Exegetical and Miscellaneous Fragments 5–13

On the holy Gospel according to Luke, chapter 22, verse 42 and following. Verse 42. “Father, if you will, remove this cup from me; yet not my will but yours be done.” But let this be said about the will. As for “Let the cup pass,” it does not mean “Let it not come near” or “Let it not approach me.” For what passes by must certainly first come to him, and approach the one whom it passes by; for if it did not draw near, it would not pass by. As one, then, who already perceived it present, he began to be grieved and distressed and amazed and to be in agony; and, as it was near and set before him, he does not simply say “the cup,” but points to it: “this.” As, then, what passes by is neither unapproachable nor abiding, so the Savior asks that the temptation, which came upon him gently and on the surface and touched him lightly, be thrust aside at first. And this is the first kind of not falling into temptation, which he counsels the weaker too to pray for: that the temptation should come (for “offenses must come”), but they themselves should not fall into the temptation. And the most perfect manner of not entering into temptation … is that which he asks second, not simply: “Not as I will, but as you.” For God is not tempted by evils; but he wishes to give us good things exceedingly beyond what we ask or think. His perfect will, then, the Beloved himself knew; and he often says that he has come to do this, not his own, that is, that of men. For he makes his own the person of men, as having become man. Therefore then too he declines to do his own, the lesser, and asks that the Father's, the greater, be done, the divine will, which according to the divinity is altogether one will, his own and the Father's. For the Father's will was that he should pass through every temptation, the Father himself leading him through marvelously, … not up to the temptation, nor into it, but to be above the temptation and beyond it. And in general it is not impossible, nor unworkable, nor contrary to the Father's will, for the Savior to ask. And it is possible, as Mark recorded him saying, “Abba, Father, all things are possible to you”; and possible if he wished, as Luke says he said: “Father, if you will, remove this cup from me.” The Holy Spirit, then, distributed among the evangelists, composes the whole disposition of our Savior out of the voice of each. For he asks nothing of the Father that the Father does not wish. For “If you will” is a mark of submission and gentleness, not a sign of ignorance or of doubt; just as we too, when we ask of a father or ruler or teacher, or of anyone we serve, something agreeable to him, are accustomed to say “If you please,” not as being in doubt. So too the Savior … said “If you will,” not knowing that the Father wished something else and then inquiring about this, but knowing exactly that he wished to remove the cup from him, he knew that what he justly wishes is possible for him. For this reason the other scripture says, “All things are possible to you.” And Matthew surely describes this as compassionate and humble, saying “If it is possible.” For if I did not fit the sense in this way, some might perhaps take “If it is possible” impiously, as though there were something impossible for God to do, except only what he does not will. He did not, then, make his request as self-willed, nor as seeming good to himself alone, or opposed to the Father's counsel, but as seeming good to God also. And yet someone will say that he is compelled and changes his mind, and at once asks something other than at first, no longer upholding his own but establishing the Father's will. Yes; but he does not take one thing altogether in exchange for another; rather, the same act pleasing both, he embraces another road and a different manner, instead of the smaller, which seemed not to please him, the greater and more marvelous measured out by the Father. For he does ask that the cup pass; “but not as I will,” he says, “but as you.” He longs either way that it pass, but better as the Father wills. For he did not ask instead for its not passing in place of its passing, but, its passing being set before him, he asks that this happen as the Father wills. For twofold is the force of “passing by”: either, having appeared or touched, to be driven off at once, or run past and be gone, like those who graze past one another in races; or, having lived with and lingered and sat down beside, like a band of robbers or an army, then, defeated and taking nothing, scarcely to go away empty-handed: for if they had taken the place, they would not have passed by, but would have led away with them those they had subdued; but if they could not prevail, they pass by in shame. He wished, then, after the first manner, that the cup should come into his hands and pass from him quickly, most easily and most swiftly. But as soon as he had said it, being immediately strengthened in his humanity by the Father's divinity, he makes his request more secure, and no longer wishes it so, but as it pleases the Father: to drink it gloriously and steadfastly and to the full. For John, who recorded the greatest and most divine of the Savior's words and deeds, heard him say this: “The cup that my Father has given me, shall I not drink it?” And to drink the cup was to fulfill the ministry and the whole economy of the temptation, holding courageously to the Father, to complete it and to pass beyond the terrors. … For each is said to pass from the other, both the one who remains from the one who departs, and the one who departs from the one who remains. And Matthew showed most clearly that he asked that the cup pass, yet asked that this happen not as he, but as the Father willed. We must fit the words of Mark and Luke accordingly. For Mark says, “But not what I will, but what you will,” and Luke, “Yet not my will but yours be done.” For he himself said and wished that the suffering should quickly abate and cease, but the Father wished him to complete the contest steadfastly and to the end. So he offered himself to all that befell him; and like darts striking iron and unbreakable armor, or rather as against a solid rock, some were shattered and others bounced back: slaps, spittings, scourgings, death, and the lifting up of death. And while these things were being accomplished he was silent and endured, as though suffering nothing, or as one already dead. But when death was prolonged and was already overpowering him beyond his strength, he cried out to the Father. And “Why have you forsaken me?” was, then, consistent with what he had asked before: Why is death yoked to me until now, and you do not yet remove the cup? Why have I not already drunk it and finished it? But there is fear lest I be swallowed up by it, as it lies full upon me; which would happen if you forsook me. It will remain full, and I shall be gone, emptied. Let the baptism be completed at last, as I was long ago constrained until it should be accomplished. This thought of the Savior I infer to have been expressed in a brief cry; and he spoke truly, and he was not forsaken, but immediately drank it off, as he asked, and it passed. And of this the vinegar offered to him seems to me to have been a symbol. For the turned wine signified, perhaps, his sharp turning and change, which he received, taking in exchange impassibility for suffering, immortality for death, incorruption for corruption, judging for being judged, reigning for being tyrannized. For the sponge, I think, showed the complete mingling of the Holy Spirit through the whole that came to be in him; and the reed indicated the royal scepter and the divine law; and the hyssop showed his life-giving and saving resurrection, by which he has made us too healthy. But concerning these things enough has been said both in (the commentary on) Matthew and now; let us keep to what follows. Verse 43. “And an angel from heaven appeared to him, strengthening him.” Verse 44. “And being in agony he prayed more earnestly; and his sweat became as clots of blood falling down upon the ground.” A sweat of blood is said proverbially of those who are greatly grieved and in agony, as it is said of those who lament bitterly that they weep blood; for in saying “as clots of blood” he did not declare them clots of blood. For then he would not have said that the sweat came in likeness of these; for the “as” presents this. But wishing rather to show that the Lord's body was moistened not with thin drops, appearing as it were for show, but was truly bedewed all over with sweat like heavy drops, he took the clots of blood as an image of what happened. He showed, then, as by the intense prayer and great agony, so also by the thickness of the sweat, that the Savior was man by nature and truly, and not in show and appearance, and was subject to the natural and blameless passions of men. And the saying, “I have authority to lay down my life, and I have authority to take it again,” shows in these words that the suffering was voluntary; and further, that the soul laid down and taken up is one thing, and the divinity that lays it down and takes it up is another. And as, having willingly endured death in the flesh, he planted incorruption in it, so, having accepted by his will the suffering proper to the condition of a slave, he sowed in it boldness and courage, by which he braced those who believe in him for the great contests of martyrdom; and so clots of his sweat ran down marvelously like drops of blood, that he might as it were dry up and banish from our nature the spring of cowardice. For if this had not been done as in a mystery, not even if someone were utterly cowardly and ignoble would he be moistened, contrary to nature, from agony alone with drops of blood like beads of sweat. Such too is the saying that an angel stood by the Savior and strengthened him. For this too was done for the sake of the economy on our behalf. For those who are about to contend in the sacred contests for piety have angels from heaven helping them. Perhaps too he said “Father, remove the cup” not as fearing death, but in order by these words to provoke the devil to set up the cross for him. With crafty words that one deceived Adam; let the crafty one be deceived by timid words. But there is not one will of the Son and another of the Father. For he who wills what the Father wills is found to have the will of the Father. In a figure, then, he says, “Not mine but yours”; for he does not wish it to be removed, but he refers to the Father's will the achievement that comes from the passion, honoring the Father as source. For if the fathers call disposition “opinion” (γνώμη), and disposition comes about … toward what is hidden, prudently, as from deliberation, how do some say that the Lord, who is above all these things, has a deliberative will? Or is it clear that it is from irrationality? Verse 45. “And rising from prayer, he came to the disciples and found them sleeping from grief.” Verse 46. “And he said to them: Why are you sleeping? Rise and pray, that you may not enter into temptation.” Which he himself also prayed, often falling on his face, and asking by both sayings not to enter into temptation, both “If it is possible, let the cup pass,” and “Not as I will, but as you.” For it was not entering into temptation that he spoke of and asked for, not that he should not be tried at all by any circumstance, or not be in any hardship whatever. For it is impossible, perhaps, for any man to live his life altogether without tasting evil. “For the whole world,” it says, “lies in the evil one”; and “the most of man's days are toil and trouble”; as they themselves also say: “Short and grievous is our life.” Nor was it likely that he would command them to pray that the curse should not be fulfilled which says: “Cursed is the ground in your works; in sorrow you shall eat of it all the days of your life”; or “You are earth, and to earth you shall return”; which the divine scriptures, showing in various ways the sorrowfulness of life, call “the valley of weeping.” And the world is most painful to the saints, to whom he who cannot lie says: “In this world you will have affliction”; and likewise through the prophet: “Many are the afflictions of the righteous.” But I suppose that by “not to enter into temptation” he means to be delivered from the afflictions, according to the prophet: “For out of them all,” he says, “the Lord delivers them”; and, as his own word promises, to master the afflictions, and to share in the victory that he won on our behalf; for after saying, “In the world you will have affliction,” he added: “But take courage, I have overcome the world.” And again he taught us to pray not to fall into temptation: “And lead us not into temptation,” that is, “Do not let us fall into temptation.” And that this was not “not to be tempted,” but to be delivered from the evil one, he added: “But deliver us from the evil one.” But what is the difference, you will perhaps say, between being tempted and falling or entering into temptation? He who has been defeated by the evil one (and he will be defeated if he does not contend, and if God does not shield him) has fallen into temptation and entered into temptation, and is in it and under it, as one led captive. But he who has resisted and endured has been tempted, yet has not entered or fallen into temptation. Jesus, at any rate, was led up by the Spirit, not to enter into temptation, but “to be tempted by the devil.” And Abraham did not enter into temptation, nor did God lead him into temptation; he tested him, but did not cast him into temptation. And the Lord himself tested the disciples. For the evil one, tempting, drags down into temptations, as a tempter of evils; but God, testing, brings one past temptations, as untempted by evils; for “God,” it says, “cannot be tempted by evils.” The devil uses force, dragging to destruction; but God, training, leads by the hand to salvation. Verse 47. “While he was still speaking, behold, a crowd; and the one called Judas, one of the twelve, was going before them, and he drew near to Jesus to kiss him.” Verse 48. “But Jesus said to him: Judas, do you betray the Son of Man with a kiss?” Oh, the forbearance of the Master, who both kissed the traitor and uttered words softer than the kiss! For he did not say: “O defiled and utterly defiled one, and traitor, is this the return you give us for so great a kindness?” But how? “Judas,” using his proper name, which was more the mark of one pitying and calling back than of one angered. And he did not say “your teacher, your master, your benefactor,” but “the Son of Man,” that is, the gentle, the meek. For even if he were not your teacher nor master nor benefactor, do you betray one so guilelessly, so gently disposed toward you, that at the time of the betrayal he kisses you, and that when the kiss is the signal of the betrayal? Blessed are you, Lord! What an example of forbearance, what an example of humility you have become for us! And not only so, but the Master has also given this as an example of not desisting from counsel to the brethren, even if nothing more comes of our words. For just as incurable wounds yield neither to harsh medicines nor to those that can soothe them, so too a soul, once it has become captive and has given itself over to any offense whatever, and does not wish to perceive its own advantage, gains nothing, even if one sounds countless warnings in its ears; but, as having dead ears, it receives no benefit from the exhortation, not because it cannot, but because it will not. This happened in the case of Judas. But Christ, though he foreknew all these things, did not cease from beginning to end to show all that was his to do. Knowing this, we too must always correct the negligent, even if no profit comes from the counsel.

For God wills nothing from necessity or from grief; since what you have once dedicated through the promise in your prayers is not yours.

“And so all Israel will be saved.” Of Dionysius of Alexandria: instead of “the greater part.”

… so he who bears temptations nobly is crowned. But it is otherwise with the devil; for he tempts in order to kill those who obey him. And he does so not knowing what will be; but God, though knowing what will be, nevertheless grants man to do what he wills, because of free will. He shows that even if they put on a show of a teaching discourse, they are wholly fleshly and do the worst things. This Paul reproached: “For where there is jealousy and strife among you,” he says, “are you not fleshly?” For the man who possesses a sufficient field, since he sees his neighbor's to be larger, strives to enlarge his own; and likewise to make his house higher.

… and he will see God face to face, not in riddles, but as the holy apostles did, as the great Dionysius says.

… having conversed in letters, (Dionysius) left various benefits to those who still now take pains over his words. … To all men disposed contrariwise, and to the … It is ridiculous for a man who has neglected his own to try to educate strangers.

As in diseases that come at intervals periodically one would not be said to be healthy because of the remissions, but ill because of the attacks, so life is not happy because it sometimes rests from pains, but is altogether toilsome for all, since it is often familiar with painful things.

Misfortunes ought to be pitied, not hated.

There is nothing more honorable or more humane for us than to show mercy and do good, since there is nothing more so for God either. But the strong and exact reasoning says that bitter things are provisions for sweet ones, and that pleasures are the fruits of labors; for nothing can come about without toil. Either say something better than silence, or keep silence. He did not cease, since he did not begin.