Homilies on the Psalms — Homily 20 — Psalm 77 (LXX; MT 78), Homily III: vv. 13–22 (the Exodus wonders)
Greek source: Origen's homilies on the Psalms, preserved in a single manuscript (Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Cod. graec. 314, 12th century), from the reading text of L. Perrone et al. (eds.), Die neuen Psalmenhomilien. Eine kritische Edition des Codex Monacensis Graecus 314, Origenes Werke XIII (GCS NF 19; Berlin, 2015), pp. 384–389. Psalms are numbered as in the Septuagint. This English translation is released into the public domain.On the 77th Psalm, Homily 3
1. When the simple hear these things and learn about the people of old, how, "by splitting", God "led it through the sea", and how "he parted the waters as into a wineskin", and that "he guided it with a cloud by day and all the night with a light of fire", they call those people blessed for having seen such signs and wonders. But they think that they themselves come away with less than those people did, because they have not witnessed such things. Let us all be taught, however, that there are different kinds of signs and wonders: some signs and wonders are bodily, and others are spiritual. And as far as the spirit surpasses the body, so far are the spiritual signs more effective and more beneficial than the bodily signs. Suppose, then, that God himself were to speak and give the choice to take whichever one wishes, as he once gave it to David, and suppose he spoke to us and said: "I shall grant you one of the two: either the spiritual signs in this passage, or the bodily ones." The simple and unbelieving person, who does not believe unless he sees signs and wonders, will choose the bodily ones. But the one who has crossed over, who believes God, but not on the basis of these things, and has no doubts, will choose the spiritual signs.
In the present passage "He split", it says, "the sea and led them through". What great thing is it for God to split a bodily sea and lead me through on my journey? But suppose I come to understand the sea of life, and the waves in life, and the bitterness and saltiness of the affairs of this life. And suppose that God's kindness enables me to understand how it is not some bodily Pharaoh or bodily Egyptians who pursue me, and that, having understood this, I am able to flee the spiritual Pharaoh. Then what else would I pray for, except that God split the sea of the affairs of life and make these waves stand "like a wineskin", and that I cross everything while walls rise up for me on the right and on the left? And I would wish to see the Egyptians who pursue me, the spiritual Egyptians, drowned. Then, having passed through the Red Sea as God opens it for me, I would be able to say: "Let us sing to the Lord; gloriously has he been glorified. Horse and rider" (not bodily ones, but "the spiritual hosts of wickedness") "he has cast into the sea". And so I would be able to say: "He became my helper and protector unto salvation".
So whenever you read of signs and wonders, whether in the books of the Old Testament or in those concerning the coming of Christ, see that you do not become like that hard-hearted and bodily people who sought signs and wonders, preferring material and bodily things to those that are greater and spiritual. The bodily signs are nothing compared with the others. For these will make an unbeliever a believer, but those others are able to give the very greatest benefit to the one who believes and has crossed over. Let us too pray, then, whenever we find ourselves beside the sea, in persecutions, in afflictions, in dangers, in distresses. Let us pray that God split the sea of such troubles and lead us through unharmed, and make these waters stand held fast like a wineskin, and that he "guide" us "with a cloud by day and all the night with a light of fire".
2. For these things too can be spoken of in two ways. It said that they were guided in a bodily way "with a cloud", a bodily one, "by day". But the soul is not benefited by that, for it did not see true light. If, however, you understand a spiritual and better cloud, the light cloud on which the Savior is prophesied to sit when he comes to Egypt, you will see that such a cloud, sent from God to guide us, brings us great benefit and salvation. Even now the cloud is present and guides us, if indeed we are in the light of day. This cloud shelters us, so that the blessing may come upon us that says: "By day the sun shall not scorch you, nor the moon by night". And if ever dark and difficult things overtake us, it guides us also with a light of fire. For an intelligible fire appears, of which the Savior said: "I came to cast fire upon the earth, and would that it were already kindled". When this fire has appeared, we are guided and are not in darkness. What surrounds others is darkness, but we see as by day.
For this reason the intelligible fire, which was also in Egypt, comes also to the people of God on their journey. What was it in Egypt? A darkness that could be felt held all the Egyptians, and no one saw even his neighbor, but those people alone had light in all the places where they lived. Understand something of this kind, then, I beg you. When we too are journeying, the world is darkened and all things are filled with ignorance. But we alone, as we wrestle against "the spiritual hosts of wickedness and the world-rulers of this darkness", are not in this darkness but in light, because of the true light, Christ Jesus, who is also our Lord.
3. In the same way, just as "he split a rock in the desert and gave them drink as in a great deep", so now too God splits rocks in the desert of the world and gives us waters in a land without water. For who, having read these Scriptures, and especially the more perplexing passages, will not say that they are dry, without water, matters that offer nothing to drink? Nevertheless, if God grants it, the rock is struck (the dryness of the Scriptures), and waters come forth and torrents flood. For "he split" (God, that is) "a rock in the desert and gave" us "drink as in a great deep", and "brought forth water from a rock". Of Christ Jesus it is written: "We saw him, and he had no form or beauty, but his form was without honor, failing beyond the sons of men, a man in affliction and in toil, and knowing how to bear infirmity". Who, seeing him, will not say: "This is a rock; what can this do?" And yet see what great rivers came forth from him and gushed over the whole inhabited world, as, on this very day, the churches under heaven give drink, in remembrance of the resurrection of Christ Jesus, from the water that came forth from that rock of which some said: "We saw him, and he had no form or beauty". So he himself is a rock, as it says: "and the rock was Christ".
"He brought down waters like rivers". So if God wishes, now too, to bring down from above, from the heavens, "waters like rivers", he brings down the waters that come from them. Yet though all these things take place, we are no less sinners again, and this too is written down. For it is written not so that we may see that the people sinned, but so that we may look to see whether we too are in the same state: "And they went on still to sin against him; they embittered the Most High in the waterless place". After this assembly, after the teaching, after the exhortation, after the rousing words, suppose we go out and sin again, forgetting the words that nourished us and the water from the rock. Do we not also embitter "the Most High in the waterless place", and tempt "God in" our "hearts", and say the same kind of things that they too were recorded as having said then: "so as to ask food for their souls"?
4. For we often doubt whether God gives us food in this desert. At a loss, and despairing of food because we do not see it as something perceptible, we speak against God and say: "Surely God will not be able to prepare a table in the desert? Since he struck a rock, and waters flowed and torrents overflowed". Even if we were given drink, can we also partake of food? "Can he also give bread, or prepare a table for his people?" But hear this: we do indeed despair of whether he can prepare a table in the desert, but he does not quarrel with our sins. Instead, he makes a table full of spiritual foods and sets it before us.
About this table we have learned the following: "If you sit down to dine at the table of rulers, understand intelligibly what is set before you, and put out your hand, knowing that you must prepare such things". So we say: "Or to prepare" (is he able?) "a table for his people?" And we go on to say: "Therefore the Lord heard and put it off, and fire was kindled in Jacob". Wherever there is unbelief, there is fire; for the fiery darts of the evil one come upon the unbelieving. And if "fire was kindled" then "in Jacob", much more now. If we sin, fire will be kindled. That fire was perceptible, and it did not harm the soul. But now, if fire is kindled, it brings us death: not the kind of death those people died, according to the symbol that happened to them, but eternal death. Therefore let us not disbelieve God, in case fire is kindled in us too "and wrath comes up against Israel". So let wrath not come up against us; let the Holy Spirit come up! For if it finds us rather abject, wrath comes up against us. And if it comes up, why does wrath come up? If fire is kindled. But why fire is kindled is something we must consider.
5. "Because", it says, "they did not believe in God, nor did they hope in his salvation". It is good to believe not only God (τῷ θεῷ) but also "in God" (ἐν τῷ θεῷ). For I know a difference between believing God and believing "in God": "Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness". But these people, whom the text blames, it says, "did not believe in God". How then shall we understand both believing "God" and believing "in him"? I remember a Gospel text that I once explained, which proved useful to me for stating the difference between believing "God" and believing "in God". The text runs as follows: "Whoever confesses in me before men, I too shall confess in him before my Father who is in heaven; but whoever denies me" (he no longer said "in me", for the one who denies is not in Christ, but "whoever denies me"), "I too shall deny". He did not say "in him", but "I shall deny him". In the text, then, if confession takes place in the Savior, the Savior too confesses in the one who has confessed. But if denial takes place, it is not in the Savior; rather, the one who denies, not being in him, denies him. And the Savior, not being in the one who denies, denies him. By this reasoning, then, to believe "in God" is something greater than to believe "God". But believing God is the beginning of progress, so that after this, having come to be in God and standing firm, we may believe God himself through Jesus Christ our Savior, to whom belong the glory and the might to the ages of ages. Amen.