Chapter 11

Josaphat said to him: All your words are good and wonderful, and I have believed and do believe, hating all idolatry from my heart. Even before you came to me, my soul was disposed toward it sidelong and with doubt; but now I hate it with a perfect hatred, having learned from you the emptiness of these idols and the folly of those who serve them. I long to become a servant of the true God, if only he will not push me, unworthy as I am, away because of my transgressions, but will pardon me all of them—being, as you teach, a lover of mankind and full of compassion—and count me worthy to become his servant. So I am now ready both to receive baptism and to keep everything you tell me. But what must I do after baptism? And is this alone enough for salvation—

to believe and be baptized—or must some other things be added as well? Barlaam said to him: Hear what one must do after baptism. One must abstain from all sin and every passion, and build upon the foundation of the orthodox faith the practice of the virtues, since faith without works is dead, just as works are dead without faith. For the Apostle says: Walk in the Spirit, and you will not fulfill the desire of the flesh. Now the works of the flesh are plain, and these they are: adulteries, fornications, impurities, licentiousness, idolatries, sorceries, enmities, strife, jealousies, fits of anger, factions, dissensions, heresies, envyings, murders, love of money, abuse, love of pleasure, drunkenness, revelings, arrogance, and the like; of which I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faith, gentleness, self-control, sanctification of soul and body, humility of heart and contrition, almsgiving, the bearing of no grudges, love of mankind, watchfulness, exact repentance for all former failings, the tear of compunction, mourning for one's own sins and for one's neighbor's, and the like—which, like so many steps and rungs of a ladder, holding to one another and supporting one another,

raise the soul to heaven. See, then, we have been commanded to hold fast to these after baptism, and to abstain from their opposites. But if, after receiving the knowledge of the truth, we take up again our former dead works and turn back like a dog to its own vomit, what the Lord said will befall us. For when, he says, the unclean spirit goes out of a man—that is, by the grace of baptism—it passes through waterless places seeking rest and finds none; and, unable to wander long without house or hearth, it says: I will return to my house, from which I came out. And coming, it finds it swept and adorned, but empty and unoccupied—not having received the work of grace, nor filled itself with the wealth of the virtues. Then it goes and takes with itself seven other spirits more wicked than itself; and entering, they dwell there; and the last state of that man becomes worse than the first. For baptism, burying in its water the bonds of all former sins, delivers them over to utter destruction,

and thereafter is for us a sure wall and rampart and a mighty weapon against the array of the enemy. Yet it does not take away free will, nor does it carry forgiveness of the sins committed after baptism, nor a second descent into the font. For we confess one baptism; and we must keep ourselves with all watchfulness, lest we fall into a second defilement, but lay hold of the Lord's commandments. For when he said to the Apostles, Go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, he did not stop there, but added: Teaching them to keep all that I have commanded you. And he commanded that we be poor in spirit, whom he blesses and calls worthy of the kingdom of heaven. Then he prescribes that we mourn in this present life, so that we may be counted worthy of the comfort to come; that we be gentle, and always hunger and thirst for righteousness, and be merciful and generous in giving, compassionate and full of sympathy,

pure in heart, abstaining from every defilement of flesh and spirit, peacemakers toward our neighbors and toward our own soul—that is, having subjected the worse to the better, and by right judgment having made peace in the perpetual war between them; that we endure every persecution and every affliction and reproach brought upon us for righteousness' sake, for the sake of his name, so that we may be counted worthy of eternal joy in the bright distribution of his gifts. And he likewise bids that our light so shine before men in the world that they may see, he says, your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven. For the law of Moses, given of old to the Israelites, says: You shall not kill, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal, you shall not bear false witness; but Christ says that everyone who is angry with his brother without cause shall be liable to judgment; and whoever says "You fool" shall be liable to the Gehenna of fire; and: If you bring your gift to the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar, and go first to be reconciled to your brother; and: Everyone who looks at a woman to desire her

has already committed adultery with her in his heart—calling the defilement of the soul and the consent to passion adultery. And again, while the law forbade perjury, Christ commanded not to swear at all, but only to say Yes or No. There it was an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth; but here: Whoever strikes you on the right cheek, he says, turn to him the other also; and to the one who wishes to go to law with you and take your tunic, leave him your cloak as well; and whoever compels you to go one mile, go with him two; give to the one who asks of you, and do not turn away the one who wishes to borrow from you; love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who mistreat and persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven, for he makes his sun rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the just and the unjust. Do not judge, that you be not judged; forgive, and you will be forgiven. Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal; but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in

nor steal; for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. Do not be anxious for your soul, what you will eat and what you will drink, nor for your body, what you will put on; for your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. He, then, who gave the soul and the body, will surely also give food and clothing—he who feeds the birds of heaven and adorns the lilies of the field with such beauty. But seek first, he says, the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. Do not be anxious about tomorrow; for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Whatever you wish that people should do to you, do so to them as well. Enter through the narrow gate, for wide is the gate and broad the way that leads to destruction, and many are those who go in by it; narrow and hard is the way that leads to life, and few are those who find it. Not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever does not take up his cross and follow after me is not worthy of me. See, these things and the like the Savior commanded the apostles

to teach the faithful; and all these we are bound to keep, if indeed we long to attain perfection and to be counted worthy of the incorruptible crowns of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will bestow on that day upon all who have loved his appearing. Josaphat said to the old man: Since, then, the precision of these doctrines requires this unalloyed way of life, if after baptism it happens that I fail in one or two of these commandments, shall I, by failing, miss the whole goal, and will all my hope be in vain? Barlaam said: Do not regard these matters in that way. For God the Word, who became man for the salvation of our race, knowing well the great weakness and wretchedness of our nature, did not leave us even in this respect to sicken without remedy; but, like an all-wise physician, he mixed for our slippery and sin-loving disposition the medicine of repentance, proclaiming it for the forgiveness of sins. For after we have received the knowledge of the truth and have been sanctified by water and the Spirit,

and have been cleansed of all sin and every defilement without toil, if it happens that we fall into certain trespasses of sin, there is not, through baptism, a second regeneration in the water of the font wrought by the Spirit and recasting us anew to perfection. For this gift is given once for all. But through laborious repentance and warm tears, through toils and sweat, there comes a cleansing and forgiveness of faults, by the tender mercies of our God. For the fountain of tears too has been called a baptism, by the grace of the Master—though one that requires toil and time—and it has saved many out of many faults; since there is no sin that overcomes the love of God for mankind, provided we make haste to repent and to wash away with tears the shame of our faults, and provided death does not first cast us out from this life still defiled; for in Hades there is no confession, nor repentance. But so long as we are among the living, the foundation of the orthodox faith remaining unbroken, even if something of the roof or the inner structure is loosened, it is possible to renew again by repentance what the faults have rotted. For it is impossible to number the multitude of God's compassions or to measure the greatness of his mercy; but sins and faults, whatever they may be, are subject to measure and can be counted. Our faults, then, being subject to measure and number, cannot overcome the immeasurable mercy and the

uncountable compassions of God. Therefore we have not been bidden to despair over our sins, but to recognize the goodness of God, and to condemn the sins whose forgiveness is set before us through the love of Christ for mankind, who poured out his own blood for our sins. And from many places in Scripture we are taught the power of repentance, and above all from the commands and parables of our Lord Jesus Christ. For from that time, it says, Jesus began to teach and to say: Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. And in a parable he introduces a son who, having taken his father's substance and journeyed into a far country, there squandered everything in dissolute living; then, a famine arising in that land, he went and attached himself to one of the wicked citizens of that sin-ridden country, who sent him, it says, into his fields to feed swine—so calling the harshest and most loathsome sin. After many hardships, then, and reduced to the utmost wretchedness, so that he could not even fill his own belly with the foul food of the swine, coming at last to a sense of such shame, he lamented over himself and said:

How many of my father's hired servants have bread in abundance, while I am perishing with hunger! I will arise and go to my father, and I will say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you, and I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me as one of your hired servants. And he arose and came to his father. But the father, seeing him from afar, was moved with compassion, and running to him embraced him and kissed him tenderly; and counting him worthy of his former honor, he made a joyful feast at his recovery, slaughtering the fattened calf. See, this parable he set forth for us concerning those who turn back from sins and fall down in repentance. And again he tells of a certain good shepherd who had a hundred sheep and, one of them being lost, left the ninety-nine and went out in search of the one that had strayed, until he found it; and taking it up on his shoulders, he mingled it with those that had not strayed, calling together his friends and neighbors to celebrate at its recovery. So, says the Savior, there will be joy in heaven over one sinner who repents, more than over ninety-nine righteous who have no need of repentance. Indeed, even the chief of the disciples, Peter, the rock of faith, at the very time of the Savior's passion, being for a little while abandoned by a certain providential abandonment—so that he might learn the cheapness and wretchedness of human weakness—fell into the charge of denial; then at once, remembering the Lord's words,

he went out and wept bitterly; and by those warm tears he recalled his defeat and won the victory back to the other side. For being practiced in war, even though he had fallen, he was not undone, nor did he despair of himself; but, springing up, he brought forth most bitter tears from an afflicted heart; and at once the enemy, beholding them, as though his eyes were scorched by a most violent flame, leapt away and fled far off, wailing terribly. And the chief was again the chief—appointed teacher of the world, and so likewise becoming a pattern of repentance. After the divine resurrection, Christ, addressing him three times, Peter, do you love me? set right the threefold denial, the apostle answering: Yes, Lord, you know that I love you. From all these, then, and from many other examples beyond number, we learn the power of tears and of repentance; only let its manner be worthy—let it spring from a disposition that abhors sin, hating and condemning it, and that makes use of tears, as the prophet David says:

I am weary with my groaning; every night I will wash my bed; with my tears I will drench my couch. And then the cleansing of sins will come through the blood of Christ, in the greatness of his mercy and the multitude of the compassions of God, who said: Though your sins be as scarlet, I will make them white as snow, and so on. These things, then, are so, and so we believe. But after receiving the knowledge of the truth, and being counted worthy of regeneration and adoption, and tasting the divine mysteries, we must with all our power guard ourselves against falling. For falling does not befit the athlete, since many who have fallen have not been able to rise: some, having opened a door to the passions and clung hard to them, no longer had the strength to run back to repentance; others, snatched away beforehand by death, and not having made haste to wash themselves of the defilement of sin through a change of mind, were condemned. And for this reason it is dangerous to fall into any passion whatever; but if it happens that one falls, he must spring up at once and stand again for the noble contest;

and as often as this happens, that too—the rising and standing—must follow at once, until the end. For turn back to me, and I will turn back to you, says the Lord God.