IV. Homily on the Holy Sabbath
A Joannis humilis monachi presbyteri Damasceni, sermo in Sabbatum sanctum.
1. Who shall speak of the mighty acts of the Lord, or who shall make all his praises heard? Who shall recount the limitless and vast sea of his goodness? Who can fathom the incomprehensible love he bears toward his servants? Who can grasp his condescension, which surpasses all human understanding? Who can describe his tender love toward us, and the ineffable providence that has its source therein? Truly, there is no one who can do so, not even if one were to speak with the tongues of angels and men, and had gathered into himself all human wisdom. For although the spirit is willing, the tongue is weak to express it, and the mind is dim in its capacity to understand. For the mystery of the divine dispensation is admittedly great; it is not to be grasped by intellectual power, but by faith alone, and it requires a purity of soul that is established by the fear and love of God. For it is impossible for a soul to attain purification in any other way than through divine fear and love. Nor, yet again, is it possible to receive the divine illumination B if the visionary faculty of the soul has not first been purged. For the Divine is inaccessible to the profane; only the "pure in heart" shall see God, as Christ, who is the Truth itself, says. For even in the theophany that once occurred to Moses in the burning bush, he is first commanded to put off his shoes, and only then approach the symbol that appeared to him. The taking off of the shoes signifies the laying aside of dead and earth-bound thoughts. And again, when Mount Sinai was smoking as God gave the Law upon it, not everyone went up; rather, the ascent was permitted only to those who had undergone purification. If, therefore, in those things which were but types, the cleansing of every stain was ordained, how much more does it behoove us to render ourselves pure and godlike if we wish to approach the true and primal realities? Let us therefore purify ourselves, brethren, from every earthly mindset, from all turmoil, and from the clouded cares of this life, so that we may see clearly and receive the light-bearing splendors of the divine Word, and feed our souls with the spiritual bread, which is the food of the angels. Being thus brought into the inner sanctuary, we may know clearly the divine sufferings of the Passionless One, and the things that bring salvation to the whole world.
2. Now the mystery hidden from the ages is revealed; now the head of the divine dispensation is being unveiled.
A now the crown of the incarnation of the Word of God is brought to completion; now the abyss of divine love is made public. For thus did the God Word love the world, that by the good pleasure of the Father He descended for the sake of incarnation, as the Immaterial took on the weight of material flesh, so that by receiving in the part that is apt for suffering the passion, and becoming subject to death, He might clothe us, who are subject to passions, with freedom from passion. Hence come hunger, and thirst, and sleep, and fatigue, and sorrow, and anxiety, and fear—that is, the essential appetite for life; hence come the cross, and the passion, and death, from our own nature. For these are its natural passions, and these are the blameless ones of my constitution, the experience of which He did not refuse, so that, having been stirred and subdued within Him, they might become subject to us.
3. Let us meet Christ B in the cross, and let us be made participants in His sufferings, that we may also become partakers of His glory. Christ is among the dead: let us be dead to sin, that we may live to righteousness. Christ is wrapped in clean swaddling clothes and linen cloths: let us be loosed from the chains of sin, and clothe ourselves in the divine radiance. Christ is laid in a new tomb: let us cleanse ourselves from the old leaven, and become a new batch, that we may become a dwelling-place for Christ. Christ is in Hades: let us descend with Him to the humility that brings about exaltation, that we may also rise with Him, and be exalted with Him, and be glorified with Him, always seeing God and being seen by Him.
You who are from the age, be loosed; you who are bound, come out; you who are in darkness, be uncovered; go free, you who are held captive; and you blind, receive your sight. Awake, you who sleep, Adam, and arise from the dead; C for Christ, our resurrection, has appeared. But, if it seems good, let us make the beginning of our discourse from the primary focus; for thus it will be clearer and more persuasive at once, and will proceed along a smooth and easy path; and do you implore for me the divine illumination of the Holy Spirit, without whom the wise are foolish, and with whom the unlearned become wiser than the very wise.
4. God is the author and source of all things, but He Himself is from no one, whence also He is unbegotten; having an enhypostatic Word, co-eternal, begotten from Him without flux or time, never separated from the Father: a perfect God, in all things like D to Him who begat Him, except for His unbegottenness, in essence and power, in will and energy, in kingdom and...
lordship. He is not without cause, for He is from the Father; He did not take His beginning from time, for there never was a time when the Father was not, when the A Son was not. For the Father is the Father of the Son, and the Father shall not exist if the Son does not exist, who has His existence with the Father, begotten from Him indivisibly, and remaining in Him without ever departing, being the wisdom of the One who begat Him, and a subsistent power, God by nature, consubstantial with the Father, not known without the Spirit. For the Holy Spirit also proceeds from the Father; B equal in strength, identical in purpose, in action, in power, co-eternal, subsistent, not begotten, but proceeding. This is another mode of existence, divine and incomprehensible. To the Father and the Son, He is in all things like; good, ruling, lord, creator, by nature God, consubstantial with the Father and the Son, reigning together, glorified together, worshipped together by all creation. This is who is worshipped by us. The Father is the begetter of the Son, unbegotten—for He is not from anyone. The Son is the offspring of the Father, as begotten from Him. The Holy Spirit C is of God and the Father, as proceeding from Him, which is also said to be of the Son, as being manifested through Him and imparted to creation, yet not having His existence from Him. One God, because there is one Godhead, one power, one essence, one will, one energy, undivided in the three distinct hypostases alone, that is, in the properties of existence. Since the Father is the cause, the primal cause, these things are not indicators of substance but of the relation toward one another, and of the mode of existence, and of the difference in manifestation—if I may so speak—or the difference in the relation toward one another; this has also made them different in name. For just as the beams of the indivisible D light, having an indivisible relation toward one another according to nature: the Godhead is common. But what are the properties? Paternity and Filiation. According to the cause and that which is caused, excluding only the appellation and the reality of the Father and the Son. We know God: but in the three properties only—of Paternity, and of Filiation, and of Procession—we understand the difference according to the cause, and that which is caused, and the perfection of the hypostasis, that is, the mode of existence.
is the Godhead, one power, one essence, one will, one undivided operation and indistinguishable in the distinct and separate persons, or by the properties of existence. For to the Father alone it belongs to be unbegotten; to the Son alone, to be begotten of the Father without time and eternally; to the Holy Spirit alone, to proceed without time and eternally. A For to the Father alone belongs the unbegotten, to the Son alone the having been begotten of the Father without beginning, without time, and eternally, and to the Spirit alone the proceeding without time and eternally. A Trinity one, simple, uncompounded, an infinite substance, light incomprehensible, power unlimited, a sea of goodness, one God glorified indivisibly in three perfect subsistences. B Or the Trinity is one, simple, uncompounded, an infinite substance, light incomprehensible, power unlimited, a sea of goodness, one God glorified indivisibly in three perfect subsistences.
5. He created the angels when they were not, heaven, earth, and all that is in them: ethereal fire, and the abyss of the waters, the air as a storehouse for breath, and the most transparent vehicle of light, a second firmament established in the waters, the boundary between the high and the abyssal waters, which he also called heaven: C the shining sun, a double-coursed worker of day and night, illuminating all things with its glorious brightness; the moon, by which the night is illuminated, and the heat excited by the sun's splendor is tempered: and these, indeed, as the most glorious ornaments of the firmament: and all things that are upon the earth: flowers of every kind and of great utility, grass bearing seed, fruit-bearing trees, a most beautiful adornment for the earth: infinite species of aquatic animals, vast whales and creatures of stupendous mass: various kinds of reptiles and winged birds, which have their origin from the waters, but fly in the air and dwell upon the earth: again, animals from the earth, and untamed beasts, and flocks and herds of tame animals, all together as proofs of his own magnificence, and as a delight for him who was about to be formed according to the divine image.
6. And last of all, man, as a certain king, that most celebrated animal, adorned by his own hand and image; forming the body, indeed, from the earth, but creating the soul by a divine and vital breath; D I mean the Holy Spirit, the life-giving, the creative, and the one who perfects and sanctifies all things; not binding it to the body as having pre-existed (away with that harsh and absurd babbling of Origen), but in the composite shaping, producing and creating it from nothing.
D. I have included this, because I know not what theological boasters of our own time do not hesitate to banish the trite doctrine concerning divine relations to the commentaries of our scholastics, and to assert without hesitation that they were unknown to Nazianzen and others. Clearly, if the persons of the Trinity did not differ only by mutual relations, each one would differ from another by a peculiar gift proper to itself, and thus tritheism, or rather inequality of persons, would be introduced; or if they were distinguished neither by any absolute quality nor by any relation, then the Jews and Socinians have won, so that God is one person, and not properly Father and Son and Holy Spirit. Wherefore Petavius rightly concludes: That there are relations in God is a matter of faith, and not of opinion.
[7.] God fashioned this man, whom He made capable of intelligence and reason, endowed with a spirit of life, deemed him worthy of the communication of His grace, and made him the lord of the paradise He had planted toward the east (for the Hebrews call pleasure *Heden*). He kindly bestowed upon him a life blessed and most happy, immune from every care, peaceful and relaxed, from which groaning was banished. A For as another angel dwelling upon earth, he praised God his Creator, being filled with divine concepts, led through all created things to the Creator Himself, for whose sake he had also been formed. For in my judgment, if one were to call this tree the tree of life—this whole and full universality, which bears the undivided and sole communication of good—he would not wander from the anagogical sense.
[8.] But the inventor of wickedness, the father of lies, the devil who is the artificer of envy, could not bear to see a man dwelling in an abundance of so many good things. He sets upon him, therefore, with the intent of depriving him of those good things. And while appearing to show goodwill, he trips B the man up through deceit, and brings him down in a fall, of all falls the most pitiable. And observe what the bait is.
[9.] What is there of all things that is higher? Or what is only higher? C God, clearly, who is above all things and the cause of all. What, then, could be more desirable than to be called by the name of God? There is nothing at all. Mocking the man with the desire for this, he persuades him to taste of the tree of knowledge, having first plundered the simplicity of the woman. For it is the nature of evil somehow to be hidden under the guise of good; for even personal disgraces are grafted onto virtue; of which tree the all-knowing One, in His providence, had warned Adam against tasting. For He says: "Of every tree that is in the paradise, you shall eat; but of the tree of knowing good and evil, you shall not eat of it, nor shall you touch it; for in whatever day you eat from it, you shall die the death." But if you wish to understand it also as a tree planted for the proof and testing of obedience and disobedience, and thence named the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, or even as providing D a cognitive energy regarding the nature of those who partake of it, you will not at all depart from the truth.
[10.] But the tasting of this was unprofitable before perfection. For, having tasted, he immediately knew himself to be naked, and thought to provide himself with a covering; he began to be distracted, and was troubled by concerns for his own body, removed from divine contemplation. Hence, stripped of the grace of God, he put on corruption, returned to the earth, was exiled from the divine paradise, and was subjected to sweat, labor, and death by divine decree.
A For it is not the wood that generates death—for God did not make death—but the harm of disobedience dragging it along. From this, sin, having found nourishment, enslaves me, the thrice-wretched, and works in me every kind of evil, and through itself, while fattening me like sweet fodder, it delivers me to death.
11. Why, then, is He who by nature is compassionate, who gave us our very being and granted us our well-being, to overlook His own creature, the most precious and best-beloved, being so cruelly tyrannized? Not at all. But, to speak with the Apostle: *God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spoke in times past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son*, B His only-begotten and consubstantial Son, whom He sent into the world that He might lead back the wandering man to his ancient blessedness. And—O the greatness of His goodness!—what comes to pass? Things that cannot be mixed are mixed; things that transcend nature come into being; what eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor has it entered into the heart of man, is now seen, heard, spoken of, and believed. What is this? The Son of God and God becomes the Son of man, a mediator between God and man, without losing what He is as God. For He is immutable; nor is He merely feigning to be man—as one who cannot lie, and to whom all fraud and deception are foreign to the upright decree of His own benevolent will—but He truly became man by nature, without any change or confusion C, that He might truly bestow salvation upon our nature.
12. Therefore, He is perfect God; for *in Him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily*. He is also perfect man, so that He might save the whole man; for what is not assumed is not healed. One and the same person is recognized in two perfect natures, without any division; according to hypostasis, He is identified with His own flesh, but by nature He is consubstantial with the Father and the Spirit as God; and as man He has become akin and of the same race as us, bearing in Himself the whole substance of the first Adam, from which, and in which, and what man is: I mean a mortal body and an intelligent, immortal, rational, self-determining, volitional, and operative soul. For that which is from one of these... D [alt-version omitted] ...to the Lord, as is decreed. Hail, most holy Mother, Virgin-Theotokos, who gave birth to Him who was incarnate of thee by the Holy Spirit, Christ, the Son of God, who is perfect in Godhead and perfect in humanity—that is, in two natures and wills and energies, both willing and acting as God, and willing and acting as man, that He might possess the same power in both, unconfusedly and indivisibly.
A being animal bereft of all these, is not human. From the holy Virgin, having fashioned for Himself a body animated by a soul rational and intelligent, and having been united with this according to hypostasis, and being conceived, God incarnate, He was born one Son, and Christ, and Lord, B and rendered her who bore Him the Theotokos.
13. [13.] For if He is not one according to hypostasis, how did the Word become flesh? This, the Holy Spirit signifies, not that the Word was changed into flesh, but rather was united to flesh according to hypostasis. Or how, as they say, did the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, declare Him? B For the man who was seen was the one who declared Him; and if He were not also God, how would He be believed to be in the bosom of the Father? Or how, "No one has ascended into heaven, but He who descended from heaven, the Son of man, who is in heaven" 87? For He had not yet ascended into heaven bodily, where, even after the resurrection, He said: "For I have not yet ascended to My Father" 88. Or how is it that the very one who descended is also the one who ascended? He descended, indeed, in divinity, not by change of place, but by condescension; but He ascended bodily, being one and the same God and man. Or how is it that the man who spoke and was seen says: "I and the Father are one" 90? For it would not be consistent for a mere man to utter such statements, unless He were also God, consubstantial with the Father 91.
14. C But if He is not recognized in two natures, how could the same one be both mortal and immortal, created and uncreated, visible and invisible, perfect God and perfect man? For these things would not... D ...lest he should persist in preaching the term "two energies" for the future, which they promised in the most insistent manner that the aforementioned man would do, if also Cyrus, our brother and fellow bishop, were to depart from the term "one energy." By what reasoning the Palestinians complied with this command, may be gathered perhaps from the Short Exposition of Faith of Anastasius Sinaita, a contemporary of the events and a witness (p. 10), where he deliberately warns his reader not to speak rashly and inconsiderately of two natures, and two wills, and natural operations, in the manner of certain ignorant people. For among the simpler folk, a scandal is begotten when they hear "two naturals." This is what he often explains with complete accuracy, so that hardly anyone anywhere does better. In the end he adds that the Nestorians do not posit a human will and operation, on account of the vice of the human will and operation, which is indeed always tainted by sin and assaulted by the devil; but the Monophysites invented, in their own brain, an identity of willing and acting, because of the identity of nature which they had dreamt up.
(80) 80 And Theotokos, Deiparam. You have many [references to this] in *De fide orthodoxa*, published under the name of Justinian. Also in the little book of Cyril of Alexandria, *On those who do not wish to confess the holy Virgin to be Theotokos*. And in another of his essays, *Apologetic*, *On the twelve chapters*, ch. 2. PANTINUS.
created and uncreated, visible and invisible, perfect God and perfect man, should be one and the same? For these properties cannot belong to one nature. For that which is created is not the same by nature as that which is uncreated, nor is the mortal the same as the immortal, the visible as the invisible, nor divinity as humanity.
15. How, moreover, could Christ be of one composite nature, when the Father and the Spirit are considered in a nature that is altogether simple? And how will he be of the same essence as the Father and as us, according to the same nature, unless someone should say that the Father is also of the same essence as us? Which would be more absurd than any monstrous fiction. And how does he himself say: *He who sees me, sees the Father*? And again: *Why do you seek to kill me, a man who has told you the truth*? For he who saw him merely as a man, did not see God and the Father. B
16. But if we also assert that his energy is one, where shall we place his bodily walking, the breaking of bread, the utterance of speech, and other things of that kind, which are surely not of the divine nature, but of human faculty? For these did not happen in appearance only, but in the truth of nature.
17. Furthermore, if we should assume that, as man, he was devoid of natural and self-determining will, I pray you, to what shall we attribute his natural appetite for nourishment and other things, I mean sleep, drink, and the like? For these, being aroused by the law of nature, move the soul that is devoid of reason with power so that they may be satisfied (whence there also accompanies this very appetite an impulse toward the act itself, because nature leads the brute animals, which is why they are blameless and not subject to any kind of punishment): but in the case of those in whom reason resides, since they are moved by free will, they rather lead nature, it being in their power both to follow the appetite and to restrain it. For C will is a natural, rational, and self-determining appetite. These things, I say, apply to those who preserve what is according to nature; for those who, through negligence, have slipped into what is contrary to nature are led rather than they lead, as the habit of passions has acquired dominion over them like a law.
18. Furthermore, by what will shall we say that he went into the house D and, wishing that no one should know it, could not remain hidden? For it is manifest to everyone that the divine will is omnipotent, but the human is surely weak and powerless. And how, pray, did he, while setting aside his own will, pray for the fulfillment of the Father’s will? Of what nature is praying the property? Of the created, clearly. Therefore, to this [nature] belongs also the will that sets [the other] aside. Thus, one law.
A And thus one Christ, Son and Lord, is in two perfect natures and their native properties, at once indivisibly and inconfusedly willing and acting those things which are of either nature, with the communion of the other, according to the unconfused interpenetration of the natures within one another—one, I say, of the holy Trinity, the Son of God, and for our sake become the Son of Man.
19. For since through man came death, through man it was necessary that the resurrection be bestowed 6. And since a soul endowed with intellect had through its own free will violated the commandment, it was necessary that an intellect-endowed soul by its natural and free will should render obedience to the Creator, and that by the same reasons salvation should return whereby death had exterminated life, lest death should consider that it was to exercise perpetual tyranny over men 7.
20. What then follows from this? He who by the hope of divinity had lured man, is himself caught by the screen of flesh; and death, having tasted of a body free from sin, felt nausea, and the wretch vomited out all the food it had sent down into its bowels. For God the Word, our own Creator, having taking upon Himself everything that is ours for our sake, and having been tempted in our sufferings according to likeness apart from sin 9, fulfilled the law, appearing as the only one among men free from sin, and therefore not liable to death; and having made manifest the power of His divine essence through miracles, He at last voluntarily approaches the passion which is the salvation of the whole world for our sake, and gives Himself up, becoming a curse 10 for our sake—not that He Himself was a curse, but rather a blessing and sanctification, although He took upon Himself the curse that we had incurred—for our sake He is crucified, dies, and is buried. B For cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree, says the Scripture 11. And, Earth you are, and into earth you shall return, God said to Adam 12. He becomes, therefore, a curse for us, that we might receive the blessing. For as many, He says, as received Him, to them gave He power to become the children of God, to those who believe in His name 13.
21. O the wonder! He who feeds Israel 14 as the eternal God, is delivered to death as a man by an Israelitish hand. He who leads Israel like a sheep 15 is led as a guileless lamb to the slaughter, and He brings the tree of life against the tree of knowledge, and by the taste of the gall mixed with vinegar 16, He has driven out the malady that had made its home in our nature from the pleasant eating. He who sits upon the Cherubim as God is suspended upon the cross as a criminal, being Himself the life of all men, which the God-slayers, seeing it hanging from the tree, did not believe. For they closed their eyes
A and heard heavily with their ears. He who fashioned man with divine hands stretched out His immaculate hands all the day long toward a people who did not believe and who contradicted Him, and at last He commits His soul into the hands of the Father 19. His side, which had fashioned Eve from the side of Adam 21, is pierced by a lance 20, and it pours forth divine blood and water, a cup of immortality and a laver of restoration. Hence the sun was covered with shame, not bearing to see the intelligible sun of righteousness afflicted by the mockeries of the insolent. The earth was shaken, sprinkled with the Lord’s blood, casting off the stain of idols, and rejoicing in its own purification. The dead arose from the monuments, foreshadowing the resurrection of Him who died for our sake 89. The sun was extinguished and kindled again, to make up the number of three days decreed by the Lord 90. The veil of the temple was rent, clearly signifying the approach to the holies of holies and the revelation of hidden things. For the thief was about to enter Paradise, and that man who was killed as a criminal was to be believed and worshipped by all creation as God—for He is truly God—and that body formed from dust and earth was to be carried above all the heavens and to sit with God, and the knowledge of the holy, blessed, and most praiseworthy Trinity was to be manifested.
22. He who breathed the breath of life into Adam and made him a living soul 22 is laid dead and breathless in the tomb. He who condemned man to return to the earth is numbered among those who have been given over to oblivion in the earth 23. Brazen gates are broken in pieces, and iron levers are shattered 24; the everlasting gates were lifted up, the gatekeeper of Hades shuddered 93, and the foundations of the earth were revealed 25. For He who was free from sin was reckoned among the dead; He who had unloosed the bandages 26 of Lazarus is Himself wrapped in grave-clothes, that He might unloose from their bonds the man who had died in sin and was bound by its chains, and might set him free. C Now the King of glory has descended to the tyrant, the One who is strong in battle 28, whose goings forth to us are from the highest heaven, who ran the way of this life like a giant. For He engages with him, displaying the weakness of humanity, and as he overcomes the strong man like a sparrow, He scatters his satellites with His omnipotent deity and plunders his vessels 29, duly leading back those whom he had wickedly cast into the abyss. Now the Word descends to the serpent, to that Leviathan, the deserter (for Leviathan is interpreted as "serpent"), that great intellect of the Assyrians, or
A I mean of the opposing powers, who was lurking in the heart of the earth; and he draws him out with the hook of his divinity, as if it were a worm, by means of his hidden body, and forces him to disgorge those he had swallowed and most miserably devoured in his strength, sending away empty the one who was boasting in the pride of his riches. Having been born and given to us as a child, he descended into the hole of the asps and throttles, kills, and destroys that arrogant and haughty one. Now Hades has become a heaven, and the subterranean regions are filled with light, and the darkness which formerly pursued is driven away, and sight is given to the blind. For to those sitting in darkness and in the shadow of death, a sunrise from on high has appeared. These things the prophets, and patriarchs, and righteous men clearly prefigured and foretold before.
23. B The Just One is bound, as one of no use. For they have taken counsel against them, delivering a fate of destruction—they who reap down the people of the Lord and disturb the paths of their feet. Woe to their soul! Evil will befall them according to their deeds, says Isaiah. But for us, the action has already truly become a release from labors and a healing of pain. "I give my back to the scourges, and my cheeks to cuffs, and I endure the reproach of spitting," said he who spoke in Isaiah. Therefore, the work of my hands shall not be put to shame, it shall not be confounded. For I did not consider it robbery to be equal to God; but being God, consubstantial with the Father, I emptied myself for your sake, and humble myself unto death for the ungodly, the Father having thus willed it. For what he wills, I will, being naturally a co-willer with him, and a partaker of his divinity. C And I, who am the Most High, am exalted, and through me, human nature is glorified (for thus I commend the Father's love), in order that in my blood those justified, and in my death having attained reconciliation to my Father, they may live in life, and rest under my wings, the sheep that are kept for me.
24. Let us understand, we who have seen, and let us believe in the hearing of those who announce peace. For to us the arm of God, his all-working power, is revealed. For we shall be glorified if we understand, and we shall be greatly glorified, beholding in his vileness the glory of the Lord as in a mirror, and in that form devoid of glory, contemplating the beauty which is beyond reason. For even if he suffered through infirmity, yet he lives by the power of God. D Even if he is seen hanging upon the tree, misshapen and without glory beyond all the sons of men, yet he himself is the radiance of his glory, seeing whom the earth was ashamed and mourned. He carried our sins upon the tree, and felt pain for our wounds, and for our sake was pained, and bore the blow, and the pain, and the affliction of...
A our peace, as an atonement. For since we had wandered like sheep, swerving far from the way of the Lord and wearying ourselves in our own path, he was delivered up for our sins through the bowels of mercy; he did not strive, nor did he cry aloud, leaving us an example, and as a sheep he is led without a voice to the slaughter for our sake. "You shall see," says Moses, "your life hanging before your eyes, and you shall not believe in your life." David, the ancestor of God—or rather, through David, the Lord of David—foretelling his own passion and life-giving burial, said: "They divided my garments among themselves, and for my clothing they cast lots." He who had clothed the first parents of our race in garments of skin, willingly strips himself for the crucifixion, that having stripped us of our mortality, he might clothe us in the comeliness of incorruptibility. B And he leaves his garment to be apportioned by the soldiers. For he who was to rise from the dead was about to send forth to the nations those whom he himself had chosen as disciples, and he himself was to become the covering of divine baptism for the faithful: "For as many of you," says Paul, "as were baptized into Christ, have put on Christ."
25. And Noah, confined in the ark, and preserving the seeds of a second world by the wood, and again becoming the beginning of the human race, prefigured Christ willingly buried—he who washed away sin with the blood that flowed with water from his side, and who saved our whole race by the wood of the cross, and became the guide to a common life and a new way of living. Abraham, the great patriarch, taking his son Isaac to be offered as a whole burnt offering—he who was from the promise, and in whom were the promises—openly typified the slaughter of the Lord. For Isaac himself was graciously restored alive to his father by God; but a ram, caught by its horns in the thicket of Sabek, became the sacrifice. And thus the double mystery, of both the ram and Isaac, becomes a true type of Christ our God. For he is double and composite, being the same both God and man; for in so far as he is the Son of God by nature and God, he has remained in impassibility, but in so far as he himself, having become man for the sake of man, offered himself as a pure and blameless sacrifice C for the sake of the world to the Father in the thicket of Sabek, that is, in the wood of remission (for Sabek is interpreted as 'remission'). What do the three measures of fine flour, from which the bread baked in ashes was made, signify? Do they not clearly hint at the three-day burial of the bread of life? And what of the pit of Joseph first, and the prison afterwards? Do they not most clearly represent the same burial, and the guard added to it? "They set me," he says, "in a pit in the lowest place, in dark places, and in the shadow of death." And what of Moses, the beholder of God and legislator? Is he not hidden in the D basket, surrendered to death, and taken up by the princess? Thus
A Christ is concealed in the tomb, dead indeed as far as the body is concerned, but raised again to life by the power of his own divinity, which reigns over all creation. Does not Moses, again, striking the sea with his rod, and by the twofold stroke—the upright and the transverse—indicate the form of the cross? He descends into the deep, showing the Savior’s descent into Hades, and puts Pharaoh, the pursuer, to death, and brings salvation to Israel. For Christ, too, has put death to death, and saves all who believe in him. By the stretching forth of his hands, putting Amalek to flight and making Israel victorious, he also foreshadows the same mystery of the Savior. B The miraculous manna also fills my mind with wonder. For just as it was hidden away only at the evening of the Sabbath, so too my God Jesus, who for my sake became man—my whole sweetness and my whole desire—is covered in the tomb at the end of the Preparation. And does not the Lord himself foretell that Jonas is a type of him? For, he says, "As Jonas spent three days and three nights in the belly of the whale, so must the Son of Man be in the heart of the earth three days and three nights."
26. But someone will say: If he endured voluntary death on the Preparation, and rose again on the first of the Sabbaths, how will it be true that he spent three nights in the heart of the earth? But indeed, the divine Moses speaks to us in this way: "God called the light day, and the darkness he called night." When, therefore, the Lord was suspended on the immaculate cross, C darkness came over the whole earth, not by a cloud intervening to cover the sun, nor by the lunar body acting as a wall or partition to bar the sun’s splendor from reaching us (for those skilled in these matters teach that solar eclipses happen in this way), but by the earth being entirely seized by darkness, far denser than that with which the Egyptians were struck. For the light-giving power that streams from the solar body failed. For it was fitting that the whole of creation should mourn the bodily death of the Creator. Hence the prophet also says: "The sun shall set at midday, and the light shall be darkened in the day." And another again: "In that day there shall be no light; and there shall be neither day nor night, and at evening there shall be light." In that darkness, therefore, the divine and holy soul, D separated from the most holy and life-giving body, was present in the heart of the earth.
which is accounted as night. Then, after the darkness, the day is again fashioned by the Creator, with the sun having returned to its proper course; wherefore the prophet foretold that there should be light at evening. Then the night before the Sabbath, and the Sabbath itself, which was before the first of the Sabbaths, and this the very day of the holy Lord's day, brilliant and light-bringing, in which the uncreated light proceeds bodily from the tomb, like a bridegroom beautiful in the splendor of the resurrection (for the end of the Sabbaths, which the evangelist calls "late on the Sabbath," becomes the beginning of the first of the Sabbaths): in this way A you have the clear enumeration of the three days and as many nights. But let us return again to where we turned aside.
27. He who fashioned man from dust is brought down into the dust of death, and his life is taken from the earth. For he lays aside things that are of the earth—I do not mean the body, but the things of the body: sleep, and labor, and hunger, and thirst, and wounding, and flowing. For these things crept into our life through disobedience. And his burial takes place in peace, which he provided for us through the cross and burial, joining things that were distant, and subjecting man, the deserter, to God the Creator. Therefore, the wicked are delivered to destruction in place of his burial: the Jews, indeed, after the destruction of the temple and the city, led away as captives by their enemies, never to return again to their own land; for they are left destitute of divine assistance after that voice of the Lord, "Your house is left desolate." But the demons, having been deprived of the proud and arrogant tyranny B which they, being evil, had exercised over us in an evil way, enslaving us to the most shameful passions, have themselves been spoiled. He, however, has claimed as spoils of the most wicked ones all those who had died from the ages, all who were held under the yoke of sin. For while he was counted among the lawless, he planted righteousness, and the seed of the unbelievers became destruction; their feasts were turned into mourning, and in place of songs, sounds of lamentation echoed. But for us, light has risen from darkness, and life has come forth from the tomb, and resurrection has welled up from Hades, and joy, and gladness, and exultation.
28. Moreover, it will not be irrelevant, having touched upon the evangelical words, to draw forth the wealth hidden within them. They say who spoke divine truths by the Spirit, and who had Christ himself speaking within them, the evangelists: "When it was evening, there came a rich man from Arimathea, named Joseph, a noble councillor, a good and just man, C who himself had also been a disciple of Jesus, and was expecting the kingdom of God. He had not consented to their deed; but for fear of the Jews he was hiding. He boldly entered to Pilate, and asked for the body of Jesus." O blessed and lau-
laudable man! Truly, says the Lord, every tree is known by its own fruits. A Being therefore good and righteous, he had not consented to their counsel and deed. Verily, this is a blessed man, as the God-inspired David says. For he did not walk in the counsel of the ungodly, nor did he stand in the way of sinners, nor did he boast, nor did he sit in the seat of the pestilent against the Lord and against His Christ, having taken counsel with lawless peoples. He did not say: "Take away, take away, crucify him." He did not utter the voice of the wretches, drawing upon himself and his own offspring the penalty of innocent and divine blood; but having his will in the law of the Lord, and in His law meditating and standing B or lying down always, he was watering his own mind with the God-implanted streams of the Spirit. For he had become a disciple of the good Teacher, and had followed in His footsteps. O the purpose of the rich man! O wise merchant, who seized the heavenly wealth in exchange for earthly, and hid the treasure of Life within himself! But Pilate, he says, marveled if He were already dead. He marveled how Life had died, how the Dispenser of the breath of men had given up the breath. Yes, He has died, O Pilate, but willingly. For He has power to lay down His soul, and He has power to take it up again. Yes, He has died, that He might plunder death, that He might bring to life him who is held by chains, that, having become the firstborn from the dead, He might spring forth resurrection to the dead, that the mortal might be swallowed up by Life.
29. Therefore, the body is granted to Joseph. O the uncontainable daring and boldness, which faith and divine love brought forth! The disciples who had been partakers of divine benefits are hidden, constrained by fear, and you—do you seek the dead Master? You have imitated your leader and Lord more quickly than them. For by your own disposition you have surrendered your own soul to death. You could not bear to see naked the holy body of the Lord, which was united to the Godhead according to hypostasis. You touched the divine coal, whose likeness even the Seraphim are unable to touch. C O blessed hands! O most blessed arms, with which, having taken hold of the body of my God, you wrapped it in a clean linen cloth and costly myrrh! For thus, he says, is the custom among the Jews to bury. There was, he says, in the place where He was crucified, a garden, and in the garden a new monument, in which no one had yet been laid. There, therefore, because of the Preparation of the Jews, since the monument was near, they placed Jesus, whom he had hewn out in the rock; and having rolled a great stone against the door, he departed. Preparation, then, is so called, D as being a kind of preparation
A for the rest of the Sabbath. For the Sabbath had the cessation from works, since God had ordained to the Hebrews that they should not touch any servile work at all; but for us, the divine passion has become a preparation for vacating sin and the evils that arise from it. He is wrapped, therefore, in a clean linen cloth, He who alone is clean and undefiled, He who covers the heaven with clouds, He who is clothed with light as with a garment; He is placed in a tomb, He who has heaven as His throne and the earth as His footstool, He who fills and contains all things, He who alone as God is uncircumscribed, and who holds the creation in the palm of His hand, is circumscribed bodily in a tomb. He is worshipped as God in heaven with the Father and the Spirit, and He is the same who lies bodily in the tomb as man, and is dwelling in the recesses of Hades B in His soul, and making the way into paradise accessible to the thief, while the uncircumscribed Divinity accompanies Him everywhere. For although the holy soul was separated from the life-giving and immaculate body, yet the divinity of the Word, after the conception in the womb of the holy Virgin and Theotokos Mary, having come to be in an inseparable union of the two natures according to hypostasis, remained undivided from both, I mean from the soul and the body; and thus one hypostasis of Christ remained even in death, the soul and the body subsisting in the hypostasis of the Word of God, and retaining this hypostasis even after death. For this reason, every knee shall bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth, and every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
30. Why, however, is He placed in a new tomb, in which no dead man had yet been laid? It seems to me, lest the resurrection be suspected as belonging to one of those who had been buried there long ago. For those who are envious of their own salvation are ready for wickedness, and are most quick to unbelief. In order, therefore, that the resurrection of the Lord might be shown to be manifest and clear, He alone is buried in a new and empty tomb, [He who is] the spiritual rock of life, from which the ungrateful ones formerly drank; the stone, I say, the cornerstone and not cut by hands, is concealed in a hewn-out rock C. For soft souls, and those who easily flow away into pleasures, cannot endure to receive the divine Word, but rather those that are firm and prepared in masculine strength for virtue.
31. “On the morrow,” it says, “which was after the Preparation, the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered unto Pilate, saying.” Again the council of iniquity is gathered. Those who kill the prophets, and stone those who are sent to them; those who have cruelly devoured the vineyard of the Lord, the Israelite people D,
A devouring; who, having killed the servants, inhumanely slew even the Heir Himself. For they did not know that, as a man, He would be the heir of all creation. For if they had known, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. And what do they say to Pilate? "Sir, we remembered that that deceiver said while he was still alive, 'After three days I will rise.'" O the customary lawlessness of idolaters! They call the comrade of error and the slave of sin their lord—they, the deceivers themselves, and those who share in the error. But the Savior and Lord of all, who is truly the Truth, the Wisdom and Power of the Father, the true Light that enlightens every man coming into the world, they call a deceiver. Why, while He was still alive, do you not say this beforehand? Does He not live after death, He who is the Author of life to the living and to those who exist, the cause of their being? B Among the dead He was, indeed, but living, inasmuch as He was free. Have you never heard the Lord speaking in the prophet Jonah: "Yet three days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown"? For error shall be overthrown, as the Lord rises on the third day from the tomb, and righteousness and truth shall be planted. "Command, therefore," they say, "that the tomb be made secure until the third day." Why are you troubled in vain, you wretches? Why do you fear a fear where there is no fear? A seal shall not contain the Incircumscript One. If the seals of the pit did not hinder the entry of Habakkuk, so that he could not go to feed Daniel, the prophet and servant of God, how shall these seals be able to detain the Lord of all? But blind indeed is wickedness, and C quickly it is turned aside. "Lest," they say, "His disciples come and steal Him away, and say to the people, that He is risen from the dead; and the last error will be worse than the first." Who steals a corpse, O senseless ones? Those who dig up tombs are accustomed to loot the garments of the departed; but who has ever stolen a corpse? For if He should not rise, and if He should lie about the resurrection in His prediction, what cause will there be for the disciples to cling to Him in vain? For every dead man, as the Scripture testifies, is forgotten from the heart of mortals. But if He is, moreover, a deceiver, how much sooner will He be forgotten? And how will they bring upon themselves deaths and tribulations of every kind and a heap of evils, by clinging to a dead deceiver—as indeed they would have brought these upon themselves? Truly, the very error you attribute to yourselves, you falsely charge to the truthful.
D 32. "But Pilate said, 'You have a guard; go, make it as secure as you know how.' So they went and made the tomb secure, sealing the stone with the guard." Pilate shrinks from association with the God-killers, knowing that he found no cause of death in Him, and he casts the whole blame for the outrage upon them. "As you know," he says, "make it secure." Lest any doubt arises among you as to the resurrection,
A I have handed over to you both the seal and the guard. Do not, therefore, provide wicked pretexts and false impostures, 20 since the predictions of the deceiver, as you call Him, are proved true by the event of the resurrection. Now the matter stands on a razor's edge. [20*] Now is the judgment, as He Himself said. For if He Himself is lifted up from the earth by rising, you, the rulers, will be cast out, and He will draw all men to Himself. Such were the words of Pilate. But the shameless and ungrateful Jews, rushing like dogs to the tomb, seal the stone. Thus He lies dead in the tomb, guarded by watchers and seals—He who created the abyss and sealed it, He who set the sand as a boundary for the sea. He rested as a lion, B as a lion's whelp He fell asleep, sleeping guarded in the manner of a king. Who shall awaken Him? "Now I will arise," says the Lord; "now I will be exalted, now I will be glorified; now you shall see, now you shall perceive."
33. Meanwhile, the women, inflamed with the most ardent desire for the Master, seeing all these things openly and being most prepared to face any danger for the Lord, surpassed the apostles in boldness, not enduring to be outdone by them in this portion of praise. Therefore, "where sin abounded, grace did much more abound." 89 For it was fitting that through those by whom death had been ministered, through them also the resurrection should be served. But what does it mean that the apostles are now hiding? Surely there was need for the most faithful witnesses of the divine economy to be preserved, who would be heralds to the nations, as C eyewitnesses and ministers of the divine words. And why was Peter, that emulator and most diligent guardian of good things, permitted to fall even into denial? 90 It was, of course, destined that the rudder of the Church be entrusted to him. Therefore, so that he might know how to forgive those who return from transgression, by supreme providence God permitted this denial to overtake him, so that, instructed by his own fall, he might have compassion on the fall of others. But the women, filled with divine grace like ointment, and drawing to themselves by their love Christ, that ointment poured out for our restoration—Him, that is, who is poured out in the manner of divinity and is the Anointer, but who is also the Anointed in body—for the Anointing and the Anointed came together into one person and hypostasis—Him, I say, constantly pursuing with D the ardor of love, and running steadily in the fragrance of His ointments, they buy ointments again and hasten to the tomb. Wherefore they also become the first participants in the divine resurrection, as the righteous Judge bestows grace commensurate with their zeal.
34. Let us, therefore, also become like the wise servants waiting for the arrival of the master of the house,
A and let us use every effort to multiply the talent we have received, so that, like good servants and faithful stewards, we may attain the joy of the Lord. And it seems to me that this talent is every gift bestowed by divine goodness upon men. For there is no one who is entirely without a share of divine gifts, B but one is suited for this virtue, another for another; one for more, another for fewer; one for higher and more exalted tasks, another for humbler and more modest ones. To each God has distributed a measure of faith. Those who are powerful will be powerfully examined, and from him to whom much was entrusted, they will demand much. For each is required to give account according to the measure of the power entrusted to him by God. And He who gives knows to whom He gives, and all things are naked and exposed to His eyes. Let us therefore hasten with all our might to multiply the talent. Let him who received five give back five more to the One who gave them; and let him who was entrusted with two do likewise. Let each one who has received this grace stretch out a helping hand to those who are in need and exhausted by the burden of poverty. Let another feed with the Word those who are withering in the famine and parched by the heat of unbelief. Let us acquire friends from the mammon of iniquity, and let us fill the bellies of the poor, so that they, like confident advocates, may plead our cause before the tribunal filled with dread. C Let us welcome the homeless; let us clothe the naked; let us visit the sick; let us not hesitate to direct our feet toward those detained in prison; let us stretch out our hand to those who are in distress and sorrow. Let us suffer with them; let us pour out tears of sympathy, for this will extinguish the unending fire of Gehenna. If we accomplish these things with a thirsting heart, the Lord will say to us also, "Come, you blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you."
35. We who have been called, let us clothe ourselves radiantly in a wedding garment, so that we may become partakers of the divine marriage; D and let us be found worthy of the calling, and let us partake of the fatted calf and the lamb of the Passover, and let us drink our fill of the new fruit of the vine—now indeed the flesh of God from wheat, and the blood of God from wine—truly, by the invocation, mysteriously transformed (for He is a stranger to falsehood who [ordained] it).
A For eating and drinking with a pure conscience, and being purified by these sevenfold, as if by some gold, and scrubbed clean of the counterfeit of sin, and receiving incorruptibility as an inheritance, and being joined to God, and being deified, and reveling in the participation of Him: when the trumpet of the Lord shall sound, and the dead shall rise, when the judgment seat shall be set, and in the day in which God established to judge the world in righteousness; when all things shall receive their own restoration, with no other restoration remaining; when fire shall devour the adversaries without consuming them, B but the mansions prepared before the ages shall receive the righteous, as well as the bosom of Abraham—the Word of God and Lord himself, who was incarnate from the bosom of Abraham. When the earth of the impious shall fall, and darkness shall receive them, and the dark fire which they kindled for themselves, and the worm that gnaws without ceasing, and wailing mixed with the gnashing of teeth; but the earth of the meek shall receive those who are upright in heart and possess an unblemished faith, who are bright and shining brightly like the sun. When the foolish virgins shall be most foolishly troubled, seeking at a time not their own the things of the [proper] time, and hastening to adorn their extinguished lamps with strange oil, against whom the bridal chamber shall indeed be shut, but the voice of the impartial Judge shall sound from within, sharp and severe: "I do not know you." It is the same as to say: "I do not love you; for you did not love my brothers, nor did you show the bowels of mercy toward them." Therefore, "judgment without mercy [will be] to the one who has not shown mercy." For I, who am merciful, am delighted by no worship such as mercy. C Nothing so captures my heart as compassion. "For I desire mercy, and not sacrifice." You did not open the doors of mercy to those in need, nor shall I myself open to you the entrance to my kingdom. This is the harvest that the foolish have gathered for themselves. But the wise virgins were prepared, and they were not troubled. For having filled their lamps with every kind of virtue, and having abundantly watered them with the oil of beneficence, and having kindled them with the illuminating fire of the orthodox faith, they went out as radiant ones, radiantly to meet the Bridegroom at midnight; they dance in the divine bridal chamber, and enjoy the joys therein, being intellectually joined forever to the Pure One, and being deemed worthy to converse purely with the Pure. D 36. And therefore you, O divine and holy flock of the Great Shepherd and Priest and Victim, a chosen people, a royal priesthood, who have gained the common name as servants of Christ, mindful of His sufferings, and words, and deeds, let us strive to keep His life-giving commandments. For He says: "Believe in God, and believe in me." And again: "The Father will send the Helper, who proceeds from the Father."
Believing, therefore, let us love Him fervently. "For he that loveth me," He says, "shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him."
A 37. Let us therefore hate His enemies. Whosoever does not confess Christ as the Son of God and Lord, is an antichrist. If anyone shall say that Christ is a servant, let us close our ears, knowing that he is a liar, and the truth is not in him. Let us bear His reproach as a diadem of glory. For "Blessed are you," He says, "when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake. Rejoice, and be exceeding glad; for great is your reward in heaven." For thus, we shall turn away from the folly of the foolish virgins, but we shall emulate the wisdom of the prudent ones.
B 38. But let us also be ready for the Lord’s resurrection from the dead. Let us not prepare for our belly things that make for luxury. Let us not accumulate a multitude of garments for the body, nor useless luxury of perfumes, nor revelries and drunkenness, and the beds and wantonness akin to these; let us not think highly of ourselves against the poor; let us not kindle an appetite for empty glory, and let us not reject the temperate bridles of desire; let us not become like lust-maddened horses, wildly craving things that belong to others; let us not sow in the flesh the fuel for fire; let us not be lured by the wicked enticement of gold and silver and precious stones; let us not allow our own table, filled with food, to excite the untamable worm of Gehenna while others are hungry. For behold, the Bridegroom is rising! Behold, the King of kings comes forth from the sepulcher! Let us prepare ourselves, so that we may not be deprived of the joy. Let us be expert money-changers, discerning the better from the worse, and let us burn the one with the fire of divine zeal and love, and store the other away in our own treasuries. Let us chasten anger and desire; let us wither the gluttony of the belly. C Let us gird ourselves with chastity through abstinence and a humble heart; let us cast down pride through humility and the memory of death; let us become all things to all men; let us bear insults bravely; being wronged, let us rejoice in hope. For "the fashion of this world passes away," and all that is presently seen moves on.
39. Let us, above all, be minded thus in ourselves, as in Christ Jesus, who loved us when we were enemies, and having loved us, had mercy on us, and having had mercy, humbled Himself, and humbling Himself, saved us. For mercy comes from love, and humility from mercy, and salvation and exaltation from humility. If we conduct ourselves thus, now indeed we shall be delivered D from the evils that beset us. If we cast aside the yoke of the passions,
A we shall also be delivered from the tyranny (31) that presses upon us; and just as painful things have come to us from better things, so too will better things return again from painful ones, and we shall regain our ancient boldness, and we shall purely celebrate the feast of our departure to the Lord God; and we shall be delivered from the blasphemous voice raised against the Creator, and the administration of the Church will be in peace. Then, with radiant lamps, we shall splendidly go out to meet the victor over death, the immortal Bridegroom, and the immaculate bridal chamber will receive us, and with unveiled face we shall contemplate the glory of the Lord, and we shall feast upon his beauty; with whom, to the Father, together with the Holy Spirit, be glory, honor, adoration, and magnificence, now and always, and unto the ages of ages. Amen.
NOTICE REGARDING THE FOLLOWING HOMILY
I have nowhere found this homily, which is now published for the first time in Latin, on the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mother of God in Greek, but only in Arabic in the Colbertine codex, such as also exists at Oxford in England among the manuscripts of Balliol College, no. B, with the name of John of Damascus prefixed; and I have no doubt that it is his offspring. However, it seems to be in large part defective and mutilated, and it has not been rendered completely by the Arabic translator. Hence it is that it does not everywhere sufficiently reflect the talent and vein of our author, which, however, the first part of the discourse represents not badly. As for the Latin translation, it was prepared for me by a man of exceptional learning, and one also most skilled in the Arabic language, the most illustrious Abbot du Four de Longuerue, whose most ready and inexhaustible goodwill toward me and my studies I experience daily.
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
SERMON OF OUR MOST HOLY FATHER JOHN OF DAMASCUS ON THE ANGELIC ANNUNCIATION OF THE INCARNATION OF CHRIST TO OUR IMMACULATE LADY MARY
C It is the beginning of the world and the source of our salvation. Today the Son of God, who is before the ages, now becomes the Son of man in time. Today is the beginning of the renewal of human nature. Today the abolition of original sin has occurred. Today our nature has been sanctified, in the habitation of the Creator himself. Today it has become worthy to rule over the archangels. Today the time has been completed of which the oracles of the prophets sounded. Today the time has been completed which the minds of the saints and the elect desired. Today Adam has built a temple for his Creator from his own lineage, in which he might dwell enfolded, and which he might redeem: Mary the virgin, precious, blessed, holy, the purest part of the Adamic nature, and the queen of the human race, pure, than whom none purer will be found anywhere in the body in the whole human race: holy, than whom none among future creatures is holier in soul as regards intelligible things: the glory of the Israelite nation, and the light of the Davidic lineage: of whom her grandfather David exclaims, raising his prophetic voice: Hear, O daughter, and see, and incline thine ear, and forget thy people, and thy father's house; and the King shall greatly desire thy beauty. This is she, D whose origin is the source of our salvation. It is now time, most beloved brethren, that we should exclaim with this Davidic voice: How magnified are thy works, O Lord; in wisdom hast thou made them all. For the present solemnity is the beginning of our festivals, and the head of our solemnities: whence our salvation arose, and our law had its beginning. For we were formerly subjects of an ancestral and original rebellion, and with the guilt of heavy sins added to it, we had become inhabitants of darkness and of the regions of death, nor could any of the prophets sent by God, and of the holy righteous, enlighten us with light, by redeeming us from the sins and wickedness of our transgressions. Wherefore the Creator himself became the redeemer, and illumined us with the light of his approach to us, just as the prophet says: The people that sat in darkness has seen a great light: and the secrets of his coming were entrusted to us, when he himself sent the angel Gabriel to announce the miracles of his incarnation. This present day is the beginning of our solemnities.