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making a remembrance of his death; and this is one, and not many. How one, and not many? Because it was offered once, like that sacrifice in the Holy of Holies. This is a type of that, and that of this; for we always offer the same, not one lamb today, and another tomorrow, but always the same one. So that the sacrifice is one. Otherwise, by this reasoning, since it is offered in many places, are there many Christs? But not at all; Christ is one everywhere, both here fully and there fully, one Body. As therefore, though offered in many places, there is one Body, and not many bodies; so also there is one sacrifice. Our High Priest is He, who offered the sacrifice that cleanses us. That sacrifice we offer now also, which was then offered, which is inexhaustible. This is done for a remembrance of what was then done. For, he says, "Do this in remembrance of Me." We do not offer another sacrifice, as the High Priest then did, but always the same one; or rather, we perform a remembrance of a sacrifice. 4. But since I have made mention of this sacrifice, I wish to say a few things to you who have been initiated; things little in measure, but having great force and benefit; for what is said is not ours, but of the divine Spirit. What then is it? Many partake of this sacrifice once in the whole year, others twice, others many times. Our word therefore is to all, not to those here only, but also to those who are settled in the desert; for they partake once in the year, and often even every two years. What then? Whom shall we approve 63.132 of? Those who do so once? Those who do so many times? Those who do so a few times? Neither those who do so once, nor those who do so many times, nor those who do so a few times, but those who do so with a pure conscience, with a pure heart, with a blameless life. Let such always approach; but those who are not such, not even once. Why so? Because they receive to themselves judgment, and condemnation and punishment and vengeance. And do not wonder; for as food, being nourishing by nature, if it falls into a sickly stomach, ruins and corrupts everything, and becomes an occasion of disease; so also is it with these awesome mysteries. You partake of a spiritual Table, a royal Table, and do you again defile your mouth with mire? You anoint it with myrrh, and do you again fill it with foul odors? Tell me, I beseech you, thinking to partake of the Communion after a year, do you think that the forty days are sufficient for you for the purifying of the sins of the whole time? And again, when a week has passed, do you give yourself up to your former ways? Tell me now, if having been well for forty days after a long illness, you should again give yourself up to those foods that cause sickness, have you not lost your former labor too? It is plain that you have. For if things of nature are changed, much more those of free will. I mean this: By nature we see, and have healthy eyes by nature; but often from a bad habit our power of seeing is injured. If then things of nature are changed, are not things of free will much more so? You assign forty days for the health of your soul, or perhaps not even forty, and you expect to propitiate God? You are jesting, man. I say these things, not forbidding you from coming once a year, but wishing you to approach the holy things always. For this reason the priest then exclaims, calling the holy, and by this voice examining all, so that no one may approach unprepared. For as in a flock, where many sheep are healthy, and many are full of the scab, it is necessary to separate these from the healthy; so also in the Church, since some are healthy sheep and some are diseased, by this voice he separates these from those, the priest going about everywhere with this most awesome cry, and calling and drawing the holy. For since it is not possible for one who is a man to know the things of his neighbor; For what man, he says, knows the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? he utters this voice after the whole sacrifice has been completed, so that no one should come to the spiritual fountain simply and as it may be. For in the case of the
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ποιούμενοι τοῦ θανάτου αὐτοῦ· καὶ μία ἐστὶν αὕτη, καὶ οὐ πολλαί. Πῶς μία, καὶ οὐ πολλαί; Ἐπειδὴ ἅπαξ προσηνέχθη, ὥσπερ ἐκείνη ἡ εἰς τὰ Ἅγια τῶν ἁγίων. Τοῦτο ἐκείνης τύπος ἐστὶ, καὶ αὕτη ἐκείνης· τὸν γὰρ αὐτὸν ἀεὶ προσφέρομεν, οὐ νῦν μὲν ἕτερον πρόβατον, αὔριον δὲ ἕτερον, ἀλλ' ἀεὶ τὸ αὐτό· ὥστε μία ἐστὶν ἡ θυσία. Ἐπεὶ τῷ λόγῳ τούτῳ, ἐπειδὴ πολλαχοῦ προσφέρεται, καὶ πολλοὶ Χριστοί; ἀλλ' οὐδαμῶς, ἀλλ' εἷς πανταχοῦ ὁ Χριστὸς, καὶ ἐνταῦθα πλήρης ὢν, καὶ ἐκεῖ πλήρης, ἓν σῶμα. Ὥσπερ οὖν πολλαχοῦ προσφερόμενος ἓν σῶμά ἐστι, καὶ οὐ πολλὰ σώματα, οὕτω καὶ μία θυσία. Ὁ ἀρχιερεὺς ἡμῶν ἐκεῖνός ἐστιν ὁ τὴν θυσίαν τὴν καθαίρουσαν ἡμᾶς προσενεγκών. Ἐκείνην προσφέρομεν καὶ νῦν, τὴν τότε προσενεχθεῖσαν, τὴν ἀνάλωτον. Τοῦτο εἰς ἀνάμνησιν γίνεται τοῦ τότε γενομένου· Τοῦτο γὰρ ποιεῖτε, φησὶν, εἰς τὴν ἐμὴν ἀνάμνησιν. Οὐκ ἄλλην θυσίαν, καθάπερ ὁ ἀρχιερεὺς τότε, ἀλλὰ τὴν αὐτὴν ἀεὶ ποιοῦμεν· μᾶλλον δὲ ἀνάμνησιν ἐργαζόμεθα θυσίας. δʹ. Ἀλλ' ἐπειδὴ τῆς θυσίας ταύτης ἐμνήσθην, βούλομαι μικρὰ πρὸς ὑμᾶς εἰπεῖν τοὺς μεμυημένους, μικρὰ μὲν τῷ μέτρῳ, μεγάλην δὲ ἔχοντα τὴν ἰσχὺν καὶ τὴν ὠφέλειαν· οὐ γὰρ ἡμετερά ἐστιν, ἀλλὰ τοῦ θείου Πνεύματος τὰ λεγόμενα. Τί οὖν ἐστι; Πολλοὶ τῆς θυσίας ταύτης ἅπαξ μεταλαμβάνουσι τοῦ παντὸς ἐνιαυτοῦ, ἄλλοι δὲ δὶς, ἄλλοι δὲ πολλάκις. Πρὸς οὖν ἅπαντας ἡμῖν ὁ λόγος ἐστὶν, οὐ πρὸς τοὺς ἐνταῦθα δὲ μόνον, ἀλλὰ καὶ πρὸς τοὺς ἐν τῇ ἐρήμῳ καθεζομένους· ἐκεῖνοι γὰρ ἅπαξ τοῦ ἐνιαυτοῦ μετέχουσι, πολλάκις δὲ καὶ διὰ δύο ἐτῶν. Τί οὖν; τίνας ἀποδε 63.132 ξόμεθα; τοὺς ἅπαξ; τοὺς πολλάκις; τοὺς ὀλιγάκις; Οὔτε τοὺς ἅπαξ, οὔτε τοὺς πολλάκις, οὔτε τοὺς ὀλιγάκις, ἀλλὰ τοὺς μετὰ καθαροῦ συνειδότος, τοὺς μετὰ καθαρᾶς καρδίας, τοὺς μετὰ βίου ἀλήπτου. Οἱ τοιοῦτοι ἀεὶ προσίτωσαν· οἱ δὲ μὴ τοιοῦτοι, μηδὲ ἅπαξ. Τί δήποτε; Ὅτι κρῖμα ἑαυτοῖς λαμβάνουσι, καὶ κατάκριμα καὶ κόλασιν καὶ τιμωρίαν. Καὶ μὴ θαυμάσῃς· ὥσπερ γὰρ ἡ τροφὴ φύσει οὖσα θρεπτικὴ, ἐὰν εἰς κακόσιτον ἐμπέσῃ, πάντα ἀπόλλυσι καὶ διαφθείρει, καὶ γίνεται νόσου ἀφορμή· οὕτω δὴ καὶ ταῦτα τὰ τῶν φρικτῶν μυστηρίων. Τραπέζης ἀπολαύεις πνευματικῆς, τραπέζης βασιλικῆς, καὶ πάλιν φύρεις βορβόρῳ τὸ στόμα; μύρῳ χρίεις, καὶ πάλιν δυσωδίας πληροῖς; Εἰπέ μοι, παρακαλῶ, μετ' ἐνιαυτὸν τῆς μεταλήψεως μετέχων, τὰς τεσσαράκοντα ἡμέρας οἴει ἀρκεῖν σοι πρὸς καθαρμὸν τῶν ἁμαρτημάτων παντὸς τοῦ χρόνου; καὶ πάλιν, ἑβδομάδος παρελθούσης, ἐκδίδως σαυτὸν τοῖς προτέροις; Εἰπὲ δή μοι, ἐὰν ὑγιάνας τεσσαράκοντα ἡμέρας ἀπὸ νόσου μακρᾶς, πάλιν σαυτὸν τοῖς, σιτίοις ἐκδῷς ἐκείνοις τοῖς νοσοποιοῖς, οὐχὶ καὶ τὸν πρότερον κόπον ἀπώλεσας; Εὔδηλον ὅτι. Εἰ γὰρ τὰ φυσικὰ μεθίσταται, πολλῷ μᾶλλον τὰ τῆς προαιρέσεως. Οἷόν τι λέγω· Φύσει βλέπομεν, καὶ ὑγιεῖς ἔχομεν ὀφθαλμοὺς κατὰ φύσιν· ἀλλὰ πολλάκις ἀπὸ καχεξίας βλάπτεται ἡμῶν τὸ ὀπτικόν. Εἰ τοίνυν τὰ ἐκ φύσεως μεθίσταται, οὐχὶ μάλιστα τὰ ἐκ προαιρέσεως; Τεσσαράκοντα ἡμέρας ἀπονέμεις τῇ ὑγείᾳ τῆς ψυχῆς, τάχα δὲ οὐδὲ τεσσαράκοντα, καὶ προσδοκᾷς ἐξιλεώσασθαι τὸν Θεόν; Παίζεις, ἄνθρωπε. Ταῦτα λέγω, οὐχὶ τῆς μιᾶς καὶ ἐνιαυσιαίου προσόδου κωλύων ὑμᾶς, ἀλλὰ βουλόμενος μᾶλλον διαπαντὸς ὑμᾶς προσιέναι τοῖς ἁγίοις. ∆ιὰ τοῦτο καὶ ὁ ἱερεὺς ἐπιφωνεῖ τότε τοὺς ἁγίους καλῶν, καὶ διὰ τῆς φωνῆς ταύτης μωμοσκοπῶν ἅπαντας, ὥστε μὴ προσελθεῖν τινα ἀπαράσκευον. Καθάπερ γὰρ ἐπὶ ποίμνης, ἔνθα πολλὰ μὲν ὑγιαίνει πρόβατα, πολλὰ δὲ ψώρας ἀναπέπλησται, ἀνάγκη ταῦτα διείργεσθαι ἀπὸ τῶν ὑγιαινόντων· οὕτω καὶ ἐν τῇ Ἐκκλησίᾳ, ἐπειδὴ τὰ μέν ἐστιν ὑγιεινὰ πρόβατα, τὰ δὲ κεκακωμένα, διὰ τῆς φωνῆς ταύτης διείργει ταῦτα ἐκείνων περιιὼν πανταχοῦ διὰ τῆς κραυγῆς ταύτης τῆς φρικωδεστάτης ὁ ἱερεὺς, καὶ τοὺς ἁγίους καλῶν καὶ ἕλκων. Ἐπειδὴ γὰρ οὐκ ἔνι ἄνθρωπον ὄντα εἰδέναι τὰ τοῦ πλησίον· Τίς γὰρ οἶδεν ἀνθρώπων, φησὶ, τὰ τοῦ ἀνθρώπου, εἰ μὴ τὸ πνεῦμα τοῦ ἀνθρώπου τὸ ἐν αὐτῷ; ταύτην ἀφίησι τὴν φωνὴν μετὰ τὸ τὴν θυσίαν ἀπαρτισθῆναι πᾶσαν, ὥστε μηδένα ἁπλῶς καὶ ὡς ἔτυχεν, ἐπὶ τὴν πηγὴν ἐλθεῖν τὴν πνευματικήν. Καὶ γὰρ ἐπὶ τῆς