Methodius of Olympus — Commentary on Scripture

Isaiah 44:4

For everywhere the divine writings take the willow as the type of chastity, because when its flower is steeped in water, if it is drunk, it extinguishes whatever kindles sensual desires and passions within us, until it renders completely barren and makes every inclination to the begetting of children without effect, as also Homer indicated, for this reason calling the willows destructive of fruit.… For as it is the nature of this tree to bud and grow to maturity when enriched by words, so it is the nature of virginity to blossom and grow to maturity when enriched by words, so that one can hang one's body on it.If, then, the rivers of Babylon are the streams of voluptuousness, as wise people say, which confuse and disturb the soul, then the willows must be chastity, to which we may suspend and draw up the organs of lust that overbalance and weigh down the mind, so that they may not be borne down by the torrents of incontinence and be drawn like worms to impurity and corruption.

SYMPOSIUM OR BANQUET OF THE TEN VIRGINS 4:3-4

Isaiah 45:18

For in reality God did not establish the universe in vain or to no purpose but destruction, as those weak-minded people say, but to exist and be inhabited and continue. Therefore the earth and the heaven must exist again after the conflagration and shaking of all things.

ON THE RESURRECTION 1:8

Isaiah 51:6

But if our opponents say, How then is it, if the universe is not destroyed, that the Lord says that “heaven and earth shall pass away,” and the prophet, that “the heaven shall perish as smoke” and “the earth shall grow old as a garment”; we answer, because it is usual for the Scriptures to call the change of the world from its present condition to a better and more glorious one destruction, as its earlier form is lost in the change of all things to a state of greater splendor, for there is neither contradiction nor absurdity in the Scriptures. For not “the world” but “the fashion of this world” passes away, it is said. So it is usual for the Scriptures to call the change from an earlier form to a better and more comely state “destruction”; just as when one calls by the name of “destruction” the change from a childish form into a perfect adult, as the stature of the child is turned into mature size and beauty.

ON THE RESURRECTION 1:9

Isaiah 52:2

The creation, then, after being restored to a better and more fitting state, remains, rejoicing and exulting over the children of God at the resurrection. For their sake the creation now groans and travails, waiting itself also for our redemption from the corruption of the body, that, when we have risen and shaken off the mortality of the flesh, according to that which is written, “shake off the dust, and arise and sit down, O Jerusalem,” and have been set free from sin, it also shall be freed from corruption and be subject no longer to vanity but to righteousness.

ON THE RESURRECTION 1:8

Isaiah 60:1

Hail and shine, thou Jerusalem, for thy light is come, the Light eternal, the Light forever enduring, the Light supreme, the Light immaterial, the Light of same substance with God and the Father, the Light that is in the Spirit, and that is the Father; the Light that illumines the ages; the Light that gives light to mundane and supramundane things, Christ our very God.

ORATION CONCERNING SIMEON AND ANNA 13

Isaiah 60:3

It is the church whose children shall come to it with all speed after the resurrection, running to it from all quarters. [The church] rejoices, receiving the light that never goes down and clothed with the brightness of the Word as with a robe. For with what other more precious or honorable ornament was it becoming that the queen should be adorned, to be led as a bride to the Lord, when she had received a garment of light and therefore was called by the Father? Come then, let us go forward in our discourse and look on this marvelous woman as on virgins prepared for a marriage, pure and undefiled, perfect and radiating a permanent beauty, lacking nothing of the brightness of light; and instead of a dress, clothed with light itself; and instead of precious stones, her head adorned with shining stars.

SYMPOSIUM OR BANQUET OF THE TEN VIRGINS 8:5

Isaiah 66:7

“Before she was in labor, she gave birth; before her pains came, she escaped and delivered a male child.” Who has heard such a thing? Who has seen such things? The most holy virgin mother, therefore, escaped entirely the manner of women even before she gave birth, doubtless in order that with the Holy Spirit betrothing her to himself and sanctifying her, she might conceive without intercourse with man. She has brought forth her firstborn Son, even the only-begotten Son of God … who on earth, in the Virgin’s nuptial chamber, joined to himself the nature of Adam, like a bridegroom, by an inalienable union, and he preserved his mother’s purity incorrupt and uninjured; him in short who in heaven was begotten without corruption and on earth birthed in a manner quite unspeakable.

ORATION CONCERNING SIMEON AND ANNA 3