A Homily for Great Thursday at the Liturgy: On the Holy Mysteries of Christ (Part 1)

“Bread strengthens the human heart” (Ps 103:15), the prophet prophesied about a certain wondrous bread which, in contrast to ordinary material bread that strengthens the body, was to strengthen the human heart. Our heart needs strengthening! Terribly shaken by our fall, it cannot by itself stop its trembling. It is constantly disturbed by various passions. In vain and to no purpose does fallen man, in his blindness, proclaim the firmness of human will. This firmness does not exist: the will is carried away by the violence of the sin that dominates it. We need, we need the foretold wondrous bread, to strengthen the shaken, weakened human heart.

The strengthening of the human heart is accomplished by “the bread that came down from heaven,” “the bread of life” (Jn 6:48, 58). This bread is our Lord Jesus Christ. He said: “I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh…Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them” (Jn 6:51, 56).

What a wondrous ordinance! It is natural for the human mind to be bewildered before a supernatural, incomprehensible ordinance. The people heard the ordinance, darkened by fleshly thinking and unbelief, did not wish to receive an explanation from God about the divine ordinance, and pronounced their judgment about the divine ordinance to their own condemnation and ruin. “This teaching is difficult”, they said, “who can accept it?” Because of this many of his disciples turned back and no longer went about “with him” (Jn 6:60, 66). Even now, those who merely bear the name Christian, who keep the external customs of Christianity, but are alien to Christianity by their life and the pledge of their hearts, are beset by doubt concerning this great mystery. The word would be harsh if pronounced by a man; obedience to the word would be impossible if pronounced by a man. The word was pronounced by God, Who, in His infinite goodness, took upon Himself humanity for the salvation of men—and therefore the word must be filled with goodness. The word was pronounced by God, Who took upon Himself humanity for the salvation of men—and therefore attention to the word and judgment about it should not be superficial. Obedience to the word should be accepted by faith, from the whole soul, just as the incarnate God should be received. The incarnation of God is incomprehensible to men; equally incomprehensible are the ordinances and actions of the God-man, they—to a man conceived in iniquities and born in sins, a man condemned to eternal ruin and eternal torment in the dungeons and abysses of hell—assimilate to God, make him god by grace, raise him to heaven for eternal dwelling and eternal blessedness in heaven. Those who condemned the word and ordinance of the God-man, who rejected the word and ordinance, condemned and rejected the Word—“Spirit and life” (Jn 6:63)—condemned and rejected the ordinance by which is given to the disciple of Christ “Spirit and life. Truly, truly, I say to you,” said the Lord, “unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in yourselves” (Jn 6:53). “One must learn”, says the holy John Chrysostom, “the wondrous nature and action of the Holy Mysteries: what are they? For what are they given? What benefit do they bring? We are one body with the body of our Lord Jesus Christ, we are ‘bone of His bones’ and ‘flesh of His flesh’ (Gen 2:23). Initiate brethren! attend to what is said: we are united to the most holy flesh of the Lord not only through love, but through the mystery itself. The most holy flesh of the Lord becomes our food! He has given us this food, wishing to show the love He has for us. He mixed Himself with us and kneaded His body into us, so that we might be united with Him as the body is united with the head: such is the nature of the unspeakable love. Prefiguring the Lord, Job spoke of his servants, whom he greatly loved, saying that they, in explanation of his great love for him, said: ‘Who would grant that we might be satisfied with his flesh!’ (Job 31:31). Christ has granted us this, introducing us into the greatest love, and showing His love for us, giving to those who wish not only to see Him, but to touch Him, to eat of Him, and to be united with Him, and to fulfill every desire”. The Lord, substituting Himself for our forefather Adam, from whom we are born to death, becoming our ancestor, replaces the flesh and blood we inherited from Adam with His flesh and blood. Such action of the Lord, in pious contemplation of the redemption of men by the incarnation of God, while remaining incomprehensible and supernatural, becomes clear and natural. The unworthy flesh and blood of corrupted and rejected nature must be replaced in the nature renewed by the God-man with the most holy flesh and blood of the God-man.

“The good, most good, and super-good God,” theologizes the holy John of Damascus, “being wholly goodness, by the immeasurable riches of His goodness, did not suffer that this good, that is, His nature, should remain alone, and that no one should be a partaker of this nature”. Such is the view of the human mind, illuminated by the light of the Holy Spirit, on the actions of God; such is the explanation of the actions of God by this mind; thus this mind explains the actions of God to itself: the actions of God and the beginning of the actions of God are intelligible in their exact definition only to God Himself. The mind illuminated from above utters the following sacred proclamation. It came to pass through the good pleasure of God that the all-perfect goodness, that is, the essence of God, was reflected in other beings, as the sun is reflected on the objects which it touches with its rays. For this purpose God first created spirits and the world in which they dwell, then the sensible world, and finally man, who by his soul belongs to the created spirits, and by his body, in which the soul is clothed, belongs to the sensible world. God, being life, the source of life, poured forth from Himself life to all that lives and exists. The life of the world is the reflection in it of the source of life—God. Both spirits and man and all other creatures came from the hands of the Creator perfect, perfect in relation to their limited nature, filled with perfect good, without the slightest admixture of evil. Good in creatures, corresponding to their nature, was the reflection of the boundless goodness of the boundless Creator. The limited perfection of creatures was the reflection of the all-perfect perfection that constitutes the attribute of the sole Creator. Spirits and man became among creatures the nearest and clearest reflection of God. In their very essence the Creator inscribed His image; He adorned this image with qualities similar to those qualities which in their boundlessness and totality constitute the essence of God. God is goodness: and He made the rational creatures good. God is wisdom: and He made the rational creatures wise. To the decisive character of likeness He granted to the rational creatures His Holy Spirit—by this He united their spirit, their whole being, with Himself.

Evil appeared from the free will of rational creatures. Spirits conceived evil within themselves and gave it birth into real existence. They communicated the poison of evil to all mankind, infecting with evil the root of the race—the forefather, deceiving the forefather with the promise of a state equal to God. Here appears the goodness of God in the most astonishing manifestation. To draw mankind out of the fall and ruin, the Triune God, by one of His Persons, takes upon Himself humanity, renews man in Himself and by Himself, gives him thereby a union with Himself incomparably more intimate than was granted at creation. The Son of God by nature, having taken flesh and become the ancestor of men, made them sons of God by grace. The bestial conception and birth to which men were subject after the fall are rejected: it is covered, so to speak, by birth from the Holy Spirit at Baptism. Reborn men are transformed from flesh into spirit, not in nature, but in quality: “What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit” (Jn 3:6). Christians, born of Adam into death, are born by Baptism into life, born of God, born as children of God (Jn 1:12–13). Their existence is called “rebirth” and is “rebirth” (Mt 19:28; Tit 3:5); it is an existence to eternal life, an existence altogether different from that which was an existence to death; it is a second existence, secondly given after the loss of the first existence through the fall, eternal death. To the state of rebirth is given food corresponding to the state. As rebirth is birth from the Holy Spirit, so also the nourishment given to renewed man is prepared by the Holy Spirit. This nourishment is the flesh and blood of the God-man. ‘The flesh of the Lord is quickening Spirit,’ said the holy John of Damascus, ‘since it was conceived by the quickening Spirit; I say this not denying (not rejecting) the nature of the body, but wishing to show all its divineness and quickening power’.

The God-man, being the all-perfect God, appeared to the outward senses of men, marked by the fall, as merely a man. Holy men, who became through Baptism children of God, who became spirit, preserving and developing this sonship and spiritual state through a life pleasing to God, appeared to the outward senses of men, marked by the fall, as ordinary men, distinguished by nothing from other men. The Holy Mysteries of Christ, being the body and blood of the God-man, being Spirit, preserve to the bodily senses the outward appearance of bread and wine. Bread and wine are seen, bread and wine are smelled, bread and wine are touched, bread and wine are tasted. The Holy Mysteries reveal and manifest themselves through their action. Thus God was revealed, covered by humanity: He revealed Himself and bore witness to Himself by His actions. Thus the holy saints of God, vessels of the Spirit, revealed themselves: they were revealed and uncovered by their actions. The appearance is profoundly humble, veiled in simplicity, foreign to affectation, foreign to effect—a supernatural, divine action! By divine action the dignity of the wonderfully humble appearance is exalted. Indeed! God humbled Himself unspeakably by the incarnation and by His earthly life: all His actions are unspeakably humble, unspeakably beautiful and majestic in their humility. This applies also to the Holy Mysteries. What can be more humble in appearance, more ordinary, than the food offered to renewed men, that extraordinary, wondrous, awesome food in which the Holy Spirit is given for nourishment, in which the God-man is given for nourishment? “Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood”, He said, “…abide in me, and I in them” (Jn 6:56–57). “Those who partake of the most holy body and most holy blood,” said a great Father, “stand with the angels and archangels and powers on high, clothed in the very royal purple of Christ, girded with spiritual armor. By this I have still said nothing great: they are clothed in the King Himself”. When the figurative sacrifices were established, the eating of meat cooked by fire was permitted, the drinking of blood was forbidden. The reason for the prohibition was announced: “the life of the flesh is in the blood” (Lev 17:11). When the new-covenant Sacrifice was offered, Foreshadowed by weak shadows—the old-covenant sacrifices; when the new-covenant Sacrifice was offered by the Priest—the Lord, Who was both Sacrifice and Priest, then came from God a different command concerning the blood of sacrifice. “Drink from it, all of you”, the Lord commands all, calling all, “for this is my blood of the covenant” (Mt 26:27–28). All are invited to drink of Christ’s blood! The invitation is given for the same reason that the prohibition was pronounced. In Christ’s blood is His life. There is clearly perceived at communion with the Holy Mysteries a touching of the soul of Christ to the soul of the communicant, a union of the soul of Christ with the soul of the communicant. Without words, without teaching by words, the soul begins to feel in itself peace foreign to its fallen nature, gentleness, humility, love for all, coldness toward the perishable and transitory, sympathy for the coming age. These feelings are breathed upon the soul and implanted in it from the soul of Christ, as He said: “Learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls” (Mt 11:29). “Learn not from an Angel, not from a man, not from a book; learn from Me,” said the holy John of the Ladder, explaining the words of the Saviour, “learn from My self-giving to you, from My shining and action in you, that I am gentle and humble in heart, and in thought, and in the manner of My thinking, and you will find rest from the inner struggle, relief for your souls from the burden and disturbance caused by thoughts brought from the realm of fallen spirits”. Such is the action of the Holy Mysteries: they, acting upon us, at the same time act upon our invisible and sleepless enemies, the demons, shielding from them their vessel—man, who worthily receives them within himself. Food that appears outwardly material, received by the mouth, acts against the spirits, binds them as if with chains! A table on which bread and wine appear outwardly fights against the spirits, tramples them! “You prepare a table before me”, exclaimed the prophet in exultation to God, pointing from afar to the Christian altar, “in the presence of those who trouble me” (Ps 22:5). This action of the Holy Mysteries is especially known to monks living in silence and subjected to the fierce assault of demonic thoughts. “They burn,” said the Venerable Pimen the Great, speaking from his own experience, “from the poison of malicious demons, and they eagerly await Saturday and the Lord’s day, to come to the sources of living water—the body and blood of the Lord—to be purified by them from the bitterness with which the enemy has poisoned them”. And the fallen spirits know the power of the Holy Mysteries. They tremble at it, hate it, envy those who partake, envy them with the envy of which demons are capable. Often they attack with fury those who are preparing for communion, scatter their thoughts, bring coldness and hardness to the heart, bring heavy sinful memories and fantasies, try to defile the conscience, bring a Christian into confusion, prevent communion; often after communion the spirits make a similar attack, again with the aim of plunging one into confusion and disturbance, with the aim of shaking faith, sowing the thought that communion with the Holy Mysteries brings no benefit. This invisible warfare waged by the spirits of wickedness against those who communicate is testimony to the utmost importance and benefit of the Holy Mysteries. Precious treasure, which enemies are so zealous to prevent man from obtaining! Precious treasure, which the enemy so furiously tries to seize from man! Let us be strengthened by faith, and manfully resist our enemies. When we prepare ourselves to receive the Holy Mysteries, let us try to maintain every possible watchfulness over ourselves; after receiving the Holy Mysteries, let us try to maintain this watchfulness over ourselves. Let us not fear the soul’s turbulence produced by the assault of spirits! Let us not allow despondency and disturbance to overcome us. The action of the Holy Mysteries will surely reveal itself in the soul of the patient ascetic, as the sun appears in the sky when it is cleared of clouds. “I will look in triumph on my enemies” (Ps 53:9), said the holy David when the disturbance produced by them in his soul had passed. The communicant of the Holy Mysteries, freed from the assault of spirits, will utter this same confession, all the more clearly detecting in himself the action of the Holy Mysteries. Everyone who communicates with attention and reverence, with proper preparation, with faith, feels a change in himself, even if not immediately after communion, then after some time. A wondrous peace descends upon the mind and heart; the members of the body are clothed in tranquility; the seal of grace is impressed upon the face; thoughts and feelings are bound by sacred, spiritual bonds, forbidding reckless freedom and levity, restraining them. With a constantly pious and attentive life, the action of the Holy Mysteries becomes clearer, more perceptible, more abundant. This action is compared by Scripture to an anointing of the head, that is, the mind, with spiritual oil, compared to a mighty, royal chalice, which powerfully inebriates the soul with feelings flowing from the Holy Spirit, flowing from Christ. With a constantly attentive and pious life, the incomprehensible mercy of God becomes in some measure comprehensible, revealed to men in the granting to them of heavenly food. This “mercy” of God “will pursue” to salvation, by its supernatural power, the one who communicates as often as possible, as worthily as possible “all the days” of his earthly “life”, “and will settle” him in the heavenly “house of the Lord” for the infinite “length of eternal days” (Ps 22:5–6).

Material bread is an image of heavenly bread, and wine is an image of true spiritual drink. The action of material bread and wine serves as an image of the action of Christ’s body and blood. Bread, being consumed as food, separates from itself through the medium of digestion juices into the body in a manner unknown and incomprehensible to man. The manner of action is unknown and incomprehensible; the consequences of action, and therefore the action itself, are evident. Similar to the action of bread is the action of wine, which acts principally on the blood. It separates from itself gases which change the state of the blood, by means of the blood they act on the soul, act on the mind, act on the heart. The action of material bread and wine is material. Bread sustains and strengthens the powers of the body; wine, acting on the blood, arouses activity in it, helps bread in nourishing and strengthening the body. A body deprived of material food must of necessity become the victim of death. Spiritual bread—the body of Christ—strengthens the human heart, strengthens all one’s being, strengthens the will, strengthens the mind, gives righteousness to the desires and inclinations of soul and body, frees the natural properties of men from the infirmities with which they became infected at the fall, which are called passions, that is, sufferings, ailments. Spiritual nourishment serves the spiritual food. It imparts to the soul the qualities of Christ’s properties. Christ took upon Himself all human properties except sin; the properties of Christ’s human soul are untainted by sin, immaculate; by reason of union with Godhead, they are divine. The soul of one who drinks Christ’s blood is saturated with these deified properties. “As material wine,” said the holy Mark, “is dissolved in all the members of the one drinking it, and the wine becomes in him and he becomes in the wine; so also the one who drinks the blood of Christ is saturated with the Spirit of Godhead, is dissolved in the perfect soul [of Christ], and this soul is in him, sanctified in this way, becomes worthy of the Lord”. The one who abstains from communion with the Holy Mysteries alienates himself from Christ, is abandoned to himself, to his nature struck by eternal death. Eternal death is destroyed in man, within him, in mind and heart, only by Christ. He enters as almighty God into the impenetrable treasuries of man, there strikes death with death. If this is not accomplished, eternal death will remain in man, will remain as the beginning and pledge of eternal ruin. There is no possibility of escaping eternal ruin for one who has and preserves within himself the beginning and pledge of it—eternal death.

O! how the invitation of the all-merciful Lord becomes understandable and natural—the invitation to taste His all-holy body and blood, to be nourished by them. This invitation is the most persuasive, it is joined with great promises and great threats. The Lord, by His unspeakable love for us, saved us by Himself, replacing our punishments with His punishment, replacing our defiled dignity with His most holy dignity; by this same unspeakable love, in the wondrous order and system established by this love, He calls us to the closest union with Himself through communion with the Holy Mysteries, as the surest, as the necessary condition of our salvation. “Do not work for the food that perishes”, He says, “but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you” (Jn 6:27). “My Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world” (Jn 6:32–33). “I am the living bread” (Jn 6:48). “I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh” (Jn 6:51). “My flesh is true food and my blood is true drink” (Jn 6:55). “Very truly, I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you” (Jn 6:53). Communion with the Holy Mysteries is ordained to be daily. Daily communion with the life of Christ ought daily to quicken the Christian with spiritual life. “Frequent communion with life,” said Basil the Great, “what else does it mean but frequent quickening?” Frequent communion—what else does it mean but the constant renewal in oneself of the properties of the God-man, but the renewal of oneself with these properties? Renewal, constantly sustained and nourished, becomes assimilated. From it and by it the oldness acquired by the fall is destroyed; eternal death is conquered and mortified by eternal life, living in Christ, flowing from Christ; life—Christ—takes up His dwelling in man.

The Holy Mysteries have the special action of God’s word described by the holy Apostle Paul. This is natural! As Christ acts in God’s word, as the Holy Spirit acts, as Christ and the Holy Spirit act together, working from the one principle equal in honor and identical in nature—the Father, so They act also in the Holy Mysteries. “The word of God is living and active”, the great Paul announced, “sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing until it divides soul from spirit, joints from marrow; it is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart” (Heb 4:12). The same must be said of the Holy Mysteries! “They enter into our essence,” says the holy John of Damascus, “for our preservation and cleansing from all defilement, for warding off all harm from us. If they encounter counterfeit gold in us, they purify it by the fire of judgment, lest we be condemned in peace in the coming age: they purify through illnesses and all afflictions”. The communicant of the Holy Mysteries must know that, in receiving them, he “eats and drinks judgment against himself” (1 Cor 11:29), as the apostle said. This judgment justifies those who live a life pleasing to God, distributes and bestows upon them spiritual rewards; it judges the failings of those whose piety is insufficient, heals the failings with temporal punishments to prevent eternal ones; it strikes with punishments, terrible punishments, those who dare approach the Holy Mysteries while living a life deliberately sinful, contrary to Christ’s commandments.

On this basis it is enjoined that those who desire to approach the Holy Mysteries prepare themselves most carefully. “Let a person examine himself”, says the apostle, “and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup” (1 Cor 11:28). One must delve into self-examination, carefully consider, investigate oneself; one must cleanse oneself from sins, uproot them from oneself by confession and repentance; one must correct even the finest deviations from the path of Christ’s commandments by returning to this path, must lay in the soul an intention to hold steadfastly to this path with all strength, strengthen this intention through reading, study of God’s word, fervent prayers, frequent communion with the Holy Mysteries. One must consider the nothingness, poverty, sinfulness, and fallen state of man, on the one hand; on the other, the greatness of God, the unspeakable goodness of the Saviour, Who gave up to death His body for us, for the shedding of His blood; the unspeakable love of the Saviour, Who feeds us with His flesh and blood, by this nourishment bringing us into the closest union with Himself. From such consideration and judgment of oneself arises a contrite heart, the Christian is prepared to receive the Holy Mysteries worthily by sincere awareness of his unworthiness. Such self-examination is set forth by the holy Fathers in the prayers before communion, by which the Fathers assist our dull sight and hardness of heart, by which they clothe our souls as in bridal garments in humility, so beloved of our Saviour. “All who exalt themselves will be humbled” (Lk 18:14), said the Saviour, “and whoever eats of this bread will live forever” (Jn 6:51).