what is the end of those who do not believe in the Gospel of God? A And if the righteous is scarcely saved, where shall the sinner and the ungodly appear?”
B The time being now at hand for the judgment of God to begin, He begins to make his passage from the greater to the less. Therefore he says: “The time for the beginning of judgment is from the house of God,” that is, from the faithful who fully constitute the Church of the living God. Whence he also infers: if the examination of our deeds and thoughts is made first upon us, who are the house of God, what end do you believe will come to those who do not believe in the Gospel of God? By this he brings upon the faithful a great conflict and much fear, that they may learn to be cautious of the Judge, to whom they will without doubt have to render an account. Therefore, stimulating them, he invites them to his fear, saying that those who do not believe the divine doctrine will inevitably receive the vengeance which he called their end, noting their incredulity.
Teaching them with these words and rather exciting them, he says: Since the righteous can scarcely, and with a stronger contest, obtain salvation, what ought one to think of the ungodly, since, being judged by themselves, they do not rise to the judgment, and of the sinners, who do not rise in the congregation of the righteous? For these, who have done good things, are raised to the resurrection of life, while those who have done evil are raised to the resurrection of judgment. C Wherefore by no means will the sinner and the ungodly appear among the good, since the righteous is scarcely saved, agonizing and struggling—how then shall their judgment be transacted? For although one is conscious of nothing evil in himself, nevertheless, knowing that he is not justified by this, until the judge grants him justification, he agonizes and struggles.
The question: is a sinner something different from an ungodly man? Because here it says, as also in other places of Scripture, where it says: “Therefore the ungodly shall not rise in judgment, nor sinners in the counsel of the just.” From this, a difference between the two orders is indeed shown. But in other places he calls the same person both a sinner and ungodly, when he says: “But God sets forth his love in us, because, while we were sinners, Christ died for us,” and soon afterward says: “for the ungodly.”
There is, indeed, a righteous man, who is found in the action of God; but an ungodly man can be one who is entirely outside the Lord, while a sinner is one whom God indeed contains, but who disdains Him, while he transgresses His laws. If, however, sometimes in the text the same person is found to be both a sinner and ungodly, he will nevertheless have a difference in understanding. It is possible, however, for him who sins soon to be also ungodly, when through contempt he acts impiously against God.
DIDYMUS THE ALEXANDRIAN ON THE SECOND EPISTLE OF SAINT PETER, AN EXPOSITION.
CAP. II, VERS. 11. “Whereas angels, though they are greater in strength and power, do not bring a railing judgment against them.”
Angels remaining in the holiness which they have from God are more powerful than men, although men are excellently blessed; for truly, angels guard the holy
A men, and assist them, while men are in no way able to offer comforts to angels. So also that which is said in the Gospel of John: “Because no one born of women is greater than he,” when he is found to be more powerful who is less in the kingdom; wise men have interpreted this, saying that since he is perfect among men, he is inferior to no mortal, when he who is lower than all rational heavenly beings is greater than he: because they are superior to him not only in the difference of virtue and knowledge, but also because they are not involved in heavy and passible bodies. But another says that angels are by no means greater than men in strength and virtue, because they are deprived of mortal life. Finally, one angel struck the army of the king of the Assyrians, in one moment of time, one hundred eighty-five thousand. B And another devastated almost the entire people of the Israelites; were it not for the fact that David their king quickly implored God that He might put an end to the anger and a limit to the vengeance—which had been brought about on account of the sin—that was contracted from the numbered people.
CHAP. III, VERS. 5. “For this escapes their notice, when they wish it, that the heavens existed of old, and the earth out of water and through water, constituted by the word, and through which the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished: but the heavens and the earth which are now, are kept in store by the same word, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.”
It is a wonder to many, and from these words, mundane revolutions and changes are signified. For thus they have: for the heaven was of old and the earth out of water, and through water constituted by the word of God, by which the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished; but the heavens and earth which now are, are kept in store by the word, reserved C unto fire. And after other things: “Nevertheless we look for new heavens and a new earth according to his promise.” For those who are held by this opinion say: there was an age of old, and the earth without heavens, and the earth which now is, and outside these, which now are, there will be new heavens and a new earth. It is manifest to all that three worlds exist by succession, since it is written: “The heavens and the earth which are now are kept in store by the same word;” and the change will be again similar to those who perished under the flood. But the writer of the Epistle recognized these things from the words of Jesus concerning the consummation of the age, proved thus: “For as in the days of Noah, men were eating and drinking, marrying and being given in marriage, selling, buying, planting, building, until the day that Noah entered into the ark, and the flood came and took them all away, so shall it be in the presence of the Son of man.” He preaches further on these words, when he says that this creature which is now seen is to be dissolved by fire. He says D that the day of judgment will come secretly, like a thief, in which the heavens will pass away with a great rush and without delay, the elements being, of course, melted by the applied fire; after which, the heavens having been cut off from the root, there will be new heavens and a new earth, in which the just may possess the justice and promises of God in their habitation. It is not, therefore, to be ignored that the present Epistle is falsified, which, although it is published, is not nevertheless in the canon.
What we have done thus far, does not indeed seem to be that which could lead and satisfy the minds for the sacred Pentecostal days, for which these things were written: yet they are not so alien that no occasion at all could be taken from them for instituting those meditations which the Holy Spirit, given in the very origin of the Church with abundant showers, happily and most holily demands as if it were His own. And even if I should grant that the Enarratio of Didymus, besides the fact that it now lies overcome and buried in a state of nearly eternal barbarity and squalor, is so fashioned by its own genius that it almost totally displeases you by your right, nor can you sufficiently extol the happiness of our age, which uniquely rejoices and congratulates itself on the truth, simplicity, and finally the elegance of interpreting; yet in this very thing, that you hold the Didymian manner of interpreting—namely that unpleasant and fruitless one—as alien to you and full of tedium, there is prepared for you not an unworthy occasion and matter for truly Pentecostal meditations. For indeed, to whom are those things owed in which our age boasts itself more happily than others by its own right? Is not everything that is considered good and glorious among Christian men? Is not every pursuit of virtue and honest praise, and finally every progress more eager toward truth, owed to the one Holy Spirit, that divine and magnificent author, guide, and promoter of the Church, by whose gifts, from the first effusion of graces, these very holy days are held never interrupted, nor to be interrupted? But indeed, while you meditate on these things, attend, I pray, that this divine Spirit has never happened to anyone reluctant and resisting, but is communicated only to those men, and finds delight only in those, who with pure hearts, honest studies, tireless labors, and finally ardent prayers, act so that they are held worthy that He should dwell with them, and communicate His gifts entire. Therefore, let us meditate on this, let us drink this in more deeply, which the apostle Paul gravely admonished: Μὴ λυπεῖτε τὸ Πνεῦμα τὸ ἅγιον τοῦ Θεοῦ, ἐν ᾧ ἐσφραγίσθητε εἰς ἡμέραν ἀπολυτρώσεως, that is: “Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, in whom you were sealed unto the day of redemption.”