Symposium (The Banquet of the Ten Virgins) preface–1.5

EUBOULION: You have come at the best possible moment, Gregorion. I was looking for you just now, wanting to learn about the gathering of Marcella, Theopatra, and the other virgins who were present then at the banquet, and what their speeches on chastity were. For they say that they contended so magnificently and so powerfully that they lacked nothing needful to the subject. So if you have come for some other reason, put that off till later, and do not hesitate now to go through for us in order everything we are asking you. GREGORION: It seems I have missed my hope, since you already know about what you are asking. For I thought you had not yet heard anything of what happened, and I was very proud of it and gave myself airs as the one who would be first to tell you. That is why I hurried to come here to you, precisely so as not to be forestalled by someone else. EUBOULION: Take heart, my dear; we know nothing precisely of what happened. The one who brought the news could not relate more than that there had been discussions; what they were and how they went, he did not know when questioned. GREGORION: Do you want, then, since I came here for this very purpose, to hear everything that was said from the beginning? Or shall I pass over some things and mention those I think worth remembering? EUBOULION: Not at all; but from the beginning, Gregorion. First describe for us the gathering, where it took place, and the preparation of the food, and how you yourself poured the wine: “and they pledged one another in golden cups, gazing up at the great heaven.” GREGORION: You are always clever in conversation and very curious, simply cross-examining everyone. EUBOULION: It is not worth arguing about these things now, Gregorion; but, as we asked you, tell us what happened from the beginning, and do not do otherwise. GREGORION: I will try. But first answer me this yourself: you surely know Arete, the daughter of Philosophy? EUBOULION: What of it? GREGORION: Invited by her into the garden toward the east to gather the fruits of the season, we went, “I myself,” Theopatra told me (for it was she I was questioning), “and Procilla and Tysiane. We travelled, Gregorion, a rough and hard road, and steep. When we were already near the place,” said Theopatra, “a tall and beautiful woman met us, walking quietly and gracefully, clothed in a robe as brilliant as snow. Her whole beauty was something divine and beyond description; great modesty bloomed on her face together with dignity, and her gaze was stern yet cheerfully blended with gentleness, as,” she said, “I have never seen. For she was entirely unadorned and wore nothing counterfeit. She came up to us with great joy and, like a mother seeing us after a long time, embraced and kissed each of us, saying: ‘Daughters, I have longed greatly to bring you into the meadow of incorruption; you have come at last, perhaps because creeping things frightened you on the way. For as I watched I saw you often turning aside, and I feared that you might spring away and slip over the cliffs. But thanks be to the Bridegroom, to whom I have betrothed you, children, who has granted all our prayers.’ And as she was saying this,” she said, “we reached the enclosure, the doors being still open, and going in we found Thecla, Agathe, and Marcella already about to dine. At once Arete,” she said, “said: ‘Come, you too, and recline here in order beside these who share your way of life.’ There were, I think, ten of us feasting there in all,” she told me. “The place was exceedingly beautiful and full of great rest. The air was spread about, lightly mingled with pure rays of light in fine order; and in the very middle a spring bubbled up quietly like oil, a most sweet drink, and from it clear and pure water flowed and formed fountains, which overflowed like rivers and watered the whole place, giving rich streams. For there were various trees there, laden with fresh fruit, the fruits hanging cheerfully in one beauty, and ever-green meadows garlanded with fragrant and many-coloured flowers, from which a breeze gently blew bearing much sweet scent. Near by was a tall chaste-tree, under which we rested, because it was very spreading and shady.” EUBOULION: You seem to me, my dear, to be describing a second dwelling of paradise. GREGORION: You guess rightly. “When, then,” she said, “we were enjoying a feast of every kind and varied delight, so that we lacked nothing pleasant, Arete came in after this and began thus: ‘Maidens, pride of my greatness of mind, fair virgins, who tend the unploughed meadows of Christ with unwedded hands: we have had enough food and feasting now; for all that we provide is plentiful. What is it, then, that I want now, and what do I expect? That each of you speak a speech in praise of virginity. Let Marcella begin, since she reclines first and is also the eldest. As for the one who contends well, I would be ashamed of myself if I did not make her envied, crowning her with the undefiled leaves of wisdom.’”

Marcella, then, she said, began at once from this point and said: “Virginity is something exceedingly great and wonderful and glorious; and, to speak plainly and in keeping with the Scriptures, this best and most beautiful way of life alone is the richest part of the church, and its flower and its first-fruits. For this reason the Lord too promises to bring into the kingdom of heaven those who have kept themselves virgins, where in the Gospels he gives instruction about the different kinds of eunuchs. For chastity is very rare and hard for human beings to attain, and the more supreme and magnificent it is, the greater the dangers it involves. It needs strong and noble natures, which, turning aside the whole stream of pleasure, steer the chariot of the soul upward on high, not falling short of the goal, until, leaping lightly over the world with the swiftest speed of thought and standing truly upon the vault of heaven, they gaze purely upon incorruption itself, springing forth from the undefiled bosom of the Almighty. The earth could not produce this drink; heaven alone knows how to make it flow. For virginity must be thought of as walking on earth but touching the heavens. Some, longing for it and looking only to its end, came forward with unwashed feet, imperfect through vulgarity of mind, and turned back halfway along the road, having taken up no thought worthy of the way of life. For it is not only bodies that must be kept uncorrupted, just as temples should not be made more splendid than the images in them; rather, souls, which are the images of the bodies, must be cared for and adorned with righteousness. And they are cared for and cleansed most when, striving eagerly to listen to the divine words, they do not stop until they lay hold of what is true, coming to the doors of the wise. For as with salt the juices of meat are drawn out, and its putrefactions and everything that corrupts it, in the same way all the irrational desires of the body are dried out of the virgin by teachings. For a soul that is not sprinkled, like salt, with the words of Christ must necessarily stink and breed worms, just as David the king, confessing with tears, cried out in the mountains, ‘My wounds stank and festered,’ because he had not dried himself out by salting himself with discipline, but through carelessness was dragged into passion and reeked of adultery. That is why in Leviticus every offering, unless it is first salted with salt, is forbidden to be brought as a whole burnt offering to the Lord God. For all spiritual study of the Scriptures has been given to us as salt, which stings and dries out for our benefit; without it no soul can be offered through the Word to the Almighty. ‘For you are the salt of the earth,’ the Lord said to the apostles. The virgin, then, must always love what is noble and stand out among those foremost in wisdom, and have nothing careless or soft, but think thoughts worthy of virginity, always scouring away with the word the [stains] of pleasure, lest a small unnoticed putrefaction breed the worm of licentiousness. ‘For the unmarried woman,’ says blessed Paul, ‘is anxious about the things of the Lord, how to please the Lord, that she may be holy in both body and spirit.’ But many, thinking listening a side matter, suppose they are doing a great favour if they lend their ears even briefly. Such women must be excluded; for a petty and low nature, which only pretends to wisdom, should not share in divine teachings. Is it not ridiculous to chatter with women who strain to do everything for things of little worth, so that what they complete may be most exact, but in necessary things, through which the love of self-control grows most, do not think exactness most important?

“For truly it was by a great abundance that the plant of virginity was sent down to human beings from heaven; and for this reason it was not revealed to the first generations. For humanity was still very few, and it had first to grow to a multitude and then be perfected. That is why the men of old did nothing shameful in taking their own sisters as wives, until the law came, set the distinction, and, forbidding what had earlier seemed good, declared it sin, calling ‘accursed’ ‘the one who uncovers the nakedness of his sister’; for God was carefully bringing to our race, at each time, what suited it, just as fathers do with their sons. For they do not set tutors over them straight away from the beginning, but, letting the age of childhood frolic like calves, they first send them to teachers who lisp along with them, until, having cast off the youthful hair of the mind, they are passed on to the practice of greater studies, and from there again to still greater ones. In this way we must think that God, the Father of all, dealt with those before us. For the world, not yet filled with human beings, was like an infant, and it had first to grow to manhood from these beginnings and be multiplied. But when at last it had been settled from end to end, spread out without limit, God no longer allowed humanity to remain in the same practices, but considered how, passing from these to others, they might advance nearer to heaven, until, arriving at virginity itself, the greatest and most supreme teaching, they should be perfected: travelling first from marriage with sisters to taking wives from other families; and from there to no longer mounting many women by the law of four-footed beasts, as if born for breeding; and from there to not being adulterers; and again to continence, and from continence to virginity, where, having practised despising the flesh, they come fearlessly to anchor in the calm harbour of incorruption.

“But if anyone dares to accuse this account of lacking support from the Scriptures, come, let us set out the words of the prophets as well and show what has been said to be even more true. Abraham, at any rate, who first received circumcision as a covenant, seems to signify nothing else, by being circumcised in a member of his flesh, than this: that one should no longer [go] to flesh formed from the same blood, teaching each person to cut off the pleasure of intercourse with his own sister, as with his own flesh. So lying with one's own sisters and having them as bedfellows ceased from the times of Abraham; and being joined in unions with several wives is abolished from the times of the prophets. For it says, ‘Do not go after your desires, and restrain yourself from your appetites,’ for ‘wine and women will lead astray men of understanding.’ And in another place: ‘Let your fountain of water be your own, and rejoice with the wife of your youth,’ clearly now forbidding many wives. And Jeremiah openly calls those who rage after various women ‘stallions mad for mares’; for ‘the prolific multitude of the ungodly,’ it says, ‘will be of no use, and from bastard slips it will not strike deep root.’ But, so as not to speak at length gathering the prophetic sayings, come, let us show again how continence succeeds the union with one wife, until it wholly loosens the inclination toward intercourse that comes from habit, taking away little by little the pleasures of the flesh. Straightway, indeed, someone is introduced who already plainly renounces this distraction, saying: ‘O Lord, Father and Master of my life, do not abandon me to their counsel; take from me the haughtiness of the eyes; let not the appetite of the belly and intercourse seize me.’ And in the all-virtuous Wisdom, the Holy Spirit, now openly drawing the hearers to self-control and continence, sings thus, crying out, ‘Better is childlessness with virtue; for immortality is in its memory, because it is known both with God and with men; they honour it when present and long for it when it has departed; and in eternity it marches crowned, having won the contest for undefiled prizes.’

“About the stages of humanity, then, how, beginning from marriage between brothers and sisters, it travelled toward continence, enough has been said; virginity remains. As far as possible, then, we must try to speak of it. First we must examine why, when many prophets and righteous men taught and did many good things, none either praised or chose virginity. It was reserved, it seems, for the Lord alone to be the first to teach this doctrine, since he alone, coming among us, taught humanity to advance to God. For it was fitting that he, the chief priest and chief prophet and chief angel, should also be called chief virgin. In ancient times humanity was not yet perfect, and therefore it was not yet able to receive the perfect thing, virginity. For, having been made ‘in the image’ of God, it still needed to receive also what is ‘according to the likeness.’ To accomplish this the Word was sent down into the world and first took on our form, spotted with many sins, so that we, for whose sake he wore it, might in turn be able to receive his. For it is possible to be perfected according to the likeness of God when, like skilful painters, we imprint in ourselves, as on tablets, the same features of his human way of life, and remain unharmed as disciples of the path that he revealed. That is why, being God, he chose to put on human flesh, so that, seeing as on a tablet the divine model of life, we too might be able to imitate the one who painted it. For he did not think one thing and do another, nor, thinking one thing good, teach another; but what was truly profitable and good, that he both taught and did.

“What, then, did the Lord, the Truth, the Light, accomplish when he came down into the world? He kept his flesh uncorrupted, adorning it with virginity. We too, then, if we are to be ‘according to the likeness’ of God, should strive to honour the virginity of Christ; for likeness to God is flight from corruption. And that the Word made man became the chief virgin of the church, as he became the chief shepherd and chief prophet, John too, who was possessed by Christ, shows us in the book of Revelation, saying: ‘And I looked, and behold, the Lamb standing on Mount Zion, and with him a hundred and forty-four thousand having his name and the name of his Father written on their foreheads. And I heard a voice from heaven like the sound of many waters and like the sound of loud thunder; and the voice that I heard was like that of harpers playing on their harps. And they sing a new song before the throne and before the four living creatures and the elders; and no one could learn the song except the hundred and forty-four thousand, who have been redeemed from the earth. These are the ones who were not defiled with women; for they are virgins, these who follow the Lamb wherever he goes’: showing the Lord as leader of the chorus of virgins. Notice besides how great is the dignity of virginity with God: ‘These were redeemed from among men as first-fruits for God and for the Lamb, and in their mouth no lie was found; they are blameless; they follow,’ it says, ‘the Lamb wherever he goes.’ Here too he clearly wants to teach us that the multitude of virgins was limited from the start to this number, that is, a hundred and forty-four thousand, while the other saints crowd together in an unlimited multitude. For we must attend to what he declares when speaking about the others: ‘And I saw from every tongue and tribe and nation a great multitude, which no one could number.’ So it is established, as I said, that for the other saints he introduces an unspeakable multitude, but for those in virginity a very small number, in comparison with those who make up a countless multitude. This, Arete,” she said, “is my speech to you on virginity. And if I have left anything out, let Theophila succeed me and fill it up.”