...instructed by their Creator, with five senses for the uses of life; yet these senses are not free nor of their own authority, but each one is servile and under law. The first sense is the eye. See, he says, and consider those things that it is good to see: the sun, which illuminates all the world; the moon, which illuminates the sad and dark night; and the other stars, which do not provide us much or sufficient light, but exhibit a beautiful brightness, which they obtained. Consider the earth blooming with various flowers and herbs, and the sea extended like a plain when a pure calm is present. Use the faculty of sight for these and similar things; but avoid and pass by other spectacles which induce damage to the soul, and place a covering upon yourself that you may not see. For it is better for this sense to be darkened than to provide service to the works of darkness. Therefore, yesterday, the Lord said to us through Matthew: *Every one who looketh on a woman to lust after her, hath already committed adultery with her in his heart* (Matt. V, 28); and it is better to pluck it out when it looks upon things that are disorderly and baneful. The hearing also has precepts that prohibit it from listening to evil things. For it ought to be open when it hears good things, and to commit to the mind those which can be useful; but if anything pestiferous and corrupt approaches, which could stir up the filth of sins, it ought to flee it as a venomous beast. Let the tongue be tempered with the mouth; let it speak just things, abstain from things prohibited, from railings, from slanders, from unjust accusation, from detraction concerning the brethren, from blasphemy against God. Let it speak all things good, pious, and which exhort to good works; let every man say these words of the holy psalmist: *I said, I will take heed to my ways, that I sin not with my tongue*; and, *As a sharpened razor thou hast performed deceit*; and, *With their tongues they dealt deceitfully*; and, *Why dost thou glory in malice, who art powerful in malice? Thy tongue hath thought upon iniquity all the day* (Ps. XXXVIII). Let the nostrils also be tempered, so that they may not always smell sweet things, nor draw unto the head the vapor and fragrance of precious ointments; for Isaiah greatly disapproves of similar things. Let the hand remember the precepts, so that it may not touch all things without restraint; let it be extended toward almsgiving, not to rapine; let it keep its own, and not scrape together another's; let it touch sick and infirm bodies, by visiting them, not the bodies of those who are vigorous and given to fornication. We have proved also that we are not our own masters, but only stewards. For whatever is subject to laws and precepts is a servant and subordinate to the legislator. But if the parts of our body B are not free from power, but are subject in their operations to the will of the master, what will you say to those who think they have the possession of gold, silver, earth, and other things without having to render any account? Nothing is thine, O man; thou art a servant, and thine are the Lord's: for a servant does not have free property. For thou wast brought naked into this light; what thou hast, thou receivedst according to the law of thy Lord, either from paternal inheritance—because God so ordained: *Parents*, he says, *shall divide spoils for their children* (Prov. XIX, 14)—or from marriage that obtained opulence; for marriages and the things that follow them are ordained by God; or from negotiation, or agriculture, and other ways, God cooperating with thee for them. Lo, it has been demonstrated that thou hast not received thine own. Let us see, then, what has been commanded unto thee, and what the administration of those things ought to be. Give to the hungry, clothe the naked, care for the afflicted, do not despise the needy man cast out at the crossroads; do not be anxious C about thyself, nor care how thou shalt live even unto the end. If thou doest these things, thou shalt be honored by the Lord; if thou obeyest not the precept, thou shalt be bitterly tormented. I do not see these things to be the power of a man possessing his own self or his own life; on the contrary, those many precepts indicate to me that man is strongly ruled, subject to the dominical laws, from whom the discipline of life is required as a debt. But how do we act? As if we had a life not liable to render any account, we despise the miserable and the afflicted, failing in calamities; yet we spend bountifully upon empty things, feeding a troop of lost flatterers, dragging along crowds of unhappy parasites; likewise we dissipate riches in the country against beasts and wild animals, sparing no expense in feeding horses; and again we pour out money upon conjurers and mimes and similar pests. We suffer a thing new and almost insane. For where expense brings immense gain and eternal life, we hold back the silver greatly, so that not even a few obols fall from the hand; where, however, the expense is a sin, and the cause of a thousand torments, and brings the torture of fire, there liberality outruns the request, and with all doors opened, we allow our riches to go forth to strangers. But this mind is not of servants awaiting their Lord, but of prodigal youths, revelers, the lustful. If thou wishest, however, O hearer, to see the fear of the steward, who with prudence and piety administers the things entrusted to him, unfold the book of David, seek those words where a man, who is very anxious about the end of his own life, thus addresses God: *Make known to me, O Lord, my end, and the number of my days* (Ps. XXXVIII, 5).
CONCERNING FASTING
I cry with a voice D higher than a trumpet, not to deceive the ears with pleasure, but, by saying true things, to extinguish pleasure, and by the word to sedate the concupiscence of the belly, and to excite longing for fasting. For the desire of fasting is a celestial gain; but the gain of pleasure is damaging. For he who gives attention to gluttony and fulfills the concupiscence of the belly, weakens the spiritual fruit of the soul; but he who macerates the body with fasting, and flees the voracity of foods, seeks a treasure of better things. For fasting teaches chastity, and renders one tolerant; fasting sharpens toward piety, and exercises toward patience; fasting renders life angelic, and makes the body spiritual; fasting is a custody of the soul and an impregnable armament of the body. For it does not admit the deceiver, pleasure, and defeats the attacking concupiscence. Fasting lifts the mind toward heaven, and instructs it with wings, that it may fly toward immortal life. Let us fast, therefore, beloved, not passing the days of fasting with a sad countenance, but with joyous souls as servants of Christ affected toward them. For if thou approachest fasting with desire, be not sad, but rejoice: for this kind of poison purges thy soul. Do not admit fasting from goods, of which the foods are sweet; but patiently expect until thou receivest doctrine, which is sweeter than foods. Therefore thou fastest from foods, that thou mayest be nourished by the spirit; therefore thou abstainest from corporeal foods, that thou mayest be filled with celestial gifts. Fasting is a drug that takes away wickedness, and an emollient cataplasm that cleanses unto piety. But as worse diseases, cured by the sharpest and most biting remedies, eject rot from the body: so sin, infected with mold, which corrodes the soul, entered by the sharpest fasting, little by little diminishes and dries up, and altogether destroys and expurgates. Therefore, even if fasting be laborious, it is nevertheless useful and easy. Do not, therefore, fast unwillingly, lest thou loose the labor, and do not murmur because thou delayest a little, lest for a small time thou lose the whole: for how much more the body is macerated by fasting, so much greater is the utility from fasting. Recur to the life of the just, and thou wilt find them to have shone more from fasting. First Moses, fasting, entered into the darkness, and through fasting spoke with God; performing a fast of forty days,the legislator for fasting is effective: nor does he eat bread, nor drink wine; for he was satisfied with food such as it was, that he might teach the law to the legislator. But he also indicates how harmful drunkenness is to one who opposes the fast; consider what was done by Moses, and what was done by the people, and you will find the power of the fast. Above, Moses was receiving the law, and below, the people were overturning the law. Having been grieved, Moses shattered the law, not deeming it reasonable that the law be entrusted to the drunken, and that the oracles be handed over to minds weighed down by wine. See how much harm drunkenness does in opposing the fast. But again, the fast, having set right such a great evil, using the same days, again recalled the law. A He left a memorial for us for the security of life and conduct, perhaps intending in this way also to indicate a mystery: that the first legislation would be idle, being shattered because of the unbelief of the former people; but the second was effective, being given everywhere, as the second people faithfully received the second law, and observed it together. And Elijah, having fasted for forty days, and having traversed the desert with one meal, did not feel fatigue; for the fast sustained him, lightening the labor; and after the fast he saw God, as much as it was possible for human nature to understand. B He saw the incorporeal, not with bodily eyes, but by understanding the invisible with his heart, according to the purity of the soul. For blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Having fasted in this way, he closed heaven against the intemperate and those who consume their own lives in luxury, so that what they did not choose by their own volition, they might learn by being disciplined through the fast of famine, and know how beneficial the fast is, and the work it displays in time of luxury. Daniel, too, having fasted for three weeks, and not having tasted desirable bread, having come into the lions' den out of zeal against the intemperate, taught the lions there to fast. For the wild beasts were made ashamed by the faster, becoming tamer than the rational beasts, and they closed their own mouth, not daring to touch the holy body. For C as if placing a weapon against his own body, the fast, and having fortified his whole self through it, he led astray the eyes of the lions, not displaying a human body, but an angelic one. And the three youths in Babylon, not wishing to participate in the lawless table of the king, but to follow the fast according to the law, having entered into the ignited pyre of the furnace, extinguished the flame, having worked the furnace into dew instead of fire through the fast; and the fire dared to touch those inexperienced in the fast (for it consumed all the surrounding Chaldeans); but it withdrew from those in the habit of the fast, not being able to touch their body. For there was not any matter in the body, since the fast had made it spiritual. Similarly, the Ninevites also, having fasted, warded off death; for having persisted in fasting for three days, D having transformed eternal punishment through these few days, they have left eternal praise for the world. See, beloved, how much the fast avails when performed with prayer and works. For fasting and petition are born from death; but righteousness is above both. Fasting is both the destruction of death and the redemption from wrath; fasting is the purification of the mind, the companion of temperance, the gymnasium of piety, the yoke of righteousness. Fasting knows how to make the poor man rich; for it does not allow him to spend unseasonably, providing the sufficiency of what is needed. It also knows how to make the rich man a manager of his own possessions, not allowing him to spend fearlessly; fasting also knows the prime of youth. It teaches a bridle for foods, it puts on temperance, and wisely guiding it towards piety and chastity. It also knows how to make the elderly wise, and to keep the bond of the mind pure. Fasting also keeps the body healthier; for it is not weighed down by foods and does not receive the material for illnesses, but being lightened from edibles, it becomes robust for the reception of graces. For this reason let us fast, beloved, that we may attain the spiritual gifts. He who is fasting also tutors the soul towards piety, taking the care of the soul as an image of bodily temperance, so that just as he abstains from the foods entering from without, so also from the evil thoughts ascending in the mind. For if, he says, the spirit of the one having power should ascend upon you, do not leave your place, for it will stop the sin. Just as now you abstain from foods, not tasting them, so abstain from sins, changing your ways. Do you fast, not touching wine? Fast also by abstaining from wickedness; for evil knows how to produce a greater drunkenness in the soul. Do you fast, not touching meats? Fast also by abstaining from slander, so that through it you do not eat the flesh of your brothers, tasting their very bodies. For true fasting is the abstention from sins. Do you hear the Prophet saying: Did I choose this fast, or a day for a man to humble his soul? 1848 But what? Loose, he says, every bond of injustice, dissolve the knots of violent contracts; break your bread for the hungry, bring the homeless into your house; if you see the naked, clothe them. This, beloved, is the true fast, acceptable to God, and life-saving to man, and pleasing to all. Following this is the possession of the heavens, and the truthful promise of the Master. For see what He adds: Then your light will break forth early, and then you will cry out, and He will hear you; while you are still speaking, He will say: Behold, I am here. Do you see the great gifts of the fast, and how much piety it holds, so as to move God Himself to approach human nature? Fast, therefore, remain in prayers, in assemblies, in admonitions, not being absent from the congregation, as is the custom of some; nor in business or in courtrooms for the whole day; so that you may not gather money, which you ought to have scattered; or pursue your brother, whom you ought to have been treating. You came at evening, or at the ninth hour, not that you might fulfill the purpose of the fast, but that you might fill the craving of your belly. And do not think that you are drunk because you abstain from wine for the sake of being sober, while being filled with wickedness, so that you may not hear, Woe to those who are drunk, not from wine! But drunkenness is not a companion of the fast, but an enmity and an opponent. That we may arrive at the hope of the resurrection prepared for us, there enjoying the laid-up good things, and here rejoicing in those expected in Christ Jesus, to whom is the glory unto the ages of ages. Amen.
CONCERNING THE SON OF THE WIDOW
And it came to pass afterwards, He was traveling to a city called Naim: and His disciples were traveling with Him, and a great crowd. And as He drew near to the gate of the city, and behold, a dead man was being carried out, an only-begotten son to his mother, and she was a widow (Luke 7.11, 12). All things were full of misery, and of much sympathy. An only son having been released from the present life, the sweetest mother was crying out, that I was born a mother, from whom death has harvested the pains of childbirth. The vine had one cluster, and the storm of death shattered this; she possessed one staff, and death, the common one, took this away. The woman was without protection, and with the staff removed, she saw no life for herself. Henceforth she had no consolation, with the only one lost. Being seized by multiple grief, and that inconsolable; no one could alleviate the sorrow; tears were flowing like streams, the grief upon the woman was intolerable. She contemplated the form of her son, her bowels were being torn with love. And she remained entirely a widow, she [was] entirely in the most wretched state; and she was bereft of her husband and only son. Verily, it was a miserable state for the widow, full of mourning, of weeping, of calamity. No spectator spared tears; there was groaning, and one could not find one who was mourning the first, the dead son, and the widow, the living [one]. And one might ask, is the widow living? Even if she seemed to live (for I speak according to the present life, not the future one), she was dead. For the widow in reality, if she is wealthy, the pain diminishes this for a short time, hence she is refreshed by something, her wound is cured, the pain is alleviated, she is strengthened by abundance, meanwhile