But first let us tear our mind away from earthly things. Since we are about to hear divine sayings, let us sharpen our attention, so that we may heed what is spoken with all diligence.
Thus we may worthily enter into fellowship with the Holy Spirit, who through the Apostle teaches us the hidden mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven.
This is what he says: "The first man was from the earth, earthy; the second Man is the Lord from heaven."
Beloved, do not leave this saying unexamined, and do not think that it is easily understood. It contains deep thoughts and requires great attention and inquiry.
Prepare your hearing for what will be said, and you will know the depth of the mysteries of God hidden in this saying.
"The first man was from the earth, earthy; the second Man is the Lord from heaven. As was the earthy man, so are those who are earthy; and as is the heavenly Man, so also are those who are heavenly."
By the first and earthy man he means Adam, as it is written: "And God formed man, taking dust from the earth" (Gen 2:7).
After he had been formed from the earth as earthy, he received the spirit of life, which is called the noetic soul and the image of God.
He was brought by God into Paradise and received the command to cultivate it and keep it. As long as he kept God's commandment, he was to remain there immortal.
He was to converse with the Angels, glorify God always together with them, contemplate Him noetically, receive noetic illuminations from Him, and, when needed, hear His divine voice.
But at the hour when he transgressed God's commandment and ate from the tree from which he had been commanded not to eat, he was to be handed over to mortality.
He would become blind in the eyes of his soul, be stripped of the garment of divine glory, be deprived of converse with the Angels, and be cast out of Paradise. All this he indeed suffered.
When he inclined toward the evil words of the deceiving devil and transgressed God's commandment by tasting from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, he was justly deprived of all those blessings.
He became deaf to spiritual things, so that with unclean ears he would no longer hear divine words, which only the worthy hear.
He also became blind in soul, so that he would no longer see that ineffable glory. For by his own will he had withdrawn his mind from it.
With passionate attention he fastened himself upon the fruit of the forbidden tree, believing the serpent, who said: "In the day you eat of it, you will be as gods, knowing good and evil" (Gen 3:5).
The earthy man was deceived by these words. Hoping that he really would become a god, he tasted from the tree of knowledge.
For this he was deprived of all spiritual and heavenly blessings. In their place he received attachment to earthly and visible creatures.
He became, I say again, deaf, blind, naked, and insensible to the blessings from which he had fallen. Moreover he became mortal, corruptible, and senseless, like irrational animals.
As David the king and prophet says: "He was joined to senseless beasts and became like them" (Ps 48:13).
Do you now see from what glory and blessedness into what dishonor, irrationality, and corruption man was cast down?
From how great a wealth into how great a poverty did he come? And we have not yet said all that ought to be said.
Thus the first man was from the earth, earthy, and became morally earthy, that is, fleshly, as we have said.
Now let us see and learn from the divine Scriptures who the second Man is, the Lord from heaven.
He is God from God, the beginningless Son of the beginningless Father, bodiless from the Bodiless, incomprehensible from the Incomprehensible, eternal from the Eternal, unapproachable from the Unapproachable, uncircumscribed from the Uncircumscribed, immortal from the Immortal, invisible from the Invisible.
He is the Word of God and God, by whom all things were made, both earthly and heavenly.
Being such, abiding in the Father and having the Father abiding in Himself, and not being separated from Him, He came down to earth.
He was incarnate of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became man, like us in all things except sin.
He did this in order to recreate and renew that first man, and with him all who were born and are born from him. For they also resemble the one who begot them.
Adam, who begot them, became corruptible, mortal, blind, stripped of the divine garment, and insensible after he transgressed the commandment.
So all who were born from him became everything that he, the earthy one, had become: corruptible, mortal, deaf, blind, naked, and insensible.
They differed almost in nothing from irrational animals. Or rather, they became worse than they, because they gathered into themselves the passions of every animal and held them within themselves.
Moreover, those born earthy fell into such great mindlessness and such ignorance of God and His commandments that they began to give visible creatures the honor due to God alone.
They deified not only heaven and earth, the sun, moon, and stars, fire, water, and the other creatures. They even deified the most shameful passions, and in their folly worshiped them as God.
And what passions? Fornication, adultery, sodomy, murder, and much else like these.
The devil taught man and inclined him to do all this. Through it he subjected the whole human race to himself.
If in ancient times, among countless multitudes of people, there was someone who did not carry out every will of the devil, still each sinned in one way or another.
Indeed, this alone was enough for each person to be handed over to death and corruption and brought down into Hades: each came from the seed of those who sinned in the beginning.
There was no one who could deliver him from the devil's hands.
But God the Word, our Creator, had compassion on us. As He Himself knows, He came down to earth and became man.
He did not become man according to the manner of human conception, but from the Holy Spirit and Mary the Ever-Virgin, as it is written: "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us" (Jn 1:14).
In the beginning God created man, taking dust from the earth and breathing into his face the breath of life. The man became complete, a living soul, not in the manner in which human beings are usually born.
So also He Himself, coming to recreate him, became man, complete in body and soul, not according to the manner of human conception.
We read in the Old Testament Scripture that God brought sleep upon Adam and, taking one of his ribs, fashioned a woman from it. So He did here also, in His own Incarnation.
But attend, so that you may understand.
THEOSIS