Chapter 47
Good Monday Morning to this new week 47/2023
Your accumulated offences do not surpass the multitude of God’s mercies: your wounds do not surpass the great Physician’s skill.
Hesychius lived during the fourth and fifth centuries and was a priest and a monk. He also wrote about many different things in the Church. He wrote on the Church’s history and about the problems of his day (including the Nestorian and Arian heresies). He wrote commentaries on some of the books of the Bible, meditations on the prophets. It is said that Hesychius was known to deliver Easter homilies in the basilica in Jerusalem, which is thought to be the place where Jesus was crucified. Hesychius died in 450.
The crises that the Church faces today may seem minor when compared with the threat posed by the Arian heresy, which denied the divinity of Christ and almost overcame Christianity in the fourth century. Raised in Jerusalem and well-educated, especially in the Scriptures, he was ordained a priest by the bishop of Jerusalem and given the task during Lent of catechizing those preparing for Baptism and catechizing the newly baptized during the Easter season. His Catecheses remain valuable as examples of the ritual and theology of the Church in the mid-fourth century.
A few more quotes by Hesychius of Jerusalem;
For the kingdom of heaven is not the reward of our work, but it is a gift of grace from our Lord, prepared for His faithful servants.
The wider our contemplation of creation, the grander is our conception of God.
In regard to the divine and holy mysteries of the faith, not the least part may be handed on without the Holy Scriptures. Do not be led astray by winning words and clever arguments. Even to me, who tell you these things, do not give ready belief, unless you receive from the Holy Scriptures the proof of the things which I announce. The salvation in which we believe is not proved from clever reasoning, but from the Holy Scriptures.
Drink from your own cistern, and make use of your own resources. You are not merely watering the earth but enlightening human souls.
Come hither, eat your bread with joy, that is the mystical bread.
In the person of Christ a man has not become God; God has become man.
In regard to the divine and holy mysteries of the faith, not the least part may be handed on without the Holy Scriptures. Do not be led astray by winning words and clever arguments. Even to me, who tell you these things, do not give ready belief, unless you receive from the Holy Scriptures the proof of the things which I announce. The salvation in which we believe is not proved from clever reasoning, but from the Holy Scriptures.
About the end of 350 A.D he succeeded Maximus as Bishop of Jerusalem, but was exiled on more than one occasion due to the enmity of Acacius of Caesarea, and the policies of various emperors. Cyril’s writings are filled with the loving and forgiving nature of God, which was somewhat uncommon during his time period. Cyril fills his writings with great lines of the healing power of forgiveness, such as “The Spirit comes gently and makes Himself known by his fragrance. He is not felt as a burden, for God is light, very light.”
Let us then, my brethren, endure in hope. Let us devote ourselves, side-by-side with our hoping, so that the God of all the universe, as he beholds our intention, may cleanse us from all sins, fill us with high hopes from what we have in hand, and grant us the change of heart that saves. God has called you, and you have your calling.
Wishing you a good start to the week, drawing inspiration from a bygone era that mirrors our current times—navigating conflicts and grappling with the challenges faced by the church and faith.
Philemon