عبرانیان ۳.۵-۱۱, ۱۷-۱۹ (رساله)

۵موسی در مقام خادم در تمام خانۀ خدا امین بود تا بر آنچه می‌بایست در آینده گفته شود، شهادت دهد. ۶امّا مسیح، در مقام پسرِ صاحب‌اختیار بر خانۀ خدا، امین است. و خانۀ او ما هستیم، به شرطی که آزادگی خود را حفظ کنیم و در مباهات به امید خود همچنان پایدار بمانیم. ۷پس همان‌گونه که روح‌القدس می‌فرماید: «امروز، اگر صدای او را می‌شنوید، ۸دل خود را سخت مسازید، چنانکه در ایام تمرد کردید، به هنگام آزمایش در بیابان. ۹آنجا پدران شما مرا آزمایش و امتحان کردند، با اینکه چهل سال کارهای مرا دیده بودند. ۱۰به همین سبب، از آن نسل خشمگین بودم و گفتم: ”اینان همواره در دل خود گمراهند، و راههای مرا نمی‌شناسند؛“ ۱۱پس در خشم خود سوگند خوردم که به آسایش من هرگز راه نخواهند یافت.» ۱۷و از چه کسانی چهل سال خشمگین بود؟ مگر نه آنان که گناه کردند و اجسادشان در بیابان افتاد؟ ۱۸و دربارۀ چه کسانی سوگند خورد که به آسایش او هرگز راه نخواهند یافت؟ مگر نه همانها که نافرمانی کردند؟ ۱۹پس می‌بینیم به سبب بی‌ایمانی بود که نتوانستند راه بیابند.

لوقا ۲۰.۲۷-۴۴ (انجیل)

۲۷سپس تنی چند از صَدّوقیان که منکر قیامتند آمدند، ۲۸و سؤالی از او کرده، گفتند: «استاد، موسی برای ما نوشت که اگر برادر مردی بمیرد و از خود زنی بی‌فرزند بر جای نهد، آن مرد باید او را به زنی بگیرد تا نسلی برای برادرش باقی گذارد. ۲۹باری، هفت برادر بودند. برادر نخستین زنی گرفت و بی‌فرزند مُرد. ۳۰سپس دوّمین ۳۱و بعد سوّمین او را به زنی گرفتند و به همین‌سان هر هفت برادر مردند، بی‌آنکه از خود فرزندی بر جای نهند. ۳۲سرانجام آن زن نیز بمرد. ۳۳حال، در قیامت، او زنِ کدام‌یک خواهد بود؟ زیرا هر هفت برادر او را به زنی گرفتند.» ۳۴عیسی پاسخ داد: «مردم این عصر زن می‌گیرند و شوهر می‌کنند. ۳۵امّا آنان که شایستۀ رسیدن به عصر آینده و قیامت مردگان محسوب شوند، نه زن خواهند گرفت و نه شوهر خواهند کرد، ۳۶و نه دیگر خواهند مرد؛ زیرا مانند فرشتگان خواهند بود. آنان فرزندان خدایند، چرا که فرزندان قیامتند. ۳۷حقیقتِ برخاستن مردگان را حتی موسی نیز در شرح ماجرای بوتۀ سوزان آشکار می‌کند، آنجا که خداوند، خدای ابراهیم و خدای اسحاق و خدای یعقوب خوانده شده است. ۳۸امّا او نه خدای مردگان، بلکه خدای زندگان است؛ زیرا نزد او همه زنده‌اند.» ۳۹بعضی از علمای دین در پاسخ گفتند: «استاد، نیکو گفتی!» ۴۰و دیگر هیچ‌کس جرأت نکرد پرسشی از او کند. ۴۱سپس عیسی به آنان گفت: «چگونه است که می‌گویند مسیح پسر داوود است؟ ۴۲چرا که داوود خود در کتاب مزامیر می‌گوید: «”خداوند به خداوند من گفت: به دست راست من بنشین ۴۳تا آن هنگام که دشمنانت را کرسیِ زیر پایت سازم.“ ۴۴اگر داوود او را ’خداوند‘ می‌خواند، چگونه او می‌تواند پسر داوود باشد؟»

قدیسان آتاناسیوس کبیر و کیریل اسکندریه (۳۷۳) (۴۴۴)

Saint Athanasius, pillar of Orthodoxy and Father of the Church, was born in Alexandria in 275, to pious Christian parents. Even as a child, his piety and devotion to the Faith were so notable that Alexander, the Patriarch of the city, took Athanasius under his protection. As a student, he acquired a thorough education, but was more interested in the things of God than in secular learning, and withdrew for a time into the desert to sit at the feet of Saint Anthony (January 17), whose disciple he became and whose biography he later wrote. On returning to Alexandria, he was ordained to the diaconate and began his public labors for the Church. He wrote his treatise On the Incarnation, when he was only twenty. (It contains a phrase, still often quoted today, that express in a few words some of the depths of the Mystery of the Incarnation: God became man that man might become god.)

Just at this time Arius, a priest in Alexandria, was promoting his enticing view that the Son and Word of God is not of one essence with the Father, but a divine creation of the Father. This view, which (as Athanasius realized) strikes at the very possibility of mankind’s salvation, gained wide acceptance and seemed for a time to threaten the Christian Faith itself. In 325, the Emperor Constantine the Great convoked a Council of the Church at Nicaea to settle the turmoil that the Arian teaching had spread through the Church. Athanasius attended the Council, and defended the Orthodox view so powerfully that he won the admiration of the Orthodox and the undying enmity of the Arians. From that time forth his life was founded on the defense of the true consubstantiality (homoousia) of the Son with the Father.

In 326, not long before his death, Patriarch Alexander appointed Athanasius to be his successor, and Athanasius was duly elevated to the patriarchal throne. He was active in his pastoral role, traveling throughout Egypt, visiting churches and monasteries, and working tirelessly not only to put down the Arian heresy, but to resolve various schisms and moral declines that affected his territory.

Though the Arian heresy had apparently been condemned once and for all at Nicea, Arius had many powerful allies throughout the Empire, even in the Imperial court, and Athanasius was soon subjected to many kinds of persecution, some local, some coming from the Imperial throne itself. Though he was Patriarch of Alexandria for more than forty years, a large amount of that time was spent in hiding from powerful enemies who threatened him with imprisonment or death. Twice he fled to Rome for protection by the Pope, who in the early centuries of the Church was a consistent champion of Orthodoxy against its various enemies. From his various hiding places, Athanasius issued tracts, treatises and epistles which helped to rally the faithful throughout Christendom to the Orthodox cause.

In 366, the Emperor Valens, fearing a revolt of the Egyptians on behalf of their beloved Archbishop, officially restored Athanasius to favor, and he was able to spend the last seven years of his life in peace. Of his forty-seven years as Patriarch, about seventeen were spent in hiding or exile. He reposed in peace in 373, having given his entire adult life, at great suffering, to the defense of the Faith of Christ.

With St Athanasius, the Church commemorates St Cyril (Kyrillos), also Archbishop of Alexandria (412-44). His lot was to defend the Faith against the heretic Nestorius, Patriarch of Constantinople, who denied that Christ in his Incarnation truly united the divine with the human nature. Cyril attempted in private correspondence to restore Nestorius to the Christian faith, and when this failed he, along with Pope Celestine of Rome, led the defense of Orthodoxy against Nestorius’ teaching. Saint Cyril presided at the Third Ecumenical Council in 431, at which the Nestorian error was officially overthrown. After guiding his flock for thirty-two years, he reposed in 444.