239

and of thought; and crying out earnestly; that is, with a great voice, or rather, with boldness against lawlessness confessing the license of former sins; and departing as from some road from the customary course; and from the injustice worked by actions as if with hands.

Thus therefore Nineveh, being understood as the common nature, that is, the Church of the Gentiles, shows Jonah preaching in it for all time; that is, the word of prophetic grace; and each day turning the lost to God. But if we understand Nineveh in relation to the contemplation of each individual, we say that the soul of each one is the great city, to which the word of God is sent when it transgresses, preaching repentance unto life. And we understand its king to be the mind; and its rulers, the innate powers; and its people, the passionate thoughts; and its cattle, the movements of the body according to desire; and its oxen, the covetous movements of anger concerning material things; and its sheep, the movements perceptive of sensible things according to sense without thought. And the king, the mind, as rising from the throne of its former state of ignorance, and as putting off like a garment the false opinion concerning beings; and as putting on sackcloth, the remorse for its evil thoughts; and sitting in ashes, the state of poverty of spirit; and commanding the people and the cattle and the oxen and the sheep to fast from the food of wickedness and the drink of ignorance; that is, to abstain from the practice of evil things, and from the contemplation (708) that has gone astray according to the senses; and to put on [Fr. to have put on] sackcloths, that is, the state which mortifies the passions contrary to nature, but produces the virtues and knowledge according to nature; and to cry out to God earnestly; to confess clearly and concisely former things, and by humility to propitiate him who is able to give forgiveness for what has preceded; and to ask for the energy of better things, and for the preservation of purpose an unchangeable power, from him who readily grants this to those who ask; and as from a wicked road, to hinder the mind from its former error; and to put away the inventive habit of evil from the practical powers of the soul.

And in this great city, that is, the common nature of men, and the Church from the Gentiles; or the soul of each individual, being saved through the word of virtue and of knowledge, that is, of faith and of a good conscience, there are more than twelve myriads of people, who did not know their right hand, or their left hand. I suppose Scripture here says twelve myriads according to the principles of anagogy, the principles concerning time and nature; that is, the knowledge which with the things not without is comprehensive of visible nature. For if the number twelve is composed of five and seven; and nature is fivefold because of sense-perception; and time is sevenfold; therefore the number twelve clearly indicates nature and time. And significantly, it said more than twelve myriads of people, so that we might know this number is circumscribed, and indefinitely surpassed by the greater number, making for themselves an amount over the number twelve.

Therefore the all-praised Church of God, having those who in virtue and knowledge have passed beyond the principles of time and nature, and have crossed over to the magnificence of eternal and intelligible things, has more than twelve myriads of men, not knowing their right hand, or their left hand. For he who because of lawful virtue makes a forgetting of the passions in the flesh as of left things, and because of unerring knowledge in his achievements, with the disease of puffing-up conceit as

239

τε καί φρονήματος· καί ἀναβοῶντας ἐκτενῶς· τουτέστιν, μεγάλῃ τῇ φωνῆ, ἤγουν τῇ κατά τῆς ἀνομίας παῤῥησίᾳ ἐξαγορεύοντας τῶν προτέρων ἁμαρτημάτων τήν ἄδειαν· καί ἀφισταμένους ὡς ὁδοῦ τινος τοῦ κατά συνήθειαν δρόμου· καί τῆς ὡς ἐν χερσίν ταῖς πράξεσιν ἐνεργουμένης ἀδικίας.

Οὕτω μέν οὖν εἰς τήν κοινήν φύσιν, ἤγουν τήν τῶν ἐθνῶν Ἐκκλησίαν ἡ Νινευή νοουμένη, διά παντός δείκνυσιν ἐν αὐτῇ κηρύττοντα τόν Ἰωνάν· τουτέστι τόν λόγον τῆς προφητικῆς χάριτος· καί καθ᾿ ἑκάστην ἡμέραν πρός τόν Θεόν ἐπιστρέφοντα τούς πεπλανημένους. Εἰ δέ πρός τήν τοῦ καθ᾿ ἕκαστον θεωρίαν τήν Νινευή νοοῦμεν, τήν ἑκάστου ψυχήν εἶναι φαμεν τήν πόλιν τήν μεγάλην, πρός ἥν ἀποτέλλεται παρανομοῦσαν ὁ τοῦ Θεοῦ λόγος, κηρύττων μετάνοιαν πρός ζωήν. Ταύτης δέ βασιλέα νοοῦμεν τόν νοῦν· ἄρχοντας δέ, τάς ἐμφύτους δυνάμεις· ἀνθρώπους δέ, τούς ἐμπαθεῖς λογισμούς· κτήνη δέ, τά περί τό σῶμα κατ᾿ ἐπιθυμίαν κινήματα· βόας δέ, τάς κατά τόν θυμόν περί τά ὑλικά πλεονεκτικάς κινήσεις· πρόβατα δέ, τά κατά τήν αἴσθησιν χωρίς διανοίας ἀντιληπτικά τῶν αἰσθητῶν κινήματα. Καί τόν μέν βασιλέα νοῦν ὡς ἀπό θρόνου τινός τῆς κατά τήν προτέραν ἄγνοιαν ἐξανιστάμενον ἕξεως, καί ὥσπερ στολήν τήν ψευδῆ περί τῶν ὄντων δόξαν ἀποτιθέμενον· καί ὡς σάκκον περιβαλλόμενον, τόν ἐπί τοῖς κακῶς φρονηθεῖσι μετάμελον· καί ἐπί σποδοῦ καθήμενον, τῆς κατά τήν πτωχείαν τοῦ πνεύματος ἕξεως· καί προστάσσοντα τοῖς ἀνθρώποις καί τοῖς κτήνεσι καί τοῖς βουσί καί τοῖς προβάτοις νηστεύειν τῆς τε κατά κακίαν βρώσεως, καί τῆς κατά τήν ἄγνοιαν πόσεως· τουτέστι πράξεως κακῶν ἀποσχέσθαι, καί τῆς κατ᾿ αἴσθησιν πεπαπληνημένης (708) θεωρίας· καί περιβάλλεσθαι [Fr. περιβαλέσθαι] σάκκους, τουτέστι, τήν νεκρωτικήν μέν τῶν παρά φύσιν παθῶν, περιποιητικήν δέ τῶν κατά φύσιν ἀρετῶν τε καί γνώσεων ἕξιν· καί ἀναβοῆσαι πρός τόν Θεόν ἐκτενῶς· ἐξαγορεῦσαι δῆλον ὅτι συντόμως τά πρότερα, καί ἱλεώσασθαι τῇ ταπεινώσει τήν συγχώρησιν δοῦναι τῶν προλαβόντων δυνάμενον· καί αἰτῆσαι πρός τήν τῶν κρειττόνων ἐνέργειαν, καί φυλακήν προαιρέσεως δύναμιν ἄτρεπτον, τόν ἑτοίμως ταύτην τοῖς αἰτοῦσι δωρούμενον· καί ὥσπερ ὁδοῦ πονηρᾶς, τῆς προτέρας πλάνης κωλῦσαι τήν διάνοιαν· καί τήν ἐπινοητικήν τῆς κακίας ἕξιν, τῶν κατά ψυχήν πρακτικῶν ἀποθέσθαι δυνάμεων.

Εἰς ταύτην δέ τήν πόλιν τήν μεγάλην, τουτέστι, τήν κοινήν φύσιν τῶν ἀνθρώπων, καί τήν ἐξ ἐθνῶν Ἐκκλησίαν· ἤ τήν τοῦ καθ᾿ ἕκαστον ψυχήν, διά τοῦ λόγου τῆς ἀρετῆς καί τῆς γνώσεως, ἤγουν πίστεως καί ἀγαθῆς συνειδήσεως σωζομένην, ὑπάρχουσιν πλείους ἤ δώδεκα μυριάδες ἀνθρώπων, οἵτινες οὐκ ἔγνωσαν δεξιά αὐτῶν, ἤ ἀριστεράν αὐτῶν. ∆ώδεκα μυριάδας ἐνταῦθα λέγειν ὑπονοῶ τήν Γραφήν κατά τούς τῆς ἀναγωγῆς λόγους, τούς περί χρόνου καί φύσεως λόγους· ἤγουν τήν μετά τῶν οὐκ ἄνευ εὐπεριληπτικήν τῆς ὁρωμένης φύσεως γνῶσιν. Εἰ γάρ ὁ δώδεκα ἀριθμός, ἐκ πέντε καί ἑπτά συντιθέμενος ἀποτελεῖται· ἡ δέ φύσις ὑπάρχει πενταδική διά τήν αἴσθησιν· ὁ δέ χρόνος ἐστίν ἑβδοματικός· ἄρα φύσιν καί χρόνον ὁ δώδεκα δηλοῖ σαφῶς ἀριθμός. Σεσημειωμένως δέ, πλείους ἤ δώδεκα μυριάδας εἶπεν ἀνθρώπων, ἵνα γνῶμεν περιγραφέντα τοῦτον τόν ἀριθμόν, καί ὑπερβαθέντα τοῖς πλείοσιν ἀορίστως, τό ὑπέρ δώδεκα ἀριθμόν δι᾿ ἑαυτῶν ποιουμένοις ποσόν.

Οὐκοῦν ἡ τοῦ Θεοῦ πανεύφημος Ἐκκλησία, τούς κατά τήν ἀρετήν καί τήν γνῶσιν παρελθόντας μέν τούς κατά χρόνον καί φύσιν λόγους, πρός δέ τήν τῶν αἰωνίων καί νοητῶν διαβάντας μεγαλοπρέπειαν ἔχουσα, πλείους ἤ δώδεκα μυριάδας ἀνδρῶν ἔχει, μή γινώσκοντας δεξιάν αὐτῶν, ἤ ἀριστεράν αὐτῶν. Ὁ γάρ διά τήν ἔννομον ἀρετήν τῶν ἐν σαρκί παθῶν ὡς ἀριστερῶν ποιούμενος λήθην, καί διά τήν ἄπταιστον γνῶσιν ἐπί τοῖς κατορθώμασι, τῆ νόσῳ τῆς φυσιούσης οἰήσεως ὡς