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ORATION 36

ORATION 36 On himself and to those who claim that it was he who wanted the see of Constantinople.1 am mystified. What in the world have my sermons done to you? How can you have been so taken with the sound of my voice, the voice of a stranger and one that is perhaps weak and devoid of all charm, that you give me the impression of being drawn to us like iron to a magnet ?2 Clinging to each other, one on one, you hang on me, and all of us on God from whom are all things3 and to whom are all things. How wondrous is the chain forged by the Holy Spirit with indissoluble links! As to the reason, neither do I myself, to the best of my knowledge, have any greater claim to wisdom than anyone else (unless of course one assumes that my wisdom consists of precisely this, that I know that I am not wise4 and do not approach the original, true wisdom, a judgment our latterday wise men are far from making about themselves, since it is very easy, if one is puffed up with pride, to deceive oneself and to think that he is something when he is nothing);5 nor was I the first to preach to you the doctrine of the true Faith that you so ardently embrace. I have merely followed in others’ footsteps —yours, to be precise, since you are the true disciples of the famous Alexander,6 the great champion and herald of the 1. PG 36.265A–80C. Delivered 380 in Constantinople. The text in PG 36.265A includes the phrase, “and regarding the eagerness that the people exhibited toward him,” which is omitted from both the text and critical apparatus in SC 318. 2. Plato, Ion 533d–e. 3. 1 Cor 8.6. 4. Plato, Apology 23b. 5. Gal 6.3; Plato, Apology 41e. 6. Alexander, the orthodox bishop of Constantinople (327?–40), whose prayers are credited with causing the death of Arius in 336. Athanasius compares Arius to Judas by quoting Acts 1.18 (“falling headlong he burst open in 220 Trinity who drove impiety from our midst by deed as well as by words. You remember the prayer, worthy of an apostle, that destroyed the prince of impiety in places well-suited to the sewage that issued from his mouth in order that outrage might be repaid with outrage and that the wrongful death of souls might forever live in infamy thanks to a death richly deserved. 2. And so the spring that we have tapped for you is not new like the one that Moses produced in a waterless place for the refugees from Egypt.7 We have instead opened up one that was hidden and covered over, just as the servants of the celebrated Isaac not only dug wells of springing water but also cleared those that the Philistines had stopped.8 But I am not at all one of those characters known for their pleasantries and wit, the kind of man who tries to extort goodwill by flattery, as I see quite a number of my contemporaries doing who profess themselves priests. They take our simple and uncomplicated religion and turn it into something complicated, a new brand of politics transferred from the marketplace to the sanctuary, from the public arena to mystic rites forbidden to public view. The result is that we now have two platforms for theatrical performances, if I may use so bold an expression, which differ from one another to the extent that one is open to all and the other to a few, the one for laughter, the other for reverence, the one labelled theatrical, the other spiritual. You are witnesses, and God also,9 says the holy Apostle, that we are not of this portion. On the contrary , I would sooner be charged with being tactless and inept than unctuous and servile. Indeed, even my most loyal supporters feel that there are occasions now and then when I ride roughshod over them if in my judgment they are behaving unreasonably . This was recently demonstrated by the unprecedented action you took with regard to us: you, the people, fired ORATION 36 221 the middle”) and has the heresiarch’s death take place in a public toilet; see the Letter to Serapion on the Death of Arius, PG 25.688C and cf. Gregory’s Or. 25.8 and n. 15. A more detailed account in...