Catechetical Lectures 14.1–14.23

Rejoice, all you who mourned before when you heard of the outrages and lawless deeds of the Jews; for he who was insulted by them here has risen again. And as the hearing about the cross was grievous, so let the good news of the resurrection gladden those present. Let mourning be turned into gladness, and lamentation into joy; and let our mouth be filled with joy and gladness, because of him who after the resurrection said, “Rejoice.” For I know the grief of the lovers of Christ in the past days: since what was said ended at the death and the burial and did not announce the resurrection, your mind was in suspense to hear what it longed for. The dead one, then, has risen, he who was free among the dead and the liberator of the dead; he who in dishonour, by his endurance, had the crown of thorns bound around him has risen and put on the diadem of victory over death.

But as we set out the testimonies concerning his cross, come, let us now also make sure of the proofs of the resurrection; since the Apostle before us says, “He was buried, and has been raised on the third day according to the Scriptures.” Since, then, the Apostle has sent us back to the testimonies of the Scriptures, it is good for us to come to know the hope of our salvation, and to learn first whether the divine Scriptures tell us the season of his resurrection, whether it comes in summer or in autumn or after winter; and from what kind of place the Saviour rose; and what name of the place of the resurrection has been proclaimed in the wonderful prophets; and whether the women who sought him and did not find him rejoice afterwards when they find him; so that when the Gospels are read, the narratives of the holy Gospels may not be thought fables or rhapsodies.

That the Saviour was buried you have heard plainly in the previous discourse, from Isaiah, who says, “His burial shall be in peace”; for in his burial he made peace between heaven and earth, bringing sinners to God; and, “The righteous man is taken away from the face of unrighteousness”; and, “His burial shall be in peace”; and, “I will give the wicked in return for his burial”; and the prophecy of Jacob in the Scriptures, which says, “He lay down and slept like a lion and like a lion's whelp; who shall rouse him?”; and the similar saying in Numbers, “He couched and lay down like a lion and like a lion's whelp.” And you have often heard the psalm that says, “And you brought me down into the dust of death.” And we noted the place too, when we said, “Look to the rock …” … [4] First, then, he says in the eleventh psalm, “Because of the misery of the poor and the groaning of the needy, now I will arise, says the Lord.” But this is still doubtful to some; for he often rises up in anger too, to take vengeance on his enemies. Come, then, to the fifteenth psalm, which says plainly, “Preserve me, Lord, for in you I have hoped”; and after this, “I will not gather their assemblies of blood, nor will I remember their names upon my lips,” since they rejected me and enrolled Caesar as their king; and what follows, “I foresaw the Lord always before me, for he is at my right hand, that I may not be shaken”; and a little later, “Moreover even until night my reins instructed me”; and after this he says most plainly, “For you will not leave my soul in Hades, nor will you give your Holy One to see corruption.” He did not say, “Nor will you give your Holy One to see death,” since then he would not have died; but, “Corruption,” he says, “I do not see, and in death I shall not remain.” “You have made known to me the ways of life.” Behold, life after death is plainly proclaimed. Come also to the twenty-ninth psalm: “I will exalt you, O Lord, for you have lifted me up, and have not made my enemies rejoice over me.” What happened? Were you rescued from enemies, or set free when about to be struck? He himself says most plainly, “O Lord, you have brought up my soul from Hades.” There he says, “You will not leave,” prophetically; here he speaks of what was to happen as having happened: “You have brought up.” “You have saved me from those who go down into the pit.” At what time does what follows happen? “Weeping shall lodge in the evening, and gladness in the morning.” For in the evening was the grief of the disciples, and in the morning the gladness of the resurrection.

And would you know the place too? He says again in the Song, “I went down into the garden of nuts”; for there was a garden where he was crucified. For though it has now been adorned most splendidly with royal gifts, it was formerly a garden, and its signs and remains are still there. “A garden enclosed, a fountain sealed”: by the Jews who said, “We remember that that deceiver said while he was still alive, After three days I rise; command, then, that the tomb be made secure,” and so on; “and they went and made the tomb secure, sealing the stone, with the guard.” Against whom someone aptly says, “And you will judge them at rest.” And who is the sealed fountain, who is interpreted as “a well of living water”? It is the Saviour himself, of whom it is written, “For with you is the fountain of life.”

But what does Zephaniah say to the disciples in the person of Christ? “Prepare yourself, rise at dawn; all their gleaning is destroyed”: of the Jews, that is, among whom there is left no cluster of salvation, not even a gleaning; for their vine is cut down. See how he says to the disciples, “Prepare yourself, rise at dawn”: expect the resurrection at dawn. And next, in the same sequence of Scripture, he says, “Therefore wait for me, says the Lord, until the day of my resurrection, for a testimony.” You see that the prophet foresaw also the place of the resurrection, which was to be called the Martyrium (“Testimony”). For for what reason is this place of Golgotha and of the resurrection not called a church, like the other churches, but a Martyrium? Perhaps because of the prophet, who said, “until the day of my resurrection, for a testimony.”

And who, then, is this, and what is the sign of the one who rises? In what follows, in the same sequence of the prophet, he says plainly, “For then I will turn to the peoples a tongue”; since after the resurrection, when the Holy Spirit was sent, the gift of tongues was given, “that they may serve the Lord under one yoke.” And what other sign is set out in the same prophet that they would serve the Lord under one yoke? “From the ends of the rivers of Ethiopia they shall bring me sacrifices.” You know what is written in the Acts, when an Ethiopian eunuch came from the ends of the rivers of Ethiopia. When, then, the Scriptures tell both the time and the particular feature of the place, and also the signs after the resurrection, be assured henceforth of the resurrection, and let no one shake you from confessing Christ risen from the dead.

Take also another testimony, in the eighty-seventh psalm, where Christ speaks in the prophets (for he who then spoke came afterwards among us): “O Lord, God of my salvation, by day I cried, and by night before you”; and a little later, “I became as a man without help, free among the dead.” He did not say, “I became a man without help,” but “as a man without help.” For he was crucified not from weakness but willingly, and his death did not come from weakness against his will. “I was counted with those who go down into the pit.” And what is the sign? “You have put my acquaintances far from me” (for the disciples had fled). “Will you work wonders for the dead?” Then a little later, “And I cried to you, O Lord, and in the morning my prayer shall come before you.” You see how they show the time of the hour, both of the passion and of the resurrection? [9] And from where did the Saviour rise? He says in the Song of Songs, “Arise, come, my neighbour,” and in what follows, “in the shelter of the rock.” He called “shelter of the rock” the shelter that stood then before the door of the Saviour's tomb, hewn out of the rock itself, as it is customary here to make before tombs. For now it is not seen, since the outer shelter was cut away at that time for the present adornment. For before the building of the tomb by royal munificence, there was a shelter in front of the rock. But where is the rock that has the shelter? Does it lie near the middle of the city, or near the walls and the outskirts? And is it within the ancient walls, or within the outer walls built later? He says, then, in the Song, “in the shelter of the rock, close to the outer wall.”

At what season does the Saviour rise? Is it the season of summer, or another? In the same Song, just before the words quoted, he says, “The winter has passed, the rain has passed and gone; the flowers have appeared on the earth; the time of pruning has come.” Is not the earth now full of flowers, and are they not pruning the vines? You see how he said that the winter is already past. For when this month Xanthicus has come, it is already spring. And this is the season, the first month among the Hebrews, in which falls the feast of the Passover, formerly figurative but now true. This is the season of the creation of the world; for then God said, “Let the earth bring forth the herb of grass, yielding seed after its kind and after its likeness.” And now, as you see, every herb is already seeding. And as God then, having made the sun and moon, gave them courses of equal length, so a few days ago it was the season of the equinox. Then God said, “Let us make man in our image and likeness.” And the image he received, but the likeness he obscured through disobedience. In the season, then, in which he lost it, in that season the restoration also took place. When the man who had been fashioned disobeyed and was cast out of paradise, then he who believed obeyed and was brought in. Salvation, then, took place at the season when the fall took place: when the flowers appeared and the pruning had come.

A garden was the place of the burial, and a vine was what was planted there: “And I am the vine,” he said. He was planted, then, in the earth, so that the curse that came because of Adam might be rooted out. The earth had been condemned to thorns and thistles; the true vine sprang up out of the earth, so that the saying might be fulfilled, “Truth sprang up out of the earth, and righteousness looked down from heaven.” And what will he who is buried in the garden say? “I have gathered my myrrh with my spices”; and again, “Myrrh and aloes, with all the chief spices.” These are the tokens of the burial; and in the Gospels it is said, “The women came to the tomb, bringing the spices which they had prepared,” and “Nicodemus, bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes.” And next it is written, “I ate my bread with my honey”: the bitter before the passion, and the sweet after the resurrection. Then, having risen, he entered through closed doors; but they disbelieved, for they thought they were seeing a spirit. But he said, “Touch me and see.” “Put your fingers into the mark of the nails,” as Thomas demanded. And while they still disbelieved for joy and were wondering, he said to them, “Have you anything here to eat?” And they gave him a piece of broiled fish and a honeycomb. You see how “I ate my bread with my honey” has been fulfilled.

But before he entered through the closed doors, the Bridegroom and Healer of souls was sought by those noble and courageous women. The blessed women came to the tomb and sought the one who had been raised, and the tears were still dropping from their eyes, when they ought rather to have been glad and to dance for him who had risen. Mary came seeking him, according to the Gospel, and did not find him; and afterwards she heard from the angels, and later saw the Christ. Are these things too written? He says, then, in the Song of Songs, “On my bed I sought him whom my soul loved.” At what season? “On my bed by night I sought him whom my soul loved” (Mary, it says, came while it was still dark). “On my bed by night I sought him; I sought him, and did not find him.” And in the Gospels Mary says, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” But the angels who were present then heal their ignorance; for they said, “Why do you seek the living among the dead?” Not only did he rise, but he rose having the dead with him. But she did not know, and in her person the Song of Songs says to the angels, “Have you seen him whom my soul loves?” “It was but a little while after I passed from them” (that is, from the two angels) “until I found him whom my soul loves; I held him and would not let him go.”

For after the vision of the angels Jesus came as his own messenger, and the Gospel says, “And behold, Jesus met them, saying, Rejoice. And they came and took hold of his feet.” They took hold of him, so that the saying might be fulfilled, “I will hold him and will not let him go.” The woman's body was weak, but her spirit was manly. “Much water did not quench love, nor did rivers overwhelm it”: the one sought was dead, but the hope of the resurrection was not quenched. And the angel says to them again, “Do not you be afraid.” It is not to the soldiers that I say, “Do not be afraid,” but to you. Let them be afraid, so that, learning by experience, they may bear witness and say, “Truly he was the Son of God”; but you need not be afraid, for “perfect love casts out fear.” “Go, tell his disciples that he is risen,” and so on. And they depart with joy, though afraid. Is this too written? The second psalm, which tells of the passion of Christ, says, “Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice in him with trembling”: rejoice because of the risen Lord, but with trembling because of the earthquake and the angel who appeared like lightning.

The chief priests and Pharisees, then, sealed the tomb through Pilate; but the women saw the risen one. And Isaiah, knowing the worthlessness of the chief priests and the firmness of the women's faith, says, “Women, coming from the sight, come; for it is not a people that has understanding”: the chief priests are without understanding, and the women are eyewitnesses. And when the soldiers came to them in the city and reported all that had happened, they said to them, “Say that his disciples came by night and stole him while we were asleep.” Well, then, did Isaiah foretell this too, as from their lips: “But speak to us, and tell us another deceit.” The risen one has risen; and by a gift of money they persuade the soldiers; but they do not persuade the kings of today. … gave up the truth; but the kings of today, in their piety, have made this holy church of the Resurrection of God the Saviour, in which we are present, overlaid with silver and inlaid with gold, and have adorned it with treasures of silver and gold and precious stones. “And if this comes to the governor's ears, we will persuade him.” Even if you persuade them, you do not persuade the world. For why, as the guards were condemned when Peter came out of prison, were not those who guarded Jesus Christ condemned too? Upon those the condemnation came from Herod, for out of ignorance they could find no defence; but these, having seen the truth and hiding it for the money, were protected by the chief priests. But though few of the Jews were persuaded then, the world obeyed. Those who hid the truth were themselves hidden; but those who received it were made manifest by the power of the Saviour, who not only rose from the dead, but also raised the dead with himself; in whose person the prophet Hosea says, “He will heal us after two days; on the third day we shall rise up and live before him.”

But since the divine Scriptures do not persuade the disobedient Jews, but, forgetting all that is written, they speak against the resurrection of Jesus, it would be good to answer them thus: For what reason, while you say that Elisha and Elijah raised the dead, do you speak against the resurrection of our Saviour? Is it because we have no living witnesses now, from that time, of what is said? Then you too, produce witnesses of what happened then. But that is written? This too is written. Why, then, do you accept the one and reject the other? Hebrews wrote those things; and the apostles were all Hebrews. Why, then, do you disbelieve the Jews? Matthew, who wrote the Gospel, wrote it in the Hebrew tongue; and Paul the herald was “a Hebrew of Hebrews”; and the twelve apostles were all of the Hebrews. Then fifteen bishops of Jerusalem were appointed in succession from among the Hebrews. For what reason, then, do you accept your own writings but reject ours, though these too were written by Hebrews from among you?

“But it is impossible,” someone says, “for the dead to rise.” Yet Elisha raised the dead twice, both while he lived and after he had died. Do we, then, believe that when Elisha was dead, a dead man thrown upon him touched him and rose, and has Christ not been raised from the dead? But there, when the dead man touched Elisha, he rose, and the one who raised him remained dead as before; but here both our dead one rose, and many dead who had not even touched him rose. For “many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised, and coming out of the tombs after his resurrection they went into the holy city” (plainly this one, in which we now are) “and appeared to many.” Elisha, then, raised a dead man, but he did not conquer the world; Elijah raised a dead man, but demons are not driven out in the name of Elijah. We do not speak ill of the prophets, but we praise their Master the more highly. For we do not exalt our own things by disparaging theirs; for those too are ours. But we confirm ours from what they acknowledge.

But again they say, “A dead man who had then just died was raised by one who was living; but show us that it is possible for one three days dead to rise, and possible for a man who has been buried to rise after three days.” When we seek testimony about such things, the Lord Jesus himself gives it to us in the Gospels, saying, “For as Jonah was in the belly of the sea monster three days and three nights, so will the Son of Man be in the heart of the earth three days and three nights.” And when we examine the account of Jonah, the force of the likeness is great. Jesus was sent to preach repentance; Jonah too was sent. But the one fled, not knowing what would happen; the other came willingly, for repentance unto salvation. Jonah slept in the ship and snored while the sea was storm-tossed; and while Jesus slept the sea was roused by God's dispensation, so that afterwards the power of the sleeper might be known. To the one they said, “Why do you snore? Arise, call upon your God, that God may save us”; here they say to the Master, “Lord, save us.” There they said, “Call upon your God”; here, “Save.” But the one says, “Take me up and throw me into the sea, and the sea will be calm for you”; here he himself rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm. And the one was cast into the belly of the sea monster; but this one went down willingly to where the spiritual sea monster of death is. … [18] Having come to this point of our discourse, let us consider which is harder: for a man who has been buried to rise from the earth, or for a man in the belly of a sea monster, having gone down into such great heat of the animal, not to rot? What man does not know that bellies have such great heat that even bones that are swallowed rot? How, then, did Jonah, being in the belly of the sea monster three days and three nights, not rot? And how, since it is the nature of all men that we cannot live without breathing this air, did he live three days without breathing this air? But the Jews answer and say, “The power of God went down with Jonah as he was tossed about in Hades.” Then does the Lord give life to his own servant by sending his power with him, and can he not give it to himself? If that is credible, this is credible too; if this is incredible, that too is incredible. For to me both are equally credible. For I believe that Jonah too was preserved, “for all things are possible with God.” I believe that Christ too was raised from the dead; for I have many testimonies about this, both from the divine Scriptures and from the working of the risen one to this day; who went down into Hades alone, but came up with many. For he went down into death, and “many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised” through him.

Death was struck with dismay at seeing a new kind of visitor come down into Hades, one not held by the bonds there. Why, O gatekeepers of Hades, did you cower at the sight of him? What unaccustomed fear took hold of you? Death fled, and its flight convicted it of cowardice. The holy prophets ran to him, and Moses the lawgiver, and Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, David and Samuel, and Isaiah, and John the Baptist, who said and bore witness, “Are you he who is to come, or do we look for another?” All the righteous whom death had swallowed were being redeemed; for it was fitting that the King who had been proclaimed should become the redeemer of his good heralds. Then each of the righteous said, “O death, where is your victory? O Hades, where is your sting?” For the conqueror has redeemed us.

The prophet Jonah fulfilled the figure of this our Saviour, when he prayed out of the belly of the sea monster and said, “I cried in my affliction,” and so on, “out of the belly of Hades.” And yet he was in the sea monster; but though in the sea monster, he says he is in Hades, for he was a figure of Christ, who was to go down into Hades. And a little later he speaks in the person of Christ, prophesying most plainly, “My head went down into the clefts of the mountains.” And yet he was in the belly of the sea monster; what mountains, then, hold you? But I know, he says, that I bear the figure of him who is to be laid in the hewn tomb of the rock. And though he was in the sea, Jonah says, “I went down into the earth,” since he bore the figure of Christ, who went down into the heart of the earth. And foreseeing the Jews persuading the soldiers to lie and saying, “Say that they stole him,” he says, “Those who keep vain and false things have forsaken their own mercy.” For he who had mercy on them came, and was crucified, and rose, giving his own precious blood for Jews and Gentiles; and they say, “Say that they stole him,” keeping vain and false things. Concerning his resurrection Isaiah too says, “He who brought up from the earth the great shepherd of the sheep.” He added “great,” so that he might not be thought equal in honour to the shepherds who went before.

Since, then, we have the prophecies, let faith remain with us. Let those fall who fall through unbelief, since they so wish; but you have taken your stand on the rock of faith concerning the resurrection. Let no heretic ever persuade you to speak evil of the resurrection. For to this day the Manichaeans say that the Saviour's resurrection was an appearance and not real, not heeding Paul, who writes, “who was born of the seed of David according to the flesh,” and next again, “by the resurrection from the dead of Jesus Christ our Lord”; and again he aims at them and says, “Do not say in your heart, Who will ascend into heaven? or, Who will descend into the abyss?—that is, to bring Christ up from the dead”; and guarding us likewise he wrote again elsewhere, “Remember Jesus Christ, risen from the dead”; and again, “And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain, and our faith is in vain; and we are even found to be false witnesses of God, because we testified against God that he raised Christ, whom he did not raise.” But next he says, “But now Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep”; “and he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve.” If you do not believe one witness, you have twelve witnesses. “Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at once.” If they disbelieve the twelve, let them accept the five hundred. “Then he appeared to James,” his own brother, and the first bishop of this diocese. Since, then, such a bishop first saw Christ Jesus risen, do not you, his disciple, disbelieve. But you say that his brother James bore witness out of favour. “Then he appeared also to me,” Paul, the enemy. What testimony is doubted when an enemy proclaims it? “I, the former persecutor, now bring the good news of the resurrection.”

Many are the witnesses of the Saviour's resurrection: the night, and the light of the full moon (for it was the night of the sixteenth); the rock of the tomb which received him; and the stone will stand up against the faces of the Jews, for it saw the Lord; and the stone that was then rolled away itself bears witness to the resurrection, lying there to this day. Angels of God who were present bore witness to the resurrection of the Only-begotten; Peter and John and Thomas and all the rest of the apostles: some ran to the tomb and saw the linen cloths of the burial, in which he had been wrapped before, lying there after the resurrection; others touched his hands and feet and saw the marks of the nails; and all together enjoyed the saving breath and were counted worthy to forgive sins in the power of the Holy Spirit. The women who took hold of his feet and saw the greatness of the earthquake and the brightness of the angel who stood by; and the linen cloths which he had worn and left behind when he rose; the soldiers, and the money that was given them; the place itself, still to be seen; and this house of the holy Church, built by the Christ-loving resolve of the emperor Constantine of blessed memory and, as you see, so splendidly adorned.

Tabitha too, raised from the dead in his name, bears witness to the resurrection of Jesus. For how shall Christ's resurrection be disbelieved, when even his name raised the dead? The sea too bears witness to the resurrection of Jesus, as you heard before; the catch of fish bears witness, and the fire of coals lying there, and the fish laid on it; Peter bears witness, who before denied him three times, but three times confessed him, and was commanded to shepherd the spiritual sheep. The Mount of Olives stands to this day, all but showing to this day to the eyes of the faithful him who went up on a cloud, and the heavenly gate of the ascent. For he came down from heaven into Bethlehem, but from the Mount of Olives he went up into heaven; there beginning his contests among men, and here crowned for his contests. You have, then, many witnesses: you have this place of the resurrection; you have also, to the east of us, the place of the ascension; you have as witnesses also the angels who bore witness there, and the cloud on which he went up, and the disciples who came down from there.