In the Gospel we see two paths to the newborn Christ: the path of the Magi and the path of the shepherds. The path of the Magi is the path of light and knowledge, guided by the clear sign of the star which they saw in the east and which led them to Jerusalem and Bethlehem. The path of pastors is the path of shadow and mystery, the path of faith, and not of vision, which, after a brief illumination of the glory of the Lord, is received into the night watch, is accomplished without a guide, and is not provided by any special sign, except for the discernible sign of the infant lying in a manger. Who wouldn't have thought that the bright path of the Magi should be safer, more convenient and shorter? On the contrary, it was longer, more difficult, and more dangerous than the dark path of pastors. Instead of Bethlehem, the wise men first appear in Jerusalem - here the knowledge preached by them serves no purpose, except for general confusion; they are perplexed about the continuation of their path; the instruction of the heavenly sign becomes incomprehensible to them, and the Divine Child, before whom they wished to prostrate themselves in reverence, is almost thrown into the hands of impiety. Pastors traverse the field of darkness and, having reached Bethlehem, reach the point where the glory of the Lord, which once shone upon them from heaven, now invisibly dwells in themselves: "The shepherd returns, glorifying and praising God" (Luke 2:20).

Let us glorify Him who glorified the way of the Magi, let us not despise the way of the shepherds. If the bright path of knowledge attracts our eyes, let us not forget that we should not be traveling spectators, but prudent travelers. While our eyes are lost in the contemplation of the majestic views that present themselves to us, it may easily happen that we do not notice stones, nets, and precipices under our feet, or stop on our way, when we should stretch out in the past. And therefore bright illuminations of the mind cannot always be taken as immutable signs of approaching Christ and as true indications of the true path of regeneration. There are enlightened spirits, like transparent bodies, who receive and transmit light, but do not feel it themselves, and even produce flames in others, but themselves remain cold and dead. The highest human wisdom is a luminary which, insofar as it itself follows an indefinite path, cannot be a reliable guide, and which, the more glorious in its radiance, the more terrible it is in its eclipse. How can you wish for the best? True and living vision, in fact, is not the lot of our present life - its very blessedness consists in believing: "We walk by faith, and not by sight" (2 Corinthians 5:7), blessed are those who have not seen, and have believed (John 20:29). Let us follow in the footsteps of the shepherds of Bethlehem to the hay-mysterious path of faith, and the more hidden and invisible it is, the more we will try to notice it with the tangible sign peculiar to it.

Only he can leave clear and undoubted signs to wanderers on a new and unknown path for them, who has walked it, has known it, and measured it. And who can more perfectly know, and reveal, and signify the course of pure birth, if not of flesh and blood (John 1:13), if not He Who alone is not born in sins, but by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and the overshadowing of the power of the Most High (Luke 1:35), and Who alone gives to all who receive Him the region to be children of God (John 1:12)? For this reason, hearers, He was born on earth, in order to manifest here the heavenly birth, He was born visibly, in order to put before His eyes the invisible birth, and since He who was born in purity and holiness had no need to ascend to another, better birth, He made His very birth according to the flesh only a transparent veil (Hebrews 10:20), through which we can see the new and living path of our spiritual birth. Do not inquire, O lord, your souls to the Lord, do not ask any more with David: "Tell me, O Lord, the way, which I will go" (Psalm 142:8) – this unknown way to the hearing of the flesh itself is now spoken by the incarnate Word of God: "I am the way" (John 14:6). Philosophizing on high! Do not consider in your heart any other ascent to God, except the degrees by which the Son of God descends to man: "Let this be reasoned in you, even in Christ Jesus, who in the image of God, was not equal to God, but exhausted himself, took the form of a servant, being in the likeness of a man, and was found in the likeness of a man" (Phil. 2:5, 7). Do not hastily pass by the sign that was revealed with such unadorned simplicity in Bethlehem of Judea - by this very simplicity is sealed the mystery of your own Bethlehem: in the outward sign of the newborn Saviour is contained the inner sign of salvific rebirth.

And first, this is a sign unto you, Ye shall find a child. The pride of Lucifer, incarnated in man, grew him into a giant, for whom the narrow gate and the strait way lead into the belly (Matt. 7:14) became impassable. The Son of God, in order to renew this path with His flesh, constrains His boundless greatness in the scanty age of infancy and sets it as the measure to which we would come, entering the path of life and approaching the gates of the Kingdom. What He once said to His disciples in response to their question: "Who is sick in the Kingdom of Heaven?" was preached even before by His mute infancy: "Unless ye be converted, and be as children, ye shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven" (Matt. 18:1,3). Therefore, whoever wants to find the way of Jesus, let him seek His infancy. A child rests in his mother's arms, thinks with her mind, is guided by her will, eats her food, lives her life, if you rest in childlike simplicity in the arms of Providence, if your mind forgets itself in reverent humility before the destinies of the Wisdom of God, if you do the will of God as if it were your will, if you have loved verbal and unflattering milk (1 Peter 2:2) not only as a delight, but also as food, the return and quickening of the spirit, then bless God, Who has confirmed in you the living sign of the Savior's birth.

Secondly, this is a sign unto you: ye shall find a child entwined. The sign of wrapping in swaddling clothes is explained to us by one of the ancient teachers of the Church (Tertullian. Adversus Marcionem, cap. IV[132]). In swaddling clothes, he says, Jesus begins his burial. In fact, the swaddling clothes of the infant and the shroud of the deceased were first woven by the same artist, the cradle and the coffin have the same inventor. If sin had not invented the tomb and the shroud, there would also have been no swaddling clothes and no cradle. Just as the infirmities of birth are the beginnings of death, so the cradle, the forerunner of the coffin and the shroud, is the first edge of the gradually developing burial shroud. Why does the Son of God, deigning to be wrapped in swaddling clothes, foreshadow with them a life of unceasing mortification? Whoever you are who want to walk in Jesus' footsteps, you must also pass through the shadow of death on the way of being born into eternal life. Every instrument of temptation must be cut off (Matt. 18:8), every movement of property is restrained and stopped, every earthly lust is bound and put to death: "Put to death your rods that are on the earth" (Col. 3:5). You must, like one wrapped in swaddling clothes, preserve your freedom, open your eyes only in order to become accustomed to calmly look at the bonds of your old man and thus mortify your very sight; you must guard your lips only in order to breathe the sighs of prayer. Thus the faithful followers of the Lord bore His deadness in their bodies, and died all the days (2 Corinthians 4:10; 1 Corinthians 15:31), but in this very death they drew new life: "As we die, and behold, we live" (2 Corinthians 6:9). The life of mortification is an indisputable sign of the path of Christ, and the tomb of the old is the true cradle of the new man.

Finally, this is a sign unto you: Ye shall find a child coiled lying in a manger. If infancy and the swaddling clothes of the God-Man are signs of His deep humility and mortification, then His manger is an image of incomprehensible exhaustion. Already He humbled Himself before the Angels with His humanity, and in His infancy and swaddling clothes He took upon Himself that which is most humble in men: He descends again, and the Word, which is inseparable from God (John 1:1), is imputed to the dumb. Oh, how before this sign of Divine exhaustion all that is exalted in men, all that is glorious in the world, is not humiliated and diminished, but crumbles, disappears, and is hidden in its natural insignificance! And blessed is he who reveres the manger of the God-Man as well as the Throne of His Majesty, who, prostrating himself before them, sees them above him in the same height as the sky! Let him lose the whole world, lose himself in the boundless depth of his insignificance. This infinity is the limit of communication with the boundless Divinity. Let him, according to the words of the Psalmist, vanish his soul: it vanishes unto salvation (Psalm 118:81).

You see, listeners, how the Bethlehem sign of the newborn Savior was given not only to the pastors of Bethlehem, but also to each of us, in order to guide our spiritual path to Christ the Savior. Let us ask once more, whether we have passed on to Bethlehem and have found that which our soul naturally seeks, as unswervingly, unhindered, and faithfully, as these shepherds, faithful in their simplicity, came in haste, and found it (Luke 2:16)? O infant Jesus! How difficult it seems to us to be reduced to this meager measure of Thy! We do not love to grow with Thee, but to grow in ourselves, to grow in self-wisdom, to grow in lusts, to grow in false glory. O life, wrapped in burial! How often do we unheedingly trample and boldly tear Thy swaddling clothes! We would rather live in order to die than die in order to live! O wisdom and Word of God, Who teaches us now from Thy manger! How little do we heed the great preaching of Thy muteness! As if the signs of the Son of God on earth were small and low for us, as if we were waiting for the sign of the Son of man in heaven to appear to us. It will appear, but then there will be no time to celebrate or learn - then all the tribes of the earth will mourn (Matt. 24:30).

Let us hasten, Christians, to walk the gloomy path of faith, so that the light of the day of judgment does not suddenly blind us. Let us meet with the love of Christ, Who descends from heaven, so that He may meet us with mercy, ascending to Heaven. And if anyone has already come to him with pastors, let him always return with them from glorious signs to simplicity of belief, writing glory to God alone. And if anyone with the Magi came to the hidden Bethlehem from noisy Jerusalem, let him not return to Herod (Matt. 2:12) to boast of his finding, - let not the mystery of the King of glory become a weapon of the ruler of the darkness of this world, who seeks the Child, let him destroy Him (Matt. 2:13). Amen.

Homily on the Nativity of Christ. 1824

And all this came to pass, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying, Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel: "As it is said, God is with us" (Mt 1:22, 23).

The holy Evangelist Matthew repeatedly remarks that all the circumstances and events that marked the birth of our incarnate God and Savior Jesus Christ on earth were not simply confluent circumstances and events, but exact events of prophetic predictions. This is a remark important not only for the Jews, who look through the glass of the Prophets even at what can be seen with simple eyes, but also for everyone who wishes to discover the traces of Providence in the paths of men confused by accidents, and to see the works of God in the events of the world. Is not God's work evident when what has been predicted for several centuries comes true exactly, and especially when what seemed unrealizable according to ordinary concepts and considerations comes true?