khazarzar-gregory-of-nyssa-in-sanctum-ephraim

A Panegyric by the Same Author on Our Holy Father Ephraim. The parable in the holy Gospels, the mystical teaching of the lamp, stirs me toward the present subject, and it loosens the tongue that was enslaved by the muzzle of speechlessness, and it levels the paths of thoughts like tracks for chariots, and it prepares the most manifold chariot of the word to run upon the broad highway, crying out loudly in some such way as this: They do not light a lamp and put it under the bushel, but on the lampstand, and it shines for all who are in the house. And it adds what is understood from this in depth, saying: Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works. Would it not then be blameworthy to cover ourselves and be afraid in those matters in which the Master himself commanded us to be of good courage? He, as it were, having kindled a bright torch, brighter than the sun's, the conduct of our present holy Father for narration, does not wish this to be hidden under the bushel of silence, but to be set up on high upon the very summit of the Church, so as to shine for all who are busied in the worldly house; and from this, that those who see may glorify the Father who is in the heavens.

One must not, therefore, revere that paternal bond of his because a Lordly ordinance is trampled; for it is necessary to take the beginnings of praises from that source, even if the present mention is assigned in order after the encomia. Since, for one who knows how to distinguish matters well, that bond is not simply a bond, preventing one from crowning with encomia a man who turns away from human glory; but it is a bond without bonds, and a restraint without restraint, driving lovers toward the opposite. For through those means by which he calculated to escape our praises, walling off the attempt with a bond, through these we take the occasions for encomia. Each of his advantages, then, serves as an occasion for complete praise, but especially the fact that he does not delight in praise. For he wished not to seem, but to be, good. Therefore, for this reason alone, even if he had done nothing else worthy of praise, it is just that he be praised, because he so much said he delighted in encomia that he sealed the prohibition against them with a bond. For us, this first opens the stadium of our discourse, and assures us that we are not walking aimlessly, nor being borne over a cliff, but are traveling a royal road, as we rightly consider that if the wondrous man of God had not considered himself unworthy of praise, he would not have forbidden those who wished to praise him. For no one who is not admired, while still alive, for the greatest advantages, charges those after him to obscure his memory by the fall of forgetfulness. In addition to these things, one may also say this:

For just as Paul, the herald of grace, the bridegroom-attendant of the Church, the mouth of Christ, did not lose the title of Apostle because he said, "I am not worthy to be called an Apostle"—rather, on the contrary, it was precisely through this humility that he carried off greater glory—so too our great Father, who in reverence judged himself unworthy of praises, will be found worthy in accordance with what follows. Since, then, it is our law of the Church to crown the zealous lovers of virtue by pursuing its forms from this source, and of these, all who have been spiritually exalted most of all by the measure of humble-mindedness—according to what the Lord said in the Gospels, somewhat as follows: "He who humbles himself will be exalted"—those who record the virtues of this present God-bearing Father, and who raise up his life for us as a kind of living and breathing pillar, are entirely beyond blame and mockery and even condemnation itself. And the wise hearer will behold the truth of what has been promised, gathering up after the discourse the varied forms of his virtues, which we, having wrought like a certain crown of gold soldered together and adorned with precious and diverse stones, will bring as a longed-for gift to the bride of Christ, the Church; for she rejoices to be greeted with such gifts, when the yearly memorial of the righteous comes around. And now time, running on, has brought Ephraim into our praise; and how will she not gladly receive his memorial? Ephraim—that man borne about on the lips of all Christians. Ephraim, I mean, the Syrian; for I am not ashamed of his race, since I take pride in his character.

Ephraim, whose light of life and contemplation shone forth over the whole earth; he who is known to nearly all under the sun, yet unknown to as many as the great luminary of the Church, Basil; Ephraim, the true intelligible Euphrates of the Church, from which the multitude of the faithful is irrigated, yielding a hundredfold the seed of faith; Ephraim, the fruitful vine of God, blooming with teachings like sweet clusters of grapes, and delighting the nurslings of the Church with the satiety of divine love; Ephraim, the good and faithful steward of grace, who measures out the words of the virtues proportionally to his fellow servants, and administers the Lord’s household most excellently. As for his lineage, the land that bore him, the distinction of his ancestors, the glory of his parents, his birth, upbringing, growth in age, physical aptitude, fortune, crafts, and the other embellishments for praise gathered by external writers, we have deemed it superfluous to bring forward, because we have not learned to praise divine men from such things; even if, from abundance, he possesses praiseworthiness from these as well, from those things by which he himself made himself illustrious in life and word, from these let us also weave the crown of speech for him. For praises are of things within our power, and the rewards of things that are voluntary.

Of those who have been enumerated, there are also unreasonable censures and incongruous praises. For how could this man have accepted to be praised for his lineage, who loathed all worldly nobility and earnestly desired to become a child of God through the pursuit of the best works? Or how could he be honored for his homeland, who reckoned the whole earth as alien to himself and turned away from the material creation as from an enemy, for the sake of the eternal blessedness laid up in the heavens? How again could he have taken pleasure in the glory of ancestors or parents, who simply trampled upon bodily attachment and was weighed down even by the very tunic of the soul, that is, the little flesh, finding it an obstacle to his swiftest courses of virtue? How, in general, would he have wished to be praised for bodily growth and manner of life, or for aptitude, or for skill, or for any other pursuit in life that is to be despised, who was nurtured from his earliest age and grew up in the study of the divine Scriptures, was watered by the ever-flowing channels of grace, and reached, in the apostolic phrase, to the measure of the stature of Christ? Knowing, then, that our great Father does not take pleasure in being magnified by such things as bodily men do with ridiculous praises, let us attempt to exalt him moderately from his own labors; for the discourse cannot by nature extend beyond its power. So then, that neither our silence may check our longing, nor again, treading a strange path of the Fathers, we may stray from the royal road by running along the byways, let us craft our discourse with moderation. And what are these things of his, through which we proposed to weave his praise?

Action and contemplation, to which the whole swarm of the virtues in turn follows—faith, hope, love, piety toward God, meditation on the divine Scriptures, purification of soul and body, continual tears, desert-dwelling, withdrawal from place to place, flight from harmful things, unceasing teaching, ceaseless prayer, fasting and vigil knowing no measure, sleeping on the ground and austerity surpassing reason, poverty and humility carried to the extreme, almsgiving raising him above human nature, divine zeal against those raging against piety; and, to speak simply, everything that is known to characterize a man according to God. With such praises our Father is adorned, and he knows what is said, and understands his own excellences, and welcomes the words as bringing benefit, not to himself but to us; since even the mere mention of his name becomes a ground of virtue for the zealous. For we have learned these things from no other source than from what he himself sowed in words concerning himself. From these we, like the praiseworthy bee, having gathered the useful things from many flowers, have wrought this spiritual honeycomb. And it will surely not be held against us for the undertaking, that he no longer fears the wicked demon, because at the very end of his contests he has tripped up many, and once having reached the calm harbors of the incorporeal powers, he is outside both storm and surge. Come then, let us linger a little in the account of each one of those enumerated, and show to those gathered here what the wondrous man became, and to what measure of spiritual ascent he attained.

For his faith was exceedingly orthodox, not inclining anywhere near impiety, as we have received both from his own writings and from the reputation concerning him handed down by the Church; for he equally abhorred the irrational confusion of Sabellius and the mad division of Arius. He stood within the boundaries of piety, dividing by number but uniting in essence the one, unconfused, and all-holy Trinity, so that he might neither be reproached Jewishly with a poverty of divinity, nor rave Greekly with a multitude of gods—sufferings which those who have raged drunkenly against the incomprehensible Trinity are shown to have undergone. And so great was his rejection of the irrational doctrine of Apollinaris that he made every effort to expel it from every Christian soul. Moreover, against the Anomoeans, by many demonstrative and Scriptural arguments, he blocked their unbarred mouths, leaving us his God-taught oracles as our greatest security. And if anyone wishes to behold the defeat of the most audacious Novatus, let him see the fall of the adversary in the wrestling match through the words of Ephraim, in which he will find the superiority of our Teacher's power in the presentation of the argument to be as great as that of a pancratiast over a child weak through tenderness. Nor did he refute by the right word of faith only the tares of heresies that sprang up in that time or before by the sower of evil, but also those that were to sprout wickedly afterward, beholding them with prophetic eye, he uprooted beforehand. And every writing and composition of his is full of these demonstrations. Thus never at any time did the son of the truth think contrary to the truth.

But his hope was in God alone, from whom come the graces of the hopes laid up for the worthy. For throughout his life, meditating on the psalm in word and deed, he used to say, "In him my heart hoped, and I was helped." Because he hoped in the Lord for such a reason, mercy will surround him. And his confidence in him likens him to Mount Zion; but it also places the one who possesses it within the highest blessedness, as one may observe from the prophets themselves—David saying, "Blessed is the man whose hope the name of the Lord is"; and Jeremiah: "Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, and the Lord shall be his hope; and he shall be like a tree flourishing by the waters, and he shall send forth his root to the moisture." And Isaiah: "The Lord is our King, the Lord is our Savior, he himself will save us. Behold, God is my Savior, the Lord; I will trust in him and be of good courage." And the blessed Paul exhorting and saying: "We hold fast the promise of hope; for faithful is the one who promised us.

Turning in upon himself with this divine and stored-up hope, he despised all worldly things and longed for eternal glory. He guarded so carefully the love of God and neighbor that he himself spoke thus as he departed from life—for it is good to bring forward the very words of the God-bearing Father, since they are mightier than any demonstration. "Never," he says, "in all my life did I revile the Lord, and no foolish word passed from my lips. In all my life I cursed no one, and I strove with no faithful man at all." O blessed tongue, which, taking courage, uttered such a voice, a voice most fitting for angels alone, because of the immateriality and peacefulness of its life. But for us who are enslaved to the flesh, it is strange and beyond nature, and hard to achieve. And though you labor much, searching the lives of those famed for virtues, you would nowhere find such a sign for the telling of pure and spotless love as in the Father set before us. If, then, love is greater than all the virtues, and blessed Ephraim achieved it as no other of the Fathers did—and each will receive according to his works—we shall leave it to others to draw conclusions from these things, lest we seem to compare Fathers with Fathers. For we have not taken up what has been said for the sake of comparison, but only that we might set before the eyes of the many how our own—or rather the teacher of the inhabited world, Ephraim—reached the very summit of the spiritual ladder of the virtues. Having traded in godliness in the possession of true wisdom (according to what is said in Job—

Behold, this is wisdom through devotion; through it, as we made clear a little above, tracing the purity of his faith, he ascended to the third heaven, according to Paul, and has enriched the Church with an immortal memory and abiding renown. His meditation on the divine Scriptures was kindled from the lamp of David, who says, "In my meditation a fire shall be kindled." For the love that made him a citizen of spiritual contemplation raised his longing into a soaring flame. For having studied the whole Scripture, both Old and New, and having dwelt in such contemplations as no other, he interpreted it all accurately down to the letter, from the creation of the world to the last book of grace, bringing the depths of hidden contemplations into the open, using the Spirit as his lamp. Nor did he drink the whole spiritual cup of this our God-inspired wisdom and share it with others only, but also of the secular learning—both what pertains to the polished and correct expression of speech and what pertains to the depth of thoughts—having thoroughly practiced it, he took in as much as was useful and cast away as much as was unprofitable, trading both action and contemplation with the balance of righteousness. He achieved purity of soul and body, as much as nature could contain—or rather, even beyond nature, for the gift belongs to grace. For he did not allow his soul to slip from its right-minded disposition, but was truly one who reigned over his soul and shone radiantly in his body.

And the change of the harlot who is recorded in history bears witness to what is said, whom Beliar, the murderer of mortals, using as a bait for evil to deceive the enlightened man, fell so far short of what he hoped, that even the adulteress herself arrayed herself against that very Evil One who surpasses all, and, changed by his exhortations and turnings, and by the incantations of divine words, and remolded toward the better, was shown to be chaste instead of licentious, modest instead of shameless, and pure instead of defiled. But when I desire to speak of that ever-flowing stream of tears, tears truly come upon me; because not without this could one sail through the sea of his tears in speech. For as breathing is innate to all men and always active, so is weeping to Ephraim. For there was no day, no night, no midnight, no hour, not the finest fraction of a moment, when his unsleeping eye was seen dry; now bewailing in common, now in private, as he said, the improprieties, and wisely channeling the streams of his eyes with groans; or rather, by the outpourings of his eyes he summoned forth groans. And the procession of both was paradoxical, the one appearing as the cause of the other; for tears gave birth to groans in him, and groans again to tears; and the cause was unknown to most. For since time did not divide these things, but tears always succeeded groans, and then again groans succeeded these, and a kind of cycle was formed, the beginning was unclear, and the cause of the other. And one will observe this if he has conversed with his own writings.

For you will find him not only weeping in his discourses on repentance, character, and good conduct, but also in his very festal orations, where most people are accustomed to display great rejoicing in their words. But he was the same everywhere, and continually rich in the grace of compunction. Hence even now he calls almost all his hearers of his words back to the true life. So great is the power possessed by his God-inspired word, mingled with tears. For what unyielding person, or who is stony-hearted, having heard his words, will not be softened, and casting off the hardness of his character, will not grieve over his own vices? What person savage in character, or beast-like in manner, having listened to his soul-profiting teaching, will not immediately be good and gentle, and kindly disposed in his ways? What person accustomed to take pleasure in the luxuries of life, and turning away from weeping, having heard a few of his words, will not lament and weep, and come to remembrance of the things he has lived, of the future recompense?

You are boiling a stone—the proverb of outsiders uses this for impossible things. But experience has set this plainly before us. For this divine elder persuaded souls that were unyielding and unsubmissive both to be guarded and to submit. Who, having encountered his discourse on humility, will not immediately hate all conceit, and proclaim himself lower than everyone? Who, having applied himself to his writings on love, will not be eager to risk danger for the sake of love? Who, having conversed with his writings on virginity, will not strive to present himself pure in soul and body to God? Who, having stooped into his writings on judgment, that is, the second coming of Christ, will not think that he is standing before that tribunal, and, becoming all atremble, will not seem to himself to have the final sentence already pronounced against him? For this man, celebrated in song and most prophetic, so set before them the future judgment seat of God that nothing else was left for knowledge, but only to learn it by this deed and experience. The blessed man, always held fast by such imaginings about judgment, fled the world and the things in the world; and he went far away in his flight, as the Scriptures say, and lodged in the wilderness, attending to himself alone and to God, and from there receiving the advancements of the virtues. For he knew precisely that a life in the wilderness frees the one who wills from worldly tumults, makes him a companion of angels in stillness, and raises up the mind, as far as is attainable, to contemplations of God. And to change from place to place, whenever the Spirit, moving him, arranged it for the edification of the many, he did not disobey, nor did he resist.

For he was obedient to divine commands, if ever anyone was. From there he reached the city of the Edessenes, his native land, as that divine Abraham was commanded. For it was not right that the sun be hidden under the earth for so long. And this for two reasons: to embrace the holy things there, and before that to encounter the oracle and either receive or impart the fruit of knowledge. Among these, as it is recorded, having come to the city and passing through it, he met a certain prostitute instead of the lover of learning he had prayed to encounter. But since what appeared was other than his expectation, the encounter turned out grievous to him. Therefore, fixing his gaze on the prostitute, as one deceived in his hope, he was led away; but she, seeing him gazing at her, herself also looked at him carefully and scrutinized him. And the wise man said to her: Tell me, woman, why do you look at me so intently? And she: It is fitting and proper for me; for I have been taken from you, the man, but do not scrutinize me—rather the earth, from which you were taken. The wise man, hearing this beyond his expectation, confessed that he had been greatly benefited; and he glorified exceedingly the incomprehensible power of God, who grants the things of hope even through things contrary to hope. And departing from there to Caesarea of Cappadocia, guided by the Holy Spirit, he beheld the great Basil, the mouth of the Church, the golden nightingale of the doctrines; and when the elder saw him, he began to greet him with many words of praise.

For with the discerning eye of his soul, he saw a radiant, venerable figure seated at his right shoulder, supplying him with words of teaching, and that figure conveying these words to the people. He who was initiated by the venerable one who taught him about this figure perceived his arrival and recognized that he was Ephraim the Syrian. And indeed both were deemed worthy of a timely spiritual fellowship; thus the plundering proved no loss to Ephraim. The natural integrity of his life pointed out to him the avoidance of harmful things, teaching him both to foresee what was better and to guard against what was worse, and to admit those thoughts that are approved and pure, and to choose those more advantageous for the benefit of the good, especially those which advance the need of teaching. For the talent of the word had been given abundantly by Christ to the divine elder, which he was obliged above all other things to deposit at the tables of the hearts of the many. And this he appears to say about himself, that having just passed beyond the tender age of childhood, he was mystically shown at his tongue how his vine ascended exceedingly fruitful, grown so much as to fill the earth, and every bird of heaven coming was filled with food from it. And that the vine itself, when pruned, and every bird received, was rather enriched with its clusters. And another of the very discerning ones at that time also testified this about him, saying that he saw a multitude of angels descending from heaven, carrying a scroll in their hands, written on the outside and on the inside.

That divine assembly that appeared said among itself: Who then ought to be entrusted with this volume? In answer to this, some preferred one man, others another, and others still a different one—those whom that time had as its chosen. Then, after the testing, all said: "Truly these are holy men and servants of God; yet they cannot be entrusted with this volume." And when they had called to mind many of the saints of that time, they were not well pleased with them; finally, coming to agreement, they said: "No one can be entrusted with this volume except Ephraim." And indeed that seer is said to have beheld the divine angels handing the volume to Ephraim. Rising at dawn, he came to the church—the one who had been initiated into the vision—and heard Ephraim teaching in abundant discourse seasoned with grace; and judging that vision which had been shown to him, he glorified God and was struck with wonder at the rich gift of discourse given to the saint. For so great an abundance of wisdom had been granted to him that the channels of his words were ever-flowing, but slow to the manifestation of his thoughts—not through sluggishness of tongue, but through the density of his conceptions—so that his tongue was equal to the speed of others' conceptions, but less than his own contemplations. Therefore the great elder himself, entreating God concerning himself, on account of the delay of the unrestrained gift of chosen words, is said to have spoken such things as these: Release, O

Master, the waves of your grace. For beneath his tongue the abyss of teaching, swelling like a sea, did not permit him to bear the waves of thoughts, one after another, since the organs for speaking did not serve his zealous ministry. Nothing else cut short his words but prayer alone, and prayer was cut short by his words, and his words by his tears, and these again by prayer. And he was a word of the Word—or, to speak more fittingly, in the Word—continually occupied with the contemplations of God through all these things. For having put the body to death together with its pleasures, and having through self-control made it a slave to the ruling reason, he kept it unmoved toward what was not fitting, forestalled by fasting, and firm toward what was profitable and procured salvation for the soul. But not even the nights interrupted for him the course of virtue, deceiving him with fantasies from sleep. For receiving him sober from the day, they left him still wakeful as they passed by, occupied with this: that the hand of the ruler of this darkness might not overtake him sleeping. He partook of sleep only as much as was sufficient for living, so that, if the natural sequence were entirely overturned, his flesh might not undergo a violent dissolution. Many other things drove this away from him and expelled it from his eyes, but especially sleeping on the ground, austerity, and every kind of bodily hardship. For by these especially the passion of sleep is naturally banished. And he acquired such freedom from possessions as you hear the divine apostles had. Therefore, if anyone calls him an archetype of those who own nothing, he will not miss what is fitting.

For we have that sweetest and blessed voice of his very own, which, when he was about to depart for the heavenly things, he left to us as a teacher of poverty, being somewhat as follows: Ephraim never possessed a purse, nor a staff, nor a wallet. Neither indeed silver, nor gold, nor did I acquire any other possession upon the earth. For I heard the good King in the Gospels saying to his own disciples to acquire nothing upon the earth. Whence I did not hold even passionately toward any such thing. Thus then little regarding glory and money, but a lover of every better thing more than all, by equal course from here as well contending with the apostles. But what shall we testify concerning his humility, seeing that every word and writing of his plainly proclaims this virtue, although it was pursued by him out of great abundance? For when would he who summons tears with tears, and eats ashes as it were bread, the roughness of his diet and its joylessness, and mixes his drink with weeping, as the oracles say, strike the foot of his soul against the stone of arrogance or conceit? Or he who turns away from all human glory, and while still living in this life, when someone praised him, was distressed, and changing now one color and now another, and bowing down to the earth, and dripping with fine sweat, and held by a terrible speechlessness, as though shame were making his tongue idle? And when departing toward the blessed and unceasing life, again restraining this very thing with vehement rebuke, and saying: Do not sing a song over Ephraim, do not praise him, do not bury me in costly clothing, do not make a tomb for my body privately.

For I have a word with God, that I should lodge with strangers. I am a stranger and a sojourner, as all my fathers were. You have, then, from this abundance also, as indeed from the rest, clear proofs of this virtue. But of almsgiving and compassion the definition and law of truth will vote him not only a doer but also a teacher. For since, in perfect poverty, he had nothing to give to the needy, by rousing others to mercy with frequent exhortations he pursued almsgiving. For truly his word, even without his face, was a key forged by God, opening the treasuries of the rich and supplying the needy with what they required; and his angelic appearance sufficed, even seen alone, to move to compassion and pity even those who were utterly unmerciful, by its simplicity, gentleness, and great and well-tempered nobility. And who was so given over to shamelessness that, having looked upon him, he did not blush, and somehow become more orderly than himself? Perhaps, then, someone who has heard of so great a multitude of achievements will suppose that this divine man did not advance into the depth of the Church's doctrines. For what leisure, I would say, had such a man, divided among so many virtues? Yet the knowledge of the divine doctrines was not superficial in him. For he did not pursue this only to the extent of speaking and exhorting others; rather, he was well instructed in both—both the doctrines of the Church themselves and those who attempt to contradict them: the former he learned to the extent of diligent study, the latter for the refutation of heretics. For zeal against the Church's wild beasts stirred him;

Whence also a certain unwritten account reached us, displaying to us this man's zeal for the truth, having it thus—as the light-minded, or rather senseless and irrational, Apollinarius, having innovated many things and belched forth from his belly, sketched out an unjust Writing of piety, composing it in two books. And he handed these over for safekeeping to a certain woman, to her who, as was reported, served that man's pleasures. But when the matter of the writing became known to the Great one, the wise man, fashioning for himself the appearance of that man's repute, approaches the woman who guarded the profane books, making himself known, and bringing her blessings as though from the desert, and perhaps also contriving certain other things. Later, then, he begs that there be granted to him, for the sake of benefit, as he said, the teacher's writings, so that he might be able easily to contend against the heretics—thus, as it were, calling us. But she, not having been enlightened in mind, and having been deceived into thinking that this man too was of the faction of Apollinarius, provided the books, deeming their return to be swift. But this great Jacob, having tripped up the profane Esau and taken the evil firstborn things of his thoughts, withdrew cleverly; for having stuck leaf to leaf, and having smeared the whole with fish glue, he made the whole of the book into one volume, the one part not being permitted by the strong binding to be torn apart from the other. Thus, having contrived with the two books, he gave them back again to her who had used them; and she, like a woman and inexperienced in wise thoughts, having seen their outward appearance intact, did not inquire precisely about the depth.

Not many days later, the divine elder arranged for certain of the orthodox to summon the impious Apollinarius to a disputation. He, having accepted the summons and trusting in his godless books, came to the appointed place, and he himself declined to dispute, as one worn out by old age; he demanded that his own books be brought forward and that through them he answer and argue in reply. So when his initiates brought the books, greatly preening themselves over them, that man—the judge of the injustice of evil days, grown old—took one of the books and attempted to open it. But when it would not yield, pressed shut by its glue, he made his attempt at its middle; and it was likewise unopened. So when he had failed with the first, he proceeded then to the second, and when he saw that this one too was entirely inseparable and altogether unyielding, his face was changed by shame; he was struck in his soul with bewilderment, and the man, beside himself, withdrew from the assembly, and through despondency and sickness drew near at last to death, unable to bear the insult. Such was our great father and teacher Ephraim also in his zeal for piety: in some matters displaying gentleness and reasonableness, when there was no need of war; in others, the astringent and austere, when the danger concerned the faith above all—pursuing all things wisely, as the occasion required. For this too was no less a fruit of his many fasts and tears and unceasing prayers—I mean the zeal according to God, or rather even beyond those things; inasmuch as they confine their benefit to the one who practices them alone; but that—

But it passes over to the common benefit. Since the true Word tests the good hunter against the beasts that fight, and the good pilot against the winds that blow against the ship, and the wise physician against the diseases hard to cure, and the noble soldier against the heavy battle-line set against him, and the earnest and zealous man of piety in the height of dangers and difficulties, so that he may draw both himself and others out of the plot. There is, then, no kind of virtues found among certain men of old, labored after with love of toil, that was not also successfully achieved in this man. And one may liken his soul to a spring gushing with streams of every kind, adorned with usefulness and sweetness and delight; or to a meadow fragrant with varied scents; or to an earthly heaven adorned with diverse lamps, or to a paradise—such as you hear of the paradise of Eden, glorified with countless fruit-bearing trees; except that it is not to be trodden by the most wicked serpent, and the cause of exile; or if nature has honored any other of the fair and delightful things with many and diverse goods—reckon the blessed soul of the great Ephraim to be such, encircled on every side by many forms of virtues. For the wondrous man, having made it his study through his whole life to acquire virtue in its entirety, strove alone to embrace all excellences.

For having imitated the God-spoken offering of Abel, the first among the righteous, as a priest, he did not bring victims from flocks, nor fat to the Lord, but a bloodless sacrifice, the rational worship, wholly consumed by the purity of his life, rivaling that man to this extent—that he was not slain by the evil murderer, but escaped and fled from the snares of the man-hating demon, and passed over, like him, to unending life, having shown himself superior to the plot. And having emulated the hope of Enoch, he has not only called upon the name of the Lord God himself, but has also taught others to call upon it together. Enoch did not pursue that strange translation from earth to paradise, but the passage from material attachment to the spirit. Noah did not pursue the small preservation of the race in a wooden ark, but the safeguarding of his own soul on every side, so as to pass unharmed through the surge of life and suffer no loss of the cargo of virtue. He has become an imitator of Abraham in many other things too—in faith, gentleness, and love toward God—but especially in his flight from the world, just as that man exchanged his own land and kindred for a friend, and in taking the sacrifice of the Only-Begotten as that man's voluntary offering of his body for God's sake, having put to death the members that are upon the earth. Of Isaac, in his willing and untroubled death—except that his was not at a father's hand. For this man, acting as priest of himself everywhere in the manner of the apostles, was wholly offered in body, as far as his intention went, yet lived in spirit, and lives to God because of the pure offering of his body as of a ram.

Jacob, in supplanting the profane Esau—that is, the begetter of heresies—and in receiving the firstborn rights, the upright doctrines of the Church; and in seeing not a ladder set firm from earth to heaven, but a pillar of fire reaching to heaven, displaying somewhat more clearly the deep mystery. And further, also in that, like Jacob to his sons, when about to depart from the body, he distributed blessings to his disciples; and anyone who diligently stoops to examine these will think them to be those of that great Jacob himself. Of Joseph, especially in the chastity and purity of the body, but far more in the distribution of the word, as that one distributed grain. Of Moses, in all things or in most things similar; for he too fled the beguiling Pharaoh, and lodged in the wilderness, and saw God, as far as is attainable by contemplation, and worked wonders, and led the people, having been appointed their teacher; and he outwitted the Egyptians, plundering their wealth, taking captive and triumphing over the books of the heretics, and he divided the sea, the salt and undrinkable unbelief, and led the people across, the orthodox

And he drowned the Egyptians, the godless offspring of the heretics. And he routed Amalek (if you wish to call one of the heretics by this name); he received the law of orthodoxy from God, and shared it with us all. He beheld on the mountain the type of the tabernacle, not the one under Moses, but the one of the coming dread judgment and order. He perfected the priests, legislating concerning the priesthood. He made water gush from the rock, causing stony hearts to drip tears. He fed with bread as that one fed with heavenly bread, setting before all the words of love, by which especially every soul is established, and comes with confidence to the divine and mystical bread, which came from the bosom of the Father for our salvation. He gave quail, teaching us the faithful from below to journey heavenward by the remembrance of God, and to envision the beauties there. And simply put, with whatever words of contemplation you wish to compare the venerable glories of the Father with those of the ancients, you will find him in no way inferior.

Since Joshua the son of Nun also split the Jordan, opening the hands that had been closed to sharing their wealth and lifting them up for beneficence, and allotted to the people a land—not of the promise below, but of the heavenly kingdom. As Samuel was dedicated to God from infancy and heard the divine voice. As the great Elijah made a public example of the priests of shame and brought down a noetic fire upon the rational sacrifice, not once but many times; and on the fiery chariot of the virtues he was carried up, not as a charioteer of the ether but of heaven. As Elisha was enriched with the double grace of the Spirit; and as the prophets were often deemed worthy of divine manifestations. The account dares to compare him even with the one greater than those born of women, the mediator of the law and of grace. As the Forerunner he lodged in the wilderness; and he became a word of God to this man too, and was accounted a herald of repentance, and he taught those who came forward to confess their sins. As Paul, the vessel of election, he endured all kinds of temptations, and he did not grow slack in casting down the seeds of repentance, as that man did of faith. And why must one compare him to these in detail, when his achievements fill the whole inhabited world? But since the works are manifest, lengthy speech is superfluous; and the length of the discourse turns to the discredit of the virtues, as though they were not sufficient to reveal themselves adequately through works, but needed the assistance of words. It is good, then, as a kind of most delightful seasoning, to add to the discourse also the wondrous deed that is sung concerning his end.

For this God-bearing man, when he was about to depart for the heavenly realms, gave orders concerning those present, that it was not permitted for them to bury his body in costly clothing. And if anyone, being a lover of his father, had foreseen or prepared any such thing, he was in no way to bring the plan to fulfillment, but that very thing appointed for his burial was to be given to the poor. Accordingly, one of those standing by, and he too among the prominent, having prepared costly clothing and having resolved to bury the body of the divine elder in it, when he heard the rebuke, was grieved, and he chose instead to give the garment he had prepared to the poor, judging it more holy in his mind to give a worthy price to those in need. He, immediately struck by an evil demon, reaped the bitterest sheaves of his disobedience, tearing at himself before the bed of the holy man and frothing foam from his mouth. But the man of God, most compassionate, says to the sufferer: Since, O man, what unreasonable thing has been done to you, that it has cast you into this danger? And he, roused by the command, though his mind was darkened by the demon, spoke out the hidden thought and made his disobedience manifest.

The most compassionate elder restored to health the man who had confessed, delivering him from his suffering by the laying on of holy hands and by prayer; and then he addressed him: Fulfill your promise, O man, which you long ago purposed in your mind. Having accomplished such a wonder toward the end of his life, and having stirred up those present to zeal for virtue by many exhortations, as his final word makes clear, he breathed his last and departed into the calm harbor of the eternal kingdom, well-pleasing. And where else should one suppose that his soul came to rest, than plainly in the heavenly tabernacles, where are the orders of angels, where the choirs of prophets, where the thrones of apostles, where the joy of martyrs, where the gladness of the saints, where the splendor of teachers, where the assembly of the firstborn, and the pure sound of those celebrating there. Into those good things which angels desire to look into, into that sacred place, came the most blessed and holy soul of our blessed and renowned Father. And I think that the virtues of his life went before it in its ascent to heaven, and each one showed it those ineffable and unseen beauties; and love, perhaps the greatest of all the virtues, coming forward, spoke thus: Behold, most beloved soul, what beauty I have prepared for you beforehand; and with the word she pointed out the delight. And humility, running up, said: Consider, soul beloved of God, what a place of rest I too have prepared for you. And one by one all the virtues spoke and pointed out what recompenses, having been labored for beforehand, they had prepared for it afterward. O much-hymned and enviable departure!

O death that needs no tears! O departure that procures the longed-for union! O passing that brings no regret to the one who has passed! O burial that holds no regret! For from the very things by which we marvel at his ways, from these we receive consolation. For in the case of other men, death is known to be the cause of tears for those left behind; but in the case of the saints, it becomes the procurer of gladness and festal celebration; because such a thing is not death, but rather a departure and a passage to better things. These praises are brought to you from us, best of the Fathers and teacher of the inhabited world, with a bold tongue, as gifts unworthy of your merit—not as though you had need of them (for what renown does a word bestow when it walks behind the worth of the one praised?), but rather for the benefit of the living; because the greatest encouragement and exhortation to the many toward better things is the eulogy of good men. And many other things besides moved us to these words and made us bold. For I pass over the manifold excellences of your life and speech, proclaimed throughout the whole ordered world; but greater than these is your wondrous oversight, and the deliverance that came to your namesake, who also urged us to strip for these contests—he who, carried off as a captive by the barbarian descendants of Ishmael and separated for no small time from his native land, as he returned to his own and did not know the profitable way, obtained your paradoxical oversight, and was taught the road more suited to deliverance, and truly did not miss his aim.

Indeed, when he had come to the very extremity of dangers and was awaiting death, hemmed in on the road by barbarian insolence, so that he only remembered your name, saying, "Holy Ephraim, help me," he passed through the peril of dangers unharmed, and despised fear, and obtained salvation beyond understanding, and was restored to his homeland beyond hope, guarded by your providence. For this reason we dared to extend our remarks beyond what was said before, and we dared to touch upon his praises with unclean lips. And if we have fallen far short of what is fitting in our words, we shall inscribe you as the cause of our success, and we shall acknowledge our gratitude to you. But if our praises fall far short of his worth, then again we shall blame you as the cause of our failure, even if the word be somewhat bold. For you, wishing to flee praises, and as you were in life, so also after your departure embracing humility, hinder those who wish to praise you. Nevertheless, whether this or what came before it, we discharge our debt as far as we are able, and we believe that you will not turn away from us who are fervent lovers of fathers; but you will receive them as children's affectionate babblings to parents. And you, standing at the divine altar and serving with angels the life-giving and all-holy Trinity, remember all of us, asking for us forgiveness of sins and the enjoyment of the eternal kingdom, in Christ Jesus our Lord, to whom be glory with the Father without beginning and the divine and life-giving Spirit, now and always and unto the ages of ages. Amen.