Conversations about death

Contents A Word about death in general A Word about death A Word about what death is A Word about the origin of death A Word about the origin of death A Word about how death occurred in the human race A Word about how sin gave birth to death A Word about what Jesus Christ did with death A Word about the fate of death itself Having chosen death as our subject, we would like, my brethren, to portray this last enemy of ours, as death is called in the word of God, before you so that our old and carnal man would be struck by all the horror that can occur in him from the grave and corruption, and so that at the same time the new and spiritual man in us, living by faith and hope, could lift his head and find consolation for himself in the very thing for which the flesh and the flesh tremble so much. blood. That is, we would like for two feelings to remain in us from thinking and talking about death for the rest of our lives: a feeling of saving fear, which would serve us as a shield from the delights and temptations of the world, a shield against our own passions and lusts, and a feeling of Christian hope, which would lift us above those unworthy of a Christian, cowardice and despair, with which the servants of sin and the flesh face the death of the children of this age. What should we do to achieve this ultimate goal? Should I lead you immediately to Eden, to the forbidden tree, from which death sprang for us, where for the first time the terrible word of judgment and execution thundered for us: you are earth and you will return to earth? Or take you to Golgotha ​​and place you at the foot of the Cross of Christ, where our death is trampled upon by the death of the Son of God, and where the comforting appeal of the Prophet began to come true in all its strength: where is the sting of death? Where the hell is victory? (Hos. 13, 14; 1 Cor. 15, 55). Should I immediately go with you to the cemetery to our departed brothers and pray to them? may they tell us the secret of death, may we understand what awaits each of us at the hour of our death? Or should we descend directly to our own last bed and show how the Angel of Death will approach us, how our soul will have to be separated from the body, and we will go to that country from which there is no return? It will not be superfluous if we do all this and examine our enemy from all sides, in order to see all his strength and all his powerlessness. Thank God that we can now see death in all its entrances and exits. The poor pagans, who did not have the revelation of heaven, could only tremble before death, for the wisest of them, being left to their own reason, which sees nothing beyond the senses, could not say anything about where death comes from and what awaits a person on the other side of the coffin. But a Christian with the Gospel in his hands boldly goes to the cemetery: for him there is no impenetrable darkness there; he clearly sees not only the beginning, but also the end of death. Using this heavenly light, let us delve into the origin and essence of death, consider what precedes it and what follows it, delve into the reasons why death is fierce and how we can make it quiet and painless, and in conclusion, let us pay attention to our own death awaiting us, and learn how to meet death in a Christian way. All this will be the subject of our subsequent discussions. And this time we will limit ourselves to a general overview of death and its dominion over the human race. If one of the celestial beings who had never been on the earth inhabited by us appeared on it and drew attention to our human race, then what do you think could most strike his gaze? It seems to me that he would most likely be surprised and amazed by our terrible mortality. In the face of a man, he would immediately recognize the ruler of the earth, to whom everything is subordinated and serves, willingly or unwillingly; and in death he would immediately see a fierce enemy and tyrant, to whom this ruler of the earth was sacrificed along with the last of the dumb. And how long would he have to wait to make this final conclusion about us? Not even a single second. For on the earth we inhabit, you will recognize and be horrified! not a single second passes without someone dying, so if we counted continuously and in order a series of human deaths, then this count could serve instead of the most accurate clock for measuring our earthly time. So frail and fleeting is the way of our existence here! Almost a quarter of people, apparently, are born just to die, leaving no trace of their existence, except perhaps in the heart of their parents, torn apart by grief; For many, the minute of birth also serves as the minute of death; many die without entering the world, having their mother’s womb in their coffin. Of those remaining to live, barely a third reaches adolescence and barely half passes beyond the middle of life; and those who live to the last limits of life (and are they great? 70, 80 years!) are as few as the classes that have escaped from under the reaper’s sickle. No one is free from death. Enter a dilapidated hut, see a coffin, death on the mountains, death in the valleys, death on the seas and rivers. There is a deadline and a time for everything: there is no death. She passes the old man and kidnaps the young man; leaves the baby and takes the mother who fed him; this one uses all means to get rid of an apparently unimportant disease and dies from it; and he, apparently, does everything to upset his health and shorten his days, and lives. The sage dies without completing his discoveries, on which he worked for a whole century; the commander dies at the end of a battle that should decide the fate of his fatherland; a son returning from a long journey dies an hour away from his father's blood; the bride or groom dies having returned only or without returning from the wedding crown. Death does not care about anything of ours, human: it is a skeleton without a heart and soul, with only a scythe and a sickle. For the most part, she likes to preface herself, as a messenger and forerunner, with various ailments and illnesses: sometimes, as if admiring the suffering of her victim, she slows down her arrival and blow; but she loves to strike suddenly, like a thief in the night. How many people have not risen from their bed at night, having laid down on it with plans for many years! How many fell asleep in their last sleep during the meal! No matter how many times they returned to the house, they went out for a few minutes! In vain does the science of health exhaust all art and all efforts: the power of death is still the same, and the same ferocity and suddenness. Doctors, as if in revenge for an attempt on the impossible, enjoy the least longevity of all. Religion itself does not save you from death. Here is a man who dedicated his whole life to God, faith, virtue and humanity. Everyone wished for the continuation of his days as mercy from heaven. But death does not listen to anything, and the righteous man lies lifeless. Looking at all this, who together with St. The singer will not exclaim with all his sorrowful soul: “What is this sacrament about us? How do we give in to decay? How do we mate with death? The question is bitter, inevitable, but which person is able to resolve it on his own? There is no voice or answer from the grave; the one who returns from hell has not been known. Is it surprising, therefore, if even the wisest, apparently among people, left to the poor guidance of their own minds and having, moreover, the misfortune of losing the purity of their souls and consciences, came to the terrible thought that we were born by chance and then we will be, as if nothing had happened. Let us recognize the advantage of our condition in the Christian faith and thank the Lord that without any of our merits He destined us to see life in the depths of the Church. Now the youth and the baby know about the purpose of human existence and our life beyond the grave, than all the sages and pagan philosophers knew about this. From Golgotha, from the Cross and the Holy Sepulcher, everything is visible and everything is clear. Now we know not only the beginning, but also the end, one might say, the death of death itself, as it will turn out in our next interviews. Amen. No matter how superficially we surveyed the dominion of death over the human race last time, we could not help but see how destructive and terrible this dominion is - terrible by its inevitability for everyone, for who is a person who will live and not see death (Ps. 88:49)? The unknown of the hour of death is terrible, for who can know and say that he will not die before then; the terribly preceding physical and mental suffering that usually precedes any death; It’s terrible even in the absence of any suffering, when death befalls a person completely suddenly and unexpectedly. Do you want to take a look with us at the consequences of death over a person in order to more and more firmly awaken in yourself the saving fear of death, which is so necessary and beneficial for us in the matter of our repentance and salvation? If so, then let it be known to you that the consequences of death are in all respects extremely important and decisive, in a word, such that whoever once delves into them and fully understands their power and significance, he can never get them out of his head and thoughts. We do not even understand the consequences to which a person who dies in another world, where he passes from us, is subject, and which we, despite their importance, cannot see, but can only and should assume. Consider only those consequences that concern our world and which are therefore before our eyes and our judgment. These consequences, I say, are extremely important, irresistible and absolutely immutable! And, firstly, in the very essence of man. Until death - no matter how much he suffers, no matter how exhausted and deformed he is, even if he is like Job in rot - he is still a man, a living, feeling and intelligent being: death comes - and this man, at least a minute before was strong and in blooming health, becomes soulless, who remains with everything that was before, but without any action: the eyes do not see, the ear does not hear, the lips are closed, the arms and legs, the very the heart is motionless. And this bodily remnant of a person soon loses its appearance more and more, and begins to decompose into parts, after which what remains of the person, and not forever, is only a few bare bones, a few handfuls of dust. One can judge from this what a terrible change must occur to a person after his death! What happens here is more, much more, as if a person were, by some miracle, taken away from our earth and placed in one of the celestial globes; for, despite all the difference in the way of existence there from our earthly one, if transferred there, he would still remain with his corporeality and would find himself among the material elements, somewhat similar to those here. In death, on the contrary, everything bodily leaves a person: he remains and becomes one spirit, having no flesh and blood at all; at the same time, the entire image of human existence and all its relationships to others like themselves and to the whole world must change significantly. As long as a person is in the body and alive, until then he is engaged in the sensual and bodily; the corporeal and visible provide him with ways to maintain his being and to exercise his most spiritual abilities; with death this union with the visible and sensible ceases forever. Without a body, a person no longer needs at all what he had to work so hard to acquire and in which he believed his bliss. On the other hand, whatever his soul was busy with, no matter how familiar, kind, necessary it may seem, all this must be left forever, for without the body and feelings there is no longer the means and opportunity to do what he did before. Thus, the cohabitant of the altar no longer has either an altar or a church; the lover of science and knowledge no longer has any stars in the sky to observe, no grass and animals on earth to consider; at Oratai - fields for cultivation; I will buy trade items from the dealer. The deceased needs new food, a new range of activities, consistent with his new way of being in another world. Can we say after this that death ceases forever all human activity, no matter what it finds him doing when it comes to him? You were working on some great and generally useful work, a little time was already required to complete it, without you, perhaps no one would even be able to finish it: death has nothing to do with this; it brings with it the end of your very earthly existence, and what you have not completed remains so for you forever. If you managed to dispose of your property and declare your last will - well, you didn’t have time - it will go without your will, wherever you may not want it at all. You would extremely like to change some of your previous actions, for example, to reconcile in a Christian way with such and such an enemy, to reward one of those offended by you, to leave someone a sign of your love and respect; if this is not done before death, it will never be done again. Death once and forever puts an end to our earthly activity, no matter what it consists of and no matter what it requires. If only the dead could at least convey their desires to our world in some way! Many, if not all, of our relatives and neighbors would consider it their duty to carry them out; but this is impossible! Having lost his body, a person along with it loses all means of communication with this world and with those remaining in it, who, for their part, being clothed with physicality, are not able to penetrate into the realm of spirits where the dead are located. Therefore, no matter how much they continue to love you here, no matter how much they wish you every good thing beyond the grave, no one is able to know and fulfill your will, nor you to convey it to them. They will regret and cry for you, they will pray for you and do good in your name, which is what the saint so encourages all his children to do. Church ; but no one will have a message with you. All our intentions, desires, needs will be buried forever with you, and no one on earth will recognize them, unless the Lord Himself deigns to reveal this to someone in a special way, which, as we see from St. history, happens extremely rarely. Think, my brothers, about all this and be horrified! Think and derive from this the rules for your behavior in life. They are short and simple, but equally useful and necessary for everyone. If our body should leave us in death and turn to dust, which, perhaps, is already very close to us, then is it prudent to constantly take care of one body and ignore the state of our soul, with which we will remain for all eternity? If the world that surrounds us and completely occupies us must disappear in death for us forever, then is it prudent to limit all the activity of our spirit to it, to become attached to it with all the strength of the heart and not to prepare ourselves for activities of a higher kind that will meet us beyond the grave, to stock up in time for what will be needed there? If our activity in this world completely ceases with death, and just as it is impossible after death not only to accomplish or complete any of our affairs, or even for anyone here to know about our desires, then shouldn’t everyone try to do what is necessary in advance, without waiting for the hour of death, which can suddenly befall? Here we can repeat the words of the Savior: whatever you do, do it quickly: make peace with your opponent, that is, with the justice of God and your conscience, until you are on the way. Prepare the lamp and the oil of good works, before midnight comes, and the bridegroom suddenly comes, and the doors of the palace are shut on you. Amen. A WORD ABOUT WHAT DEATH IS We have sufficiently surveyed the bodily area of death from the outside, we have seen its vastness and the extraordinary consequences for a person of his death; Now is the time to come closer to our deathbed, to look more closely in the face of death, in order to find out - as much as possible - what death is? It would seem that it was more appropriate for people to know how this subject is, meeting so often the dying and dead? Marvel, my brothers! All sages and natural scientists cannot say definitively what the essence of death is; they often cannot even say whether the death of such and such a person actually followed. This is precisely why there are so many precautions taken by the law itself and by governments to ensure that someone who has not yet died is considered dead and is therefore not buried alive. Why such uncertainty? Because there is a human state that is similar to death, and yet does not constitute death. These are precisely prolonged and severe fainting spells. Here all the signs of death are presented: not only movement is not visible, nor the warmth of life, even the lightest breath is not visible; a person appears to be a soulless corpse, and this continues not for several hours, but for whole days, sometimes even signs of decay can be felt, which is especially revered as decisive proof of death; and yet the person considered dead has not died, but is alive, can still return to life and health and continue his existence on earth not in a short time. Such is the veil stretched by the hand of God’s Providence itself over the end of human life! Who can lift it even partially? “It would be better to expect this from those who have already passed through the gates of death, from the great number of our deceased brethren.” But while they were still in front of this gate, until then, without a doubt, they themselves did not know what would meet them there, and when they passed through it, and this gate closed behind them, it is not possible for them to look back and tell us what happened to them when they passed through it. One could even more expect an explanation for us of the great mystery of death from those to whom it was given, having left this life, to pass on to the earthly existence and then return back to us, to this world, that is, from people resurrected from the dead. There have not been many of these in the entire history of mankind; and yet there were such, namely those who, for example, were raised from the dead by our Savior, such as the righteous Lazarus. Without a doubt, the contemporaries of such people, out of sheer curiosity, did not fail to learn from them what happens to a person during his death. But if we did learn anything, then, by God’s Providence, almost nothing of this information reached us! And most likely - it seems to me - that these resurrected people did not reveal the secret of death to anyone, although they experienced it on themselves. Why didn't they reveal it? Because they were not given the opportunity to reveal it; or even because they couldn’t do it. For for higher and supernatural objects in our earthly language there are not even words for explanation. In both senses, our witness is the Apostle Paul, who was caught up, as he himself testifies, to the third heaven, saw and heard many things and verbs there, but which ones? About them, as he himself puts it, a person should not fly (2 Cor. 12:4). From the subsequent sacred history of Christianity, we have, however, no more than two or three legends of people who returned to us from the region of death; but these legends relate more to what the dead saw and met outside the coffin, in another life, and not what they experienced at the moment of death itself; therefore, they do not provide a direct answer to our question: what is death? What can we say about her after this? Let us say first of all that death is a mystery, and a great and inscrutable mystery! It was the will of God's Providence itself and, without a doubt, for the most sufficient reasons, for the most beneficial purposes. What are these reasons? In all likelihood, the fact is that this is the object itself. To explain death to us, it was necessary to clarify the relationship between the two worlds - our sensory and spiritual, time and eternity: would we even have enough concepts and words for this? It is not without reason that when our human wisdom approaches this subject, then, with all its desire for verbosity, it involuntarily becomes numb and does not know what to say. Was it really necessary for Revelation to invent a new special language for this and teach us it? And why would it do this, even if it were possible for it? – Explaining the mystery of death would rather serve us to our detriment than to our benefit; satisfying one curiosity, in all likelihood, would at the same time deprive death of its beneficial effect on our morality. Then we approached death as if we were approaching some dark passage through mountains and forests, of which we know the entrances and exits: the majestic and sacred darkness of death would have lost its saving fear and grandeur for us. But how, does anyone think, could we be left completely ignorant of such a subject as what the end of our life is? Thank God, we are not left in this ignorance. The Word of God has told us everything we need to know regarding this subject, as we will see in our next conversation. Now let us draw from the very mystery of our death a lesson that is useful to us. We are faced with such a great and mysterious event as death: how unreasonable are those of us who live without thinking at all about what awaits them at the end of life! I would direct this general reproach especially to those of us who, in all our activities, are guided especially by curiosity and curiosity, which are especially the case with people who devote themselves to the sciences. Whoever you are, beloved brother, one of those, here is something for you to ponder: your own death! Amen. A WORD ON THE ORIGIN OF DEATH Where does death come from in people? The question is extremely important not only in its subject, what is death, but also in its consequences in relation to our entire life. For if I die because this is precisely what human nature has always been and is, then I, having abandoned all further concern about my state after death, can only submit to necessity and pay tribute to nature. But if, on the contrary, death is not a consequence of the immutable structure of my nature, but the action of some special cause that has spoiled my nature, then I cannot help but think diligently about whether there is a way, if not to evade death, then at least to change its property for me, to protect myself from its destructive consequences, to neutralize myself, so to speak, from its poisonous power. With this in mind, let us ask again: where does death come from in people? We have two opposite answers at hand to this important question, as we have seen. One answer states that death is a consequence of our very nature, namely the frailty of our bodily composition. Another answer asserts that death is not part of our nature, but as an accidental evil that invaded our nature through sin and the transgression of God’s law. Who asserts first, that death is natural and inevitable to us by our very nature? This is what the entire pagan world, with all its sages and philosophers, argued before the appearance of Christianity in the world. So, beyond expectation, some of the most Christians affirmed and affirmed. This, without thinking about it ourselves, is in some way confirmed by us ourselves when, wanting to say that such and such died, we say instead that such and such paid a debt or tribute to nature - a pagan expression that, unfortunately, has passed into Christianity. Who teaches that death is not a tribute to nature, but to sin, that it invaded our immortal nature by chance - through our falling away from the Source of life - God, through the violation of His life-giving commandment? The word of God constantly teaches this; all the prophets and all the apostles instilled this; Our Savior proclaimed this very thing, and after Him the same thing has always been accepted and is now accepted by the Church of Christ. To ask which of these two teachings is true would mean to offend the dignity of the Christian faith and the feelings of every true Christian. But, since, as we have seen, there were and are in Christianity itself people who, following the pagans, think that death is a consequence of our very nature, since St. The Church on the day of Orthodoxy finds it necessary to solemnly excommunicate this error, then we will do something not alien to our duty if, to protect weakness, we show the absurdity of this error. What does it consist of and what does it rely on? The fact that death is a universal and ever-present phenomenon: it has been so since time immemorial that our nature, that is, our bodily composition, is so frail and fragile that it inevitably deteriorates over time, and it is difficult to imagine how we could live forever with this present body. All this is completely true: but who claims that immortality belonged to us with this mortal body? The Word of God, which attributes immortality to our nature, sees more clearly than all the sages the frailty of our present body and its inability to do so; which is why he directly calls it the body of death. If, therefore, immortality is assimilated in him, then it is not to our current, fallen and sinful nature, but to the primitive nature, as it was in a state of innocence when it came out of creative hands. Then it was completely different not only with our soul and body, but with all things in the world. It is now difficult for us to imagine this primitive state of our immortality, because we have not seen it and now do not see anything similar either in ourselves or in others. But this is no reason to reject its existence when there are extremely important reasons to assume and admit it. Firstly, the voice of our very nature, which, amid great misfortunes, turns away from death as something completely contrary to it. No matter how you are and no matter how false opinions and philosophies overshadow your healthy concept of things in your mind, stand at the tomb, for example, of a young man, who yesterday was still full of life and strength, and now lies before you lifeless and disfigured by death. Look into the face of the deceased and tell me, can you affirm, without hesitation, that this terrible phenomenon was a work of nature? A matter of nature? Why does your whole nature tremble at this, your heart shrinks, your feelings become numb, your mind is troubled, your lips don’t know what to say? If this is nature, then I don’t know what to call it, in what hostile attitude to present it to the poor human race, how to explain its ferocity over us? In this case, one explanation: to accept that the whole world, including people, is dominated by some dark and evil principle, which delights in destruction, delights in the tears and torment of its creatures. And in the world, and above us, as everything else shows, God’s Providence reigns. You yourself admit it. If you truly recognize and have the correct concept of God and His perfections, then judge for yourself: could death come from God and be the work of His hands? “It’s the same as if light produced darkness from itself, sweetness exuded bitterness.” And why would that be? Could the Almighty lack the means so that, having created man, he would not be sacrificed to death? And why would this be? Who is given up to death according to human judgment? The most serious criminals. Where would Divine justice be if death were the lot of an innocent man, as he came from creative hands? And let death not at least be accompanied by suffering! But look at the majority of those who die: is this the work of nature and the hands of God? No, or death is unnatural to man and exists, as St. Scripture is not a consequence of nature and the Creator, but the fruit of damage and sin - or the Creator is not good and not just. Therefore, those who frivolously think that death is nothing more than a tribute to nature, must at the same time think differently about God and His perfections, or, more precisely, reject most of these perfections, as, unfortunately, happens with many of them! We will take from this our conversation the lesson not to use frivolously the pagan expression about death, that it is a tribute to nature; no, this tribute is not to nature, but to sin, or, perhaps, to nature, but not to the primitive, pure and innocent, as it came from the hands of God, but to fallen nature, as sin and the devil made it, as we will see in our next conversation. Amen. In our past conversation, we saw, even with a faint flicker of the weak human mind, that death is not and cannot be a part of our very nature and the work of our Creator, and that to think in this way, as, unfortunately, some people think, would mean to offend the greatness of God, and especially His undoubted, infinite goodness, even His justice. After this, the inevitable question arises: where did death come from and how did it come to us, into our nature and into the entire human race? Our own nature does not provide an answer to this; Neither the chronicles nor the very legends of the human race answer. But Divine Revelation gives the answer, an answer that the sound human mind, not infected with wisdom and prejudices, involuntarily accepts. Let us present this answer in all its simplicity, as befits the importance of such a subject. Death did not and could not exist in the universe, as the work of an all-perfect Being, in the Kingdom of God. It is not the work of the Creator, but of the creatures themselves, a consequence of the abuse of their freedom and activity. Here it is very clear to everyone that rationally free beings could use arbitrariness, will, and their strength as they pleased - for good or for evil: they could rush along the path of truth and eternal life, or, rushing along the opposite path of evil and untruth, go contrary to the laws of their Creator, separate from Him, the only Source of life and well-being, and in this separation from Him and the opposite of Him it is necessary to face the fall, the transformation of their powers, exhaustion and finally death. Where and how did this terrible separation of rationally free beings from the Source of life and immortality - from God? The Word of God tells us - and who could tell it to us without it? - that such a terrible transformation followed not on earth, but in heaven; followed, in all likelihood, even before the creation of our earth and the human race. The first dead man was not on earth, in Eden, as we usually imagine, but in heaven, at the very throne of God, and he was not a man, but an Archangel, perhaps even the first of the Archangels. He was the closest spectator of the perfections of God, the first successor of the uncreated light and, therefore, the most blessed of created beings. What could be missing to his perfection, to strengthening this perfection for him for all eternity, except grateful remembrance and love for his most good Creator? But that’s exactly what was missing! How and why was it missing? This is a mystery, unsearchable for us! But this luminous Archangel did not maintain his rank, was not satisfied with his dignity and bliss, rebelled against his Creator and Benefactor, and madly imagined that he could not only do without His favor, but also openly enter into a struggle with Him. There was a battle between the creature and the Creator: the Archangel and his minions (for his madness was shared with him by other Angels) could not resist the Almighty and were cast from heaven into the underworld!.. Here is the first dead man and the first cemetery in the world! Not having our body as spirits, the indignant Angels could not have our death; but along with their indignation, with their separation from God through sin, they immediately lost life and bliss, became dead to life in God, lost strength and bliss. As imperishable spirits, they could not lose their existence at all, they could not break into pieces and decay, as our body decays, but they were subjected to a hundred times greater death - eternal and irrevocable separation from God - the only Source of all true life. You can imagine what a terrible disorder should have occurred in the entire created world from this terrible transformation of disembodied spirits, from this death of Archangels and Angels!.. Here one could expect the destruction of the entire universe!.. One could expect that Divine creativity itself would refuse to create and produce new kinds of rationally free beings. But it was here that the abundant abyss of the wisdom and power of God opened up. A new world has appeared - ours, and among it is man... He, too, as we will see, will not stand in the perfection given to him, he will undergo death in his turn, but as if precisely so that it would be revealed to him that there are no limits to the omnipotence and goodness of God, as the first fallen archangel madly dreamed. Amen. THE WORD ABOUT HOW DEATH OCCURRED IN THE HUMAN KIND We saw how death was revealed for the first time in the world, revealed contrary to the intention and will of the Creator; they saw how the fallen Archangel produced it in himself and communicated it to other Angels. Now let us add only one thing: this first death in the angelic world was the most terrible, for it immediately became death and eternal, from which there is no resurrection. No matter how terrible this death was, it had no effect on us, for we, the human race, even our earth and sky, then, in all likelihood, did not yet exist. Meanwhile, to demonstrate the infinity of His power and goodness, the Creator was pleased to create our visible, sensory and physical world. At its head, a being was produced and placed that contained both spirit and body. This was the first man, our ancestors. In their souls and in the interior of their beings they were Angels; but these Angels were clothed with physicality and in this respect were similar to other corporeal beings of our earth. Their body, in its appearance, parts, and actions, undoubtedly resembled our body, but at the same time it had a great number of perfections that are not present in our current body. And most importantly, it was immortal, not in the sense that it could not die, like, for example, the soul, but in the sense that it contained the possibility and ability not to die, but to live forever, which is not present in our current body. Such a precious ability depended on various reasons, and most of all on the fact that the innocent man was the image of God and was sincerely united with his prototype. Eternal life flowed directly from the being of God into the being of man, filling his soul, and through it the body itself, with power and incorruptibility. Along with this, or more precisely, for this very reason, the bodily nature of the first people was higher than the current domination of the elements over it, due to which so many destructive principles act on it. In the nature that surrounded man, nothing harmed his health and strength, but, on the contrary, everything strived to support him, if there was a need for it. I say: if only; for the pure physicality of man, imbued with the power of spiritual God-likeness, instead of having a need to maintain its strength, could itself be a source of reinforcement and revival for the creatures surrounding it, the lower ones. According to all this, the first man, despite the fact that his being included a sensory body, had the ability not to die, but to live forever. But he could have died. There was only one path to this misfortune - separation from God, the Source of life, and inevitably man was left to himself and, not having the source of life in himself, had to undergo powerlessness and destruction instead of what was destructible in him, that is, his entire physicality. And for man there was also only one path to separation from God - deviation from the will of God, sin. In order not to fall into sin and resistance to the will of God and thereby not lose immortality, man was supplied with everything necessary to completeness and abundance. But there was freedom in him, a lofty gift, necessary for a rational and moral being, but at the same time extremely dangerous; for by the power of this freedom, man, like the Archangel in heaven before, could make anything out of himself, could remain in connection with the Source of life - his Creator; He could have moved away from Him, to his greatest harm and destruction. To help a person quickly discover his freedom and will and, through using them for good, to establish himself in goodness, the Fatherly Providence of God gave man as a test a positive commandment about not eating the fruits of one of the trees of paradise. Thus, all cases of fall were reduced to one case, all possible temptations of an innocent person to evil (which, as we will see now, were before him) were reduced into one, the smallest temptation, which was very easy to overcome. In order to further protect man from abusing his freedom and from all nasty suggestions, the All-Good Creator even pointed out the harmful consequences of violating the commandment given to man, and directly declared that the immediate consequence of this would be death. The next day you eat from it (from the fruits of the forbidden tree), you will die (Gen. 2:17), that is, according to the force of this expression in the sacred language, you will inevitably die, horribly, you will be subjected to the greatest disaster. Thus, we were protected in every possible way from danger on all sides. Since we needed to show our freedom, to decide for ourselves, as rational beings, our fate, to choose, so to speak, our own way of being, either in union with God, according to intention and plan, or according to our wisdom and whim, then the simplest and easiest case was deliberately invented for us. But at the same time, all measures have been taken to ensure that this fatal experience is successful and happy on our part. Let us now imagine the position of our ancestors in Eden, even put ourselves there with them - mentally: here before us is a forbidden tree with its fruit, and above it is the commandment of God with the threat of death. Shouldn’t it be said about this situation that the prophet later spoke on behalf of God to the people of Israel: Behold, you have given life and death before you (Deut. 30:15) - choose, that is, whatever you want! Indeed, in Eden, what was before our faces was not only life, for we used it, but immortality and death itself. Who would have expected that we would be so unreasonable, so, one might say, hostile to ourselves, that we would reject both immortality and life, and arbitrarily choose death? But this is exactly what happened, as we will see in the next interview1. Now let’s say a few more words to explain our Edenic immortality. Some, as we noted before, are confused by bewilderment, how could the human body not be mortal? Why, we ask, could it – without sin – be mortal? Where would death come from in him? From God? But He filled the whole man even with His life, which, with the perfection of man, would penetrate him to the point of deification, as in the bodily nature of our Savior. From the outside world? But there was no present death and decay in him. From the man himself? But in him, until he fell into sin, there was one life. If the sun and moon are still alive, then why shouldn’t man be alive? All the bewilderment is because in this case we make our judgments based on our present body, but this body is not primitive. To judge this way is a hundred times more wrong, as if someone were to judge the precious royal purple when it has turned into rags. Let us remember the words of St. Paul: there is a natural body and there is a spiritual body (1 Cor. 15:44). The primitive body must be close to the latter, if it was not yet spiritual, and in the spiritual there is nothing to decay and decay into parts. Was it really possible that man, someone else might think, was not going to undergo any change; was he really supposed to remain on earth forever? Thus, there would be absolutely not enough space on earth for the human race to live. Perhaps a certain change of existence was ahead of man, a certain ascent into the heavenly realm: but is the path to this only present death? Look at Enoch and Elijah, taken from our world without death! Look at our beloved Savior ascending from Olivet into heaven! Amen. A Word on How Sin Caused Death We have seen that death is a punishment for sin, that it did not come from the structure of our nature, but from the fruit of the forbidden, or, what is the same, from the violation of the commandment of God. But here we are immediately confronted with a new and important question: how did sin give rise to death? Is it from himself, like a poisonous tree coming out of a poisonous seed, or by forcing God’s justice to bring death upon us from without? For punishments in general are of two kinds: some stem from the essence of the crimes themselves and follow them like a shadow behind a thing; others are imposed from without, by divine or human justice. So, for example, torment of conscience naturally follows all sins, just as some illnesses directly result from some vices. These are the so-called natural punishments for sin. But there are punishments for sin from the outside, such as a flood; The almighty power of God brought him down for sin on the entire human race. How, we repeat, did sin give birth to death - from itself, or by forcing God’s justice to bring death to man from the outside? We have no doubt at all, my brothers, to affirm the first thing before you and say that in this regard, God, as Scripture says, did not create death, but it came out of sin by itself. For we do not see from Sacred History that after the fall of man any special order was made for him to be struck by death. On the contrary, the entire effect of God's Justice consisted only in the fact that he was left to himself, or, more precisely, to the destructive power of sin that reigned in him. True, Moses says that our ancestor was removed from paradise precisely so that he would not eat the fruit of the tree of life and would not remain alive forever, but this was only the deprivation of their extraordinary means of maintaining endless life within themselves, and not the direct cause of their mortality. This reason was hidden in them themselves - in the sin that infected them with itself. Just as if someone deprived a patient of a medicine that could temporarily prevent death, it would not be possible to say that the death occurred from a lack of medicine. It came from a disease, and drugs could only slow it down. A Word about What Jesus Christ Did with Death If anything, then with death, apparently, there has never been any change: it is always the same. As the first man died, so will the last one die. Meanwhile, with death a great change has occurred, so that it is now not at all what it should have been and what it would have been if He had not come who, as the Church sings, trampled death under His death. How has death changed? The fact that it is now the separation of the soul from the body is not eternal, but temporary; is that all the dead, after a certain time, must one day come out of their graves and again put on an already immortal body; is that death itself will one day be abolished. The change, as you can see, is great. It would not exist if death remained as it is by nature. Then man would remain so forever; then the body, having been separated from the soul, would never again be united with it. Who brought about this great change with death? Our Divine Redeemer Jesus Christ. How? Because He Himself suffered death for us. “Trample upon death death,” sings the Holy Church. How did Christ's death change our death? A WORD ABOUT THE FATE OF DEATH ITSELF Hitherto we have surveyed the realm of death in its past and present: now let us look at it in its future, for we can do this too from this sacred place. The human mind cannot say anything about the fate of death itself; but the word of God can and does speak. What does he say? Hearken, for your edification and comfort. The dominion of death, although already defeated, and bound, and destined for destruction, must continue until the end of the world over the human race, for its own good, as we have seen, and admonition. Therefore, he would be a foolish person who would try to avoid death on earth in any way: it is impossible! Everyone and everyone must go through the grave and decay in the dust of the earth. We can only and must all achieve a peaceful, shameless and even painless death, as the saint herself prays for us every day. Church. But before the end of the world with death, according to the testimony of the word of God, a great and extraordinary change will occur, consisting in the fact that those whom the end of the world finds alive (and there should be a great many of them) will no longer die, like all previous people, but instead of death will undergo some special kind of change, which should produce on them the same thing that death produced on others, only in a different way; that is, as a result of this miraculous change, which, according to the assurance of St. Paul, to be accomplished in the twinkling of an eye, in the shortest possible way - everything mortal in them will be consumed by the belly, and they will appear along with all those resurrected from the dead in a new body, no longer subject to corruption, but immortal and eternal. All of us, writes the Apostle, will not sleep, that is, we will not die, but we will all change (before the end of the world): soon, in the twinkling of an eye (1 Cor. 15:51-55). Such a miraculous change and transformation of temporary LIFE into eternal life without our actual dying and the release of the soul from the body will obviously not be a natural action of the forces of nature, but a consequence of the omnipotent voice of God, although the forces of nature, before the end of the world, must come into special motion and can therefore produce extraordinary phenomena. After the resurrection of the dead, after the renewal of the whole world, after the final judgment and the decision thereon of the fate of everyone and everything for all eternity, there will obviously be no place left for the present death; which is why it is said in the revelation of John that there will be no death for anyone, and in another place that death and hell will be cast into the lake of fire (Apoc. 20:14, 21:4). In this way the terrible reign of death should have completely ended and the very last traces of it would have disappeared. But, alas, it will not disappear completely even then! Alas, one type of it will remain forever, a new type, which will reveal itself precisely when real death ceases. Holy Scripture calls this the second death. What will it consist of? The fact is that some of the resurrected people will find themselves lacking the life of God, the spirit of Christ, or even the firstfruits of both; they will find themselves, as a result of their sins and complete unrepentance, completely imbued with the spirit of hellish malice, imagining in themselves the image of God’s enemy, the devil. The second death will prevail over such and such unfortunates, and they, like the righteous, will be clothed in incorruptible bodies, and the former present death will have no effect on them; but, not having the ability to live in God, to stay in the abodes of the Heavenly Father, they will be sent to hell, to rejected spirits for all eternity. Such immortality will be a hundred times worse than death, for their eternity will be; the most unfortunate. It is obvious who will be to blame for this terrible second death: the sinners themselves. It will no longer be possible to free yourself from it. For then it is all over and there is no return. It is this death that we should fear most of all, and not our bodily death, which should be followed by resurrection. Amen. You might be interested in: