Поучение первое на Собор Архистратига Михаила, месяца ноября, в 8 день («Ангелам Своим Он заповедает о тебе – хранить тебя на всех путях твоих» (Пс. 90:11))

Our Almighty Creator God is strong to protect us by Himself and without angelic guards being assigned to us, beloved listeners! Our Lord is strong in Himself, without requiring anyone’s help, to manage our lives, just as He Himself created us without the help of Angels. He is strong, I say, to preserve us Himself, as He Himself contains all creation, visible and invisible, sensual and spiritual. However, God deigned, according to His unsearchable advice, incomprehensible wisdom and infinite reason, to create with His omnipotent power the things above and below, Angels and people, and to establish orderly order in all His creation, in the manifestation of God's power and God's wisdom, and so that we glorify Him, our Creator, exclaiming along with the Psalmist: “Great is our Lord and His power is great, and His understanding is incomprehensible. How majestic are Your works, O Lord! You have created everything with wisdom” (Ps. 146:5, 103:24). Having created the entire universe, visible and invisible, sensual and spiritual, the All-Wise Creator placed it in three great places, as if in three kingdoms: the highest, the lowest and the middle. The highest place is the highest heaven, called the heaven of heavens. It is also the Throne of God, the place of His Divine glory, unapproachable light, where He Himself reigns “the King of kings and the Lord of Lords: our God lives on high and looks upon the humble” (Ps. 113:5–6). The lowest place is the earth that the Lord gave people to inhabit, according to the Scripture: “The highest heaven is to the Lord, and the earth He gave to the sons of men” (Ps. 113:24) - and on which he made man king, crowning him with glory and honor and subduing everything to him. The middle place is heaven, located under the highest heaven, He gave it to the holy Angels, creating them to reign forever in His grace, placing them as Authorities, Principalities, Dominions and other high ranks. Having thus arranged the entire universe in these three places, our Lord established such an order so that the middle place was ruled by the highest and the lowest by the middle, that is, God Himself deigned to rule the Angels, and commanded the Angels to rule and guard people: “He will command His angels about you - to keep you in all your ways.” What do they control, what do the holy Angels do in us, being mediators between God and us and protecting us? How many good deeds, how many necessary things they do for us, both for the soul and for the body, being present around us day and night and in every place - this is impossible to say or count! To fully collect and tell in detail all the news and evidence about this found in the Divine Scriptures, in church narratives and in various stories, there is not enough time for either the narrator or the listener. Therefore, let us mention only one of them - from the Holy Scriptures. What exactly? I think that one story about the two righteous Tobias will be enough to partly show the angelic protection of us, their management and good deeds. And therefore, on the current feast of the angelic council, I will offer this story about the two Tobias as the subject of our spiritual conversation, in order to show the angelic protection of us, management and good deeds, for the sake of the honor of God and His holy Angels, and for our spiritual benefit. The old and blind righteous Tobias prays in captivity, in the great Assyrian city of Nineveh, living in poverty and misfortune, he prays with tears to the Lord God. “Now, Lord, remember me,” he says, “command me to take my spirit in peace; It would be better for me to die than to live” (Tov. 3:6). The old man was bothered by misfortune in captivity, in a foreign country, blindness was bothering him, poverty was bothering him, and he would be glad to die: “It’s better for me to die.” But do not despair of God’s mercy, righteous man! “Your youth will be renewed like an eagle’s” (Ps. 102:5), and your sight will be even faster than an eagle’s eyes! Your captivity will turn into freedom and poverty into wealth! Just trust in God! At the same hour, the beautiful and pure virgin Sarah, daughter of Raguel, who came from the same tribe with Tobiah, from the tribe of Naphtali, prays in Ragah, a city of Media. This virgin prays with many tears and sobs to the Lord God, for she has already had seven suitors, and all were killed by the demon. “You know, Lord,” she says, “that I never desired a husband and kept my soul pure from all lust; She agreed to marriage not with lust, but with fear of Your law; therefore, either remove me from this shame, or take me from this land” (see Tob. 3:12–15). But do not despair of God’s mercy, holy virgin, beautiful in body and soul, daughter of a holy family! The time is already approaching when you will marry a wonderful and chaste groom like you, young Tobias, and inherit God’s blessing in childbearing! So the prayer of both of these persons - old Tobias in Nineveh, in the city of Assyria, and the virgin Sarah in Ragah, in the city of Media - who prayed to God at the same time at a far distance from each other - was heard before the Throne of God, as it is said in Scripture: “And at that time the prayer of both was heard before the glory of the Most High God” (Tob. 3:16). Let us listen, not only does Scripture say: “God heard the prayers of both,” but: “the prayer of both was heard before the glory of the Most High God.” The glory of the Most High God, incomprehensible to our small minds, we can partly comprehend, reasoning humanly, from the presence of all heavenly ranks, just as they say about earthly kings that they sit in glory, not when they are alone in the inner chambers, but when they sit on the royal throne, surrounded by princes, boyars and other people of various ranks, chiefs, gunsmiths and many warriors. Only then do they say that the king sits in glory. The glory of the Most High God in heaven is the presence before Him by thousands of thousands and tens of thousands of all the heavenly ranks - Cherubim, six-winged Seraphim, many-eyed. Scripture does not say: “God heard the prayers,” because there is no doubt that God Himself hears the prayer of everyone, not only pronounced with the lips or produced by the larynx, but also created with the heart, in silence, with only one thought, He hears without reporting to Him, without announcement, as “he who tests the hearts and wombs” (Ps. 7:10). His heavenly glory, that is, the heavenly ranks standing before Him, are not such all-seeing and all-hearing people as God Himself, and therefore they need (so to speak) denunciations, reports and announcements. And when the prayers of Tobias and Sarah were heard “before the glory of the Most High God,” that is, by the heavenly ranks standing before the Throne of God, they were heard no other way than because they were conveyed, reported, announced. Who brought them? Let us listen to what Angel Raphael says to old Tobiah: “When you prayed with tears, I brought your prayer to the Lord God, and it was acceptable before Him” (Tob. 12:12). Tobiah prays, Sarah prays at a far distance from him, both pray at the same time, and the Angel lifts the prayers of both to heaven and reveals them, according to the will of God, for hearing before the Throne of God, before all His glory, all who stand before God, so that not only He Himself, but all His heavenly glory, all who stand before Him hear and know the prayers of His saints. So, in this story one can see, firstly, the good deed done to us by the holy Angels, our Guardians, that they bring our prayers, performed with contrition of heart, before the glory of the Most High God, to His Divine Throne, as St. John testifies in the Apocalypse, saying: “And another Angel came and stood before the altar, holding a golden censer; and a great deal of incense was given to him, so that with the prayers of all the saints he would place it on the golden altar, which was in front of the Throne. And the smoke of incense ascended with the prayers of the saints from the hand of an angel before God” (Rev. 8:3–4). From this we can see that the holy Angels lift up our prayers to God and make them known to all other heavenly ranks who stand before God. Young Tobias, sent by the old one, goes to the Median city of Ragi, accompanied by an Angel in the form of a human mercenary. The father blessed his son on the journey, saying: “Go for good, and may the Lord be with you and may His Angel guide you.” The Angel also promises truthfully: “I will bring you a healthy son, and I will bring you your son healthy” (see Tov. Chapter 5). From here we can see that the holy Angels, our Guardians, are constantly with us in our ways, invisibly accompanying us, protecting us in all our paths at the behest of God, the Lover of Mankind, in which His great and ineffable love and mercy is manifested for us, His unworthy servants, both from many other ineffable blessings constantly shown to us, and from what He commanded the Angels To keep us as yours in all our ways. To know, our Lord loves us if he has such care for us that he protects us with His holy Angels, “so that by their army, guarded and instructed, we may achieve” salvation (see prayer on the Hours). Worthy guardians are assigned to worthy things. To know, we are also worthy in the eyes of our Creator, if He has assigned to us such worthy guardians, bodiless and immortal spirits, inhabitants of the heavenly city, standing before the Throne of God. Guardian guardians are usually assigned to small children to carry them in their arms. We are small in the eyes of our Master, “lower than the angels” (Ps. 8:6), but we are His beloved children: “He has given us power to become children of God” (John 1:12); “I will be a Father to you, and you will be My sons and daughters,” says the Lord Almighty” (2 Cor. 6:18). And like little children, He assigned us mentors and guardians—holy angels—to carry us in their arms: “They will take you in their arms, so that you do not dash your foot against a stone” (Ps. 90:12). Angels keep us in our ways, if only we “go for good,” as Tobiah told his son, if we do not go to any evil, if we do not go to theft or anger God, if we go for a good deed, with a good intention. The travelers spent the first night on the Tigre River. Tobias sleeps, tired from the journey. What is his hired companion, an Angel in the form of a man, doing? Does he also sleep? But how can the disembodied and never-sleeping eye fall asleep? “The Guardian of Israel will neither slumber nor sleep” (Ps. 120:4). The angel guarding Tobias did not take a nap or fall asleep, but stood near the sleeping man. So what's surprising? For the Lord Himself commanded the Angels to guard His servants. We find something similar in the lives of the saints. A certain brother came to the Monk Paisius, wanting to see him, and found him sleeping. And he saw the holy Guardian Angel, beautiful in appearance, standing at the head of the saint, and he said in surprise: truly God protects those who love Him. And not daring to approach his sleeping father in the presence of an Angel, he left, thanking God (Comm. June 19). In the same way, near Saint Peter, Bishop of Sebaste, brother of Saint Basil the Great, during his sleep they saw the Angels of God hovering over him. We conclude from this that both during our sleep, as well as during our wakefulness, we are protected by the holy Angels, our Guardians. Rising from sleep, Tobias went to the Tigris River to wash his face as usual. And suddenly a bad thing happened: he was almost eaten by a fish. He was washing his face, and a huge fish jumped out of the river and wanted to devour him. And, horrified, Tobiah shouted in a loud voice: “The fish wants to devour me!” Don't be afraid, good young man! Angel is with you. He who could stop the gaping mouths of the lions so that Daniel would not be devoured, will he not stop the mouth of the fish? “If I walk in the shadow of death, I will fear no evil,” for an Angel is with you (Ps. 23:4). How many times does the invisible enemy want to devour us with his gaping lips! Here he walks, “our adversary the devil, like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour,” as the apostle says (1 Pet. 5:8), and would have swallowed him up if the Guardian Angel had not blocked his destructive lips. Anyone who has read the life of St. Theodore, Bishop of Edessa, remembers that when the bishop asked the perspicacious stylite: how does he see the righteous and sinners? - the stylite answered: “If a righteous man who fears God passes by this place, I see that the grace of God shines over him and that the most holy Angels of God accompany him on both sides, while demons walk far behind, not daring to approach him. If a sinful person walks past me, I see a horde of rejoicing demons around him, while an angel follows in the distance, lamenting and grieving over the death of the sinner. When the demons want to destroy that person, an angel with a fiery weapon immediately approaches and drives them away.” This is how the holy Angels save us from being swallowed up by the enemy. Having defeated the fish, Tobias pulled it ashore, and the Angel told him: “Cut the fish and keep its heart and gall, for they may be needed and can be useful for healing” (Tob. 6:5). From here we see that the holy Angels, our guardians, care not only about our spiritual salvation, but also about our physical health, invent medicine for us and heal us. We read about this in the Patericon. A certain hermit, who was very sick in the womb, was healed by an Angel, who, appearing to the sick man, asked him: “What are you sick with, elder? Show me your illness." When the sick man showed him the sore spot, the Angel ripped it open with his finger, as if with a knife, wiped away the pus with a handkerchief and then, smoothing it over, healed it and made the old man healthy (July 12). But tell me, holy Angel, what is the strength of the heart and gall of that fish? The Angel answers: “If you lay part of a fish’s heart on burning coals, then the smoke from it will drive away every kind of demon from both husband and wife; the eyes are anointed with gall if there is a thorn on them, and they become healthy” (see Tob. 6th chapter). What kind of fish is this whose heart and bile have such power? Some commentators think that it was a whale similar to the one that swallowed Jonah. But a whale so great could not have been brought ashore by Tobias alone. Others believe that it was a crocodile, a fish-beast that lives in the water and comes to land, attacks a person and devours him. But crocodile flesh is not eaten, but Tobiah ate that fish. Some say that in the Tigris River in Mesopotamia there is a fish called “kallionimos”, that is, “beautiful”. This fish is also called “sky-viewer” or “sky-viewer”, since it has a head arranged upward by the Creator, as if looking at the sky. It is large and attacks a person when it sees him in the water. The heart of this fish has the power to drive away the demon, and the bile has the power to heal an eyesore. Let us think: he who always looks up, who, I say, constantly raises his mental eyes to God who lives in heaven, has power against demons: demons run away from him. It has the power to benefit others: to enlighten the eyes of the soul. But let's return to the previous one. It is not surprising that bile with its bitterness can drive away thorns from the eyes and heal them. It’s amazing how can the smoke of a fish heart placed on burning coals drive away demons from a person? Can a demon, sooty and blackened by the smoke of a terrible hellish fire, be afraid of fish smoke? He is used to being in fire and stinking smoke, and how can the smoke of a burning fish heart drive him away? Some of the interpreters of Divine Scripture explain this in such a way that the Lord God, humbling the ascended demonic pride, subjugated it not only to His servants, giving them the power to step on the serpent, the scorpion and all the power of the enemy, but also some soulless things, such as, for example, some herbs, roots, flowers, leaves and other things, like the heart of a fish, so that demons are afraid of these things and run away from them incense. In a similar way, God subjugated the demon to the playing of David's harp, for when he was tormenting King Saul, and David, taking the harp, sang and played on it, the demon retreated from Saul (1 Sam. 16:23). Others say that the heart and gall of that fish were only an image of healing, and under this image angelic power acted. She drove the demon away from the maiden Sarah, and she enlightened the eyes of old Tobiah. This interpretation seems to us more correct than the first, for, truly, the holy Angels drive away demons from us and perform all kinds of healings. However, both the heart and bile of the fish are not without some mysterious meaning. Some of the godly people see in them, in the heart and bile, the transformation of the suffering of our Lord, drunk with bile and pierced by a spear into the heart, blazing with love for the human race, like burning coals. The power of Christ’s suffering crushed the demonic power, captivating hell and illuminating the mental eyes of the peoples with the light of faith. We, talking about the diligent angelic care for us, must from here conclude that the holy Angels, our guardians, want to see in us nothing other than our Lord “Jesus Christ, and him crucified” (1 Cor. 2:2). Offering Tobias, under the image of a fish heart and bile, the mysterious transformation of the Lord’s suffering, the Angel predicted the power of the Lord’s suffering itself, that is, he predicted that it would crush the demons and enlighten the universe and that if anyone thought with his mind about the suffering of the Lord, he would be terrible for the demons. By crucifying with Christ and tasting the gall of a sorrowful life, he will see the light of Christ’s glory in the heavenly kingdom. Tobias approaches a city called Ragi, and the Angel accompanying him advises him to marry. “There is here,” he says, “a close relative of yours, named Raguel, who has a daughter named Sarah; ask her father, and he will give her to you as a wife.” Holy angel! Is it your business to advise someone to get married? Wouldn't it be better for you to advise a young man to live a pure, unmarried, virginal, angelic life? What do you care about those getting married and getting married? He cares about this, but why? – we will find out later. First, we learn that God and His Angels are much more pleased with the life of people in legal marriage than the life of unmarried people living in lawlessness. What is the benefit of being without a wife and wallowing in carnal impurity, being an Angel in appearance, but being a demon in heart? But I don’t want to talk much about this and will remain silent along with the apostle, who says: “What they do in secret is shameful even to speak of” (Eph. 5:12). What does Angel have to do with Tobiah's marriage? The point is this: he wants to expel the demon living in the house of the chaste maiden Sarah. That demon was called Asmodeus, which means prodigal demon. God sent an Angel with Tobiah to bind and drive him out. But what was the demon doing in Sarrina's room? We know that he had no power over her, that girl was not possessed, and the demon was afraid of her, as she was chaste and holy. Why did the demon live there near her? Anyone who has read the story of Tobiah knows why the demon was in Sarah’s room. In particular, this can be understood from the following words of the Angel: “Over those who marry in such a way that they drive God away from themselves and from their minds, and in their fornication are like “a horse and a mule who have no understanding” (Ps. 31:9), the demon has power over them.” The demon sat there secretly, somewhere in the corner, like a thief wanting to steal something and waiting for the right time, or like a hidden hunter, waiting for the desired prey. Sarah was betrothed to the first groom, and when he entered the girl’s bedroom not with the fear of God, but “like a horse and a mule,” inflamed by carnal lust, the demon, seeing him, said within himself: “This one is mine, over such I have power!” And, attacking him, he killed him. After some time, the girl was betrothed to another groom, who, having entered her with the same carnal fervor, without the fear of God, suffered in the same way as the first: he was killed by a demon. And so all seven suitors suffered. Listen, you who live in marriage! Listen, you who are getting married! Listen and understand that marriage without the fear of God and without abstinence is the same joy for demons as fornication itself! But I won’t talk much about this either, because I’m ashamed! Let them read in the Book of Tobias about how those who marry should act, and let them learn from it. We should turn our eyes to the holy Angel. A chaste, pure young man, the holy and God-fearing Tobiah, entered the room of the chaste, pure, God-fearing, holy maiden Sarah. For three days and three nights they abstained from themselves and only diligently prayed to God (see Tob. 8th chapter). Asmodeus, the prodigal demon, flees, but the Angel of the Lord caught him and bound him in the desert above Egypt (see Tob. 8:3). Live in the deserts, you prodigal demon, and not among the people of God! Live where the pagans, who do not know God, who do not understand the power of a pure, Christian and chaste life, remain in their uncleanness, like wild beasts of the desert or, better, like cattle, “like a horse and a mule.” So, from this story we clearly saw the angelic guardianship, management and good deeds to us, we saw that they care and provide for everything necessary for both our soul and body, preserve us in our ways and in our entire life, guide, direct, teach, instruct us to live virtuously and chastely in Christian purity, drive away demonic power from us, enlighten our mental eyes and offer up our prayers to God. The holy elder Tobias, consoled in his old age by great joys, having received the sight of his eyes, seeing the light of heaven and the light of his eyes - his beloved son and daughter-in-law Sarah with the wealth she brought, said to his son: “What can we give to this holy man who walked with you?” Young Tobias answered his father: “Father! What reward should we give him and how should we adequately pay for all his good deeds? He went with me and brought me back healthy. He gave me a wife and drove the demon away from her. He delivered me from the fish's mouth, restored your sight to see the light of heaven, he filled us with all good things. How will we adequately reward him for all this?” (see Tov. 12 chapter). We already know in part, beloved, how many good deeds the holy Angels, our guardians, do to us according to the will of God. What kind of thanks can we give them according to the Lord God? What worthy thing can we give them for their good deeds? Let us give ourselves, we will be their obedient slaves, we will always do their will in everything, we will obey them whenever they put thoughts of good deeds in us, we will do what they command us, we will not drive them away from us with vile deeds and sinful impurity. Pure holy Angels love to live with pure ones. “Let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit” (2 Cor. 7:1) and let us place our hope in the shadow of their wings. Holy Archangel Michael with the entire council of angels! Autumn our head on the day of our battle, visible and invisible! Cover us with the shelter of your wings and drive away every enemy and adversary from us! Amen.