Two words against Mohammed

An accusatory word against the Hagaran error and against the nasty dog Mohammed who invented it * To the extent of the pious faith living in me and to what extent the grace of the Holy Spirit contributed, we have already exposed Jewish evil-doing, Hellenic wickedness and Latin heresies; If we leave the godless Hagarians’ manifold wickedness and demonic deception without reproof, no one will praise us for this, but on the contrary, everyone will condemn us for extreme negligence and weakening of divine zeal for good faith. Therefore, calling upon the innumerable grace of the Divine and worshiped Paraclete (Comforter, Holy Spirit), let us begin, with God’s help, to speak in defense of the infallible, God-loving and only saving faith. There are many different signs that make up true faith, saving according to God, but of these, three properties are more necessary than all others to show infallible and saving faith. They are the following: Did God Himself, the Creator and Ruler of all, establish this or that faith; whether the one through whom God, the Creator and Master, brought it into life is righteous and reverent and pious, and full of all wisdom and understanding, and thirdly, whether the laws of the known faith agree in everything with the dogmas and covenants of the divinely inspired prophets and apostles and ecumenical fathers and teachers who have been from the ages. The most reliable witnesses to these words are Abraham and Moses and all the divine prophets who came after him at different times and Christ himself, who, for their perfect virtue and for their piety, chose and filled them with all wisdom and reason and made them lawgivers of godly life, who Himself fulfilled what they had legitimized, although imperfect, due to the weakness of the people of that time, and sealed it divinely and powerfully. Having chosen blessed Abraham, praising and blessing him for the fact that he, with a pious mind and commendable zeal, denounced his father as having become a teacher of wickedness for other people, he crushed the idols he had created, having come to know the only God and confessing Him as the Creator and Provider of heaven and earth and everything that is in them, having understood from the goodness of creation their most excellent Artist. For such piety, the Lord rewarded him by appearing to him in the form of three men, being under the roof of his tabernacle, and receiving food from him in a human form, and giving him the greatest promises that he would make him the father of many nations, and that his wife, Sarah, already old, would bear him a son, and that from his Seed all the nations of the earth would be blessed, and that his seed would multiply like the sand that is on the seashore, and like heavenly stars. Having given him such promises, the Creator and Ruler of all laid down for him an unwritten law - the mystery of circumcision, saying to him: “Be well-pleasing to Me and be blameless and blameless” (Gen. 17:1). All this, that blessed man accepted with faith and preserved and fulfilled without blemish, both himself and his descendants, even to Moses. – These are the appearances and vows of the Creator of all, the Lord and God, which were to that blessed and pious man, Patriarch Abraham, as is clear from the Divine Scripture. And the appearance, descent and coming that happened to blessed Moses are so great and terrible! They are truly terrible and surpass every word and every thought. God Himself appeared to him in a vision of fire illuminating but not scorching the bush, and called upon that man by the divine name, and declared himself the God of his fathers: Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and sent him to Egypt to rescue him from many years of slavery and from the oppression of the descendants of Abraham, that is, the people of Israel. He glorified him there before Pharaoh and before all of Egypt with many miracles, and then in the Red Sea, which with His Divine power he dried up and the countless people of Israel passed through it with wet feet. But, so that by listing in a row all the supernatural miracles that were there, without boring you with stories about what you already know, I will finish my speech with the descent of God to the top of Mount Sinai, for a direct interview, where He revealed Himself to him, to what extent human weakness can perceive the appearance of God - spoke to him as a friend speaks to his friend and gave him a law written on tablets made of sapphire stone, having inscribed on them with His Divine finger the ten commandments, living by which and directing themselves according to them, people could please God. That these blessed men were such and so wondrous, and that through them the Creator of all and the Lord, through them, magnificently, out of His innumerable love for mankind, introduced His law into human life - quite a lot has been said about this. And about our Savior Himself, Christ God, Who enlightened all, in general, visible and invisible creation with the gospel sermon, or, what is the same, with the non-evening light of infallible knowledge of God and piety, it seems unnecessary to talk about. The prophet speaks about this: “The heavens have covered His virtue, and the earth is full of His praises,” and again, “And His radiance will be like light” (Habakk 3:3–4). Beginning with the very pandemonium, after the flood that happened under Noah, when people multiplied throughout the entire earth, and the human race was darkened with all malice and every kind of wickedness and the charm of idolatry - who could, right up to the incarnation of God the Word, which exceeds all mind and word, completely deliver our race from this delusion and plant in us again the great and supernatural mystery of piety, which the prophet called radiance and light. Radiance because previously it was contained in one people and in one country of Judaism and locally illuminated them; light, as if it had already spread from there and completely illuminated all languages, through the blessed apostles, as it is said in Scripture: “Your lightning illuminated the universe” (Ps. 76:19). This prophetic saying can be understood differently. Radiance is the law given by Moses, as if it were not perfect, according to the word of the divine Apostle, who says: “The law did nothing” (Heb. 7:19), or as the giver of both laws himself explained, saying about the Law of Moses: “I did not come to destroy the law or the prophets, but to fulfill it” (Matthew 5:17), that is: to perfect it, as not perfect. For the law of Moses punishes only the very acts of sin, saying: do not commit adultery, do not kill, do not steal, and so on. And the Gospel law of the New Testament declares the very causes of the named sins to be subject to terrible condemnation, saying: “I say to you: whoever looks at a woman to lust after her, has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matthew 5:28). And again: “Everyone should be angry with his brother in vain, he is guilty of judgment, for if anyone speaks cancer to his brother, he is guilty of the host, and if anyone speaks to a freak, he is guilty of fiery hell” (Matthew 5:22); and so about the rest. For the beginning and cause of murder is immeasurable rage and anger, just as fornication is evil, lustful looking. So, the old law, as showing only sinful acts, is equated with radiance; for radiance is usually called the morning light at dawn, so to speak, sunless light; perfect light, this is the gospel law, as making a person perfect according to God and elevating him to the original goodness of the most good God, who created him in His image and likeness. Having said as much as necessary about Christ the Savior and about the true faith established by Him, let us turn, with the help of God, to the denunciation of the wickedness of the nasty dog ​​Mohammed. At the beginning of this word, we said that three certain properties most constitute the most necessary accessory to the saving and infallible faith in God, that is: was it established by God himself, and is he righteous and reverend and pious and full of all divinely inspired wisdom and infallible reason, through whom the Lord of all introduced it into human life, and does it agree in everything with the dogmas and traditions of the divinely inspired prophets? and the apostles. Leaving now the consideration of the first and last of these properties, let us first consider the average between them. For when this property is exposed, then the rest will conveniently be exposed. I'll start with the next one. That this nasty flatterer and forerunner of the most wicked Antichrist was at first not involved in either piety or any wisdom and had no scientific education, this is clearly proven by the existing story about him, which I heard from reliable men who reliably knew about him. They said that he was an employee of a rich Ishmaelite in Arabia, worked as a carriage driver for him and often went to Palestine and Syria for hire with Ishmaelian and Syrian merchants. When his master died, his former mistress, having fallen in love with him, made him her partner and heir to all her estates. Having received great wealth and having eldership among his Arabian people, he wanted to introduce a new law, and to deviate the Arabian tribe akin to him, who served idols, from this and supposedly bring him into a pious faith. When he began to think about this, the source of all evil - the devil, who always advocates and slanderes against the pious Christian race, brought to him a weapon corresponding to his malice and filth - a certain Jew named Elijah, who for some heresy was driven out by the Jews living in Jerusalem. This one, being kindly received by the bad Mohammed, taught him all kinds of Jewish evil and heresy: he taught him to know one God in one person, and not the Trinitarian; also taught to be circumcised, not to eat pork, to frequently cleanse oneself with water from daily sins, and many other things observed by the Jews; take as many wives as anyone wants and can support. The Jew taught him all this, something he had absolutely no knowledge of before. To further deceive the human race, the malicious devil introduced another teacher of malice to him in the person of a certain monk, expelled from Constantinople for the Arian heresy and his other godless blasphemies. This one, having come to him and realizing the underdevelopment of his mind, and that he was not at all versed in divine matters, did not blaspheme or reject those previously taught to him by the Jew, but, on the contrary, confirmed him in them; on his own behalf he instilled in him the whole Arian heresy, teaching him to call Christ, revered by Christians, not God, but only a man filled with all holiness, surpassing in holiness all the prophets who have been since the beginning of time, but to confess him not as God and not as the Son of God, but as a servant of God, and a creation of God, and not the Creator. He taught him to read and kiss the divine book of the Holy Gospels, as if it had come down from heaven, and he taught him some other similar teachings, for which he received greater honor from him than the Jews. Envying him for this, the Jew set out to destroy the Arian monk, which he carried out in the following way. One day the bad Mohammed went for a walk in the field, having both of these teachers with him. Having driven around and thoroughly enjoyed the walk, they sat down to eat; having had their fill of food and drunk of wine, they went to bed, with his teachers lying on both sides of the student. Mohammed and the monk fell into a deep sleep, but the Jew did not sleep. Rising from his bed and taking Mohammed’s sword, he stabbed the accursed monk with it, and he himself lay down and pretended to be asleep. Soon after that, Mohammed woke up and, seeing the monk lying near him, stabbed to death, he was very embarrassed, woke up the Jew and began to argue with him about the murder of the monk, but the Jew, vehemently objecting to him and justifying himself, said to Mohammed: “Let's see whose sword is bloody, and by this we will know who beheaded him.” When both took their swords out of their scabbards, the Mohammedan sword found itself covered in blood. Then the Jew says to Mohammed: “Behold, your sword has resolved the doubt and testifies to me that I am not guilty of the blood of this man.” Then, as the story tells about this, Mohammed was greatly ashamed of his deed and decreed a law for his like-minded people and for the followers of his unbelief, not to drink wine at all, since it is the cause of murder. But here we should return to the previous insidious actions of the murdered monk, and what he did to confirm the new-found demonic charm of the nasty Mohammed; Having said this first, I will move on to the narration of the rest of his wickedness, how much will Jesus Christ, who sees the truth, who is God over all, help me. The wife of this bad man (Mohammed) greatly grieved that her husband suffered greatly at every new moon and, like a sleepwalker, foamed at the mouth, fell to the ground and suffered terrible torment from the evil demon, and for this reason she wanted to divorce him. The nasty Mohammed reveals all this to the monk and asks him to help him if he can. He tells him: “Don’t be upset about this at all: I will save you from this new sorrow, just let me talk to your wife.” With the permission of Mohammed, the monk came to her, talked with her a lot about the prophets and about the revelations that came to them from God through angelic phenomena, and that sometimes something terrible appears to the prophets of God from the angels sent to them from God, and often, being unable to bear their terrible vision, they fall in horror to the ground. “Something similar, they say, happens to your husband when the Archangel Gabriel descends from heaven to him, revealing to him God’s commands and advice. Therefore, you should rejoice, madam, and boast that you are worthy to be the wife of such a husband.” With such cunning speeches, that flatterer, the monk, convinced the woman and through her soon glorified him as a prophet among the people of Arabia, for his wife boasted without hesitation to every woman, calling herself the wife of the prophet of God. When such fame spread about him among the wicked people of Arabia, engaged in cattle breeding and living like cattle, everyone began to reverence him as a newly-minted prophet and a true mentor. Taking advantage of this and guided by complete fearlessness, this most vile man began to prescribe laws to them. Having within himself the devil himself wholly living, who spoke through him what serves to the eternal destruction of those who listen, he allowed them all kinds of pleasure in general and everything that could delight the larynx, belly and hypogastric region, saying that for this reason we were first created by the common Creator of all, and that therefore in the paradise he created, the Creator prepared for them, according to the words of this bad man, three rivers, states of honey, wine and milk, and there are many beautiful young women with whom they will copulate all day and who the next day again turn out to be virgins. By giving them such promises after death, and deceiving them with such flattering speeches, this bad one became for them a kind mentor to their eternal destruction. Finally, he deceived them and convinced them to accept with all their souls the laws and promises he introduced in the following way, as the writers who know this reliably told us. Figuring out some way to confirm his followers in his godless laws, and to glorify himself and show himself equal to the disciples of Christ, who received the Holy Spirit in the form of fiery tongues, this wicked man invents such a trick. He taught a domestic pigeon to sit on his shoulder and take food out of his ear, which had been previously placed there, and this happened while he was conducting his conversations with the barbarians. In this way he convinced them that, admonished by the Holy Spirit, he was teaching them laws and useful teachings. With this insidious trick, he most of all captivated those bestial barbarians and confirmed them in his wickedness. And as in every nation there are some who are more reasonable and prudent, from among this people some of these approached the wicked Mohammed and said to him: “Our mentor! We heard that Moses, who was sent by God to Egypt to deliver the descendants of Abraham from long-term enslavement to Pharaoh, performed many miracles in Egypt, and in the Red Sea, and in the Sinai desert; also the prophets of God who came after him - each in his time worked miracles; but most of all, Christ himself, now revered by all so-called Christians, and worshiped as God, performed wondrous and supernatural miracles: what kind of miracle are you showing, seeing which, we could believe that you were really sent by the Most High Himself to be our guide to salvation in this life?” He answered this rudely and proudly, saying: “Moses and those who came after him, the so-called prophets, and Christ himself were sent from God with wonders and various signs, but I was sent with a sword and have orders to kill those who disobey my words.” From this rude answer, as well as from many of his other actions, it is clear that this bad one was not sent from God - for the good God does not force anyone - but from the God-fighter and man-hating devil, to the eternal destruction of those who follow him. From the beginning the devil was a murderer and, as a tormentor, delights in the shedding of human blood; for he is an irreconcilable enemy of the human race and by all means is strengthening himself, the vile one, to drag everyone with him into fiery Gehenna. And the Most High is a lover of mankind, generous, merciful, righteous and “does not want the sinner to die, but to be converted... and he will live” (Ezek. 33:11), and does not force anyone and does not order anyone to kill, but meekly and lovingly calls everyone to Himself, saying: “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” you" (Matthew 11:28). And again: “if anyone wants to follow Me,” and so on. (Matthew 16:24). Therefore, when the sons of Zebedee boasted to burn with fire from heaven those who did not accept the Lord into their village, He forbade them, saying: “You do not know what spirit you are; The Son of Man did not come to destroy the souls of men, but to save” (Lk. 9:56), “and to give His soul redemption for many” (Matthew 20:28). So, as for the wickedness, rudeness and madness of this man, and the fact that he was not at all pious, or involved in wisdom, and that he was never vouchsafed any divine manifestation, as God’s prophets were vouchsafed, enough has been said about this for those who are rational and understanding according to God. For what is the need to prove to the intelligent through unnecessary accusations that darkness is not light, but darkness, and that a lie is not truth, but a lie? It must now be shown that the lawless laws and dogmas of this nasty man not only do not agree in any way with the laws and testaments of God’s ancient prophets and apostles, but that they were invented by him to completely reject and pervert the divine Gospel commandments and dogmas. Although in many places of his cursed book, called the “Koran,” he verbally extols the divine and sacred Gospel of Christ the Savior, calling it fair and correct, but in reality it is not at all the same: for this bad one everywhere introduces laws that are contrary to him. That he does not verbally reject, but extols it, should not be surprising. The devil who has taken possession of him, being cunning and knowing that otherwise people will not accept his wicked law, when the light of the Gospel has already abundantly illuminated the entire universe, he, reluctantly, praises the Holy Gospel, calling it fair, being himself the most unrighteous and crooked and alien to all truth and righteousness. In good time, someone can, turning to him, say: “If you consider the divine and worshiped Gospel of Christ to have come down from heaven, and therefore call and recognize it as just and correct, then why resist it when it so clearly testifies to the Divinity of Christ, saying: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was to God, and God was the Word, who from time immemorial was to God” (John 1:1-2 ). Do you hear that He who was in the beginning to God - the Word - is God, just like God the Father who gives birth to Him? But you, O most wicked one, why do you dismiss His Divinity and call Him only a holy man, only superior to other prophets? And that the Word is not only God, but also the Creator of everything - listen intelligently to what the Divine Gospel says about him a little further: “all things were by Him, and without Him nothing came into being” (John 1:3). If everything, visible and invisible, came into being through Him, then how do you consider and call Him created by man - tell me, darkened and most insane of dumb beasts? Can man create heaven and earth and everything in them: seas, lakes, the forces of the winds and, above all, thousands of thousands of angelic heavenly forces? If, indeed, you believe that the Divine Gospel was sent down from heaven and that it is fair and correct, as you say in many places, as we believe, then stop blaspheming Christ, calling and considering a simple man to be in the beginning with God, God the Word, but confess Him as a perfect God, like God the Father who gives birth to Him. Recognize Him also as a perfect man, incarnate in recent times from the Holy Spirit and the Ever-Virgin Mary, descended from the seed of David, and not from Miriam, the sister of Moses, as you, because of your great ignorance and rudeness, talk idle talk, wretched one. From Moses and his sister Mariam, 1480 years passed until the birth in the flesh of Jesus Christ, who is God above all, who was born by carnal birth under Augustus Caesar, and was baptized in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, as the Divine Gospel of Luke narrates. The Gospel of John clearly says this: “And the Word became flesh, and dwelt in us” (John 1:14). Do you hear, most insensible one, that the Word of God, hitherto incorporeal, later “became flesh,” that is, became a perfect man in everything, except for sin. “And they dwelt,” he says, “in us,” that is, as a perfect man he settled and lived with us people, taking food and drink and talking. “And we saw,” he says, “His glory, the glory as the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14). When did you see His glory? Then, when by His Divine power He cast out demons from those possessed by them, when He cleansed lepers with a single word, when He gave sight to the blind, walking to the lame, He healed the weak, He made the dry healthy, He raised the dead as if awakening them from sleep, when on Mount Tabor He showed His disciples the beauty of divine kindness and from above received a testimony from the Father, who proclaimed: “This is My beloved Son, I was well pleased about him. Listen to him” (Matthew 17:5). The Creator of all and God from above calls Him and calls Him His beloved Son and gives the following testimony about Him: Do you call Him only a man and a servant of God? And if the Only Begotten Son of God is a servant, as you, the wicked, blasphemer, say, and not the beloved Son and God, consubstantial with God the Father who begets Him, does it mean that the source of all truth and righteousness and honor, the Creator of all and the Lord, according to you, lied, calling Him His beloved Son - and not once or twice, but in many places of the inspired Scripture of the Old and New Testament? This is your wickedness, demonic wickedness, demonic fury and audacity in words, damned one! Listen to the following. “Fill,” he says, “with grace and truth... For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ” (John 1:14, 17). If by Jesus Christ “grace and truth came,” as the Divine Gospel says, then how do you, O most wicked one, dare to pervert the institutions of God’s grace and truth and God-given commandments with your wisdom and testaments, which you conveyed to the countless accomplices of your blasphemies, collected by you through demonic inspiration in your Koran? But, perhaps, due to your great shamelessness and madness, you dare to slander Christians, saying that they themselves wrote this about Christ in the Gospel? Let it be as you say, slandering us. Have we really spoiled those prophetic books that the Jews have, which clearly preach Christ as God, the Son of God and Creator of all? The first Moses says: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” Do you understand that he calls the Word of God God, by whom the Father established the heavens, according to the words of the divine David, who says: “By the Word of the Lord the heavens were established” (Ps. 33:6). Blessed Jeremiah (Baruch) and the great-voiced Isaiah, not guessingly, but clearly preach Him as God and a perfect man. Jeremiah (Baruch) says this: “This God is ours, it will not be imputed to Him. You will invent every way of cunning, and give it to Jacob to His servant and to His beloved Israel. Therefore, he appeared on earth and lived with men” (Bar. 3:36–38). Do you understand, madman, that Whom he confessed above to be God, He, in his words, appeared on earth “and lived with men,” that is, through an incomprehensible love for mankind, he became a man. Hear, O insensible one, and Isaiah, who speaks more clearly about Him: “Behold, the Virgin will be with child and give birth to a Son, and they will call His name Immanuel” (Is. 7:14); then, a little lower, he speaks about the same Emmanuel, who was born of the Virgin: “For as a child a Son was born to us, and was given unto us, whose rulership was on His frame”; then he leads: “And His name is called: Great is the counsel of the Angel, Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Sovereign, Prince of Peace, Father of the Age to Come” (Is. 9:6). Do you hear that he recognizes and preaches the newborn, given to us by the Son, as the mighty God, and the Ruler, and the Ruler of the world, and the Father of the next century? And that Christ is perfect God and at the same time man, listen carefully to the blessed prophet and king David, who speaks of Christ like this: “God is the Lord and has appeared to us, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord” (Ps. 117:27,26), that is, in the name of the Father, by whom he was sent for the deliverance of the human race. He recognizes and calls Him God and Lord, since He, as a man, was given from the Father authority in heaven and on earth, as He Himself told His disciples about Himself after resurrecting from the dead, saying: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me” (Matthew 28:18). Blessed David long ago announced this power of His in the second psalm, clearly speaking from the Person of God the Father, speaking to His Consubstantial Word and Son like this: “The Lord speaks to me: Thou art My Son, this day I have begotten Thee; ask of Me, and I will give You the tongues of Your inheritance and Your possession to the ends of the earth. I have protected with a rod of iron, as I have crushed the vessels of the wicked” (Ps. 2:7-9), that is, those who deny His Divinity and do not submit to the truth of the worshiped and divine gospel preaching. Oh, that He would crush you, the nasty and blasphemous one, immediately after your birth! It would have been better for you if you had not been born into the world at all, or, having been born, would have been immediately crushed by this club, which grazes in the pastures of animals and on the waters of rest those who submit to the righteousness and truth of the Gospel preaching, and those who do not submit to it - crushes them completely and imprisons them in endless torment, of whom you, the most vile, have already become the main heir, with all those consistent with your wickedness. To demonstrate the Divinity of Christ the Savior and His Divine power and strength over all, enough has been said so far. Now I will turn to the rest of this nasty Mohammed’s wickedness and, with the help of God, I will expose him, showing that he is, indeed, a flatterer and a wolf, clothed in sheep’s skin, and the forerunner and preacher of the God-fighter-Antichrist who is about to come. Tell me, you, the most wicked of all the wicked: since you praise the holy book of the Gospel, why do you not command your followers to be baptized in the Name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, as Jesus Christ, the God of all, commanded, Who says in the Gospel of Matthew to His disciples: “Going into the whole world, teach all languages, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, keep all the commandments given to you" (Matthew 28:19). Also in the Gospel of Mark he says: “Whoever has faith and is baptized will be saved” (Mark 16:16). But you, due to your great shamelessness, will say in every possible way: “And I strictly command my followers to wash themselves with clean water several times a day.” Against this godless objection of yours, I will say, firstly, the following: who are you, the most wicked, or who do you consider yourself to be, that you dare to pervert this second establishment of infallible evangelical piety and mysterious purification? Are you greater than John the Baptist, who was sent by God himself to preach to the Jewish people the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins and who said to those being baptized: “For I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who comes after me is stronger than me.” He is not worthy to carry the boots; The one you baptize with the Holy Spirit and fire” (Matthew 3:11). Who sent you? It is clear that - by the devil himself, to pervert the gospel sermon, since he hates this sermon, for it ruins his machinations against the pious and makes his destructive power completely insignificant; This is why you were sent by him. You wash the outside of glassware and dishes with one weak water several times a day, but their insides are full of all uncleanness and lawlessness, as the God of all and Savior Jesus Christ says about the Pharisees and scribes like you. John also baptized, but only with water; Christ is the Holy Spirit and fire - not this material fire that we have, but the fire of Divine love, cleansing the souls and hearts of the faithful from all sinful filth of the flesh and spirit and making them God-like. If the baptism of John, who was more than all the prophets and was sent by the Most High Himself, performed with water alone, did not impart to those baptized either the remission of sins or the Holy Spirit, as is clear from the words spoken by Christ Himself to His disciples: “John baptized to eat with water, but you shall not be baptized with the Holy Spirit for many of these days” (Acts 1:5), then what about you, most wicked, do you think with one weak water to cleanse yourself and your followers from the wickedness of your hearts, without being sent from God and without being baptized in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit? How will you be cleansed from your wickedness if you do not believe with all your soul that Jesus Christ, who was crucified voluntarily, is the co-existent Son and Word of the beginningless Father, who came into the world to save sinners? The Only Begotten Son Himself and the Word of God clearly explains this in the Gospel of John, saying: “For God so loved the world, as He gave His only Son to eat, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life” (John 3:16). And a little lower he says: “Whoever believes in He (the Son) will not be condemned, but he who does not believe is already condemned, for he who does not believe in the name of the Only Begotten Son of God” (John 3:18). John the Baptist says the same thing about him in the same Gospel: “Whoever believes in the Son will have eternal life, but whoever does not believe in the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him” (John 3:36). By virtue of this false saying, the wrath of God will remain on you, more than all other former God-fighting heretics before you, since you not only reject the Divinity of the Only Begotten, but you also wickedly pervert the entire Gospel sermon, and in every way you fight against the pious Christian faith and take up arms against it. What untruth, what shameless deeds and what lawlessness are not in your godless writings and stories? But so that, by enumerating all your wickednesses, I do not introduce the inexhaustible mud of your stench into the thoughts of the pious, I will offer two or three of them and, having denounced them, I will finish the word. If you consider the Divine Gospel to be just and correct and to have come down from heaven, then why do you, the most wicked one, legitimize what is contrary to it? It says to the Sadducees: “You are deceived by those who do not know the Scripture or the power of God: for at the resurrection they neither marry nor commit violence, but like angels... they are in heaven” (Matthew 22:30); You, the most wicked one, legitimize the opposite, promising your followers a multitude of beautiful young women prepared by God after the resurrection, and a long stay in an insatiable, ugly, bestial activity, and even before God himself. Oh, what wickedness! Truly, “the throat of your grave is open” (Ps. 5:10), the most vile, spewing out all sorts of abominations, bestial uncleanness, unbearable stench and demonic blasphemies against God, with which, humiliating Him, you affirm, vile one, that God delights in their deeds. Truly, the most evil demon and God-fighter, the unclean spirit, having taken possession of your unclean soul, moves your harmful tongue to speak and write such blasphemies to the deception and eternal destruction of those who submit to your wickedness. Moreover, if the Divine Gospel is just and correct, as you yourself say, and as we believe and profess, then why, contrary to the commandment of the Gospel not to swear by heaven, nor earth, or anything else, do you, most wicked, command your followers not to renounce any kind of oath to deceive Christians? Why did you, O most wicked one, command this to your followers? Obviously, for no other purpose than to finally destroy in this way the power of Christian kings, rulers and princes that has spread throughout the entire universe. Yours, or better yet, the nasty demon that has taken possession of you, is numerous and varied; against us, the pious, there is cunning and demonization, which if anyone wanted to fully reveal and expose, they would be forced to compile a whole huge book. Therefore, not wanting to defile my mind with the inexhaustible stench of your feces-like promises and stories, I present this to others, more skillful than I, who have the gift of speech. Your next promise I both praise and blame. You command your followers, saying: “If any of you is ever forced by Christians to deny me and is subjected to torture for this, then do not refuse such denial, even if this happens to one of you many times. This, you say, I don’t impute to anything; for I am generous and merciful - not like Christ, Who is merciless and finally excommunicates the one who one day denies Him.” Against this will of yours, I will answer you this way. If you recognize yourself as a righteous man and a friend of God, and sent from Him to people as a lawgiver, then how do you contradict yourself and allow your followers to reject you if they are subjected to various torments? Above, you said that you were sent from God with sword and weapon to mercilessly kill all those who reject you and your words. However, for this promise you also deserve praise: for you are worthy, and fully worthy, not only to be rejected, but also to be cursed, spat upon and despised by everyone in general, as a wicked and obvious fighter against God, and the forerunner of the coming Antichrist himself and the lying prophet mentioned (in Scripture). For your scriptures, covenants and counsels are full of all ungodliness, uncleanness and lawlessness. How can you, an animated instrument and dwelling place of the devil himself, dare, in your great madness, to call yourself the most merciful of Christ Himself, Who is God above all, and you lie in this, as in many other things, about the Savior Christ? For Christ rejects not the one who only denies Him, but the one who, after renunciation, does not repent, but remains in wickedness, not wanting to convert. The proof of this is His supreme disciple, blessed Peter, who rejected Him three times during His betrayal, but repented and bitterly mourned this, which is why Christ not only accepted him, but also awarded him greater honor than before, three times confirming his primacy over the other disciples and making him a true shepherd. And that you are a liar and a flatterer, a fighter against God, sent by Satan himself to pervert the entire Divine Gospel of Christ, to the destruction of many nations following you, Christ himself in his Divine Gospel convicts you of this, most wicked one, saying this: “Whoever is not with Me is on Me, and whoever does not gather with Me scatters” (Matthew 12:30). If you were with Christ, like the divine prophets sent by him, and His holy disciples and apostles who came after them, and then our apostolic fathers and teachers who were throughout the entire universe, who, like bright stars, illuminated the churches of God and our Savior Christ, then you would in no way rebel against Christ, but would agree with Him and His disciples in everything, and would gather with Him and not scatter, most wicked, collected by Him. But perhaps you will say, due to your great godlessness, that you have gathered so many peoples and are constantly gathering them to follow your wickedness? Indeed, you too collect - and we admit this - but not with Christ, and not in the same way as Christ, but in opposition to Him. Through infallible knowledge of God and the narrow and sorrowful path leading to eternal life, he gathers pure wheat, that is, holy and God-seeing souls, into his heavenly granaries, that is, for eternal life and an unshakable kingdom. But you, O most wicked one, by your bestial-like legalization sold from the demon, on a wide and spacious path leading to eternal destruction, do not gather pure wheat, like Christ, but tares and reeds, in the words of the Gospel, burned in eternal fire along with you and your father, the devil, the leader and gatherer and secret teacher of your newly revealed wickedness. If you were to gather with Christ, you would in no way reject, most vile one, Christ’s baptism, which is performed in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, which cleanses all sinful filth, and makes those who are baptized, who accept it with right faith and sincere desire, godlike. If you were to gather with Christ, you would not in any way reject the mystery of the holy and worshiped Trinity, which surpasses every mind and word, but would confess with us the Father, without beginning and ever-present, the Son consubstantial and co-originating with the Father, and the Holy Spirit, co-essential with Him and co-originating - the triune God in three Persons, inseparably divided and again inseparably united by the being. If you were with Christ and gathered with Him, you would teach your followers to know that after the resurrection they neither marry nor commit sexual intercourse, but that the angels of God are in heaven, as the divine Gospel of Christ teaches (Matthew 22:30), and you would not promise them after death and after the resurrection from the dead of beautiful young women, and rivers of wine, milk and honey, and paradise, desecrated and rejected because of the insatiable and bestial satiation of you and your followers; but you would also say with Christ and with Paul the Wise: “The kingdom of God is not food and drink, but truth and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit” (Rom. 14:17). If you stood with Christ and gathered with Him, you would bequeath to your followers, saying: if anyone wants to follow Christ, that is, enter the Kingdom of Heaven, let him deny himself, that is, his lusts of the flesh and soul, and let him take up his cross, which means the voluntary mortification of his feelings, and let him follow, that is, let him lead his life according to His holy commandments. But you, by legislating and bequeathing the opposite of this, clearly prove that you were sent by the God-fighter himself - Satan, as the forerunner of the Antichrist, to the destruction of many peoples leading a bestial life. It would behoove us, having learned from all the divinely inspired writings your demonic charm and your wickedness in everything, to finish the word here regarding the truth and not to labor in vain in excessive verbosity, proving that darkness is not light, but darkness, and that dung is not tasty bread, but stinking feces: such are all yours, most vile, and laws, and promises, and stories. Truly you had a bestial disposition, filled with all sorts of malice and demonic deceit! And since you, out of your great demonic vanity and madness, dared to say about yourself that you ascended to heaven, and that there you saw your godless name engraved on the right side of the throne of God, and that you saw God Himself, Whom no one has ever seen, as the Only Begotten Son of God testified, Who says in the Gospel of John: “No one has seen God anywhere, the Only Begotten Son, Who is in bosom of the Father, He is the confessor” (John 1:18), then it seems necessary to us to continue the word of the truth of the Gospel and to expose you in this, as in many other things, that you lie and, like the devil, talk and boast. It will not be some simple sage of this world who will expose you, but Christ himself, the hypostatic Wisdom of God the Father, who created everything that exists and preserves it. He speaks thus in the Gospel of John to Nicodemus, one of the princes of the Jews, who came to Him by night; “Amen, amen, I say to you, unless someone is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God” (John 3:3). And again there: “Amen, amen, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God” (John 3:5), and to this he adds, saying: “and no one ascends into heaven except the Son of Man who came down from heaven, who is in heaven” (John 3:13). These are the revered words of the God of all and the Savior, Jesus Christ, spoken to Nicodemus. But you, the most wicked, imputing all this as if for nothing, say about yourself that you ascended into heaven, while you were not born again at all, were not baptized with water and the Holy Spirit in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, and you do not confess Christ as the true God and Creator of all. Who do you consider yourself to be, the most wicked and filthy of all former godless heretics? The Lord of all and God says: “no one ascends into heaven” (John 3:13), and you, perverting this divine saying, say about yourself that you ascended into heaven. Are you greater than Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, Moses and David himself, Elijah and Elisha and the rest of the former divinely inspired prophets after them, none of whom ascended to heaven, according to the divine saying of the God of all and the Savior Christ? For what virtue of yours, or for what piety, for what truth and truth and zeal for the truth of the Gospel, have you been awarded such a rise from God? Oh, what terrible blasphemy and wickedness! Those were born according to the promise of God and are considered to come from the blessed seed of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and lived their lives blamelessly, according to God’s holy commandments - and do not boast that they ascended to heaven, but you, born of Ishmael, the son of the slave Hagar, driven out, by the command of God, from the inheritance of Abraham, and recognized as coming from the tribe hated by God Esau, and at the same time perverting and rejecting the holy commandments and the God-given teaching and commands of Jesus Christ, descended according to the flesh from the blessed seed of those - did you ascend to heaven and see God Himself, whom no one has ever seen and cannot see, as the apostle claims, and you saw your godly name engraved on the right side of the throne of the Master? Truly, you are a disciple and imitator of your father, the devil, who once boasted, saying: “I will set my throne above the stars of heaven... I will ascend above the clouds, I will be like the Most High” (Isaiah 14:13-14). God strictly forbade the Moabite and the Ammonite to enter his church, which is in Jerusalem, by the Law of Moses: did He allow you, the most vile, coming from their family, to ascend into heaven? But what does light have in common with darkness, or what fellowship does Christ have with beliar? He is the mental Light, which enlightens every person coming into the world, as He says about Himself: “I am the light that has come into the world” (John 12:46), and again: “I am the light of the world, and whoever walks in Me must not walk in darkness, but have living light” (John 8:12). Whoever believes in Christ, was baptized in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, as Christ commanded, and follows Him, that is, lives according to His saving commandments, he has animal light, which is the true mind of the knowledge of God, and does not walk in the darkness of your demonic delusion and your wickedness, the most vile. Christ is the Light who came into the world, called in the Holy Scriptures the Sun of Truth, Who illuminated the entire universe with the bringing rays of the Gospel knowledge of God and legalization. But you, the most wicked one, darkness and an evil wolf, a murderer, a demon in the flesh and a charmer, came into the world to deceive bestial people in every possible way by allowing them all lawlessness and all untruth. About Christ the Savior and about His Divinity, about the knowledge of God, true piety and the eternal kingdom, and about the fact that He had to come into this world and be incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the pure immaculate Virgin, and to guide the fallen poor human nature on the path of infallible knowledge of God and piety and all truth, not only all the divinely inspired prophetic and narrative scriptures speak about this. expresses, but many of the Hellenic sages foreknew, being admonished by God, and placed it in their writings - some fortune-telling and hidden, and others clearly and openly. Of these, the first, Orpheus, the ancient and wise Hellenic poet, speaks of Christ that He will be born of a Virgin. And the wise prophecies of the fortuneteller Sibyl about the appearance of Christ the Savior, about His saving sufferings, about His resurrection from the dead and all those who have died from the beginning - what cruel heart and what unfaithful soul is not able to soften and convince in order to confess that Jesus Christ, crucified under Pontius Pilate, is the one true omnipotent God? How was she able to make such predictions about Christ? It is obvious that she was providentially enlightened by God, so that the mystery of Christ’s Incarnation would have authentication not only from the divinely inspired Jewish scriptures, but also from the Greeks who were most estranged from God. What divinely inspired scripture ever mentioned you, most wicked one, as good and sent from God? How about good - not one, but how - about a tat, about a beast, about a pig and a wild boar, plucking and devouring the chosen vine of the Lord, which “the right hand of the Most High planted - all the God-inspired scriptures remember this and express your God-fighting rage, with which you rage against the truth of the Gospel, trying to finally destroy it from the face of the earth. You, truly, are the one the thief mentioned in the Gospel, who “comes... let him steal and kill and destroy” (John 10:10). With your flattering speeches and promises of a wide and spacious path, you steal human souls, trapping them in your wickedness, mentally slaughter them as a sacrifice to the fighter against God, your father the devil, and finally destroy them, dragging them with you to the darkest bottom of hell. You, truly, are that pig and that wild “boar from the oak forest,” that is, from the thicket of your countless false teachings, which “grows and devours” (Ps. 79:14), but more correctly always plucks and devours the chosen vine, which “the right hand” of the Most High has planted (Ps. 79:16). You are that mental “wolf” (John 10:12) who snatches the verbal sheep of Christ the Savior from the pious flock and scatters them - alas! - due to the negligence of their shepherds (John 10:13). You, without a doubt, are the beast that rises from the earth, that is, from bestial life, and has two horns like a lamb, conversing with the first beast, that is, the Antichrist, assisting him in seducing many unestablished peoples and preparing for him crooked paths leading to eternal destruction. The two horns of lambs are assigned to you by divine prophetic revelation, thereby clearly showing your hypocritical, malicious behavior - that you have borrowed some customs and testaments from both testaments of God. For, following the Jews, you recognize in God one hypostasis, and not three, as the divine Gospel of Christ and all the ancient inspired theologians teach, and you command your followers to be circumcised, to abhor pork meat, to cleanse themselves with frequent ablutions, and you legitimize for them other vain and useless Jewish rites. Such are your cunning actions regarding the Jews; Regarding Christians, you show that you do not completely turn away from Christ, like the Jews, but half confess Him, calling Him a holy prophet of God, incomparably higher than all the prophets, but not God and not the Son of God, but consider and call Him the servant of God. You strongly praise, exalt and testify of the Divine Gospel as holy and descended from heaven, but you trample upon all the divine dogmas and commands contained in it, most wicked, and try with all your might to overthrow. But malice will not completely overcome virtue, and wickedness will not defeat infallible wisdom. It was said by God himself, Jesus Christ in the Divine Gospel: everyone “who falls on this stone will be broken; This is the stone that the divine prophet Daniel saw secretly separating from the mountain, without a man’s hand, and crushing the body made up of various parts, shown in a dream to Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon; the very stone turned into a great mountain and covered the whole earth. This mental stone will crush you in every possible way when you finally fall on it, and will consign you to the depths of oblivion, like all the wicked persecutors and tormentors like you who are furious against it. For God and the Father of the Only Begotten Son and His Word, Jesus Christ, is false, terrible and omnipotent, above all God, about whom and for whose sake he makes such promises, speaking through the mouth of David, the prophet and king: “I have put help on the strong one, I have lifted up the chosen one of my people: I found David my servant, with my holy oil I anointed him, for my hand will protect him, and my arm will protect him.” will strengthen Him” (Ps. 88:20-22). Then, so that no one thinks that this is said about David, the son of Jesse, he adds, saying: “Nothing will the enemy succeed against Him, and the son of iniquity will not attempt to embitter Him” (Ps. 88:23). An enemy, the devil, who is also called the son of iniquity, stood against David, plunging him into the sin of adultery and murder of Uriah; The Word was in no way able to attack the God-Man, although He approached Him three times when He was fasting in the desert, but, having been deposed three times by Him, He retreated from Him in shame. It further says: “And I will cut off His enemies from before Him and overcome those who hate Him. And My truth and My mercy are with Him, and in My name His horn will be exalted, and I will place His hand on the seas, and His right hand on the rivers. He will call on Me: You are My Father, My God and the intercessor of My salvation. And I will make Him the firstborn, higher than the kings of the earth” (Ps. 88:24-28). All this shows the divine intercession, the power and glory and the kingdom of the God-man-Word over humanity: for He is God and the King of all who are on earth, the Almighty and all-powerful Lord. And that the gospel covenant, which He taught to His sacred disciples, and through them to all who believe in Him, will remain immutable to the end, and will not change like the old one, and that His seed, that is, the Christian race, will endure forever - hear what God the Father further says: “I will keep My mercy to Him forever, and My covenant is faithful to Him,” that is, unshakable and immutable, “and I will place His seed for the age of ages,” that is, those who believe in Him, “and His throne,” that is, His kingdom, “like the days of heaven” (Ps. 89:29-30), that is, endlessly, as he says a little lower: “I swore alone on My Holy One, lest I lie to David; His seed will endure forever, and His throne will be like the sun before Me, and like the moon is perfect forever.” Then he leads, saying: “And the witness in heaven is faithful” (Ps. 88:36-38), that is, I myself, the Creator of all things, am a witness to My Christ, that all this will be as I swore about My Holy One, that I will not lie to David, that is, to Christ, revered according to humanity from the seed of David, the son of Jesse. If this is how it was written about Christ by the blessed prophet and king David himself, as if on behalf of God Himself, and so it was fulfilled, then you, the most wicked one, perverting the entire Gospel of Christ, denying His Divinity and the power of dominion, trampling all His holy commandments and not accepting the dogmas about the Holy Reigning Trinity, rebelling against the Gospel of Christ and persecuting the Christian people in every way and pursuing and trying to completely destroy him - are you not a clear forerunner and a lying prophet of the Antichrist himself, although at the present time it has not yet been given to you to work miracles and false signs, as it is written about that, and you have not yet set up the image of the first beast, I mean, the Antichrist, and you do not force the deceived to worship the earthly image. Although you do not yet make marks on your foreheads and on your right hand so that those who do not have this mark cannot sell or buy, for the time of this delusion and the appearance of the son of destruction has not yet come, but in due time all this will be fulfilled in every possible way, according to the unspoken destinies of God, by the successor and executor of your godless wickedness. If, as stated above, the Creator of all promised with an oath that the seed of His Christ, that is, the Christian race, will endure forever and ever, and His throne is like the sun before God the Father, then it means that your wicked seed, as opposed to Christ, will be destroyed forever, as the Holy Scripture says: “For sinners will perish, defeat the Lord, and be glorified by them and ascend, disappearing like smoke” (Ps. 36:19-20). Hear also the reason for the eternal existence of the pious: “for those who bless Him,” that is, Christ, “will inherit the earth,” that is, the heavenly Jerusalem, on which the feet of the meek walk; “those who swear at Him,” that is, Christ, “will be consumed” (Ps. 36:22), as he says a little lower: “The wicked will be consumed and the seed of the wicked will be consumed. The righteous will inherit the earth, and will dwell in it for ever and ever” (Ps. 36:28-29). And again, a little lower, he says: “Keep innocence, and see righteousness, as there is a remnant for a person in peace. The wicked will be consumed together, the remnants of the wicked will be consumed; The salvation of the righteous is from the Lord" (Ps. 36:37-39). But you, the most wicked one, who neither preserves nor sees any kindness or righteousness, but on the contrary, has introduced into this life all malice, all lawlessness, corruption and perversion of all piety and delights in wars against the pious, their captivities and bloodsheds - you have no remains, that is, there is no participation for you after death with the righteous, unless you bless the King with them and Their Savior Jesus Christ. Your fellowship with those who curse him, the God-fighting Jews, and your inheritance with your father, the devil in Gehenna of unquenchable fire, as his disciple and accomplice in blasphemies against Christ. Having the devil himself living in your filthy soul and in your heart, and in every way rejecting the ever-present Divinity of Christ and His dominion, you did not stop bringing up the following slander against Him. You blasphemously say that when He ascended to heaven, God asked Him: “Is it true that You called Yourself God on earth?”, and that He answered: “No, Lord! It is people who have falsely invented such lies against Me.” Oh, what your unparalleled malice, what deceit, son of the devil! Having reached this place, I was overwhelmed with great bewilderment: how can I properly expose your wickedness and madness? However, having called for the help of Christ the Savior, for whose sake I have undertaken all this work, to the best of my ability I will not retreat from the accusations, but I will show that in this too you are lying and blaspheming the Divinity of the Only Begotten, as well as against all of God’s holy prophets and apostles, and against the Archangel Gabriel himself, sent from God to the Virgin Mary, who comes from the seed of David. And what I say about the archangel and the prophets - you have refined your God-fighting language against the Most High Himself, who knows everything before being. If you truly, and not hypocritically and through demonic cunning, praise the divine Gospel, then the Gospel says clearly: “in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to the city of Galilee, whose name was Nazareth, to a betrothed virgin to a man, whose name was Joseph, from the house of David: and the name of the virgin was Miriam. And an angel came to her and said: Rejoice, full of grace: the Lord is with you!” (Luke 1:26–28). If Gabriel was sent from God to announce the coming of the Lord to that Holy Virgin, or, which is the same, to announce that God deigned to dwell in Her, for only God is the Lord, as the Creator of everything and possessing everything according to Divinity, then how do you, the most vile one, say that God asked Christ when He ascended into heaven whether it was true that He called Himself God on earth? Did God send a man or an angel from heaven into a virgin’s womb? If the archangel knew that a man or an angel was sent to Her (for incarnation) from God, then the Lord would not have called him, and would not have said: “The same thing that is born” of you “is holy, he will be called the Son of God” (Luke 1:35); He also would not have called Him the Eternal King, saying: “He will reign in the house of Jacob forever, and of His kingdom there will be no end” (Luke 1:33). So, the Lord sent His Only Begotten Son and Word to the Virgin, Who is the Lord of all and the Master, just as the Only Begotten Himself speaks of Himself through the prophet Isaiah: “The Lord sent Me and His Spirit” (Is 48:16). That the Holy Scripture calls not only God the Father Lord, but also the Only Begotten Son of God - listen carefully to what the blessed prophet and King David say about both: “The Lord said to my Lord: sit at My right hand,” and so on (Ps. 109:1). Here are two Lords - Father and Son. And again there: “from the womb before the morning star I gave birth to Thee” (Ps. 109:3). The Lord Father says this to the Only Begotten Son and His Word. Does God give birth to man? As God and the Lord give birth in a magnificent manner, the Father from the womb, that is, from His Divine being, gives birth to God and the Lord, who is in every way similar to Himself. What after this? “They swear,” he says, “the Lord will not repent.” What did you swear about? - “You are a priest forever, according to the order of Melchizedek” (Ps. 109:4). And again in another place the same king and prophet says: “The Lord looked down from heaven to earth,” that is, the Son of God the Father. Why did you look for it? “to hear,” he says, “the groaning of the chained, to release the sons of the slain, to proclaim the name of the Lord in Zion, and his praise in Jerusalem” (Ps. 102:20-22). Behold, the Lord, looking down from heaven to earth, is the Son; also the Lord and He whose name He came to proclaim in Zion. If God the Father, as the Lord, so called by all the divine prophets, sent the Lord, that is, His Only Begotten Son, into the world, so that everyone would honor the Son as they honor the Father, as the Only Begotten Himself says this about Himself; and again He says: “Behold, this is the eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Him you have sent, Jesus Christ” (John 17:3): then how do you imagine God indignantly asking Christ whether it was true that He called Himself God before people, and Christ, as if answering with fear: “No, Master, I did not dare to say this, but people lied against Me?” Let it be as you blaspheme, most vile one, let His disciples, who wrote the Holy Gospel, lie against Him. Could it be that the divine prophets, sent by the Most High Himself many years before His supernatural incarnation, who, at the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, call Him God, lied against Him? Oh, what disgusting blasphemy, what wickedness on your part, most vile one! If these also lied, it means, through your madness, that the Most High Himself lied, having sent them before and revealing to them the mystery hidden from God for centuries, the incarnation of the Only Begotten Son and His Word, which surpasses all mind and every word. For how could they, mortal men, foreknow this great and terrible secret, which was unknown to the holy angels themselves, if God Himself had not revealed it to them? If God revealed it, how do you think He didn’t know it? For to ask with indignation about what he himself previously testified through his prophets is characteristic of someone who does not know. But it is obvious that such a madman is the one who admonished you to utter such blasphemies against the Most High God and his holy prophets and apostles - your father, the devil. He has never understood and cannot understand a single good deed of God, a single mystery, correctly and piously, for his unreasonable heart has gone mad since he rebelled against his Lord and Creator. Therefore, having seen Him already in human form, having spent 40 days and 40 nights in fasting, and not comprehending the mystery of His supernatural incarnation, in bewilderment approached Him with cunning, saying: “If you are the Son of God, the Lord, let these breads be made of stone” (Matthew 4:3). Understand, foolish and most insensitive, vile Mohammed: your father and teacher is the devil, and against his will he confesses Him as the Son of God, God the Word made man; for he, without a doubt, heard how on the Jordan the Father from above testified about Him as the Son of God, saying: “This is My beloved Son, in Him I am well pleased” (Matthew 17:5). But you, the most wicked one, reject His Divinity and accuse all, in general, of God’s prophets and His holy disciples and apostles from the beginning of time, and the Most High Himself, and His Only Begotten Son. And if we admit, according to your godless and blasphemous assurance, that they all lie, then how can the Gospel be divine, correct and just, and come down from heaven, as you repeatedly testify, and as we believe? If you do not believe the prophets and evangelists who confess Him as the Son of God and God, for whose sake the countless number of martyrs bowed their necks to the sword with zeal, then at least believe your father the devil, who calls Him the Son of God and God. For he knew that God alone was able to create such a great miracle, that is, to transform the cruelest nature of stone into pleasant bread. If you do not obey your father himself, the devil, then what else can I say and think about you except that you are more wicked than even the most demons, more insane and worse than the most unreasonable beasts? Having shown you as you really are, it’s time for us to say about you the well-known divine saying of the blessed prophet and king David: “The fool says in his heart: there is no God” (Ps. 13:1). Therefore, you are worthy to be called an atheist, according to the divine saying of the Gospel, which says: “Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent Him” (John 5:23). Although you seem to confess the One God, but not as He revealed Himself through the Only Begotten and Holy Spirit Himself, first to the ancient prophets, then to the holy disciples of Christ and the apostles; but you preach and legitimize the opposite to them, most wicked, trying by all means to pervert the prophetic and evangelical mystery of the Holy Trinity, rejecting all dogmas, all preaching and all the evangelical and apostolic law of the New Testament. But you can't defeat him completely. Although at the present time, for our sins, with the permission of God, according to His incomprehensible destinies, you, apparently, have prevailed and are attacking the pious - you, wicked and godless; but you will one day be crushed in every possible way, and your name will perish with a noise, just as the most severe persecutors who were before you perished: the Jews, the Romans and the Greeks. The unfaithful lips of the Almighty God, Jesus Christ, said to His supreme disciple Peter: “You are Peter, (that is, the stone), and on seven stones I will build My Church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against Her” (Matthew 16:18). He called the gates of hell those who from time to time rebel against the pious Christian faith throughout the universe, god-fighting kings and harsh brutal tormentors and persecutors, one of whom was you, the most vile one, who most powerfully and insidiously persecutes and seduces the faithful, like none of the persecutors who were before you: - some, through violence and torment, others - with promises of many gifts and great dignities, and some - hypocrisy, under the pretext, supposedly, of good faith and truth; most of all, by the fact that you allow those who obey you to walk the wide and spacious path that leads to eternal destruction, according to the divine saying of the terrible and incorruptible Judge, who is God, the Savior Christ, above all. To him be glory and power forever and ever. Amen. Word 2, about the same thing, to the pious against the God-fighter and the dog Mohammed; here is partly a legend about the end of this century How much the grace of God, admonishing from above, helped to speak against this godless opponent of Christ and the visible demon, I mean the nasty Mohammed, I have expressed. Now I address the word to the pious - not as some teacher superior to them, or placed over them from above, but as their least and weakest brother, and a co-follower of the pious dogmas of the immaculate and God-given Christian faith, remembering to them, and partly to myself, that which can confirm us and preserve us in faith in Christ, our true God and Savior, in hope and love, and keep unharmed from the turmoil that has befallen us at the present time and, so to speak, from the dark and hopeless darkness. Now more than ever, it is fitting for us to say to the blessed prophet and king David: “You, O Lord, have kept us from this generation and forever” (Ps. 11:8). Why? Therefore, he says that “wickedness walks around” (Ps. 11:9). Wherever you look around the universe, you see that the darkness of the wickedness of the Ishmaelites, opponents of Christianity, is multiplying and darkening everyone. Beginning from the time of Heraclius, the king of Greece, it continues to this day, and it is certain that in subsequent times, as I learn from the Divine Scripture, it will continue, until the very appearance of the God-fighter Antichrist, which is no longer very far, but is, as it were, at the door, as the Divine Scripture teaches us, which clearly says that in the eighth century there will be a dispensation for everyone, that is, Greek power will cease, torment will begin the God-fighter-Antichrist, and the second terrible coming to earth of Christ the Savior will come. And that this expected dispensation of all the faithful is close is evident both from many other clear indications and testimonies of Scripture, and most importantly from what the blessed Apostle Paul writes in his second letter to the Thessalonians, indicating what signs there will be before the second coming of the Lord. “Let no one deceive you,” he says, “not in any way: for if the apostasy does not come first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of perdition, an adversary and one who exalts himself more than any professed god or worshiper, how can he sit in the Church of God like a god,” and so on (2 Thess. 2:3-4). Apostasy, that is, the falling away of peoples from the immaculate and right Christian faith into various godless heresies and towards Hagaran unbelief hostile to Christ, can we ever expect to see or hear more than what is now? Where are the beauty and glory of the faithful now shining in piety and godly honesty - in Jerusalem, in Alexandria, in Egypt, in Libya and Antioch? Where is that warmth and divine zeal that shone forth in fasting in the Skete, in the Upper Thebaid and in various countries and mountains of our God-bearing and equal-angelic Fathers? Where is the unattainable height and praise of all Western nations that has grown in good faith, the holy, I say, and apostolic Church of ancient Rome? - Isn’t all this now, as we see, either in the power of the godless Hagarians, or devastated by them, while others have become worthless and completely indecent due to various godless heresies, the leader of which is that same ancient Rome, which was formerly the brightest and most famous in piety and in all venerable knowledge and wisdom, and after it all of Italy? Go with your mind's eye, soul, to India, to Ethiopia, to all the ends of the universe, everywhere you will find all sorts of ugliness and defilement of all kinds of heresies. In other places you will see the Hagarian wickedness, seducing the local peoples and attracting them to themselves, various eastern faithful peoples, in whom the light of good faith first shone under the divine apostles, which has reached us, Europeans. Isn’t it all, almost all, Hagarian darkness that has already attracted to itself, then made it worthless, constrained and corrupted mentally and is constantly corrupting in various ways? But is it possible to say more than all the most significant changes and incidents that have happened on earth before? Where is the height and unparalleled glory of the Christian kings who were in power, glorious in wisdom, all virtue, good laws and Orthodox faith, reigning in the glorious and pious city of the Great Constantine? Where is that universal light of good faith, which, like the sun, enlightened the entire universe through the equally angelic hierarchs who presided over it? Hasn’t all this been enslaved and subjected to the Ishmaelites for many years? And there is no deliverance for us from anywhere, but on the contrary, everything about us comes to the worse, and their situation becomes more and more glorious. Let us understand what an unfortunate situation things have reached for us, the poor Greeks: how we have lost all those blessings in general, “and our tongue has grown fainter than all others” (Dan. 3:37) and “we have been reproached by our neighbors, imitated and desecrated by those around us” (Ps. 78:4), in the words of Divine Scripture. Where are now those miracles of the Most Pure Mother of God that surpass the mind and word, which were performed in this city, saving it, beyond all hope, from frequent barbarian attacks? Why has all this gone out now? Why does not the City Guardian and Lady now arise for intercession and deliverance? Obviously, because of the unhealed iniquities that our forefathers previously dared to commit in this city. Isn’t this what the divine hymn says about the Jews who were not honored in our likeness: “Thou didst bring evil upon them because of their flattery; What a desolation it was; suddenly disappeared, perished for her iniquity. Like the sleep of one who rises” (Ps. 73:18-20)? But, leaving behind the detailed mourning of our misfortunes, let us return to what is before us and understand from other divine untrue sayings that the dispensation of all, that is, the expected end of this age, is not far away, but is close, and that the vile Mohammed is the lying prophet most mentioned in the divine Apocalypse and the forerunner of the God-fighting Antichrist. Let's pay attention to the following. Our Lord Jesus Christ, as it is said in the Holy Gospel, when He taught His disciples and confirmed them, and through them all believers, in His faith and love, He was asked by them: “Told us when this will happen; and that there is a sign of Your coming and the end of the age" (Matthew 24:3), - then He, having predicted to them what troubles and disorders would befall humanity before His terrible coming and the end of this age, added, saying: "And then many will be offended, and will betray one another, and will hate one another: and many false prophets will arise and deceive many" (Matthew 24:10–11). With this, the Lord pointed to the leaders of the various heresies that appeared in His church, which were: Simon the Magus, Marcion, Manent, Origen, Arius, Macedonius, Nestorius, Sergius and the godless iconoclasts; All of them in various ways caused troubles and suffering to the Catholic Church of Christ and distracted countless Orthodox Christians into their heresies. Then he added, saying: “And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached throughout the whole world as a testimony with every tongue, and then the end will come” (Matthew 24:14). Why “preach for a testimony?” - So that those who heard and believed would be saved, and those who did not believe would be condemned by a righteous court, as having no justification for their unbelief. And that the Gospel of the kingdom of God has long been preached throughout the entire universe is a reliable witness to this, the divine Apostle Paul, who speaks of the other apostles to the condemnation of the unbelieving Jews: “But I say: did you not hear food?” No, we heard, for “their message went out into all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world” (Rom. 10:18), that is, the apostles of Christ. Then, after he predicted for them the future darkening of the luminaries, the fall of the stars and that the powers of heaven would move, he presented to them the time of the end of the age and His coming with an incoming example, saying: “from the fig tree you will learn parables,” that is, learn what I am now telling you fortune-telling: “when its branches are already young (soft) “and the leaves vegetate, Lead, for the harvest is near. So, when you see all this, know that it is near, at the door,” that is, the end of the century. When speaking about the fig tree, the Lord, it seems to me, does not mean this sensual fruit-bearing tree; for the branches of this tree are soft throughout the summer, bear fruit and produce leaves. But He mysteriously calls the fig tree His holy catholic and apostolic Church, which has spread throughout the entire universe; the fruitful branch is the teaching word, or the gospel sermon, by which the pious everywhere are enlightened and taught by the primates of the Church of Christ - the bishops, through which this mental fig tree becomes fruitful to its heavenly Gardener and for this always receives a spiritual blessing from above and constantly prospers for the better. If this branch is soft, that is, the teaching word will not have firmness and steadfastness, regardless of person, according to the word of the divine Apostle, who says: “reprove, rebuke, entreat, be present in good times and in untimely times, do the work of an evangelist” (2 Tim. 4, 2, 5): then its branches will grow only leaves, that is, there will be sterility of good deeds, or, more correctly, contempt and disobedience of God’s Gospel commandments, due to the complete neglect of the shepherds, and will not receive spiritual blessings from above, but on the contrary, will hear: “He exercises the seedlings of this earth and earth” (Luke 13:7), also: “Let there be no more fruit from you forever” (Matthew 21:19). At what other time was the branch of this mysterious divine fig tree softer and more foliage growing than now, when there is no one diligently teaching and admonishing the disorderly, comforting the faint-hearted, interceding for the weak and caring for them, no one who would reprove those who resist the word of piety, who would rebuke the shameless, who would convert those who are lost from the truth and honesty? Christian residence; There is no one who, for the sake of perfect humility, would shirk the priestly ranks, or who would seek these ranks out of divine jealousy in order to correct lawless and atrocious people. On the contrary, you will now find many who dare to do this. Everyone is ready to buy these ranks in order to always live in joy, glory and all peace. The divine saying is most appropriate for the present time: “all have strayed,” that is, they have deviated from the saving path of the Gospel commandments and the apostolic and paternal traditions, “together there was indecentness” (Ps. 52:4), that is, they became indecent in life, in words, and in deeds. And what follows after this, I will keep silent about, sparing those who are indignant against the word and boldness and zeal for the truth. Oh, how can anyone adequately mourn the darkness into which our race has come! “Wickedness walk around” (Ps. 11:9) like “roaring lions” (Ezek. 22:25), who in every way deceive and snatch away the godly from God and bring them to their father, the devil, as a gift, very dear to him. Our shepherds became more insensitive than the stones, considering it sufficient for themselves to answer during the test that they were able to save themselves. They voluntarily despise and do not understand the divine voice, which says: “I am the good shepherd; The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep, but the hired hand, who is not the shepherd, sees the wolf coming from afar, and leaves the sheep and runs away, “because he is a hireling, “and neglects the sheep, and the wolf will plunder them and scatter the sheep,” whose blood, he says, I will require at the hand of the shepherds. This threat to you is terrible, O most honest shepherds, and full of every kind of horror! Listen to the blessed Apostle Paul, who clearly speaks about you and about the answer that you will have to give to the incorruptible Judge: “brothers,” he says, “obey your teachers,” listen to why he commands you to obey: “for they watch,” he says, “for your souls, so that you may repay the word” for you (Heb. 13:17). But let us return again to what is presented. The falling away of the peoples from the preaching of the Gospel into various godless heresies and to the godless wickedness of the Hagaryan descendants, predicted by the divine apostle, has partly already come true, and partly we see it coming true every day; We also see that the branch of the mysterious fig tree has become softer than oil, as the prophecy says, and does not bear fruit, as before, but leaves. Seeing this, what else will we wait for if not the end of everything, according to Divine Scripture. In particular, we see that the Hagaran torment, which began from the time of King Heraclius, conquered most of the best countries of the universe and is constantly conquering it with the allowance of the incomprehensible destinies of God, while the kingdom of the Orthodox kings was divided into many parts and has been devastated by the Hagarians for many years, not receiving any help from anywhere. On the contrary, the remnants of the Western Roman power, having divided into many kingdoms and states, live constantly in enmity among themselves, and the Western kings fight against each other, like our former European kings, sovereigns and princes, Greeks, Bulgarians and Serbs, all of whom were completely exterminated, by permission from above, by the evil and godless Ishmaelite. And the apostolic word was fulfilled, saying: “If you devour and bite one another, take heed, lest you be destroyed from one another” (Gal. 5:15). The divine voice of the Master defines the same thing, saying: “every kingdom that is divided among itself will be desolate” (Matt. 12:25). For, as the mutual peace of God and like-mindedness among many people instills and maintains in them Christ himself, Who is Peace itself, Who grows and blesses and multiplies them, according to the divine saying, which says: “For where there are two or three congregations in My name, I am in the midst of them” (Matt. 18:20), so if many are in disagreement and struggle against each other because of pride, love of power and love of money, then this mood instills in them the very fighter against God and the murderer - the devil, and they, invisibly led by him, do not cease to fight with bitterness against each other, like wild animals, until they are finally exterminated one by the other. All this was so and is happening daily according to the incomprehensible destinies of God. Therefore, it is good and salutary for us, and it is favorable for the Most High to reject from our thoughts all relaxation and despair harmful to the soul, and especially the vain hopes that flatter us, by which we expect that the royal power will again be established in Constantinople as before, but we should awaken from the many years of sleep of our great negligence and neglect, obeying the word of the preacher who says: “Brethren, go to those without in all wisdom, redeeming the time, for the days are evil” (Col. 4:5; Eph. 5:16). And again it is the same: “the night has passed away” (Rom. 13:12), that is, this long-term darkness of the deception of evil demons, which possessed the human race until the coming in the flesh of our Lord Jesus Christ, has passed and finally disappeared with the appearance of the Ever-Essential Life and Light, O “the day is approaching” (Rom. 13:12), that is, the brightest light has come. infallible knowledge of God, when the rational Sun of truth arose and spread throughout the entire universe and enlightened it. Therefore, “let us put aside,” he says, “dark works” (Rom. 13:12), “which are... fornication, adultery,” all “uncleanness” of the flesh, “deeds of adultery,” untruth, covetousness and all disobedience and crime of the divine commandments of Christ the Savior (Gal. 5:19). He calls them works of darkness, not because they are committed in darkness—and during the day people commit fornication, steal, and commit lawlessness in various other ways—but because they betray us, their workers, to eternal underworld darkness. “And let us put on,” he says, “the armor of light” (Rom. 13:12), that is, in the main four spiritual virtues, which are (Wis. Sol. 8, 7): right “reason, truth, courage” - not that which overthrows bodies and destroys city fortresses, but spiritual strength and patience in the face of various misfortunes and adventures inflicted on us by demons and evil people - “and chastity”, which preserves us in all holiness and reverence and unites us with the holy angels themselves; also in other good deeds born from them: in abstinence, meekness, humility, faith, hope, love, which is the fulfillment of the whole law. Armed with such spiritual weapons, let us take up arms against the wickedness of the godless Hagarians, the leader and inventor of which is the good-hater and godless devil himself, who has completely taken possession of the vile Mohammed. Let us not be deceived and horrified by their happiness, noble victories and (external) success: it is not in this and the like that the truth of faith in Christ God lies and is known. Much more glorious and amazing than them and happier in their famous victories were Alexander the Great and Caesar Augustus, who was the ruler of the entire universe, as well as the Roman kings who came after him; but it does not follow from this that they were pious, for they were servants of evil demons and their idols. The persecutors of Christ are beasts, like the current bad Mohammed, who persecutes us in every way and enslaves us, but this is done by God’s permission, for our sins, and not because of any of his good faith. Let us not understand this in any way: for how can one be considered pious who rejects God Himself, who sent His only begotten Son Jesus Christ, as the divine voice proclaims, saying: “Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent Him” (John 5:23), that is, who rejects the Son, rejects the Father who sent Him and His saving commandments perverting - he confesses Christ Himself not as the Son of God and not as God, but recognizes and calls him a servant and a creation of God. So, it was not for any of his piety that he rose to such a height of earthly glory and is constantly rising, just as the aforementioned Hellenic and Roman kings did not rise for this reason, but this is done according to the unexplored and incomprehensible destinies of God, who wisely created and governs everything visible and invisible. Let us not, for the Lord’s sake, be horrified by this, or grieve that we have been enslaved by them for so many years and we still have no intercession or help from anywhere, and we will not consider ourselves abandoned by God, our Savior. After all, even before us, the former Christians, being for 318 years under the power of the tormentors of Christ: Greeks, Romans and Jews, and being persecuted by them and tortured and offended in every possible way, did not grieve and did not lose heart, but on the contrary rejoiced and were glad that for Christ and for their faith in Him they endured persecution, and that their bodies were exhausted by all sorts of torment. They strengthened themselves with faith in Him and love and were strengthened by hope, remembering with firm and undoubted faith the promises of our Lord and God Jesus Christ, who said: “The blessed ones were driven out for righteousness’ sake: for to them is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when they revile you, and condemn you, and say all sorts of evil things against you for lying to Me; rejoice and be glad, for your reward is many in heaven” (Matthew 5:10-12). They also understood the testament of blessed James, the brother of the Lord, who says: “Have all joy, my brethren, when you fall into various temptations” (James 1:2); holding on to these divine promises, the most blessed former Christians, being persecuted by the wicked, variously tormented and tormented and deprived of their property and acquisitions, did not grieve, but on the contrary, thanked Christ the Savior for having made them worthy to suffer so for His Divine glory. For this reason, Christ mutually glorified them not only in heaven, making them equal to the holy angels and crowning them with crowns of unfading glory, but also on earth glorified their honest relics by donating all sorts of healings and various wondrous miracles. This is what God and their Lord Himself promised through His prophet, saying: “I will glorify those who glorify Me” (1 Samuel 2:30), and those who dishonor Me will be dishonored. But the spiritual song also proclaimed about them long ago: “I was greatly honored by Your friends, - God, their dominion was greatly established; I will count them, and they will multiply more than the sand” (Ps. 139:17). Therefore, we, brethren, as descendants of those blessed ones and heirs of their faith in Christ, our true God, being also participants in the same reproaches and sorrows that they endured, will not complain and lose heart, being persecuted by the wicked and insulted in various ways for faith in Christ. But, imitating the warmth of faith in Christ, the ardent love and desire for the eternal blessings of those equally angelic men, let us rejoice and be glad with all our souls and thank the Savior Christ for all our sufferings that we endure for the sake of the glory of His holy and worshiped name. Let us listen to the Supreme Apostle who says: “Of love..., since you partake of Christ’s passion, rejoice, for even at the revelation of His glory you will rejoice with joy. If you are reproached in the name of Christ, you are blessed: for the glory and Spirit of God rests upon you” (1 Peter 4:12-14). Let us also say, together with those who, like us, are given over to sorrows by the righteous destinies of the common Master: “all this has come upon us, and we have not forgotten You, and not untruthfully in Your covenant, and our hearts have not turned back; as if You have humbled us in the place of bitterness, and covered the shadow of death. For Your sake we are put to death all day long, counted as sheep of the slaughter. Arise, sleep away, Lord; rise again, and do not deny it completely. You turn away Your face, you forget our poverty and our sorrow; for our soul is humbled into the dust, our womb clings to the earth. Rise up, Lord, help us, and deliver us for Your name’s sake” (Ps. 43: 18–20, 23–27). Let us glorify Him on earth with all kinds of righteous deeds, commendable life and patience with the sorrows inflicted on us, so that He, for his part, will glorify us in heaven. We are not far from martyrdom and crowns, but we are in the very arena of confessing for Christ, if we are right. Through many sorrows we must enter the Kingdom of Heaven, and no one, sitting and dozing, wins victory, as St. Basil the Great says. And the holy Apostle Paul says: no one “gets married unless he has been legally martyred” (2 Tim. 2:5). “Behold, now is the time acceptable, behold, now is the day of salvation” (2 Cor. 6:2). “Brothers, do not be children in your minds,” said the divine apostle, “but be childish in malice and have perfect minds” (1 Cor. 14:20). May we also be worthy of the perfection of those most blessed men, their unfading glory and crowns, in Christ Jesus our Lord, to whom is due all glory, honor and worship, with His beginningless Father and His All-Holy and Most Good and Life-giving Spirit, now and ever and unto the ages of ages. Amen. This is the original title, which the editors, as is customary in scientific publications, place along with the entire text as a historical monument. You might be interested in: