Qualitative Change and the End

Because of an existing wickedness. Why then do you turn away? Will you then forget our poverty and our affliction? Because of you we are afflicted, because of you we are poor. But you do not forget these things. In which things one conquers, even if he is gloomy or even if he is joyless. It was said that the dust is more bodily. 'Our soul was humbled' therefore, of those saying these things, 'into the dust'. 'The body of humiliation' surrounds us, but we were not humbled by it. As if someone, for instance, receives a blow from a certain tyrant, he seems to have been humbled, but he was not humbled; for he still has the same pride, he still has the same joy. Because of this we are poor and are afflicted, because our soul, having been humbled into the dust, does not clearly possess its own resurrection, and 'our belly was stuck to the earth' (Ps 22:14).

But they do not say this about them in truth, but about their own members, about their own people. And there are two ways for the belly to have been humbled to the earth: when someone thinks of earthly things and seeks lower things, he does not produce heavenly offspring, he does not produce God-fearing thoughts, but all human things; and the soul saying these things becomes a mother, 'because our belly was stuck to the earth' (Ps 22:14). And according to a second meaning, the one being nourished by the heavenly bread, the belly receiving heavenly nourishment, was stuck to heaven. But those who eat the flesh of the dragon and carry the same food to the serpent, being earth, have the belly stuck to the earth. And just as it is said concerning the sensible things: 'the foods to the belly, and the belly to the foods; and God will destroy both this and these' (Lk 10:19), so also the belly and the stomach of the soul, when it is not nourished by heavenly things, when it does not receive from its divine bridegroom, has the belly stuck to the earth.

Arise, Lord, help us and redeem us for the sake of your name. We ask for help, lest the afflictions remaining for a long time might harm our soul which is turning. Ka-

And then, so that they may not boast in their own righteousness, trusting in it, he says: 'Arise, O Lord, help us and redeem us for the sake of your name' (Ps 3:7). We are enriched by you. For this reason we have come into these afflictions, because we are yours, and for the sake of help you have sent us into this hardship.

1 Toward the end, for those who are being changed; to the sons of Kore for understanding; a song for the beloved. Change is a movement and a transformation of something according to quality. Not every movement and transformation is a change. For there is a change according to becoming. I say, for instance, an egg becoming a bird and a grain of wheat a stalk. This movement and transformation is according to becoming. And there is another occurring according to corruption; when the body of a human decays and is dissolved into fluids and worms and the like, it is not said to be changed, but to have decayed. And there is also another movement and transformation according to increase, when an addition to the previous amount occurs; for when I am extended from a smaller to a greater size, I am said to have increased, but to have diminished when the amount is contracted and becomes less. Change, therefore, is a movement according to quality, such as from sickness to health and from health to sickness, from ignorance to knowledge and likewise, from unbelief to faith.

'Toward the end,' therefore, 'for those who are being changed.' We have often explained regarding the end, that it is that which is after all things, the last thing to be desired. Thus, 'toward the end, for those who are being changed.' When change reaches such a limit that it is no longer possible for it to be further extended, in the perfection of things, when 'God becomes all in all' (1 Cor 15:28), the quality can no longer be extended. Every knowledge and every virtue is a quality. It is possible, therefore, to begin virtue and to make progress in it, and it is always possible to receive more to that which already exists. But when someone possesses virtue perfectly as if nothing...