27. The Good Shepherd (ibidsermon 2, 801A-D)
GREGORY OF NYSSA
27. The Good Shepherd (ibidsermon 2, 801A-D) Where dost Thou pasture Thy sheep, O good Shepherd,
Who carriest all Thy flock upon Thy shoulders? For the one lamb which Thou tookest up is the entire human race which Thou didst raise upon Thy shoulders. Show me then the place of pasture, make known to me the waters of rest, lead me out to the good grass, call me by name that I, Thy sheep, may listen to Thy voice, and may Thy call be the gift of eternal life.
Shew me, 0 thou whom my soul loveth (Cant. 1.6). This is the name I give Thee, for Thy name is above all names
(Phil. 2.9) and is inexpressible and inaccessible to all rational creatures. But this name expresses Thy goodness, and the attitude of my soul towards Thee. How could I not love Thee,
Who hast loved me so much, even though I am blac\ (Cant.
1.4), so as to lay down Thy life for the sheep whose Shepherd Thou art ? There can be no greater love than this, to lay down
Thy life for my salvation.
Shew me, then, she says, where thou feedest (Cant. 1.6), that I may find the pasture of salvation and be filled with the food of heaven which all men must eat if they would enter into life. And running to Thee, the source, I shall drink the draught Thou sendest forth for those who thirst; this water pours from Thy side ever since the spear laid open that vein; and whoever tastes of this shall become a fountain springing up into life everlasting (}ohn 4.14).
If Thou dost shepherd me in this way, Thou wilt make me lie down in the midday (Cant. 1.6), and then in peace at once
I shall sleep and rest (Ps. 4.9) in the light that knows no
FROM GLORY TO GLORY
shadow. There is no shadow at midday because the sun shines directly overhead. Then Thou wilt make them lie down, all those that thou feedest, when Thou wilt take Thy children with Thee into Thy bed (Luke 11.7). And no one will be judged worthy of the midday rest unless he is a son of the day and of the light. But he who has left the dark of evening and the dark before dawn, that is, the beginning and the end of evil, he shall be made to lie down at midday by the Sun of Justice (Mai. 4.2).
Show me, says the bride, how I must lie down, show me the path of the midday rest, lest I stray from Thy secure guid ance and lest ignorance of the truth herd me into flocks that are different from Thine own. This is what the bride says in anxiety over her God-given beauty, asking to know how her loveliness may abide forever. Still, she is not yet thought worthy to hear the voice of the Bridegroom, for God has greater plans for her: He wants the beginning of her enjoy ment to arouse a greater yearning for Him, that her desire might give zest to her joy.
28. Know Thyself (ibid., 804A-808B) Our greatest protection is self-knowledge, and to avoid the delusion that we are seeing ourselves when we are in reality looking at something else. This is what happens to those who do not scrutinize themselves. What they see is strength, beauty, reputation, political power, abundant wealth, pomp, self-importance, bodily stature, a certain grace of form or the like, and they think that this is what they are. Such persons make very poor guardians of themselves: because of their
i6o
GREGORY OF NYSSA
absorption in something else, they overlook what is their own and leave it unguarded. How can a person protect what he does not know ? The most secure protection for our treasure is to know ourselves: each one must know himself as he is, and distinguish himself from all that is not he, that he may not unconsciously be protecting something else instead of himself.
Now anyone who has any regard for the life of this world or thinks that worldly honor is worth protecting, does not know how to distinguish himself from what he is not. No passing thing is strictly ours. For how can we have dominion over that which is passing and transitory? Spiritual and imma terial beings are always the same; whereas matter passes, con stantly changing in a kind of flux or movement. Hence it must follow that he who separates himself from what is stable will be carried along by that which is in flux. And in aban doning what is stable for that which is passing, he will lose both, for while he gives up the one, he is unable to keep up with the other.
This is the reason why the friends of the Bridegroom offer this counsel: If thou \nowest not thyself, O fairest among women, go forth and follow after the steps of the flocks and feed thy kids beside the tents of the shepherds (Cant. 1.7).
And what does this mean ? It is that he who does not know himself strays from the flock of sheep and pastures with the goats, that have been placed on the left. The Good Shepherd puts the sheep on his right hand (Matth. 25.33), and sepa rates the goats from this more perfect group and places them on his left. Thus we learn from the counsel offered by the friends of the Bridegroom that we must closely study the very nature of reality and aim at the truth with unfaltering steps.
FROM GLORY TO GLORY 161
But I must explain myself a little more clearly. A good many men do not draw their conclusions from the very na ture of reality, but merely consider the way men have lived before them; and so they fall completely short of an accurate judgment about reality, and they take, as their criterion of what is good, irrational custom instead of sober reason.
Hence they force their way into political office and power, they make a good deal of merely external show since they are unaware of the fact that all this will come to an end after this life. For custom is no sure guarantee for the future, for very often this may lead us to the goats and not to the flock of sheep.
My meaning will become clear if you will consider the words of the Gospel. If you consider that which is proper to man, that is, his reason, you will despise the force of custom as irrational, and you will never choose as good that which brings no advantage to the soul. We must not then seriously consider the footprints of those who have gone before us like so many cattle leaving their trace upon the world. For what is best to choose is not clear from sense phenomena— nor shall it be until we depart from this life; then we will know whom we have followed. The man then who merely follows in the tracks of those who have lived before, and takes the customs of this world as his guide in life, and does not distinguish good from evil on the basis of actual reality, very often makes a mistake, and in the day of that just Judgment he becomes a goat instead of a sheep.
This, then, is what we can understand those friends as say ing: Soul now fair, though once you were black, if you are anxious that the charm of your beauty endure forever, do not wander off in the footsteps of those who have preceded
j62 GREGORY OF NYSSA
you in this world. For this path that you see may be the path of the goats, which you are following because you cannot see those who have made the path with their footprints. And when you have passed out of this life and have slipped into the fold of death, beware that you may not be put into the flock of the goats, because you ignorantly followed their foot prints during life.
If thou \now not thyself, 0 fairest among women, go forth, and follow after the steps of the flocks, and feed thy kids beside the tents of the shepherds (Cant. 1.7). It will be easier to understand this text if you would consider another version, in which the structure of the sentence does not seem so dis connected:36 If thou \now not thyself, O fairest among women, thou hast gone forth and followed after the steps of the floc\s and dost feed thy bids before the tents of the shep herds. Now the meaning of this version exactly fits the inter pretation we have just proposed. The text then would be say ing: Beware lest this happen to you. For this is the safest way to protect the good things you enjoy: by realizing how much your Creator has honored you above all other creatures. He did not make the heavens in His image, nor the moon, the sun, the beauty of the stars, nor anything else which you can see in the created universe. You alone are made in the likeness of that nature which surpasses all understanding; you alone are a similitude of eternal beauty, a receptacle of happiness, an image of the true Light; and if you look up to Him, you will become what He is, imitating Him Who shines within you,
Whose glory is reflected in your purity. Nothing in all crea tion can equal your grandeur. All the heavens can fit into the palm of God's hand; the earth and the sea are measured in the hollow of His hand (Is. 40.12). And though He is so great that He can grasp all creation in His palm, you can
FROM GLORY TO GLORY 163
wholly embrace Him; He dwells within you, nor is He cramped as He pervades your entire being,3' saying: 1 will dwell in them, and wal\ among them (2 Cor. 6.16).
If you realize this you will not allow your eye to rest on anything of this world. Indeed, you will no longer marvel even at the heavens. For how can you admire the heavens, my son, when you see that you are more permanent than they ?
For the heavens pass away, but you will abide for all eternity with Him Who is forever. Do not admire, then, the vastness of the earth or the ocean that stretches out to infinity, for like a chariot and horses they have been given in your charge.
You have these elements in your power to be obedient to your will. For the earth ministers the necessities of life, and the sea offers its back like a tame steed to its rider.
If, then, thou \nowest thyself, O fairest among women, you will despise the entire universe, and with your eye upon that spiritual goal you will overlook the wandering footprints which you find in life. And so, be on your guard, and make no mistake about the flock of goats, and then you will not be marked out as a goat instead of a sheep on the day of Judg ment, or excluded from a place at the right hand of the throne. Rather, you will hear that sweet voice that speaks to all the humble and wool-bearing sheep: Come, ye blessed of my Father, possess you the \ingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world (Matth. 25.34).
29. The Odor of Spikenard (ibid., sermon 3, 824A-825C)38 There are many different perfumes, not all equally frag rant, from which a certain harmonious and artistic blend pro duces a very special kind of unguent called spikenard, taking
164 GREGORY OF NYSSA
its name from one of the fragrant herbs that are compounded in it. It is the result of many different perfumes coalescing into a single fragrance; and this is the sweet scent which the Bridegroom perceives with pure senses. In this text I think that the Word teaches us that by His very nature He transcends the entire order and structure of the created uni verse, that He is inaccessible, intangible, and incomprehen sible. But in His stead we have this perfume within us distilled from the perfection of our virtues; and this imitates in its purity His essential incorruptibility, in its goodness His goodness, in its immortality His immortality, in its stability
His immutability, and in all the virtues we possess we repre sent His true virtue, which as the prophet Habacuc says, covers all the heavens (Hab. 3.3).
And so when the bride says to the friends of the Bride groom, My spikenard sent forth the odor of him (Cant.
1.11), this is the profound lesson I think she is teaching us.
It is that even though one may gather from all the different meadows of virtue every perfume and every flower of frag rance, and should make his whole life fragrant with the good odor of all these virtuous actions, and become perfect in this way, even then he would not be able to look steadily upon the Word of God, no more than he could the sun. But he can look upon this Sun within himself as in a mirror. For the all perfect virtue of God sends forth rays of sinlessness to il luminate the lives of those who are pure; and these rays make the invisible visible, and allow us to comprehend the inac cessible by impressing an image of the Sun upon the mirror of our souls. Now as far as our interpretation goes, it is much the same thing to speak of the sun's rays, or the emanations of virtue, or the fragrance of perfume. For no matter which
FROM GLORY TO GLORY 165
of these analogies we use for the purpose of our discourse, the underlying idea is one and the same: that it is through our virtues that we derive a knowledge of the Good that surpasses all understanding, in the same way that we may infer the beauty of an archetype from its image.
So too Paul is a bride, who imitated the virtues of his Bride groom and took as a model for his life that eternal Beauty; he compounded his spikenard from the fruits of the spirit, from charity, joy, peace, and all the others (Gal. 5.22), saying he was the good odor of Christ (2 Cor. 2.15). He inhaled the fragrance of that inaccessible and transcendent grace, offering himself to others as a kind of incense for them to partake of according to their ability, and he became a fragrance which, according to each one's disposition, could bring them life or bring them death.
The same perfume will have different effects on the pigeon and the scarab: inhaling the fragrance makes the pigeon stronger, whereas the scarab dies. Similarly, that great sacri ficial incense of God, St. Paul, was in this respect like the dove; and Titus, Silvanus and Timothy all shared with Paul in the fragrance of the perfume, advancing in every sort of virtue with his example before them. But those like Demas,
Alexander, and Hermogenes39 could not stand the incense of continence, and like the scarab were banished by its fragrant smell. This was the reason why Paul, who was so fragrant with these perfumes, said: We are the good odor of Christ in them that are saved, and in them that perish (2
Cor. 2.15).
Now it is possible that there is a connection between the bride's spikenard and the spikenard mentioned in the Gos pels. If so, we may, if we wish, conclude from what we have
GREGORY OF NYSSA
said to the nature of that right spikenard, that was so precious (Mark 14.3; John 12.3), and filled the house with its odor when it was poured on the Lord's head. This perhaps was no different from the bride's spikenard which sent forth the odor of the Bridegroom; in the Gospel it is poured upon the Lord and fills the house, where the dinner was being held, with a sweet fragrance. Here I think that the woman, by a kind of divine inspiration, was foreshadowing in the spike nard the mystery of His death. And thus the Lord testifies to what she has done when He says: She is come beforehand to bury me (Mark 14.8; Matth. 26.12). And He teaches us that the house filled with the fragrance stands for the whole world, the entire universe, when He says: Wheresoever this gospel shall be preached in the whole world, the fragrance of her deed will be diffused with the preaching of the Gospel, and the Gospel, He says, will be a memory of her (Matth.
26.13).
Thus in the Canticle, the spikenard brings to the bride the sweet odor of her Bridegroom. In the Gospel, however, the perfume that fills the house becomes the good odor of Christ and the fragrance of the whole body of the Church, in all the world and in the entire universe. I think that in this way a connection may be discovered between the two passages, such that each would seem to be saying the same thing.
30. The Bundle of Myrrh (ibid., 825D-828B)40 It is said that vain women take great care over external ornaments so that those around them may take notice of them; and also that they use scent to make their persons more
FROM GLORY TO GLORY
attractive to their husbands. And so they will take a perfume that is suitable for this purpose and hide it in a fold of their dress, so that while it gives off its particular odor it may lend the body some of the fragrance of its perfume. Now against the background of this custom, what is the noble and courageous bride saying in the text? She is saying: I have a sachet which hangs down upon my breast, and with it I give my body a sweet fragrance. But it is not an ordinary perfume; the Lord Himself is the fragrant oil lying within the sachet of my conscience, dwelling within my heart.
Scholars tell us that the heart is situated in the center of the breast. Now here is where the bride tells us that she has her bundle of myrrh\ this is the spot where her treasure is stored. They also tell us that the heart is the source of all warmth, and that the heat from it is diffused through all the body by means of the arteries, and that in this way the parts of the body become warm and living, heated by the fire of the heart.41 The bride, then, receiving the sweet odor of Christ in the highest part of her soul, makes her heart a sachet, as it were, of this incense; she thus makes every single action of her life, like so many parts of the body, burn fer vently with the breath that issues from her heart, so that the love of God may never be chilled in any part of her by dis obedience.
31. The Birth of the Word (ibid., 828B-829C) A cluster of cypress my love is to me, says the bride, in the vineyards of Engaddi (Cant. 1.13). Is this not a blessed gift, indeed a gift surpassing all happiness, that one can see the
GREGORY OF NYSSA
very Master of the vineyard by looking at the fruit upon his own cluster? See how much the bride has grown: she has seen the sweet odor of the Bridegroom in her own perfume, and her fragrance has become sweet because of Him; she en compasses this perfume in the sachet of her heart, that her treasure might stay constantly with her and never be dissi pated; she now becomes the mother of the divine cluster of grapes that bloomed, that is, flourished42 before the Passion, and during the Passion poured out its wine. For after the divine drama of the Passion the wine that cheers the heart
(Ps. 103.15) is rightly called the blood of the grape.
A cluster of grapes gives us pleasure in two ways. First of all by its blossom, which charms the senses with its fragrance; and secondly by its fruit, which we can pluck when it is ripe and eat to our heart's content, or when it is made into wine, enjoy it at a banquet. Now in our text (Cant. 1.13), the bride asks the flowering cluster to bear fruit, calling the vineblossom cypress.43
Now Jesus, who is born as a child for us, advances in wis dom and age and grace (Luke 2.52) in different ways in the hearts of those who receive Him. He is not the same in every one, but only according to the measure of those in Whom He dwells, adapting Himself to the capacity of each one who receives Him: to some He comes as a Babe, to others as one advancing, to others in full maturity, according to the nature of the cluster. And hence He is never seen on the vine in the same form, but He changes His appearance with the course of time, now budding, now in full bloom, now mature, now fully ripe. Thus the vine with its fruit holds up expectations; though not ripe enough for wine and still awaiting maturity, it is not completely devoid of pleasure and delight. It charms
FROM GLORY TO GLORY 169
the smell rather than the taste with expectations for the fu ture; it gives pleasure to the senses of our soul by its fragrance of hope. For a firm and unshakable faith in a favor we hope for becomes a present joy to those who look forward to their future expectations with patience.
And so the cluster of cypress is a cluster that gives promise of wine. Though not yet made into wine, it offers by its blos som a guarantee of future grace; for the blossom is hope. The addition of the name Engaddi suggests a fertile spot, where the vine can strike root and put forth fine, sweet fruit. Stu dents of geography tell us that the land of Engaddi is most suitable for the cultivation of the vine. Hence the man whose will is in harmony with God's law, meditating on it all night and day (Ps. 1.2), becomes as a flourishing tree fed by streams of water (Ps. 1.3), rendering fruit in due season (Matth.
21.41). For this reason the Bridegroom's vine is planted in Engaddi, in a fertile place, that is, in the depths of the soul.
And watered and matured by the divine doctrine, it has brought forth that flowering, blossoming cluster, in which the soul can see its husbandman and vine-dresser.
It is a blessed viticulture whose fruit takes on the beauty of the Bridegroom! For He is true light (John 1.9), true life
(John 14.6) and true justice, as the book of Wisdom tells us, and all the rest. And hence whenever a man by a good life takes on His qualities, if he looks at the cluster of his own conscience, he will see the Bridegroom in it, sending forth a blossom which is the light of truth from His own luminous and incorruptible life. Thus the flourishing vine says: Mine is the cluster that blossoms with flowers. He indeed is the true grape cluster Who showed Himself to us on a wooden
I7o GREGORY OF NYSSA
cross, Whose Blood is a draught of salvation to those that drink it with joy.
32. The Mirror of the Soul (ibid., sermon 4, 832D-833C)44 Man's nature adapts itself to the direction of reason, and it is susceptible of whatever form it is inclined to by the move ment of free will. Under the passion of anger, it becomes angry; when overwhelmed by concupiscence, it is dissolved in pleasure. And so whatever inclination there may be towards cowardice or fear or any of the other passions, our human nature similarly receives the forms of each of them.
Contrariwise, if it takes unto itself the virtue of fortitude, purity, peace, resistance to anger or grief? courage, imper turbability, and the like, lulling itself into a state of tran quility it impresses the form of each of these virtues upon the structure of the soul.
Now virtue and vice are directly opposed; hence they cannot both be present together at the same time. If one re jects temperance, he must necessarily fall into a life of in continence; one who despises impurity, by his very with drawal from sin establishes himself in chastity. And so it is with all the other virtues. The humble man has put off arrogance; the vain and pompous man has rejected humility.
Thus we need not discuss each instance in detail. For it is clear that with things that are essentially contradictory the absence of the one implies the establishment in existence of the other. It is thus of the very nature of our free will to be able to take on the form of whatever it desires. And so rightly does the Word say to the soul that has been made beautiful
FROM GLORY TO GLORY
(Cant. 1.14): You have drawn nearer to me by your rejection of any contact with sin. By coming closer to the inaccessible
Beauty you have yourself become beautiful, and like a mirror, as it were, you have taken on my appearance.
Indeed, human nature is very much like a mirror in its ability to change in accordance with the different impres sions of its free will. When you put gold in front of a mirror, the mirror takes on the appearance of the gold and because of the reflection it shines with the same gleam as the real sub stance. So too, if it catches the reflection of something loath some, it imitates this ugliness by means of a likeness, as for example of a frog, a toad, a millepede, or anything else that is disgusting to look at, thus reproducing in its own substance whatever is placed in front of it.
So it is that the soul that has been purified by the Word and has put off all sin, receives within itself the circular form of the Sun and shines now with this reflected light. Hence the Word says to her: You have become fair because you have come near to my light, and by this closeness to me you have attracted this participation in beauty.
33. The Eyes of the Dove (ibid., 833C-836C) Thy eyes, He says, are as those of doves (Cant. 1.14).
Earlier when the bride was compared with a steed, she was praised for her cheeks and her neck (Cant. 1.8-9). Now, when her beauty appears in its own right, she is praised for the charm of her eyes; and the praise consists in saying that they are the eyes of a dove. This, I think, suggests the follow ing meaning. When the pupils of one's eyes are clear you can
IJ2
GREGORY OF NYSSA
see in them the faces of those who look into them. Now those who are expert in the study of natural phenomena say that, in seeing, the eye functions by receiving the impression of certain images which flow from the visible object. Thus the beauty of the bride's eyes is praised because of the image of the Dove which appears in her pupils. For we receive within ourselves a likeness of whatever we look upon. Now the man who no longer looks toward flesh and blood, gazes rather on the life of the spirit; as the Apostle says (Gal. 5.16), he lives and walks in the spirit, and by killing the deeds of the flesh by means of the spirit, he becomes neither natural nor carnal but wholly spiritual.
This is the reason why the Bridegroom praises the soul that has been freed of all carnal passion by saying that the image of the Dove is in its eyes; for this means that the im pression of the spiritual life shines within the clarity of the soul. And when the purified eye of the soul has received the impression of the Dove, it turns to contemplate the Bride groom's beauty. So too in our text the maiden first gazes at the Bridegroom's beauy when she has the Dove in her eyes.
For no man can say the Lord Jesus, but by the Holy Ghost (1 Cor. 12.3). And she says: Behold thou art fair, my beloved, and comely (Cant. 1.15). Indeed, ever since I have felt that nothing else was beautiful, ever since I turned away from everything I used to think good, my judgment of the beautiful has never gone so astray as to think that anything could be beautiful alongside of Thee, whether it be the praise of men, reputation, reknown, worldly power. For those who look only to the senses these things have indeed a surface appear ance of beauty; but they are not what they seem. For how can a thing be beautiful if it is not completely stable? The