Jesus said to her, “Touch Me not, for I have not yet ascended to My Father.”
The meaning of this saying is not clear to all, for it contains a mystery. Yet it must be examined for our profit, since the Lord will grant us understanding of His words.
He forbids the woman to approach Him and does not allow her desire to embrace His feet to be fulfilled. Explaining the reason, He says, “For I have not yet ascended to My Father.” We must ask how these words are to be understood.
Why, if He had not yet ascended to the heavenly Father, was this a sufficient reason that those who loved Him should not touch His holy flesh? Would it not be groundless to think that the Lord said this because He feared defilement from her touch, or wished to ascend pure to the heavenly Father? Would not such a thought be utterly foolish and senseless?
The divine nature can in no way be subject to defilement. The light of a sunbeam may touch filthy heaps or other impurities of the earth, yet it suffers no harm. It remains what it is, plainly unstained and in no way sharing their foulness. So also the divine and most pure nature can in no way receive impurity from defilement.
What, then, is the meaning of His stopping Mary as she came to Him and wished to touch His holy flesh? What does the Lord wish to indicate by the words, “For I have not yet ascended to My Father”? This we must consider, as far as we are able.
We point out that there were many and various causes of the coming of our Savior. Yet one of them is especially important, and He Himself indicated it when He said, “I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (Mt 9:13).
Therefore, before the saving Cross and the Resurrection from the dead, while the divine economy concerning us had not yet received its fitting completion, He had fellowship with both righteous and unrighteous. He ate with publicans and sinners. He gave free access to those who wished to touch His holy flesh, that He might sanctify all, call them to the knowledge of the truth, and restore to health those who were sick and crushed by the diseases of sins.
For this reason He also said to them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick” (Lk 5:31). Thus, before the Resurrection from the dead, He entered without distinction into fellowship with righteous and sinners. He absolutely rejected none who approached Him.
Thus, when He once reclined in the house of a Pharisee, a woman approached weeping, “who was a sinner in the city” (Lk 7:37), as it is written. Loosening the hair she had always arranged, and having barely left her former sins, she began to wipe His feet. He is not shown to have forbidden her.
Likewise, when He was going to raise the daughter of the ruler of the synagogue, “a woman who had a flow of blood approached and touched the hem of His garment” (Lk 8:43-44). We see that He was not at all angry with her. On the contrary, He counted her worthy of a gracious word: “Daughter,” He said, “your faith has saved you; go in peace” (Lk 8:48).
At that time, for a providential purpose, even those still unclean, and those whose bodies and souls were defiled, were allowed unhindered to touch the very holy flesh of our Savior Christ. They received every blessing from Him.
But when He had fulfilled the divine economy concerning us, had endured crucifixion itself and death on the Cross, and had come to life again, manifesting His nature as superior to death, He then forbids this. He no longer readily permits all who approach to touch His holy flesh.
By this He gives an example to the holy churches and to His mystery, the Eucharist. The law of wise Moses also indicated this example when it commanded that the lamb be slain as a type of Christ. For it says, “No uncircumcised person shall eat of it” (Ex 12:48), calling the unclean uncircumcised.
Humanity must be understood as unclean by its own nature. For what is human nature when compared with the purity proper to God? Therefore those still uncircumcised, that is, unclean, must not touch the Holy Body. Rather, those who have been made pure by the circumcision understood in the Spirit may do so. “For circumcision is of the heart, in the Spirit” (Rom 2:29), according to Paul.
Yet there would be no circumcision in the Spirit in us unless the Holy Spirit dwelt in us through faith and holy baptism. Therefore was it not fitting that Mary should for the moment remain kept from touching the Holy Body, since she had not yet received the Spirit?
For although Christ had risen from the dead, the Spirit had not yet been given by the Father through Him to humanity. After His ascent to God and the Father, He sent Him down to us. Therefore He said, “It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Advocate will not come to you. But if I go, I will send Him to you” (Jn 16:7).
Thus, since the Holy Spirit had not yet been sent, because the Savior had not yet ascended to the Father, He restrains Mary as one who had not yet received the Spirit. He says, “Do not touch Me, for I have not yet ascended to My Father.” That is, “I have not yet sent the Holy Spirit to you.”
From this comes an example for the churches. For this reason we also keep from the sacred table those who have known His Godhead and have already confessed the faith, that is, the catechumens. They have not yet been enriched by the Holy Spirit, for He does not dwell in those not yet baptized.
But when we become partakers of the Holy Spirit, then nothing prevents us from touching our Savior Christ. This is why the ministers of the divine mysteries proclaim to those who wish to partake of the mystical blessing, “Holy things for the holy.” They teach that communion in the Holy Gifts is wholly fitting only for those sanctified in the Spirit.
“But go to My brethren, and say to them: I ascend to My Father and your Father, and to My God and your God.”
For the reasons already given, He does not allow Mary to touch His flesh, though she greatly desired this because of her love for God. Yet He repays her attachment to Him and appoints a double reward for such great faith and love. He shows that piety toward Him does not remain fruitless in those who advance in it.
More important still, in Mary first, speaking generally, the whole female sex is crowned with a double honor and receives deliverance from its ancient infirmities. She was the first to lament Christ in this way and to make Him the cause of tears. She turned sorrow into joy when she heard from Him, who once condemned woman and made her easily subject to the assaults of grief, that she must not weep.
For God had said to the woman, “In sorrows you shall bring forth children” (Gen 3:16). As He once subjected her to sorrows in paradise, when she followed the serpent’s suggestions and obeyed the devil’s devices, so again in a garden He commands her no longer to weep.
Releasing her also from the very curse by which sorrows were assigned to her, He commands her to become the first herald of great blessings. He bids her proclaim to the disciples the ascent into heaven.
This was so that, just as the first and most ancient of all women followed the devil’s suggestions and was condemned, and in her the whole female sex, so this woman, obeying the words of our Savior and announcing what leads to eternal life, might free the whole female sex from blame.
Thus the Lord grants Mary no longer to weep and no longer to be easily accessible to sorrows in her heart. He grants her to acquire beautiful feet. For according to the prophet, “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach good things” (Rom 10:15 from Is 52:7). The first woman did not have beautiful feet, for she preached no good thing when she advised the forefather to transgress the divine commandment.
You may see that Mary is worthy of honor from the fact that she was counted worthy of prophetic mention. What did the prophet say concerning her and the women with her, who announced the Savior’s Resurrection to the holy disciples? “Women coming from the sight, come; for the people are without understanding” (Is 27:11).
Here the Word of God commands these women, truly lovers of God, to hasten swiftly and announce what they had seen. He also condemns the senselessness of the Jews, because they mocked even the very report of the Resurrection of our Savior Christ.
There were other women, as the other Evangelists report (Mt 28:1; Mk 16:1; Lk 23:55; 24:1). Yet wise John mentioned only Mary. We must not regard this as a contradiction among the words of the holy Evangelists.
John naturally mentioned Mary Magdalene alone, because she had a more fervent love for Christ. She saw the tomb before the others, came into the garden, and searched all the surrounding place to find the body. For she thought that the Lord had truly been moved.
The outcome and completion of intentions and deeds are usually attributed to the principal persons, even if there were other advisers and fellow workers. Therefore, for Mary’s honor, glory, and perpetual praise, the Savior granted her to announce to the brethren, “I ascend to My Father and your Father, and to My God and your God.”
Again receive from me this deep and great mystery. Do not allow your heart to turn aside from the faithful rule of the divine doctrines.
Do you not hear how the Only-begotten Word of God became like us, that we also might become like Him, as far as this is accessible to our nature and as far as it may be said concerning our renewal by grace? He humbled Himself in order to raise what is low by nature to His own height. He bore the form of a servant (Phil 2:6-7), though by nature He is Lord and Son, that He might transfer what is servile by nature into the glory of sonship, according to His image and likeness (Gal 4:4-5).
As He became like us, that is, man, so that we might become like Him, that is, gods and sons (Jn 10:34; 1 Jn 3:1), He takes into Himself what is ours and gives us in return what is His own.
How does this happen? You will reasonably wish to ask. I shall answer as I can.
First, those who by condition and nature are servants, since creatures are servants of the Creator (Ps 118:91), He calls His brethren. He names God as His common Father and ours. Since He made human properties His own because of His likeness to us, He called our God His God, though He is Son by nature.
This was so that, just as we, through likeness to Him, were raised to a dignity above our nature, so also He, because He took our form and became man according to the Scriptures (Jn 1:14; 1 Tim 3:16), has God as His God. Yet by nature He is God from God, and true God.
For we are not sons of God by nature, yet we are called sons of God, because through His Spirit He cries in us, “Abba, Father!” (Rom 8:15).
Therefore do not be scandalized if you hear that He calls God His God. Rather, as one eager to learn, focus your attention and carefully consider the precision of the expression.
He says that God is His Father and our God, speaking the truth in both respects. The God of all is by nature and in reality the Father of Christ. He is not our father by nature, but rather God, as Creator and Lord.
Yet, as though mingling Himself with us, the Son grants to our nature the dignity proper and particular to Himself. He calls His own Begetter our common Father. Again, because of His likeness to us, He takes into Himself what is innate to our nature, for He calls His own Father His God. He does not wish to dishonor His likeness to us, because of His own love for mankind and mercy.
If, therefore, in your ignorance you wish to accuse this expression, and if it seems unbearable to you that the Lord calls the Father and God His God, then you must senselessly accuse the divine economy that took place for your sake. When you ought to give thanks, you will dishonor the Benefactor and irrationally slander the form of God’s love shown to us.
Indeed, if He humbled Himself (Phil 2:7), despising the shame (Heb 12:2), and became man for your sake, then this, beloved, is because of your lowliness. To Him who wished to undergo this for your sake, great and complete reverence is due.
THEOSIS