Weep for your sins, and you will be cleansed, because, according to the testimony of St. Peter of Damascus, there is no purification without weeping. You can't whiten a black flap without water. So sins cannot be washed away without warm tears. Tears will whiten the Ethiopian.

The sinner's wife had an Ethiopian face, for it is written about sinners in the Prophet Jeremiah: "Their face is darker than all black" (Lamentations 4:8).

But see how she was convinced with tears whiter than snow, wept at the feet of Christ, and heard: "Her many sins are forgiven" (Luke 7:47).

Nothing is so pleasing to God as the tear of a penitent. Fasting is good, but sometimes... "Is this the fast which I have chosen?" says the Lord (Isaiah 58:5). Prayer is good, but sometimes it is not without flaw: "Let his prayer be unto sin" (Psalm 108:7). Alms are also good, but there is no firm hope in it: "And if I give away all my possessions, it profiteth me nothing" (1 Corinthians 13:3).

Only a tear broken before God is blameless: "God will not despise a broken and humble heart" (Psalm 50:19).

Who does not know Josiah king of Jerusalem? His memory is truly worthy of praise: he smashed the idols, destroyed their altars, threw down the altars on the high places, slew the priests, and scattered their bones in the air — such zeal he showed to God. And then he wept for the people who had angered God with idolatry. Then only the word came to him: "Thou hast torn thy garments, and wept before me, and I have heard thee" (4 Kings 22:19)... Look, lowering down, and as if forgetting all his good deeds, only his tears are remembered, and for their sake he heard him, so pleasing are they to Him! Reflecting on this, Saint Theodoret said: "So useful are contrition and tears to those who have acquired them!"

In the Song of Songs, the Zealot of Christ, depicting all the ouds of the Beloved, and likening His head to gold, cheeks to cups with aromas, lips to lilies exuding myrrh, says of his eyes: "His eyes are like doves by streams of water" (Song of Songs 5:12).

It is not without mystery that His eyes are likened to the eyes of doves, for it is said of the Palestinian doves that they love to live above the waters, and to delight their eyes with the streams of water. And if Christ's eyes are like doves, know that He also loves to gladden His eyes with streams of water, with those streams of which David mentions: "Fountains of waters have brought forth my eyes, for I have not kept Thy law" (Psalm 118:136).

Christ always wants to look at the tears of the truly repentant, it is not in vain that the prophet said: "Thou hast laid my tears before Thee" (Psalm 55:9).

Some rejoice to look at gold, some at the beauty of the face, some at sweet food and drink, and Christ at the tears of people weeping over their sins. "The angels of God have joy even over one sinner who repents" (Luke 15:10). How much more joy is there for the Creator, Who for the sake of sinners bowed down the heavens, descended to earth and suffered: "Christ, while we were still weak, died at a certain time for the wicked" (Romans 5:6).

Therefore, let us weep over the evil we have done, and let us rejoice in the Lord, Who looks at us, and wash away the filth of sins, and be vouchsafed eternal joy after weeping.

Such is the transformation of tears: "Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted" (Matt. 5:4).

Prilogue (addition)