The Seventh Festal Letter, for Easter 335

The blessed Paul wrote to the Corinthians that he always carried about in his body the dying of Jesus. He did not mean that he alone should make that boast, but that they and we should make it too; and in this, my brothers and sisters, let us follow his example. Let this be the usual boast of all of us, at all times. David shared in it when he said in the Psalms, “For your sake we die all day long; we are counted as sheep for the slaughter.” This is fitting for us, especially in the days of the feast, when we keep the remembrance of our Savior’s death. For whoever is made like him in his death is also eager in the practice of virtue. He has put to death his members that are on the earth; he crucifies the flesh with its passions and cravings; he lives in the Spirit and is conformed to the Spirit. He is always mindful of God and never forgets him, and he never does the deeds of death. Now, so that we may carry the dying of Jesus in our body, Paul at once adds the way to such fellowship, saying, “We have the same spirit of faith, as it is written, ‘I believed, and therefore I have spoken’; we also believe, and therefore we speak.” He adds as well, speaking of the grace that comes from knowledge, “For he who raised up Jesus will also raise us up with Jesus, and will present us before him with you.” [a]

When the saints have taken hold of this true life by such faith and knowledge, they no doubt receive the joy that is in heaven. The wicked, who do not care for it, are rightly deprived of the blessedness that comes from it. For, “Let the wicked be taken away, so that he will not see the glory of the Lord.” They will hear the call of the promise that goes out to all, “Wake up, you who sleep, and rise from the dead,” and they will rise, and will even come to heaven, knocking and saying, “Open to us.” Yet the Lord will rebuke them as people who put the knowledge of him far from themselves, and will say, “I do not know you.” And the Holy Spirit cries out against them, “The wicked will be turned into hell, all the nations that forget God.” We do say that the wicked are dead, but not in the sense of an ascetic life set against sin; nor do they, like the saints, carry about dying in their bodies. Rather, it is the soul they bury in sins and follies. They draw near to the dead and feed the soul on dead food, like young eagles that swoop down from high places onto the carcasses of the dead. The law forbade these, giving its command in a figure: “You shall not eat the eagle, nor any other bird that feeds on a dead carcass”; and it declared unclean whatever eats the dead. But these people kill the soul with cravings, and say nothing except, “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.” And the prophet at once describes the kind of fruit those have who love pleasure in this way, adding, “And these things are revealed in the ears of the Lord of Hosts: this sin will not be forgiven you until you die.” Yes, even while they live they will be put to shame, because they count their belly their lord; and when they are dead they will be tormented, because they have made a boast of such a death. Paul too bears witness to this when he says, “Food for the belly, and the belly for food; but God will destroy both it and them.” And the divine word declared beforehand concerning them, “The death of sinners is evil, and those who hate the righteous commit sin.” For bitter is the worm, and grievous the darkness, that wicked men inherit. [d]

But the saints, and those who truly practice virtue, “put to death their members that are on the earth: sexual immorality, uncleanness, passion, evil craving.” As a result they are pure and without stain, trusting in the promise of our Savior, who said, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.” Having become dead to the world and having given up the world’s trading, they gain an honorable death; for “precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints.” Keeping the likeness of the apostle, they too are able to say, “I am crucified with Christ; nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ lives in me.” For the true life is the one a man lives in Christ. Although they are dead to the world, they live as though in heaven, setting their minds on the things above, as one who loved such a home said: “While we walk on earth, our dwelling is in heaven.” Now only those who live this way and share in such virtue are able to give glory to God, and this is what truly makes a feast and a holiday. For the feast does not consist in pleasant company at meals, nor in splendid clothing, nor in days of leisure, but in acknowledging God and offering him thanksgiving and praise. And this belongs to the saints alone, who live in Christ; for it is written, “The dead will not praise you, O Lord, nor any of those who go down into silence; but we who live will bless the Lord, from now on and forever.” So it was with Hezekiah, who was rescued from death and therefore praised God, saying, “Those who are in Hades cannot praise you; the dead cannot bless you; but the living will bless you, as I do.” For praising and blessing God belongs only to those who live in Christ, and by this they go up to the feast. The Passover is not for the Gentiles, nor for those who are still Jews in the flesh, but for those who acknowledge the truth in Christ, as he declares who was sent to proclaim such a feast: “Christ, our Passover, is sacrificed.” [f]

So, although wicked men press forward to keep the feast, praise God as people do at a feast, and push their way into the church of the saints, God protests, saying to the sinner, “Why do you speak of my ordinances?” And the gentle Spirit rebukes them, saying, “Praise is not fitting in the mouth of a sinner.” Sin has no common ground with the praise of God, for the sinner has a mouth that speaks perverse things, as the Proverb says: “The mouth of the wicked answers evil things.” How can we praise God with an impure mouth? Things that are opposite to each other cannot exist together. “For what partnership does righteousness have with wickedness? Or what fellowship is there between light and darkness?” So cries Paul, a minister of the gospel. This is why sinners, and all who are strangers to the catholic church, heretics and schismatics, cannot rightly even go on keeping the feast, since they are shut out from glorifying God with the saints. But the righteous man, though he seems to be dying to the world, speaks boldly, saying, “I will not die, but live, and tell of all your marvelous deeds.” For God is not ashamed to be called the God of those who truly put to death their members that are on the earth and live in Christ; for he is the God of the living, not of the dead. By his living Word he gives life to all people, and he gives the Word to the saints to be their food and life, as the Lord declares: “I am the bread of life.” Because the Jews were dull of perception, had not trained the senses of the soul in virtue, and did not understand this saying about bread, they grumbled against him for saying, “I am the bread that came down from heaven and gives life to people.” [j]

For sin has her own special bread, the bread of her death. Calling to those who love pleasure and lack understanding, she says, “Touch with delight the secret bread, and the sweet waters that are stolen.” Whoever so much as touches them does not know that what is born of the earth perishes with her. Even when the sinner thinks he will find pleasure, the end of that food is not pleasant, as the Wisdom of God says again: “Bread of deceit is pleasant to a man, but afterward his mouth will be filled with gravel.” And again: “Honey drips from the lips of a prostitute, and for a time it is sweet to your palate; but in the end you will find it more bitter than gall, and sharper than a two-edged sword.” So he eats and enjoys it for a little while; afterward he spurns it, once he has carried his soul far away. For the fool does not know that those who go far from God will perish. Besides this, the prophet’s warning holds him back, saying, “What have you to do with the way of Egypt, to drink the waters of Gihon? And what have you to do with the way of Asshur, to drink the waters of the rivers?” And the Wisdom of God, who loves humankind, forbids these things, crying out, “But leave quickly; do not linger in the place, and do not fix your eye on it; for so you will pass over strange waters and leave the strange river quickly.” She also calls them to herself: “For Wisdom has built her house and set it up on seven pillars. She has killed her sacrifices, mixed her wine in the bowls, and prepared her table. She has sent out her servants, inviting to the bowl with a loud proclamation and saying, ‘Whoever is foolish, let him turn in to me.’ And to those who lack understanding she says, ‘Come, eat of my bread, and drink of the wine I have mixed for you.’” And what hope is offered in place of those other things? “Leave folly behind, so that you may live; and seek understanding, so that you may endure.” For the bread of Wisdom is living fruit, as the Lord said: “I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever.” When Israel ate the manna, which was indeed pleasant and wonderful, Israel still died; whoever ate it did not live forever because of it, but that whole multitude died in the wilderness. The Lord teaches this, saying, “I am the bread of life. Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they are dead. This is the bread that came down from heaven, so that a man may eat of it and not die.” [m]

Now wicked men go hungry for bread like this, for effeminate souls will hunger; but the righteous alone, being prepared, will be satisfied, saying, “I will see your face in righteousness; I will be satisfied when your glory is seen by me.” For whoever shares in the divine bread always hungers with longing for it; and whoever hungers this way has a gift that never fails, as Wisdom promises, saying, “The Lord will not kill the righteous soul with famine.” He promises in the Psalms too: “I will bless her provision abundantly; I will satisfy her poor with bread.” And we can hear our Savior saying, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.” Rightly, then, do the saints and those who love the life that is in Christ lift themselves up to a longing for this food. One of them pleads earnestly, saying, “As the deer longs for the springs of water, so my soul longs for you, O God. My soul thirsts for the living God; when shall I come and see the face of God?” And another says, “My God, my God, I seek you at dawn; my soul thirsts for you, and how often my flesh does too, in a dry and pathless land without water. So I appeared before you in holiness, to see your power and your glory.” [o]

Since this is so, my brothers and sisters, let us put to death our members that are on the earth, and be nourished with living bread by faith and love toward God, knowing that without faith it is impossible to share in bread like this. For when our Savior called all people to himself and said, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink,” he at once spoke of the faith without which a person cannot receive such food: “Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture says, out of his belly will flow rivers of living water.” For this reason he continually nourished his believing disciples with his words, and gave them life by the nearness of his divinity. But to the Canaanite woman, because she was not yet a believer, he did not even grant her a reply, although she stood in great need of food from him. He did this not out of scorn, far from it, for the Lord loves people and is good, and that is why he went into the region of Tyre and Sidon. He did it because of her unbelief, and because she was one of those who did not have the word. And he did it justly, my brothers and sisters. Nothing would have been gained by her offering her plea before she believed; it was by her faith that she would support her request. “For whoever comes to God must first believe that he exists, and that he rewards those who seek him,” and “without faith it is impossible for a man to please him.” Paul teaches this. Now he shows that she was still an unbeliever, one of the unholy, when he says, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.” Then, convinced by the power of the word, she changed her ways and gained faith as well. The Lord no longer spoke to her as to a dog, but talked with her as a human being, saying, “O woman, great is your faith!” And since she believed, he at once gave her the fruit of faith and said, “Let it be for you as you desire.” And her daughter was healed that very hour. [q]

For the righteous man, brought up in faith and knowledge and in keeping the divine commandments, always has a healthy soul. That is why we are commanded to “welcome the one who is weak in the faith” and to nourish him, even if he cannot yet eat bread but only vegetables, “for the one who is weak eats vegetables.” Even the Corinthians could not share in such bread, being still infants; like infants they drank milk. “For everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness,” in the words of that divine man. The apostle urges his beloved son Timothy in his first letter “to be nourished in the word of faith and the good teaching he had attained.” And in the second: “Hold fast the pattern of sound words that you have heard from me, in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus.” And it is not only here, my brothers and sisters, that this bread is the food of the righteous; nor is it only the saints on earth who are nourished by such bread and such blood. We also eat them in heaven, for the Lord is the food even of the exalted spirits and the angels, and he is the joy of the whole heavenly host. He is everything to all, and he has pity on all, according to his loving-kindness. The Lord has already given us angels’ food, and he makes a promise to those who stay with him in his trials, saying, “And I promise you a kingdom, as my Father has promised me, that you will eat and drink at my table in my kingdom, and sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.” Oh, what a banquet this is, my brothers and sisters, and how great the harmony and gladness of those who eat at this heavenly table! For they take their delight not in the food that is cast out, but in the food that produces everlasting life. Who, then, will be thought worthy of that gathering? Who is so blessed as to be called, and counted worthy of that divine feast? Truly, “Blessed is he who will eat bread in your kingdom.” [r]

Now whoever has been counted worthy of the heavenly calling, and has been made holy by this calling, and then grows careless in it, becomes defiled even though he was washed. “Counting the blood of the covenant by which he was made holy an unholy thing, and despising the Spirit of grace,” he hears the words, “Friend, how did you get in here without wedding garments?” For the banquet of the saints is spotless and pure; “for many are called, but few are chosen.” Judas, for example, came to the supper, but because he despised it he went out from the presence of the Lord, and having abandoned his Life, he hanged himself. But the disciples who stayed with the Redeemer shared in the happiness of the feast. And then there is the young man who went into a far country and there wasted his property in reckless living. Suppose he comes to long for this divine feast, and comes to himself, and says, “How many of my father’s hired servants have bread to spare, while I perish here with hunger!” Suppose he then gets up and comes to his father and confesses to him, saying, “I have sinned against heaven and before you, and I am not worthy to be called your son; make me as one of your hired servants.” When he confesses like this, he will be counted worthy of more than he asked for. For the father does not receive him as a hired servant, nor does he look on him as a stranger. He kisses him as a son, brings him back to life as if from the dead, counts him worthy of the divine feast, and gives him his former, precious robe. So, for this reason, there is singing and gladness in his father’s house. [s]

For this is the work of the Father’s loving-kindness and goodness: not only does he make him alive from the dead, but he also makes his grace shine out through the Spirit. In place of corruption he clothes him with an incorruptible garment. In place of hunger he kills the fattened calf. In place of far journeys the Father watched for his return, and provided shoes for his feet. And, most wonderful of all, he put a divine signet ring on his hand. By all these things he gave him a new birth into the image of the glory of Christ. These are the gracious gifts of the Father, by which the Lord honors and nourishes those who stay with him, and also those who return to him and repent. For he promises, saying, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will not hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst.” We too will be counted worthy of these things if we hold fast to our Savior at all times, and if we are pure, not only in these six days of Easter, but count the whole course of our life as a feast; if we stay near and do not go far away, saying to him, “You have the words of eternal life, and where shall we go?” Let those of us who are far away return, confessing our wrongdoing, holding nothing against anyone, and by the spirit putting to death the deeds of the body. For in this way, having first nourished the soul here, we will share with the angels at that heavenly and spiritual table. We will not knock and be turned away like the five foolish virgins, but will go in with the Lord like those who were wise and loved the bridegroom; and showing the dying of Jesus in our bodies, we will receive life and the kingdom from him. [t]

We begin the fast of forty days on the 23rd of Mechir, the 17th of February, and the holy fast of the blessed feast on the 28th of Phamenoth, the 24th of March. Joining to these the six days that follow them, in fasting and keeping watch as each one is able, let us rest on the 3rd of the month Pharmuthi, the 29th of March, on the evening of the seventh day. Then, when that day which is holy and blessed in every way, which bears the name of Christ, namely the Lord’s day, has dawned on us on the 4th of Pharmuthi, the 30th of March, let us keep the holy feast of Pentecost from then on. Let us at all times worship the Father in Christ, through whom, to him and with him, be glory and dominion by the Holy Spirit forever and ever. Amen. All the brothers who are with me send you greetings. Greet one another with a holy kiss. There is no eighth or ninth letter, for he did not send them, for the reason mentioned earlier. Here ends the seventh Festal Letter of the holy Athanasius, the patriarch. [v]