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COMPLETE WORKS, OF MAXIMUS THE CONFESSOR *

Volume 8 15 A ....................................................................................................................... 1 MINOR THEOLOGICAL AND POLEMICAL WORKS ................................................................................ 1

Volume 8 15 A MINOR THEOLOGICAL AND POLEMICAL WORKS * TO MARINUS THE MOST HOLY PRESBYTER 15Α_010 Having set for yourself the goal of the all-hymned toward God

to obtain friendship, God-honored Father, you run the race toward it in an orderly way. With reason, on the one hand, for the generation of virtue, describing the nature of beings;(1) with the mind, on the other hand, for the establishment of an unerring union (knowledge), circumscribing the motion of all age and time; with which the warmer desire for God enters; by His infinity co-extending the movement of you who desire; and by the incomprehensibility of the one desired, making your longing incomprehensible; whose end is God Himself; becoming the fulfillment of desire for the worthy, as a self-subsistent enjoyment of good things; of which reason knows only the experience as comprehension, as it is clearly beyond understanding, a union, as it does not fall under any intellectual type whatsoever. For this reason, your life has become the face(2) of your reason; and the nature of your life, 0012 reason; truly sketching the new man according to Christ; worthily bearing the image and likeness of God the creator; which must now be understood as truth and goodness; the one being the end of contemplation, the other, of practice; and the one, the opponent of falsehood, the other, of wickedness.

15Α_012 Hence for you, by the right practice of the virtues, the comprehension of divine dogmas has been joined; being held together both by the abundance of knowledge and by the power of proof; according to which, that which by some was not accurately stated concerning

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ΑΠΑΝΤΑ, ΜΑΞΙΜΟΥ τοῦ ΟΜΟΛΟΓΗΤΟΥ *

8ος Τόμος 15 Α ....................................................................................................................... 1 ΜΙΚΡΑ ΘΕΟΛΟΓΙΚΑ ΚΑΙ ΠΟΛΕΜΙΚΑ ................................................................................ 1

8ος Τόμος 15 Α ΜΙΚΡΑ ΘΕΟΛΟΓΙΚΑ ΚΑΙ ΠΟΛΕΜΙΚΑ * ΠΡΟΣ ΜΑΡΙΝΟΝ ΤΟΝ ΟΣΙΩΤΑΤΟΝ ΠΡΕΣΒΥΤΕΡΟΝ 15Α_010 Σκοπόν θέμενος σαυτῷ τήν πανύμνητον πρός τόν Θεόν

στείλασθαι φιλίαν, θεοτίμητε Πάτερ, εὐτάκτως πρός αὐτήν διανύεις τόν δρόμον. Λόγῳ μέν πρός ἀρετῆς γένεσιν τήν τῶν ὄντων φύσιν περιγράφων(1) νῷ δέ, πρός ἀπλανοῦς ἑνώσεως (γνώσεως) σύστασιν, παντός αἰῶνος καί χρόνου περιορίζων τήν κίνησιν· αἷς θερμότερος ὁ τοῦ Θεοῦ συνεισέρχεται πόθος· τῇ τε ἀπειρίᾳ συμπαρεκτείνων σου τοῦ ποθοῦντος τήν κίνησιν· καί τῷ ἀκαταλήπτῳ τοῦ ποθουμένου, τήν ἔφεσίν σοι ποιῶν ἀκατάληπτον· ἧς τέλος αὐτός ἐστιν ὁ Θεός· πόθου τοῖς ἀξίοις γινόμενος πλήρωσις, ὡς ἀπόλαυσις ἀγαθῶν αὐθυπόστατος· ἧς μόνην τήν πεῖραν οἶδε κατάληψιν ὁ λόγος, οἷα σαφῶς ὑπέρ νόησιν τυγχάνουσαν, ἕνωσιν, ὡς μηδενί τύπῳ νοερῷ καθοτιοῦν ὑποπιπτούσης. ∆ιά τοῦτο, τοῦ μέν λόγου σοι γέγονε πρόσωπον(2) ὁ βίος· τοῦ δέ βίου φύσις, 0012 ὁ λόγος· τόν καινόν ἀληθῶς κατά Χριστόν ὑπογράφοντες ἄνθρωπον· εὐμιμήτως φέροντα τοῦ κτίσαντος Θεοῦ τήν εἰκόνα καί τήν ὁμοίωσιν· ἅστινας ὑποληπτέον νῦν τήν ἀλήθειαν καί τήν ἀγαθότητα· τήν μέν θεωρίας, τήν δέ, πράξεως τέλος ὑπάρχουσαν· καί τήν μέν, ψεύδους, τήν δέ, πονηρίας ἀντίπαλον.

15Α_012 Ἐντεῦθεν σοι τῇ κατορθώσει τῶν ἀρετῶν, ἡ τῶν θείων συνήφθη δογμάτων κατάληψις· τῷ τε πλήθει τῆς γνώσεως, καί τῇ δυνάμει συνεχομένη τῆς ἀποδείξεως· καθ᾿ ἥν, τό πρός τινων οὐκ ἠκριβωμένως περί