The Body of Death and the Nature of the Soul

He finds pleasure in the burden of wickedness rather, and distances himself from Jesus. For this reason it is also said in Isaiah: 'Egypt has grown weary, the commerce of Ethiopia, and the Sabeans, lofty men, shall pass over you and shall be your servants and shall worship you, for God strengthens and there is no god besides you' (Isa 18:7). 'Egypt has grown weary' at the time when those who are of the wicked have received sensation, practicing idolatry and possessing idle chatter regarding curious things, regarding augury, regarding necromancy, and the demons lying near them. But when they do not have sensation of these, they do not grow weary. 'The commerce' therefore 'of the Ethiopians' or 'the trades of the Ethiopians' grows weary then. And 'Ethiopians' refers to those darkened according to the inner man.

Thus also the devil in the Epistle of Barnabas and in the Shepherd is called 'the black one,' not according to the body, but having been darkened according to the mind, having become outside the brightness of the saints. These therefore the Ethiopians have a journey or a way, where their commerce is. And they grow weary then when they receive sensation, for howsoever one finds pleasure in sinning, he does not grow weary.

'They swelled and my sores decayed from the face of my folly' (Ps 38:3). I had sores from the arrows of punishment or from the burning arrows of the evil one; for it has also been said to have burning arrows. When someone receives impressions, that is, thoughts and memories of evils and impieties, he is in a sore. But when these have increased and having become unburdened they swell, then they also undergo putrefaction. 'They swelled' therefore 'and my sores decayed.' But from where did I have the sores, from where has their putrefaction happened? — 'from the face of my folly.' It is necessary to expose my folly and to turn away from it. Someone undergoes folly when he does not possess prudence.

The stings of thoughts and of desires, these make sores. It is necessary to heal these quickly. Someone saw a woman toward desire; he had a sore. Let him heal, and until the passion, let him set the anger in order; for in this way neither desire shall swell nor bring putrefaction. But when the mind remains, these bring both putrefaction and stench and uncleanness. When he does not have this prudence so as to know what ought to be done and what not, having the things said in a mixed way as indifferent, in...

It is in folly. And folly, regarding those things that boast of being small sins so as to compare them to madness, nourishes and strengthens, and becomes a stench and corruption. Likewise, regarding the essence of which the word is spoken, it takes the resemblance and the corruption; for nothing bodily appears; for many foolish people are healthy and have strong bodies.

I was wretched and was bowed down to the end. The unseemly and burdensome things often bring wretchedness. And the body itself indeed makes the one burdened wretched. This concept is submitted by the apostolic word which has it thus: 'Wretched am I, man; who will rescue me from the body of this death?' (Romans 7:24). Since indeed I am in the body of death, I am wretched, and not by chance will the Savior make me out of such wretchedness; for he immediately brought forward: 'I give thanks through Jesus Christ' (Romans 7:25), who freed me from the body. We say, therefore, that wretchedness comes to the soul from the body of death.

We do not at once take the body of death to be any body, but a body of this kind. When someone uses this body as if to do sins toward death, a body of death remains surrounding him. But it is possible to make it not a body of death; for when I separate from it those things making it a body of death, it is no longer a body of death. And just as this perceptible body has underlying matter and the form of a body, it is possible to separate this body from the thick body. When it takes only the three dimensions without matter, this body is not essence.

In these readily available things, when it is said, for example, 'color in body,' does it not also mean 'in a certain body,' because by saying 'color in body' it showed that this body means the seen thing, which we touch? But when it says a single form is the quantity of the body, it does not say this; for how can an essence be a genus of essence? So the body is homonymous: for that which is taken according to the three dimensions without matter, this is the quantitative body; for that with matter, we take not only the dimensions but also the underlying essence with them. This body is something else. The body, therefore, is then a body of death, when those things working in it and its movements happen sinfully. It is possible, therefore, to separate this from...