Homilies on Numbers 24.1–24.3

[On the sacrifices which are commanded to be offered at each festival, and on the vows which are vowed to God.] All who are to be instructed in higher disciplines find the labour of the rudiments irksome for as long as they do not know what is the end and fruit of the discipline into which they are being introduced. But when perfection in the discipline has come to those who have been instructed in order, then they will be glad to have borne the irksomeness of the rudiments. So in holy and divine matters too there are certain first rudiments by which those are introduced who strive toward the perfection of blessedness. This the servant of God plainly indicates in the song of Exodus, saying: “Bring them in and plant them on the mountain of your inheritance, in your prepared dwelling which you have prepared, Lord.” The apostle Paul too, knowing that there are certain first beginnings of instruction, and that then in time one also comes to perfection, wrote to some and said: “For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need again that someone teach you the elementary principles of the words of God, and you have become such as need milk, not solid food. For everyone who is fed on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a child. But the food of the perfect is solid, who, according to their capacity of taking it, have their senses trained to distinguish good and evil.” And again elsewhere he calls the letter of the law and all writing of this kind the elements of the world. And now, then, the things which belonged to those who were instructed in the first elements seem irksome to us at first hearing; for each of the hearers who wishes to learn about the things that pertain to salvation, when the sacrifices of rams and goats and calves are read, judges that writings of this kind bring him no profit, as far as the hearing itself is concerned. But if anyone is found who can remove the veil that lies over the reading of the Old Testament, and from there search out what are the true sacrifices that purify the people on the feast days, then he will see how wonderful and magnificent are the things signified by these, which are thought superfluous and superstitious by the ignorant. But these things Paul and those who are like him have known more fully and perfectly from the very Wisdom and Word of God; we, however, as far as we can gather from their writings, in which they have given us certain indications as through a shadow and image, will try to discuss briefly some things about the rite of the sacrifices for the common edification. At the festival of the Passover it is a lamb that purifies the people, at others a calf, at others a goat or a ram, or a she-goat, or a heifer, as you have learned from what was read. One of these animals, then, which are taken to purify the people, is said to be our Lord and Saviour. For so John, who is greater than all the prophets, understood it, and marked it of him, saying: “Behold the Lamb of God, behold him who takes away the sins of the world.” And if the lamb that was given to purify the people refers to the person of our Lord and Saviour, it seems to follow that the other animals too, which are assigned to the same purifying uses, ought likewise to be referred to certain persons who, by the merit of the blood of Christ, contribute something to the purification of the human race. See, then, whether perhaps, just as our Lord and Saviour, led like a lamb to the slaughter and offered as the sacrifice of the altar, granted the remission of sins to the whole world, so perhaps the blood of the other saints and righteous too, which was shed from the blood of Abel the righteous to the blood of Zechariah the prophet, who was killed between the temple and the altar, the blood of one as of a heifer, of another as of a goat, or of a she-goat, or of one of these, was shed to make expiation for some part of the people. Whether these things are to be referred to the persons of the righteous and the prophets who were slain in this world, or of those who say, “For your sake we are put to death all the day long, we are counted as sheep for the slaughter,” or even to the higher powers to whom the care of the human race has been given, who would easily dare to affirm? For these animals are not to be thought to refer to this or that person in outward form, but in figure. For the Lord Jesus Christ himself is not called a lamb as if he had been changed and turned into the form of a lamb. Yet he is called a lamb because his will and goodness, by which he made God propitious to men and gave forgiveness of sins, proved to be for the human race like the spotless and innocent victim of a lamb, by which the divine is believed to be appeased toward men. So, then, perhaps, if there is any of the angels and heavenly powers, or any of righteous men, or even of the holy prophets and apostles, who intercedes more earnestly for the sins of men, he can be taken as offered in sacrifice for divine propitiation, like a ram, or a calf, or a goat, to obtain purification for the people. Does not Paul seem to have offered himself as a burnt offering, like a ram or a goat, for the people of Israel, when he said: “For I myself wished to be accursed from Christ for my brothers, who are my kinsmen according to the flesh”? Do you wish to know that Paul offers himself as a victim to be slain? Hear him saying elsewhere: “For I am already being sacrificed, and the time of my dissolution,” or, as we read in the Greek copies, “of my return, is at hand.” So, then, it can be seen figuratively that one is offered for the festival of New Fruits, another for the festival of the Sabbath, another for the festival of Tabernacles, like a goat, or a calf, or a ram, to reconcile God to men. For as long as there are sins, victims for sins must be sought. Now suppose, for example, there had been no sin: if there had been no sin, it would not have been necessary for the Son of God to become a lamb, nor would there have been need for him, placed in the flesh, to be slain, but he would have remained what he was in the beginning, God the Word. But since sin entered into this world, and the necessity of sin requires propitiation, and propitiation is made only through a victim, it was necessary that a victim be provided for sin. And since there were different and various qualities of sin itself, victims of different animals are commanded, doubtless such as would fit the varieties of sins. So, then, one of the saints, whether angels, as we said, or men, becomes a calf, interceding at that festival for the offences of the people; another a ram at another festival, through whose intercession purification is made for sins. And if men can be purified from sins and become purer, the victims too are reduced. For if victims are for sins, they are without doubt multiplied for a multitude of sins and reduced for their fewness. Of this we have indications in the present places of Scripture, that is, in the last festival, Tabernacles, when victims are commanded to be offered for eight days. And on the first day, as if sins were still abundant, fourteen calves are commanded to be offered. But on the second day, since the sins have been diminished, the victims are also reduced, and thirteen calves are offered. On the third day twelve, and after that eleven: and so, as the multitude of sins fails day by day through purifications, the number of victims is consequently reduced too. In this way you may also understand the plan of purification in the governance of the whole world. For not only the things on earth need purification, but also those in heaven. For perdition threatens even the heavens, for so the prophet says: “They will perish, and all will grow old like a garment, and like a cloak you will roll them up, and they will be changed.” Behold, then, the purification of the whole world, that is, of heavenly and earthly and infernal things: see how many victims all these need, how many calves, how many rams, how many goats they require. But among all these there is one lamb who was able to take away the sin of the whole world; and therefore the other victims ceased, because this victim was such that it alone sufficed for the salvation of the whole world. For the others remitted sins by prayers; he alone remitted them by power. For he said: “Son, your sins are forgiven you.” So, then, the world is instructed first to seek remission of sins through various victims, until it comes to the perfect victim, the consummate victim, the yearling lamb, perfect, who takes away the sins of the whole world; through whom it may keep spiritual festivals, not for the satiety of the flesh but for the advance of the spirit, with spiritual sacrifices offered in purification of the mind. For it befits God that the victim of the heart and the sacrifice of a broken spirit be offered to him, not that flesh and blood be slain: because even if we once knew Christ according to the flesh, now we no longer know him so; and therefore let us keep the feast in the spirit and slay spiritual sacrifices. Let these things, according to our strength, have been discussed about the variety of the sacrifices, whose understanding to the full is known by him to whom all things are naked and laid bare, and there is no creature invisible in his sight.

After these things the law of vows is set down, and in this legislation Moses uses a new beginning. For he says: “A man, a man, whoever vows a vow to the Lord.” What is the reason for repeating the noun? As if it were not enough to have said, “a man who vows a vow to the Lord.” What it means, then, that he says “a man, a man,” and what the doubled naming of man signifies, does not seem to me to be passed over in silence. The Apostle teaches that the inner man is one and the outer man another: and that the former is the one who is renewed day by day according to the image of him who created him, but the latter is the visible one, who is being corrupted. When, then, one comes to this stage of advance, that the law of God is received and vows are offered to the Lord (and no one can offer vows to the Lord unless he has something in himself and in his substance to offer to God), this outer man is not enough to receive the law of God, nor to offer vows alone, for he cannot have anything worthy of God; but it is the inner man who rather has in himself something for God. For in him is the dwelling of the virtues, in him all the understanding of knowledge, in him the renewal of the divine image. When he has recovered the form in which he was made by God from the beginning, and by the restoration of the virtues has received back the beauty of his former shape, then he can offer vows to God, and then he will be called not only “man,” but “man, man.” For he who does not cultivate the inner man, who takes no care of him, does not furnish him with virtues, does not adorn him with good conduct, does not exercise him in divine teachings, does not seek the wisdom of God, does not devote effort to the knowledge of the Scriptures, cannot be called “man, man,” but only “man,” and natural man: because that inner one, to whom the name of man belongs more truly and nobly, is lulled to sleep in him by carnal vices and overwhelmed by the cares and anxieties of this world, so that not even the title of his name can be held in him. Hence each of us must take great pains, if perhaps he sees the inner man in himself lying oppressed by the filth of sins and the rubble of vices, quickly to take away from him all uncleanness, quickly to rescue him from all defilement of flesh and blood, to turn him at last to repentance, to call back to him the memory of God, to call back the hope of salvation. For these things are not to be sought outside from elsewhere, but the occasion of salvation is within us, as the Lord too said: “For behold, the kingdom of God is within you.” For the power of conversion is within us. For when you have turned and groaned, you will be saved; and then you will be able worthily to render your vows to the Most High and be called “man, man.” A vow is when we offer something of ours to God. God wishes, then, first to receive something from us, and so himself to bestow something on us, so that he may be seen to bestow his gifts and presents on the deserving and not the undeserving. But what is it that God wishes to receive from us? Hear the sentence of Scripture: “And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God ask of you, but that you fear the Lord your God and walk in all his ways, and love him with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength?” These, then, are the things which God asks of us. Unless we offer first, we shall receive nothing from him. We read in another place too: “Give glory to God,” and “Give majesty to God.” If you give glory, you will receive glory. For so God himself says: “Those who glorify me I will glorify.” And I say that if we offer him our righteousness, we shall receive from him the righteousness of God. And if we offer him our chastity, that is, of the body, we shall receive from him chastity of the spirit. And if we offer him our mind, we shall receive from him his mind; as the Apostle too said: “But we have the mind of the Lord Christ.” And when we have offered to God the things that are in us, and he has conferred on us the things that are his, then truly we shall be called not only “man” but “man, man.” For each man is fittingly adorned with the perfection of the name. These, then, are the vows which he ought to pay who is called “man, man.” I know that different vows are recorded in the Scriptures. Hannah vowed to God the fruit of her womb and consecrated Samuel in the temple. Another vowed to God whatever should meet him as he returned after victory, and when his daughter met him, he paid a vow to be wept over. Some offer to God as vows calves, or rams, or houses, or other such things lacking reason. But he who is called a Nazirite vowed himself to God. For this is the vow of the Nazirite, which is above every vow. For to offer a son or a daughter, or cattle, or an estate, is all outside us. To offer oneself to God, and to please him not by another’s labour but by one’s own, this is more perfect and more eminent than all vows: and he who does this is an imitator of Christ. For he gave man the earth, the sea, and all that is in them; he gave even the heavens for his service; the sun too and the moon and stars he granted for the ministry of men; rains, winds, and everything that is in the world he bestowed on men. But after all these things he gave himself. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son” for the life of this world. What great thing, then, will a man do if he offers himself to God, to whom God first offered himself? If, then, you take up your cross and follow Christ, if you say, “Yet I live, no longer I, but Christ lives in me,” if our soul desires and thirsts to return and be with Christ, as the Apostle too said, and takes no delight in the enticements of the present age, and if it fulfils spiritually the whole law that was given about the Nazirites, then it has offered itself, that is, its soul, to God. He who lives in chastity has vowed his body to God, according to him who said: “But the virgin thinks how she may be holy in body and spirit.” For this very word “holy” looks to this: for those are called holy who have vowed themselves to God. Hence a ram too, for example, if it is vowed to God, is called holy, and it is not lawful to shear it for common uses. And a calf too, if it has been devoted to God, is no less called holy, and it is not lawful to yoke it for common work. From these, then, let us gather what it is for a man to vow himself to God. If you have vowed yourself to God, you must imitate the calf, which may not serve human works, doing nothing that pertains to men and to the present life; but whatever pertains to the soul and the observance of divine worship, this you must both do and think.

But meanwhile the present reading contains certain differences between vows. For if it is a man who has vowed, he is said to be free in his vows and subject to no one. But if a woman vows, if she is in her father’s house, her vow depends on her father’s decision: and if he refuses, she will be set free. But if he does not refuse, both he and the daughter are held bound. And if, after the father has not refused, the daughter does not pay the vow, the sin remains with her. Likewise it is decided concerning the husband, that if a wife has vowed something in her husband’s house and the husband hears and does not refuse, he is liable for the vow together with his wife. But if he refuses, then the wife is free, and so is the husband. But if he keeps silent, both, as we said, are held liable. These are the things that are written; but we must pray God to deign to give us an understanding worthy of himself, by which we may understand and perceive these things, as is fitting, from the words of God. All of us who live under the law of God and are held in his church live, some under fathers, some under husbands. And if the soul is little and has only beginnings in divine instruction, is to be believed to live under a father. But if it has now grown older, so that it is marriageable, able to conceive the seed of the word of God and to grasp the secrets of spiritual doctrine, it is said to be placed under a husband. For so Paul too said of the Corinthians: “For I wish to present you all as a chaste virgin to one husband, to Christ.” But of those who are more perfect and more eminent than these it is not said that they are under a husband; but hear how Paul declares of himself and those like him: “Until we all meet,” he says, “in a perfect man, in the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.” Over this soul, then, which meets in a perfect man, no one has dominion in its vows, but it has power and freedom over its own vows. But if the soul is still of the female sex, so that a husband or a father has dominion over its vows, the fault is not always in it, but sometimes goes back to the husbands or fathers. Who these are may be difficult to apply; yet we will bring forward what we can by the Lord’s gift. We have often said that the souls of those who are in the church of God are under the care and stewardship of angels, and we have shown that these also come to judgment with men, so that it may be established in that divine examination whether men sinned by their own sloth or by the negligence of those who warned and guarded them. It seems to me that in this place too it is indicated and shown in a mystery that some souls live under them as daughters, others as wives, according to the distinctions we made above. If, then, one of these wishes to offer and vow something to God, and if what it vows is over-hasty and less suitable, it belongs to that angel, as guardian and counsellor, to hold back and restrain the boldness of the one vowing. But if, hearing, he does not restrain or warn, the soul will indeed be freed from blame, but he himself will remain liable for the vow. This, indeed, is to be understood as happening with each of the lower souls; to the more perfect God himself is present, as it is written of the people of Israel: “The Lord himself led them.” But after they sinned and became lower than themselves, they are handed over to an angel. Hence Moses too said: “Unless you yourself come with us, do not lead me up from here.” And of the righteous man God says: “I am with him in tribulation”; and elsewhere he says: “Do not be afraid to go down into Egypt, for I will be with you.” To the righteous and chosen, then, the Lord himself is present; but to the lower the angels are present, according to what we said above, governing and caring for them, and sometimes transferring their vows to themselves, but sometimes leaving them upon them. But we must strive to meet in a perfect man, in the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may enjoy freedom of vows, and hasten so to cleave to the Lord that we may be one spirit with him, and he may abide in us and we in him; and that nothing feminine, nothing of childish age, may be found in us, lest we need to be left by the Father under guardians and stewards; but let us hasten to hear that voice of our Lord and Saviour in which he says, “The Father himself loves you”; to him be glory for ages of ages. Amen.