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Shorter Rules
St Basil the Great, tr. Lowther Clarke, 1925
Rule 92: Since the Lord Orders Us to Sell Our Possessions, with What Intention Must We Do…
In answer to this we must say first that no possession if it had been bad in itself would have been created by God.1 ‘For every creature of God “ it says ‘is good and nothing is to be rejected.” Secondly, that the commandment of the Lord instructed us not to cast away possessions as evil and avoid them, but to administer them as stewards. And a man is condemned, not absolutely because he has them but because he had wrong thoughts concerning them, or used them badly. For an indifferent and sane state of mind as regards them, and the administering of them according to the commandment, benefit us in many most necessary ways—now helping in the cleansing of our sins, for it is written: “Howbeit give for alms those things which are within; and behold all things are clean unto you”’2; now helping towards inheriting the kingdom of heaven and the acquiring of unfailing treasure, according to what is written in another place: ‘Fear not, little flock, for it is your heavenly Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell that ye have and give alms. Make for yourselves purses which wax not old, a treasure in the heavens that faileth not.”3
Notes
- 1 Tim. iv. 4.
- Lk. xi. 41.
- Lk. xii. 32 ηὐδόκησεν for εὐδόκησεν**, add ὁ οὐράνιος**; 33.