\"Blessed are those who hunger\"
John MacArthur Jr. Beatitudes
“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.”
Matthew 5:6
Keep in mind that in his Gospel, Matthew seeks to show that Jesus is the true King. Matthew constantly emphasizes the signs of Christ's kingship, whether we are talking about His genealogy, the worship of the Magi (official Eastern influencers), the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecies regarding the King of the Jews, or His victory over the devil. In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus Christ is presented as King.
The fifth chapter contains the words of the King, the manifesto of His Kingdom. If Christ is the King, then what is His Kingdom? He Himself answers this question in chapters 5, 6 and 7, immediately emphasizing that we are talking about the spiritual Kingdom. At the very end of the Sermon on the Mount it is said in Matt. 7:28: “And when Jesus had finished these words, the people were amazed at his teaching.” Why? “For He taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes and Pharisees” (Matt. 7:29).
Not only what Christ said testifies to His kingship, but also how He said it. His approach was regal, Christ speaking with authority. He didn't give any quotes. Whereas rabbis and scribes always cited quotes from famous personalities. Jesus spoke simply.
Jesus began His sermon by saying that the beatitudes He offers are the blessings He offers. However, Christ's offer was not what they expected. He offered the people a bliss they had never known, and a path to achieving it they had never heard of, and it surprised them. But by the end of Christ’s preaching, the people were not just surprised, but amazed.
Let me make an important clarification. People ask: “Are the truths set forth in the Beatitudes rules for how to enter the Kingdom of Heaven or how to live for those who have already entered it?” The answer to both of these questions is “Yes.” To enter the Kingdom of Heaven, a person must be poor in spirit. Living and being in this kingdom, he will continue to be aware of his spiritual poverty. In order to enter the Kingdom of Heaven, a person needs to mourn his own sinfulness. But even while you are in it, you will continue to mourn her. To enter the Kingdom of Heaven, you need to be meek. The proud will not enter there. But while in the Kingdom, a person will remain meek, as you will be more and more amazed at the greatness of God. To enter the Kingdom of Heaven you need to be hungry and thirsty for righteousness. But being in it, this hunger and this thirst for truth will continue. Obviously, at times we will be less faithful and sometimes disobedient to these demands. And they will remain a part of our lives.
The verse in question speaks of a very strong desire, a very strong thirst, i.e. vitality of ambition, in human nature. The Bible gives enough clear examples when inner thirst was directed towards the wrong goals. This is what Lucifer, Nebuchadnezzar, the rich madman and others did. Nevertheless, aspirations, drives, decisive measures and great desires in themselves are not something bad if they are aimed at achieving the right goals.
But what are the right goals? Let's read our verse again: "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness." These are very strong words. Food and water are the necessities of life, and here Christ says that you need righteousness as much as you need food. Our bodily life is impossible without food and water, our spiritual life is impossible without righteousness.
Today, thousands of people are dying from hunger and related diseases in Africa, India and Latin America. Hunger is like war or epidemics. He kills people. He destroys. However, even more terrible is spiritual hunger and spiritual thirst if they are not satisfied.
Unsaved people are thirsty and spiritually hungry for happiness, but they are looking for it in the wrong places. The Apostle Peter compares unsaved people to dogs licking their own vomit and to pigs wallowing in the mud (see 2 Pet. 2:22). The heart of every person living in the world, believer or non-believer, was created by God, and a thirst and hunger for God is placed in it. However, people try to satisfy their hunger for God with all sorts of wrong things. They seek that which, according to Scripture, “is not bread” (Isa. 55:2).
Jesus knew that the people had such a hunger, and He offered Himself to them as bread. He knew that people were thirsty and He offered Himself to them as water. However, people follow the wrong path, as is very clearly shown in the book of the prophet Jeremiah 2:13: “For my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken Me, the fountain of living water, and have hewed out for themselves broken cisterns that cannot hold water.”
In 1 Epistle 2:15-16, the apostle John warns that we will not find satisfaction in this world: “Do not love the world, nor the things that are in the world: ...the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life.” None of this will last forever. It is like a breath of wind. And only those who obey the Spirit of God come to the Heavenly Father and fill their empty hearts at His feet.
So go back to the very beginning and ask yourself, what are you craving? Strength? Glory? Wealth? Pleasures? Have you become like a dog, a dog licking its own vomit? Or a pig wallowing in the mud? Or are you looking for true wealth? Your answer to these questions will determine whether you are in the Kingdom of God. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness.
As in other cases, we need to answer several key questions:
How does this bliss fit in with others?
We have already said that the “spiritual poverty” referred to in verse three means that one has nothing righteous and one is spiritually bankrupt. People cannot help themselves in any way. His condition is hopeless. He is sinful. This is followed by “crying and mourning” - this is a reaction to your spiritual poverty. Then if a person comes into a state of meekness and says: “Compared to God, I am nothing!” This is humility. In meekness before God, a person realizes that there is only one hope of obtaining righteousness, and that is to receive it from His hands. And this leads a person to the fourth beatitude, i.e. to hunger and thirst for something he does not have.
Thus, the gradual development of thought is clearly visible. Martyn Lloyd-Jones writes:
This Beatitude logically follows from the previous one. It is a logical conclusion drawn from the previous commandments. And this is what we should be especially deeply grateful to God for. I can think of no better self-examination of our Christian faith than this verse. If you have this beatitude, and if it is to you the most blessed statement in Holy Scripture, you can be sure that you are a true Christian. If not, then you need to check what your faith is based on.”
Jesus Christ says: blessedness is spiritual poverty, blessedness is mourning, blessedness is meekness, blessedness is hunger and thirst for righteousness. Notice how the results of these bliss combine with each other. “Theirs is the kingdom of heaven, they will be comforted, they will inherit the earth, they will be satisfied.” Isn't this amazing? If we add up what has been said, we get all of the above!
In other words: by accepting God's conditions, a person receives everything. The world is furiously striving to achieve all this. But only by accepting God's conditions will a person enter the Kingdom of Heaven and receive all this. People are willing to break their necks to grab what God wants to give freely! (See James 4:1-2.)
The Jews tried to create this Kingdom. They did everything to find solace in difficult circumstances and passionately desired to inherit the land. They tried to make their whole life meaningful. But they were going the wrong way, and the Lord simply told them: “I will give you everything you want. I will give you the Kingdom. I will give you comfort. I will fill your life with everything you need. I will give you all the land. You will have everything if you only come to Me, accepting My conditions.”
If we believe God's promises, we don't have to work, we inherit. I read my Bible and in it God says, “You are My child. You will inherit the earth." Why should I waste time trying to earn this land for myself? Absolutely pointless. The land will still be mine. I don't mind if someone uses it temporarily. According to His promise, she belongs to me.
Isaac moved from well to well. Every time he dug a new well, someone would lay claim to it and take it away. But in the end he dug a well, which no one else claimed, and called it “Rehoboth”; for, he said, now the LORD has given us a spacious place” (Gen. 26:22). He knew that God would take care of him. There is no self-interest in it. And this is the main thing on which the Sermon on the Mount is based.
Bliss can only be yours if you receive it from the hands of God. And this becomes motivation for other things. It is said: “And whoever wants to sue you and take your shirt, give him your outer garment too” (Matt. 5:4). Why? Because you have everything you need in the Kingdom of Heaven. What are you concerned about? “And whoever forces you to go one mile with him, go with him two miles. Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you” (Matthew 5:41-42). Don't rely on what this world relies on. Everything will be yours in any case. So share with others. With such a heart and with such a spirit a person can have the right aspiration.
If you say, “All I want, God, is to have Your righteousness. All I want is to be meek before You. All I want is to have Your Kingdom on Your terms,” then you can rely on His promise to inherit it all. Yes all! The Apostle Paul tells the Corinthians: “...all things are yours; But you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s” (1 Cor. 3:22-23). One way or another - it's all yours!
Jesus says about this: “Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you” (Matthew 6:33). In any case, all this is ours on God's terms, and therefore we can say: “Blessed are those who hunger.”
Verse 3 talks about suffering, i.e. about “spiritual poverty”; in verse 4 we are talking again about suffering - “those who mourn”; verse 5 speaks of suffering—“meekness” (i.e., giving up one’s self). However, after suffering, hungering and thirsting, satiety comes in verse 6 as we reach the point where we accept God. That is why this bliss is what we are talking about here. That's the whole point.
What does it mean to be hungry and thirsty?
We have already briefly talked about what it means to be hungry and thirsty. It's about desire, a very strong desire. The words of Christ have special power, and especially considering the circumstances in which they were spoken. We don't know what it is to be truly hungry or thirsty. When we think we are thirsty, it means we simply decide to go to an available source to quench our thirst. When we say that we are hungry, we mean that it is already one o'clock in the afternoon, the time when we are used to having lunch at 12:15.
James Boyce gives the account of Major Gilbert, the famous troop commander, who recounts in his book The Last March his and his soldiers' sufferings from thirst in the Palestine Desert during the First World War.
We had a headache. The eyes became bloodshot and dull from the blindingly bright light... The tongue began to swell... the lips became purple-black and cracked. We never saw those who lagged behind the column again, but nevertheless we fought desperately for the town of Sheriya. There was a well there, but we were never able to take possession of Sheriya until nightfall, and thousands died of thirst.
We fought for our lives that day. Pursuing literally the retreating Turks on their heels, we broke into the Sheriya station. The first thing that caught my eye was the large stone pools, full of cool, clean, drinkable water... It took four hours for all our people to quench their thirst... I think this was the first real biblical lesson we learned on the way from Beersheba to the wells Sherry. If we were so thirsty for God and His righteousness, so eager to do His will in our lives, if this were our constant and main desire, then how much richer and more fruitful we would be in the Holy Spirit.
Jesus spoke about hunger and thirst to those people who experienced what it was like. In the Greek text, the verbs to hunger and thirst have very strong meanings. Peinao means to be in need, to be very hungry. The word dipsao means very strong thirst. Jesus points to the strongest physical impulses in development, representing some as hungry and others as thirsty. Do not forget that these qualities must be present not only when entering the Kingdom of Heaven, but also when staying in it.
When I came to Jesus Christ, I hungered and thirsted for His righteousness, but now that I have come to know Him, I continue to hunger and thirst for more and more of His righteousness. The famous Bible expositor Lensky says: “This hunger and thirst not only continues, but also intensifies with an ever-increasing desire for satisfaction.” And if you do not experience hunger and thirst for righteousness, then your very existence in the Kingdom of Heaven is in question.
Let me illustrate this truth with the example of Moses. After forty years in the desert, he was called by God. He saw God in the burning thorn bush. When Moses returned to lead the people of Israel out of the land of Egypt, Moses saw the hand of God in the ten plagues of Egypt and in the parting of the Red Sea. He saw God, the radiance of God's Glory in the pillar of fire leading them through the desert. He saw the hand of God in the water for drinking and the manna for food. And after the tabernacle was built at the command of God, Moses said: “God, I want to see Your glory.”
You can say: “Well, that’s enough, that’s enough, Moses! You’ve already seen a lot.” But Moses would have answered, “No, that is not enough for me.” God took him to a high mountain, and there Moses saw a flaming finger writing the Law of God on stone tablets, but for Moses this was not enough. He never felt that what he had was enough. “He cries again, “Show me your glory” (Ex. 33:18). This is how the sons of the Kingdom of Heaven should be. They should always want more.
David was a man after God's own heart and was in close fellowship with the Lord. He wrote Psalm 23. Throughout his life he knew a God who cared for and kept him. Zeal for the house of the Lord consumed David, and he had God's experiences within him. And he was close to God.
And yet David cries out: “As the deer longs for streams of water, so longs my soul for You, O God! My soul thirsts for the mighty, living God: when will I come and appear before the face of God!” (Ps. 41:2-3). And he also says: “God! You are my God, I have been looking for You since the early dawn; My soul thirsts for You, My flesh yearns for You in an empty, parched and waterless land” (Ps. 62:2).
David's hunger and thirst for God was never satisfied. For true sons of the Kingdom, it is a daily way of life.
The Apostle Paul had three visions of Jesus Christ: first on the road to Damascus (Acts 9:3-9), then in Corinth (Acts 18:9-10) and finally when he was caught up to the third heaven (2 Cor. 12:1-4). The Apostle Paul in his letters set forth profound theological truths that became the main part of the New Testament. Could he have asked for anything more?
Yet he cries out, “That I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings.” It was never enough for him. Of course he knew the law. In verses 6-8 he says, “...according to legal righteousness, blameless...I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus” (Phil. 3:10).
A faithful servant of God, who labored much in the early days of the Plymouth Brethren movement, J. N. Derby said: “Just being hungry is not enough; I have to be truly hungry to find out what God wants for me personally. When the prodigal son began to starve, he began to eat the horns that were used to feed the pigs. However, when he became hungry, he decided to return to his father.” This is a hunger that only God can satisfy.
Until people hunger and thirst for righteousness, they do not seek the fullness that God can give. Luke 1:53 says, “He filled those who were hungry with good things, but those who were rich he sent away empty.” (See also Ps. 106:8). Such hunger and thirst are very strong, these are insatiable feelings. I think I hunger for God's righteousness more now than I did before, and I believe that tomorrow I will hunger more than I do today.
What should we hunger and thirst for?
The prophet Amos says that the worldly people are chasing after the dust of the earth (Amos 2:7). People really want to be happy, but they are looking for happiness in the dust of the earth. The pursuit of entertainment that is so inherent in our society always surprises me. I'm not against Disneyland or other entertainment venues. However, there is too much entertainment and pleasure in our lives. We are like a person who is in pain from some illness, and although he wants to be free from pain, he does not want to cure his illness.
This is true even of the church. Some believers pursue various pleasures. They want to have some exciting spiritual experiences. They attend various meetings and conferences and various consultants as if they want to get some spiritual lessons, but this is not what they should be looking for. They want to find bliss, not realizing that bliss is the result of hunger and thirst for righteousness. It is not acquired with holiness.
Righteousness or justification in Greek is dikaiosun and means to be in right relationship with God. And only such a relationship with God is true bliss.
This beatitude points to the following two things: salvation and sanctification. Let us turn our attention first to salvation. A person who hungers and thirsts for righteousness seeks salvation. He sees his sin, recognizes that he is opposing God, and recognizes the fact that he is separated from a holy God. He is poor in spirit, sorrowful, meek and longing to be reborn before God. He wants forgiveness, hungers, and thirsts for the righteousness of God that comes with salvation. He longs for liberation from his self. He longs to be freed from sin, from its presence, its power, and from the punishment of sin.
The prophet Isaiah often compares righteousness and salvation (see Isa. 45:8; 46:12-13; 51:5; 56:1; 61:10). A person receives it at the moment of receiving salvation. In fact, the beatitude we are considering could be paraphrased as follows: “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for salvation.” Do you want to be happy? Hunger for salvation. Thirst for the blood of Christ to wash you from your sins. When a person loses all hope of saving himself, he begins to yearn for salvation, which can only be received from the hands of God, and only then can he know what it means to be happy.
This is precisely where the Jews who lived during the days of Jesus Christ on earth stumbled. They tried to earn salvation by their own works. They said: “We have already achieved righteousness.” However, Jesus said: “Until you find yourself prostrate before the Lord and until you begin to hunger and thirst for the righteousness that you yourself cannot achieve, you will not know blessedness.”
Bliss belongs to the saints. Remember that at the moment of the most difficult experiences and suffering, the Apostle Paul says: “Rejoice.” And if you feel unhappy, something has happened to your holiness. Jesus was speaking to the Jews who considered themselves righteous. For them, holiness meant following their rules. This was an outward manifestation of holiness, which was not enough. This is why Jesus Christ says: “Unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:20). The Beatitudes call for abandoning the external and focusing on the internal.
As I said, there is a second element: sanctification. We hunger and thirst for sanctification, i.e. ever-increasing holiness. I cannot fully express in words the depth of my feelings, however, I hope that this hunger in my life will never stop, i.e. my desire to be more and more like Jesus Christ will not cease. This is the characteristic sign of a Christian. We can never reach a position where we can think, “At last I have achieved bliss.” Such a thought would be most tragic both for unregenerate people who think they can save themselves and for Christians who think they have already achieved everything they need (see Phil. 3:13-14). The sons of the kingdom will never stop hungering.
The Apostle Paul says: “And I pray that your love may increase more and more” (Phil. 1:9). Despite your strong love, you must love more. Despite your fervent prayer, you must pray more. Despite your submissiveness, you must be even more submissive. Despite the closeness of your thoughts to the thoughts of Christ, they should be even closer. Blessed are those who continue to hunger and thirst.
This does not mean that we should desire some “pieces” or parts of righteousness. We long for complete righteousness, i.e. everything that constitutes righteousness. We long to be like Jesus Christ. We are never satisfied with what we have achieved. No matter what righteousness we have received by God's grace, we still don't have everything that goes into it, do we? Therefore, when we feel hunger and thirst, we, like David, cry out: “When I awaken, I will be satisfied with Your image” (Ps. 16:15).
So righteousness begins with salvation and continues with sanctification, and we are never satisfied with only a part of it. I admire that I should hunger and thirst for righteousness, and not possess it, such is the command. Only the Jews could say, “It is we who have righteousness.”
Jesus rejected the very idea. He said that people who think they have righteousness are not blessed, but people who know they have no righteousness are blessed. Just because a person thinks that he has righteousness, he is in a hopeless state. God blesses those who hunger and thirst so that they always desire it even more. Someone said: “Earthly sources do not quench thirst. Death to those whom Christ does not nourish.” I call this Divine dissatisfaction.
What are the results of this hunger and thirst?
"For they shall be satisfied." The word will be filled is a special word. It was usually used when it came to feeding livestock. And it meant complete satisfaction. God wants us to be happy and fulfilled. Satisfied with what? What are we hungry for? What do we crave? - Righteousness.
But isn't this paradoxical? You are satisfied and yet not. My wife knows how to make a special lemon cream pie. I always enjoy it when I eat it, but I always want more. I'm already full, but I always want more, because every bite whets my appetite. So it is with righteousness. We are satiated and desire even more satiation.
If we thirst for God's righteousness, He gives it to us. The Word of God says: “For He has satisfied the thirsty soul, and filled the hungry soul with good things,” “...but those who seek the Lord lack no good thing.” “I will lack for nothing” and “My cup overflows,” “...and My people will be satisfied with My good things, says the LORD” (Ps. 106:9; Ps. 23:1, 5; Jer. 31:14).
In John 4:14, Jesus said to the Samaritan woman at the well, “Whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never thirst.” And again: “I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me shall not hunger” (John 6:35).
Jesus Christ satisfies hunger, but this blessed hunger reappears and we desire to receive even more from Him. Complete satiety will come only when we see Him. The sons of the Kingdom always have a great desire to receive from God not power or pleasure, not some riches or glory, but righteousness.
How can I know if I am truly hungry and thirsty?
Are you satisfied with yourself? The Puritans said, “Those who desire righteousness less need it more.” Do you recognize yourself in the words: “Poor man I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? (Rom. 7:24). Or you feel so righteous that everyone else seems wrong to you. If you are feeling self-satisfied, I doubt if you even know what it means to hunger and thirst for truth. Do you feel a constant pain of dissatisfaction? These are signs that you are seeking the ways of the Lord.
Do outward manifestations of righteousness satisfy you? Do you notice that such external manifestations affect you? Can you satisfy your appetite for the wrong things, and does it disappear after that? The hunger for righteousness cannot be satisfied by anything.
Do you have a big appetite for God's Word? His word sets forth those rules by which we will have righteousness if we follow them. The prophet Jeremiah says: “Your words were found, and I ate them” (Jer. 15:16). If there is a hunger and thirst for righteousness, you will have such an appetite for the Word of God that you will devour it. If you do not have a hunger and thirst for righteousness, then perhaps you are a son of the Kingdom who remains in sin. But perhaps you are not a child of God at all. In any case, you lose the right to bliss.
Does everything Divine delight you too? Proverbs 27:7 says, “…all bitter things are sweet to the hungry soul.” I can recognize anyone who seeks righteousness if he accepts the losses of life that the Lord allows with thanksgiving and satisfaction. After all, even if they cause pain, they come from God. Some people can only be happy when they receive good things. If something difficult befalls them, then they don’t like it. They are not hungry and thirsty, they are just chasing happiness.
Thomas Watson says, “He who hungers and thirsts for righteousness will eat the oil of the gospel as gladly as he eats honey.” I can tell you from my own experience that trials can seem as sweet as pleasant events because God Himself is present in them and they serve His purposes and make us more righteous.
Are your hunger and thirst unconditional? Remember the rich young man who asked Jesus Christ what he needed to do to inherit eternal life, but refused to part with his wealth. His hunger turned out to be conditional, and therefore he never satisfied it. What do you do? Do you say, “I want to be with Christ and with my sin at the same time. With Christ and with my pride. With Christ and my lusts. With Christ and with the desire to deceive people. With Christ and with my lies. With Christ and with my greed. With Christ and with my pursuit of material wealth. With Christ and...with Christ and..."?
A hungry man cannot desire food and a new suit at the same time. A thirsty person will not desire both water and a pair of new shoes. The hungry and thirsty want only food and water. “My soul is weary of desire for Your judgments at all times,” says Psalm 119:20.
What does your self-analysis tell you? The prophet Isaiah says: “With my soul I have longed for You in the night, and with my spirit I will seek You within me” (Is. 26:9). David thirsted for God sincerely and turned to Him from early morning. The wise virgins filled their vessels before the bridegroom arrived. Some people will feel thirsty, but it will be too late and they will suffer the same fate as the rich man described in Luke 16:24. They will say: “Oh, send someone who can dip his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am tormented in this flame!” Such is the thirst that can never be quenched.
Have a thirst now and it will be quenched.
Publishing house of the Slavic Evangelical Society, 1991
The Nine Beatitudes - The Commandments of Jesus Christ's Happiness
If the ten commandments of Moses, given to him on Mount Sinai, are essentially prohibitive: they say what one should not do in order to please God, these are strict commandments - then in the Sermon on the Mount, as in all of Christianity, the commandments are filled with the spirit of love and teach how need to do. There is another parallel between the commandments of the Old and New Testaments: the ancient commandments are written on stone tablets (slabs), which is a symbol of external, rough perception. The new ones are written on the tablets of the heart of a believer who will voluntarily fulfill them - by the Holy Spirit. That's why people sometimes call them the moral, ethical commandments of Christianity. We find the text of the Beatitudes in two Gospels:
- Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.
- Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.
- Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.
- Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be satisfied.
- Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy.
- Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.
- Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God.
- Blessed are those who are persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.
- Blessed are you when they revile you and persecute you and slander you in every way unjustly because of Me. Rejoice and be glad, for great is your reward in heaven” (Matthew 5:1-12).
The Lord in these commandments speaks about what a person must become in order to gain the fullness of life. Bliss is the totality of those qualities that make a person happy, without any deficiency. This is joy, it is unemotional and intimate, but as real as a person is able to contain it - Christians already live with it in this world, and they will take it with them into eternity.
Gospel according to Matthew 5:9
Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God
In the sacred tabernacle of meeting, which the Lawgiver built for the Israelites according to the image shown by God on the mountain, everything contained within the fence, as well as every single part, were holy and sacred. The innermost part was untouched and inaccessible, and was called the Holy of Holies. And this strongly expressed name shows, I think, that this part had holiness not in equal measure with other parts, but as much as the sanctified and holy differed from the common and unclean, just as much this inaccessible part was more sacred and purer than the shrines surrounding it. Therefore, I believe that all the blessings previously indicated to us on this mountain, how many of them were previously prepared by God’s word, are such that each is sacred and holy, but now offered to view in the true sense is the sanctuary and holy of holies. For if there is no greater good than this, to see God; then to become a son of God is, without a doubt, above all well-being. What invention of sayings, what signification of names will fully embrace the gift of such a promise? Whatever anyone can imagine in their mind, what is imagined is, without a doubt, higher than the idea. If we call what is offered in the promise of this blessedness good, or precious, or sublime; then the signified is greater than what is expressed by these names. Success is higher than desire, gift is higher than hope, grace is higher than nature.
What is man in comparison with the nature of God? From which of the saints will I borrow a word to express the humiliation of man? According to the word of Abraham, he is earth and ashes (Gen. 18:27); according to the word of Isaiah, hay (Is. 40:6); according to the word of David, not even hay, but the likeness of hay: for Isaiah says: all flesh is hay; and David says: man is like grass (Ps. 37:2). According to Ecclesiastes, he is vanity; and according to Pavlov’s word, damnation (1 Cor. 15:10); for in the sayings by which the Apostle called himself, all mankind is mourned. That's what a man is; and what is God? How can I say anything about something that cannot be seen, or heard, or grasped with the heart? What words will I use to describe nature? What similarity of this good will I find in the good things known to us? What words will I invent to signify the ineffable and unspeakable? I hear that the Holy Scripture tells great things about the Supreme Nature; but what does this mean in comparison with Nature itself? The word has spoken as much as I am capable of receiving, and not as much as the signified contains. Just as those who breathe air into themselves receive it, each according to its capacity, one more, the other less, but even the one who contains a lot does not contain all the elements within himself, but on the contrary, he, as much as he could, took in as much from the whole, and this is the whole in it: so the theological concepts of Holy Scripture, set forth to us by the Holy Spirit by God-bearing men, for our measure of understanding are high, great, and surpass all magnitude, but do not reach the true magnitude. It is said: who measured water in a handful, and the sky in a span, and all the earth in a handful (Isa. 40:12)? Do you see what a lofty thought the one who describes unspeakable power has? But what does this mean in comparison with what really exists? The prophetic word in such high terms showed only a part of the Divine activity. It did not say, and did not mean to speak, about the very force from which activity, not to mention the nature from which force, but on the contrary refers to the word, according to some guesses, representing only the Divinity, as if pronouncing from the face of God these words: to whom will you liken Me (Isa. 46:5)? says the Lord. Ecclesiastes offers the same advice in his own words: do not be quick to speak the word before the face of God, for God is in heaven, you are an eye on earth below (Eccl. 5:1), by the mutual distance of these elements, as I think, showing to what extent The nature of God exceeds earthly thoughts.
By this Being, so powerful and great that it is impossible to see Him, hear Him, or comprehend Him in thought, a sane person is appropriated into nothingness among beings - this ashes, this hay, this vanity; He will be adopted as a son by the God of all. What can be found worthy of thanksgiving for this mercy? Where is such a word, such a thought, such a movement of thought to glorify this abundance of mercy? Man goes beyond the limits of his nature, becomes immortal from mortal, immutable from soon-perishing, eternal from ephemeral, in one word, from man to God; because he who is worthy to become the son of God will, without a doubt, have in himself the dignity of the Father, becoming the heir of all his father’s blessings. What greatness of the rich Lord! What a wide hand! What a great hand! How many gifts of ineffable treasures! Nature dishonored by sin brings us almost into equality with itself! For if the property of what He Himself is by nature bestows on people, what else is this affinity proclaimed if not some kind of equality?
This is the reward, what kind of feat is this? It is said: if you are a peacemaker, then the grace of sonship will crown you. It seems to me that the work for which such a reward is promised is a new gift. For in enjoying what we desire in this world, what is sweeter for people in peaceful life? Whatever pleasant thing you talk about in life, in order for it to be pleasant, you need peace; for if there is everything that is valued in this world, wealth, health, wife, children, house, family, servants, friends, land, sea, both enriching with their gifts, gardens, animal traps, baths, places for wrestling and bodily exercises, for coolness and fun, all that there are, inventions of voluptuousness; add to this entertainment shows, music, and if there is anything else that delights the life of the luxurious; If all this happens, but there is no good - peace, what is the use of all the good, the enjoyment of which will be stopped by war? Therefore, the world itself is pleasant to those who enjoy it, and delights everything that is valued in this world. If even during the time of peace we suffer some kind of disaster in humanity, then evil, mixed with good, becomes easy for those who suffer. It is true that when life is constrained by war, we are also insensitive to such sorrowful cases; because the general calamity exceeds the private calamities in its sorrows. And just as, as doctors of bodily suffering say, if two illnesses come together in one body at the same time, then the stronger one becomes noticeable, and the painful sensation of a lesser evil is somehow hidden, stolen by the increase of overpowering pain: so the disasters of war, predominantly sorrowful, bring to the point that every private person becomes insensitive to his own misfortunes. But if even in order to feel its own evils, the soul somehow becomes numb, struck by the general disasters of the war; then how can she have a pleasant feeling? Where are the weapons, the spears, the sophisticated iron, the sounding trumpets, the rattling cymbals of the squad, the closed shields, the helmets terribly anointed with feathers, the collisions, the crowds, the fights, the battles, the massacres, the flights, the persecutions, the groans, the joyful cries, the earth moistened with blood, the trampled dead, without the wounded are left behind for help, and everything that is in war, one can see and hear about the sad events of war - can anyone really find the time there to sometimes incline the thought to the memory of something entertaining? If a memory of something very pleasant comes to the soul; then will not this, in times of danger, the remembrance of the most beloved object entering into the thought, serve to increase the calamity? Therefore, the One who rewards you, if you have prevented the disaster of war, will give you two instead of a gift; One gift is a reward, and another gift is the feat itself; because, even if there were nothing to hope for for such a deed, then peace itself for those who have intelligence is more valuable than any care about it. Therefore, the abundance of God’s love for mankind can be recognized in this, that he rewards with good rewards not for labor and sweat, but for pleasures, one might say, joys; since of all that makes you happy, the main thing is peace, which everyone would like to have in such an extent that they can not only use it themselves, but, due to the great abundance of it, give it to those who do not have it. For it is said: blessed are the peacemakers, and a peacemaker is one who gives peace to others.
But no one will tell another what he does not have himself. Therefore, it is desirable that you first fill yourself with the blessings of the world, and then provide such wealth to those who need it. And my word does not need to extend an extremely inquisitive review to the depths; because to acquire a good, the concept that appears at first glance is sufficient for us.
Blessed are the peacemakers . Scripture briefly offers the gift of healing for many ailments, concluding details in this comprehensive and general speech. First let's understand what the world is? Nothing more than a love-filled disposition towards a fellow tribesman. Therefore, what is meant by the opposite of love? Hatred, anger, irritation, envy, rancor, hypocrisy, the scourge of war. Do you see how many and for what ailments one saying serves as a preventative medicine? For the world equally opposes everything that has been calculated, and with its presence brings evil to destruction. Just as upon the return of health disease is destroyed, and upon the appearance of light there is no darkness left, so with the appearance of peace all passions excited by the resistant disappear. And what a blessing this is, I don’t consider it necessary to describe it in words. Judge with yourself, what is the life of those who mutually suspect and hate each other? Their meetings are unpleasant, everything about one is disgusting to the other; the lips are silent, the eyes are turned in different directions; the hearing is blocked from the words of both the hater and the hated; One of them likes everything that the other doesn’t like; and on the contrary, everything that is kind to the hostile is hostile and hostile. Therefore, just as a fragrant aroma fills the surrounding air with its fragrance, so it pleases the Lord to abundantly increase the grace of the world for you, so that your life will be a cure for someone else’s illness.
And how great such a good is, you will find out more accurately by calculating the disasters from every passion generated in the soul by hostile will. Who will describe, as it should, the passionate movements of anger? What word can describe the indecency of such a disease? See how the same attacks appear in those possessed by irritation as in those possessed by demons. Compare the suffering from the demon and from irritation, and judge what the difference is between them. The bloodshot and perverted eyes of the possessed, the language spoken unclearly, the pronunciation rough, the voice shrill and intermittent, these are the common actions of both irritation and the demon; shaking of the head, frantic movements of the hands, trembling of the whole body, legs not standing still - in similar terms, one description of two diseases. The only difference is that one evil is voluntary, while another, to whom it happens, strikes him involuntarily. But by one’s own desire to be exposed to disaster, and not against one’s will to suffer, how much more is this worthy of regret? Whoever sees illness from a demon will certainly take pity; and at the same time he sees disorderly actions out of irritation and imitates them, recognizing it as a loss for himself not to overcome with his passion the one who fell ill before him. And the demon, tormenting the body of the sufferer, stops the evil at this point, that the demon in vain strikes the air with his hands; and the demon of irritability does not make bodily movements in vain. For when this one gains the upper hand, the blood in the atrium boils, as they say, with bitter bile from an irritable disposition that has spread throughout the body; then, from the constriction of internal vapors, all the main sensitivities are oppressed. The eyes emerge from the outline of the eyelashes, and something bloody and serpentine is directed at what is offensive to them. And the insides are suppressed by breathing, the veins in the neck are exposed, the tongue becomes white, the voice from the compression of the beating vein involuntarily becomes sonorous, the lips from the cold bile that has entered them harden, turn black and become difficult to move naturally, so that they are unable to retain saliva , filling the mouth, but they spew it out along with the words, and from forced pronunciation they spit it out in the form of foam. Then you can see that the arms, as well as the legs, are set in motion, and these members are no longer moving in vain, as happens with those who are possessed, but for the evil of those who are clinging to each other because of this disease. For the aspirations of those who strike each other are directed at the main sensitivities. And if in this fight the lips come close to the body; then the teeth do not remain idle, but, like the teeth of an animal, bite into what is close to them. And who will tell in order all the many evils that arise from irritation? Therefore, whoever does not allow such disgrace to occur will rightly be called blessed and honorable for this very great benefit. If one who has freed a person from some kind of bodily trouble is worthy of honor for such a good deed, then how much more so will one who has freed the soul from this illness with intelligence be recognized as a benefactor of life? For just as much as the soul is better than the body, the one who heals the soul is preferable to those who heal the body.
And let no one think that, in my opinion, trouble caused out of irritation is worse than evil deeds committed out of hatred. Passions: envy and hypocrisy, it seems to me, are much worse than the one mentioned now, and precisely to the same extent that the hidden is more terrible than the obvious. And we are more afraid of those dogs who do not first notify us of their irritation, neither by barking, nor by attacking from the front, but in a meek and quiet form lie in wait for us unexpectedly, when we do not foresee it. Such are the passions of envy and hypocrisy in people in whom hatred, like fire, flares up secretly in the depths of their hearts; and the exterior is covered with the mask of friendship, like a fire covered with straw, from which, while it burns what lies inside, the flame is not visible, but only acrid smoke comes out, strongly condensed inside; but as soon as someone blows, a clear and bright flame spreads. So envy eats away the heart inside, like a fire, as if buried under some pile of straw. And although illness hides from shame, it cannot be completely hidden; but, as if some kind of acrid smoke, the bitterness of envy is revealed in external attacks. But if the one who is envied is touched by some kind of misfortune, then the envious person then discovers this illness, turning the sadness of the distressed person into fun and pleasure. However, the secrets of this passion, when they think about hiding it, are shown by obvious signs on the face. What in the desperately ill is a sign of imminent death, you often see in someone consumed by envy: dry eyes sunken between widened eyelids, drooping eyebrows, bones sticking out in place of a shoulder. What is the cause of the disease? The fact that a brother, or relative, or neighbor lives happily. What extraordinary injustice! To blame the fact that the one whose well-being he is sad about is not in poverty, recognizing for himself an offense not that he himself suffered any evil from another, but that this other, without doing any offense, lives as he wishes. What's wrong with you, poor thing? I would tell him. Why are you drying up, looking with a bitter eye at the well-being of your neighbor? How can you blame him? Is it because he is beautiful in body? Or what is adorned with the gift of speech? Or what takes advantage of birth? or what, having assumed the position of chief, in this rank turns out to be worthy of respect? Or that he has a lot of money? Or that they respect him for his prudence in speech? Or that he is known to many for his good deeds? Or what makes children happy? Or what amuses his wife? Or that he lives luxuriously from the income of his home? Why does this fall on your heart like the point of an arrow? You fold your hands, press your fingers between your fingers, worry with your thoughts, sigh deeply and painfully; It’s unpleasant for you to use what you have; the meal is bitter, the house is gloomy. The ear is ready to listen to slander against someone who lives safely; and if anything good is said about him, hearing is blocked for this. And with such a spiritual disposition, why do you cover up your illness with hypocrisy? Why do you pretend to be friendship out of feigned affection? Why do you greet with respectful names, asking to be cheerful and healthy, but in secret with your soul uttering desires that are contrary to this? Such was Cain, irritated by God's favor towards Abel. Envy within inspires him to murder, and hypocrisy becomes the perpetrator of the crime. Having assumed some kind of friendly and welcoming appearance, he leads Abel to the field away from his parental protection, and there he reveals envy through murder. Therefore, whoever eradicates such a disease from human life, binds people of the same tribe with goodwill and peace, and brings people into friendly harmony, is he not truly performing a work of divine power, destroying evil in the human race, and in its place introducing the communion of good things? That is why the Lord calls the peacemaker the son of God; for by bestowing this on human life, one becomes an imitator of the true God.
So blessed are the peacemakers: for these shall be called the sons of God . Who exactly? Imitators of God's love for mankind, which is characteristic of God's activity, show this very thing in their lives. The Beneficent Giver of blessings and the Lord completely destroys and turns into nothing everything that is not akin to goodness and is alien to it, and legitimizes this way of action for you, to drive out hatred, stop war, destroy envy, prevent battles, destroy hypocrisy, quench what burns in the heart the inside is vindictiveness, but to introduce in place of this, which is restored by the destruction of the opposite. Just as light comes with the removal of darkness, so instead of those listed above, the fruits of the spirit appear: love, joy, peace, kindness, long-suffering, and all the number of blessings collected by the Apostle (Gal. 5:22). Therefore, how is it that the dispenser of divine gifts is not blessed, who is likened to God by his gifts, and who likens his benevolence to God’s generosity? But perhaps, gratification does not only mean the good delivered to others, but, as I think, in the proper sense it is called a peacemaker, whoever the rebellion of the flesh and spirit and the internecine warfare of nature in himself brings into peaceful harmony, when the law has already come to inaction bodily, opposing the law of the mind (Rom. 7:23), and, having submitted to a better kingdom, becomes a servant of the divine commandments. It is better to say, let us hold on to the thought that the word of God does not advise this, that is, it does not imagine the life of those who have succeeded in duality, but that when the mediastinum of the fence (Eph. 2:14) of vice is destroyed in us, with the dissolution of The best wallpapers became united into one. So, since we believe that the Divinity is simple, uncomplicated and indescribable, then when human nature, for such pacification, becomes alien to the composition of the dual, it exactly returns to goodness, becoming simple, indescribable, and, as it were, in the true sense, one, so that in In it, both the visible and the secret and the hidden and the visible are one and the same; then blessedness is truly confirmed, and such in the true sense are called sons of God, having become blessed according to the promise of our Lord Jesus Christ. Glory to him forever and ever! Amen.
About the Beatitudes. Word 7.
Chapter 2. The Beatitudes / “Blessed are the pure in heart”
The sixth commandment again speaks not about behavior, but about the inner quality of a person: Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God (Matthew 5:8).
The phrase pure in heart (καθαροὶ τῇ καρδίᾳ) is borrowed from the Psalter: How good God is to Israel, to the pure in heart! (Ps. 72:1); Who will ascend to the mountain of the Lord, or who will stand in His holy place? The one whose hands are innocent and whose heart is pure... (Ps. 23:3-4). Again we see Jesus using an expression that has been heard by many. To understand its meaning, we need to consider two key concepts from which it consists: “purity” and “heart”.
In the language of the Old Testament, the concept of purity is associated primarily with the shrine, worship, sacrifice, altar, tabernacle, temple: nothing unclean should touch the shrine. In this case, uncleanness can be either physical, associated with illnesses, injuries or bodily defects (Lev. 21:17–23), or spiritual (Isa. 1:10–17). The source of purity and cleansing is God, to whom David in the repentant psalm turns with prayer: Wash me often from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin... Sprinkle me with hyssop, and I will be clean; Wash me, and I will be whiter than snow (Ps. 50:4, 9).
The heart in the Old Testament tradition is perceived not only as a physical organ and not only as the center of human emotional activity. It is also a spiritual center that determines his actions, life choices, and attitude towards God and the people around him. Thoughts and decisions mature in the heart; in the heart a person conducts a dialogue with himself and with God. The heart is that spiritual depth in a person into which God peers (1 Sam. 16:17; Jer. 17:10). Not only man, but also God has a heart (Gen. 6:6; 8:21; Ps. 32:11).
Purity of heart cannot be acquired only through one’s own efforts; God's help is needed: Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me (Ps. 50:12). Repentance is expected from a person: A sacrifice to God is a contrite spirit; You will not despise a broken and humble heart, O God (Ps. 50:19). As a modern researcher notes, renewal of the heart is the main theme of the Sermon on the Mount. However, Jesus not only demands a new heart from His disciples: He Himself gives it to them1Neumann F. The New Heart. P. 9..
Purity of heart is a condition for communication with God: Who will ascend the mountain of the Lord, or who will stand in His holy place? He whose hands are innocent and whose heart is pure... Such is the generation of those who seek Him, who seek Your face, O God of Jacob! (Ps. 23:3–4, 6). Without purity of heart it is impossible to touch a shrine, meet God and see the face of God.
The promise that they will see God makes us first of all recall a whole series of biblical texts that talk about seeing God.
On the one hand, in both the Old and New Testaments we encounter persistent statements that the vision of God is impossible for man. When Moses ascends Mount Sinai, God promises to bring all His glory before him, but at the same time declares: You cannot see My face, because man cannot see Me and live (Ex. 33:20–21). According to the Apostle Paul, no man has seen or can see God (1 Tim. 6:16). The statement that no one has ever seen God occurs twice in the corpus of John's writings (John 1:18; 1 John 4:12).
On the other hand, some texts speak of the possibility of seeing God. Jacob, who wrestled with God, exclaims: I have seen God face to face, and my soul is preserved (Gen. 32:30). Job expresses the hope that he will see God with his own eyes: And I know that my Redeemer lives, and on the last day He will raise this decaying skin of mine from the dust, and I will see God in my flesh. I will see Him myself; my eyes, not the eyes of another, will see Him (Job 19:25-27). The apostles John and Paul speak about the vision of God in the future life (1 John 3:2; 1 Cor. 13:12).
The initial paradox of the theme of vision of God is clearly expressed by Gregory of Nyssa in his interpretation of the sixth commandment of Beatitude:
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God (Matthew 5:8). Those who have purified their hearts are promised that they will see God. But no one has ever seen God, as the great John says (John 1:18). And the sublime mind of Paul confirms this conclusion when he says: whom no man has seen or can see (1 Tim. 6:16)... All possibility of comprehension is taken away by this clear denial: Man cannot see Me and live (Exod. 33:20). And yet, in the vision of the Lord, eternal life lies... Do you see the confusion of the soul, which is drawn into the depths revealed in these words? If God is life, then a person who does not see Him does not see life. On the other hand, divinely inspired prophets and apostles testify that it is impossible to see God. Where should human hope turn? 2 Gregory of Nyssa. About the Beatitudes. 6 (PG 44, 1264). Rus. Per.: Part 2. pp. 436–437.
In patristic literature there are various approaches to the “visible-invisible” paradox. 3 Here and further, speaking about patristic approaches to solving this problem, we repeat the conclusions made earlier in the book: Hilarion (Alfeev), Metropolitan. Venerable Simeon the New Theologian and Orthodox Tradition. pp. 297–299..
The first explanation is that God is invisible by His nature, but He can be seen in His energies (actions), His glory, His goodness, His revelations, His condescensions. According to Gregory of Nyssa, “God is invisible by nature, but becomes visible in His energies”4 Gregory of Nyssa. About the Beatitudes. 6 (PG 44, 1269). Rus. trans.: p. 442.. John Chrysostom, recalling the appearance of God to Moses, Isaiah and other prophets, speaks of God’s “condescension” (οἰκονομία) revealed to them:
All these cases were manifestations of God’s condescension, and not a vision of the purest Being Himself, for if the prophets had really seen the very nature of God, they would not have contemplated it under different forms... God in essence was not seen by not only the prophets, but even angels or archangels... Many saw Him in the form that was available to them, but no one ever contemplated His essence...5John Chrysostom. Conversations on the Gospel of John. 15, 1 (PG 59, 98). Rus. trans.: T. 8. Book. 1. P. 98.
The second way to resolve the visible-invisible problem presupposes a Christological dimension: God is invisible in His essence, but revealed Himself in the human flesh of the Son of God. Ignatius the God-Bearer says that God is “invisible, but became visible to us” in the Person of His Son6 Ignatius the God-Bearer. Epistle to Polycarp. 3, 2 (SC 10, 172). Rus. trans.: P. 347.. Irenaeus of Lyon states that “The Father is the invisible of the Son, and the Son is the visible of the Father.”7 Irenaeus of Lyon. Against heresies. 4, 6, 6 (SC 100, 450). Rus. transl.: p. 331.. According to John Chrysostom, the Son of God, being as invisible by Divine nature as the Father, became visible when he took on human flesh8 John Chrysostom. Conversations on the Gospel of John. 15, 1 (PG 59, 98). Rus. trans.: T. 8. Book. 1. P. 98.. Theodore the Studite writes: “Before, when Christ was not in the flesh, He was invisible, for, as it is said, no one has ever seen God (1 John 4:12). But when He took on rough human flesh... He voluntarily became tangible.”9 Theodore the Studite. Yambs. 33 (Jamben. S. 181). Rus. Per.: T. 3. P. 865..
The third possible approach to the problem is the desire to resolve it from an eschatological perspective: God is not visible in this life, but after death the righteous will see Him. No matter how much a person improves before God, says Isaac the Syrian, in real life he sees God from behind, as in a mirror, he sees only His image; in the next century God will show him His face10 Isaac the Syrian. Ascetic words. 45 (De perfectione. P. 324). Rus. trans.: P. 405 (Homily 85).. Theodore the Studite considers the vision of God to be a reward given in the future life: one should strive and suffer here in order to see in the next century “the immeasurable beauty, the unspeakable glory of the face of Christ”11 Theodore the Studite. Great Announcement. I, 12. Rus. Per.: T. 1. P. 488..
Finally, the fourth way to explain the “visible-invisible” contradiction is to place it in the context of the concept of the purification of the soul: God is invisible to man in his fallen state, but becomes visible to those who have achieved purification of the heart. We find such a thought in Theophilus of Antioch, who believes that one must be cleansed of sin in order to see God12 Theophilus of Antioch. To Autolycus. 1, 2 (PG 6, 1025, 1028). Rus. trans.: pp. 128–129.. When a person’s heart is cleansed, says Gregory of Nyssa, “he will see the image of the Divine nature in his own beauty”13 Gregory of Nyssa. About the Beatitudes. 6 (PG 44, 1269). Rus. Transl.: Part 2. P. 443..
Which of these four approaches comes closest to the original meaning of Jesus' statement about the blessedness of the pure in heart? I think there is a fourth, in which the vision of God is directly linked to the purity of the heart, but it does not say when a person can see God: in earthly or afterlife. Unlike the Sermon on the Plain in Luke, where all the promises are in the future as opposed to what is happening “now,” there is no such contrast in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew. There is no time gap between purity of heart and the vision of God, just as there is no gap between other beatitudes and the promises that flow from them. This gives Simeon the New Theologian the right to challenge the eschatological interpretation of the sixth Beatitude and say that the vision of God occurs simultaneously with the achievement of purity of heart:
...They will say: “Yes, indeed, the pure in heart will see God, but this will happen in the next century, and not in the present.” Why and how will this be, beloved? If Christ said that God is visible through a pure heart, then, of course, when purity comes, then vision follows it... For if purity is here, then vision will be here. If you say that vision happens after death, then, of course, you place purity after death, and thus it will happen to you that you will never see God, because after the exodus you will not have any work through which you would gain purity. New Theologian. The word is moral. 5, 112–125 (SC 129. P. 78–118). Rus. trans.: T. 2. P. 111–112 (Word 63)..
At the same time, we must point out that the second of the given patristic interpretations has a direct parallel in the Gospel, in particular in the dialogue between Philip and Jesus at the Last Supper. In response to Jesus’ words addressed to the disciples that they know and have seen the Father, Philip says: Lord! show us the Father, and it is enough for us. Jesus answers: I have been with you so long and you do not know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; how do you say, show us the Father? (John 14:7–9). Jesus identifies the vision of God the Father with the appearance of the Son of God: through the human face of Jesus, the way is opened for people to see the Divine face of the invisible Father. Thus, like the other Beatitudes, the sixth commandment has a strong Christological dimension.
"Blessed are the merciful"
Table of contents
"Blessed are the peacemakers"
Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.
The next spiritual quality that the Lord Jesus Christ exalts in His doctrine of beatitude is meekness. A person whose heart is in a state of peace can be called meek. Saint Ignatius (Brianchaninov), discussing the Gospel beatitudes, writes that the soul of a meek person is devoid of anger, hatred, remembrance and condemnation. Consequently, such a person gets rid of soul-destroying vices, the basis of which is pride. Pride, as the opposite quality to meekness, especially distances a person from eternal bliss. Any sin, and especially pride, brings discord into the harmony of the soul. It is no coincidence that the holy Apostle Paul calls sin a burden, the deadly weight of which he considers it necessary to refuse: “Let us lay aside every burden and the sin that so easily besets us” (Heb. 12:1). Like a poisonous poison, pride paralyzes the natural powers of the soul, which the Creator placed in each of us so that we could live in spiritual union with God. The Monk Abba Dorotheos, speaking about the blessed life of the first man before the Fall, exclaims: “Was not man, after his creation, in all pleasure, in all joy, in all peace, in all glory? Wasn't he in heaven? . A person who wants a blissful life with God must strive to eradicate the manifestations of this destructive passion in his inner world.
To successfully overcome pride and other sinful inclinations, a Christian must go through two stages of spiritual development, which were mentioned earlier: first of all, a person who believes in Christ must acquire spiritual poverty, acquire a state of humility, that is, a modest state of soul, which in turn must accompanied by tears, regret and repentance for our sins, which disfigure our soul and distance us from the Source of life - God.
Having acquired humility and lamentation for sins, a person must come to a state of meekness, goodness, modesty, and simplicity. The highest example, the image of such meekness is Christ Himself, Who says: “I am meek and lowly in heart” (Matthew 11:29).
Concepts such as humility and meekness are sometimes unfairly associated with human weakness and lack of will. Someone may incorrectly believe that the meek and humble Lord Jesus Christ calls His followers to cowardice and indifference, since He teaches us not to resist the evil directed against us. The Evangelist Matthew contains the following words of the Lord: “But I say to you: do not resist evil. But whoever strikes you on your right cheek, turn the other also to him” (Matthew 5:39). If the Old Testament decree required people to respond proportionately to injustice, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth (see Exodus 21:23–27), then Christ calls humanity to non-resistance to evil. However, the words of Christ do not mean that a Christian must agree and reconcile himself with the existence of evil in the world. They say that we must resist the evil that is directed against us not with retaliatory evil, but with patience and meekness, which requires enormous strength of spirit from a person. Saint John Chrysostom notes that just as fire is extinguished not by fire, but by water, so evil cannot be stopped by retaliatory evil. “Truly, nothing restrains those who offend so much as the gentle patience of those who are offended. It not only keeps them from further impulses, but also forces them to repent of the previous ones,” says Saint John. The seemingly fair revenge of the offended, on the contrary, causes bitterness in the offender, which leads to the opposite consequences. Thus, meekness and humility are the qualities of a courageous, strong-willed, strong-willed person who, with his patience, limits the existence of evil in the world. This is confirmed by the following words of St. John Climacus: “Meekness is a sign of great strength; in order to be meek, you need to have a noble, courageous and very high soul.”
Christ calls man to be meek and humble in wisdom. A Christian who possesses these qualities opens his inner world to the action of God Himself in it, Who, in due time, will call His creation to inherit the earth (Matt. 5:5). Not this earth on which we all live, but that Heavenly earth, which is prepared for meek, humble people who regret their sins, who have brought their lives closer to God and his Heavenly Kingdom. Meekness is the most important quality of the human soul, necessary for each of us to return to the heavenly palace of the Heavenly Father.
Evangelical Reformed Church
Blessed are those who thirst for righteousness
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be satisfied.
Matthew 5:6
The Beatitudes are a single whole. And although each of them has deep meaning and deserves separate study, each of them must be considered in context with other commandments. They are closely related to each other; moreover, the order of their arrangement is not accidental.
It is not difficult to discover how the first three beatitudes are related to the fourth. First, Jesus talks about spiritual poverty, and that blessed are those people who are aware of it. He then says that the only proper response to one's sinfulness is to cry over one's sins. Some people try to justify their sins, but only those who cry over them are blessed. Crying over sins inevitably leads to meekness and humility before God. Blessed are those who, realizing their spiritual powerlessness, with meekness expect mercy from God and are ready to accept the path of salvation that He offers.
The first three beatitudes encourage a person to pay attention first of all to himself. The content of the fourth expands these limits. One of the main problems of a person is that he thinks too much about himself. Jesus teaches us that we should not dwell on our sins and withdraw into ourselves. We must trust in God, trust in the path of salvation that He offers. Having realized our helplessness, we must seek help in Christ. Blessed are the people who strive for truth.
So, the fourth beatitude says that we must strive to get rid of sin.
Blessed are those who thirst for righteousness. This is exactly what this beatitude should sound like. Truth should be understood as righteousness. Russian translators a hundred years ago found it necessary to translate the Greek word “dikaios” with similar meanings, but with different words: “truth” and “righteousness.” The context of the Sermon on the Mount suggests that “truth” and “righteousness” mean the same thing. (For example: “If your righteousness does not exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees...”) The Russian translation is misleading and makes it appear that Jesus is talking about truth, honesty, or justice. It is precisely this erroneous interpretation that is given, for example, in the book of the Orthodox author Abbot Peter, “The Moral Improvement of a Christian According to the Beatitudes of the Savior,” which defines truth as truth, contrasting it with lies and slander.
However, we are not talking only about honesty and justice (although these qualities are included in the broader concept of righteousness). Jesus says nothing here about so-called truth-seekers or truth-seekers. Blessed are those who thirst for righteousness.
So, bliss lies precisely in the thirst for righteousness. People who crave something else are not only not blessed, they are miserable. It is righteousness that is the main element of bliss. Not every thirst will be quenched: Jesus promises to quench only the thirst for righteousness.
Remember the story of Jacob and Esau. Jacob longed for the blessings of his father Isaac. He longed for the promises God had made to Abraham to come to him. For him, nothing was more important than the covenant made between his grandfather and God. Therefore, unlike Esau, he spent a lot of time in tents. His grandfather Abraham was still alive, and it was still possible to talk with him. Jacob was preparing to receive God's blessings. And he knew that he would get them, since God promised this even before he was born.
Esau was indifferent to God's blessings. He craved something else. He wanted to take everything he could from this life. He spent whole days in the fields, hunting animals. Hunting was entertainment for him, because there was enough food anyway: Abraham and Isaac had huge herds of animals. But Esau longed for a fulfilling life now; he did not want to wait for future blessings. He longed to be strong and independent. He quenched his own thirst.
But Esau's thirst did not make him happy. This thirst deprived him of the blessings of God. When the moment came to choose between the blessings of God and life here and now, he chose the second. Returning from the hunt, he sold his brother Jacob the right to receive his father's blessings for lentil stew (Gen. 25). Esau would not have starved to death if Jacob had not given him his soup. He wasn't that hungry. He simply openly declared that he did not value the right of the firstborn son to the blessings of God, that even lentil stew was more important to him. As a result, Jacob became the father of God's chosen people, and Esau and his descendants turned into ordinary pagans.
Lentil soup is a symbol of carnal life. Esau craved lentil soup. And anyone who thirsts for lentil soup cannot be happy, because only those who thirst for righteousness are blessed.
Brothers Arkady and Boris Strugatsky wrote a wonderful science fiction story called “Interns.” This story is about caring people, about thirsty people. But what did they crave? No, not money. The positive heroes of this work despised the pursuit of money and wealth. In pictures of the future, the Strugatskys paint the ideal of human aspirations.
One of the main characters would like to become famous. He was a great planetary explorer, and it was very important for him that historians know for sure that it was he who led the first expedition to Saturn.
Another hero, a young man named Yura, longed for adventure. Scientists on Mars, who had been confined to a small developed area for several decades, conducting scientific experiments in laboratories, were hungry for the unknown, eager to explore the rest of Mars. Young scientists on asteroids carried out unique experiments to study gravitational waves, and most of all in life they longed for confirmation of their hypotheses as a result of experiments and for this they risked their lives and were ready to live in cramped and uncomfortable space laboratories.
And in general, all the positive heroes had one desire - to work, to do work that was interesting and needed by society.
Favorite work - this is the ideal of the aspirations of the godless mind! The Strugatskys, who reflected in their works the quest of the best part of our society in the 60s and 70s, did not go further than this. All their heroes and they themselves are unhappy. They do not thirst for righteousness and are therefore doomed to misfortune.
Neither work, nor adventures, nor scientific results, nor world fame make a person blessed. Only the thirst for righteousness leads to bliss. Only the thirst for righteousness Jesus promised to quench. And as long as a person craves something else more than righteousness, he will never become happy. Esau, who craved lentil soup, lost the blessings of God. Jacob found them.
Blessed are those who thirst for righteousness. What is righteousness? This is justification and sanctification. The previous three verses indicate precisely this interpretation of righteousness in the fourth beatitude. Jesus spoke about sins, now He speaks about the desire to get rid of them. Let's look at what different people should thirst for in order to be blessed after getting rid of sins.
Non-Christians must crave justification in order to be blessed. I am speaking to non-believers. What do you crave? Perhaps you long to get a well-paid job or leave this country for the paradise called the “civilized West”. What are you craving? Maybe you want to achieve a sporting result? Or make a scientific discovery? Or just raise children as humans? But Jesus says that without righteousness you will not be happy. If you are still living without God, then you need to turn to Christ so that He will give you His righteousness. Jesus lived a righteous life on earth, and He can share His righteousness with you. And He calls you to thirst for this righteousness. If you receive the righteousness of Christ, it means that God will forget your sins. The prophet Micah says that God will cast your sins into the sea (Micah 7:19). And things are thrown into the sea, never to be found and forgotten about. Likewise, God will no longer find your sins or remember them if you receive the righteousness of Christ. And for this you need to thirst for this righteousness.
Seek the righteousness of Christ. Search for it until you find it. This is your bliss. Let your thirst for righteousness be quenched only by righteousness itself and nothing else. And never allow yourself to crave something else so much that you drown out your thirst for righteousness.
Remember that blessed are those who hunger for righteousness. The mother of Jesus, Mary, in the psalm that she sang to the glory of God, who sent Christ, said the following words: “He filled those who were hungry with good things, but those who were rich he sent away empty…” (Luke 1:53). You will not receive the righteousness of Christ if you think it is just another pearl in your collection of spiritual riches. If you ask Christ for righteousness and at the same time think that if you do not receive it, then there will be no harm in it, Christ will let you go with nothing. You must ask for righteousness as the only treasure without which you cannot live. You must leave all your riches after the first words of Christ: “...blessed are the poor in spirit...”
Charles Spurgeon, the famous English preacher of the last century, organized a pastoral college at his church, in which ministers underwent unique advanced training courses. There were no entrance exams, you just had to pass an interview. Spurgeon himself usually conducted the interviews. One day a young man came to him and said that he wanted to go to college. Spurgeon, as usual, asked him to tell him something about himself. The young man was ready for this question and said that he had read many books on philosophy and theology. In addition, he took eloquence lessons and mastered the art of oratory quite well. To convince his interlocutor of his abilities, the young man asked him to choose any passage from the Bible, on the topic of which he would preach a fifteen-minute sermon without preparation. Spurgeon sent the young man away empty-handed, saying: “Our college is attended by people who can do nothing, and not by those who have abilities like yours. You simply have no business in our college.”
Believers must long for sanctification in order to be blessed. Brothers and sisters, we once thirsted for vindication, and the Lord quenched our thirst. Justification is ours, we don’t have to strive for it, we don’t have to crave it. We are justified once and for all from all sins: past, present and future.
But we must long for freedom from sin in our daily lives. We must long to be rid of the desire to sin that still lives within us. We must be eager to step over all sinful barriers that prevent us from communicating with God. We must long for holiness, long to be like Jesus in everything.
And here I want to stop and ask one very practical question: “If we long for holiness, does that mean that Jesus promises to give us holiness on earth? And if not, what then does He promise?
From experience we know that it is impossible to become a saint on earth, and no one has achieved holiness during earthly life. This is not because Jesus does not keep his promises, but because we do not hunger for holiness enough.
A person who has recently turned to Christ knows little about his sin. But the more he is sanctified, the purer he becomes, the more clearly his remaining sins appear. The great English preacher of the 18th century, John Berridge, at the end of his life, wrote in one of his letters that when he looks into his heart, he becomes desperate and is overcome with horror from his sins. And it’s not that Berridge became corrupt towards the end of his life. On the contrary, he became much cleaner, and that is why he was so worried about his sins.
In words we long for complete holiness, but in reality we long for holiness only to the extent that we are aware of our sins and hate them. And we do not thirst for holiness as much as, for example, the Apostle Paul, who could sincerely call himself the first of sinners.
Jesus promises to quench whatever thirst we have now. And when we quench that thirst for holiness that we have, we begin to thirst even more. And Jesus again quenches our increased thirst. And the thirst grows again, and Jesus quenches it again. Christians are somewhat similar to multiple world champion in pole vaulting Sergei Bubka. When he reaches another dizzying height, he asks to set the bar a centimeter higher. After intense training, he overcomes this milestone, but immediately he has a desire to jump even higher. So it is with sanctification. The purer a person is, the more painful sin is for him, the more he thirsts for cleansing.
The day will come when the promise of Christ will be fully fulfilled. When we are resurrected in a new body, we will be holy. There will not be a single stain of sin on us. We will be sinless like Christ.
However, I want to return again to the fourth beatitude: “Blessed are those who hunger for righteousness.” Hungry - wanting to eat, tormented by hunger. Jesus wanted and wants people to desire righteousness as a hungry person desires food to satisfy his hunger.
Now I want to cite a passage from the Old Testament that will help you understand what it means to truly want to eat. But before we get to that, I encourage you to ask yourself, “Do I really want sanctification?” This question is essentially not much different from the question: “Am I a Christian?” A true Christian cannot help but long for holiness.
So, before us is an excerpt from the Fourth Book of Kings, chapter 6: “After this Ben-hadad king of Syria gathered all his army, and went out and besieged Samaria. And there was a great famine in Samaria when they besieged it, so that a donkey's head was sold for eighty shekels of silver, and the fourth part of a cabbage of pigeon dung for five shekels of silver. One day the king of Israel walked along the wall, and a woman screamed and said to him, “Help me, my lord the king.” And he said, If the Lord does not help you, how can I help you? Is it from the threshing floor, or from the grindstone? And the king said to her: what do you want? And she said: this woman told me: “Give me your son, we will eat him today, and we will eat my son tomorrow.” And we cooked my son and ate him. And I said to her the next day: “Give me your son, and we will eat him.” But she hid her son. The king, having listened to the woman’s words, tore his clothes; and he walked along the wall, and the people saw that sackcloth was on his very body.”
The people who listened to Christ knew what hunger was. And they were probably thinking, “Are we really supposed to hunger for righteousness the way we want a piece of bread?!” Perhaps He inadvertently mentioned the famine? No, Jesus spoke very deliberately about famine. He called to strive for righteousness as a man dying of hunger strives for bread. We must truly desire holiness, and then we will be blessed. The story from the Fourth Book of Kings is not an example to follow; on the contrary, it warns us of the terrible crimes that a person can commit due to hunger. But, on the other hand, it helps to understand what real hunger is. Do we really hunger and thirst for righteousness?
Are we happy or unhappy? Do we want to be happy?
The path is indicated.
True, at the very beginning of the path there is a fork. We must not make a mistake in choosing the direction. Jesus does not say, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for blessedness.” You cannot find bliss by chasing it. We find bliss as a result of searching for something else - righteousness. He who seeks bliss itself will not find it. The true way is different: “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled.”
From the archives of the magazine “At the Beginning”, 1999.
Author of the text: Georgy Vyazovsky
Date: December 05, 1999 Topics:
