Homilies on Hebrews 30.1

“For the moment all discipline seems to be not of joy but of grief; but later it yields the [peaceful] fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it. Therefore [lift up] the drooping hands and the paralyzed knees, and make straight paths for your feet.” Those who drink bitter medicines first endure some unpleasantness, and then feel the benefit. For such is virtue, and such is vice: there pleasure comes first, then dejection; here dejection first, and then pleasure. But they are not at all equal; for it is not the same to be grieved first and pleased later, and to be pleased first and grieved later. How? For in the one case the expectation of the coming dejection makes the present pleasure smaller; but in the other the expectation of the coming pleasure cuts down the severity of the present dejection; so that it happens that in the one case one is never pleased, in the other never grieved. And the difference lies not only in this, but in another way too. How? Because the times are not equal either, but [the one] is much greater and longer. And here there is something more in spiritual things. From this, then, Paul undertakes to bring in his encouragement, and again takes up the common judgment, which no one can oppose nor fight against the common vote. For when someone says what is agreed by all, all assent … this with reason; for such is discipline: it has such a beginning. That is why he added thus: “For the moment all discipline seems to be not of joy but of grief.” He said well, “seems”; for discipline is not of grief, but only seems to be; and not one kind is and another is not, but all: “For all discipline,” he says, “seems to be not of joy but of grief,” that is, both the human and the spiritual. Do you see him contending from common notions? “It seems,” he says, “to be of grief”; so it is not. For what grief produces joy? None; just as no pleasure [produces grief]. “But later it yields the peaceful fruits of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.” He did not say “fruit” but “fruits,” showing the great abundance. “To those who have been trained by it,” he says. What is “to those trained by it”? To those who have held out long and persevered. Do you see how he uses an auspicious name too? So discipline is a training, making the athlete strong and unconquerable in contests and irresistible in wars. If, then, all discipline is such, this too will be such. So one must expect good things, and an end that is sweet and peaceful. And do not wonder if, though harsh, it has sweet fruits; since in trees too the bark is tasteless and rough, but the fruits sweet. But he took it from the common notion. If, then, one must expect such things, why do you grieve? Why, having endured the painful things, do you grow faint about the good things? The unpleasant things you had to endure, you have endured; do not, then, grow faint about the recompense. “Therefore lift up the drooping hands and the paralyzed knees, and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be turned aside, but rather be healed.” He speaks as to runners and boxers and soldiers. Do you see how he arms them, how he raises them up? Here he says this about their thoughts. “Walk straight,” he says, that is, not doubting. For if discipline is from love, if it begins from care, if it ends in a good end (for he proves this by facts and by words and by all things), why do you grow faint? For such are those who have despaired, who are not strengthened by the hope of the things to come. “Walk straight,” he says, so that the lameness may not be increased, but changed back to its former state; for one who runs while lame aggravates the evil. Do you see that it is in our power to be wholly healed? “Pursue peace with all, and holiness, without which no one will see the Lord.” What he said above too, “[Not abandoning our own assembling together]”, he hints at here too. For nothing [makes one easy prey] so much as being torn apart. And see how: break up a phalanx in war, and the enemy will not even need toil, but will take them bound, finding them on their own and so weaker. “Pursue peace with all,” he says. So even with those who do evil. This he says elsewhere too: “If possible, so far as it depends on you, be at peace with all people.” For your part, he says, keep the peace, in no way harming godliness, but in what you suffer evil, bear it nobly; for forbearance is a great weapon in trials. So too Christ made the disciples strong, saying, “See, I send you as sheep in the midst of wolves; be therefore wise as serpents and innocent as doves.” What are you saying? We are among wolves, and you bid us be like sheep and like doves? Yes, he says; for nothing so shames the one who does evil as your bearing nobly what is brought on you, and not avenging yourselves by word or deed. This both makes us [wiser] and procures a greater reward, and benefits them. Has so-and-so insulted you? Bless him. See how much you gain from this: [you have quenched the evil], you have procured a reward for yourself, [you have shamed him], you have suffered nothing terrible. “Pursue peace with all, and holiness.” What does he mean by holiness? Chastity and orderliness in marriage. If someone is without marriage, he says, let him remain chaste, [or] marry; if in marriage, let him not commit sexual immorality, but let him have his own wife; for this too is holiness. How? Marriage is not holiness, but marriage guards the holiness that comes from faith, not letting one turn to a harlot. For marriage is honorable, not holy; marriage is pure, but it does not confer holiness, except in preventing the holiness given by faith from being defiled. “Without which,” he says, “no one will see the Lord.” Which he also says in the letter to the Corinthians: “Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor adulterers, nor idolaters, nor the effeminate, [nor thieves, nor the greedy], nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor robbers will inherit the kingdom of God.” For how will one who has become the body of a harlot be able to be the body of Christ? “See to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God, that no root of bitterness springs up and causes trouble, and by it many be defiled; that no one be sexually immoral or profane.” Do you see how everywhere he entrusts to each one the common salvation? “Exhorting one another,” he says, “every day, as long as it is called today.” Do not, then, throw everything on the teachers, nor everything on the leaders; you too, he says, can build one another up. Which he also said writing to the Thessalonians: “Build one another up, as indeed you are doing”; and again, “Comfort one another with these words.” This we too urge on you now. For you will accomplish more than we, if you wish, toward one another; for you spend more time with one another, and know one another's affairs better than we do, and you are not ignorant of one another's failings, and you have more freedom of speech and love and familiarity; and these are no small things for teaching, but great entrances and opportunities; and you will be able to rebuke and exhort better than we. And not only this, but because I am one, but you are many, and all of you, as many as you are, can be teachers. Therefore, I beg you, do not neglect this gift. Each has a wife, has a friend, has a servant, [has a neighbor] … For how is it not absurd to have common meals and drinking parties for the sake of food, and to have a fixed day for coming together, and to have what each lacks on his own supplied through partnership, for instance if one must go to a funeral, or to luncheons, or help a neighbor in something, but not to do this for teaching virtue? Yes, I beg you, let no one be negligent; for he receives a great reward from God. And so that you may learn: the one entrusted with five talents is the teacher, and the one with one talent the disciple. If the disciple says, “I am a disciple; I am in no danger,” and hides the word that he received from God, this common and plain one, and does not exhort, does not speak freely, does not reprove, does not admonish, if he can, but hides it in the earth (for a heart that hides God's gift is truly earth and darkness): if, then, he hides it either from sloth or from wickedness, it will not help him to say, “I had one talent.” You had one talent: you ought to have brought one more and doubled the talent; if you had brought one, you would not have been accused. For neither did he say to the one who brought the two, “Why did you not bring five?” but counted him worthy of the same things as the one who brought the five. Why? Because he worked with as much as he had; and he did not, because he received less than the one entrusted with five, become careless, nor use the smallness as an excuse for idleness. Nor ought you to have looked to the one with two; or rather, you ought to have looked to him, and just as he, having two, imitated the one with five, so you too ought to have emulated the one who had two. For if punishment lies in store for one who has money and does not share it, how will there not be the greatest punishment for one who can exhort in any way whatever and does not do it? There a body is fed, here a soul; there you prevent temporary death, here [eternal death]. “But I have no eloquence,” someone says. But there is no need of eloquence or fluent speech. If you see your friend committing sexual immorality, say to him, “It is a wicked thing that you pursue; are you not ashamed? Do you not blush? This is evil.” “Does he himself not know,” someone says, “that it is evil?” Yes, he knows, but he is dragged by desire. The sick too know that drinking cold water is bad, but nevertheless they need those who will prevent them; for one who is in the grip of passion will not quickly be able to suffice for himself in the disease. So you who are healthy are needed for his cure; and if he is not persuaded by the word, watch for him as he is going out and hold him back; perhaps he will be ashamed. “And what is the use,” someone says, “when he does this because of me, and because he was held back by me?” Do not be too precise; meanwhile, by any means, draw him away from the wicked practice; let him be accustomed not to go to that pit; whether he is prevented because of you or because of anything whatever, there will be gain from this. For when you have accustomed him not to go, then you will be able, when he has breathed a little, to take him and teach him that he must not do this for God's sake, and not for a man's. Do not wish to set everything right at once, since you will not be able, but gently and little by little. If you see him going to drinking, and to drinking parties full of drunkenness, do the same there too; and again urge him, if he sees you have any failing, to help and correct you. For so he will bear reproof on his own account too, when he sees that you too need reproofs, and that you help not as one who has set everything right, nor as a teacher, but as a friend and brother. Say to him: “I have helped you by reminding you of what is profitable; you too, whatever failing you see I have, rein me in, …; if you see me angry, if greedy, hold me back, bind me with exhortation.” This is friendship; thus “a brother helped by a brother becomes like a strong city”; for it is not eating and drinking that makes friendship; robbers and murderers have such friendship too; but if we are friends, if we truly care for one another, let us help one another in these things; these lead us to a profitable friendship, these prevent us from going away to Gehenna. Let the one who is reproved, then, not be indignant; for we are human and have failings; and let the one who reproves not do it as one who mocks or tramples, nor parading it, but privately, with gentleness; for the one who reproves needs more gentleness, so as to persuade [the other] to bear the cutting. Do you not see physicians, [how gently] they apply the treatment? Much more must those who reprove do this; for reproof is more violent even than fire and iron, and makes one leap away; that is why physicians too take great pains so that the cutting may be borne mildly, and apply it as gently as possible, giving way a little and then allowing [the patient] to breathe. So must those who reprove do too, so that those reproved may not leap away. And even if we must be insulted, even if we must be struck, let us not refuse. For those who are cut too cry out countless things against those who cut them; but these look to none of this, but only to the health of the sick. So here too we must do everything for the reproof to become useful, and bear everything, looking to the reward laid up. “Bear one another's burdens,” he says, “and so fulfill the law of Christ.” So, then, both reproving and bearing with one another, we shall be able to complete the building of Christ; and so you will make our labor light for us, helping us in all things and reaching out a hand and becoming sharers and partners both in one another's salvation and each in his own. Let us persevere, then, both bearing one another's burdens and reproving, so that we may obtain the good things promised to us, in Christ Jesus our Lord.