Help And Teaching

Διὰ τί ἔφης, μετὰ τῶν τριῶν ὁσίων παίδων τὴν πυρκαῖὰν οὐ κατεδικάσθη ὁ μέγας Δανιὴλ παρὰ τοῦ Βαβυλωνίου, σύμφρων αὐτοῖς τυγχάνων καὶ συμφυλέτης, καὶ ὁμοδίαιτος, καὶ μᾶλλον τῆς εὐσεβείας διδάσκαλος; Ἐπειδὴ, φημὶ, κατὰ θείαν τοῦτο ᾠκονομήθη προμήθειαν, ἵνα μὴ τῷ ὀνόματι τοῦ Βαβυλωνίου Θεοῦ, τὴν κατάκαυσιν τῆς φλοψὸς οἱ ἀσεβεῖς ἐπιγράφωσι· Βαλτάσαρ γὰρ αὐτὸν, εἰς τιμὴν τῆς τῶν ἀποῥῥητων σαφηνείας, ὠνόμαζον. Καὶ δόγμα τοιοῦτο παρ' ἐκείνοις κρατεῖ, ὠς καὶ μόνον ὀνομαζόμενον, θαυματουργεῖν τὸν Θεὸν αὐτῶν. Ἵνα ταύτην τοίνυν καταργησῃ τὴν δόξαν, ἐν τῇ κρίσει ταύτῃ τὸν Δανιὴλ ἐχώρισε, καὶ εὑρέθη γυμνὴ καθ' ἑαυτὴν ἡ τῶν νέων εγκράτεια, καὶ τοῦ Θεοῦ ἡ βοήθεια, τὴν βροντῶσαν μαράνασα κάμινον. Ἅγιος Ἰσίδωρος Του Πηλουσιώτου, Βιβλιον Πρῶτον, Ἐπιστολή ΙΘ´ Ἡρακλειδῃ Ἐπισκοπῳ Source: Migne PG 78.193c-d

Concerning your enquiry about why the great Daniel was not condemned to the flames by the king of Babylon along with the three pious youths, the same sentence being given to all three who shared the same way of life, 1 it was that he might be a teacher of piety. And this, I say, was a matter of Divine providence, lest impious men should attribute the suppression of the flames to the name of a Babylonian God, the one who they called Baltazarus, and they proclaim it a mystery in his honour, and so with this teaching prevailing among them, in name only, their god be the wonder worker. Whence to suppress and abolish this opinion, Daniel was separated from the judgement of the others, and it was found that the roaring furnace was suppressed by the continence of the youths and the help of God. Saint Isidore of Pelusium, Book 1, Letter 19, To The Bishop Heracleides 1 Dan 3

Considering The Wretched

Aiunt igitur a Deo omnia praetermitti, quia nec coerceat malos nec tueatur bonos, et ideo in hoc saeculo deteriorem admodum statum esse meliorum; bonos quippe esse in paupertate, malos in abundantia; bonos in infirmitate, malos in fortitudine; bonos semper in luctu, malos semper in gaudio, bonos in miseria et abjectione, malos in prosperitate et dignitate. Primum igitur ab iis qui hoc ita esse vel dolent vel accusant, illud requiro, de sanctis hoc, id est, de veris ac fidelibus Christianis, an de falsis et impostoribus doleant. Si de falsis; superfluus dolor, qui malos doleat non beatos esse; cum utique quicumque mali sunt, successu rerum deteriores fiant, gaudentes sibi nequitiae studium bene cedere; et ideo vel ob hoc ipsum miserrimi esse debent ut mali esse desistant, vindicantes improbissimus quaestionibus nomen religionis, et praeferentes ad sordidissimas negotiationes titulum sanctitatis: quorum scilicet nequitiis si miseriae comparentur, minus sunt miseri quam merentur: quai in quibuslibet miseriis constituti, non sunt tamen tam miseri quam sunt mali. Nequaquam ergo pro his dolendum quod non sunt divites ac beati; multo autem pro sanctis minus: quia quamlibet videantur ignorantibus esse miseri, non possunt tamen esse aliud quam beati. Superfluum autem est ut eos quispiam vel infirmitate vel paupertate vel aliis istiusmodi rebus existimet esse miseros, quibus se illi confidunt esse felices. Nemo enim aliorum sensu miser est, sed suo. Et ideo non possunt cujusquam falso judicio esse miseri, qui sunt vere sua conscientia beati. Nulli enim, ut opinor, beatiores sunt quam qui ex sententia sua atque ex voto agunt. Humiles sunt religiosi, hoc volunt: pauperes sunt, pauperie delectantur: sine ambitone sunt, ambitum respuunt, inhonori sunt, honorem fugiunt, lugent lugere gestiunt, infirmitate laetantur. Cum enim, inquit Apostolus, infirmor, tunc potens sum. Nec immeriot sic arbitratur, ad quem Deus ipse sic loquitur: Sufficit tibi gratia mea: nam virtus in infirmitate perficitur. Nequaquam ergo nobis dolenda est haec afflictio infirmitatum, quam intelligimus matrem esse virtutum. Itaque quidquid illud fuerit, quicumque vere religiosi sunt, beati esse dicendi sunt: quia inter quamlibet dura, quamlibet aspera, nulli beatiores sunt quam qui hoc sunt quod volunt. Soleant quamvis esse nonulli ui turpia atque obscena sectantes, etsi juxta opinionem suum beati sunt, quia adipiscuntur quod volunt; re tamen ipsa beati non sunt, quia quod volunt, nolle debuerant. Religiosi autem hunc cunctis beatiores sunt, quia et habent quae volant, et meliora quam quae habent omnino habere non possunt. Labor itaque, et jejunium, et paupertas, et humilitas, et infirmitas non omnibus sunt onerosa tolerantibus, sed tolerare nolentibus. Sive enim gravia haec, sive levia, animus tolerantis facit. Nam sicut nihil est tam leve quod ei non grave sit qui invitus facit, sic nihil est tam grave quod non ei qui id libenter exsequitur, leve esse videatur. Nisi forte antiquis illis priscae virtutis viris, Fabiis, Fabriciis, Cincinnatis, grave fuisse existimamus quod pauperes erant, qui divites esse nolebant; cum omnia scilicet studia, omnes conatus suos ad communia emolumenta conferrent, et crescentes reipublicae vires privata paupertate ditarent. Numquid parcam illam tunc agrestemque vitam cum gemitu et dolore tolerabant, cum viles ac rusticos cibos ante ipsos quibus coxerant focos sumerent, eosque ipsos capere nisi ad vesperam non liceret? Numquid aegre ferebant quod avara ac divite conscientia auri talenta non premerent, cum etiam argenti usum legibus coercerent? Numquid illecebrae et cupiditatis poenam putabant quod distenta aureis nummis marsupia non haberent, cum patricium hominem, quod usque ad decem argenti libras dives esse voluisset, indignum curia judicarent? Non despiciebant tunc, puto, pauperes cultus, cum vestem hirtam ac brevem sumerent, cum ab aratro arcesserentur ad fasces, et illustrandi habitu consulari, illis fortasse ipsis quas assumpturi erant imperialibus togis madidum sudore pulverem detergerent. Itaque tunc illi pauperes magistratus opulentam rempublicam habebant; nunc autem dives potestas pauperem facit esse rempublicam. Et quae, rogo, insania est, aut quae caecitas, ut egestuosa et mendicante republica divitias posse cedant stare privatas? Tales ergo tunc veteres Romani erant; et sic illi tunc contemnebant divitias, nescientes Deum sicut nunc spernunt sequentes Dominum. Slavian De Gubernatione Dei Source:  Migne PL 53.30c-33b

They say, then, that everything is neglected by God, since He neither restrains the wicked nor protects the good, and therefore in this world the state of better men is much worse, certainly with the good in poverty and the wicked in abundance, the good weak and the wicked strong, the good ever in grief and the wicked always joyful, the good in misery and abjection and the wicked prosperous and honoured. Firstly I wish to ask this of those who lament or denounce these things: do they grieve for the saints, that is, the true and faithful Christians, or for the false impostors? If for the false, needless is the grief that bewails the unhappiness of the wicked, since all evil folk are made worse by success in their affairs, who rejoice at some fortunate outcome of their iniquity; yet they should be the most wretched in order that they may cease to be wicked, that they stop vindicating their evil advances under the name of religion and giving the title of sanctity to their most sordid deeds; indeed, if one were to compare their crimes with the misfortunes of sinners they would be shown to be less wretched than they deserve, for in whatever misfortunes they are placed they are not so wretched as they are wicked. Thus one must never grieve because they are not rich and happy, and much less so for the saints, for however wretched they may seem to be to those who are ignorant, they are not able to be anything else but happy. Indeed it is superfluous to think them wretched because of sickness, or poverty, or some similar thing, in which they confess themselves happy. No one is wretched because of the opinion of another, but only in his own mind. And therefore they are not able to be wretched by the incorrect judgement of another who are in their own consciences truly happy. For none, I think, are happier than those who live and act according to their own resolution and vows. The religious are lowly and they choose to be so; they are poor and they delight in poverty; they lack ambition, reviling ambition; they are without honour, fleeing honour; they weep and exult in weeping; they rejoice in weakness. 'For when,' says the Apostle,' I am weak, I am strong.' 1 And not without reason is it so judged by him to whom God Himself said: 'Let my grace suffice for you; virtue is perfected in weakness.' 2 Never then should this affliction of weakness be a cause of sorrow to us, for we understand it to be the mother of the virtues. Therefore, whatever may have befallen, those who are truly religious should be called happy, since amid any hardships or difficulties none are happier than those who are what they wish. Although it is usual that a few pursue things vile and obscene, even if according to their own opinion they are happy when they gain what they wish, yet in truth they are not happy, because what they want they should not. And in this the religious are happier than all others, because they have what they wish and indeed cannot have anything better than they have. So toil, fasting, poverty, humility and infirmity are not burdens to all who bear them, but to those who are unwilling to bear them. Whether something is heavy or light the mind of the one who bears it makes it so. For just as no task is so light that it is not a burden to the one who performs it unwillingly, so none is so heavy that to the one who it does it glady it does not seem light. Unless perhaps to those ancient men of old virtue, the Fabii, Fabricii and Cincinnati, we think that it was a burden that they were poor who did not wish to be rich, when all their cares, all their efforts, were for the common good, and by their private poverty they enriched the growth of the state. Was it, then, with groans and grief that they bore that lean and rustic life, when they ate cheap country foods before the very fire on which they had cooked it, and did not permit themselves to take of it it until evening? Was it that they bore it ill that they were not driven to talents of gold by an avarious and grasping mind, when their laws restricted the use even of silver? Was it that they thought it a punishment according to enticing desire that they did not have purses stuffed with gold, when they judged a patrician unworthy of the senate because he had wished to increase his wealth to the sum of ten pounds? Then, I think, they did not despise the way of the poor who wore only one short and shaggy garment, who from the plow were summoned to the fasces, and, about to be made illustrious in consular robes, perhaps wiped off the dusty mositure of sweat with the imperial togas that they were about to put on. Then the magistrates were poor, but the nation rich; now the wealth of those in power makes the state poor. And what madness is it, I ask, or what blindness, to think that amid the poverty and beggary of the state private fortunes will stand fast? Such, then, were the ancient Romans; so they in their day scorned riches, not knowing God, just as now the followers of the Lord scorn them. Salvian, On The Providence of God 1 1 2 Cor 12.10 2 2 Cor 12.9

The Grace of Flight

Τοσαύτην χάριν ὁ Θεὸς καὶ πρὸ τοῦ αἰῶνος τοῦ μέλλοντος τοῖς μοναχοῖς ἐδωρήσατο, ὥστε τούτους μὲν μὴ θέλειν τὴν ἀνθρωπίνην δόξαν, μήτ' ἐπιθυμεῖν τῶν ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ παντοίων ἀξιωμάτων, ἀλλὰ καὶ κρύπτεσθαι πολλάκις, καὶ σπουδάζειν μᾶλλον λανθάνειν τοὺς ἀνθρώπους διὰ τὸ ἐγκαταμίξαι ἐκουσίως ἑαυτοὺς τοῖς εὐτελέσι καὶ ἐξουδενωμένοις τῶν ἀδελφῶν· πολλοὺς δὲ μεγιστᾰνας, καὶ πᾶσαν τὴν ἐν κόσμῳ ἀξίαν, εἴθ' ἑκουσίως, εἴτ' ἀβουλήτως διά τινος περιστατάσεως προσφεύγειν τοῖς ταπεινοῐς μοναχοῖς, καὶ λυροῦσθαι μὲν κινδύνων θανατηφόρων, σωτηρίας δὲ, καὶ προσκαίρου, καὶ αἰωνίου τυγχάνειν. Ἡ γὰρ θεία πρόνοια συνωθεϊ τοὺς δυνάστας, ἑκόντας τε καὶ ἄκοντας, προσφεύγειν τοῖς ἐλαχίστοις, καὶ σώζεσθαι. Ἅγιος Νειλος,Βιβλιον Πρῶτον, Ἐπιστολὴ Α', Πτολεμαιῳ Συνκλητικῳ Source: Migne PG 79.81a-b

Such grace before the future age God has given to monks that neither do they wish for human glory, nor desire any honour in the world, but to be often hidden and to be eager rather to be forgotten by men, mixing of their own free will with the vile and most despicable brothers. And yet many great men, conspicuous with worldly glories, either by their own will, or unwillingly on account of something that they must flee, fly to humble monks, and so are ransomed from fatal dangers unto salvation, both now and forever. For the Divine providence compels the powerful, the willing and the unwilling, to flee to the least, that they be saved. Saint Nilus of Sinai, Book 1, Letter 1, To Ptolemaeus

Bestirring Drunkards

Expergiscimini ebrii, et flete, et ululate, omnes qui bibitis vinum in dulcedine: quoniam periit ab ore vestro. LXX: Evigilate, quo ebrii estis in vino vestro: et plorate et plangite, omnes qui bibitis vinum in ebrietate: quoniam ablatum est de ore vestro.   Quasi senes atque presbyteri audire debemus: nulla res ita inebriat ut animi perturbatio. Est tristitia quae ducit ad mortem: haec abominanda ebrietas est. Est ira quae justitiam Dei non operatur, et furori proxima,mentis suae impotem facit: in tantum ut labia tremant, dentes concrepent, vultus pallore mutetur. Recteque illud laudatur Archytae Tarentini, qui cum villico suo esset iratus: Iam te, inquit, occiderem, nisi iratus essem. Quid referam de gaudio et voluptate, et maxime amore, qui excaecat cordis oculos: et nihil aliud amantem, nisi id quod amat, cogitare permittit. An non est dicenda ebrietas, eum propter vile scortum, et ignominiosam corporis partem, animae libertas in serviles blanditias inclinatur? cum laborem suum alterius facit esse delicias? cum furto, scelere, atque perjuriis, opes futurae praeparet voluptatis? Et cum videatur ab omnibus, se existimat non videri: dummodo potiatur eo quod desiderat. Sed et avaritia excaecat animum ejus, cui nihil satis est: et muliebris timor, et dulcium cupido vitiorum. Unde dicitur ad eos: Evigilate et expergiscimini, qui ebrii estis: nequaquam vino, ut in solis LXX continetur, sed omni perturbatione vitiorum: Flete, et plangite, et agite poenitentiam: et assumite tristitiam quae ducit ad vitam, et ululate, omnes qui  bibitis vinum in dulcedine, sive, in ebrietate. Dulcia enim sunt vitia: quia mel distillat de labiis mulieris meretricis: et idcirco in Dei sacrificia non offertur: quoniam periit, sive ablatum est de ore vestro vinum, ebrietas atque dulcedo quae vos deceperat. Saepe quippe Dei fit providentia, ut qui non cognoverunt Deum in prosperis, cognoscant in adversis: et qui divitiis male abusi sunt, ad virtutes penuria corrigantur. Juxta hunc sensum audiant senes: habitatores autem terrae percipiant auribus, de illo vino nunc praecipi, in quo est luxuria, et quo qui inebriati fuerint, regnum Dei possidere non possunt. Qui vini ebrietate sopitus est, evigilet et ploret ebrium se fuisse, et ululet: ut postea ululatus ejus et fletus vertatur in risum, et gaudeat se ebrietatis materiam non habere, quae eum per abundantiam ebrium fecerat et vesanum. Sanctus Hieronymous, Commentarium in Joelem Prophetam, Cap I Source: Migne PL 25.953c-954b

Bestir yourselves drunkards and weep, and howl all you who drink wine in sweetness, because it has perished from your mouth. The Septuagint reads: Wake, you who are drunk on your wine, and weep and cry out, all you who drink wine in drunkenness, because it has been taken away from your mouth.1 As old men and elders we should hear: nothing inebriates like the troubled soul. It is a gloom that leads to death, and this is the drunkenness to be abominated. It is an anger that does not work the righteousness of God, 2 and it is near to fury, making the mind powerless, so that the lip trembles, the teeth ache, and the face blanches. And rightly praised is Archytas of Tarentum, who said to his steward, 'I would have already killed you if I had been angry.' What can I tell of joy and pleasure and especially love to him who has blinded the eyes of the heart and is permitted to think nothing else loveable unless it is that which he loves? But must it not be said of drunkenness, on account of vile prostitutes and the disgraceful parts of the body, that it inclines the freedom of the soul to servile charm? When all a man's labour is but to make himself dear to another? With the thief, amid crime and false oaths, will he not prepare the future wealth of his pleasure? And when it is observed by all, yet he does not judge himself so, provided that he drinks down what he desires. But as avarice blinds the soul, which is sated with nothing, so it is with fretfulness for a woman, and the desire of the sweetness of the vices. Whence it is said to them: Watch and wake, you who are drunk, and not now for wine, which is found  only in the Septuagint, but weep for every tribulation of the vices and cry out and make penance, and take up the sorrow which leads to life, and howl all you who drink wine in sweetness, or in drunkenness. Sweet indeed are the vices, because honey drips from the lips of a whorish woman, 3 and thus no sacrifice is offered to God, because your wine has perished, or has been taken away from the mouth, the drunkenness and the sweetness for which He reproves you. Often indeed the providence of God may be so, that those who do not know God in prosperity shall know him in adversity, and he who with wealth is vilely abused, may be led to virtue by poverty. According to this understanding let the old hear, let the ears of the dwellers on the earth attend, on that wine thinking, in which is luxury and by which they were made drunks, unable to possess the kingdom of God. 4 He who has been made insensible by wine, let him wake and weep over his drunkenness and howl, that after crying out and tears he may turn to smiles, and rejoice that he is no longer drunk, which through an abundance of drunkenness made him a madman. Saint Jerome, Commentary on The Prophet Joel, Chapter 1 1 Joel 1. 5 2 James 1.20  3 Prov 5.3  4 Ephes 5.5