Catechesis 78

On listening with understanding to the holy Scriptures.

Brethren and fathers, all we human beings have eyes and ears; however it is not given to all to see and hear, but to those who in addition have a ear which obeys and an eye for looking. That is why the Lord says in the Gospels, ‘Those who have ears to hear, let them hear’ [Matthew 13.9]. While of those who are hard of hearing the Prophet says, ‘God gave them a spirit of compunction, eyes for not looking and ears for not hearing’ [Romans 11.8]. We should surely then listen with understanding to the things that are read to us, not simple-mindedly or anyhow, so that we may not fall beneath the threat, but rather that we may able to say, as it is written, ‘The Lord’s training opens my ears’ [Isaias 50.5]. The one who hears like this is attentive and moved by compunction, as we sing in David’s Psalms, ‘Rejoice in the Lord, you just’ [Psalm 32.1]. Such a person considers everything here to be a passing shadow; considers everything to be rubbish, so that he may gain Christ [Cf. Philippians 3.8]. Just as he hears him saying to his Disciples, ‘I will not leave you orphans. I am coming to you. A little while, and the world sees me no longer. But you see me, because I live and you will live’ [John 14.18-19]. And again, ‘I am the vine and you are the branches’ [John 15.5]. And again, ‘You are my friends, if you do whatever I command you. I no longer call you servants, because the servant does not know what his lord does. But I have called you friends, because everything that I have heard from my Father, I have made known to you’ [John 15.14-15]. And again, ‘You have remained with me in my trials, and I make a covenant with you — an eternal covenant — that you may eat and drink for ever at my table in my kingdom’ [Luke 22.28-30]. When someone who loves God hears such words, they not only rejoice but also choose to die for Christ every day. This then was how all the Saints lived their lives, with statements such as these they gloried triumphantly of their longing for God. Jeremias says, ‘I did not grow weary following you, Lord, nor did I desire any human day’ [Jeremias 17.16]. David says, ‘What shall I give the Lord in return for all that he has given me? I will take the cup of salvation and call on the name of the Lord’ [Psalm 115.3-4], while the Apostle again says, ‘It has been given us by God not only to believe in Christ, but also to suffer for him’ [Philippians 1.29]. Similarly the Apostles, after they had been flogged, rejoiced, as Scripture says, ‘because they had been found worthy to be dishonoured for the name of Christ’ [Acts 5.41]. In short each of the Saints with words like these reveals their love for Christ. And therefore, brethren, let us too hear obediently what is said and love our beloved God with love, always giving thanks for all the good things that he has done for us, that he chose us from the beginning for salvation by the sanctification of our profession here; that he gave us the grace to worship him with orthodox faith and not be carried astray. For how many have gone astray, utterly deceived ‘by human trickery, by villainy to the cunning of error’ [Ephesians 4.14]! How many are famished ‘not with a famine of bread or thirst for water, but a famine of hearing the word of God’ [Amos 8.11], as it is written! To us has been given, like a full table, the teaching of the Saints, whence one works the divine words like a goldsmith, another and another from here and from there sweetens by his utterances. It is opportune then to say with the Apostle, ‘If God is for, who is against us? For the One who did not spare his own Son, but handed him over for us all, how will he not with him also grant us all things? Who will bring a charge against God’s chosen one? It is God who justifies. Who then condemns? It was Christ who died, yet rather he was raised from the dead, who is also at the right hand of God and who also makes intercession for us’ [Romans 8.31-34], to God the Father that is, and who will also bestow on us his eternal kingdom, for to him belong glory and might, with the Father and the Holy Spirit, now and for ever, and to the ages of ages, Amen.

Translation and notes by Fr Ephrem Lash.