ACC ~ Hebrews 12 v2

THE SAVIOR’S JOY IS THE SALVATION OF HUMAN BEINGS. THEODORET OF CYR: He could have avoided suffering, he is saying, had he so chosen; but he put up with the suffering for the benefit of all. The Savior’s joy is the salvation of human beings; for it he endured the suffering, and after the suffering he is seated with the Father who begot him. INTERPRETATION OF HEBREWS 12.

HE IS ABLE TO REWARD YOU. OECUMENIUS: “For the joy that was set before him” can be understood also as Gregory says: although it was possible for him to remain in his own personal glory and divinity, he not only humbled himself to the very point of the form of a slave, but he also endured the cross and despised its shame.

Therefore he says that he is able to reward you for all your afflictions for his sake. For not only was he crucified, but also he sat down at “the right hand of God,”the right hand and the throne giving him the same honor. FRAGMENTS ON THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS 12.2.

LEARN TO RUN WELL. CHRYSOSTOM: As in all arts and games, we impress the art upon our mind by looking to our masters, receiving certain rules through our sight, so here also, if we wish to run and to learn to run well, let us look to Christ, even to Jesus, “the author and finisher of our faith.” What is this? He has put the faith within us. For he said to his disciples, “You did not choose me, but I chose you”; and Paul too says, “But then shall I understand, even as I have been fully understood.” He put the beginning into us; he will also put on the end. ON THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS 28.4.

AN ARENA OF STRUGGLE AND ENDURANCE. JEROME: God has entered us as contestants in a racecourse where it is our lot to be always striving. This place, then, a valley of tears, is not a condition of peace, not a state of security, but an arena of struggle and of endurance. HOMILIES ON THE PSALMS 16 (PSALM 83).

ALL THINGS ARE TWOFOLD IN OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. CYRIL OF JERUSALEM: We preach not one coming of Christ but a second as well, far more glorious than the first. The first gave us a spectacle of his patience; the second will bring with it the crown of the kingdom of God. In general all things are twofold in our Lord Jesus Christ. His birth is twofold, one of God before the ages and one of a virgin in the consummation of the ages. His descent is twofold, one lowly, “like the rain upon the fleece,” and a second, his manifest coming, which is yet to be. In his first coming he was wrapped in swaddling clothes in the manger; in his second he will be “robed in light as with a cloak.” In his first coming he “endured the cross, despising the shame”; in his second he will come in glory, attended by a host of angels. We do not rest, therefore, in his first coming, but we look also for his second. Just as we said of his first coming, “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord,”so we shall repeat the same at his second. CATECHETICAL LECTURES 15.1.

GIVEN FAITH BY THE ONE WHO MADE CHRIST. AUGUSTINE: Our being born again by water and the Spirit is not a recompense for any merit but is freely given. And if faith has led us to the bath of regeneration, we ought not for that reason to think that we have first given something, so that our saving regeneration might be given us in return. For that one has made us believe in Christ who made for us the Christ in whom we believe. That one made in humans the beginning and the completion of their faith in Jesus who made the human Jesus “the author and finisher of the faith,” for this is what he is called, as you know, in the Epistle to the Hebrews. PREDESTINATION OF THE SAINTS 31.

HE FINISHED IT THROUGH THE CROSS. EPHREM THE SYRIAN: Let us look not toward human beings for the perfection of our faith. In fact, among them one is good for something, but the other is not. Rather let us look into “Jesus Christ, the pioneer of faith,” who was made our leader and “the perfecter” of our faith, because he began from the Jordan the fight against the enemy, then continued it in the desert, and finished it in Jerusalem through the cross, which was erected by the persecutors on Golgotha. COMMENTARY ON THE EPISTLE TO THE HE-BREWS.

UNDER NO NECESSITY OF BEING CRUCIFIED. CHRYSOSTOM: “Who,” he says, “for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame.” That is, it was in his power not to suffer at all, if he so willed. For “he committed no sin; no guile was found on his lips”;as he also says in the Gospels, “the ruler of this world is coming, and he has no power over me.” It lay then in his power, if so he willed, not to come to the cross. For “I have power,” he says, “to lay down my life; and I have power to take it again.” If then he who was under no necessity of being crucified was crucified for our sake, how much more is it right that we should endure all things nobly! “Who for the joy that was set before him,” he says, “endured the cross, despising the shame.” But what is “despising the shame”? He chose, he means, that ignominious death. For suppose that he died. Some wonder why he should die so ignominiously. For no other reason than to teach us to make no account of glory from the human sphere. Therefore, though under no obligation, he chose death, teaching us to be bold against it and to make it as nothing. Why did the apostle say not “pain” but “shame”? Because it was not with pain that he bore these things. ON THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS 28.4.

THE FLAME OF HIS LIFE. GREGORY OF NYSSA: A fire that lies in wood hidden below the surface is often unobserved by the senses of those who see or even touch it but is manifest when it blazes up. So too, at his death (which he brought about at his will, who separated his soul from his body; who said to his own Father, “Into your hands I commit my spirit”;who, as he says, “had power to lay it down and had power to take it again”) he—who, because he is the lord of glory, despised that which is shame among men—having concealed, as it were, the flame of his life in his bodily nature, by the dispensation of his death, kindled and inflamed it once more by the power of his own Godhead, fostering into life that which had been brought to death. Having infused with the infinity of his divine power that humble firstfruits of our nature, he made it also to be that which he himself was—making the servile form to be Lord, and the human born of Mary to be Christ, and him who was crucified through weakness to be life and power, and making all that is piously conceived to be in God the Word to be also in that which the Word assumed. Thus these attributes no longer seem to be in either nature by way of division, but the perishable nature, being, by its commixture with the divine, made anew in conformity with the nature that overwhelms it, participates in the power of the Godhead, as if one were to say that mixture makes a drop of vinegar mingled in the deep to be sea, by reason that the natural quality of this liquid does not continue in the infinity of that which overwhelms it. This is our doctrine. AGAINST EUNOMIUS 5.5.

WHAT IS SUPERFLUOUS, DO WITHOUT. CHRYSOSTOM: Why do I trifle in saying these things to people who do not even choose to disregard riches but hold fast to them as though they were immortal, and, if they give a little out of much, think they have done all? This is not almsgiving, for almsgiving is that of the widow, who emptied out “her whole living.” But if you do not go on to contribute so much as the widow, at least contribute the whole of your superfluity. Keep what is sufficient, not what is superfluous. But there are none who contribute even their superabundance. For so long as you have many servants and garments of silk, these things are all superfluities. Nothing is indispensable or necessary, without which we are able to live. These things are superfluous and are simply superadded. Let us then see, if you please, what we cannot live without. If we have only two servants, we can live. For, whereas some live without servants, what excuse have we, if we are not content with two? We can also have a house built of brick of three rooms, and this is sufficient for us. For are there not some with children and wife who have but one room? Let there be also, if you will, two serving boys.

And how is it not a shame, you say, that a gentlewoman should walk out with only two servants? It is no shame that a gentlewoman should walk along with two servants, but it is a shame that she should go forth with many. Perhaps you laugh when you hear this. Believe me, it is a shame. Do you think it a great matter to go out with many servants, like dealers in sheep or dealers in slaves? This is pride and vainglory; the other is love of wisdom and respectability. For a gentlewoman ought not to be known from the multitude of her attendants. For what virtue is it to have many servants? This belongs not to the soul, and whatever is not of the soul does not show gentility. When she is content with a few things, then is she a gentlewoman indeed; but when she needs many, she is a servant and inferior to slaves.

Tell me, do not the angels go to and fro about the world alone and need not anyone to follow them? Are they then on this account inferior to us? Are they who need no attendants inferior to us, who need them? If, then, not needing an attendant at all is angelic, who comes nearer to the angelic life—she who needs many, or she who needs few? Is not this a shame? For a shame it is to do anything out of place. ON THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS 28.9-10.

CONSPICUOUS CONSUMPTION. CHRYSOSTOM: Tell me, who attracts the attention of those who are in the public places, she who brings many in her train or she who brings but few? And is not she who is alone less conspicuous even than she who is attended by few? Do you see that this is a shame? Who attracts the attention of those in the public places, she who wears beautiful garments or she who is dressed simply and artlessly? Again, who attracts those in the public places, she who is borne on mules and with trappings ornamented with gold, or she who walks out simply and, as it may be, with propriety? Perhaps we do not even look at this latter, if we even see her; but the multitudes not only force their way to see the other but ask, “Who is she, and where from?” And I do not say what great envy is hereby produced. Tell me, then, is it disgraceful to be looked at or not to be looked at? When is the shame greater, when all stare at her, or when no one does? When they inform themselves about her, or when they do not even care? Do you see that we do everything, not for modesty’s sake, but for vainglory?

However, since it is impossible to draw you away from that, I am content for the present that you should learn that this is no disgrace. Sin alone is a disgrace, which no one thinks to be a disgrace, but everything rather than this. . . .

But my discourse is not addressed to women only but also to men. For the rest of the things that we have are all superfluous; only the poor possess no superfluities, and perhaps they from necessity, since, if it had been in their power, even they would not have abstained from them. Nevertheless, “whether in pretense or in truth,” so far they have no superfluities. ON THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS 28.10-11.

Heb