The three blessed children from Judea, cast into the fire, were an image of you, O Virgin! For you carried the immaterial fire, of which the bush of Moses was once a type.
Eighth Song: The King of Heaven
B 15. The Pisidians glory in having these saints as their fellow citizens, and Claudiopolis, where they ended their lives. Taught the good late, but strengthened by a vehement faith, the victors are now praised with beautiful hymns. Melted in the crucible of temptations, you shine like freshly cast gold, the ornament and splendor of martyrs. O Virgin, we have found in the palace of your womb the King of heaven, the liberator from all captivity.
Cantus nonus: Vere Deiparam te
16. There is no place of bright lineage in the Lord. Thus, the renowned athletes, having appeared radiant in the nobility of their souls, are numbered among the choirs of bodiless spirits. O Marcus, shepherd of the mountains, remember your spiritual pupils who honor your memory; and those whom you fed here, glorify there. O three soldiers of God, whom we now celebrate, who fought against the terrible and savage barbarism of the nations, deliver us from them. O truly Theotokos, mother who knew not man, purity of virgins, our guardian glorified by the angel, we magnify you.
ORATION ON THE HOLY MARTYRS ANANIAS, AZARIAS, AND MISAEL CAST INTO THE FURNACE
1. The fire of the Babylonian furnace was to some extent burning, when it dispersed its exuding flames unto the destruction of the wicked and exercised its violence upon them, attacking the Chaldeans standing round about. On the other hand, it cooled the saints like dew, and, enfeebled by God, it allowed the force of the air to descend upon them—that is, it let the cooling effect of the air reach the children of God, whom the flame did not burn in the least, but only illuminated and enlightened. It was as if, occupied against the enemies of God, it forgot that it was a flame toward the men of God, or as if, having given itself entirely to falling upon the Chaldeans, it allowed the air to cool the divinely-aged children of God. For one must not maintain that the air surrounding us is entirely hot, nor must one hold immovably to this opinion, if one pays any attention to the author of the books *On Providence*, a man wise and holy.
2. And if it seems inconsistent that the same furnace should both burn and cool, because both do not act in the same way—but heat expands that which is ignited, while cold produces an effect that is not equal but different from the relaxation or yielding through which, divinely, the fire was treated as if absent—one must take note in a thousand cases that
A there are found such opposing energies, proceeding from one most diverse cause. Nor is it difficult for an industrious man to adduce many similar examples; I shall now mention one that is very clear to the learned, which is as follows. A skilled pilot knows how to save a ship, and equally how to destroy it: to save when he is present, and to destroy if he is absent. Clearly, therefore, when the fire was unable to exert its natural force, it was then considered to be absent. And thus, I think, one might reconcile without conflict how that furnace could be divided in its incompatible energies, at least as regards what is natural, into two: that of burning according to nature, and that of cooling beyond nature—both having one presiding cause, the divine decree, or to speak otherwise, God, who is regarded as both immaterial fire and heavenly rain. And thus is established the second solution.
B 3. There is also this third point, which itself also necessarily presupposes the divine ordering of providence, and for this reason it must be known in advance: namely, that every act determined by an ordinance, just as by the principle of command, is not to be attributed to the agent but to the one who orders, whether he be a king, or a master, or any other kind of leader. With this set forth, one must also observe that great effects are produced by God the ordainer, or by the divine ordinance. We must also add that miracles and supernatural things are performed by Him, to which no man can attain, in a word, the causes of which no human mind can even slightly grasp. Although, therefore, certain natural forces inhere in fire, constant from the first origin of the world, these do not possess such power that the Creator God cannot alter and change the entire property and virtue of fire, lest the Persians, who worship fire, boast that it is omnipotent and not subject to God. Therefore, God the ordainer turns and extinguishes the forces excited by nature itself, and adds, when He wills, others that are supernatural and prodigious. Whence, sometimes, fire—so corrosive and all-devouring—nourishes and gives life at God's command, as is testified by small animals nourished in boiling water, which a hand cannot touch. The same fire utterly vacates its power of burning, God ordaining it, as that myriad of martyrs provides an invincible argument—those who overcame fire, not by any material covering of their bodies, but by the conversion of the burning coals into a cooling dew, and together with the holy youths, the precentors of this miracle, they sang in unison the victory over the fire, and C exulted in triumph over it, while those who trampled the fire, not with material covering but by the change of the burning fire into a cooling dew, sang a paean in concert with the holy youths over the victory over this fire, and celebrated their triumph.
4. Every rational man will grant, therefore, that fire becomes dew-like to those it encompasses when the divine decree so wills; since it is more fitting that the pure and those void of all filth should overcome fire than asbestos, which, according to natural history, fire cannot overcome, as experience teaches. Yet it is not at all unique, according to the holy Psalmist, that dew should spring up for the saints, when from elsewhere a holocaust of the just is kindled by water. Is it not altogether appropriate that he who
cools in fire, the same should also burn through water, and that these things should yield to their opposites, mix and come together, and operate the properties of one another by a principle of interchange, so that we too might be taught that concord is a good thing, and brotherhood natural to it? A
5. To this end, therefore, the third solution is reduced: that God does not distribute to the fire predetermined powers, this one or that one, but simply grants it—as He also bestows upon the other elements—all powers, to be portioned out by a process of transformation according to whatever He deems good, where it is necessary, just as He Himself ordains. Even now, of the two powers implanted in it—namely, the natural power of burning and the supernatural and divinely-ordained power of cooling—He let the one loose against the Chaldeans, while He favored the faithful with the other. B
6. And there is indeed another new operation of fire, commanded from above: to burn, clearly, in a fierce way, yet not to consume. Those who examine divine things behold it as a refining, beautifying the souls within such a fire as if for a golden radiance. But I cannot affirm that this goldsmith’s fire was the Chaldean one; for I know the tradition which reports it to have been something completely unprecedented—its inactivity and idleness, through which it was not only unable to refine the youths who were friends of God within it, but could not even warm them, being situated as if a dew had been poured around them. C That great, vast fire was to them as if a dim light were brought near to a vivid flame, and extinguished. And indeed the matter is consistent; for the fire of faith and the flame therefrom, with which the youths were fired toward God, were incommensurate with the Chaldean fire and incomparable; and thus they caused that fire and the coals associated with it to wither away, being overcome by another greater, and most divine, and for that reason unbearable, fire. D
7. It was necessary, therefore, that those who were inflamed by zeal for God should not be subject to that sensible fire, but should dance within it as if they had entered cooling water. For it shuddered, according to him who spoke thus, and yielded to the holy bodies in which God dwelt—the fire, as a fellow servant—and it could not withstand the humble ones who were the genuine ministers of Him; but, as if having frozen in fear, it became inactive and possessed no boast of burning.
8. And after this third solution was brought forward, there was added to it this other, a fourth one. For it is possible to think here both of the virtues mentioned earlier and those which were at times perceived in the fire long ago. Nor would it be undeserved for me to say that, as in a mirror, one might foresee in it the great and most divine events that followed these scriptural figures of truth, which that fire sketched in outline, and by which the birth of our Savior Jesus Christ was portended. In this, indeed, through a notable miracle, the fire of the Godhead—as it is sung elsewhere—did not burn the Virgin, who, in the manner of the rain which prophetic vision foresaw, carried the fire, namely, Christ, One of the Trinity. There are ineffable properties of fire in this supernatural birth, through which, as through fire burning and at the same time lifegiving
and bedewing, every A impure matter of our nature, which according to the manner of the Chaldeans ought to have been consumed, was scorched and burned up, and vanished and was destroyed as if reduced to dust, consumed by the fire; according to the Prophet's word, destroying every malitia of sin. But that which was necessary to remain and to be saved for the life and glory of God, the part living an angelic life, was preserved; and this remaining part for us is as the people of God, which is itself similar to that fire, not consumed by it, but illumined B and at the same time refreshed by the divine baptism, and thus shines with a more divine splendor.
9. The Chaldean furnace, foreshowing in the latter times at the end of the ages C the operations manifested to us, and figuratively shadowing them forth through the purity of the three great youths, practiced one operation against the Chaldeans, whom it burned, and another against the holy youths, whom it refreshed. But if the present explanation must be clarified with greater brightness regarding the energy of the Babylonian fire, the canticle says it was divided, not so much regarding the forces which were then in it and exercised by it, as those which were to be in the future, so that then, indeed, such properties of fire were perceived only by prophetic vision, but afterwards appeared clearly to the eyes themselves, and thus responded to the ancient figures, according to the sacred singer, being fulfilled now by later events—namely, when the fire of the Godhead was conceived in the Virgin without burning, from which arose the source of life, boiling over with flames to burn up all the devil's thorns, and rich in dew to water the plants of God. The fire prefigured such future operations, joyful indeed for the faithful, but otherwise for the infidels, and thus to be divided proportionately to each, and dividing them, effecting by its greatest power things that are irreconcilable.
10. This fourth and final solution is added to the three; for D nothing more remains for the solution of the previous difficulty. The other one, set out below in the discourse and derived from these words: "Restore both, O Christ God," the following explanation will clarify, illuminating the darkness of the obscure sentence with two solutions as if with torches: of which solutions one is clear, the other has something of depth.
11. And the one less deep would be of this kind: "Often, O God, singing hymns to You, I mix in sin, doing the former rightly, but the latter wrongly." It is necessary, therefore, as the first has been corrected, so also for the second to be rectified, so that one part may not be without defect, and the latter limp badly; but may both be corrected by Your grace, leveled out by Your excellent balance, which inclines to the other side. Such is the first solution of that difficulty, more liquid, yet not to be called, I think, unrefined. The other, however, is this: Sometimes it happens that we speak and do not know what we are saying, just as we also read and do not know what we are reading. And this happens not through ignorance, but because the mind does not attend to those things which are spoken or read. Then we seem like a parrot, or a magpie, or that creature of Scripture a-i-
-A-i-drunken ones, who babble many things without mind, being only a little removed from those who are truly mad. Therefore, he who sings hymns while wandering toward other things—and these not even necessary for life, which for their impropriety do not please God—sins, falsifying the worship of God and cheating Him of the elevation of mind directed toward Him. And thus, that person does not perform the song correctly, and for this reason he himself is in need of correction, just as one who simply acts sinfully. For as such a person is not with the Good when he performs sin, even if he perhaps knows God and knows Him correctly, so too he who sings, yet does not stretch his own self toward the Lord being praised; this man, for this reason, crying out "Lord, Lord" in vain according to the evangelical sentiment, is rightly considered not even as a whelp of a beast roaring and seeking food for itself, but rather as B sounding brass, or a clanging cymbal, or a child’s rattle making noise to no purpose.
12. Therefore, it is desirable for such a man to be corrected in both respects: both the impropriety of his evil thoughts and the hymnody mixed with them, which is thus rendered useless. For it does not push out evil—not as a nail drives out a nail, according to the proverb—but rather, just as iniquity drives out holiness, so too do evil thoughts remove a perfect prayer, which must be from the whole mind, and from the whole heart, and from the whole soul. That this is clear to us is shown by the fact that we often sing in this way without even remembering whether we are praying. For how could one pray with the whole soul, who has turned it all away from God, not even clinging to Him by so much as the letter of the words? Such a state of mind is, I think, accurately expressed by those tragic words: "The tongue has sworn, but the mind has not sworn." For there are those who are precipitate in their words and forward with their tongue, before immersing themselves in their mind and deepening their thoughts in the matter; they C abjure, so to speak, the tongue from their own mind. And such oaths are especially those made for love; therefore, it is said that they are not even strong. And I know that the tragic opinion was mocked by comedy; but out of respect for the wisdom of the satirist, I hesitate to contradict it, though I would say that there are countless words that fly out without the mind, which we might call offspring of folly. Such too is hymnody, to which evil thoughts are mixed in, and sometimes even irrational actions. For to whom must God be thought to be present in such a case? To the word of the hymnody, in the mere letters themselves? Or to the evil thought? He accepts the former, but strongly hates the latter. The things of the tongue are beautiful, but the mind D disagrees. God does not yet hasten to receive one who sings with the tongue alone, but pushes him away, because he acts wickedly with the better part, the soul. He loves one who is mindful of Him; but because he does not remember Him from the soul—not that it is entirely absent, but he does not even remember Him at all—He does not love him greatly, and sometimes even shuts His ears to his voice, leaving the one who sings to the demon whom he serves.
13. You draw God to yourself, O man, by the things with which you sing to Him; but by the things with which you think those of the evil one, you drive away your own greatest benefactor. You speak wisely with your mouth, while your heart is foolish; whatever comes into your mouth
A you count as rational, and in this way you divide the faculty of reason within you, whereby the flesh acts, but your mind is present as though absent. You serve God, yet you chant for only a short time; for the greater part you give pleasure to the adversary, who rejoices and dances because you chant in such a way, and rightly so. For while you ought to drive him away by chanting correctly, and cry out to him in this way things that strike fear into him, you instead give him the boldness to approach you, chanting discordant songs to God but pleasing hymns to the other. And you seem to do something B similar to a man who, with one hand, runs over chords, touching them to produce a melodious sound, while with the other hand he strikes potsherds together, and thus pains the one hearing him. For so too, you gladden God for a little while, with those things you set out to sing to Him, then you provoke Him to anger with the things that disturb Him, by reasoning in an absurd manner.
14. May it therefore be granted to you, and to all of us, O brother, that both such things may be corrected, and thus we may sing in an untroubled manner, and in a way pleasing to God and unmixed with evil thoughts, so that both the tongue and the mind may be in harmony with the divine psalter, regulated by God Himself, the moderator of all our affairs. For if He Himself does not stand by, and deign to apply the door of restraint and all manner of guardianship, first to the mouth and lips of the interior man, C and then to that of the visible covering—that is, to the external mouth and lips, which themselves also stand in need of no little guarding and restraint—our prayer and the lifting up of the soul to God that comes through it is not perfectly directed in our life. For we must always fear lest, when the inner mouth and the lips pertaining to it are opened unguardedly, evil things might enter in along with the good chants, such as we often experience when right reason does not preside over our psalmodies. Just as, when sheepfolds are left unguarded, nothing prevents a wolf from sometimes leaping into the flock of sheep and plundering everything within; and just as, when the gates of cities are not diligently watched, those whom wise government hates can enter along with the citizens: so too, when the gates of the soul are not guarded with precision, there is nothing to prevent the wolf from leaping in together with the flock of our thoughts, and ravaging things within; and likewise with the gates of cities, all which are not guarded with precision, those whom the right order of the state hates may enter alongside the citizens.
15. Let us therefore pray to chant both with mouth and with soul, and that we ourselves may thus be filled with the divine Spirit and so full of God, that we may sing to Him D completely and perfectly; and let us feel ashamed if we are vigilant with our lips but asleep in our mind, and are alive with our mouth but dead in the rest of human nature. God blesses the tongue that chants; but what profit is this to us, if He does not bless the soul as well? Let us not provide the adversaries an occasion to laugh at us, who themselves, though crying out that Christ the Savior is the Son of God, were nevertheless not on His side. Let us not, while the speech is entrusted to our lips, wander off ourselves to some other place—like some man who, having dug a channel through which a stream flows, then departs, leaving the water to wander hither and thither wherever it chances. Nor is a master praised who sleeps himself, while commanding his servant to watch in vain. For is the mind in us not the master, while the tongue in our chanting is the servant serving no useful purpose? It is better, believe me, if we are to chant with the tongue alone while the governing mind is absent, to chant separately with simple sambucas, and with timbrels, pipes, and lyres, and whatever musical instruments the ancients played upon. Why, therefore, is it better? Because the mind in them...