FROM THE SECOND HOMILY AGAINST PURGATORIAL FIRE81
3. We affirm that neither the righteous have as yet received the fullness of their lot and that blessed condition for which they have prepared themselves here through works, nor have sinners, after death, been led away into the eternal punishment in which they shall be tormented eternally. Rather, both the one and the other must necessarily take place after the Judgment of that last day and the resurrection of all. Now, however, both the one and the other are in places proper to them: the first, in absolute repose and free, are in heaven with the angels and before God Himself, and already as if in the paradise from which Adam fell (into which the good thief entered before others) and often visit us in those temples where they are venerated, and hear those who call on them and pray for them to God, having received from Him this surpassing gift, and through their relics perform miracles, and take delight in the vision of God and the illumination sent from Him more perfectly and purely than before, when they were alive; while the second, in their turn, being confined in hell, remain in the lowest pit, in darkness and in the shadow of death (Ps. 87:7), as David says, and then Job: to the land where light is as darkness (Job 10:21-22). And the first remain in every joy and rejoicing, already expecting and only not having in their hands the Kingdom and the unutterable good things promised them; and the second, on the contrary, remain in all confinement and inconsolable suffering, like condemned men awaiting the Judge’s sentence and foreseeing those torments. Neither have the first yet received the inheritance of the Kingdom and those good things which eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man (I Cor. 2:9); nor have the second yet been given over to eternal torments nor to burning in the unquenchable fire. And this teaching we have as handed down from our Fathers in antiquity, and we can easily present it from the Divine Scriptures themselves.
10. That which certain of the saints have seen in vision and revelation regarding the future torment of the impious and sinners who are in it are certain images of future things and as it were depictions, and not what is already in fact happening now. Thus, for example, Daniel, describing that future Judgment, says: As I looked, thrones were placed and one that was ancient of days took his seat... and the books were opened (Daniel 7:9-10), whereas it is clear that this in very fact has not taken place, but was revealed in the spirit beforehand to the Prophet.
19. When we examine the testimonies which you have cited from the book of Maccabees and the Gospel, speaking simply with love for the truth, we see that they do not at all contain any testimony of some kind of punishment or cleansing, but speak only of the remission of sins. You have made a certain astonishing division, saying that every sin must be understood under two aspects: (1) the offense itself which is made to God, and (2) the punishment which follows it. Of these two aspects (you teach), the offense to God, indeed, can be remitted after repentance and turning away from evil, but the liability to punishment must exist in every case; so that, on the basis of this idea, it is essential that those released from sins should all the same be subject to punishment for them.
But we allow ourselves to say that such a stating of the question contradicts clear and commonly known truths: if we do not see that a king, after he has granted an amnesty and pardon, subjects the guilty to yet more punishment, then all the more God, among Whose many characteristics love of mankind is an especially outstanding one, even though He does punish a man after a sin which he has committed, still, after He has forgiven him He immediately delivers him from punishment also. And this is natural. For if the offense to God leads to punishment, then when the guilt is forgiven and reconciliation has occurred, the very consequence of the guilt — the punishment — of necessity comes to an end.
APPENDIX II
Recent Discussion
SOME RECENT ORTHODOX RESPONSES TO THE CURRENT DISCUSSION ON LIFE AFTER DEATH
The Mystery of Death and the Beyond 82
By Father Ambroise Fontrier Dean of French Orthodox Parishes of the Russian Church Outside of Russia
Radio, television, periodicals, and a book have been speaking lately (in France) about death and the beyond. Even a Greek periodical appearing in French, and supposedly Orthodox, has taken part in this chorus, publishing an article entitled: “Tell me why ... no one has ever returned!” And the author concludes: “No human knowledge can give a certain answer to this mystery of the beyond: only faith dissipates the shadows a little....” In passing, he tips his hat to the Lord, Whom he calls “the qualified ferryman ...,” a ferryman who strangely recalls Charon, the pilot of hades in Greek mythology, who conducted the souls of the dead over the river Styx in his boat for the price of an obolus.
If the author of the article in question only had the text of the Orthodox funeral service, or the services for the dead on Saturdays; if he had read the Lives of the Saints or of the Fathers of the desert — he would have been able to “give an answer to this mystery of the beyond” and edify his readers. But our “Orthodox” ecumenists and modernists, owing to their flirtation with this world for which Christ the Saviour did not wish to pray, have become the salt which has lost its savor and which is good for nothing but to be trampled underfoot, according to the infallible word of the Lord.
In order to “dissipate a little the shadows” of the editor of the Greek periodical and edify at the same time our faithful and our readers, we give here three texts on the mystery of death and the beyond.
Tr. note: The first two texts are from St. Dionysius the Areopagite and from the life of an Athonite monk, showing how an Orthodox Christian prepares for death and the separation of the soul from the body. The third text, from the life of the late Greek iconographer, Photios Kontoglou (reposed in 1965) is translated below in full. (For his biography, see The Orthodox Word, Sept.-Oct., 1966).
The Great Wager Between Believers and Unbelievers
By Photios Kontoglou83
On Pascha Monday, in the evening after midnight, before lying down to sleep I went out into the little garden behind my house. The sky was dark and covered with stars. I seemed to see it for the first time, and a distant psalmody seemed to descend from it. My lips murmured, very softly: “Exalt ye the Lord our God, and worship the footstool of His feet.” A holy man once told me that during these hours the heavens are opened. The air exhaled a fragrance of the flowers and herbs I had planted. “Heaven and earth are filled with the glory of the Lord.”
I could well have remained there alone until break of day. I was as if without a body and without any bond to the earth. But fearing that my absence would disturb those with me in the house, I returned and lay down.
Sleep had not really taken possession of me; I do not know whether I was awake or asleep, when suddenly a strange man rose up before me. He was as pale as a dead man. His eyes were as if open, and he looked at me in terror. His face was like a mask, like a mummy’s. His glistening, dark yellow skin was stretched tight over his dead man’s head with all its cavities. He was as if panting. In one hand he held some kind of bizarre object which I could not make out; the other hand was clutching his breast as if he were suffering.
81
It is related in the Life of St. Proclus (Nov. 20) that when St. Chrysostom was working on his commentaries on St. Paul’s epistles, St. Proclus saw St. Paul himself bending over St. Chrysostom and whispering into his ear.
82
Translated from the author’s periodical