Thus, the Lord could heal the sick only by the faith of those who brought him. But there are signs that the sick man himself had faith. First of all, would a person who is at all conscious, without faith, allow himself to be dragged along with his bed through the streets, and, what is more important, would he allow himself to be lifted up on the roof and lowered through it into the house? But there is another hidden sign of faith of the paralytic. The Lord, addressing him, calls him the word child: be of good cheer, child! thy sins are forgiven thee. Would Christ call an unbeliever a child? Could it be possible to say to the impenitent: thy sins are forgiven thee? At the resurrection of the son of the widow of Nain, Christ calls him neither "child" nor "son," but a young man. For the dead do not believe, and cannot repent. Here, however, He says to the sick man: Child! And then, did not the Lord say: "If a brother repents, forgive him" (Luke 17:3-4)? Repentance, therefore, is a condition of forgiveness. And repentance is impossible without shame and fear of God and without faith in God.

And some of the scribes said to themselves, He blasphemes. Thus thought those who do not rejoice in good, allies and slaves of evil. It is as if they are saying: "Who can forgive sins except God alone?" These people with shrunken souls, who considered themselves the greatest sages and longed to reduce Christ at least to their level, if not lower, were certainly unable to accommodate in their carnal and darkened minds the thought that God could appear as a Man and that this manifestation of God in Man took place in the person of our Lord Jesus Christ Himself. They do not care about the sufferings of the paralytic, much less about his healing, they monitor every word of Christ in order to be able to humiliate Christ, to remove Him from their path and from their conscience. "In avenging their passions, they thought they were avenging blasphemy" (Zigaben). For He was too great for them.

And Jesus, seeing their thoughts, said, Why do you think evil in your hearts? The scribes who were present said nothing with their lips, but only thought in their hearts. It is not said "in minds," but in hearts, and this means that this thought was combined with anger and hatred. For they listened to Christ not as believers or as objective investigators, but as informers and persecutors. If they were believers, they would rejoice in the word and work of Christ, like the rest of the people, who, seeing this, glorified God. And if they had been able to become objective researchers, they would have believed in Christ, as the centurion believed under the Cross on Golgotha. For he, looking objectively and disinterested at all that had happened, and seeing with what fear, earthquake and terror all nature responded to the death of Christ, exclaimed: "Truly He was the Son of God" (Matt. 27:54).

Our Lord Jesus Christ saw their thoughts. Who can see thoughts but God? May the wickedness of sinners end, and correct the righteous, search hearts and bowels, O God, righteously, - cries David (Psalm 7:10). I, the Lord, penetrate the heart and search the inward parts, that I may reward each one according to his way and according to the fruits of his works, saith the Lord Himself through the prophet Jeremiah (Jeremiah 17:10). And Solomon in his prayer says to God: "Thou alone knowest the heart of the sons of men" (2 Chronicles 6:30). And behold, our Lord Jesus Christ sees the heart and the thoughts in the heart. As the earth cannot see the eye, but the eye can see the earth, so all earthly creatures, shrouded in time, cannot look into the mysteries of eternity, but the Eye of eternity can penetrate the earth and see everything that is there. Looking through this vision of eternity, our Lord Jesus Christ saw through, penetrating what is hidden in the depths of the sea, and in the depths of the human heart, and in all the depths of time and space.

Why do you think evil in your hearts? Thus does the gentle Lord ask His spies and persecutors. O immeasurable purity of Jesus' thoughts! O indescribable beauty of His heart! And the meekness of the lamb! Why do you think evil? Why do you not think good? Why do you expect evil? Why do you not expect good? Why do you rejoice in evil? Why do you not rejoice in good things? Why, standing at a clear spring, do you expect muddy water to flow from it? Why, looking at the sun, do you expect its eclipse? Give up these unhealthy habits; and rejoice in the purity of the spring and the sunlight! The Lord does not ridicule them, does not attack them, does not scold them, as an ordinary mortal would behave with his enemies if he managed to restore health and strength to the paralytic. Truly, even the most attentive physician could not address the most grievous of his sick more gently than the meek and merciful Lord addresses His foolish persecutors: why do you think evil in your hearts, if you can think good, and expect good, and rejoice in good?

For what is easier to say, Thy sins are forgiven, or to say, Arise and walk? But that you may know that the Son of Man has power on earth to forgive sins, then He saith unto the paralytic, Arise, take up thy bed, and go into thy house. And he arose, and took up his bed, and went to his house. For the Lord, to speak a word is the same as to do a deed. For ordinary mortal language it is equally easy to say: "Your sins are forgiven" and: "Arise and walk; for both remain without any consequences. But for the sinless Lord, the word is the same as the deed. Therefore, when He pronounces the above words, He means: what is easier to do - to forgive a person's sins or to raise him from bed healthy? Both are equally impossible for an ordinary mortal man. With men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible (Matt. 19:26). So, which is easier: to heal the soul or to heal the body? The soul cannot be healed until it is freed from its sins. When sins are forgiven, the soul becomes healthy; and if the soul is healthy, then it is easy for the body to recover. Therefore, it is much more important to forgive the sins of a sick person than to put him on his feet, just as it is more important to remove a worm from the roots of a tree than to cleanse the tree of wormholes from the outside. For as long as a worm lives in a tree, there cannot be wormholes on the tree. Sin is the cause of illnesses, both mental and physical, and this is almost always the case. The exceptions are those cases when God, in His good Providence, allows bodily illnesses to the righteous, which is best seen in the example of the righteous Job. But since the creation of the world, the rule has been in force: sin is the cause of disease. And He Who can destroy sin in a sick person can make his body healthy even more easily. He who could temporarily give health to the body, but could not forgive sins, would do the same as the gardener who cleaned the tree of wormholes, but does not know how and cannot destroy the worm living in its roots.

Everything that our Lord Jesus Christ does, He does perfectly, consistently and infallibly. For him, the joy is to return the sick to full health of both soul and body. Therefore, first He heals his soul, and then He awaits the actions of the scribes, that is, their words: He blasphemes, in order to get an opportunity to explain the connection between sin and illness, to note the superiority of the soul over the body, and to manifest His Divine power even more strongly. A seriously ill person is sometimes given a strong dose of medicine. In this case, the Lord emphasizes that He is the one who has authority. Here He does not refer to the Heavenly Father, but to His eternal authority and power. Attention should also be paid to the words "on earth": the Son of Man has power on earth to forgive sins. That is, sins can be forgiven only while a person is on earth, in this world. But for the departed from this world, forgiveness no longer exists. In the other world there is no forgiveness for sinners who have left this life unrepentant. That is why it is said: on earth.

Arise, take up thy bed, and go into thy house. Thus decisively does the Lord speak to the sick, not as the scribes, but as one who has authority. And just as He has the power to forgive the sins of the soul, so He also has the power to command the body to become healthy. But so that there would be no doubt about the healing of the sick man, the Lord commanded him to take his own bed, on which four brought him, and go to his house. And why does He command him to go to his house? Firstly, because the Lord, Himself rejoicing in the good of others, desires that the healed man come to his house as soon as possible, bring joy to the place where sorrow reigned for a long time, and rejoice all His household, who suffered with him during his illness. Secondly, to show the glory-loving scribes that everything He does, He does out of pure love for mankind, and not like them, waiting for people's praise. Just as it doesn't matter to a shepherd whether the sheep praise him or not, so it doesn't matter to Christ whether people praise Him. I do not receive glory from men, He said on another occasion (John 5:41), but here He wanted to show it.

The people, seeing this, were amazed and glorified God, Who had given such power to men. While the scribes blaspheme Christ in their hearts, the rest of the people, whose worldly vanity has not yet completely darkened their minds and poisoned their hearts, are amazed and glorify God for the unprecedented miracle that the Lord has wrought before their eyes. This people, so amazed and glorifying God, is much better than their stiff-necked scribes and much closer to goodness and truth than the Gadarene pagans, who, at the sight of the miracle, did not glorify God, but, taking pity on their pigs, expelled Christ the Lover of Mankind from their borders. But all the same, this people did not understand the Divine power of Christ the Savior. He glorified God, who gave such power to men. This people do not see and do not recognize our Lord Jesus Christ as the Only-begotten Son of God.

But that which all the people of that time did not see and did not acknowledge, let us see and acknowledge, who through the Church have received the grace to see and acknowledge the truth. Let us learn to rejoice in good, for all good is from God; and in this way we will learn to rejoice in God, the Life-giving Source of eternal joy. As the God-inspired prophet says: "I will rejoice and rejoice in Thee, I will sing to Thy name, O Most High" (Psalm 9:3). And this joy will open our eyes to the contemplation of all the fullness of truth in our Lord Jesus Christ; and He will loose the bonds of our tongue, so that we may acknowledge and glorify Him as the Son of God, the only Savior of men and the only Lover of mankind. To Him is due honor and glory, with the Father and the Holy Spirit, to the Trinity, One-in-Essence and Indivisible, now and ever, at all times and unto the ages of ages. Amen.

Seventh Sunday after Pentecost. The Gospel of the Healed and Incurable Blind

Matt. 33 rec., 9:27-35.

The first-created man lived, like the angels, by the vision of God; his descendants after the Fall lived by faith in God. Those to whom vision is closed, and faith is not open, cannot be considered alive, because they have no connection with Life; What should they live on, then?

One lake, open to the sky, receives water from a height, fills up and does not dry up. Another lake, closed to the sky, receives water from the ground, from mountain springs, fills up and does not dry up. But the third lake, closed to the sky and cut off from underground waters, cannot but be empty and dry up.