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Translated by Ch. Browne and J. Swallow.
Gregory Theologian Bilingual Anthology, Resources Online and in Print
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21 Pages
Page 6
10. But why should I paint for you the portrait of the man? St. Paul [3291] has sketched him by anticipation. This he does, when he sings the praises of the great High-priest, who hath passed through the heavens [3292] (for I will venture to say even this, since Scripture [3293] can call those who live according to Christ by the name of Christs): [3294] and again when by the rules in his letter to Timothy, [3295] he gives a model for future Bishops: for if you will apply the law as a test to him who deserves these praises, you will clearly perceive his perfect exactness. Come then to aid me in my panegyric; for I am labouring heavily in my speech, and though I desire to pass by point after point, they seize upon me one after another, and I can find no surpassing excellence in a form which is in all respects well proportioned and beautiful; for each as it occurs to me seems fairer than the rest and so takes by storm my speech. Come then I pray, you who have been his admirers and witnesses, divide among yourselves his excellences, contend bravely with one another, men and women alike, young men and maidens, old men and children, priests and people, solitaries and cenobites, [3296] men of simple or of exact life, contemplatives or practically minded. Let one praise him in his fastings and prayers as if he had been disembodied and immaterial, another his unweariedness and zeal for vigils and psalmody, another his patronage of the needy, another his dauntlessness towards the powerful, or his condescension to the lowly. Let the virgins celebrate the friend of the Bridegroom; [3297] those under the yoke [3298] their restrainer, hermits him who lent wings to their course, cenobites their lawgiver, simple folk their guide, contemplatives the divine, the joyous their bridle, the unfortunate their consolation, the hoary-headed their staff, youths their instructor, the poor their resource, the wealthy their steward. Even the widows will, methinks, praise their protector, even the orphans their father, even the poor their benefactor, strangers their entertainer, brethren the man of brotherly love, the sick their physician, in whatever sickness or treatment you will, the healthy the guard of health, yea all men him who made himself all things to all men that he might gain almost, if not quite, all.
[3291] St. Paul. To whom here the Ep. to the Hebrews is assigned.
[3292] Heb. iv. 14.
[3293] Ps. cv. 15.
[3294] Christs. i.e., Ps. cv. 15. "Touch not Mine anointed." (LXX.) and Vulg. "my Christs."
[3295] 1 Tim. iii. 2 et seq.
[3296] Cenobites migades. Cf. Orat. ii. 29; xliii. 62.
[3297] S. John iii. 29.
[3298] Under the yoke, i.e. "Married." Cf. Orat. xlii. 11.
Reference address : https://www.elpenor.org/gregory-nazianzen/athanasius-alexandria.asp?pg=6
