Clement of Alexandria · a new plain-English translation from the original language
Let us flee, then, from habit; let us flee it as a dangerous headland, or the threat of Charybdis, or the mythical Sirens. It chokes a man, turns him from the truth, leads him away from life; it is a snare, it is a pit, it is a chasm — habit is a ravenous evil: "Keep the ship outside that smoke and surge." Let us flee, O shipmates, let us flee this wave; it belches fire, it is a wicked island heaped up with bones and corpses, and on it sings a lovely little harlot, Pleasure, delighting in music for the common crowd. "Come hither, come, renowned Odysseus, great glory of the Achaeans; bring your ship to rest, that you may hear a diviner voice." She praises you, O sailor, and calls you much-sung of, and the harlot claims for herself the glory of the Greeks. Let her feed upon the dead; from heaven a spirit arrives to assist you. Pass by Pleasure; she deceives. And let not a woman with trailing robes beguile your mind, cooing her wheedling talk, seeking out your nest. Sail past the song; it works death. If you will only wish it, you have conquered destruction, and bound to the wood you shall be freed from all corruption; the Word of God will pilot you, and the Holy Spirit will bring you to anchor in the harbors of the heavens. Then you shall behold my God, and shall be initiated into those holy mysteries, and shall enjoy the hidden things in the heavens, kept in store for me — "things which ear has not heard, nor have they come up upon the heart" of anyone. Indeed, someone raving in Bacchic frenzy over idols, drunk with sheer ignorance, once said, "I seem to see two suns and a twofold Thebes." I would rather pity such a man in his drunken madness, and call him, thus deranged, to the sober salvation, since the Lord, too, desires that a sinner turn back rather than perish. Come, you madman — lean not upon your thyrsus, nor wrap yourself in ivy; throw away the headband, throw away the fawnskin, come to your senses. I will reveal to you the Word, and the Word's own mysteries, setting them forth to match your own likeness. This is a mountain beloved of God, not one lying under tragedies like Cithaeron, but one consecrated to dramas of truth, a sober mountain, shaded with holy woods. On it hold Bacchic revel not the sisters of the thunder-born Semele, the maenads, initiated into an unholy division of raw flesh, but the daughters of God, those unblemished lambs, proclaiming the Word's solemn rites and forming a sober chorus. The chorus is the righteous; the song is a hymn of the King of all. The maidens sing to the harp, the angels give glory, the prophets speak, the sound of music goes forth; they pursue the sacred band at a run, those who are called hasten, longing to receive back their Father. Come to me also, O old man, leaving Thebes behind, and casting off divination and Bacchic rite, let yourself be led by the hand to the truth. Look, I give you the wood to lean upon; hasten, Teiresias, believe: you shall see. Christ shines forth brighter than the sun, through whom the eyes of the blind see again. Night will flee from you, fire will be afraid, death will depart; you shall see the heavens, O old man, you who could not see Thebes.
O truly holy mysteries! O pure light! I am torch-borne to behold the heavens and God; I become holy by being initiated. The Lord is the hierophant, and he seals the initiate while leading him to the light, and presents to the Father the one who has believed, kept safe for the ages. These are the Bacchic revels of my mysteries. If you wish, be initiated yourself as well, and you shall join the dance with angels around the Unbegotten and Imperishable and only true God, while the Word of God joins with us in the hymn. This eternal Jesus, sole and great high priest of the sole God who is likewise Father, intercedes for humanity and charges humanity, saying, "Listen, you tribes without number" — or rather, all among men endowed with reason, both foreigners and Greeks; I summon the entire race of men, whose creator I am, through the Father's will. Draw near to me, to be clothed under a single God and his one Word, and do not be satisfied simply with outranking the unreasoning animals in reason, but strive so that among all mortal creatures you alone might harvest immortality. For I wish, I wish to give you a share also of this grace, bestowing the whole benefit entire — incorruption; and I grant you the Word, the knowledge of God; I grant you my perfect self. This is who I am; this is God's desire; this is unity; this is the Father's accord; here is the Son, here is Christ, here is God's own Word — the Lord's right arm, the strength that sustains the cosmos, the Father's purpose. O images of old, not all alike — I wish to set you right after the archetype, that you may become like me also. I will anoint you with the ointment of faith, by which you cast off corruption, and I will lay bare the unclothed shape of righteousness, through which you rise up toward God. "Come to me, all you who toil and are weighed down, and I will grant you rest; place my yoke upon your shoulders and learn from me, for I am mild and humble at heart, and rest will come to your souls; for my yoke is kindly and what I lay on you is light." Let us hasten, let us run, O images beloved of God and formed after the likeness of the Word; let us hasten, let us run, let us take up his yoke, let us set ourselves upon incorruption; let us love Christ, the good charioteer of men. He led the colt, unbroken, harnessed together with the old one; and having yoked the pair of mankind together, he directs the chariot toward immortality, hastening toward God to fulfill openly what he had before signified in a riddle — formerly by riding into Jerusalem, but now by riding up into the heavens — the Son everlasting and triumphant, the fairest spectacle to the Father. Let us then become men eager for what is good and beloved of God, and let us acquire the greatest of goods, God and life. And the Word is our helper; let us trust in him, and let there never come upon us so great a longing for silver and gold, nor for glory, as for the Word of truth itself. For it is not pleasing even to God himself if we count the things of greatest worth as of least account, while we choose above them the plain outrages of ignorance and unlearning and sloth and idol-worship, and the utmost impiety. For it is not out of keeping with the children of philosophers to say that all the things the foolish do, they consider unholy and impious, and describing even ignorance itself as a kind of madness, they confess in effect that the many are simply insane. The Word, then, allows no room to doubt which of the two is better, to be sane or to be mad; but holding fast to the truth with a firm grip, one must with all one's strength, in soundness of mind, follow God and consider all things his, as indeed they are — and further, since we ourselves have learned that we are his fairest possession, we must commit ourselves to God, loving the Lord God, and regarding this as our task for the whole of life. And if "the goods of friends are held in common," and man is beloved of God (for indeed he is a friend of God, the Word acting as mediator), then everything belongs to man, since everything belongs to God, and what the two friends possess remains shared, God's and man's alike. Now is the moment for us to declare that only the man who fears God is truly rich, wise, and nobly born, and thereby an image of God in his likeness, and to say and believe that, having become "righteous and holy with wisdom" through Christ Jesus, he is to that degree already like God as well. The prophet, at any rate, does not conceal the grace when he says, "I said, You are gods, and all of you sons of the Most High." For us, us he has adopted as sons, and it is us alone he wishes to be called Father, not those who disobey. And indeed this, more or less, is how it stands with us who are followers of Christ: as are the counsels, so are the words; and as are the words, so also are the deeds; and as are the works, such is the life. Good is the whole life of men who have come to know Christ.
Enough words, I think, even if I have gone on rather at length out of love for mankind, pouring forth whatever I had received from God, as one exhorting toward the greatest of goods, salvation. For concerning life that has no end at all, no cessation, my words too are unwilling ever to cease their sacred proclamation. There remains for you still this one profitable choice to make, either judgment or grace; for my part, I do not think it even worth debating which of the two is better, nor indeed is it right to set life and destruction side by side for comparison.
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