VI
Cei care cercetează unele ca acestea să răspundă la urmatoarele intrebări: De unde vin bolile? De unde beteşugurile trupului? Că nu se poate spune ca boala este necreată, dar nici că este creaţie a lui Dumnezeu. Nu! Fiinţele au fost create cu o structura naturală potrivit firii lor si au fost aduse la viata avand desavarsite toate madularele; se imbolnavesc atunci cand isi pierd starea naturala de vietuire; isi pierd sanatatea sau printr-o vietuire rea, sau dintr-o pricina oarecare ce aduce imbolnavirea trupului. Deci Dumnezeu a facut trupul, nu boala; a facut sufletul, nu pacatul; sufletul se inraieste cand se indeparteaza de starea lui naturala!
– Dar in ce consta pentru suflet binele pe care il avea inainte de a se inrai?
– In aceea ca era aproape de Dumnezeu si unit cu El prin dragoste. Dupa ce sufletul a cazut din aceasta stare, a fost stricat de fel de fel de boli.
– Dar, pe scurt, pentru ce sufletul primeste raul?
– Pentru ca este inzestrat cu vointa libera, unul din titlurile de glorie ale fiintelor inzestrate cu ratiune. Slobod de orice constrangere si creat de Creator cu vointa libera – pentru ca a fost facut dupa chipul lui Dumnezeu -, sufletul concepe binele, cunoaste desfatarea ce vine din savarsirea binelui; are capacitatea si puterea de a-si pastra starea sa naturala, daca staruie in contemplarea binelui si in desfatarea bunatatilor spirituale; dar are si capacitatea de a se indeparta uneori de bine; aceasta i se intampla cand, saturat de desfatarile cele duhovnicesti, ca ingreunat de somn si alunecat de la cele de Sus, se amesteca cu trupul, spre a se desfata cu placeri rusinoase.
VII
Odinioara Adam era sus nu in ce priveste locul, ci prin libertatea vointei sale; cand, indata ce i s-a dat viata, si-a aruncat privirile spre cer, s-a bucurat de cele vazute si a iubit nespus de mult pe Binefacatorul sau, Care-i daruise desfatarea vietii vesnice, il asezase in desfatarea paradisului, ii daduse aceeasi stapanire pe care o aveau ingerii, il facuse sa aiba acelasi fel de vietuire cu arhanghelii si sa auda glas dumnezeiesc. Pe langa toate acestea, era sub paza lui Dumnezeu si se desfata cu bunatatile Lui.
Dar iute s-a saturat de toate aceste bunatati; si, ocărând oarecum saţiul, a preferat frumusetii spirituale ceea ce parea placut ochilor trupului si a pretuit mai mult saturarea pantecelui decat desfatarile cele duhovnicesti. De aceea, a fost izgonit indata din rai, a pierdut acea vietuire fericita si a ajuns rau nu din constrangere, ci din nesocotinta.
A pacatuit pentru ca a intrebuintat rau vointa sa libera si a murit din pricina pacatului, “ca plata pacatului este moartea”. Cu cat se departa de viata, pe atat se apropia de moarte. Ca Dumnezeu este viata, iar lipsa vietii, moarte. Deci, Adam, prin departarea sa de Dumnezeu, si-a pricinuit moartea, potrivit celor scrise: “Iata, vor pieri cei care se departeaza de Tine” Astfel, nu Dumnezeu a creat moartea, ci noi, prin vointa noastra rea, am atras-o asupra noastra. Pentru pricinile de mai sus, Dumnezeu a ingaduit desfacerea trupului, ca sa nu se pastreze pentru noi nemuritoare boala, intocmai ca un olar care nu vrea sa bage in foc un vas de lut stricat, inainte de a indrepta, prin refacerea lui, stricaciunea pe care o are.
– Dar pentru ce n-am fost creati, as putea fi intrebat, cu capacitatea de a nu mai pacatui, incat sa nu mai putem pacatui chiar daca am voi?
– Dar si tu socotesti bune slugile tale, cand le vezi ca isi indeplinesc indatoririle lor de buna voie, nu cand le ai sub lanturi! Asadar, si lui Dumnezeu nu-I este draga fapta savarsita prin constrangere, ci aceea savarsita prin virtute; iar virtutea se indeplineste prin libera alegere, si nu prin constrangere; iar alegerea depinde de noi, si ceea ce depinde de noi este tocmai liberul arbitru. Asadar cel care huleste pe Creator, ca nu ne-a facut infailibili prin fire, nu face altceva decat sa prefere firii rationale pe cea irationala, firii libere si active pe cea imobila si lipsita de initiativa.
Am facut o digresiune de la subiect, dar era necesara pentru ca nu cumva, cazand in adanc de ganduri, sa simti si lipsa lui Dumnezeu pe langa lipsa dorurilor tale. Sa incetam, dar, a corija pe Cel intelept. Sa incetam a cauta ceva mai bun decat ceea ce a facut El. Chiar daca scapa puterii noastre de patrundere pricinile randuielilor marunte ale lui Dumnezeu cu privire la viata noastra, totusi sa fie nestramutata in sufletele noastre invatatura ca de la Cel bun nu vine nimic rau.
( OMILII SI CUVÂNTĂRI, Omilia a IX-a – Că Dumnezeu nu este autorul relelor, Editura Institutului Biblic , 2004)
“In the beginning God created”–It is He, beneficent Nature, Goodness without measure, a worthy object of love for all beings endowed with reason, the beauty the most to be desired, the origin of all that exists, the source of life, intellectual light, impenetrable wisdom, it is He who “in the beginning created heaven and earth.”
3. Do not then imagine, O man! that the visible world is without a beginning; and because the celestial bodies move in a circular course, and it is difficult for our senses to define the point where the circle begins, do not believe that bodies impelled by a circular movement are, from their nature, without a beginning. Without doubt the circle (I mean the plane figure described by a single line) is beyond our perception, and it is impossible for us to find out where it begins or where it ends; but we ought not on this account to believe it to be without a beginning. Although we are not sensible of it, it really begins at some point where the draughtsman has begun to draw it at a certain radius from the centre.(1) Thus seeing that figures which move in a circle always return upon themselves, without for a single instant interrupting the regularity of their course, do not vainly imagine to yourselves that the world has neither beginning nor end. “For the fashion of this world passeth away”(2) and “Heaven and earth shall pass away.”(3) The dogmas of the end, and of the renewing of the world, are announced beforehand in these short words put at the head of the inspired history. “In the beginning God made.” That which was begun in time is condemned to come to an end in time. If there has been a beginning do not doubt of the end.(4) Of what use men are geometry–the calculations of arithmetic–the study of solids and far-famed astronomy, this laborious vanity, if those who pursue them imagine that this visible world is co-eternal with the Creator of all things, with God Himself; if they attribute to this limited world, which has a material body, the same glory as to the incomprehensible and invisible nature; if they cannot conceive that a whole, of which the parts are subject to corruption and change, must of necessity end by itself submitting to the fate of its parts? But they have become “vain in their imaginations and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools.”(1) Some have affirmed that heaven co-exists with God from all eternity;(2) others that it is God Himself without beginning or end, and the cause of the particular arrangement of all things.(3)
4. One day, doubtless, their terrible condemnation will be the greater for all this worldly wisdom, since, seeing so clearly into yam sciences, they have wilfully shut their eyes to the knowledge of the truth. These men who measure the distances of the stare and describe them, both those of the North, always shining brilliantly in our view, and those of the southern pole visible to the inhabitants of the South, but unknown to us; who divide the Northern zone and the circle of the Zodiac into an infinity of parts, who observe with exactitude the course of the stars, their fixed places, their declensions, their return and the time that each takes to make its revolution; these men, I say, have discovered all except one tiring: the fact that God is the Creator of the universe, and the just Judge who rewards all the actions of life according to their merit. They have not known how to raise themselves to the idea of the consummation of all things, the consequence of the doctrine of judgment, and to see that the world must change if souls pass from this life to a new life. In reality, as the nature of the present life presents an affinity to this world, so in the future life our souls will enjoy a lot conformable to their new condition. But they are so far from applying these truths, that they do but laugh when we announce to them the end of all things and the regeneration of the age. Since the beginning naturally precedes that which is derived from it, the writer, of necessity, when speaking to us of things which had their origin in time, puts at the head of his narrative these words–“In the beginning God created.”
(Nine Homilies of Hexaemeron, Excerpt from Homily I )