Origen · a new plain-English translation from the Greek and Latin
Everything written concerning God, even if it seems on its face to be unfitting, must be understood as worthy of a good God. For who will not say that it seems unfitting, when applied to God, that he has wrath, that he makes use of anger, that he repents, and indeed even that he sleeps? But each of these will be found, by one who knows how “to hear dark sayings,” to be worthy of God. The
his wrath, then, is not without fruit, but just as his word disciplines, so too his wrath disciplines; for those who are not disciplined by word he disciplines by wrath. And it is necessary for God to make use of what is called wrath, just as he makes use of what is named word; for his word is not of the same kind as the word of all things. For of no one
is the word “living being,” of no one is the word “God,” of no one was the word “in the beginning” with the one with whom the Word was, even if that one alone is from some beginning. So too the wrath of God is called wrath, not as the wrath of anyone whatsoever [is called wrath]. And just as the word of God has something strange beyond every
word of anyone whatsoever—and it has as something strange both being God and being Word while being a living being, subsisting on its own, serving the Father—so too, once his so-called wrath was named God’s, it has something strange and foreign to all the wrath that is otherwise so defined. So too his anger has something proper to it; for it belongs to the purpose of
the one who rebukes in anger, wishing the one rebuked to turn back through the rebuke. The word also rebukes, as the word disciplines; but the word does not rebuke in the way that anger rebukes. For those who are not helped by the rebuke that comes from the word will need the rebuke that comes from anger. We were saying that there is also a certain repentance of God that seems on its face unfitting, since it is written: “I repent that I anointed
Saul as king.” It is right that you inquire also into this repentance, and do not suppose that his repentance has any kinship with the repentance of those who repent. For just as his word had something exceptional, so too his wrath, and his anger something surpassing, and none of these had anything akin to the things sharing their name, in the same way also his repentance is homonymous with
our repentance; and things are homonymous when only the name is common, while the account corresponding to the name belongs to a different reality. Only the name, then, is common to God’s anger and the anger of anyone whatsoever, and only the name is common to the wrath of anyone whatsoever and the wrath of God. So too must one understand in the case of repentance. And whoever is able will inquire what God’s repentance accomplishes, what it did accomplish. It brought down Saul
who was reigning unlawfully, and raised up for the people as king the one after God’s own heart; for on account of that good repentance he said: “I have found a man after my own heart, David son of Jesse.” But all these things are, for me, preliminary remarks, on account of the fact that the beginning of the reading from Jeremiah is this: “You deceived me, Lord, and I was deceived.” (19) For we inquire whether
As with everyone else, anger is a bad thing, but God's is corrective; and everyone's wrath is harsh, but the wrath called God's is disciplinary; and in all of us, regret indicts the weakness of what preceded the regret, but in God's case regret does not indict God, but rather the outside circumstances on account of which the regret is taken up.
In the same way one must also understand God's "deception" as belonging to a different category from our deception, the deception by which we deceive. What, then, is the deception that belongs to God — the deception which the prophet, once he understood it, having ceased to be deceived, spoke of, knowing the benefit that came from having been deceived, when he said, "You deceived me, Lord, and I was deceived"? And first I will make use of a Hebrew tradition that came to us through someone
who had fled on account of faith in Christ and on account of having advanced beyond the law, and who had come to the place where we spend our time. He used to tell something — whether it was an apparent myth or an account capable of leading hearers to the meaning of "You deceived me, Lord, and I was deceived." He used to say something of this sort: God does not play the tyrant, but reigns as king, and in reigning he does not use force, but persuades, and wishes those under him to offer
themselves voluntarily to his providential ordering, so that the good in someone might not come about by necessity, but according to what is voluntary in him. This is also what Paul, understanding it, said in his letter to Philemon concerning Onesimus: "so that your good deed might not be by compulsion but voluntary." The God of all things, then, was able to make what is reckoned as
good in us come about, so that we might give alms out of necessity and be self-controlled out of necessity, but he has not willed it so. Therefore he does not command us to do what we do out of grief or out of necessity, so that what comes about might be voluntary. He seeks, then, so to speak, a way by which one might do voluntarily what God wills. So the tradition went on to tell me something
of this kind as well: he wished to send Jeremiah to prophesy to all the nations, and before all the nations, to the people. But since the prophecies were rather grim (for they announced punishments, by which each would be punished according to what was fitting), and he knew the prophet's disposition, that he did not wish to prophesy worse things to the people of Israel, for this reason he arranged to say:
"Take this cup, and you shall give all the nations to drink, to whom I will send you." God, then, commanded Jeremiah to take the cup, urging him to take the cup of unmixed wine, saying, "and I will send you to all the nations, bearing this cup of unmixed wine." But Jeremiah, on hearing
that he was being sent to all the nations, that he was to minister to them a cup of wrath, a cup of punishments, not suspecting that Israel too was about to drink from the cup of punishment — deceived, he took the cup in order to give all the nations to drink; and having taken the cup he heard: "and you shall give to drink first..." Since, then, he expected one thing, but a different thing met him, thereupon...
To him indeed he says: "You deceived me, Lord, and I was deceived." He rendered something similar to this account also in Isaiah; for that man too, not knowing what he would be commanded to say to the people, hears God saying, according to what is written: "Who shall I dispatch, and who is it that will go before this people?" And he, it says, answered: "Here I am; send me." He hears: "Go
and say to this people: with hearing you will hear yet fail to grasp it, and looking on you will look yet fail to see. For the heart of this people has grown thick" and so on. Since, then, not knowing what he was about to prophesy, nor that he was about to threaten the people with such things, he had said, "Here I am; send me," for this reason, it says, in what follows, "the voice
of a lion: cry out" — yet he did not answer as one eager to do what was commanded, but said, "What shall I cry?" For he was wary lest he hear again, as at the earlier prophecy: "Go and say to this people: hearing you shall hear and shall not understand." "What then shall I cry?" "All flesh is grass, and all its glory as the flower of the grass" and so on. He heard nothing
in these words against Israel. These are the things that man was telling us in handing down the saying, "You deceived me, Lord, and I was deceived." (19) But I pray that what I receive from those who give it I may not merely keep, nor bury in the ground the talent of those who speak to me, nor tie up in a napkin the mina of those who teach something useful, but make an increase of the lessons
which I receive from the one handing them down and able to hand down useful things. I pray to make the mina — whether of gospel, or of apostle, or of prophet, or of law — many times over. Having heard these things, then, I was pondering within myself the matter of "You deceived me, Lord, and I was deceived." And in pondering it I pray to find something true on the point. Is it, then, perhaps just as a father wishes to deceive a son who is still an infant, for his benefit,
since the child cannot otherwise be helped unless he is deceived — as a physician contrives to deceive the one who is ill, since he cannot be healed unless he accepts words of deception — so too the God of all, since he has set before himself the aim of benefiting the human race. Let the physician say to the sick man: "You must be cut, you must be cauterized, you must suffer other harsher things" — he would not
submit himself to that. But sometimes the physician says something else, and hides under the sponge that cutting thing, the blade of iron that divides, and again hides — if I may put it this way — under honey the nature of the bitter and unpleasant drug, wishing not to harm but to heal the one being treated. The whole of divine scripture is full of such drugs. And some things are beneficial while hidden,
while others are bitter while hidden. If you see a father threatening as though he hated his son, and saying fearful things to the son, and not displaying his tender affection but hiding the love he has for his son, you will see that he wishes to deceive the infant; for it is not beneficial for the son to know the love of the father, his friendly disposition; for he would grow slack, and
he will not be disciplined. For this reason he hides the sweetness of his affection but shows the bitterness of his threat. God does something like this, in proportion, as both father and physician. There are certain bitter things which heal even the most righteous and the wisest person . . . for everyone who has sinned must be punished for his sins. "Do not be deceived, God
is not mocked." "Whether fornicator or adulterer or effeminate or one who lies with men or thief or drunkard or reviler or swindler, they will not inherit the kingdom of God." If this is understood and taken with precision by those who cannot see the surgeon's blade beneath the sponge, by those who cannot perceive the bitter medicine beneath the honey, one will lose heart. For which of us
is not conscious in himself of having drunk without restraint and become drunk? Which of us is free from theft and from failing to provide what is needed as one ought? But see what the text says: "Do not be deceived, that these will not inherit the kingdom of God." The mystery in this passage must be kept hidden, so that the majority not lose heart, so that, having learned the facts, one not expect the departure
not as a rest but as a punishment. Or who will be found a Paul, able to say: "For it is better to depart and be with Christ"? My wood must be burned in me. For I know that if I depart, my wood must be burned in me. And I have as wood my reviling words, I have as wood my bouts of drunkenness, as wood my thefts, and countless other pieces of wood I have built
into my building. Do you see that all these things escape the notice of most believers, and rightly so they escape notice? And each of us supposes, since he has not worshipped idols, since he has not fornicated (would that we were pure even in such matters), that once freed from this life he will be saved. Do we not see that "we must all be presented before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each may receive back the things done through the
body, in accordance with what he has practiced, whether good or worthless"? Do we not see the one who said: "But you alone have I known out of all the tribes of the earth; therefore I will punish you for all your practices," not some but not others? Since, then, the physician sometimes hides the surgeon's blade beneath the soft and delicate sponge, and
the father likewise hides his affection through the appearance of a threat, and deceptions of one kind remove fatty growths and varicose veins and whatever else harms the body's constitution, while another kind removes lack of discipline and slackness — something of this sort the prophet has perceived God to do, mystically, and he says, having seen how he has been deceived by God
for his good [and he says]: "You deceived me, Lord, and I was deceived." He led him to so great a favor as to pray and say to God: deceive me, if this is beneficial. For the deception that comes from God is one thing, the deception that comes from the serpent another. See what the woman says to God: "The serpent deceived me, and I ate."
And the deception that came from the serpent drove Adam and his wife out of the paradise of God; but the deception that happened to the prophet who said, “You deceived me, Lord, and I was deceived,” led him to so great a grace of prophecy, to the increase in him of power, to his being made perfect and
being able to serve the will of the word of God without fear of man. Understanding these things, then, let us too pray, both for the present and for the future, to be deceived by God. Only let the serpent not deceive us. And elsewhere something akin to this is written, for it is said in Isaiah: “For the Lord mixed for them a spirit of error.” You will attend
there too to what the spirit of error, mixed by God, does. And it is well said that God did not give the spirit of error unmixed, but, as the prophet named it, he mixed it. (19.) I want to take a risk and give an example of people benefited by being deceived. There are some who for this reason practice chastity and purity, and others who for this reason practice
single marriage, since they expected that whoever had married sexually would perish, that whoever married a second time would perish. Let us compare within ourselves what is more profitable for the once-married woman: to have been deceived and to believe that the twice-married woman is punished and handed over to eternal punishment, so that she herself remains once-married and pure, or to know the truth and marry a second time? I think anyone who looks at what follows can say that it would have been more blessed to remain pure and not
marry a second time without having been deceived, and to see that the twice-married woman too shares in some measure of salvation, yet not in so great a blessedness as she would have had if, though free to marry a second time, she had remained pure. But if this is not possible, it is better to have been deceived, believing that the twice-married perish, and through that deception to remain pure, than to have known the truth and to have ended up in the lesser rank of the twice-married. You will find something similar also in the case of some
who practice chastity and complete purity. Many other things too could be found that are done by us under deception and yet benefit us. But how many who were thought wise, having discovered the truth about punishment and having, as they suppose, seen through the matters of deception, have ended up living a worse life? It would have profited them to think as they had thought before concerning “their worm shall not die” and
that “their fire shall not be quenched,” and that “all flesh will behold them as a spectacle,” and that “the chaff shall be burned up with unquenchable fire.” But if, having imagined something other than their first understanding, they are about to despise the riches of God's kindness and forbearance and patience, see whether it is not truly for this reason - because they no longer thought themselves deceived - that they have stored up
for themselves “wrath for the day of wrath and revelation and righteous judgment of God,” which they would not have stored up if they had been deceived. These things were said on account of the deception that comes from God, since the prophet said, “You deceived me, Lord, and I was deceived.” Let us pass on and consider separately the phrase “I was deceived.” Why did he not say only “You deceived me, Lord,” but added also “I was deceived”? It is sometimes possible to conceive
[...] one person working the deception, and another guarding himself against being deceived, and so not being deceived. But when the one works the deceiving, and the other does not guard against being deceived but falls into the deception, he might say: “You deceived me, Lord, and I was deceived.” But I, if I found myself in that position, would say something like this about whatever the serpent says to me, even if
he tells me the truth, and even if he wants to deceive me: I am suspicious of his words, persuaded that whether he deceives me or tells the truth, he harms me. For even his truth harms; nothing beneficial comes from the serpent, since “a bad tree cannot bear good fruit.” But whatever God tells me, and I am persuaded that it is God who speaks, I am ready
to hand myself over. If he tells the truth, I accept it; if he wants to deceive me, I am willingly deceived — let God alone deceive me. And since I hand myself over, persuaded that the one speaking is God, both to be deceived and not to pry further, wanting to be deceived not by another but by God — for this reason I say that not only did you work the deceiving, but that I too suffered being
deceived by you, and accordingly I say, “You deceived me, Lord, and I was deceived.” And what follows from God being the one who deceives and a man being the one deceived? “You overpowered me, and you prevailed.” And having overpowered, he is able. But if he does not overpower, then I have need of labors. “You overpowered me, and you prevailed.” Next after these things he says: “I became—” I used to hear this said about the passage, that Jeremiah lived in
the most sinful of times (indeed, the captivity took place in his own time). And they were so sinful that they would sneer and laugh and mock whenever the prophet spoke the prophetic preface, “Thus says the Lord.” Those who heard would laugh and sneer at what was said. The one who had been deceived, and who benefited from being deceived, refrained from saying “Thus says the Lord.” For this reason he too, wishing
to deceive so as to benefit from the deceiving, would say: “I speak my own words to you, since you will not listen to the words of the Lord.” Then they would offer their ears as though to the words of Jeremiah, and would hear the words of God. This is what the one who handed the passage to me was saying, examining the prefaces and the openings of the prophecies. There is, then, also an opening of Jeremiah’s prophecy
in our tradition, as the Seventy have handed it down, for some reason I do not know: “The word of God that came upon Jeremiah son of Chelkias, of the priests”; but in the Hebrew and in the rest of the editions: “The words of Jeremiah son of Chelkias,” and all agreed in saying: “The words of Jeremiah son of Chelkias.” Why then “the words of Jeremiah”? Because the preface
for him, in speaking to those unwilling to listen, was: “Hear my words.” And we too, at times, do such things, when it seems advantageous to us. Sometimes we bring words to those from the nations, wishing to bring them to the faith, and if we see that they are prejudiced against Christianity and abhor the name and hate to hear that this
is the speech of Christians, we do not pretend to speak the beneficial speech of Christians. But whenever that speech is composed by us to the best of our ability, and we seem to grip the hearer so that he does not hear what is said as if by chance, then we confess that this was the praiseworthy speech of Christians. And we do something similar to the one who no longer says “thus says the LORD” but rather: “Hear the words of me, Jeremiah.”
These things because of “I have become a laughingstock.” And do we grow indignant if ever, when speaking, we are laughed at, when Jeremiah, such a man, says: “I have become a laughingstock; all day long I have continued to be scorned”? Why do I say Jeremiah? Even my Jesus was scorned; for it says, “The Pharisees, being lovers of money, heard all these things, and they scorned him.” But the Lord thoroughly scorns all who scorn the words of God.
“I have become a laughingstock.” See what sorts of lives the prophets lived: at one time being laughed at, at another time endangered and struck down and stoned by the people, killed, hated, driven out; and they suffered and endured all things, so that, in accordance with the will of God, seeking the glory that comes from him alone, proclaiming the word, they might attain the end that comes from God. “All
the day I have continued to be scorned.” He continued the day being scorned. (19,) “For at my bitter word I will laugh.” There is a certain laughter that is a promise, of which promise the patriarch Isaac bears the name; for it is interpreted “Laughter.” That laughter is a promise is clear from “Blessed are those who weep now”; and the promise is “for they shall laugh.” Just as the promise is “they shall be called sons of God,” and “they shall see God,” and “they shall inherit
the earth,” and “theirs is the kingdom of heaven,” so too laughter is a promise; and opposite to that promise, the weeping that is blessed is its counterpart. But you will inquire whether, according to one line of thought or another, the weeping that is blessed accords with this good laughter, while a different weeping, reserved and opposed, is set against those pronounced wretched by the opposite fate. For “woe to those who laugh now, for they shall mourn and
weep”: for the weeping that is blessed is one thing, and the weeping reserved for those who have lived wickedly is another. But whether that latter weeping too has some beneficial end, I do not know. What am I saying? [But whether that latter weeping too has some beneficial end, I do not know.] Hear Paul. Because he taught, he made it his business to grieve his hearers, as he says. And he confesses that he rejoiced most of all at the very time when someone was grieved on his account; for he says: “And
who is it that gladdens me, if not the one who is grieved by me?” And if anyone is capable of moving the soul of a hearer, especially one who has sinned, he prays to speak such words as, delivered with power and marshaled force and divine quality and sacred thoughts, will shake the soul of the hearer and move him to mourning and to weeping and to tears, so that the speaker rejoices
when he sees the audience delighted and filled up at what is said. For where the speech leads to the promises, as “through the narrow and constricted road of grieving, toward life,” it leads through weeping to the laughter that is pronounced blessed. But when it does not achieve this, I fear it may be saying something like: “woe to those who laugh now, for you shall mourn…”
"...and you will weep." Why has this been said to me, except because he wishes to hint that he says, "I will laugh at my bitter word," and to set forth a laughter of weeping, and that weeping which those who laugh here will weep, since God is perhaps working to bring forth weeping in them? For "there" "will be the weeping and the gnashing of teeth." And this is what God is working, seeing that the one who weeps over
his own sins, who mourns over his own transgressions, has already come to a perception of his own evils. Would that each of us, for each sin, said: "Every night I will wash my bed, I will drench my couch with my tears." Would that each of us, weeping over his own sins, said: "My tears became my bread by day and
by night." If my word here is somewhat bitter, and bitter because I am afflicted on its account, those who hear are displeased. Those who are reproved, when they find the speaker burdensome - I know that the end of my bitter word is to laugh, and to laugh the laughter of the blessed. And perhaps knowing this the prophet said: "for I will laugh at my bitter word" - already
with "a bitter word," but not yet do I laugh; rather, "I will laugh at my bitter word." (19.) "I will invoke faithlessness and wretchedness." The righteous man invokes God, and the unrighteous man also invokes wisdom; for it says, "it shall be that when you call upon me, I will not listen to you." There indeed are the unrighteous; and the righteous too clearly invoke wisdom at some point: "and everyone who
calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved." But here the prophet says: "I will invoke faithlessness and wretchedness," as if invoking faithlessness the way one invokes God, and wretchedness the way one invokes the Lord. Is it then a good thing you invoke, Jeremiah, in that you promise, saying, "I will invoke faithlessness and wretchedness"? But one must consider the covenants we make and their breakings, that it is possible at times to make covenants badly; and
after making covenants badly, would that we might then invoke the breaking of them. So too if I consider "the broad and spacious way that leads to destruction," and that in walking on it I do not suffer hardship, then passing over from the "broad and spacious way" and coming to the "narrow and constricted" one, and suffering hardship, I say: "I will invoke wretchedness." I am about to break the covenants made with
the world and worldly affairs, so that I may take up heavenly covenants. "I will invoke faithlessness." And so, leaving behind the "broad and spacious way" and coming to the "narrow and constricted" one, so that I may become wretched like Paul, I say: "I will invoke wretchedness." For not every man will say, "Wretched man that I am! Who shall rescue me out of this body doomed to death?"
But the one who has understood the body of death, who wishes to be delivered from this body of death, will say, "Wretched man that I am." But the one who loves the body, the majority, who disbelieves in the age to come, does not say, "Wretched man that I am," but calls himself blessed, both because he is a man, and because he is in the body of death. If then I am able, having understood,
How Paul said, "Wretched man that I am," not yet having invoked wretchedness — I will invoke it, from setting aside the covenants made for wickedness, and I will say, as Jeremiah did, "I will invoke faithlessness and wretchedness." For he did not say, "I will invoke the faithlessness of God." I want to give an example from Scripture of a righteous person who set aside covenants, so that I may show how that person, by the deed, invoked faithlessness. Judith made a covenant
with Holofernes, that after going out for so many days to pray to God, and after so many days she would give herself to Holofernes' bed. Holofernes accepted these terms. He released Judith outside the camp for her prayers. What was Judith obliged to do — keep the covenant or set it aside? It is agreed that she was to set it aside; for to set aside the covenant made with Holofernes was a blessed thing to do
before God. Judith was about to set aside the covenant made with Holofernes; she was about to say, "I will invoke faithlessness" — and indeed she did invoke faithlessness. Would that I too might become such a person, that I might say, "I will invoke faithlessness," and invoke the faithlessness toward the serpent, toward the devil. Once the serpent made a covenant with Eve, and he was dear to her, and the serpent was dear
to the woman. But God, being good, brought it about that this covenant be dissolved and this evil friendship be broken up, and, as a good God, he says: "I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed." Let us then listen with gratitude to how God makes enmity toward
this one, so that he may make friendship toward Christ; for it is impossible to be a friend of opposites at the same time. And just as "no one can serve two masters," so no one can be a friend both of God and of mammon, a friend both of Christ and of the serpent. But it is necessary that friendship toward Christ produce enmity toward the serpent, and that friendship
toward the serpent produce enmity toward Christ. "I will invoke faithlessness and wretchedness." But so that you may understand more fully "I will invoke wretchedness," let me describe something that happens among ascetics. Often, when marriage lies within reach and there is no obstacle to it, yet the flesh rises up against the spirit, someone chooses not to make use of the right to marry, but instead to endure wretchedness and toil, to buffet the body with fastings
and to enslave it through abstinence from certain foods, and by every means to bring the body's deeds to death through the spirit. Does not such a person, then, invoke wretchedness, when it was possible to give himself over to luxury and pleasure and not invoke wretchedness? If, then, anyone is able to imitate the prophet, let him invoke faithlessness too, as we have explained, and let him invoke wretchedness in his ascetic labors as well. It happened
that the account concerning Jeremiah was true also in this respect, that he lived in purity as well; for the Lord said to him: "You shall not take a wife, nor shall you beget children." And he lived in purity; for he invoked faithlessness and wretchedness. (19) "Because the word of the Lord became to me a reproach." Blessed is Jeremiah, having no other reproach than the word
...of the Lord. But we wretches bear reproaches not on account of the word of the Lord, but on account of our own sins, and we are reproached for the things in which we stumble and have stumbled, and are reviled for our wicked deeds. But the Savior does not want us to be reproached with reproaches of that kind; rather, let them say, "Blessed are you when they reproach you and persecute you and say every kind of evil word against
you for my sake." "Rejoice on that day and leap for joy." "The word," then, it says, "of the Lord has become for me a reproach and a mockery all the day." Then consider how the prophets are honest men, and do not hide their own sins as we do, and speak not only of the sins of their own time, but of all the generations that have
sinned. I myself hesitate to confess my sins before the few people here, since those listening are about to condemn me. But Jeremiah, though he suffered something sinful, was not ashamed, but recorded his own sin; for what follows was a sin, in the words: "And I said: I will not name the name of the Lord, and I will no longer speak in his name."
You have been taught to "do everything in the name of the Lord," to act in the name of God; but you say, "shall I not name the name of the Lord"? But what name are you going to name instead? "You shall not call to mind the name of other gods in your hearts," and yet you say, "I will not name the name of the Lord, and I will no longer speak in his name"? He speaks, then, having undergone something human, which
we too are often at risk of undergoing. And especially if someone is conscious in himself of having once suffered hardship and affliction and hatred on account of teaching and the word, he often says: I will withdraw — what do I have to do with such affairs? If it is from this that I am even involved in troubles, from teaching, from putting forth the word, why should I not rather withdraw into solitude and quiet? Something of this sort
the prophet too underwent, when he declared: "So I said, I will never again pronounce the Lord's name, nor speak any longer in his name." But in this the Lord is good, who prevents such sins on the part of such great men. He did not allow the prophet to make true what he had said, but even in this made Jeremiah call upon and nullify what had been said as a breach of faith.
For he said: "I will not name the name of the Lord any longer, and I will no longer speak in his name." But "there came to be," he says, "in my heart something like a burning fire, blazing in my bones, and I am utterly undone and I cannot bear it." The word of the Lord came to be a fire burning his heart. "And it
came to be in my heart like a burning fire, blazing in my bones." He cast off the sin which he had committed in saying, "I will not name the name of the Lord, and I will no longer speak in his name," and Jeremiah cast off the sin at the very moment of speaking. Would that I too, at the very moment of sinning and speaking a sinful word, perceived that "there has come to be a fire"
burning and flaming in my heart, so that I am not able to bear it.” The discourse is about to venture something, though I do not know whether it is advantageous for such an audience, and one of this kind. He has said that there is a certain kind of fire, a fire not perceptible to sense, punishing the one being punished with pain so as not to be able
to bear it. For he said: “It became in my heart like a burning fire,” and “flaming,” not only in my heart but also “in my bones, and I am undone on every side, and I am not able to bear it.” I am afraid that what is stored up for us may be of this kind, becoming fire, as it became in the heart of Jeremiah. But we have not suffered this. If we had suffered
this, and the two fires were set before us, this fire and the outer fire which we see upon those being burned by the rulers of the nations, we would have chosen that fire rather than this one. For that fire burns the surface, but this one burns the heart, and beginning from the heart it makes its way through to all the bones, and making its way through to
the bones it comes upon the whole person burning, and it comes in such a way that the one burning cannot bear it. Who, in the case of this fire, can say, “and I am not able to bear it”? I know that even robbers have been able to endure this fire, the pain that comes from this fire. The pain from the fire that Jeremiah described is different, when he says: “And
it became in my heart like a fire burning, flaming in my bones, and I am undone on every side, and I am not able to bear it.” It is that very fire which the Savior kindles, who declared, “Fire is what I came to cast upon the earth.” And since it is that fire the Savior kindles, for this reason, to those who are beginning to hear him, he starts from the fire, casting fire first
upon their heart; which Simon and Cleopas confess, saying concerning his words, “Was not our heart burning within us on the road, as he opened the scriptures to us?” Here the heart burns with fire, both Simon’s and Cleopas’s. Hear them saying, “Was not our heart burning?” 9. Who is now worthy to receive that fire
in the heart, so that he may not receive it there? I want to describe who it is that has this fire in the heart. Describe for me two people who have committed the same sin in kind, the foul, the unclean fornication, and among these two who have fornicated, picture the one who is not grieved nor pained nor stung, but who suffers what is said in Proverbs
concerning the promiscuous woman, “who, whenever she does it, washes herself and says she has done nothing wrong.” Show me the other one, who after the fall cannot bear it, but is punished in conscience, tormented in heart, unable to eat and drink, fasting not by rule but by the anguish of repentance. Describe for me such a one, gloomy the whole day, and worn down, and going about, groaning
...from the groaning of his heart, seeing his sin set before him, continually accusing him to his face. And behold such a man being punished not for one day nor for one night, but for a long time. Which of the two do you prefer? Which do you say has hopes before God? Is it that man who fornicated and gave it no thought, but grew callous, even to the point of handing
himself over to licentiousness, or this man who mourns and laments after a single sin? This man † is of hopes. The more he is burned by the fire of grief, the more he is shown mercy, and there is for him a sufficient time of relief, as much as is given to that other man as a time of punishment, the one who fornicated and grieved. And since for this man the time of punishment here is beneficial, for this reason
[Paul] undertook to punish the man who had fornicated, and when he had punished him with grief and saw that the grief was sufficient, he says: "lest such a man be swallowed up by excessive grief, confirm your love toward him." Let each of us examine his own conscience, and see what he has sinned, since he must be punished. Let him pray to God that this fire which is in Jeremiah come upon him, and then the
fire that came upon Simon and Cleopas come upon him too. But whoever has sinned and given it no thought will be kept for that other fire. "And it became in my heart like a burning fire, blazing in my bones, and I am undone on every side and cannot bear it, for I have heard the reproach of many gathering round about." The blameless, blessed Jeremiah (I say this with the exception of this small sin of his
and whatever other small thing he may have done) was reproached by many. But the reproach he received from the many was, before God, a commendation. For those who reproached him said: "Gather together, and let all of us, his friends, gather together against him; watch his design, and he will be deceived." They wished to deceive him with another, destructive deception, the opposite of the deception about which he said: "You deceived me, Lord, and I was deceived."
And these who gather together against him say: "and we shall prevail against him, and we shall take our revenge on him." Those who have been rebuked for their own sins think that they have been wronged, and because they suppose they have been wronged they say: "we shall take our revenge on him." Those who sawed Isaiah in two did something of the same sort; for as though they had been wronged (since the prophecies kept turning them back and punishing
them, rebuking them, censuring them) they sawed him in two and passed a death sentence upon him. But Jeremiah says of these who gathered together against him: "and the Lord is with me like a mighty warrior." If we become the kind of people we ought to be, and welcome that fire coming upon our own sins as it came upon Jeremiah and those like him, the Lord afterward becomes with us "like a mighty
warrior." And "therefore they persecuted, and were not able to understand" [the Jews who persecuted him: "they were greatly ashamed and did not perceive their own dishonor," being dishonored for so long a time they do not speak of their own sins], because the Lord was with the one being persecuted, and one who is persecuted cannot become subject to them. Perhaps, then, just as many things said of Jeremiah are referred to the Savior, this too
Can it be so? For ‘assemble’ and ‘let us assemble against him’ is also said of the Savior. And ‘the Lord’ was with him ‘as a mighty warrior; therefore they pursued him and were not able to understand’ — the Jews who pursued him. ‘They were greatly ashamed and did not perceive their dishonor,’ though dishonored for so long a time they do not speak of their own sins, ‘which will never be forgotten,’ but they suppose
that in this age their lawless deeds will be forgotten. But we see that their lawless deeds will not be forgotten forever, and seeing this we remember the saying, ‘Do not be arrogant, but fear; for if God did not spare the branches that grew by nature, how much more’ will he ‘not spare’ those contrary to nature? ‘The Lord,’ then, ‘of hosts’ is with us, ‘testing what is just, understanding kidneys
and hearts.’ The Lord tests what is just and rejects what is unjust, and he is, if I may put it this way, a money-changer of just and unjust things; and this same Lord also ‘understands kidneys and hearts.’ I ask what difference there is between ‘understanding kidneys and hearts’ and, on the other hand, ‘examining hearts and kidneys.’ He does not examine the hearts and kidneys of everyone, but of those who have sinned; for I am pausing on
the meaning of ‘examining,’ as it is used in this life concerning those who are tortured. In courts of law, some examine and others are examined, and some are also under the heaviest of pains. But he alone has a new manner of examination, for he examines hearts, and to the Lord alone belongs the examining of hearts and kidneys. Here robbers are examined, at the command of a governor, in their
sides; but there it is not at the command of God but by the Lord himself that someone’s kidneys and heart are examined — unless indeed I should say here that the one who is commanded is the Son, and the one who commands is the Father, and the Word is the one who examines hearts and kidneys. And I think that of all torments, of all pains, the heaviest are those that come from the
Word, whenever it examines both hearts and kidneys. Therefore let us do everything possible so that we are not handed over to that examination. I think that those handed over to the ones called torturers in the gospel suffer less than that examination; for they are handed over to many, perhaps at first to more torturers, since they are not yet worthy of being handed over to the one Word who examines hearts and kidneys. That rich man was not yet worthy
of being handed over to the one who examines hearts and kidneys; for this reason he was tormented by many. But whether later he too suffers this or not, let whoever is able examine the question. In any case, what await us are torturers, and the one who examines hearts and kidneys because of our sins; and if we are not swiftly freed from these sins, we shall be among them. Therefore let us rise up and ask for help
from God, that we may be blessed in Christ Jesus, to whom be glory forever. Amen.