Homily 18. An epistle to a certain friend of his, sitting in prison, who asked him how to get rid of the temptation of Satan, from the foul tortures that occur in dreams, from fornicatory sensations and thoughts, and from faint-heartedness

I was amazed at your request that, being possessed by such sorrow, you earnestly ask me for spiritual healing from the temptations inflicted on you through demonic envy. I, being devoid of all virtue, and incapable of such treatment, how and how can I help you, especially since I myself require such treatment? However, according to your faith, as far as God enlightens my foolish thought, I will remind you of what I myself know. Bestial kindling and the consequent nightly defilement arise either from excessive natural warmth, or from immeasurable satiety with delicious foods, or from the former frequent satisfaction of this passion and habit for it; it also happens from pride, when we condemn our neighbors, and it also happens from the constant evil action of demons against us, kindling bestial lust in our hearts. The first two causes of this abominable defilement are extinguished and completely destroyed by abstaining from excess food and sleep, as the one who teaches us: "And when they are out," that is, demons and prodigal thoughts, "I am cold, and put on sackcloth, and fasted my soul" (Psalm 34:13). By sackcloth understand weeping and tenderness and rejection of bodily rest. The same one again teaches us, saying: "Return to the passion, when we have lost thorns" (Psalm 31:4). By thorns understand the kindled arrow of fornication, and by the return to passion —

And why is that? "For my frogs," he says, "are filled with reproach," that is, fornication, "and there is no healing in my flesh" (Psalm 37:7, 8). But enough has been said about this. And since you say, "I am faint-hearted," console yourself with the words of the same righteous man who says: "Behold, I departed fleeing, and dwelt in the wilderness" (Psalm 54:8). And how he helped himself there, when he was troubled by faint-heartedness and storm, listen attentively: "I hope for God," he says, "Who saves me from faint-heartedness and from the storm" of all mental disturbances raised by demons. Imitate this righteous man, according to your strength, arming yourself with faith and shameless hope in the Savior's love for mankind, and you will receive help from Him in every way, for "the Lord is near," he says, "to all those who call upon Him in truth: He will do the will of those who fear Him, and will hear their prayer, and I will save them" (Psalm 144:18, 19). And what do you say: "I can't dig" and so on; then I will tell you this: do not cease to dig, but not the earth, which grows grass, but your heart and conscience, eradicating from them the worldly evil thoughts and indecent morals, thoughts and customs that vegetate there because of a long-term bad habit. Do not be ashamed to ask the Saviour with commendable intransigence for forgiveness of your former sins, and so that you may reform yourself in the future and lead a good and God-pleasing life. The Saviour loves such unrelenting supplicants and annoyers, for He Himself said: "Seek, and ye shall find, pound, and it shall be opened unto you" (Matt. 7:7). Prosperity for a monk consists in walking with all his soul, with all his heart's desire, always on the path of the Savior's commandments and the decrees of the fathers.

Homily 19. Against those who indulge in the insanely abominable foul sins of Sodomy, which bring down to perdition and eternal punishment

"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, but understanding is good to all who do" (Psalm 110:10), says the divine psalmist. What is the case for one who is led by the fear of the Lord, this is taught by the same psalmist in another psalm, saying: "Blessed is the man who fears the Lord, in His commandments he has exalted the earth" (Psalm 111:1), that is, to love them, to diligently direct his life according to them, and will constantly learn from them, as the same one again says: "If they love Thy law, Lord, all day long there is my teaching"; and again: "If Thy words are sweet to my throat, more than honey to my lips" (Psalm 118:97, 103). But if reason is good for all who do the fear of the Lord, that is, for those who fulfill His holy commandments by deed, then for those who violate them there is no good reason, but there is extreme madness and eternal perdition, as the same prophet says: "Far from sinners you will save, for you have not sought Your justifications" (Psalm 118:155); also: "Thou hast despised all those who depart from Thy justifications, for their thoughts are unrighteous" (Psalm 118:118). But if those who depart from God's justifications are humiliated by Him, then it is obvious that they will go to eternal destruction.

Therefore, it would be proper for Christians, who have such a terrible indication of God's wrath, not only to abhor such abominable defilement, which, above all, angers the Most High, but to burn with fire and anathematize those who commit such defilement and do not consider it a crime, while this abominable defilement kindles the intolerable wrath of God against the Orthodox, as against those who are cursed by God, Who says: "Cursed is everyone who sleepeth with the male sex" (Lev. 18:22), and those who do not abandon their abominable defilement, not to be vouchsafed any Christian blessing, but to distance themselves from them, according to the commandment of the Apostle, which says: "If any brother be called a fornicator, or a covetous, or an idolater, or a drunkard, or a swindler, or a pestilence, with such are below the food" (1 Corinthians 5:1). 11). If this filth had not been very hateful to God, He would not have burned down the cities of Sodom with unbearable wrath, and would not have turned their land into a stinking lake to show and denounce their abominable filth. How abominable and ungodly is the sin of the filth of Sodomy, the divine Apostle Paul also showed in his Epistle to the Romans, saying: "And God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to uncleanness, so that they defiled their own bodies. They replaced the truth of God with a lie, and worshipped and served the creature instead of the Creator, who is blessed forever, Amen. That is why God gave them over to shameful passions: their women replaced their natural use with an unnatural one; in the same way, men, abandoning the natural use of the female sex, were inflamed with lust for one another, men making shame on men" (Rom. 1, 24—27). And if in this life God gave them over to the passions of dishonor and uncleanness, then it is clear that in the future He will also imprison them in eternal torment and in unbearable torment, together with their ancient accomplices, the Sodomites. Oh, what wretchedness, what insane and irreconcilable corruption! Know yourselves, accursed ones, to what foul pleasure you have given yourselves! Leave him as soon as possible, while the ineffable goodness of God gives you time to repent! Voluntarily remaining in dishonor, do you not understand that you dig a dunghill pit, take the stinking feces that come out of it, eat it and swallow it? Oh, what unparalleled insensibility and wretchedness! Oh, what unbearable torments into which you will be cast! By committing such abominable iniquity against each other, such as dumb brutes do not have, you have become more dumb than the most dumb ones. Know yourselves, most accursed ones, know that you were created in the image and likeness of God for good works, so that God would glorify you by you, and you would also be glorified by Him through the spiritual gifts you receive from Him. But you, being blinded and deceived by your abominable carnal lust, not only are you deprived of this dignity and beauty of the image of God, by which you were honored, but you are also made more foolish and dumb than the most dumb brutes, daring shamelessly before the most pure eyes of Him Who created you to abominable defilement, such as dumb brutes do not have. It seems to me that those who shamelessly dare to commit such an abominable defilement will be given over to more grievous torments than the ancient Sodomites: for they, even before the law and before the commandment was laid down forbidding this abominable defilement, dishonored before God through ignorance. And those who now commit this abominable deed like them, they sin not through ignorance, but because of their greatest insensibility and madness, with full awareness of the dreadful judgment of God. For this reason they will be given over to more severe torments, according to the terrible word of the Gospel, which says: "A servant who knows the will of his master, and if he does not do it, there will be many beatings," that is, he will be tormented greatly and endlessly; "But he who is ignorant, having created that which is worthy of wounds, will have few beatings," that is, he will be more easily tested by eternal torments. Therefore worthy of great praise is the ancient and ever-memorable emperor Justinian the Great, who, inspired by the great zeal of God, subjected to various tortures those who committed this abominable defilement during his reign. No less worthy of praise is a certain prince of the glorious city of Venice, who, too, through divine zeal, burned many of them with fire, adding to them his own son, who had been slandered by a certain boy whom he had raped, and he did not spare him in the least, but, as the legend relates, hanged him, using a gold chain for this purpose. There is a belief that the evidence obtained from the opposing party is considered the most reliable. Therefore, I will not keep silent about what I have heard from the Christ-hating Hagarites. Though they have such filth in great use, yet those who are more prudent among them assert that those who do this filth will not see the face of God, that is, without any judgment and without trial, they will be condemned to destruction. Hear and be ashamed, you fools, who consider this abominable filth innocent, and if no divinely inspired scripture, threatening eternal torment, can correct you, then at least with this brief answer of the Christ-hating Hagarites, come to your senses and leave this abominable wandering. "Receive chastisement quickly, lest the Lord be angry, and perish from the way of righteousness, when His wrath shall soon be kindled" (Psalm 2:12). "It is terrible to fall into the hands of the Living God." And how frightening it is when it is impossible to hide from Him anywhere, according to the words of the righteous David: "I will go from Thy spirit, and from Thy presence I will flee," that is, from Thy wrath and from Thy unbearable righteous wrath, from which if I "ascend into heaven," or "descend into hell," or "dwell in the last of the seas," I will not be able to escape Thy hands, but also "there Thy hand shall guide me, and Thy right hand shall hold me" (Psalm 138:7-10). "Do not be afraid," says the Lord, "from those who kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: fear rather than him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell" (Matt. 10:28). When you hear Gehenna, do not consider it a purgatory fire, as the wise Latins, who follow the heretic Origen, assert, but know that this is an unquenchable fire, tormenting impious and unrepentant sinners for endless ages, in proportion to their depravity. For the Lord did not say: "He who is able to cleanse both soul and body in hell, but to "destroy him," that is, to torment him endlessly and to put him to eternal death. If you like to be given over to such a death and the most severe torments for endless ages, then hold on to this vile and miserly pleasure of yours and wallow in it with pleasure, like a stinking pig in the filthy mire. If, however, as pious Christians, you sincerely desire to receive eternal enjoyment of the blessings prepared for the saints, then try to quickly abandon this filthy and foulest pleasure of yours, to hate it, and whoever asserts that it is innocent, give him over to eternal anathema, as an opponent of the Gospel of Christ the Saviour and corrupting its teaching. Purify yourselves with sincere repentance, warm tears, almsgiving, and pure undistracted prayer, so that you may be vouchsafed to enter together with the wise virgins, who have burning lamps, into the mental chamber of the immortal Bridegroom, Who says: "Come unto Me, all ye that labour" in the vanities of this present life, "and burdened" with various sins, "and I will give you rest" (Matt. 11:28). I have already said many times, and I will not cease to say: Hate this wickedness with all your heart, lest you be sons of damnation and eternal destruction. You are Christians, and you are called such, having received this excellent name from Christ, the most pure and all-holy God: live therefore worthy of Christ in all holiness and chastity, being content with the natural likeness of the female sex given to you by the good Creator. Do not be like the wicked Ishmaelites, descended from the slave girl Hagar, who have no part in the heavenly inheritance with Isaac, the son of the free woman. Do not deprive yourselves madly of such a God-given inheritance of ineffable eternal blessings because of the vile, abominable and abominable enjoyment of this accursed filth of yours. Do not be like "a horse and a horse that has no understanding, lest by the reins and bridle," that is, by the wrath of God and His wrath, "your jaws be tightened," that is, because of the disobedience of your souls, you would not be deprived of freedom, as you do not want to voluntarily draw near to Him by true and complete repentance, by which alone the sinfulness of the soul in the present life is cleansed, and not a future purifying fire. For the present life is a time of work, that is, a time for the manifestation of good deeds, and the future age is a time of retribution, not purification. Divine Apostle you bequeath us not to be deceived by the vain hopes and deceptive speeches of heretical people; therefore, let us hold fast to the teaching of the Gospel and the Apostles and the traditions of the Fathers, and in this way we will be vouchsafed to receive the pleasures of eternal blessings, through the mercy and love of mankind of our Lord God and Saviour Jesus Christ, to Whom is due glory, honor and worship unto endless ages. Amen.

Слово 20. О том, какое исповедание надлежало бы епископу Тверскому принести Создателю всего, после того, как сгорел соборный храм и весь двор его, со всем имуществом, также самый город Тверь, где сгорело множество иных храмов, обывательских домов и людей, казнимых гневом Божиим, что было 22 июля 1537 года, и какой боголепный ответ последовал бы ему от Господа; чему следует внимать со страхом и нелицемерною верою.

Прости меня, будь милостив ко мне, Владыка, дерзающему высказать пред Твоим величеством слова печали и безумия, по причине великой скорби от обдержащих меня зол. Никогда не вознерадел я, —Ты мне свидетель, Владыка, —о божественных Твоих песнопениях и о благолепии Твоих служений, всегда совершая Твои духовные торжества с благогласным пением, со множеством благолепных священнослужителей, со звоном громогласных звучных колоколов, при курении различных благовонных ароматов; честныя Твои и Твоей Пречистой Матери иконы великолено украшены мною золотом и серебром и драгоценными камнями. Но, чем я думал благоугодить Тебе, Царю, —оказалось, что этим я более Тебя прогневал; почему и испытал праведный гнев Твой. Будучи праведен и благ по естеству, несказанно щедр и человеколюбив, Ты никоим образом не истребил бы сразу всепоядающим огнем всю красоту и всю эту доброту, если бы мы сами не прогневали крайнейшую Твою благость преступлением Твоих заповедей. Поэтому, умоляем Тебя, рабы Твои: скажи нам, чем мы согрешили, чтобы мы могли достойным, соответственно своих согрешений, покаянием умилостивить Тебя, праведного и страшного Судию своего?

На это Господь и Создатель всего кротким гласом так ответил: зачем вы, о, человеки, неблагодарно и напрасно клевещете на праведный Мой суд? Тогда как вы должны бы были каяться предо Мной в том, в чем всегда бесстыдно согрешаете, —вы еще более прогневляете благость Мою, представляя Мне свои доброгласные пения и звон колоколов, многоценное украшение икон и курение различных благовоний, которые, если приносите их от законных приобретений и праведных ваших трудов, с праведным расположением, как древний Авель, то они Мне приятны, и Я призираю на них и воздаю вам Своими божественными дарованиями; ибо Я—праведный мздовоздаятель и не оставляю без мзды даже чашу студеной воды.

Внезапная гибель великолепного и сильнейшего греческого царства постигшая его по праведному Моему гневу за несколько лет пред сим, пусть заставит вас отстать от прогневления Меня, если не хотите подвергнуться тому же.