SUNDAY OF THE BLIND MAN

 

Today’s Gospel reading and church hymns describe to us how the Lord Jesus Christ healed a man blind from birth. The Lord saw the blind man, spat on the ground, made clay from this spittle, anointed the blind man’s eyes with the clay, and then told him to go and wash his face in the pool of Siloam. The blind man obeyed the Lord, went away, and came back seeing (John 9:1-7).

The issue was as clear as day. That same Jesus, Whom the scribes were ready to stone as a blasphemer, had performed yet another great miracle. It only remained to acknowledge Him, repent of their blindness, and give glory to God Who had honored His people with such great signs. But for that they had to humble their pride and have their spiritual eyes opened – which was precisely what they did not wish to happen. Even the blind man, if he had not obeyed the Lord and had not gone to the pool of Siloam to wash his face, – would not have had his sight restored. Most importantly, though, the blind man began seeing not only with his physical eyes, but also spiritually.

Several times the Pharisees and the scribes interrogated the former blind man about what had taken place, called in his parents, and demanded that the healed man acknowledge his healer as a sinner, so that finally he lost all patience with them; the former blind man then rebuked and lectured them on the fact that God does not listen to sinners, but listens to those who honor God and act according to His will. Not seeing and not wishing to see the truth of these words, the scribes and the Pharisees did not know what to reply to him, but expelled him instead, using violence in place of words.

Hearing of his expulsion from the synagogue, Christ Himself found him and strengthened his faith. “Dost thou believe in the Son of God?” – He asked the seeing man. – “And who is He, Lord, that I might believe in Him?” Then followed the merciful reply: “Thou hast both seen Him and it is He that talketh with thee.” Seeing the divine image standing before his seeing eyes, the former blind man joyously exclaimed: “I believe, Lord!” and worshipped Him.

If this question were addressed to us, how many of us would have said “I do not believe?” We are all Christians and belong to the true Church of Christ, the Orthodox Church. But which one of us can say that his faith in God is firm, unshakeable, living, active, attested to by his entire life and works? “Show me thy faith from thy works” – says the Apostle Paul in one of his epistles. In truth, which one of us truly believes in God, the Almighty Creator, Master over all, i.e. is convinced that his life, as it had come from God in the beginning, so remains at all times in His omnipotent will?

A certain man came to confession to one of our native ascetics, who was engaged in spiritual endeavor near Kiev. After hearing the man’s long confession of all his personal sins, the ascetic said: “I can see that you are repenting of your personal sins, but you have not said the most important thing – do you love God and do you believe in His word?” The man was quite surprised by such a question and said: “O venerable father, how can one not love God, pray, and why should one not believe in His word, which consists of total truth and holiness?” The ascetic then replied: “If you loved God, you would be thinking about Him incessantly and with heartfelt pleasure, while for you the contemplation of God represents hardship and boredom. If you were convinced and believed beyond any doubt that there was eternal life beyond the grave, with retribution for all earthly deeds, you would be thinking about it constantly, and you would be spending your life on earth as a stranger preparing to leave for his homeland. Yet your thoughts secretly run along the lines of “who knows what will come after death?” Thus the cause of disbelief in God is lack of faith, and the cause of lack of faith is lack of conviction, and the cause of lack of conviction is a refusal to seek true knowledge and spiritual enlightenment. In other words: it is impossible to love without believing.”

Let us think a moment about this. Let us try to ponder this more deeply. It is hard to ascend the ladder of virtues, but such an endeavor comprises the feat of our salvation. Even the blind man did not remain as he had been, but was included among Christ’s disciples; he multiplied the faith and the commendation which he had received from the Lord for the glory of God.

This ardent faith of the former blind man caused Christ to say a homily on spiritual blindness: “I have come into this world to judge, so that the unseeing would see, and the seeing would become blind.” It turned out that when the true Light appeared, bringing enlightenment to every man, only those who were regarded as ignorant and blind were able to see Him, – all those poor in spirit, who in the simplicity of their hearts fully accepted the Lord; and on the contrary – those who in their pride imagined themselves to be seeing and all-knowing – turned out to be pitifully blind.

Unfortunately, such spiritual blindness is widely spread even now, and is being further spread primarily among those classes of society which believe themselves to be people of reason and learning. In their blindness such people now think to re-educate the whole of society and the entire world. A tree is known by its fruits, and we see their fruits every day in the anti-religious education they are promoting, which is based exclusively upon worldly knowledge.

Let us become church-bound, dear Orthodox brethren, and not only through external churchgoing, but primarily through inner development. Let today’s Gospel narrative convince us of the unreliability of earthly knowledge, which seeks enlightenment for itself only within its own limited reason and not in divine reason. Therefore, all of us – both educated and non-educated – should appeal to the Lord together with the Holy Church, that our spiritual eyes be opened and that life-giving faith be preserved within us as an indubitable pledge of eternal life: let us fan the flames of this faith within us by prayer and the reading of the Word of God, fulfilling God’s commandments earnestly and faithfully, and the Lord will not abandon us, as He had not abandoned the blind man, for “God will not despise a broken and contrite heart.” Amen.

 Protopriest Igor Hrebinka

 

 

SIGNIFICANCE OF THE PENTECOSTAL PRAYERS

 

On the day of the Holy Pentecost (Trinity Day), when the Church commemorates the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the apostles, there also occurs an abundant outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon all of us who pray in church on that day. During the Vespers (which follow immediately after the Divine liturgy), the Church prays for “all those present, awaiting the grace of the Holy Spirit,” while the subsequent kneeling prayers speak of the actions performed by the grace of the Holy Spirit. And we, too, pray to the Holy Spirit to visit His grace upon us, to cleanse us of all impurity, and to grant us holiness and comfort, because He is the Source of both one and the other.

A certain elder said: on the day of the feast of the Holy Pentecost, when you will be kneeling, brother, and piously heeding the prayers offered by the priest on behalf of his congregation, then you should definitely know for what you should pray, for on that day the Holy Spirit is present in the Church so obviously, so fragrantly and divinely, that He will hear your prayers. Therefore, brother, concentrate your thoughts and think ahead of what you will ask of God. Perhaps there are many sorrows, and cares, and burdens weighing upon your heart, and you wish to ask God to resolve your problems and to help you. Pray for it. But your first, and primary, and infinitely more important entreaty should be that God grant you the grace of the Holy Spirit and fill your heart with it to a surfeit, i.e. that He receive you into the Heavenly Kingdom while you are still on earth, that He grant you the pledge of future eternal rapture. I will even tell you that that should actually be your only entreaty on that day. However, the flesh is weak, and in your frailty you may ask God for help with worldly cares, if you so desire. God will hear you, as it is written: “The Lord hear thee in the day of trouble” (Psalm 20:1). Always remember the words of our Lord Jesus Christ: “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness, and all these things (i.e. all your earthly needs) shall be added unto you” (Matt. 6:33). Incorporate these words both into your faith and into your life: believe in God and trust in God. Know also that God knows how much your heart suffers from earthly misfortunes, and that the small coal of love upon which flames and rises the incense of your prayer and faith may be completely extinguished if sorrows sap your spiritual energy. God knows that your heart is diminutive, and He wishes it to belong to Him entirely, as it is written: “My son, give Me thine heart” (Prov. 23:26). Thus, if you give Him your heart, God will make sure that it remains His and will not allow great sorrows and the demons, – who act under the cover of sorrows and who incite tempests in order to prize your heart away from God and with strong currents of misfortune extinguish your love for God and all your thoughts of eternal life. – to weaken your soul and bring it to the point of total exhaustion. Thus, brother, give your heart to God and afterwards remain without a care in the world, and be solely concerned with having your heart remain constantly in God’s hands. Thus, on the day of the Holy Pentecost, on the day of the commemoration of the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the apostles, earnestly pray that the Holy Spirit descend upon you, too, and prior to that prepare yourself with prayer and the reading of holy books.

Thus, ask the Heavenly King to grant you this charity: the grace of the Holy Spirit. “Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord” (Matt. 25:21). Amen.

Archimandrite Amvrossy

 

 

THE HOLY TRINITY – AN IMAGE OF CONCILIARITY

From eternity and before all ages our God exists in the form of Trinity: three Persons in one Being.

Throughout a number of centuries the comprehension of this sacred truth and major Christian dogma was completely forgotten by Christian humanity to such a degree, that the countless multitude of enemies of our faith cite precisely this dogma as incomprehensible, while the defenders of Christianity, being almost in agreement, demand a blind acceptance of this truth on faith, without the least attempt to delve into it more deeply and understand it, since such understanding is supposedly totally impossible.

Of course total understanding is impossible, but total understanding of anything at all, especially dogmas of faith, is equally impossible. An in-depth study of this particular dogma and a fuller understanding of it as much as possible are especially important and necessary for a proper understanding of both the Christian Church and of human nature itself.

The Lord created man in His image and likeness, because only a being like unto God can be truly good.

God is one in essence, but triune in Persons. God’s creation was due to become the same. Adam and Eve were individual beings, but together were due to become one. The means to this was to be another God-like quality – love – the divine force which achieves total and absolute unity within the Divinity despite the difference in the Persons, and which is so inherent to God that Apostle John says that God is love.

This same God-like quality of love, given by God to humans, was supposed to unite them into a single being through love for each other, so that this single human being, also through love, but in this case towards God, would gradually, in an infinitely joyous process of realization of love, unite into a single being with God.

This is what St. Basil the Great formulated so clearly: “I am a man, but have been tasked with becoming God.” This process is never-ending, because the task assigned to man is boundless and infinite.

However, man stumbled in his first step towards it. In order to accomplish his task, man was supposed to achieve perfection in love, manifesting it and nurturing it by a voluntary (because love is a God-like quality and cannot be forced) fulfillment of the commandment of the One Whom he had been called upon to love. Man broke off his love for God by violating His commandment, and ruptured the tie of love between himself and his helpmate by placing the blame upon each other while being called to account before God.

Nevertheless, since man’s sin was not absolute, and the humans expelled from paradise stepped unto a path of repentance, the tie of conciliation, though broken, was not completely destroyed in mankind. All manifestations of love, compassion, and mutual understanding are manifestations of this innate conciliarity among humans. The only reason I am able to understand the thoughts of another person is that by God’s design I am supposed to be one-in-essence with him. But never will I be able to fully understand another person, never will I be able to fully assimilate the life of another as my own, because our natural conciliarity has been corrupted by sin, and we have become locked into self-assertion.

The greatest manifestations of this, though corrupted, but still existing natural human conciliarity are marriage and motherhood. Here, more than anywhere else, a person lives the life of another as his own. In marriage two individuals, while fully retaining their personal characteristics, their individual uniqueness, strive to become a single being. A good and loving marriage is the closest approach towards the accomplishment of our God-given purpose. A loving husband and wife truly live each other’s lives almost as their own. And at the same time their unity does not limit them in any way, does not lessen the personal uniqueness of each of the spouses.

However, even in the most perfect human marriage, not to speak of other manifestations of conciliarity ruptured by sin, the fullness of unity of essence is never reached. Never can man fully live the life of another as his own.

And yet, according to God’s design, in the pre-eternal Council of the Trinity man was tasked with attaining complete and perfect unity of essence similar to the unity of essence in the Holy Trinity, in Whose image man was created. And, in turn, the desired union in the Kingdom of God, the union of man with God, is called the wedding feast of the Lamb, i.e. the marriage of Divinity and the human soul, in which, without losing his personality, man unites with God to the same extent as a loving husband and wife strive to merge into a single being.

In the light of such understanding of the immemorial and all-encompassing nature of the law of love as the foundation of God’s design for mankind, it becomes understandable why Christ the Saviour, Who came to restore the lost unity between men and God, placed the commandments of loving God and neighbor as the cornerstone of His teaching, and said that upon these two commandments hang the entire law and all the prophets.

To love one’s neighbor as oneself, to live his life as one’s own means precisely to be one-in-essence with him.

To love God with all one’s heart, all one’s thoughts, all one’s might, all one’s being means to fulfill God’s design for mankind, because all of man’s spiritual forces, his entire being were given to him precisely in order to strive for unity with God and to attain it in the infinitely joyous process of the wedding feast of the Lamb.

This supreme precept of love was brought by Christ to mankind. But it is very nearsighted to think that that was all the Saviour did, as think the rationalistic moralists, who find the only value in Christianity to be its lofty moral law. If this were so, then those who take this point of view a step further and conclude that actually Christianity has not given mankind anything really new would largely be correct, because the founders of other religions also proposed lofty moral precepts that were quite often similar to very basic Christian laws and, moreover, appeared prior to Christianity.

We can easily agree with that. Of course, it does not mean that Christianity has nothing of its own, as rationalists think, that it is borrowed from outside sources. It only means, as one ancient Church father said, that man’s soul is Christian in nature, and that the roots of likeness to God are planted deeply within it, making it thirst at all historical stages and under all the various geographical conditions for the true ideal and not an illusory one.

But never could any commandment, even the most perfect Christian moral law, be fulfilled by any man, as a consequence of his essence being damaged by sin, had not Christ imbued mankind with a new force, giving it the possibility of uniting with Him into a single being within the Church, thus restoring the conciliar unity of people, similar to the conciliarity of the Holy Trinity, that had been lost in the Fall.

And Christ – one-in-essence with God the Father and the Holy Spirit in the Holy Trinity – also became one-in-essence with us in the Church, as a consequence of which we now acquire within it an infinite invisible power that gives us the opportunity of eternal life in the Kingdom of God, which is represented by the Church, i.e. the realization of the process with which we were erstwhile tasked – a blessed union with God, a return to Him.

This does not mean that the Church accomplishes our salvation mechanically. One enters the Church, unites with God, and is already saved – no, our sojourn in the Church, precisely because it represents a union with God, requires very difficult conditions from man – a total lack of sin, total purity and lack of vice, because it is impossible to unite anything sinful with God. Therefore, in order to truly enter the Church, one must be completely cleansed of sin, one must completely fulfill the Gospel law of perfection.

The foundation of this law is love, whose basic element is comprised of ancient and innate human conciliarity, which has remained in man and has preserved for him the possibility of salvation and renewal. Without it we cannot achieve the new conciliarity – union with God and other people within the Church. It is also a sign of the soul’s relative maturity.

It is noteworthy how sins and crimes obscure the natural human conciliarity, and how a man who serves himself, his sins, and his passions loses all interest in others, loses the ability to understand others, destroys within himself his innate conciliarity, and thus dooms himself to dissatisfaction and moral torment. This is because only a God-like conciliar life with love and interest in each other can give joy in life.

For this reason the dark demonic forces, who after their apostasy from God have totally and absolutely lost their former innate angelic conciliarity and have consequently become immersed in utter darkness and torment, battle primarily against the sense of conciliarity among people.

As a result of mankind’s widespread apostasy from God in the modern age, we clearly see the fading out of conciliarity in mankind, which tries in vain to camouflage this terrible phenomenon with various international conferences, assemblies, and treaties. However, people have lost the feelings of pity, compassion, and interest in each other, which are all manifestations of conciliarity.

We, Christians, on the contrary, declare conciliarity in all its facets to be the foundation of our life. We joyously greet all manifestations of love, trust, understanding, and solidarity in people, seeing in them the scattered but significantly important elements of the ancient conciliarity implanted into man by God, yet knowing all the while that this natural conciliarity, ruptured by sin, is not sufficient and is corrupted, and through it we strive for a higher, boundless, and invincible conciliarity, a conciliarity in Church through union with Christ, and through Him with the entire Holy Trinity, and at the same time with all the angels and humans incorporated into this unity.

Archbishop Nathaniel (Lvov)

 

 

CHRISTIAN TEACHING

 

The meaning of life

 

The ultimate goal of each person is in God, in communion or living union with God. Having been created in the image and likeness of God, the very nature of man is to some extent a form of divine nature. By being partly divine in nature, man cannot but seek communion with God, not only as his source and prototype, but as his highest good.

For this reason our heart is content only when it communes with God and is possessed by God. No one can comfort it except God. Solomon knew many things, possessed many things, and enjoyed many things, but in the final analysis he was forced to acknowledge all of it as vanity and vexation of spirit.

However, our good lies not only in the sole aspiration of all our desires towards God. In seeking God, we wish to acquire Him, we wish to truly become part of Him, to be within Him, and have Him within ourselves. Such a living, internal, direct communion of God with man and man with God represents our ultimate goal.

Let not anyone think, though, that a living union with God requires the soul to evaporate within God and to lose its freedom and independence. Not at all! Although the soul truly comes under the influence of God, touches upon God in a certain sense, and is permeated by His force, it still does not cease to be a soul – a reasoning and free spirit, just as white-hot iron or coal, being engulfed by fire, do not cease to be iron or coal.

On the other hand, it is also wrong to believe that when communion with God becomes man’s ultimate goal, such a man will become worthy of it only at the end, for example after all his endeavors. No, it must be man’s constant, uninterrupted state of being, so that if there is no communion with God, if it is not felt, then man must admit that he is standing outside his goal and his purpose.

Thus those people are far from the truth who believe man’s ultimate goal to be man himself, whatever fancy appellations they may give to such a belief – calling it a development of spiritual forces, for example, or a striving towards improvement. With such a goal people become disjointed through their concern only for their own selves, and become used to turning everything into a means to that end, including God Himself, whereas in reality man, like all other creation, is a means in God’s hands for the purposes of His Divine Providence.

It is also unfair to consider the good of others as man’s ultimate goal, to focus all one’s concern on the well-being of society. To assist universal well-being is man’s unarguable obligation, but not the primary, nor exclusive one. If this were to be the prime duty, then each person would turn his mind and his heart towards others and away from God and, consequently, all the people would make up a society closed in upon itself, but separated from God.

This would be like a body without a head. On the contrary, when in communion with God, all people become united in this single goal, not only in thought, but in deed, and all of them together, filled with one spirit and one force, make up a whole, living, and well-functioning organism. Only under such conditions can a genuine and reliable union be created among people.

Saint Theophanus the Recluse

 

 

 

LIVES OF THE SAINTS

 

On May 21^st(the 8^th by the old calendar) the Church commemorates the memory of the venerable Arsenius the Great.

St. Arsenius was born in Rome, received a good upbringing and an excellent education, but left off his studies and dedicated himself to God, becoming a deacon. Against his will he was taken by Emperor Theodosius to Constantinople as a worthy instructor of the emperor’s sons. However, the saint’s soul yearned for solitude, and he was greatly burdened by his position. The Lord acceded to his appeals, and one day he heard a voice saying: “Arsenius, run away from people and you shall be saved.” Leaving the palace in secret, he went off and entered one of the Egyptian monasteries. Once, while praying, the saint again heard a voice saying: “Arsenius, run away from people and remain silent – that is the root of sinlessness.” After that the saint went into seclusion, coming to church only on Sundays and major holidays. He spent 55 years in great spiritual feats and reposed at the age of 95. St. Arsenius taught: “Many times I have repented of my words, but never of my silence.” In response to the question of why he hid from people, the ascetic replied: “God sees that I love everyone, but I cannot simultaneously be with God and with people. The heavenly powers have a single will and glorify God in unison, while on earth each person has his own will, and people’s thoughts are different. I cannot leave God and live with people.”

 

 

On inner purity

 

(An instruction by St. Arsenius the Great)

 

Many people, in order to cleanse themselves of the iniquities of the flesh and sin, spend a very strict life. Yet they do not think at all or very little of mental purity and of absolute cleansing of oneself. Many try to avoid fornication and other vices of the flesh, but few take care to suppress within themselves their innermost passions, such as envy, vanity, egoism, avarice, and – worst of all – pride. For this reason they are not only half-pure, but the greater and more important part of themselves remains impure. They are like statues which glitter with gold externally, but internally are full of all kinds of foul things.

Above all we must try to cleanse ourselves of our secret passions. We must know that our enemy the devil tries to tempt us with various cunning approaches, and tries to throw us into the abyss of vice even by means of good deeds. For example, by enticing us to offer hospitality, he lures us into partaking of forbidden food and drink together with our guests. Hospitality in itself is a wonderful virtue – that of love. However, by means of it he secretly and gradually makes us slaves to our bellies and nourishes incontinence and lust within us. Others he disposes towards the giving of charity, towards generosity, but through this he incites within them love of money and avarice. And so on.

 

 

A NON-SENSATION

 

The discovery of previously unavailable texts dating back to great antiquity is always a subject of a certain degree of scholarly interest. However, interest in the “Gospel of Judas” – a 2^nd or 3^rd century literary historical document preserved in the Coptic language – was artificially heated up over the course of several months in some mass media outlets. The public was fed the idea that at long last hidden information had been obtained, information which Church officials had hidden from the faithful for centuries, and that the newly discovered historical document would rock the traditional teachings of Christianity. It was expected that publication of the document, which contained a “rehabilitation of Judas,” would have the same effect as that made by the Da Vinci Code.

However, at the first mention of the discovery, theologians and clergy familiar with the history of Christianity and literature related to Christianity warned that one should not expect a sensation, as the “Gospel of Judas” was far from the first historical document of its type. A large number of manuscripts of Gnostic origin were extant, and they were of interest only in the study of the development of heretical movements in the early history of Christianity. Not a single one of those compositions had succeeded in rocking the foundations of the teachings of the Church, although in their day - in the early stages of the spread of Christianity - some of them had served to draw Christians away into Gnostic sects.

Early Church writers had been aware of the “Gospel of Judas.” In enumerating the Gnostic sects of his time, the 2^nd century Hieromartyr, St. Irenaeus of Lyons, mentioned the Cainite sect, which taught that “as only Judas knew the truth, it was he that performed the mystery of betrayal, and through it, they say, everything on earth and in heaven had been resolved. They likewise disseminate an imaginary history of that type, calling it the Gospel of Judas.”

Tertulian, another great teacher and apologist of the early Church (circa A.D. 160-225), comments on this false and highly pernicious teaching in the following manner: “Another heresy has flared up, called the Cainite heresy. The reason for it is that they (the Cainites) glorify Cain for supposedly having been engendered by some exceedingly powerful energy that acted within him, while Abel, having been conceived from a weaker force, was the poorer (smaller). Those who assert this also defend the traitor Judas, telling us that the latter is worthy of respect and is even to be considered great because of the blessings which he supposedly passed on to mankind; some of them think that he (Judas) is due gratitude for the reason that he, realizing clearly that Christ wished to betray the truth, betrayed Him in turn, so that there would be no opportunity to pervert the truth. And there are yet others who, on the contrary, assert that because the rulers of the world did not agree to have Christ suffer and thus obtain salvation for mankind through His death, he (Judas), wishing to assist the salvation of mankind, betrayed Christ in order to prevent opposition to salvation, which salvation was truly being impeded by the forces which opposed Christ’s suffering; thus, through Christ’s suffering, nothing would impede the salvation of mankind.”

As we see from the above-mentioned quote, the heresy now being spread by various false Western theologians is not new at all. On the contrary, it has its roots and precedents in great antiquity and was combatted by some of the most famous apologists of Orthodoxy in those times.

What gave rise to the renewal of this ancient Cainite heresy in our times? In 1945, 13 papyrus scrolls were found near the Nag Hammadi village in Egypt, containing a total of 49 Gnostic treatises. However, the so-called “Gospel of Judas,” mentioned by St. Irenaeus in his essay on the Cainite heresy, was not found among them. For this reason many theologians thought that the hierarch of Lyons had been mistaken. But was he mistaken? Not at all! Recently a 14^th scroll was discovered, which was found to contain this “Gospel of Judas.”

The recent discovery of the document fully supports information about its Gnostic origin. The text has undergone significant damage, thus complicating the problem of fully establishing the author’s impressions as to Judas’ role in the matter of betraying Jesus. From the surviving fragments, however, it becomes evident that the author of the document saw in Judas a disciple who was especially close to Jesus, one to whom Jesus revealed the “mysteries of the Kingdom.” It seems that his act of betrayal was upon direct orders from Jesus.

Gnostic sects of the 2^nd and 3^rd centuries displayed a wide and diverse range of theological teachings. However, they held in common the tendency to combine elements of Christianity with elements of Eastern religions, occultism, magic, and astrology. Characteristic of most Gnostic systems was the concept of two equally powerful forces - the force of good and the force of evil - in control of the history of the universe. Within that framework, the material world was presumed to be a creation not of the good God, but of the evil Demiurge. The concept of man as a creature endowed with free will was absent from Gnostic systems; man was something more like a toy in the hands of good or evil powers.

The figure of Christ did not occupy a central role in any of the Gnostic systems. Only individual elements of His teachings were woven into the Gnostics’ phantasmagoric constructs. Thus, the Gnostics were not satisfied with the Gospels used in the Church; they created their own personal alternative Gospels. One of them was the “Gospel of Judas.”

The concept that in betraying Jesus, Judas was merely obeying Jesus’ will, is absolutely consonant with Gnostic teaching about good and evil as two equal forces controlling the universe. However, in no way is it consistent with Church teaching, which insists that each man has personal responsibility for his actions, and that no one is predetermined to do some evil or other.

According to Christian teaching, there is a mystical paradox between God’s omniscience and individual free will. On the one hand, God knows in advance about evil deeds that will be done by any individual. On the other hand, God’s omniscience does not justify evil deeds: St. John Damascene wrote in the 8^th century, “One must know that God knows everything in advance, but that He does not predetermine everything. For He knows in advance what is in our power, but does not predetermine it. For He does not wish transgressions to occur, but does not forcibly compel us to move in the direction of virtues.”

Judas’ betrayal was not foreordained for him, and when the Lord chose him to be one of His twelve disciples, He chose him not to be a traitor, but to be an Apostle. Judas was not deprived of any of the gifts with which the other apostles were endowed. He was with them at the Mystical Supper, and together with them received into himself the Body and Blood of Incarnate God. However, as it says in the services for Great Thursday, “the glorious disciples were illumined at the Supper during the washing of the feet, but ungodly Judas was darkened by the disease of avarice.” While the other disciples heeded the Savior’s words, in Judas’ heart a plan of betrayal took shape.

No one forced Judas to commit an act of betrayal: it was solely his own free choice. Jesus’ words to Judas, “that thou doest, do quickly” (John 13:27), were neither an order nor a signal to take action. Judas could have seen them as evidence that Jesus knew of his plans, and they could have stopped him at the last minute. However, the plan of betrayal had already taken shape in Judas’ heart, and even the words of the Savior did not stop him.

The perniciousness of Judas’ betrayal is augmented by the fact that it was committed after Judas had communed of the Holy Body and Blood of Christ at the Mystical Supper. This is clearly stated by the great theologian and universal teacher of Orthodoxy St. John Chrysostome: “Judas was not turned toward Christ when he partook of the Holy Mysteries. Thus his crime becomes even more abominable for two reasons: being hardened with such resolve (to betray Christ), he yet dared to partake of the Holy Mysteries; and, having partaken of them, he did not become any better, neither from fear, nor from the benefit received, nor from the honor which he was granted.”

As St. Augustine says: “And it is not surprising that condemnation followed his (Judas’) ingratitude for the blessing received. And because of this ingratitude all that was good in him turned into evil, as happens with those who partake of the Holy Mysteries unworthily.”

And there is another important point: did Judas act of his own free will for the good of mankind, as is asserted by both ancient and modern Cainites, or was he prompted by the ancient lying serpent, i.e. the devil? The answer to this question is given to us in the Gospel of St. John the Theologian: “And He (Jesus) dipped the sop and gave it to Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon. And after the sop Satan entered into him” (John 13:26). Thus, if Judas acted at the prompting of the devil, as Church tradition and the Holy Scriptures themselves teach us, then what kind of rehabilitation are we talking about? For what communion can there be between light and darkness?

Christ said to His disciples: “Woe unto the world because of offenses! For it must needs be that offenses come; but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh!” (Matthew 18:7). Those words referred first of all to Judas the betrayer. Jesus Christ accepted his Passion voluntarily, and His Passion had a redemptive meaning for all mankind. However, Judas did nothing deserving in the work of salvation and redemption of mankind. Salvation and redemption would have taken place even without Judas’ participation. Betrayal was not the essential link in the chain of events that brought mankind to salvation.

On Great Thursday, the Orthodox Church reminds the faithful not only of the Mystical Supper, the first Eucharist, offered by our Lord Jesus Christ Himself. It also reminds us of that moral responsibility borne by each of us, by everyone Jesus calls to salvation and eternal life.

And it is no accident that before the Eucharistic Chalice, Orthodox Christians say the words, “nor will I give Thee a kiss as did Judas.” The image of Judas is kept by the Church as an example of a man who had crossed the last boundary line, the line man must not cross for any reason, or at any price. Beyond that line lies perdition and eternal death.

 

(Reprinted from “Orthodox Russia,” No. 3, 2006)

 

 

 

 

 

Teach me to love Thee, O Lord, With all my mind, all comprehension, To entrust my soul into Thy care And my life with each heartbeat’s ascension.   Teach me to heed and fulfill Only Thy merciful will, Teach not to grumble or complain Of my toilsome and sorrowful lot.   All whom Thou came to redeem With Thy purest and holiest Blood, – With a deep and unselfish love Teach me to love, O my God.   - K.R. (Grand-Duke Konstantin Romanov)