn from plants into the ground? How is it that his hand, together with the plant, buries the human soul into the ground, so that with the loss of feathers in the soul, man’s desire for pleasure falls? Therefore, there is the same absurdity in another opinion, namely, to believe that the soul is curious to know when those living in marriage come together, or observes the conception of babies in order to enter the nascent bodies. And if the husband renounces marriage, and the wife is freed from the necessity of the pains of birth, then does vice really not burden the soul? Consequently, does marriage give vice the impulse to attack the soul there, in the high country, or does attachment to the opposite affect the soul even without it? And therefore, the soul will wander homeless and wandering in the middle, having fallen away from heavenly things and not receiving, if this happens, a body to its share. Then how can we assume that the Divinity rules over beings, attributing the beginning of human life to this random and unreasonable fall of souls? For, by all necessity, what follows is in accordance with the beginning, and if life began by some random event, then, without a doubt, its continuation becomes accidental. But in vain such teachers make beings dependent on Divine power when they claim that they were not born into the world by God’s will, but attribute the beginning of what comes into being to some bad event, as if human life would not have been formed if evil had not given rise to life. Therefore, if this is the beginning of life, then obviously the continuation will follow the beginning, for no one will say that good comes from bad and bad from good - on the contrary, by the nature of the seed we expect fruits. And so all life will be governed by unauthorized and random movement, when there is no providence for creatures. But the foresight of reason will be completely useless, no benefit will come from virtue, and it will cost nothing to avoid evil. For everything will certainly consist in chance and life will be no different from unequipped ships, by the most indeterminable accidents, as if by some waves, being transferred from one meeting with good or bad to another meeting, for there can be no benefit from virtue for those whose nature begins from the opposite. If our life is at God’s disposal, then at the same time it is recognized that it is not vice that gives rise to our life. If we come from vice, then, of course, we live in everything in accordance with it. So, therefore, the judgment after this life, and reward according to dignity, and everything else that is told to us and which we believe for the eradication of vice will turn out to be nonsense. For how is it possible for a person born due to a defect to be without defect? And how can any voluntary striving for a virtuous life occur in a person whose nature, as they say, originates from vice? Just as no dumb animal attempts to speak humanly, but, using a natural and natural voice, it does not consider it a small loss that it does not have a share in the gift of speech; In the same way, those who recognize vice as the beginning and cause of life would not come to desire virtue, since it is not in their nature. But in all those who have purified their souls with reason, there is a desire for a virtuous life and care for it. And this clearly shows that vice is not older than life and it was not from it that nature received its first beginning - on the contrary, the beginning of our life is God's wisdom, which organizes everything; the soul, having come into existence in such a way as was pleasing to the Creator, by the very power to choose what it likes, then becomes by the power of will what it wanted to be. This can be learned from an example. Let's take the eye for this - it is natural for it to see, but it does not see due to arbitrariness or illness, for sometimes the unnatural can take the place of the natural, when someone either voluntarily closes the eye or is deprived of sight due to illness. So it can be said about the soul that although its creation is from the Divine and, as in the Divinity, no vice is conceivable, then for the soul there is no need for vice, however, being so created, it is determined by its own judgment in what it decides to do, either by choice, closing the eye for the beautiful, or by the malicious intent of the enemy who is with you in life, damaging this eye, lives in the darkness of seduction, or, on the contrary, with a pure eye looking at the truth, one becomes far from dark passions. Therefore, when, another will ask, was it brought into being and how? But the question of how each thing came about should be completely removed from the word, for even about what is at hand to our understanding, about which we have a concept with the help of feeling, it would be impossible for the investigating mind to comprehend how the visible was formed; therefore, something like this, even by God-bearing and holy men, is considered incomprehensible. For by faith, says the apostle, we understand that the word of God has been perfected forever, in which things were not made visible (Heb. And, 3), and this, I think, he would not have said if he had believed that what was sought was cognizable by reason, - on the contrary, that by the will of God both the age itself and everything that was created in it were perfect (and the age is the very thing in which all creation, both visible and invisible, is mentally represented) - I believe this, said the apostle. But how it was created he left unexplored. For something like this, I think, is incomprehensible to seekers, since the question about this shows us many difficulties in itself: how from a constant nature - movable, from a simple and unextended nature - extended and complex? Is it from the highest Essence itself? But this cannot be recognized by the heterogeneity of creatures with Her. Where else? Reason does not perceive anything outside of God's nature, for our opinion will be divided into different principles if, in addition to the creative cause, something is recognized from which artistic wisdom borrows reserves for creation. So, since the Author of beings is one, but with the higher being brought into existence by Him is not homogeneous, then on both sides there is the same inconsistency of assumptions - whether to recognize the creation as having originated from God's nature or to say that everything was made up of some other essence. For either it will be assumed that the Divinity also has the properties of a creature, if what is created is akin to God, or a certain material nature will be introduced outside of God’s essence, which, due to the uncreated eternity of the being, is equal to God, as, having imagined, the Manichaeans and some Hellenic wisdom, drawn into similar opinions, turned this idea into dogma. Therefore, in order to especially avoid mutual incongruity in the question of beings, we will leave the word about how each of them comes into being, following the example of the Apostle, unexamined, noting only one thing: that the aspiration of the Divine will, when it wishes, becomes a deed and the will is carried out, immediately turning into nature by the power of the Almighty, which only wisely and artistically wills, does not leave the will not given into action. Bringing the will into action is the essence. But since beings are divided into two kinds: spiritual and corporeal beings, the creation of spiritual beings does not seem in any way inconsistent with the nature of the incorporeal, but, on the contrary, close to it, showing in itself invisibility, intangibility, non-extension, that if anyone imagines in thoughts a superior nature, he will not sin. The corporeal creature, since it appears with properties that are not somehow communicable with the Divine, most of all causes great difficulty to the mind, which is not able to understand how from the invisible what is visible, from the intangible what is solid and stubborn, from what is indefinite and definite, from what does not have quantity and magnitude, necessarily included in some measures represented in relation to quantity, and also taken separately, everything that is noticeable in nature bodily We will only say one thing about this, namely, that nothing of what is seen in the body is in itself a body: not the body - appearance, and color, and heaviness, and extension, and quantity, and any other visible quality, but, on the contrary, each of them is a concept, and their mutual confluence and connection with each other becomes a body. Therefore, since these qualities that make up the fullness of the body are comprehended by the mind, and not by feeling, and the Divinity is spiritual, then what kind of work is done for the intelligent by the intelligent, which through its mutual confluence gave rise to the nature of the body for us. But this is no longer subject to research. And we were asked: if souls did not exist before bodies, then when and how did they come into existence? And for this reason, the question of how they come into being, as inaccessible, our word left unexplored, and from what time souls have the beginning of being, as immediately following what was considered before, remains to be found. For if it is admitted that the soul lives before the body in a certain lonely state, then it is quite necessary to recognize as valid other absurdly invented teachings that infuse souls into bodies due to vice. But no one with common sense will assume that the origin of souls is later and follows the formation of bodies, since it is clear to everyone that everything inanimate has neither a moving nor a vegetative force, and the growth and local movement of what is brought up in the mother’s womb is not subject to doubt or dispute. Therefore, it remains to admit that the beginning of the composition of the soul and body is one and the same. And just as the earth, having received a shoot from a root from the farmers, produces a tree, not from itself putting plant power into what is nourished, but providing only to what is put in it the means of growth, so we say that what is stolen from a person for the planting of a person is itself in some way something living - animated from the animate, nourished from the nourished. If the smallness of the shoot did not contain all the actions and movements of the soul, this is not at all surprising, for even a grain of wheat in a seed does not immediately appear as an ear (for how can an ear fit in the grain?), but since the earth nourishes the grain with decent juices, it becomes an ear, without changing its nature in the earthly lump, but revealing and perfecting itself through the action of poverty. Therefore, just as in plant seeds growth gradually comes to perfection, so in the human composition, in proportion to the bodily size, mental strength also manifests itself, first becoming nourishing and vegetative in the formed innards, after that imparting the gift of sensation to those occurring in the world and then, like a certain fruit on a grown plant, slightly showing reasonable strength, not all at once, but as the plant goes upward, successively increasing its prosperity. So, since what is stolen from the animate into the basis of the animate composition cannot be dead (because mortification occurs through the loss of the soul, and loss does not precede possession), we understand from this that in the co-dissolution, which is made up of soul and body, the transition into being is common, so that neither precedes nor lags behind the other. But in the increase in the number of souls, the mind must necessarily foresee a stop over time, so that there is no continuous flow in nature through new arrivals, which always flows forward and does not stop moving anywhere. And that in our race there must inevitably come a stop over time, we believe that the reason for this is that, since every intelligible nature has its own completeness, it is natural for the human race to reach its limit over time (since it also belongs to the intelligible nature), so as not to think of it as if it always seems insufficient, because the constant addition of new arrivals becomes an accusation to the race that it still lacks. Therefore, when humanity reaches its fullness, then this fluid movement of nature will certainly stop, having reached the necessary limit, and the place of this life will be taken by another certain state, separate from the current one, carried out in birth and decay, for if there is no birth, then, of all necessity, there will be no decay. Before decomposition, addition begins (by addition we call birth; birth); from this it necessarily follows that when addition has not preceded, decomposition will not follow. So, according to faith, the life that follows turns out to be some kind of permanent and indestructible, unchangeable by either birth or decay Grigory. When the teacher finished this, since it seemed to many of those sitting with us that the speech had reached the proper end, then, fearing that there would be no one with us to decide what was proposed about the resurrection by outsiders, if the teacher suffered from an illness (which actually happened), I said: the speech has not yet touched upon the most important question in the dogma: the Inspired Scripture in both the New and Old Testament teaching says that when our nature is in in a certain order and in connection will complete a complete revolution of time, this fluid movement accomplished by the succession of those born will certainly finally stop, and, as the filling of the Universe will no longer allow an increase in a greater number, the entire fullness of souls from an invisible and scattered state will again return to the collected and visible, and the same elements will converge with each other again in the same connection. And this state of life, according to the Divine teaching of Scripture, is called resurrection, and this name signifies the entire movement of the elements during the restoration of the earthly. Macrina. Therefore, which of these, she says, is not mentioned in what was said before? Grigory. About the dogma of resurrection itself, I say. Macrina. However, she says, much of what has now been said at length leads to this goal. Grigory. Don’t you know, I said, what a swarm of objections regarding this hope are opposed to us by our opponents? And together I intended to express what is invented by lovers of controversy to refute the resurrection. Macrina. But she says: first, it seems to me, it is necessary to briefly repeat what is stated about this dogma in various places of Divine Scripture, so that we can conclude our word. Thus, I hear David hymning in the divine songs, when, having chosen the structure of the Universe as the subject of his song, in the hundred and third psalm, towards the end of the song, he says the following: Take away their spirit, and they will disappear, and return to their dust; expresses by this that the power of the Spirit, which accomplishes everything in everything, gives life to those in whom only it exists and, on the contrary, deprives the life of those whom it only leaves. So, since he says that with the withdrawal of the Spirit, the disappearance of living creatures occurs, and with His appearance, the restoration of those who have disappeared, and the disappearance in the order of speech precedes the renewed one, we affirm that by this the mystery of the resurrection is announced to the Church, as David prophesied this grace with a prophetic spirit. But in another place the same Prophet says that the God of the Universe and the Lord of beings appeared to us during the preparation of the feast in the frequenting (Ps. 117:27), with the phrase frequenting meaning the feast of tabernacles, which, although anciently legitimized by the tradition of Moses (and the legislator, as I think, prophetically predicted the future), however, although always being performed, was not yet completed in reality, for in images the mysterious meaning of what was happening the truth was foretold; the true feast of tabernacles itself had not yet taken place, but for this purpose, according to the prophetic word, the God of all and the Lord appeared to us, so that for human nature, from our devastated dwelling, a tabernacle would be formed, again bodily made more frequent by the gathering of the elements. For the word teaching, according to the concept expressed in it, means clothing and adornment with it. This saying in psalmody has the following form: God is the Lord, and having appeared to us, create a holiday in the frequenting ways of the altar (Ps. 117:27). And it, it seems to me, mysteriously foreshadows with all rational creation the formation of a single holiday, on which the lower and the higher rejoice together in the assembly of the good. For during the transformative structure of the temple, not everyone was allowed to be inside the outer fence, but the entry of everything pagan and foreign was forbidden, and those who entered inside were not equally given access to the interior, but only those who had purified themselves by a certain purer way of life and certain sprinklings; and of these, again, not everyone had access to the interior of the temple itself, but some priests were given the legal right to be inside the veil for the needs of sacred rites; and that inaccessible and hidden part of the temple, in which the altar was erected, decorated with certain fences made of horns, was closed to the entrance of the priests themselves, except for one who presided over the priesthood, who once a year, on a certain legal day, performing some unspoken and mysterious sacred service, alone entered the interior. Therefore, when there was such a great difference in this church, which served as the image and likeness of the spiritual state, observance of the regulations concerning the body teaches that not all verbal nature approaches the church of God, that is, to the confession of the great God; but those who are misled by false assumptions are outside the Divine fence, and of those who are admitted inside for confession, those who have previously purified themselves with sprinklings and purity of life are preferable to others, and of these, the initiates already have the greater advantage of being worthy of internal secrecy. But in order for anyone to be able to bring the meaning of the riddle into greater clarity, he must learn with the help of a teaching word that some of the rational powers, like a holy altar, are erected in the sanctuary of the Divinity, and some of these again appear superior, standing out like horns; and others around them, in some sequential order, occupy first and second places. The human race, due to its innate depravity, is expelled from the Divine fence and, cleansed by the bath of ablution, is allowed inside. But since these middle barriers, by which vice has separated us from what is inside the veil, will one day be destroyed, then when our nature through the resurrection is again raised into the tabernacle and all corruption of creatures caused by vice is destroyed, then around God for those who are frequented by the resurrection, a common holiday will be formed, on which the same joy is offered to everyone, because no difference divides a more rational nature in the communion of equals. good, but those who are now outside due to depravity will one day be inside the sanctuaries of Divine bliss and will be united with each other by the horns of the altar, that is, by the most excellent of the worldly powers. The Apostle speaks more openly about this, expressing universal agreement for good: Every knee will worship Him, of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father (Phil. 2:10-11). Instead of horns, he names the angelic and heavenly ranks, and by the rest he means the creation that is thought of after them, that is, us, over whom a single consonant holiday will prevail. The holiday is the confession and knowledge of the truly Existent. But it is possible, she continues, to collect many other places of Holy Scripture in support of the dogma of the resurrection. For Ezekiel, with the prophetic spirit, having passed through the entire middle time and its continuation, stops by the power of foreknowledge at the time of resurrection itself and, looking at the future as already at the present, presents it to his gaze in his narration. He sees a great field, stretching into infinity, and on it bones, now collected in a great heap, now scattered, no matter how they are, in different places; then by Divine power they move with their relatives and their own and enter into their compositions, then they are covered with veins, flesh and skins (which the psalmody calls quickened), and the spirit gives life and awakens everything that lay on the field (Ezek. 37: 1-10). What will anyone say about the apostle’s depiction of miracles after the resurrection, which is at the hands of those reading and in which Scripture says that by some command, by the sound of trumpets, in an instant everything dead and lying will suddenly change into a state of immortal nature (1 Thess. 11:16)? But let us not repeat the Gospel sayings, as everyone knows, for the Lord does not only say in words that the dead will rise, but actually performs the resurrection itself, beginning the working of miracles with what is closer to us and what could seem less incredible. For first, in mortal illnesses, it shows life-giving power, driving away illnesses with command and word; then he erects a recently deceased young woman; then the young man, having already been carried out for burial, rises from his bed and gives it to his mother; after this, Lazarus, who had already been decomposing for four days, was brought out alive from the tomb, reviving the lying man with his voice and command; then he resurrects himself, a man pierced with nails and a spear, from the dead on the third day, presenting the places of the nails and the blow of the spear as evidence of the Resurrection. I don’t consider it necessary to expand on this, because there is no doubt about those who accepted what was written. Grigory. But the question, I said, is not that there will someday be a resurrection and a person will appear in an impartial judgment - many of those who hear will agree with this, both because of the evidence from Scripture and on the basis of what has already been studied. It remains to consider whether what is hoped for will also be in agreement with what is now? But if this really happens, then I told them that it is better to run away from people in the hope of resurrection. For if human bodies, as they are at the end of life, are restored to life again as such, then people in the resurrection expect some kind of endless disaster. And can there be any sight more pitiful than this, when in extreme old age the bent bodies are transformed into something vile and ugly, because the flesh in them has been exhausted by time, the wrinkled skin has dried to the bones?! Since the veins are tightened, as if they were no longer thickened by natural moisture, and therefore the whole body has shrunk, a strange and pitiful sight appears, because the head is bowed to the knee, the hand, incapable of natural activity, always involuntarily thrusts here and there with a trembling. What are the bodies like again of those exhausted by long-term illnesses, only different from bare bones in that they seem covered with thin and already worn-out skin? What are the symptoms of those swollen from water sickness? And among those possessed by the (so-called) sacred disease, what word can present to the eye an ugly distortion of the body? How does the rottenness gradually spreading among them consume all their members - both instrumental and sensitive? What will anyone say about those who were mutilated during earthquakes or in wars or for some other reason and lived for some time in this disastrous state before death, or about those whose limbs were mutilated from birth due to some kind of damage throughout their entire lives? What should one think about newborn babies who are thrown, suffocated, or die by accident? If they are brought back into life again, will they remain in infancy? What's worse than this? But they will reach the measure of age. And what kind of milk will nature raise them again? Therefore, if our body comes to life again in everything the same, what we expect is disastrous. And if not the same, the resurrected one will be someone else, and not the one lying in the tomb. For if a child is laid, and a full-grown one is raised, or vice versa, then how can one say that the dead man himself has been resurrected, when the buried person has changed due to the difference in age? For does he not see another instead of one, before whom instead of a child - a full-grown one, instead of an old man - blooming with age, instead of an emaciated one - a healthy one, instead of a withered one - a stout one, as well as everything else, the detailed calculation of which would be difficult to describe? If the body comes to life again, not the same as it was when it was consigned to the earth, then it is not the dead who will be resurrected, but the earth will again be transformed into another person. Therefore, what is resurrection for me if someone else comes to life instead of me? How can I recognize myself, seeing myself no longer as myself? For I will not be truly if I am not in everything the same with myself. As in real life, if I have someone’s features in my memory, I will assume for the sake of words that such and such is bald, with large lips, a snub nose, a white body, with blue eyes, with gray hair, with a wrinkled body; then, looking for him, I meet a young man, long-haired, hook-nosed, dark-skinned, and all other facial features that have a different appearance - do I really, looking at the latter, recognize him as the former? But what is the need to hesitate any longer over the weakest objections, leaving the stronger ones? For who does not know that human nature is like some kind of stream: a person from birth to death is always in some kind of movement, and then the movement in him ceases when he ceases to exist. Movement is not some kind of local permutation; nature does not emerge from itself, but moves forward through change. Change, while it continues, does not stop at the same thing (for how is it possible to remain identical to what is changing?); but, like the fire on a lamp, apparently it always seems to be the same, because the constant movement always makes it possible to see that it is continuously the same and connected with itself; in fact, always following itself successively, it never remains the same, for the moisture extracted by heat together ignites and, burning, turns into smoke, and the force of change always produces the movement of the flame, the burning object changing itself into smoke; therefore, it is impossible for someone who touches the flame twice in the same place to touch the same thing both times; the speed of change does not wait for the one who touches it again another time, no matter how quickly he does it - on the contrary, the flame is always new, each time just happened, always following itself and never remaining the same; something similar happens with the nature of our body. For what always flows in and flows out in our nature, passing and moving, always through the movement of change, only then stops when life also ceases. While the body is alive, there is no stop in it: it either fills up, or evaporates, or with both it certainly always maintains its existence. Therefore, if a person is no longer the same after yesterday, but as a result of a change becomes different, then when the resurrection returns our body to life again, then one, without a doubt, will become some kind of crowd of people, so that in the resurrected there will be everything without lack: a baby, a child, a youth, a youth, a husband, a father, an old man and every middle age. And since chastity and lewdness are closely brought into play, as both those who endure painful executions for piety, and those who, due to effeminacy, cannot endure them, show both with their bodily senses, then how is it possible for justice to be preserved in court? Or when the same person now sins, then cleanses himself by repentance and, if it happens, creeps into sin again, the body - both defiled and undefiled - changes according to the natural sequence, and none of them will be forever, then what kind of body will be punished for the indecent? Did it become wrinkled in old age before death? But this is something else, and not the one by which the sin was committed. Or defiled by passion? Where is the old man? Therefore, either he will not be resurrected and the resurrection is not valid, or he will be resurrected and will escape the punishment that is due to him. I will also say something else that is objected to by those who do not accept this teaching. Nature, they say, has not left a single part of the body idle: some contain the reason and strength of our life, without them our carnal life cannot exist - such as, for example, the heart, liver, brain, lung, womb and other internal organs; others are destined for sensual movement; the departure of others is activity and movement from place to place, while others are given the ability to produce offspring. Therefore, if our subsequent life consists of the same thing, then the death is in vain. If that word is true (as indeed it is true) by which it is determined that in life after the resurrection there is no place for marriage and that life is not then supported by food and drink, then what use will be of these members of the body when in that life that is not expected from them for the sake of which we have those members now? For if for marriage - that which serves for marriage, then when there is no marriage, we will have no need for one who serves for it. So the hands are used for work, the legs are for walking, the mouth is for eating, the teeth are for chewing, the entrails are for digestion, the original paths are for the eruption of what turns out to be unnecessary. Therefore, when those departures are not there, why or for what purpose will there be something arranged for them? And as a result of this, if there is not in the body that which cannot in the least contribute to this life, it is necessary that nothing that composes the body now be related to it, because life will consist in something else. Others will not even call resurrection such a change in the body that not one of its members, due to its uselessness in this life, will rise with the body. If the resurrection of all these members has its effect, then the Creator of the resurrection will make it in vain for us and useless for the future life. But we must believe that there will be a resurrection, and it will not be in vain. So, the word must carefully consider the teaching, so that in this dogma we retain the correctness in all respects. Macrina. When I said this, not without dignity, the teacher said: you attacked the dogmas of the resurrection using so-called rhetoric and presented convincing objections from all sides, contrasting them with the truth in such a way that those who did not really delve into the mystery of the truth probably wavered somewhat in the teaching and thought that it was not for nothing that doubt had been raised in what was said. But the truth is not like that, she continues, although we are not able to answer objections with such rhetorical skill, however, the true teaching about this is preserved in the secret treasures of wisdom and will then become clear when we ourselves study the mystery of the resurrection and we no longer need words to discover what is hoped for. But just as for someone who is awake at night, long speeches about what the sun’s light is like are rendered useless as soon as the pleasantness of the ray appears, so every thought, speculatively concerning the future state, will turn out to be insignificant when the expected happens to us through experience. But since it is necessary for us not to leave the objections made to us completely unexamined, we will talk about them this way: we must first understand what the purpose of the dogma of the resurrection is, for the sake of which it is spoken of in the holy word and constitutes an object of belief. Therefore, in order to be able to present this in the scope of any definition, let’s say this: resurrection is the restoration of our nature to its original state. But in the first life, the Creator of which was God himself, there was, most likely, neither old age, nor childhood, nor suffering from various ailments, nor any other disastrous bodily situation, because it was unnatural for God to create something like that. On the contrary, until the desire for evil occurred in humanity, human nature was a kind of property of God. But all this invaded us along with the entrance of vice. Therefore, a life without vice will not have any need for what came from vice. For, as a necessary consequence for one who travels in cold weather, the body becomes chilled, or for one walking under the heat of the rays, the surface of the body becomes tanned, and if there is neither heat nor cold, then, without a doubt, the traveler will be freed from sunburn and from chills, and it would be unreasonable for anyone to ask what the reason was for this, when there is no reason - so our nature, having become passionate, met with the necessary consequences passionate life, but, having returned again to dispassionate bliss, will no longer be subject to the consequences of vice. So, since everything that was mixed into human nature from the life of the dumb was not in us before, until humanity fell into passion due to vice, it is necessary, having left passion, to leave together everything that is seen with it. Therefore, it would be unreasonable for anyone to seek in the future life for what happened in us through passion. Just as if someone, having a torn tunic on himself, throws off this clothing, he will no longer see on himself the disgrace of what has been discarded, so when we also take off this deathly and vile tunic imposed on us from the skins of dumb animals (and when I hear about skin, I think to understand the appearance of a dumb nature, which we put on, having become accustomed to passion), then everything that was on us was made of skin We will cast off the dumb ones from ourselves when we take off our tunic. And what we have received from the skin of the dumb is carnal mixture, conception, birth, uncleanness, breasts, food, eruption, gradual coming to perfect age, maturity of age, old age, illness, death. Therefore, if this is not with us, then how will what happened from this remain with us? Therefore, with the hope that some other state will follow in the future life, it is in vain to oppose the dogma of the resurrection, which has nothing to do with life after the resurrection. For the wrinkledness and corpulence of the body, leanness and fullness, and everything else that happens to the fluid nature of bodies, what do they have in common with that life that is alien to the fluid and quickly passing transmission of real life? The concept of resurrection requires only one thing, that man come into existence by birth, or, better said, as the Gospel says: Man was born into the world (John 16:21); about the duration or brevity of life and about death - one way or another it happened - it is in vain to enter into research when thinking about the resurrection. One way or another, let us suppose it, the result will, of course, be the same, because from such a difference there is neither difficulty nor convenience in the resurrection. He who begins to live, without a doubt, must live as soon as the destruction wrought in him by death is corrected by the resurrection. And how or when does destruction happen, what is in this resurrection? Finding out this leads to another goal, for example, whether someone lived in pleasure or in sorrow, virtuously or viciously, praiseworthy or reprehensible, spent time in misery or happily. For all this and similar things are revealed from the measure and way of life, and in this case, in order to pronounce judgment on the life spent, it will be necessary for the judge to examine passion, loss, illness, old age, maturity, youth, wealth, poverty, how a person, being in each of these circumstances, spent the life that was given to him well or badly, and whether for a long time he experienced many good or bad things or did not touch at all the beginning of both, ending his life in a still imperfect mind? But when God, by resurrection, returns human nature to its original structure, then there will be no need to talk about things like this and think that such difficulties will prevent the power of God from achieving its goal. But God has one goal: when by people, one after the other, the entire fullness of our nature has already been completed, some soon after this life will find themselves clean from vice, others will experience the healing of fire at the appropriate times after this, others will be found to have known neither good nor evil through experience in this life - to grant to all the communion of the blessings that exist in Him, which, as the Scripture says, neither eye sees nor hear hears, and which do not exist in thoughts. available (1 Cor. 2:9). And this, in my understanding, means nothing more than being in God himself, for the good that surpasses the ear, the eye, the heart, will itself be superior to everything. The difference between a virtuous or a vicious life after this will most appear in the fact that sooner or later a person will partake of the hoped-for bliss, for the extent of the depravity that has arisen in each will, of course, correspond to the duration of the healing. By healing the soul will be cleansed from depravity. And this cannot be successful without a painful disposition, as was found in previous research. But the one who delves into the depths of the apostolic wisdom will better understand the excess and unsuitability of the objection, for the apostle, clarifying this mystery to the Corinthians, who, perhaps, presented to him the same thing that is opposed to those who are now rebelling against dogma to refute what is acceptable by faith, overthrowing the insolence of their ignorance with their own dignity, says this: Will you tell me: How will the dead rise? in what body will they come? Madness, the apostle continues, the hedgehog will not come to life unless it dies: and the hedgehog will not live, not the body of the future of the seed, but a bare grain, if there is wheat or any other seed: God gives him a body as he pleases (1 Cor. 13, 35 - 38). Here, it seems to me, the apostle stops the lips of those who do not know their own measures of nature, who judge God’s power by their strength, believing that as much is possible for God as human understanding can accommodate, and that what is higher than us also exceeds God’s power. For the one who asked the apostle: How will the dead rise? – makes it seem impossible for the scattered elements of the body to come back into union; and since it cannot exist, there is no other body left except the union, elements and possibility, then, following the example of those who are strong in the debate of words, after a certain sequence of conclusions from what they proposed, he says: if the body is a collection of elements, and their secondary union is impossible, then what kind of body will the resurrected ones use? Therefore, what seemed to them intertwined with some kind of artificial wisdom, the apostle called madness in those who do not see the superiority of God's power in other creatures, for, leaving the highest miracles of God, with which he could lead the listener into bewilderment, for example: what is the heavenly body and where does it come from? What is a solar body, or a lunar body, or visible in the stars? What is ether, air, water, earth? - the imprudence of those objecting exposes what is usually with us and common to us. Doesn’t agriculture teach you to say that he who guesses about the power of God, which surpasses all measure, is vain according to his measure? Why do bodies grow from seeds? What precedes their growth? Is it not death, if only the decomposition of what has been put together is death? For the seed would not sprout without decomposing in the earth's firmament, without becoming swollen and multi-welled, so that by its quality it could enter into unity with the surrounding moisture and thus transform into a root and shoot and not stop there, but turn into a stem, as if with some kind of connections, girded in the middle with the knees, so that it could directly carry the burden of the fruit. ear Therefore, where was this thing emerging from the grain of wheat before its decomposition in the earth? However, it is in the grain. And if this had not happened before, then the ear of grain would not have happened. Therefore, just as the body of the ear of grain is born from the seed, because the power of God artistically produces the first from this latter, and it is not exactly the same with the seed and is not at all different from it, so, says the apostle, the mystery of the resurrection is already interpreted to you in the miracles that are performed on the seeds, so that the power of God, by the excess of its power, not only returns to you what has been decayed, but at the same time gives you something else great and beautiful than nature is brought into greater splendor for you. It is said, it is sown in corruption, it is raised in incorruption: it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power, it is sown not in honor, it is raised in glory, a spiritual body is sown, a spiritual body is raised (1 Cor. 15:42-44). For, just as a grain of wheat, after its decomposition in the earth’s firmament, leaving its quantitative smallness and its distinctive quality as an external appearance, did not lose itself, but, remaining in itself, becomes an ear, very much different from itself in size, beauty, variety and appearance, in the same way human nature, leaving in death all its distinctive properties, which it acquired through a passionate disposition, I mean dishonor, corruption, weakness, differences in age, have not lost themselves, but, as if in an ear of corn, they are applied into incorruptibility, glory, honor, strength, perfection in everything; and his life is no longer governed by natural properties, but passes into a certain spiritual and dispassionate state, because the very property of the mental body is that, due to some kind of flow and movement, it always changes and from the state in which it is, passes into another. For what we now see as beautiful not only in people, but also in plants and animals, nothing of that will remain in the life of that time. But in everything, the apostolic word seems to me to be in agreement with our concept of the resurrection and shows the very thing that our definition contains, saying that the resurrection is nothing other than the restoration of our nature to its original state. For at the beginning of the creation of the world, as we know from the Scriptures, first, as the word says, the earth sprouted the former herbs (Gen. 1:12), then from the sprout a seed arose, from which, when it fell to the ground, the same kind of what originally grew sprang up again. But this, says the divine apostle, also takes place at the resurrection. Not only do we learn from him that humanity will change into great splendor, but also that what is hoped for is nothing other than what was in the beginning. Since initially it is not the ear from the seed, but the seed from the ear, and after this the ear grows from the seed, the sequence noted in the example clearly shows that all the bliss that will grow for us in the resurrection goes back to the original grace. For we too, having originally in some way been an ear of corn, have since been dried up by the heat of vice. But the earth, having received us, disintegrated by death, into the spring of resurrection, will again show this bare grain of the body as a full-grown ear, branched, straight and stretching into heavenly heights instead of straw or a stem, adorned with incorruption and other divine signs. It is fitting, it is said, for this corruptible to put on incorruptibility (1 Cor. 15:53). And incorruptibility, glory, honor and power, as we confess, belong to God’s own nature, and they were previously in the one created in the image and are expected again. For the first ear was the first man Adam, but since with the entry of vice the nature was divided into many, then, as happens with fruit in an ear, so we, one by one, stripped of our appearance, like this ear, and mixed with the earth, in resurrection, instead of one first ear, becoming countless darknesses of harvests, we are again born in primeval beauty. A virtuous life will have this difference from vice, that here, during the continuation of life, those who have cultivated themselves with virtue will immediately grow into a perfect ear, and those whose strength in the spiritual seed during this life has become somehow depleted and withered from vice, according to those knowledgeable in such things, as happens with the so-called horny growths, although they will grow in the resurrection, they will meet with great severity from the judge, since they are not able to come into the form of an ear of corn and become what we were before falling to the earth. The steward’s going after the harvest consists of a collection of tares and thorns that grew along with the seed, because all the power feeding the root was poured into the counterfeit seed, which is why the real one remained unnutritious and unripe, drowned out by unnatural growth. Therefore, when in the nutritious everything that is counterfeit and alien in it is weakened and comes to destruction, after the destruction of the unnatural by fire, then the nature of the nourishing seeds will have abundant food and will ripen into fruit, with such care, taking on the general form originally given to us from God. But blessed are those in whom immediately, as soon as they are born into the resurrection, the perfect beauty of the ears of grain shines forth. We do not say this in the sense that in the resurrection some kind of bodily difference will be revealed in those who lived virtuously or viciously, so that one is considered imperfect in body, and the other is recognized as having achieved perfection - on the contrary, as during the continuation of life, both a prisoner and someone living in freedom are both similar in body, but there is a great difference between both in pleasure and sorrow; I think this is how we should conclude about the difference between good and evil in the future. For the perfection of bodies growing from what is sown, according to the apostle, consists in incorruptibility, glory, honor and power; the belittlement of such qualities does not mean some kind of bodily cutting off of the increased, but the taking away and alienation of every property that is considered good. So, since what is imagined about us must necessarily be one of the opposite: either good or evil, it is clear that to say about someone “he is not in good” will serve as proof that he is certainly in evil. And in vice there is no honor, no glory, no incorruptibility, no power. Therefore, it is absolutely necessary, in someone who does not have this, to accept for certain that in him there is what is represented by the opposite: weakness, dishonor, corruption and everything that is similar to that kind, which was spoken of in the previous words, that it is difficult to free oneself from spiritual passions arising from vice, completely dissolved and fused with the soul, turning with it into something single. Therefore, after the purification and extermination of such passions by fiery healing, the place of each property will be replaced by what is represented by the best: incorruptibility, life, honor, grace, glory, power - and if anything else similar to this we imagine contemplating both in God himself and in His image, that is, in human nature. You might be interested in: