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Shorter Rules
St Basil the Great, tr. Lowther Clarke, 1925
Rule 207: If Therefore We Must Not Even Be Anxious About the Necessaries of Life, and…
The Lord Himself explained His own commandment in each place. In the one, after forbidding to seek the things needed for life by saying: “Seek not what ye shall eat or what ye shall drink; for after all these things do the Gentiles seek,”3 He ordered them: ‘But seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness.”4 But how we must seek them He showed by the conduct recommended as appropriate to them. When He forbade us to work for the meat that perisheth He taught us to work for the meat which abideth unto eternal life. This again He showed in another place when He said: “My meat is to do the will of my Father which sent me.”5 But if it is God’s will that we should nourish the hungry, give the thirsty to drink, clothe the naked, and the rest, it is very necessary that we should imitate the apostle who says: I showed you all things, how that so labouring ye ought to support the weak,”6 and obey his teaching when he says: Rather let him labour, working with his own hands the thing that is good, that he may have whereof to give to him that hath need.”7 Since then we have these precepts delivered us from the Lord through the Gospel and the apostle, to be anxious or work for one’s own sake is clearly absolutely forbidden. But according to the Lord’s commandment we should be anxious and work eagerly, on account of our neighbour’s need, especially since the Lord receives as given to Himself the services rendered to those dedicated to Him and promises in return the kingdom of heaven.
Notes
- Jn. vi. 27.
- περισσὸν τὸ ἐργάζεσθαι; “superfluum esse manibus operari?”
- Lk. xii. 29; 30.
- Mt. vi. 33 add τοῦ θεοῦ K.
- Jn. iv. 34 ποιῶ for ποιήσω K, add πατρός*.
- Acts xx. 35.
- Eph. iv. 28 add ἰδίαις, τὸ ἀγαθόν after χερσί.