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Already the sacred rays of Christ’s light shine forth, and the pure luminaries of the pure Spirit arise; the heavenly treasuries of glory and divinity have been opened. The great and dark night has been swallowed up, the invisible darkness has been consumed in itself, and the gloomy shadow of death has been overshadowed. Life has been spread over all things, and all things are filled with insatiable light. The risings of the suns hold sway over the whole, and the one who is before the morning star and the luminaries, immortal and manifold, great Christ blooms over all things beyond the sun. And for this reason, a long, eternal, and unquenchable bright day dwells among us, all who have believed in him: the mystical Pascha, typologically ministered through the law, but effectively fulfilled through Christ; the wondrous Pascha, a work of divine virtue and power, a marvel; truly a feast and an eternal memorial: from passion, impassibility; from death, immortality; from deadness, life; from wound, healing; from fall, resurrection; from descent, ascent. Thus God works great things, thus he creates the paradoxical from the impossible, so that it may be known that to him alone all things that he wills are possible.

Let Egypt then announce the types, and let the law interpret the images of the truth; let an angel proclaim the great advent of a great king, where the Egyptian multitude of the firstborn dies, while the mystical blood saves Israel. All these are the shadow of things to come, but in us are the forms of the images and the fulfillments of the types, and instead of the shadow, the very precision and confirmation of the truth. For this reason the law advanced in type, signifying the forms of the truth, and the type came to be, while the truth was found. There, a lamb from the flock; here, a lamb from the heavens. There, the sign of blood and the small safeguard of the whole; here, the Word and the cup full of divine blood and spirit. There, a sheep from the flock; here, the shepherd himself in place of the sheep. How then do the works not proclaim the universal salvation of all, when even the types alone are salvific? Let the heavens of heavens rejoice, as the divine Spirit cries out, recounting the glory of God, first receiving the paternal risings of the divine Spirit. Let the angels and archangels of the heavens also rejoice, and let the whole heavenly people and host celebrate, seeing the commander-in-chief of the upper army arriving bodily in the world.

Let the choruses of the stars also celebrate, announcing the one who rises before the morning star; let the air, measured in boundless depths and breadths, also celebrate; let the salty water of the sea, honored by sacred footsteps and foundations, also celebrate; let the earth, bathed in divine blood, also celebrate; let every human soul, refreshed for the new regeneration through resurrection, also celebrate. This Pascha is the common festival of all, the sending of the Father’s will to the world, the inspired rising of Christ upon the earth, the eternal feast of angels and archangels, the immortal life of the whole world, the death-dealing blow to death, the incorruptible food of humans, and the heavenly soul of all things, the sacred rite of heaven and earth, proclaiming ancient and new mysteries, seen visibly on earth, but understood in the heavens. Therefore, prostrating ourselves before those initiated with sacred knowledge into the new and old, we have briefly provided to say such is the public festival of Pascha. But in order that we may also feast in detail on the word, partaking not of earthly but of heavenly things, let us also eat the rational Pascha with spiritual desire, with which the Lord himself desired to eat with us, saying: “I have earnestly desired to eat the Pascha with you.” Come then, first taking it up briefly, let us say what law is and what the need for law is, and why law came after Egypt; second, what the Pascha is that originates from Egypt, and what the whole economy concerning Pascha is, and what the whole mystery of Pascha is and concerning the whole.

We will first set forth the Scripture itself, so that by comparison and juxtaposition we may observe each of the matters under consideration. And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, saying: This month shall be for you the beginning of months; it is the first for you among the months of the year. Speak to every assembly of the sons of Israel, saying: On the tenth of this month, let them take a sheep according to households of families, a sheep according to each house. But if there are few in the house, so that they are not sufficient for the sheep, he shall take with them his neighbor who is near him according to the number of souls; each one shall be counted as sufficient for himself for the sheep. The sheep shall be for you a perfect yearling; you shall take from the lambs and from the goats. And it shall be for you kept until the fourteenth of this month, and the whole multitude of the assembly of the sons of Israel shall slaughter it toward evening. And they shall take from the blood and place it on the two doorposts and on the lintel and in the houses in which they may eat in them. And they shall eat the flesh in that same night, roasted by fire, and they shall eat unleavened bread with bitter herbs. You shall not eat from them raw nor boiled in water, but roasted by fire, the head together with the feet and the entrails. Nothing shall be left of them until morning; and you shall not break any bone from it. And what remains until morning you shall burn in fire. And thus you shall eat it: your loins girded, and your sandals on your feet, and your staffs in your hands; and you shall eat it with haste. It is the Passover of the Lord.

And I will pass through the land of Egypt in this night and I will strike every firstborn in the land of Egypt in this night, from man to beast, and upon all the gods of the Egyptians I will execute vengeance: I am the Lord. And the blood shall be for you a sign upon the houses in which you are there; and I will see the blood and I will shelter you, and there shall be among you no plague to destroy you, when I strike in the land of Egypt. And this day shall be for you a memorial, and you shall celebrate it as a feast to the Lord for your generations; an eternal ordinance you shall celebrate it. For seven days you shall eat unleavened bread with bitter herbs. And again the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, saying: This is the law of the Passover: no foreigner shall eat of it. Every servant of someone and one bought with silver, you shall circumcise him and then he shall eat of it. A sojourner and a hired man shall not eat of it. It shall be eaten in one house; you shall not carry out of that house the meat outside. And you shall not break a bone from it. Every assembly of Israel shall do it. Every uncircumcised man shall not eat of it. There shall be one law for the native and for the proselyte who comes among you.

The divine scripture thus mystically foretold the sacred feast, and we shall now examine in detail each of the things read, searching out the hidden mysteries of the scriptures with your prayers, neither annulling the truth of what is written, nor contemplating the precision of the mysteries through the types. For the divine Spirit commands Moses to make the tabernacle "according to the pattern which I will show you," it says; thus what is seen typologically and mystically is understood according to the original and first-born pattern. Let us first say what this month is, the beginning of the months, and why this month, that of Passover, is first among the months of the year; second, what the sheep taken on the tenth of the month is, and the perfect yearling sheep, who is the neighbor and who is the one taken along nearby, why the sheep is kept until the fourteenth, then sacrificed toward evening: "and the whole multitude of the congregation of the sons of Israel will slaughter it toward evening"; what the blood on the two doorposts and on the lintel is, why they eat the meat at night, and this roasted by fire, neither raw nor boiled in water; or what "the head together with the feet and the entrails" means, and why "you will not break a bone"; and what the unleavened bread with bitter herbs is, and why "you will eat the Passover with haste.

What are the loins that are girded, and the sandals on the feet, and the staffs in the hands, and what is the "Passover of the Lord" and the "blood as a sign on the houses in which you are there, and I will see the blood and shelter you, and there will be among you no plague to destroy you when I strike in the land of Egypt"? And why "for seven days you shall eat unleavened bread"? Why the foreigner shall not eat, but the homeborn shall be circumcised? And what is "It shall be eaten in one house, and you shall not carry the meat outside, and you shall not break a bone from it. No uncircumcised person shall eat of it. Every assembly shall make it—what is the assembly? There shall be one law for the native and for the proselyte who comes; one and the same law for both." Now the types and symbols and mysteries, in Israel performed visibly, in us are accomplished spiritually. Having discussed these matters briefly, let us thus proceed to the mysteries of the truth: what is the advent of Jesus Christ after the law, and why did he come with a body? What is the Passover he desired to eat with us? And why did he who raised the dead by his word not also utterly rebuke death while alive? And why did he endure death at all, by wood? What is the crown of thorns he wore, or what the vinegar and gall he drank? And what is the opened side from which flowed blood and water? Why does he pray that the cup pass by, which he certainly came to drink? Who are the thieves crucified with him, and who is the one from both in paradise?

Why is the Spirit deposited in the hands of the Father, but the body in the new tomb? What was to be "in paradise" and happening "today"? What is the three-day period during which he remained under the earth? And why do women first see him, and he, announcing the good news, says, "Women, rejoice"? These are the delicacies of our sacred feast, this is the spiritual table, this is the immortal food and delight. Having partaken of the bread from the heavens and drunk the cup of gladness, that which is boiling and fiery, blood indeed stamped from above with warm spirit, and having taken up the word, let us first say what law is and what the economy of law is; for thus we shall know by comparison what word is and what the freedom of word is. Law is the collection of various and necessary doctrines through Moses, a common benefit of all the good things in life, a mystical imitation of the polity in heaven, the honors of the lamps and lampstands and fire and lights of the above torch-bearing.

The Law through Moses is the prefiguration of piety, the ordinance of orderly polity, the prevention of the first sin, the enigma of the future truth. The Law through Moses is the chastisement of Egyptian error, inscribed by the finger of God, for otherwise the high arm was reserved. The Law through Moses is the founder of piety, the guide of justice, the illumination of the blind, the refutation of the foolish, the pedagogue of infants, the bond of the ungrateful, the bridle of the stiff-necked, and the yoke of necessity for those who bear a different yoke. The Law through Moses is the angel of Christ, the forerunner of Jesus, the herald and prophet of the great king, a wise training ground, a necessary exercise, a cosmic school, a provisional decree, a passing mystery. The Law through Moses is the symbolic and enigmatic epitome of the future grace, announcing through images the perfection of the future truth, through the sacrifices the victim, through the blood the blood, through the lamb the lamb, through the dove the dove, through the altars the high priest, through the temple the dwelling of the divinity, through the fire on the altar the light of the whole world from above. So the Law is here mystically predetermined for us; but after Egypt, the Law necessarily comes, cutting out the invisible evil shoots of a soul raging with matter and an Egyptianizing heart, like a plow cutting the dense and thick thorns of thoughts within, plowing and splitting the depths of the soul in furrows, preparing and renewing the soul for the reception of the heavenly divine word and seed; hence the divine Spirit rightly cries: "Plow new fields for yourselves and do not sow among thorns.

For this reason, the Passover also begins mystically first from Egypt: the first excision of dark idolatry, the mystical severance of godless idol-mania, and the nocturnal and just plague upon the firstborn seeds of error. Thus Egypt admittedly suffered the plague of the firstborn, and every earlier-born people perished, so that the stiff-necked Pharaoh, not having been taught by the first plagues, might be slowly educated even thus, while Israel might be paradoxically saved in these events, and God be glorified in all. For Egypt, the suffering was in a plague; for Israel, the Passover was in a feast, which is why it is called the feast of the Passover of the Lord. There are many other mysteries of the future philanthropy of God, for the entire discourse on these matters holds here: Egypt is the image of the vast and dark, deep error, for from there come the first streams of deceit—calves, fish, birds, beasts, and all such animals being deified and theologized. But when the just wrath from the heavens is revealed and the great anger spreads over the whole earth, then first the superstitious and idol-maniacal error will be struck down. "For among all the gods of the Egyptians," it says, "I will execute vengeance; I am the Lord." And the plague falls upon all the firstborn, because they claimed for themselves the primacy of the ages, having held everything older, along with the servitudes of idolatry. The plague is dark and by night, for the judgments of dark works and demons are dark, gloomy, unsmiling, lightless, and savage. "For I will give," it says, "portents in the sky and on the earth: blood, fire, vapor.

The sun will be turned into darkness and the moon into blood before the great and manifest day of the Lord comes," and: "Woe, he says, to those who desire the day of the Lord! Why do you want this day of the Lord? It too is darkness and not light. For just as a man might flee from the face of a lion and a bear meet him, and he enter into the house and rest his hands against the wall and a snake bite him—is not the day of the Lord darkness and not light, and gloom, and there is no brightness in it?" And "blood for a sign" is the blood-filled mystery of the seal of Christ; but a "sign" is not yet the truth itself, but the sign of a truth to come is a sign; for all who have the sign through blood stamped and at the same time anointed upon their souls as upon their houses, all these the destroying plague will pass by: "For in whatever houses, he says, the blood is seen, I will cover you, and there will be no plague among you to destroy, when I strike in the land of Egypt.

Now the "blood as a sign" is a protective charm; and the "in the houses" is as in the souls, for this is the sacred dwelling-place of the divine Spirit that comes from faith; and the "I will shelter you" refers to the outstretchings of the hands of Jesus, which shelter the believers, insatiable coverings. Now the cosmic and universal mystery of the Passover is of this sort; but listen also to how it is possible for us, as we narrate the divine rite in detail. For the truth of these matters, God and the Word who adorned the sacred Passover in himself and through himself know; but let pardon be granted to us as humans, beloved, if we truly go astray. Let us speak, then, taking it up from the beginning: first, what this month is, the beginning of months, and why the month of the Passover is first among the months of the year. Now the secret tradition of the Hebrews says that this is the time in which the craftsman and creator God of all things created the universe, and that this is the first flower of creation, the beauty of the world, when the creator saw the all-skillful statue moving harmoniously according to his own mind.

They infer it from the good order of the heavens and the mild temperance of the seasons and the lawful courses of the sun and the unwaning risings of the light, and indeed also from the bursting forth of fruits and the eager shoots of plants and the fair-blooming upgrowths of trees and the births of flocks now giving birth, when all the earth is already green with grass, and trees, growing after them, are swelling with flowers as they travail toward the bursting forth of fruits, when the farmer, having loosed the yoke-pair from the plough, has given rest to the lowing team and, casting the divine seeds upon the earth, awaits the heavenly springs from above, when the shepherd already milks white milk from the flocks and the bee-keepers make the sweet monthly wax-drops, when the sailor, now made glad, takes courage against the sea and with gain-loving skills dares the gray-blue wave—that this good order of all things and the fair arrangement of the universe and, as one might say, this good fortune is the first firstfruit, and the beginning of the year is the sweet pleasure of spring. But I do not disbelieve even these arguments, and I think—what I have in fact more firmly believed—that because of the spiritual feast of the Pascha this month of the Pascha, in which this great mystery is accomplished and sanctified, has been regarded as the beginning and head and first leadership of all time and age, so that just as the Lord of all things, both intelligible and invisible, is the first-begotten and firstborn from the beginning, so also this month, honored by the sacred rite, has become the first of the year and the beginning of every age. And this is the year of which the divine Scripture cries out: "To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord." The sacred victim is a sheep.

For he himself," it says, "was led as a sheep to the slaughter and as a lamb before its shearer, voiceless," and John says: "Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world." The sheep is perfect and a year old: perfect as from the heavens, a year old as on earth; for a year is a measure of time on earth, taking hold of itself and revolving back into itself, and by its circuit imitating the boundless age. It is taken on the tenth of the month, and very symbolically; for the interval is a law of the Gospel, and the most preeminent doctrine of the law is the Decalogue, and after the ten commandments of the law, then the mystical sheep from the heavens comes. It is kept for the intervening days, hinting by the Scripture in the middle of the time until the passion in the bodily sojourn of the Passover, and the conception which, having been conceived in the high priest's chambers, was kept. The one who takes the sheep is the neighbor, I am the neighbor; for by you, O Israel, the sheep was not received. Then the sheep is sacrificed toward evening; for at the setting of the sun also the sacred lamb of God

He is murdered. But the whole multitude of the congregation of the sons of Israel will slaughter it; for unbelieving Israel has become guilty of that precious blood—the one slaying long ago, the other disbelieving until now. Therefore the divine Spirit testifies against them and cries out, saying: "Your hands are full of blood." And the blood is on the doorpost, as on the church, and on the two side posts, as on the two peoples. For the Savior does not refuse being sent to you first, O Israel: "For I was not sent," he says, "to you, but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel." But I, like a little dog, was sitting at a foreign table, not yet able to eat the bread, but gathering up the crumbs that fell, a parasite on another's food. But since you did not recognize the manna from the heavens, the bread has been transferred to me through faith, and I who was a dog am now becoming a son [...]. And in the night the flesh is eaten; for the light of the world set upon the great body of Christ: "Take, eat, this is my body." And the flesh is roasted with fire; for the rational body of Christ is fiery: "I came to cast fire upon the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled!" The flesh is not raw, so that the word may be easily worked, well-seasoned, and readily received; nor boiled in water, so that the word may not be watery or diluted or slack. The head with the feet and the entrails, [...] as the invisible counsel, the feet as man. The head with the feet and the entrails—beginning and middle and end—holding all things together and binding and gluing them in himself with indissoluble bonds, having truly become "a mediator between God and men.

The head with the feet and the inner parts: God, Word, and man on earth. The head with the feet and the inner parts: in height and depth and breadth ** and the roots of the earth. The head with the feet and the inner parts: law and word and apostles—law as the beginning, word as the counsel, and apostles as the feet: "How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news of good things." But you shall not break a bone of him, so that the resurrection with the body may be known; for he says, "Put your fingers into the marks of the nails, that you may know that a spirit does not have flesh and bones." You shall eat unleavened bread with bitter herbs; for your mysteries are bitter, or the works of bitter things: "Your land is desolate, your cities are burned with fire, strangers devour your country before you, and it is laid waste, overthrown by foreign peoples." Eat the Passover with haste; for everyone who is about to approach the great body must be awake and sober. Your loins girded: let the springs loosened through generation cease—the entanglements of the flesh and filthy pleasures. Your sandals on your feet: let your steps be upright, supports without lameness; for they are the roots of truth. Your sandals on your feet, which Moses loosed and Jesus put on; for he says, "Loose the sandal from your feet," that the passing nature of the law may be shown; "whose sandal-strap I am not worthy to loose," that the wholly bound-together nature of the Word may be made known.

Your staffs in your hands, the signs of divine power, the supports of rational strength: the staff through Moses, the staff through Aaron, the staff of almond wood, the staff that cut through the depths of the sea, the staff that sweetened the bitterness of springs, the staff upon which the seven holy spirits of God rested: "a spirit of wisdom and understanding, a spirit of counsel and strength, a spirit of knowledge and piety, a spirit of fear of God will fill him." But the Passover is the Lord's Passover. What did the Spirit cry out more clearly than this, that the Passover is not a type, not a history, not a shadow, but truly the Lord's Passover? And the blood is for a sign, and a sign of the truth to come, the prototype of the true Spirit, the imitation of the great anointing. And I will see the blood and I will cover you. You truly covered us, Jesus, from great destruction, and you stretched out the Father's hands, you hid us within your Father's wings, you poured out divine blood upon the earth by your bloody and philanthropic labors, and you removed from us the threats of wrath, and you restored to us from above the former reconciliations. Let those, then, eat unleavened bread for seven days, meditating on the sevenfold circuit of the world and eating the lawful food upon the earth. But "Christ our Passover has been sacrificed," and we have received the new lump of his sacred mixture, all of us leavened by a mightier power and kneaded together by his Spirit.

For I, having leavened the kingdom of heaven itself with the mixed leaven, in proportion to three measures of fine flour. Therefore from this Passover the foreigner shall not eat, for I do not cast pearls before swine, I do not give what is holy to the dogs; but the one who has long been enslaved in sins shall have his heart circumcised, and having been released from bitter slavery, thus with nobility he will approach the mystery, and then with freedom he will eat the Passover freely; for "Christ has redeemed us from" slavery and "from the curse, having become a curse for us." In one house it shall be eaten, and you shall not carry the meat outside, for the assembly is one and the house is one, that is, the one church, in which the sacred body of Christ is eaten, and therefore outside the one house—the church—the meat shall not be cast out, but the one who eats elsewhere shall be punished as impious and a thief. There shall be one law for the free man and the proselyte; where Christ is, there is freedom, equality of speech for all, equality under law, equality of honor; all were bought with precious blood. Therefore "you are no longer a slave," no longer a Jew, but free; for we have all become free in Christ. Hear, then, hear, after the types and the legal dispensation, who and how great is the visitation of Christ on earth after the law. What is the visitation of Christ? Escape from slavery, release from ancient compulsion, the beginning of freedom, the honor of adoption, the fountain of the forgiveness of sins, truly immortal life in all things.

Seeing us from above tyrannized by death and at once loosed and bound by the bonds of corruption, flowing along the necessary and irreversible road, he came and took ** of the first-formed creature in the Father's counsels, and did not entrust the ministry on our behalf to angels or archangels, but the Word himself undertook the whole contest on our behalf, obeying the Father's commandments. But since the undiluted divine Spirit was wholly unapproachable, lest all things suffer together with the unmixed injections of the Spirit, he of his own will contracted himself within himself and gathered and collected the whole magnitude of his divinity into himself, and came as great as he willed, neither diminished in himself nor lessened nor spent in glory; but by the abundance of the Father's power he did not lose what he had, and receiving what he did not have, he came as great as he was about to be contained. And since it was necessary that there also be a vessel of the divine Spirit, so that the first of human nature and substance might partake ** having filtered and numbered together, boiling off and separating out whatever was excessive and turbid, and illuminating and flashing around and shining around and firing and adorning and making virginal whatever was pure and clear and unmixed, and, so to speak, making it radiant, into the human

He was formed bodily into an image, having his rising in the spirit but taking on bodily shape. Therefore the Scripture also marked him most mystically; for it says, "Behold, a man, the East is his name"—East as in the spirit, man as in the body: "For the Spirit of the Lord shall come upon you, and the power of the Most High shall overshadow you; therefore also the holy thing that is born shall be called the Son of the Most High." And since the generation is beyond expectation and divine, rightly also the Spirit marveled, saying, "Who shall declare his generation?" And since there are four sovereign names of the Godhead, through which the divine Spirit is especially believed—lordship and godhead, sonship and eternal kingship—see that he was honored to receive not only these excellences and glories. And first, indeed, see his Lord. "The Lord said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand." You see his things from the Lord to the Lord; see also his Son: "He shall call upon me as Father, and I will make him firstborn," and: "You are my Son, today I have begotten you; ask of me and I will give you the nations as your inheritance." You see his Son, both firstborn and only-begotten; see also his God: "Lofty men shall pass over to you and shall pray in you and shall worship in you and shall follow bound in fetters, for you are God, because God is in you." You have seen his God; see also his eternal King: "Your throne, O God, is forever and ever; a rod of uprightness is the rod of your kingdom; you loved righteousness and hated lawlessness.

Therefore God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness beyond your companions. You have seen his king; see with the king also the Lord of hosts: "Lift up your gates, you rulers, and be lifted up, you everlasting gates, and the King of glory shall enter. Who is this King of glory? The Lord of hosts, he is the King of glory." You see with the king also the Lord of hosts; see from his abundance also the eternal high priest: "The Lord has sworn and will not repent: you are a priest forever." But if he is Lord and God and Son and King and Lord of hosts and eternal high priest, when he wills, "he is also man, and who will know him?" And the "also man" clearly means that he is also God, existing beforehand. And so that he may not be thought, according to the opinions of men, to have come to the earth as a self-made phantom or spirit without generation, hear also of his becoming a child: "Hear now, house of David: is it a small thing for you to give men trouble, and how do you give the Lord trouble? The Lord himself will give you a sign: behold, the virgin shall conceive in the womb and bear a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel," and: "I would that they had been burned with fire; for a child has been born to us, whose government is upon his shoulder, and his name is called Angel of great counsel, wonderful counselor, God of power, ruler of peace, father of the age to come." So then this great Jesus, God and man, has come to us—let no one disbelieve it—and a governing spirit has been contained by a human body.

For Adam too, while he was still earth and clay, received the first mystical breath of the Father; for the divine Spirit is not harmed by being joined to the body by the will of God. And if the first dust received the holy Spirit, a body ensouled received the immortal life of Christ. If then only the Spirit had come upon sin and what was enslaved to death, the great coming of the body would thus have been superfluous, since neither sin nor death would have been conquered; but it was necessary both that sin be destroyed and that the body be set free. And for this reason "he himself committed no sin, nor was deceit found in his mouth." He himself therefore put on that first poor and dead body, and for this reason the Spirit cries out concerning him: "He has no form nor glory, and we saw him, and he had no form nor beauty, but his form was dishonored, failing among the sons of men," for "in the likeness of sinful flesh, apart from sin, he condemned sin," showing that "those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick." He healed therefore also all our bodies of their sicknesses, and healed the particular diseases by the authority of his power, that it might be fulfilled: "I am the Lord God; I have called you in righteousness, I will hold your right hand and strengthen you; I have given you as a covenant of my people, as a light of the nations, to open the eyes of the blind, to bring out from bonds those who are bound and from the house of prison those who sit in darkness.

I am the Lord God; this is my name. Hear, you deaf, the words of the book, and to those who sit in darkness light has risen. Then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the stammerers shall be clear. But when the things of wickedness are taken away one by one, the last enemy, death, is destroyed in victory. Where is your sting, O death? This was the Passover that Jesus desired to suffer for us: by suffering he freed us from suffering, and by death he conquered death, and through the visible food he supplied his immortal life. This is the saving desire of Jesus, this is the most spiritual love: to show the types as types, and to give his sacred body to his disciples in return: Take, eat, this is my body; take, drink, this is my blood, the new covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. For this reason he does not desire to eat so much as he desires to suffer, so that he might free us from the suffering that comes through eating. And for this reason, having rooted wood against wood, and having piously nailed his own undefiled hand in place of the hand that was once wickedly and impiously stretched out, he showed that the whole of life truly hangs in him. You, O Israel, were not able to eat, but we have eaten with unbroken spiritual knowledge, and having eaten we do not die. This is the plant for my eternal salvation; by this I am nourished, with this I feast.

In its roots I am rooted, in its branches I am stretched out, in its dew I am made bright, by its spirit, as by a wind, I am tended and take delight. Under its shadow I have dwelt, and escaping the great heat I have a dewy resting place. With its flowers I bloom, with its fruits I rejoice perfectly, and the fruits kept for me from the beginning I gather without hindrance. This is food for me when I hunger, and a spring when I thirst, and a covering when I am stripped bare; its leaves too are a spirit of life to me, no longer leaves of a fig tree. This is a safeguard for me when I fear God, and a support when I am shaken, and a prize when I contend, and a trophy when I have conquered. This is the narrow path for me, this the pressed road. This is Jacob's ladder and the journey of the angels, at whose top the Lord has truly been set. This is a tree reaching to heaven, which rose from earth to the heavens, an immortal plant, establishing itself in the midst of heaven and earth, the seat of all things, the support of the universe, the stay of the whole inhabited world, a cosmic interweaving, holding together the varied human substance, compacted by the invisible nails of the Spirit, so that, joined to the divine, it might no longer be dissolved. Touching the heights of the heavens with its topmost points, supporting the earth with its feet, and encompassing from every side with immeasurable hands the great and middle spirit of the air, it was wholly in all things and everywhere. And having filled the whole by itself, it stripped and did battle naked against the aerial principalities. And for a little while it cries out that the cup pass by, to show truly that he was "also a man"; but remembering for what he was sent, to fulfill the economy

Desiring that for which he was sent, he cries out again: "Not my will, but your will." "For the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak." As one running the contest for the soul and winning the victory, he first crowned his sacred head with thorns, taking away the whole ancient curse of the earth and again taming for the divine head the thorny growth that had multiplied because of sin. And drinking the bitter and sharp gall of the serpent, he poured out for us in return all the sweet springs that flow from him. For desiring to undo the work of the woman and to check the death-bringing flow that once streamed from the side, he now sharpened his sacred side within himself, from which flowed the sacred blood and water, the perfect signs of the spiritual marriages—the mystical ones—and of adoption and regeneration. "For he himself will baptize you in the Holy Spirit and fire," the water as "in the Spirit," and the blood as "in fire." Then two robbers are stretched out with him, bearing in themselves the signs of two peoples, of whom the one, from a change of heart, is well-disposed and confesses with confession and is pious toward the Lord, while the other is moved, being stiff-necked, and is ungrateful toward the Lord and does not act piously, and lingers among his old sins. Or else these two are thoughts of the soul, of which the one is changed from its old sins and strips itself for the Lord, and therefore is deemed worthy of the lovingkindness and honor that come from repentance, while the other is without excuse, because it is unchangeable and remains a robber to the end.

When the worldly contest had reached its end and he had struggled through everything from every side and won, neither exalted as God nor defeated as man, he remained rooted in the midst of all things, leading forth and triumphing in himself as a victory trophy against the enemy. Then the whole universe was astonished at his enduring patience; then the heavens were shaken, the principalities were moved, the supercosmic thrones and laws, seeing the commander-in-chief of the great power hanging, and the stars of heaven would almost have fallen, seeing him who was before the morning star stretched out, and the fire of the sun was nearly extinguished, seeing the great light of the world dimmed; then the rocks of the earth were split, crying out the ignorance of Israel: You did not know the spiritual rock, from which, following, you drank; and the veil of the temple was torn, suffering with him and revealing the truly heavenly high priest, and the whole world would almost have been confounded and dissolved in the fear of the passion, had not the great Jesus breathed forth the divine Spirit, saying: "Father, I commit my spirit into your hands." For while all things were being shaken and quaking with fear, and all things were being moved, when the divine Spirit went up again, the whole, in a manner, was cooled and given life and established, and stood firm again.

O the divine extension in all things and everywhere, O the crucifixion spread through all things. O only one truly wholly whole through all things, let the heavens have your spirit, and paradise your soul—for he says, "Today I will be with you in paradise"—and the earth your body. The indivisible has been divided, so that all things might be saved, so that not even the lower place might be uninitiated into the divine visitation. "We did not see his form, but we heard his voice." He loosed the bonds of death even during his life, exercising royal authority, as when he said, "Lazarus, come out," and, "Child, arise," so that his power to command might be made clear. Therefore he also gave his whole self freely to death, so that the insatiable beast and the insatiable bond might be wholly put to death in himself. With his sinless body he sought his own nourishment everywhere—nowhere pleasure, nowhere anger, nowhere disobedience, nowhere at all the old sin, the first nourishment of death; for he says, "The sting of death is sin." But since he found nothing in himself that nourishes death, having been wholly enclosed in himself and dissolved by lack of nourishment, he became death to himself. And as many of the righteous also, announcing good news and prophesying and ** the firstborn from the dead in the resurrection, he also endured the three-day stay beneath the earth, so that he might save the whole and entire race of men—those before the law, those under the law, those through himself. Perhaps also so that he might raise up the whole living creature—soul and spirit and body—for this reason he also spends three days.

The women are the first to see him risen; for just as a woman was first to bring sin into the world, so she is also first to announce life to the world. Therefore they also hear the sacred voice: "Women, rejoice," so that the first grief might be swallowed up by the joy of the resurrection. Having remained a little while and confirmed his sacred resurrection, he gives even to the unbelieving as proof of the resurrection, so that his resurrection from the dead might be believed to have happened with a body. And when, bearing the whole image in himself, he had put it on, and having taken up the old man again, he transferred him into the heavenly man, then the image, commingled, also ascended together with him into the heavens. And the powers, seeing the great mystery—man now ascending together with God—cried out with joy, urging on the hosts above: "Lift up your gates, O rulers, and be lifted up, you everlasting gates, and the King of glory shall enter in." But they, seeing the strange wonder—man commingled with God—cry back and say: "Who is this King of glory?" And they, being asked again, answered: "The Lord of hosts, he is the King of glory, strong and mighty and powerful in war." O the mystical provision, O the spiritual feast. O the divine Pascha that journeyed from heaven to earth and from earth again ascends to the heavens.

O common festival of all things, cosmic celebration, O joy and honor and nourishment and delight of the universe, through which dark death was destroyed, and life was spread out over all things, and the gates of heaven were opened, and God appeared as man and man ascended as God, through whom the gates of Hades were broken and its adamantine bars were loosed, and the people below arose from the dead proclaiming the good news, while to the fullnesses above a choir was given back from the earth. O divine Pascha, which joined God from the heavens, not in a narrowing, and now spiritually, through which the great bridal chamber was filled, and all wear the bridal garments, and no one is cast out as not having the wedding garment. O Pascha, the illumination of a new lamp-bearing, the adornment of a virginal torch-procession, through which the lamps of souls are no longer extinguished, since the fire is torch-borne in all things divinely and spiritually, supplied to body and spirit, and with the oil of Christ. And we beseech you, O God, spiritual and eternal Master and King Christ, stretch out your great hands over your holy Church

And upon your holy people always, guarding, preserving, warring on their behalf, marching out with them, contending with them, subjecting all their enemies, conquering even those who oppose them by invisible power—as you also conquered our enemies—raise up even now yourself the trophies won on our behalf, and grant us also to sing with Moses the song of victory, for yours is the glory and the might unto the ages of ages. Amen.