Letter 53: Why do you carry books around for nothing, when your reading is contradicted by your conduct?

On the Twelve Prophets. On the saying spoken by Amos: "The naked one shall flee in that day." [Amos 2:16] "The naked one shall flee in that day," says the prophet. Taken in its ready sense, this contemplates the things that came to pass in the Passion of the Lord, and points to the naked man who fled, the one who, wrapped in a linen cloth over his bare body, escaped the assault [literally "the attempt"] of those who killed the Lord, leaving the linen cloth behind for them. [Mark 14:51-52] But the hidden and veiled meaning of this signifies the man who is lean and unencumbered, who has no part in the weights of the flesh and has no hindrance to his ascent from here below; light and easily shifting, he withdraws from the mortal mire, and on wing meets the incorruptible life.

Τῶν ιβ΄ προφητῶν, Εἰς τὸ εἰρημένον ὑπὸ τοῦ Ἀμώς, «Ὁ γυμνὸς φεύξεται ἐν τῇ ἡμέρᾳ ἐκείνῃ.» Ὁ γυμνὸς φεύξεται ἐν ἐκείνῃ τῇ ἡμέρᾳ, » φησὶν ὁ προφήτης. Προχείρως μὲν τὰ ἐν τῷ πάθει τοῦ Κυρίου συμβάντα θεωρεῶν, καὶ τὸν γυμνὸν πεφευγότα δηλῶν, ὃς σινδόνα περιβεβλημένος ἐπὶ γυμνῇ, τὴν πεῖραν (52) τῶν Κυριοκτόνων ἀπέφυγε, καταλιπὼν αὐτοῖς τὴν σινδόνα. Ἡ δὲ κεκρυμμένη τούτου καὶ παρακεκαλυμμένη διάνοια, σημαίνει τὸν ἰσχνὸν καὶ ἀπέριττον, καὶ τῶν βαρῶν τῆς σαρκὸς ἀμέτοχον, μηδὲν κώλυμα πρὸς τὴν ἐντεῦθεν ἀνάβασιν ἔχοντα· κοῦφον [δὲ] καὶ εὐπάλλακτον τῆς θνητῆς ἀναχωροῦντα ἰλύος, καὶ πρὸς τὴν ἄφθαρτον ζωήν, πτηνῇ ἀπαντῶντα.