Sermons to the People 289.1–290.7

The reason for our crowded gathering today is the birthday of John the Baptist, whose wonderful conception and birth we heard about when the Gospel was read. A great mystery, my brothers: John’s mother was both barren and old, his father old; offspring was altogether despaired of on both sides. But because nothing is impossible with God, a son was promised to one who did not believe. Voice was taken away from the father who lacked faith: for it had already been written, “I believed, therefore I spoke.” He did not believe, and he did not speak. Meanwhile a virgin also conceived, and this was a sublime miracle and far more excellent. A barren woman conceives the herald, a virgin the judge. John from a man and a woman, Christ from a woman alone. Is John perhaps to be compared with Christ? Far from it. Yet not without reason did so great a one go before so great a One. For if, the Lord our God himself deigning and granting power to my effort, I am able to explain what I think, neither will my lowliness be abandoned nor your expectation cheated. But if I am less able to explain what I think, the Lord our God will supply in your hearts what he may perhaps have withheld from me because of my weakness. I have said this beforehand because I know what I want to say and you do not, and I already feel how difficult it is to explain. But it had to be commended to you, so that by your very attention you might be able to pray for us.

Elizabeth conceived a man, Mary a man: Elizabeth the mother of John, Mary the mother of Christ; but Elizabeth only a man, Mary God and man. It is a wonderful thing, how a creature could conceive the Creator. What, then, are we to understand, my brothers, except that he who made the first man without father and mother made flesh for himself from a mother alone? Our first fall was when the woman through whom we died conceived the serpent’s poison in her heart. For the serpent urged sin, and the evil counselor was admitted. If our first fall was when a woman conceived in her heart the serpent’s poison, it is not surprising that our salvation came about when a woman conceived in her womb the flesh of the Almighty. Both sexes had fallen; both had to be restored. Through a woman we had been sent to destruction; through a woman salvation has been given back to us.

What, then, is the meaning of John? Why was he set in between? Why was he sent ahead? I will say, if I can. Our Lord Jesus Christ said of John: “Among those born of women none has arisen greater than John the Baptist.” If John is compared with men, this man surpasses all; no one surpasses him but the God-man. John was sent before the Lord. There was such excellence in him, such grace, that he himself was thought to be the Christ. For the Jews were waiting for the Christ, because Christ had been foretold by the very prophets whom they too read. They waited for him when absent; they killed him when present. While they think it is not he, they themselves failed, and he remained. Yet not all failed: many even of the Jews believed. So, since the Christ was awaited, you see John’s glory: when so great a grace was noticed in him, as he baptized in repentance and prepared the way for the Lord like a surveyor sent ahead, the Jews sent to him and said, “Who are you? Are you Elijah, or the prophet? Or are you the Christ?” “I am not,” he said, “the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the prophet.” “And who are you?” they say. “I am,” he says, “the voice of one crying in the wilderness.” John answered the Jews, who asked who he was and were already beginning to think that he was the Christ: “I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness.” You heard, if you were attentive, the prophetic reading which was recited first. There it is written: “The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight. Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be brought low, and the crooked shall become straight, and the rough ways smooth; and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.” Then the Lord said through the prophet: “Cry out”; and I said, “What shall I cry?” And the Lord there in the prophet: “All flesh is grass, and all the glory of the flesh like the flower of grass: the grass has withered and the flower has fallen; but the word of the Lord abides forever.” John said, “I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare the way of the Lord”: that is to say, it was foretold of me by the prophet that I would be crying in the wilderness. So it belongs to John to say, “All flesh is grass, and all the glory of the flesh like the flower of grass: the grass has withered and the flower has fallen; but the word of the Lord abides forever.” The Word is conceived in the virgin’s womb; the voice of the Word cries in the wilderness. A voice, if it is not a word, is perhaps a noise for the ears; indeed even that could hardly be said of it. Every word is a voice; not every voice is a word. If a man with open mouth shouts as loud as he can, it is a voice, it is not a word. But what is the voice that is called a word? When something is understood, a signifying voice is a word. But see, it does not yet sound; I want to say something, and the word is already in my heart. The word is in the heart, and not yet the voice in the mouth. So there can be a word without a voice, and there can be a voice without a word. Add voice to word, and the word comes forth into knowledge. What then is Christ in Mary? The hidden Word. The voice was sent ahead, so that it might go before the Word. What is John? “The voice of one crying in the wilderness.” What is Christ? “In the beginning was the Word.” What are you, voice? What are you, man? “All flesh is grass, and all the glory of man like the flower of grass: the grass has withered, and the flower has fallen; but the word of the Lord abides forever.” Hold yourself to the Word; for your sake the Word took on grass. Christ is the Word incarnate. But all flesh is grass, and all the honor of the flesh like the flower of grass: let us despise present things; let us hope for things to come. “Every valley shall be filled”: all humility shall be exalted. “And every mountain and hill shall be brought low”: all pride shall be cast down. Lay down the mountains, fill the valleys, and the evenness of a plain is made. Give me the rich and honored, from the flower of grass: let them hear, “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” Give me the poor in despair, aware of their weakness: let them not despair; let them believe in him who came for all. Let these be lifted up, those pressed down. Let him who is to come find a plain, not a stone on which to strike his foot. For this is why John himself said, “Prepare the way of the Lord”: not for me, but for the Lord; by whom I was sent, not what I am.

But the Jews say, “Are you the Christ?” If he had not been a valley to be filled but a mountain to be brought low, he had found an occasion to deceive. For they wanted to hear from him what they would believe. For they so admired his grace that they would believe without doubt whatever he said. See, he had found an occasion to deceive the human race: if he said, “I am the Christ,” they would believe him. If he boasted of himself by another’s name, he would lose his own merit. If he boasted of himself as the Christ, would he not answer himself: “Why do you exalt yourself? All flesh is grass, and its glory like the flower of grass: the grass has withered, the flower has fallen.” Understand what abides forever: “But the word of the Lord abides forever.” He knew himself: rightly the Lord called him a lamp. The Lord says this of John: “He was a burning and shining lamp, and you were willing to rejoice for an hour in his light.” But what does John the evangelist say of him? “There was a man sent from God whose name was John: he came for testimony, to bear witness to the light; he was not the light.” Who? John the Baptist. Who says this? John the evangelist: “He was not the light, but came to bear witness to the light.” You say, “He was not the light”: of whom the Light himself says, “He was a burning and shining lamp.” But I know, he says, what kind of light I mean: I know the light in comparison with which a lamp is no light. Listen to what follows: “That was the true light, which enlightens every man coming into this world.” John does not enlighten every man; Christ enlightens every man. And John knew himself to be a lamp, lest he be put out by the wind of pride. A lamp can both be lit and be put out. The Word of God cannot be put out; a lamp always can.

So the highest man was sent to bear witness to him who was more than man. For when he, than whom none greater has arisen among those born of women, says, “I am not the Christ,” and humbles himself before Christ, something more than man is to be understood. For if you seek the highest man, it is John; more than man is Christ. So understand the forerunner that you may seek the judge; so hear the herald that you may fear the judge. He was sent; he foretold the one to come. And what testimony does John bear to Christ? Hear what kind: “The strap of whose sandal I am not worthy to loosen.” Have you understood, O man, what you should do? “Everyone who humbles himself will be exalted.” What then of Christ? “We have all received from his fullness.” What does “we all” mean? So the patriarchs, prophets, and holy apostles, whether sent ahead before the incarnation or sent by the incarnate One: “we have all received from his fullness.” We are vessels; he is the fountain. So if we have understood the mystery, my brothers, John is a man, Christ is God: let man be humbled, and God exalted. That man might be humbled, John was born on the day on which the days begin to decrease. That God might be exalted, Christ was born on the day on which the days begin to increase. A great mystery. We celebrate John’s birthday as we do Christ’s because that very birth is full of mystery. What mystery? Of our height. Let us decrease in man, let us increase in God. Let us be humbled in ourselves, so that we may be exalted in him. The mystery of so great a thing was fulfilled by the deaths of both. That man might decrease, John lost his head; that God might be exalted, Christ was hung on the wood. John was sent for this: that we might imitate him and hold ourselves to the Word. However much human pride may boast of any excellence of holiness, who will be what John was? Whoever you are who think yourself great, you will not be what John was. He was not yet born, and already, leaping in the womb, he foretold the Lord who was to be born. What is more excellent than this holiness? Imitate him: hear what he says of Christ: “We have received from his fullness.” The lamp in the night shows you the fountain, from which it too drinks: “For we,” he says, “have all received from his fullness.” We all: he the fountain, we the vessels; he the day, we lamps. Great is the weakness of men: the day is sought by means of a lamp. But the apostles too, my brothers, are lamps of the day. Do not think that John alone is a lamp and the apostles are not. The Lord says to them: “You are the light of the world.” And lest they think they were such a light as he was called light of whom it was said, “That was the true light, which enlightens every man coming into this world,” he at once taught them what that true lamp is. When he had said, “You are the light of the world,” he added and said, “No one lights a lamp and puts it under a bushel.” When I called you light, I called you a lamp: do not exult in your pride, lest the little flame be put out. I do not put you under a bushel, but so that you may shine you will be on a lampstand. What is the lampstand of the lamp? Hear the lampstand: be lamps, and you will have a lampstand. The cross of Christ is the great lampstand. Whoever wants to shine, let him not be ashamed of the wooden lampstand. Listen, so that you may understand that the lampstand is the cross of Christ. “No one lights a lamp and puts it under a bushel, but on a lampstand, so that it may give light to all who are in the house. So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify”—not as you seek to be glorified: you seek to be put out—“glorify your Father who is in heaven.” Through your good works let them glorify your Father. That you might be lamps, you could not light yourselves, you could not set yourselves on the lampstand: let him be glorified who granted you this. Listen, then, to the apostle Paul, listen to the lamp exulting on the lampstand. “But for me,” he says—those who know what follows are crying out—“but for me”: what then for you? “Far be it from me to glory except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.” I glory in the lampstand: if the lampstand is withdrawn, I fall. “Far be it from me to glory except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.” You have praised and applauded. Let the world be crucified to you; be crucified to the world. What is this? Do not seek happiness from the world: keep yourselves from the happiness of the world. The world flatters: let the corrupter be guarded against; the world threatens: let the assailant not be feared. If the good things of the world do not corrupt you, if the evil things of the world do not break you, the world has been crucified to you, and you to the world. Glory in the lampstand; keep, O lamp, humility always on the lampstand, so that you may keep your brightness; take care not to be put out by pride. Keep what you were made, so that you may glory in the Maker. For what were you, O man? Every man, consider how you were born: even if you were born noble, you were born naked. What is nobility? The nakedness of the poor man and the rich at birth is equal. Or perhaps, because you were born noble, do you live as long as you want? When you did not know, you entered; when you do not want, you go out. Finally, let the tombs be inspected and the bones of the rich be recognized.

Saint John—not the evangelist but the Baptist—was sent before the face of Christ to prepare his ways. Christ’s testimony about John is: “Among those born of women there has not arisen a greater than John the Baptist.” John’s testimony about Christ is: “He who comes after me is greater than I, the strap of whose sandal I am not worthy to loosen.” Let us consider both testimonies, the one the Lord bore to the servant and the one the servant bore to the Lord. What is the Lord’s testimony about the servant? “Among those born of women there has not arisen a greater than John the Baptist.” What is the servant’s testimony about the Lord? “He who comes after me is greater than I.” If, then, among those born of women there has not arisen a greater than John the Baptist, what is he who is greater than he? John is a great man, but a man; Christ is greater than John, because he is God and man. Both were wonderfully born: the herald and the judge, the lamp and the day, the voice and the Word, the servant and the Lord. The servant from a barren woman, the Lord from a virgin. The Lord himself made a servant for himself in a barren womb, from an old father and an aged mother; and the same Lord made flesh for himself in a virgin’s womb, without a human father, he who made the first man without father and mother. None has arisen among those born of women greater than John the Baptist. John seemed so great that he was even thought by some to be the Christ. He did not in his pride follow another’s error, nor dare to say, “I am what you think”; but, which was good for him, he knew himself, so that the servant was humbled at the Lord’s feet and at the strap of his sandal, lest the lamp be put out by the wind of pride.

Indeed, because John was born in a great mystery, the Church celebrates the birthday of him alone among the righteous. The Lord’s birthday is also celebrated, but as the Lord’s. Give me another servant besides John, among the patriarchs, among the prophets, among the apostles, whose birthday the Church of Christ celebrates. We celebrate the day of martyrdom for very many servants; the day of birth for none but John. You heard, when the Gospel was read, what the order was of the two being born, the forerunner and the Ruler, and, as I said a little earlier, the herald and the Judge, the voice and the Word. The angel Gabriel announces John; the same angel Gabriel announces the Lord Jesus Christ. The one goes before, the other follows: the one goes before by obeying, the other follows by ruling. For he follows in being born, he goes before in ruling: because Christ also created John himself, after whom Christ was created, both creator and created; creator before his mother, creator of his mother, created in his mother. And why do I say, creator before his mother? “Before Abraham was, I am,” he himself said; the Gospel says so: listen, or read it. But it is too little to say creator before Abraham: creator before Adam, creator before heaven and earth, creator before all the angels and the whole spiritual creation, thrones, dominions, principalities, and powers, creator before all things. Because in the beginning the Word was not made, but the Word was, “and the Word was with God, and the Word was God: he was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him.” If all things, visible and invisible, heaven and earth, then the virgin Mary too: for the virgin Mary too is from the earth, and Christ, the maker of the earth, was made from the earth, because “truth has sprung up from the earth.”

Briefly, then, I commend a great mystery to Your Love. Because there were going to be many who would think that Christ was only a man, nothing more than a man, therefore a great man, than whom there was none greater among men, John, bore witness to him, subject, bowed down, humbled. How far would he have made himself humble if he had said he was worthy to loosen the strap of his sandal? Attend, in a great mystery, to the strap of the sandal. How humble would John have shown himself even if he had said he was worthy? What did he do by calling himself unworthy? For this reason the day of his birth has been marked and commended to the Church’s celebration.

But there is a very great difference, not only in the mothers—that one was a virgin, the other a barren married woman; the one bearing by the Holy Spirit the Son of God, our Lord, the other bearing by her old husband the Lord’s forerunner. Attend to this too. Zechariah did not believe. How did he not believe? He asked the angel by what he would know what was being promised, since he was old and his wife was advanced in her days. And the angel said to him: “Behold, you will be silent and unable to speak until the day on which these things come to pass, because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their time.” The same angel comes to Mary, announces that Christ will be born of her in the flesh, and Mary says something similar. For he said: “By what shall I know this? For I am old, and my wife is advanced in her days.” And it is said to him: “Behold, you will be silent and unable to speak until the day on which these things are fulfilled, because you did not believe my words.” And he received the punishment of silence as the desert of unbelief. What had the prophet said of John? “The voice of one crying in the wilderness.” Zechariah, about to beget the voice, is silent. Because he did not believe, he was silent; rightly he was struck dumb until the voice should be born. For if it was rightly said, or rather because it was very rightly said in the holy psalm, “I believed, therefore I have spoken,” because he did not believe, he rightly did not speak. But I beg, Lord—I knock together with those who hear me—open to us, explain to us what this question means. Zechariah asks the angel for reasons, by what he would know what was announced to him, since he was old and his wife advanced in her days: it is said to him, “Because you did not believe, you will be silent.” Christ is announced to the virgin Mary, and she too asks a reason and says to the angel, “How will this be, since I do not know a man?” He: “By what shall I know this? For I am old, and my wife is advanced in her days.” And she: “How will this be, since I do not know a man?” To him it is said, “You will be silent, because you do not believe”; to her the reason is explained, silence is not imposed. “How will this be, since I do not know a man?” And the angel: “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you.” See how what you ask will come about, see how you do not know a man and will give birth, see how: because the Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Do not fear the heat of lust under the shade of so great a holiness. Why this? If we attend to the words, either both believed or both doubted, Zechariah and Mary. But we are able to hear the words; God can question even the hearts.

We understand, dearly beloved, that when Zechariah said, “By what shall I know this? For I am old, and my wife is advanced in her days,” he spoke despairing, not inquiring; but when Mary on the contrary said, “How will this be, since I do not know a man?” she spoke inquiring, not despairing. While she asked, she did not doubt the promise. O truly full of grace! For so she was greeted by the angel: “Hail, full of grace.” Who can explain this grace? Who is sufficient to give thanks for this grace? Man is made, and through free choice man perishes; and he who made man is found made man, so that what he made might not perish. In the beginning the Word, God with God, through whom all things were made, becomes flesh: “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” The Word becomes flesh, but the flesh comes to the Word; the Word does not perish in the flesh. O grace! What were we worthy of, that we should have this? But see what holy Mary herself says, full of faith, full of grace, the mother to be, the virgin to remain. What does she say among other things, of which it would take very long to speak one by one? What does she say? “He has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty.” Who are the hungry? The humble, the needy. Who are the rich? The proud and puffed up. I do not send you far: I show you now, in one temple, a rich man of those who are sent away empty, and a poor man of those who are filled with good things. “Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector.” The Pharisee was speaking. What was he saying? Attend to the rich man belching undigested food, breathing out a surfeit, but of pride, not of justice: “God,” he said, “I thank you that I am not like other men, robbers, unjust, adulterers, like this tax collector. I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess.” Had you come to ask, or to praise yourself? You said you had everything; you asked for nothing as one in need. How then did you come to pray? “I thank you, Lord.” He does not say, “Lord, give me grace.” “That I am not like other men, robbers, unjust, adulterers.” Are you then the only righteous one? “That I am not like this tax collector.” You insult, you do not exult. “I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess.” O rich man to be emptied! Come, come, poor man, hungry tax collector; or rather, stand there where you are standing. For “the tax collector stood far off.” But the Lord drew near to the humble one. “Nor did he dare to raise his eyes to heaven.” Where he did not raise his eyes, there he had his heart. “But he beat his breast, saying, Lord, be merciful to me a sinner.” O hungry man, to be filled with good things!

You have heard the dispute, Lord: deliver your verdict. Pronounce the verdict between the parties brought before you. The defeated party does not appeal, because there is no one to appeal to. For he does not appeal from the Son to the Father. “For the Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son.” Let the Truth, then, pronounce the verdict between the parties. “Truly,” he says, “I tell you, this man went down from the temple justified rather than that Pharisee.” Why so, I ask you? By what justice? Do you want to hear? “Because everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.” By whom this man will be exalted, by him he who exalts himself will be humbled. Because “he has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty.” Go now, and fan out your riches, boast, and say, “I am rich.” How rich? “If I will, I am righteous; if I will not, I am not righteous. It is in my power to be righteous and not to be righteous.” Do you not hear in the psalm, “Those who trust in their own strength”? So God gave you flesh, God gave you sense, God gave you a soul, God gave you a mind, God gave you understanding: do you give yourself justice? What is flesh, what are the senses, what is the soul, what is the mind, what is understanding without justice? Will not all these, if they lack justice, serve for punishment? Are you so rich, then, that, while God gave you the lower things, you give yourself the better? Badly rich, rich to be emptied; if indeed you have what you said you have. “What do you have that you did not receive?” You did not learn even from that proud and rich Pharisee to give thanks to the Lord for the things you said you have.