in four books

2nd edition, revised

Russian translation from the Greek original

Book 1

Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew

Preface

The divine men who lived before the law did not learn from scriptures and books, but, having a pure mind, were enlightened by the illumination of the All-Holy Spirit, and thus learned the will of God from the conversation of God Himself with them lip to mouth. Such were Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Job, Moses. But when people became corrupt and unworthy of enlightenment and instruction from the Holy Spirit, then the loving God gave the Scriptures, so that, even with its help, they would remember the will of God. In the same way, Christ Himself first personally conversed with the Apostles, and (after) sent them the grace of the Holy Spirit as a teacher. But since the Lord foresaw that heresies would arise later and our morals would deteriorate, He was pleased that the Gospels should be written, so that we, learning the truth from them, would not be carried away by heretical lies, and so that our morals would not be completely corrupted.

He gave us the four Gospels because we learn from them the four main virtues: courage, wisdom, truth, and chastity: we learn courage when the Lord says: do not be afraid of those who kill the body. but the souls of those who are not able to kill (Matt. 10:28); wisdom, when He says: "Be ye wise as serpents" (Matt. 10:16); truth when he teaches: "You want people to do to you." do ye also unto them (Luke 6:31); chastity, when He says: "Whosoever looketh upon a woman to lust after her, hath already committed adultery with nothing in his heart" (Matt. 5:28). He gave us the four Gospels also because they contain objects of four kinds, namely, dogmas and commandments, threats and promises. To those who believe in dogmas, but do not keep the commandments, they threaten with future punishments, and they promise eternal blessings to those who keep them. The Gospel (evangelism) is so called because it proclaims to us things that are good and joyful for us, such as: the remission of sins, justification, migration to heaven, adoption as sons of God, the inheritance of eternal blessings, and deliverance from torment. It also declares that we receive these blessings easily, for we do not acquire them by our labors, nor do we receive them for our good works, but we are worthy of them by the grace and love of God.

There are four Evangelists: two of them, Matthew and John, were of the twelve, and the other two, Mark and Luke, of the seventy. Mark was a companion and disciple of Peter, and Luke was a disciple of Paul. Matthew was the first to write the Gospel in Hebrew for the believing Jews, eight years after the Ascension of Christ. From the Hebrew language into Greek, it was translated by John. Mark, at the instruction of Peter, wrote the Gospel ten years after his ascension; Luke after fifteen years, and John after thirty-two years. It is said that, after the death of the former Evangelists, the Gospels were presented to him, at his request, in order to examine them and say whether they were written correctly, and John, since he had received a great grace of truth, added what was omitted in them, and about what they said briefly, he wrote in his Gospel at greater length. He received the name of Theologian because the other Evangelists did not mention the pre-eternal existence of God the Word, but he said with divine inspiration that they would not think that the Word of God is simply a man, that is, not God. Matthew speaks of the life of Christ only according to the flesh: for he wrote for the Jews, for whom it was enough to know that Christ was born of Abraham and David. For he who believes from among the Jews is comforted if he is convinced that Christ is from David.

You say: "Was not even one Evangelist enough?" Of course, one was enough, but in order for the truth to be revealed more clearly, it is permitted to write four. For when you see that these four did not come together and did not sit in one place, but were in different places, and yet wrote about the same thing as if it had been said with one mouth, how can you not be amazed at the truth of the Gospel, and say that the Evangelists spoke under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit!

Don't tell me they don't agree on everything. For see where they disagree. Did any of them say that Christ was born, and the other, "He was not born"? Or did one of them say that Christ was risen, and the other: "He is not risen"? No, no! On the necessary and most important they agree. And if they do not disagree on the main thing, then why should it be surprising that they apparently disagree on the unimportant; for from the fact that they do not agree on everything, their truth is most evident. Otherwise, they would have been thought to have written when they came together, or by conspiring with each other. Now it seems that they disagree, because what one of them omitted, the other wrote. And this is really so. Let us proceed to the Gospel itself.