Letter 947

To Primus the Subdeacon. You have learned how God hands over those who despise his commandments to the passions of dishonor, and to deeds that are exceedingly servile and filthy, according to what was said by the Apostle, that "God gave them up to passions of dishonor and to base practices" [Romans 1:26-28]. Having heard this, then, consider it thus: just as, if someone were to say that the sun, by not being seen, cast a man into the pit, we do not reckon it so, that the light-giver thrust into the pit the one who was unwilling to look toward it, but rather that the cause of the fall into the pit is the not partaking of the light; so also God, having thrust away the one who pays no heed to his laws, and to his threats, and to his light-giving commandments, casts that one into the pit of sin.

Ἐπύθου, ὡς ὁ Θεὸς τοὺς καταφρονοῦντας τῶν αὐτοῦ ἐνταλμάτων εἰς τὰ πάθη ἐκδίδωσι τῆς ἀτιμίας, καὶ εἰς τὰς πράξεις τὰς λίαν ἀνδραποδώδεις καὶ ῥυπαράς, κατὰ τὸ εἰρημένον ὑπὸ τοῦ Ἀποστόλου, ὅτι « Παρέδωκεν αὐτοὺς ὁ Θεὸς εἰς πάθη ἀτιμίας καὶ φαῦλα ἐπιτηδεύματα. » Ἀκούσας τοΐνυν, ὅτι ὥσπερ εἴ τις εἰπόντος, ὅτι μὴ ὀφθείς ὁ ἥλιος τὸν ἄνθρωπον τῷ βοθύνῳ ἔρριψεν, οὐχὶ λογιζόμεθα τοῦτο, ὅτι ὁ φωστὴρ τὸν μὴ βουληθέντα πρὸς αὐτὸν ἰδεῖν εἰς τὸν βόθυνον ἀπώσατο, ἀλλ’ ὅτι αἰτιόν ἐστι τῆς εἰς τὸν βόθρον καταπτώσεως τὸ μὴ μετέχειν τοῦ φωτός. Οὕτω καὶ ὁ Θεὸς τὸν μὴ προσέχοντα τοῖς νόμοις αὐτοῦ, καὶ ταῖς ἀπειλαῖς, καὶ ταῖς φωταυγέσιν ἐντολαῖς ἀπωσάμενος, τοῦτον εἰς τὸν βόθυνον ῥίπτει τῆς ἁμαρτίας.