Chapter 17

¹ “And it came to pass, while they were watching for a suitable day, that she went in once, as on the day before and the day before that, with only two maidservants, and she desired to bathe in the garden, for it was hot.”

² “It came to pass, then, while they were watching for a suitable day.” And what suitable day does the Scripture mean, except that of the Pascha, on which the bath is prepared in the garden for those who are burning with heat, and the Church, like Susanna washed clean, presents herself to God as a pure bride?

³ Now the Scripture’s saying that she went in “as on the day before and the day before that, with only two maidservants, and desired to bathe in the garden” makes this clear: that whenever the Church desires to receive the customary spiritual bath, of necessity two maidens must accompany her. For it is through faith in Christ and through love toward God that the Church receives the bath as she makes her confession […]

⁴ […] and the two maidens, as the ones accompanying her—faith and love—prepare the oil and the unguents for those who bathe.

⁵ And what were the unguents, except the commandments of the Word? And what the oil, except the power of the Holy Spirit, with which, after the bath, those who believe are anointed as with ointment?

⁶ These things were prefigured of old through the blessed Susanna for our sake, so that we who now believe in God might not regard the things now done in the Church as strange, but might believe that these things were prefigured of old through the patriarchs, just as the Apostle also says: “Now these things happened to them as types, and they were written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the ages have come.”