Date: 2026-08-15T00:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Asceticism & Spirituality; John of Kronstadt; Orthodox catechism; the Creed explained; creation and the six days; the Holy Trinity; providence and redemption; Russian Orthodox teaching; Religion & Spirituality; Christianity / Orthodox; Christian Living / Spiritual Growth
Description: Eighteen ordered lessons in which Saint John of Kronstadt raises the whole house of the Faith — from the Holy Trinity through creation, the angels, and the fall to providence, Redemption, and the Incarnation. A parish priest's catechism that never loses its wonder, reading the sun and the sea and the six days of Genesis alongside the Fathers, and turning every doctrine toward the saving of the soul.

Catechetical Talks

John of Kronstadt

Royal Archives

2026

Copyright

The modern English translation and the cover design are © 2026 Royal Archives. All rights reserved.

The underlying source text is in the public domain.

Published by Royal Archives

First published 2026

Translated by Royal Archives

Source: Катехизические беседы (azbyka.ru; from the pre-revolutionary Russian edition of St John of Kronstadt’s catechetical instructions)

Cover: Sunday Reading in a Village School (Воскресное чтение в сельской школе, 1895) by Nikolai Bogdanov-Belsky (Russian, 1868–1945), Wikimedia Commons, which is in the public domain.

Edition identifier: urn:royalarchives:katehizicheskie-besedy:en:1

Introduction

The Author

The priest who delivered these talks is known to most of the world by the town he served rather than by his name. He was born Ivan Ilyich Sergiev on the nineteenth of October, 1829, in Sura, a poor village in the far north of Russia, in the Arkhangelsk region, where his father served the parish church as a sacristan. The family had little; the boy grew up close to the liturgy and closer still to want. He made his way south to study, and by 1855 had completed his course at the Theological Academy of Saint Petersburg. For a time he dreamed of carrying the Gospel to the peoples of Siberia and Alaska, but he came to believe that the mission field lay nearer at hand, among the baptized who had drifted from the faith of their baptism. That conviction shaped everything he afterward became.

On graduating he married Elizaveta Nesvitskaia, a daughter of the clergy attached to Saint Andrew’s Cathedral in Kronstadt, the naval town set on an island in the Gulf of Finland within sight of the capital. He was ordained deacon and, two days later, priest, and assigned to that same cathedral. He would remain there for fifty-three years, until his death. Kronstadt in those years was a hard place—a garrison and port with a large population of laborers, exiles, and the destitute crowded into cellars and shanties. The young priest went to them where they lived. He did not come to perform a rite in ten minutes and leave; by every account he stayed for hours, sitting with the poor, listening, weeping and rejoicing with them, giving away his own money until he had nothing left to give. Out of this labor grew the House of Industry he founded in Kronstadt to give the town’s poor honest work rather than alms alone.

Over the decades his reputation spread far beyond the island. He became one of the most sought-after pastors in the Russian Empire—a confessor, a preacher, and, in the eyes of countless people who came to him or wrote to him, a healer through whose prayers the sick recovered. His spiritual diary, published as My Life in Christ, has been read and reread by Christians of many traditions as a classic of the interior life; but that book belongs to his maturity. The present work comes from the other end of his ministry, from a priest still in his twenties who had only just begun. He reposed at Kronstadt on the twentieth of December, 1908. The Russian Orthodox Church Abroad glorified him as a saint in 1964, and the Church of Russia did so on the eighth of June, 1990; he is commemorated on the twentieth of December and the nineteenth of October, and is honored across the Orthodox world as Saint John of Kronstadt, the wonderworker.

The Work: Occasion and Purpose

Catechetical Talks is the fruit of that first pastoral impulse—the desire to teach the faith to people who had received it without ever quite grasping it. From the very start of his service at Saint Andrew’s Cathedral, the young Father John gathered his people for a course of catechetical instruction, and these are the addresses he gave. They were first printed in Kronstadt in 1859, only four years into his priesthood, under a title that names their setting exactly: Catechetical Talks, spoken in the Kronstadt Cathedral of Saint Andrew by the priest John Sergiev. The censor’s approval is dated the thirtieth of June that year. This is, in other words, one of the earliest things he ever published—a document of his beginnings, composed long before fame gathered around him and while he was simply the parish priest of a difficult town doing the ordinary work of teaching.

The talks are exactly that: talks, not treatises. Their language everywhere betrays the pulpit. He addresses his hearers directly as “brothers”; he reminds them of what was said “on the past Sunday” and promises what will come in the talks “to follow”; he pauses to note that a discourse “has run on longer than necessary.” Several are tied to the day on which they were spoken—one closes by invoking the Holy Spirit “whose coming upon the holy Apostles we celebrate today,” marking Pentecost. The setting is the cathedral itself, and the frame of reference is the life his hearers already shared there: the prayers they heard sung, the Creed they recited, the feasts they kept. He builds his instruction on what they already had in their ears and mouths, and asks only that they understand it.

His stated aim is never merely to inform. “The servant of the holy altar,” he tells them at the outset, “must teach the faith clearly and distinctly to all”—and clarity, for him, is in the service of salvation. He wants his people to know the God they worship, because “upon the correct knowledge of the Tri-radiant Godhead depends our eternal destiny,” and because a doctrine truly grasped becomes the ground of a changed life. Every talk therefore turns, before it ends, from teaching to exhortation: having explained the fall, he wants his hearers to feel its wound; having expounded providence, he wants them to trust the hand that orders their days; having set out the Redemption, he wants them to weigh what their souls cost and Who paid the price. The catechism is not information about God but, in his own understanding, the groundwork of a life lived toward Him.

Argument and Structure

The talks are arranged as a single ascending course of eighteen lessons, gathered under three headings that follow the opening articles of the Nicene Creed—belief in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth. Father John takes the Creed as his map and walks his hearers through it in order, one sure step at a time.

The first part, “On God—the Most Holy Trinity” (Talks 1–4), begins where the Creed begins, with the one God in three Persons. The opening talk is introductory: it argues that no knowledge matters more than the knowledge of God, and that this highest of all truths must be received in humble faith, since the mystery of the Trinity is hidden even from the angels. From there he proceeds carefully—the confession of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as one essence in three Persons; the personal properties that distinguish them, the Father unbegotten, the Son begotten, the Spirit proceeding; and the full equality and consubstantiality of the three. Throughout he keeps returning his hearers to the words they already know—the Creed, the Trisagion, the doxologies of the Liturgy—showing them that the dogma they are learning is the same faith they pray every week.

The second and longest part, “On God—the Creator of the World” (Talks 5–15), opens outward into the whole created order. He begins with the invisible creation: the existence, nature, number, and ranks of the angels, arranged in the nine orders and three hierarchies of the Church’s tradition, and then the tragedy of the angels who fell—the origin of evil in a free creature’s pride, and the reality and malice of the demons. He then turns to the visible world and follows the six days of Genesis at length, reading the created world with evident delight: the primordial light, the firmament and the waters, the sun and moon and stars, the seas and their creatures, the birds of the air. This long meditation on creation—the heart of the book—culminates in the making of man in the image and likeness of God, body from the earth and soul from the divine breath. The part closes with the blessed first state of Adam and Eve, the temptation and the fall, and the transmission of original sin to all their children, so that the reader arrives at the human condition as Scripture describes it: labor, sorrow, sickness, and death, and beneath them the deep corruption of a nature that has turned from its source.

The third part, “God—the Providence of the World” (Talks 16–18), gathers the whole into hope. First comes God’s general providence: His unceasing care that upholds the world as the soul upholds the body, governs nations and consciences, and turns even calamity and suffering to the instruction and cleansing of souls. Then Father John narrows to what he calls God’s special providence—the redemption of fallen mankind. He shows the long preparation of the world for a Deliverer through the prophecies and types of the Old Testament, each pointing forward to Christ, and then, in the final talk, the fulfillment: the manifestation of God in the flesh, the annunciation to the Virgin, the nativity at Bethlehem, and the meaning of the Incarnation—that the Son of God became man to satisfy divine justice and to recreate a human nature no creature could mend. The course that opened with the eternal Trinity ends at the manger, with the eternal Son entered into time for the saving of the world.

Two features of his method run through the whole. The first is his constant recourse to the Fathers: he teaches the faith not as his own but as the Church’s, weaving in the voices of Basil the Great on the days of creation, Gregory the Theologian on the making of man, John Chrysostom, Cyril of Jerusalem, John of Damascus, and Dionysius the Areopagite. The second is his refusal to let doctrine grow cold. When he reaches the physical world he lingers over it—the distance of the sun, the multitude of the stars, the structure of the human eye and its lashes—reading nature as Scripture’s companion and drawing from the order and beauty of created things the clearest evidence of their Creator. In his hands a summary of dogma becomes a sustained act of wonder.

Theological and Spiritual Significance

What gives these talks their particular value is the union in them of doctrinal precision and pastoral warmth. Father John is exact where exactness matters. On the Trinity he holds the distinctions firmly—one essence, three Persons, neither confused nor divided; begetting and procession affirmed and carefully kept from any fleshly picture. On the Incarnation he states the Church’s faith without softening it: the Redeemer is “perfect God and perfect man,” and the necessity of His coming lies in the fact that only the Creator could recreate a corrupted human nature, and only an infinite satisfaction could answer an infinitely offended justice. The eucharistic and sacramental notes are equally unreduced—Baptism as a true spiritual birth “of water and the Spirit,” the “saving Mysteries” through which the risen Lord remains with His people. This is a young priest, but a doctrinally careful one, teaching the whole faith and cutting no corners.

Yet the doctrine is never abstract. Its natural setting, for Father John, is worship and daily life. He explains the Trinity by way of the prayers his people sing; he explains providence by way of the illnesses and sudden deaths and public disasters they actually see, and reads each as a summons to repentance rather than a proof of God’s absence. His anthropology is at once exalted and humbling: man is a “microcosm,” a “second world great in the small,” crowned as king of creation and stamped with the image of the Trinity in his mind, word, and breath—and at the same time dust of the earth, whose pride is best cured by remembering what he is made of. His long delight in the created world gives the book a quietly apologetic force as well; against those who “will not believe anything they do not see,” he argues from the visible to the invisible, from the life that animates a blade of grass to the vast unseen world of spirits, and from the beauty of the world to the goodness of its Maker.

The talks are also a small monument of nineteenth-century Russian catechesis in the tradition of the ancient catechetical schools—a parish priest doing for his own congregation what Cyril of Jerusalem once did for his catechumens, expounding the faith of the Creed step by step and grounding every article in Scripture and the Fathers. As the work of a man the wider Church would later receive as a saint, it carries the added interest of showing his mind at its beginning: the same pastoral zeal, the same love of the liturgy, the same tenderness toward sinners that mark his celebrated later diary are already fully present here, decades earlier, in the plain form of Sunday instruction.

Because the talks were composed by a priest of the Christian East, they naturally reflect that setting. Father John teaches the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed in the form received in the East, expounding the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father, and he honors the Mother of God and the angels with the devotion characteristic of the Eastern tradition. These are features of his world, offered here as plain description rather than argument; the substance of what he teaches—the Trinity, creation, the fall, providence, and the redeeming Incarnation of the Son of God—is the common inheritance of Christians, and it is on that broad ground that the book speaks most fully.

Reception and Influence

Father John of Kronstadt became, in his own lifetime, one of the most widely revered figures in Russian Christianity, and his influence only grew after his death. His pastoral example—frequent Communion, wholehearted preaching, unstinting charity, and a spirituality centered on the Liturgy—has been studied by clergy across the Orthodox world as a model of the parish priesthood, and My Life in Christ has found readers well beyond his own communion. The Catechetical Talks stand nearer the root of that legacy than to its flowering: printed in 1859 and reprinted in Russia in the generations since, they show the pastoral and catechetical instincts that would define him, already at work in the first years of his service at Saint Andrew’s Cathedral. To read them is to meet the teacher before the fame—and to receive, in orderly and unhurried form, the whole architecture of the faith as he first set it out for his people.

The Text and This Edition

This edition presents Catechetical Talks in a fresh, modern English translation made from the Russian. The text underlying it is the public-domain Russian of the work as preserved at azbyka.ru, descending from the pre-revolutionary Kronstadt edition of Father John’s catechetical instructions first published in 1859. The translation is offered in English only; it is a readable rendering for study and devotion, not a scholarly parallel text, and it aims throughout to carry his plain, earnest, spoken voice into contemporary English without flattening it.

Two matters of care deserve mention. In the received Russian text, the long meditation on the six days of creation—the block of talks on the visible world—had come down in a doubly abridged form, with the patristic quotations thinned and cosmological detail lost. For this edition that section was translated in full: the voices of Basil the Great, John Chrysostom, Gregory the Theologian, and Cyril of Jerusalem have been restored to their places, and the contemplation of creation stands again at its intended length. Scripture within the talks is rendered to follow Father John’s own citations—which reflect the Church-Slavonic Bible he preached from—rather than being conformed to any standard printed English version, so that his quotations read as he meant them and in his own register.

The edition follows the conventions of this series. Attribution is traditional: the author is named as the Church has received him, Saint John of Kronstadt, and those who prepared this English text are credited as translators, never as authors. Chapter divisions and Scripture references are given in the ordinary modern (Arabic) style for ease of reading. The doctrinal substance of the talks—on the Trinity, providence, the Redemption, and the Incarnation—has been collated for fidelity to the Russian, with particular attention to the places where precision matters most, so that the teaching reaches the reader whole and unaltered.

Suggestions for Reading

Catechetical Talks was built to be taken in order, and it rewards that approach. Father John assumes almost nothing and explains a great deal, so a reader new to the faith can begin at the first talk and simply follow the stairway he lays out—from God in Himself, to the world God made, to the providence and redemption by which God saves it. Those already at home in Christian doctrine may find the opening talks on the Trinity a careful refresher, and will likely be most struck by the central meditations on creation and man, where the book’s warmth and eye for wonder are fullest. However one reads, it helps to remember what these pages originally were: sermons, spoken to a congregation by a young priest who loved them and wanted, above all, that they should know God and be saved. Read slowly, as they were delivered, they still do what he intended—turn the mind’s assent into the heart’s.

On God—the Most Holy Trinity

Talk 1 (Introductory)

With God’s help, we will set before you, brothers, the most essential teaching of our faith—the dogma of the Holy Trinity. Among us there are some who know this teaching well and need no instruction, yet such people are very few; far greater in number are those who understand it poorly, and even more who understand it hardly at all. The servant of the holy altar must teach the faith clearly and distinctly to all. And even for those who know well, it is no vain thing to review the familiar teachings of faith, just as it is no vain thing to see light continually with our eyes, or to breathe and exhale air—because our teaching is far more necessary than visible light and air itself. “To remember God,” says Saint Gregory the Theologian, “is more necessary than breathing itself.”

Therefore, the teaching about God is necessary for all. For this reason we speak as though all present were equal in their degree of knowledge. But before we set forth the teaching about the primordial, royal, and blessed Trinity, we shall say to you, brothers, a few words about the importance and incomprehensibility of this teaching, and about the humble simplicity of faith with which we must hear it. The teaching on the Most Holy Trinity is so important that in the Christian Faith there is no teaching more important and exalted than this; and all other human knowledge, whatever it may concern the affairs of earthly life and does not touch upon the Faith, if we gather it all together, is in comparison with the knowledge of the one God, worshipped in Trinity—as barely a perceptible point: for God is the source of all wisdom and knowledge, and the knowledge of God in the Holy Trinity is eternal life for all rational creatures. Without the confession of the Most Holy Trinity, there is no Christianity. We are called Christians, as everyone knows, from faith in Christ, the Son of God, the Only-Begotten; and everyone who confesses the Son also has the Father, according to the words of Saint John the Theologian, and has the Holy Spirit, of whom the Lord said: The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me. Therefore, whoever believes in Christ must necessarily believe in the Holy Trinity: in the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Without the confession of the Most Holy Trinity we would have neither the Church, which nurtures us for heaven, nor the Mysteries through which it sanctifies, strengthens, and guides us toward the land of immortality; without the teaching on the Holy Trinity, the terrible judgment, the resurrection of the dead, the recompense to each according to their deeds in the life to come would be for us empty words. All of this necessarily rests upon our belief in God the Father, who is pre-eternal Love and Truth; in God the Son, as the Redeemer of mankind; and in God the Holy Spirit, as the Sanctifier and Comforter of the faithful. Such is the importance of this teaching. But it is likewise the most incomprehensible. Only by condescension to our weakness did God deign to reveal the mystery of the Most Holy Trinity under the names of Father and Son and Holy Spirit; and therefore we must not take this Name (that is, Father and Son and Holy Spirit) in the sense in which we understand it of men. Thus, the Son of God is called also the Word of God and Wisdom; but we cannot speak thus of men. As for how in the one God there are three Persons, how the Father is God, and the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God—this surpasses all understanding. The Trinity of Persons in the Godhead is the greatest mystery, hidden even from the many-eyed Cherubim, who unceasingly gaze into the incomprehensible light of the Godhead and from there draw all knowledge and blessedness. “But where mystery is,” says Saint John Chrysostom, “there is great silence; where mystery is, the mind calls upon faith to itself.” So, brothers, our reason must necessarily humble itself and be silent before the mystery of the Tri-hypostatic Godhead, and, feeling its powerlessness to comprehend it, must call upon faith to its aid.

Humble simplicity of faith is necessary for each of us. Where are there no mysteries? Man himself—in his soul and in his body—is a mystery to himself. Who has adequately explained, for instance, how the human soul is united with the body, how they act mutually upon each other, how sleep restores a man’s strength, and so forth? Therefore, first of all, man must believe in his own mysteries. There are countless mysteries in the nature surrounding us: man knows so little in comparison with what he still does not know—despite the progress of the natural sciences—that each of us must humbly acknowledge with one of the ancient philosophers that we know only that we know nothing. Holy Scripture testifies that we can scarcely comprehend even what is on earth, and we understand with difficulty what is in our hands, and then it adds: But what is in heaven—who has inquired into it?

And so, if there are mysteries in ourselves and in the nature surrounding us, and we must receive them by faith, not comprehending them by reason, how much more must we believe the heavenly mysteries, and especially the highest mystery of the Tri-hypostatic Godhead? Can creatures comprehend the Creator? “I speak now,” says Saint Cyril of Jerusalem, “and everyone speaks in his time; but as we speak, we cannot tell it: how then can I utter Him who gave speech? I have a soul and cannot explain its properties; how then can I utter Him who gave the soul? For piety it is enough for us to know only that we have God” and to humbly acknowledge that no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God.

Therefore, brothers, in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, we ask from you for the time to come your attention to the teaching on the greatest mystery of the Christian Faith. Let us remember that upon the correct knowledge of the Tri-radiant Godhead depends our eternal destiny. This is eternal life, that they know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom You have sent. Amen.

Talk 2

On the past Sunday we promised to begin our talk on the highest mystery of the Christian Faith—the Trinity of Persons in the Godhead. With God’s help we now begin this talk. In the one God, according to the teaching of the Christian Faith, there are three Persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit—a Trinity consubstantial and indivisible. The very first words of the Creed already make known to everyone that, although we believe in one God, yet we do not believe in one Person of God: for we call the one God Father. “And the name of Father,” says Saint Cyril of Jerusalem, “in its very utterance makes known to us also the Son; just as, when we say the name of the Son, we immediately picture to ourselves the Father as well. For if He is the Father, then without doubt He is Father of the Son; and if He is the Son, then without doubt He is Son of the Father.” And in believing in the Father and the Son, we must necessarily believe also in the Holy Spirit, as consubstantial with the Father and the Son, and revealed through the Son to men. We worship one God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity, not confusing the Persons and not dividing the one essence of God: for the Person of the Father is one, the Person of the Son is another, and another is the Holy Spirit. God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, but not three gods, but one God. Go therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them, said the Lord to the Apostles, in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. He did not say “in the names,” so as not to give occasion to divide the one essence into three Persons, but “in the name,” to show their consubstantiality, or unity of essence in the Trinity of Persons. “One in substance I hymn You, in three Persons I honor You: Father, Son, and most holy Spirit”—thus is it said in one of the Church’s books.

Because of the special importance of the teaching on the Most Holy Trinity for each Christian, the name of the three Divine Persons—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—is used by the Church—both in the temple, during Divine worship, and even in the homes of the faithful, in the performance of various prayers—very frequently, just as the name of the king is frequently used among his subjects, just as a son very often calls his father by his name; the one who is benefited—his benefactor; a friend—the name of his friend; a servant—the name of his master. And our God, worshipped in Trinity, in the preeminent and highest sense, truly, brothers, is for us both King and Father and Benefactor. Therefore, for a Christian not to know and not to honor as he ought the Divine Trinity would be both foolish presumption and ingratitude. Every subject knows, at least by name, his King; he knows of his dominion, authority, and power; he reveres his sacred Majesty; the one who is benefited often and gladly remembers and speaks of his benefactor. Even an ox knows the one who owns it and the donkey the manger of its master. How then should we not know that the dominion, kingdom, power, and glory of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit are over all men and over all the world? How should not a man, who has received from the Holy Trinity all his gifts, beginning with life itself down to the very breath of air he inhales, often and with proper reverence remember the Triune Benefactor? “For in Him we live and move and have our being,” says the holy Apostle of God.

Therefore, brothers, each of us absolutely needs to know correctly and to honor with proper reverence the royal and life-creating Trinity. And you have long been all familiar with the great and eternally worshipped name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, because—as we have said—the holy Church very frequently both in the temple and even in your homes has taught you this glorious name. It is necessary only to give an explanation of what we hear about the Triune God in the Church, or in our homes.

We hear very frequently in the Church and in our homes brief prayers and brief praises to the Holy Trinity. Namely, we very frequently hear prayers: above all to the Holy Spirit: King of heaven, Comforter, Spirit of truth. Since the third Person of the Holy Trinity—that is, the Holy Spirit—teaches us to pray to God worthily, strengthens us in His service, and in general raises up, exalts, and establishes those who serve God worthily, and thus brings about our salvation, which was acquired for us by the Son of God; the holy Church at the beginning of every service, every prayer-service, calls upon Him, the Almighty Sanctifier; then—a prayer to all Persons of the Holy Trinity together: Holy God, Holy Mighty One, Holy Immortal One, have mercy on us. This Trisagion we hear sometimes separately, but more often together with the prayer: Most Holy Trinity, have mercy on us—several times in all the Divine Services. The holy Church especially loves to repeat it, imitating the unceasing cry to God of the heavenly powers: Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord of Hosts. When we pronounce the prayer: King of heaven, we are preparing ourselves for worthy prayer to the Lord God, asking that the All-holy Spirit dwell in us and cleanse us from all defilement; and saying the subsequent prayers to the Most Holy Trinity, we pray in deed, honoring with divine worship the Holy Comforting Spirit, whom we asked to dwell in us and cleanse us from defilement for worthy prayer to the Triune God. After this is read the prayer to the first Person of the Holy Trinity—according to the commandment of the Savior, who commanded us: Thus you shall pray: Our Father in heaven… and so forth; at the end of the prayer the Priest pronounces a doxology to the Holy Trinity, to show that both the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit are one essence, and kingdom, power, and glory belong equally to the three Persons. We often also hear an invitation to worship our King and God Jesus Christ: Come, let us worship our King God, or, as it further says: Come, let us worship and bow down to Christ our King and God. Besides this, the priest and reader often send up from the person of the holy Church a single glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit with a common name for all three Persons: one name signifies that the three Persons have one essence.

Thus the holy Church at every service invites us to prayer and worship of the three Persons of the Holy Trinity—now together, as equal in honor, now separately, to seek necessary gifts from one or another Person.

Therefore, when we hear the repetition of the same prayers to the Most Holy Trinity, pronounced by the priest or reader, or the Creed, let us not pass them by without attention, much less grow weary when they are read or sung. The holy Church, which has ever before its eyes the Tri-holy Master of our life, Judge and God, repeats them very frequently so as to root in our minds and hearts the name of the Life-creating Trinity, so that we are constantly breathing and living in prayer, praise, and thanksgiving to It. Let us then follow the holy Church in pronouncing these prayers, praises, or thanksgivings to the all-sustaining Trinity.

In offering proper worship to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, the three Persons in one essence, let us strive, to the glory of the Triune God, to be united with one another in unity of mind, desires, and good deeds—which the Savior himself desired and asked in his last prayer to his Father: I do not pray for these alone, but for those also who believe in Me through their word; that they all may be one; as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You, that they also may be one in Us. To this unity our faith calls us, which is founded on love for the Lord, and the unity of our nature, the unity of our earthly needs and spiritual requirements. Indeed, one might say that all the nature surrounding us, the whole beautiful world of God, calls men to the closest, mutual union. You see how it is orderly in its course and life, and with all the diversity of its parts, comprises one harmonious whole. So should men be harmonious in their lives and, with the diversity of their gifts and abilities, form one whole, resplendent with faith and love. There will come a time, or rather eternity, when all the countless multitude of the righteous, who have departed from this life and those yet to depart from it into eternity, will be united in the age to come in the most perfect unity of thought, feeling, and striving for God’s glory and their own blessedness. Even here on earth the holy Church strives to prepare us for this union through unity of faith, hope, and love. May we all be worthy to attain the blessed unity to the glory of the Triune God.

Amen.

Talk 3

Now we shall speak, brothers, about the personal properties of the Persons of the Godhead: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Since in God there is one essence or nature, but three Persons: in order not to confuse the three Persons into one, we absolutely must know the distinction of one Person from another. This distinction must be precisely personal only, but never essential: because by His essence all three Persons possess exactly the same properties.

In what then does the personal distinction of the Father from the Son and the Holy Spirit consist, as well as the Son from the Father and the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son?

God the Father is distinguished from the Son and the Holy Spirit in that He has being and life from Himself, or, as Holy Scripture says, He has life in Himself; that is, He was not created by anyone, nor born, nor does He proceed from anyone; but He Himself gives birth to—or rather, has begotten before all ages the Son, and brings forth the Holy Spirit. Therefore, God the Father in the order of the Divine Persons ordinarily occupies the first place and is called the first Person of the Holy Trinity.

When we imagine, brothers, that God the Father begets the Son, we must not imagine this begetting as resembling our human birth. We are born of our mothers in pain, and at birth we are usually separated from our mother. Divine begetting is quite different. God is Spirit: in Him there are not and cannot be any of the parts that man has: He has neither head nor hands nor feet—nothing, in short, of what man has. Therefore in Divine begetting there can be neither suffering nor any separation whatsoever. As Spirit, God begets spiritually, incomprehensibly to us, in the way that He alone, the Son, and the Holy Spirit know; God begets or has begotten the Son before all time, eternally: there was no time when the Father was not Father of the Son, just as there was no time when He was not God. “When you hear of God begetting,” says Saint Cyril of Jerusalem, “do not fall into fleshly thoughts; do not understand an earthly begetting, that you may not become impious.” God is Spirit, and His begetting is spiritual. From bodies, bodies are born, and for bodily birth a certain duration of time is required. On the contrary, the begetting of the Son from the Father is without the medium of time.

Moreover, what is born among men is born imperfect; but the Son of God was born perfect. For what He now is, He has been from the beginning, being born without beginning. We, upon being born, pass from a state of infantile senselessness into a state of reason. Your birth, O man, is not complete. Your growth occurs gradually. But do not think thus about that begetting (Divine), and do not accuse Him who begat of weakness. The Son of God was born in all respects like to Him who begat Him; was born—as Life from Life, Light from Light, Truth from Truth, Wisdom from Wisdom, King from King, God from God.

Moreover, God the Father begat Him without dividing: He begat Wisdom, but Himself remained not without Wisdom; He begat Power, but did not weaken; He begat God, but did not deprive Himself of Godhead, and lost nothing, was not diminished, was not changed; and He who was Begotten likewise has no deficiency: He who begat is perfect, perfectly is He who was begotten; He who begat is God, and God too is He who was begotten. To say that God the Father after deliberation, in time, became Father, is the greatest impiety. For God was never without the Son, nor did He become Father after—in time—but He always has the Son, having begotten Him in the way known only to Himself, before all ages, having begotten incomparably more swiftly than among us are born words and thoughts. For when we utter words in time, we spend time on this; but the begetting accomplished by the power of God has no time. God did not bring His Son from non-being into being (as, for example, the Angels), nor did He accept in adoption someone who was not already his son: but as the eternal Father, He eternally and ineffably begot His only Son, who has no brother. Not two principles, but one Principle—the Father—is the Head of the Son.

Such is the begetting of the Son from the Father and such is Their distinction. The Father begat the Son and gave Him Himself to have life in Himself; the Son was born, received life from the Father before all ages, not separated from His essence.

When we hear that God the Father, having begotten before all ages the Son, also brings forth the Holy Spirit, then this bringing forth, or rather—procession, we must understand not sensually, that is, not in a human way, but spiritually, as God alone knows, and equally we must acknowledge it as distinct from begetting, although we do not know in what the begetting differs from the procession. The Holy Spirit also proceeds eternally from the Father, just as the Son was eternally begotten of the Father; He proceeds, but never separates Himself from the Father. And when the Comforter comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, said the Savior, comforting His disciples in the coming separation from Him, even the Spirit of truth who comes forth from the Father, He will testify of Me. Thus Holy Scripture teaches clearly about the procession of the Holy Spirit, God from God the Father—and from Him alone, and not from the Son as well, as some teach. In our Creed we read about the Holy Spirit: (I believe) in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the Life-giver, who proceeds from the Father. And here too there is no word: and from the Son. And this Creed is older than all the innovations introduced by non-Orthodox into the teaching of the faith, and in its most important passages is drawn almost word for word from Holy Scripture; indeed, the whole of it is founded upon Holy Scripture.

Therefore, brothers, let us believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the Life-giver, who proceeds from the Father. Whoever adds: “and from the Son” will be a heretic, not Orthodox. So we must believe on this basis, that in Holy Scripture there is nowhere a single word about the eternal procession of the Holy Spirit from the Son as well, although there are several places in which it speaks of His temporal sending into the world through the Son of God. And hearing that the Holy Spirit is called Life-giver, we must understand that God the Holy Spirit, together with God the Father and the Son, gives life to every creature—rational and irrational, animate and inanimate: the creatures of heaven and earth have received life from Him; but especially the Angels and men, by their spiritual life and growth in it, are obliged to the Life-giving Spirit of God. By the Holy Spirit every soul is vivified and by purity is raised up.

Such is the distinction of the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son. The Holy Spirit proceeds, but is not begotten of the Father—He proceeds before all ages, as the Son was begotten before all ages. There was never a time when the Father did not have the Spirit proceeding from Him. Although the procession of the Holy Spirit is distinct from the begetting of the Son, what this distinction is—we do not know: because Holy Scripture has not revealed it. Saint John of Damascus says: The Father is the source and cause of the Son and the Holy Spirit, but of the Son alone is the Father the begetter, and of the Spirit He is the producer.

In conclusion of our talk it is well to remind that God the Father, who from eternity has begotten the Son and also from eternity brings forth the Holy Spirit, deigns to be called our Father as well. His Only-Begotten Son says to us: Call no one on earth your father; for One is your Father, He who is in heaven; and He has given us the very prayer in which He commanded all of us to call God Father, who is in heaven, our Father. Let us not disgrace ourselves by deeds contrary to Him. Let us be obedient in all things to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ and to our Father by grace; let us pray that His kingdom also be on earth, a kingdom of peace and love, that His will also be done on earth as it is in heaven. Let us strive to live in love, as children of one heavenly Father, and thus let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven. Let children more often remember the Son of God, who knows no other will except the will of the Father; let them learn to obey their parents in all things—if the will of the parents is lawful—and always to honor them as mediators in the Divine gift of life. All of us: both fathers and children, men and women, elders and young people, let us worship the Tri-hypostatic Godhead: the Son in the Father with the Holy Spirit, the Spirit proceeding from the Father and resting in the Son. Amen.

Talk 4

Before we spoke, brothers, of the fact that in the one God there are three Persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit—that the Father is God, and the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God, but not three gods, but one God, only in three Persons. Then we showed the personal distinction between Them—namely, that the first Person of the Holy Trinity, or God the Father, is not created by anyone, nor begotten, nor does He proceed from anyone, but has life from Himself and in Himself; the Son was begotten of the Father before all time, or before all ages, spiritually, without any separation from the Parent—incomparably more swiftly than among us are born thoughts and words—was begotten incomprehensibly to any of the rational creatures; the Holy Spirit likewise before all time, eternally and in a spiritual manner proceeds from the Father, not separating Himself from Him.

Now we must say that the three Persons of the Most Holy Trinity are completely equal with one another in dignity, so that among Them there is nothing first or last, greater or lesser, servile or accidental, which did not exist before or came afterwards. God the Son and God the Holy Spirit are God in the full and proper sense—God just as truly as God the Father—with all Divine perfections: to each one, to the second, and to the third Person belong equally all Divine attributes: absolute perfection, self-existence, omnipresence, eternity, immutability, omnipotence, omniscience, perfect holiness, infinite goodness and justice—though in such a way that there are not three perfect ones, three self-existent beings, three omnipresent beings, three eternal beings, three immutable beings, etc., but one perfect God, distinguished only in Persons, but in essence and in essential properties eternally One. Although the Son and the Holy Spirit have their being from the Father—the one through begetting, the other through procession—this is not an obstacle to their equality with each other and with the Father: because Their essence or nature is one—so that, as we said, in the Trinity there is nothing first or last, greater or lesser, but the three Persons are consubstantial with themselves and equal. For this reason Their names are often used in different order: sometimes the name of the Father comes first, sometimes the Son, and sometimes the Holy Spirit. Here is one example in which the name of the second Person of the Most Holy Trinity is placed before the first Person. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God the Father, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all, writes the holy Apostle to the newly converted Christians. The Son of God Himself speaks of His equality and consubstantiality with the Father thus: My Father has been working until now, and I have been working. Whatever the Father does, the Son does likewise. As the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so the Son gives life to whom He will. I am in the Father and the Father is in Me. I and the Father are one. In the Acts of the Apostles it is said that the Holy Spirit is the same God as God the Father and God the Son. Why have you conceived this thing in your heart? You have not lied to men but to God, says the holy Apostle Peter to Ananias, who had withheld part of the price of the sold field.

Saint Cyril of Jerusalem says in one of his teachings: “The Father does not have one glory, nor the Son another: but they have one and the same, just as the Holy Spirit as well;” in another: “The Son always possesses royal dignity, sits together with the Father, is God and Wisdom and Power;” and in yet another: “The Holy Spirit is honored with equal glory of Godhead with the Father and the Son: in Him have need thrones and dominions, principalities and powers—”that is to say, we add, all the orders of Angels. “For there is one God, the Father of Christ, and one Lord Jesus Christ, the Only-Begotten Son of the one God; and one is the Holy Spirit, who sanctifies all and deifies, who spoke in the Law and the Prophets, in the Old Testament and in the New.”

Therefore, brothers, the three Persons of the one God are completely equal with one another—and you have heard testimony of Their equality from Divine Scripture and from the teaching of the holy Fathers of the Church. But you can forget these testimonies, as is often forgotten whatever is not more and more confirmed in our memory through repetition. Therefore we point you to the testimonies or teaching on this subject which you can hear and repeat very frequently yourselves. In the Church of God during every Divine Service, each one can hear the Creed of the Orthodox Faith in which we confess the Only-Begotten Son of God as “the true God from true God, of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made,”—and the Holy Spirit as “the Lord, the Life-giver, worshipped and glorified together with the Father and the Son—”and by these words we acknowledge their complete equality with one another. Moreover, all those standing in the temple hear how the priest in his exclamations or the reader in brief doxologies and endings of prayers from the person of the whole Church frequently send up a single glory and honor to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Especially in the exclamations of the Priest is clearly shown both the consubstantiality and the equality of the Divine Persons. As the one God in three Persons, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, are always mentioned together, with the elevation of their common dominion, kingdom, power, and glory, for example: “For Yours is the dominion and Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit;” or: “For You are our God, and to You we send up glory: to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit;” or again: “For You are the King of the world and the Savior of our souls: and to You we send up glory: to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit,” and so forth.

Let us therefore, brothers, always honor with equal and indivisible worship the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, the Godhead one-sovereign and co-throned. If we pray to our heavenly Father, let us bring to mind at the same time His Only-Begotten and Consubstantial Son and the Holy Spirit, equal in honor to the Father, proceeding from the Father, and let us bow down to the three Persons in one essence. If we bring a prayer to the Son of God, then, asking Him for necessary blessings or having brought Him thanksgiving for His benefits toward us, let us send up together with Him glory to His unoriginate Father with His most holy, good, and life-giving Spirit. And when we ask for blessings from the Spirit of God, then again let us glorify His name with the Father and His Only-Begotten Son. All three Persons of the Most Holy Trinity, as self-sufficient, grant us—in addition to the gifts common to all of Them—also special blessings, but as Persons of one substance, They participate also in the granting of blessings sent from one or another Person separately, because They have one will and one intention.

Each time, in every prayer, let us glorify the Father, exalt the Son, and faithfully worship the Divine Spirit—the indivisible Trinity, the Unity in essence, as Light and by Light, and Life and by Life.

Tri-hypostatic Unity, O Father, Son, and Spirit Living, one Godhead, one kingdom—You are praised by the Light-bringing hosts of Angels, and we, who are on earth, sing, bless, and exalt You forever. With this talk we conclude the teaching on the Most Holy Trinity, or on God as He is in Himself. In the talks to follow we shall speak of God as the Creator of the world. Amen.

First Homily. On Theology

1Jn 2:23

Lk 4:18.

Explanation of Sundays and Feast Days of the Gospel. St. P. B. 1806, p. 6.

Chrysostom. Discourse 54.

Socrates.

Solom 9:16.

Summary of Teachings, 6, p. 102, ed. 1824.

1Cor 2:11

Jn 17:3 .

Summary of Teachings VII, p. 132

Creed of Saint Gregory the Wonderworker

From the Creed of Saint Athanasius

Mt 28

Trinity Fasting Triodion, p. 29

Mal 1:6,14.

Is 1:3.

Act 17:28.

Rom 8:26.

See prayer in the Liturgy of Saint Basil the Great before the consecration of the holy Gifts.

Liturgy of the Hours, ch. 6, doxology

Mt 6:9.

Jn 17:20,21.

Jn 5:26.

Summary of Teachings XI, p. 190.

Ibid., p. 188.

Ibid., p. 200.

P. 191.

Pp. 196–197.

Jn 15:26.

Theology of Saint John of Damascus, Russian translation, pp. 41–42.

Mt 23:9.

Jn 5:20.

Verses for Great Vespers on Friday, ch. 2, p. 9

From the Creed of Saint Athanasius

Creed of Saint Gregory the Wonderworker

2Cor 13:13 .

Jn 5:17,19,21.

Jn 14:11,10:30.

Act 5:3,4.

Summary of Teachings 6, p. 91.

Teaching 4, p. 62.

Summary of Teachings 16, p. 348.

See the order of Matins.

Fasting Triodion, p. 13, verso. Trinity.

P. 216, ibid.

On God—the Creator of the World

Talk 5

By the words of the Creed—I believe in one God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible—we confess and declare that God created the visible and invisible world, that He holds all things created in His power and governs all things; or more briefly: we confess God as Creator and Providence of the world. Therefore, let us first speak of God as the Creator of the world, and then of God as the Providence of the world.

When it is said, brothers, that God created the world; this means: a) that it was created by God, worshipped in the Holy Trinity—that is, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Thus in the Creed itself, God the Father is called Creator; of the Son of God it is said that through Him all things came to be—by whom all things were made—and the Holy Spirit is called Life-giver; b) He created it by a single word or command: He spoke, and they came to be; He commanded, and they were created; c) He created it, or in other words: brought it from absolute non-being into being; d) He created it by His goodness alone, but certainly not by necessity of any kind: because the self-sufficient and all-blessed God is in need of no one and nothing; e) that from the time of creation began time, or the sequence of one thing after another, and before the creation of the world there was no time; before that there was only eternity, ever constant, having neither beginning nor end—or rather, there was only the eternal God in the Holy Trinity.

God first of all created the spiritual world—the rational and divine powers of heaven, or the Orders of Angels; then the visible world that we see, and finally man, who in his soul belongs to the spiritual world and in his body to the material world; for which reason he is called a microcosm. Therefore, first of all, brothers, we shall speak of the creation of the Angels, and namely, we shall say that they truly exist and were created before the visible world: about their nature, number, and degrees.

Do Angels exist? There are people who have the misfortune of denying the invisible world, the whole world of spirits, contrary to the clear testimonies of Holy Scripture and the testimonies of holy men, who themselves on earth became like to the heavenly powers in the holiness of their lives and love of God, and lived in fellowship with them. To whom should we believe more? As in all else, so especially in this matter, surely to Holy Scripture and to the Saints of God. That Angels exist is beyond all doubt.

Let us understand why some people say there are no Angels. It is because they do not see proof of their existence; and they simply refuse to believe: they want to see everything, touch it—in short, to test it; and since they cannot see or touch Angels, they deny them. These are people who are guided even in faith by their lower nature—by their senses. But in this very case, the very blindness of such people somehow proves that Angels truly exist. Thus, a blind man does not see the sun, moon, and stars that adorn the sky and illuminate the earth; but this non-seeing only proves that he is blind. The heavenly bodies shine regardless of whether he sees them or not. Likewise, the existence of Angels does not depend, of course, on whether we see them with the eye of faith, or—because we are unwilling to rise above the dust from which we are made and see nothing beyond the earth—for this very reason do not notice the signs of the existence not only of bright spirits, but perhaps of much else as well. There are some people whose spiritual eyes are so darkened that they do not even believe in the spiritual Sun, which illuminates and gives life to all. But this, brothers, is a grievous sickness of the soul, spiritual blindness. Let us ask about Angels from holy and pious people: and they will prove to us as clearly as day the existence of the spiritual world.

However, those who wish to be assured from the visible that the invisible world of spirits exists, will not lack assurance from this side either: it is only necessary to be attentive. From man down to the blade of grass—everything testifies to the invisible. That which thinks and feels in us is invisible. And in general, everything that we call the life of visible creatures, animals and plants, is precisely what is invisible: for the visible withers, dries up, decays, and is destroyed, when the invisible leaves it. If the invisible, the spiritual, constitutes the life of all things even here on earth: shall we think there is no special, vast invisible world, purely spiritual?

Holy Scripture decisively assures us, brothers, of the existence of a special world of spirits. Whoever has read or heard the books of the Old and New Testament can have a true and clear understanding of Angels as servants of the King of heaven. We will point to several examples. For instance: Angels are guests together with the Lord at Abraham’s home; Angels save Lot from the perishing Sodom; the Patriarch Jacob encounters bands of Angels on his way and in a dream sees them ascending and descending to the earth; the Archangel of the strength of the Lord appears to Joshua and commands the miraculous conquest of Jericho; Isaiah sees the Seraphim surrounding the throne of the Lord, and from one of them receives fiery purification; the Prophet Daniel sees thousands upon thousands serving the Ancient of Days and myriads of myriads standing before Him. An Angel announces the birthless conception of the Savior; a whole army of Angels sing the birth of the Savior; and so on. Thus, the existence of Angels is undoubted.

When were the Angels created? They were created before the visible world: there is an indication of this in the Book of Job. In it, it is said that when the stars were created, already the Angels of God praised Him, thus they existed before the creation of the world. When the stars were created, says the Lord, My Angels praised Me with a loud voice. The Creator of the Angels is the Son of God, through whom all things were created. This is testified to by the holy Apostle Paul. “Through Him,” says he—through the Son of God—“all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers”—that is, all Orders of Angels—“all things were created through Him and for Him.”

As for the nature of Angels: they are, as we have already said in part above—spirits, purely incorporeal, greater than us in strength and power. Thus, for example, one Angel in a single night once destroyed one hundred eighty-five thousand soldiers of the Assyrian army; and similarly—in understanding and will they are more perfect than us: because they constantly walk in the light of God’s face. If Angels are depicted in icons as winged men, it is, brothers, because they appeared as men on earth to people, so that people would not fear them, seeing their own nature and form in them; but in reality they have no flesh, and therefore no bodily members: neither head nor tongue nor wings nor hands nor feet, nothing bodily; therefore they are called in Holy Scripture everywhere spirits—just as the Lord God is called Spirit, although He is the Spirit, more perfect than any created spirit. If in Holy Scripture mention is made of the tongue of Angels, of their praises to the Lord: this is spoken in human fashion, so that we may understand in some measure the praises of the Angels. In reality they do not praise God with voice or tongue as we do, but spiritually, in an intellectual manner. The holy Church speaks of their praises thus: “With bodiless lips and rational mouths, the angelic orders offer ceaseless songs to Your unapproachable Godhead, O Lord.” For now this is enough about the Angels.

Let us glorify and thank the Lord, who created the entire world, including us, solely out of His goodness, and let us learn never to become forgetful in life, remembering that we have been called to life from absolute nothingness, and we have nothing either in ourselves or around us that is our own, but everything is God’s. Sometimes people dare to reject some truth revealed in Holy Scripture, some rule of Christian faith and life. Ah! If only they would remember that they themselves were only recently called from nothingness and are not far from that nothingness. For example, they say: “I exist, I live; but Angels do not exist.” But let us count the years of our life and ask ourselves: what were we before others began to count days, months, and years, and then we ourselves—the years of our life? We were nothing, or rather: we did not exist. What will we be after our body is separated from our soul? The body will return to dust—that is, to the senses, again will be nothing—and the soul will be in the invisible place of departed spirits. What does our earthly life mean? A few years ago we did not exist, and a few years from now we will not exist again. This is a fleeting shadow of life. There, in heaven, will be our life. No, it is easier to agree that we do not exist on earth, or walk upon it like a phantom (Ps 38:7), than to agree that Angels do not exist. We in our very life, from our sins, decay both spiritually and physically: and can decay be called life? Meanwhile the Angels, as pure spirits, by their nature are incorruptible and immortal. Of them, after the Lord God, it ought to be said that they live. Yes, they live without doubt and unceasingly glorify their Creator, whom we are not able to glorify as we ought. Both they and we have the same purpose—to glorify the Creator.

Let us learn from them to offer constant glory and thanksgiving to the Creator of the world for His infinite goodness toward His creatures, for bringing them to life and blessedness. Amen.

Talk 6

In our previous talk, speaking of the Angels of God, we did not say all that we intended to say about them; and specifically—we did not say how many they are and what order exists among them: for the rational Powers must necessarily have an order. Now about this we shall speak, brothers. So how many Angels of God are there, or all the Powers of heaven? The question is not unimportant for us: for every believer after baptism enters into fellowship with the Angels; and love and reverence toward them impels us to know—at least approximately—their number.

From our earlier talk, brothers, we know that Holy Scripture speaks of countless heavenly hosts, numbering them by thousands of thousands and myriads of myriads. For example, one Prophet saw in his vision that when the Ancient of Days, that is the Lord of Hosts, sat upon His throne, thousands of thousands served Him and myriads of myriads stood before Him. Saint Cyril of Jerusalem, speaking of the number of angels and citing this passage from the book of the Prophet Daniel, remarks that “of thousands of thousands and myriads of myriads of angels—and not more—it is said not because such is their exact number, but because the Prophet could not express a greater number”62, that is, our human numbers are insufficient to encompass all the heavenly powers. Therefore, brothers, the angels are countless.

And this should be so by the very nature of reason itself. On earth, which constitutes the very insignificant part of all visible creation, we count both creatures of the same kind, especially those of different kinds, so many that we are almost lost in their number, not to mention how many we still do not know. Should not the immeasurably greater number be the incorporeal Powers, for whom, according to Holy Scripture, the entire heaven serves as a dwelling place, although Angels are not limited to place as we are? “The earth inhabited by us,” says Saint Cyril of Jerusalem, “is as if a certain point situated in the middle of heaven; therefore the heaven surrounding it has as many inhabitants as has greater space.” Further: looking at the autumn or winter sky on a cloudless evening, we see an extraordinary multitude of stars—so many that men who have studied the sky over the course of thousands of years to this day have not been able to count them for their multitude and distance. If in the visible, material world, the Almighty Creator has displayed His creative power, His magnitude so boundlessly, in such an incomprehensible multitude of heavenly lights: has He not shown Himself even more boundlessly in the world of bright spirits, has He not created an even greater number of creatures like Himself—so that they might glorify His perfections, enjoy His countenance, and be blessed? The greatness of God is more striking, more evident in the spiritual world: is it not there, in the world of spirits, in their countless multitudes, that the Lord Almighty, as the source of goodness, shines forth with eternal love? It was befitting to the boundless, all-good Creator to show Himself precisely in an innumerable multitude of rational creatures. And the best of men desire—when there is the opportunity—that there be as many as possible who are benefited by them. Would not the all-good God desire this, and therefore not have done it—since His desire is at the same time His deed? But many things with the Lord are not as they are with us. To Him our numbers mean nothing. To us thousands and millions seem already very great numbers: but with our Creator there are no thousands and millions: with Him one is as a thousand and a thousand as one, a million as a unit and a unit as a million—that is, both many and few for Him are equally insignificant. His “many” means our “without number.” Our Lord Jesus Christ, the Creator of Angels, counts all the Angels as ninety-nine sheep of His own, but the entire human race as one, only one sheep. How many Angels there must be! Thus the holy Fathers understand the Savior’s parable of a man who has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. You see, brothers, what accounting the Lord has in His divine reckoning; for our human, limited counting is not fitting to Him, when it concerns the number of His creatures. Yes, the Lord has creatures infinitely many, not according to our numbers. Infinitely many of them on earth, and in heaven—all the more. Thus there is an innumerable multitude of Angels.

But with multitude there must be order. In the Wise Creator we see order everywhere: in heaven—among the heavenly lights, which in their turn rise and set, moving in constant order and never colliding with each other, though they have moved in the sky for entire thousands of years; and on earth, both in inanimate nature and in living nature; order and obedience are especially noticeable among certain animals, not to mention men, among whom order and subordination to each other have been present since the beginning of the human race. How much more must there be order and subordination among the heavenly Powers! If men have hierarchies: how much greater—with the inhabitants of heaven—and earthly, human hierarchy is only the weakest imitation of heavenly, angelic hierarchy. So, brothers, the Angels have their own hierarchy: there are on high rational Thrones on which God rests rationally and through which He establishes His righteous judgments; there are Dominions, Principalities and Powers, just as with us—on earth, in well-ordered states, there are Kings on whom God pours out His grace and through whom He governs peoples, so there are Dominions, Principalities and Powers. The holy Apostle Paul speaks of the Orders of Angels thus: “Through Him all things were created that are in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible.” What precisely was created on high, invisible? “Whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers: all things were created through Him and for Him.” And so the Angels are divided according to Orders. How many Orders of Angels are there?

The holy Church teaches that Angels are divided into nine choirs or orders, and these nine into three ranks. In the first rank are those who are closest of all to God, namely: Thrones, Cherubim, and Seraphim; in the second: Dominions, Powers, and Authorities; in the third: Angels, Archangels, Principalities. All these Orders are met in Holy Scripture and there are no more than these. Saint Dionysius the Areopagite, a student of the holy Apostle Paul, says that the Orders of Angels were thus divided by the holy Apostle Paul himself. “All the heavenly Powers,” he says, “Holy Scripture has called by nine distinct names, and our Divine Instructor” (meaning the Apostle Paul) “divided them into three threefold degrees.” However, the teaching on the heavenly hierarchy is generally mysterious and incomprehensible to our reason while we are on earth and see the objects of the spiritual world only as in a mirror, in a riddle. For us it is enough to know only that Angels are an innumerable multitude—far greater than the entire human race—and that they are divided by degrees—into lower and higher, those closer to God and those less close. In honor and glory of the All-holy Spirit, the Lord Life-giver, whose coming upon the holy Apostles we celebrate today, we will add that the source of life and perfection for all the Orders of Angels is He, the All-holy Spirit, together with the Father and the Son, just as the holy Spirit also gives life to every human soul and raises it up to purity, illuminates it in the sacred mystery of the Trinity in unity.

What principle for our own lives shall we derive from the teaching on the number of Angels and their division by degrees? There is an innumerable multitude of Angels and all of them are bright, rational, good spirits, strong in power, yet even among them there are higher and lower according to their gifts and perfections; and they for their mutual benefit submit to each other in the most perfect way—the lower to the higher, these to the yet higher, these to the still higher, and so on: each of the holy Angels knows his place and his order. So it should be, brothers, among us also. People are likewise not equal in their gifts and abilities. For all to be happy, there must necessarily be mutual submission: in society there must be higher and lower, even—rich and poor, strong and weak: for with equality of all people, no one would serve another: each, in his present corrupt state, would be seized by pride, and people could even come to destroying each other.

We can further derive from this both knowledge and a principle for piety. We often hear in the temple that the Church magnifies the Mother of God as “more honorable than the Cherubim and beyond compare more glorious than the Seraphim.” Let us imagine, brothers, the greatness of the Mother of God. The world of spirits, we said earlier, is innumerable in the proper sense of the word, and they constitute a truly well-ordered, luminous world, gradually approaching God. The very closest to God Orders of Angels are the Cherubim and Seraphim—spirits most pure, lightning-like, burning with eternal love for God, shining with the light of God’s Wisdom and pouring out wisdom to others. In them God especially rests His grace, as the Psalmist says: He ascended upon the Cherubim and flew; or: He who sits on the Cherubim appeared. But the Mother of God is more honorable than even the Cherubim: more glorious even than the Seraphim, with no comparison whatever; for She not only held on Her most pure hands Him who sustains the entire world by His word, but also in Her womb, and is the true Mother of God the Word. Let us understand, brothers, as much as we can, the greatness of the Mother of God, and let us honor Her as is due, as the Mistress of Angels and men. Let us not forget to honor the Angels with proper worship as the friends of God, as the most perfect, rational creatures of God, in whom God especially rests His grace. Amen.

Talk 7

Until now, brothers, we have seen in heaven only light and grace. The Lord God, worshipped in Trinity, is the Light that illuminates and gives life to all. The Angels of God—the second lights after God, full of grace and living by grace. Now we shall see that some of these lights became darkness, and in the kingdom of the all-good, yet righteous God, sin appeared—or opposition to the will of God—for the first time. You surmise, brothers, that we wish to speak about evil spirits.

Yes, a part of heaven, or a part of the inhabitants of heaven became darkened at one time—and darkened once and for all, throughout infinite ages—through pride and rebellion against God. In heaven among the Angels of God there was one great, radiant spirit—called the Morning Star from his radiance—one of those closest to God. The bright spirit should have lived and been blessed—adorned by God’s goodness, with such divine generosity, with all perfections—in the light of God’s Face. But no: he wanted to be a self-sufficient light, wanted to be God himself; he said: I will ascend to heaven, above the stars of heaven I will set my throne; I will be like the Most High. And the proud, stubborn spirit who darkened himself through unrepentant rebellion against his Creator, the Lord cast down from the bright heaven: for what fellowship has light with darkness? Since the Morning Star was the chief of certain subordinate spirits, he drew them after him, stirring them up also against the Ruler of all creation. Heaven had fewer inhabitants, though certainly not few: for all Angels are an innumerable multitude.

“But is there really such a thing as evil, fallen spirits?”—some ask and will ask. That evil spirits exist is beyond all doubt. During the earthly life of Jesus Christ they confessed Him through the mouths of demon-possessed men as the Son of God; they testified, as if involuntarily, that they are condemned by Him to eternal torment; with the malice inherent in them—truly hellish—they tormented demon-possessed people and departed from them with the same malice at the Savior’s command, before a multitude of people. Once, having come out at the Savior’s word from two demon-possessed men in order to enter swine pasturing nearby, they most clearly proved their shameful existence by the fact that the herd of swine, into which they entered, driven and tormented by their power, rushed all into the sea and drowned. Holy Scripture directly calls them evil spirits, unclean spirits, spirits of hatred, demons or devils, and among them distinguishes one chief, or leader, whom it calls the devil, Satan, the prince of the world, the prince of the power of the air, the prince of demons.

But besides Holy Scripture, experience also assures us of the existence of evil spirits.

Those who have observed themselves, watching over the state of their spiritual life, have noticed that their soul, which was previously peaceful and calm like a majestic river flowing evenly within its banks, was suddenly disturbed by some hostile, evil force—and began to stir confusedly under the pressure of unclean thoughts and passionate desires; they perceived that within them, at times, someone thrusts with force at the very foundations, at the saving convictions of reason and the most holy feelings; shaking faith at its very roots, darkening and troubling the mind and reasoning, so that in this darkness and confusion evil spirits might more easily steal away the treasure of faith; they thrust upon us various vile, deceitful, and blasphemous thoughts at times when a person is disposed toward holy and elevated thoughts; and they do this with such force that a person must sometimes defend, in sweat and tears, the very holy and life-giving truths of faith, their reverence for those exalted and glorified in heaven and on earth, and for sacred things worthy of all respect. In general, this malicious force tries to present to a person everything good and holy in a dark and unclean light, concealing in darkness all that is bright and beautiful. Read the various prayers composed by the Church for different occasions, the verses of canons, or the lives of the saints: and you will see there that the holy saints of God in their earthly lives were in constant struggle with some spiritual, hostile force, which attacked them both early and late and tormented them with painful conflict. How can we explain this phenomenon in our soul? What is this force, which creeps so freely through the body into the soul, at times leaving us in peace, at times rushing upon us again, which comes from we know not where and goes we know not where? It is not merely the corruption of our nature; it is not only that other law in our members warring against the law of our mind, of which the holy Apostle speaks. No: here we clearly perceive the action of an alien evil force, which opposes the good force growing stronger in us. This is precisely the action of spiritual wickedness in high places. The holy Apostle was so decisively convinced of the reality of this inner struggle with evil spirits that, as an experienced spiritual director, he urged newly converted Christians to put on the full spiritual armor, in order to be able to withstand the schemes of the devil. “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood”—he says, that is, not against our nature corrupted by sin alone, “but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the world-forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places”. By the existence of evil spirits much is explained in the destiny and life of mankind: the fall of man, his corruption, godlessness, idolatry, and other abominable vices. The very mystery of our redemption by the Son of God is founded upon the existence of evil spirits, because He came to destroy the works of the devil.

Concerning the nature of evil spirits: first of all, as spirits, they are incorporeal and therefore freely penetrate into the soul of each person, according to God’s permission, suggesting to him evil thoughts and desires and scheming against him in every way. As evil spirits, they are wicked to an extreme degree; it is difficult for us even to imagine how wicked they are. Only partly, through their deeds in people and animals, can we judge their wickedness. Thus, one demoniac, whom Jesus Christ healed, was often driven by a demon to fire so that he might be burned, and to water so that he might drown in it. With another demoniac, the demon had bound the tongue so that with his tongue bound he could speak nothing. When the Lord cast out the demon: immediately the mute man began to speak. Again, two other demoniacs lived in tombs, in which, probably, the demons wished to bury them alive, and they were so fierce and terrible that no one dared to travel that road where they were. From these two demoniacs the Lord commanded the demons to come out and enter, as they requested, into a herd of swine. When they entered the swine, they immediately rushed them down into the sea and drowned them. The Lord permitted them to enter the herd of swine, among other things, to show people the wickedness of demons. Moreover, the wickedness of demons can be seen in people full of impiety and depravity, who utter blasphemies against holy faith and piety and the ordinances of the Church, who mock sacred persons and things: for demons cannot endure anything sacred. Demons especially long for the destruction of the human soul, and “the devil, as a roaring lion, walks about seeking whom he may devour”.

Despite their extreme wickedness, evil spirits are very cunning in evil—because they received from God at the beginning a mind superior to man’s, and because they live very long, never dying, and continually devise ever more means to carry out their malice, which is their very life. Moreover, they are very powerful, which is proven by examples of demoniacs whom at times nothing could restrain; and even when they were restrained during moments of quiet, they would tear even iron chains. But their power is seen most clearly over wicked people and those possessed by passions, who neglect their salvation, whom the Lord, on account of their neglect, delivers into the power of the devil: the infernal force with such might draws them toward destruction that a person becomes a complete slave of demons, doing all that the demons suggest. Such is the example of Judas. The fall of evil spirits is so great and hardened, their wicked deeds in the kingdom of God so destructive, that they themselves can never repent, and therefore await certain and eternal torment in hell together with unrepentant sinners. Holy Scripture repeatedly tells us that the Lord God keeps them for judgment on the great day of His second and glorious coming, after which they will be tormented forever and ever. The fallen spirits are so numerous that they constitute a whole kingdom, according to the words of the Savior: “if Satan himself is divided against himself, how will his kingdom stand”? Most of the holy Church Fathers held the opinion that with Satan there fell from heaven an innumerable multitude of spirits subject to him, without specifying exactly how many.

Brothers! Evil spirits were good at the beginning, and only afterward became evil through opposing the will of God; therefore they are condemned, for their stubborn pride, to eternal torment. This danger—of being subjected to eternal torment together with evil spirits—can easily threaten us as well: and people become bold opponents of God’s will when, for example, they stubbornly refuse to acknowledge what God’s Word and the Holy Church command us to acknowledge, or intentionally, in defiance, act against some commandment of God, placing their own thoughts and rules above God’s Word or the statutes of the Church. Finally, God the Lord rejects such people from His face, as He rejected the proud Lucifer along with the spirits subject to him. And so let us fear pride, “that we may not be exalted in pride and fall into judgment with the devil”—that we may not be subjected to the same condemnation as the devil. Unclean spirits suggest to us false thoughts and evil desires, striving to turn our mind and heart away from sacred things. Let us therefore in every way resist them, not allowing base thoughts and desires to take root in ourselves. Demons are very wicked—and their very life consists in doing evil. We, on the other hand, brothers, as chosen by God, let us clothe ourselves in the heart of mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience—and let us strengthen one another with encouragement in love and good deeds, always remembering that evil will receive its due recompense at the fearful judgment of Christ, just as every good deed will not be left without its proper reward, and “giving thanks to God the Father… who has rescued us from the power of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of His beloved Son”. Amen.

Talk 8

The time has come, brothers, for us to talk also about the creation of the visible world, at which we look every day and which, out of habit, we value so little. Yes, we have grown accustomed to everything even in God’s world, just as at home we are used to our household furnishings. And yet this world is a wondrous creation of God: everywhere in it are seen the infinite wisdom and the ever-present power of the Creator; everything in it is so beautiful, so majestic, and so beneficial for living creatures, that the holy Fathers, who found a special delight in contemplating it, could not find words enough to praise the wisdom, the goodness, and the omnipotence of the Creator—to describe the magnificence and beauty of the world. And indeed, brothers, from the contemplation of the world there is clearly visible to everyone—the learned and the unlearned alike—the omnipotence, the goodness, and the wisdom of God: «for by the greatness and beauty of created things their Maker is correspondingly known»108, says Holy Scripture.

But why do we need to know how, from where, and for what the world came to be? For this reason: that, having learned its origin—with all that is in it—from the all-good Creator, and the purpose with which He created it all, we may stand in awe before the Creator, know the worth of things, and with gratitude make use of all that we have and all that surrounds us; that, having learned what the whole visible world is, with all its appurtenances and with all its span of time—how transient it is—we may not attach ourselves too closely to this fleeting life and its goods, but may from the visible, changing, transient world ascend to the invisible, unchanging, and eternal Kingdom of Heaven, for which we are appointed to prepare here.

Let us begin, then, with God’s help, our talks about the creation of the world. You see, brothers, that everything in the world is in constant motion: each day of God the sun appears in the morning in the east, and in the evening in the west; the moon goes its own round; and both the sun and the moon are plainly, by turns, now beneath the earth, now above it, shining now on us, now on those who are beneath us; the stars too are seen at one time in one place, and at another in another. And these round, great bodies, at the beckoning of the Almighty Creator, move about in an orderly, measured, unchanging way. This movement of the great round spheres serves, brothers, as the basis for the measurement of time; and this same movement is, further, a sure proof that the world is not eternal, but at some point received a beginning. Thus, looking at the movement of a clock’s hand or at the turning of the wheels within a clock, everyone concludes that the clock was made and set going by a clockmaker. The same must be said when we look at the movement of the world—namely, that it received its beginning from the Creator, and together with its beginning received its motion. And when the world has a beginning, then it will surely have an end as well. It pleased the Almighty Creator that the movement of these great spheres, called planets (and our earth too is a sphere), should serve the life of the world. And so, brothers, the very movement of the heavenly luminaries and of our earth brings us to the thought of their beginning. Not always was everything as it is now; there was a time when there was nothing: neither heaven, nor earth, nor any visible creature. How then did everything come to be? The holy Prophet and Seer of God Moses revealed to us how everything came to be, and from where came all this multitude and variety of creatures. «In the beginning,» he says, «God created the heaven and the earth»109—and further he recounts how He created everything in heaven and on earth. And the Lord God Himself, through the lips of the Prophet Isaiah, says: «I made the earth and man upon it; I with My hand established the heaven; I gave command to all the stars»110. Let us listen, then, to the narrative of Moses. In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And when—in the beginning? Then, that is, when it pleased His goodness to grant a beginning to the visible world. He created. This means He did not merely fashion it out of ready material, as, for instance, a sculptor, a mason, or a carpenter produce various fine and useful things out of ready material, but He created everything out of nothing, bringing it from complete non-being into being. Let us marvel, brothers, at our wondrous, almighty God, who made everything by His numberless power and brought everything from non-being into being through the multitude of His mercy111—and let us fall down before Him in the dust with a feeling of complete humility and surrender to His will.

He created the heaven and the earth. God first created the substance of the universe, and only then set about ordering it step by step. This substance was in the beginning undefined and without order: here everything was together—earth and water and air and fire; nothing was separated, nothing yet had those aspects and forms which we see now.

«And the earth was,» it says further, «invisible and unformed.» Invisible, because, as St. Basil the Great says, the earth was sunk in the deep, and because of the water spread over its surface it could not be seen; and it was called unformed because there was not yet upon it that ordering which was made in the following days112. Why, then, was the earth in the beginning shapeless and unformed—that is, why did the Creator not at once make it perfect? St. Chrysostom answers this thus: «The earth is the universal table, and homeland, and nurse, and mother; the universal city and the grave: our bodies are from it, our dwelling and habitation are upon it, and after death we return again into it. And so, lest the necessity of using the earth make you marvel at it beyond its worth, and lest the multitude of benefits from the earth carry you off into impiety, God shows it to you beforehand as shapeless and unarranged, so that you, seeing its imperfection, may marvel at Him who created it and placed within it all this power; that you may glorify Him who arranged so many things for our convenience113.» Further the holy Narrator continues: «and darkness was upon the deep»—that is, over the water which covered the whole earth was an impenetrable darkness, a gloom.

And the Spirit of God moved over the water. The Holy Spirit, the Lord, the Giver of life, worshipped and glorified together with the Father and the Son, the third Person of the Holy Life-originating Trinity, moved over this deep and poured into it warmth and life, warming and quickening the watery nature. Thus the world is, as it were, born from water by the action of the Holy Spirit. Something similar happens also at our own birth, brothers. In the Mystery of Holy Baptism, which is a spiritual birth, we too are born of water and the Spirit, as the Savior says: «unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God»114.

It is not known whether the earth remained unformed for long or not, nor how long the gloom lay over the waters; only that the Lord God first of all created the nature of material light, so that through it He might do away with the disorder and confusion that had prevailed until then, and that the work of His hands might enjoy the beneficial action of light.

«And God said: let there be light: and there was light.» The Creator said that there should be light, and light came to be. So all-powerful is the Word of the Creator. Since the Lord God is infinite being, to bring everything from non-being into being is incomparably easier for Him than for us to make anything out of ready material; and indeed the world could not have come into being otherwise than out of non-being, out of nothing—because there was no other being except God; and if there had been, then God would not be God. And so light was created out of nothing by God’s command. A wondrous creation is this light! Without it a thing exists, yet it is as though it were not there, while light makes it manifest. So, before light came to be, the earth existed, yet it was as though it did not exist, because no eye would have seen it, even had there been one. And even now it often happens on a dark autumn night, in unlit places, that everything seems to vanish—the sky, and the earth, and the water, and the forests, and the houses, and every object—and we see not only no beauty of the world, but absolutely nothing. Not without reason is the world itself called by a word that means light. Truly it may be called light: what sort of world would it be without light? All the animals and even the plants themselves are so made that they cannot live without light; and besides, light gives everything such a fine, attractive appearance, whereas without light it is as if there were no world at all. Let us learn, then, brothers, to value this gift of God—light—and also this light of our eyes, sight, without which even in the light one can see nothing. But let us not be too attached to material light and to the sense of sight; there are people who will not believe anything they do not see: «if I do not see it,» they say, «I will not believe.» Look: the earth existed in the beginning, but it was invisible because of the darkness everywhere. So too we do not see the spiritual world, yet it exists. Light and eyes are given to us only for this visible world, not for that invisible one; for that world another eye is needed: the enlightened eyes of the heart115, or a pure heart: «blessed are the pure in heart, it is said, for they shall see God»116. And the human soul we do not see, yet in reality it exists. In a person it gives life and beauty to the body, and especially expression to the face; in him it is the chief cause of all that he does; but once the soul has departed the body, there remains only a shapeless corpse, dust of the earth.

Having created light, the Lord God Himself testified that light is a good thing. «And God saw the light, that it was good.» And indeed it is good. The whole world feels what a good thing light is. But besides material light there is also, brothers, a spiritual light. This light, and the source of light, is the Lord God, who dwells in unapproachable light117. The angels too are called second lights after God, as we said in the previous talk. We prize material light because we find it very necessary and useful for ourselves. But if we value sensible light, let us also come to know and value the light of the mind. That light, as you yourselves see, is inconstant: it appears and disappears, and serves almost only the body, which is itself inconstant and not eternal; but this other light is eternal, and God gave us to see the sensible light for this very reason—that He might make us worthy of the noetic light at the time He Himself has appointed118; and the blessedness and beauty of this noetic light are such that we cannot now comprehend them in their fullness: sins, passions, and the cares of daily life hinder us in this present life from vividly feeling this light in the soul; the garment of the body also hides it from the soul. The spiritual light was in the world too; but alas, people did not receive it: «Light came into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, for their deeds were evil»119. To be made worthy of becoming partakers of the spiritual light, we must clearly put off the works of darkness—that is, our sins.

«And God divided between the light and between the darkness. And God called the light day, and the darkness night.» Although God created light, He did not entirely destroy the darkness that had existed before the creation of light—because unbroken light would have been harmful to creatures—but only made a division between them, appointing an order and succession for the one and for the other. But how could there then be day and night, when there was as yet no sun? «Then,» says St. Basil the Great, «day came and night followed, not by the movement of the sun, but because the primordial light, in a measure appointed by God, now expanded and now again contracted120.»

«And there was evening, and there was morning, one day»—not merely the first, but the one, that is, the only day. It was so called in order to show its importance and preeminence above the other days: because it is the head of time, the beginning of days, contemporary with the light, as St. Basil the Great says121. For this time let us conclude our talk with the first day of creation: it is enough if we retain even this in memory. Let us remember that the whole world was created by God out of nothing, solely by His goodness, and, remembering this, let us stand in awe before Him and gratefully glorify Him. Amen.

Talk 9

Now we shall speak, brothers, about the second and third days of creation. What, then, did the world become on the second day of its life, or what was created on the second day? The core of the earth was still in the water and was not visible; but light already illumined by day the unformed, shapeless substance of the world. On the second day the world begins, by God’s word, more and more to pass from disorder into order. God creates this visible vault of heaven, called in Holy Scripture the firmament—because upon it, as it were, the heavenly luminaries are made fast—and, at the command of the Creator, the coarser parts of the water-like world-substance strive toward the earth and, uniting with it, disclose its outline, while part of it rises upward, that is, toward the other opaque bodies that are in the heavenly space, for which the firmament likewise had to be opened122. «And God said,—says the holy Narrator,—let there be a firmament in the midst of the water, and let it divide between water and water: and it was so. And God made the firmament: and God divided between the water which was under the firmament and the water which was above the firmament. And God called the firmament heaven: and God saw that it was good. And there was evening, and there was morning, the second day.» So speaks great Moses about the creation on the second day. What, then, did he wish to say by the words: «and God made the firmament, and God divided between the water which was under the firmament and the water which was above the firmament»? This: that on the second day God created the airy space surrounding the earth, and all the boundless starry space with its enormous heavenly spheres, at that time still dark, separated from one another by the very greatest distances123. On this same day, because of the moving of the Spirit of God over the waters, pouring warmth and life into them, the unformed and unordered earth began to show signs of life and of initial arrangement: from the warmth the water began to evaporate and rise upward toward the sky; clouds appeared and that day began to float through the air. From this day the earthly sphere began to make its revolutions. But there was still so much water on the earth that the vapors could not carry up enough of it with them for the core of the earth to be uncovered: it was still submerged in water.

Thanks be to the almighty Creator, who by His almighty word created the air, pouring out such a fine, transparent, life-giving fluid, necessary for every animate creature and for all plants. Yes, brothers, without air neither we nor the animals could exist for even a few minutes: it is as necessary—and even more so—as food or drink: we breathe it every minute. Fresh air, when in motion, is besides an excellent remedy in cases of mild illness, available to everyone: it refreshes and strengthens our body. But the air can also be a conductor of death, sent by God for our sins: pestilential plagues have their place and path in the air; without a good tempering of the air people sometimes also perish of starvation, or at least often suffer hunger; and that is why the Holy Church daily prays to the Lord, among other things, for the good tempering of the airs. In the air you see and hear, brothers, various phenomena, and among them thunder and lightning. What a menacing spectacle the clouds often present when, having thickened, they seem to belch out of themselves thunder and lightning! The sight of the sky covered with black storm-clouds, shaking the earth with thunderclaps and lighting it up with terribly flashing lightning, has in every age produced in people such dread that they—in their paganism—set over these phenomena a special god and called him the thunderer, Perun. We, thank God, know for certain that everything in the world takes place under the governance of the one Lord God, and that no outsider rules with authority in His kingdom. Some even among Christians thought, and still think, that it is the Prophet Elijah who thunders. But, brothers, this is done by none other than the Lord God, who gave His laws to nature once and for all. This is very easy to grasp. Just as, for example, earthquakes or the eruptions of fire-breathing mountains occur without any outside person, so too the thunder-hurling and fire-breathing clouds occur of themselves, likewise without any outside person, by the sole laws of the Creator who made the universe. Brothers! At the sight of the clouds we can remember that time when the Lord, amid the myriads of His holy angels, will come again to our dark earth for the fearful judgment of the human race; He will come upon the clouds, as the Seer of Mysteries says: «behold, He comes with the clouds, and every eye shall see Him»124; and the righteous at that time will also be caught up on the clouds to meet the Lord in the air125.

«And there was evening, and there was morning, the second day»126. Here already is the evening of the second day of the world, and the earth is still not to be seen.

On the third day of the world the Lord formed special receptacles on the earth for the waters and uncovered the face of the earth in certain places. On this same day the mountains were thrust up out of the earth and raised upon it—because for the water it was necessary to make broad and deep hollows; and to form them, evidently, it was necessary to push up the earth and set in place these mountain masses127. The receptacles of water were called seas, and the dry land was called earth. «And God said,—continues the holy Narrator,—let the water which is under heaven be gathered into one gathering, and let the dry land appear: and it was so: and the water which is under heaven was gathered into its gatherings, and the dry land appeared. And God called the dry land earth: and the gatherings of the waters He called seas: and God saw that it was good»128. And so, this is when the dry land appeared: already on the third day. As yet there are no living creatures either in the air or in the water; but the dry land on this day will already bring forth from itself wondrous plants: out of coarse earth, out of sand, out of clay, out of mud, will come the most delicate, beautiful, and varied kinds of grasses, flowers, and other herbs, as well as all sorts of trees.

But why is it that—compared with the waters—there is so little dry land on the earth, while the creatures that live on dry land are so many? The waters are two-thirds, and the dry land only one-third? Here, brothers, marvel at the wisdom of the Creator. The oceans and seas, serving as a dwelling for a countless multitude of water creatures, at the same time serve as, so to speak, reserve reservoirs for the watering or irrigation of the earth. You know how plants love water, how much of it they draw in through their little roots and conduct through the whole trunk and through all the branches and little leaves—that without water they cannot even feed; you know too what an incalculable multitude there is of plants great and small. Picture to yourselves, then, brothers, how much water is needed for every blade of grass, flower, shrub, and tree—and where such an enormous quantity of it could be found, were there no oceans and seas, lakes and rivers? Thanks to these reservoirs of water, the earth, with its countless families of plants, knows no lack of water: from the oceans, seas, and other reservoirs of water a multitude of vapors rises daily; these vapors, in the form of clouds, circle the earth in the upper layers of the air and rain down upon it, or descend in the form of dew, and thus bring drink to every blade of grass, flower, and tree, which cannot themselves go in search of drink. We say nothing of what a countless multitude there is, on the earth and in the water, of various animate creatures—from man down to the tiniest insects, invisible to the naked eye—and how much water is needed for them as well: each wants to drink and to eat; and the food itself is always, to a greater or lesser degree, dissolved in liquid. Everything that lives has need of water without fail. And with all this, recall what a mass of fire is hidden within the earth’s interior: and after this, surely no one will say that there is a disproportionate amount of water on the earth: there is as much of it as is needed for the well-being of all earthly creatures. The Creator made everything by number, measure, and weight.

Brothers! Although water is a soulless thing, yet, obeying the word of the Lord, it does what we ourselves sometimes do not. You see that it, by the laws of the Creator, rising up from various water-reservoirs in the form of vapors, then descends as rain or dew upon the plants, which cannot themselves change their place—and brings them a life-giving drink, or at least makes the air moist. So let us too always serve our poor and infirm brothers, offering them a word of comfort in their affliction, like a refreshing drink, or such alms as each of us can give.

«And God said: let the earth bring forth the grass of the herb, sowing seed after its kind and after its likeness, and the fruit-bearing tree, making its fruit, whose seed is in it after its kind upon the earth: and it was so»129. It is still the third day. When the water had grown warm and warmed the earth, and from this the vapors began to rise—and when, by the word of the Lord, the water that had covered the earth withdrew into the receptacles appointed for it, and thus the dry land appeared with its mountains, hills, and valleys—then upon the earth, likewise by the word of the Lord, there suddenly appears an endless variety of grasses, each with its own seeds, containing within itself, in the smallest form, a multitude of those very grasses or herbs that bear them upon their stalk; there appears also—together with fruitless trees, which contain within themselves only their own seeds—every fruit-bearing tree that of itself, without any outside teacher, makes beautiful and tasty fruits, likewise with seed, according to the kind of the tree—so that each kind of tree had to reproduce itself and not mix with other trees, or be corrupted in any way.

Here, brothers, is the origin of our varied plant food, which sustains our life and serves for our enjoyment. When we eat it, let us remember that it is the work of God’s goodness and omnipotence; let us know its worth and measure, and never forget to give thanks for it to the Creator. And turning our attention, on the one hand, to the beauty of flowers, and, on the other, to how little they are valued and how they are neglected, let us recall the words of the Savior by which He teaches us to hope in the providence of God: «if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is and tomorrow is cast into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith»130? And let us not be too anxious about clothing, especially fine clothing. We may also learn humility at the sight of the beauty and delicacy of flowers and their swift withering, at the sight of the beauty and stateliness of trees and their falling under the axe of man or from the onslaughts of the wind. Flowers are fair and delicate, but they have nothing to be proud of: they are not their own but God’s, and besides they soon wither; trees are beautiful and stately, but they too have nothing to boast of: God both planted them, and watered them, and made them grow. In just the same way beautiful people and stately men—like the flowers of the field and the shapely trees—have nothing to boast of: their body is God’s creation; there is nothing in it that is their own; God made it grow and gave it food and drink for its nourishment; and of the soul there is no need even to speak: it too is wholly God’s. And besides, both flowers and trees alike fall, though some live less and others longer. So too all people, whatever they may be, will all fall under the axe of death. But let us return to the creation. The Lord God, as we heard, said that the earth should bring forth plants: and it brought forth all the plants after their kind. Wondrous is Your omnipotence, O Lord! As You said in the beginning, so to this day every herb, every little tree and tree obeys You: with the coming of spring, as soon as there is a sufficient amount of warmth for the development of the plants, in Your soulless creature a wondrous work begins, in the modest obscurity of the earth’s interior, and also upon the stalks and boughs of the trees—without noise, without knocking, regularly, evenly. And here they come out into God’s light: not a single blade of grass, not a single little leaf, not a single little tree strays from its path or forgets the pattern (the form) given to it—and behold: from where does it all come? A blade of grass on the earth or a little leaf on the tree unfolds, grows wider and wider, larger and larger, and at last the bare earth is covered with a beautiful, many-colored carpet that draws both the eye and the sense of smell, while the trees deck themselves in a leafy, thick garment and cover their limbs. So everything on our earth is made picturesque and adorned by these plants! And all of this is taken, as it were, out of nothing, by a single word of the Lord, spoken once for all. And are we too, brothers, not likewise raised out of that same non-being into being? What are we in the beginning—in the loins of our fathers131? Is it not evident through this that the Creator gives us to know that in the beginning He brought everything from non-being into being? Brothers, let us look at the plants and be instructed. How evident, how palpable is our Lord, our almighty Father, in these plants! Every blade of grass, every little leaf, every flower seems to whisper to us: «here is the Lord.» Examine, brothers, the wise structure of plants and come to know God in them: plants are available to nearly all of you at all times, both in winter and in summer. But it is time now to bring the talk to an end; forgive me for its length; for it is hard not to speak much of the wise works of the Creator. Amen.

Talk 10

The subject of the present talk will be, brothers, the creation of the heavenly luminaries, which followed on the fourth day of creation, and how they fulfill their appointed task in relation to the earth, and also their size and their distance from the earth.

Let us hear how the holy Narrator Moses speaks of the creation of the luminaries in his book of the genesis of heaven and earth. Here is how he speaks of it: «and God said: let there be lights in the firmament of heaven, to give light upon the earth and to divide between the day and the night: and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and for years. And let them be for illumination in the firmament of heaven, so as to shine upon the earth: and it was so. And God made two great lights: the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night, and the stars. And God set them in the firmament of heaven, to shine upon the earth, and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide between the light and the darkness: and God saw that it was good. And there was evening, and there was morning, the fourth day»132. And so, the sun, the moon, and the stars were created 1) to give light to the earth; 2) so that they might produce upon the earth days and nights and the seasons of the year, and so that people might keep by them their earthly reckonings of time; and 3) so that they might serve as signs or tokens for knowing fair or foul weather, wind and storm, one’s location on land or at sea. Such is the appointed task of the luminaries with respect to the earth: no other task has been revealed to us. And how beautifully and unchangingly it is fulfilled!

And God made two great lights: the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night. What a brilliant luminary is this sun! What a multitude of light comes from it, and how wondrously it shines upon the earth! For several thousand versts in every direction it lights everything up at once, and so brightly that on the earth one can make out every grain of sand, every blade of grass: the whole earth is, as it were, flooded with a sea of light. But since light is a substance, judge, brothers, how great the luminary must be that sends out from itself so much light upon the earth. Evidently it is very great and incomparably larger than the earth, because, were it equal to or smaller than the earth, then the light over the whole earth would be incomparably scantier. But now take into account both the lavishness of the illumination and the extent of this illumination, equal to the whole earthly hemisphere, and also this circumstance—in what measure the light of a candle grows weaker and weaker when we, for example, gradually move a book away from it—and then judge how great the sun must be, which shines equally brightly, so that the enormous distance, which makes it appear a small disk, means, as it were, nothing for the earth. From this anyone may easily conclude that it is exceedingly great. It has been ascertained that the sun is several hundred thousand times larger than the earth. And if it appears such a small disk, this is, as we said, because of the astonishing height at which it burns above the earth. It is removed from the earth by 144 million versts133. This has been ascertained by the learned. What are our earthly distances in comparison with this distance? What, then, must the Creator be, by whose will such luminaries move across the sky, and at such a distance? Evidently He must be omnipresent and all-powerful; for Him every distance, every magnitude, is as nothing. But in us too, brothers, there is a likeness of the omnipresent Godhead: for our thought there are no such distances as there are for the body or for the senses; human thought can in an instant fly around immeasurable distances; and the more a person strives to live virtuously and in holiness, the freer his thought becomes, the more he detaches himself from the narrow bonds of the earth; whereas, on the contrary, the vicious, passionate person is, in his thought and in his whole being, as though chained to the earth: on the earth are all his hopes and all his happiness. Very bright is the sun, brothers, so bright that we have seen nothing brighter than it, and it beholds the whole earth at once. But the eyes of the Lord are ten thousand times brighter than the sun134, and they see the whole universe at once, all that is hidden and secret in people: there is no place where one could hide from them. In general the sun, moon, and stars are beautiful; but their Creator is more beautiful still. «If the heaven is beautiful,» says one of our own native Hierarchs, «and in the heaven the visible sun, moon, and stars—oh, how much more beautiful is He who created these beautiful things135!»

But why is it, brothers, that the sun sets below the earth and leaves it in darkness, and then rises again over the earth? Why are there this dawn, morning and evening, and these gold-glowing clouds at dawn? This too happens by the all-powerful word, or by the laws, of the Creator, who made the earth round like a sphere and commanded it to revolve about itself and about the sun. Earlier we said simply, without proofs, that the earth is a sphere; but now the rising and setting of the sun, the morning and evening dawn, and the gold-glowing clouds at dawn will prove to us that our earth is in fact an enormous sphere, like the heavenly spheres. You often see, brothers, that the Lord Almighty is depicted on the icons for the most part with a sphere, on top of which is a cross. This sphere signifies the terrestrial sphere and is called the orb—because in antiquity the Roman emperors had the custom of holding it in the hand on solemn occasions136. Our Lord Jesus Christ holds in His hand the terrestrial sphere, as the King of heaven and earth, as the Almighty. We say this in order to show you that our earth is round, like a sphere. But how is the roundness of the earth proved by the phenomena at the rising and setting of the sun? In the following way: if the earth were not round but flat, then the sun would at once hide beneath the earth, or come out from under it, and would immediately leave us either in the full shadow of the earth, or light us with full light. But now, since the earth is round, we make use of the remnants of light from the sun even when it is lighting the sloping side of the earth, when the sun is, so to speak, beneath the hill and produces for us the dawn, like the glow of an enormous fire. This dawn comes about because the rays of the set or rising sun, lighting the sloping side of the earth, at the same time light also the air around the earth, which surrounds it like water, and thus make the light of the dawn. Observing the dawn, we see, from the gradual diminishing of the light—from how it gradually turns from bright rose paler and paler—that the earth is indeed round, and that the sun, as it were, glides step by step, evenly, along a circle. And it is known that this phenomenon comes from the wheel-like turning of the earth, from its roundness. Looking at the clouds, at the setting of the sun, we see the same; often there are several rows of them: one higher, the others lower. Look: the sun has set, and we no longer see it; only the tops of the buildings still take upon themselves its last rays; meanwhile the lower clouds are still crimson, and the upper ones also; and now the lower ones have gone out, like red-hot iron taken from the fire, but the upper clouds are still gold-glowing; for them the sun has not yet set: with us it is already twilight, but there, on high, is full light. But now, at last, these lofty, gold-glowing clouds have also grown dark—that is, they too have come into the shadow of the earth; the sun has sunk low beneath the earth. How evident from this that the earth is round! But why do I strive to prove to you that the earth is a sphere? In order to set before you the omnipotence of God in the most striking form. The earth is a sphere. But why did God make it spherical? So that it might revolve about itself and about the sun. And so the earth revolves in the air—in enormous spaces—and, in the words of the church hymn, hangs upon nothing. What power must hold it in the air upon nothing! What power must carry it around the sun like a light ball! How insignificant for the Lord God is our earth! How true and faithful are the words of the Lord: «heaven is My throne, and the earth is the footstool of My feet»137—only a footstool! Such is the earth, and so it is made. But by the same laws the heavenly luminaries too were created: and they are all likewise hung upon nothing, upon no thing at all. How Your works are magnified, O Lord! You have made them all in wisdom138. But most of all this radiant luminary amazes us. You lit a single lamp, O God, for the whole earth, and its light is enough for all; no one has any need to ask that it be moved nearer to himself so that the light might be brighter: everywhere and for everyone it shines equally bright—for king and subject, rich and poor, strong and weak, righteous and sinner. And it is not enough that it shines: it also warms and gives life to all and to everything; the gift is given to all alike: no one is wronged. In the sun, brothers, one can see a likeness of the one and all-good Lord and of the one Church. The sun alone shines for the whole earth; and the spiritual Sun—the Lord God—is likewise one for the whole world, in all parts of the world; there is one Gospel of the Lord in all the world; there is one Church of the Lord, or one fold of the Lord’s rational sheep; there is one Chief Shepherd, Jesus Christ. Further—the sun is a likeness of the all-good God, who makes His sun shine on the evil and the good. A wondrous spectacle of God’s goodness! What does one or another of us not sometimes do? What sins, what evil deeds are there not among people, committed both openly and in secret? Sometimes people live in complete forgetfulness of God. But the heavenly Father commands His sun to shine equally on all: His sun will never forget, in its time, to rise over us. We are often still asleep, while it, like a bridegroom from his chamber, has long since come out upon our horizon and pours down with all lavishness its dazzling rays, gladdening every animate creature, lighting and quickening everything. Let us too, brothers, imitate the heavenly Father, each according to his strength, shining upon others with the light of our good deeds and warming with our compassion the hearts of those who are in need of compassion.

When the sun hides behind the earth, for the most part another luminary at once appears in its place—a lesser one—and shines upon the earth all night long. What an exact order in the changes! What solicitude for our dark earth! So that it should not be very dark upon it during the sun’s withdrawal from us into the other hemisphere, the moon, at once upon the setting of the sun, takes upon itself the office of a luminary, though with far from such light as the sun. Its light, as learned people have ascertained, is 100,000 times weaker than an overcast day, while, compared with the light of a sunny day, the very clearest moonlit night is 300,000 times darker139. It too lights up a great deal of space at once—not merely a thousand versts; and therefore it must likewise be concluded that it is both large and very far from us; it is, however, much smaller not only than the sun, but even than the earth, and it stands off from the earth by only 300,000 versts. By the light of the moon we usually see in the sky a countless multitude of stars, of which some are larger and others smaller. Many of you, brothers, do not know the mystery of the starry heaven, and there is no special need for all to know it; but it is there that all the infinite power of the Creator is disclosed. On the earth too, out of all God’s creatures, His omnipotence is visible; but the earth is only a single grain of sand in comparison with the boundlessness of the sky. All the stars, each one separately, are larger than our earth, and the greater part, perhaps, are larger even than the sun itself, and it is not millions of versts that separate our earth from them, but whole billions—such numbers as are rarely even used among us. Beautiful are these stars; quiet and pleasant is their light. On our earth people know no better means of setting forth outwardly the glorious deeds of some man who has rendered many services to his country than the shining of a star, made in imitation and hung upon such a man’s breast.

All these round spheres appeared out of shapeless substance, brothers, by a single word of the Lord, already on the second day140. Only then they were dark; but on this day light was given to them and they became bright. This we understand both of the stars, and of the moon, and of the sun. «In the beginning God created,—says St. Gregory the Theologian,—not this sunlight, but light not enclosed in a body and in the sun, and only afterward given to the sun to light the whole universe»141. From this one may conclude that the body of the sun existed before light was given to it; likewise the body of the moon and of the stars. Looking at the starry world, one involuntarily thinks: what an abyss of the omnipotence and wisdom of God! What is our earth in comparison with the sky? What are we, people? Who will not say with the holy Psalmist David: «when I behold the heavens, the works of Your hands, the moon and the stars, which You have founded: what is man, that You are mindful of him, or the son of man, that You visit him»142?

Holy Scripture has not revealed to us any other appointed task of the heavenly luminaries than their task for the earth. This task, as we indicated earlier, consists in this: 1) to give light to the earth—and we all see that they do indeed fulfill this task, especially the sun and the moon; 2) so that people might keep by them the count of time: let them be, it is said, for seasons, and for days, and for years. Let us now speak in more detail about this second task. By seasons here are meant the seasons of the year: spring, summer, autumn, and winter. And so days and nights and the seasons of the year on the earth come from the heavenly luminaries, namely from the sun and the moon. Days and nights come from the wheel-like turning of the earth about itself. When the side of the earth on which we live turns downward, and the side beneath us upward, then below with us it is night, and above it is day; and when we again rise upward, and those beneath us go downward, then with us it is day, and with them night. The seasons of the year come about thus: when the earth is in such a position toward the sun that it casts its rays upon it straight down, as rain falls from the clouds, or at least not very obliquely, then it is very warm on the earth—that is, it is summer; as the slant in the fall of the sun’s rays increases, the earth becomes colder and colder: autumn sets in; at this time, from the uneven cooling of the earth, the water, and the air surrounding them, a multitude of vapor rises into the air out of the seas, lakes, rivers, and marshes: hence the almost incessant, heavy rains in autumn. Finally the sun’s rays, deviating from the earth more and more, as it were only glide along the earth, barely touching it: hence severe frosts set in, the days become short and the nights long. Among the inhabitants of the other earthly hemisphere at this time the days gradually lengthen and the nights shorten, and the heat reaches its highest degree. After this the sun again begins to rise higher and higher over our hemisphere; its rays begin to fall upon us more and more directly: the thaw begins, spring comes. All these changes take place during the earth’s revolution about the sun, and this revolution is completed over a whole year. In this way it becomes with us both dark and cold when the sun lights us little; and, on the contrary, light and warm when the sun’s rays fall straight upon the earth. In just the same way, brothers, it is also with the soul of a Christian. When the source of spiritual light and life-giving warmth—Jesus Christ and the Life-giving Spirit—withdraw from it, then there are in it spiritual gloom and cold; but when they draw near to it and act upon it with their grace, then suddenly light and warmth are established in it, and it tastes a wondrous peace and heavenly joy.

There is yet a third appointed task of the luminaries: that they should be signs or tokens of various states and changes of the air, and also of the position of travelers on the earth. Thus mariners usually judge, by a certain color of the rising or setting sun, of stormy weather or of calm; and by the stars they often discover their position at sea—and even on the dry way, people walking in a deep, dense forest learn by the sun and the stars in what quarter they are and where they need to come out. But, beyond expectation, our talk has dragged on too long, and it is now time to bring it to an end. And so, having rendered glory to God, wondrous in His works, let us here bring our talk to an end. Amen.

Talk 11

In the first four days from the beginning of the world there appeared, by God’s word, the heaven with its luminaries and the earth surrounded by air, with dry land and upon it various plants, as well as the receptacles of the waters. But there was as yet no living creature—neither in the air, nor on the dry land, nor in the water. Only on the fifth day does God people the waters with fishes and various water reptiles, and the air with birds. So the holy Narrator Moses recounts the creation on the fifth day. «And God said: let the waters bring forth reptiles of living souls, and birds flying above the earth in the firmament of heaven: and it was so. And God made the great whales, and every living soul of reptiles which the waters brought forth after their kinds, and every winged bird after its kind: and God saw that it was good. And God blessed them, saying: increase and multiply, and fill the waters that are in the seas, and let the birds multiply upon the earth. And there was evening, and there was morning, the fifth day.» Out of one and the same water God created fishes and birds by His almighty word. «The nature of water is one,—says St. Cyril of Jerusalem,—but from it are born both fishes and birds, and as the former swim in the waters, so the latter fly in the air»143. Yes, brothers, out of one and the same substance the Creator makes whatever He pleases. Thus, for example, «the same water from which fishes and birds are born,—says the same St. Cyril,—becomes in the grapevines the wine that gladdens the heart of man; in the olives, the oil that anoints the face of man; and is turned also into the bread that strengthens the heart of man, and into all kinds of fruits»144. So all things in the world are bound together in the closest way, though at first glance this does not appear so. And yet this is not so surprising: fishes and birds—both the one and the other—are at least living, moving creatures; water, oil, and wine, however different, are the same liquid. But here is what is surprising: between plants and animals, which, it would seem, have least of all in common with one another, there is the closest kinship, namely: among the plants there are animal-plants, that is, such animals as by their structure resemble plants; they are propagated, like plants, by grafting and by transplanting shoots, and they produce offspring as a tree produces its branches145. Someone might doubt that this is an animal; but the sensation and voluntary movement of such a strange being will assure him that it is indeed an animal.

Does not this close kinship of all earthly creatures teach us something, us rational creatures? It teaches us close, friendly union with one another. We see that everything in the world is joined by inseparable bonds: plants with animals, and both with one another: shall we then debase ourselves before irrational nature, separating from one another through self-love, hatred, and the other passions? Let us show that we are rational, God-like beings; let us unite with one another in pure love, which for us is the bond of perfection; let us not destroy the order of the Creator, who bound all creatures together in kinship for their well-being.

«And God made the great whales, and every living soul of reptiles which the waters brought forth after their kinds, and every winged bird after its kind: and God saw that it was good.» Of the creatures living in the water, holy Moses named by name only the whale, as the most enormous sea animal, as the king of all that is in the waters. This whale, a dweller worthy of the abyss of the ocean, is fifteen sazhens long. And on what does it feed? By the wise arrangement of the Creator, it feeds not on great fishes—otherwise how much devastation the whales would work in the sea—no, it is satisfied only with worms and sea insects, which enter its maw with a long stream of water146. What shall we say of the other kinds of fishes? Holy Scripture says that the waters brought forth living souls of reptiles after their kinds. Of these kinds of fishes and various water animals there is a countless multitude: to this day no one has counted them, nor is it possible to count them, because of the inaccessibility of the water’s depth. It is known only that of the kinds of fishes and sea reptiles there is a countless multitude, and that they multiply in enormous quantity. Some fishes cast several hundred thousand eggs, and others several million, out of which fishes are afterward born147; thus truly effective is the word of the Creator: increase and multiply and fill the waters! Yes, there are infinitely many fishes in the waters; and with the incalculable multiplication of fishes it is natural that they should also die in a countless multitude. What then has the Creator done—what places, what graveyards has He set aside for such a multitude of dead fishes? The fishes that fall asleep serve as food and as a kind of reserve storehouse for water creatures of another kind. In the sea there is, for example, among others a worm resembling an eel, to which God has appointed to seek out and devour the dead sea fishes. On the bottom of the sea millions of such worms, constantly crawling, devour every rotting body and thus preserve the waters and the air from the decay of so many fishes, and consequently from the diseases that might otherwise arise from it among people and animals, and among the fishes themselves148. Thanks to such a wise arrangement of the Creator, the sea and all the waters teem with healthy and cheerful creatures. Yes, among God’s creatures contentment with life is everywhere visible. And if here too, in the waters, you should find something resembling war, resembling pursuit; if you should see that some fishes destroy others, devouring them—this does not mean that there, in the depth of the waters, disorder reigns, that there are many unhappy inhabitants there: no, all this tends toward the order, the harmony, and the well-being of the water kingdom; all this shows the astonishing wisdom of the Creator.

From the most ancient times God has shown people a means of catching fish for use as food. The waters furnish daily an enormous quantity of food both to the huts of the poor and to the tables of the rich. Our Savior Himself, during His earthly life, ate fish, as is evident from the fact that the holy Apostles carried fish and bread among their small traveling provisions. Once, by His creative beckoning, He drew into a net cast by the Apostle Peter into the sea on purpose such a multitude of fishes that the Apostles were at a loss how the nets held together: so obedient is creation to the beckoning of the Creator! So majestically did our Lord Jesus Christ everywhere show Himself the Creator! Let us, brothers, be grateful to the Lord that He, without any merits on our part, feeds us and provides us with all good things.

Great is the multitude of water creatures visible to the eyes—and it cannot even be compared with the number of those creatures which, because of their smallness, cannot even be seen by the naked eye: through a magnifying glass one can see in a single drop of water such a multitude of living beings that the observer may forget himself and wonder whether there is not a special world of creatures before his eyes. Who, seeing all this multitude of great and insignificant creatures, will not ascend in thought to the infinite Mind, to the infinite Wisdom, which alone called out of nothingness into life an infinite multitude of the most varied creatures and gave to all the most wise structure, life, and the sweet feeling of existence? «How Your works are magnified, O Lord: You have made them all in wisdom: the earth is filled with Your creation»149! And (God made) every winged bird after its kind. Together with the fishes God also created all the kinds of birds—domestic, birds of prey, songbirds, and others. How many there are of these winged creatures too! Very many of them have by now been recognized and described, but still new, unknown ones keep being discovered. Who will describe their beauty, their manners, habits, and the abilities they have received from the Creator common to all? Some of them bring even material benefit to man, such as domestic fowl; some sing in his dwelling, while others amuse him with sounds imitating the sounds of human speech. But by far the greater part of them live in freedom in God’s spacious world, joyfully soaring on high, knowing over themselves only one Master—God—not subject to human vanity and pride. Yes, man, for all your grandeur, for all your pride, you must confess with humility that a multitude of irrational creatures are utterly independent of you in every respect, that over them there is one Master—God: He gave them various abilities, put into them various dispositions and habits; He brought them forth; He feeds and rears them. Indeed, is it by your skill, for example, that the hawk stands, spreading its wings unmoving, gazing toward the south? Is it by your command that the eagle soars aloft150? «Yes,—you will say,—this is not the work of my art: these are not my subjects»—yet you and they have one Creator. Birds, for the obtaining of food for themselves and for their defense, are endowed with the sharpest sight, and therefore usually easily find themselves food and detect danger. Our Lord Jesus Christ, pointing people to the heavenly Father’s solicitude in providing food for every little bird, teaches us not to be too anxious about food. «Behold the birds of the air,—He says, — for they neither sow, nor reap, nor gather into barns, and your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much better than they151?» As among the sea reptiles there are those which destroy the dead and rotting bodies in the sea, so among the birds too there are those which destroy the dead bodies on the earth, such as eagles, kites, ravens, and other birds of prey. The Savior Himself mentioned in the Gospel—in a parable—this property of the rapacious eagles: «wherever the body is,—He says, — there the eagles will be gathered together»152. Such is the everywhere-wise foresight, such the wise cycle of life! In the world nothing is lost in vain: everything lives, or serves as a store for life.

Fishes and birds, as we have seen, were created out of one and the same water, and as the former are born from little eggs, so the latter too from a watery egg. But there is between them still a greater likeness. However swift the flight of birds, the swimming of many fishes does not yield to it in speed. Moreover, both the one and the other move through liquids, though not the same in their density.

The wings of birds are the same as the swimming fins of fishes; and in place of the feathers with which birds are provided, like a warm garment, fishes are served by scales. There are water birds, and there are also fishes that are in part airborne, or flying. The swimming fins of fishes can bend and unbend, just as the wings of birds do; swimming and flying take place in just the same way, only in two different liquids: one may say that a fish flies in the water as a bird swims in the air, which for it is the same as a great ocean, just as the sea for a fish is a kind of air. Birds living in hot regions have very beautiful feathers, and the fishes in the seas—in those same regions—are adorned with brilliant colors, namely: they are covered with golden, silver, azure, ruby, and emerald scales, and in the gleam of the sun’s rays they shine in the waters like precious stones. There are fishes that pass in enormous shoals from some seas into others: there are also birds that fly across from one region into another. From such striking likeness of creatures of different kinds we conclude, brothers, that there is one supreme Being who created all, and by no means two or several, as some have idly babbled. From the varied beauty observed in the creatures, which amid all its variety is something single and common to them all, we conclude that there is one highest Beauty, from which comes every beauty in the world. The whole world is a single beauty: because one supreme Sage created it. And people too will be one beautiful flock, when God shall be all in all, in the age to come.

Having created fishes and birds after their kind, the Lord God Himself testified that they are good, and then blessed them to increase and multiply: «and God blessed them, saying: increase and multiply and fill the waters that are in the seas, and let the birds multiply upon the earth.» It is remarkable that the Lord God blessed these living creatures for the first time, as He afterward blessed the first people. Here is seen the fatherly solicitude and love of the Lord God for His living creatures. Having blessed them, He said to them: «increase and multiply and fill the waters in the seas, and let the birds multiply upon the earth.» This means that the Creator in the beginning created only the beginnings of fishes and birds—their kinds—and left their multiplication to themselves, under His protection, just as also the multiplication of the human race. And to this day all the kinds of fishes and birds, having multiplied to infinity, preserve exactly the appearance, manners, and habits of their kinds, without in the least mixing with others. Every fish and bird and every reptile, such as they were several thousand years ago, such they remain also today, with the same properties they received from the Creator in the beginning. The ancient and the new descriptions of fishes and birds are one and the same. So, brothers, everything divine is firm and constant! So firm and unchanging are the laws of the Creator! But as unchanging as the laws of the Creator given to creation, so unchanging is the determination of the Lord concerning the Holy Church, that neither the gates of hell, nor all the power of hell, shall overcome it, and that it will stand firm to the end of the age. «I will build My Church, and the gates of hell shall not overcome it»153, said the Savior. These are the words of that same Creator, who as it were said also of the world in the beginning: «I will create My world, I will give it laws, and no power for ever and ever shall shake it.» Let the mortal race then rejoice, because it will always be possible for us to find salvation in the Holy Church until the end of the world, and let it glorify the Creator of every creature. Amen.

Talk 12

Have you noticed, brothers, with what gradualness the Lord God created this world that we see? Let us repeat in a few words what was said before about the creation. First He created the liquid, water-like, and unformed substance of the world out of nothing, and then out of this substance He produced and arranged in six days the whole world with all the creatures that are in it. On the first day He produced light: «for it was fitting,» says St. Gregory the Theologian, «for the great Light (that is, God) to begin the creation of the world with the making of light, by which He does away with darkness and the disorder and confusion that had prevailed until then»; on the second—the firmament, with all the multitude of enormous spheres, then still dark, separated from one another by an immeasurable distance—the airy space surrounding the earth; on the third—He separated from the earth the water that had covered the whole earth round about, commanding it to withdraw into the receptacles or hollows specially formed in the earth, and on this same day He commanded the earth to bring forth all the kinds of trees, fruit-bearing and fruitless, all the fruits of the earth, all the herbs and flowers; on the fourth—He gave the sun light and warmth for the lighting and warming of the earth with its creatures, and light also to the stars; on the fifth—He commanded the water to bring forth from itself fishes and birds. Of all this it was spoken in the previous four talks. Now we shall speak about the sixth and last day of creation, on which were created the earthly animals and man—the crown of creation—and specifically, for this time, we shall speak about the creation of the earthly animals, about their division into domestic and wild, and about the benefit brought by both.

“And God said”—says Saint Moses—“let the earth bring forth a living soul according to kind, cattle and creeping things and beasts of the earth according to kind: and it was so. And God made the beasts of the earth according to kind and the cattle according to their kind, and all the creeping things of the earth according to their kind: and God saw that it was good”.

“And God said”. We have seen already, brothers, many times in our earlier talks how mighty the Word of God is: He spoke and it became; He commanded and creation appeared. He said—says the Holy Psalmist—and they came to be; He commanded, and they were created154. Now again we shall see the same power of the Lord’s word.

“And God said: let the earth bring forth a living soul”. These words do not mean, brothers, that the earth itself possessed living souls within it which God commanded it to bring forth or give birth to, but rather that God gave the earth the power to bring forth from itself living creatures—that is, animals were created by the almighty Word of God, just as, for example, God created a serpent from the staff of Moses, or as He, according to Saint John the Baptist, is able to raise up children to Abraham from stones. And so every living creature comes from God or from God’s Word in its entire being, and likewise lives by God’s Word sustaining in existence all kinds of creatures: food, drink, breath and movement—these are merely secondary causes of life for earthly creatures. Without God, without God’s Word, without God’s will there is and cannot be any life not only on earth but also in heaven. His Word called forth every life and by His same Word every life is sustained: He alone bears all things by the word of His power155, that is, by His mighty Word.

“Let the earth bring forth a living soul”. This means that the soul of animals comes from the earth and is something earthly, though refined: and therefore upon the death of the animal it returns to the earth. Only the human soul is immortal: because only in mankind, of all earthly creatures, is there reason, freedom, and a striving toward God, toward the immortal. Therefore we must above all care for it and enrich it with good, salvific deeds; as for the body, which is as a garment for the soul, fashioned for us by the Lord God from the earth and necessary to us in its present form only so long as we are on earth—we should not take excessive care of it: for just as worn-out clothing, worn from use and from time, falls apart and turns to dust, so our body too—this perishable garment—will necessarily fall apart and turn to dust; and from prosperity, from beauty, from bodily strength nothing will remain but earth alone. “Let the earth bring forth a living soul according to kind, cattle and creeping things and beasts of the earth according to kind: and it was so”. The four-footed animals the Holy Chronicler Moses called here, as we may suppose, domestic or tame animals, while beasts meant the wild, forest beasts. But was there always such a division of animals into domestic or tame and wild or beast; were not all at first tame, though most of them were created to dwell in forests? Man is the earthly king; he was placed as master of all earthly creatures: and the subjects should be obedient and submissive to their master. Indeed, at the beginning all beasts were obedient to man and all were tame; but when man sinned and showed disobedience to God, the beasts too departed from obedience to man, ceased to be tame; moreover, they became frightful to him. “When sin entered”—says Saint Chrysostom—“dominion was taken from them; and as among servants the dutiful are feared by their companions while the wicked fear even their fellow servants: so it happened with man. So long as he had boldness before God, he was fearful to beasts; but when he sinned, he began to fear even the least of his fellow-servants, that is, the beasts156”. But—continues the holy father—“God did not entirely take from man on account of his sin the honor of dominion over beasts, did not deprive him of all authority over them; no: He left outside man’s dominion only those animals which serve him less for earthly profit; but the necessary, useful animals which provide him with much help in life—these God left in subjection to us. He left horses so that they might draw the plow, break up the earth, help us in the labors of transporting heavy things; share with us, when needed, the toils and dangers of war; and also, when needful or for our pleasure, carry us from place to place; He left herds of cattle and sheep so that they might provide for our table, so that we might have plenty of material for making clothes. He left us as well other kinds of animals which provide us with no small benefit in life. He condemned us for sin to perpetual labor and sweat, but also commanded certain beasts to share in our toil for gaining us food and other necessities, and sometimes without toil gives it to us, permitting us to feed on the flesh of animals. How much we should be grateful for this to the Creator! We have grown accustomed to everything in the world and think little about it: to whom, to what Benefactor do we owe these gifts. The horse bears our burdens its whole life; our tables are often laden with dishes from the flesh of animals; our entire body from foot to head is clothed in garments made from the skin or wool of animals: but how many words, or even secret feelings of gratitude does the one who enjoys all this possess? Very few. But the wild beasts as well, though they are not subject to man, are useful to him: first, in that they tangibly give him assurance of the power of the Lord and do not let him forget himself in pride and presumption. Just as thunder and lightning make us tremble and involuntarily make us aware of our nothingness before the almighty Creator speaking to us in an awesome and majestic voice through visible nature: in just the same way fierce wild beasts, terrible in their cruelty, strike fear in us and cause us to think of their Creator, who made them fearful to us, of man’s lost greatness and his present nothingness. Indeed, who could harbor high thoughts of himself at the sight of a fierce beast, living with complete independence in the forests, flashing fiery eyes and in a moment ready to destroy the majestic king of the earth? And by his position and appearance he seems to say to man: I do not belong to you but to the fearful God; He gave me life; He feeds me, not you; you cannot force me to serve you as you do a horse or an ox. Indeed, will the unicorn deign to serve you, or lie down at your manger? Will you bind him with cords, or will he plow the fields for you?157 No: many wild beasts live entirely not for you, man, so that you might know that you now possess very little, that with your sins you are restricted to an extraordinary degree, that only righteousness can restore to you dominion over beasts, as it did to the Holy Prophet Daniel over lions, as it did to many Saints over lions and other fierce beasts. Moreover, wild beasts are useful also in that they provide men with clothing through their skins, and sometimes with food through their flesh, and also—in the general order of nature—in that they devour the carcasses of other forest animals which would otherwise corrupt the air through their decay; they prevent the excessive multiplication of certain weaker but harmful animals by feeding on them. As for poisonous serpents, snakes, scorpions and others like them: they too are useful to man in that they also remind him of his fall, his guilt, and death, and cause him to tremble before the Almighty God. But why should we insist that every kind of animal and reptile be useful to us? God created them not only for our benefit but also to show forth His wisdom and goodness. Indeed, what wisdom of God is visible in the structure, appearance, habits and customs of different kinds of animals? For the attentive and thoughtful man, animals serve as living preachers of God’s wisdom. And look at the life of each animal, at their habits and customs, at their means of defense, and you will see how all of them are content with their life, praise the goodness of God and say: the Lord is good to all and His mercy is on all His works158. If you insist on having profit from them, you will find it in almost every animal: even the most seemingly insignificant creature provides us with benefit. From the ant—says Saint Chrysostom—one can learn diligence; from the bee—love of cleanliness, of labor and of neighbor: she labors and works daily not so much for herself as for us. And it is proper for the Christian to seek profit not for himself but for others. As the bee flies over all meadows to prepare food for another: so do you too, man: if you have gathered wealth, use part of it, as you see fit, for the poor; if you have abundance in anything else: be useful to those in need with your abundance. And do we not see that the bee is respected more than other animals not for the fact that it labors, but especially because it labors for others? For the spider too labors and strives and stretches across the walls thin tissues surpassing all women’s art, but it is not respected because its work is entirely useless to us: such are those who labor and strive only for themselves159”. In general, one can learn much from the beasts; one thing in them can be imitated while another can be shunned. For example: the ox and the donkey love their master, as the Prophet says: the ox knows his master and the donkey his owner’s manger160; let us not be worse than these beasts—let us not turn away from our Lord and Creator. “The dog”—let us further say with Saint Chrysostom—“though faithful, is shameless: and both qualities should be a lesson to us: let us take up faithfulness and cast away shamelessness. The fox is cunning and deceitful: let us not imitate this vice. But as the bee, flying over meadows, does not take everything with her but chooses what is useful and leaves the rest, so let us do: having examined the kind of beasts, let us take for ourselves what is useful in them, and whatever good qualities they have by nature, let us perfect in ourselves by free choice. In this we are honored by God, for He gave us the ability to perform the natural good that is in beasts by free will, so that we may receive reward for it. And so, taking from the beasts all that is best, let us use it: man is king of the beasts, and kings have in abundance the best of what their subjects possess: whether gold or silver or precious stones or magnificent garments”161.

“And God saw that it was good”. After the creation of each day the Lord God Himself testifies that His creation perfectly accords with His purposes and intentions, that all is perfect and beautiful. And no mortal with sound reason can say that in the creation of the wise Creator there is anything amiss, anything out of order; on the contrary, everyone will say that all is harmonious and beautiful beyond words and understanding.

But it is time now to bring to an end both this discourse and our talks on the creation of the world. In the next discourse we shall speak in conclusion about the crown of all creation—about mankind. We have only lightly touched upon God’s creation and have not said or explained very much that should have been said and explained; yet we have said something; and even this something may bring great benefit to those who are attentive and thoughtful. Above all let us not forget one thing: the visible world will end because it is elemental and composite; only the invisible world, being simple and non-composite, is eternal and will never end. Therefore we should think especially of the invisible, look according to the word of the Apostle not to the visible but to the invisible, and strive toward the invisible: for the visible is temporal, the invisible is eternal162. Amen.

Talk 13

Brothers! Do you remember what creatures God created first of all? Since some probably do not remember, I will remind you that the Creator brought into being first of all beings akin to Himself in nature—spiritual creatures, invisible to our eyes, not subject to our senses, the Angels, or the Angelic world; and then already the visible, material creation, that is all the shining heavenly bodies, our earth with its waters, air, and all living creatures upon it. Such variety, such multitude of God’s creatures! “Since the first creatures were pleasing to God”—says Saint Gregory the Theologian—“He devises another world—the material one; and this is the harmonious composition of heaven, earth, and what is between them, wonderful in the beautiful qualities of each thing and even more worthy of wonder in the harmony and accord of the whole, in which both each relates to each other and all to all in beautiful proportion, serving the fullness of one world. And by this God showed that He is able to create not only what is akin to Him but also what is entirely foreign to Him in nature. Akin to Godhead are the intellectual natures understood only by intellect (that is, Angels), entirely foreign are the creatures subject to the senses (birds, fish, serpents, beasts), and from these latter even further removed from Divine nature are creatures entirely without soul and without motion” (plants, stones, earth, water, air, fire)163.

And so there was a time when the Son of God created the world which had not existed before. He spoke and all that pleased Him was accomplished during six days. “But when all this—earth, heaven and sea—had composed a world”—says Saint Gregory the Theologian—“there was needed a spectator of wisdom, the mother of all, and a reverent earthly king, that is, man was needed. Then the Son of God spoke: the vast heaven is inhabited by pure and ever-living servants, by immaculate minds, by good Angels, singers of praise, unceasingly hymning My glory. But earth is beautified with only irrational animals alone. Therefore it is pleasing to Me to create a race of creatures in which both would be contained—a race midway between the mortal and immortal, a rational man who would delight in My works, would be a wise keeper of heavenly mysteries, a great ruler of earth, a new Angel born from dust, a hymner of My power and My wisdom. Thus spoke the Son of God, and He creates a living being in which both are brought into unity—the invisible and visible nature—creates, I say, man; and taking the body from already created matter while placing life from Himself (what in God’s Word is known by the name of soul and the image of God), He makes as it were a second world—great in the small; He places on earth another Angel, composed of different natures, a worshiper, a spectator of visible creation, a keeper of intelligible creation, a king over earthly things, subject to the heavenly kingdom, earthly and heavenly, temporal and immortal, visible and intelligible”. Thus far Saint Gregory the Theologian164.

But let us listen on this very matter to the God-inspired Moses himself. When the earth was already adorned with all kinds of irrational creatures, then, says Moses, God said: “Let us make man in Our image and in Our likeness: and let him have dominion over the fish of the sea and the birds of the sky, the beasts and the cattle and all the earth and all the creeping things that creep upon the earth. And God created man in the image of God, created him: male and female He created them. And God blessed them, saying: increase and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and the beasts and the birds of the sky and all the cattle and all the earth and all the creeping things that creep upon the earth”165.

So man was created in the image and likeness of God—created so that he might rule over earthly creatures, be a spectator of God’s works, hymn God, render Him the debt of love and gratitude for bringing him and all earthly creatures from non-being into being, and in all this find blessedness for himself here on earth—and after his earthly life ends, enter into the inheritance of future life, into communion with God.

“And God said: Let us make man in Our image and in Our likeness”. To whom, brothers, does the Lord God speak before making man; with whom does He take counsel; who are these Persons equal to the Creator in whose image He wishes to make man? These are two Persons of the Holy Trinity: the Son of God and the Holy Spirit. It is God the Father speaking with Them166. So, brothers, man was created in the image of the Holy Trinity. For this reason the Holy Fathers find in man as it were a certain imprint of the Trinity of Divine Persons: mind, word, and breath167. And it is no wonder, brothers, that we have such a strong love for the number three that we do many things in life three times. All peoples, even non-Christian ones, hold the number three in special honor and use. By this they honor, without knowing it, the Holy Trinity; the human soul secretly acknowledges through this God as its Creator in the Trinity.

“And let him have dominion over the fish of the sea and the birds of the sky, the beasts and the cattle and all the earth and all the creeping things that creep upon the earth”. In this, among other things, brothers, consists the image of God in man: just as God reigns over all creation—over heaven and earth and all living creatures inhabiting heaven and earth—so man too is placed by God as an earthly king or as it were a viceroy of the heavenly King. This is the first characteristic of the image of God, though it is now greatly disfigured in us. In the previous discourse we saw that man lost very much authority over animals after sin, that many beasts and serpents now even frighten him. Yet even now there remains some trace of authority in man over animals; at least even now, as the Holy Apostle James says, every nature of beasts and birds, serpents and fish, is tamed and has been tamed by human nature168. And this is accomplished by the power of human intellect and will, which also constitute characteristics of the image of God in man; because the Lord God also has intellect, only infinite, and a will, only all-holy and all-perfect—so that human intellect and human will are as it were a reflection of Divine intellect and Divine will. However, in man’s present state his intellect and will are corrupted, darkened by sin and passions, for which reason the enlightenment of intellect and the formation of will, its direction toward good, is commonly called education—that is, the restoration of the image of God in man, though it is seldom that educators and teachers manage to fully direct the will toward good if it has been thoroughly corrupted from its very beginning or from earliest childhood. Furthermore: man, for example, loves truth: and God also loves truth169 and commands earthly judges to judge with justice170; your heart is inclined to love that is reasonable and conscious: God is love Himself171: He loves all His creatures, and our love, for example, for parents, for friends, and parents’ love for us, is only a faint reflection of the love with which the Lord God loves us. Earthly parents often forget their children, but God will never forget us, His children by grace: “Even if she forgets him”—He says—“I will not forget you. Behold, I have written your walls on My hands and you are always before Me”172. Your thought flies in an instant across immense distances: this too is an image of Godhead, which is omnipresent. In general, whatever good is in you, whatever is morally right, this is a reflection of what is in God. Therefore the Lord God requires of man that he completely resemble Him as the image resembles the Original. For example, Christ the Savior says: Therefore be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect173. Therefore no man, not even a savage, can exist without God; therefore man strives toward God. Let us then, brothers, strive with all our might to preserve in ourselves the image of God: in it is hidden the pledge of our blessedness on earth and in heaven. And what does the likeness of God consist in? The likeness to God or conformity to the Lord God consists in having a pure, luminous, God-enlightened intellect, such as the Prophets, Apostles and all the saints had; a will that chooses truth and good; a pure, sincere, good, simple heart. For this reason the Holy Fathers, who labored and labor to acquire such intellect, such will, and such heart more than all, were called and are called venerable fathers—that is, fathers venerable to God. And blessed, brothers, are the people who are venerable to God, whoever they may be: whether monks or living in the world: they shall see God face to face: we shall be like Him—says the Holy Evangelist John—for we shall see Him as He is174; Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God175—says the Savior Himself. And since it is our common duty to conform to the Lord, let us all endeavor, brothers, each according to his abilities, to succeed in conformity to the Lord. “And God created man in the image of God, created him: male and female He created them”. Just as the Lord took counsel in His trinitarian Council to create man, so He created him—that is, in the image of God; and moreover He created not only the male but also the female, because such is the universal law of generation and multiplication of earthly creatures—through the male and female sexes; and man, though by his soul he belongs to heaven, by his body belongs to earth, and therefore necessarily must, like many other things, submit to the universal earthly law. He created them male and female. He created the male thus: He took dust from the earth and breathed into the face of the formed human body the breath of life—that is, as Saint Gregory the Theologian says, He imparted to him His own Divine life, or sent into him a spirit which is a ray of invisible Godhead176.

“And man became a living soul”. From earth and from the Divine breath man became, by God’s omnipotence. And the first woman the Lord created thus: He brought a deep sleep upon Adam, and he slept—and He took one of his ribs and filled up the place of it with flesh instead, that is, filled with Adam’s own flesh the place left by the taken rib. “And the Lord God built the rib which He took from Adam into a woman and brought her to Adam”. From the rib taken while Adam slept, God created the first woman—so that all mankind would be as it were one body, and so that people could more easily care for and love one another. Having created the woman, God brought her to Adam who had awakened. Adam recognized that she was bone of his bones and flesh of his flesh; he called her woman—because she was taken from man, and he foretold that in all times a man and woman would constitute one flesh, so that a man because of his attachment to his wife would leave his father and mother, strong and natural as is the love of children for parents. Thus were the first people created.

Now let us turn our attention to our body and soul and see what they teach us through their origin and structure; how we should conduct ourselves with them. Man’s body was created from earth. Behold, brothers, a truth humbling to our pride: our body is from that very earth which we tread upon with our feet. Indeed, from what does the body of a developing infant in the mother’s womb grow and develop? From the mother’s blood and fluids. And where do blood and fluids come from? From the food taken by the mother, and food comes from earth. And so you see, brothers, that our body is formed from earth. If men would more often remember this, how much they would diminish their pride, how many whims invented for the adornment and gratification of the body they would abandon! Then naturally many would reason thus: I am earth and ashes177: why then should I pamper my body so, why worry excessively about it, its nourishment and clothing, when it will return to earth again, when all my care and labor for it will be repaid only with loathsome decay and destruction? In general, an attentive man in examining the nature of his body, its structure, its purpose, its needs, easily comes to a humble opinion of himself. Our body is only a temporary earthly house for our soul, constructed by the action of Divine omnipotence. Most people do not know their own dwelling, its structure, the arrangement of its parts, though a man lives in it on earth for several decades: our body is nourished, grows, lives, yet we do not know how all this happens; we would not know when we need to eat and drink if hunger and thirst did not tell us; we would not know how to restore our exhausted strength if nature itself did not show us the means for this in sleep. In his body man is a very limited and weak being, and entirely not his own but God’s.

Yet despite the fact that our flesh is weak and created from earth, and infinite wisdom of the Creator is manifested in it—we should not utterly neglect our body: it is a beautiful, living instrument of our soul and a co-heir of the Kingdom of Heaven: together with our soul our body too will one day partake of eternal blessedness. “If you wish to know what kind of wisdom the One who created us possesses”—says Saint John Chrysostom—“think of what is made from clay: what else but brick or tile? And yet the great artist God from this very substance—from which only brick and tile are made—was able to construct an eye so beautiful that all who look upon it marvel, and to give it such power that it reaches with sight to so great a height of the air, and through a small pupil embraces such great bodies: mountains, forests, hills, seas, and sky. And what shall we say of the pupil and the power of vision? If one considers only the eyelashes of the eye—this seemingly most insignificant of all the members—one will see in them great wisdom of the Creator God. Just as the bristles on grain stalks, protruding forward like spears, drive away birds and prevent them from settling on the fruit and breaking the still very tender stalk: so also on the eyes the hairs of the eyelashes protrude like bristles and spears, they ward off dust, dirt and everything that troubles from without, and protect the eyelids from damage. You will see no less wisdom in the eyebrows. Who does not marvel at their position? They are not so prominent as to darken the eyes, nor are they sunk too deep inside; but protruding from above like a roof’s overhang on a house, they catch the sweat that flows from the head and prevent it from harming the eyes”178. To this we shall add from ourselves that the sense of sight is protected in us most carefully because it is the noblest and most active sense: through sight we know above all the glory of God: “When I see”—says the Psalmist—“the heavens, the works of Your hands, the moon and the stars, which You have established: what is man that You remember him”179? Hearing ranks second after it. And through it we know the glory of God, as well as who we are, for what we were born and live, what will become of us after death, and so forth. This happens especially when we listen attentively in church to the reading and singing or the preaching of God’s Word. Through hearing we gain many other various forms of knowledge. Speaking of sight and hearing, it is natural, brothers, to come to the thought that He who created hearing and sight, surely sees and hears all things Himself. Indeed, did He who planted the ear not hear, or He who formed the eye not see180? Oh! Surely He hears and sees all things, even what we think and feel, or will yet think and feel in the future. Let us then be careful in our thoughts, words and deeds. Much could be said about the wisely arranged structure of other parts of the body: the brain and its coverings, about the structure of the heart, and so forth, but it is time now to say something about the soul.

What then shall we say about it? If God showed such wisdom in the body: then certainly much more incomparably in the soul, which was created in the image of God. Let us turn our attention to the human intellect. What has it not done in the world through its own wit? It has penetrated in part into the starry world; it has observed and in part applied to its benefit the laws of nature: it has invented thousands of diverse arts; it has created various sciences; in general through its intellect it performs many great deeds. But unfortunately, among carnal men the power and work of intellect is directed more toward increasing the comforts and pleasures of temporal life rather than toward easing man’s ascent to heavenly, eternal life: carnal, sinful will has bent even the entire intellect toward earth, while the Christian should think above all about heavenly things. Man, for example, soars in an air balloon and hovers in it above all earthly things; or travels over water in a steam ship and with enormous force of steam plows through the liquid element; or with the same force of steam makes incredible weights roll along an iron road; or in a few moments or minutes transmits his desires or thoughts to people at great distances; or finally has found the means with little effort to extract from the earth as large a quantity of fruit as possible. All these discoveries do honor to human intellect, and nearly all are very useful. But far greater would be the honor to man if with all these inventions he crawled less along the earth in evil; if with the enlightenment of intellect he remained less in the darkness of destructive self-will and passions raging more violently now than at any other time—and if he soared toward heaven, his true homeland, growing wise in the means of salvation. You soar, man, in an air balloon, but only for a brief pleasure of spectators, not for their genuine benefit. The stylites elevated on pillars for the labors of virtue, or true monks who labored and labor on mountains and wherever, are far more honorable than you: in elevating themselves from the earth in body they elevated themselves in spirit—as much for their own spiritual benefit as for the benefit of mankind, from which crowds sometimes gathered from everywhere for instruction from God’s saints; but you either do not elevate yourself in spirit at all, or elevate yourself only in body, and only when flying. In the liquid element you make for yourself a swift path, or over land—on a machine set in motion by steam—you fly like an arrow: honor to you, or rather—glory to the Lord illuminating the minds of men to make many useful discoveries in nature rich with mysteries and through them to make our much-laboring life more convenient. But, man, where is your swift ascent to heaven, to your true homeland? You are swift on the earthly path; but how slow and often immobile are you on the heavenly one! However swift your earthly path, it carries you no further than earthly dwellings, no further than earth; yet a most necessary path to heavenly dwellings and to endless life awaits you! You have found the means through a long wire and the lightning-like current of a certain force in nature, despite great earthly distances, to transmit your thoughts to others in a few minutes; and this does you honor. But how great would your honor be if with like speed, or incomparably greater speed, you more often raised your mind and heart upward—to God, and were not strongly attached to the earth; if your intellect soared more often in eternity awaiting you; if with the speed proper to intellect you were more often carried in spirit—now toward eternal torments, now—toward unimaginable endless bliss! Yet you rarely think of this. Concerning the nourishment of your body and its adornment with clothing you exert all effort and always do for it in this regard more than proper; why then do you take such little care, or none at all, for the nourishment of your immortal soul with the incorruptible food of God’s Word, the Life-giving Mysteries, and prayer, for adorning your soul with the garment of good deeds? In all this the earthly mind alone is visible; but the Christian should think above all about heavenly things.

Let us remember more often, brothers, that we are by our nature—as says Saint Gregory the Theologian—both earthly and heavenly, both temporal and immortal; that here on earth we are only being prepared, and after death we shall be taken to another world. Therefore let us not prefer the perishable and temporal to the imperishable and eternal. Amen.

Talk 14—On the Blessed State and Fall of the First People

In the previous discourse we spoke, among other things, brothers, of how the first people were created in the image and likeness of the Lord God. And since the Lord God possesses the highest, infinite blessedness—because He possesses to infinity everything necessary for blessedness—for this very reason the first people, created in the image and likeness of the all-sufficient and supremely blessed God, were at first content with everything and blessed, or entirely happy. Yes, they had reason to be content and happy. Their intellect was luminous and easily knew all that surrounded them: the Lord God Himself was the light of their intellect, and the first, most life-giving knowledge for them was knowledge of the Lord God. Their heart was full of love for God and for each other and was blessed by this love; the objects of worldly vanity, such as wealth, glory, excessive earthly comforts, whims and amusements, which satisfy not at all the immortal spirit of man and occupy people greatly in this present age, then had no place whatever in their pure heart; peace and joy in the Holy Spirit, unchanging and constant, dwelt in the heart of our ancestors, and with peace and joy—the Lord God Himself. Their will was holy; it strove to cling to the Lord God: it desired only to do what pleased Him. Like innocent children, the first people lived by God, were comforted by God, breathed by God: both the beginning and end of their thoughts, desires and deeds was the Lord God. Moreover, the cause of their blessedness was the very beautiful world, only just created by the almighty Word of God. And in this world—the work of Divine wisdom and goodness—what was lacking for the enjoyment of spiritual and bodily delights? For the first people the Lord God specially prepared the most beautiful paradise or garden worthy of an earthly ruler, and among many beautiful and fruitful trees, He planted in paradise the Tree of Life, the fruits of which had a wonderful property—to prevent disease and death, so that man would always be healthy and strong from eating these fruits and would never die in body. Finally the whole earth with all creatures upon it was given into the power of the first people. Only from one tree of all the trees in paradise the Lord under threat of death forbade them to eat the fruit, and He did this only to test their will, endowed with freedom, their devotion and obedience to God. This tree was called the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. “And the Lord God commanded Adam, saying: from every tree of the paradise you may eat food; but from the tree of knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat: for in whatever day you eat from it, dying you shall die” (Gen 2:16,17). It seems the first people should have considered themselves happy that in return for all the gifts of God presented to them with such love and generosity, they could offer to their Creator and Benefactor even one obedience, which is better than sacrifice181, and thereby earn new and greater mercies of God. But neither gratitude to the Creator nor fear of death held the first people in obedience to the Ruler of their life: they showed distrust of God, faithful and true in His words, and proved very trusting of a creature fallen from God through pride and disobedience—that is, of the devil, the father of lies. The devil, having been cast down from heaven for resistance to God together with the rebellious lower spirits (see discourse 7), looked with envy upon the blessedness of the first people, little less than the Angels. Knowing that men were created by the Lord free, that they were able to turn toward evil, just as it was possible for the good fallen spirits to become evil, knowing that it would be good to entangle their mind and darken their conscience more skillfully, to captivate their heart with a false representation of incomparably higher blessedness than that in which they were, he resolved to destroy them. And so the malicious and cunning spirit set up a deadly net for our ancestors, prepared so skillfully that they did not notice it in their heedlessness until they were entangled in it.

Behold how the temptation proceeded and how the very fall itself occurred. The devil entered into the serpent—a cunning animal—and through its tongue began speaking in paradise with Eve, who had not heard the prohibition personally from the Lord—not to eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil—but had only heard it from her husband. And the serpent said to the woman, says the holy chronicler Moses: “Why did God say you should not eat from any of the trees in paradise?” Note, brothers: with the very first words the devil strives to sow in Eve distrust of God, as if He were not true in His words, and to win her trust in himself; he presents God as a malevolent being, and himself—as some sort of benefactor, ready to be of service.

Brothers! Always be on guard of your thoughts and your heart: the devil even now tempts every person who strives to live piously, in a way pleasing to God, and especially when a person is engaged in pious works; he dares to slander God to men and in every way strives to steal from their hearts faith in Him. Even our Lord Jesus Christ, after His baptism, was led into the wilderness by the Spirit to be tempted by the devil, according to His humanity; behold proof that the devil’s temptation befalls all people who zealously strive to fulfill God’s commandments Mt 3:15. Beware of the age-old slayer of men; invoke more often in your aid the Lord Jesus Christ, who conquered the devil and has given us strong weapons against him: His terrible Name, fearsome to demons, and the life-giving cross. “Put on the whole armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the devil’s schemes”. How then can we recognize the schemes of the man-slayer against man? “By their fruits you shall know them.” He, like a thief, comes to man only to steal, kill, and destroy—that is, you shall recognize the presence of the tempter by the loss of your spiritual treasures: spiritual peace, living, heartfelt faith in God, hope in Him and love for Him, by a spirit of blasphemy, complaint, impatience, by a spirit of pride, envy, hatred, and other passions, by a certain involuntary doubt about the inviolable truths of faith, which destroys the soul, and so forth.

Let us turn our attention to the further words in Moses’ narrative of our ancestors’ fall. In response to the devil’s words: “Why did God say you should not eat from any of the trees in paradise?” in which was evident a strong desire to slander God, Eve replied: “We may eat from all the trees in paradise; but from the fruit of the tree which is in the middle of paradise, God said we should not eat from it and should not touch it, lest we die.” Eve, refuting the enemy’s first lie, speaks as if to say: “You speak falsely, as if God forbade us to eat the fruit from all the trees in paradise: no, we may eat from all the trees in paradise, but the Lord God said only that we should not eat and should not even touch the fruit only of that tree standing in the middle of paradise, lest we die.” “And the serpent said to the woman,—the devil continues his treacherous conversation with the wife and still seeks to sow in her distrust of God:—You will not surely die: for God knows that on the day you eat from it, your eyes will be opened and you will be like gods, knowing good and evil.” The slanderer, the father of all lies, levels a bold slander against God Himself, slanders Him who is the Truth. The Lord clearly said: “You shall die,” but the devil says: “You will not die”; and more, to destroy the fear of death, which guarded the first people from breaking the commandment, he promises them instead of death—life and divine omniscience: “You will not die,” he says, “for God knows that on the day you eat from it, your eyes will be opened and you will become like gods, knowing good and evil.” What then did Eve do? She heeded the conversation of the evil tempter, who had skillfully set a snare for her self-love instead of immediately turning her ear away from his lying words; she gazed at the forbidden fruit: “And the woman saw that the tree was good for food and that it was pleasing to the eye”; she did not think of God’s commandment but of her own enjoyment: she deliberately looked at what she ought not look at—and thereby stirred the sense of taste; finally she dreamed of divine knowledge: “and desirable for gaining wisdom.” What then? “Could it be that the forbidden tree alone is good, pleasant, and beautiful? Self-love, blinded, saw nothing else.” Eve inclined to the side of the tempter: and taking from its fruit, she ate: and gave to her husband with her, and he also ate. The temptation was accomplished: “The gold has lost its luster; the fine silver has lost its sheen”; the radiant image of God in people was darkened. Spiritual death seized them first, and with it clouded their intellect, robbed them of the purity of heart and along with it the peace and joy in the Holy Spirit, and cut off, as if wings, their best spiritual aspirations. “And the eyes of both were opened and they knew they were naked, and they sewed fig leaves and made loincloths for themselves.” The eyes of the first people were opened, but not as gods, but as sinful, mortal, wretched creatures; they were opened so that they might see their great misery, their spiritual and bodily nakedness. Before, when Adam and Eve were pure and innocent, the holiness of God covered them as with a garment, and better than any garment: and they knew no nakedness, living in divine purity. But when through sin they departed from God, fell from His divine communion, then, naturally, they felt their nakedness—that is, the painful feeling of being stripped of the garment proper to them—holiness, whose source is God. We too, brothers, lack this garment of purity, holiness, and good deeds: we too are naked, though not all understand that we are naked; covering our bodies with soft, fine, and costly garments, many of us pride themselves in them and think they are dressed as they should be, but they—like all of us—are naked: our souls are naked before the eyes of the Lord, though the body is covered decently. “You are naked”—says the Lord, meaning spiritually. Let us all concern ourselves, brothers, with garments of good deeds. If we do not acquire them, eternal darkness and death await us Mt 22:11-13.

The Lord did not delay in condemning the guilty. “And at noon Adam and Eve heard the voice of the Lord God walking in paradise: and they hid themselves from the Lord God in the middle of the paradise tree. And the Lord God called to Adam and said to him: Adam, where are you? Where have you fallen? And he said to him: Adam said, I heard Your voice walking in paradise and I was afraid because I am naked and I hid myself.” The Lord, calling the guilty to repentance, said that the cause of his nakedness was eating from the forbidden fruit. But Adam did not confess his guilt; instead he laid the blame on the woman and even on God: “The woman,” he said, “whom You gave to be with me, she gave me from the tree and I ate”; and the woman in turn blamed the serpent: “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.” Behold the destructive consequence of sin: sin makes man proud, inclined to lie, stubborn. This happened to the first people; it has always been so; and it is now. Both adults and children are often ashamed to confess the sin they have committed and they refer either to human weakness or to various circumstances or to other people; often you see in the guilty only pride and stubbornness; sometimes you meet such sinners (and we are all sinners) in whom neither humility nor acknowledgment before God of their guilt is evident. May God protect everyone from these satanic weeds.

Brothers! We are all undoubtedly sinful, and “if we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us”. In times of temptation or after falling into sin—there is but one salvation for us: humility, acknowledgment of our guilt before God, and sincere sorrow for our sins. An arrogant sinner is detestable in God’s eyes and does not deserve His forgiveness; on the contrary, a humble sinner is pleasing to Him, and God gives him the grace of justification. “The Lord opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble”.

Since God is righteous, and the sin that had been committed was the deed of man’s free will, who proved inattentive, ungrateful, and distrustful toward his Creator, and since it was very easy not to violate the commandment given its ease of fulfillment: God determined a punishment fitting for the ancestors, and in them for all people. To Eve, who had been first deceived, He foretold great sorrows and sighs, pains in bearing children, and subjection to her husband; to Adam, for his sin, the Lord pronounced a curse upon the earth and foretold excessive labors, sorrows, and griefs, which henceforth would be joined to earning their daily bread, until they and all men would return through death to that earth from which they were formed. And since they were now unworthy to eat of the fruits of the Tree of Life, which would have only prolonged their wretched existence and with it their evil, the Lord cast the first people from paradise to till the earth, and stationed a Cherub at the gate of paradise with a fiery, revolving sword to guard the way to the Tree of Life. And so labor and sorrow, sickness and death became the lot of humanity, by God’s decree. And we all know this decree is strictly fulfilled. Nevertheless, the Lord did not rage against us entirely: in His incomparable mercy He left the sorrowful hearts of our ancestors hope of a Deliverer, who should deliver them and all mankind from sin, curse, and death. This Deliverer is the Son of God. Since He was to be born of a Virgin without a man, from the Holy Spirit, He was therefore called the Seed of the woman.

Our talk today has run on longer than necessary. Let us therefore hasten to bring it to an end by offering you a moral lesson from what has been said.

The first people fell into sin through lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, and pride. From this follows the following rule for our life: we should by no means gratify the flesh that loves sin, since it is a dangerous, domestic enemy of ours; we should crucify it with its passions and desires, and should not gaze with lust upon what is forbidden by God’s commandments, even if it seems pleasing to the eye. Let us recall the Savior’s words: “If your right eye causes you to stumble, tear it out and throw it away from you: it is better for you that one of your members perish than that your whole body be cast into hell fire”—that is, decide not to look at what causes you to stumble, or: “Everyone who looks at a woman to lust after her has already committed adultery with her in his heart”. Let us love humility above all from our whole hearts: it is the foundation of all virtue and the Lord God looks upon it with favor, as the all-holy Virgin teaches us: “The Lord has looked upon the humility of His handmaid”, and with our whole soul let us detest all pride as the offspring of proud Satan: it destroys all virtue and makes a person infected with it repugnant to both God and men. From our whole heart let us believe in God and in His holy word, and equally in the Church, the keeper of truth, and let us be afraid to believe—under pain of death—all that others speak against God and the Church. Amen.

Talk 15—On Original Sin

In the previous church discourse, brothers, we spoke of how the first people were at first innocent before the Creator and Lord, and therefore blessed. The Lord God, the source of all life, the light of every mind, peace and joy for every pure heart, was always with them; He dwelt in their hearts; He loved them and gave them inexpressible peace and joy—and if the first people had forever remained in their innocence and in their blessedness: then all people born of them would likewise be innocent and blessed. But Adam and Eve, as we have seen, did not preserve their innocence, did not fulfill the obedience laid upon them by their Creator, and—dreaming of being more than they were, proved to be proud, self-loving, and faithless—and violated God’s commandment. And as through disobedience, pride, and distrust of God they departed from Him, so He departed from them. But what is life without God, when all life—whether in heaven or on earth—comes from God, and without God there is no life? That is why, brothers, the first people, as soon as they sinned, felt disorder, confusion, sorrow, and tightness in the soul: because by the law of God’s righteousness, “there is distress and anguish for every person who does evil”; they suddenly noticed that their soul was darkened; their thoughts and desires were troubled; their imagination and memory began to be clouded. Instead of former joys and peace of soul, they now had to endure the most agonizing labors and all kinds of misery; finally sorrow and a life of suffering awaited them, and after it—death. But what is most terrible—the devil, who delights in human suffering, gained power over them. The very elements—that is, air, fire, and so forth—after sin became hostile to them: from that time they began to feel the harmful effects of cold, heat, winds, and bad weather. Beasts became fierce and began to look upon men as upon enemies—whereas before, when people were innocent, beasts feared man as their king. All that became true for the first people after sin necessarily had to become—as it indeed has become and still is—for all people born from them: because all men were in Adam as the fruit is in the seed; and what the seed is, so is the fruit; or as the tree is, so are its fruits; as the root of the tree is, so are its branches. “A bad tree cannot bear good fruit”. Among other consequences of sin, mankind was visited by various diseases, which with the passage of time became more diverse and severe; furthermore: men soon forgot that they were brothers and ceased to love one another; more than that: they began to attack one another, to be proud, to hate, to envy, to deceive, to torture, and to murder one another. Such did men become after the first sin. The sinful state of our nature, with which we are born and in which we are born, is called original sin, and all the evil consequences of it for men are called the consequences of original sin. When, brothers, you notice weakness of mind in yourselves, feel evil in your heart, or experience grief, sickness of the body, and various misfortunes: humble yourselves then before the judgment of God’s righteousness and blame yourselves or sin, which has produced all troubles in the world, and with all the strength of your soul hate this greatest of evils.

The consequences of original sin are worthy of tears especially in that human flesh has come to dominate the soul, as it ought not to do; the better has become subject to the worse; the flesh began to incline the soul to every sin, whereas the soul—the divine breath—instead of ruling the flesh, itself began to live according to the sinful inclinations of the flesh. There remained, to be sure, in the soul knowledge of God, a striving toward Him, a desire for union with Him: but all this was weak; and besides, the flesh strove as quickly as possible to stifle, to lull this: that is why all people very quickly became corrupted—so much so that it was necessary to wash them from the face of the earth with the waters of the Flood. God said of the antediluvian people: “My Spirit will not contend with humans forever, for they are mortal”. But the evil of the flesh or of carnal men was not destroyed by the Flood, but only weakened, and therefore it spread rapidly after the Flood as well.

To subject sinful flesh to the soul, so that the soul does not fulfill the desires of the flesh, man must work much: throughout his entire life he must endure an inevitable struggle between flesh and spirit. When a Christian strives to change his life for the better: he will at once notice that “the flesh desires what is contrary to the spirit, and the spirit what is contrary to the flesh”; the flesh wishes to conquer the spirit, and the spirit—the flesh; the flesh wishes to be proud and boastful, whereas the spirit, on the contrary, wishes to humble itself; the flesh wants to rage, grow hateful, quarrel, and take revenge in deed or word, whereas the spirit does not wish this; on the contrary—it wishes to forgive everything with gentleness; the flesh wants to wallow in deeds of which it is shameful even to speak: whereas the spirit avoids them and desires only chastity; the flesh wants to lie, flatter, deceive, scheme, practice deception and hypocrisy, but the spirit hates this and desires to speak only truth and to act simply, without any scheming or hypocrisy; the flesh wants to hate men, whereas the spirit wants to love every man; the flesh wants to live in idleness and laziness, whereas the spirit will not tolerate this; on the contrary it seeks exercise in blessed labors; the flesh seeks revelries and feasting, whereas the spirit turns from them and wishes either to live temperately or to fast; the flesh wants to seek in this world honor, glory, wealth: whereas the spirit despises all this and strives only for eternal good things; the flesh flees from prayer or communion with God, whereas the spirit lives only to pray; the flesh strives to destroy faith in all heavenly things and to live only by what is earthly; whereas the spirit places all its joy in contemplation of the heavenly, invisible.

Such is the struggle between flesh and spirit, such is the contradiction within ourselves: one in us wants one thing, and another wants another. And this struggle occurs in us because of original sin. All, even great saints, noticed this strange struggle between flesh and spirit in themselves. Thus St. Apostle Paul says of himself: “I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh: for to will is present with me, but to do good is not. For the good that I want to do, I do not do, but the evil I do not want to do, this I do. But if I do what I do not want to do, then it is no longer I who do it, but sin dwelling in me”. St. Gregory the Theologian speaks thus of this strange contradiction within himself: “I endure the unceasing turmoil of warfare between those mutually hostile and intimately conflicting flesh and soul: I am the image of God and am drawn into sinfulness; the worse in me unjustly opposes the better; either I flee from sins and resist them, yet not without effort, after many struggles and only with heavenly help. For there are two, truly two minds in me: one—good, and it follows all that is beautiful; another—bad, and it follows what is base; one mind goes toward light and is ready to submit to Christ; whereas another mind—of flesh and blood—is drawn into darkness and is content to surrender into the captivity of the devil; or one is delighted with earthly things and seeks what is profitable for itself not in what is eternal, but in what is fleeting, loves feasting, quarrels, burdensome overeating, the shame of dark deeds and deceits, goes by the broad way and, covered in impenetrable mist of folly, amuses itself with its own ruin; whereas the other—is transported by heavenly things and things hoped for, as present; in God alone places the hope of life—whereas earthly things, subject to various accidents, it considers not as permanent things but as fleeting smoke; loves poverty, labors, and blessed concerns and goes by the narrow way of life”.

Why then have we spoken all this of original sin and its consequences? Why have we pointed out this corruption in men; why have we presented this ingrained disease of mankind, which oppresses and weighs down, but which men have no means within themselves to heal? Because we wish to show that for people, in their sinful corruption and in their distance from God, divine aid was necessary—as it still is now—there was a need for—as there still is now—a Divine Savior, without whom they would perish in their sins irretrievably and forever. This Savior was promised by the all-good God to the first people soon after their sin, and He gradually prepared mankind to receive Him—as we shall see later—through prefigurements and prophecies, and finally actually sent Him into the world. By faith in this Divine Savior men were saved long before His coming, just as they are saved and will be saved after His coming. This Savior of the whole world, the Son of God, the God-man Jesus Christ, fulfilled for us all obedience to God, “obedient even to death, even death on the cross” and, having given men saving precepts, showed through His own life an example for our life and has given us all the divine powers “needed for life and godliness” so that by His grace we can overcome our passions and evil habits and inclinations. By His most pure blood, shed for us and now offered on the altars of Christian churches, He renewed and renews our nature corrupted by sin so that “if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation”—that is, a true Christian becomes a completely new person, holy and pleasing to God.

We, brothers, are called Christians; but here is what the Apostle says of true Christians: “Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.” Do we crucify our flesh with its passions and desires? Do we not gratify it in everything? Alas! We gratify it in everything: we live carelessly, using little or none of the aids so readily offered to us daily in God’s Word and in the Mysteries of faith for our salvation.

Brothers! Eternal salvation is desirable and priceless; and eternal damnation is fearful. But one cannot be saved without arming oneself against carnal desires, while being Christians only in name and not in deeds.

Therefore, calling upon the Lord Jesus Christ, our Helper, our almighty Savior, to our aid, let us resist sin, not gratify the flesh in its desires, and let us begin to walk in renewal of life. Amen.

Ps 148:5

Gen 18 ch.

Gen 19 ch.

Gen 28 ch.

Nav 5:14 and ff.

Is 6.

Dan 7:10.

Lk 1:26.

Lk 2:13

Job 38:7

Col 1:16

2King 19:35

Service for November 8. The Bodiless Powers. On the liturgical verses, ch. 2.

Raging with the storm of soul-destroying passions, Master Christ, calm the sea of desires within us.

Hebr 12:22-24.

Discourse XV, p. 332 in the Russian translation.

There.

E.g., see St. Cyril of Jerusalem in Discourse XV, p. 352 and others.

Gen 4:17.

Days of Divine Truth of the Church, Part II, p. 3, Ps. 9:5.

Prov 8:15.

Col 1:16.

On the Heavenly Hierarchy, ch. 6, p. 2.

Ladder, ch. 1.

Days of Divine Truth of the Church, Part 2, p. 3.

Ps 17:11

Ps 79:2

Hebr 1:3

Canon of the Guardian Angel. Verses, ch. 2.

Verses and Canon of the Bodiless Ones. Verse 1.

Canon of the Bodiless Ones. Song 5, p. 5.

St. Athanasius the Great in his discourse on virginity.

2Cor 6:14

Mt 8:28-34

Mt 8:30-32.

Lk 7:21

Mt 10:1

Eph 6:12

Lk 8:30,33,35

1Pet 5:8

Apok 20:2,7

Jn 12:31

Eph 2:2

Mt 9:34

E.g., see Canon of the Guardian Angel, p. 3, v. 4.

Rom 7:23.

Eph 6:10-12

1Jn 3:8

Catechetical Discourse of Metropolitan Philaret, Part 1, p. 32.

Mt 17:15

Mt 9:33

Mt 8:28,34

Explanation of Sunday and Festal Gospels, p. 75.

1Pet 5:8

Lk 22:3-6 Jn 13:27-30

2Pet 3; Juda 1:6, Mt 25 ch.

Lk 12:26

St. John of Damascus, An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith, Book 2, ch. 4.

1Tim 3:6.

Col 3:12

Col 1:12,13.

Solom 13:5.

Genesis, ch. 1.

Is 45:12

In the Liturgical prayer of the headdrop.

Six Days of Creation.

Discourse 19, p. 387, vol. 11, Discourses of Chrysostom.

Jn 3:5.

Eph 1:18.

Mt 5:8.

1Tim 6:16

Prayer book, prayer for a woman bearing a child on the 40th day.

Jn 3:19

Six Days of Creation.

There.

Notes on the Book of Genesis, p. 18 and 19.

Catechetical Discourses, Protohegumen I. Yakhontov, Discourse 6, on the fifth day of creation. Works.

Apok 1:7

1Thes 4:17

Gen 1:8

Theological Works of St. John of Damascus, Book 2, ch. 9, on the waters.

Gen 1:10.

Gen 1:11.

Mt 6:30.

Hebr 7:10

Gen 1:14-19

Astronomy by Zeleny.

Sir 23:27

St. Demetrius of Rostov, Works, Part II, p. 618.

It was the Roman Emperor Augustus who first introduced this (Isid. lib. 17 in Gretzero—de Sancta Cruce—citatus). Only under him and the following emperors until Constantine the Great was there no cross on the imperial standard: it was set up on it by Constantine the Equal-to-the-Apostles (Niceph. lib. 7 cap. 49 in praef. sua historiae). When the emperor was depicted on coins or elsewhere, often underneath the sphere on the Roman tongue they would inscribe: “ruler of the earth”, or more precisely, “ruler of the earthly sphere” (rector orbis). Gretz.

Is 66:1

Ps 103:24

Astronomy by Zeleny.

Catechetical Discourses, Protohegumen I. Yakhontov, on the fifth day of creation.

Works of the Holy Fathers, Year 2, Book 3, p. 143.

Ps 8:4,5.

Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Discourse IX, p. 158.

p. 157.

Book titled “The Beholder of God’s Works in the Universe.”

Book titled “The Majesty of God in All the Kingdoms of Nature.”

Zoology by Yu. Semashko.

See the book: The Majesty of God in the Kingdoms of Nature.

Ps 103:24

Job 39:26,27

Mt 6:26

Lk 17:37

Mt 16:18

Ps 32:9

Hebr 1:3

Discourse on the Book of Genesis, 3rd discourse.

Job 39:9,10

Ps 144:9

Discourse of Chrysostom on the occasion of the deposition of the emperor, p. 11.

Is 1:3

Discourse 11.

2Cor 4:18

Collected Works of the Holy Fathers, year 2, book 4, pages 156 and 157

Collected Works of the Holy Fathers, year 2, book 4

Gen 1:26-28

Saint Irenaeus

Divine Damascene, page 6

Jac 3:7

Ps 10:7

Is 1:17

1Jn 4:8

Is 49:15,16

Mt 5:48

1Jn 3:2

Mt 5:8

Collected Works of the Holy Fathers, book 4

Gen 18:27

Homilies on Evil, occasioned by the fall of royal power, section 10

Ps 8:4,5

Ps 93:9

1 Kings 15:22

Testimonies to this are full of various prayers, verses of canons, and hymns

Lk 8:12

Eph 6:11

Jn 10:10

Lam 4:1

Apok 3:17

1Jn 1:8

Jac 4:6

Gal 5:24

Mt 5:29

Mt 5:28

Lk 1:48

Rom 2:9

Mt 7:18

Gen 6:3

Gal 5:17

Tikhon of Voronezh, On Christian Duty, section 58

Rom 7:18-20

Works of the Holy Gregory the Theologian, book 4, pages 305 and 306, in Russian translation

Phil 2:8

2Pet 1:3

2Cor 5:17

Rom 13:14

Rom 6:4

God the Providence of the World

Talk 16

Brothers, we know how this visible world was created and the invisible one, to which the Angels belong; how among all the creatures of the visible world, man appeared as well; how he was at first sinless and blessed, and how later he fell into sin and subjected himself to various misfortunes in this brief life, especially to passions, sorrows, sicknesses, and death. We know that by God all things were created from nothing: all that is above in heaven and all that is below on earth; we know that even the luminous beings of the heavenly hosts, the Lord gloriously brought into being from non-being206, that is, from nothing. Vast and boundless is God’s world! But however great it is, however boundless it seems, to the Lord it is now, when already it exists, no more than a mote in the heavens, or like a drop of morning dew falling upon the earth207. And it exists only because God the Creator wills it; because He exercises providence over His creation. “You created all things, it is said in the Revelation of the Holy Apostle John the Theologian, and by Your will they both were created and exist208.”

So, brothers, in order that creatures, created from nothing, might be what God created them to be, it is necessary that He also exercise providence over them, that is, preserve their life and the powers which He gave them, direct them toward a good end, assist all good things, and restrain or correct and turn to good consequences the evil that arises among rational creatures through their turning away from good209; in short, that He never for a moment abandon His creation to its own devices, but preserve it through His supreme wisdom, almightiness, and goodness. God’s providence over the world is as necessary for the world as the soul is for the body. While the soul is in the body, the body lives, it has beauty; all within it is orderly and arranged. But as soon as the soul leaves the body, the body becomes dead and ugly: all its order and beauty perish; all within it breaks down and decays. The same is true of the world. As long as God exercises providence over it, as long as the Spirit of God vivifies it, then in it there is life, beauty, order in all things, small and great: in the movement of the celestial bodies and in the movement of the sap in plants. But as soon as the Lord withdraws His Spirit from the world, then all its life, all its beauty will vanish: “When You hide Your face, they are terrified; when You take away their breath, they die and return to the dust. When You send forth Your Spirit, they are created, and You renew the face of the earth210.” So, brothers, the Lord continually and with love exercises providence over the world. “You love all things that exist, says the wise Solomon, and loathe nothing that You have made, for You would not have made anything if You had hated it. How would anything have endured unless You had willed it, or been preserved unless called forth by You? But You spare all things, because they are Yours, Lord, lover of souls”211! The holy and righteous Job says that God Himself oversees all that is under heaven, knowing all things that are on earth, all that He has created212. Again, in Scripture it is said that God cares for all things213.

And how could the all-good Creator not exercise providence over His creation? Even people devote their utmost care to the upbringing and health of their own children, and among animals we see the most necessary care for the preservation of their young. If creatures so care for their offspring, would God then abandon His creatures without providence? To whom are they dearer and more beloved than to Him? “How could He fail to care for His creation, asks one teacher of the Church, He who created it for the multitude of His goodness”214?

We shall not speak here of how God exercises providence over the Angels. This providence of the Lord over the creatures nearest to Him is mysterious and little known to us. We might say only that if the Angels have been established forever in goodness and can no longer do evil, the Lord God has preserved and keeps them steadfast against evil through His love for them215. Nor shall we expatiate on how God exercises providence over the visible world. This providence is evident. We see, for example, that the sun rises every day and after the darkness of night illuminates the earth with its bright light, then sets and takes away its light and as if sends in its place the moon and stars, and then rises again. This is enough for us to recognize God’s Providence over the world; in the movement of the heavenly lights the finger of the Almighty is evident. Therefore, each time, when looking at the sun or other lights, one can joyfully and with a feeling of gratitude say: “Truly the all-good God exercises providence over the world. It is He, the all-good one, whose sun shines on the evil and the good216.” We see that fire gives light, warmth, and burns; bread nourishes, water quenches and satisfies thirst; air refreshes and vivifies; the earth brings forth plants and animals multiply. This is enough to assure us to say: “The all-good God truly exercises providence over the world.” Otherwise, how would the elements, so wisely composed, not fall apart into their component parts? How could they have their effects if the wise Creator of the world did not maintain them in their very composition and keep them in order? How could animals, senseless and unreasoning in themselves, or reasoning animals like humans, live, grow, and multiply? Moreover, when we look at the magnificent spectacle of vegetation and see how various types of grasses and flowers emerge and form on the earth’s surface; how trees are covered with green leaves and some with fruit, we have ample reason to confirm: yes, there is God’s providence. Plants reveal an invisible, wise power, which adorns even the smallest flower as Solomon, the richest and wisest of all kings, was not clothed in all his glory. This power is precisely the Spirit of God, the life-giving one. “God clothes them so”217. Thus, the providence of God over the material world is evident.

Let us speak of God’s providence, which is closest to us: about God’s providence over people, and specifically say that the Lord God exercises providence over kingdoms and nations. Imagine, brothers, any state or realm with its authorities. How many authorities exist in it, beginning with the sovereign down to the lowest authority! And do you know how necessary each, even the lowest, authority is in society? So necessary that one cannot eliminate it without damaging the society in which it is established. Authorities, brothers, like bonds in buildings, bind together the life of society. Without them, societies would inevitably fall. Who devised these authorities in societies? Who established them? The Lord God Himself established them. “No authority exists except from God, says the Apostle; and those that do exist have been established by God”218.

See, brothers, how God exercises providence over kingdoms and nations, how He wisely bound and held together a multitude of people into one whole through authorities, especially through the autocratic, kingly authority. That is why whoever resists authority resists God’s command. “Therefore, he who resists authority, it is said, resists God’s command”219. Besides various authorities established from above, God exercises providence over people through the conscience of each person. Conscience is our impartial judge: it carefully watches over our thoughts and desires, words and deeds: nothing escapes it; and whoever does not violate it, whoever obeys it, it guides him excellently, rewarding or punishing him for every good or not good thought, desire, word, or deed. Evidence that God exercises providence over people is all Scripture. Whoever has read it with attention and judgment could not fail to notice that God continually exercises providence over mankind and is the immortal King, Judge, and Father of mankind, ruling over its destinies according to His wise, good, and inscrutable laws. “How then, some will ask, can one explain so-called chance misfortunes that befall people, if truly the all-good Providence directs people?” And they serve, brothers, as evidence that the Heavenly Father cares for us, and especially for our eternal destiny. For example, let us suppose that from the most trivial causes, seemingly, a fire breaks out and destroys an entire city; or from such trivial causes, say, from the slightest oversight, an enormous ship with a multitude of people perishes in the waves of the sea; or people, sometimes out of the blind passion of one man, destroy one another like beasts in civil strife or in wars with other peoples. Shortsighted and weak-willed people, scandalized by such apparently chance occurrences, say: “Where is Providence then? This is blind chance.” No: here too, brothers, as we have said, there lies hidden a wise Providence. Once in Jerusalem during the earthly life of the Savior, a tower fell and killed eighteen people with its fall; and at another time the Roman governor in Judea, Pilate, in his anger killed many Galileans and mingled their blood with their sacrifices. Was this a chance event? No, it was not; all this was done with the knowledge and permission of God’s Providence. About these two unfortunate occurrences, the Lord asked His listeners when they were told about them: “Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered this way? Or those eighteen on whom the tower of Siloam fell and killed them—do you think they were more guilty than all the others living in Jerusalem? And He Himself gave such an answer: No, I tell you, but unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did220”—that is, no, these unfortunate ones were not more sinful before God than all those living in those cities. But the wise and all-good Providence allowed them to perish bodily, both for their sins and for their cleansing, and also for the instruction of the living, that they might repent of their sins and change their life, from careless becoming careful (Thoughts of St. John Chrysostom). So we too, brothers, hearing of misfortunes that befall people and seeing them ourselves, must absolutely keep in mind the words of the Savior mentioned above and receive these occurrences as the work of God’s Providence for the salvation of people. A public calamity is an instruction for a people: and woe to people who are not instructed by it.

Brothers! The Lord, loving us, disciplines us. Having disciplined our first parents for their sins with sorrows, sicknesses, and death, will He not employ means of instruction and cleansing for our sinful souls—sorrows, sicknesses, and other various means that harm the body but cannot destroy the soul221, but rather heal it from sins through suffering itself? Without doubt He will employ them if it proves necessary. Therefore, when we see severe and prolonged illnesses among people, sometimes lasting tens of years—examples of which we see in the Gospel, and which we observe now—let us thank God’s Providence, which through bodily illness and spiritual sorrow purges the soul from sins, to make it worthy of the imperishable and eternal blessings of the Kingdom of Heaven. Illnesses are sent by God for sins. “See, you are well, the Savior says to the healed paralytic; sin no more, so that nothing worse happens to you222.” If we see sudden violent death of people, let us be instructed by it and say to ourselves: this is God giving us a lesson to live carefully, in virtue, in remembrance of death and of the terrible judgment of God. If a bloody war rages somewhere, let us say to ourselves: apparently the sins of a people have become too great and God disciplines and instructs the people through war—to turn to faith and piety. Wars have always been for the Lord a means (among other means) of punishing people’s sins and of instructing them223. In general, at the sight of misfortunes that befall people, we must remember that the greatest, the only truly terrible misfortune is sin, while all other misfortunes serve either to cleanse sin, or to be the fitting punishment for sin and to instruct those people who see or hear of the misfortune. And if sometimes great sinners are not punished here and live happily, carefree: then from this it does not follow that God does not exercise providence over people, or that He exercises it unequally for all. God does not punish such people here in order to punish them there—in the other life. One must always remember that there are two lives for each person: one present, and another—the life of the age to come, of which it is spoken in the Creed. If someone is not punished here for his sins, he will be punished there. But another suffers sorrows, griefs, and illnesses here, and in return will there enjoy bliss. All this can be seen in the example of the rich man and Lazarus mentioned in the Holy Gospel: one was hard-hearted and enjoyed himself here all the days, brightly; the other was righteous and sick, lay at the gate of the rich man, covered with festering sores. But the first of them was sent to torment after death—for carelessness about his soul and for inattention to the sick one who was always before his eyes; and the latter—for his sufferings endured here—was after death carried by Angels to Abraham’s bosom—into the Kingdom of Heaven224.

Therefore, brothers, with steadfast faith in God’s Divine Providence over us, let us entrust ourselves, one another, and our entire life to Christ God our Savior, committing to Him the salvation of us in the destinies known to Him, while ourselves not remaining idle. Amen.

Talk 17—On the Redemption of Mankind and Its Preparation

And now, brothers, we will speak of God’s providence, but not of general providence, but of a special, extraordinary kind225. We have said before that God, who created all the world from nothing, has since its appearance and until now exercised providence over it, watches over it from the height of His holy throne, preserves and sustains it with His almighty Word, and is therefore called the Almighty. From the Seraph, the spirit closest to God, down to the blade of grass, all enjoy His providence or care. Now we will speak of that providence which the Lord has over the lost race of mankind, over the salvation of His rational sheep: “because He, as eternal Love, does not desire the death of sinners, but that they turn and live”226. In what, then, does this special providence of God toward us consist? “God so loved the world, says the Lord Jesus Christ, that He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life”—that is, the special providence of God over people consists in their redemption from eternal ruin through the sufferings and death of the Son of God, who came down from heaven for the sake of us humans and for our salvation.

Before God appeared in flesh on earth, the Son of God, to live among people and teach them the knowledge of God and a holy life pleasing to God, to suffer and die for them, a long time passed, many centuries. Why was this so? Because, as people of their own will turned away from God and strayed from their path, they needed to experience all the harm of willfulness, of sin; they needed to learn by experience how false were the words of the devil: “You will be like gods”; they needed time to experience their helplessness in struggling against sin, so that of their own will they would earnestly desire divine help when their own efforts were useless. It was for this very reason that the Heavenly Father postponed the coming of His Son to earth for several thousands of years after the fall of the first people. And during this time people saw and experienced every evil and every disaster that sin, the murderous devil, evil human will, or the righteous wrath of God could produce—so that in the end all people began to desire and expect divine help, all learned from experience that evil is bitter, and to be far from God is bitter227.

So, brothers, without God or far from God—life is hard for a person. This is not even life, but some kind of phantom of life, or rather—death. There is no need to explain how this happens: spiritual death is experienced by everyone who turns away from God, and one knows that it is very grievous. What soul of a person who does evil has not experienced sorrow and tightness228?

When evil in mankind reached its extreme degree, when people experienced their powerlessness for good, clearly saw all and felt the need for a heavenly Deliverer from sin; when the torment of the enemy of mankind, the devil, had also reached its extreme—then the time of fulfillment came, and God the Father sent His Only Son, through whom He created the ages. And He, the All-Compassionate One, unable to bear to see mankind tormented by the devil229, came to us on earth to save us and to destroy the works of the devil230.

Long before the Savior came to earth, however, God was preparing people gradually to receive this Divine Messenger through His revelations and prophecies about Him, and also through types, or preliminary likenesses of what the Son of God was to do for mankind’s salvation. This is because prophecies and types nurtured faith and hope in the people for a future Redeemer, and, being exclusively the work of God, they irrefutably assured and assure careful and well-intentioned people of the Divinity of our Savior, to whom they refer. If He had come suddenly, not pointed out to people beforehand, they would not have believed Him that He was the Son of God, despite His miracles, as there were also many people who performed miracles by God’s power. And among people it happens that if a king or royal son wishes to visit certain cities or other places in the realm, the people are informed of this in advance, so that they might prepare for his arrival and receive him as is fitting. So it was here as well. The coming to earth of the Son of God was proclaimed long in advance on earth, a proclamation that was not made for any of the prophets or other holy ones of the Old Testament—an honor befitting only the King of all—God! Already to the progenitor Adam, after he sinned, it was said by God for consolation that the Seed of the woman, that is, the God-man, who was to be born of the Most Pure Virgin and by the Holy Spirit, would crush or break the head of the serpent231, the deceiver of mankind—the devil, who had worked through the serpent. Then to Abraham after the flood it was proclaimed from God that the great, promised Descendant of his would be the cause of heavenly blessing for all the peoples of the earth232; then to Isaac, the son233, and to Jacob, the grandson of Abraham234, the same was confirmed; and in various rites of Jewish faith or in certain events with the Jewish people and with certain of their individuals, God had, thousands of years in advance, set forth much of the circumstances of the birth, life, sufferings, and death of the Son of God for the sins of people, while the Holy Spirit in like manner, several centuries in advance, predicted His birth, life, teaching, miracles, His death for the sins of the world, and much else. Thus, for example, to show to people beforehand the unburnt bearing in the womb of the Mother of God of the Fire of God’s Divinity of Christ, to the Prophet Moses was shown a bush, burning with fire and not being consumed235; likewise, the three youths in the fiery furnace of Babylon or Chaldea were preserved unharmed amid a terrible conflagration236. The Church’s hymn explains this very thing, sung at the All-Night Vigil on Sundays or on feasts of the Mother of God: “The righteous youths in the furnace the birth of the Mother of God saved, then depicted in image, now accomplished in deed237.” To show beforehand, in likeness, the cross-sufferings for us and the death of our sinless Redeemer, Jesus Christ, the Hebrews were commanded to slay every year at the Passover feast an unblemished lamb, that is, without any blemish, and to eat it with unleavened bread and bitter herbs238; to show beforehand the three-day lying of the body of the Lord Savior in the grave, the Prophet Jonah, by God’s arrangement, lay in the belly of the whale for three days and three nights239; and to nourish in people the faith in the cleansing blood of the sinless, sacrificed by His own will for all the Lamb of God Jesus Christ, among the Hebrews the blood of goats and calves was continually used for sprinkling and cleansing of people and things240; to train the people beforehand to believe in the saving, cross-sufferings of the future Redeemer, a likeness of Him hanging on the cross was shown in the brazen serpent raised by Moses, so that the Hebrews, stung by serpents in the Aravian desert, when looking at this image, would be healed241. Besides, among the Prophets—the great Moses predicted that God would raise up for the Hebrews from among their brothers a great Prophet like himself242; the Prophet Isaiah foretold that the Savior would be born of a Virgin243; the Prophet Micah—that He would be born in Bethlehem244; the Prophet Malachi predicted that the Savior would come to the Temple of Jerusalem, rebuilt after the Babylonian captivity, and that a forerunner would be sent before Him245; the Prophet Zechariah predicted the royal entry of the Savior on a young donkey into Jerusalem246; the Prophet Isaiah and King-Prophet David predicted with such clarity the sufferings of the Savior as if they themselves had been present at His sufferings and stood at His cross and there described all that happened to Him247. The Prophet Daniel, or rather the Archangel Gabriel, to the Prophet Daniel, foretold that only 490 years remained until the coming of Christ the Savior248. Thus the most important circumstances of the life, sufferings, death, resurrection from the dead, and ascension of the Savior into heaven were beforehand written down in the Old Testament in types and likenesses or predicted by the Prophets in such a way that the life of the Savior with all His teaching and deeds was evidently the fulfillment of what was in God’s mind from eternity. This is why Christ the Savior said to His hasty brothers who asked Him to reveal Himself more quickly to the world: “My time has not yet come; but your time is always ready”249; this is why also He said to His Most Pure Mother at the wedding in Cana of Galilee, to Her words: “They have no wine—what is that to Me and to You, Woman? My hour has not yet come”250, although soon after this hour came, and He performed His first miracle. The Evangelists frequently also remark that the Jews, despite their many attempts to seize the Lord, could not do so because His hour of death had not yet come. “The Jews sought to seize Him, and no one laid hands on Him, says the holy Evangelist John, because His hour had not yet come”251. “Are there not twelve hours in the day?” said the Savior to His disciples on the way to Judea, when they pointed out to Him that He could not go there because the Jews had just tried to stone Him to death. “Are there not twelve hours in the day? If anyone walks in the day, he does not stumble, for he sees the light of the world”252—as if He said thus: “I know when My hour of death comes, My night. Now it has not yet come; therefore, although I am defenseless and the Jews seek My death, they cannot endanger My life. While My day has not ended, no one will kill Me.” All—both favorable and unfavorable—circumstances in the Savior’s life were predicted long beforehand, and therefore even the unfavorable circumstances in His life disarm all unbelief, so that every mouth should be closed and its silence should affirm the truth of the Divinity of Jesus Christ. If, for example, many did not believe in the Lord, it was not because few signs were done to assure people of His Divinity. No, “the Lord did many good deeds before the people from His Father”253. People did not believe the Savior because of the corruption of their hearts, and only fulfilled what the Prophet Isaiah predicted: “Lord! Who has believed our report? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?” or: “He has blinded their eyes and hardened their hearts, so that they might not see with their eyes and understand with their hearts, and turn to Me so that I would heal them”254. “This Isaiah said when he saw His glory and spoke of Him”255. If many hated the Lord, this too was not a matter of chance, that is, it did not happen because it would be reasonable for anyone in their right mind to hate the most perfect Lord for any reason; rather, evil naturally hates good precisely because it is good, and this also was predicted long beforehand: “the word must be fulfilled that is written in their law, ‘They hated Me without cause’”256. “Have you never read in the Scriptures: The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. This is the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes”257. If the Jewish people, the chief priests, and the scribes mocked Him, tortured, and crucified Him, it was because the cup of His sufferings and death for the sins of the world had been prepared for Him by the Heavenly Father from eternity. People were only wretched, although free, instruments of God’s will. “Brothers, I know that you acted in ignorance” said the Apostle Peter to the Jews, “(that is, you killed the Author of life Jesus Christ), as did your rulers. But God fulfilled what He had proclaimed through all the prophets, that Christ would suffer”258. If the soldiers, who crucified Him, divided His garments among themselves and cast lots for His clothing, they did this, fulfilling the prophecy—that the Scripture might be fulfilled that says: “They divided My garments among themselves, and for My clothing they cast lots”259. When the Savior, hanging on the cross and suffering in the agony of death, said: “I thirst”260, He said this in order that, according to the prophecy, they gave Him vinegar, and there stood by the cross a vessel full of vinegar. So all that happened with Jesus was predicted by the Prophets down to details. Therefore, to assure the Jews of His Divinity, the Savior pointed them to the prophecies and types about Him in Scripture: “Search the Scriptures, He said, for you think that in them you have eternal life; and they are the ones that testify about Me. These are the words261”, He said to His disciples after His resurrection from the dead, “which I spoke to you while I was still with you, saying that everything written about Me in the law of Moses and in the prophets and in the psalms must be fulfilled”262. Throughout His entire life, the Lord did, in the proper sense, the deeds of the One who sent Him, did the will of His Father, and presented to the people His teaching (as He often said Himself263)—that is, He did what, taught what, and fulfilled what was appointed to happen from eternity.

See, brothers, the Heavenly Father, Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, employed all means to assure people of His Divinity and to convince us to obey Him in all things as His beloved Son. “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; listen to Him,” He spoke from heaven. See how much God loves the world, that “He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish, but have eternal life”264. Yes, brothers, there is eternal life, there is another life, for which we were created and to the attainment of which the believing, repenting Christians have a right through the intercession of the Son of God. But there is also eternal perdition, from which no one will be saved except through the only Mediator of God and man—the God-man Christ Jesus. But He will not save those who do not obey Him, those who live not as Christians but as pagans, who know not His commandments and do not fulfill them, and only bear the name of Christians. Such people condemn themselves and deprive themselves of their inheritance in His kingdom. “Not everyone who says to Me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of My Father, who is in heaven”265.

Brothers! Jesus Christ is the beloved Son of God. Listen to Him. Amen.

Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh

He, of whom the Prophet and God-seer Moses wrote much in the Old Testament, of whom many other Prophets foretold, has at last come—He came to earth as the Reconciler of sinful humanity with the righteous God. After the long waiting for a Redeemer, at last joyful voices were heard on earth: “We have found the Messiah”266; “We have found Jesus, whom Moses wrote about in the law, and the prophets”267. “The people living in darkness have seen a great light, and on those sitting in the land of the shadow of death a light has dawned”268. “In many different ways and many different forms God spoke in the past to our fathers through the prophets, but in these final days He has spoken to us through His Son”269, who, though He was God, became man for us, and yet remained God. The Sun of Righteousness, Christ our God, has shone upon the earth.

From where, then, and how did our Sun of Righteousness shine upon the earth? From the city of Bethlehem, from the Most Holy Virgin Mary.

We have said before that God, in advance, in various ways prepared people for the reception, for the meeting of the radiant Sun of Righteousness—Christ the Lord—through prophecies about Him and through various types. And according to these prophecies it was known to those who paid attention, long before the Nativity of Christ, that Christ would be born in the city of Bethlehem, among the Hebrew people, in the tribe of Judah, from a pure Virgin of royal descent; and it was also known that before the birth of the Messiah—Christ—His forerunner would be born. Now, when the time came for the Son of God to appear on earth in our humble human form, all came to pass exactly as had been foretold by the Prophets. And so a certain priest of the Hebrews by name Zechariah, whose wife Elizabeth, having reached old age, had no children because of barrenness, is visited by the Angel of the Lord in the Temple—at the time when he, according to the custom of the priesthood, was performing incense there. Let us hear what message the Angel brought from heaven, what will of the Lord he announced to the priest. He brought joyful tidings to the holy elder, tidings of the birth of a son from Elizabeth, and announced his name in advance: “You will name him John,” he says. What next? “And you will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth. For he will be great in the sight of the Lord; he will go on before Him in the spirit and power of Elijah”270. Do you hear, brothers, about whom the words concern? About the Forerunner of the Lord, about His birth. And if God sends the Forerunner of Christ into the world, then clearly Christ Himself will soon come as well; if the morning star of the Sun appears: then clearly the Sun itself will soon rise. So it was. Five months after the conception of the Forerunner, the Archangel Gabriel flew down from the heavenly heights to Nazareth, where the Most Holy Virgin Mary dwelt, betrothed to the righteous Joseph for the keeping of Her virginity, and who was brought up in the Temple in the Holy of Holies, and entering to Her, said: “Hail, full of grace! The Lord is with You; blessed are You among women.” Behold the Angel’s Annunciation of the conception and birth of the Savior! The Most Holy Virgin, seeing the Angel, was confused because of His words and wondered what this greeting could mean. The Angel continues the Annunciation: “Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God. And now, you will conceive in your womb and bear a Son, and you will name Him Jesus. He will be great and will be called Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David, and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and His kingdom will have no end.” The Most Holy Virgin says to the Angel: “How will this be, since I am a virgin?” The Angel answers Her: “The Holy Spirit will come upon You, and the power of the Most High will overshadow You; therefore the Child to be born will be holy, He will be called Son of God.” The All-Pure Virgin said: “Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be done to me according to your word.” “Behold I am, the humble servant of the Lord. Let it be done to me according to Your word. Let the Holy Spirit come upon me and the power of the Most High overshadow me for the conception in my womb of the Pre-Eternal Son of God. I believe that it will come to pass, the word of the Lord will be fulfilled. Even now my soul feels the coming of the All-Holy, life-giving Spirit of God and this overshadowing of the power of the Most High; already my soul magnifies the Lord, so closely joined to me—and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, that He has regard for the humility of His servant. For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed, will magnify, will glorify me throughout all the earth, in all times, to the end of the age; and all this greatness has been wrought in me by the mighty God. Holy is His name. And His mercy is for those who fear Him from generation to generation, in all times.” Meanwhile the morning star of the Sun of Righteousness soon after the Angel’s Annunciation to the Virgin Mary rose: the Forerunner—the all-holy fruit of the barren mother271—was born. He was named John, according to the word of the Angel. The time of the great miracles of the Lord came. All who heard of the miraculous conception and birth of John the Forerunner, thought deeply and said: “What then will this child become?” And his father, Zechariah, chastened before this by God for his disbelief of the Angel’s message with muteness for nine months and several days, received the loosing of his tongue, was now filled with the Holy Spirit, and prophesying about his son, said: “And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High, for you will go before the Lord to prepare His ways, to give knowledge of salvation to His people by the forgiveness of their sins.” The great child grew and became strong in spirit, and lived in the desert until the day of His manifestation to the people of Israel as the forerunner of the Lord272.

Five months after the birth of John the Forerunner was born the Savior of the world, our Lord Jesus Christ, but not in Nazareth, but in the city of Bethlehem, as had been foretold by the Prophet Micah: “But you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for from you will come a ruler who will shepherd my people Israel”273. Because of the extraordinary gathering of people in Bethlehem for the registration of their names by order of Caesar Augustus, there was no room in the house for the Most Holy Virgin and Her righteous betrothed, who had come from Nazareth also to register themselves; and the newborn Divine Child, after being wrapped in swaddling clothes, was placed in a manger.

So great is the humility of the Lord—for our salvation!

Brothers! Let us not be idle spectators of such a voluntary self-emptying of the King of Glory, clothed in light as with a garment, to whom heaven is a throne and earth a footstool. This self-emptying gives all of us a great, saving lesson of humility. It is not magnificent palaces, not wealth that fills with pride, not honors, not the glory of this world that should occupy us, immortal in spirit as we are creatures of God; no: meekness, humility before God and unquestioning devotion to His holy will should be the first desire of our heart and occupy our mind so that they are evident in all our actions. Pride destroyed us; humility should save us. Let us then bring as a gift meekness, humility, and an awareness of our spiritual poverty to Him who became poor for us, though He was rich, that we might be enriched by His poverty274.

But amid the extreme humility of the newborn God-child, His glory also shines forth. The Angel of the Lord appeared to the shepherds, who as was their custom were keeping watch in that night and guarding their flock, and said to them: “I bring you good news of great joy for all the people. For to you is born today in the city of David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign for you: you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger.” When the Angel said this, suddenly there appeared with him a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men”275!

Do you hear, brothers! The Angels proclaim peace to the earth at the birth of the Lord Jesus. Is there peace in our souls? After all, the Savior brought us heavenly peace in abundance. Woe to us if there is no peace within us. This means we are not coming with faith and love to the Savior, who says: “Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens; and I will give you rest”276. This means we are people of little faith, passionate: malicious, proud, envious, lovers of the world, vain. Peace, brothers, I, the humble servant of Christ, proclaim to you! Come to the childhood-King of peace with hearts full of heartfelt faith and humility, and receive from Him peace for your souls with healing of your passions. After the Angels departed to heaven, the shepherds hurried to Bethlehem, found Joseph, Mary, and the Child lying in the manger, and they were the first to worship Him. On the eighth day after His birth, according to the custom of the Old Testament, the Lord was named Jesus, a name announced by the Angel before His conception in the womb; and on the fortieth day, when the Most Holy Virgin brought Him to the Temple of the Lord—to present Him before the Lord and to offer the sacrifice according to the Law of the Lord—the righteous elder Simeon, to whom it had been promised by the Spirit of God that he would not see death before he saw the Christ, was blessed to meet Him in the Temple, and taking Him in his arms, said: “Master, now You are dismissing Your servant in peace, according to Your word; for my eyes have seen Your salvation…” Thus shone forth from the Holy Virgin—the Mother—our Lord Jesus Christ, God of God, the Father, born before the ages, and man of the substance of His mother born in time, perfect God and perfect man.

O wonder of wonders! God, sustaining the whole universe by His word, became human so that He might raise humanity to its first blessedness. “Heaven and earth marveled at this, the Church sings, that God appeared to mankind in flesh”277. “All the angelic nature wondered at the great work of God’s becoming man, because the imperceptible God they saw become accessible to all as a man, living together with people”278. Brothers! Seeing God, strange in His becoming human, let us turn away from the vain world and set our minds on the heavens (on the Divine): because it is for this reason God came down to earth—to raise us to the heavens279.

But for what purpose such an extraordinary condescension of the Son of God to us? someone will ask. Why did the Son of God assume human nature? We answer: The Incarnation of the Son of God for the salvation of people was absolutely necessary. To save a human being, it was necessary to satisfy God’s justice for human sin; but no single human, not for others but even for himself, is able to give a ransom, and the price of redemption of his soul280, and satisfaction of infinite divine justice, infinitely offended by the sin of human disobedience, had to be equally infinite. Besides, it was necessary to crush in a person the power of evil, which separated him from God and constantly pushed him further and further away; without this it was impossible to unite him again with God281, who abhors sin. But to destroy human sinfulness—for any human being whatsoever—was an impossible thing: because it is a deep corruption of human nature, innate to each person, and to destroy it would mean the same as to renew, to recreate humanity. Who could recreate humanity other than the Creator? And so through the Incarnation, the sufferings and death of the God-man Son of God, satisfaction was made to God’s justice for the sins of humans; and through His saving teaching, or commandments, through His life, through His life-giving body and blood, and through His other mysteries, human nature was renewed, recreated, and continues to be recreated. The Savior, as a sinless God and man, throughout His entire earthly life and in all His deeds, on our behalf offered perfect obedience to the will of God the Father, with complete denial of His own will; He endured all the sorrows, sufferings, and death itself—appointed by God’s justice—and by such a sacrifice, boundless in its worth, completely satisfied the Divine justice for all human sins; and just as Adam’s sin made all humans guilty before God, so the righteousness of the God-man, as the second, sinless Adam, makes them righteous before God through their faith in the God-man. “Just as Adam brought death to his descendants, even though they did not eat of the forbidden fruit, by the eating of the forbidden fruit, so Christ for those who believe in Him, even though they had no righteous deeds, became the cause of righteousness, which He gave to all of us through the cross282.”

Brothers! Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, the Son of God, has already deigned to fulfill all the Father’s purpose for us, accomplishing our salvation through His teaching, His life, His death for us, and His resurrection—and has already ascended in His humanity to heaven and sits at the right hand of God the Father. But our salvation has not been accomplished unconditionally. To be among those who are saved, we must accept with all our heart the saving teaching of Jesus Christ and act according to it. “If you love Me, you will keep My word,” says the Lord (Jn 14:23). We must also each, as far as we are able, imitate His life, which is the model of our life. “Whoever serves Me must follow Me; and where I am, there My servant will also be” (Jn 12:26).

Having ascended from us into heaven, the Lord is always with us through His Divine omnipresence (I am with you always); with us is His miraculous, sweet Name, His holy word, His life-giving cross and His saving mysteries.

Let us therefore invoke, as often as we can, with living faith the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, for everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved, says the prophetic word (Joel 11:32); let us with faith and love use—for our sanctification and salvation—His saving mysteries, and turn to the invincible, incomprehensible Divine power of His precious and life-giving cross in all circumstances of our life. At all this let us not forget to diligently read and hear His word and to ask Him that He would dwell by faith in our hearts; when He dwells in us, then in us will be the gracious life, which foreshadows the future blissful life. Amen.

Canon of the Archangels, Song 6, verse 1

Wisdom of Solomon 11:23

Apok 4:11

Catechism of Filaret

Ps 103:29

Wisdom of Solomon 11:25–27

Job 28:24

Wisdom of Solomon 12:13

Theodore, Against Heresies, book 5, chapter 10

Canon of the Archangels, Song 5, verse 3

Mt 5:45

Mt 6:29,30

Rom 13:1

Rom 13:2

Lk 13:2-5

Mt 10:28

Jn 5:14

Book of Judges

Lk 16

We have called the mystery of redemption Providence on the basis of many of our Church books. Thus, for example: the mystery of redemption is called saving providence in the prayer to Jesus the Sweet (at the end of the Canon and Akathist); in the Akathist to the Most Holy Mother of God: likewise in other places of the Canon book and in various liturgical books. When counting years from the Nativity of Christ, it is also said in some books: in the year of saving providence such-and-such a year.

Ezek 33:11

Jer 2:19

Rom 2:9

Prayer of the Blessing of Water Before Baptism

Jn 3:8

Gen 3:15

Gen 22:18

Gen 26:4

Gen 28:14

Ex 3:2

Dan 3:24-100

Song 8

Ex 22

Lk 11:29,30

Hebr 9:12-15

Jn 3:14,15

Deuteronomy 18:15

Is 7:14

Mic 5:2

Mal 3:1,4,5

Zah 9:9

Is 53 verse and Ps 21

Dan 9

Jn 7:6

Jn 2:3,4

Jn 7:30,8:20

Jn 9:9,10

Jn 10:32

Is 53:1

Jn 12:37-41

Jn 25:25

Ps 117:22 verse Mt 21:42

Act 3:17,18

Ps 21:19 verse Jn 19:24

Ps 73:22 verse Jn 28 and 99

Jn 5:39

Mt 24:44

Jn 7:16,8,28,55,9,4,10,37,12,49,50

Jn 3:16

Mt 7:21

Jn 1:41

Jn 1:45

Mt 4:16

Hebr 1:1

Lk 1

Canon of the Forerunner, Song 7 of the Mother of God

Lk 1

Mic 5:2, Mt 2:6

2Cor 8:9

Lk 2

Mt 11:28

Song 9

Akathist to the Most Holy Mother of God, Kondakion 9

Akathist to Jesus the Sweet, Kondakion 8

Ps 48:8

Solom 11:25, Is 5:7

Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans, Homily 10, page 207, in Russian translation

Scripture Index

Every Scripture reference identified in this book, sorted in canonical Bible order. Tap a reference to jump to the verse where it appears.

Genesis

Genesis 1:815. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.187)

Genesis 1:1015. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.189)

Genesis 1:1115. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.190)

Genesis 1:14–1915. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.193)

Genesis 1:26–2815. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.226)

Genesis 3:1518. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.57)

Genesis 4:1715. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.126)

Genesis 6:315. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.257)

Genesis 18:2715. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.238)

Genesis 22:1818. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.58)

Genesis 26:418. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.59)

Genesis 28:1418. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.60)

Exodus

Exodus 3:218. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.61)

Joshua

Joshua 5:1415. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.112)

2 Samuel

2 Samuel 19:3515. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.119)

Job

Job 28:2418. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.38)

Job 38:715. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.117)

Psalms

Psalms 10:715. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.230)

Psalms 17:1115. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.133)

Psalms 21:1918. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.85)

Psalms 32:915. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.215)

Psalms 38:75. Talk 5 (2.11)

Psalms 48:818. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.106)

Psalms 73:2218. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.86)

Psalms 79:215. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.134)

Psalms 93:915. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.241)

Psalms 103:2415. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.199, 2.210)

Psalms 103:2918. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.36)

Psalms 117:2218. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.83)

Psalms 144:915. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.219)

Psalms 148:515. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.108)

Proverbs

Proverbs 8:1515. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.128)

Isaiah

Isaiah 1:34. Talk 4 (1.52); 15. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.221)

Isaiah 1:1715. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.231)

Isaiah 5:718. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.107)

Isaiah 7:1418. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.69)

Isaiah 45:1215. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.171)

Isaiah 53:118. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.80)

Isaiah 66:115. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.198)

Jeremiah

Jeremiah 2:1918. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.53)

Lamentations

Lamentations 4:115. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.247)

Ezekiel

Ezekiel 33:1118. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.52)

Daniel

Daniel 3:24–10018. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.62)

Daniel 7:1015. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.114)

Joel

Joel 2:3218. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.31)

Micah

Micah 5:218. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.70, 3.99)

Zechariah

Zechariah 9:918. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.72)

Wisdom

Wisdom 9:164. Talk 4 (1.42)

Wisdom 11:2518. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.107)

Wisdom 13:515. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.169)

Sirach

Sirach 23:2715. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.195)

Matthew

Matthew 2:618. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.99)

Matthew 3:1514. Talk 14—On the Blessed State and Fall of the First People (2.92)

Matthew 4:1618. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.94)

Matthew 5:815. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.177, 2.236)

Matthew 5:2815. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.253)

Matthew 5:2915. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.252)

Matthew 5:4518. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.42)

Matthew 5:4815. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.234)

Matthew 6:94. Talk 4 (1.57)

Matthew 6:2615. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.212)

Matthew 6:3015. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.191)

Matthew 7:1815. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.256)

Matthew 7:2118. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.91)

Matthew 8:28–3415. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.141)

Matthew 8:30–3215. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.142)

Matthew 9:3315. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.158)

Matthew 9:3415. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.151)

Matthew 10:115. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.144)

Matthew 10:2818. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.47)

Matthew 11:2818. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.102)

Matthew 16:1815. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.214)

Matthew 17:1515. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.157)

Matthew 21:4218. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.83)

Matthew 22:11–1314. Talk 14—On the Blessed State and Fall of the First People (2.93)

Matthew 23:94. Talk 4 (1.67)

Matthew 24:4418. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.88)

Luke
Luke 1:2615. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.115)
Luke 1:4815. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.254)
Luke 2:1315. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.116)
Luke 4:184. Talk 4 (1.38)
Luke 7:2115. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.143)
Luke 8:1215. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.244)
Luke 12:2615. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.164)

Luke 13:2–518. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.46)

Luke 17:3715. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.213)

Luke 22:3–615. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.162)

John

John 1:4118. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.92)

John 1:4518. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.93)

John 3:515. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.175)

John 3:818. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.56)

John 3:1618. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.90)

John 3:1915. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.180)

John 5:1418. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.48)

John 5:204. Talk 4 (1.68)

John 5:264. Talk 4 (1.59)

John 5:3918. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.87)

John 7:618. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.75)

John 10:1015. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.246)

John 10:3218. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.79)

John 12:2618. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.29)

John 12:3115. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.149)

John 12:37–4118. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.81)

John 13:27–3015. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.162)

John 14:2318. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.29)

John 15:264. Talk 4 (1.65)

John 17:34. Talk 4 (1.45)

John 19:2418. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.85)

John 25:2518. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.82)

Acts
Acts 17:284. Talk 4 (1.53)
Romans

Romans 2:915. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.255); 18. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.54)

Romans 6:415. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.266)

Romans 7:18–2015. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.260)

Romans 7:2315. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.153)

Romans 8:264. Talk 4 (1.54)

Romans 13:118. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.44)

Romans 13:218. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.45)

Romans 13:1415. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.265)

1 Corinthians
1 Corinthians 2:114. Talk 4 (1.44)
2 Corinthians

2 Corinthians 4:1815. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.223)

2 Corinthians 5:1715. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.264)

2 Corinthians 6:1415. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.140)

2 Corinthians 8:918. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.100)

2 Corinthians 13:134. Talk 4 (1.72)

Galatians

Galatians 5:1715. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.258)

Galatians 5:2415. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.251)

Ephesians

Ephesians 1:1815. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.176)

Ephesians 2:215. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.150)

Ephesians 6:10–1215. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.154)

Ephesians 6:1115. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.245)

Ephesians 6:1215. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.145)

Philippians

Philippians 2:815. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.262)

Colossians

Colossians 1:1615. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.118, 2.129)

Colossians 3:1215. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.167)

1 Thessalonians

1 Thessalonians 4:1715. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.186)

1 Timothy

1 Timothy 3:615. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.166)

1 Timothy 6:1615. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.178)

Hebrews

Hebrews 1:118. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.95)

Hebrews 1:315. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.135, 2.216)

Hebrews 7:1015. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.192)

Hebrews 9:12–1518. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.66)

Hebrews 12:22–2415. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.122)

James
James 3:715. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.229)
James 4:615. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.250)
1 Peter

1 Peter 5:815. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.147, 2.161)

2 Peter

2 Peter 1:315. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.263)

1 John
1 John 1:815. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.249)
1 John 2:234. Talk 4 (1.37)
1 John 3:215. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.235)
1 John 3:815. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.155)
1 John 4:815. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.232)
Jude
Jude 1:615. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.163)
Revelation

Revelation 1:715. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.185)

Revelation 3:1715. Talk 15—On Original Sin (2.248)

Revelation 4:1118. Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh (3.34)

The Author: Saint John of Kronstadt

Saint John of Kronstadt (1829–1908) was a Russian Orthodox archpriest, pastor, and spiritual writer, and one of the most beloved and influential figures of the late Russian Church. A married parish priest rather than a monk or a bishop, he became renowned across the whole empire for his fervent celebration of the Divine Liturgy, his ministry of prayer and healing, and his tireless charity among the poor of Kronstadt.

He was born Ioann Ilyich Sergiev to a poor clerical family in the far north of Russia, in the village of Sura in the Arkhangelsk province. He was educated at the Saint Petersburg Theological Academy, and in 1855 was ordained to serve at Saint Andrew’s Cathedral in Kronstadt, the naval town near the capital, where he would remain for more than half a century. He gave himself to the destitute of the town, founding the House of Diligence to give work and dignity to the poor, and thousands sought him out for confession, counsel, and prayer.

He is best remembered for his spiritual masterwork My Life in Christ, a collection of reflections drawn from his diaries on prayer, repentance, and the Eucharist, marked throughout by a vivid sense of the reality of God and of the Church’s Mysteries. His many sermons, catechetical talks, and later diaries—among them A Living Ear of Wheat and his Lenten preaching—extend the same ardent, experiential piety, and everywhere his eucharistic realism is stated without reserve.

He reposed in 1908 and was mourned throughout Russia. He was glorified by the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia in 1964 and by the Moscow Patriarchate in 1990, and is commemorated on 20 December and on 1 June, the day of his glorification. His writings remain a standard of modern Orthodox spiritual life.

Colophon

Catechetical Talks
by John of Kronstadt.

This edition was produced by
Royal Archives.

The cover features
Sunday Reading in a Village School (Воскресное чтение в сельской школе, 1895)
by Nikolai Bogdanov-Belsky (Russian, 1868–1945), Wikimedia Commons, which is in the public domain.

The text is set in Palatino and Georgia.

The first edition of this ebook was released on
August 16, 2026.

Table of Contents

- Title Page
- Copyright
- Introduction

- On God—the Most Holy Trinity

- Talk 1 (Introductory)
- Talk 2
- Talk 3
- Talk 4

- On God—the Creator of the World

- Talk 5
- Talk 6
- Talk 7
- Talk 8
- Talk 9
- Talk 10
- Talk 11
- Talk 12
- Talk 13

- Talk 14—On the Blessed State and Fall of the First People

- Talk 15—On Original Sin

- God the Providence of the World

- Talk 16

- Talk 17—On the Redemption of Mankind and Its Preparation

- Talk 18—On the Manifestation of God in the Flesh

- Scripture Index
- The Author: Saint John of Kronstadt
- Colophon