THEOSISJohn Chrysostom
See Heb 11:10. He then adds something clearer than what has been said: “These all died in faith, not having received the promises” (Heb 11:13). Two questions arise here. How, after saying that Enoch “was translated so that he should not see death,” does he now say, “These all died in faith”? And again, after saying, “not having received the promises,” how does he say that Noah received the salvation of his household as a reward, that Enoch was translated, that Abel “still speaks,” and that Abraham received the land?
“They died in faith,” he says, “not having received the promises.” What do his words mean? We must first resolve one question, and then the other. “These all,” he says, “died in faith.” He says “these all” here, not because absolutely all of them died, but because, except for Enoch, all whom we know as having died truly did die.
The words “not having received the promises” are also just, since the promise given to Noah did not concern this. Of what promises, then, does he speak? The land was promised to Isaac and Jacob. But what promises did Noah, Abel, and Enoch receive? Here he speaks either of the last three, or of them together with the others.
It was not a promise that Abel became an object of admiration, that Enoch was translated, or that Noah was saved from the flood. All this was granted to them for their virtue, and was a certain foretaste of the future. God, knowing from the beginning that the human race needs great condescension, grants us not only future things, but present things also.
So Christ also said to the disciples: “And everyone who has left houses, or brothers, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for My name’s sake, shall receive a hundredfold, and inherit eternal life” (Mt 19:29). And again: “Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you” (Mt 6:33). Do you see that this too is given by Him as an addition, so that we may not lose heart?
Combatants receive relief even while they are in the contest. Yet, being subject to the rules, they do not have complete rest, but enjoy it afterward. So also God does not grant us complete repose here. Though He grants it in part, He preserves it fully for the life to come.
That this is so, the Apostle himself explained by adding what follows: “but having seen them afar off, and were glad” (Heb 11:13). Here he hints at something mystical. He shows that they had a foreknowledge of all that was said concerning the future, the resurrection, the Kingdom of heaven, and the rest. These are the things Christ preached when He came to earth, and by “promises” he means precisely these.
Thus he either says this, or he means that, although they did not receive such promises, they ended their lives hoping in them. And they hoped by faith alone. “Having seen them afar off,” that is, after four generations, for after so many generations they came out of Egypt. “And were glad,” he says.
They were so sure of these promises that they even greeted them. They were like sailors who see from afar the cities toward which they are sailing. Before they enter them, they salute them and already reckon them their own.
The first virtue, and the universal virtue, consists in being a stranger and sojourner in this world. It means having nothing in common with the things here, but standing toward them as toward things alien to us. So were those blessed disciples of whom the Apostle says: “they wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, afflicted, ill-treated, of whom the world was not worthy” (Heb 11:37-38).
They called themselves strangers. Paul said something still greater of himself. He not only called himself a stranger, but said that he was dead to the world, and the world was dead to him: “The world,” he says, “has been crucified to me, and I to the world” (Gal 6:14).
But we behave like citizens here, and arrange all the affairs of our life as living citizens of this world. What the righteous were to the world, namely strangers and dead men, we are to heaven. What they were to heaven, namely living citizens, we are to the world.
We are dead because we have turned aside from true life and chosen the temporary one. We anger God because we do not wish to withdraw from earthly goods, though heavenly blessedness has been prepared for us. Like worms, we crawl from one patch of earth to another, and from that one back again to the first.
In general, we do not wish to come to our senses or withdraw from human affairs. We are as though sunk in deep sleep, or stupefied by drunkenness, and are carried away by dreams. People who give themselves to pleasant sleep lie in bed not only at night, but when morning and bright day have come.
They are not ashamed to indulge such pleasure, turning the time of labor and activity into a time of sleep and idleness. So also we, when day has drawn near and night has passed, or rather when day has already come, do the works of night.
For it is said: work “while it is day” (Jn 9:4). Yet we sleep, we dream, and we delight in fantasies. Our eyes are closed, both those of the mind and those of the body. We speak empty words and utter nonsense.
We would not feel it if someone inflicted a deep wound on us, stole all our property, and set the house itself on fire. Or rather, we do not even wait for others to do this. We ourselves do it. Every day we wound and strike ourselves.
We behave shamelessly, know neither decency nor honor, and do not conceal our shameful deeds. Nor do we allow others to conceal them. With complete shamelessness we make ourselves a laughingstock and an object of countless insults to all who see us and pass by.
Do you not know that even vicious people laugh at those like themselves and condemn them? God has implanted in us an incorruptible tribunal that never changes, even if we fall into the depths of evil. Therefore even vicious people condemn themselves.
If someone calls them what they truly are, they are ashamed, angry, and offended. Thus, if not in deed, then in word they condemn their actions in conscience. Or rather, they condemn them in deed as well.
For if they do their deeds secretly and in hiding, by this they give clear proof of their own judgment about those deeds. Evil is so manifest that all condemn it, even those who do it. Virtue is such that even those who do not follow it admire it.
The fornicator praises chastity. The covetous man condemns injustice. The irritable man admires freedom from malice and censures faintheartedness. The dissolute man condemns licentiousness. Why then, you ask, do they do these things themselves?
Because of extreme negligence, not because they think them good. Otherwise they would not be ashamed of their deeds and deny them when someone else exposes them. Many, when exposed, could not bear the shame and killed themselves.
Such is the testimony within us concerning what is good and seemly. Thus good deeds are brighter than the sun, and their opposites are more vile than anything. The saints were strangers and sojourners. How and in what way?
Where does Abraham acknowledge himself to be a stranger and sojourner? Perhaps he also acknowledged this. That David acknowledged himself as such is beyond doubt. Listen to what he himself says: “I am a stranger with Thee, and a sojourner, as all my fathers were” (Ps 38:13).
Those who lived in tents and bought burial places with money were plainly such strangers that they did not even have a place to bury their dead. What then? Did they call themselves strangers only in relation to the land of Palestine?
No, in relation to the whole universe, and rightly so. They saw in it nothing that they desired. Everything was strange and alien to them. They wished to practice virtue, but here there was a multitude of vices. Therefore everything here was alien to them.
They had not one friend, not one close companion, except a few. And how were they strangers? They did not care for things here, and they proved this not by words, but by deeds themselves.
How and in what way? God said to Abraham: leave your supposed homeland and go into a foreign land (Gen 12:1). He did not remain there out of love for his kin, but left it without regret, as though it were a foreign land.
God said to him: offer your son in sacrifice (Gen 22:2). And he offered him as though he had no son at all. He offered him as though he were not clothed in human nature. He regarded his possessions as common to all who came to him, and counted them as nothing.
He yielded the first place to others, exposed himself to dangers, and endured countless sufferings. He did not build splendid houses, indulge in luxury, or care about clothing or anything else found in this world. On the contrary, he lived the life of the city above.
He was hospitable, brother-loving, merciful, and long-suffering. He despised possessions, present glory, and all the rest. His son also was such. When he was driven away and attacked, he did not resist, but yielded as one dwelling in a foreign land.
For strangers, whatever they suffer, endure everything because they are not in their homeland. He also bore the loss of his wife as a stranger. He lived a higher life, preserving chastity and all self-restraint. After begetting a son, he had no relations with his wife.
He had married her when the flower of youth had already passed. By this he showed that he did so not from passion, but to serve the fulfillment of God’s promise. And Jacob? Did he not seek only bread and clothing?
These are the needs proper to true strangers who have fallen into utter poverty. When persecuted, did he not yield as a stranger? Did he not work for hire? Did he not endure countless misfortunes, journeying everywhere as a stranger?
By enduring all this, they showed that they sought another homeland. O what a difference! They daily languished with the desire to be released from here and return to their homeland. We do the opposite. When some feverish illness comes, we abandon everything, and like little children we weep and fear death.
We suffer this justly, because we do not live here as strangers and do not hasten there as to a homeland. Instead, we go as if to execution. Therefore we grieve, because we do not use things as we ought, but have overturned their order.
Therefore we suffer torment when we ought to rejoice. Therefore we tremble like murderers and robbers when they are about to appear before the court. They recall all their deeds, and for this reason they fear and tremble.
Those men were not such. They themselves hastened there. Paul even groaned for it, as he himself says: “We who are in this tent groan, being burdened” (2 Cor 5:4). Such was Abraham and those like him.
They were strangers, says the Apostle, to the whole universe, and they sought a homeland. What kind? Was it the one they had left? No. What prevented them, if they wished, from returning there and becoming its citizens? They sought a heavenly homeland.
So eagerly did they hasten to depart from here, and so did they please God. Therefore God Himself is not ashamed to be called their God. O what honor! He willed to be called their God.
But what great thing is it, you say, that He is not ashamed to be called their God, when He is called God of earth and God of heaven? It is great, truly great, and a sign of great blessedness.
Why? Because He is called God of heaven and earth in the same way that He is God of the Gentiles. He is God of heaven and earth as their Creator and Orderer. But He is called God of those saints not in this sense, but as their close friend.
I will explain this to you by an example. In great houses, when some of the chief servants are distinguished above the others, and greatly distinguished, managing everything and having great boldness before their masters, the master is called by their name. Many are so called.
But what am I saying? Just as He could be called God not of the Gentiles, but of the universe, so also He could be called God of Abraham. You do not know what honor is contained in this, because we do not possess it.