Questions and Answers to the Orthodox 1–24

[Question 1.] If God abolished the ancient worship as not pleasing to him, and introduced in its place that of the Christians as pleasing to him, but the orthodox, who alone please God, are not equal in number to the Greeks and Jews and all the heretics, but fewer, what proof is there that it is not through poverty of power, on the part of the one who chose this worship instead of that, that error remains unuprooted? And how is the abolition of that worship not useless, when much error still holds the world? Answer. God, having abolished the ancient worship and purposed to introduce the new one in its place through the Old Testament, … introducing this one instead of that one, first, when it was proclaimed in words attested by divine powers, abolished Judaism and Hellenism; and later, by divine works done likewise by powers, he brings about the uprooting of all error among men and demons, and with it of all the evils in the world … If not all who have received the worship keep and hold the same opinion about the same things, but some hold it rightly and others not rightly, this is no reproach against God for poverty of power, that they through their own negligence or some other weakness do not rightly understand what they believe; it is a reproach against their negligence. It has been said in the worship that was being introduced, about the fewness of the orthodox, at one time, “Many are called, but few are chosen”; at another, “Narrow and hard is the way that leads to life, and few are those who find it.” Likewise about the heresies, which the Lord in his parables calls tares and rotten fish. If, then, nothing in the Christian worship is false, as the truth of events bears witness, making the future believed from what has already come about, then no pretext remains for slandering God for poverty of power, or for calling useless the worship introduced in place of the other worship, which now dissolves Judaism and Hellenism, and later the heresies too. [2] Question. If prophets and apostles foretold the things that were going to happen, such as victories in wars, attacks of enemies, and the destruction of cities by those who attacked them, and among the Greeks too the words of oracles foretold them, how are the former known to be better than those outside, when the prediction of what was going to happen came from both sides? Answer. All these things belong to the same God, both the prediction in words and the outcome in deeds; he announced beforehand through the prophets and apostles what he was going to do, and likewise through those outside piety he himself announced beforehand what he was going to do. For as through the soothsayer Balaam he blessed Israel and cursed his enemies, doing each by the foretelling of what would be, so too through divination he announced beforehand to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon the capture of Israel, as the prophet Ezekiel says: “And the king of Babylon will stand at the ancient way, at the head of the two ways, to use divination, to shake the rod, to inquire of the carved images, and to look out from his right hand; and it was against Jerusalem,” and so on. So too, through the soothsayers among the Greeks, whatever received its outcome in deeds he himself announced beforehand. But the difference between the prophets and the soothsayers is great. First, the God in whose name the prophets and apostles prophesied, of him they have had the knowledge and the faith and the worship; and all that the prophets foretold about the overthrow of the Greek gods and oracles and about the establishment of Christian things received its outcome; but of what the soothsayers foretold, either against the true God and those who worship him, or for the establishment of Greek things, [nothing] received its outcome. And a witness of this is the destruction of the Assyrians, who, setting out from their own divination, said: “Have I come up without the Lord against this land to destroy it? The Lord said to me, Go up and destroy it.” And having gone up, contrary to the divination, he was destroyed. [3] Question. If all who have sinned are punished at the resurrection, but those who knew God's will and did not do it are punished more, what is the difference, what the gain, between the Christian and the Greek, the baptized and the unbaptized, the orthodox and the one who is not orthodox? Answer. If, according to the apostle Paul, the believer who does not provide for his own has denied God and is worse than the unbelievers, as one who does not have, together with knowledge and faith and baptism, the way of life characteristic of discipleship to Christ, but has the form of piety while denying its power, he is worse than the unbelievers. So sinning with knowledge is as much worse than sinning without knowledge as an inexcusable sin is worse than a sin that has an excuse.

[Question.] If the heretics hastened with all their power to know and keep the truth of the doctrines, and were not able, how is it not unjust to subject to punishment those who have missed the truth? Answer. So far were the heretics from seeking the truth with all their power that even when it was demonstrated to them by those who had found it, they were neither able nor willing to accept it. And if this defense were true, they ought … one another … , and not to have set up, out of wickedness of judgment, heresies that fight against themselves and against the truth. But now, since they condemn one another for the strangeness of their thinking, it is clear that all the heresies took the occasions of their establishment from the love of glory or the antipathy of the heresiarchs; for which reason the founders of the heresies were named “grievous wolves” by the apostle. That it is impossible for one who seeks the truth with his whole heart and power not to find it, the Lord bears witness, saying: “Everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks will find, and to him who knocks it will be opened.”

[Question.] If in the churches of the heretics powers are at work, such as healings of diseases, expulsions of unclean spirits, the bearing of fruits of the earth, and gushings of oil, how is it not inevitable that they are confirmed in their error by these? [Answer.] … on the evil and the good, and to send rain on the just and the unjust, is not a confirming of the unjust in their wickedness and injustice, but a preparation for just punishment, so it is not a confirming of the heretics in their error that some powers are at work among them. For if working powers were a proof and sign of piety, the Lord would not have declared unapproved and unworthy of his [acquaintance] those who said, “[Lord,] did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?”, saying to them, “I never knew you; depart from me, you who work lawlessness.” … having taught you to feed and give drink to the hungry and the thirsty, much more does he himself do the like of what he taught us, heaping fire on their heads, since they have not known the giver of the faith worthily.

[Question.] If passibility is shown in those who feel pain and pleasure, and in the judgment sinners [will feel] the one and the righteous the other, how does he speak truly who declared that there is impassibility for men after the resurrection? [Answer.] … that from what we are by nature we receive no change, neither into opposites, in respect of being and not being, nor into contraries, in respect of more and less; for instance, we are not changed from joy into grief, nor do we rejoice over the same good sometimes more and sometimes less. Even if we rejoice more over a greater good and less over a lesser one, yet even so the quantity of joy remains unchanged in proportion to the goods. And this holds for those who rise to life; and for those who rise to judgment the same argument holds, when they are released, as from death, so from judgment. For of those who rise, according to one or the other, some rise to life, others to judgment. [7] Question. If it is a mark of change to take good and bad things into one's mind, how are those who are punished unchanged, when they reckon the rest of the righteous; or again those who are at rest, when they think of the punishment of sinners? For each gives a greater perception of the other when the contraries are set side by side. Answer. In the age to come the quantity of the perception of honor and of punishment lies in a fixed measure, and perception cannot receive increase or decrease by the setting side by side of opposites. For all things there are unchangeable, in quantity as in quality. [8] Question. If we have received the knowledge of good and evil from God, together with our being, how is he not the cause of each, who has also implanted in our nature both the knowledge and the power for both? Answer. Not only has God given us the power of being and of knowing and doing good and evil, but he has also made us masters of choosing freely what seems good among the things known; and he placed our being good or bad not in the knowledge of the things known, but in the choice of the things chosen. God, then, is not the cause of our being good or bad, but our free choice. For as the one who sees a prostitute and knows that she is a prostitute is not a fornicator because of the knowledge; nor even if the knowledge arouses the passion of desire is he a fornicator thereby; but if his free choice consents to the passion, then he is a fornicator, either in act or in disposition; so too of good and bad men knowledge is not the cause of their being good or bad, but free choice, according to preference … [9] Question. … [If God gives …] and crowns and punishes each man according to his deeds, how does he do both justly, when [man] has each from God himself? Answer. What belongs to us and what is up to us differ from one another. We are male and female; but it is up to us to be chaste or fornicators. We are crowned or punished because of what is up to us; for we are either crowned or punished because of the things to which our free choice leads us. For God has given us powers for acting, but has subjected them to the authority of free choice; and God's judgment is with regard to free choice, which governs the powers of choice in us, and not with regard to nature. We have received from God the power of acting and of not acting: of doing what is just and of not doing what is unjust. When, then, we act otherwise, and turn the acting and the not acting to the opposite, we are justly punished. [10] Question. If the bodily things said by the poets about the gods among the Greeks, and by the prophets about God, have another meaning by allegory, how are not both shown to be myth? Answer. What the prophets said allegorically about God was said by transference from what is by nature to what is not by nature: for instance, “The Lord smelled a sweet savor.” In men smelling is by nature; in God it is said by an extended use and not by nature. But what the poets say mythically about the gods is not said by transference from what is by nature to what is not by nature. For man does not by nature swallow man, so that we should understand by transference that Kronos swallowed Zeus. The myth about the swallowing of Zeus has nothing in it but falsehood. [11] Question. If what contains is greater than what is contained in substance, but less in worth — as heaven and earth contain the angels, a house its inhabitants, the body the soul — and God contains the universe, how is he not less than the universe by the argument of worth? Answer. This argument is not universal; therefore the question was not soundly put. For arguments whose contrary can be found by the same means, since they lack necessity, also lack credibility. For there are some contained things that are less than their containers both in substance and in worth, like the seeds of fruits. Further, the containers mentioned contain the things contained by their being; but God alone contains the universe by his will. And the other containers themselves need something to contain them; but God does not need anything to contain him. And for the other contained things their being and continuance does not come from their containers; but for the universe both come from God. And the containers mentioned exist because of the things contained; but God does not exist because of the universe. Therefore God is greater than the universe, in worth as in substance. [12] Question. If what contains serves to guard and keep what is contained, how does God, who contains the universe, not contain it for the guarding and continuance of evil? For evil too is seen in a part of the universe. Answer. The universe is the work of God; and God keeps the universe as his own work; and as God made nothing evil by nature, so he keeps nothing evil by nature.

[Question.] If the resurrection takes place for the requital of what each has lived, how do infants, or those who died in the womb, not rise superfluously, since because of the untimeliness of their age they [could have earned neither rest] nor affliction, nor receive perception [of what is coming]? Answer. For one who believes it true that “it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power,” it is possible and fitting to believe in the resurrection of infants too. For he who grants them incorruption can also grant them the power to perceive the goods set before them. If there is no resurrection of these, God will be found to have fashioned them in vain. But if God does nothing in vain, then the infants too necessarily came into being for the sake of the resurrection. And how is it not out of place [to speak of vengeance on] Herod, if the infants who are avenged did not exist? Witness to these things are the leaps of exultation of John the Baptist in his mother's womb, and the hymn of the infants and sucklings …

[Question.] If the baptism given by the heretics is false and vain, why do the orthodox not baptize the heretic who takes refuge in orthodoxy, but [receive him] as in a true baptism, the spurious one? And if he happens to have received ordination from them, they themselves accept this too as valid. How then are the one received and those who received him [not …]? Answer. When the heretic comes over to orthodoxy, his error is corrected: his false belief by the change of his thinking; his baptism by the anointing with the holy chrism; his ordination by the laying on of hands; and nothing of the old remains unloosed.

[Question.] If Job did not sin [in cursing] the day, clearly he was heard as a righteous man; and if he was heard, God overturned his own [day] …, and one must seek in the divine Scripture the destruction of that day. But if he was not heard, how is it not [necessary] to say that he was not heard because he was a sinner? For [the will] of those who fear him God will do; but about sinners it is said, “If you … your prayer, I will not hear you.” Answer. Job's aim in the curse set forth was this, as if he were saying: “Would that the day on which I was born had been cursed with this curse!” Why? “So that I,” he says, “might not have been born.” For it is not possible for anyone to be born on a day so cursed. This curse, then, was not pronounced so as to await fulfillment. For if the curse had been so made as to await its fulfillment, he would have recalled his own words when he was freed from his afflictions and had come into better things. It was because of the excess of his affliction, then, that he uttered the words of his heart; and when it had left him, clearly he no longer held the same opinion about the same day.

[Question.] If, according to our nature, whatever is begotten is of the same essence as the one who begot it, how, according to this same nature, does not whatever has been begotten exist after the one who begot it? But if not the second, then neither will the first … in the divine begetting be as with us. [Answer.] … having our existence before the begetting, which takes place after our existence; but God begot at the same time as he exists. Therefore with God there is no later existence of what is begotten, since there is no earlier existence before the begetting.

[Question.] If the essence of the divine hypostases is one and indivisible, how can they be called three hypostases and three persons, and not rather [one]? Answer. Of the divine hypostases, what belongs to the essence is one and indivisible, but what belongs to them as three is divisible. Therefore the three hypostases are distinct … ; and the hypostasis we call [another], we no longer call the same hypostasis, but another. For we say that the Trinity of the names of the Trinity belongs to the hypostases, not to their unity. Therefore God is one by the oneness and indivisibility of the essence, but the persons are three by the distinction of the hypostases.

[Question.] If “God” indicates the essence and “Father” the person, how is saying “Son of God” the same as saying “Son of the Father”? [Answer.] … Son, sometimes Son of the Father, sometimes Son of God. He is, then, Son of the Father, the Son of the God who is according to essence. And to say “Son of the Father” is the same as to say “Son of God,” since whatever belongs to the person belongs also to the essence of the person. … having the begetting preceding their existence. [19] Question. [If the observation of palpitations is not the mark] of the pious, why are the pious, though they wish with all their power to reject it, unable to do so, since it announces either something cheerful or something gloomy? And if this is bad, how does it come upon us against our purpose? But if it is good, which I do not think, why is it forbidden? Answer. Foreknowledge of the future belongs to the soul enlightened by the divine Spirit for knowledge of things hitherto unclear, and not to the involuntary motion of the body. Palpitation is a bodily affection arising from the coursing of the natural spirit through the body, which exists in all animals; therefore the saints judged such a bodily motion unworthy to be a criterion of the future; and as sneezes of the nose and ringings of the ears come upon us against our purpose, so does palpitation. Further, for those who have received the hope of the future state and have one aim, to … , it is superfluous to know beforehand here, through palpitations, what is cheerful or gloomy. And if the same palpitation that foretells wealth comes to the man of the world and to the ascetic, how is the foretelling of wealth by palpitation not proved false by the choice of the ascetic, who chooses not only not to acquire what he does not have, but not even to possess what he has?

[Question.] If fishermen take fish from the waters to death and corruption, how did the Master Christ, intending to bring men to eternal life through the apostles, promise to make them fishers of men? Answer. Since the men caught by the apostles in the net of the kingdom had to die to their former life in sins, for this reason the Lord compared the catching of men to the catching of fish. And he added “to life,” supplying for the thing illustrated what was lacking in the illustration. [21] Question. If monks have turned away from marital pleasures, why in their fantasies during sleep do they suffer involuntary things, and not only with chance women, but sometimes in the fantasy … they seem to have intercourse even with mothers and sisters? What, then, must be used for deliverance from such a war? And must the one so attacked abstain from the mysteries, or approach them? … [And he chose the apostles from fishermen, and promised to make them fishers of men] … since there is much inquiry about this among them too. [Answer.] … they have an adversary who contrives by every means in his power to set [stumbling blocks] before the pious; for this reason they suffer involuntary things in sleep. And the adversary knows that for things not in our power we are neither praised for the honorable nor blamed for the shameful (for praise and blame belong to the things done by us with the consent of reason), and that dreams are among the things not in our power; yet through dreams too he stirs up in us the doing of both, honorable things and shameful, having these hopes in himself: that perhaps, either through boasting of what we have not done, or through the working of shameful things, he might be able to find us delighting in the involuntary act. But to see such dreams is not in our power; to be delighted or grieved at an act so involuntary, that is in our power. If, then, he finds us delighting in the involuntary act, the adversary boasts as victor; but if he finds us grieving, he is frustrated in his plan and defeated. It is sufficient, then, for deliverance from the evil device to be grieved at what happened involuntarily, and to wash away the defilement with tears. But for those who suffer such involuntary things to abstain from communion in the divine mysteries is not at all just; otherwise we would abolish by this the difference between voluntary and involuntary evils.

[Question.] If the Master Christ declared that the tares grow together with the wheat, how have the tares multiplied while the wheat has almost failed? And what proof is there that what has failed is wheat, and that the prediction of their growing together has not proved false? Answer. The proof that what has failed is wheat is this, the prediction from him: “… the love of many will grow cold.” And again: “In later times some will depart from the faith … of men.” And again: “They will turn away from the truth and will turn aside to myths.” And again: “[Grievous wolves] will come in among you, not sparing the flock, to draw away the disciples after them.” That the wheat does not fail until the end of the age the Lord shows, saying: “For the sake of the elect, whom the Father … , those days will be shortened.” If something happened to the wheat, in its growing and failing, that was not said about it, clearly the word about it has proved false; but if from the beginning of the preaching until the end of the age all the things that happen … , it is [clear] that the word about it has in no way proved false. If there are tares, there must also be wheat; for by being set side by side the wheat is known for what it is, and likewise the tares; and if the one does not exist, the other is not known for what it is either.

[Question.] If before the passion the Lord prayed that the disciples be sanctified by the Father, but afterwards Judas perished, how does the prayer offered for them appear to have been accepted? And how is “I know that you always hear me” shown to be true? Answer. Judas' perdition took place from the moment when Christ, taking the morsel and dipping it, gave it to him; and when Judas took the morsel, Satan entered into him, and going out he tore himself away from the rest of the disciples. The prayer for the disciples took place after Judas had separated himself; and this is shown from the prayer itself, when the Lord, praying, said: “Those whom you gave me I have guarded, and none of them perished except the son of perdition, that the Scripture might be fulfilled.” First, then, came the perdition of Judas, then the prayer for the disciples, and then the passion of the Savior.

[Question.] If God is the creator and Master of creation, how do the [talismans] of Apollonius have power in the parts of creation? For, as we see, they check the onrushes of the sea, the blasts of the winds, and the attacks of mice and wild beasts. And if the miracles done by the Lord are carried only in the narrative, while most of those done by that man are shown in the very facts, how do they not deceive those who see them? And if this has happened by divine permission, how has such a permission not become a guide to Hellenism? But if not, how have those things not come about by the power of demons? Again, if God cooperated with him because he was pleased with what was done as good, why were such things not done through prophets or apostles? But if he was not pleased with it as bad, why did he not either prevent the bad at once, or … [Having in these things the marks of the divine power of Christ, … that Christ's miracles lie in bare narrative] … allow it to prevail over creation? Answer. Apollonius, as a man skilled in the natural powers and in the sympathies and antipathies in them, made his talismans by this science, not by divine authority; therefore in all his effects there was need of the use of suitable materials, cooperating with him for the accomplishment of what was being done. But our Savior Christ, doing his miracles by his divine authority, in no way needed matter, but the facts followed and still follow his commands and predictions. And the talismans made by Apollonius, since they came about by the science of natural powers, … for the bodily work of men, the Lord did not overturn; but the demon himself, who was established in his statue and deceived men in the oracles into worshiping and honoring Apollonius as a god, he muzzled, abolishing his oracles; and with him he destroyed the dominion of the other demons honored by the Greeks under the name of gods, as the facts are seen [to show].