By Maximos Pafilis, Bishop of Melitene
Homily on the Gospel according to Matthew 5:14-19
In the catacombs there were no chandeliers. Only an oil lamp, thrust into a niche dug in the tufa, and faces all around smelling of damp, bread, death. That was all. And yet, no one knows how, that feeble light ascended to the surface of the empire and troubled its sleep. With torches the persecutors sought it, and did not find it, because it burned within men. Three centuries this paradox lasted, years of blood, and then indeed, beneath the sandals of the heathens, without temple, without title, within the earth the Church was established, as never since.
Afterwards, we came out of the holes. We blinked our eyes in the sun and the first thing we thought was to build radiant temples and mosaics and domes that vied with the sky, and beside them courts, dignities, protocols. We embraced tightly, naturally, almost divinely ordained, with power. She clothed us in purple, we lent her tranquillity. Like a silken blanket, heavy, the Byzantine magnificence spread over the Christian communities, while underneath the secular poisoning worked silently, without haste. And today not much has changed, rather it has worsened. In the light of day now, the lampstand that shone in the darkness steadily, began to flicker.
Immediately, of course, no one noticed it. As soon as the persecutions ended, at the point where the executioner’s knife was absent, the strifes opened, the dispute for the thrones sprouted. Schisms, ancient traits of human nature, together with the dividing of power, entered with honours through the main entrance into the body of the Church. Worldly power becomes mud, it seems, and muddies the water of faith. This remains unaltered, no one changed it, but you do not see the bottom anymore. And whoever thirsts, drinks it muddy now.
“Ye are the light of the world” (Matt. 5:14). To fishermen this word was spoken, to men who, having nowhere to lay their head, smelled of salt. Neither synod existed then nor wood-carved throne nor jewels. The weight of the phrase, however, he does not bear who has not understood that the true light is only the Son of God, while the disciples are called lampstands because they became partakers of his illumination. They became coals that were kindled by him. For this reason, as Eusebius of Caesarea wrote centuries ago, the energy of the fire is twofold, it illumines the righteous, it consumes the transgressors.[1] They are coals, therefore. Its own radiance the coal does not possess, only the receptivity of the kindling. For a little while it retains a red hue if it rolls outside the hearth, then it greys, blackens, cools. Inside the most official brazier of the ecumene it may lie, but ashes it will become.
Under the bushel, who hides the lamp today? The question offends. The bushel, you see, is not always the hand of the enemy, more often it is our own hands. A leather armchair in a luxurious office, a dignity that was loved for itself, a flawless ecclesiastical decorum beneath which truth writhes seeking air… all these can become a bushel. Truly, does anyone believe that as light the great titles, the successive forms of address, the gold-woven garments will impose him upon the conscience of the world? Before, indeed, Him who Is the light of the world? An infallible instinct the world possesses, however naive it may seem. From afar it smells the muddy water. A pure soul is needed, and two clean eyes. All the rest are superfluous…
There is, however, also the other half of the pericope. That which, because it does not possess images, we hurriedly pass by, the law. “I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil” (Matt. 5:17), and with it comes the assurance that, until heaven and earth pass, “one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass” (Matt. 5:18). One iota. A scratch of ink, the least unit of writing, and the Lord reckons it as though creation hangs upon it. Otherwise we have learned to weigh, great the suppers, small the commandments, sonorous the declarations, negligible the daily obedience. Of “least” commandments, however, Jesus speaks, and least in the kingdom shall be called whoever shall break even one and so teach men. Out of humility he calls them least, to teach modesty to us also, whereas, the “shall be called least” means last at the resurrection, rejected.[2] Always, besides, the “shall do” precedes the “shall teach”, for how am I to lead another on a road that I myself did not walk? All the severity of the Gospel hides here, silent, without cries. First you do it. You open the mouth afterwards.
Consider now him who passed his life building his personal grandeur as a “man of God”. Compliments he gathered, forms of address, photographs with the powerful. They flattered him, they censed him, that his name would supposedly remain in history. Will it indeed be preserved? Slowly the centuries grind and they ask no one. Before him will have been erased from history those who flattered him, without a trace or even a footnote. And he, a small note in the margin of some catalogue in the best case, will be a name that the scholar passes by. The painful thing, however, is not this. There begins the real tragedy, when, the oblivion of men ceasing to matter, the possibility of another oblivion opens, that Christ himself has forgotten you. That the “I know you not” (Matt. 25:12) be heard for someone who a whole life spoke in His name. Before this, child’s play seems history with its archives.
And yet, the same text that cuts, also heals. “Let your light so shine before men” (Matt. 5:16). The purpose is declared, in order that seeing the works, men may glorify the Father. Transparent is the radiance, in other words, otherwise it loses its essence, the genuine light always points beyond its bearer. As happens with the pane of glass: the cleaner it is, the less you see it. An hour will come, besides, when the sun of our planetary system, that which counts days and harvests, will cease to have a say. And man will find himself opposite the true Sun, defenceless, without signature, without curriculum vitae. It is not healed anymore, whatever he did not care for until then. With a little oil burned the lamp of the catacomb, and it was enough. Our own reserve, where is it going?
[1] Eusebius of Caesarea (Pamphili), Τὰ Εὑρισκόμενα Πάντα, in Patrologia Graeca (PG), ed. J.-P. Migne, vol. 23 (Paris: J.-P. Migne, 1857), col. 1229: «καὶ τὸ μὲν φῶς τοῖς δικαίοις ἀποχαρίζεται, ἡ δὲ καῦσις τοῖς παρανόμοις ἀφώρισται.» URL: https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Patrologiae_cursus_completus_series_grae/uFNFAAAAYAAJ?hl=el&gbpv=1
[2] Eusebius of Caesarea (Pamphili), Τὰ Εὑρισκόμενα Πάντα, in Patrologia Graeca (PG), ed. J.-P. Migne, vol. 23 (Paris: J.-P. Migne, 1857), col. 1229: «καὶ τὸ μὲν φῶς τοῖς δικαίοις ἀποχαρίζεται, ἡ δὲ καῦσις τοῖς παρανόμοις ἀφώρισται.» URL: https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Patrologiae_cursus_completus_series_grae/uFNFAAAAYAAJ?hl=el&gbpv=1
