Книга четырнадцатая

Again we are talking about the sin of the first man. Blessed Augustine teaches that this sin was the cause of carnal life and vicious dispositions; in particular, it shows that the evil of shameful lust was the reverse punishment for disobedience, and solves the question of how a person would give birth to children without lust if he had not sinned. Chapter I. The disobedience of the first man would inevitably plunge all people into the second death, if the grace of God had not saved many In previous books we have already said that in order for the human race to be united not only by a commonality of nature, but also connected in a certain sense by ties of blood relationship, God was pleased to produce people from one person. They also said that this race would not have died even in individuals, if the first two people had not deserved this by their disobedience, of whom the very first was created from nothing, and the other from the first. They committed such a great crime that as a result of it, human nature itself changed for the worse, handed down to posterity already guilty of sin and inevitable death. The kingdom of death has prevailed over people to such an extent that it would have carried everyone, as if to a deserved punishment, into the second death, which has no end, if the undeserved grace of God had not saved some from it. From here it turned out that, although such a multitude of such numerous peoples, each living on earth according to special charters and customs, and differing from each other in the variety of languages, weapons, utensils, clothes, nevertheless, there have always existed no more than two kinds of human communication, which we, following our Scriptures, can call two cities. One of them is composed of people who want to live in the world only according to the flesh, the other - from those who also want to live according to the spirit. When each of them achieves his goal, each lives in the corresponding world. Chapter II. About carnal life, by which we must understand life consisting of vices not only of the body, but also of the soul But first of all, we need to determine what it means to live according to the flesh and what to live according to the spirit. Anyone who either forgets the way of expressing Holy Scripture or pays little attention to it, having heard what we have said, may at first think that the Epicurean philosophers live according to the flesh first of all, because they decided that the highest good for man consists in bodily pleasure; then other philosophers who, in one way or another, sought the highest good for man in the physical; and then - all those people who, not by virtue of any theory or philosophy of this kind, but simply by inclination towards voluptuousness, find pleasure solely in the pleasures received from the bodily senses. But the Stoics, who seek the highest good for man in the soul, live according to the spirit; for what is the human soul if not spirit? But according to the meaning connected with these expressions by divine Scripture, both of them live according to the flesh. For Scripture does not always call only the body of an earthly and mortal animate being flesh, as, for example, when it says: “Not all flesh is the same flesh; but there is another flesh among men, another flesh among beasts, another among fishes, and another among birds” (1 Cor. XV, 39); but uses this word in many other meanings. With such different uses of the word, it often calls man himself flesh, that is, the nature of man, in a figurative sense from part to whole, such as, for example, the expression: “By the works of the law will no flesh be justified in His sight” (Rom. III, 20). Who, if not man as a whole, is Scripture talking about in this case? A little further on it is expressed more clearly: “By the law no one will be justified before God” (Gal. III, 11); and also to the Galatians: “Having learned that a man is not justified by the works of the law...” (Gal. II, 16). The expression: “And the Word became flesh” (John I, 14), that is, became a man, has the same meaning. Misunderstanding this last expression, some thought that Christ did not have a human soul. But how does a whole mean a part when the words of Mary Magdalene are quoted in the Gospel, who says: “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid Him” (John XX, 13), although she spoke only about the flesh of Christ, which she considered taken away from the tomb; so by part, when the flesh is called, of course the whole, that is, the whole person, as in the above words. So, if the divine Scripture uses the word “flesh” in different places in different senses, and it would take too much time to revise these places and bring them together, then in order to find out what it means to live according to the flesh (which, undoubtedly, is evil, although the very nature of the flesh is not evil), let us carefully consider the well-known passage from the letter of the Apostle Paul to the Galatians, in which he says: “The works of the flesh are known; they are: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, quarrels, envy, anger, strife, disagreements, (temptations), heresies, hatred, murders, riots and the like; I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do this will not inherit the Kingdom of God” (Gal. V, 19-21). This passage of the apostolic epistle, considered in its entirety, as far as it seems sufficient in this case, can resolve the question of what it means to live according to the flesh. Among the works of the flesh, which the apostle, having enumerated, condemned, we find not only those that relate to the pleasures of the flesh, which are: fornication, uncleanness, adultery, lasciviousness, disorderly conduct, but also those that show vices of the soul that are alien to carnal pleasure. Who does not recognize that service performed to idols, sorcery, enmity, quarrels, envy, anger, strife, heresies are rather vices of the soul than of the flesh? It may happen that for the sake of idolatry or some heretical error they will abstain from the pleasures of the flesh: nevertheless, according to the meaning of the apostolic words, a person will then live according to the flesh, although, at first glance, he abstains and suppresses the lusts of the flesh; and by abstaining from the pleasures of the flesh, he proves that he is committing condemnable deeds of the flesh. Who harbors enmity not in his soul? Or who will use such a turn of phrase as to say to his real or imaginary enemy: “It is your flesh that is angry with me, and not your soul?” Finally, I will say this: just as no one, hearing the word “corporality,” would doubt to refer it to the body, so no one doubts that rage (aniniositates) refers to the soul (ad animum). So, why does the teacher of languages ​​in faith and truth classify all this and the like as works of the flesh, if not because by the flesh he means the person himself, using a well-known turn of phrase when the whole is called by the name of the part? Chapter III. The impulse to sin arose from the soul, not from the flesh, and the damage resulting from sin is not sin, but punishment Someone, perhaps, will say that the cause of all kinds of vices in an immoral life is the flesh, because the soul lives this way under the influence of the flesh. But someone who says this does not pay due attention to human nature in its entirety. True, “the corruptible body burdens the soul” (Wis. IX, 15). Therefore, the apostle, speaking about the same corruptible body, about which not long before he said: “Our outer man decays” (2 Cor. IV, 16), says: “We know that when our earthly house, this hut, is destroyed, we have from God a dwelling in heaven, a house not made with hands, eternal. That is why we sigh, wanting to put on our heavenly dwelling; As long as we don’t end up naked even though we’re dressed. For we, being in this hut, groan under the burden, because we do not want to be undressed, but to be clothed, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up in life” (2 Cor. V, 1-4). So, although we are burdened with a corruptible body, since we know that the cause of the burden is not the nature or essence of the body, but its damage, we wish not to be stripped of the body, but to be clothed with its immortality. For it will exist even then, but, not being perishable, it will not be a burden. “The perishable body burdens the soul, and the earthly dwelling burdens the mind with many cares (Wis. IX, 15.) 137 And yet those who think that all mental evil comes from the body are mistaken. Virgil, in his beautiful verses, seems to express Plato's opinion when he says: The source of their life is fire, and the beginning of their tribe is sky; But their own criminal bodies serve as an obstacle to them, And they stupefy the earthly joints and mortal members. Then, as if making it clear that the four well-known passions of the soul: desire, fear, joy and sorrow, which serve as the beginning of all sins, come from the body, he adds: Hence their fears and desires, suffering and joy; And the sound does not reach them, imprisoned in their dark prison 138. But our faith teaches differently. For the damage to the body, which burdens the soul, was not the cause of the first sin, but a punishment. It was not the corruptible flesh that made the soul sinful, but the sinful soul that made the flesh corruptible. Although some vicious impulses and desires depend on this damage to the flesh, not all the vices of a bad life should be attributed to the flesh: otherwise we would have to imagine the devil, who has no flesh, as pure from all of them. Although we cannot call the devil a fornicator or a drunkard, or attribute to him another vice of the same kind related to carnal pleasure (although he secretly advises and incites such sins); nevertheless, he himself is extremely proud and envious. The depravity of the latter property took possession of him to such an extent that for it he was doomed in the prisons of darkness to the judgment of the great day (Jude I, 6). The apostle attributed these vices that dominate the devil to the flesh, which the devil undoubtedly does not have. He says that “idolatry, sorcery, enmity, quarrels, envy, anger, strife, discord, (temptations), heresies, hatred” (Gal. V, 20) are the works of the flesh. The head and beginning of all these evils is pride, which reigns in the devil without flesh. Indeed, who is more hostile to the saints than he? Who can be imagined in relation to them more quarrelsome, more merciless, more jealous and envious? If he has all this without the flesh, then how will it be the work of the flesh, if not in the sense of the works of man, whom the apostle, as I said, means by the name of the flesh? Man did not become like the devil because he had flesh, which the devil does not have; but by the fact that it lives by itself, that is, by man. For the devil also wanted to live on his own when he did not stand in the truth; so he began to tell lies, speaking from himself, and not from God, and became not only a liar, but also the father of lies (John VIII, 44). He was the first to lie. From him sin began; It was from him that the lies began. Chapter IV. What does it mean to live according to man, and what does it mean to live according to God? So, when a person lives according to man, and not according to God, he is like the devil. For even an angel had to live not according to an angel, but according to God, in order to stand in the truth and speak the truth from God, and not a lie from himself. And about man the apostle says in another place: “If the faithfulness of God is elevated by my unfaithfulness to the glory of God, why else should I be judged as a sinner?” (Rom. III, 7). He called infidelity (lies) his own, and fidelity (truth) – God’s. So, when a person lives according to the truth, he lives not by himself, but by God. For it was God who said: “I am the way and the truth and the life” (John XIV, 6). When he lives according to himself, that is, according to man, and not according to God, he undoubtedly lives according to a lie. This is not because the man himself is a lie. Its culprit and Creator is God, Who is in no way the culprit and creator of lies; but because man was created right on the condition that he lived not according to himself, but according to Him by whom he was created, that is, he fulfilled His will, and not his own. Living differently from the way he was created to live is a lie. For he wants to be blessed without living in such a way as to be blessed. What could be more false than such a desire? Therefore, we can say that every sin is a lie. For sin occurs by the will by which we want it to be good for us, or do not want it to be bad for us. And then a lie appears: and from what is done for the sake of good, bad things happen for us; or from what is done for the sake of the best, the worst happens to us. Why is this, if not because a person can feel good only from God, Whom, when he sins, he leaves, and not from himself, living according to whom he sins? So, what we said that two different and opposite cities were formed because some began to live according to the flesh, and others according to the Spirit, can also be expressed in such a way that two cities were formed because some live according to man, and others according to God. For the apostle in his letter to the Corinthians says very clearly: “If there is envy, contention and disagreement among you, are you not carnal, and are you not walking according to human custom?” (1 Cor. III, 3). To act in a human way means to be carnal, but under the flesh, that is, under a part of a person, of course, the whole person. Above, he calls the same ones spiritual, whom he later calls carnal. He says: “What man knows what is in a man except the spirit of man that dwells in him? Likewise, no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God. But we did not receive the spirit of this world, but the Spirit from God, so that we might know what was given to us from God, which we proclaim not in words taught by human wisdom, but in words taught by the Holy Spirit, comparing spiritual with spiritual. But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, because he considers them foolishness" (1 Cor. II, 11–14). To such, that is, spiritual, he later says: “I could not speak to you, brethren, as to spiritual ones, but as to carnal ones” (1 Cor. III, 1). And this expression has the same meaning, transferred from part to whole. For the name of the soul, like the name of the flesh, which are parts of a person, can designate the whole, that is, a person. Thus, it is one thing to be a spiritual person, and quite another to be a carnal person; but both are one and the same, that is, a man living according to a man. In the same way, people are meant when it is said: “By the works of the law will no flesh be justified in His sight” (Rom: III, 20); and in that when it is said: “All the souls of the house of Jacob that went over to Egypt were seventy-five” (Gen. 46:27). Just as there we mean man by flesh, so here by seventy-five souls we mean seventy-five people. Likewise, the expression “words not learned from human wisdom” could be replaced by the expression “words not learned from carnal wisdom”; just as surely as the expression “you walk according to the custom of men” could be replaced by the expression “you walk according to the custom of the flesh.” This is especially clear from his subsequent words: when someone says: I am Pavlov; another: I am Apollosov, are you not carnal?” (1 Cor. III, 4). What he meant by the words “carnal” and “spiritual,” he expressed more clearly with the word “people,” i.e. you live according to man, and not according to God; if you lived according to Him, you would be gods. Chapter V. That the opinion of the Platonists about the nature of body and soul is more tolerant than the opinion of the Manichaeans; but the Platonists also deserve reproach for attributing the causes of vices to the nature of the flesh So, we should not offend the Creator by blaming the nature of the flesh, which is good in its kind and order, for our sins and vices. But it is bad if, having left the good Creator, we begin to live according to the good creation: whether someone begins to live according to the flesh, or according to the soul, or according to the whole person (which can be designated by the name of one soul or the name of one flesh). For whoever represents the nature of the soul as the highest good, and considers the nature of the flesh to be evil, strives for the soul carnally, and carnally avoids the flesh, because ideas of this kind are based in him on human vanity, and not on divine truth. The Platonists are not mad, like the Manichaeans, who abhor earthly bodies as the nature of evil. They, on the contrary, are all the elements from which this visible and tangible world is composed, and the properties of these elements are attributed to the artist-God. However, they think that souls are relaxed with earthly joints and mortal members, so that because of this relaxation, diseases of desire, fear, joy and sorrow arise in them - the four perturbationes, as Cicero calls them, or the four passions, as many others call them, translating literally the Greek name - which constitute the content of all the depravity of human morals. But if this is so, then why does Aeneas in Virgil, having heard from his father in the underworld that souls must return to bodies again, express surprise at this, exclaiming: Do you really have to believe, father, that beautiful souls Will they not go to heaven from here, but will they return to their bodies? What kind of unfortunate desire for light do the poor have? 139 Has this unfortunate desire really passed on to the notorious purity of souls from earthly joints and mortal members? Doesn’t he imagine them cleansed of all this kind of, as he says, bodily infections, when they begin to desire to return to their bodies again? It follows from this that even if things happened in such a way (however, all this is complete nonsense) that the purification of constantly departing souls and the defilement of constantly returning souls would be replaced one by one by the other, it is still impossible to truly assert that reprehensible and vicious movements of souls arise in them from earthly bodies. For, and in their opinion, this, as the famous talker calls it, unhappy desire, does not depend on the body to such an extent that the soul, cleansed of all bodily infection and located outside of any body, prompts itself to appear in the body. Thus, according to them, not only under the influence of the body does the soul desire, fear, rejoice and grieve, but these movements can arise in it and from itself. Chapter VI. On the quality of the human will, which determines the bad and good dispositions of the soul The difference lies in what a person’s will is: if it is perverse, then these movements will also be perverted; if she is good, then the movements will not only not be reprehensible, but also commendable. For the will is inherent in all of them; moreover, they are all nothing more than will. After all, what is passionate desire and joy if not a will that sympathizes with what we want? And what are fear and sadness if not the same will that does not sympathize with what we do not want? If we sympathize, striving for what we want, this is called passionate desire; if we sympathize, using what we want - joy. In the same way, if we do not sympathize with what we do not want to happen, such a will is fear; and if we do not sympathize with what happened against our desire, such a will is sadness. In general, according to the difference between the objects that we strive for or which we avoid, the extent to which they attract or repel the will of a person, the dispositions change and turn into one or the other. Therefore, a person who lives according to God, and not according to man, must be a lover of good, and, therefore, hate evil. But since no one is evil by nature, and if he is evil, it is due to vice, then he who lives according to God must have a correct hatred of evil. He should not hate a person for the sake of vice, just as he should not love vice for the sake of a person. But he must hate vice, and love man. When healing from vice follows, then only what he should love will remain, and nothing will remain of what he should hate. Chapter VII. That the words: love (amor) and affection (dilectio) are used in the Holy Scriptures indifferently, both for good and for the other way He who has made it a rule to love God, and not according to man, but according to God, to love his neighbor as himself, is called for this love a person who has a good will. More often this feeling is called in the Holy Scriptures caritas 140; but it is also called simply love (amor). The Apostle, for example, says that the one whom he commanded to be chosen to govern the people (bishop) must be a lover of good (amatorem boni) (Titus 1:8). And when the Lord, asking Peter, expressed himself this way: “Do you love me? (diligis me - is he disposed towards Me) more than they?” , Peter answered: “Yes, Lord! You know that I love you" (amo te) . Again the Lord asked not whether He loved Him, but whether Peter was disposed towards Him; and again Peter answered: “Yes, Lord! You know that I love you." Asking for the third time, the Lord Himself did not say: “Are you disposed towards Me,” but said: “Do you love Me?” (amas me)? Then, as the evangelist notes, “Peter was saddened that for the third time he asked him: “Do you love Me?” , although the Lord did not repeat it for the third time, but only for the first time asked: “Do you love Me?” ; two (previous) times he said: “Are you disposed towards Me?” From here we conclude that even at the time when the Lord said: “Are you disposed towards Me,” He said nothing more than: “Do you love Me?” ******** Peter continued to call the same thing by the same name, and for the third time he said the same: “You know that I love You” (John XXI, 15-17). I found it necessary to mention this because some believe that disposition (dilectio) or caritas is one thing, and love (amor) 141 is quite another. They say that favor should be understood in a good sense, and love in a bad sense. But it is extremely certain that secular writers themselves never claimed this. Let them also look to see whether these expressions were distinguished, and if so, on what grounds did philosophers distinguish them? Their books say quite clearly that they highly valued love in good deeds and towards God himself. For our part, we need to provide evidence that our Scriptures, the authority of which we place above all other literature, call love the same thing as affection for equals or superiors (dilectionem vel caritatem). We have already shown that the word “love” is used in a good sense. And lest anyone think that although the word “love” can be understood both for good and for bad, the word “disposition” should be understood only in a good sense, let him pay attention to the expression in the psalm “Loving His soul hates violence” (Ps. X, 5); and to the famous expression of the Apostle John: “Whoever loves Father" (1 John II, 15). Here in one and the same place there is an indication of both the good and the bad side. And so that someone does not bother with demands for proof that the word “love” is used in a bad sense (we have already indicated its use in a good sense), let him read the words of Scripture: “For people will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money” (se ipsos amantes, amatores pecunia_e) (2 Tim. III, 2). So, a good will is good love, and a bad will. Love that seeks to possess the object of love is a passionate desire; the same love that possesses and uses this object is joy; but if it feels something contrary to it, it is sorrow. benefits. Let us prove what we have said using examples from Scripture. The apostle desired to be “absolved and to be with Christ” (Phil. 1:23). Also: “My soul is weary of the desire of Your judgments at all times” (Ps. 119:20), or, to use a more appropriate expression: “My soul has loved to desire Your judgments.” And again: “The desire for wisdom leads to the Kingdom” (Wis. VI, 20). However, it has become a custom that if the word “passionate desire” or “lust” (cupiditas vel concupiscentia) is used and its object is not indicated, then it can only be understood in a bad way. The words “cheerfulness” and “joy” are also used in a good sense: “Rejoice in the Lord and rejoice, ye righteous” (Ps. XXXI, 11). Also: “You have filled my heart with joy” (Ps. IV, 8). And again: “Fullness of joy is before You” (Ps. XV, 11). The word “fear” in a good sense is found in the apostle when he says: “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling” (Phil. II, 12). Also: “Do not be proud, but be afraid” (Rom. XI, 20). And again: “But I am afraid, lest, just as the serpent deceived Eve with his cunning, so your minds may be corrupted, straying from the simplicity that is in Christ” (2 Cor. XI, 3). But regarding sorrow (tristitia), which Cicero more often calls sorrow (a_egritudo) 142, and Virgil - suffering (dolor), when he says: Hence they have... suffering and joy, and which I would prefer to call sadness (tristitia), because the words "sorrow" and "suffering" are more often used in relation to bodies - with regard to this sadness the question of whether it can have a good side seems very difficult. Chapter VIII. About the three emotions that the Stoics allowed in the soul of the wise, with the exception of suffering or sadness, which spiritual valor should not experience The Stoics allowed in the soul of the wise three good states, called by the Greeks εὐπάθειαι 143, which Cicero called in Latin constantia_e 144, instead of three emotional disturbances: instead of passionate desire - will, instead of fun - joy, instead of fear - caution. Instead of sorrow or suffering, which we preferred to call sadness to avoid ambiguity, they refused to allow anything like that in the soul of the wise. The will, they say, strives for the good that the wise do. Joy comes from the achieved good, which the wise person realizes in everything. Prudence avoids the evils that the wise must avoid. But sadness, they say, since it comes from evil that has already happened (and, in their opinion, no evil can happen to a wise man), cannot be replaced by anything in the soul of a wise man. According to them, it thus turns out that only the wise can want, rejoice, and beware; a fool can only wish, have fun, be afraid, and be sad. The first three states are constantia_e, and the last, according to Cicero, are excitement (perturbationes), in the language of the majority - passions (passiones). And the Greeks, as I said, call the first three εὐπάθειαι, and the last four - πάθη. When I examined with all possible care whether this usage was consistent with Holy Scripture, I found the following. The prophet says: “The wicked shall not rejoice, saith the Lord” (Isa. 57:21); He speaks as if the wicked can receive amusement from evil rather than joy, since joy is the lot of good and pious people. The well-known expression in the Gospel is just as accurate: “As you want people to do to you, so do you to them” (Matthew VII: 12) is said, apparently, in the sense that someone may not want something bad and shameful, but desire it. Some translators, taking into account the usual use of words, even added the word “kindly” and translated it like this: “If you want people to treat you kindly.” They believed that perhaps someone would want not entirely good things from people, like luxurious feasts, for example (in order to keep silent about the more vile ones), and think that he would fulfill the above commandment if he himself gave the same feasts for others. But in the Greek Gospel, from which the translation was made into Latin, the word “kindly” is not present. But it doesn’t exist, I believe, because the very word “want” makes it clear “you want good.” Otherwise it would say “wish.” But it is not always, however, that this meaning should be connected with the indicated words, but they should be understood in this sense only in certain cases. When reading those writers whose authority we must necessarily submit to, we must understand them this way in cases where a correct understanding of the passage does not allow for any other interpretation. Such, for example, are the passages that we cited partly from the prophets, partly from the Gospel. Who, in fact, does not know that even the wicked can have endless fun? Nevertheless - “The wicked shall not rejoice.” What does this mean if not that rejoicing is something else when this word is used in its proper and most precise sense? In the same way, who will deny that it was fair to command people that by doing to others what they want others to do to them, they should not seek pleasure from each other in shameful lust. And yet, the most saving and true commandment says: “As you want people to do to you, do so to them.” What does this mean if not that the word “want” in this place is used in some proper sense in such a way that cannot be understood in a bad way? But with the more common use of words most often found in speech, in no case would it be said: “Thou shalt not delight in lies” (Wis. VII, 13) ********, if there were no will or will of evil, from the evil properties of which what was predicted by the angels differs, in the words: “On earth peace, good will towards men” (good will - bona_e voluntatis) (Luke II, 14 ). The addition of “good” would be unnecessary if the will were only good. Then, what great thing would the apostle say in praise of love when he said that it “does not rejoice in unrighteousness” (1 Cor. XIII, 6), if ill-will did not rejoice in it? Such indifferent use of the mentioned words is also found among secular writers. The famous orator Cicero says, for example: “I wish, senators, to be lenient” 145. Since Cicero used this word in a good sense, is there any learned pedant who would argue that he should have said “I want” and not “I wish”? Further, in Terence, the depraved young man, devoured by insane passion, says: “I want nothing but Philumena” 146. That this desire was a bad passion is shown quite clearly by the answer of this gentleman’s servant cited there. The servant says: “It would be much better if you threw this love out of your head, and did not talk about it, which makes your passion even more inflamed.” And that writers also used the word “joy” in a bad way, proof of this is the above verse of Virgil, in which four emotional disturbances are listed in the most concise form: Hence their fears and desires, suffering and joy. The same author in another place says: “The evil joy of the soul” 147. Thus, both the good and the bad want, beware, rejoice, or, in other words, the same thing, both the good and the bad desire, fear and rejoice; but the good - in a good way, and the bad - in a bad way, depending on whether people have a good or evil will. And the word “sadness” itself, which the Stoics could not come up with anything to replace in the soul of the wise, is often used in a good sense, especially among our writers. The Apostle, for example, praises the Corinthians because they were sad “for God’s sake” (II Cor. VII, 9). But perhaps someone will say that the apostle is pleased with them because they expressed their repentance through sadness, and this kind of sadness can only be the sadness of those who have sinned. Indeed, the apostle says this: “Therefore, if I grieved you with the message, I do not regret it, although I did regret it; for I see that that message saddened you, however, for a while. Now I rejoice, not because you were saddened, but because you were saddened to repentance; for they grieved for God's sake, so that they suffered no harm from us. For Godly sorrow produces unchanging repentance leading to salvation, but worldly sorrow produces death. For the very thing that made you sad for God’s sake, see what zeal has produced in you” (2 Cor. VII: 8-11). The Stoics can therefore answer in defense of their opinion that sadness seems useful for repentance of sins, but it cannot exist in the soul of a wise person precisely because neither sin happens to him, repentance for which would make him sad, nor any other evil, experiencing or feeling which he would be sad. It is said about Alcibiades (if my memory serves me correctly), for example, that, considering himself a completely happy person, he cried when Socrates reasoned and proved to him that he was unhappy because he was stupid. For this man, then, stupidity was the cause of useful and desirable sadness, which makes a person grieve that he is what he should not be. But the Stoics say not about the stupid, but about the wise, that he should not be sad. Chapter IX. About emotional disturbances, a good disposition towards which is manifested in the lives of righteous people But we have already answered these philosophers, as far as this question of spiritual unrest is concerned, in the ninth book of this work, showing that they, paying attention not so much to deeds as to words, love disputes more than truth. With us, according to our Scriptures and sound teaching, the citizens of the holy city of God, while wandering in this life, living according to God, fear and desire, grieve and rejoice. And since their love is impeccable, then all these spiritual dispositions are impeccable. They are afraid of eternal punishment, they desire eternal life; they mourn because they groan, “waiting for adoption,” they sigh for the “redemption of their body” (Rom. VIII, 23); they rejoice in hope, because “the word that is written will be fulfilled: “Death is swallowed up in victory” (1 Cor. XV, 54). In the same way they are afraid to sin, they want to remain steadfast; they mourn over sins, rejoice over good deeds. In order to be afraid to sin, they hear the words: “Because iniquity will increase, the love of many will grow cold” (Matthew XXIV, 12). In order to want to remain steadfast, they hear the saying of Scripture: “He who endures to the end will be saved” (Matt. X, 22). To grieve over sins, they hear: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us” (1 John I, 8). To rejoice when doing good deeds, they hear: “God loves a cheerful giver” (2 Cor. IX: 7). In the same way, depending on their unsteadiness or firmness, they either fear temptations or desire temptations; they grieve in temptations or rejoice when exposed to temptations. In order to fear temptations, they hear: “If a person falls into any sin, you who are spiritual correct him in a spirit of meekness, watching each one of you, so as not to be tempted” (Gal. VI, 1). And in order to desire temptations, they hear a certain strong man of the city of God, who says: “Test me, O Lord, and try me; melt my bowels and my heart” (Ps. XXV, 2). To grieve in temptation, they see Peter weeping (Matt. XXVI, 75); in order to rejoice in temptations, they hear James, who says: “Count it all joy, my brothers, when you fall into various temptations” (James I, 2). And they experience these emotional movements not only because of themselves, but also because of those whom they wish to be saved, for whom they fear so that they do not perish, for whom they mourn if they perish, and rejoice if they are saved. With the eyes of faith and with full sympathy they look at that excellent and extremely firm man (it is most fitting for us who came to the Church of Christ from the pagans to remember him, the teacher of the pagans in faith and truth), who boasts about his weaknesses (II Cor. XII, 5), who labored more than all the apostles (I Cor. XV, 10), and instructed not only those nations with many messages God, which he saw before him, but also those whom he foresaw in the future, look, I say, at this man, the fighter of Christ, learned from Him (Gal. 1:19), anointed by Him, crucified with Him (Gal. II, 19), glorified in Him on the theatrical stage of our world, for whom he became a spectacle for both angels and men (I Cor. IV, 9), legitimately competing and striving forward “to the honor of the highest calling” (Philip. III, 14); (teaching) to rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep (Rom. XIII, 15), having “attacks from without, fears from within” (II Cor. VII, 5); having “the desire to be resolved and to be with Christ” (Philip. I, 23); who wants to see the Romans “in order to have some fruit” with them, “as with other nations” (Rom. I, 13); zealous for the Corinthians, and as a result of this zeal, afraid that their minds would not be turned away from the purity of Christ through deception (2 Cor. XI, 2-3); having great sorrow and constant heart disease for the Israelites (Rom. IX, 2), “for, not understanding the righteousness of God and trying to establish their own righteousness, they did not submit to the righteousness of God” (Rom. X, 3); announcing not only sorrow, but also his lamentation for some, “who had sinned before and did not repent” (II Cor. XII, 21). If these movements, these feelings, stemming from a disposition to goodness, but without holy love, must be recognized as vices, then we allow real vices to be called virtues. But when these mental dispositions have the right direction, as long as they turn towards what they should, then who then dares to call them illnesses or vicious passions? Therefore, the Lord himself, who was pleased to lead human life in the form of a slave, but who had absolutely no sin, had these dispositions in those cases in which he considered it necessary to have them. And human feeling was not false in the One in Whom was the true body of man and the true human soul. So, it is not said falsely when it is related in His Gospel that He grieved with anger over the petrification of the hearts of the Jews (Mark III: 5); that he said: “I rejoice for you, that I was not there, so that you might believe” (John XI, 15); that, starting to raise Lazarus, he shed tears (John XI 35), that he desired to eat the Passover with his disciples (Luke XXII, 15); that when suffering approached, His soul grieved (Matthew XXVI, 38). And for the purposes of a certain economy, He accepted these movements of the human soul when He wanted, just as He became a man when He wanted. Therefore, we must admit that even though these dispositions in us were impeccable and appeared according to God, they are still the dispositions of this life, and not the one that we expect to occur in the future, and that we often yield to them even against our will. They depend in us on human weakness, and not as in the Lord Jesus, whose very weakness was in His power. But while we bear the weaknesses of this life, we do not live properly even when we do not have them at all. The Apostle reproached and condemned some, whom he called lacking in disposition (Rom. I, 31). The sacred psalm also complains about such people, saying: “I was waiting for compassion, but there was none, comforters, but I did not find it” (Ps. 68:21). For to achieve, while we are in a real disastrous life, such a state as not to feel sorrow at all, even in the opinion of one of the secular writers 148, is possible only at the cost of strong mental bitterness and bodily numbness. Therefore, the so-called in Greek ἀπάθεια or, if one can call it that in Latin, impassibilitas (dispassion), since by it is meant life (and by it is meant a mental state, not a physical one), alien to such dispositions that appear contrary to reason and disturb the mind, a thing is really good and highly desirable; but even this is not the lot of real life. “A double-minded man is not steadfast in all his ways” (James I, 8) - this is not the voice of just any people, but of people who are extremely pious and very righteous and holy. This ἀπάθεια will be when there is no sin in a person. At present, life is already good enough if there are no crimes in it; he who imagines that he lives without sin does not lead the matter to the point of not having sin, but to the point of not receiving forgiveness. Further, if by ἀπάθεια we understand a state that absolutely excludes any movement of feeling, then who does not recognize this numbness as worse than any vice? It can be argued, not without reason, that complete bliss will not be combined with the anxieties of fear and with any kind of sadness; but who, other than someone who has moved away from the truth in all respects, would argue that there will be no love and joy there? If by ἀπάθεια we mean a state that is not frightened by any fear and is not crushed by any sorrow, then it should be avoided in this life if we want to live correctly, that is, according to God; and in that blessed life, which, according to the promise, has to be eternal, it is really to be expected. That fear that the Apostle John speaks about: “There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear, because in fear there is torment; he who fears is not perfect in love” (1 John IV, 18), is not the same fear as the one that the Apostle Paul feared, lest the Corinthians be deceived by the cunning of the serpent (II Cor. XI, 3). Love also has the last fear, even love alone has it; The first fear of this kind is that it is not in love. The Apostle Paul says about him: “You did not receive the spirit of slavery, so that you could live again in fear” (Rom. VIII, 15). And that fear, pure and “enduring forever” (Ps. XVIII, 10), if it will be in the next century (for how else can we understand its abiding forever?), then it is not a fear that confuses with the evil that can happen, but a fear that holds back in the good that cannot be abandoned. Where there is unchanging love for the good achieved, there is fear, so to speak, free from the fear of evil. The name of pure fear is undoubtedly the will by which we, having recognized sin, will naturally beware of sin, not out of fear for our weakness, which could dispose us to sin, but out of purity of love. Or, if in that completely serene enjoyment of continuous happiness and joys there will be absolutely no kind of fear, then what is said: “The fear of the Lord is pure and abides forever” is said in the same sense as the words: “The patience of the poor will not perish until the end” (Isa. IX, 19). Patience itself, of course, will not last forever, because it is necessary only where there is evil that must be endured; but what is achieved through patience will last forever. It is possible that pure fear is called enduring forever because what this fear leads to will endure forever. If this is so, then, since the right life should be considered to be that which should lead to a blessed life, then the right life has the mentioned correct dispositions, and the wrong life has the wrong ones. A blessed life, which is also eternal, will have both love and joy, not only correct, but also indispensable; he will have no fear or sorrow at all. From here one way or another it is clear what citizens of the city of God should be like during this journey, living according to the spirit, and not according to the flesh, that is, according to God, and not according to man, and what they will be like in that immortality to which they strive. The (earthly) city, that is, the society of the wicked, living not according to God, but according to man, both in the veneration of a false deity and in neglect of the true Divinity, following the teachings of people or demons, is tormented by these perverted dispositions, like illnesses and unrest. And if there are other citizens in it who seem to be restraining these movements within themselves and, as it were, curbing them, then they are so proud and arrogant in their wickedness that this makes their swelling increase as much as its pain decreases. And if some, out of vanity, the more brutal the rarer, have tempered themselves in this to such an extent that they are no longer inaccessible to any movements and stimulations of feeling, are not touched by anything, do not bow to anything, then they rather lose all humanity than achieve true peace. For it is not because something is right that it is hardened, nor is it because something is healthy that it is insensitive. Chapter X. Should we think that the first people, living in paradise, were not subjected to any mental disturbances before they sinned? But it is not without reason that they ask: did the first man, or did the first people (for there was a conjugal union of two) before sin in the spiritual body have such movements that we will not have after cleansing from all sin in the spiritual body? After all, if they had them, then how were they blessed in that memorable place of bliss, that is, in paradise? Who can really be called unconditionally blessed if he is subject to fear or sorrow? But what could these first people fear, what could these first people grieve about with such an abundance of goods, when they were not threatened by either death or any illness; when there was no shortage of anything that would satisfy a good desire, and there was nothing that would unpleasantly strike the body or soul of a person living happily? There was a serene love for God and mutual love between spouses who lived in a faithful and sincere community, and as a result of this love they had great joy, since the object of love did not cease to be an object of pleasure. The evasion from sin was calm, and while it existed, there was absolutely nowhere for any evil to come from that would upset them. Or, perhaps, they had a desire to eat from the forbidden tree, but they were afraid to die, and thus desire and fear already worried these people? No, we do not think that this could happen where there was absolutely no sin. For what the law of God prohibits is not at all sinless: to desire and abstain from desire out of fear of punishment, and not out of love for truth. No, I say, it is impossible that before any sin there would already be such a sin, and that people would allow in themselves in relation to a tree what the Lord says in relation to a woman: “Everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matt. V, 28). So, just as the first people were happy, as they were not subjected to any mental disturbances and did not endure any physical adversities, so the entire human community would have been happy if they themselves had not committed evil, spreading it to their descendants, and if no one from their generation had committed a lie that was condemned. And this happiness would continue until it was fulfilled through the well-known blessing, which says: “Be fruitful and multiply” (Gen. I, 28), the number of predestined saints. Then another highest happiness would have been given, which was given to the most blessed angels. Then there would be an undeniable certainty that no one would sin and no one would die; and the life of the saints, without testing any labor, sorrow, or death, would be the same as it will be after enduring all this in corruptible bodies, after the resurrection of the dead. Chapter XI. About the fall of the first man, whose nature was created good and cannot be restored by anyone except his Creator But since God knew everything in advance, and therefore could not help but know that man would sin, we must imagine the holy city according to how He foresaw and predestined it, and not according to what could not be accessible to our knowledge, since it was not part of the Lord’s plans. For man could not, by his sin, upset the divine council in such a way as to force God to change His predestination, because God foreshadowed both with His foreknowledge: that is, in His foreknowledge it was both that the person whom He created good would become evil, and that in this case He Himself would do good to man. Although it is said that God changes his decisions (Gen. VI, 6), why in the Holy Scriptures there is even a figurative expression that God repented (1 Sam. XV, 11), - it is said in accordance with what a person hoped for or what followed from the order of natural causes, but not in relation to the fact that the Almighty knew in advance that He would do this. So, God, as Scripture says, created man upright, and therefore with a good will. He would not be right if he did not have good will. Therefore, good will is the work of God, and it was with it that God created man. The first evil will, which preceded all evil deeds in man, was rather a falling away from the work of God to one’s own deeds, rather than any deed. That is why these deeds are evil, because they are not done according to God; so that for these deeds, as if for certain fruits, the tree of a kind was the will itself or the person himself, insofar as he had an evil will. Further, although evil will is not a will that corresponds to nature, but is contrary to nature, because it is a vice, it is nevertheless of the same nature as a vice that could only exist in nature; but - in that nature which the Creator created out of nothing, and not in that which He begat from Himself, as He begat the Word, by Whom everything was created. For although God formed man from the dust of the ground, the earth itself and all earthly matter came into being from nothing; and out of nothing, God gave the created soul to the body when man was created. That is why good surpasses evil to such an extent that, although evil is allowed to prove that the most provident truth of God can use evil itself for good; however, good can exist without evil, just as God himself, the true and highest, exists, just as every visible and invisible heavenly creature exists above this gloomy air; but evil cannot exist without good, because the natures in which it exists, as far as they are natures, are good natures. And evil is destroyed not through the destruction of any incoming nature or a certain part of it, but through the healing and correction of a corrupted and perverted nature. So, the arbitrariness of the will is then truly free when it does not serve vices and sins. Thus it was given from God, and, lost as a result of the damage that depended on it, can be restored only by the One by whom it could have been given. Therefore, the Truth says: “If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed” (John VIII, 36). It is as if He had said, “If the Son heals you, you will be truly well.” He is the Liberator from that from which he is the Savior, So, man lived according to God in a physical and, at the same time, spiritual paradise. It was not only a physical paradise for the sake of bodily benefits, but it was also a spiritual paradise for the mind; It was not only a spiritual paradise, which a person could enjoy through internal senses, without being at the same time a physical paradise, accessible to external senses. He was both to both. But this angel, proud and therefore envious, as a result of the same pride, turned away from God and turned to himself, out of a desire, through some kind of tyrannical arrogance, to have subjects rather than to be a subject himself, fell from the spiritual paradise (about the fall of him and his allies, who became his angels from the angels of God, I, as far as I could, said enough in the eleventh and twelfth books of this essays). Trying with malicious cunning to inconspicuously influence the feelings of a person whom, as he continued to stand, he, like a fallen one, envied, he, in a bodily paradise, where, together with two people, lived other subordinate and harmless earthly animals, he chose a snake, a slippery and very mobile animal, corresponding to his plan - he chose to conduct speech through him. Subduing it with angelic action and the superiority of nature, but with the cunning of the spirit, and using it as an instrument, he began a cunning conversation with the woman, that is, he began with the lower part of the human union in order to gradually move on to the whole. He did not consider the husband gullible and therefore believed that he could be caught not by misleading him, but by the fact that he would make a concession to someone else’s delusion. After all, it was not out of error that he sympathized, but because of the conditions in which he was, Aaron gave in to the erring people when he created the idol (Ex. XXXII, 4); It is incredible that Solomon was so mistaken that he really considered it necessary to worship idols, but was drawn into this sacrilege by female caresses (1 Kings XI, 4). It is also precisely necessary to think that this husband, in order to violate the law of God, followed his wife - followed one another, man to man, husband to his wife - not because the one led into deception believed her, as if speaking the truth, but because he submitted to her for the sake of the marital relationship. For it was not in vain that the apostle said: “It was not Adam who was deceived, but the woman, being deceived, fell into transgression” (1 Tim. II, 14). This means that she accepted as truth what the serpent told her, and he (Adam) did not want to be separated from her even in sin. This did not make him any less guilty; on the contrary, he sinned consciously and judiciously. That is why the apostle says “I was not deceived,” and not “I did not sin.” He makes the same thing clear when he says: “By one man sin entered into the world,” and, a little further, he notes more clearly: “Like the crime of Adam” (Rom. V, 12:14). By deceived he means those who do things that they do not consider sin; and Adam knew what he was doing. Otherwise, how could it be true that “Adam was not deceived”? But, not having experienced divine severity, he could be deceived in the sense that he could consider this crime excusable. Therefore, although he was not deceived by what the wife was deceived by, he was deceived as to how the words that he subsequently said would be accepted: “The woman whom You gave me, she gave me from the tree, and I ate” (Gen. III, 15). But what more? Even if not both of them were deceived, but both were caught in sin and entangled in the snares of the devil. Chapter XII. On the properties of the first sin committed by man The question may arise: why does human nature not change in the same way from other sins as it changed from the violation of the commandment by the first two people, and changed so much that it even led to death, whereas today we see that much more serious sins are being committed? To this it should be answered that the mentioned crime cannot be considered light on the sole grounds that it was associated with food, and not bad or harmful (for, of course, God did not plant anything bad or harmful in paradise), but only with forbidden food. But the essence of the commandment is obedience, and the virtue of obedience in a rational creature is in some way the mother and guardian of all virtues. For this creature was created in such a way that it is useful for it to be subordinate, and, on the contrary, it is disastrous to do its own will, and not the One by whom it was created. The commandment about not eating a certain kind of food in a place that abounded in all kinds of food was easy to fulfill, especially since there was no punishment for disobedience and therefore lust did not oppose the will, and that is why its violation was the greatest injustice. Chapter XIII. That in Adam's crime the evil deed was preceded by an evil will But they began to be evil in secret, only to then fall into open disobedience. They would not have reached the point of evil if it had not been preceded by evil will. The beginning of evil will is pride. “Pride is the beginning” of all “sin” (Sir. X, 15). And what is pride if not the desire for perverse exaltation? The perverse exaltation consists in the fact that the soul, having left the Beginning to which it should cleave, tries to become such a beginning for itself. This happens when she begins to please herself too much, shying away from her Good, Which she should like more than herself. This evasion is a voluntary evasion. Had her will remained firm in love for the highest and unchangeable Good, from Which she received enlightenment in order to see, and with which she was warmed in order to love, she would not have turned away from Him in order to admire herself, become darkened and cool down. The wife would not have believed the serpent then, and Adam would not have preferred his wife’s proposal to the will of God. So this evil deed was done by those who were already evil. The fruit would not be evil if it were not from an evil tree, and a tree could become evil only contrary to nature; Only a vice of the will is repugnant to nature. But only a nature that was created from “nothing” could be damaged by vice. What makes it nature, it received from God, the same thing that it deviated from what it is follows from the fact that it was created from “nothing.” However, a person does not deviate so much as to fall into complete insignificance, but, deviating towards himself, he diminishes in comparison with what he was when he clung to the One who is the highest and true being. So, leaving God and turning towards oneself does not mean turning into nothingness, but getting closer to insignificance. Therefore, the proud in the Holy Scriptures are otherwise called “self-pleasing” (2 Peter II, 10). It is good to have love in your heart, but not for yourself, which is a sure sign of pride, but for the Lord, which is a sign of obedience, which belongs only to the humble. There is something in humility that amazingly elevates the heart, and there is something in pride that lowers the heart. Thus, humility elevates, and exaltation pulls down, for humility makes one submissive to the highest, that is, God, and exaltation, falling from the heights, degrades. Therefore, at the present time in the city of God and the city of God wandering in this world, humility is first of all recommended and especially glorified in the person of their King, Who is Christ; The vice of pride, which is opposite to this virtue, according to the teaching of Scripture, dominates in its opponent, the devil. This is the greatest difference between the two cities we are talking about. One of them is a society of the pious, the other of the wicked, both with their respective angels; and in the first, love for God predominates, and in the second, love for oneself. So, by obvious sin, which consisted in doing what God forbade to do, the devil could not have seduced a person if self-satisfaction had not already taken possession of the person. That’s why he liked what he heard: “You will be like gods” (Gen. III, 5). They would be much more likely to be such if they clung to the highest and true Principle with their humility, and did not turn in their pride to themselves, to their beginning. For the created gods are gods not through themselves, but as a result of communication with the true God. To desire more means to diminish. So, this is the evil that - when in his self-satisfaction a person imagines himself to be his own light, turning away from that Light, thanks to Which he himself shone - this, I say, evil preceded in secret, so that it would be followed by another, obvious evil. For it is truly said that “before contrition the heart is exalted... and before glory it is humbled” (Prov. XVIII, 12). There is no doubt that an obvious collapse is preceded by a secret collapse, although it is not always considered as such. Who, in fact, will consider exaltation a ruin, although it already contains the fall of the exalted? But everyone can see the collapse in which an obvious violation of the commandment is committed. Therefore, God forbade something that, having been committed, could not be justified on any far-fetched basis. I even believe that it is useful for the proud to fall into some obvious sin, so that this diminishes their self-righteousness. For Peter, it was more salutary for him to be dissatisfied with himself when he cried than to be content when he imagined a lot about himself (Matt. XXVI, 33 and Matt. XXVI, 75). The same thing is said in the psalm: “Fill their faces with dishonor, so that they may seek Your name, O Lord!” (Ps. 82:17), that is, so that, seeking Your name, those who, seeking their name, found pleasure in themselves, would find pleasure in You. Chapter XIV. About the pride of crime, which was worse than the crime itself But much worse and more worthy of condemnation is the pride that seeks justification for itself even in obvious sins. This is how those first people behaved when she said: “The serpent deceived me, and I ate,” and he echoed her: “The woman whom You gave me, she gave me from the tree, and I ate” (Gen. III, 13-12). Were these requests for mercy, pleas for healing? Although they did not, like Cain, deny what they had done, out of pride they tried to place their guilt on someone else. But where the violation of the divine commandment is obvious, there is an accusation, not an apology. What if the wife followed the serpent's advice and the husband gave in to his wife? Is it really possible to believe or yield to anyone contrary to the command of God? Chapter XV. About the justice of the retribution that the first people received for their disobedience So, man neglected the command of God, who created him in His image, placed him over all the animals, settled him in paradise, provided an abundance of everything necessary for happiness, did not burden him with many difficult commandments to fulfill, but in order to assist in saving obedience, gave only one, short and easy, reminding that He is the Lord of every creature that benefits from voluntary obedience. This was followed by a just condemnation, according to which a person who, if he kept the commandment and in the flesh, could become spiritual, became carnal in mind. Having loved himself in his pride, he was left to himself by the truth of God, but left in such a way that, disagreeing with himself, instead of the desired freedom, he was subjected to cruel and miserable slavery under the power of the one with whom he sympathized with his sin; he who died in spirit by will had to die in body by captivity; he who neglected eternal life was condemned to eternal death, no matter how grace saved him from it. Anyone who considers such condemnation excessive apparently cannot understand how much wickedness there was where it was so easy not to sin. Just as the great obedience of Abraham is rightly praised, for he was commanded to do an unusually difficult task to carry out - the murder of his son, so in paradise disobedience was the greater because the easiest task was to fulfill what was commanded. And just as the obedience of the second Man is all the more praiseworthy because He was “obedient even to death” (Philip. II, 8), so the disobedience of the first man is all the more vile because he became disobedient even to death. When a grave punishment is prescribed for disobedience, and a command is given to carry out an easy task, then where else can all the power of evil manifest itself with such force, if not in this kind of disobedience? Finally, in the very punishment for this sin, what retribution did disobedience receive if not disobedience? For what is a person’s misfortune if not in disobedience to himself, because of which he does not want what he can and wants what he cannot? Although in heaven he could not do everything, he nevertheless wanted what he could, and therefore had everything he wanted. Now, as we ourselves see and as Scripture testifies to the same, “man is like vanity” (Ps. 143:4). Who can list how many impossible things he desires, while not only his soul, but also his flesh does not obey him? Against his will, his soul is constantly agitated, and his flesh grieves and dies; We also endure a lot of other things that we would never tolerate against our will if our nature could obey this will. But, they say, the flesh itself suffers something that does not allow it to submit. Does it really matter how and why, since, being subordinate to God, we ourselves did not want to serve Him, and our flesh, which was subordinate to us, refusing to serve, became a burden to us; although we, by not serving God, have become a burden to ourselves, and not to Him. He does not need our service, just as we ourselves need our body to serve us. However, the so-called sorrows of the flesh are the sorrows of the soul in the flesh and from the flesh. Does the flesh itself grieve or desire? When they say that the flesh grieves or desires, it means either the person himself as a whole, or some part of his soul that is affected by carnal feelings. The sorrow of the flesh is unpleasant sensations in the soul from the flesh, while the sorrow of the soul, also called sadness, is disgust from what happens to us against our will. Meanwhile, sadness is often preceded by fear, which itself only occurs in the soul, and not in the flesh. Carnal sorrow is not preceded by some kind of carnal fear, which would be felt in the flesh itself before the sorrow. But pleasures, however, are preceded by a kind of demands, felt in the flesh as some of its desires, for example: hunger, thirst, lust, although, however, lust is the general name for all passionate desires. For anger itself, according to the definition of the ancients 149, is the lust of revenge. True, sometimes a person gets angry in cases where revenge does not make any sense, for example, he gets angry at a pen that writes poorly, breaking it out of frustration. But even in this, the lust for revenge is visible, although it is extremely unreasonable. So there is a lust for revenge, called wrath; there is a lust for money, called greed; there is a desire to insist on one’s own way at any cost, called stubbornness; there is a lust for self-exaltation, called boasting. In general, there are many different lusts, not all of which even have their own name. How, for example, should we call the lust for domination, the extraordinary strength of which in the souls of tyrants is evidenced by numerous civil wars? Chapter XVI. About evil lust, the name of which, although it corresponds to many vices, is acquired primarily by shameful bodily movements But although there is a great variety of lusts, when they say simply “lust,” without adding what the lust is, what usually appears to the mind is the shameful lust of the flesh. This lust takes possession of the whole body, not only externally, but also internally, and leads the whole person into agitation, mixing with the carnal attraction the disposition of the soul; the pleasure from it is the greatest of all carnal pleasures, which is why, when it is achieved, all insight and vigilance of thought is lost. Who among the lovers of wisdom and holy joys, who spends his life in marriage and wants to follow the words of the apostle, who taught: “So that each of you knows how to keep his vessel in holiness and honor, and not in the passion of lust, like the pagans who do not know God” (1 Thess. IV, 4-5), would not agree that childbearing is not accompanied by such lust, and the fulfillment of the duty of procreation is entirely subject to the requirement of the will, and not aroused by the fire of lust? But the lovers of this pleasure themselves are not aroused to it solely by their own will. That impulse does not come at a time when no one asks for it, but it happens when the soul is on fire, but the body remains cold. It turns out that lust does not want to submit not only to the will of procreation, but also to voluptuousness itself; Resisting in everything the mind that curbs her, she sometimes resists herself, exciting the soul, but not exciting the body. Chapter XVII. About the nakedness of the first people, which they found vile and shameful after sin It is true that this lust is the subject of the greatest shame, and those very members that it does or does not move are called shameful. But they were not like that before the Fall, for it is written: “And they were both naked and not ashamed” (Gen. II, 25). This is not because they were not aware of their nakedness, but because nakedness was not yet vile. Lust has not yet set certain members in motion against the will, the flesh has not yet shown its disobedience. People were not created blind, as the ignorant mob sometimes thinks: they saw animals to which they gave names, and about her it is said: “And the woman saw that the tree was good for food” (Gen. III, 6). Their eyes were open, but at the same time they did not see, that is, they did not pay attention to the fact that if their members do not resist their will, then they owe this to the grace that envelops them. As soon as this grace departed from them, a certain independent movement was immediately discovered in their members, which, thanks to their nakedness, attracted attention and made them feel ashamed. That is why, after they clearly transgressed the commandment of God, it is written about them: “And the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked, and they sewed together fig leaves and made aprons for themselves” (Gen. III, 7). Their eyes were opened not in order to see (they had seen before), but in order to understand the difference between the good that they had lost and the evil into which they had fallen. Therefore, that tree itself was called the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. When the burden of illness is experienced, the pleasantness of health becomes clearer. So, “they knew that they were naked”; that is, they were naked by the deprivation of that grace, thanks to which the nakedness of their bodies did not disturb them by any sinful law opposing their minds. Thus, they learned how fortunate it would have been for them not to know this if, in obeying God, they had not done something that made them realize in practice how harmful infidelity and disobedience are. Then, embarrassed by the disobedience of their flesh, they “sewed together fig leaves and made aprons for themselves.” (campestria), i.e. the girdle (succinctoria) of the reproductive parts. Other translators used the word succinctoria. However, campestria, although a Latin word, is derived from the term “in the field” (in campo): when young men practiced various kinds of games naked on a special field, they covered their private parts with bandages, which is why the common people call those tied in this way campestrati. So, what lust aroused against the disobedient will, which refused to obey it, was bashfully covered up by modesty. Therefore, it is customary for everyone, even the most barbaric peoples, to cover their private parts. They say that in the dark deserts of India, where some Indians indulge in philosophical studies naked (which is why they are called gymnosophists), it is customary to cover the reproductive organs, although all other parts of the body remain naked. Chapter XVIII. About the shame of copulation, not only public, but also marital The very thing that is done with such lust seeks cover not only when it comes to any kind of corruption, which is prosecuted by human courts, but also in the case of communication with public women, which is permitted by the earthly city. According to the requirement of natural modesty, there is a diligently guarded secret for the brothels themselves: it is easier for debauchery to get rid of the bonds of prohibition than for shamelessness to throw off the veils of its ugliness. And this disgrace is considered such by the disgraceful people themselves: although they love it, they do not dare to show it off. But even marital copulation itself, which according to all laws must take place for the sake of procreation, with all its honesty, requires a bed removed from witnesses. Doesn’t it send out all the servants, all the relatives and in general everyone whom the spouses are always happy to see at other times? One of the greatest representatives of Roman eloquence 150 rightly said that everything that is done well wants to be seen and known about, and this, even if done according to the law, is ashamed to be seen. In fact, who doesn’t know what spouses need to do to have children? After all, this is why marriages are so solemnly concluded. Meanwhile, at the conception of children, the children themselves who were born before are not allowed to be present. This matter is legal, and public opinion knows about it, but it avoids prying eyes. Why is this so, if not because what is decent by nature is accompanied by what is shameful by sin? Chapter XIX. That the angry and lustful parts (of the soul) have such corrupt movements that they must be restrained by the bridle of wisdom; which, in a healthy state of nature, did not exist before sin Therefore, those philosophers who came closest to the truth 151 recognized that anger and lust are products of the lower part of the soul, for the movements caused by them are violent and disorderly even in those cases when they are allowed by wisdom; and therefore they especially need the guidance of the mind. They imagine this third part of the soul ********** to be dominant over all the others, and if the others are ready to obey it, then justice reigns in a person. And these (lower) parts, which are recognized as corrupt even in a wise and temperate person, so that his mind must constantly pacify them, curb and distract them from the direction of their wrong movements, turning them to what is permitted by the law of wisdom: anger, for example, to the application of legal punishment, lust - to the obligation of procreation - these, I say, were not corrupt in paradise before sin. They did not show any movement towards anything contrary to a fair will, and, therefore, they were easily kept within their boundaries by the ruling rein of reason. For their current movements, which those who live justly and piously moderate now with greater or less ease, but not otherwise than by restraining and curbing, are not a sign of their healthy natural state, but of relaxation due to damage. And the fact that modesty does not hide the manifestations of anger and other mental movements as much as the manifestations of lust in the reproductive members, the only reason for this is that in all other cases the organs of the body are set in motion not by the passions themselves, but by the will that sympathizes with them. He who uttered a swear word in anger, or even struck someone, could not have done this if his will had not set in motion his tongue or his hand, which it moves whenever it wishes, and without any anger, while lust has acquired such rights over the reproductive parts of the body that without it they cannot move. This is the subject of shame: a man would more willingly endure the presence of a whole crowd when he is unjustly angry than the presence of even one witness during his lawful intercourse with his wife. Chapter XX. About the empty shamelessness of cynics The so-called people could not understand this. canine philosophers, cynics, when, despite human modesty, they pursued a truly canine, i.e., unclean and shameless idea that, they say, since what is done with a wife is legal, then it is not shameful to do it openly, and one should not shy away from it either on the street or in any public place. But natural shame conquered the darkness of this delusion. However, they say that the vain Diogenes once did this, believing that his sect would become more famous if this shamelessness was imprinted in the memory of people. But subsequent Cynics abandoned this. The shame turned out to be stronger, and it even seems to me that Diogenes did not do this either, but only imitated certain movements so that the people standing nearby, who could not see what his cloak was hiding, would think that he was copulating; for if he himself was not ashamed of this, then his lust was undoubtedly ashamed. There are still Cynic philosophers today. These are the ones who not only dress in Greek cloaks, but also carry clubs. But none of them dares to repeat Diogenes’ shame. And if anyone dared, I’m sure he would drown, covered in spit. Human nature is ashamed of this lust, and rightly so. Her disobedience tore her from the power of her will, thus sufficiently showing what kind of retribution the well-known disobedience of man received. This retribution was to be revealed primarily in those parts that are directly related to the birth of nature, which changed for the worse as a result of the first sin. No one is freed from the bonds of this sin, with the exception of individuals who are cleansed by the grace of God. Chapter XXI. About the blessing for the reproduction of the human race before sin, which the crime did not take away, but to which the disease of lust was added So, we should not think that the blessing of the Lord: “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth” (Gen. I, 28) the spouses living in paradise had to fulfill through this lust, ashamed of which they hid certain members. After sin this lust appeared, after sin the power over the members of the body was lost. The blessing was given before sin, which showed that the birth of children relates to the honor of marriage, and not to the punishment for sin. But in our time, people, not having a correct idea of ​​​​the blissful state in paradise, do not imagine how they can give birth to children otherwise than as they know from experience, that is, through lust, which even the most honest marriage is ashamed of. Some of them do not take into account at all the testimony of Scripture, in which it is read that after sin people were ashamed of their nakedness and covered their shameful members, and laugh at this in disbelief. Others, although they accept this testimony and treat it with respect, do not want to understand the words of Scripture: “Be fruitful and multiply” in relation to carnal fertility. This is because something similar is said regarding the soul: “Multiply me in my soul by Thy power” (Ps. 137:3), so that in the following words of the book of Genesis “And fill the earth and subdue it,” they mean by earth the flesh that the soul fills with its presence and over which it dominates if it is strengthened in virtue. Carnal children (they say) could not be born without lust even at that time, and were not born, for the first people copulated for their birth and gave birth to them after they were expelled from paradise. Chapter XXII. About the marriage relationship, originally established and blessed by God But we have no doubt that the blessing of the Lord was bestowed precisely on marriage, which God established before the Fall of man, when He created husband and wife, whose difference in sex is clearly visible in the flesh. The blessing is confined to this creation, for after it is written: “Male and female he created them,” it is immediately added: “And God blessed them, and God said to them: Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth” (Gen. I, 27–28). One can, of course, interpret everything said in a purely spiritual sense, but in view of the obvious difference between the bodies of men and women based on gender, one cannot deny that they were created this way to give birth to children who would continue to be fruitful and multiply and would fill the earth. When the Lord was asked whether it was possible to divorce a wife, for Moses, seeing the hardness of the hearts of the Israelites, allowed a letter of divorce to be given, the Lord answered not about the spirit, not about the rational soul, not about contemplative virtue, not about the knowledge of the mind, but specifically about the marital union: “Have you not read that He who created in the beginning made them male and female? And he said, “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh, so that they are no longer two, but one flesh.” So, “what God has joined together, let no man put asunder” (Matthew XIX: 4–6). So, there is no doubt that man and woman were created from the very beginning as we see them now: two people of different sexes. But they are called one either because of the marriage union, or because the woman was created from the rib of the man. And the apostle, on the basis of this first divine institution, exhorts that husbands love their wives (Eph. V, 25-33). Chapter XXIII. Would there be a birth in paradise if no one sinned; or even there the teaching of purity would be carried out in opposition to lust Those who assert that the first people would not have copulated and multiplied if they had not sinned, argue nothing less than that sin was necessary for the appearance of saints. It turns out that sin was necessary for the appearance of many righteous people! Since such a thought is absurd, one should think that if no one had sinned, then, nevertheless, the number of righteous people required to form the most blessed city would be the same as it is now being restored by God’s grace from the total mass of sinners, until the sons of this age are born and give birth. Therefore, that marriage union, if it remained worthy of heavenly bliss, would give birth to children, an object of love, and would not know lust, an object of shame. How this could happen - we do not know. Nevertheless, it should not seem incredible that this too could be completely subject to the will, as many of our members are now subject to it. Thus, Cicero, speaking in his books on the Republic about the difference in the use of power, uses man as an example, saying that the members of the body, due to their obedience, are easy to govern, and therefore they are governed like children; the vicious sides of the soul should be curbed by stricter authority, like slaves. In the natural order of things, the soul is in all respects superior to the body, and yet it is easier for the soul to control the body than itself. But this lust, which we are now talking about, is all the more shameful because the soul controls itself more easily than it, while the body, as lower in nature, should be completely subordinate to it. Thus, the soul’s resistance to itself is less shameful for it than the resistance of individual bodily members to it. But when other members are restrained by the power of will, without whose help those members that are excited by lust against the will cannot fulfill what they strive for, then modesty is preserved not by eliminating, but by not allowing sinful pleasure. Marriage in paradise undoubtedly did not know this resistance, this struggle, this dispute between will and lust, even if it ended in favor of the will, and the “family field” 152, if the first people had not committed sin, would have inseminated the projectile intended for this, just as the hand of a peasant now inseminates the earth. And if now, when we want to touch on this topic in more detail, modesty rises up and demands a preliminary apology from chaste ears, then our speech would flow freely, not at all ashamed of the obscenity of the subject. Moreover, there would be no words that would be considered obscene. So, the shameless person reading these lines, let him be ashamed of the crime, and not of nature, let him brand the deeds of his wickedness, and not the words that we use out of necessity. The chaste and pious reader will excuse me while I refute the unbelief that draws conclusions not about supersensible objects, but about those that are subject to the senses. Anyone who is not afraid to read the apostle will read this without any sinful thought when he condemns the shamelessness of those women who “exchanged natural use for unnatural” (Rom. I, 26), especially since in this case we do not remind and do not reproach, as he does, reprehensible shamelessness, but, explaining as much as possible those actions on which human birth depends, we avoid, like him, obscene words Chapter XXIV. That, remaining innocent and by right of obedience continuing to dwell in paradise, people would use their reproductive members to give birth to children in the same way as others, according to the free will So, spouses would give birth to offspring, using their reproductive members for this when it was necessary, and as much as necessary, and they would be controlled by the will, and not by lust. For our will sets in motion not only those members that have joints, muscles and tendons, such as arms and legs, but also other, more tender ones, such as the mouth, eyes, etc. There are even more delicate organs, the most delicate, with the exception of the brains, which are enclosed in the chest cavity, with the help of which we inhale and exhale, sigh and give voice - and they are subject to our will. Not to mention the natural ability of some animals to miraculously set in motion certain areas of the skin, by the trembling of which they can not only drive away flies, but also throw off pierced darts. Consequently, a person could also have had lower members in obedience, if he had not lost this because of his own disobedience. For it was not difficult for the Lord to create it in such a way that not one of its members would move against his will. We know that there are people who know how to control individual members of the body in a way that an ordinary person cannot control them: someone knows how to skillfully move their ears, both together or alternately; the other - with the skin of the forehead, lowering the hairline almost to eye level; the third can swallow all kinds of objects, and then easily remove them back, and in absolutely intact form. Some are able to imitate the voices of animals and birds with extraordinary skill. There are ventriloquists, there are people who can cry at will. But perhaps the most incredible thing was recently observed by some of the brothers with their own eyes. There was one presbyter in the diocese of the Kalm Church, named Restitut. Whenever he felt like it (and sometimes at the request of others), he, accompanied by sounds imitating crying, was distracted from all bodily feelings to such an extent that he could be pinched and stabbed, and even burned with fire - he did not feel any pain, except perhaps after, from the wounds inflicted. Moreover, they say that in this state he even stopped breathing. He heard the voices of people, as he later said himself, but as if sounding from afar. So, if even today in some people, who spend this miserable life in corruptible flesh, the body in many movements beyond the usual measure shows amazing submission, then what reason do we have not to believe that before sin and the punishment for sin, the members intended for the reproduction of offspring could obediently submit to the human will without any lust? Man is left to himself because, admiring himself, he has left God; but, not obeying God, he could not obey himself. The insignificance of this condition of his is most obvious in the fact that he cannot live as he wants. For, if he lived as he wanted, he would consider himself blessed, although in reality, however, he would not be so if he lived badly. Chapter XXV. About true bliss, which real life does not possess After all, if you look into the matter more closely, then, except for the blessed one, no one lives as he wants; and none is blessed except the righteous. But the righteous himself does not live as he wants, unless he manages to achieve such a state that it will be absolutely impossible for him to die, or fall into error, or be exposed to danger; and at the same time he will be absolutely sure that it will always be this way. Nature strives for this, and she will not be completely and completely blessed if she does not achieve what she strives for. And nowadays, which person can live as he wants, since life itself is not in his power? He wants to live, but is forced to die. Does he live as he wants if he cannot live as long as he wants? And if he wished to die, then how can someone who does not want to live live the way he wants? And if he wanted to die in order to find bliss after death, then especially now he does not live the way he wants. But even if he lived as he wanted: wouldn’t he live like that because he forced himself not to want what he cannot, as Terence said: “If it is impossible to get what you want, desire what is possible” 153 . Is it bliss to be patiently miserable? Is the life that is not loved blessed? And if she is blessed and she is loved, then isn’t she loved for her own sake, and everything else is also loved for her sake? If she is loved as much as she is worthy of love, then it is impossible for the one who loves her not to desire her to be eternal. So, she will be blessed when she is eternal. Chapter XXVI. It must be assumed that the happy inhabitants of paradise could perform the duties of procreation without shameful desire So, man lived in paradise as he wanted, as long as he wanted what God commanded. He lived enjoying God, from Whom, as good, he himself was good. He lived without any lack, having in his power to live like this forever. There was food so as not to experience hunger, there was drink so as not to feel thirsty, and finally, there was a tree of life so that old age would not weaken it. There was nothing that hurt, there were no diseases to be afraid of. The flesh was healthy, the soul was calm. There was neither heat nor cold; there was no sadness, there was no artificial joy: there was one continuous joy flowing from God, for whom love burned “from a pure heart and a good conscience and unfeigned faith” (1 Tim. 1:5); and at the same time there was faithful communication between spouses, based on pure love, agreement of mind and body, easy observance of an easy commandment. Fatigue did not tire me, sleep did not force me against my will. How can we doubt that they could have produced offspring without the disease of lust? Proper members, like all others, would be set in motion by the demand of the will, and “the husband would cling to the womb of his wife” 154 without passionate excitement, with complete peace of mind and body and maintaining chastity. For if our life experience does not confirm this, then it does not at all follow that this cannot happen at all. We are talking about subjects that currently offend modesty, and therefore, although we make assumptions about what they might have been like before they began to be ashamed, it is necessary that our speech should rather be curbed by modesty, which stops us, than seek help from eloquence, which we are not good at. For what we are talking about was not experienced in practice by those who could have experienced it (they deserved expulsion from paradise before they managed, through a calm movement of the will, to copulate to generate offspring); but as soon as we mention this now, human feeling immediately imagines the experience of passionate lust, and not the disposition of free will. That is why shame interferes with speech, although the mind does not change thinking. But be that as it may, the almighty God and the most blessed Creator did not lack the provident wisdom to fill His city from the condemned human race with a certain predetermined number of citizens, singling them out not according to merit, for all people, without exception, were condemned at their corrupted roots, but by grace, and showing to the liberated both by the example of themselves and by the example of the unliberated how great He was to them. gifts. For everyone can see that it is not by merit, but by undeserved and merciful grace that he is delivered from evil. Why, in this case, would God not have created those about whom He knew in advance that they would sin, if it was in them and through them, through the crime they committed and through the grace He bestowed, that He was able to show that under the authority of the Creator and Provider, the perverse disorder of sinners cannot pervert the correct order of things? Chapter XXVII. About sinners, angels and people, whose corruption does not upset the plans of God's providence Sinners, both angels and men, can do nothing that would hinder the great works of the Lord, which “are desirable to all who love them” (Ps. 111:2). For He who has prudently distributed to each what is his own knows how to properly use not only the good, but also the evil. Therefore, using an evil angel, as punishment for the first evil will of the first man, God allowed the first man, who was originally created with a good will, to be tempted by this angel. Created good, he, relying on God's help, would have defeated the evil angel, but, content with himself in pride, he abandoned the Creator and was defeated. Thus, his crime consisted of a perverted will that turned away from the Creator. But was it really in his power that, even being content with himself, he could evade the benefits of divine grace? Just as it is not in our power to continue to live in the flesh without its proper nutrition, but not to live in it is in our power, so it was not in our power to live well without God’s help, even in heaven, it was not in our power, but it was in our power to live badly. So, although God knew about the future fall of man, what reason could there be why He would not allow the cunning of an envious angel to tempt him? Knowing that he would be defeated, God also knew in advance that the same devil, with the assistance of the grace of God, would be defeated by the seed of man with even greater glory for the saints. Thus, nothing was hidden from God, and with His foreknowledge He did not force anyone to sin. But who dares to think or say that it was not in the power of God that neither angel nor man should fall? But He chose not to take away their power to do this, and thus show how much evil their pride can do, and how much good His grace can do. Chapter XXVIII. On the properties of two cities, earthly and heavenly So, two cities were created by two kinds of love: earthly - love for oneself, which reached the point of contempt for God; heavenly - love for God, reaching the point of self-contempt. The first places his glory in himself, the second in the Lord. For he seeks glory from people, and for this the greatest glory is God, the witness of conscience. He lifts up his head in his glory, and this one says to his God: “You, Lord... are my glory, and you lift up my head” (Ps. III, 4). Those who are ruled by the lust of domination, in this they serve each other out of love. He loves his own strength in his best people, but this one says: “I will love You, O Lord, my strength!” (Ps. XVII, 2). Therefore, in that city, its wise men, living according to man, sought some benefits for their body or soul, or for both at once, but those who could know God “did not glorify Him as God and did not give thanks, but became futile in their speculations, and their foolish hearts were darkened, calling themselves wise” (i.e. exalted under the influence of pride in their wisdom), “they became mad and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image similar to corruptible man, and birds, and four-footed animals, and reptiles” (for in the veneration of idols of this kind they were either leaders of nations or followers), “and they worshiped and served the creature instead of the Creator, who is blessed forever” (Rom. I, 21-25). In this city there is no other wisdom except piety, which rightly honors the true God, expecting in the company of saints, not only people, but also angels, that reward when “God will be all in all” (1 Cor. XV, 28). In the Kiev edition, the words in the quotation are rearranged. – Editorial staff of “ABC of Faith” Caritas is a feeling of love for superiors, combined with a feeling of respect, such as for parents, for the fatherland, for God; amor - a feeling of love between equals, as between spouses, brothers, etc. In the modern Russian canonical edition, the words of the Lord are translated three times as “you love.” For example, Origen. Homil. I in Cant. Experience the impressions with equanimity. The link is incorrect. – Editorial staff of “ABC of Faith” Virg. A_En. VI. v. 278–279. Crantor at Citzer. Tucul. III Genitale arvum, as Virgil calls it. Georg. III. Virg. A_En. VIII. v. 406. You might be interested in: