Nisibis 47

The sound of his voice, a fire within the wood, hidden and concealed, strikes and kindles it. It kindles with its sparks, and the will of the desire warms the creatures. As the will of all that is able commanded and kindled it, the soul within the body, which went out and left it, again dwells within it. The body and the soul, O Lord, sing in your paradise. The youth of the house in which you dwelt follows, O Lord. The soul, the tenant of this house, gave the rent of the house at its departure; it overturned and destroyed it. May it return and dwell in it.

Again, praise in the midst of his monastery, and sing in his dwellings, and again her voice is heard. From the dwelling of the just one, the sign of life, which is placed in his members, the motions of her thoughts, which are hidden within her senses, the treasures of her hearing, which are opened in her strings, and it changes what is fitting for her repayment, in which her wealth stands, in which her glory is adorned. When the desire follows, their running and their labors, prayer in his mouth drew near to the hearer of all; in his hands, to the alms, it lent to the repayer of all; in his eyes, it called the book; in his ears, to the kingdom; in his feet, the door of his house. He served, and they saw in the help in which the whole stands. Blessed is he who raised himself up to join her partnership. The will of his creator weakens his firm one; it renews and made him a temple of praise. He enters and in his nakedness, he makes known the daughter of his union. And he who was clothed in a garment is stripped; and he whose hope was cut off, he wails in his kingdom; and he on whom the fools entered, on him the mercies are active. His feet are bound, he treads in paradise; and his hands are loosed, they pluck all the blessings; his eyes are closed, they see the illumination of all; his mouth is silenced, it is opened; and his ears are stopped, they hear the trumpet; and his body is destroyed, it partakes in praise. And if it is he who, when anger, desire, and ignorance, and the rest of the passions, behold, they flee from him, because he is worthy of the eyes in the world of his will. The deniers confess that he is the temple, and not the vessel of the spirit that dwells in his voice.

And he was not like Jeremiah in the narrow pit. He covered the heretics who were entangled in their own words, who thought they were righteous, confessing that the Holy Spirit dwells within their bodies—a persecutor and a devourer. And when they thought they had conquered, they were conquered, for while he was in error, his dwelling place was beautiful. How much, in his folly, he was pitied in his madness! A demon dwelt in the body, and while the helper was raging, he loved to dwell in him. While the accursed one was a guest, fasting uprooted him from the root that does not cease. How much will you pity her dwelling place? They drank together, expelled the inhabitant, and called upon the Holy Spirit to dwell in their petitions. And they were also a foul spirit dwelling in a vessel, and upon a corpse, a reclining one, and one bound, and a partaker of wood, a carved one that does not hear. How much more will the Holy Spirit love the body that is upon hope?

He was sacrificed and did not sacrifice. It is clear that he also killed him. He was a martyr of the mystery, for it was not a god of the dead who said, "The dead are sick." The dead of your dead, graves without hope, they were troubled who plotted with him, who struck the sons of error with that cause which they mounted. They were justified, that the scribe might err for them, and he raised the dead for them with words and deeds. He called his truth the mystery; he called Lazarus, and he went out in the flesh of the dead, that he might show his Lord dead. He was not able, and he denied him. He was alive in his death, to the voice that raised him. The dead one was alive, and they showed him. They envied and died. The sick one wept over them, that the lives of the dead were, who were buried in the mystery, that he might save Lazarus, the dead one of life, hidden, buried in it. He is alive to God before he was troubled. So also the sinner. He was dead before he was circumcised. A dead one to the deniers, he was appeasing, that these dead ones, buried in their lives, cast out in their errors, erring in their sins, "Do not, my Lord, see me with them in Gehenna, and they think that nothing from them remains." It is not possible that I should be judged for the sake of truth. "Do not, my Lord, see me near them." Know that for this reason I have sinned in the mystery, that concerning the mystery I have spoken as I have.