“He who loves his brother abides in the light, and there is no stumbling in him.” Who stumbles or creates a stumbling block? He who is scandalized by Christ and by the Church. Those scandalized by Christ are as if scorched by the sun, and those scandalized by the Church by the moon. But the psalm says, “The sun shall not scorch you by day, nor the moon by night” (Ps 120:6). That is, if you hold fast to love, you will stumble neither over Christ nor over the Church. You will leave neither Christ nor the Church.
For if someone leaves the Church, how can he be in Christ when he is not among His members? How can he be in Christ who is not in the body of Christ? Therefore those stumble who leave Christ or the Church.
How did we understand that the psalm, when it said, “The sun shall not scorch you by day, nor the moon by night,” meant stumbling by scorching? First look at the comparison itself. Just as one who is scorched says, “I cannot endure it, I cannot bear it,” and withdraws, so those who cannot bear something in the Church withdraw either from the name of Christ or from the Church. These are the ones who stumble.
See how those carnal men suffered stumbling as if from the sun, when Christ preached His flesh to them and said, “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you will have no life in you” (Jn 6:53). Then almost seventy men said, “This is a hard saying,” and withdrew from Him, and twelve remained. The sun scorched all those men, and they withdrew because they could not bear the force of the word.
And so the twelve remained. But so that men would not think that by believing in Christ they were doing Him a service, rather than themselves receiving a benefit from Him, when the twelve remained, the Lord said to them, “Do you also wish to go away?” This was so that you would know that I need you, and not you Me. But they, not scorched by the sun, answered through the mouth of Peter, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life” (Jn 6:54-69).
And whom did the Church scorch like the moon in the night? Those who produced schisms. Listen to such a word spoken by the Apostle: “Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is made to stumble, and I am not burned?” (2 Cor 11:29). Why is there no stumbling in the one who loves his brother? Because whoever loves his brother endures all things for the sake of unity, since brotherhood consists in the unity of love.
Someone has offended you, either a bad man, or one whom you consider bad, or one whom you imagine to be bad. And do you leave so many good men? Fine brotherly love indeed, which they, the Donatists, show us. They accuse the Christians of Africa and have broken with the whole world. Were there no saints in the whole world? And could you condemn all without hearing them? But if you loved the brethren, then there would be no stumbling in you.
Listen to what the psalm says: “Great peace have those who love Your law, and for them there is no stumbling” (Ps 118:165). Great peace, as it says here, belongs to those who love the law of God, and therefore there is no stumbling in them. Thus those who stumble lose peace. And of whom did he say that they do not stumble and create stumbling blocks? Of those who love the law of God, and therefore stand in love.
But someone will say, “The psalm says, ‘those who love the law,’ not the brethren.” Then listen to what the Lord says: “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another” (Jn 13:34). What is the law if not a commandment? And how, then, do those not stumble who cannot endure one another? As Paul says, “Bearing with one another, endeavoring to preserve love in the bond of peace” (Eph 4:2-3). And since this is the law of Christ, listen to how the same Apostle exhorts us to fulfill this law: “Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ” (Gal 6:2).
THEOSIS