XXV. And if He ascend up into Heaven, [4676] ascend with Him. Be one of those angels who escort Him, or one of those who receive Him. Bid the gates be lifted up, [4677] or be made higher, that they may receive Him, exalted after His Passion. Answer to those who are in doubt because He bears up with Him His body and the tokens of His Passion, which He had not when He came down, and who therefore inquire, "Who is this King of Glory?" that it is the Lord strong and mighty, as in all things that He hath done from time to time and does, so now in His battle and triumph for the sake of Mankind. And give to the doubting of the question the twofold answer. And if they marvel and say as in Isaiah's drama Who is this that cometh from Edom and from the things of earth? Or How are the garments red of Him that is without blood or body, as of one that treads in the full wine-press? [4678] set forth the beauty of the array of the Body that suffered, adorned by the Passion, and made splendid by the Godhead, than which nothing can be more lovely or more beautiful.
XXVI. [4679] To this what will those cavillers say, those bitter reasoners about Godhead, those detractors of all things that are praiseworthy, those darkeners of Light, uncultured in respect of Wisdom, for whom Christ died in vain, unthankful creatures, the work of the Evil One. Do you turn this benefit into a reproach to God? Will you deem Him little on this account, that He humbled Himself for your sake, and because to seek for that which had wandered the Good Shepherd, He who layeth down His life for the sheep, [4680] came upon the mountains and hills upon which you used to sacrifice, [4681] and found the wandering one; and having found it, took it upon His shoulders, [4682] on which He also bore the wood; and having borne it, brought it back to the life above; and having brought it back, numbered it among those who have never strayed. That He lit a candle, [4683] His own flesh, and swept the house, by cleansing away the sin of the world, and sought for the coin, the Royal Image that was all covered up with passions, and calls together His friends, the Angelic Powers, at the finding of the coin, and makes them sharers of His joy, as He had before made them sharers of the secret of His Incarnation? That the Light that is exceeding bright should follow the Candle--Forerunner, [4684] and the Word, the Voice, and the Bridegroom, the Bridegroom's friend, [4685] that prepared for the Lord a peculiar people [4686] and cleansed them by the water [4687] in preparation for the Spirit? Do you Reproach God with this? Do you conceive of Him as less because He girds Himself with a towel and washes His disciples, [4688] and shows that humiliation is the best road to exaltation; [4689] because He humbles Himself for the sake of the soul that is bent down to the ground, [4690] that He may even exalt with Himself that which is bent double under a weight of sin? How comes it that you do not also charge it upon Him as a crime that He eateth with Publicans [4691] and at Publicans' tables, and makes disciples of Publicans [4692] that He too may make some gain. And what gain? The salvation of sinners. If so, one must blame the physician for stooping over suffering and putting up with evil smells in order to give health to the sick; and him also who leans over the ditch, that he may, according to the Law, save the beast that has fallen into it.
XXVII. He was sent, but sent according to His Manhood (for He was of two Natures), since He was hungry and thirsty and weary, and was distressed and wept, according to the Laws of human nature. But even if He were sent also as God, what of that? Consider the Mission to be the good pleasure of the Father, to which He refers all that concerns Himself, both that He may honour the Eternal Principle, and that He may avoid the appearance of being a rival God. For He is said on the one hand to have been betrayed, and on the other it is written that He gave Himself up; and so too that He was raised and taken up by the Father, and also that of His own power He rose and ascended. The former belongs to the Good Pleasure, the latter to His own Authority; but you dwell upon all that diminishes Him, while you ignore all that exalts Him. For instance, you score that He suffered, but you do not add "of His own Will." Ah, what things has the Word even now to suffer! By some He is honoured as God but confused with the Father; by others He is dishonoured as Flesh, and is severed from God. With whom shall He be most angry--or rather which shall He forgive--those who falsely contract Him, or those who divide Him? For the former ought to have made a distinction, and the latter to have made a Union, the one in number, the other in Godhead. Do you stumble at His Flesh? So did the Jews. Do you call Him a Samaritan, [4693] and the rest which I will not utter? This did not even the demons, O man more unbelieving than demons, and more stupid than Jews. The Jews recognized the title Son as expressing equal rank; and the demons knew that He who drove them out was God, for they were persuaded by their own experience. But you will not either admit the equality or confess the Godhead. It would have been better for you to have been circumcised and a demoniac--to reduce the matter to an absurdity--than in uncircumcision and robust health to be thus ill and ungodly disposed. But for our war with such men, let it be brought to an end by their returning, however late, to a sound mind, if they will; or else if they will not, let it be postponed to another occasion, if they continue as they are. Anyhow, we will have no fear when contending for the Trinity with the help of the Trinity.
XXVIII. It is now needful for us to sum up our discourse as follows: We were created that we might be made happy. We were made happy when we were created. We were entrusted with Paradise that we might enjoy life. We received a Commandment that we might obtain a good repute by keeping it; not that God did not know what would take place, but because He had laid down the law of Free Will. We were deceived because we were the objects of envy. We were cast out because we transgressed. We fasted because we refused to fast, being overpowered by the Tree of Knowledge. For the Commandment was ancient, coeval with ourselves, and was a kind of education of our souls and curb of luxury, to which we were reasonably made subject, in order that we might recover by keeping it that which we had lost by not keeping it. We needed an Incarnate God, a God put to death, that we might live. We were put to death together with Him, that we might be cleansed; we rose again with Him because we were put to death with Him; we were glorified with Him, because we rose again with Him.
XXIX. Many indeed are the miracles of that time: God crucified; the sun darkened and again rekindled; for it was fitting that the creatures should suffer with their Creator; the veil rent; the Blood and Water shed from His Side; the one as from a man, the other as above man; the rocks rent for the Rock's sake; the dead raised for a pledge of the final Resurrection of all men; the Signs at the Sepulchre and after the Sepulchre, which none can worthily celebrate; and yet none of these equal to the Miracle of my salvation. A few drops of Blood recreate the whole world, and become to all men what rennet is to milk, drawing us together and compressing us into unity.
XXX. But, O Pascha, great and holy and purifier of all the world--for I will speak to thee as to a living person--O Word of God and Light and Life and Wisdom and Might--for I rejoice in all Thy names--O Offspring and Expression and Signet of the Great Mind; O Word conceived and Man contemplated, Who bearest all things, binding them by the Word of Thy power; receive this discourse, not now as firstfruits, but perhaps as the completion of my offerings, a thanksgiving, and at the same time a supplication, that we may suffer no evil beyond those necessary and sacred cares in which our life has been passed; and stay the tyranny of the body over us; (Thou seest, O Lord, how great it is and how it bows me down) or Thine own sentence, if we are to be condemned by Thee. But if we are to be released, in accordance with our desire, and be received into the Heavenly Tabernacle, there too it may be we shall offer Thee acceptable Sacrifices upon Thine Altar, to Father and Word and Holy Ghost; for to Thee belongeth all glory and honour and might, world without end. Amen.
[4587] Hab. ii. 1.
[4588] Judg. xiii. 6.
[4589] 2 Cor. v. 17.
[4590] The reading eudokia of the Received Text is pronounced by Tischendorf to have less authority than eudokias, which he adopts on the testimony of important mss., but chiefly on the strength of a citation and comment three times in Origen, and because all the Latin Fathers read bonæ voluntatis. Lachmann, Tregelles, Westcott, and with some hesitation Alford follow him; though Tregelles and Westcott allow eudokias a place in the margin. Wordsworth (giving no reason); and Scrivener because he thinks it makes better sense, read eudokia, and scout eudokias; which, however, is found in four of the five oldest mss., and in all the Latin versions and Fathers. The Greek Fathers, however, all but unanimously support the Received Text.
[4591] heorte heorton, kai paneguris panegurion. heorte says Nicetas, is one thing, paneguris another. heorte is the Commemoration of a Saint; paneguris is Easter, or Ascension, or some other mystical festival. Thus Synesius calls the Paschal Letters of the Alexandrian Patriarch panegurika grammata.
[4592] This passage to the end of c. ix. occurs verbatim in the oration on the Theophany, cc. vii.-xiii.
[4593] "There is no Past in Eternity, and no Future; for that which is past has ceased to be, and that which is future has not yet come into existence; but Eternity is only Present; it has no Past which does not still exist nor any Future which does not yet exist" (S. Augustine de Vera Rel., c. 49).
[4594] The Environment here spoken of seems to mean those created Existences of which God is the Self-Existent Cause.
[4595] John x. 15; 1 Cor. xiii. 12.
[4596] Wisd. ii. 24.
[4597] Pascha represents the Hebrew PHSKH. Throughout 2 Chron. the LXX. represents the word by Phasek, which like Pascha is a transliteration of the Hebrew word. The form which the transliteration takes is due to the fact that the Greek language does not tolerate these two aspirates in juxtapostion. S. Gregory is correct in remarking that Pascha has no real connection with pascho (to suffer), though it might appear to unlearned ears that it has.
[4598] Heb. x. 1.
[4599] Exod. xxv. 40.
[4600] aphairema is given by the Lexicons as the Heave-Offering, and it is certainly used in that sense among others (all sacrificial) in the LXX. Suicer, however, follows Suidas in regarding the word as quite general; he also quotes Zonaras' definition, "Quod offertur aphairema dicitur, quod a toto mactatæ animantis corpore abstractum sit." Balsamon, according to the same authority, makes it the portion which was severed from the carcase of the victim and set apart for the Priest (i.e., the heave-offering, Lev. vii. 14, 32).
[4601] Rom. xi. 33.
[4602] The Jewish Sacrifices had a deep inner meaning and mystery. In a limited sense they may be called Sacraments of the future Atonement, which they prefigured and appealed to. But only in a limited sense can they be so called, because they did not convey grace to the soul, but only appealed to the grace to come; and so the Sin-offerings of the Law are only said to cover, not to take away sin. They removed the spiritual disqualification for worship; but they did not restore full Spiritual Communion with God. Still they were not altogether unhallowed or useless like those of the heathen, inasmuch as they did point forward and plead the merits of the One true Sacrifice.
[4603] Isa. xiii. 3.
[4604] Mal. iv. 2.
[4605] The Greek here is very obscure. The meaning seems to be that which Nicetas suggests, viz.:--that our Lord in coming to earth and becoming Incarnate did not in His Divine Nature leave Heaven, but was, while still here on earth in His own words, "The Son of Man Which is in Heaven."