Romans 10.1-10

Matthew 8.28-9.1

It says that when the LORD had come to the ‘other side, He was met by two men, possessed by demons, coming out of the tombs, exceedingly fierce.’ Coming out of the tombs: it’s an image of the LORD descending into hell with His soul and being met by all the souls in hell. He is the uncreated Brilliance of the Eternal Light. He illumines brilliantly even the darkness of hell, and hell cannot overcome Him.

‘When I am lifted up on the Cross,’ the LORD says, ‘I will draw all men to Myself.’ I see these two demon-possessed men as an image of all men, both living and dead, drawn to the eternal Light of Christ in whom is the eternal Life of God (Jn 1.13). For, even on ‘this side,’ one can be living already in the tomb of hell on the ‘other side.’ Listen to St Macarios:

‘When you hear that at that time the LORD delivered the souls from hell and darkness, and went down to hell, and did a glorious work, do not imagine that these things are so very far from your own soul. Death keeps fast hold of the souls of Adam, and the thoughts of the soul lie imprisoned in the darkness. When you hear of tombs, do not think only of visible ones. Your own heart is a tomb. When the prince of wickedness and his angels burrow there, and make paths and thoroughfares there, on which the powers of Satan walk into your mind and thoughts, are you not a hell, a tomb, a dead man towards God?’ (Hom 11.11)

But I see the townspeople also as an image of those living in hell on ‘this side’ even before they have passed on to the other side. They are afraid to come out of the ‘cities’ of the world, their distractions and diversions, to descend into the tomb of their heart. They’re afraid to see their Mr. Hyde that lurks in the shadows beneath their Dr Jekyl. So, when they are drawn out of the city and they see the Light, Jesus Christ, who has come into the world, they beg Him, as did the demons, to leave them alone. ‘For they loved the darkness rather than the Light because their deeds were evil.’ (Jn 3.19)

Eden is a mountain. The Tree of Life is the Wisdom of God, it is Jesus Christ, and He is at the top of the Edenic Mountain. The tree of learning good and evil was halfway up the Mountain. Its branches stretched all the way across like a curtain, like the heavens – like the iconostas – so that the Tree of Life could not be seen by Adam and Eve.

The tree of learning good and evil is not evil. It’s the creation. And it is beautiful because it is the reflection of Wisdom by whom it was created; and divine Wisdom is the Source of Beauty, more beautiful than the sun. (Wisd 7.29)

St Gregory of Nyssa (4^th Cent) gives us to understand that God commanded Adam and Eve not to eat from the tree of learning good and evil not because it was evil, but to give them a command so that, through obedience to the command, they could consummate their union with divine Wisdom, the Tree of Life, and become partakers of the divine nature. (2 Pt 1.4)

St John of Damascus (8^th cent), called the space in front of the tree of learning good and evil a ‘gymnasium.’ That was where Adam and Eve could practice denying themselves out of love for God that they may gain the Beauty of God’s Wisdom, more beautiful than the sun.

Beneath the melody of Holy Scripture is the e-song of the holy fathers’ teaching that the root of our being is our ‘erotic desire.’ Erotic desire is not lust. Lust is the perversion of our erotic desire. St Maximus the Confessor (7^th cent) writes: The Divine erotic power pre-existing in God, has given birth to the same blessed force within us. Through it, we long for the beautiful and the good, as did Solomon who ‘became a lover [erotas] of the Beauty of Wisdom (Wisd 8.2). This divine erotic force produces an ekstasis, a going out of oneself, compelling those who love to belong not to themselves but to those whom they love.’ (Philo 2, pp. 280-1, §§ 83&85).

This divine and blessed erotic force in us is a desire to become one with God, the Source of Beauty. The LORD’s command to Adam and Eve was the command to deny themselves out of love for God so that they could become one with Him and He with them; so that He could abide in them and they in Him. In the joy of this Spiritual Marriage, their every desire would be filled with all the riches and all the good things of God.

Eve was deceived because she listened to the lie of the serpent without discernment. Listening to the serpent, she distanced herself from God. She drew near instead to the serpent. He enticed her to look at the tree, i.e., the beauty of creation. She saw that it was desirable, beautiful to look at and to think about. She listened to the serpent, she looked with her eyes, she acted on her desire. She took the fruit, and she ate it. She gave her erotic desire to the serpent. He became her lord, and she now belonged to him as his slave. (St Macarios, Hom 5)

The root of sin is given by different fathers as self-love, love of money, greed. Are these not but different ways of saying that the root of sin is our erotic desire turned away from God – perverted – to cleave to the beauty of His creation?

Our Gospel this morning is another biblical image of what happens to us when our erotic desire is corrupted to become the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life. (1 Jn 2.16) Might our lust for carnal pleasure be but the expression of our soul’s longing for union with God?

We see Jesus coming to the ‘other side,’ even to the tombs as Wisdom ‘going about seeking such as are worthy of Her. Who are those worthy of Her? Those who become ‘lovers [erwtaV] of Her beauty, and who long to make Her their Spouse.’ (Wisd 8.2)

Wisdom Herself tells us how to become worthy of Her. ‘The beginning of Wisdom is the desire (same word for ‘lust’) for discipline and instruction. Discipline is all about gaining love. Love is keeping Wisdom’s Laws. (Wisd 5.17-18) We read in St John on Friday: ‘This is the love of God: that we keep his commandments.’ [1Jo 5.3] And Wisdom, incarnate as Jesus Christ, says: ‘If you love me, you will keep my commandments.’ [Jn 14.15]. ‘If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love.’ [Jhn 15.10] ‘To keep the commandments of Wisdom,’ it says, ‘is to be established in incorruption; incorruption makes us near to God’ (Wisd 5.18-20) – it makes us ‘kin’ to God. ‘Therefore, desire (epiqumia) for Wisdom leads us up to the Kingdom of Heaven.’ (Wisd 5.20, cf. Eze 37.10-12) Therefore, when Wisdom – the Beautiful God – beceomes flesh,  He says: ‘Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!’

We can be sure the demons wanted to flee the LORD when He came to the other side! But, see how the two men overpowered the demons in their desire and ran to meet the LORD.’ The demons could not stop them. Our erotic desire for God is the root of our being, and so it is more powerful than the demons. When we turn our ‘erotic force’ in repentance toward Wisdom, it acquires all its innate power because it is united to God who, by His death on the Cross, destroyed the devil. He trampled down death and gave life to those in the tombs. He delivered us from bondage to the enemy. As we cleave to Our LORD Jesus Christ in love for Him who first loved us, and unite ourselves to Him who has united Himself to us, He cleanses us and purifies us and sanctifies us. He deifies us and restores us to our original beauty. Uniting us to Himself, He establishes us in our original power and freedom in the joy of eternal communion with God that He created us for. Amen!