Solomon's Accurate Interpretation of Ecclesiastes

Eccl.1:1–11. Verbs of Ecclesiastes, son of David, king of Israel in Jerusalem. Vanity of vanities, all kinds of vanity, says Ecclesiastes. What abundance is there for a man in all his labor, who labors under the sun! A generation passes, and a generation comes, but the earth stands forever. And the sun rises, and the sun sets, and is drawn to its place: this, shining there, goes to the south, and goes around to the north: the spirit goes around, and the spirit turns in circles. All the people go to the sea, and the sea cannot be filled; to the place, maybe the potots go, the tamo tii return it. All words are difficult; a man will not be able to speak; neither will the eye of seeing be satisfied, nor the ear of hearing be filled. What was, also is, will be: and what was created, also will be created: and there is nothing new under the sun, who speaks and says: This is new, it has already been in all those who were before us. The memory of the first will not be carried, and the last past will not be their memory with the future for the last time. Ecclesiastes is offered to us for interpretation, the difficulty of viewing which is equal to the greatness of the benefit it provides. For after the mind has already been trained in tributary thoughts, in which, according to what was said in the preface to the book of Proverbs, there are dark words and wise sayings, and fortune-telling and various figures of speech (Proverbs 1:6), - only those who have already come to an age capable of listening to the most perfect lessons are able to ascend to this much sublime and inspired scripture. Therefore, if the parable and the exercise that prepares us for these lessons are something so difficult and difficult to comprehend; then how much work is needed to delve into these sublime thoughts that are now offered to us for review? For just as those who labored in bodily exercises in school prepare to shed more sweat and endure greater labor in real struggles; Likewise, the tributary teaching seems to me to be a kind of exercise that teaches our souls and makes them flexible in church exploits. Therefore, if this preliminary exercise is successful with much sweat and much labor; What should we conclude about the exploits themselves? Of course, no matter how extremely great a degree someone imagines them in his mind, he will not depict in words, as he should, those works that in the field represented by this writing are indicated to those who strive for safety with ascetic experience in the spiritual, so that the word does not turn out to be sinful, but, with every struggle of thought, the mind remains unswervingly standing in the truth. However, since this is also the Lord’s commandment, and we must test the Scriptures (John 5:39), then at least our mind, not comprehending the greatness of thoughts, turns out to be lagging behind the truth, so as not to appear as despisers of the Lord’s commandment, it is absolutely necessary, to the best of our ability, to succeed in zeal for the word. Therefore, as much as we can, let us test the proposed scripture. For He who gave the commandment to test will, without a doubt, give strength for this, as it is written: “The Lord will give the word to those who bring good news with much power” (Psalm 67:12). And, firstly, let the inscription of this book be before our eyes. Throughout the Church, Moses and the law, the prophets, psalmody, all history are read, and if anything is contained in the Old and New Testaments, everything is proclaimed in the churches. So, why is this one book predominantly decorated with the inscription of Ecclesiastes? What can we assume about this? Is it not that in all other writings, historical and prophetic, their goal tends towards something else that is not at all useful for the Church. For what need is there for the Church to study exactly the disastrous consequences of wars, or who were the princes of the nations, the founders of cities, who moved out from whom, or what kingdoms will disappear in the future, how many such marriages and births of children, which are carefully mentioned, and all the like, about which information can only be gleaned in every scripture, can the Church so much contribute to the cause of piety? And the teaching of this book refers only to the way of life that the Church requires, and teaches what a person can do to succeed in a virtuous life. For the purpose of what is being said here is to place the mind above the senses, finally leaving behind everything that seems great and brilliant in beings, to turn the soul to what is inaccessible to sensory understanding, to perceive the desire for what is inaccessible to the senses. Or perhaps the inscription also refers to the Leader of the Church. For the true Ecclesiastes, gathering the scattered into one completeness and churching those who wander many times along different deceptive paths into a single host, is who other than the true King of Israel, the Son of God, to whom Nathanael said: “Thou art the Son of God, Thou art the King of Israel” (John 1:49)? Therefore, if these “verbs” are the King of Israel, and He is the same, as the Gospel says, and the Son of God; then He is also called Ecclesiastes. Yes, and not without reason, perhaps, we raise the meaning of the inscription to this meaning, but in order to find out through this that the power of these “verbs” is raised to the One who established the Church on the Gospel. For it is said: “the words of Ecclesiastes, the son of David” (Eccl. 1:1). And this is what Matthew calls Him at the beginning of the Gospel, calling the Lord the son of David. Eccl.1:2. Vanity of vanities in the speech of Ecclesiastes: all vanity. By the word: “vain” it is understood that it is not realizable, has existence in one verbal pronunciation, but along with the meaning of the name, an accomplished thing does not appear, but there is some kind of idle sound, containing nothing in itself, in the form of some kind of speech, accidentally pronounced in syllables, striking the ear without meaning, as for example, others jokingly compose names for which there is no signified. This is one kind of hustle. Another type of vanity is the uselessness of something that is done with some kind of diligence without any purpose; such as, for example, children's buildings on the sand, throwing arrows at the stars, trying to catch the wind, racing in speed with one's shadow, when one tries to step on the top of one's shadow. And if we find anything else similar to this in what we do in vain, all this is signified by the word: “vanity.” But it is customary to often call the following vain: when someone, having some goal in mind, and diligently, as if doing something useful, puts everything into action, as if doing something useful, and then, when encountering something contrary, his work turns out to be useless, then this very thing, that diligence remained without any success, is signified by the word: “vain.” For it is customary to say about something like this: “I worked in vain, I hoped in vain, I made a lot of effort in vain.” And in order not to list in detail all the cases in which the word “vanity” is used in its proper sense, in a few words we will define the concept of this saying: vanity is, or a word without thought, or a useless thing, or an impracticable plan, or diligence that does not lead to an end, or in general something that does not serve anything useful. But if we have understood the concept of vanity, then we will have to examine what it means: “vanity of vanities.” And perhaps it will be more convenient for us to understand what we are looking for if we examine the custom of Scripture to express itself in the superlative degree about what is presented. Dealing with something necessary and useful is called “work” in Scripture, but doing something higher, everything that relates to worship, as can be seen from history, is called “work of works” (Num. 4:47); and by this expression: “a matter of affairs,” I think it shows which occupation relative to us is to some extent preferable to others. For what is the relationship between diligence in business and idleness in general, the same relationship between activity in higher and more preferable pursuits to other matters. Thus the Scripture speaks of something else: “holy,” and of something else again: “holy of holies,” because in equal measure, just as the holy is superior in holiness to the unholy, so the holy of holies appears to abound in holiness before the most holy. Therefore, what we have learned about this custom of writing - in relation to the best, thus means strengthening the concept in question, meaning also about the expression: “vanity of vanities,” we will not err in the least. Scripture says that what is visible in beings is not just vanity, but that the meaning of vanity belongs to it in some excess; as if someone said: “This is deader than the dead, more soulless than the soulless.” Although this comparative strengthening does not take place in such concepts, it is nevertheless expressed by this statement in order to clarify the superiority of the signified. Therefore, since there is a work of works and the Holy of Holies is mentally represented, and this expresses an indication of superiority in perfection; so the expression: “vanity of vanities” shows the extreme degree of excess of vanity. And let no one think that what has been said serves as a condemnation of the creature. For the accusation would fall on the Creator of everything, if everything were vanity, and the creator of this turned out to be the One who brought everything into being from nothing. But since the composition of man is twofold, the soul is united with the body; then the way of life is divided according to each of the parts seen in us. Another life of the soul and another of the body; one is mortal and temporary, the other is impassive and indestructible; and the former has in mind only the present, while the goal of the latter extends into the imperishable. Therefore, since there is a great difference between the mortal and the immortal, between the temporary and the eternal; then the word of Ecclesiastes leads to the fact that what should be meant is not this sensory life, which, in comparison with true life, is somehow invalid and untenable. But nevertheless, others will say that this reasoning does not free us from blaming the Creator, because both soul and body are from Him. If life is condemned because of the flesh, and the Creator of the flesh is God; then such reproach will have to be applied to Him. But this will be said, of course, by someone who is not yet outside the flesh and has not thoroughly penetrated into the higher life. For one who is trained in the Divine mysteries, without a doubt, does not know that a life similar to the Divine nature is characteristic and natural for people, and sensual life, pursued in the activity of the senses, is given to nature so that the knowledge of the visible becomes for the soul a guide to the knowledge of the invisible, as Wisdom says: “from the majesty of the beauty of creatures, the relative Creator of all things is known” (Wis. 13, 5). But human misunderstanding did not look at what was worthy of surprise because of what was visible, but was surprised at what it saw. Therefore, since the activity of the senses is temporary and perishable, from this lofty speech we learn that the one who means this does not mean anything; but whoever, guided by this to the understanding of existing things, with the help of the transitory has understood the constant nature, has comprehended that which is always the same, he has seen the truly existing good, and what he has seen has taken possession of it, because the vision of this good is possession. For Ecclesiastes says: “What is a man’s abundance in all his labor that he labors under the sun?” (Eccl. 1, 3). He called life in the body labor, seeking profit without any success. For he says: “What abundance is there for man?” that is, what is acquired by the soul in everyday labor by living only for the visible? What is life itself? Which of the visible goods always remains the same? The sun completes its course, alternately producing light and darkness, illuminating the air above us when it appears above the earth, and bringing darkness with its setting, “But the earth stands forever” (Eccl. 1:4), and in its standing it remains motionless, and what has become does not come into motion, and what has begun to move does not stop. It turns out that everything throughout the entire continuation of time does not itself change in any way by turning into something new. The sea serves as a receiver for waters flowing from everywhere, and their influx does not stop, and the sea does not increase. What is the purpose of the flow of waters that always fill what is being filled? Why does the sea receive influxes of water, remaining forever unincreased by this increase? Ecclesiastes says this in order to first explain from the very elements in which human life is contained the inconsistency of what we care about. For if this established flow of the sun has no limit, this alternating succession of light and darkness does not allow stopping, and the earth, condemned to stand, remains motionless in its standing, the rivers work uselessly, draining themselves into the unrefillable nature of the sea, and the sea in vain receives influxes of water, not gaining in the least from receiving what is constantly poured into its bowels - if we notice this in these elements; then in what position should humanity be, whose life is enclosed in the same elements, and what is surprising if “a generation passes and a generation comes” (Eccl. 1:4), and this flow does not leave nature, while the incoming race of people drives away the one that preceded it, and is itself driven out by the new one? Therefore, what does this word proclaim to the Church? The following: “as you survey the universe, people, understand your own nature.” What you see in heaven and on earth, what you see in the sun, what you notice in the sea, let your nature explain to you. For our nature, like the sun, has east and west. One path for everyone, one circle of life. As soon as we are born, we are again carried away to our dear country. For with the decline of our life, our illumination becomes underground, when our sense becomes capable of perceiving light: and the earth, without a doubt, resolves into something akin to it. And this circle constantly rotates in the same way. As the course of the sun takes place, says Ecclesiastes, the sun, rising over the upper part of the earth, passes through the southern countries, and under the earth it goes through the opposite northern part; and, thus always turning in circles, goes around its path, and goes again, returning to it (for it is said: “it goes around”): so therefore your spirit “goes” (continues Ecclesiastes, by the private name meaning every human spirit), performing this circular procession in the same way. For it is said: “The spirit goes and turns in circles” (Eccl. 1:6) And whoever understands this will gain a lot of benefit for his life. What is more brilliant than light? What is clearer than rays? However, if the sun goes underground, the light is hidden and the ray disappears. Looking at this, a more chaste person goes through his life despising the local nobility, having learned from what is visible that what is famous does not always remain so. But the succession of opposites is changeable, nothing remains as it is at the present time, not youth, not beauty, not the splendor of power. And this goes to those living in some kind of prosperity. And for those who find a virtuous life difficult, let their souls patiently endure adversity learn from the example of the earth. “The earth stands forever” (Eccl. 1:4). What is more difficult than this motionless standing? However, this standing extends to a century. And for you the time of achievement is short. Don't be more soulless than the earth. Do not be more senseless than the insensitive, equipped with reason and controlled in life by reason; but “continue,” as the Apostle says, “in which you were taught, and the matter was entrusted to you” (2 Tim. 3:14), standing firmly and unapproachable, because among the divine commandments is the following: “Be strong and impenetrable” (1 Cor. 15:58). May chastity remain unshakable in you, faith is firm, love is unapproachable, standing motionless in all that is beautiful, just as “the earth stands in you forever” (Eccl. 1:4). If anyone is given over to covetousness, and like some sea, having opened up immeasurable lust, is not satisfied with the profits flowing in from everywhere; then, looking at the real sea, let him heal For, just as the sea, with countless influxes of water, does not exceed its measure, but remains in the same fullness, as if there were no addition of water in it; in the same way, human nature, limited by special measures in the enjoyment of what it has, cannot expand the capacity for pleasure with greed, depending on the multitude of income; Therefore, if pleasure cannot exceed the measure of nature; then why do we attract influxes of income to ourselves, and never use them to benefit others, even beyond what comes in? And since, according to our concept of vanity, whether a useless word or a useless deed is vanity; then the speech begins beautifully with this; so that we, whether we do or say anything, if anyone has a local goal in mind, do not consider this to be anything worthwhile; because all human diligence, occupied with something everyday in the true sense, is the play of children in the sand, whose enjoyment of what has been done ceases along with the diligence to do it. As soon as the work stopped, the sand crumbled into the same position in which it was before, and with this, not a trace of the labor involved remains. Such is human life, ambition is sand, love of power is sand, wealth is sand, sand and everything that is carefully enjoyed through the medium of the flesh; The infant souls now fussed about this, who endure a lot of work for every thing that gives such pleasure, but as soon as they leave this sandy region, I mean carnal life, they will then learn the vanity of the local way of life. For with material life pleasure continues; They take nothing with them except their conscience. And the great Ecclesiastes, it seems to me, as having already become outside of this and entering the immaterial life with a distracted soul, uttered what we will probably say over time, when we are outside this coastal region, which is full of sands thrown up by the sea of ​​life, and we move away from all the noisy and deafening waves. Then, from the mental sea, bringing one memory of what was sought there, let’s say: “vanity of vanities,... all kinds of vanity” (Eccl. 1, 2), and there is no “abundance for man in what he labors at under the sun” (Eccl. 1, 3). So, according to my reasoning, this will be the word of every soul, when, having been stripped of what is here, it moves into the life of hope. For, if in this life she has succeeded in something more sublime, she will condemn what she was busy with, humiliating the past in comparison with what she found. If, however, being addicted to the substance, she sees the unexpected and learns through experience that what she has tried in life is useless for her; with tears he will then utter these words with which we people express our repentance, with tears describing our recklessness: “vanity of vanities,” and so on. Eccl.1:8. All words, says Ecclesiastes, are difficult, and a man will not be able to speak. Of all the things at our disposal, we find it most convenient to speak. For what is the work of saying what to anyone? The language is flexible and agile, easily adapting to whatever type of speech you want; the transfer of exhaled air, with the help of which it produces sounds, is also unhindered; the serving of the cheeks and, at the same time, the assistance of the lips to pronounce what is said are not painful. So, what kind of work does Ecclesiastes see in the word? For, without digging the earth, without moving stones, without carrying weights on our shoulders, without doing anything else difficult, we pronounce the word. But the thought that has taken place in us, being discovered through the voice, becomes a word. since such a word is not difficult; then you should think about what kind of words these are - “difficult words that a husband cannot speak?” (Ecclesiastes 1:8) – Elders, it is said, “are given greater honor, especially to those who labor in the word” (1 Tim. 5:17). According to custom, a presbyter is called [one] who has come out of a disorderly age and is in an elderly state; so if someone is fickle in thought and does not lead his life in order, then such a person, even if he shows gray hair, is not a presbyter, but still a husband. Therefore, “words, words” in the true sense that are useful to the soul, serving for the good of people, are “words” that require sweat and labor, and they, in order to become “words,” lead to many efforts. For “it is fitting for a laboring worker to first partake of the fruit” (2 Tim. 2:6), says the artist of such words, so that by word should not be understood a saying, but a virtue offered to those who see in deeds, so that instead of a word they become a lesson in life for those taught. Therefore, all such words of those teachers of virtue are difficult who at first themselves succeed in what they teach. For this means what has been said: first it is fitting to partake of the fruits that we first cultivate in ourselves through virtue before others. Or perhaps this word also explains the weakness of rational nature. For when we are outside the senses, which are called vanity, and thought, having somehow intruded into the contemplation of the invisible, attempts to represent the conceivable in words; then there is great labor for the word, because this interpretative speech does not find any means of clarifying what is not spoken. We look at the sky, accept the rays of the luminaries into ourselves with our senses, walk on the earth, draw air into ourselves with our lips, apparently we use water for nature, and we accept fire into the communion of life; but, if we wish to think a little about this, what each of the visible things is in relation to the essence, from where, or how it was composed; then “a man will not be able to speak,” even if he were taller than others; because all comprehensible knowledge is unable to express the incomprehensible. If speaking about this constitutes work that surpasses human ability to speak and human nature; then what kind of work, another will say, will they be forced to endure “words” about the Word itself, or about the Father of the Word, where all high-sounding and grand-voice is some kind of obscurity and silence, if compared with the true meaning of what is sought; why only one thing can be said about Him in the proper sense: if someone sets all his thoughts in motion, and he does not lack any of the godly ideas, but if he compares his speech with the very dignity of the subject, then even then, whatever he says, it is not yet a word, because “a person will not be able to speak.” Vision does not stop at the overview of the visible that the eyes provide to the soul; on the contrary, looking incessantly, as if we had not seen at all, we still remain in the dark about what we perceive with our senses. Vision cannot penetrate beyond color; but the measure of his activity is what appears to him on the surface of things. Therefore, says Ecclesiastes, “the eye of seeing will not be satisfied, nor the ear of hearing will be filled” (Eccl. 1:8). The ability of hearing, accepting the word about each thing, cannot be filled in its nature; because there is no word that would exactly capture what we are looking for. Therefore, how can the ear be filled with hearing about what is sought when there is no filler? Then, after these words, Ecclesiastes asks himself, and answers himself. For having asked: “What happened?” , says: “The same is, the hedgehog will be”, and also asking: “What was created? answers: “He was also created” (Eccl. 1:9). So why this question? As a result of what we have learned, we object and tell him: “if all this is vanity, then, obviously, nothing happened of what did not happen; but vain things are, without a doubt, untenable, and no one will honor the untenable as having been.” If this is not the case; then tell me: what is the past, or what remains in being? Therefore, he has a short answer to this question. Do you want to know what an ex is? think about what the future is, and you will find out what happened. And this means: think, I ask you, man, what kind of person you will become by elevating yourself through virtue, if you distinguish your soul with good traits in everything, if you will become clean from the stains of vice, if you will wash away from your nature all the impurity of material filth; How will you wear such jewelry, what image will you take on? If you look into it with your mind; then you studied what was originally in the image and likeness of God. At the same time, I ask the teacher: where is now what once was, and what there is hope for in the future, but what is now missing? Without a doubt, the One who teaches us high lessons will answer with the same word; That is why the present is called vanity, because it is not in the present. And “what was created,” says Ecclesiastes, “also had to be created” (Eccl. 1:9). Let no one who listens recognize the verbosity and any vain repetition of words in distinguishing between what was and what was created. For the word with each of these sayings shows the difference between the soul and the flesh. The soul was (more precisely: it became), and the body was created. Not because the force of these sayings expresses something that is not the same thing, but in order to make it possible to conclude what follows about each of the signifieds, the word used this difference in sayings about soul and body. The soul was originally what it will be again after purification, and the body, created by God's hands, was created by what its resurrection will show in due times. For as you will always see him after the resurrection, this is, of course, how he was originally created; because resurrection is nothing other than, without a doubt, restoration to the primitive state. Why does Ecclesiastes add the following to this, saying that there is nothing other than the primitive. For he says: “There is nothing new under the sun” (Eccl. 1:10). And thus he seemed to say: if something is not according to the primitive, then it does not exist at all, but is only considered to have existence. For “there is nothing,” says Ecclesiastes, “that is new under the sun” (Eccl. 1:10), so that someone could say and point to something that is happening: “this is new, and has really happened.” This is the meaning of what was said, and it reads like this: “and there is nothing new under the sun, who speaks and says: Behold, this is new” (Eccl. 1:10). And he defends what was said. in the following, saying: if something really happened, it is the same as what happened in the centuries that preceded us. This thought is shown by the very sayings of Scripture, read like this: “it has already happened in all those who were before us” (Eccl. 1, 10). If we are overcome by oblivion of what was; then do not marvel at this. For even what is now is being forgotten. When nature has deviated into vice; then we forgot what was good. But when the return to good comes for us; then the bad will again be covered in oblivion. For this, I think, is the meaning of what was said when Ecclesiastes says: “the memory of the first is not, and the memory of the last will not be their memory” (Eccl. 1:11). He seemed to say this: the memory of what happened in the initial prosperity, and from which humanity became immersed in evil, will erase what will happen after a long time. For there will be no memory of this after what has happened in the end; that is, the complete destruction of the remembrance of evils was accomplished for nature by the final restoration in Christ Jesus. To him be glory and power, forever and ever! Amen. Eccl.1:12. Az, it is said, Ecclesiastes. And we found out who this Ecclesiastes is, who gathers the lost and scattered into one, makes everything into a single herd, so that nothing remains inattentive to the beautiful, all-reviving voice of the Shepherd; because he says: “the verbs that I speak... are the spirit and the life” (John 6:63). He calls himself Ecclesiastes, as a doctor, and life, and resurrection, and light, and way, and door, and truth, and as love for mankind called by all names. Therefore, like the voice of a doctor, welcoming to the sick, like the word of life, it becomes effective on the dead, who, as soon as they hear the voice of the Son of Man, no longer remain in the ancient deadness, but, while in the tombs, seek the voice of resurrection, like the word of light, it is applied to those who are in darkness, like a path, smooth for those who wander, like a door, ready for those who need to enter; This is how Ecclesiastes, of course, talks with the constituents of the Church. Therefore Ecclesiastes speaks to us; and we, the Church, will listen to his words. For as the face turns to the guide, the swimmers look to the helmsman, and the military formation turns to the commander; so those who make up the fullness of the Church - to the Ruler of the Church. Therefore, what does Ecclesiastes say? Eccl.1:12. I was king over Israel in Jerusalem. When is this? Was it not then, without a doubt, that “a king was appointed from Him over Zion by His holy mountain. Proclaim the commandment of the Lord” (Psalm 2:6–7). To whom did the Lord say: “Thou art my Son, and this day have I begotten Thee” (Heb. 1:5)? For “speech” that He gave birth to the Creator of the universe and the Father of ages “today,” so that the word, by this application of the time of speech to the time of birth, represents not a pre-eternal existence, but a carnal birth in time for the salvation of men. This, I think, is what the true Ecclesiastes portrays, teaching the great piety of the mystery for which God appeared in the flesh. For Ecclesiastes says: Eccl.1:13. Let my heart seek and consider in wisdom all who are under heaven. This is the reason why the Lord came to people in the flesh - “to give His heart to consider in His wisdom those who are under heaven.” For what is higher than heaven, being not overcome by illness, had no need for a watcher or a healer. Therefore, since evil on earth (a reptile and insolent beast - the serpent, dragging along on the toes and on the belly, turns the earth into food for itself, not feeding on anything heavenly, but dragging along what is trampled, it always has in mind, watching the heel of the human procession, and pouring poison into those who have lost “the power to tread on serpents” (Luke 10, 19 )); Therefore, he set forth His heart “to seek and consider all those who are under heaven.” For in that which is above the heavens, the Prophet sees Divine splendor not in humiliation, saying: “Your splendor will be taken above the heavens” (Psalm 8:2); because the heavenly region was also degraded by sin. So the psalmist says: “humble yourselves” for the sake of your sins (Psalm 105:43). This is what Ecclesiastes came to consider, namely, that something happened under heaven that did not happen before: how did vanity arise, why did the unrealized begin to prevail, what dominion does that which does not have? For evil is not independent; because it does not have its own peculiarity from existence. And what is not of existence, then, of course, does not exist by a special nature; and yet to those who are like vanity, vanity prevails. Therefore, He came to seek with His wisdom what happened under the sun? What kind of confusion is there in what is being done here? How did the existent become enslaved to the non-existent? Why does the unrealized dominate over the existing? and saw: Eccl.1:13. For God gave the son of man a deceitful care, even if he exercised it. It is ungodly to think about this in a way that someone else would understand at first glance, namely: as if God Himself gave people evil care. In that case, the cause of evil would be attributed to Him. For He who is good by nature is certainly ready to supply with goods. Why “every good tree produces good fruit” (Matthew 7:17); The grapes are not born on thorns, nor are thorns born on the vine. By nature, what is good does not yield anything evil from its treasures. And a good person, out of the abundance of his heart, does not speak evil, but speaks according to his nature. Moreover, will the Source of good things pour out anything evil from His nature? On the contrary, a more pious sense requires us to understand this in such a way that God’s giving is good. This is a free movement, which, when used sinfully by people, has become an instrument of sin. For whatever is free and not enslaved is good by nature; and what is associated with necessity, no one will count as good. On the contrary, the very free striving of thought, without guidance, deviating towards the choice of the bad, became a temptation for the soul, carried away from the high and honorable to the passionate movements of nature. This is what the word “dade” means, which does not mean that God put evil into human life, but that man recklessly used the blessings given by God to serve evil. And Holy Scripture usually expresses similar thoughts with such sayings. For example: “God gave them up in the passion of dishonor” (Rom. 1:26); and: “I gave them over... to an unskilled mind” (Rom. 1:28); and: “harden... the heart of Pharaoh” (Ex. 9:12); and: “Why have you, Lord, turned us away from Your path, having hardened our hearts so that we should not fear You” (Isa. 63:17); and: “I have made mistakes along the pathless path, and not along the path” (Psalm 106:40); and: “Thou hast deceived me... and was deceived” (Jer. 20:7). Such are all similar sayings, the exact meaning of which not only confirms that in human nature anything human comes from God, but, on the contrary, accuses freedom, which is good and a gift given to nature by God, but has become evil from an inclination to the opposite. Therefore, Ecclesiastes saw “all things created” in this life “under the sun,” namely, that everything was “vanity” (Eccl. 1:14), because there was no one who understood, there was no seeking God, when “everything went astray, and came to be without the keys” (Psalm 13:3). Therefore, having said: “and behold all vanity,” he added a reason, namely, that it is not God who is the culprit of this, but the will of human lust, which he called “spirit.” This spirit accuses not because it was like that from the beginning (it would not be subject to condemnation if it was created like that); but because, having become corrupted, he came into discord with the structure of the whole. For he says: Eccl.1:15. What is corrupt cannot be reformed that is, let it not be that the creature well-ordered by God should be characterized by perversity. Just as an artist who makes something for himself according to an intended drawing, uses a ruler and a cord to process the parts, which, in their artistic relationship to one another, constitute the whole work of the vessel, and if any of the parts has not yet been processed according to the cord, then this disgrace, of course, will not be allowed by the correct structure of the whole, but this part will also need to be fitted to a straight line, brought under the cord and straightened: so Ecclesiastes says that a nature corrupted by vice cannot exist in a creature in which the relationship of parts is arranged correctly. Eccl.1:15. And the deprivation, he says, cannot be calculated. The usual usage of words in Scripture teaches that by “deprivation” we mean a lack. And you can be sure of this from many places. For “in everything and in everyone,” Paul, who was skilled, knew how to “become deprived and abound” (Phil. 4:12). And he who squandered his father’s property through debauchery, when he was overcome by hunger, “began to be deprived” (Luke 15:4). And speaking about the saints, Paul lists other sufferings in their bodies, and also adds this, that they were “deprived” and “sorrowful” (Heb. 11:37). Therefore, here too, Scripture, having said: “deprivation,” with this saying indicated a lack. And what is missing cannot be counted among what is. For the disciples, while they were all in their fullness, were twelve in number; When the son of perdition perished, the number became incomplete, because what was missing was not counted among what remained. After Judas the number of disciples was and was called one. Therefore, Ecclesiastes says: “the deprivation cannot be counted.” What does this mean in the word? That we were once included in the whole; because we also belonged to the sacred hundred verbal sheep. But since one sheep strayed from the pasture of the mountains, our nature was carried away by vice into this salty and dry country; then the number in the herd of those who are not lost is no longer mentioned, but it is called the number: ninety-nine. For the vain becomes something outside the number of truly existing things. Why “deprivation cannot be calculated.” Therefore, “I came to seek and save the lost” (Luke 15:10), and, having taken it upon my shoulders, to restore into the number of those who exist what was perishing in the vanity of the non-existent, so that indeed the number of God’s creation, when the lost is saved with those who were not lost, would become complete again. So, what is the return of the lost, and what is the method of renouncing evils for fellowship in goodness, we will learn this later. For “He who was tempted in every way according to the likeness of sin” (Heb. 4:15) speaks to us from our own side, He who took upon Himself our weaknesses with the very weaknesses of nature shows the way beyond vice. Imagine now that the wisdom of the One who is from Solomon himself according to the flesh is talking about what especially guides us to the contempt of what is desired for people. For it is not in the likeness of many, who do not have the power to desire, and the word is spoken to them, so that therefore he has no credibility, accusing him of what he has not experienced. For we know everything not by our experience, but by inference alone we know that which poverty forbids us from enjoying the pleasantness of experience. If we offer advice to anyone that he should not value what people value at anything; then the listener has a ready remark: “That’s why you don’t appreciate this because you yourself didn’t know it through experience.” But in the reasoning of the One who talks to us about this, any such objection is actually destroyed; because Solomon says this. And this Solomon is the third of the kings of Israel, after Saul and David, chosen by the Lord. He, having accepted leadership from his father, and having already achieved the greatness of the Israelites, is proclaimed king of the kingdom; not by war and battles subjugating his subjects, but by living in the world with all his power, he set himself the task not of acquiring what he did not have, but of enjoying what he had; so there was no obstacle to anything he wanted. For abundance extended to the same extent as desire, and there was free leisure for enjoyment; since nothing unpleasant stopped spending time with what was desired. But, being wise in other things and having sufficient understanding to find something for pleasure, he said that he himself came up with both of those desired for pleasure, and having done everything that he subsequently counted in words, he claimed that by experience he had learned one end of all concerns in this, namely: “vanity.” He gave his story about this such order that at first, in the first times of his life, he spent time on studying, and did not weaken his efforts in these works; He took advantage of the will of the spirit, that is, the natural desire to increase knowledge, although with difficulty he succeeded in what he wanted. Thus, having grown in wisdom, not only with reason did he approach this passionate and unreasonable seduction of people by bodily pleasures, but through experience he learned the vanity of each of the lusts. This is the purpose of the research. But it is time later to offer in the order of what was written and the very review of what is being read. Eccl.1:16. The verbs are in my heart, saying: behold, I have been exalted; because I saw the greatness of dominion and the splendor of the kingdom suddenly copulating on me. But before that, I stocked up on acquiring wisdom in everything, which is impossible to acquire except through labor and shedding sweat. Therefore, having said: “I have spoken in my heart, saying: Behold, I have been magnified,” and added this: “I have increased wisdom”; because the splendor of dominion, which came to me by itself, I increased by the addition of wisdom, saying to myself that in this it is especially necessary for me to appear to have the upper hand over the kings who were before me, and to have more than their wisdom. For he says: “I will increase wisdom more than all those who were before me in Jerusalem” (Eccl. 1:16). And I thought about how it was possible to achieve this. For who does not know that wisdom consists in knowing what other industrious people have previously worked on? Why does he say: “my heart has seen much, wisdom and understanding,” since knowledge of such things was not given by itself, not without effort; but because, says Ecclesiastes, “my heart is filled with wisdom and understanding” (Eccl. 1:17). It would not have been possible for me to find out this if work and reflection did not precede knowledge. But “I understood both parables and cunning,” he continues, that is, I acquired the concept of the highest, compiled by similarity through comparison with what surrounds us. And I studied this, he says. For, as he testifies, “I understood parables and cunning.” Just as the Lord, teaching the listeners in the Gospel, presents to the eyes the word about the Kingdom, depicting either a pearl, or a treasure, or a marriage, or a mustard seed, or leaven, or something similar, not in the sense that this very thing is the Kingdom; but by assimilating what is signified by these things, it shows the listeners some reflections and mysterious features of what exceeds the concept. And for this, says Ecclesiastes, it became my will of spirit to acquire for myself a wealth of wisdom, so that, having become wise, I myself would not err in the knowledge of things, and would not remain ignorant of what is useful; because knowledge is made up of wisdom, and knowledge makes the judgment of the attentive more accessible to us. This, however, is usually achieved not without effort by those who are diligent, but he who applies knowledge to himself, without a doubt, extends labor to the same extent as teaching. Therefore, Ecclesiastes says: “Whoever applies reason will add disease” (Eccl. 1:18). And when he has come to this, then he pronounces a sentence about the pleasant as about vanity. Eccl.2:1. I said in my heart: Come now, that I may tempt you with joy, and see with the eye: and this is also vanity. For I did not immediately submit myself to such a test, and not before, having tasted a strict and well-behaved life, I crawled to participate in pleasures, but having tested myself in the first, and having succeeded in disposition in gloominess and inflexibility, in which the lessons of wisdom are especially for those who are diligent; Then he already condescends to what is considered pleasant for the feeling, not drawn into it by passion, but with the intention of considering whether the feeling brought into pleasure in any way contributes to the knowledge of the truly good. For then, that is, at the beginning, he makes laughter his enemy, and calls passion “sin” (Eccl. 2:2); and this in meaning also means what to call feeblemindedness and madness. For if anyone in the proper sense calls this laughter anything else, it is neither a word nor a deed of any kind, performed for any purpose, but an obscene opening of the mouth, intermittent breathing, a trembling of the whole body, widening of the cheeks, discovery of teeth, gums and palate in the mouth, writhing of the neck, an erratic change in the voice, interrupted by interruptions in breathing; then will it be something else, asks Ecclesiastes, and not madness? Why does he say: “I laugh: sin” (Eccl. 2:2); as if he said to laughter: “You’re out of your mind, you’ve lost your temper, you’re not keeping within the bounds of duty, you’re voluntarily disfiguring yourself, perverting your appearance into a passionate one and carrying out this perversion without any benefit.” Eccl.2:2. Rejoice and joy: what are you doing? This also means the same as saying: “I was against pleasure, suspecting its approach, like some thief, secretly creeping into the secret places of the soul; never allowed him to take over his thoughts. For how soon I learned that pleasure, like some kind of beast, was creeping towards my feelings; He immediately entered into a fight with him, and met him, saying to this slavish and unreasonable joy: “What are you doing?” Why do you weaken the courage of nature? Why do you soften the strength of thought? Why do you weaken the vigor of your soul? Why do you harm your thoughts? Why do you darken the bright clarity of pure thoughts with your obscurity?” Having done all this and the like, Ecclesiastes continues: Eccl.2:3. Let me see if my heart will draw my flesh like wine, that is, he looked at how care for the spiritual can become dominant over carnal movements, so that nature does not come into discord with itself, when the mind chooses one thing, and the flesh is drawn to another, but so that our carnal wisdom can be made obedient and handy to the rational part of the soul, when the lesser will be carried away and absorbed by the excess, as happens with those who are thirsty.” For wine, if brought to thirsty lips, does not remain in the cup, but is poured into the drinker, and whoever carefully draws it in becomes bright. When I accomplished this, then the ascent to the knowledge of existence became infallible and unhindered for me. “My heart,” says Ecclesiastes, “instruct me in wisdom,” with which I overcame the rebellion of voluptuousness; and this training became for me the reason “to hold back my joy” (Eccl. 2:3). This is the meaning contained in these words in connection with the reading: and what I most desired in the knowledge was not to waste my life on anything vain, but to find that good, having been granted which, a person does not sin in judging what is useful, and which constantly, and not temporarily, continues throughout life, giving hope to possess the good at every age, both the first and the middle and the last and in all the number of days. Eccl.2:3. “Before I see,” he says, “some good things the sons of man do under the sun on the number of days of their life.” Although what the flesh desires serves most as a bait to the feeling in the present, what delights it is momentary. For it is impossible to enjoy anything that happens in the body for a long time. But the pleasure of drinking ceases with satiety; and when eating, also the filling of the belly quenches the desire; and every other desire in the same way weakens upon satisfaction, and if it appears again, it disappears again. But nothing pleasing to the senses lasts forever, and does not remain so. And besides this, there is still another good for a person in childhood, and another for a flourishing age, and another for someone who has come to maturity, another for an old age, and another again for an old man looking at the ground. But I, says Ecclesiastes, sought that good, which at every age and at every time of life is equally good - such a good that one does not expect satiety with it, and there is no satiety in it, but even with satisfaction the lust continues, along with pleasure the desire intensifies, and is not limited by the age of the lover; but the more a person enjoys this good, the more the desire grows with pleasure, and with desire the pleasure flares up, and throughout life it is always wonderful for those who possess it, not changing the least due to the impermanence of ages and times; whether someone closes his eyes or lifts his gaze, whether he is prosperous or sad, whether he spends the night or the day - in one word, it serves everyone in life with such goodness that even for someone who has fallen into any unfortunate circumstance, it does not become worse or better, is not diminished, does not increase. This, in my opinion, is in the true sense the good that Solomon sought to see; “Even the same things people do under the sun throughout the number of days of their life.” It seems to me nothing other than a matter of faith, the reality of which is common to everyone, is equally offered to those who wish, is omnipotent, and constantly abides in life. This is the good work that may also be done in us, in Christ Jesus our Lord. Glory to him forever and ever! Amen. Time to explore what the word of Ecclesiastes will teach us after this. First, we learned what we had learned, namely: that this Ecclesiastes of all creation, seeking the lost and gathering into one the lost, He Himself oversees earthly life. For the things on earth are the things in heaven, which in Scripture are called those things which are under heaven, and in which deception and failure prevail. And in the second conversation we learned that on behalf of Solomonov a condemnation was made of a life disposed to pleasures and passions, so that we would be all the more convinced to reject such a life, when he who has every opportunity to enjoy pleasure spat upon everything that seems desirable to people as if it were nothing. So, what do we learn in order in this case from the third conversation? I think the lesson is most appropriate for those who belong to the Church, I mean the confession of what was done not according to reason, in which a painful feeling of shame is produced in the soul by admitting to inappropriate deeds. For the great and powerful weapon for avoiding sin is the shame usually stored in people, for this purpose, I think, put into us by God, so that such a disposition of the soul would produce in us aversion from the worst. For shame itself and the painful feeling of shame are akin and close to each other; sin is repented of by both, if only someone wishes to take advantage of such a disposition of the soul for this. For shame often taught more than fear to avoid doing inappropriate things. And the shame that follows the conviction of a sin, in itself, can sufficiently discipline the sinner so that he does not fall into anything similar again. And if anyone wanted to define the difference between shame and shame, then shame is the highest degree of shame, and shame, on the contrary, is the lowest degree of shame. The difference and communication of these painful feelings are revealed on the face with paint. For shame is signified by one blush, since the body, by some natural disposition, has some compassion with the soul, and the heat of the heart’s hymen boils on the surface of the face; and the one who is disgraced by the discovery of an offense becomes blue and purple, because fear mixes bile with the blush. Therefore, such a painful feeling for those who decide to do something incongruous will be enough to prevent them from remaining longer in that for which they were exposed to shame. If this is really so, and Scripture has touched upon a painful feeling necessary for a person, because such a disposition is innate to nature as a protection against wrongdoing; then it is good to recognize this confession of sins and achieved success as the Church’s own lesson. For through this a person brings his soul to safety with the weapon of shame. Just as if someone, due to immoderate gluttony, accumulates some indigestible juices in himself, then, when heat occurs in the body, having cured the disease by cutting and cauterization, and looking at the scab left on the body from cauterization, he will have him as a mentor, keeping him from disorder in his subsequent life: thus, having exposed himself to shame by confessing the secret, remembering the painful feeling of shame sets himself a mentor for later life. So this is what the Church teaches from the current reading of what is written in Ecclesiastes. For he speaks, making it known with free speech, and before all people, like a pillar covered with writing, erecting a confession of what he has done; it is such that ignorance of this and silence about this is more glorious than words. Whether he says, having actually done this, or having imagined it for our benefit, so that the word subsequently reaches its goal, I cannot say this exactly, at least he says what someone with virtue in mind would not voluntarily agree to say. And he, if by special observation he describes what was not done as if it had been done, and condemns it, as if he had experienced it; then he does this so that before the test we evade the desire for what is condemned; and if he voluntarily allowed himself to enjoy such things, in order to occupy his sensibilities with the fact that one thing is opposite to the other; then it is left to the will of the person who wishes to make any guess about this. But if anyone says that Solomon really experienced the pleasantness of life; then let us accept this, understanding it in the following way: as those who plunge into the depths of the sea and are looking for something at the bottom under the water, if they find some kind of pearl or something similar that is born in the depths, then the distress under the water does not give them any pleasure, but the hope of profit forces them to dive; So Solomon, if he experienced this, then, of course, like some fisherman in a sea of ​​purple shells, he plunged into pleasure not in order to be filled with salty sea water (and by this water I mean pleasure), but in order to find in such depths something useful for the mind. What is found in this way, according to my fortune-telling, usefully serves either to weaken the impulses of the body by allowing what it pleases, because nature always strives more persistently for what is forbidden, or to make this teacher worthy of probability, so that a vain thing, despised by those who have studied it by experience, is no longer considered attractive to people. For they also say about doctors that their art excels in that which concerns the type of ailments they recognize on their own bodies, and that they become more reliable advisors and healers in such diseases about which, having previously been cured of them, they have acquired knowledge to the extent that they have been taught by their own suffering. Let us therefore see that the one who heals our lives recognizes himself as having suffered in his life? Eccl.2:4. I will magnify, he says, my creation, and create houses for me. The word directly begins with condemnation. For he says: “great,” not God’s “creation,” which is myself, but mine. And my creation is nothing other than that which gives pleasure to the senses. According to the generic concept, this creation is one, but, with fractional division, it is necessarily decomposed into many according to the needs of pleasure. Anyone who has once entered into the depths of the material must necessarily turn his eye everywhere and see where pleasure can come from. Just as water from one source is carried through streams to many places, and water divided from a source remains the same water, even if it flows in thousands of streams: so pleasure, being one in nature, but presenting itself differently in different activities, flows everywhere, adding itself to the needs of life. For example, life has made housing necessary for nature, because humanity is weak to endure the inequalities of heat and cold. Therefore, in this respect, the house is useful for life, but pleasure forced a person to transgress the limits of need. For not only by providing the body with what is needed in the house, but by preparing pleasures and delights for the eyes, he almost cries because he has not made the sky his upper dwelling, and that he does not have the rays of the sun to attach them to the ceiling. Why does it spread rows of buildings in all directions, creating a chain of rooms around itself, as if some other universe; builds walls to extreme heights; and the interior of the dwellings varies in arrangement; stone from Laconia and Thessaly and Carysto is divided into thin layers by iron, Nile and Numidian fossils are found. And if somewhere, with great diligence, a Phrygian stone is found, scattering deep purple in places across the whiteness of the marble, then this becomes a delight for greedy eyes, vividly imagining some kind of multiform and varied spill of colors on the white. How much effort goes into this! so many drawings! How many tricks do those who cut substances with water and iron have! and human hands work day and night to saw other processed substances. And this is not enough for those who work on vain decoration, and man paints pure glass in various colors through compositions, so that they too can add something to the invented luxury. Who will describe the exquisite design of the ceilings, on which trees that were once cedars are, through the art of art, again converted into imaginary trees, and with the help of carvings grow branches, leaves and fruits? I am silent about the gold stretched into thin and airy hymens, and placed everywhere on them in order to attract the greed of the eyes. Who can depict the use of ivory for the exquisite decoration of entrances, the coating of carvings made on them with gold, or sheets of silver nailed to the carvings and the like? Or are the floors of houses shining with different colors of stones, so that their feet also enjoy the shine of these stones? And the exaltation of a multitude of such houses, the construction of which makes it necessary, is not a need of life, but a whim, extending from one foolishness to another, Ecclesiastes finds useless. For some of the buildings should be used for racing, others for walking, some to be entrances, others for entrances, and others for gates. And it is considered insufficient for splendor to have gates and entrances, and a wide passage inside the gate, if those entering do not encounter something that can immediately amaze the beholder upon entering. At the same time, the fonts combine utility with splendor, entire rivers are irrigated from abundant watercourses, and special rooms for bodily exercises are built around them, decorated to excess with various marbles; from everywhere around the building there are porches supported by Numidian, or Thessalian, or Egyptian pillars - the copper in the idols takes on thousands of forms into which petty whimsicality casts the substance; marble sculptures and paintings are visible, the spectators of which commit fornication with their eyes, because art, imitating what is not visible, reveals it in the paintings, and what is permissible to see is depicted in them in amazing beauty. But how can one list in detail everything that care about what serves as an accusation and accusation of negligence about what is more important? For the more a person increases his zeal for buildings with the multitude and high cost of materials prepared, the more he will expose the lack of decoration of the soul. And whoever is attentive to himself and truly decorates his home in order to eventually accept God as an inhabitant, has other substances from which he collects decoration for such a home. I know the gold that shines in such matters, and is mined from the depths of the thoughts of the scriptures; I know the silver - the words of God, kindled, whose lordship, like lightning, shines, illuminating the truth. And under the rays of the various stones with which the walls of such a church are decorated, and under the platform of the building, imagining in your mind the various dispositions of virtues, you will not fail in decorating this house appropriately. Let the platform be covered with abstinence, in which the dust of earthly understanding will not disturb the one who lives abstinently. Let the hope of heaven illuminate the ceiling, at which, looking with the eye of the soul, you will see not likenesses of beauty depicted by chisels, but the very prototype of beauty, not decorated with gold or silver, but with that which is much higher than gold and more precious than stone. If you need to describe in words the decoration of different parts; then let incorruption and dispassion adorn the house here; and there the decoration of the home is truth and gentleness; on one side humility and generosity shine, and on the other again piety before God. Still, this is a wonderful artist - let love adapt one to the other in the best order. Would you like some fonts? if you want, you have your own home font and your own watercourses, from which you can wash away spiritual impurities; The great David also used this, enjoying this font at night. And do not make the pillars that support the porch of the soul any Phrygian or porphyry; but on the contrary, let constancy and immobility in all good things be more valuable to you than these material embellishments. Likenesses of any kind, either painted or sculptured, which are prepared by human art for deception in imitation of the truth, are not at all allowed in such a dwelling, in which everything is filled with sculptures of the truth. And when you desire running races and walks, you instead have practice in the commandments. For this is what Wisdom says: “I walk in the paths of righteousness, and in the midst of the path of justification I live” (Prov. 8:20). How wonderful it is to set the soul in motion and exercise on these paths, and in the movement of the commandment to the one who has passed the field to return to it again! That is, whoever fulfills the commandment in that to which he applies diligence, let the success of his character and decency of life be adorned the second and third time. Whoever brings beauty to his building in this way will not bother himself much with earthly matter, will not worry about fossils, will not go overseas to buy ivory over the Indian seas, will not hire artists whose art is dedicated to a certain substance for exquisite work; opposite that house he has wealth that supplies materials for such buildings. Well-behaved children recognize the ugly situation as worthy of regret, but for a stupid and rude son, the spectacle of intoxication serves as a reason for laughter. The great list of passionate movements contains recognition of the planting of grapes. For how many and what passionate actions wine produces, the power of all this is expressed by the word. Who does not know all that wine, when it exceeds the need through immoderation, is food for the inflammation of lewdness and for the delivery of pleasure, the corruption of youth, the ugliness of old age, dishonor for wives, a substance that leads to frenzy, a path to disorder, poison of the soul, deadening of the mind, alienation from virtue. Hence, without any reason, laughter, without any reason, crying, randomly flowing tears, unjustified boasting, shamelessness in lies, wishing for the impossible, hope for the impossible, arrogant threat, unreasonable fear, insensitivity to the truly terrible, unfounded suspicion, unreasonable philanthropy, promise of the impossible, let’s not even talk about other things, about indecent drowsiness, about relaxing pain in head, about indecency from immoderate satiety, about relaxation of the limbs, about the bending of the neck, no longer supported by the shoulders, when the wine moisture relaxes the bonds of its composition. What produced this vile lawlessness - incest with daughters? What robbed Lot of the understanding of what he had done to such an extent that he dared to commit a vile act, and did not know what he dared to do? Who, as if mysteriously, invented a strange name for these children? How did the mothers of the criminal fetus become sisters to their children? How did children have the same father and grandfather? Who mixed nature into lawlessness? Was it not the wine that exceeded the limit that produced this incredible and deplorable event? Was it not drunkenness that brought into history such a fable-like legend, which in its extraordinaryness surpasses even genuine fables? “He made his father drunk,” it is said, “with wine” (Gen. 19:33). And thus, when his understanding was driven out of him by wine, as if possessed by some spell, he left this deplorable story to the world, because his sense was stolen by intoxication at the time of the crime. Oh, for what harm did these wives bring with them this wine from Sodom’s reserves! Oh, what an unkind greeting from a bad cup poured into the father! Eccl.2:4. Planted, he says, “we are grapes, which I had no need for; because I myself am a fruitful grape, a flowering spiritual grape, many-branched, intertwined with the same tribe with branches of life and loving rings, showing off decent morals instead of leaves, growing sweet and ripe grapes of virtue. Whoever plants this in his own soul, cultivates the wine that gladdens the heart, “makes his own land,” according to the word of the inflow (Proverbs 12:11), as the law of such work requires, so that he brings life to life with reason, from the roots of the virtues plucks out what is alien to them and has grown to them, irrigates the soul with lessons, with the sickle of a strictly appraising mind cuts off the impulses of thought towards the unnecessary and useless; he is very blessed in this work, having squeezed his grapes into the cup of wisdom. But he who turns to the earth and embraces earthly things does not know such a planting; because it adds to this the rich decoration of vertograds and fruitful gardens. What is the need for many gardens for someone who has one garden (paradise) in mind? What benefit do I have from a garden that grows vegetables—the food of the weak? If I had been in that garden, I would not have entertained the wishes of many gardens. If I kept my soul healthy so that I could eat solid food, I would not worry about vegetables, cultivating for food what is suitable for illness. But when one day luxury has risen to the need, and its desire has exceeded its limits, then, after extravagance in houses and after spending on vanities under the roof of a home, a person indulges in luxury in the open air, and uses the property of the air to satisfy the desire for pleasure. He strives for the fact that through cultivation, his trees are always green and hay-leaved, serve in the air instead of a roof, so that he enjoys the open air as if he were in a house; the surface of the earth, according to the art of the gardener, is dressed with all kinds of herbs, so that wherever he turns his gaze, everything pleasant appears to the eye everywhere, and is always surrounded by what gives pleasure, at every season he sees unusual times, in winter grass, early flowers, a vine turning into a tree, and intertwining its branches with other people's branches, the tender embrace of ivy with trees. And what types of fruits on them, being mixed with each other from heterogeneous ones, do violence to nature, in appearance and taste showing in themselves something in between, so that the fruit, apparently, is both, which can come from the dissolution of heterogeneous ones - about all this, and if anything else has been invented in plants by art that violates nature, which the need of life does not seek, but unbridled desire seeks; He who confesses his deeds speaks about all this, that this happened in his artificial hills and gardens. For, having said: “I planted trees of every kind of fruit” (Eccl. 2:5), with this collective expression he showed that he had no shortage of such things. Then, after the food grown under the open sky and under the roof, water is not left uncontributing to a variety of pleasures, as if one should enjoy all the elements, the earth through what is peculiar to it, the air through trees, water through the sea made by human hands. For in order for the look at the water to delight the eyes, the platform is made into a lake, because the water around is surrounded by the walls of the building, so that bathing gives pleasure to those cooling the body, and the flowing water, sharing everywhere where irrigation is needed, makes the gardens more flourishing. “I created for me,” says Ecclesiastes, “fonts of water, so that the trees could be healed from them” (Eccl. 2:6). But I had a source of paradise, that is, the teaching of virtues, which watered spiritual dryness, while I despised earthly waters, the enjoyment of which is temporary, and the nature of which passes away. So, it is much better to bring for yourself at least a small stream from the divine source, with which spiritual virtues are watered and restored, so that the garden of good intentions can grow green in our souls, with the help of our Lord Jesus Christ. To him be glory and power forever and ever! Amen. Our word is still delayed by this confession; because the one who tells about his affairs describes almost everything from which the vanity of the affairs of this life is learned. Now he proceeds, as it were, to a greater condemnation of what he has done, and to what serves to condemn the passion of pride. For which of those things, whether it is an expensive house, a multitude of vineyards, the beauty of the gardens, the collection of waters in fonts, or the irrigation of gardens with them, shows as much arrogance as he has in himself, who, being a man, considers himself the ruler of his fellow tribesmen? And Ecclesiastes says: Eccl.2:7. The attractions of male and female slaves, and members of the household were with us. Look at the arrogance of arrogance! To become equal with God - that is how exalted this word is! For “every kind of work” is done by the power that exceeds all, we heard in prophecy (Psalm 118:91). Therefore, whoever makes the property of God his own property, giving his family the power to be considered the master of husbands and wives, what is he doing other than transgressing nature itself in pride, looking at himself as something other than his subordinates? "Attractions of slaves and slaves". You condemn a person whose nature is free and autocratic to slavery; you give a law contrary to God, perverting the law He gave to nature. For the one created to be the master of the earth, and whom the Creator placed in authority, you bring under the yoke of slavery, as if contradicting and opposing the divine commandment. Have you forgotten the limits of power, that your leadership is limited to supervising the dumb? For it is said: “let him possess” birds, fish and four-footed animals (Gen. 1:26). Why, having left those subordinate to you as slaves, do you exalt yourself above the freest race, classifying your fellow tribesmen as four-legged and even legless? “Thou hast subdued all things” to man, the Word calls out in prophecy (Psalm 8:7), and lists the cattle, oxen, and sheep subordinate to his mind. Do you think people came from cattle? Do you think oxen gave birth to the human race? One service people have is the dumb. “Grow up the grass for cattle, and the grain for the service of man” (Psalm 103:14); and you, having mixed the nature of slavery and domination, made it serve itself and dominate itself. "Attractions of slaves and slaves". For what price, tell me? Which of the creatures did you find equivalent to this genus? With what coin is the mind valued? How many oxen did you put for the image of God? How many staters did you buy God-created nature for? “God said: Let us make man in Our image and likeness” (Gen. 1:26). And this prince of the whole earth, in the likeness of God, who inherited from God the power over everything on earth, tell me, who sells and who buys? Only God can do this; It’s better to say that God Himself cannot do this. “Unrepentant,” as it is said, “is the gift” of Him (Rom. 11:29). Therefore, our nature will not be enslaved by God, who called us into freedom, willfully enslaved to sin. If God does not enslave the free, who has placed his dominion above God? How will the prince of all the earth and everything on earth be sold? For it is absolutely necessary that the property of the one being bought be sold together. How much will we value what is in the whole earth? And if it is invaluable, then tell me, what price is worthy of the one who is above this? If you name the whole world, then even then you will not find a worthy price. For the One who knows how to accurately evaluate human nature said that the whole world is an unworthy ransom for a human soul (Matthew 16:26). He is brought out into the marketplace as the lord of the earth, and therefore the creation will be declared to be sold along with him, that is, the land, the sea, the islands, and everything in them. So, what will the buyer pay for it? What will the seller receive when such an acquisition follows the exchange? But a small book, a written agreement, a deduction of ovols deceived you, as if you had become the ruler of the image of God. - What madness! If the contract is lost, if the scripture is moth-eaten, or if a drop of water falls from somewhere and washes it away, where will you have guarantees? where do you have the right to rule? Apart from the fact that I have become your assistant by name, I don’t see anything else except one name. For what has power added to your nature? No time, no advantages; and your birth from the same people, and the same way of life, and you who dominate, and you who are subordinate to domination, are equally possessed by mental and physical passions, suffering and joy, joy, anxiety, sadness and pleasure, irritation and fears, illness and death. There is no difference in this between a slave and a master. Is it not the same air that one draws in through breathing? Don't they look at the sun the same way? Isn’t it the same way to support nature by taking new food? And are not both one dust after death? Isn't there one court? Isn't there a common kingdom, and isn't Gehenna also common? Having equal in everything, tell me, in what do you have more, so that you, being a man, consider yourself the ruler of man? And “attracts,” you say, “slaves and female slaves,” like a herd of goats or pigs. For having said that he attracted “slaves and female slaves” to himself, he added about the abundance of sheep and oxen that he previously had: “and the acquisition of cattle and herds became many” (Eccl. 2:7), says Ecclesiastes, as if in one order both of them were subordinate to him power. Then, after this, the confession of sins moves on to the most important ones. For he ascribes to himself “the root of all evil, the love of money” (1 Tim. 6:10). Eccl.2:8. I have collected silver and gold. What sorrow did gold cause to the earth, being mixed with it and scattered in those places where it was originally intended by the Creator? What has the Creator created that brings more benefit than the fruits of the earth? Didn’t He provide only tree fruits and seeds for food? Why have you transgressed the limits of power? Or prove that the Creator has allowed you to do this too - to rummage and go deep in the earth, to melt with fire what is under the earth, and to gather what you did not sow; or, perhaps, someone else will not blame himself for collecting money in this way, tearing it out of the ground? But since it is attached to the word: “and the estates of kings and countries” (Eccl. 2:8); then the thought of gathering is no longer irresponsible. For how much is it permissible for the royal power to collect property from “countries”, that is, how much to impose taxes, how much to demand tithes, what monetary contributions to force subjects to make, Ecclesiastes says that this is how he then collected gold and silver. However, I would willingly like to find out what kind of substances will come from the one who collects one way or another? Let us agree to the proposal that it is not by money, or drachma, or talent that they come from money lovers, but suddenly everything became rich for them, the earth, the sand, the mountains, the plains, the hills; suppose that everything suddenly turned into this substance; How will life increase in prosperity through this? If he sees in everything what he now sees in small quantities, what of the spiritual blessings, what of the desired for the body, will come from this abundance? Will this give rise to the hope that someone living in such an abundance of gold will become wise, resourceful, reasonable, knowledgeable, God-loving, chaste, pure, dispassionate, not allowing into himself and not tolerating everything that attracts to vice? Or, although he is unable to do this, he can nevertheless continue the life of the body for many centuries; make him ageless, painless, unharmed, give him everything that is desirable for carnal life? But no one is so vain, and no one knows so much about our general nature as to think that this would also happen to people if the substance from which money is made flows to everyone in an innumerable quantity at the desire of everyone. For even now one can see that many of those who have the advantage of such abundance live in the most miserable body, and if there were no doctors with them; then they couldn’t live without doctors. So, if the abundance of gold supposedly assigned to us by the word showed no benefit either to body or soul; then, all the more, what is found in small quantities is condemned as not serving the benefit of those who have it. Or what will be the possessor of this substance, when it has no effect on taste, smell, or hearing, and even has the same value for touch as anything solid? For me, no one will give food or clothing mined in exchange for gold in addition to gold. For whoever exchanged bread or clothing for gold has rewarded something useful with something useless, and he lives having made bread and not gold as food for himself. And whoever collected this substance for himself in such a trade, what does he use this money for, what advice does he use from them, what teaching in present affairs, what prediction about the future? What consolation is there from them in bodily illnesses? Counts, postpones, stamps; if they ask, he renounces, and if they don’t believe, he swears - this is bliss, this is the end of effort, this is pleasure: all happiness extends to this - to provide food for perjury! But gold, they say, has a good-colored appearance; but is it more beautiful than fire, or more beautiful than the stars, but is it brighter than the rays of the sun? Who is preventing you from this pleasure, so that you need to please your eyes with the good color of gold? “But the fire, they say, is going out; the sun sets, and the pleasantness of this luminary is not always felt. - Yes, and gold in the darkness, tell me, what is the difference with lead? - But, from fire or stars, they say, we would not have skins, wrists, buckles, belts, necklaces, wreaths, and the like; gold provides this too, and if anything else is done for decoration. So the desire to protect this substance led to the most important thing in being careful about vanity. For this is what I will say to them: “What is he trying to do, who colors his hair with gold, or attaches jewelry to his lips, or covers the skin of his neck with necklaces, or shows that he is wearing gold on any other part of his body? Wherever it is placed on the body, the person himself will not be in the least transformed by the shine of gold. Whoever sees the gold-bearer also looks at the gold, as if it were lying in a shop, and sees the wearer in the same way as he is used to seeing him. Even if this gold is well crafted and minted, even if it contains colored and fire-like stones, nevertheless, nature does not acquire any sensation from what is placed on a person; but if he has any damage to his face, or is missing some of the natural accessories, or his eye is gouged out, or a disgusting scar is drawn on his cheek; then the vileness remains in sight, not darkened by the glitter of gold; and if anyone happens to have a sick body, then this substance will not provide any consolation to the sufferer. Therefore, why care about something that does not bring anything useful to those who care about it, either for beauty or for the well-being of the body, and does not console them in sorrow?” And what is the disposition of those who are attached with their hearts to this substance, when, having come to the consciousness of the value of such acquisition, they rejoice, as if they had something more. If someone asks them: “Do you approve of your nature being changed into this; and it became something that is valued by you with such a disposition; Will you agree to this change, so that from people you may become gold; and turn out to be no longer verbal, rational, having feelings for the functions of life, but yellow, heavy, dumb, inanimate and insensitive, what is the nature of gold? - I don’t think they would agree to this, even if they were strongly attached to this substance by their lust. Therefore, if for sane people the desire for a person to have the properties of an inanimate substance serves as a curse; then what kind of insane frenzy is it to care about acquiring something that is the end of vanity, so that those driven into a frenzy by money for the sake of it dare to murder and robbery? And not only for this, but also for the crafty invention of losses, which others, calling new robbery and murder, will not sin against the truth. For what is the difference between having someone else’s property that was secretly looted from a dug-up wall, and killing a passer-by and becoming the owner of his property, or by forced growth acquiring something that does not belong to oneself? What a bad name! growth serves as the name for robbery (Greek: offspring, and therefore both growth with money and the fruit of the womb). What a bitter marriage! What an evil state, which nature did not recognize, and which the disease of money lovers introduced into the inanimate! What a heavy burden of womb-bearing, from which such offspring are born! Among living beings, the only difference between animate beings is male and female. After creation, God told them: “Grow and multiply” (Gen. 1:22), so that by giving birth to each other living beings increase to a multitude. And this offspring of gold is due to what kind of marriage? What is the result of pregnancy? But I know the pains of giving birth to such an offspring, having learned from the Prophet: “Behold, through unrighteousness, disease has been conceived, and iniquity has been brought forth” (Psalm 7:15). This is the offspring that sickened covetousness, which gives birth to lawlessness, which breeds misanthropy. For whoever always hides his lack, assures with an oath that he has nothing, as soon as he sees that need is pressing on someone, then he appears with a fraught pocket, out of selfishness he is then tormented by the birth of evil growth, he shows the unfortunate one the hope of a loan, thereby adding food to his misfortune, like someone who extinguishes a fire with oil; because a loan does not heal, but intensifies the loss. And just as in times of drought the fields grow thorns of their own accord, so in times of adversity the covetous have ready growth for those in need. Then he holds out his hand with the money, like a fishing hook covered with bait. And the poor man, seduced by wealth at the moment, if he had anything hidden in his pantry, vomits up along with the pulled hook. Such are the benefits of growth! If someone forcibly takes away or secretly steals travel supplies from another, they call him a robber, a thief, and similar names; and whoever inflicts proven insult and cruelty, confirms lawlessness with agreements, he is called philanthropic, benefactor, savior and all good names. What is acquired by robbery is called theft, and whoever exposes Christ in such a need, his cruelty is called philanthropy; for this is the name given to the damage done to the poor. “I have collected gold and silver.” But the wise one, teaching life, included this in the list of things that one confesses, so that people would learn from those who have experienced that this is one of the things condemned for inappropriateness; before learning by experience, they would protect themselves from the attack of this evil, just as in places where robbers and animals are found, one can pass without harm, because the dangers that were previously exposed to them have passed. But the Divine Apostle perfectly defines the passion of the love of money, calling it the root of “all evil” (1 Tim. 6:10). If there is a rush of spoiled and rotten juice to any part of the body, and inflammation occurs in that place; What is most necessary is that the accumulated moisture, as it rushes towards the outside, breaks out in some special place and abscess. So in whomever there is a surge of the disease of love of money, in that passion most often tends towards intemperance. Therefore, Ecclesiastes, following the abundance of gold and silver, adds to the previous illness the subsequent lack of decency. For he says: Eccl.2:8. I created those who sing and those who sing, the delights of feasts, cupbearers and cupbearers. The reminder of names is enough to put this passion to shame, to which the path is paved by the disease of love of money. How inappropriate is this refinement in the arts! How suddenly this river of pleasures covers, as if flooding souls with two streams of hearing and sight, so that they both see and hear evil! Singing subjugates the ear, sight prevails over the gaze. There, a woman’s voice, with a freely harmonious song, introduces passion into the heart; here the gaze, like some kind of military weapon, striking the eyes of one already softened by the songs of the one striking, subjugates the soul. The leader of this squad is wine, like some cunning arrow, wounding a person with two kinds of arrows, directing the points to hearing and sight. For singing is an arrow to the ear, and visible things to the sight. It is not for nothing that the name cupbearers was used, but of course the name is given in accordance with the matter itself. Therefore, when whole wine is abundantly poured out to those who feast, and for this servant, youth blooming with beauty is used, or youths are dressed like women, or the very female gender is present at the feast, and merges indecent thoughts with good wishes; Then what is the natural outcome of such efforts? For whoever presupposes a goal for himself in every undertaking, and transcends the need to care about how to dress those who sing songs, what kind of dress he will dress the cupbearer in, it is better to remain silent about this, and not go deeper into the description of such things in words, so that in passionate people this reminder does not irritate the wounds with the very accusation. That's what gold is for, that's what silver is for - to prepare such baits for pleasure! Is this not why the passion of voluptuousness in Scripture is called a serpent, which has the ability, if its head passes into a groove in the wall, to pass into it with its entire body trailing behind? For example, what should I say? Nature makes housing necessary for people; but, due to this need, voluptuousness, creeping into the groove of the soul, turned this need into immeasurable spending on expensive decorations, and changed the subject of care; then this beast - voluptuousness creeps towards some vineyards, fonts, gardens and decorations of helicopter cities. After this, he arms himself with pride, clothed himself in arrogance, arrogating to himself authority over his fellow tribesmen. This is followed by a trail of love of money, which is necessarily followed by intemperance - this is the last and extreme part of becoming like a beast in voluptuousness. But just as it is impossible to drag a snake by the edge of its tail, because the scales naturally rest against those who drag it in: so it is impossible to start from the outermost parts of the soul in order to survive the invading voluptuousness from it, if one does not block this evil from the first entrance. Why does the Teacher of Virtue command us to guard its head, calling the head the beginning of vice, in which, if it is not allowed, the rest remains inactive. For whoever opposes pleasure in general with hostility will not succumb to the particular attacks of passion. And whoever allowed the beginning of passion into himself, at the same time he accepted the whole beast into himself. Therefore, the one who brings out such passions, having described everything, repeats the word briefly. For having said at the beginning: “I have magnified my creation,” he now adds in parts a statement of what has been done, namely, he says: “I have magnified,” showing that his knowledge of the opposite did not come from something small, but that the experience was brought to the most extreme magnitude, so that in what happened before him, not a single memory of anything similar is equal to this. For he says: “we have become exalted”; and even added: “more than all those who were before me in Jerusalem” (Eccl. 2:9), and now revealed the purpose for which he condescended to test such things, having learned all wisdom. Eccl.2:9. And my wisdom remains with me, says Ecclesiastes. He makes it clear to what has been said that with wisdom he experienced every idea of ​​pleasure, that his understanding stopped at the very top of what was found in it; vision contributed to desire, the will, with the pleasure of the eyes, was filled with what was desired, so that nothing remained of what was intended for pleasure, but participation in pleasure became a share of acquisition. And this, it seems to me, means nothing else, but the fact that in himself he had the ability to invent all kinds of pleasure, as if from some property, from what was done, gathering joy into fruit. Eccl.2:10. And I did not forbid my heart from all my joy, and my heart rejoiced in all my labor: and this was my portion from all my labor. Ecclesiastes calls “part” possession. So, when he described pleasures in parts, continuing from beginning to end, and depicting in words everything from which pleasures are gathered for those who enjoy them, the beauty of buildings, vineyards, helipads, fonts, gardens, the leadership of fellow tribesmen, the abundance of money, the preparation of entertainment at feasts, all, as he calls, “pleasures” with which his wisdom was occupied, exploring and inventing similar things with which, as he says, Ecclesiastes, he enjoyed every feeling, and eyes that found what served for pleasure, and a soul that was not forbidden to have everything that it desired; then he explains the expression that he used at the beginning of the word, saying that everything is vanity. For, looking at this, he decisively says about human life that everything is vanity, and that the sense sees, and that it is intended by people for fun. Eccl.2:11. And I looked upon all my creations that my hands had made, and on the labor that they labored to create: and behold, all is vanity, and the will of the spirit, and there is abundance under the sun. For all the strength and effectiveness of feelings has its limit in life under the sun; The sensory nature is not able to cross this limit and comprehend with understanding the goods that exceed the sensory nature. Therefore, having reviewed all this and the like, he teaches not to look at anything here in life, neither at wealth, nor at curiosity, nor at superiority over subordinates, nor at amusements, fun and feasts, and if anything else is considered precious; but to see that one end to all this is vanity, in which abundance is not found in the end. For just as those who write on water, although they make a letter with their hands, drawing images of letters on the moisture, none of the marks remains in its form, and the attempt to write is limited to the mere act of writing; because the writing hand is always followed by the surface of water, smoothing out what is written; Thus, all effort for pleasure and all activity are revealed in the fact that this is done. And with the cessation of the action, the pleasure is erased, and nothing is saved for the next time, and in those who have enjoyed themselves there remains no trace of joy, or any residue in the pleasure of the past activity. This is what the word says: “there is abundance under the sun” for those who labor about something for which the limit is vanity. May we also be strangers to this by the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ! To him be glory and power forever and ever! Amen. Now the great Leader of the Church is leading us in secret to the most sublime lessons. For, having pre-purified the souls in the previous conversations, and eliminating every vain desire remaining in people, he thus leads the mind to the truth, shaking off the sorrow of vanity, like some burden from the shoulder. Let the Church learn the same dogma, learning from this teaching that the beginning of a virtuous life is to become beyond vice. Therefore, the great David, offering in the psalmody a certain preliminary guide to a pure way of life, does not begin in the word with what appears to be the most perfect in the teaching of the beatitudes. For he did not say first of all that the happiest of all is the one who is prosperous in everything, like a tree planted at the source of waters, always blossoming, being in goodness, and in due time reaping the fruits of life; but he set the beginning of bliss to be away from evil; since it is impossible to become good until you wash away the filth of vice. So this great Ecclesiastes first cleanses with a word from vanity, so that, as in a sick body, the blessings of health are restored. That’s why he pursued vanity with a word, saying that feeling is not a reliable appraiser of the beautiful, presented to the eyes the inconsistency of what our lustful disposition desires, separated us from bodily pleasure, and thus shows that what is truly worthy of choice and truly desired is the desire for which is something real and consistent, always present for those participating in it, and far from any vain thought. Eccl.2:12. And I dreamed of seeing wisdom, says Ecclesiastes. But in order to see exactly what I wanted, I first saw flattery and madness; because the view of what is desired becomes more accurate when compared with the opposite. He calls wisdom “council,” saying: “Who is the man who follows the advice of counsel, and will he do great things in him? . Therefore, it teaches what human wisdom it is to follow true wisdom, which it also calls advice, creating what truly exists and is worthwhile, and not presenting itself in vanity. This is the height of human wisdom. And true wisdom and advice, in my opinion, is nothing other than providential wisdom about everything: this is the wisdom with which God created everything, as the Prophet says: “With wisdom you created all things” (Psalm 103:24). Christ is “God’s power and God’s Wisdom” (1 Cor. 1:24), by which everything is brought into being and arranged. Therefore, if human wisdom consists in coming to an understanding of the true deeds of real wisdom and advice, and by the deed of this advice; or this wisdom, in my opinion, incorruption, bliss of the soul, courage, justice, prudence and, in relation to virtue, every imaginable name and concept; then by it we are consistently led, perhaps, to the knowledge of goods. When, says Ecclesiastes, I saw this, then, as if on a scale, I distinguished what is from what is not, in order to find the difference between wisdom and madness, as it can be found when comparing light with darkness. And it seems to me that in discussing the beautiful it is decent to use an example taken from the light, because darkness by nature is not consistent; Without something blocking the sun's ray there will be no darkness. Light itself is mentally represented in its own essence. By this example, Ecclesiastes shows that depravity is not consistent in itself, but is constituted by the deprivation of goodness. But good is always the same, and constantly abides, and is formed without any prior deprivation of anything. What is imagined by the mind to be the opposite of good does not exist in essence. For what does not exist in itself does not exist at all. And depravity is the deprivation of being, not being. Therefore, the difference is equal, both between light and darkness, and between wisdom and madness. For under the name of wisdom Ecclesiastes includes in part all good, and by madness means the whole nature of evil. But what good is it for us to be amazed at good things if the teacher does not indicate some way to acquire this? Therefore, let us listen to the teacher, so that we too may become partakers of the beautiful. Eccl.2:14. Wise, he says, his eyes are at his head. What does it mean? Is there a living creature at all, let's say living in water; either on land, or in the air, who would have this sensory - eyes completely outside the head? For every eye is before the rest of the body, but those who have a head are established in the head. Why does Ecclesiastes say here that one wise man has eyes on his head? Or does the word imply that there is some similarity between what is seen in the soul and between the parts of the body? And just as in the structure of the body that which prevails over the whole is called the head, so in the soul, instead of the head, is it understood that it is sovereign and superior? And just as we call the sole of the foot the heel, so can the soul have a sole, with which it comes into contact with the body akin to it, and imparts sensitive strength and activity to the subject? Therefore, when the insightful and vigilant power of the soul is occupied with the sensory, then the nature of the eyes moves to its heels, with which it examines further, remaining blind to the highest sights. But if, having recognized the vanity of what is to be considered, he lifts his gaze to his Head, which, as Paul interprets, “is Christ” (Eph. 4, 15); then let him be blessed for his keen vision, having eyes where there is no darkness of evil. The great Paul and others, if they are great like him, and all who live, move and have their being in Christ, had eyes at their head. Just as it is impossible for one who is in the light to see darkness, so it is impossible for one who has an eye in Christ to direct it to anything vain. Therefore, he who has eyes “at the head,” and the head, as we have understood, is the beginning of everything, has eyes in all virtue (because all virtue is Christ) - in truth, in justice, in incorruptibility and in all good. Therefore, “wise his eyes are at his head, but the fool walks in darkness” (Eccl. 2:14). For whoever does not put his lamp on the candlestick, but puts it under the platform of the bed, makes the light darkness for himself, becoming the creator of the untenable. What is untenable is vain. Therefore, darkness is equal in meaning to vanity. And the soul of a madman, having become somehow carnal and carnal, looking at this, sees nothing. For acuteness in this is truly darkness. Do you see these lively and resourceful people in everyday life, called jurists, how they pave the way for untruths, witnesses, defenders, records, helpfulness of judges, in order to do evil and bring them to punishment? Who would not marvel at the subtlety and resourcefulness of such people? But nevertheless, such people are blind if they direct an inquisitive eye to the one who turns his gaze to the things above, who is placed at the head of creatures, they are completely blind, decorating their heel, bitten by the teeth of the serpent; by the very fact that they turn their gaze to what is below them, they inscribe within themselves the dictates of sin. For “he who loves unrighteousness hates his own soul” (Psalm 10:5). And what they please in people is worse than any misfortune. But how many more, on the contrary, are there who are filled with the height of the feats they perform, are busy contemplating what truly exists, but are considered some kind of blind people and useless people in material matters, as Paul boasts of such an opinion about him, calling himself “buy for Christ’s sake” because his prudence and wisdom were not occupied with anything desired here? That’s why he says: “We are buoys for Christ’s sake” (1 Cor. 4:10), as if to express this: we are blind to the life below, since we fix our gaze on things above and have our eyes at the head. For this reason, he had neither a home nor a table, was a beggar, a wanderer, endured nakedness, and was tormented by hunger and thirst. But being like that, look how woeful he was. For he who had ascended to the third heaven, where his head was, had eyes there, drawn into admiration by the inexpressible mysteries of paradise, seeing the invisible and enjoying what is above sense and understanding. And who would not consider him pitiful, seeing him as a prisoner, suffering wounds from blows, drowning during a shipwreck and being carried along with his bonds on the waves of the sea? But even if he endured this kind of thing among people, he did not constantly deny having eyes at the head, saying: “Who will separate us from the love” of Christ in Christ Jesus? “Is it tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or trouble, or sword” (Rom. 8:35)? And this means the same thing as saying: who will tear my eyes out of my head and place them on earthly things that are trampled underfoot? But the Apostle commands us to do this equally, teaching us to “be wise on high” (Col. 3:2), which is the same as if he demanded to have eyes at the head. But if we have found out why “the wise man’s eyes are at his head,” then we will flee from madness, which, for those who live through real life, is a kind of darkness. For it is said: “but a fool walks in darkness.” The fool, as the prophecy says, is the one who says in his heart: “There is no God,” and is corrupt and disgusted “in his undertakings” (Psalm 13:1). And what is said in the following, according to the order of speech, heals those who are attached to real life to the point of cowardice, in whose opinion death is something difficult, and how they are sure; For those who live a higher lifestyle, there is no benefit from living a virtuous life, because for both, life ends with the same end, and although we succeed in a better life, death cannot be avoided. Therefore, Ecclesiastes, as if on his own behalf, making similar objections, again attacks the absurdity of those who present them, as not paying attention to the nature of what exists, and shows the difference between virtue and vice, and in what way one prevails over the other, so that we do not expect from them any equal honor, because of the death that befalls everyone, but because of the good or evil that awaits us later, we find this difference. Literally, this objection reads like this: Eccl.2:15–16. Let me know that one chance will happen to all of them. And I said in my heart: like the case of a madman, it will happen to me: and what have I managed to do in excess? words in my heart, yet the fool from excess says that this too is vanity. As if the memory of the wise and the foolish cannot endure forever, yet in the days to come all will be forgotten: and how will the wise and the foolish die? . To this Ecclesiastes adds that he recognizes as worthy of hatred everything to which he was previously partial, loving vain things as good. And he says that he hated everything he worked on, meaning real life; because he worked not at all for himself, but for the one who will follow him, and about whom; Due to the uncertainty of the future, it is impossible to predict how he will use his works. Literally it says this: Eccl.2:17–19. And I hated the belly: for what was created under the sun was evil to me: because of all vanity and will of the spirit. And I hate all kinds of my work, and I toil with it under the sun, as if I would leave it to the man who will follow me. And who knows whether he will be wise or foolish? and whether to have all the labor that we have labored and philosophized under the sun? and this is vanity. Having said this, he says that that thought is alien to his soul; as if it were one and the same destiny for one who lives virtuously and does not make any effort about it. For one, he says, the work is in wisdom, in knowledge, in courage; and the other in irritation, in sorrows caused by worldly zeal. Therefore, bringing them into equality with each other, he says, is not just vanity; but also deceit. It reads like this: Eccl.2:20–23. And I turned back, denying to my heart all the labor that I labored under the sun. For there is a man whose labor is in wisdom, and in understanding, and in courage: and the man who has not labored for him will give him his portion: and this is vanity and great wickedness. As it happens to a man in all his labor, and in the will of his heart, even as he labors under the sun. For all the days of his sickness and rage are his care, and his heart does not sleep at night: and this is vanity. But he still offers himself the objection of those who recognize the voluptuous life as preferable to the exalted life, and refutes what is proposed, on his own behalf setting out this and that, both the objection and the solution. For the point presented in the objection is this: nothing else should be considered good except what a person has taken into himself, that is, food and drink. The refutation is that it is not the good with which a person feeds and enjoys himself, but it is wisdom and knowledge, so that caring about them is already good; and what is desirable for the flesh is worry and vanity for the soul. And the true words of this most sublime teaching are as follows: Eccl.2:24–26. There is no good for a man who eats and drinks, and shows his soul good in his work: and I saw this, as if it were from the hand of God. Who eats and drinks besides Him? For He has given wisdom, understanding, and joy to man who is good before Him; To the one who sins, give him care to apply and collect, to give good things before the face of God: for this is vanity and the will of the spirit. Therefore, although the meaning of what was subsequently written and a preliminary view of the connection of speech lead to the same thing that we have now briefly outlined, it would still be timely to repeat the reading again and exactly agree the concept with the sayings. Eccl.2:14–15. And I realized that one chance would happen to all of them: and I said that a crazy case would happen to me too, and did I manage to do what? . Here is the objection that Ecclesiastes makes to himself, saying: if this one case of death for both, and the virtue of one who abides in wisdom does not deliver from the taste of death, then the zeal for wisdom has become vain for me. What is the refutation of what was said in this word? “I,” he says, “have too many verbs in my heart, but the fool from excess says: for this also is vanity. For the memory of the wise carries with the fool forever” (Ecclesiastes 2:15-16). Ecclesiastes condemns this objection as excessively and inconsistently made, and calls foolish a word that does not belong to those worthy of saving, and is not worn out from inside the storehouses wisdom, but, like some excess of understanding, it is ejected like foam; because “a madman speaks from excess.” But to use the word in this way is vain and serves no purpose, because this word has no concern for anything else, but only tries to convince people not to pay attention to the visible. In this world there is no judgment about the virtuous and evil life; because only the evil one would have to die bodily, but the good one would have to remain without experiencing bodily death. And he says this without knowing what the immortality of virtue consists of, and what the death of those living viciously consists of. The memory of the wise, says Ecclesiastes, always lives and continues throughout the entire age, but with the foolish the memory of him fades away. About such the Prophet says: “they are remembered” very loudly and obviously (Psalm 9:7). For this is shown by the addition: “with noise.” Therefore, Ecclesiastes says: “The memory of the wise and the foolish shall not endure forever”: on the contrary, the life of the wise is immortalized by memory; and oblivion accompanies the madman. For “in the days to come” everything that concerns the fool will come into oblivion; It is always expressed in such a saying, as if the days to come had already arrived, “and all was forgotten” (Eccl. 2:16). So, if the wise seek wisdom, and the fool is destroyed by the death of oblivion, then “how,” asks Ecclesiastes, do you say that “the wise will die with the fool?” (Eccl. 2:16). Therefore, he grieves and is ashamed of what was desired for him in this life, and says that he hates everything that he desired for this life, enduring like someone who, out of greed, is immeasurably satisfied with honey mixed with something, then, when this delicacy turns into bad juice in him, when he vomits the mixed composition, he feels it being spat out along with the honey, and therefore, from the memory of this trouble, he hates honey; because satiety with the mixed composition produced disorder. Therefore, Ecclesiastes, having filled himself to the point of satiety with what he desires for pleasure, while purifying himself through confession, as if feeling disgust and disgust at the quality of some poison, he cries out shamefully for what he has done, that he hates this life, saying word for word like this: “and I hated the life: for the creation that was made under the sun is evil to me” (Eccl. 2:17). Not for anyone else, he says, but for myself, I became wicked in what I did under the sun. For I had nothing left of what I had done, but everything I desired was a dream and an impulse of will. “All vanity and will of the spirit” (Eccl. 2:17), he says. And another calls the care of the local people worthy of hatred; because a person does not work for himself, but for the one who will follow him. Whatever can be done with diligence in this life, shelters for ships, piers, majestic and multi-standing reserves for fortresses and buildings, vestibules, towers, beautiful passages and ascents, agricultural work, all kinds of groves, the grace of meadows, vineyards, the vastness of which resembles the seas, and if he works on anything else similar to this, whatever he manages to do, the one who enters life after him takes advantage of it. And it is unknown whether he will turn this abundance into food for vice. For it is not possible for everyone, in order to acquire knowledge, to subject the sense to the test of such things, as I did, says Ecclesiastes, by the inspiration of wisdom. Natural desire, like a young horse, having been given freedom for a short time to be carried away by lower passions, I again bridled the reins of reason and subordinated it to power. Who knows, says Ecclesiastes, whether those who follow us will be in the same circumstances will prevail over attachment to pleasure, and will not rather remain in their power, like some kind of slave, bowing before the dominion of voluptuousness? That’s why he says: “I hate all kinds of my work, and I toil under the sun with it, as if I were leaving it to the man who will follow me. And who knows whether he will be wise or foolish, and whether he will have all the labor that we have worked for, and that we have learned through wisdom under the sun?” (Eccl. 2:18–19). This, I think, is the meaning of this saying: Ecclesiastes says about himself that he did not crawl out of passion to lead a life of pleasure, but came to this through some inspiration of wisdom, enjoying this life freely, and not subjecting himself to its dominion. Therefore, who knows, he says, that the future for me will not possess what I worked on not out of passion, but guided by wisdom? For he makes it clear that he also called pleasure labor; because he forced himself to participate in pleasure, like some kind of insurmountable struggle. Therefore, says Ecclesiastes, let a man count this as vanity. He also tells someone else that he has renounced this with his soul, and is ready to reveal in his words what he intends to say. For he is slandered before the one who sins against the right judgment, as if, seeing the clear difference between the opposite kinds of life, of which in one they work for virtue, and do not turn their desires to anything human, and in the other they do the opposite, he does not tolerate any labor of virtuous people, but spends his time in only bodily activities. Why, when someone pronounces a sentence about the beautiful before him, then, despising the one who is superior in wisdom, he gives not only a vain, but an evil and unfair judgment. Ecclesiastes expresses this in these words: “And I turned back,” he says, “having denied to my heart all the labor that I have labored under the sun” (Eccl. 2:20). What exactly did he renounce? “For there is a man whose labor is in wisdom and in reason and in courage,” but the other man did not bother at all about the like. So why would another give such a share of preference? Therefore, he says, that a person will also “give him his share” (Eccl. 2:21); and this means he will call such a life a good lot. But this, says Ecclesiastes, is “vanity and great wickedness” (Eccl. 2:21). For isn’t there great wickedness when it knows how much zeal for work is in a person, and how much willfulness there is? This is what Ecclesiastes expresses in the words: “As man knows in all his labor, and in the will of his heart, that he labors under the sun” (Eccl. 2:22). What does he know? “For all the days of his sickness and rage are his care, and his heart does not sleep in the night.” For the life of those whose soul does not know rest from this temptation is truly sad, and as if by what thorns The heart is wounded by desires for more. This zeal of the covetous is painful, not so much enjoying what he has as being saddened by what he lacks; for such people, work is devoted to both day and night, occupying them in accordance with one and the other part of the time, when the day is spent on work, and the night drives sleep away from the eyes. For worries about profit do not give room to sleep. How can this diligence not be recognized as vanity? To what was said before, Ecclesiastes adds: “and this is vanity” (Eccl. 2:23). This also concerns another objection, and the objection is this: if anything is outside of us, you count it among vanity, teacher; then you unfairly condemn as vain, and what is acceptable to yourself. But food and drink are within ourselves; This means that something like this is not something to be rejected; On the contrary, another will call this grace God’s good deed. This is the meaning of the objection; the very words have this form. “It is not good for a man,” says Ecclesiastes, “unless a hedgehog eats and drinks, and shows his soul good in his labor: and I saw this, as if it were from the hand of God, as if anyone eats and drinks besides Him” (Eccl. 2:24-25). This is what the defender of gluttony objects to the teacher, and the teacher of wisdom gives an answer to this “to the good man” (Eccl. 2:26). (The addition of the word: “good”, without a doubt, indicates a difference, so that what is meant by the name of goodness is made clear from the opposite.) Therefore, to man, and not to cattle, not to the kind of person who looks at his belly, and has a larynx instead of reason, but to “good,” living in the image of the only Good. God, who delights in bestial nature, did not legitimize that pleasure, but in exchange for food He “gave” it wisdom, reason and joy. And will anyone increase the gifts of goodness with the food of the belly? “Man will not live on bread alone” (Matthew 4:4) - this is the word of the true Word. Virtue is not nourished by bread, the strength of the soul is not strengthened and fattened by meat; high life is nourished and given courage by other dishes. Good food is chastity, bread is wisdom, seasoning is justice, drinking is dispassion, pleasure is not any bodily intercourse with what is pleasant, but that which is joy in name and in fact (ευφροσήνη). That is why Ecclesiastes used this word to name the disposition towards beauty that occurs in the soul, because such a state is a consequence of prudence (εκ του ευφρονειν). Therefore, we must learn from this the same thing that we hear from the Apostle: “The Kingdom of God is not meat and drink, but righteousness,” and dispassion, and bliss (Rom. 14:17). And what people strive for for bodily pleasure excites the diligence of sinners, and is the care of the soul, drawn from the heavenly to the earthly, in which the entire continuation of its stay in this life is spent on carefully “applying and collecting.” Therefore, whoever, before the face of God, recognizes this as good, does not himself know that he is delivering good in vain things. I said this in my own words, but this thought is captured by the addition of God’s words. For Ecclesiastes continues: “Give the sinner care to lay down and gather together, to present that which is good before the face of God: for this is vanity and the will of the spirit” (Eccl. 2:26). Therefore, what we have learned in this teaching through this mutual comparison of good and bad, let it be a guide to us to avoid what is condemned, and a path to success in the best. Eccl.3:1. There is a time for everything, and a time for everything under heaven. Here is the beginning of the words subject to our review. And the labor of research is not small; and the benefits from it are worth the effort. For the purpose of what we reviewed in the first parts of the book will perhaps be revealed most of all in this part, as the following speech will show in order. In the previous words, everything that a person seeks not for any spiritual benefit is condemned as vain. For the good is indicated, to which we should raise our gaze according to those concepts that are implanted in our minds, and those who prefer bodily pleasure are contrasted with pleasure in accordance with wisdom. It remains to find out how a person can live virtuously, borrowing from this word, as it were, a certain art and method for success in life. This is what the study of Ecclesiastes promises us at its beginning, where it is stated that “there is a time for everything, and a time for every thing under heaven.” If anyone delves into the depth of the meaning, he will find great wisdom contained in these sayings, both contemplative and full of useful advice. And so that the way to review this saying is open to us in a few words, let’s approach the word like this. In existing things, one thing is material and sensible, and the other is intelligible and immaterial. In the latter, the incorporeal is higher than sensory comprehension, and we understand this better when we divest ourselves of the senses. The sense, capable of comprehending the nature of the material, does not have the ability to penetrate the celestial body and extend beyond the limits of the visible. For this reason, this word speaks to us both about earthly and heavenly things, so that we lead this life without sin. This material life is life in the flesh; the view of beauty is obscured somewhat by what is visible sensually. Therefore, in order to judge the beautiful, we need some kind of information, so that, as in construction, everything that is done is given direction by some rule or thread. Therefore, we are also shown in advance by the word how life is directed towards what it should be. Two, says Ecclesiastes, distinctive in life signs of beauty in every thing that is desired for real life, namely proportionality and timing. And this is what he teaches now, saying: “there is a time for everything” (ο χρόνος), “and a time for every thing under heaven.” And by time (ο χρόνος) we must mean measure, because everything that comes into existence has an extended time. Therefore, I do not try to assert that these distinctive signs of beauty are completely applicable to any advancement in virtue until the continuation of speech shows this; but that there is more success in a life spent in such observance of what has been said, this can be noticed by anyone. For who does not know that virtue is a measure measured by the mediocrity of those being compared? It cannot be a virtue if it has either a deficiency or an excess beyond its due measure; So, for example, in courage, a lack of it becomes timidity, and an excess becomes insolence. Therefore, some of the pupils of external wisdom, having perhaps become predators of our writings, and having understood the thought expressed in this saying, one in his short rule advised not to lack anything, the other forbade excess. One argued that moderation is best, the other legitimized that excess should not be allowed in anything. And both prove that not achieving the measure required by virtue is worthy of condemnation, but exceeding proportionality is worthy of contempt. But regarding timing, the same word will explain to us that both not anticipating the timing and not being late against it is considered a good deed. What good is it to the farmer who ordered the cutting of the ears of corn before the harvest was ripe, or who put off caring for the harvest until the seeds spilled out of the stalks? In neither case will taking care of the matter do any good, because the untimeliness of the harvest will result in the loss of the benefit of time that was not used for this purpose when it should have been. And what is said about a part must also be understood about the whole. We learn something similar in navigation, if someone warns or omits the timing, but what will someone else say about the art of medicine? How much harm will the excess or lack of time and measures appropriate for healing cause? But this must be left, because in the continuation of the speech the example presented will reveal this more clearly in the words of Ecclesiastes himself. Why is this proposed to our consideration in advance? For something in which neither measure nor time is observed is not good; on the contrary, it is beautiful and desirable that it has perfection in both. For if only one thing in him is desired, and the rest is despised, then success in the rest is useless. Therefore, as with us, who move with two legs, if something happens to one, the uninjured leg becomes useless for walking, due to weakness contributing: so, if in time there is a lack of measure, or in the measure of opportuneness, then what is lacking will certainly turn into useless what is there, but in time proportionality is beneficial, and in measure opportunism. Therefore, time (χρόνος) is understood by us as a measure, because time serves as a measure for each individual measure. Whatever happens, without a doubt, happens in time, and with the continuation of everything that happens, the extension of time continues together, the small extension of time with the small, and the greater with the greater. There is a measure for womb-bearing, a measure for the growth of ears, a measure for the ripening of fruits, a measure for navigation, a measure for travel, a measure for every age, infancy, childhood, adolescence, adolescence, adolescence, courage, middle age, adulthood, maturity and old age. Therefore, since there is not one measure of time for everything, for due to the difference of subjects it is not possible for everything to be equal to one another, but the common measure, as has been said, of everything measured is time, which embraces everything: therefore Ecclesiastes himself did not say: there is a measure for everything, because of the great equality in what is measured in relation to the greater and the lesser, but says: “time for all” - this generic measure by which everything that happens is measured. How in humanity the obsolete languishes, and the unripe goes on rampage; the best is the middle between two ages, that which avoids the troubles of both, in which strength is found, not combined with the excesses of youth, and prudence, not coupled with the infirmity of old age, why strength is dissolved with prudence, and equally avoids both senile impotence and youthful insolence: so the one who determines time for everyone eliminates with a word the vice in both respects, arising from non-compliance with the measure, depriving of honor that which has transgressed time, and rejecting that which has not reached perfection in time. But it’s time for us to continue in order and the very review of inspired words. Eccl.3:2. A time to give birth, says Ecclesiastes, and a time to die. In the first place, he beautifully combined this necessary couple with a word, combining death with birth (for birth necessarily follows death, and every birth is resolved into corruption), so that with a combined indication of death and birth, a reminder of death, as if with a sting, awaken those immersed in carnal life and lead to concern for the future. In the same way, in a hidden way, in the first inscriptions of the books, the friend of God speaks of wisdom; Moses, right after Genesis, wrote Exodus, so that those who read what was written in the very order of the books would be taught what they need to know about themselves. For anyone who has heard about “Genesis” cannot help but immediately think about “Exodus.” The great Ecclesiastes turns out to have the same thought here when he brings death to such close proximity to birth. For he says: “a time to give birth, and a time to die,” that is, the time has come, and I was born; the time will come and I will die. If we pay all attention to this, then we will not go, leaving this shortened procession, to circle with the wicked, voluntarily wandering along the circular path of life, carried away by power, nobility and wealth, with which we are slowed down on so many paths of this world, we will not find an exit from the labyrinth of this life, thereby, apparently, we are using effort, confusing for ourselves the signs of an infallible path. How blessed are, says Ecclesiastes, those people who, leaving the treacherous deceptions of life, lead themselves to the hidden path of virtue. And on this path is the one who does not turn his soul to anything here, but strives diligently towards what is offered in the hope of faith. But let's examine what was said again. “There is a time,” says Ecclesiastes, “to give birth, and a time to die.” Oh, if only for me both the birth came at the right time and the death was well-timed! For no one will say that this involuntary birth and voluntary death are now indicated by Ecclesiastes as a means to progress in virtue: because the pain of birth is not by the will of the wife, and it is not by choice that it ends in death. And what does not depend on us, no one will call either virtue or vice. Therefore, we must understand this timely birth, and this death that occurs in time. It seems to me that that birth is mature and not premature, when someone, as Isaiah says, having conceived from the fear of God, with the spiritual pangs of birth, gives birth to his own salvation (Is. 26:18). when we form, generate and bring ourselves into the world by good will. We accomplish this by accepting God into ourselves, becoming children of God, children of power, and sons of the Most High. And again we are born prematurely, and become premature and lightweight, when the image of Christ is not imagined in us, as the Apostle says (Gal. 4:19). For the man of God must be perfect (2 Tim. 3:17). Of course, he is perfect in whom the law of nature is completely fulfilled. Therefore, if someone through his virtue has made himself a child of God, having accepted the right to this nobility, then he has known the time of a good birth, and rightly, according to the Gospel, he rejoices, “as a man was born into the world” (John 16:21). But he who became a “child of wrath” (Eph. 2:3), “son of destruction” (2 Thessalonians 2:3), a fiend of darkness, a birth of vipers (Matthew 3:7), an evil generation, and everything else that is only condemned as an evil birth, did not know the time that gives birth to life. For there is one, and not many, times that give birth to life. Whoever sinned in this by the untimely birth, he gave birth to destruction, and led his soul to death. But if it is obvious how we can be born in time, then it is also obvious to everyone how we can die in time; for example, with St. Paul, every time was opportune for a good death. For in his own writings he cries out about this, confirming it with a kind of oath, when he says: “I die all the days, such is your praise” (1 Cor. 15:31)! And also: “For your sake we are put to death all the day long” (Rom. 8:36); and: “We have within ourselves the condemnation of death” (2 Cor. 1:9). Of course It is not known how Paul dies “all the days”, who never lives in sin, always mortifies the flesh, and carries within himself the deadness of the body of Christ, is always crucified to Christ, and never lives for himself, but has within himself the living Christ. That death, according to our reasoning, will be well-timed, which becomes the cause of true life. 39), to ascertain that to be mortified to sin and quickened to the Spirit is in truth a gift from God: because by this mortification the Divine Word is promised to be quickened. But like what was said, what follows: Eccl.3:2. It is time, says Ecclesiastes, to plant, and it is time to pluck up what has been planted. We know who our “doer” is, and whose “struggle” we are. For we learned one thing from Christ, and another from Christ’s servant Paul. The Lord says: “My Father is a workman” (John 15:1); The Apostle tells us: “God’s desires are natural” (1 Cor. 3:9). Therefore, the great Doer knows how to plant only good things (for “God planted paradise in Eden on the east” (Gen. 2:8)); it casts out everything that is contrary to good. For “every garden that My Heavenly Father does not plant will be uprooted” (Matthew 15:13). Therefore, the Pharisees’ malice, unbelief and ingratitude for the miracles performed by the Lord are the plants that are plucked up. For the saving preaching must prevail; the Gospel must be preached throughout the whole world; every tongue must confess, “as the Lord Jesus Christ is in the glory of God the Father” (Phil. 2:11) So, since this must certainly happen, the unbelief of some that prevails now is not the planting of the Father, but of him who sowed tares, or planted the rods of Sodom in the Master’s vineyard. So, what we were taught in the Gospel by the Master’s word, we now learned the same thing in this riddle of Ecclesiastes, namely, that it is one and the same time to both accept the saving planting of faith into ourselves and to pluck out the tares of unbelief at the same time. But what is said in part about progress in faith should also be understood about all virtue. “It’s time to plant” chastity “and purge” the planting of lewdness. Thus, when justice is implanted, the vegetation of unrighteousness is eradicated; the inculcation of humility overthrows arrogance; vegetated love dries up the evil tree of hatred, just as with the fruits of the opposite tree, that is, hatred, multiplied untruth cools love. And in this way (so as not to delay words, speaking about everything separately) we will not sin by imagining everything else in the same way. Again, the following speech agrees with what was studied before. For Ecclesiastes says: Eccl.3:3. A time to kill and a time to heal. And this is clearly interpreted in advance in the prophetic word, which says on behalf of God: “I will kill and make life” (Deut. 32:39). If we do not kill hostility in ourselves, then we will not heal the disposition to love, which suffers in us from hatred. And also time to kill and everything else that lives to harm us, I mean this evil horde of passions, this internecine warfare raised against us by lust and captivating us by the sinful law. For the killing of such enemies becomes healing for those who are exhausted by sins. Doctors say that worms and some other similar animals originate in the entrails due to thinness; and their life becomes a disease for the body. But if they are killed by any medicinal drink; then the sufferer is restored to health again. Such suffering of the body is similar to mental illness. When irritability by sucking the entrails, or by memory-malice weakening the strength and reason of the soul, and a bad way of life give rise to this beast - envy, or some other equally evil one; Then he who feels that his soul feeds the beast within himself will use the medicine that destroys passions in good time. And so that after killing them, healing can take place in those who have done this, the Gospel teaching serves this purpose. Eccl.3:3. A time to destroy and a time to create. This can also be seen in what was said on behalf of God by the Prophet Jeremiah, to whom was given from God the power to first destroy, uproot, waste, and then renew, create and plant (Jer. 1:10). For first it is necessary to overthrow the buildings of vice in us, and then to find the time and place to build the church of God, built in our souls, for which virtue serves as the substance. “If anyone edifies on this basis, gold, silver, honest stone” (1 Cor. 3:12) - all this is called virtue, and wood, hay, reeds, according to the interpretation, signify the nature of vice, which is not prepared for anything else, but only for destruction by fire. Therefore, when buildings consist of hay and reeds, that is, of untruth and pride, and other worldly malice; then the word commands first to bring them to destruction, and then to use the gold of virtue as material for the construction of a spiritual house. For it is impossible for silver to be united with a reed, or for gold to be united with hay, or for a pearl to be united with wood. If this happens, one of the two substances being combined must certainly be destroyed. For “what fellowship is there between light and darkness” (2 Cor. 6:14)? Therefore, let the buildings of darkness be first destroyed, and then the bright buildings of life be erected. Eccl.3:4. Time to cry and time to laugh. This word is clarified by the Gospel saying spoken on behalf of the Lord, which says: “Blessed are those who mourn: for they will be comforted” (Matthew 5:4). Therefore now is the time to weep; and the time to laugh is given in hope; because real sadness will become the mother of expected joy. And who will spend his whole life not in tears and not in sorrow, if only he comes to his senses and learns about himself, what he had and what he lost, in what state his nature was originally, and in what state it is now? There was no death then, the disease did not appear; mine and yours - these crafty sayings in the beginning had no place in life. For just as there was a common sun, and a common air, and above all, the common grace of God and the common blessing of God, so the right to participate in every good was equally given to everyone, and the disease of covetousness was unknown, there was no hatred among those who had less for the owners of more, there was not even this more at all; and besides this, countless qualities, which no one can imagine in words, were many times greater in their greatness than what was said, I mean: equality with the Angels, boldness before God, contemplation of the highest blessings, the opportunity for us to be adorned with the indescribable beauty of the blessed Nature, showing in ourselves the divine image, shining with the beauty of the soul. In place of this, a crafty swarm of suffering appeared in us, an evil nest of sorrows. What would anyone name as the first of the evils of life? All one thing is equal to the other, all one thing anticipates the primacy of the other in the superiority of evils, everything becomes a reason for the same tears. What will anyone mourn more than this miserable life? Why complain more about nature? Is it for modesty, or for the many difficulties of life? Is it because it begins with tears and ends with tears? Is it for pathetic infancy? Is it for feeblemindedness in old age? Is it for the impermanence of youth? Is it for being burdened with labor at an adult age? Is it because of the burden of marriage? Is loneliness in a celibate life worth it? Is it for childlessness that leaves no root? Is it because wealth excites envy and poverty is painful? I am silent about the multitude of all kinds of differences in illnesses, about the loss of members, about mutilations, about putrefaction, about the loss of activity in the senses, about insanity of the mind from demons, about all the sufferings that nature contains within itself, and how it is possible for each person to be subjected to them. And this is the fury of love passion, this fetid mud; in which this mad passion revolves, I pass by; I’m not talking about the trouble associated with food due to eruption, so as not to give the appearance that with this word I am disgracing life in everything, presenting our nature as some kind of producer of pus. Leaving all this and the like, I will say that for the sensitive, what is most worthy of tears is what is known to everyone, namely, that after passing this shadow of such a life, “a certain expectation of judgment awaits us, and the fire of jealousy to destroy those who resist” (Heb. 10:27). Therefore, whoever argues in this way and like this; won't he spend his whole life in tears? So now let there be time to think about this. For the consequence of the sorrows of this life, as is natural, will be that we will not sin in it. And when we succeed in this, the promised grace of joy will be given to us in hope, “and hope,” as the Apostle says, “will not put to shame” (Rom. 5:5). What Ecclesiastes adds is, as it were, a repetition of what was said before. For, having spoken about the timing of tears and laughter, he added: “a time to weep, and a time to rejoice” (Eccl. 3:4). And this is nothing other than the strengthening of both of the mentioned states. Sensitive and heartfelt crying is called lamentation in Scripture. And also rejoicing means an increase in joy, as we learn something similar from the Gospel, which says: “you squealed, and did not dance; you wept, and did not cry” (Luke 7:32). So history says that the Israelites had a mourning at the time of the death of Moses, and that David, walking with the ark, when he carried it from the foreigners, galloped, not appearing in his usual form. For it is said that he uttered harmonious songs, striking the musical instrument, moving his feet in harmony, and revealing the internal arrangement with measured movements of his body (2 Samuel 6:14-16). So, since man is dual, that is, he consists of soul and body, and in accordance with this, life is also dual in every action that occurs in us; then it will be great for those who weep in bodily life, if they have many reasons to mourn this life, to prepare for the soul harmonious rejoicing. For the more often life is darkened by sadness, the more reasons for joy accumulate for the soul. Temperance looks gloomily; humility lowers the gaze; to suffer damage is a reason for tears; the excuse for crying is not to have equality with those who have it. But “he who humbles himself will be exalted” (Luke 14:11), he who struggles with poverty will be crowned, covered with scabs, and in everything showing his life worthy of tears will rest in the bosom of the patriarch, where may we also be by the mercy of Jesus Christ who saves us! To him be glory and power forever and ever! Amen. Eccl.3:5. It's time to scatter the stones, and time to gather the stones. By the very fact that this official showed the power of the church, he increased the strength of those listening, so that they could both overthrow those who resist and prepare supplies for the overthrow. For what we learned earlier, when we learned the benefit of taking into account in everything the measure that time requires, and the sign of beauty in considering timing in everything, leads us to this opportunity, as it were, to imagine in our soul some kind of muscle, with which it throws stones that will kill the enemy at the target, and at whatever enemy they are thrown, it returns them to itself again, so that it can always hit the enemy. Those who pay attention only to the letter and stop at the meaning of what is said, which appears at first glance, apply the law of Moses to real sayings, because the law commands to throw stones at those who turn out to be transgressors of the law. Thus, we learn from history itself about those who sinned against the Sabbath, about those who stole sacred things, and about other sins for which the law determined stoning as punishment. And if Ecclesiastes had recognized that it is timely to gather stones, although no law gives commands about this, and no historical event indicates anything similar to this, I would also agree with those who explain this saying by law, namely, that then the real time to throw stones is when someone breaks the Sabbath, or steals something from what was offered to God. Now this addition that the stones must be collected again, which is not determined by any law, leads us to a different understanding. Let us try to find out what kind of stones it is, which, after being thrown, must again become the property of the thrower. For Ecclesiastes teaches us that when we throw stones at a time, we will gather them up again at a time. Therefore, it seems to me that the law, if we understand it according to the first concept that presents itself, is not taken very highly. For what is great and divine in the literal understanding of what is written? If a person is caught gathering wood on the Sabbath, should he be stoned for this, when there is no evidence of injustice in this offense? For what wrong did he do, who gathered a few dry branches, scattered here and there in the desert, to support the fire with them? He is not accused of appropriating someone else's property, so it would seem fair to punish him for the offense; on the contrary, what belongs to everyone in general becomes for him the reason that stones are placed in him. But he is condemned as a villain for doing this on the Sabbath. Who does not know that every matter, whether it is bad or not, is assessed according to its own properties; is the time at which the action is performed considered separately from the property of what is done? For what does temporal continuation have in common with what is done according to our will? If someone asks us: what is a day? Without a doubt we will answer: the time when the sun is above the earth, and we will set morning and evening as its measure. The same concept of day will befit not only one of the days circulating in the seven-day circle of time; on the contrary, this same concept belongs to both the first and second days, even up to the seventh, and the Sabbath day, since it is a day, does not differ from the others. And if someone begins to inquire about the meaning of sin, about what a neighbor should not do, of course we will answer, for example; like this: “You shall not commit adultery, you shall not kill, you shall not steal” (Ex. 20:13–15) and so on. The generic law of these commandments, which contains each of them, is to love your neighbor as yourself. This is the same on every day, if it is performed, without a doubt, beautifully, and if it is violated, it is recognized as the opposite of beautiful. And if anything today is considered a bad deed, whether it be a crime - murder, or something else that is forbidden, no one will consider the same thing good the next day. Therefore, if the bad is always like this, no matter at what time someone dares to do it, then what is not subject to responsibility will not become subject to liability from time to time. Therefore, if on the eve of the Sabbath, collecting wood and lighting a fire is not untrue, and it is not subject to punishment; then why does the same thing the next day become a crime? But I know the Sabbath - a day of rest, I know the law of idleness, which, without binding a person to his natural activity, commands to be idle, if only he commands the impossible, commanding us not to do anything, who, in addition to other affairs, have the very way of life to do: these are: sight of the eyes, natural activity of hearing, smell of the nostrils, inhalation of air with the lips, words composed with the tongue, preparing food with the teeth, boiling it in water. insides, moving with the legs, doing with the hands everything that these members usually do with us. Therefore, is it possible to remain immutable to the law of non-doing, when nature does not allow inaction? How can I convince the eye that naturally has the natural ability to look at something not to see anything on Saturday? How can I keep my hearing active? How will my sense of smell convince me to postpone the receptive sensation of vapors until Saturday? How can the innards, being enslaved to the law, not act in activities that especially belong to them, leaving food undigested in the body, just to show that the nature remains idle on the Sabbath? If the other parts of our body cannot accept the law of inaction; because what is inactive will not participate in life at all: then, without a doubt, it is impossible not to break the Sabbath, even if an arm or a leg remains motionless, in the same form and in the same place. Therefore, since the law is not laid down for one member, but for the whole person, we will probably not preserve the law without acting as a member, if we violate what has been decreed, acting in accordance with nature with other senses. But the law is from God; and everything commanded by God is not such as to contradict nature, or to be not included in the law of virtue; inaction that is inconsistent with reason is not virtue; Therefore, it is necessary to find out what the commandment about Sabbath inactivity requires. So I affirm that the entire law, as given by God, has one goal, to keep those who have accepted the law clean from doing evil, and the whole law, forbidding what is forbidden, commands to keep sabbath from evil deeds. And the tablets, and the Levitical observance, and the severity prescribed in Deuteronomy, require us to be idle and inactive in that which is sin. Therefore, if anyone accepts the law in the sense that a person should be idle from vice, then I also agree that the wise Ecclesiastes determines the time to throw stones at those who gather wood for themselves, which prohibits the gathering of dry branches of vice that are collected as food for the fire. If the bare literal meaning remains; I don’t see why the law should be considered divine. Therefore, one must understand what kind of stones these are thrown at such a person, so that his zeal for collecting branches does not reach its end. If this is wood with which the fire will be kindled to the one who gathers (and of course this is not implicit for someone who somehow introduces a mysterious meaning; for the Apostle beautifully calls a bad building “wood, reeds and hay” (1 Cor. 3:12), because such buildings during the judgment are made by fire, and the chaff, says the Gospel word, are prepared for the fire (Matthew 3:12) and about the barren branch was given the sentence that it is suitable only for fire (John 15:6): it will clearly be that the wood collected for the preparation of fire is the vain purpose of life; and in the meantime, being stoned, as others will understand, without sinning against the proper meaning, is a thought tending towards evil. Without a doubt, it must be understood that thoughts that kill vice are those stones accurately thrown from the sling of Ecclesiastes, which must always be both thrown and collected. To throw down to the overthrow of that which stands against our life; but to collect so that the bosom of the soul is always full of such preparations, and to have at hand what to throw at the enemy, if ever a plot is hatched against us otherwise. Therefore, where will we collect stones to sweep away the enemy with them? I heard a prophecy that said: “holy stones are cast on the ground” (Zech. 9:16). And these are the words that come to us from the inspired Scripture; they must be collected into the bosom of the soul in order to use them in time against those who upset us; their throwing is so beautiful that they kill the enemy and do not move away from the hand of the thrower. For whoever places a stone of chastity into an intemperate thought, in pleasure gathering wood to feed the fire, will overcome the thought with this throwing, and always carry a weapon in his hand. So truth becomes a stone for unrighteousness, and kills it, and is kept in the bosom of the one who slays it. In the same way, everything that is understood as better is deadly for what is understood as worse, and does not move away from those who succeed in virtue. So, according to our reasoning, it is necessary to throw stones at a time and to collect stones at a time, so that good throwing is always carried out to destroy the worst, and our abundance of such weapons never becomes scarce. Further, in connection with the speech, the proposed thought determines the time and untimeliness of some kind of deception, and literally reads like this: Eccl.3:5. It's time to hug, and it's time to move away from hugging. But these concepts will become clear to us in no other way than by preliminary understanding of this reading from Scripture, when it becomes clear to us what the inspired word usually uses this zeal for. And the great David makes this clear in the psalms, where he cries out, saying: “Use Zion and embrace it” (Psalm 47:13). And this Solomon himself, when with love he introduces one who is disposed to wisdom into a sincere union with her, as he also says something else that brings us closer to virtue, he also adds the following: “almost yu, that he may embrace you” (Proverbs 4:8). Therefore, if David commands you to embrace Zion, and Solomon said that those who honor wisdom are embraced by it, then we will not sin against proper understanding, having recognized the very thing that it is time to embrace. Zion is a mountain towering above the Jerusalem fortress. Therefore, he who advises you to embrace him commands you to be committed to a high life in order to reach the very stronghold of virtues, which David mysteriously designated by the name of Zion. And the one who is preparing to live together with wisdom announces to you the embrace that will follow. So it is time to embrace Zion, and time to be embraced by wisdom, since the name of Zion indicates the height of life; and wisdom means any particular virtue. Therefore, if from what was said we learned the timing of an embrace, then from this same thing we learned with whom separation is more beneficial than union. For it is said: “Time to move away from hugging.” He who has become accustomed to virtue shuns relations with vice. For “what fellowship is there between light and darkness, or between Christ and beliar?” (2 Cor. 6:14-15) or how is it possible for someone who serves two opposing masters to become acceptable to both? For the love of one produces hatred in another. Therefore, when a feeling of love has a good consequence, and this is timing; then alienation from the opposite will actually follow. If you truly love chastity, you will hate its opposite. If you look at purity with love; it is clear that you were disgusted by the stench of dirt. If you are attached to the good, then you will certainly become far from being attached to the bad. And if someone transfers the meaning of deception to the love of wealth, then the Ecclesiastes word shows what kind of wealth to embrace is a good deed, and the embrace of what kind of acquisitions should be removed. I know the longed-for treasure, “hidden in the countryside” (Matthew 13:44), not visible to everyone. I also know despised wealth, not only hoped for, but already visible with the eyes. The apostolic word teaches this, saying: “those who are visible to us are not seen, but are invisible: what is visible is temporary; what is invisible is eternal” (2 Cor. 4:18). If we understand this, with the help of this we will understand the continuation of the word. Ecclesiastes says: “A time to seek, and a time to destroy” (Eccl. 3:6). For whoever has understood from what has been studied what to avoid and what to enter into contact with, he will know what to look for, and the loss of what is profitable. For it is said: “It is a time to seek, and a time to destroy.” Therefore, what should I look for in order to get decent time? But what should be sought is shown by the prophecy, saying: “Seek the Lord, and be strong” (Psalm 104:4); and again: “seek the Lord, and when you find Him, call upon him” (Is. 55:6); and: “let the hearts of those who seek the Lord rejoice” (Psalm 104:3). Therefore, from what was said, I learned what should be sought, and what finding itself is an everlasting search. For it is nothing else to seek this, and nothing else to find it; but the benefit of acquisition is the quest itself. Would you like to find out the timing? When is the time to seek the Lord? Let me answer briefly: my whole life. For it is timely to care about this one thing along with every other care. It is good not to seek the Lord on certain days or at a specific time; On the contrary, the seeker should never stop doing this at all - this is true timing. “My eyes,” says the Prophet, “I will go out to the Lord” (Psalm 24:15). You see with what diligence the eye examines what is sought, without giving itself any rest, no interruption in observing what is sought. For by adding the word: “I will take out” showed the ever-present continuation and continuity of zeal. Let us also understand “the time to destroy,” recognizing for ourselves the benefit of destroying something whose presence becomes a harm to the one who has it. Evil acquisition is the love of money, so let us destroy it; a thin reserve is rancor, so let’s discard it; a destructive acquisition is intemperate lust; for them, more than for others, we become poor, so that with such poverty we may acquire the Kingdom for ourselves: for “blessed are the poor in spirit” (Matthew 5:3), that is, those who are poor in such wealth. And it is more blessed for a person not to acquire all other devilish treasures even at the beginning, so as to become completely non-covetous of the defiler; and it is no less wonderful for someone who previously had this evil acquisition to destroy and turn such property into nothing. But to never have any participation in something like this is higher than what is common with human nature; and having received destruction, this will be enough for the fortress and human strength. Therefore, not to have any acquisitions of the enemy belongs to the only Lord, who took upon Himself the same weaknesses as us, except for sin; for He says: “The prince of this world is coming, and in Me” he finds nothing that belongs to him (John 14:30). And how to cleanse yourself through thorough repentance, examples of this can be seen in people who have distinguished themselves by virtue. Paul destroyed the evil acquisition of unbelief, with the help of the prophecy that gave him the grace, and he became filled with the treasure he was looking for. When Isaiah was cleansed with the Divine coal, he destroyed every unclean word and thought: and through this he was filled with the Holy Spirit. Anyone who partakes of the best destroys everything that is considered contrary to it. Thus the chaste destroys lewdness, the truthful destroys untruth; modest - pride, benevolent - hatred, full of love - enmity. As in the Gospel, the blind man found what he did not have, destroying what he had; for after the removal of blindness, a ray of light entered in its place, and upon the leper, after the destruction of the disease, the grace of health descends, and leaves deadness in those who are restored from death in the presence of life: so in the wisdom that lies before us, it is impossible to acquire anything high without destroying the zeal for the earthly and low. For by finding the latter, what is more preferable for us is destroyed; and conversely, the loss of this will become the reason for the acquisition of the precious. We learn this from the Lord’s Word: “He who finds his soul will lose it” (Matthew 10:39). For the very fact that the soul is found in the desired substance becomes the reason for its not being found in true goods. And vice versa, the deprivation and death of the first becomes the gain of the hoped-for. “What good is it to a man, if he gains the whole world, but loses his soul” (Matthew 16:26)? “Time,” it is said, “to seek, and time to destroy” (Eccl. 3:6). Therefore, if we have learned what is the benefit of that which is sought, which is acquired by the loss of what was acquired badly, then we will seek the first, and destroy the last. Let us seek the beautiful and destroy the bad. But what is read in connection with what is written is also beautiful and close to what has been considered. Ecclesiastes says: “a time is to be kept, and a time to be destroyed” (Eccl. 3:6). What to “store”? Obviously, what we found as a result of our search. What to "remove"? Without a doubt, the loss of which is recognized as useful. A right thought was born in you, a desire came to you to see God; “Your soul thirsts for the mighty living God” (Psalm 41:3); a strong desire was born in you to be in the courts of the Lord; and the courts of the Lord, according to my reasoning, are the virtues with which the Word is established, and everyone who follows the Word; keep this so that your wealth of pure acquisitions of the mind is not squandered. Some nasty thought creeps in, like a secretive thief who destroys frequent thoughts; he must be torn out and expelled from his mind. For after his removal, the treasure of blessings will remain safe with us. If the harmful one is not eradicated, then there will be no benefit from the acquisition; because wealth will flow away through the malice of those who dig into the walls. So, since we have experienced the time of “searching”, and everyone who seeks finds, so that what is found remains with us, we will assign some kind of vigilant guard to the treasure. It is said: “guard your heart with all care” (Proverbs 4:23), after you have found it, keeping the grace you have found. For example, having approached with faith, you found purity in the font. But it’s more work to preserve what you received than to find what you didn’t have. Because, according to what we have said, the timing of the search is not determined by any time, but the whole life is a single time for this good search: so we affirm that the time of storage is measured by the whole life, offering now also a prophetic word that says: “I will lift up my eyes to the Lord, for He will pluck my noses from the snare” (Psalm 24:15). This is the security of preserving our good acquisitions, so that God becomes the guardian of our acquisitions. For when “my eyes” are “turned out to the Lord,” then the networks of the enemy with which he plots intrigues on what is precious in the soul will remain ineffective. It is said: “Do not let your feet become troubled, and keep you from slumbering” (Psalm. 120, 3). So the present saying is in connection with the previous word; then he commanded to search in order to find; and this advises storing it so as not to lose it. The way to preserve the good is to sweep aside everything that is considered resistant, just as in a besieged city, security becomes more reliable when the traitors are expelled; and while they are in the city, these hidden enemies are plotting more obvious ones. For it is said: “time is to be kept, and time is to be taken away.” Further succession of speech elevates the soul to a higher kind of wisdom about the intelligible. For it shows that the universe itself is tightly connected, and there is no gap in the harmony of the intelligible, but on the contrary, creatures have some kind of unanimity among themselves. And nothing is separated from the mutual connection of everything; on the contrary, everything remains in being; content by the power of Being. But what really exists is either goodness itself, or another name, if anyone besides this comes up with something to mean the incorruptible Nature. Yes, and how can anyone find for Him “a name, a hedgehog,” according to the expression of the divine Apostle, “more than any name” (Phil. 2:9)? However, no matter what name is found to signify unspoken power and nature; what is signified is certainly good. - So this good, or something higher than good, actually exists in itself, and from itself has given and gives to beings strength and to come into being and to remain in being. And everything imagined outside of Him is non-essential. For what is outside of existence is not in being. Therefore, since evil seems to be something opposite to love: and God is all-perfect virtue; then outside God there is evil, whose property is not that it is in being, but that it is not in good. According to our position, the word “evil” is the name of that which is outside the concept of good. Evil seems to be as much the opposite of good as the non-existent is the opposite of the existing. So, since we, by free striving, have fallen away from good, then, as about those who are not in the light, it is said that they see darkness (for not to see anything means to see darkness); so in us, having fallen away from good, the unrealized nature of evil was then realized, and will remain until then as long as we are outside good. If the free movement of our will breaks off relations with the inessential and draws closer to the Existing, then this, which is now in me, no longer having being, will not have the ability to remain in me at all; because evil, taken outside of will, does not exist in itself. And I, having turned and clinged to the truly Existing One, remain in the Existing One, which has always been, and will always remain, and now exists. These thoughts, it seems to me, are inspired by what was said: “a time to tear, and a time to sew” (Eccl. 3:7), namely, so that we, having torn ourselves away from that with which we have become close to our own harm, cleave to that with which unity is good for us. For it is said: “It is good for me to cleave to God, to place my trust in the Lord” (Psalm 72:28). Another may say that this advice is useful for many other things; for example: “Pull out the evil one from among you” (1 Cor. 5:13). This is what the divine Apostle commands about a person condemned for lawless confusion, ordering him to be torn away from the general fullness of the Church, so that the “little kvass,” as he says, the vice in the condemned person does not make “the whole confusion” of church prayer useless (1 Cor. 5:6). The Apostle stitches the one who was rejected for sin back together with repentance, saying: “Let not much sorrow be consumed” (2 Cor. 2:7). So he knew how to tear off the contaminated part of the church vestment in good time, and sew it on again in good time, when it was washed from filth by repentance. You can see many similar things that, as, according to the legends of the ancients, and in our time, were and are being done in churches in a house-building manner. For you know with whom our unity is broken, and with whom we are always, as it were, sewn together. Having been torn away from heresy, we are at all times attached to piety, and then seeing the robe of the Church untorn when someone has been torn away from fellowship into heresy. But is Scripture wise about creatures in accordance with the view previously examined by us, or does it teach something similar in this advice; in any case, this saying contains a useful rule that can be applied to many things, at the time separating it from that with which it is bad to be in connection, and at the time tying it back to that with which unity is useful. But we will move on to what follows in the word, which, according to the highest wisdom, the word considered, it seems to me, has more similarities with the last saying. For he indicated in advance “the time to remain silent,” and after silence gave “the time to speak” (Eccl. 3:7). Therefore, when and about what is it better to remain silent? Another will say that in matters of morality, silence is often more decent than speech, as, for example, Paul distinguishes between the propriety of silence and speech, sometimes legitimizing silence, and sometimes advising to speak. “Let no corrupt word come out of your mouth - this is the law of silence; but if it is good for the creation of faith, let him give grace to those who hear” (Eph. 4:29) - now is the time to speak. “Wives in churches keep silent” (1 Cor. 14:34). The apostle again determined a time for silence. “If they want to learn something they don’t know, let them ask their husbands at home” (1 Cor. 14:35); again pointed out the timing of the word. “Do not lie to one another” (Col. 3:9); this is the timing of silence. “Speak the truth to everyone who is sincere” (Eph. 4:25) - again permission to speak. Many similar things can be said from the old scriptures. “Forever the sinner stood before me, dumb and humbled, and silent from good things” (Psalm 38:2-3): “as deaf you did not hear, and as you who were deaf did not open your lips” (Psalm 37:14). The one who remains motionless to retribution for evil becomes mute; and for what purpose the word should be used, it opens “the mouth in parables”, proclaims “gananiya” (Psalm 77:2), fulfills the “mouth of praise” (Psalm 70:8), makes the tongue a “reed” (Psalm 44:2). But when there are thousands of examples in Scripture, what is the need to refine the word about what is recognized by everyone? And what came to my mind before this, namely, that the timing of “be silent” and “verb” is consistent with the proposed speculation about “tearing” and “sewing,” I intend to say this, repeating again, in a few words. For there the word, having torn away the soul tied to its enemy for its evil, brought it into unity with what truly exists, clinging it to that which is higher than the word, as was previously discussed: but here, therefore, it seems to me, it was commanded in advance to remain silent, precisely because what the soul, rejected from evil, incessantly seeks, and with which, having found it, wants to be united, then, surpassing every concept and name, is higher everyone to the interpretation of the official word. And he who stubbornly tries to fit this into the meaning of the word, without even noticing it, sins against the Divinity. For what we believe, which exceeds everything, is, of course, higher than words. And whoever undertakes to embrace the indefinable in a word, does not he already agree that what he introduces is above all instead of the all-exceeding, because he considers his own word to be something similar and just as great, to the extent and to what extent this word has contained, not knowing that the divine concept of the truly existing is preserved only with the confidence that the Divine is above knowledge? Therefore, everything that exists in creation looks at what is akin to it by nature: and there is no being among creatures that would remain in being, having come out of itself. There is no fire in water, nor in the fire of water, nor land in the depths, nor humidity in dry land, nor in earthly air, nor in airy earth: on the contrary, each creature, remaining within its own natural limits, exists until then as long as it remains within its own limits. If something becomes outside of itself, then it will be outside of being. And just as the power of the senses, remaining in natural activities, cannot pass into the activity of anything nearby; the eye does not act like hearing, hearing has no taste, touch does not converse, the tongue does not produce what sight and hearing do: but each sense has the limit of its own power in its natural activity: so every creature cannot, by the vastness of its vision, come out of itself, but always remains within itself, and no matter what it looks at, it sees itself, although it thinks that it sees something higher than itself, but does not by nature and the ability to look outside itself. So, for example, when observing creatures, one becomes more inclined to detach oneself from the idea of ​​space, but does not detach oneself. For with every newly acquired idea, it certainly also perceives the space encompassed by the essentiality of what is represented by the mind. Space is nothing other than a creature. And the good that we have learned to seek and preserve, being above creation, is above comprehension. For our thought, traveling along spatial extension, how will it comprehend the non-spatial nature, always through the decomposition of time, learning which of what is found is older than it? Although she flows through everything cognizable with her curiosity, she does not find any way to transcend the concept of eternity in order to place herself outside, to become higher, both of the being first of all contemplated, and of eternity itself. But, as if finding yourself on some mountain top, suppose that it is some kind of rock, smooth and round, below in appearance red, stretching into an endless distance, and at the top rising into the heights like a cliff, which falls with its overhanging brow into some vast abyss. Therefore, what is natural for one who touches the edge of his foot to this cliff leaning into the abyss, and who finds neither support for his foot nor support for his hand, endures the same, in my opinion, the soul, which has gone through what is passed through in the extended, when it seeks the nature of the eternal and unextended; not finding anything to take hold of, neither place, nor time, nor measure, nor anything else of the like, to which access is possible for our understanding, but sliding everywhere in contact with the irresistible, it becomes dizzy and confused, and again turns to its kindred, loving only such a measure of knowledge about the Supreme, in which one can be convinced that It is something different from the nature of knowable things. Therefore, when the word comes to that which is higher than the word, then the time comes to remain silent, and to keep the inexplicable miracle of this unspoken power in the secret of consciousness, knowing that even great men spoke about the works of God, and not about God, saying: “Who can speak of the mighty powers of the Lord” (Psalm 105:2)? and: “I will tell all” your deeds (Psalm 9:1); and again: “generation and generation will praise Your works” (Psalm 144:4). Deeds are spoken, and deeds are announced, and they are urged to publicly confess what has been done. But when the word is about that which surpasses every word, then by the very fact that they speak they directly legitimize silence. For they say that His splendor, glory, and holiness “have no end” (Psalm 144:3). Truly a miracle! Why was the word afraid to approach the glory of the Divine miracle, so that surprise did not touch the miraculousness of anything seen from the outside? For he did not say that there is no end to the essence of God, considering it very daring to formulate a concept about this, but only expresses in words surprise at the splendor seen in the word. The Prophet also could not see the essence of glory itself, but was amazed when he mentally imagined the glory of His shrine. Therefore, how far was he from being curious about nature, what it is, who did not even have the strength to marvel at the last of what is manifested? because he was not amazed at His shrine and not at the glory of the shrine, but having assumed to be amazed only at the splendor of the glory of the shrine, by the miracle of it he was brought into exhaustion. For he did not grasp the end of the thought in arousing surprise. Why does he say that “there is no end to His glory, splendor, and shrine.” So, if we are talking about God, then when the question is about essence, it is time to remain silent: and when about some good action, the knowledge of which descends to us, then it is time to proclaim powers, proclaim miracles, tell deeds, and to this extent use the word; and in considering what is outside of them, do not allow the creature to protrude beyond its limits, but be content if it knows itself. For, according to my reasoning, if the creature has not known itself, has not comprehended what is the essence of the soul and the nature of the body, where the being comes from, where the birth of one from the other comes from, how the non-existent realizes, how the existing is resolved into the non-existent; what harmony is there in this world of opposites - if the creature has not known itself; then how to explain what is higher than it? Therefore, it is time to remain silent about this: because silence about this is better. Now is the time to talk about how our life grows in virtue, about Christ Jesus our Lord. To him be glory and power forever and ever! Amen. Eccl.3:8. A time to love and a time to hate. Who will have enough pure hearing to purely accept the word about love, without bringing into himself anything from impure love? And our ears, perhaps, need the fingers of Jesus, so that by the Divine touch of the true Word, the hearing ability of our soul will be freed from all filthiness that blocks our hearing, and we will understand praiseworthy love, we will heed with our souls when there is “a time to love” and when there is “a time to hate.” I don’t think that this was any other time than useful. For, in my opinion, the benefit of both of these dispositions shows the timing of the discovery of each; so, if what is revealed does not actually serve to benefit, then it is untimely. First of all, I think, it is necessary to understand the meaning of these two words, I mean, the words: “to love” and “to hate”, so that we can thus understand in the word their appropriate use. Love is an internal connection with what is pleasant, produced by pleasure and passion. Hatred is alienation from the unpleasant and disgust from the offensive. One or another of these dispositions can be used both with benefit and in spite of it; and every virtuous life seems to originate from here. For what we are inclined to with love, we become accustomed to with our souls; and what we are inclined to with hatred, we alienate. The soul will be connected with good or bad, and what is loved by the soul will somehow merge with it. But no matter what it is, as soon as hatred enters the environment it will create a rupture with both the good and the bad. Therefore, we must look at what is kind and what is hateful to nature, so that, taking advantage of such a disposition of the soul, we will in time become alien to evil through hatred, and enter into unity with the nature of good. And oh, if human nature would first of all learn this, I mean the distinction between what is good and what is not! Passions would not have access to our lives if we recognized the good from the very beginning. And now, by making an unreasonable feeling for the first time to appreciate the good, we grow with the judgment about things formed at the beginning, and therefore we can hardly be distracted from it; what the feeling recognized in us as good, and with which, by our growth, we established ourselves in good relations. It seems good for people that the eyes in inanimate matter, or in animate spectacles, give some pleasure to the eyes with good color. Beautiful harmonious singing for the ear! and in juices and smells good is determined, one by the approval of taste, and the other by smell. But what is most rude and unreasonable is the sense of touch, by which intemperate voluptuousness takes precedence in nature in judging what is good. So, since feelings are born to us immediately, along with our birth, and we use them from the first days of life; and sensuality has a great affinity with irrational life; because similar things are seen among the dumb; Meanwhile, the mind, which does not develop in infancy, encounters, as it were, an obstacle in its activity, and is in some way oppressed by the predominance of irrational feelings; Therefore, the very erroneous and sinful use of a disposition filled with love becomes the beginning and foundation of a vicious life. And how we have a certain double nature, dissolved from the spiritual and the sensual; then, as a consequence of this, we have a double life, taking place in accordance with one and the other nature, and precisely in terms of the sensory part of the body; and on the other side it is incorporeal. But what is beautiful and what is not is not the same thing that equally serves for both types of our life; on the contrary, for spiritual life it is the spiritual, but for the sensory and bodily part that which the sense pleases to recognize as such. So, since feeling is born along with the beginning of our existence, and the mind, which can only be revealed in a person gradually, waits until he comes to a commensurate age: then the gradually unfolding mind is for this reason under the dominion of feeling, and that which constantly gains the upper hand with all its might, gets used to obeying it, recognizing either good or bad, which either chooses or rejects feeling. Therefore, understanding what is truly good becomes difficult and unsuccessful for us; because we are prejudiced by the decision of feelings, limiting the good only to what amuses and delights. For just as it is impossible to see heavenly beauties when the air above your head is filled with fog, so the spiritual eye cannot discern virtue when, when seeing, as if in some kind of fog, it is enveloped by voluptuousness. Therefore, since feeling means pleasure, and pleasure prevents the mind from discerning virtue; then it becomes the beginning of vice, because the mind, dominated by feeling, confirms an unreasonable judgment about the good; and if the eye says that beauty consists in the good color of what is visible, the understanding agrees with this. And also in other things, what is recognized as good is what pleases the feeling. But if it were possible for us somehow in the beginning to have a true judgment about the good, and the mind itself assessed the good; then we would not be slaves, having become enslaved to an unreasonable feeling and becoming bestial. Therefore, so that such a mixture can be discerned in us, and infallibly recognized what is worthy by nature, and what is again the opposite of this, Ecclesiastes now speaks of this in the following words: “a time to love, and a time to hate,” by which he distinguishes the properties of things, showing; what is loved and what is hated can be useful. For youth, seething with the passions of its age, says that it is time for it to love what is dear to youth: but Ecclesiastes contradicts youth, defining a different time for pure love: because the sinful connection of the soul with that which is incongruous with anything is not love either. As in the healthy state of our nature, thirst appears in the body in good time; and in whom such a disposition is produced by the remorse of a special kind of viper, no one will say about those that thirst acts in them at the right time; because their thirst is not a natural impulse, but an illness: so the impure love of youth is not love, but a disease of the will produced by the inflammatory remorse of age. Therefore, not all love is timely, but only that which is felt towards someone worthy of love. But it is impossible to acquire clear knowledge about this if the very concept of love is not understood in looking at it. So, of the goods that people desire, some are truly what they are called, while others have a false name. Everything that is non-temporary gives pleasure, and is not such that it seems good to one, but is useless for others, but on the contrary, it always serves as good to everyone and in everything, no matter who has it, - there is a true good that is always the same, and does not allow the admixture of anything bad; and by those who study this precisely, it is seen in the one Divine and eternal nature. And everything else that is good for the senses, although it seems good through imaginary deception, is not, and was not, such in its nature, being of a fluid and transitory nature, by some deception and vain assumption, ignorant people recognize it as truly good. Therefore, if those who are attached to the impermanent do not always desire the unchangeable; it seems that Ecclesiastes, when he says: “a time to love and a time to hate,” as if standing on some high tower, calls out to human nature: true good is something else; it is also beautiful, and makes those who partake of it so. For whatever is the nature of that which is communed, those who partake are necessarily converted into the same thing: for example: the mouth of one who receives any fragrant aromas into the mouth becomes fragrant, and, on the contrary, the lips of one who eats garlic, or something else even more fetid, becomes stinking. So, since every sinful defilement is fetid, and on the contrary, virtue is the fragrance of Christ, love-filled intercourse with a loved one naturally produces dissolution; what we are committed to in love, we become, either the fragrance of Christ, or the stench. He who loves beauty will himself be beautiful; because the goodness of the One who dwells in him transforms into himself the one who receives it. That is why He who exists always offers Himself to us as food, so that we, having received Him into ourselves, may become the same as He. For he says: “My flesh is truly meat, and My blood is truly beer” (John 6:55). Therefore, whoever loves this Flesh is not a friend of his own flesh, and whoever is disposed towards this Blood with love will become pure from sensual blood. For the flesh of the Word and the blood that is in this flesh do not have in themselves any gift of grace, but are sweet to those who taste, desirable to those who lust, and acceptable to those who love. If anyone turns love to the insolvent; what it is by nature, the one who indulges in it will necessarily become the same. Therefore, since in what exists, some are real, and some are vain, it is necessary to recognize the vain in order to understand through opposition the nature of what really exists. This is what all the saints do, turning those who have deviated from the straight path and following a sinful path back to the path from which they turned aside, calling to them from afar: “flee the path you are walking on; on it there are robbers and robbers and ambushes of murderers,” so that together the traveler can avert the danger of a destructive path, and evasion from this path becomes a guide to the path of salvation. So the great Ecclesiastes calls from above to the human race, wandering “in the unpassable”, and “not along the path,” as the Prophet says (Psalm 106:40), clearly expressing the following in what was said: “Why, people, do you wander in life! Why do you love vain things, are committed to the impermanent, and are attached by your disposition to that which has no validity? There is another way that is infallible and salutary; love it, walk on it with love; this name is truth, life, incorruptibility, light and the like. And the path you are following is worthy of hatred and disgust; because it is deprived of light and covered with darkness, it leads to rapids, abysses and places where animals live and robbers hide.” Therefore, he who said: “the time to love,” indicated that he really deserves friendship and kindly: and he who prescribed a time for hatred taught what one should have disgust from. Therefore, having recognized what is worthy of love by nature, let us cleave to this with love, not in the least led astray by our inability to judge what is beautiful and not wasting our love on what the great David forbids to love, saying: “Sons of humanity, how long will it be hard-hearted? Do you love vanity and seek lies” (Psalm 4:3)? For there is only one thing that is worthy of love by nature - the truly Existent One, about which the law speaks in the ten chapters: “thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart,” and with all thy mind (Deut. 6:5). And one thing is also truly hateful, this is the inventor of sin, the enemy of our life, about whom the law says: “You will hate your enemy” (Matthew 5:43). Love for God becomes the strength of the lover; and a disposition towards vice brings destruction to the one who loves evil. For this is what the prophecy says: “I will love you, O Lord, my strength: the Lord is my strength, and my refuge, and my deliverer” (Psalm 17:2-3). About the opposite he says: “he who loves untruth hates his own soul. He will rain nets on sinners” (Psalm 10:5–6). Therefore, the time for love of God is all life; and the time to alienate oneself from an opponent is a lifetime. Whoever, even for a small part of his life, remains outside the love of God, is, without a doubt, outside of the One from whose love he has distanced himself. And he who is outside of God must be outside of light (because God is light), also outside of life and incorruption, and outside of every concept and every thing imagined by the best, that everything is God. For whoever is not in this is, without a doubt, in the opposite. Therefore, darkness, corruption, all-destruction and death accept such a person. Having distinguished this in a short saying, the Ecclesiastes word shows the properties of both of those presented in opposition, revealing this with love in time and in time revealed hatred. Time, he says, to love what is good; and it is also time to hate the opposite; He says this: “hold on to this thought, man, that this word means beautiful; because the perverted and sinful disposition of our soul, towards one or another of these, is the root and beginning of sin. It is said: no one can “work for two masters, for he will either hate the one and love the other” (Luke 16:13). This opposition teaches who rules badly, and who should be alienated out of hatred, and also who rules over those under his rule for good, and to whom it is proper to cleave to love. If someone adheres to what is hateful and neglects what is worthy, he will violate the timing of love and hatred to his own harm. For he who neglects the matter will suffer harm from it, but he who holds on to destruction will gain for himself what he held on to. Therefore, he who has distinguished in words what is understood about virtue and vice, knows the timing, how one should behave in reasoning about both. Temperance and voluptuousness, chastity and lasciviousness, modesty and arrogance, goodwill and evil-mindedness, also everything mentally represented as the opposite, is clearly indicated to you by Ecclesiastes, so that you are in a good mood to give useful advice to the soul about this. Therefore, it is time to love abstinence, and to hate voluptuousness, so that you become not a lover of voluptuousness, but rather a lover of God, and also hate everything else, covetousness, greed, love of glory, and that only by turning love to that which should not be loved, the connection with the good is severed. For example, we learned, among other things, the teaching that every movement of the soul towards good is prepared by the Creator of our nature; if, of course, the sinful use of such movements gave rise to reasons for vice; then our free will, being beautiful in itself, as soon as it is brought to act on evil, becomes the worst of evils. And vice versa, the force that repels the unpleasant, whose name is hatred, serves as an instrument of virtue when it is armed against the opposite; but it becomes a weapon of sin when it opposes good. Therefore, “every creation of God that is prepared for us, good and nothing, is accepted with thanksgiving” (1 Tim. 4:4); and their ungrateful use has made this creation a passion, by which closeness to God ceases, and the opposite is introduced and placed in the place of God; so that such people deify passions. So insatiable is “God’s belly” (Phil. 3:19). Thus the covetous make an idol of their illness. Thus, through deception, those who were darkened with the eyes of their souls in this age by this god created vanity for themselves. In short, what someone, having given under the yoke, makes his thought a slave and helper, then he idolizes in his own passion; but he would not have tolerated this if he had not become accustomed to love with evil. Therefore, if we understand the timing of love and hatred, then we will love one, and fight with the other. For Ecclesiastes says: “a time of war and a time of peace” (Eccl. 3:8). You see a horde of opposing passions, the “law” of the flesh, “warring against the law of the mind, and taking captive by the law of sin” (Rom. 7:23). Pay attention to the various preparations for battle, how the opposing army in a thousand places threatens to attack your city; sends spies, attracts traitors to himself, sets up outposts and ambushes, concludes conditions for assistance, prepares military weapons, slingers, archers, hand-to-hand fighters, horsepower, and all this kind of thing takes up arms against you. Of course, the meaning of what was said is not unknown to you, you know who is the traitor, who is the spy, who is lying in wait in ambush, who is the slinger, who is the archer, who is the hand-to-hand fighters and the squad of horsemen. Therefore, with all this in mind, we must arm ourselves, call on our allies, scout out those under our control to see if anyone is favoring our enemies, provide for ambushes along the way, protect ourselves from attacks with shields, protect ourselves from above from those entering hand-to-hand combat, and dig up the cavalry approach to us. And for others it is appropriate to secure the walls with fortifications so that their battering guns do not shake them. Without a doubt, we cannot explain in detail in any words; how the enemy of each city, inhabited in the soul by God, either inquires about our forces through spies, or even among ourselves finds those who have become traitors to our forces. But to make this concept clearer, let’s say: this is the first attack of temptation, where passions begin. This is who is the spy on our forces! For example, a sight presented itself to the eyes that can renew lust in us. This is how the enemy tests your strength, whether it is strong and ready to fight back, or weak and ready to give up. For if you did not assume a bent appearance, and the powers of understanding were not lost in you at what you saw, but you endured the meeting dispassionately, then you immediately terrify the spy, as if showing him what kind of a squad of warriors armed with spears, I mean a militia of thoughts. If, during the vision, the feeling is softened by pleasure, and the likeness of the visible image invades the heart through the eyes, then the inner military leader, the mind, as having no courage or any courage, but voluptuous and pampered, is then attacked, and many traitors from the crowd of thoughts gather around the spy. And these are those traitors about whom the Lord says: “Defeat a man’s household” (Matthew 10:36), who come from the heart and defile a person, and whose names can be clearly learned from the Gospel (Matthew 15:18–19). After this, it will not be difficult for you to understand in order the details of this enemy order, which invisibly prepares ambushes into which those who carelessly walk the path of life fall. For those who, under the guise of friendship and goodwill, lure those who listen to them into sinful destruction, those same ones lie in wait in ambushes along the roads, these are the praisers of voluptuousness, leading to spectacles, showing the convenience of doing evil, by their actions calling for imitation of similar deeds, calling themselves their brothers and friends to the ultimate destruction of those who are being destroyed. It is written about them that “every brother stumbles, and every friend stumbles flatteringly” (Jer. 9:4). If we understand the ambushes, then we will be able to clearly find out about this crowd of slingers, archers and spearmen; because offenders, irritable and slanderous people, themselves initiating insults, instead of arrows or stones, shoot and hit with caustic words, and those who pass without armor and carelessly hit in the middle of the heart. And those who compare the passion of arrogance and pride with the majesty of horses are also not wrong. For truly these are some high-necked and high-hearted horses, kicking modest people with arrogant arrogance, as if with puffed hooves. Scripture says about them: “let not the foot of pride come upon me” (Psalm 35:12). And under the weapons with which the ties of the wall are broken, another will do it well, understanding covetousness. For there is nothing so heavy and impregnable in the enemy’s militia as an instrument of the love of money; because, although souls are best protected by the harmonious connection of other virtues, nevertheless, this battering weapon often penetrates through them. It can be seen that even with chastity, covetousness invades; with faith, with accurate keeping of the sacraments, with abstinence and humility, and with everything like that, there is this heavy and irresistible attack of evil. Why are some abstinent, chaste, ardent with faith, people of a strict lifestyle, modest in morals, not able to resist this disease? Therefore, if we have realized the hordes of enemies, then it is time to wage war. Let no one dare to put the opposing militia to flight without taking the apostolic armor into his hands (Eph. 6:11). And of course, everyone knows the method of divine weaponry, with which the Apostle makes those standing in front of a squad of enemies invulnerable with resistant arrows. For having divided the virtues into types, the Apostle made each type of virtue a special weapon, suitable for us in every circumstance. Having weaved and weaved justice with faith, he prepares armor from them for the armed man, perfectly and safely protecting the warrior with both. And if faith and justice are separated from one another; that weapon cannot be made safe for the one to whom it is given. And faith without works of righteousness is not sufficient for salvation, and righteousness of life is not safe for salvation in itself, not in conjunction with faith. Therefore, like some kind of substance, having intertwined faith and truth in this weapon, the Apostle brings the warrior’s heart to safety; for by armor we mean the heart. And he protects the head of the valiant with hope, meaning that it is fitting for a good warrior, like a feather on a helmet, to have “hope” for something sublime in the heavenly world. And the shield, the covering weapon, is an indestructible faith, which cannot be pierced by the edge of a goad. By the furrows that our enemies throw at us, we will, of course, mean the various attacks of the passions. But the saving weapon, which arms the right hand of those who valiantly struggle against their enemies, is the Holy Spirit, terrible when it opposes, and saving when it is communicated to those who receive it. And every gospel teaching brings safety to the feet, so that no part of the body is exposed and open to receive a blow. Therefore, if we have found out with whom we should fight, and so enter into battle; then it is proper to find out the other side of the matter, with whom, as this word declares, to be in union and peace. So who is the good military leader with whom I will become close friends? Who is the king of such an army? Is it not clear, as we learn both from the inspired Scriptures, that the heavenly army is a squad of Angels? For it is said: “There was a multitude of howls in heaven praising God” (Luke 2:13). And Daniel sees the darkness of those coming, and sees thousands of thousands among the servants (Dan. 7:10). And the Prophet, who testifies to such things, calls the Lord of the universe Lord of hosts and Lord of hosts (Isa. 23:10). And the Mighty One in battle says to Joshua: “I am the Archangel of strength” (Joshua 5:14). If we understand what kind of support this is, and who is the leader of these supporters; then let us enter into an alliance with Him, let us resort to His power, and become friends of Him who has acquired so much power. What is the way to draw closer to Him? This is what the great Apostle, who introduces us to this affection, teaches us when he says: “Being justified by faith, peace be upon God” (Rom. 5, 1); and again: “We pray according to Christ, as I pray to God with us: we pray according to Christ, be reconciled to God” (2 Cor. 5:20). For we, who are now “by nature children of wrath” (Eph. 2:3), doing what was not right, and being numbered among those who resist the right hand of the Most High, having put aside ungodliness and worldly lusts, as having begun to live holy, and righteous, and pious, by this reconciliation we enter into union with the true Peace. For this is what the Apostle says about Him: “For He is our peace” (Eph. 2:14). This word is the end and the beginning of everything done in time. For we are trained to do everything on time in order to succeed for ourselves in the following: while being in a hostile disposition towards the enemy, have peace with God. Of course, if someone calls the army of the world those virtues with which one should be in friendship, then the word will not be alien to this given meaning; since every name and concept of virtue refers to the Lord of virtues. And why would anyone continue to talk about something like this, when what has been said is enough to reveal the meaning contained in these sayings? But since Ecclesiastes has awakened the soul that was previously trained by these lofty lessons, he raises the soul that follows the word to a higher state, and says: “What is the abundance of the creative, does he himself work in them?” (Eccl. 3:9) And this is also what to say: what is the consequence of all human labors, of which not a single one is any more? A person cultivates the land, sails the seas, suffers in military labor, trades, suffers a loss, gains profit, goes to court, fights, leaves the field defeated, receives a victorious verdict, is recognized as poor, is pleased, rests at home, wanders among strangers, endures everything else that we see in various everyday activities, where everyone has his own business. And to the one who spends his life on such activities, what advantage does taking care of this bring? Doesn’t life cease at the same time, and everything is covered in oblivion? Abandoned by what he desired, he leaves naked, taking with him nothing from here, except one consciousness about this, from which, after such studies in error, a voice like a voice comes to heaven to the one who spent his life: what abundance was there for you from the many labors with which you worked? Where are the great houses? Where are the cellars with money? Where are the copper statues and the exclamations of those praising? Now here is fire, scourges, incorruptible judgment, and an infallible examination of what has been done in life. Therefore, “what is the abundance of the creative, does he himself work in them?” And after this Ecclesiastes says: Eccl.3:10–11. I saw the care given to the son of man, who cared for himself. Everything that you have created is good in its time: and the age has been given in their hearts, so that man will not discover the creation that God created from the beginning and even to the end. What does this mean? I learned, he says, why human nature is preoccupied with life, borrowing the reasons for this from the blessings of God. God created everything for good, and gave to those involved in the essential an understanding that distinguishes the best, the knowledge of which the opportuneness of the use of each thing gives those who use it a feeling of beauty. since man erred in his right judgment about existence, his correctly judging mind was seduced by evil advice, then the change in time, what was useful in each thing, turned this into a test of the opposite. If someone, having offered on the table everything prepared for a feast, puts together any utensils that serve for convenient eating, such as are prepared in such things by lovers of art, or small knives with which guests cut something offered for themselves, or silver pointed shells, in which the usual emptiness on the other part is made for convenient scooping of boiled vegetables; and then one of those invited to the feast, having changed the use of the things placed on the table, uses each of them inappropriately, stabs himself or someone near him with a knife, and with a sharp point gouges out either his neighbor’s eye or his own: then another will say that such and such used the preparation of the one giving the feast for evil. Although the one who organized the feast himself prepared the reason for what happened; but the one who recklessly took advantage of what was allocated was guilty of the bad use of what was lying on the table, leading to this disaster. Thus, says Ecclesiastes, I also learned that every thing was brought into being by God for the best, if only each thing was used at its time, and as it should be; but the perversion of the correct judgment about things and the good turned into a reason for evil. For example, I will say this: what is more pleasant than the activity of the eyes? But when vision becomes a suffering servant in such matters, it is said that what was created for good became the cause of evil. And this means nothing else, but only that a person, having used something good in a bad way, made the use of it into suffering. Likewise, everything else that is given to nature by God depends on the will of those who use it, in order to become a servant for good or evil. Therefore, Ecclesiastes says: “everything that they have done is good in its time: and he has given an age to eat in their heart.” An age, as a concept of something extended, means the entire creation of God that took place in it. Therefore, the word encompassing indicates everything that is encompassed. So, everything that happened in this age, God gave to the human heart for the good, so that by the greatness and beauty of creatures, man would see the Creator in them. But people, by virtue of which they were blessed, suffered harm as a result, using every thing not as it should have been, and not for the benefit. Therefore it is said: “Let not man find the creation that God created” (Eccl. 3:10-11) with the goal of serving for the benefit of all created things from the beginning of creation and even until the completion of the universe, while among the number of creatures there is not a single bad one. For it is not natural for something bad to come from something good. And if the Author of everything is good; then, of course, good and everything that has its independence from good. Then Ecclesiastes says: Eccl.3:12. I realized that there is no good in them, but only to have fun and do good in your belly. This word briefly repeats what has already been said. For if the use of God's creatures in time determines what is good for human life; then one thing will be good, constant with good joy, which is born from good deeds. For doing the commandments gives joy to one who is now distinguished by good deeds with hope; and then, having been pleased with good hopes, he adds the joy characteristic of the worthy when the Lord says to those who have done good: “Come, blessed ones, inherit the Kingdom prepared for you” (Matthew 25:34). And what is for the body is food and drink, which supports nature, so for the soul is to have good in mind, and, as this is the true gift of God, to raise its gaze to God. For this is the name that is explained in what was said later (Eccl. 7:2). It reads like this: Eccl.3:13. And every person who eats and drinks and sees good in all his work, this is a gift from God. Just as a carnal man, says Ecclesiastes, has strength from what he eats and drinks: so, whoever has good in mind (and true good is he who alone is good), has the gift of God in all his work, precisely the same thing that always means good, with the help of our Lord Jesus Christ. To him be glory and power forever and ever! Amen. You might be interested in: