Homilia in assumptionem Christi

Of our holy father Epiphanius, bishop of Cyprus, on the assumption of our Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed is God. The head placed upon the body is the ornament of the body; the feast of today is the ornament of feasts. For what? it is said. We celebrate the assumption of Christ with flesh, as the fulfillment of the Lord's feasts being shown. For just as a head is fair of form, so also the feast of today radiates the beauty of divine grace; but many, ignorant of its magnitude, consider it lesser. And if you wish to learn, bear with me and direct your mind. Only assist me through prayers, I ask; and calm the leaden breezes; and still the waves of nonsense; and grant me your attentive ear. For according to the wise Solomon, the words of the wise are heard in repose. The first feast, then, is the awesome and wondrous birth of Christ in the flesh. For how is it not wondrous, the descent of God from the heavens to us, or rather his condescension? because the Master of all deigned to unite the form of a servant to himself, and the one who contains all to have a poor mother. The second feast is that of Theophany, having a contemplation much greater than the first. For in the first feast a star indicated the born God Logos; in the second feast John cried out, "Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world." And the Father, crying out from heaven, confirmed the testimony of the one being baptized: "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.

But even then the full enjoyment of temperance was not present, since the mortal body had not yet received immortality through the resurrection. The third feast of the saving passion, the resurrection, gives life to those who, through the baptism of his blood, flash forth rays and are reborn through water and the Holy Spirit. Therefore it also raised the fallen world and deemed the long-fallen Adam worthy of eternal life. Through wood Adam reaped death; through the wood of the cross life is granted to the world. And this feast was shown to be more glorious than the preceding feasts, since in it death, through death, having put death to death, brought immortal life to the dead. But even this feast did not possess the fullness of joy, holding the risen one on earth. And the feast of Pentecost also brought great and inexpressible joy, in which the Holy Spirit was given to the apostles; but today, on the day of the Assumption, everything is filled with gladness throughout. Having opened the light-bearing heavens, having stepped upon the most subtle air, having raised from earth to the heavenly vaults, and having urged all the natures of angels to unceasing joy, he showed us a strange spectacle: our flesh raised upon a royal throne. Where are those who busy themselves with the hippodromes and love the swiftness of charioteers? Come, see a wondrous hippodrome.

the Creator of the creation riding in a human chariot, not driving disorderly upon the earth, but newly raising up ethereal courses, hastening to reach the heavenly turning-post, and mightily overthrowing the rushing Beliar. But the children of the Jews, the envious of the truth, hearing that Christ was taken up into the heavens, wishing to obscure the paradoxical miracle of the Sun of righteousness, bring in Elijah, saying: Why do you boast greatly, Christians, that Christ was taken up, as you say? For Elijah, being a man, was deemed worthy of the same glory and was taken up into the heavens. To whom we shall speak with boldness: Why, O Jews, do you plunder the books as if blind, and do not see with precision what is written in them? Why do you read and not recognize? For what does the divine Scripture say? And Elijah was taken up in a whirlwind as if into the heaven; the phrase "as if into the heaven" has an ambiguous meaning; but "into the heaven" shows the clear truth. That neither Elijah nor any other ascended into the heaven, except only the one who came down from the heaven, the only-begotten Son of God, he himself, fully assuring all concerning himself, says: No one has ascended into the heaven except the one who came down from the heaven, the Son of Man, who is in the heaven; the good shepherd, who left the ninety-nine sheep of the angels on the heavenly mountains, and found the straying sheep, and bearing it on the shoulders of philanthropy, and bringing it into the heavenly harbor, presenting it as a gift to his own Begetter, speaks:

I have found, Father, the wandering sheep, which the deceitful serpent deceived with crafty wiles, and showed it the paths of wickedness, and defiled the purity of the knowledge of God with the mud of polytheism. Seeing it, then, drowning in the mire of life, I quickly snatched it up with the right hand of my divinity; and with the bowels of compassion I washed it in the streams of the Jordan, and anointing it with the fragrance of my Holy Spirit, I have now come through the resurrection, bringing to you as a gift worthy of your divinity the rational sheep. Today the devil laments his own defeat, seeing our body being taken up into the heavens; today sin, through the ascension of Christ Jesus, is dissolved like smoke; today the devil wails, saying, "What shall I do, wretched that I am? Having snatched from me all those from eternity as a swift hawk, he has left me desolate, and having clipped my wings from every side, he has dashed me to the ground. The son of Mary has deceived me. I did not know that God was hidden in a human body. I saw him clothed in a human body, and thinking him a mere man, I stirred up the Jews against him; and what I did not dare to accomplish through myself, I carried out through the Jews. I devised countless false accusations; I contrived every kind of insult against him; I gave him to drink from a reed and a sponge; I crowned his head with thorns; I dishonored him with slaps; I nailed him to the cross with nails; and having subjected him to death in the end, as if victorious, I celebrated with the Jews.

Having seen that he had risen on the third day, as I foretold, I fell as if struck suddenly by a sword in the heart; but seeing that he eats and drinks, I again prepared another cross. Yet as I pondered these things to myself, I behold him ascending with glory into heaven, whence I fell in shame. Therefore the Psalmist cried out from many ages past, saying: "All you nations, clap your hands; shout aloud to God with a voice of rejoicing, for the Lord is most high, a fearsome king, great over the whole earth"; and again: "God has gone up with a shout, the Lord with the sound of a trumpet." I wish to pursue him, but I am borne downward like lead; I desire to seize him, but I am invisibly thrust aside. What shall I do, wretched one? He has driven me from every side. From the heavens he has slung me down to earth like a tiny stone. Having fallen to the earth, I wished to hide in the waters; and finding me concealed in the streams of the Jordan like a serpent, he seized and scourged me. I wish to hold even the earth, and all, as guardians of a master's pasture, cry out against me: "The earth and its fullness belong to the Lord, the inhabited world and all who dwell in it." The earthquake showed that the earth is the Lord's. For the earth, not bearing the name of the Lord, was shaken with an unendurable tremor, because of the disorder of

her own children, being scourged, as if opening a mouth against the elements, she cried out the magnitude of the hidden pain; and she besought that the sinners be spared, as a mother on behalf of her children. Who will proclaim the powers of the Lord? Who will make all his praises heard? The earth and its fullness belong to the Lord. For Christ united in himself the flesh formed from the earth, and seated it in the heavens. The devil comes, wishing to defile through fornication. But, having the eye of the soul as a sleepless guardian, do not allow the robber to tear open the eye of the mind, so that you may confidently say to him: I do not become a traitor of the Lord's property, devil. For the earth belongs to the Lord, and the Church of Christ is always cultivated by the heavenly rain, and perpetually bears fruit for Christ, thirtyfold, sixtyfold, and a hundredfold. The sower went out to sow, it is said; and some fell on the road, the deception of Hellenism. And the birds came, the sharp-hungry ravening demons, and devoured it. Another fell on the rocky ground, I mean the hard-hearted disposition of the Jews, and immediately a plant of rashness and lawlessness sprouted. For such is the way of the Jews. For when they were receiving the law in the desert, they said to Moses: All that God has said, we will do and we will obey. And those who made these promises worshipped a lifeless calf, and preferred the dead to the living God. Another fell among the thorns, the rough-thorned and blasphemous-tongued heresies, which daily stifle the seed of piety.

Another fell upon the good earth, the Church of Christ, the fertile one, bearing fruit thirtyfold, sixtyfold, and a hundredfold. Thirtyfold, the yoke of temperance; sixtyfold, angelic virginity; a hundredfold, divine justice, purity, and the valor of the martyrs. For the heralds of piety, proclaiming to all the final coming of the Lord, said: Thus he will come, in the manner in which you beheld him being taken up. For two men appeared in white clothing. Two, that the truth might be believed; men, that they might strengthen the disciples in manliness; wearing white, that they might brighten the minds of the hearers. What then did those who appeared proclaim? Men of Israel, why do you stand gazing at the sky? Why do you stare at the heaven? Rather, beholding the maker of heaven, glorify the greatness of the one being taken up, and marvel at his condescension of philanthropy, that having united the earthly man to himself, he revealed him as a citizen of heaven and established him as a dweller of heaven. Amazing! To where has he raised the one lying below!

Why do you stand gazing at the sky? He will come thus. Thus. How? Wearing our body, displaying the side that was pierced by the spear, so that the Jews may see the one whom they stabbed; and we may be deemed worthy to see his face with confidence, and obtain the promised blessings, by the grace and loving-kindness of our Lord Jesus Christ, with whom to the Father and the Holy Spirit be glory, power, honor, now and always, and unto the ages of ages. Amen.