Orations (other than the Theological Orations) 40.26–40.43

Let nothing hold you back from going forward; let nothing drag back your eagerness. While desire is strong, take hold of what you desire; while the iron is hot, let it be tempered in cold water, lest something intervene and cut off the desire. I am Philip; become Candace's eunuch. Say yourself too: “See, here is water; what prevents me from being baptized?” Seize the opportunity; rejoice greatly in the good; and having spoken, be baptized, and having been baptized, be saved; even if you are an Ethiopian in body, be made white in soul. Obtain the salvation than which nothing is higher, nor more precious to those who have sense. Do not say: “Let a bishop baptize me, and he a metropolitan or a bishop of Jerusalem (for grace is not of places but of the Spirit), and one of good family; for it would be terrible if my noble birth were insulted by the baptizer.” Or: “A presbyter, yes, but one of the unmarried, of the continent and angelic in their way of life; for it would be terrible to be defiled at the moment of cleansing.” Do not look for the trustworthiness of the preacher or of the baptizer. Another is their judge, the examiner of what is hidden; since man looks on the face, but God on the heart. For you, everyone is trustworthy for your cleansing; only let him be one of those approved, and not of those openly condemned, nor a stranger to the church. Do not judge your judges, you who need healing; do not be fastidious about the rank of those who cleanse you, nor discriminate between those who beget you. One is better or lower than another, but every one is higher than you. Consider it thus: let one ring be gold and the other iron, but let both be engraved with the same royal image, and let them both press it into wax. How will this seal differ from that? Not at all. Find out the material in the wax, if you are very clever; say which impression is from the iron and which from the gold, and how they are one. For the difference is in the material, not in the stamp. So let every baptizer be for you. Even if one excels in his way of life, the power of baptism is equal; and every one who is formed in the same faith is equally able to perfect you …

Do not disdain to be baptized with a poor man, if you are rich; the well-born with the low-born; the master with one who until now has been his slave. You will not yet humble yourself as much as Christ, into whom you are baptized today, who for your sake took even the form of a slave. From the day you are transformed, all the old marks have given way: Christ has been put upon all in one form. Do not disdain to confess your sin, knowing how John baptized, that by the shame here you may escape the shame there (since this too is part of the punishment there), and that you may show that you truly hate sin by making an example of it and triumphing over it as deserving contempt. Do not spurn the healing of exorcism, nor give up because of its length: this too is a test of your sincerity towards the gift. What labour will you have like that of the queen of the Ethiopians, who rose up and came from the ends of the earth to see the wisdom of Solomon? And behold, a greater than Solomon is here, in the judgment of those who reckon rightly. Do not shrink from length of road, nor distance by sea, nor fire, if this too lies before you, nor any other hindrance, small or great, so that you may obtain the gift. But if you can obtain what you desire without labour or trouble, how foolish it is to put off the gift! “You who thirst,” it says, “go to the water” (Isaiah urges you), “and you who have no money, go and buy, and drink wine without price of money.” O the swiftness of his love for man! O the ease of the bargain! This good is for sale to you for the mere willing; he accepts the very impulse in place of a great price. He thirsts to be thirsted for; he gives drink to those who want to drink; he counts it a kindness to be asked for a kindness; he is ready and generous; he gives more gladly than others receive. Only let us not be condemned for meanness by asking for small things, unworthy of the giver. Blessed is he of whom Christ asks a drink, as he asked that Samaritan woman, and gives him a spring of water welling up to eternal life. Blessed is he who sows beside all waters, and upon every soul, to be ploughed and watered tomorrow, which ox and ass tread today while it is barren and waterless and oppressed by unreason. Blessed is he who, though he be a torrent of rushes, is watered from the house of the Lord, and becomes corn-bearing instead of rush-bearing, and produces food for man, not what is rough and useless. For this reason every effort must be made not to miss the common grace. [28] “Let this be so,” someone says, “for those who seek baptism; but what would you say about those who are still infants, and perceive neither the loss nor the grace? Shall we baptize them too?” Certainly, if any danger presses. For it is better to be sanctified without perceiving it than to depart unsealed and uninitiated.

A proof of this for us is the circumcision on the eighth day, which was a kind of typical seal and was applied to those still without reason; so too the anointing of the doorposts, which guarded the firstborn through things without sense. As for the others, I give my opinion: wait until the third year, or a little before or after it, when they can hear something of the mystery and answer, even if they do not understand it fully, yet are being formed by it; and then sanctify them, souls and bodies, with the great mystery of perfection. For this is how it is: they begin to be answerable for their life when their reason has matured and they have learned the mystery (for of sins of ignorance their age keeps them unaccountable); but to be fortified with the bath is in every way more profitable, because of the sudden assaults of danger that fall upon us, stronger than any help.

“But Christ,” someone says, “was baptized at thirty, and that though he was God; and do you bid us hasten baptism?” By saying “God” you have solved the question. For he was purity itself and did not need cleansing; but he is cleansed for you, as he also bears flesh for you, though he is without flesh. Nor was there any danger for him …

… in putting off baptism; for he was himself the steward of his suffering, as of his birth too.

But for you the danger concerns no small matter, if you should depart born only to corruption and not clothed with incorruption. And I consider this too: for him this was the necessary time for baptism, but for you the reason is not the same. For he was manifested when he had reached his thirtieth year, not before, both so as not to seem to be making a display (for that is the weakness of the vulgar), and because this age contains the perfection of virtue and the time for teaching. And since he was to suffer the saving passion of the world, all that belonged to the passion had to come together towards the passion: the manifestation, the baptism, the witness from above, the preaching, the concourse of the multitude, the miracles, as one body, not torn apart or broken up by intervals. From the baptism and the preaching came the commotion of those who flocked together (for so Scripture names that time); from the multitude, the display of signs and the miracles that led people to the gospel; from these, envy; from this, hatred; from hatred, the plotting and the betrayal; and from this, the cross, and all by which we have been saved. Such, then, are the things of Christ, and so they stand, as far as we can reach; perhaps another reason, more secret than these, might be found. [30] But what need is there for you, following examples that are above you, to take bad counsel? For many other things recorded of that time are seen to be otherwise than as they are now, and do not agree with the times …

He fasted a little before the temptation, we before Easter; the fasting is the same, but the interval between the two times is not small. For he puts up his fasts as a defence against temptations; for us this signifies dying with Christ, and it is a cleansing before the feast. And he fasts forty days, for he was God; we have measured this to our strength, even if zeal persuades some to leap beyond their strength. Again, he initiates his disciples into the Passover in an upper room, after supper and one day before his passion; we in houses of prayer, before supper and after the resurrection. He rises on the third day, we after a long time. And our observances are neither broken off from his nor joined to them in time; but, in so far as they were handed down as a pattern for ours, they have avoided being in every way the same. What wonder, then, if baptism too was received for our sake, but differs in its time? … that which you seem to me to put forward against your own salvation as something great and wonderful … [31] … prayers, tears, compassion for those in need, sharing. Let this be for you both a thank-offering for what you have received and a safeguard. You have the benefit as a reminder of many commandments: do not pass it by. Has a poor man come to you? Remember how poor you were, and how rich you have become. Is someone in need of bread or drink, some other Lazarus perhaps, cast down at your gates? Revere the mystical table to which you came, the bread of which you partook, the cup in which you shared, being initiated into the sufferings of Christ. Has a stranger fallen at your feet, homeless, a sojourner? Receive through him the one who became a stranger for your sake, and that among his own, and who made his dwelling in you through grace and drew you to the dwelling above. Be Zacchaeus, yesterday a tax collector and today great-souled: bear all your fruit at Christ's entrance, that you may appear great, even if you are small in bodily stature, having beheld Christ well. Does a sick and wounded man lie before you? Respect your own health and the wounds from which Christ set you free. If you see a naked man, clothe him, honouring your own garment of incorruption, which is Christ: for as many of us as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. If you find a debtor falling at your feet, tear up every bond, unjust or just. Remember the ten thousand talents which Christ forgave you; do not be a harsh exactor of a smaller debt. And from whom? From your fellow servants, you who were forgiven more by the Master; lest you pay the penalty for his love for man, which you did not imitate though you received it as an example.

Let the bath be for you a bath not of the body only but of the image; not only a washing away of sins but also a correction of character; let it not only wash away the mud that came before, but also cleanse the source; let it not only shape you to acquire honestly, but also to part honestly with what you have, or at the least to give up what you acquired dishonestly. For what good is it that your sin is forgiven you, if the loss you inflicted on the one you wronged is not undone? There are two evils: to have acquired unjustly, and to keep what was acquired. Of the one you received remission; the other you commit today. For today the property of another is in your hands; and the sin has not been taken away, but only divided by time: the one was dared before baptism, the other remains after baptism. For the bath grants pardon for sins that have been committed, not for sins that are being committed. The cleansing must not be counterfeited but stamped upon you; you must be made bright wholly, not coloured over; the gift must bring not a covering of sins but a release from them. “Blessed are those whose iniquities are forgiven”: this belongs to complete cleansing; “and whose sins are covered”: this to those not yet cleansed in the depths. “Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not reckon sin”: this is a third class of sinners, whose action is not praiseworthy, but whose intention is blameless. [33] … with those who dwell in tombs; do not bind yourself tight with the chains of your own sins; since it is uncertain whether he will raise you from the tombs again before the last and common resurrection, which will bring every work into judgment, not to be healed but to be judged, and to give account of what it has stored up, well or ill.

If until now you teemed with leprosy, that shapeless wickedness, but have been scraped clean of the evil matter and have received back the image whole, show me, your priest, your cleansing, that I may know how much more precious it is than the legal one. Do not be one of the nine ungrateful, but imitate the tenth; for though he was a Samaritan, he was more grateful than the rest. Take care that you do not break out in evil again, and find the disorder of the body hard to heal. Formerly meanness and stinginess withered your hand; today let generosity and kindness stretch it out. A fine cure for a sick hand is to scatter, to give to the poor, to draw lavishly on what we have until we touch the bottom (perhaps this too will spring up with food for you, as for the widow of Zarephath, especially if you happen to be feeding an Elijah), to know the fine abundance of being in want for Christ, who became poor for us. If you were deaf and dumb, let the Word sound in your ears; or rather, hold fast to him who sounded. Do not shut your ears to the instruction and admonition of the Lord, like an asp against charms. If you were blind and unenlightened, lighten your eyes, lest you ever sleep in death. In the light of the Lord see light; in the Spirit of God be illumined by the Son, the threefold and undivided light. If you receive the whole Word, you will gather into your own soul all the healings of Christ, which each received in part. Only do not be ignorant of the measure of grace; only let not the enemy sow tares while you sleep and take no care; only, having become an object of envy to the evil one through your purity, do not make yourself pitiable again through sin; only do not, rejoicing in the good and lifted up beyond measure, fall through your exaltation; only labour always at your cleansing, setting ascents in your heart; and the remission you obtained as a free gift, keep with care, so that the forgiveness may be from God, and the keeping from you as well.

How will this be? Always remember that parable, and you will help yourself best and most perfectly. The unclean and material spirit has gone out of you, driven out by baptism. It does not bear being driven out; it does not accept being homeless and without a hearth. It goes through waterless places, dry of the divine stream; there it wishes to make its haunt. It wanders seeking rest and does not find it. It meets baptized souls, whose wickedness the bath has washed out; it fears the water; it is choked by the cleansing, as Legion was in the sea. Again it returns to the house from which it went out. It is shameless, it is contentious; it attacks again, it tries again. If it finds Christ dwelling there and filling the place it had left empty, it is repulsed again and goes away without success, and becomes pitiable in its wandering. But if it sees the place in you swept and adorned, empty and idle, equally ready to receive this one or that, whichever comes first, it leaps in and settles there with greater force, and the last state becomes worse than the first; for then there was hope of correction and safety, but now the wickedness is manifest, drawing evil to itself by flight from the good, and for this reason the occupation is more secure for the one who dwells there.

Again I will remind you of the illuminations, gathering them often from the divine oracles. For I myself shall be the happier for remembering them (what is sweeter than light to those who have tasted light?), and I shall shine around you with my words. “Light has dawned for the righteous,” and its partner, gladness. “Light for the righteous always.” “You give light wonderfully from the everlasting mountains,” is said to God; of the angelic powers, I think, who work with us towards better things. “The Lord is my light and my saviour; whom shall I fear?” You have heard David saying this, and sometimes asking that the light and the truth be sent out to him, sometimes giving thanks that he had shared in it, in that the light of God was signed upon him, that is, the signs of the illumination given were impressed and made known. One light alone let us flee, the offspring of the bitter fire. Let us not walk in the light of our fire and in the flame which we have kindled. For I know a cleansing fire, which Christ came to cast upon the earth, he himself being called fire in the language of figurative interpretation. This consumes matter and evil habit, and he wishes it to be kindled as quickly as possible; for he longs for speed in doing good, since he also gives us coals of fire for our help. I know also a fire that is not cleansing but punishing: whether that of Sodom, which he rains upon all sinners mixed with brimstone and tempest; or that prepared for the devil and his angels; or that which goes before the face of the Lord and burns up his enemies round about; and, more fearful still than these, that which is ranked with the sleepless worm, not quenched but lasting for ever for the wicked. For all these belong to the destroying power; unless someone prefers to understand this too more humanely, and in a way worthy of him who punishes.

As I know a twofold fire, so also a twofold light: the one is the lamp of our ruling faculty, directing our steps according to God; the other is deceptive and meddlesome, opposed to the true light and pretending to be it, so as to steal in by its appearance. This is darkness and seems to be noonday, the height of light. So I hear of those who always flee in darkness at noon. This is night, and is thought to be illumination by those corrupted by luxury. For what does David say? “Night was about me, wretch that I was, and I did not know”, for I took luxury to be illumination. But they are such, and so it is with them; let us, however, light for ourselves the light of knowledge. This will come from sowing for righteousness and reaping the fruit of life (for action is the procurer of contemplation), so that, among other things, we may learn this too, what is the true light and what the false, and may not unawares fall into the worse as though it were good. Let us become light, as the disciples heard from the great Light, who said, “You are the light of the world.” Let us become lights in the world, holding forth the word of life, that is, a life-giving power to others. Let us lay hold of the Godhead, lay hold of the first and purest Light. Let us walk towards its radiance before our feet stumble on the dark and hostile mountains. While it is day, let us walk decently as in the day, not in revelling and drunkenness, not in debauchery and licentiousness, which are the thefts of the night. [38] Let us be cleansed in every member, brothers, let us purify every sense; let nothing in us be imperfect or of the first birth; let us leave nothing unilluminated. Let us be illumined in the eye, that we may see rightly and carry in ourselves no harlot's image from curious and busy gazing; for even if we have not worshipped the passion, yet we have defiled the soul. If there is any beam in us, or any splinter, let us clean it out, that we may be able to see those of others as well. Let us be illumined in hearing, illumined in tongue, that we may hear what the Lord God will speak, and that his mercy in the morning may be made audible to us, and that we may be made to hear joy and gladness resounding in godly ears; that we may not be a sharp sword nor a whetted razor, nor roll trouble and toil under the tongue, but speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, the hidden wisdom, revering the tongues of fire. Let us be healed in smell, that we may not become effeminate, nor be covered with dust instead of a sweet odour; but let us smell, perceiving spiritually the ointment that was poured out for us, and being so formed and transformed by it that a sweet fragrance is smelt even from ourselves. Let us be cleansed in touch, in taste, in throat, not touching softly and delighting in smoothness, but handling, as is fitting, the Word made flesh for us, imitating Thomas in this; not tickled by juices and dainties, the brothers of more bitter ticklings, but tasting and knowing that the Lord is good, the better and lasting taste; not refreshing for a short time that bitter and ungrateful passage which sends on and does not keep what is given, but delighting it with words sweeter than honey. [39] … It is good for the hands too to be perfected, and the feet: the hands, that they may be lifted up holy in every place, and lay hold of the instruction of Christ, lest the Lord be angry, and that the word may be entrusted to them through action, like the word given into the hand of a certain prophet; the feet, that they may not be swift to shed blood nor run to wickedness, but be ready for the gospel and for the prize of the upward calling, and to receive Christ washing and cleansing them. If there is also a cleansing of the belly, which receives and digests the food of the Word, it is good not to make it a god through luxury and food that perishes, but to cleanse it as much as possible and make it finer, so as to receive the word of the Lord within it, and to feel pain rightly for Israel when it stumbles. I find the heart and the inward parts also counted worthy of honour. David persuades me of this, asking that a pure heart be created in him and a right spirit renewed within him, meaning by this, I think, the thinking faculty and its movements, or thoughts.

What of the loins? What of the kidneys? Let us not pass over these either: let the cleansing touch them too. Let our loins be girded and restrained by self-control, as Israel's were of old when, according to the law, they partook of the Passover. For no one comes out of Egypt cleanly or escapes the destroyer without having disciplined these. Let the kidneys undergo the good change, transferring the whole desiring faculty to God, so as to be able to say, “Lord, all my desire is before you,” and, “I have not desired the day of man.” For one must become a man of desires, the desires of the Spirit. So also the dragon, who carries the greatest part of his strength in the navel and the loins, might be destroyed for us, his dominion over these being put to death. Do not wonder if I give more abundant honour to our less presentable parts, mortifying and chastening them by reason and standing against matter. Let us give to God all our members on the earth, let us consecrate them all; not the lobe of the liver, nor the kidneys with the fat, nor this part of the body or that; for why should we dishonour the rest? Let us offer ourselves wholly; let us become rational whole burnt offerings, perfect sacrifices; let us not make only the shoulder or only the breast a priestly portion (that is small), but, giving ourselves wholly, let us receive ourselves wholly back; for this is to receive purely: to be given to God and to offer our own salvation as a sacred act.

Above all, and before all, keep for me the good deposit, by which I live and conduct my life, which I would take with me as the companion of my departure, with which I bear all that is painful and despise every pleasure: the confession of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. This I entrust to you today; with this I will baptize you and raise you up. This I give you as the partner and protector of your whole life: the one Godhead and power, found singly in the three and comprising the three distinctly; not unequal in essences or natures, not increased or diminished by superiorities or inferiorities; equal on every side, the same on every side, as the beauty and greatness of heaven is one; the infinite coalescence of three infinites; each God when considered by himself, as the Father, so the Son, so the Holy Spirit, each keeping his property; the three one God when considered together: the former because of the sameness of essence, the latter because of the monarchy. No sooner do I conceive the one than I am illumined by the three; no sooner do I distinguish the three than I am carried back to the one. When I picture one of the three, I think it the whole, and my sight is filled, and the greater part escapes me. I cannot grasp the greatness of that one, so as to attribute more to the rest. When I gather the three together in contemplation, I see one torch, unable to divide or measure the united light …

Do you fear the word “begetting”, lest God, who cannot suffer, should suffer something? I fear the word “creation”, lest I lose God through insult and unjust division, either cutting the Son off from the Father, or the essence of the Spirit from the Son. For the strange thing is that not only is creation brought into God by those who weigh the Godhead wrongly in the balance …

… but the creation itself is again cut up against itself. As the Son is put below the Father among the lowly and those beneath, so again the dignity of the Spirit is put below the Son, so that both God and the creation are insulted by this new theology. Nothing in the Trinity, my friends, is servile, nothing created, nothing brought in from outside: so I heard one of the wise say. “If I were still pleasing men, I would not be a servant of Christ,” says the divine apostle. If I still worshipped a creature, or were baptized into a creature, I would not be deified, nor would my first birth be transformed. What shall I say to those who worship Astarte, or Chemosh the abomination of the Sidonians, or the figure of the star, a god a little above these to idolaters, but still himself a creature and a work, I who either do not worship the two into whom I have been baptized, or worship fellow servants? For they are fellow servants, even if a little more honourable; since among fellow servants too there is some difference and precedence. [43] I would like to call the Father greater, from whom the equals have both their equality and their being (for this will be granted by all); but I fear the word “principle”, lest I make him a principle of inferiors and insult him by the precedence; for the lowering of those who are from him is no glory to him from whom they are. Besides, I suspect your greed, lest, taking hold of “greater”, you cut the nature in two, using “greater” in every respect. For “greater” refers not to the nature but to the cause; for among things of the same essence nothing is greater or less in essence. I would like to honour the Son above the Spirit, as the Son; but baptism does not allow it, perfecting me through the Spirit. But are you afraid of being reproached with tritheism? Keep the good thing, the union in the three, and leave the battle to me. Let me be the shipbuilder, and you use the ship. And if someone else is the shipbuilder, take me as the architect of the house, and live in it safely, even if you have not toiled at all. You will sail no less well, nor live in the house any less, because I built them, even if you have taken no pains over them. Do you see how great the goodwill is? Do you see the kindness of the Spirit? Mine be the war, yours the victory. Let me be pelted; you be at peace, praying with the one who fights for you; lend a hand by your faith. I have three stones with which I will sling at the Philistine. I have three breathings upon the son of the widow of Zarephath, with which I will give life to the dead. I have three pourings upon the wood, with which I will consecrate the sacrifice, kindling fire with water, most wonderful of all; and I will overthrow the prophets of shame, using the power of the mystery.