John Cassian — Commentary on Scripture

2 Samuel 23:14-17

And certainly when we are disturbed at this very anger because it has stolen upon us against our brother, and we angrily cast out its deadly suggestions and do not permit it to maintain its noxious lair in the recesses of our heart. To be angry in this latter way is also taught us by that prophet who so eradicated this from his mind that he did not even want to take revenge on his own enemies, who had in fact been handed over to him by God, when he said, “Be angry and do not sin.” For when he wanted water from a well in Bethlehem and had been brought it by strong men from the midst of enemy troops, he at once poured it out on the ground and, angrily extinguishing his wanton and passionate desire in this way, he offered it as a libation to the Lord, rejecting his yearning and desire with the words “May the Lord be gracious to me, lest I do this. Shall I drink the blood of those men who went out and the danger of their souls?”

INSTITUTES 8.8

2 Thessalonians 3:6

Lastly, those very people [the Thessalonians] whom in his first epistle Paul had treated with the gentle application of his words, he endeavors in his second epistle to heal with severer and sterner remedies, as those who had not profited from any more gentle treatment. And he no longer applies the treatment of gentle words, no mild and kindly expressions such as, “But we ask you, brothers.” Rather he says, “We command you, brothers, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you withdraw from every brother that lives in a disorderly fashion.” In the first letter Paul asks; in the second he commands. In the first we see the kindness of one who is persuading; in the second the sternness of one protesting and threatening. “We command you, brothers,” because, when we first asked you, you scorned our words. Now at least obey our threats. Paul renders this commandment severe, not by his bare word but by the imprecation of the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. He is concerned that they might again scorn his teaching as merely a human word, considering it of little importance. And so quite dir…

Lastly, those very people [the Thessalonians] whom in his first epistle Paul had treated with the gentle application of his words, he endeavors in his second epistle to heal with severer and sterner remedies, as those who had not profited from any more gentle treatment. And he no longer applies the treatment of gentle words, no mild and kindly expressions such as, “But we ask you, brothers.” Rather he says, “We command you, brothers, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you withdraw from every brother that lives in a disorderly fashion.” In the first letter Paul asks; in the second he commands. In the first we see the kindness of one who is persuading; in the second the sternness of one protesting and threatening. “We command you, brothers,” because, when we first asked you, you scorned our words. Now at least obey our threats. Paul renders this commandment severe, not by his bare word but by the imprecation of the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. He is concerned that they might again scorn his teaching as merely a human word, considering it of little importance. And so quite directly, like a well-skilled physician operating on infected limbs to which he could not apply the remedy of a mild treatment, Paul attempts to cure by an incision with a spiritual knife.… He bids them withdraw from those who will not make time for work and to cut them off like limbs tainted with the festering sores of leisure. This is so that the malady of idleness, like some deadly contagion, might not infect even the healthy portion of their limbs by the gradual advance of infection.

INSTITUTES 10.7

2 Thessalonians 3:8

Once Abba Serapion finely mocked this sham humility. A man arrived at his cell, making a great show of lowliness in his dress and speech. Serapion, as is usual, asked him to offer a prayer. The visitor refused and said that he was guilty of such crimes that he did not deserve even to breathe the same air. Refusing the mat, he sat on the ground. Still less would he allow Serapion to wash his feet. After supper it is usual to have a religious conference. So Serapion began, with kindness and gentleness, to warn him against being an idle and haphazard wanderer, especially as he was young and strong. He told him that he ought to settle in a cell, subject himself to the rules of the elders and maintain himself by his own work instead of living on the hospitality of others. Since St. Paul was working for the spread of the gospel, he might reasonably have lived on others. Yet he preferred to work day and night to get daily bread for himself and those who were ministering to him and could not work themselves.… You must keep true humility of heart—and true humility comes not from affectation o…

Once Abba Serapion finely mocked this sham humility. A man arrived at his cell, making a great show of lowliness in his dress and speech. Serapion, as is usual, asked him to offer a prayer. The visitor refused and said that he was guilty of such crimes that he did not deserve even to breathe the same air. Refusing the mat, he sat on the ground. Still less would he allow Serapion to wash his feet. After supper it is usual to have a religious conference. So Serapion began, with kindness and gentleness, to warn him against being an idle and haphazard wanderer, especially as he was young and strong. He told him that he ought to settle in a cell, subject himself to the rules of the elders and maintain himself by his own work instead of living on the hospitality of others. Since St. Paul was working for the spread of the gospel, he might reasonably have lived on others. Yet he preferred to work day and night to get daily bread for himself and those who were ministering to him and could not work themselves.… You must keep true humility of heart—and true humility comes not from affectation of posture or speech but from an interior humbling of the mind.

CONFERENCES 18.11

2 Timothy 1:7

Therefore there are two degrees of fear. The one is for beginners—that is, for those who are still under the yoke and under servile dread. In regard to this it is said, “The slave shall fear his master.” And in the Gospel, “I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know what his master is doing.” And consequently he says, “The slave does not remain in the house forever; the son remains forever.” For he is instructing us to pass from the fear of punishment to the fullest freedom of love and to the confidence of the friends and sons of God. And the blessed apostle, who had long since passed beyond the degree of servile fear, thanks to the power of the Lord’s love, disdains lower things and professes that he has been endowed with greater goods.

CONFERENCES 11.13.3-5

2 Timothy 2:5

One who wants to extinguish the natural desires of the flesh should first hasten to overcome those vices whose ground is contrary to our nature. For if we desire to test out the force of the apostle’s counsel, we ought first to learn what are the laws and what the discipline of the world’s contest. This is so that finally by a comparison with these, we may be able to know what the blessed apostle meant to teach to us who are striving in the spiritual contest.

INSTITUTES 5.12

2 Timothy 3:12

Abba Germanus said: “Since you have given us the remedies for every illusion, and since the diabolical snares that used to trouble us have been disclosed to us by your teaching and by the Lord’s gift, we beseech you likewise to explain to us completely this phrase from the Gospel, “My yoke is easy and my burden is light.” For it seems quite contrary to the words of the prophet, which say, “On account of the words of your lips I have kept to hard ways.” Indeed, even the apostle says, “All who wish to live devoutly in Christ suffer persecution.” Whatever is hard and has reference to persecution, however, can be neither light nor easy.” Abba Abraham said, “We shall demonstrate by the easy proof of experience itself that the words of our Lord and Savior are most true, if we set out on the path of perfection in lawful manner and in accordance with the will of Christ.… For what can be heavy or hard to the person who has taken up Christ’s yoke with his whole mind, is established in true humility, reflects constantly upon the Lord’s suffering and rejoices in all the hardships that come upon…

Abba Germanus said: “Since you have given us the remedies for every illusion, and since the diabolical snares that used to trouble us have been disclosed to us by your teaching and by the Lord’s gift, we beseech you likewise to explain to us completely this phrase from the Gospel, “My yoke is easy and my burden is light.” For it seems quite contrary to the words of the prophet, which say, “On account of the words of your lips I have kept to hard ways.” Indeed, even the apostle says, “All who wish to live devoutly in Christ suffer persecution.” Whatever is hard and has reference to persecution, however, can be neither light nor easy.” Abba Abraham said, “We shall demonstrate by the easy proof of experience itself that the words of our Lord and Savior are most true, if we set out on the path of perfection in lawful manner and in accordance with the will of Christ.… For what can be heavy or hard to the person who has taken up Christ’s yoke with his whole mind, is established in true humility, reflects constantly upon the Lord’s suffering and rejoices in all the hardships that come upon him?”

CONFERENCES 23-24

Acts 1:1

O Theophilus: For our Lord taught us by His own example that we ought to keep to this order, as of Him it is said: “that Jesus began to do and to teach.

Acts 1:1

Take care then that you do not rush into teaching before doing, and so be reckoned among the number of those of whom the Lord speaks in the Gospel to the disciples, “So practice and observe whatever they tell you, but not what they do; for they preach but do not practice. They bind heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on men’s shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with their finger.”

CONFERENCE 14.9

Acts 3:6

Those men who received power from God never used that power as if it were their own but referred the power to him from whom they received it; for the power itself could never have any force except through the name of him who gave it. And so both the apostles and all the servants of God never did anything in their own name but in the name and invocation of Christ. For the power itself derived its force from the same source as its origin, and it could not be given through the instrumentality of the ministers, unless it had come from the Author.

ON THE INCARNATION OF THE LORD AGAINST NESTORIUS 7.19

Acts 3:12

Nor did they think that any one should be renowned for the gifts and marvels of God but rather for the fruits of his own good deeds, which are brought about by the efforts of his mind and the power of his works. For often, as was said above, people of corrupt minds, reprobate concerning the truth, both cast out devils and perform the greatest miracles in the name of the Lord.

CONFERENCE 15.6

Acts 5:5

And so if against those who did not covet other persons’ goods but tried to be sparing of their own, and had no desire to acquire but only the wish to retain, there went forth so severe a sentence, what should we think of those who desire to amass wealth, without ever having had any of their own, and, making a show of poverty before people, are before God convicted of being rich, through the passion of avarice?

INSTITUTES 7.25

Acts 7:3

[Paphnutius said,] “We read that the Lord commanded Abraham to do these three things all at once when he said to him, ‘Leave your country and your kinsfolk and your father’s house.’ ” First he spoke of “your country,” namely, of the resources of this world and of earthly wealth; second, of “your kinsfolk,” namely, of the former way of life and behavior and vices that have been related to us from our birth by a connection as it were of a certain affinity or consanguinity; third, of “your father’s house,” namely, of every vestige of this world which the eyes gaze upon.

CONFERENCE 3.6.2

Acts 9:17

He sent him then to an old man and determined that he must be instructed by his teaching rather than by his own. Otherwise what might have been rightly done with regard to Paul would have given a bad example of presumption to those who came after him, since each individual would conclude that he too should be trained in similar fashion under the guidance and by the teaching of God alone rather than by the instruction of his elders.

CONFERENCE 2.15.1

Acts 20:34

And although for this there were great rewards for his merits prepared, yet [Paul’s] mind, however holy and sublime it might be, could not help being sometimes drawn away from that heavenly contemplation by its attention to earthly labors. Further, … he saw himself enriched with such practical fruits, and on the other hand considered in his heart the good of meditation and weighed as it were in one scale the profit of all these labors and in the other the delights of divine contemplation. For a long time he had corrected the balance in his breast, while the vast rewards for his labors delighted him on one side, and on the other the desire for unity with and the inseparable companionship of Christ inclined him to depart this life. At last in his perplexity [Paul] cries out and says, “What I shall choose I know not. For I am in a strait between two, having a desire to depart and to be with Christ, for it were much better: but to abide in the flesh is more necessary for your sakes.” Though then in many ways he preferred this excellent good to all the fruits of his preaching, yet he subm…

And although for this there were great rewards for his merits prepared, yet [Paul’s] mind, however holy and sublime it might be, could not help being sometimes drawn away from that heavenly contemplation by its attention to earthly labors. Further, … he saw himself enriched with such practical fruits, and on the other hand considered in his heart the good of meditation and weighed as it were in one scale the profit of all these labors and in the other the delights of divine contemplation. For a long time he had corrected the balance in his breast, while the vast rewards for his labors delighted him on one side, and on the other the desire for unity with and the inseparable companionship of Christ inclined him to depart this life. At last in his perplexity [Paul] cries out and says, “What I shall choose I know not. For I am in a strait between two, having a desire to depart and to be with Christ, for it were much better: but to abide in the flesh is more necessary for your sakes.” Though then in many ways he preferred this excellent good to all the fruits of his preaching, yet he submits himself in consideration of love, without which none can gain the Lord; and for their sakes, whom hitherto he had soothed with milk as nourishment from the breasts of the gospel, does not refuse to be parted from Christ, which is bad for himself though useful for others. For he is driven to choose this the rather by that excessive goodness of his whereby for the salvation of his brothers he is ready, were it possible, to incur even the last evil of an anathema.

CONFERENCE 23.5.4-6

Amos 4:11

They [who refuse to repent] do not deserve to be saved by the Lord’s visitation or to be healed by temporal afflictions. They are like those “who in despair have handed themselves over to lasciviousness in the working of every error, unto uncleanness.” In their hardness of heart and with their frequent habit of sinning, they are beyond the purgation of this very brief age and the punishment of the present life. The divine Word reproves them too through the prophet: “I have destroyed you as God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, and you have become like a firebrand snatched from the fire, and not even thus have you returned to me, says the Lord.”

CONFERENCE 6:11.6

Colossians 2:20

This is what the apostle said: “You make observations of the months and of the times and of the years.” Or again: “Do not touch, do not taste, do not pick up.” And there is no doubt that this is said about the superstitions of the law. To plunge into them is to be an adulterer from Christ.

Daniel 6:10

And so in the monasteries of Palestine and Mesopotamia and all the East the services of the above-mentioned hours are ended each day with three psalms apiece, so that constant prayers may be offered to God at the appointed times, and yet, the spiritual duties being completed with due moderation, the necessary offices of work may not be in any way interfered with: for at these three seasons we know that Daniel the prophet also poured forth his prayers to God day by day in his chamber with the windows open. Nor is it without good reasons that these times are more particularly assigned to religious offices, since at them what completed the promises and summed up our salvation was fulfilled. For we can show that at the third hour the Holy Spirit, who had been of old promised by the prophets, descended in the first instance on the apostles assembled together for prayer.

INSTITUTES 3:3

Daniel 10:13

We cannot possibly doubt that this prince of the kingdom of the Persians was a hostile power that befriended the nation of the Persians as an enemy of God’s people. For in order to hinder the good which he saw would result from the archangel’s solution to the question for which the prophet prayed to the Lord, in his jealousy he strove to prevent the saving comfort of the angel from reaching Daniel too speedily and strengthening the people of God, over which the archangel Gabriel was set.

CONFERENCE 8:13

Deuteronomy 7:1

These are the seven nations whose lands the Lord promised to give to the children of Israel when they left Egypt. We must accept the fact that, according to the apostle, all the things that happened to them in a figure were written for our instruction.… The reason that they are said to be much more numerous is that there are more vices than virtues. Therefore in the list they are counted as seven nations, to be sure, but when it is a question of destroying them they are said to be innumerable.

CONFERENCE 5.16.1-2

Deuteronomy 9:4

I ask, what could be said more clearly against that pernicious opinion and presumption of ours, by which we want to attribute everything that we do to our free will and to our own effort? “Do not say in your heart, when the Lord your God has destroyed them in your sight: Because of my righteousness the Lord has led me in to possess this land.” Did he not express himself clearly to those whose souls’ eyes are open and whose ears hear? Namely, when you have enjoyed a notable success in warring against the carnal vices and you see that you have been freed from their filthiness and from this world’s way of life, you should not be puffed up with the success of the struggle and the victory and ascribe this to your own strength and wisdom, believing that you were able to obtain victory over evil spirits and carnal vices through your own efforts and application and free will. There is no doubt that you would never have been able to prevail over these if the Lord’s help had not fortified and protected you.

CONFERENCE 5.15.3-4