Homilies on First Corinthians

⁵ “I beseech you, be imitators of me, as I also am of Christ.” κάθως κὰγὼ Χριστοῦ, omitted in our version: the Vulgate has it, see 1 Corinthians 11:1 Astonishing! How great is our teacher's boldness of speech! How highly finished the image, when he can even exhort others hereunto! Not that in self-exaltation he does so, but implying that virtue is an easy thing. As if he had said, “Tell me not, 'I am not able to imitate you. You are a Teacher, and a great one.' For the difference between me and you is not so great as between Christ and me: and yet I have imitated Him.”

On the other hand, writing to the Ephesians, he interposes no mention of himself, but leads them all straight to the one point, “Be imitators of God,” is his word. But in this place, since his discourse was addressed to weak persons, he puts himself in by the way.

And besides, too, he signifies that it is possible even thus to imitate Christ. For he who copies the perfect impression of the seal, copies the original model.

Let us see then in what way he followed Christ: for this imitation needs not time and art, but a steady purpose alone. Thus if we go into the study of a painter, we shall not be able to copy the portrait, though we see it ten thousand times. But to copy him we are enabled by hearing alone. Will ye then that we bring the tablet before you and sketch out for you Paul's manner of life? Well, let it be produced, that picture far brighter than all the images of Emperors: for its material is not boards glued together, nor canvass stretched out; but the material is the work of God: being as it is a soul and a body: a soul, the work of God, not of men; and a body again in like wise.

Did you utter applause here? Nay, not here is the time for plaudits; but in what follows: for applauding, I say, and for imitating too: for so far we have but the material which is common to all without exception: inasmuch as soul differs not from soul in regard of its being a soul: but the purpose of heart shows the difference. For as one body differs not from another in so far as it is a body, but Paul's body is like every one's else, only dangers make one body more brilliant than another: just so is it in the case of the soul also.

6. Suppose then our tablet to be the soul of Paul: this tablet was lately lying covered with soot, full of spider's webs; (for nothing can be worse than blasphemy;) but when He came who transforms all things, and saw that not through indolence or sluggishness were his lines so drawn but through inexperience and his not having the tints (τὰ ἄνθη) of true piety: (for zeal indeed he had, but the colors were not there; for he had not “the zeal according to knowledge:”) He gives him the tint of the truth, that is, grace: and in a moment he exhibited the imperial image. For having got the colors and learned what he was ignorant of, he waited no time, but immediately appeared a most excellent artist. And first he shows the head of the king, preaching Christ; then also the remainder of the body; the body of a perfect Christian life. Now painters we know shut themselves up and execute all their works with great nicety and in quiet; not opening the doors to any one: but this man, setting forth his tablet in the view of the world, in the midst of universal opposition, clamor, disturbance, did under such circumstances work out this Royal Image, and was not hindered. And therefore he said, “We are made a spectacle unto the world;” in the midst of earth, and sea, and the heaven, and the whole habitable globe, and the world both material and intellectual, he was drawing that portrait of his.

Would you like to see the other parts also thereof from the head downwards? Or will you that from below we carry our description upwards? Contemplate then a statue of gold or rather of something more costly than gold, and such as might stand in heaven; not fixed with lead nor placed in one spot, but hurrying from Jerusalem even unto Illyricum, and setting forth into Spain, and borne as it were on wings over every part of the world. For what could be more “beautiful” than these “feet” which visited the whole earth under the sun? This same “beauty” the prophet also from of old proclaims, saying, “How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the Gospel of peace!” Have you seen how fair are the feet? Will you see the bosom too? Come, let me show you this also, and you shall behold it far more splendid than these beautiful, yea even than the bosom itself of the ancient lawgiver. For Moses indeed carried tablets of stone: but this man within him had Christ Himself: it was the very image of the King which he bore.

For this cause he was more awful than the Mercy Seat and the Cherubim. For no such voice went out from them as from hence; but from them it talked with men chiefly about things of sense, from the tongue of Paul on the other hand about the things above the heavens. Again, from the Mercy Seat it spoke oracles to the Jews alone; but from hence to the whole world: and there it was by things without life; but here by a soul instinct with virtue.

This Mercy Seat was brighter even than heaven, not shining forth with variety of stars nor with rays from the sun, but the very Sun of righteousness was there, and from hence He sent forth His rays. Again, from time to time in this our heaven, any cloud coursing over at times makes it gloomy; but that bosom never had any such storm sweeping across it. Or rather there did sweep over it many storms and oft: but the light they darkened not; rather in the midst of the temptation and dangers the light shone out. Wherefore also he himself when bound with his chain kept exclaiming, “The word of God is not bound.” Thus continually by means of that tongue was It sending forth its rays. And no fear, no danger made that bosom gloomy. Perhaps the bosom seems to outdo the feet; however, both they as feet are beautiful, and this as a bosom.

Will you see also the belly with its proper beauty? Hear what he says about it, “If meat make my brother to stumble, I will eat no flesh while the world stands: It is good neither to eat flesh nor to drink wine, nor anything whereby your brother stumbles, or is offended, or is made weak: Meats for the belly and the belly for meats.” What can be more beautiful in its kind than this belly thus instructed to be quiet, and taught all temperance, and knowing how both to hunger and be famished, and also to suffer thirst? For as a well-trained horse with a golden bridle, so also did this walk with measured paces, having vanquished the necessity of nature. For it was Christ walking in it. Now this being so temperate, it is quite plain that the whole body of vice besides was done away.

Would you see the hands too? Those which he now has? Or would you rather behold first their former wickedness? “Entering (this very man) into the houses, he haled,” of late, “men and women,” with the hands not of man, but of some fierce wild beast. But as soon as he had received the colors of the Truth and the spiritual experience, no longer were these the hands of a man, but spiritual; day by day being bound with chains. And they never struck any one, but they were stricken times without number. Once even a viper reverenced those hands: for they were the hands of a human being no longer; and therefore it did not even fasten on them.

And will you see also the back, resembling as it does the other members? Hear what he says about this also. “Five times I received of the Jews forty stripes save one; thrice was I beaten with rods, once was I stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I have been in the deep.”