Homilies on Numbers 11.6–12.2

After this he adds: “And the Lord spoke to Aaron, saying: Behold, I have given you the firstfruits to keep.” Although in some Latin copies “to observe” is written, “to keep” is nevertheless more accurate. But we must ask how, according to the law, firstfruits are kept. For the priests receive firstfruits not to keep them but to consume them. How, then, does he say: “Behold, I have given you the firstfruits to keep”? Hence it is clear that this cannot be applied to the law of the letter, but to the law of the spirit. For those firstfruits which we expounded spiritually above can be kept; these cannot. And if Christ is firstfruits, according to the Apostle, truly these firstfruits have been given us to keep. For what is so blessed as that the soul which has received Christ should always keep him and always have him abiding in it? Such a soul truly receives firstfruits to keep. For those firstfruits which were offered under the law were consumed as food and, having entered the belly, passed out into the drain, as the Gospel says. But whoever eats these firstfruits and tastes the bread that came down from heaven will not die but remains for eternal life. This food remains, or rather always increases. It is, then, as the Apostle says, a spiritual food, which the more it is consumed, the more it grows. For the more fully you take the word of God, the more earnestly you eat this food, the more abundantly it will overflow in you. These things have been said about what is written, “to keep the firstfruits.”

And it follows: “From all the things that are sanctified to me by the sons of Israel.” Nor is this said without a sacrament; for God does not wish to receive firstfruits from anywhere but from the sanctified of Israel. For it could happen that some works worthy of God are found among the Gentiles too; for some among them too have cultivated virtues of the soul, and philosophy has accomplished a little in some. But he does not wish these to be offered among the firstfruits. God wishes to receive good deeds from those whose mind sees God and who have been sanctified to God through faith. But a Gentile, even if he seems to have something honorable and commendable in his conduct, by the very fact that he ascribes the virtue of his soul not to God but credits it to his own boasting: such uprightness is not sanctified, and therefore it is not received among the firstfruits. As far as the definition of the letter of the law goes, it seems to exclude even proselytes from a gift of this kind; for he wishes only the sanctified from the sons of Israel to offer firstfruits. But I think one can be called an Israelite from the time he is permitted to enter the church of God; for it is written: “You shall not abhor the Edomite, for he is your brother, nor the Egyptian, because you were a sojourner in the land of Egypt. If sons are born to them, in the third generation they shall enter the church of God.” As long as the Egyptian or the Edomite, then, does not bear fruit and has not produced sons of the first, second, and third generation, he cannot enter the church of the Lord; it is the generation of sons that makes them enter the church of the Lord. Let whoever reads the divine letters observe more carefully, and not pass over the words of Scripture as he pleases, but look at each word: how it did not say, “if sons or daughters are born to them,” but, “if sons are born to them, in the third generation they shall enter the church of the Lord.” And consider, if you can, according to the mystical sense, why it is only sons, not daughters too, who make the fathers enter the church of the Lord. Indeed you will find that the saints too, to whom God gives an exceptional testimony, seldom begot daughters, but sons. Abraham did not beget daughters; nor did Isaac; Jacob alone begot one, and she was a grief to her brothers and parents. For, defiled by Shechem the son of Hamor, she brought reproach on her family and stirred up her brothers' fury for vengeance. And every male is commanded to appear before the Lord three times a year; the female is not called to appear before the Lord. So if anyone attends carefully to the divine Scriptures, he will find that it is not idle that in one place it names daughters along with sons, and in another makes no mention of daughters. And here too, then, the firstfruits that are offered are commanded to be offered by the sanctified sons of Israel, not also by the daughters: which, however, according to the spiritual understanding, are to be referred not to a distinction of sexes but to a distinction of souls. “To you,” it says, “I have given them as an honor, and to your sons after you, an eternal ordinance.” “To you,” it says. To whom? To Aaron, you will no doubt answer. But the words that follow persuade us rather to understand it of the true high priest, Christ, and of his sons, the apostles and the teachers of the churches. For it says: “an eternal ordinance.” How, then, can what is visible be eternal, when the Apostle says: “For the things that are seen are temporal, but the things that are not seen are eternal”? If, then, the firstfruits offered to Aaron are visible, being visible they cannot be called eternal. Likewise visible circumcision, visible unleavened bread, and the visible Passover must necessarily be not eternal but temporal, because the things that are seen are temporal. And again, if the things that are not seen are eternal, then the invisible circumcision, which is in secret, is eternal, and the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth, and the Passover itself, because it is among the things that are not seen, is eternal. In a similar way, then, these things too are called ordinances and eternal, not for him who is a Jew outwardly, but for him who is a Jew inwardly and who keeps the law in spirit, not in letter, according to the inner man. “And let this be yours from the things that are sanctified, holy …”

Going over these things about the sacrifices several times by myself, I have asked what “sanctified holy things” are; and it seems to me that he said “sanctified holy things” here to distinguish them from holy things that are not sanctified. I think, then, that the Holy Spirit is holy in such a way that he is not sanctified. For sanctification did not come to him from outside and from elsewhere, as something he did not have before; but he was always holy, and his holiness had no beginning. And the same must be understood of the Father and the Son. For it is the substance of the Trinity alone which is holy not by a sanctification received from outside but by its own nature. But every creature will be called holy as sanctified, either by the favor of the Holy Spirit or by reason of merits. So, then, we read it written: “Be holy, for I am holy, says the Lord God.” The likeness of holiness is not therefore to be set equally in God and in men. For of God it is said that he is holy; but men, as those who have not always been holy, are commanded to become holy. Indeed, where we have “be holy,” this saying in the Greek rather means “become holy”; but our translators have put “be” for “become” without distinction. Each of us, then, from the time he approaches the fear of God and receives the divine teaching into himself, from the time he has given himself over to God, if indeed he has given himself from the heart, from that time is made holy. But such a one can be called sanctified-holy; truly and always holy is God alone. Do you want me to open to you the difference on this point from the divine Scriptures too? Hear how Paul, writing to the Hebrews, says: “For he who sanctifies and those who are sanctified are all from one.” Who, then, sanctifies? Christ, no doubt. And who are sanctified? Those who believe in Christ. It is clear, then, that he who sanctifies is holy, because he is always holy; but those who are sanctified are to be called not simply holy but sanctified-holy. Nor should you think that what we read written of Christ is contrary to this sense: “Whom the Father sanctified and sent into this world.” For he who is sanctified here is Christ according to the flesh, not according to the spirit. For Christ, speaking according to the spirit and according to the flesh alike, said: “I sanctify myself for them”: so that he who sanctifies is understood according to the spirit, while he who is sanctified for the disciples is understood according to the flesh; yet it is one and the same Christ, who now sanctifies in the spirit and now is sanctified in the flesh. From all fruits, then, sanctified holy firstfruits are to be offered, but to the spiritual high priest. From which fruits, then, shall we offer spiritual firstfruits? Hear how many fruits the Apostle enumerates: “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience,” and the rest. What firstfruits, then, shall we offer to the true high priest from the fruit of love, which is the first fruit of the Spirit? I think the firstfruits of love are that I love the Lord my God with all my heart, and with all my soul, and with all my mind. These are the firstfruits. And what ought I to have in second place from this fruit of love? That I love my neighbor as myself. Those firstfruits of love, then, are offered to God through the high priest, while these which are in second place are left for my use. I think there is something from this fruit to be held in third place: that I love even my enemies. See, then, if you can, whether you can likewise find similar firstfruits of the other fruits of the Spirit. Joy is written as the second fruit of the Spirit. If, then, I rejoice in the Lord, and rejoice in hope, and if I rejoice when I have suffered injury for the name of the Lord, in all these and others like them I have offered the firstfruits of joy to God through the true high priest. And if I endure the plundering of my goods with joy, and tribulations; if I bear poverty, if I bear any insult rejoicing, this too, in second place, is mine among the fruits of the Spirit, the fruit of joy. For if I rejoice in the things of the world, in honors, in riches, the joys are false, from the vanities of vanities. But if I rejoice in evils and exult at the ruin of others, these are not only vain but devilish joys, or rather they are not even to be called joys. “There is no rejoicing for the ungodly,” says the Lord. I want to seek yet another fruit of joy, or rather other firstfruits of joys. If I rejoice in the word of the Lord, if I rejoice in the knowledge of the mysteries of God, if I rejoice that I have been held worthy to know the secrets and hidden things of the wisdom of God, if I rejoice that, having left everything in this world, not only useless things but useful ones, not only vain things but necessary ones, I have given myself over to the word of God alone and to his wisdom: in all these, I think, firstfruits of joy quite acceptable to God are offered. And for the other fruits of the Spirit, each may at leisure fit to them the firstfruits that suit them, lest we draw out the discourse longer than is right.

“And from all their gifts,” it says. Someone has offered a gift to God, and again from the gift firstfruits are to be offered to the high priest. In an allegorical exposition I think this can stand as follows. If someone distributes to the needy or does some good work, he has offered a gift to God according to the commandment. But he also offers firstfruits of the gift if he bestows not only food, for example, or money, but also has the disposition of mercy and compassion. For this is what God requires of man: that the mind itself be filled with and formed by pious and merciful dispositions. “And from all their sacrifices.” The spiritual sacrifice is that of which we read: “Offer to God a sacrifice of praise, and pay your vows to the Most High.” To praise God, then, and to offer vows of prayer is to sacrifice to God. But the firstfruits of such a sacrifice will be offered through the high priest in this way: if we pray not only with words and voice but also with the mind and the heart, as the Apostle too admonishes: “I will pray with the spirit, I will pray also with the mind; I will sing a psalm with the spirit, I will sing a psalm also with the mind.” For even now the angels of God, the cultivators and husbandmen of our heart, stand by and look whether there is in any of us a mind so careful, so intent, that it has received the word of God like a divine seed with all eagerness; whether it shows fruit as soon as we rise for prayer, that is, whether it prays to God with its thoughts collected and gathered within itself, whether it does not wander in mind and fly off in thoughts, so that the body is bowed in prayer while the thoughts run off in different directions. If anyone, I say, has felt his entreaty to be intent and directed, and has understood that he stands before the very sight of God and his ineffable light, and has poured out there his prayers, entreaties, petitions, and thanksgivings, disturbed by the image of no phantasm from outside, let him know that through the angel who stands by the altar he has offered the firstfruits of his sacrifice to the great and true high priest, Christ Jesus our Lord, to whom is glory and dominion for ages of ages. Amen.

The reading about the well, and about the song which Israel sang at the well, has been read to us from the book of Numbers, and we see that it overflows with its usual mysteries, or perhaps even more than usual. For it says: “And the people drank from the well. This is the well of which the Lord said to Moses: Gather the people, and I will give them water to drink.” But in these words the literal account does not seem to me to carry much weight. For why did the Lord so emphatically command Moses to gather the people in order to give them water to drink from the well? As if the people would not have come to the well of their own accord for the sake of drinking! Why, then, is the prophet so strongly commanded to gather the people by his own effort and labor to draw the water of the well? Hence the cheapness of the letter sends us back to the preciousness of the spiritual understanding. And therefore I think it fitting to gather the mysteries of wells from other places of Scripture too, so that by comparing many of them, whatever obscurity the present passage contains may become clear. The Spirit of God, then, says through Solomon in Proverbs: “Drink waters from your own vessels and from the spring of your own wells, and let not the waters overflow for you outside your spring.” Although in other copies we have read: “And let the waters be poured out for you outside your spring. Let your waters be for you alone, and let no stranger share them with you.” Each of us, then (as is indicated in these words), has a well within himself. Indeed we shall say something more: each of us has not one well but many wells, and not one vessel of water but many vessels. For he did not say, “drink waters from your vessel,” but “from your vessels”; and he did not say, “from the spring of your well,” but “from the spring of your wells.” We read that the patriarchs too had wells: Abraham had them, and Isaac had them. And I think Jacob also had them. And taking these wells as a starting point, run through all Scripture looking for wells, and come as far as the Gospels, and there you will find the well on which our Saviour sat, resting after the labor of his journey, when the Samaritan woman came and wished to draw water from the well; there the power of the well or wells in the Scriptures is set forth, a comparison of waters is made, and the secrets of the divine mystery are laid open. For it is said that if anyone drinks of the waters which that earthly well contained, he will thirst again; but whoever drinks of those which Jesus gives, there will become in him a spring of water leaping up to eternal life. And in another place of the Gospel it is no longer a spring or a well but something more that is spoken of: “He who believes in him,” it says, “as the Scripture says, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.” You see, then, that he who believes in him has within himself not only a well but wells, and not only springs but rivers; springs and rivers, however, not such as comfort this mortal life, but such as confer eternal life. According to what we set out from Proverbs, then, where wells are named together with a spring, the word of God is to be understood: a well, if it covers some deep mystery; a spring, if it abounds and flows out to the peoples. But it is not idle to ask how we can explain the plural number of the wells and the singular of the spring, since in Proverbs Wisdom says:

“Drink waters from the spring of your wells.” Let us see, then, of which wells he spoke of one spring. I think that the knowledge of the unbegotten Father can be understood as one well, and the knowledge of his only-begotten Son must be understood as another well. For the Son is other than the Father, and the Son is not the same as the Father, as he himself says in the Gospels: “There is another who bears witness about me, the Father.” And again, I think the knowledge of the Holy Spirit can be seen as a third well. For he too is other than the Father and the Son, as is said of him no less in the Gospel: “The Father will send you another Paraclete, the Spirit of truth.” This, then, is the distinction of three persons in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, which is referred to the plural number of the wells. But of these wells there is one spring. For there is one substance and nature of the Trinity. And in this way the distinction made by holy Scripture will be found not to be idle, when it says “from the spring of your wells”; rather, it has carefully marked the mystical words, so that what is said in the plural should apply to the persons, and what is said in the singular to the substance. But those too can be seen as wells of whose knowledge he spoke who was filled with the wisdom of God: “For he himself gave me true knowledge of the things that are, to know the constitution of the world and the power of the elements, the beginning and end and middle of times, the alternation of times, the changes and turns of the seasons, the cycles of the year and the positions of the stars, the natures of animals and the tempers of wild beasts, the violence of winds and the thoughts of men, the varieties of plants and the powers of roots.” You see how many wells there are in the knowledge of things? The knowledge of plants, for example, is a well, and perhaps the nature of each plant has its own well. And again there is a well of the knowledge of animals, and perhaps each species of animal has its own well. And again there is a well of the reckoning of times, their alternation and change. And because each of these has a high and deep knowledge, they are rightly called wells figuratively. And as long as the mystery of Christ was hidden from ages and generations, the knowledge of these things was rightly called wells; but when, as Paul says, God revealed it to believers through his Spirit, all these things become springs and rivers, so that their knowledge is no longer kept in secret but is brought out to many, and waters and refreshes believers. And therefore, I believe, the Saviour said to his disciples that whoever believes in him and drinks the water of his teaching, there will be in him no longer a well nor a spring, but rivers of living water. For just as this one well, which is the word of God, is said to be wells, and springs, and countless rivers, so too the soul of man, which was made in the image of God, can have in itself and bring forth from itself wells and springs and rivers. But indeed the wells that are in our soul need someone to dig them; for they must be cleaned, and everything earthly must be removed from them, so that those veins of rational thoughts which God has set in the soul may produce pure and clear streams. For as long as earth covers the veins of the waters and blocks the hidden channel of the stream, the wave of pure water cannot flow forth. That, indeed, is why it is written that the servants of Abraham dug wells, but the Philistines filled them up and covered them with earth. But Isaac, who had received his father's inheritance, dug the wells again and removed the earth of the Philistines, which they had thrown onto the waters out of envy. And we have also observed in Genesis, from which this account seems to be taken, that as long as Abraham lived the Philistines did not dare to fill the wells or throw earth into them; but when he departed this life, then the Philistines grew strong and plotted against his wells. But they are afterwards restored by Isaac and return to their former state. Moreover, Abraham's servant, when he goes to betroth or bring a wife for Isaac, finds Rebecca, whose name is interpreted “patience,” at the well; she becomes Isaac's wife, nowhere else but at the wells. Likewise Jacob too, when he came to Mesopotamia with his father's command not to take a wife of another race or of foreign blood, himself also found Rachel at the wells. And Moses found Zipporah at the wells. If, then, you have understood what and of what kind the wives of the saints are, you too, if you wish to take patience in marriage, or wisdom, or any of the other virtues of the soul, and to say what was said of wisdom, “Her I loved, her I sought to take as my bride”: be frequent, be assiduous at these wells, and there you will find a spouse of this kind. For it is certain that all the virtues of the soul dwell by living waters, that is, by the streams of the living Word. There are many wells, then, which we said are within the soul. There are also very many others, which are understood in each of the words and meanings of the Scriptures. Yet this well of which Scripture speaks in the present passage is more eminent and exceptional than the rest, because it was dug not by just any common men but by princes and by those still loftier than these, whom it called kings. For this reason a hymn too is sung to God at this same well. And therefore it is written: “Go,” it says, “to the well. This is the well of which the Lord said to Moses: Gather the people, and I will give them water from the well,” said the Lord. Moses is commanded to gather the people, to come to the well and drink water. And we have often shown that Moses is to be taken as the law. It is the law of God, then, that calls you together to come to the well. What well, but the one we spoke of above, Jesus Christ the Son of God, subsisting in his own substance, yet named with the Father and the Holy Spirit as one spring of the Godhead? To this well, then, that is, to faith in Christ, the law calls us together. For he himself said that Moses wrote about him. To what does it call us together? That we may drink water and sing a song to him: that is, that we may believe with the heart unto righteousness and confess with the mouth unto salvation.