A word to those who mourn about those who have passed from this life to eternal life

In the sermon “A Word to those who mourn for those who have passed from this present life to the eternal life,” St. Gregory of Nyssa contrasts the present temporary life of a person with the future eternal one and says that Christians, unlike pagans, should not grieve excessively over the death of their loved ones. The word reflects the main features of the eschatology of St. Gregory. According to its content, the essay is divided into three parts: in the first, the question of true good is resolved, in the second, the real value of earthly life is determined, in the third, the question of the future life is explored. *The title of the work in Greek is Λόϒος εἰς τοὺς κοιμηθέντας. *The title of the work in Latin is De mortuis non esse dolendum. Those who consider it a misfortune for those departing from life that which is an inevitable consequence of our nature, and who grieve heavily for those who have departed from this life to a spiritual and incorporeal life, it seems to me, do not pay attention to what our life is like, but suffer from the deficiency of most people, who, out of some unreasonable habit, love their present, whatever it may be, as a good, although for a being rising above the unreasonable by nature, by reason and reasoning, we should only incline towards what is good and desirable according to the judgment of reason, and not, of course, choose what, out of some habit and unreasonable passion, seems pleasant to us and to our hearts. Therefore, it seems to me good, with the help of some reflections, distracting them from their usual mood, to raise as much as possible to a better and more decent way of thinking for rational beings; for in this way those unreasonable sorrows to which many indulge would be banished from human life. In our reasoning about the hypothesized subject, we will maintain order if, first, we examine what the true good consists of; then we will consider the properties of life in the body; and then, through comparison, we will compare the present with what we observe in our hope. Thus, our reasoning will achieve the goal of the word, which is to free many from the usual way of thinking about the good. Since all people are innate with some natural attitude towards the good, and every free choice is directed towards it, making the achievement of the good the goal of all concerns in life, then, therefore, a lack of understanding of what the true good consists of is usually the cause of most errors; so if the true good were clear to everyone, then we would never deviate from that in which good is nature itself, and would not strive voluntarily, through experience, to experience evil, if only things were not covered up by some deceptive appearance of good. So, first of all, in our speech, let us think about what true good consists of, so that error regarding this does not somehow become a reason for choosing the worse instead of the better. First of all, I say, in our word we need to present some definition and characteristic property of the sought-after object, from which our concept of good would receive certainty. So, what is the characteristic property of true good? In the fact that it does not mean only what is relatively useful, what is at different times useful and sometimes useless, what is good for one and not for another, but what in itself, by its own nature, is good, and remains the same for everyone and always; This, in my judgment, is the non-false and non-deceptive characteristic property that distinguishes goodness. For what is not good for everyone, not always, not in itself, regardless of external circumstances, cannot actually be considered an essential good. Thus, many superficial observers of existing things have imagined that goodness lies in the elements of the world; but upon careful examination, no one will find that in them there is good in itself, always and for everyone, for in each of them the action of the opposite property is mixed with the useful; for example, water is life-saving for those living in it, but fatal for earthly animals if they plunge into it. In the same way, the air for those whom nature has determined to live in it is saving, but for those who have been given life in the water, it turns out to be harmful and disastrous, as soon as any of the aquatic animals happen to be in it. Likewise, fire, which in some cases brings us benefit, much more often turns out to be disastrous. And the sun itself, not always, not everywhere, and not for everything that is exposed to its action, turns out to be a blessing; in other cases it can be very harmful when it bakes beyond the proper measure, dries out excessively what is underneath, often becomes the cause of illness, causes eye disease to people with sensitive vision, and by producing rotting moisture, gives rise to harmful and disgusting creatures in the spoiled rottenness of wet substances. So, I repeat, of all things, we must recognize as good only that which is always and equally good in its very essence, that which constantly remains so and does not change due to external circumstances. About everything else that, by some unreasonable assumption, seems good to people, I’m talking about physical and external goods, such as strength and beauty, nobility of origin, money, power and fame, and everything like that, about all this, as self-evident to everyone, I think we should remain silent and not needlessly burden our words with things that are generally known. For who does not know the transience of beauty or strength, or the fickleness of power, or the fickleness of fame, or the vanity of the passion for money of people who believe good in certain substances because of their brilliance and rarity? Having ordered this regarding these subjects, we must pay attention to real life, I’m talking about life spent in the flesh, is it such that it can be seen as a characteristic sign of good, or of another kind? For what our reasoning reveals in it will, of course, be a guide for the understanding of those who study how to relate to the departure from this life. So, the life of our body consists of replenishment and deprivation, which occurs in two ways, through food and drink, then through inhalation and exhalation of air, without which carnal life naturally cannot exist; for then a person ceases to live when our nature is no longer bothered by the succession of these opposites. After this, this kind of activity completely stops, since in the deceased nothing flows from outside or stands out from him, but with the resolution and decomposition of the body into the related elements of which it consisted, our nature finally remains in motionless peace, returning to each element what is akin and homogeneous, to the earth - what is earthy, to the air - what is characteristic of it, to water - what belongs to it, and to warmth - what corresponds to it. For as soon as in the mass of the body that composes it, dissimilar substances lose their forced and involuntary connection, but each of the particles located in us returns to its place; that our bodily nature, which forcibly restrained within itself the union of heterogeneous things, ceases to exist. And if anyone also includes sleep and wakefulness among the above opposites, as modifications of this life, he will not express a wrong opinion. For our nature is also subject to this, constantly attracted to opposite states, sometimes being relaxed during sleep, sometimes excited during wakefulness; and through both, deprivation and replenishment are accomplished in him. So, if deprivation and replenishment are a feature of our life, then it would be good to compare the above-mentioned characteristic property that distinguishes good with the properties of life in order to see whether this life is true good, or something else different from this. If replenishment in itself cannot be correctly attributed to good, as its natural property, then it is clear to everyone that it is also impossible to consider its opposite, I mean deprivation, as good. For with the complete opposition of both, it is impossible to reconcile them, as they are equally contradictory in the concept of good; but if one were by nature good, then its opposite would certainly be evil. But here both are equally beneficial for nature. Consequently, it is impossible to admit either the concept of replenishment or deprivation into the definition of good. So it has been proven that replenishment is something other than good; for everyone admits that it is not useful everywhere, and not always, and not in every form. Not with unhealthy food, satiety is disastrous, but even with appropriate food, exceeding the measure of what is healthy is often the cause of danger and harm; and if, in an overflowing state of the body that requires cleansing, a new overflow intensifies the existing one, then it will cause many troubles and end in incurable diseases. So, replenishment is not always, and not completely, a good, but the benefit from it is only for something, at some time, to a certain extent and quality. In the same way, everyone will find that what is thought of as the opposite of this, I’m talking about deprivation, is dangerous for those exposed to it if it exceeds the measure of usefulness; and vice versa, it is not useful if it is used as it should, and if for the beneficial effect of deprivation, time, quantity, and quality are taken into account. So, since the form of this life that we live does not correspond to the characteristic property of good, then, based on the above, we must admit that departure from this life is not separation from any good. For it is clear that the true, proper and main good is neither deprivation nor replenishment, which, as has been proven, is useful at some time and for something and in certain cases; and this does not correspond to the character of a truly existing good. Since the true good is opposite to the untrue good, and there is no middle ground between these two opposites, it must be recognized that those who move away from the untrue good are transferred from here to the essential good, which is always, everywhere and in everything, good, and not at a certain time, in some cases and in a certain respect, but always remains the same and identical. So the soul passes to this good from the carnal life, changing the present state of life to something else; It is impossible for those united to the flesh to accurately understand this state, what it is, but by removing the signs of this life it is possible, using analogy, to make some guess about it. It will no longer be connected with bodily coarseness; life will not depend on the balance of opposing elements, the uniform mutual struggle of which produces our composition and health; for excess or deficiency of any of the opposite (elements) causes suffering and disease in our nature. In that state, neither deprivation will in any way exhaust, nor burden will burden; life will be completely independent from all the adversities of the air, I mean frost and heat, and free from everything that we imagine as a change of opposites. The soul will be where life is free from all necessary labor and is not doomed by it. She will not suffer from the hardships of agriculture, be subjected to the labors of navigation, or engage in commercial profiteering; free from concerns about construction, weaving, or crafts, she will lead a quiet and silent life (1 Tim. 2:2), as Paul says, not fighting on horseback or on ship, not rushing into hand-to-hand combat in the ranks of the infantry, not worrying about preparing weapons, not collecting taxes, not building ditches or walls; All this is not necessary for her, and she is free from all this. There are no worries for her, nor does she give them to others; in her life there is no place for slavery and domination, poverty, nobility and ignorantity of the family, the modest state of ordinary people and bureaucratic authorities and any similar inequality. For the necessity of all this is destroyed in the absence of needs and in the immateriality of that life, in which the main principle of the existence of the soul is not the assimilation of something dry or wet, but the understanding of the divine nature; the inhalation of air, we have no doubt, will be replaced there by communication with the true and Holy Spirit. The enjoyment of these goods will not be replaced, as in this life, by having them, now by deprivation, now by the desire for them, now by aversion, but will always be complete, and its fullness will never be limited by saturation. For spiritual pleasure is not burdensome and insatiable; it constantly, without satiety or excess, satisfies the desires of those who use it. That is why this life is blessed and blameless, because it is no longer misled by sensual pleasures when judging what is good. So, what is sad about the death of those close to us that arouses our grief? Does anyone consider it unfortunate that they are passing on to a life alien to suffering and worries, to which pain from blows is inaccessible, where there is no danger from fire, nor wounds from iron, nor misfortune from earthquakes, shipwrecks, captivity, nor attacks from carnivorous animals, nor the sting and sting of snakes and poisonous animals? In that life, no one is puffed up with pride, or trampled underfoot by humiliation, or is savage with insolence, or is horrified by fear, or bursts with anger, blazing with rage and raging, or trembles with fear when he is unable to withstand the (angry) impulses of his superior. In that life there is no concern about what are the morals of kings, what are the laws, what is the way of thinking of those who are entrusted with leadership, what are the regulations, how large is the annual tax; whether there was a lot of rain, whether it flooded the crops with its excess, whether the hail destroyed the hope of farmers, whether the intensified drought dried out all the vegetation. And other disasters of life there are also not terrible: the sorrow of orphanhood does not sadden this life; the troubles of widowhood have no place there; Various diseases of the body, envy of those who are prosperous, and arrogance towards those in need do not exist there; everything similar, characteristic of local life, has been expelled. Equality and equality of laws, through perfect peaceful freedom, dwells in a society of souls, where everyone has everything that he prepares for himself by free choice. And if, instead of the best, someone, through some lack of prudence, prepares for himself something worse, then death is not to blame for this, because everyone arbitrarily chooses in advance what he wants. And so, what do those mourning those who have departed from this life grieve about? And if he who, together with the body of pleasure and sorrow, had not been completely free from any passionate disposition, then he would much more justly mourn those who remain here, who experience the same thing as those in prison, but whose habit of a hard life and common dwelling in darkness with others has caused them to consider their present situation pleasant and not sad; and they, perhaps, pity those who are brought out of prison, not knowing the lightness that awaits those freed from darkness. For if they knew what can be seen in the open sky, the beauty of the air, the height of the sky, the brilliance of the luminaries, the harmonious movement of the stars, the periodic revolution of the sun, the course of the moon, the varied beauty of plants on earth, the pleasant appearance of the sea when a calm wind slightly ripples its smooth and light surface, the beauty of both private and public city buildings with which famous and magnificent cities are decorated - if these and similar things were known to those kept in prison, then they would not mourn those brought out before them. from imprisonment, as if deprived of some benefit; This is how those outside the dungeon should rather think of those still there as those still suffering in a miserable life. So, it seems to me, those freed from the prison of this life, if it were entirely possible for them to express compassion with tears for those who suffer, would weep and cry for those who are still held in the sorrows of this life, because they do not see the premium and immaterial beauties, thrones and principalities, powers and dominions, and armies of angels and assemblies, and the city above and the heavenly triumph written ( Hebrews 12:23). And the Beauty that surpasses all this, which, as the unfaithful word of God indicated, will be seen... by those who are pure in heart (Matthew 5:8), is more excellent than everything that they hope for, and above everything that they imagine fortune-telling. And it is not only this that those who have passed away would consider worthy of weeping and sadness, but also the fact that, despite the great suffering with which life is full, the habit of sorrow has become so ingrained in people that they not only endure it as a necessary duty, but even carefully try to ensure that these (sorrows) continue forever. For the passionate desire for power, for wealth, and this greed for pleasure and other similar things that constitute the subject of concern, for the sake of which weapons, and wars, and mutual murder, and all voluntarily committed misfortunes, and deceit - all this is nothing more than a certain heap of misfortunes, which with care and zeal are arbitrarily brought into life. But those who have died cannot cry, because both this and any other painful state are alien to them; they are mind and spirit; having renounced flesh and blood, they do not have the ability to be visible to those who are clothed with the whiteness of the body; they cannot personally convince people to abandon a false judgment about what exists. And so let our mind speak instead of them, and we, as much as possible, having mentally renounced the body and alienated our soul from the addiction to substance, let us say instead of them: O man! Everyone who partakes of human nature, be aware of yourself, according to the commandment of Moses (Deut. 4:9) and know yourself exactly who you are, delving into the thought of what you are in truth and what is visible around you, so that when you look at what is outside you, you do not think that you are seeing yourself. Learn from the great Paul, who carefully studied this nature, that we have, as he says, one external man, and another internal, and that when one decays, this one is renewed (2 Cor. 4:16). And looking at the smoldering one, don’t think that you see yourself. Of course, even this corruptible will once be free from corruption, when in re-existence the mortal and perishable will be transformed into the imperishable and indestructible. But what now appears outside of us flows, passes and decays. So, we should not look at this, because we should not look at anything else that is visible, but, as Paul says, we should not look at the visible: for what is visible is temporary, but what is invisible is eternal (2 Cor. 4:18), but turning the gaze of the mind to the invisible in us, we must believe that we are true that which is not accessible to knowledge through the senses. So, let us know ourselves, according to the word of the parable; for knowing oneself is a means of cleansing sins that arise from ignorance. But it is not easy for someone who wants to see himself to do this unless we figure out how to make the impossible possible. For just as with regard to the eyes of the body, nature has arranged it in such a way that, seeing everything else, they remain unseeing of themselves: in the same way, the soul, experiencing everything else, carefully studying and exploring what is outside it, is deprived of the opportunity to see itself. So, what happens to the eyes, let the soul imitate it. For just as the eyes, since they are not given by nature the power to direct visual activity to the discretion of themselves and see themselves, looking at the appearance and outline of their orbit in the mirror, see themselves through reflection: so the soul must look at its own image, and what it sees in the outline in which it is reflected, look at it as characteristic of itself. But we must change this example a little so that the thought matches the words. For as for the image in the mirror, the image fully reflects the prototype; As for the characteristic features of the soul, we mean the opposite; for the appearance of the soul is reflected according to the beauty of the divine. And so the soul then sees itself with accuracy when it looks at its Prototype. What is the Divinity to which the soul is likened? Not the body, not the outline, not the appearance, not the size, not the density, not the heaviness, not the place, not the time, nor anything else like this, which constitutes the sign of a material creature: but after taking away all this and the like, the rest must certainly be understood as something rational and immaterial, intangible and incorporeal and unextended. So, if these, as we understand, are the characteristic features of the Prototype, then, of course, it follows that the soul formed according to the appearance of It must bear the same characteristic features, so that it too must be immaterial and formless, both rational and incorporeal. Now let us consider when more human nature approaches primitive beauty, either during carnal life or when it becomes outside of it. But it is clear to everyone that just as the flesh, being material, has an affinity with this material life, so the soul then becomes involved in rational and immaterial life when it casts off the substance that contains it. So, which of these states deserves the name of misfortune? If the body were a true good, then we should grieve when detached from the flesh, since if we were removed from it, along with the body we would of course be deprived of our affinity with good. since the Good, which exceeds everything we can imagine, in the image of which we are created, is rational and incorporeal, we should be sure that when we pass through death to incorporeality, we approach that nature that is alien to any bodily coarseness, and having taken off the fleshy shell, as if some kind of vile mask, we return to the beauty that is akin to us, according to which we were formed from the beginning, having been created in the image Prototype. And such a thought should be a reason for joy, and not for despondency, for those who recognize that a person who has fulfilled this necessary service no longer lives in an alien region, when, having given to each of the elements what belongs to it, what is collected from them, he ascends to his own and natural dwelling, pure and incorporeal. For the substance of the body, with which, of necessity, united in this life, the mind, necessarily united in this life, is truly alien and incompatible with the incorporeal nature, living with it a life that is, as it were, foreign to itself. Because the mutual combination of elements, like some people of different languages ​​and alien in morals, who make up one state from different peoples, produces violent and discordant communication, since each of them is drawn by their own nature to what is related and akin to it. And the mind mixed with them, being uncomplicated in its simple and uniform nature, lives, as it were, among foreigners and strangers, being not akin to the multiplicity of elements surrounding it; He, by some necessity, permeated among the many-partness of the body, does violence to his nature, uniting with those foreign to him. When the elements, through mutual resolution, are naturally attracted to that which is akin and related to each of them, our feeling suffers from the necessary dissolution and separation of what is united; The rational power of the soul shares this feeling, being habitually inclined towards that nature that has always depressed it. But the mind will then cease to be burdened and suffer when it is outside the struggle that takes place during the interweaving of opposite elements. For when cold is defeated by the predominance of heat, or vice versa, warmth disappears from the intensification of cold, when moisture gives way to increased dryness, or the density of the dry principle is resolved from the increase in moisture, then with the cessation of the battle of death in us, the mind will receive peace; leaving the place of battle, I’m talking about the body, and having removed himself from the environment of mutually fighting elements, he will live on his own, returning through calmness his strength, which was strained in the interweaving of the body. This and similar things are said by the mind to those living in the body, uttering almost the following speech: “O people, you don’t know exactly where you are, nor do you yet understand where you will move.” For the present, as it is by nature, thought has not yet been able to explore, but pays attention to one habitual thing in life, not being able to find out: what is the nature of the body? What is the power of feelings? How are organic members structured? What is the structure of the insides? What is the self-propelled activity of nerves? How does what is within us become either the solid nature of bones or the light-like being of a shining eye? How from the same food and the same drink, one part becomes thinner into hair, and the other expands into nails on the extremities of the fingers? Or how a fire always burns in the heart, spreading through the veins throughout the body? Or how does what we drink, when it enters the liver, change both its appearance and quality, and through some change itself turns into blood? Knowledge of all this is still inaccessible, so we do not know the life we ​​live. And those who live with the help of feelings cannot see a life detached from the senses at all. For how can anyone see through sense what is inaccessible to sense? So, if both life is equally unknown; this one - because we look only at one thing that appears to us, and that one - because the feeling cannot explore it: then why do people suffer, holding on to this one as for good, although not knowing it, and fearing and fearing that one as heavy and worthy of fear? - for no other reason than because you don’t know what it is like. However, from what is sensually visible to us and unknown, there are many other things that we are not afraid of. What is the nature of what appears in the sky, or what imparts opposite movement to the celestial bodies, what maintains the density of the earth, how the fluid nature of the waters always comes from the earth, and the earth is not exhausted - we do not know this and other similar things, but we do not consider the unknown worthy of fear. Likewise, regarding this nature, which transcends all minds, the divine, blissful and incomprehensible nature, we believe that it is, but what its essence is, it has not yet been possible to even comprehend it in any kind of fortune-telling way; and yet we love, with all our heart and soul and strength, the unknown and cannot be understood by thought. So, why is this senseless fear mostly only about the life that awaits us after this life, and from ignorance alone we are afraid of what we do not know, just as happens to babies who are frightened by fictions that have no reality!? He who wishes to see the truth of what is, firstly, tries to understand the object; then he considers what he is by nature, something useful and easily accessible, or dangerous and disgusting. And what is completely unknown and unknown, how can anyone with intelligence consider it dangerous, and just because it is far from what is familiar to us, it is suspicious to look at it, as if at the approach of some kind of fire or beast? However, life clearly teaches us not to always look at what is familiar, but to turn our desires to what is good. For even people, when formed, do not constantly live in the form of an embryo; but while they are in the womb, nature makes life in the womb pleasant and appropriate for them; when they are born, they do not remain at the breasts forever, but as far as the imperfection of age is concerned, this is good and accordingly; and after this they move on to another, then the next life, not at all obeying habit in order to remain close to the chest. Then, after the state of infancy, there come other occupations for young people, and other, older ones, to which a person successively moves, without sadness changing his habits along with the ages. So, just as one who is nourished in his mother’s womb, if he had any voice, would be indignant, being expelled from the womb through birth, and would cry out that he is suffering misfortune, being torn away from the kind of life pleasant to him (which he does, at the first breath, along with his birth, shedding a tear, as if indignant and sobbing about his rejection from his usual life), so, it seems to me, those who grieve over the transition from the present life, when they want to constantly live in the area of ​​this material, unpleasant life, they experience the same thing as uterine babies. For after a fatal disease gives birth to another life, as soon as they cross into that light and breathe in the clean air, they will learn by experience how great the difference is between that life and the present one. And those who are in this damp and putrefactive life, being simply embryos, and not people, regret the one who has come out of the tightness that surrounds us, as if he had been deprived of some good, not knowing that his eye, like that of a born baby, is then opened when he becomes outside of what now surrounds him from everywhere (of course, we must understand the eye of the soul, with which it despises the truth of existence); His sense of hearing will also be opened, through which he hears unspeakable verbs, which a man should not eat with verbs (2 Cor. 12:4); their lips open and attract pure and immaterial air, with which their rational voice and true word are strengthened, when the celebrating saints join the voice; He is also rewarded with a taste of the divine, through which he knows, according to the word of psalmody, that the Lord is good (Ps. 33:9); receives the ability of smell, with which he perceives the fragrance of Christ; The soul also acquires the power of touch, touching the truth and perceiving the Word, according to the testimony of John (1 John 1:1). So, if this and the like are presented to people after birth through death, then what does crying and sorrow and despondency mean? Let the examiner of the nature of things answer us now: does he really prefer to be misled by bodily feelings in judging the good than to look at the very truth of things with the pure eye of the soul? Here on earth there is some kind of need for the soul to submit to an alien judgment in the concept of good. since the perfection of mental powers is incompatible with an infant body, and the perfection of the activity of the senses appears immediately with the birth of a child, then the senses warn the mind in judging the good; and what turned out to be pleasant for the senses, what they considered good and what they acquired as a habit, the soul recognizes without testing as the same, taking it on faith as good, which was recognized by the sense that preceded reflection, which sees good in colors and juices and similar nonsense. Since all this will no longer appear to us after leaving the body, it is quite necessary that the soul should see as true good that which it is akin to by nature. For neither the sight will be deceived by a pleasant color when this eye no longer exists, nor will the will be uniformly inclined towards anything pleasing the senses when all bodily sensation has faded away. When only the rational active force immaterially and incorporeally touches intelligible beauty, then our nature will uncontrollably perceive its inherent goodness, which is neither color, nor outline, nor distance, nor quantity, but something that surpasses any divinatory likeness. So, what, perhaps, will anyone say who regrets real life? What is this body for, and what is it for us, if, as your word proves, life is better without it? To such a person we will say that he who is able to survey the entire economy of nature will discover considerable benefits in the body. Indeed, blessed is this angelic life, which has no need for the burden of the body; but life in the body is not aimless in relation to it; for real life is the path to what we desire. So we see in plants, in them the fruit, having received its beginning from color, through it reaches what becomes fruit; and cereals born from seeds also do not immediately appear in the form of an ear, but the plant first becomes a cereal; then, from this grain, with its decay, a stem emerges and thus the fruit ripens at the top of the ear. However, the farmer does not condemn this necessary order and sequence, saying: why the flower, and moreover, before the fruit? Or what is the use of a grain that first grows from a seed, when the color disappears and the grain dries up in vain, bringing no benefit to human nutrition? Because he who understands the miracles of nature knows that a fruit can be formed from seeds and plants only by this leading to its formation through skillful sequence. Due to the fact that the cereal growing from the seeds is useless for our use, we cannot yet call what happens to the plant unnecessary and pointless. He who needs food pays attention only to what he needs, and the law of nature has in mind nothing more than that, through an established sequence, to complete the ripening of the fruit. For this purpose, firstly, nature clothes the seed lying in the ground with polysyllabic roots, through which it extracts food suitable for itself from the moisture: then it grows grain, covering the root with greenery from the harmful effects of the air. Although this grain is not a fruit, it is a kind of assistance and a path to the formation of a fruit. First of all, by highlighting the power contained in the seed, nature produces grain, apparently superfluous for the fruit, covering the root with it from the harmful effects of the air resulting from cold and heat. When the seed is firmly established in the depths with its roots, then, leaving concern for the grain, since the root no longer needs to be covered, nature concentrates all its strength on the growth of the stem; With some kind of artistic wisdom, she skillfully arranges a tube-shaped device, with the help of which the plant, striving upward, is clothed around with covers superimposed on one another; for it is necessary that at the beginning the life of the damp and weak stem is supported by these integuments, bound from the inside by connecting hymens for the sake of strength. When the stem reaches the appropriate height, the fruit appears: the outer cover produces a spike, which, being divided hair-like into many awns, at the base of each of them hides and nourishes the fruit. So, if the farmer is not annoyed either at the roots emerging from the seed, or at the grain growing from the seed, or at the awn of the ear, but in all this he sees something that is necessary, through which nature, skillfully following its own path, produces the formation of the fruit, by removing the unnecessary, elevating the productive force; then you should not be annoyed that our nature comes to its end in necessary ways, but based on the similarity with what you see in the seed, you should think that the present always has an undoubtedly useful and necessary goal for something else, and does not itself serve as the goal for which we came into being. For the Creator did not intend us to remain in the form of embryos, and it is not infant life that serves as the goal of our nature, nor the ages that follow it, in which nature always alternately clothes us, changing our appearance over time, nor the destruction of the body that occurs from death; but all this and the like are part of the path we are walking; the goal and limit of such a procession is restoration to the primitive state, which is nothing other than assimilation to the Divine. And as we saw in the example of the ear, according to the law of nature it turned out to be necessary, and the grain growing from the seed, although agriculture does not exist for it, and not the plant covers, and the awns and the stem, and the membranes serve as the object for which the farmer works, but the nutritious fruit that reaches maturity with their help; so the expected end of life is bliss. And all that we now see in bodily life - death, and old age, and youth and formation in the womb, all these are, as it were, some grains and awns, and stems, there is a path and a follow-up and the power of the desired perfection. Having this perfection in mind, if you are prudent, you will neither harbor enmity towards life, nor passionate love and attachment to it, so that you will not grieve at the loss of it, but willfully hasten to death. It is also not useless, perhaps, to add to what we have said (although it seems that we are breaking the sequence) that nature is constantly concerned about death, and death certainly connects with life flowing forward in time. Since life from the past constantly moves towards the future and never returns back, a necessary consequence, closely connected with the activity of life, is death: for in the elapsed time all vital movement and energy completely ceases. So, since the property of death is inactivity and lack of energy, and we always certainly find this behind vital energy (in the past), it is not alien to the truth to say that death is associated with this life. And in another way we can confirm the truth of this thought, since experience itself testifies in favor of the position that today’s man is not the same as yesterday’s, in terms of material composition, but in fact something in him is constantly dying and rotting, and decaying, and erupting; nature, as if from its home (I’m talking about the composition of the body), carries out a deathly stench and consigns it to the earth, which has already lost its vitality. Thus, according to the word of the great Paul, we die all our days (1 Cor. 15:31), not constantly remaining the same in the same house of the body, but each time becoming different through addition and separation, as if constantly changing into a new body. So, why do we shun death, which, as has been proven, is a subject of constant concern and exercise for the carnal life? And speaking of sleep and awakening, are we not again pointing to the combination of death and life? Doesn’t the feeling fade away for those who are sleeping, and doesn’t awakening again represent to us the action of the expected resurrection? But the subject of our research is not yet clear from what we have said, since introductory thoughts have diverted our speech to talk about something else. So let us return again to the previous position that for the hope of the blessings we expect, the physical nature is not useless. For if we remained what we were from the beginning, then, of course, we would not have the need for a robe of skins (Gen. 3:21), since our likeness to the Divine would illuminate us. The divine image, which appeared in us at the beginning, was not a feature having any outline or color, but in which divine beauty is seen, man was also adorned with it, reflecting the original grace with dispassion, bliss and incorruptibility. since, seduced by the enemy of our life, a person voluntarily acquired an inclination towards the bestial and unreasonable, then for the unreasonable it might seem useful, against his will, to distract him from evil and forcibly return him to perfection. But it seemed to the Creator of nature that this kind of order would be useless and unfair to inflict damage on nature (ours) in the greatest of its benefits. Man was godlike and blessed because he was awarded free will (since autocracy and independence are a property of divine bliss), then to force him and through captivity to lead him to something would mean to take away this dignity from him. If human nature voluntarily, by the movement of free will, rushing towards something indecent, were forcibly and forcibly removed from what it liked, then this would be the taking away of the good that it had before, and the deprivation of godlike honor; for free will is likeness to God. So, in order for freedom to remain in our nature and evil to be destroyed, the wisdom of God came up with such a means: to allow a person to remain with what he desired, so that, having tasted the evil that he desired, and having learned by experience what he exchanged for what, he again voluntarily with a strong desire returned to his former bliss, casting off everything passionate and unreasonable from his nature, as if some kind of burden, having purified himself either in real life through prayer and wisdom, or after repose from here, the furnace of purifying fire. Like a doctor, with the help of science, fully knowledgeable about what is beneficial and harmful to health, if, while advising a boy on a decent (medicine), he is not able to prevent him, imperfect in age and understanding, from becoming carried away by any harmful fruit or herbs, then having all kinds of antidotes ready, he allows the child to taste what is harmful to him, with the goal that, having experienced pain, he will learn the benefit fatherly advice, and in order to arouse in the boy a strong desire for recovery, again with the help of medicines to restore his health, which he lost from an inappropriate attraction to harmful things; so the gentle and kind Father of our nature, knowing what is saving for us, also knew what was harmful to man, and did not advise him to touch the latter; when the lust for the worst prevailed, He had no shortage of good antidotes, with the help of which it was possible to return a person to his former health. For when a person preferred this material pleasure to spiritual joy, God, apparently, assisted him in this desire, through the leather clothing with which he clothed him because of his inclination to evil, and with which the properties of an unreasonable nature were mixed with him. By the wisdom of the One who arranges the best, through that which is opposite to this, clothing has been prepared for the rational nature from the properties of irrational animals. Leather clothing, carrying in itself all the properties that are associated with irrational nature - voluptuousness and anger, and gluttony, and greed and the like, represents a way for human freedom to lean on one side or the other, being a substance for both virtue and vice. For a person in real life, through the movement of free will, can choose both, if he renounces what is inherent in unreasonable nature and turns his gaze to himself, through a more worthy life he makes real life pure from the evil mixed in with it, overcoming unreasonableness with reason; if he is inclined to the unreasonable attraction of passions, using the skin of dumb people as an aid to passions, then in another way after this he will be taught better when, after leaving the body, he learns the difference between virtue and vice because of the impossibility of being a partaker of the Divine, unless the purifying fire cleanses the filth mixed in with the soul. This is what has made the body necessary and necessary for us, through which freedom is preserved to wholeness, and the return path to good is not forbidden, but after a certain continuation of time, a voluntary inclination for the better arises in us. Some are already here, in the continuation of life in the flesh, have succeeded in spiritual life, in dispassion; such, as we know, were the patriarchs and prophets, and with them and after them, through virtue and wisdom, those who ascended to perfection - I mean the disciples, the Apostles, the martyrs and all those who preferred a virtuous life to a material life: (all of them), although fewer in number than the many who go to evil, nevertheless testify to the possibility of succeeding in virtue in the flesh. Others, through corrective education in the subsequent life, having renounced their addiction to substances in the purifying fire, through the free desire of what is good, will return to the grace destined from the beginning for our nature. For the desire for that which is alien to it does not remain in nature forever; Therefore, everyone is satiated and burdened with what is unusual for him, with which in the beginning nature itself had no communication: and what is akin and homogeneous forever remains desired and loved, as long as nature remains unchanged in itself. If he suffers any perversion from evil will, then a desire arises in him for what is alien to him, pleasure, which gives pleasure not to nature, but to the passions of nature; when passion has no place, along with it there is no place for the desire for that which is unusual for nature, and again for him it becomes desirable and close - what is characteristic of him; and such is the pure and immaterial and incorporeal that no one would be mistaken in calling it a property of the all-surpassing Divinity. For, as for the eyes of the body, when some acute suppuration damages the optic nerves, the darkness is pleasant, due to the affinity of the density (pus) with the darkness, and if the treatment removes what made vision difficult, then the light again becomes familiar and pleasant, mixing with the purity and luminosity of the pupil; in the same way, since through the seduction of the enemy, the vision of the soul was clouded with evil, as if with some kind of pus, the mind voluntarily received an inclination towards a dark life, through passions becoming akin to darkness. Everyone who does evil hates the light, says the word of God (John 3:20). When evil disappears from the realm of existence and is again brought into the non-existent, our nature will again look at the light with pleasure, after the elimination of that which covered the purity of the soul with pus. So, what we have said has proven that it is unreasonable to be hostile to the nature of the flesh, for the cause of evil does not depend on it; if this were so, then evil would have the same power for everyone who received bodily life as their inheritance. But since each of the men we mentioned was both in the flesh and not vicious, it is clear from this that it is not the body that is the cause of passions, but free will that produces passions. For the body moves in accordance with its nature, directing its aspirations to that which serves to preserve its composition and continuation (life). So, for example: it needs food and drink, so that when its strength is depleted, it can again make up for its deficiency; the attraction of nature is directed towards this. Again, through succession by birth, the nature of the body, being mortal, becomes (as it were) immortal; therefore, he has a corresponding desire for this goal. In addition, since the body was created naked and devoid of hair, we need outer clothing. Also, not being able to endure heat, cold and rain, we seek the shelter of houses. He who looks at these and similar needs rationally, calmly accepts each of them, the goal of his aspirations being to supply what is necessary: ​​a house, clothing, a spouse, food - with all this satisfying the needs of nature. And the slave of pleasure makes necessary needs the paths of passions; instead of food, he seeks the pleasures of the belly; prefers jewelry to clothes; useful arrangement of dwellings - their great value; instead of childbearing, he turns his attention to lawless and forbidden pleasures. Therefore, covetousness, effeminacy, pride, vanity, and all sorts of debauchery entered into human life through wide gates. All this and the like, as if some unnecessary offspring and branches, grew into necessary needs, because the natural desire crossed the boundaries of need and took on wide dimensions among those who care about what is of no use to anyone. For what has hammered silver utensils colored with gold and stones to do with the benefits of food? Or what is the need for clothing in gold weaving and in brightly colored purple fabric, and in the painting of weavers, through which these artists depict battles, animals, and the like on tunics and clothes? The companion of luxury was the disease of covetousness; for in order to have ready means and opportunity for it, the material for acquiring what you want is obtained from covetousness. And covetousness opened the way to infidelity; it, according to Solomon, is a broken vessel (Proverbs 23:27), which, no matter how much it is filled with water, constantly turns out to be empty. Thus, it is not the body that produces the desire for evil, but free will, which perverts expedient need into desire for what is not permitted. So, let irrational people not blame the body, which subsequently, through its transformation by rebirth into a most excellent state, will adorn the soul when death cleanses it of what is superfluous and unnecessary for the enjoyment of the future life. For in the future life what is needed for him now will not be suitable, but the structure of our body will be akin to and corresponding to the enjoyment of this life and harmoniously adapted to the use of its benefits. Let us present an example, because a similarity with something known can better explain our thought. A block of iron is useful for the art of blacksmithing, serving in its raw form as an anvil for the blacksmith. But when it is necessary to process iron for some more delicate work, then the block is carefully cleaned by fire and everything earthy and useless is removed from it, which those skilled in this matter call dross. And thus the former anvil, having been cleaned by processing, became armor or some other finely crafted thing, having been cleansed through incandescence in a furnace from that surplus, which, while it was an anvil, was not considered superfluous for the then use; for the dross that was part of the block brought some benefit, increasing the mass of iron. The example is clear to us; Now let us apply the meaning we have perceived in this example to the thought we have in mind. What does this mean? In the nature of the body there are now many qualities similar to dross, which, although in this life have some useful purpose, are completely useless for the bliss expected after this life and are alien to it. So, what happens to iron in the fire, when the melting furnace removes everything useless, happens to the body through death, when, through the resolution of death, everything unnecessary is removed. For the discerning, of course, it is obvious that there is something from which the body is subsequently cleansed, and the absence of which in real life would be harmful to it. However, for the sake of clarity, we will talk about this in a few words. In accordance with the proposed example, let us call a lump the natural desire that operates in everyone; let the dregs be that to which this desire is now drawn: pleasure, wealth, ambition, lust for power, arrogance, and the like. All this and the like are thoroughly purified by death. Desire, freed and purified from all this, will turn its active force to that which alone is worthy of aspiration and desire and love, without completely extinguishing the aspirations invested in us by nature for this, but changing them to the use of immaterial goods. For there is an unceasing love for true beauty; there is a praiseworthy covetousness of the treasures of wisdom, a beautiful and good ambition to achieve communion with the kingdom of God, a wonderful passion of greed, in which the desire for good is never stopped by satiety with these, all-surpassing goods. And so he who knows that in due time the Artist of all will melt the block of the body into a weapon of good will, making from it the armor of righteousness, as the Apostle says (Eph. 6:13-18), and the sword of the Spirit and the helmet of hope and the full armor of God, loves his body, according to the law of the Apostle, who says that no one hates his own body (Eph. 5:29). The body must be loved when it is purified, and not like dross that is rejected. For truly the word of God says that when our earthly church of the body is destroyed, then we will find it made a creation from God, a church not made with hands, eternal in heaven (2 Cor. 5:1), worthy to be a dwelling place of God in the spirit. And let no one describe to me the properties and outlines and appearance of this church not made by hands, which are similar to the properties that now appear in us and distinguish us from each other by their characteristics. since it is not only the resurrection that preaches the word of God to us, but the divine Scripture also guarantees that those renewed must be changed by the resurrection (1 Cor. 15:51, 52); then it is quite necessary that it be hidden and unknown to everyone what we will change into, since in real life no similarity with what is expected is seen. For now, everything rough and hard has a natural tendency towards the bottom; then the body, after the change, will become a mountain ascending, since the word of God says that after the change of nature in all those who have come to life through the resurrection, we will be caught up in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord (1 Thess. 4:17). So, if those who have changed have no heaviness left in their body, but those who have been transformed into a more perfect state, together with their incorporeal nature, soar with grief: then, of course, other properties of the body - color, appearance, outline and all others, in particular, will also change into something more divine. Why do we not see any need to allow between those changed by the resurrection the same difference that our nature now necessarily has from the successive change of its states. It is impossible to clearly prove that this difference will not exist, because we do not know what these properties will transform into through the change. And that the race of all will be one, when we all become one body of Christ, having perceived one image and form, we have no doubt, since the light of the divine image will equally shine in everyone. And what our nature, when changed, acquires instead of the indicated properties, we affirm, will be better than everything that our thought can guess. But so that our words about this do not seem completely unfounded, we point out the following: since the difference between the male and female sexes serves our nature for nothing other than procreation, then regarding this subject, some worthy of the fortune-telling blessing promised by God, the Treasure of Goods, can be recognized as the fact that the generative power of nature will change to serve that procreation, to which the great Isaiah was involved, who said: from fear... We received You, O Lord, in Your womb and bore, and gave birth to the spirit of Your salvation, which He created on earth (Is. 26:18). For if such childbearing is wonderful, and childbearing is the cause of salvation, as the Apostle says (1 Tim. 2:15), then no one who has once generated for himself an abundance of blessings through such a birth will ever cease to give birth to the spirit of salvation. If someone says that the distinctive appearance and image that we have will again remain the same with us when we are revived, then I cannot directly agree with this thought without considering whether this is so or not. If anyone says that when revived a person will remain in the same form, then this concept will lead to great absurdity, because in appearance and distinctive features the same person does not always remain the same, with differences in age and illness, taking on first one form and then another. A baby has a different appearance, and another a youth, another a child, a husband, a middle-aged person, an elderly person and an old man. Each of these ages is different from the other: those affected by jaundice, swollen with water, dried up by consumption, fattened by some kind of thinness, suffering from bile, plethora, and an abundance of bad moisture are also different; since each of them has an appearance consistent with the painful state that prevails in it, just as it is unreasonable to think that this appearance will remain after the resurrection (since the change will transform everything into a more divine appearance), it is also not convenient to formulate an idea of ​​​​what our more perfect appearance will be, since we believe that the blessings that are before us, that we desire, are above sight, and hearing, and thought. If anyone says that the distinctive aspect of each will be a qualitative, moral property, he will not be entirely mistaken. For just as now the difference in the distinctive properties in each comes from some change in the elements in us, since the appearance characteristic of each receives (one or another) outline and color, depending on the increase or decrease of the various elements: so in that life, it seems to me, it will not be these elements that will give each a special appearance, but the characteristics of vice or virtue, the qualitative mutual mixture of which will impart one or another distinctive character to the species. Something similar happens almost in real life, when the external expression of the face indicates the innermost state of the soul, from which we easily recognize who is oppressed by sadness, who is worried about anger, who is burning with lust, and vice versa: who is cheerful, kind, adorned with the venerable quality of chastity. So, just as in real life a certain disposition of the heart is expressed in appearance, and inner passion is reflected in the outer appearance of a person: so, it seems to me, and after our nature changes to a more perfect state, the moral qualities of a person will be the cause of one or another of his appearance; He will not be other than what he will be (essentially) and will appear differently (externally), but as he is, so he will be and will be manifest to everyone, such as: rational, righteous, meek, pure, full of love, loving God, and again at the same time, or having all the perfections, or adorned with only one, or possessing a greater part of them, or having one perfection to a lesser extent, and another to a greater extent. According to these and similar properties, relating both to perfection and to that which is opposite to it, each will receive a different and separate appearance from each other, until, as the Apostle says, the last... enemy (1 Cor. 15:26) is eliminated, and after the complete elimination of evil from all beings, the God-like beauty, in the image of which we were created in the beginning, will again shine in all. This beauty is light, and purity, and incorruptibility, and life, and truth, and the like. For it is not indecent for them to be and appear as children of day and light, and in light and purity and incorruption there will be no change or difference in relation to what is homogeneous. But for all one grace will shine when, having become sons of light, they are enlightened like the sun (Matthew 13:43), according to the untrue word of the Lord, that everyone will achieve perfection in one, according to the promise of God the Word, which means the same thing, that one and the same grace will appear in everyone, so that everyone will share the same joy with their neighbor. From this, everyone will rejoice himself, seeing the beauty of another, and communicate his own joy; since no evil will change the appearance of the soul into an ugly form. This is what our mind tells us on behalf of the departed, imitating, as much as possible, their speeches. We will conclude our advice to those who mourn with the words of the great Paul: I do not want... do not lead you, brethren, about the dead, so that you do not grieve, as do others who have no hope (1 Thess. 4:13). So, if we have learned anything worthy of attention regarding the departed, about whom our words were wise, then we will no longer indulge in this ignoble and slavish grief; and if we need to grieve, then let us choose this laudable and virtuous sorrow. For just as there is pleasure proper to animals and unreasonable, and there is pure and immaterial, so that which is opposite to pleasure is divided into vicious and virtuous. There is also a certain type of sadness, blessed and not unsuitable for the acquisition of virtue, which is opposite to this unreasonable and slavish despondency. He who has given himself over to the latter will subsequently feel repentance that, having crossed the proper limits, he allowed himself to be overcome by suffering. And blessed sorrow produces unaccompanied repentance and unshameful sadness in those who, with its help, strive for the perfection of a virtuous life. For the one who grieves correctly is the one who feels what blessings he has lost, comparing this temporary and unclean life with that immortal bliss that he possessed before he abused his freedom for evil; and the more this sorrow burdens a person in real life, the more accelerated is his acquisition of desired benefits. For the feeling of a lack of beauty is an arousal to a diligent search for what we strongly desire. So, since there is also saving sadness, as we said, then listen to those who are easily carried away by the illness of grief, that we do not forbid sadness, but only instead of reprehensible we recommend good. Sorrow not with the sorrow of the world, which brings about death, as the Apostle says (2 Cor. 7:10), but with sorrow for God, the goal of which is the salvation of the soul. For tears shed in vain and in vain over the deceased may, perhaps, be the cause of condemnation for the one who misuses a useful thing. If He who created everything through Wisdom instilled this disposition towards sadness into our nature so that it would serve as a means of purifying the evil that has prevailed over us and promoting the assimilation of the desired benefits, then he who sheds tears in vain and uselessly will perhaps be guilty before his own Master, according to the word of the Gospel, as a bad steward who uselessly squandered the wealth entrusted to him ( Luke 16:1, 2). For every increase in goodness is wealth, which is counted in honest treasuries. So, I do not want you not to be taught, brethren, about the dead (1 Thess. 4:13) what we have learned, and if besides this any other teaching is revealed to the more perfect by the Holy Spirit, do not grieve as others do who have no hope (1 Thess. 4:13). For it is common for the unfaithful to limit the hopes of life to one real life; That is why they consider death to be lamentable, because for them there is no hope for what we believe. But we, believing in the great Helper of the resurrection from the dead, the very Lord of all creation, who both died and rose again in order to confirm the word of the resurrection with deeds, will have an undoubted hope of good things, with the existence of which there will be no place for sorrow for the departed. May our God and Lord Jesus Christ, who comforts the humble (2 Cor. 7:6), comfort your hearts and confirm your love with His mercy, for to Him belongs glory forever and ever. Amen. You might be interested in: