Homilies of Maximus of Turin (Bruni's collection) 109.1–114.1

The Lord says in the holy Gospel, as the reading just completed testifies: "What is the kingdom of God like, and to what shall I compare it? It is like a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and put in his garden; and it grew and became a tree, and the birds of the sky rested in its branches."

Perhaps it troubles your minds why the kingdom of God, so glorious and so magnificent, is compared to a small grain of mustard seed, and why so great a consolation of our hope is said to be like a very cheap thing; especially since elsewhere the same Lord says to his disciples: "If you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, say to this mountain, Be lifted up and thrown into the sea, and it will be done." If, then, faith is wonderful, which can move the foundations of mountains from their very seats, the grain of mustard seed must also be great, to whose likeness we are urged to have faith. Great, I would say, not in appearance but in power; and in the quality of faith it is to be compared not to the bean but to be equalled with the vigour of sharpness. For if we attend carefully, we find that this comparison was rightly made by the Lord. For just as a grain of mustard seed at first sight is small in appearance, cheap, despised, giving no flavour, spreading no smell, showing no sweetness; but when it begins to be crushed, at once its sharpness gives off its smell, it breathes out the food of a fiery flavour, and it is kindled with such a heat of warmth that it is a wonder that so great a fire was enclosed in such trifling grains; and men take the food of this seed, especially in winter, with great pleasure, so as to drive off cold, expel humours, and warm the inward parts; and they often apply a remedy from it to the head too, so that whatever is weak or sick may be cured by the fire of mustard. So too Christian faith at first sight seems small, cheap and slight, not showing its power, not displaying pride, not offering favour. But when it begins to be crushed by various temptations, at once it shows its vigour, reveals its sharpness, breathes the warmth of belief in the Lord, and is tossed with such a burning of divine fire that it both burns itself and compels one who shares in it to burn; as in the holy Gospel Ammaon and Cleophas said when the Lord spoke with them after his passion: "Was not our heart burning within us on the way, while the Lord Jesus opened the Scriptures?" The grain of mustard, then, warms the inward parts of the limbs, but the vigour of faith burns up the sins of hearts; the former removes the harsh chill of cold, the latter drives out the devilish cold of sins. Mustard boils down the bad humours of bodies, faith consumes the floods of lusts. And by the former a remedy is provided for the head, while by faith our spiritual head, who is Christ the Lord, is often refreshed. And according to the comparison with mustard we enjoy the holy fragrance of faith, as the blessed Apostle says: "For we are the good fragrance of Christ to God."

We can therefore compare the holy martyr Lawrence to a grain of mustard seed. Crushed by various sufferings, he earned that the grace of his martyrdom should spread its fragrance through the whole world; he who before, while living in the body, was lowly, unknown and cheap, after he was harassed, torn and burned, poured the fragrance of his nobility into all the churches throughout the whole world. Rightly, then, is the comparison joined to him. For the grain of mustard seed, when it is crushed, is kindled; Lawrence, when he suffers, is set aflame; the one pours out the heat of its crushing, the other breathes out fire through many torments. Mustard, I say, is cooked down in a hot vessel by steam; Lawrence is roasted on a gridiron by the fire of flames. The blessed martyr burned outwardly with the fires of the raging tyrant, but a greater flame of the love of Christ roasted him inwardly. And though the wicked king laid wood beneath and set greater fires under him, yet holy Lawrence does not feel these flames because of the warmth of faith, and while he thinks on Christ's commandments, all that he suffers is cold to him. For he could not feel the torments of the fires in his inward parts who possessed the refreshments of paradise in his senses. Though his burned flesh may lie before the feet of the tyrant, a lifeless body, yet he suffers no loss on earth whose mind dwells in heaven. He is stretched, then, over the glowing heaps of flames and turned again and again onto his sides; but the more punishments he suffers, the more he fears Christ the Lord; and by a new kind of marvel, one man tortures him and the torments of the raging man profit another: more cruel punishments made Lawrence more devout.

Last Sunday, discussing the Lord's parable in which he says, "What is the kingdom of heaven like, and to what shall I compare it? It is like a grain of mustard seed," and so on, we touched on many things by which we proved that the kingdom of God is not without reason compared to a grain of mustard seed, and that the difference lies only in the estimation of words, not in the comparison of powers. For Christian faith is the kingdom of God; it has the same vigour that the nature of mustard brings out. For just as, when we take the juice of mustard, we are moved to tears, our face is saddened, our brow contracts and is stirred, and we receive the very health of our body with a kind of weeping of harshness; for on the one side the bitterness irritates us and the sharpness penetrates, on the other the heat of its fiery flavour kindles us, and, disturbed in the whole body, we are made the more healthy the more we weep; so too when we receive the commandments of Christian faith, we are saddened in mind, afflicted in body, moved to tears, and we obtain our very salvation with a kind of weeping and grief. On one side fasts irritate us, on another the consciousness of sins wears us down, on another the loss of our inheritance troubles us; and saddened in our whole condition we obtain salvation the more if we weep the more, according to what the Lord says: "You will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice." And just as, when the head perhaps must be cured with mustard, we are ordered to shave off the hair and remove all hindrances from the skin, so that the remedy may reach the bare body more perfectly; so too, when the soul must be cured through faith, we are commanded to take away from ourselves the substance of the world and lay aside the hindrances of gold and silver, so that the spiritual remedy may come more fittingly to the bare and lone soul. For whoever is wrapped up in the things of the world and the riches of the age will not be helped by the remedy of faith. What the juice of mustard does in the body, then, let Christian faith do in the soul. But since in the same saying of the Lord it is written that the kingdom of heaven is like a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and put in his garden, and it grew and became a tree, and the birds rested in its branches, let us inquire more carefully who it is to whom all these things fit. We said above that the nature of mustard can fit the holy martyrs, who were crushed by various sufferings. But since Scripture says, "and it grew and became a tree, and the birds rested in its branches," I think this is more rightly compared to Christ the Lord himself, who in being born as man was humbled like a grain, and in ascending to heaven was exalted like a tree. Christ is plainly a grain when he suffers, a tree when he rises. He is a grain, I say, when he endures hunger; a tree when with five loaves he fills five thousand men. There he suffers barrenness by human condition, here he bestows fullness by his own divinity. I would call the Lord a grain when he is beaten, despised, reproached; a tree when he gives light to the blind, raises the dead, forgives sins. That he is a grain he himself says in the Gospel: "Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone." The Jews, then, not at all bearing the sharpness and bitterness of this grain, that is, of the Lord Saviour, like mustard, scorned to receive the juice of heavenly discipline, saying to the blind man who had been given light: "You are his disciple; but we are disciples of Moses." They were themselves wholly ignorant of the commandments of Moses, who commanded them to eat this bitterness: when he was arranging for them the sacraments of the Passover to be celebrated, he said: "You shall eat it with bitterness; for it is the Lord's Passover." For he did not command (as they think) that the very sharp juices of cheap herbs be eaten with the roast flesh of the lamb, but he commanded that the profitably bitter words of Christ's commandments be devoured together with the very sacrament of the Lord's passion. For do not the Lord's words seem bitter when he says, "If you wish to be perfect, leave all that you have, and come, follow me"? And when he says that one is not to have two tunics, nor a bag, nor shoes, this bitterness of words is medicine for souls. And as to what the Gospel says, "which a man took and put in his garden": who do we think is this man who took the grain and sowed it, like a grain of mustard seed, in his little garden? I think it is he of whom the evangelist reports: "But behold Joseph, a councillor from Arimathea, came to Pilate, asking that he might bury the body of the Lord when it was taken down"; which he took and committed to burial in a tomb that had been prepared in a garden. And so Scripture says: "which a man took and put in his garden." Joseph's garden, then, was full of various flowers, but he had not yet planted such a shoot in it. The special garden of his soul was indeed fragrant with the varied sweetness of the virtues, but he had not yet placed Christ with spices in the secret of his heart. So, while he buries the Saviour in the tomb of his little garden, he rather placed him in the inmost parts of his soul. And if you seek the branches of this tree, you will find that Peter is a branch, Paul is a branch, all the apostles and martyrs are branches; whoever is willing to hold firmly to them will not be drowned by the waves of the world; rather, sheltering under their shade he will not suffer the burning of Gehenna, safe from the squall of the devil's storm and from the fire of the burning judgment.

You yourselves know, brothers, that from the day I began to be with you I have not ceased to admonish you with all the Lord's commandments, and, partly by exhorting, partly by rebuking, to press on you the precepts of the Godhead; so that to many I have been more a father, but to some I have proved a hard master. For whoever gladly embraced my sermon rejoiced in me as a father; but he felt me a hard master who grieved that his conscience was struck by my preaching; provided that, whether by kindness or by censure, Christ is proclaimed to you; although censure itself is kindness, which is applied to more negligent sons so that they may learn by fear what they had neglected through love. For it is not that a father does not love all his sons equally, but that it is the indulgence of a father to show a father's affection according to the difference of characters, so as to stir up a gentle son with exhortation and to address a stubborn one with severity; yet he is secure about the correction of both, since he strikes the one with love and chastises the other with severity; as the Apostle says: "All discipline for the present seems to be not of joy but of grief; but afterward it yields the peaceful fruit of justice to those trained by it." Since, then, I believe you have profited from so many discourses of mine, I wish to discuss with you some things from the divine letters, so that I may understand that you grasp what I say with lively faith. The Lord says in the holy Gospel: "To what shall I compare the kingdom of God? It is like leaven, which a woman took and hid in flour, until the whole was leavened." There is no doubt that the force and power of leaven are known to all. For though it is small in size, simple in appearance, common in nature, it bears such strength within that when it is hidden in, its juice makes the whole mass to be what it is itself; and it always so spreads through the whole heap by the vigour of its sprinkling that it makes all that great quantity of flour leaven, and so the thing by its own strength acquires for itself a mass of its own vigour. Women do this so that they may carefully provide their husbands with healthier bread and useful food. But since the law is spiritual and the Gospel stands spiritually by the method of parables, let us see what the leaven is, who the woman, what the flour. We read in the Gospel: "Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit." If, then, the Lord is wheat, the Lord is also leaven, because leaven is usually made only from wheat; rightly, then, is Christ compared to leaven, who, though he was a man in appearance, small in humility, cast down in weakness, was so strong within in the power of wisdom that the world itself could hardly grasp his teaching; who, when he began to spread himself through the whole world by the vigour of his divinity, at once drew the whole human race by his power into his own substance, so as to pour the yoke of his Holy Spirit into all, that is, to make all Christians to be what Christ is. For the fact that the Lord Jesus was a man and alone in the world, like leaven hidden in the mass, enabled all men to be what he himself is. Whoever, then, clings to that leaven of Christ becomes himself leaven too, as useful to himself as fit for all, both certain of his own salvation and secure about the winning of others. As leaven, then, when it is to be sprinkled into a heap of flour, is broken, crumbled, scattered, and is itself wholly dissolved, so that it may bind that scattered multitude of flour into one vigour and bring into a solid body what was languishing like dust in its smallness, and by its union make a useful mass of what by its own dissolution seemed useless: so too the Lord Jesus Christ, since he was the leaven of the whole world, was broken by various sufferings, torn and dissolved, and his juice, which is his precious blood, was poured out for our salvation, so that by mixing himself in he might make solid the whole human race, which before lay dissolved in different directions. For so we, who seemed to be flour from the Gentiles, have clung to him as to a kind of leaven. We, I say, who lay scattered and wholly diminished through the whole world, have been brought into his body by the vigour of Christ's passion; as the blessed Apostle says: "For we are the body of Christ and its members." We, then, who from the nations were being tossed about like dust, are gathered into the mass of his solidity by the sprinkling of the Lord's blood. And the woman who is said to hide the leaven in the flour, who is she but holy Church, which daily strives to hide the teaching of Christ in our hearts? She, I say, is the woman who in another place is also said to grind, as the Lord says: "Two women will be grinding; one will be taken and one left." For holy Church grinds through the law, through the apostles, through the prophets, when she makes catechumens, and breaks up and crushes the roughness of paganism, so that, having ground them like flour, she may make them fit to cling to the Lord's blood. For one might call the whole passion of the Lord the leaven of faith. For the leaven of our salvation is the creed itself, which is handed over, without which leaven or creed no one can earn the substance of eternal life. And since the Gospel describes two women grinding, and we have said that the one Church grinds profitably, whom must we take the other to be but the synagogue? For she too grinds through Moses and the prophets, but she grinds unprofitably, as the Apostle says of the Jews: "They have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge." Unprofitably, I say, does the synagogue grind, because she does not temper her mass with the teaching of Christ. And so the Lord commands that the leaven of the synagogue is to be avoided, saying: "Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees." For it is tempered with the bloodshed and cruelties of the Jews, who said of the Lord: "His blood be on us and on our children." Hence the Gospel says: "Two women will be grinding; one will be taken and one left." For holy Church will be taken into eternal rest, who ground the food of holiness for the Lord; the faithless synagogue will be left at the mills, to suffer for ever the circuit of her faithlessness.

I ought, brothers, after these many days, to preach something more abundant and, returning from so great a swarm of priests, to refresh you with a sweet sermon. I said rightly 'a swarm of priests'; for as bees make sweet honey from the little flowers of the divine Scriptures and compose by the art of their mouth whatever belongs to the healing of souls, priests are rightly compared to bees; because, like bees, they show chastity of body, offer the food of heavenly life, and wield the sting of the law; for they are pure for sanctification, sweet for refreshment, severe for punishment. They are plainly to be compared to bees, who are contained by grace as in a kind of hive of mother Church, in which, building the cells of various merits with most sweet preaching, they produce many swarms of Christians from the one swarm of the Saviour. Though I have never ceased, brothers, to rebuke you with fatherly kindness, I wonder that you have profited nothing by my admonitions, and I grieve that my frequent preaching does not correct you with any progress in salvation, but binds you with a kind of penalty of testimony. For the preaching of a priest is correction for those of the people who are to be saved, and testimony against those who are to be judged; for we testify to them before the judgment what awaits them in the judgment itself, so that then, every excuse removed, they may be both guilty of their sins and liable for contempt. Hence sometimes, sparing you, I would wish to be silent; but I prefer that you render account for your stubbornness rather than that I undergo judgment for negligence. For I have learned, brothers, that during my absence you came to church so rarely, came forward so very few, as though when I set out you all came with me, and as though, as I am drawn away by necessities, the same necessity drew you with me. We are alike absent from the house of God; but there is this difference, that necessity makes me absent, your will makes you absent. Do you not know that even if I am missing from the church, Christ, who is everywhere, is not missing from his Church? You come to church, brother: do you not find there the Bishop of bishops, the Saviour? For a Christian who goes to church only when the bishop is present seems to have gone not so much for God's sake as for a man's, and not to have fulfilled the duty of a God-fearing Christian but to have paid the respects of a friend. Why do I rebuke you, when you can refute me with one word? For I am refuted when I see that in this respect the clergy are more negligent than you. For how can I correct sons when I cannot amend brothers? Or with what confidence shall I be angry with lay people, when I am reduced to silence by shame before my colleagues? But I do not speak, brothers, about everyone. There are certainly some devout, and there are others negligent: I name no one; let each one's conscience address him.

Perhaps my preaching last Sunday was rather bitter, brothers, because I addressed many of you rather sharply with teaching and truth, and pursued things that brought some people not flatteries but sadness. But that is nothing to me; for I rejoice, knowing that the disciple's sadness is the master's joy. For the hearer makes progress when the preacher announces harsher things; for salvation is born in him when the sadness of amendment is pressed on him. For the blessed Apostle says: "For the sadness that is according to God works repentance unto a stable salvation." Rightly, then, I rejoice, because I work salvation when I reprove. Though my son may grieve at the harshness of my sermon, I understand that he makes progress through grief. The holy Apostle says: "For what son is there whom his father does not beat?" For a father does not always kiss his son, but sometimes chastises him. So when one who is loved is chastised, then kindness is exercised toward him; for love too has its blows, which are sweeter when they are inflicted more bitterly; for devout chastisement is sweeter than flattering leniency; hence the prophet says: "Sweeter are the wounds of a friend than the willing kisses of an enemy." Therefore, brothers, since I believe that after so many useful words of my rebuke you have profited by the kindness of your understanding, let us gather something from the sacred letters. For as a spring that does not drip with its usual moisture is stirred with sticks and so is found more abundant, and first muddy water comes from it so that purer water may follow; so too your holiness had indeed been irritated by the harshness of my sermon, but has become more devout through the sweetness of kindness. Perhaps your minds kept something turbid, but now all that is pure flows from your conduct. Let us see, then, what it means that the Lord said to his disciples: "But who do you say that I am?" The Lord does not ask as though ignorant what the people and disciples thought of him, but, knowing the minds of all, he wished to make manifest the faith of each, so that they might tell with the mouth what they believed in the heart about the Lord. For some believed the Lord to be Elijah, others Jeremiah, others John the Baptist. Peter alone confesses him to be the Christ, the Son of God. There are certain degrees of faith, and whoever believes more devoutly confesses more religiously. For this devotion it is said to Peter: "Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jona, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven. And I say to you: You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my Church." Though he was called Simon, then, for this devotion he was named Peter. We read the Apostle saying of the Lord himself: "They drank from the spiritual rock that followed them; and the rock was Christ." Rightly, then, because Christ is the rock, Simon was named Peter; so that he who had fellowship of faith with the Lord might also have with the Lord unity of the Lord's name; so that as a Christian is named from Christ, so the apostle Peter might be called from Christ the Rock. But neither can we condemn the opinion of the people who thought the Lord one of the prophets. For some perhaps thought the Saviour was Elijah because Elijah ascended to heaven as the Saviour did. But Christ is not like Elijah; for the one is caught up to heaven, the other returns; the one is carried up like a weak man in a fiery chariot, the other is borne like God by his own power; the one is led like a man, the other ascends like the Saviour; the one follows angels who lead him, the other goes before angels who accompany him. Accordingly, those same angels, returning to earth, said to the apostles on behalf of the Lord Saviour: "Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you, will come in the same way as you saw him going into heaven."

Some, brothers, who are either held by the belt of military service or are placed in public office, when they sin gravely, usually excuse themselves from the penalty of their sin with this plea, that they are in service; and lest they should ever do good, they complain that they are taken up with evil doings; as though men's service, not their will, were at fault; so they ascribe to their offices what they themselves do. For it is not an offence to serve, but to serve for the sake of plunder is a sin. Nor is it criminal to administer the commonwealth, but to administer the commonwealth so as rather to increase one's private property seems damnable. For that is why certain pay has been appointed for those who serve, lest while they seek their means of living, plunder should run riot. And what of this, that when they are rebuked by their elders for some error, and some of them are charged with why he was drunk, why he seized others' property, why he committed murder in a riot, at once he answers: 'What could I do, a man of the world and a soldier? Have I professed as a monk or a cleric?' As though everyone who is not a cleric or a monk may be permitted what is not permitted! A rule of living is prescribed to all offices; every sex, age and rank is called to do good. Let no one, then, excuse himself by his public duties, let no one complain of the occupation of military service. With every Christian the first service ought to be that of honesty. To prove what we say by the authority of the Gospel, let us look at the reading that was gone through a little while ago. For the Gospel says: "Tax collectors also came to John to be baptized by him, and they said to him, Teacher, what shall we do? And he said: Exact nothing more than what is appointed for you." An honest question indeed of the tax collectors, and a just answer of the holy prophet. For they ask anxiously, lest either in ignorance they should fall into sin by exacting more, or by slackness they should defraud the public service. And he commands with moderation, so that iniquity may have no place and the appointed tax may have its effect. For he did not say, 'Exact nothing,' but 'Exact nothing more.' From which we understand that with God it is not so much exaction as unjust exaction that is condemned. For the Lord himself says: "Render to God the things that are God's, and to Caesar the things that are Caesar's." What Caesar commands, then, is to be borne; what the emperor imposes is to be tolerated. But it becomes intolerable when the plundering of the exaction heaps it up. And what of this, that those same men who manage such levies double their sins upon sins, that is, that they call their frauds and plunderings their 'commission', since the very plunder is brought in as a commission? And they add this to their crimes, that they persecute rather those whom they see defenceless, and think they have not cheated the public levies unless they have cheated the houses of orphans: so that the children of one who perhaps two days before was a friend, colleague or brother are held, once death has intervened, as unknown, cheap and wretched. And if there is a widow, she is either so harassed with injuries that she marries again, or, if she wishes to remain in her resolve of chastity, she remains in possession of her means only by giving gifts. When, then, they have filled their purses with these frauds, you will see them hurrying to church glad and well dressed and giving thanks to God, as though this money were bestowed on them by him; sinning in this too, that they wish God to be a sharer in their plunderings. And the holy Gospel says: "Soldiers also asked him, And what shall we do? John said to them: Do not extort from anyone, nor make false accusations, but be content with your pay." Here every man who serves ought to recognize himself. For Scripture does not speak only of those in service who are held in armed service, but whoever uses the belt of his service is enrolled as a soldier of his rank. And so this sentence can be said, for example, to soldiers, guardsmen and all governors, and to anyone who receives pay publicly decreed for him: if he seeks more, he is condemned by John's sentence as a false accuser and extortioner. And this evil has so grown up that now, as if by custom, laws are sold, rights corrupted, the very sentence is for sale, and no case can now be without its 'tail'. But this divine sentence which speaks to soldiers can also be turned against the clergy; because even if they do not seem to serve the world, yet we serve the Lord and God, as the Apostle says: "No one serving God entangles himself in worldly affairs." We do not seem, I say, to serve, in our loose and flowing tunics; but we have the belt of our service, by which the inward parts of chastity are bound; of which belt the Lord says to his apostles: "Let your loins be girded and your lamps burning in your hands." We are soldiers of Christ, then, and we receive pay and a gift from him, as the blessed Apostle says: "Who has given us the pledge of the Spirit"; that is, who has enriched us with the reward of the Holy Spirit. If any Christian, then, is perhaps not content with this donative and seeks more, by that very fact he begins to lack what he earned. This happens especially to the Arian heretics: for while they seek I know not what more, finding the spirit of error, they have lost the grace of the Holy Spirit. And the catholic cleric too is held by this sentence. For if he is not content with the pay he receives from the altar at the Lord's command, but carries on trade, sells intercessions, and gladly embraces the gifts of widows, he may seem a merchant rather than a cleric. Nor can we say, 'No one charges us as robbers, no one accuses us of violence'; as though flatteries did not sometimes draw greater plunder from widows than tortures; and it makes no difference to God whether one seizes another's goods by force or by deceit, so long as by whatever means he holds what belongs to another.