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generative power, that is, the passionate activity of the senses toward sensible things, as the children and offspring of Saul, through natural contemplation on the mountain, 1364 to destroy by the anagogical ascent of the divine oracles, if somehow we desire to be filled with divine grace.

5.37 (37) Both the law understood according to the letter alone does injustice to the truth, as does the people of the Jews, and anyone who is an imitator of them in thought, circumscribing the power of the law by the letter alone, and not accepting natural contemplation for the manifestation of the mystical knowledge hidden in the letter, which exists as a mean between types and truth; leading those who are being led away from the former, and leading them back toward the latter; but as it were, completely denying this, and putting it outside of the mystagogy of divine things. Therefore, it is necessary to kill this (15∆_280> corporeal and temporary interpretation of the law, as being subject to time and flux, through natural contemplation, as on a mountain in the height of knowledge, for those who are caretakers of the divine spectacles.

5.38 (38) He who by action through natural contemplation kills the pleasure-loving and body-loving relation to unstable and flowing matter that has come to the soul from the written law, completely destroys the corporeal sense of Scripture, slaughtering, as the children and offspring of Saul, the groveling thought of the law, through the medium of natural contemplation, as on a mountain in the height of knowledge, and making manifest before the Lord, that is, through confession, the former interpretation according to the body of the law. For this, *To expose to the sun*, can be understood by the studious, before the Lord. And they exposed them to the sun, it says, on the mountain before the Lord; having brought, that is, through knowledge, the erring preconception according to the letter into the light; which is, to manifest at the height of contemplation the letter of the law as dead through knowledge in the spirit.

5.39 (39) The letter, he says, kills; but the spirit gives life. Therefore it is necessary that what is by nature able to kill, be killed by the life-giving spirit. For it is utterly impossible for the corporeal sense of the law and the divine, that is, the letter and the spirit, to coexist with each other in activity at the same time; because that which is able to take away life is not by nature able to be in harmony with that which naturally provides it.

5.40 (40) The spirit is a provider of life; but the letter is a remover of life. Therefore the letter cannot be active at the same time as the spirit, just as that which gives life cannot coexist with that which brings corruption.

1365 5.41 (41) Mystical circumcision is the complete removal of the passionate relation in the mind concerning (15∆_282> the adventitious genesis. For by applying ourselves to things naturally, we know that the removal of the completeness which is from God by nature is not perfection. For nature, when mutilated by artifice, and when, through contrivance, it puts aside what belongs to it from God according to the principle of creation, does not produce perfection, lest we introduce artifice as being stronger than God for the confirmation of righteousness, and we make the contrived lack in nature a fulfillment of the lack in righteousness according to creation; but from the topical position of the part being circumcised, we are taught to perform by our will the circumcision of the passionate disposition of the soul; according to which the will is regulated to run in harmony with nature more, correcting the passionate law of acquired genesis.

5.42 (42) The foreskin is natural. And everything natural is a work of divine creation, and very good, according to the voice which says: *And God saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good*. But the law, by commanding that the foreskin be removed by circumcision as something unclean, introduces God as correcting His own work by artifice, which it is most impious even to think. Therefore, he who applies himself naturally to the symbols of the law knows that God does not correct nature by artifice, but the obedient

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γεννητικήν, ἤγουν τῆς πρός τά αἰσθητά τῶν αἰσθήσεων ἐμπαθοῦς ἐνεργείας, ὡς Σαούλ τέκνα καί ἔκγονα, διά τῆς φυσικῆς ἐν ὄρει, 1364 τῇ τῶν θείων ἀναγωγῇ λογίων ἀφανίσαι θεωρίας, εἴ πως ἐμφορηθῆναι θείας ἐφιέμεθα χάριτος.

5.37 (λζ΄) Ἀδικεῖ τήν ἀλήθειαν ὅ τε νόμος κατά μόνον τό γράμμα νοούμενος, καί ὁ τῶν Ἰουδαίων λαός, καί εἴ τις ἐκείνων ὑπάρχει κατά διάνοιαν μιμητής, μόνῳ τῷ γράμματι περιγράφων τοῦ νόμου τήν δύναμιν, καί μή δεχόμενος πρός τήν φανέρωσιν τῆς μυστικῆς ἐγκεκρυμμένης τῷ γράμματι γνώσεως τήν φυσικήν θεωρίαν, μέσην ὑπάρχουσαν τύπων καί ἀληθείας· τῶν μέν, τούς ἀγομένους ἀπάγουσαν, πρός δέ τήν ἐπανάγουσαν· ἀλλ᾿ οἷον ταύτην πάμπαν ἀρνούμενος, καί τῆς τῶν θείων αὐτήν ἔξω ποιούμενος μυσταγωγίας. Ταύτην τοιγαροῦν χρή τοῦ νόμου τήν (15∆_280> σωματικήν καί πρόσκαιρον ἐκδοχήν ὡς ὑπό χρόνον καί ῥέουσαν, ἀποκτείνειν διά τήν φυσικῆς θεωρίας, ὡς ἐν ὄρει τῷ ὕψει τῆς γνώσεως, τούς τῶν θείων ἐπιμελητάς θεαμάτων.

5.38 (λη΄) Τόν σωματικόν νοῦν τῆς Γραφῆς ἀφανίζει παντελῶς, ὁ πράξει διά τῆς φυσικῆς θεωρίας ἀποκτείνων τήν γενομένην ἐκ τοῦ γραπτοῦ νόμου, πρός τήν ἄστατον ὕλην καί ῥέουσαν τῇ ψυχῇ φιλήδονον σχέσιν καί φιλοσώματον, κατασφάττων ὡς τέκνα τοῦ Σαούλ καί ἔκγονα, τήν χαμαίζηλον τοῦ νόμου διάνοιαν, διά μέσης τῆς φυσικῆς θεωρίας, ὡς ἐν ὄρει τῷ ὕψει τῆς γνώσεως, καί φανεράν ποιούμενος ἐνώπιον Κυρίου, δι᾿ ἐξομολογήσεως δηλαδή, τήν πρός σῶμα τοῦ νόμου προτέραν ἐκδοχήν. Τοῦτο γάρ τό, Ἐξηλιάσαι, νοεῖσθαι δύναται τοῖς φιλομαθέσιν, ἔναντι Κυρίου. Καί ἐξηλίασαν αὐτούς, φησίν, ἐν τῷ ὄρει ἔναντι Κυρίου· εἰς φῶς ἀγαγόντες, διά τῆς γνώσεως δηλαδή, τήν κατά τό γράμμα πεπλανημένην πρόληψιν· ὅπερ ἐστί, φανερῶσαι κατά τό ὕψος τῆς θεωρίας τό γράμμα τοῦ νόμου νεκρόν διά τῆς ἐν πνεύματι γνώσεως.

5.39 (λθ΄) Τό γράμμα, φησίν, ἀποκτείνει· τό δέ πνεῦμα ζωοποιεῖ. ∆ιό χρή τό ἀποκτείνειν πεφυκός, ἀποκτείνεσθαι πνεύματι ζωοποιῷ. Συνυπάρχειν γάρ ἀλλήλοις κατ᾿ ἐνέργειαν ἅμα κατά τό αὐτό τό σωματικόν τοῦ νόμου καί τό θεῖον, ἤγουν τό γράμμα καί τό πνεῦμα, παντελῶς ἀμήχανον· ὅτι μηδέ συμφωνεῖν πέφυκε τῷ παρεχομένῳ κατά φύσιν ζωήν, τό ταύτην ἀφαιρεῖσθαι δυνάμενον.

5.40 (μ΄) Τό μέν πνεῦμα, ζωῆς ὑπάρχει παρεκτικόν· τό δέ γράμμα, ζωῆς ἐστιν ἀφαιρετικόν. Οὐκοῦν οὐ δύναται καί τό γράμμα πράττειν κατά τό αὐτό καί τό πνεῦμα, ὥσπερ οὐδέ τό ζωοποιόν τῷ φθοροποιῷ συνυπάρχειν.

1365 5.41 (μα΄) Περιτομή ἐστι μυστική, τῆς ἐμπαθοῦς κατά νοῦν περί (15∆_282> τήν ἐπείσακτον γένεσιν σχέσεως, παντελής περιαίρεσις. Φυσικῶς γάρ ἐπιβάλλοντες τοῖς πράγμασιν, οἴδαμεν ὡς οὐκ ἔστι τελειότης ἡ τῆς ἐκ Θεοῦ κατά φύσιν ἀρτιότητος περιαίρεσις. Οὐ γάρ ποιεῖ τελειότητα φύσις διά τέχνης κολοβουμένη, καί διά περινοίας, ἀποτιθεμένη τό προσόν αὐτῇ θεόθεν κατά λόγον δημιουργίας, ἵνα μή τήν τέχνην, Θεοῦ πρός βεβαίωσιν δικαιοσύνης ἰσχυροτέραν εἰσάγωμεν, καί τήν περινενοημένην τῆς φύσεως ἔλλειψιν, ἀναπληρωτικήν ποιώμεθα τῆς ἐν δικαιοσύνῃ κατά δημιουργίαν ἐλλείψεως· ἀλλ᾿ ἐκ τῆς τοπικῆς τοῦ περιτεμνομένου μορίου θέσεως, διδασκόμεθα ποιεῖσθαι γνωμικῶς τήν περιτομήν τῆς κατά ψυχήν ἐμπαθοῦς διαθέσεως· καθ᾿ ἥν μᾶλλον τῇ φύσει συντρέχειν ἡ γνώμη ῥυθμίζεται, τόν ἐμπαθῆ τῆς ἐπικτήτου γενέσεως νόμον διορθουμένη.

5.42 (μβ΄) Φυσικόν ἡ ἀκροβυστία. Πᾶν δέ φυσικόν, θείας ἔργον δημιουργίας ἐστί, καί λίαν καλόν, κατά τήν φάσκουσαν φωνήν· Καί εἶδεν ὁ Θεός πάντα ὅσα ἐποίησε, καί ἰδού καλά λίαν. Ὁ δέ νόμος ὡς ἀκάθαρτον περιαιρεῖσθαι κελεύων τήν ἀκροβυστίαν διά περιτομῆς, τόν Θεόν εἰσάγει, διά τέχνης τό οἰκεῖον διορθούμενον ἔργον, ὅπερ κἄν ἐννοεῖν ἀσεβέστατον. Οὐκοῦν ὁ τοῖς συμβόλοις τοῦ νόμου φυσικῶς ἐπιβάλλων, οἶδεν ὡς οὐ τήν φύσιν ὁ Θεός διορθοῦται διά τέχνης, ἀλλά τό ἐπιπειθές