Letters

(For 347.) Coss. Rufinus, Eusebius; Præf. the same Nestorius; Indict. v; Easter-day, Prid. Id. Apr., Pharmuthi xvii; Æra Dioclet. 63; Moon 15.

'Blessed is God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,' for such an introduction is fitting for an Epistle, and more especially now, when it brings thanksgiving to the Lord, in the Apostle's words, because He has brought us from a distance, and granted us again to send openly to you, as usual, the Festal Letters. For this is the season of the feast, my brethren, and it is near; being not now proclaimed by trumpets, as the history records, but being made known and brought near to us by the Saviour, Who suffered on our behalf and rose again, even as Paul preached, saying, 'Our Passover, Christ, is sacrificed. ' Henceforth the feast of the Passover is ours, not that of a stranger, nor is it any longer of the Jews. For the time of shadows is abolished, and those former things have ceased, and now the month of new things is at hand, in which every man should keep the feast, in obedience to Him who said, 'Observe the month of new things, and keep the Passover to the Lord your God. ' Even the heathen fancy they keep festival, and the Jews hypo-critically feign to do so. But the feast of the heathen He reproves, as the bread of mourners, and He turns His face from that of the Jews, as being outcasts, saying, 'Your new moons and your sabbaths My soul hates.'