The Meaning of Muteness and the Timing of Rebuke

They are driven and, seeking evils against the one who is being driven, they speak vanity; It is nothing but vanity, offering no profit or insight into the truth. For all the evil things, the trivial things, and the transient things are vain, and they are things seen and easily dismissed and easily described and perishing. It is necessary to seek the soul profitably. But to those who approach 'the evils' against 'those seeking my soul and being driven,' it is evident that they are trivial. He who seeks to bring the sinning soul to repentance and guide the one who has strayed from the truth back to it., seeks the soul praiseworthily and profitably. For the Savior indeed 'has come to seek and to save the lost' (Luke 19:10). He, seeking the soul, seeks in order that he might lead it into salvation, so that he might restore it according to its former state. Just as therefore the Savior does this through instruction and through contributing to the good, so also the disciples and angels and men of the Savior do this. And none of these, seeking the soul, speaks vanity, and none seeks evils against it, but good and profitable things.

And they practiced craftiness all the day. They practiced crookedness all their life; for how should they not have practiced? They had 'crooked thoughts which separate from God' (Psalm 94:8), and their heart had become crooked and stumbling, which the holy man avoids having, saying: 'a stumbling heart has not clung to me.' He who has crooked thoughts practices crookedness all the day, with works and thoughts in accordance with his crooked thoughts. These indeed are the crooked thoughts cast into the soul by the devil; For it has been said: 'a serpent, a dragon, is crooked.' Thus, he becomes crooked. It has also been said carelessly in others: 'all the crooked things shall be for straightness.' The crookedness receives straightness when it casts away the crookedness. But he who practices this all the day has also crooked works, a crooked choice, and a diverted disposition.

And I, as if deaf, did not hear, and as if mute, did not speak.. The one repenting, if the devil casts into him evil or crooked thoughts, let him be as if a deaf man were not hearing, let him not understand them, let him not provide to them the hearing of the inner man, but let him be thus as if mute, as if deaf, not opening...

The mouth is closed. Here, 'mute' does not mean one who has lost his hearing, but one who does not speak; for often, especially according to the Scripture, this meaning lies regarding speech: 'after the demon had gone out,' he says, 'the mute man spoke.' He did not say, 'the mute man heard.' Yet I do not say that this word does not also mean one deprived of his hearing. It signifies both.

Again, God to Moses saying, 'I am slow of speech and heavy of tongue,' said: 'Who gave speech to man, and who has made the hard-of-speech or the mute, the seeing and the blind?' (Exodus 4:11). Here, 'mute' can lie regarding speech or regarding the loss of hearing. And the phrase, 'after the demon went out, the mute man spoke,' means a mute one who does not have vocal organs, one who does not have an active tongue.

'I became like a man not hearing and not having a rebuke in his mouth.' This says: I have not become a man who does not hear, but 'like a man not hearing.' I did not accept the words and the announcements of the deceitful, even though I was able to rebuke them. Knowing that rebukes are not brought against such a person at the right time, as if one were not able to rebuke him, the word shows that both rebukes and contradictions ought to happen at the right time. And we take the 'right time' from the object and the one being argued with. Just as food given at the right time benefits and nourishes, but offered at the wrong time harms more.

'Do not rebuke evildoers, so that they may not hate you' (Proverbs 9:8). The word teaches not to avoid being hated by the wicked, but says this: rebuke, so that you may be useful. Approaching to rebuke not at the right time—for 'there is a rebuke that is not beautiful'—does not benefit the one being rebuked, but rather makes him even more wicked, as to hate the one rebuking. 'Rebuke a wise man, and he will love you' (Job 5:17). If the wise man being rebuked loves the one bringing the rebuke, it is clear that the one who hates the rebuke is wicked.

It has also been said elsewhere: 'He will not love the uninstructed the ones rebuking him, but with the wise he will not converse.' The uninstructed does not love at all those rebuking him, but the wise man intends this. Nothing of what the wise man says is added to the evil man who hates those rebuking.