Homilies on the Gospel of St. John and the Epistle to the Hebrews

NPNF (V1-14)St. Chrysostomor turn back, (yet he had an excuse for doing so had he chosen,) but remained near the wild beastsand those savage men, preserving the feeling of a true brother. Again, when he dwelt in the prisonhouse, and was asked the cause, he spake no evil of them, but only, “I have done nothing,” and, “Iwas stolen out of the land of the Hebrews”; and after this again, when he was made lord, he nourishedthem, and delivered them from ten thousand dangers. If we be sober, the wickedness of our neighboris not strong enough to cast us out of our own virtue. But those others were not like him; they bothstripped him, and endeavored to kill him, and reproach him with his dream, though they had evenreceived their meat from him, and planned to deprive him of life and of liberty. And they ate, andcared not for their brother lying naked in the pit. What could be worse than such brutality? Werethey not worse than any number of murderers? And after this, having drawn him up, they gave himover to ten thousand deaths, selling him to barbarian and savage men, who were on their journeyto barbarians. Yet he, when he became ruler, not only remitted them their punishment, but evenacquitted them, as far at least as relating to himself, of their sin, calling what had been done adispensation of God, not any wickedness of theirs; and the things which he did against them he didnot as remembering evil, but in all these he dissembled, for his brother’s 2022 sake. After this, whenhe saw them clinging to him, he straightway threw away the mask, and wept aloud, and embracedthem, as though he had received the greatest benefits, he, who formerly was made away with bythem, and he brought them all down into Egypt, and repaid them with ten thousand benefits. Whatexcuse then shall we have, if after the Law, and after grace, and after the addition of so muchheavenly wisdom, we do not even strive to rival him who lived before grace and before the Law?Who shall deliver us from punishment? For there is nothing, there is nothing more grievous thanthe remembrance of injuries. And this the man hath showed that owed ten thousand talents; fromwhom payment was at one time not demanded, at another time again demanded; not demanded,because of the lovingkindness of God; but demanded, because of his own wickedness, and becauseof his malice toward his fellow-servant. Knowing all which things, let us forgive our neighborstheir trespasses, and repay them by deeds of an opposite kind, that we too may obtain mercy fromGod, through the grace and lovingkindness of our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom be glory and dominionfor ever and ever. Amen.261Homily LXXII.John xiii. 20 . 2023“Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that receiveth whomsoever I send, receiveth Me: and He thatreceiveth Me, receiveth Him that sent Me.”2022i.e. Benjamin’s.2023Ver. 19 omitted. “Now I tell you before it come, that when it is come to pass ye may believe that I am.”393