Basil the Great: God Sees Into the Hearts of Those who Pray Friday, May 24 2013

God sees into the hearts of those who pray.

What need then, someone will say, that we should ask God for what we need?  Does He not know already what we need?  Why then should we pray?

God does indeed know what things we need, and with generosity provides all we need for the refreshment of our bodies, and since He is good He sends down His rains upon the just and the unjust alike, and causes His sun to shine upon the good and the bad (Mt. 5:45), even before we ask Him.

But faith, and the power of virtue, and the kingdom of heaven, these you will not receive unless you ask for them in labouring and steadfastness.  We must first long for these things.

Then when you desire them, you must strive with all your heart to obtain them, seeking them with a sincere heart, with patience, and with faith, not being condemned by your conscience, as praying without attention or without reverence, and so in time, when God wills, you will obtain your request.

For He knows better than you when these things are expedient for you.  And perhaps He is delaying in giving them to you, designing to keep your attention fixed upon Him; and also that you may know that this is a gift of God, and may safeguard with fear what is given to you.

[...] Do not then lose heart if you do not speedily obtain your request.  For if it were known to Our Good Master that were you at once to receive this favour that you would not lose it, He would have been prepared to give it to you unasked.  But being concerned for you, He does not do this.

[...] Keeping this in mind, let us continue to give thanks to the Lord whether we receive speedily or slowly that which we pray for.  For all things whatsoever the Lord may do He orders all to the end of our salvation; only let us not through faintheartedness cease from our prayers.

It was because of this the Lord spoke the parable of the Widow who persuaded the judge through her steadfastness (Luke 18:2-5): that we also through our steadfastness in prayer may obtain what we ask for.

By this we also show our faith, and our love of God, since though we do not quickly receive what we ask for, yet we remain steadfast in praising Him and giving thanks.  Then let us give Him thanks at all times, so that we may be found worthy of receiving His everlasting gifts; since to Him all praise and glory is due for ever and ever.  Amen.

Basil the Great (330-379): Monastic Constitutions, ch. 1, 6-7 @ Lectionary Central.

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Basil the Great: The Dispensations Made for Man by Jesus Christ are Accomplished through the Grace of the Spirit Tuesday, May 14 2013

When we speak of the dispensations made for man by our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ, who will gainsay their having been accomplished through the grace of the Spirit?

Whether you wish to examine ancient evidence;—the blessings of the patriarchs, the succour given through the legislation, the types, the prophecies, the valorous feats in war, the signs wrought through just men;—or on the other hand the things done in the dispensation of the coming of our Lord in the flesh;—all is through the Spirit.

In the first place He was made an unction, and being inseparably present was with the very flesh of the Lord, according to that which is written, “Upon whom thou shalt see the Spirit descending and remaining on Him, the same is” “my beloved Son;” and “Jesus of Nazareth” whom “God anointed with the Holy Ghost.”

After this every operation was wrought with the co-operation of the Spirit.  He was present when the Lord was being tempted by the devil; for, it is said, “Jesus was led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted.” He was inseparably with Him while working His wonderful works; for, it is said, “If I by the Spirit of God cast out devils.”

And He did not leave Him when He had risen from the dead; for when renewing man, and, by breathing on the face of the disciples, restoring the grace, that came of the inbreathing of God, which man had lost, what did the Lord say?  “Receive ye the Holy Ghost:  whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and whose soever ye retain, they are retained.”

And is it not plain and incontestable that the ordering of the Church is effected through the Spirit?  For He gave, it is said, “in the church, first Apostles, secondarily prophets, thirdly teachers, after that miracles, then gifts of healing, helps, governments, diversities of tongues,” for this order is ordained in accordance with the division of the gifts that are of the Spirit.

Moreover by anyone who carefully uses his reason it will be found that even at the moment of the expected appearance of the Lord from heaven the Holy Spirit…will be present with Him.

For who is so ignorant of the good things prepared by God for them that are worthy, as not to know that the crown of the righteous is the grace of the Spirit, bestowed in more abundant and perfect measure in that day, when spiritual glory shall be distributed to each in proportion as he shall have nobly played the man?

Basil the Great (330-379): On the Holy Spirit 16, 39-40.

 

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Basil the Great: The Perfection of the Powers of Heaven through Communion in the Holy Spirit Saturday, May 11 2013

You are…to perceive three, the Lord [the Father] who gives the order, the Word [the Son] who creates, and the Spirit who confirms.

And what other thing could confirmation be than the perfecting according to holiness?  This perfecting expresses the confirmation’s firmness, unchangeableness, and fixity in good.  But there is no sanctification without the Spirit.

The powers of the heavens [angels] are not holy by nature; were it so there would in this respect be no difference between them and the Holy Spirit.  It is in proportion to their relative excellence that they have their recompense of holiness from the Spirit.

[...]  But their sanctification, being external to their substance, superinduces their perfection through the communion of the Spirit.  They keep their rank by their abiding in the good and true, and while they retain their freedom of will, never fall away from their patient attendance on Him who is truly good.

[...] How are angels to cry “Glory to God in the highest” without being empowered by the Spirit?  For “No man can say that Jesus is the Lord but by the Holy Ghost, and no man speaking by the Spirit of God calleth Jesus accursed;” as might be said by wicked and hostile spirits, whose fall establishes our statement of the freedom of the will of the invisible powers.

[...] And how could “thrones, dominions, principalities and powers” live their blessed life, did they not “behold the face of the Father which is in heaven”?  But to behold it is impossible without the Spirit!

Just as at night, if you withdraw the light from the house, the eyes fall blind and their faculties become inactive, and the worth of objects cannot be discerned, and gold is trodden on in ignorance as though it were iron, so in the order of the intellectual world it is impossible for the high life of Law to abide without the Spirit.

[...] How could the Seraphim cry “Holy, Holy, Holy,” were they not taught by the Spirit how often true religion requires them to lift their voice in this ascription of glory?  Do “all His angels” and “all His hosts” praise God?  It is through the co-operation of the Spirit.

[...] All the glorious and unspeakable harmony of the highest heavens both in the service of God, and in the mutual concord of the celestial powers, can therefore only be preserved by the direction of the Spirit.

Thus with those beings [angels] who are not gradually perfected by increase and advance, but are perfect from the moment of the creation, there is in creation the presence of the Holy Spirit, who confers on them the grace that flows from Him for the completion and perfection of their essence.

Basil the Great (330-379): On the Holy Spirit 16, 38.

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Basil the Great: Types and Shadows, Adam and Christ, Exodus and Baptism Wednesday, Jan 2 2013

The nature of the divine is very frequently represented by the rough and shadowy outlines of the types.

But because divine things are prefigured by small and human things, it is obvious that we must not therefore conclude the divine nature to be small.

The type is an exhibition of things expected, and gives an imitative anticipation of the future.  So Adam was a type of “Him that was to come.”

Typically, “That rock was Christ;” and the water a type of the living power of the word; as He says, “If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink.”

The manna is a type of the living bread that came down from heaven; and the serpent on the standard, of the passion of salvation accomplished by means of the cross, wherefore they who even looked thereon were preserved.

So in like manner, the history of the exodus of Israel is recorded to shew forth those who are being saved through baptism.

For the firstborn of the Israelites were preserved, like the bodies of the baptized, by the giving of grace to them that were marked with blood.

For the blood of the sheep is a type of the blood of Christ; and the firstborn, a type of the first-formed.

And inasmuch as the first-formed of necessity exists in us, and, in sequence of succession, is transmitted till the end, it follows that “in Adam” we “all die,” and that “death reigned” until the fulfilling of the law and the coming of Christ.

And the firstborn were preserved by God from being touched by the destroyer, to show that we who were made alive in Christ no longer die in Adam.

The sea and the cloud for the time being led on through amazement to faith, but for the time to come they typically prefigured the grace to be.

“Who is wise and he shall understand these things?”—how the sea is typically a baptism bringing about the departure of Pharaoh, in like manner as this washing causes the departure of the tyranny of the devil.

The sea slew the enemy in itself: and in baptism too dies our enmity towards God.

From the sea the people came out unharmed:  we too, as it were, alive from the dead, step up from the water “saved” by the “grace” of Him who called us.

And the cloud is a shadow of the gift of the Spirit, who cools the flame of our passions by the “mortification” of our “members.”

Basil the Great (330-379): On the Holy Spirit 14, 31.

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Basil the Great: The Continual Remembrance of God is a Holy Thing Thursday, Aug 23 2012

The continual remembrance of God is a holy thing, and of this pious remembrance there can never be enough for the soul that loves God.

But to put into words the things of God is a bold undertaking.

For our mind falls far below what is needed for this; while at the same time, words but feebly convey the thoughts of the mind.

If therefore our understanding is left so far behind by the greatness of the things of God, and if our words are weaker than our understanding, how should we not be silent, for fear that the wonders of the things of God should be in danger through the feebleness of our words?

Though the desire to give glory to God is implanted by nature in every rational creature, nevertheless we all alike are unable to praise Him fittingly.

But though we differ one from another in our desire to praise and serve God, yet there is no one so blinds himself, so deceives himself, as to think that he has attained to the summit of human understanding.

Rather, the further we advance in knowledge, the more clearly we perceive our own insignificance.

So it was with Abraham. So it was with Moses. For when it was given to them to see God, as far as man can see God, then especially did they humble themselves:

Abraham spoke of himself as dust and ashes (Gen. xviii. 27), and Moses said he was a stammerer and slow of tongue (Exod. iv. 10).

For he knew the poverty of his tongue, and that it was unable to serve the greatness of the things he had grasped with his mind.

But since every ear is now open to hear me speak of the things of God, and since there is never enough in the Church of hearing of these things…, we must therefore speak as best we can.

But we shall speak, not of God as He is, but of God as far as it is possible for us to know Him.

For though we cannot with mortal eyes see all that lies between heaven and earth, yet there is no reason why we should not look upon what we can see.

So with our few words we shall now endeavour to fulfil what is required of us in the service of God.

But in every word of ours we humbly bow before the majesty of His Divine Nature.

For not even the tongue of Angels, whatever they may be, nor the tongues of Archangels, joined to those of every reasoning creature, would be able to describe its least part, much less attain to speak of the Whole.

Basil the Great (330-379): Homily 15,1, Translated by M.F. Toale, D.D. (PG 31) @ Lectionary Central.

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Basil the Great: The Gospel as a Forecast of the Life that Follows on the Resurrection Sunday, Apr 22 2012

Continued from here…

On this account we do not…wash ourselves at each defilement, but own the baptism of salvation to be one.

For there the death on behalf of the world is one, and one the resurrection of the dead, whereof baptism is a type.

For this cause the Lord, who is the Dispenser of our life, gave us the covenant of baptism, containing a type of life and death, for the water fulfils the image of death, and the Spirit gives us the earnest of life.

Hence it follows that the answer to our question why the water was associated with the Spirit is clear: the reason is because in baptism two ends were proposed:

on the one hand, the destroying of the body of sin, that it may never bear fruit unto death; on the other hand, our living unto the Spirit, and having our fruit in holiness.

The water receives the body as in a tomb figures death, while the Spirit pours in the quickening power, renewing our souls from the deadness of sin unto their original life.

This then is what it is to be born again of water and of the Spirit, the being made dead being effected in the water, while our life is wrought in us through the Spirit.

In three immersions, then, and with three invocations, the great mystery of baptism is performed, to the end that the type of death may be fully figured, and that by the tradition of the divine knowledge the baptized may have their souls enlightened.

It follows that, if there is any grace in the water, it is not of the nature of the water, but of the presence of the Spirit. For baptism is “not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience towards God.”

So in training us for the life that follows on the resurrection the Lord sets out all the manner of life required by the Gospel, laying down for us the law of gentleness, of endurance of wrong, of freedom from the defilement that comes of the love of pleasure, and from covetousness, to the end that we may of set purpose win beforehand and achieve all that the life to come of its inherent nature possesses.

If therefore any one in attempting a definition were to describe the gospel as a forecast of the life that follows on the resurrection, he would not seem to me to go beyond what is meet and right.

Basil the Great (330-379): On the Holy Spirit 15,35.

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Basil the Great: Recalled from the Alienation Caused by Disobedience to Close Communion with God Friday, Apr 13 2012

The dispensation of our God and Saviour concerning man is a recall from the fall and a return from the alienation caused by disobedience to close communion with God.

This is the reason for the sojourn of Christ in the flesh, the pattern life described in the Gospels, the sufferings, the cross, the tomb, the resurrection; so that the man who is being saved through imitation of Christ receives that old adoption.

For perfection of life the imitation of Christ is necessary, not only in the example of gentleness, lowliness, and long suffering set us in His life, but also of His actual death.

So Paul, the imitator of Christ, says, “being made conformable unto his death; if by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead.”

How then are we made in the likeness of His death? In that we were buried with Him by baptism. What then is the manner of the burial? And what is the advantage resulting from the imitation?

First of all, it is necessary that the continuity of the old life be cut. And this is impossible lest a man be born again, according to the Lord’s word; for the regeneration, as indeed the name shews, is a beginning of a second life.

So before beginning the second, it is necessary to put an end to the first. For just as in the case of runners who turn and take the second course, a kind of halt and pause intervenes between the movements in the opposite direction, so also in making a change in lives it seemed necessary for death to come as mediator between the two, ending all that goes before, and beginning all that comes after.

How then do we achieve the descent into hell? By imitating, through baptism, the burial of Christ. For the bodies of the baptized are, as it were, buried in the water.

Baptism then symbolically signifies the putting off of the works of the flesh; as the apostle says, ye were “circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ; buried with him in baptism.”

And there is, as it were, a cleansing of the soul from the filth that has grown on it from the carnal mind, as it is written, “Thou shalt wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.”

Basil the Great (330-379): On the Holy Spirit 15,35.

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Basil the Great: He Is So Good, He Asks No Recompense Except Our Love Tuesday, Jan 24 2012

God fashioned man in his own image and likeness. He gave him knowledge of himself. He endowed him with the ability to think which raised him above all living creatures.

He permitted him to delight in the unimaginable beauties of paradise, and gave him dominion over everything upon earth.

Then, when man was deceived by the serpent and fell into sin, which led to death and to all the sufferings associated with death, God still did not forsake him.

He first gave man the law to help him; he set angels over him to guard him; he sent the prophets to denounce vice and to teach virtue; he restrained man’s evil impulses by warnings and roused his desire for virtue by promises.

Frequently, by way of warning, God showed him the respective ends of virtue and of vice in the lives of other men. Moreover, when man continued in disobedience even after he had done all this, God did not desert him.

No, we were not abandoned by the goodness of the Lord. Even the insult we offered to our Benefactor by despising his gifts did not destroy his love for us.

On the contrary, although we were dead, our Lord Jesus Christ restored us to life again, and in a way even more amazing than the fact itself, for his state was divine, yet he did not cling to his equality with God, but emptied himself to assume the condition of a slave.

He bore our infirmities and endured our sorrows. He was wounded for our sake so that by his wounds we might be healed.

He redeemed us from the curse by becoming a curse for our sake, and he submitted to the most ignominious death in order to exalt us to the life of glory.

Nor was he content merely to summon us back from death to life; he also bestowed on us the dignity of his own divine nature and prepared for us a place of eternal rest where there will be joy so intense as to surpass all human imagination.

How, then, shall we repay the Lord for all his goodness to us? He is so good that he asks no recompense except our love: that is the only payment he desires.

To confess my personal feelings, when I reflect on all these blessings I am overcome by a kind of dread and numbness at the very possibility of ceasing to love God and of bringing shame upon Christ because of my lack of recollection and my preoccupation with trivialities.

Basil the Great (330-379): Detailed Rules for Monks (Resp. 2, 2-4: PG 31, 914-915), taken from the Office of Readings for Tuesday of the Third week of Ordinary Time @ Crossroads Initiative.

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Basil the Great: Your Boasting and Hope Lie in Putting to Death All that is Your Own and Seeking the Future Life that is in Christ Monday, Mar 28 2011

Scripture says: The man who boasts must boast of this, that He knows and understands that I am the Lord.

Here is man’s greatness, here is man’s glory and majesty: to know in truth what is great, to hold fast to it, and to seek glory from the Lord of glory.

The Apostle tells us: The man who boasts must boast of the Lord.

He has just said: Christ was appointed by God to be our wisdom, our righteousness, our sanctification, our redemption, so that, as it is written, a man who boasts must boast of the Lord.

Boasting of God is perfect and complete when we take no pride in our own righteousness but acknowledge that we are utterly lacking in true righteousness and have been made righteous only by faith in Christ.

Paul boasts of the fact that he holds his own righteousness in contempt and seeks the righteousness in faith that comes through Christ and is from God.

He wants only to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and to have fellowship with his sufferings by taking on the likeness of his death, in the hope that somehow he may arrive at the resurrection of the dead.

[...] Humanity, there is nothing left for you to boast of, for your boasting and hope lie in putting to death all that is your own and seeking the future life that is in Christ.

Since we have its first fruits we are already in its midst, living entirely in the grace and gift of God.

It is God who is active within us, giving us both the will and the achievement, in accordance with his good purpose.

Through his Spirit, God also reveals his wisdom in the plan he has preordained for our glory.

God gives power and strength in our labours. I have toiled harder than all the others, Paul says, but it is not I but the grace of God, which is with me.

God rescues us from dangers beyond all human expectation.

We felt within ourselves that we had received the sentence of death, so that we might not trust ourselves but in God, who raises the dead; from so great a danger did he deliver us, and does deliver us; we hope in him, for he will deliver us again.

Basil the Great (330-379): Homily on Humility and Pride, taken from the Office of Readings for Monday of the Third week of Lent @ Crossroads Initiative.

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Basil the Great: The Mind is a Wonderful Thing Monday, Jan 31 2011

The mind is a wonderful thing, and therein we possess that which is after the image of the Creator.

[...] In it there are two faculties….

One of these is evil: that of the demons which draws us on to their own apostasy.

The other is divine and the good, which brings us to the likeness of God.

When, therefore, the mind remains alone and unaided, it contemplates small things, commensurate with itself.

When it yields to those who deceive it, it nullifies its proper judgment, and is concerned with monstrous fancies.

Then it considers wood to be no longer wood, but a god; then it looks on gold no longer as money, but as an object of worship.

If on the other hand it assents to its diviner part, and accepts the boons of the Spirit, then, so far as its nature admits, it becomes perceptive of the divine.

There are, as it were, three conditions of life, and three operations of the mind.

Our ways may be wicked, and the movements of our mind wicked; such as adulteries, thefts, idolatries, slanders, strife, passion, sedition, vain-glory, and all that the apostle Paul enumerates among the works of the flesh (Gal. 5:19-21).

Or the soul’s operation is, as it were, in a mean, and has nothing about it either damnable or laudable, as the perception of such mechanical crafts as we commonly speak of as indifferent, and, of their own character, inclining neither towards virtue nor towards vice.

[...] But the mind which is impregnated with the Godhead of the Spirit is at once capable of viewing great objects.

It beholds the divine beauty, though only so far as grace imparts and its nature receives.

[...] The judgment of our mind is given us for the understanding of the truth.  Now our God is the very truth.

So the primary function of our mind is to know one God, but to know Him so far as the infinitely great can be known by the very small.

[...] If the mind has been injured by devils it will be guilty of idolatry, or will be perverted to some other form of impiety.

But if it has yielded to the aid of the Spirit, it will have understanding of the truth, and will know God.

But it will know Him, as the Apostle says, in part; and in the life to come more perfectly.

For “when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away.” (1 Cor. 13:10).

Basil the Great (330-379): Letter 233 (to Amphilochius).

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