Isaac of Stella, Sermons

the sermon of the day before yesterday had not slipped from your memory, this present little question could by no means have troubled you. For He wills a great many things which, nevertheless, He does not will to give except through prayer. But nothing that He does not will to be done can in any way at all be obtained. And yet we do not always ask foolishly or impiously for what He does not will; nor always piously or wisely for what He wills. But you ought to remember that we spoke of these things at length above. Nevertheless, since we often do not know His will, we ought always to pray for that which we see to accord more with piety. Yet not absolutely, but as we have the pattern of Wisdom Himself, Who says to the Father: If it is possible, or, if Thou wilt, let this chalice pass from Me (ibid.), and likewise saying everywhere: Abba, Father, not what I will, but what Thou wilt (Mark 14:36). For if one who knows that God wills something wills that He afterwards not will the same, how will it be pious? Nay rather, to will that God, wholly unchangeable, change in order to fulfil our will, how will it be pious? Nay rather, to will that God, wholly unchangeable, change in order to fulfil our will, how will it not be sacrilegious? I want no such God at all, Whom my desire might change from the truth of His word, but One Whose effect might change my [desire] from the vanity of my word; not One Who for my sake begins to will what until now He did not will, but One Who for His own sake makes me will what He has always willed. My Teacher and Lord Jesus Christ, true God, true priest, true sacrifice, Who made Himself a victim and offering for us to Himself and to the Father and to the Holy Spirit, prayed to the Father for nothing but what the Father willed, and for those for whom the Father Himself willed, saying: Holy Father, keep those whom Thou hast given Me out of the world (John 17:11, 6). These are they, beloved, for whom, standing still before the Father's face, He intercedes, having an everlasting priesthood, He Who is not prevented by death from continuing, offering an everlasting sacrifice. For He has not changed His voice or His will, so as to have asked for some here and to intercede for others there. To Him, as to the high priest, the choir of the saints there, filling as it were the place of the unlearned, answers over this prayer: Amen, feeling or willing nothing contrary to Him or different from Him; for there neither does ignorance darken them nor does desire confound them. For as in His holy light the saints truly see what they ought to will, so in His power they are strongly able to do what they see they ought. Agreeing with them, dearest brethren, according to our littleness, let us love everything that God does, let us will what He wills because He wills it, keeping back nothing of our heart for ourselves, and to all things let us answer Amen and Thanks be to God to God, the doer and ruler of all: to Whom be honour and power in all things, and above all things, for ever and beyond. Amen.

SERMON XXXVII. ON THE SAME FEAST V.

It is not good to take the children's bread and give it to the dogs (Matt. 15:26). Today, beloved, with God helping us, we have been diligent. For something of the hour still remains, and behold, we have already fully discharged the task of the day's labour. Hence, to what in yesterday's sermon [was] less

we discharged, it is now worth our while to gird ourselves. As, then, we touched on in passing, in sacred speech men are called sons in one way according to the truth of predestination, and in another according to the quality of their life. In another way also the divine judgement upon the sons of men is often according to the purpose of His own counsel, in another according to the merit of human working. For according to the work of righteousness, or the righteousness of the work, from evil a man becomes good, and from good evil; from a son a dog, and from a dog a son. For the Hebrews, on account of the giving of the law and the covenant, and the promises of God to them, and also the common sacraments and obedience to the commandments, were once called sons: on the contrary, without these, all the Gentiles were dogs. But when those of them who were sons estranged from predestination lied to God, returned to oldness, and limped away from the paths of their fathers, who were sons by [God's] purpose, then, just as the kingdom of God was taken from them and transferred to the Gentiles, so too was the name. Hence it is accordingly sung: O God, Who givest me vengeance, and subduest peoples under me. Therefore will I confess to Thee among the nations, O Lord (Ps. 17:48, 50). As, then, those who were formerly dogs are now sons, so those who were sons before were afterwards called dogs. Many dogs, he says, have encompassed me, etc. (Ps. 21:17). And not only dogs, but also serpents, as it is written: They have sharpened their tongues like serpents (Ps. 139:4). Nay more, to crown their ignominy, those once called sons of God hear from the true, natural and only Son of God, Who alone knows the Father and all His brethren by name: You are of your father the devil (John 8:44). Since, however, there is a time for everything under the sun, and from that point, as it were, where all things are at once, the line of the universe is drawn out in a lawful course of order, so that things flow not all at once and confusedly but each in its own order, it is not good that even what is to be done should be done, except when and as it ought to be done. Hence Moses, concerning the Amorrhites, who were to be driven out as their faults demanded but had not yet reached their due fullness, says: The sins of the Amorrhites are not yet complete (Gen. 15:16). For this reason they could not yet be driven out so that the sons of Israel might be brought in. But neither ought the Hebrews to wait in Egypt, when the sins of the Egyptians were already ripe for vengeance. Hence they wandered in the desert for forty years. Like this is also what the Apostle says of certain men: To fill up their sins always (1 Thess. 2:16). And that other: He who is in filth, let him be filthy still (Rev. 22:11); and on the contrary: He who is just, let him be justified still (ibid.).

Nothing, then, happens rashly, nothing by chance, nothing confusedly, nothing without reason, nothing without cause, in the variety of all things, so far as it touches the governance of the Ruler on high. The bread was indeed to be taken from a perverse generation and from faithless sons, and given to the dogs who went round about the city; but it was not yet good, because it was not yet to be done. The slayers of the prophets had not yet slain the Lord of the prophets; the members, dead beforehand, had not yet cut off the head from themselves, so that life and sense should flee from them altogether; not yet had the Spirit, fleeing from them, filled the centurion,

so that he cried out openly: Truly this man was the Son of God (Matt. 27:54). It was not yet time, then, for them to hear: To you the kingdom of God had to be preached first, but since you have judged yourselves unworthy of eternal life, behold, we turn to the Gentiles (Acts 13:46). Before, there were threats; from then on, their fulfilment. Therefore it was not good before, because afterwards, in its own time, it was good, namely to take the children's bread and give it to the dogs. This perhaps the woman, enlightened inwardly by the Spirit, knew: namely that through Christ, to Whom she was speaking, the sonship of the Jews was to be transferred to the Gentiles. Hence, impatient through the devotion of faith and desire for the thing, she presses on, and reveals the mystery before its time, saying: Yes, Lord; for even the whelps eat of the crumbs that fall from their masters' table. Hence it is that she hears: O woman, great is your faith; which, leavened by desire and outgrowing her narrow breast, does not in the least keep itself within the cloister of its secret. Hence Isaiah, surpassing the womanly breast in manly restraint, cries: My secret to myself, my secret to myself (Isa. 24:16). And indeed, in keeping with the truth of the story, she uses a fitting parable when she says: For even the whelps eat of the crumbs that fall from their masters' table. For while Christ broke the bread of the Scriptures to the sons by teaching and by working cures, even before the passion some crumbs of His benefits fell down to the dogs; and, not to seek an example far off, to this very Canaanite woman whom we are turning over on the lip of our tongue, and to her daughter. For to her it is said: Be it done as you have asked, because, that is, great is your faith, by which you asked. For he who can believe all things can obtain all things: For all things are possible to him who believes (Mark 9:22). We fail to obtain more often for this reason, because we hesitate in asking. For to a faith great enough nothing is too great. Compared, indeed, to a grain of mustard seed, it moves even mountains. Faith, however, as occurs to me at present, is called great in four ways, namely in knowledge, or in confidence, or in devotion, or in constancy. The first is that which, with the face of the mind enlightened, is great, and able to give an account to everyone who asks concerning the hope that is in us, and to destroy every height that exalts itself against the knowledge of Christ.

This shone forth most excellently in the blessed apostle Paul, who also speaks of it thus: If I have all knowledge, and know all mysteries, etc. (1 Cor. 13:2). The second is great and powerful not only in word and knowledge but also in power, according to which signs and wonders are easily done. Of this too the same Apostle speaks thus: If I have all faith, so that I move mountains (ibid.). Of this also elsewhere: To another is given faith in the same spirit (1 Cor. 12:9). And James: Hesitating in nothing, he says, in faith (Jas. 1:6). The third is great and powerful for compunction and tears, for disgust with this whole world, and for desire of the face of God. Sighing according to this, the Prophet says: When shall I come and appear before the face of God! My tears have been my bread day and night (Ps. 41:3–4). And elsewhere: My heart has said to Thee: My face has sought Thee;

my face, Lord, will I seek (Ps. 26:8). This is the faith which, in the silence of monks, speaks to the Lord with a sweet whisper, mouth to mouth, as a man to his neighbour. Hence their mouth is holy and their lips clean, because of the word of the Lord with which they are constantly occupied. Out of desire for that cleanness, withdrawing from the midst of peoples who have unclean lips, they have fled all the delights of this world, and remain clean in solitude. The fourth is able, and great, to conquer bravely and steadfastly the world, whether it rages or flatters. Of this blessed John says: This is the victory that conquers the world, our faith (1 John 5:4). The first conquers the world by reasoning, the second by doing wonders, the third by fleeing, the fourth by warring it down. Nevertheless, according to which kind this woman's faith was called great, He knows Who formed within what He praised without. We, however, believe, because He has spoken Who can neither be deceived nor deceive. But if we wish to recall the discourse upward to higher things, so that by the sons are understood the holy angels and the spirits of the just, who, admitted to the table of the Word of God, feast in the voice of exultation and praise in the sight of God, and delight in gladness, already drunk with the plenty of His house, before whose doors we still keep watch, begging and waiting: I shall simply tell, briefly and in ordinary speech, what picture I am sometimes wont to form of it for myself, when let down from higher contemplation to an imaginative devotion. Suppose, then, that my Lord Jesus Christ, like a householder in his house with the doors shut, feasts with his friends and servants, and exults in plenty and security, as it is said: Do not trouble me: behold, I and my children are with me in bed (Luke 11:7).

But we who are still in exile from the Lord keep watch here and there, as at the doors of rich men feasting, as is the custom, a poor and lowly crowd, sick and hungry; we call on the Lord and the Lady by name, and if we know any of the guests, we appeal to them; we recount the cold and hunger we suffer, to move them to pity; nor do we in the least keep silent about our several afflictions, as we variously suffer them, namely blindness, lameness, withering, contraction, paralysis, or leprosy, or a thousand others; we also urge one another on to cry out more strongly; often overcome by impatience, we charge those within with deafness; while they are at their ease, we accuse them of being careless of others; we reproach them as not caring for the needs of the poor, or not knowing them, as inexperienced, or forgetful. Why say more? Those who have peace within bear with much patience the impatience of the sufferers, until the lawful time and hour comes for the leftovers to be distributed, or for some to be let in to the full meal. So it is the custom of certain rich men to do daily, unless perhaps the householder, wearied by the insolence of someone too importunate, and not because he is his friend, sends him something specially; as it is written: He will rise and give him as many as he needs

(Luke 11:8). But neither do I keep silent about this: that while the poor wait outside, begging and keeping watch, often some, so as to sit more softly, or more honourably, or more warmly, move away from the entrance; nay, sometimes over worthless litter, or any rubbish whatever, or straw, or the like, to put under their bare feet, they quarrel fiercely and harshly, and strike one another impiously with the fist, so that the clamour goes up to the ears of the householder and of those reclining at table with him, and stirs anger along with the beggars, or brings shame, or perhaps contempt. What else, I ask, is the strife, rivalry and provocation of religious today, especially of monks, over lands, over woods, over pastures, over cattle: for whom neither can the lands suffice for the men, nor the men for the lands, nor the pastures for the cattle, nor the cattle for the pastures? Indeed these things are in My ears, says the Lord of hosts. For whoever does not know that the name and repute of religion have become cheap in the eyes of men because of these things knows nothing.

Moreover, it is to be feared that, when the Lord comes to distribute something meanwhile to some, and to bring others in once for all, these may be far away at their quarrels and lawsuits, or may be present, more dangerously, after their quarrels and lawsuits, appearing for punishment rather than for refreshment. For when they say that in such matters they are pleading God's cause, and for the love of God, against every counsel of God, harassing a brother over a straw, this is as frivolous as it is foreign to the profession of perfection. For they are going to law for themselves, and are pleading their own causes, even if they do not know it. For what belongs to all belongs to God. Will it not be God's, and His Church's, if you yield it to him, who is a religious as you are, just as much as if you wrest from him that for which you are contending with him? Is it of such account with God to take from one church or monastery what you would bestow on another, that such a cause of yours ought to be called His? Why is not that cause also God's which the other defends, lest God lose on this side what He will gain on that, since God, Whose is the world and its fullness, possesses on both sides, and cannot gain here what He does not lose there? Is it not manifest that men go to law for themselves, to keep or acquire straw for their own feet? Where did God command lawsuit and strife: or where did He counsel it, or teach it, or allow it? But He permitted it, they say. Certainly the Good One rightly permitted adultery, murder and the other evils, but the evil one wickedly did them. But let us return to what was said above, for each one will bear his own burden, and will render an account to God for himself. As, then, when the householder, who owed nothing to anyone and gave freely to whom he would, has distributed or let in according to his own judgement, he who received less murmurs the more; so too in us, while each humbly thinks he has less grace than his brother, he murmurs as though piously against the householder, like those labourers of the vineyard in the Gospel (Matt. 20:11), and, without envy, emulates the greater and better gifts, with a good zeal zealous for another brother's way of life, whether in humility, or in obedience, or in charity, or in prayer. But whoever among the last