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Hymns on Faith

St Ephrem the Syrian, tr. Morris, 1847; selections

36. Rhythm the Thirty-sixth

The Son came down to visit the servants, because their infirmities lingered and delayed, and the physicians had been forward to come, yet had been wearied of their labour. They healed but little and left much alone. Blessed be He that sent Thee! Since they were not able to see Him, He took Him clothing from the sheep. The flock approached to Him, and loathed Him not, since the smell of the sheep breathed from His clothes. The wolves that were crafty¹ were² afraid of Him, because He had changed [His garment]. They rent His garments and revealed His glory, and though they wished it not, His bright-shining glistened forth from His veil³.

The chief pastors of that day, who saw that He was put to great shame for His sheep, as if drunken with the savour⁴ of strong wine thought that He was the Head of the pastors and shepherds; and the husbandmen that crucified Him felt that He was the Heir and Lord of the Vineyard. The shepherds thought Him a fellow-servant with the sheep, because in His love He became the Paschal Lamb. Let our eyes be opened with fountains of tears, since the Son of the Maker, by Whom we were made, did they that were made slander with⁵ their own names,—the reward that they paid Him Who made them great by His own Names⁶.⁷

Alas, for the clay that should change the Potter in name, not in Nature! the colour of the wool is changed also⁸! Give not the surname of creatures to the Name of the Son. He hath distinguished thee from the beasts⁹; reckon not thou Him with the creatures. There is freedom attached to thy own¹⁰ bondship: set not thine own yoke upon that Sovereign Nature¹¹ Who freeth all.

Wherein thou art burdened, recount to us, for haply thy bruise is like His. Who shall define what number they were, or of what kind they were, which He bare for thee? What hast thou borne for Him? If thou doest not honour to Him, yet do not do dishonour. In what fire hast thou been burned for Him¹², that the smoke of the furnace of thy obstinacy hath come up even unto Him?

See! with what zeal the Eternal Being is zealous¹³, saying, One is not divisible into Three. Let alone His Name and shew His Nature; for this very Nature giveth eyes even to the searchers. The nature of stone is divisible, and the other natures are [herein] its fellows: the nature of fire is¹⁴ not divisible. See! the assaying of their natures proves to us as good as eyes¹⁵. For they are akin in their names, when they are far off in their natures; so then thou canst not shew us a common name in which things divisible and not divisible are alike contained. Lo! every single thing that exists has a single name to it, each single body, each single person, each single one, as also every thing which is the subject of number. But if it be [only] from thy having called it so, that one is indivisible¹⁶, thou art greatly in error: the nature of water is one, yet it is divisible also; in fruits and seeds it is even changed¹⁷. It is impossible for us to rise up to Him without experience of His Nature. For the fact that He is one, doth not give us means of comprehending and finding an explanation of His Generation¹⁸ which is withdrawn from all.

There are two different assay-furnaces¹⁹, faith and experience; for either man believes the truth, or experience²⁰ is able to teach him how it is. The faith of the children of truth needeth not to be investigating²¹. To us the way of seeking for experience and disputation on every thing comes from the heretic²². Take and cast him among the waves²³ that he may cease entirely from his questionings. Demand of him an experience of the Divine Essence, how it exists, and where it exists, and whose it is? and if the Generation is explainable from any thing, or the creatures from what is nothing? Plough once and again the land of thorns²⁴, and it will yield thee the word of Truth, though itself ignorant of it.

Notes

Zeph. 3, 3.
Comp. note o, p. 21.
By the ‘wolves’ he means the Jews, who by crucifying Christ only displayed the more the Divine glory they meant to hide. See R. viii. p. 40. The veil means the veil of His Flesh. On the use of the term garment for Christ’s Body, see above, p. 51, n. y. R. xix. §. 1. Newman on Athan. p. 249, n. c. p. 291, n. k.
See Jer. 10, 22. Ezek. 34, 1. Mat. 21, 38.
R. xxxi. §. 1.
i. e. calumniously insisted that He was a creature as they were, arguing from the attributes He possessed in common with themselves, and forgetting the supernatural attributes which He had given them. See p. 122, n. h. and R. xxix. §. 1. xlvi. §. 6.
R. xxix. §. 3.
See §. 1.
R. l. §. 4.
R. xxviii. note a. and b.
S. His Lordship
R. xviii. §. 2.
S. the zeal of the Being is zealous
R. xl. §. 3.
S. is eyes to us.
The Fathers held the Godhead, though said to subsist in Three Persons, yet to be beyond all number. See on Athanas. p. 334, y. p. 412, d. and particularly p. 452, a. where a passage from St. Basil exceedingly like this occurs. The following is taken from vol. ii. p. 472, d. “Lo! the voice of truth preacheth in the Church, and from all the Scriptures crieth unto us to teach us that there is One only eternal, and that the quality of night is not polluted, and that it is not twain with evil. That they are not of one nature wise men have seen, evil being from the will, and night from the course of heaven’s lights. The Sun goes down; lo! ye have made darkness over every thing. Darkness and night are one nature. And the body and the serpent [i. e. Satan] are not one nature. But in that Eternal Being there is no number: for number belongeth to things created.”
contr. Scrut. R. i. §. 10.
p. 136, n. e.
p. 122, n. i.
[Syriac]. Ass. renders ‘fides et ratiocinium,’ which suits with the use of the word in combination with disputation just below, and might be equivalent to ἐπιχείρημα, (each being literally a ‘trying,’) which was used chiefly of arguments upon practical matters. See Quintilian in Ernest. Lex. Technolog. Rhet. in v. p. 134. and Stephanus ad Sext. Empir. p. 202. n. 17. As, however, I know no authority for such a use of the word, and faith and experience may be legitimately opposed, I have kept that word in the text. By ‘the land of thorns,’ St. E. seems to mean the field of human reasonings and disputations, which itself when carefully examined bears witness to the faith, and to its own inadequacy.
p. 136, n. e.
R. xi. §. 3.
p. 200, n. d.
R. xxxix. §. 3.