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Hymns on Faith

St Ephrem the Syrian, tr. Morris, 1847; selections

80. Rhythm the Eightieth

Inquire and hearken discriminatingly that faith is a second soul¹; and as the body standeth by the soul, the life of the soul also hangeth on faith, and if it deny it or be divided, it becometh a corpse. That mortal body then dependeth upon the soul, and the soul is dependent upon faith, and faith also itself dependeth upon the Godhead²; for from the Father Himself by the Son the Truth descendeth which quickeneth all of them in the Spirit. For by this Truth it is that man can link his soul with those above³: by the soul he liveth, and by means of the body he seeth and heareth: by Faith and Love and Wisdom⁴ he is blended also with the Godhead, and hath His Image formed in him. Let us not then loosen this wondrous fabric, nor let the faith become void in our souls, lest we should become dead invisibly, whereof the Living One said, ‘Let the dead bury their dead!’ This air is a soul which without living breath⁵ quickeneth the body, and whoso ventureth to cut himself off from it, his life floweth away, and he is visibly a dead man; and whoso cutteth off himself from the Word of Truth, his soul is invisibly a corpse.

I have no pleasure at all in the death of him that dieth,⁶ witnessed the Living One who quickeneth all. As the Sea, is that True One which cannot be deceived, a Fountain of Life! He hath made known His Will and hath certified His Love, which thirsteth mightily to kill our death⁷. The Scripture hath sealed unto us that the just in faith findeth life. He⁸ hath made the Truth as a glorious root, and works⁹ as fruits hath He hung upon faith, and suspendeth them on the branch¹⁰ of truth. By a visible type, lo! hidden things shew themselves to thee as it were to the eyes¹¹; for the body longeth over the gains as a merchant, and let the mind too gather together its treasures as a sailor, into faith the ship¹² of Life!

And as the body standeth by the life of the soul, the soul too though full of life yet without works is not even alive; for by the deeds of faith it is able to live, and the¹³ Scriptures are witnesses. Lazarus the faithful answered and came forth! and sweet was his savour through the voice of Him¹⁴ that called him: and after the type of Lazarus, the Gentiles were quickened with the hidden life; and as a type of the Jews did the thief die that hung himself, and left his ruin as an heritage to the Scribes that hired him.

Notes

§. 3. Anast. Sin. Hodeg. p. 15. “The body when without the soul hath no life of itself, neither hath the keeping of the commandments without orthodoxy; for what the soul is to the body, that orthodoxy is to the spirit.”
p. 374, n. o. c. Scrut. R. iii. §. 13.
Vol. iii. p. 581, b. “By love and by doctrine when the Truth is mingled with them, enhanced and enriched with new things is that mind that explores with discrimination the treasury of things unseen.”
This seems to point to three stages in the spiritual life, of which the last would answer to the γνωστικὸς of St. Clement Strom. vi. 8.
Ass. renders, Hujus aeris respiratio est vitalis spiritus vitamque corpori impertit. This looks as if he meant to have printed [Syriac] ‘by means of’ instead of [Syriac] ‘without,’ unless by any possibility the words ‘without living breath’ can mean, spontaneously, with our sensibly drawing in our breath.
Ezech. 18, 23.
R. x. §. 7.
Hab. 2, 4.
Comp. R. xvi. §. 2.
R. xiii. §. 2.
R. lxxvi. §. 2.
R. xlix. §. 3. R. lxix. §. 1. §. 2.
James 2, 26.
p. 350, n.