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Since God has been good to you, to command me to write and send to you those of the chapters that I had noted as perplexing to me, I have set forth first those that seemed to me most necessary.

QUESTION 1.

Are these passions evil in themselves, or evil by their use? I mean pleasure and pain, desire and fear, and the things that follow these.

Response. (269) These passions, just as the others, with human nature were not originally

co-created; for they would have even contributed to the definition of nature. I say this, having learned from the great Gregory of Nyssa, that through the fall from perfection, they were introduced, attaching themselves to the more irrational part of nature; through which, instead of the divine and blessed image, immediately at the time of the transgression, the likeness to the irrational animals became transparent and manifest in man. For it was necessary, since the dignity of the reason had been covered over by those characteristics of irrationality which he had willfully drawn upon himself, for human nature to be justly punished; God wisely ordering man to come to an awareness of his rational magnanimity.

Nevertheless, the passions also become good in the virtuous; whenever, wisely turning them away from corporeal things, they use them for the acquisition of heavenly things; for instance, they make desire into an appetitive movement of the intellectual yearning for divine things; and pleasure, a harmless gladness from the volitional energy of the mind in divine gifts; and fear, a precautionary care against the future punishment for transgressions; and pain, a corrective repentance for a present evil. And, to speak concisely, like the wise physicians who remove the neglected injury from the body of a destructive beast, the viper, using these passions for the removal of present or expected evil, and for the acquisition and guarding of both virtue and knowledge. Therefore, as I said, these things become good through their use, in those who take every thought captive to the obedience of Christ.

And if any of these things is said in Scripture of God, or of the saints; in the case of God, it is for our sake, and as it suitably manifests to us through our own passions the saving and beneficent advances of providence for us, but in the case of the saints, it is because they are unable otherwise to express through a bodily voice their intellectual relations and dispositions toward God, without the passions known to nature.

SCHOLIA. 1. How and when these passions become good. 2. That the various ways of Providence concerning us by the [passions] known to us

Scripture fashions by means of the passions. 3. That the certain relation of the saints toward God by these these names the

Scripture signifies.

79

Ἐπειδή ἠγάθυνέ σε ὁ Θεός, κελεῦσαί μοι ἅπερ εἶχον σεσημειωμένα τῶν ἀπορουμένων μοι κεφαλαίων γράψαι, καί πέμψαι σοι, τά ἀναγκαιότερά μοι φανέντα προέταξα.

ΕΡΩΤΗΣΙΣ Α ΄ .

Τά πάθη αὐτά καθ᾿ ἑαυτά κακά, ἤ παρά τήν χρῆσιν κακά; Λέγω δέ ἡδονήν καί λύπην, ἐπιθυμίαν καί φόβον, καί τά τούτοις ἑπόμενα.

Ἀπόκρισις. (269) Τά πάθη αὐτά, ὥσπερ καί τά λοιπά, τῇ φύσει τῶν ἀνθρώπων προηγουμένως οὐ

συνεκτίσθη· ἐπεί καί εἰς τόν ὅρον ἄν συνετέλουν τῆς φύσεως. Λέγω δέ, παρά τοῦ Νυσσαέως μεγάλου Γρηγορίου μαθών, ὅτι διά τήν τῆς τελειότητος ἔκπτωσιν, ἐπεισήχθη αὐτά τῷ ἀλογωτέρῳ μέρει προσφυέντα τῆς φύσεως· δι᾿ ὧν, ἀντί τῆς θείας καί μακαρίας εἰκόνος, εὐθύς ἅμα τῇ παραβάσει διαφανής καί ἐπίδηλος ἐν τῷ ἀνθρώπῳ γέγονεν, ἡ τῶν ἀλόγων ζώων ὁμοίωσις. Ἔδει γάρ τῆς ἀξίας τοῦ λόγου καλυφθείσης, ὑφ᾿ ὧν γνωμικῶς ἐπεσπάσατο τῆς ἀλογίας γνωρισμάτων, ἐνδίκως τήν φύσιν τῶν ἀνθρώπων κολάζεσθαι· σοφῶς εἰς συναίσθησιν τῆς λογικῆς μεγαλονοίας ἐλθεῖν οἰκονομοῦντος τοῦ Θεοῦ τόν ἄνθρωπον.

Πλήν καλά γίνεται καί τά πάθη ἐν τοῖς σπουδαίοις· ὁπηνίκα σοφῶς αὐτά τῶν σωματικῶν ἀποστήσαντες, πρός τήν τῶν οὐρανίων μεταχειρίζονται κτῆσιν· οἷον, τήν ἐπιθυμίαν, τῆς νοερᾶς τῶν θείων ἐφέσεως ὀρεκτικήν ἐργάζονται κίνησιν· τήν ἡδονήν δέ, τῆς ἐπί τοῖς θείοις χαρίσμασι τοῦ νοῦ θελητικῆς ἐνεργείας εὐφροσύνην ἀπήμονα· τόν δέ φόβον, τῆς μελλούσης ἐπί πλημμελήμασι τιμωρίας προφυλακτικήν ἐπιμέλειαν· τήν δέ λύπη, διορθωτικήν ἐπί παρόντι κακῷ μεταμέλειαν. Καί συντόμως εἰπεῖν, κατά τούς σοφούς τῶν ἰατρῶν, σώματι φθαρτικοῦ θηρός τῆς ἐχίδνης τήν οὖσαν ἠμελετωμένην ἀφαιρουμένους λώβωσιν, τοῖς πάθεσιν τούτοις πρός ἀναίρεσιν χρώμενοι παρούσης κακίας ἤ προσδοκωμένης, καί κτῆσιν καί φυλακήν ἀρετῆς τε καί γνώσεως. Καλά οὖν, ὡς ἔφην, ταῦτα τυγχάνει διά τήν χρῆσιν, ἐν τοῖς πᾶν νόημα αἰχμαλωτίζουσιν εἰς τήν ὑπακοήν τοῦ Χριστοῦ.

Εἰ δέ καί ἐπί Θεοῦ τι τούτων εἴρηται τῇ Γραφῇ, ἤ ἐφ᾿ ἁγίων· ἐπί μέν Θεοῦ, δι᾿ ἡμᾶς, καί ὡς ἡμῖν προσφυῶς διά τῶν ἡμετέρων παθῶν τάς σωστικάς ἡμῶν καί ἀγαθουργούς τῆς προνοίας προόδους ἐκφανούσης, ἐπί δέ τῶν ἁγίων, ὡς οὐκ ἄλλως δυναμένων τάς περί Θεόν νοεράς αὐτῶν σχέσεις καί διαθέσεις διά φωνῆς προενέγκαι σωματικῆς, χωρίς τῶν ἐγνωσμένων τῇ φύσει παθῶν.

ΣΧΟΛΙΑ. α΄. Πῶς καί πότε καλά ταῦτα τά πάθη γίνεται. β΄. Ὅτι τούς δαφόρους περί ἡμᾶς τῆς Προνοίας τρόπους τοῖς ἡμῖν ἐγνωσμένοις

πάθεσιν ἡ Γραφή διαπλάττει. γ΄. Ὅτι τήν περί Θεόν ποιάν σχέσιν τῶν ἁγίων τοῖς ὀνόμασι τούτοις τούτοις ἡ

Γραφή διασημαίνει.