But when the Pharisees heard it, they said, This fellow does not cast out demons, but by Beelzebub the prince of the demons.
All Commentaries on Matthew 12:24 Go To Matthew 12
John Chrysostom
AD 407
But to declaim against envy, one may say, is easy; but we ought to consider also how men are to be freed from the disease. How then are we to be rid of this wickedness? If we bear in mind, that as he who has committed fornication cannot lawfully enter the church, so neither he that envies; nay, and much less the latter than the former. For as things are, it is accounted even an indifferent thing; wherefore also it is little thought of; but if its real badness be made evident, we should easily refrain from it.
Weep then, and groan; lament, and entreat God. Learn to feel and to repent for it, as for a grievous sin. And if you be of this mind, you will quickly be rid of the disease.
And who knows not, one may say, that envy is an evil thing? No one indeed is ignorant of it: yet they have not the same estimation of this passion as of adultery and fornication. When, at least, did any one condemn himself bitterly for having envied? When did he entreat God concerning this pest, that He would be merciful to him? No man at any time: but if he shall fast and give a little money to a poor man, though he be envious to the thousandth degree, he counts himself to have done nothing horrid, held as he is in subjection by the most accursed passion of all. Whence, for example, did Cain become such as he was? Whence Esau? Whence the children of Laban? Whence the sons of Jacob? Whence Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, with their company? Whence Miriam? Whence Aaron? Whence the devil himself?
Herewith consider this also; that you injure not him whom you envy, but into yourself you are thrusting the sword. For wherein did Cain injure Abel? Did he not even against his own will send him the more quickly into the kingdom? But himself he pierced through with innumerable evils. Wherein did Esau harm Jacob? Did not Jacob grow wealthy, and enjoy unnumbered blessings; while he himself both became an outcast from his father's house, and wandered in a strange land, after that plot of his? And wherein did Jacob's sons again make Joseph the worse, and this, though they proceeded even unto blood? Had not they to endure famine, and encounter peril to the utmost, whereas he became king of all Egypt? For the more you envy, the more do you become a procurer of greater blessing to the object of your envy. For there is a God who beholds these things; and when He sees him injured, that does no injury, him He exalts the more, and so makes him glorious, but you He punishes.
For if them that exult over their enemies, He suffer not to go unpunished (For rejoice not, it is said, when your enemies fall, lest at any time the Lord see it, and it displease Him ); much more such as envy those who have done no wrong.
Let us then extirpate the many-headed wild beast. For in truth many are the kinds of envy. Thus, if he that loves one that is a friend to him has no more than the publican, where shall he stand who hates him that does him no wrong? And how shall he escape hell, becoming worse than the heathens? Wherefore also I do exceedingly grieve, that we who are commanded to copy the angels, or rather the Lord of the angels, emulate the devil. For indeed there is much envy, even in the church; and more among us, than among those under authority. Wherefore we must even discourse unto ourselves.
5. Tell me then, why do you envy your neighbor? Because you see him reaping honor, and words of good report? Then do you not bear in mind how much evil honors bring on the unguarded? Lifting them up to pride, to vainglory, to arrogance, to contemptuousness; making them more careless? And besides these evils, they wither also lightly away. For the most grievous thing is this, that the evils arising therefrom abide immortal, but the pleasure at the moment of its appearing, is flown away. For these things then do you envy? Tell me.
But he has great influence with the Ruler, and leads and drives all things which way he will, and inflicts pain on them that offend him, and benefits his flatterers, and has much power. These are the sayings of secular persons, and of men that are riveted to the earth. For the spiritual man nothing shall be able to hurt.
For what serious harm shall he do to him? Vote him out of his office? And what of that? For if it be justly done, he is even profited; for nothing so provokes God, as for one to hold the priest's office unworthily. But if unjustly, the blame again falls on the other, not on him; for he who has suffered anything unjustly, and borne it nobly, obtains in this way the greater confidence towards God.
Let us not then aim at this, how we may be in places of power, and honor, and authority, but that we may live in virtue and self denial. For indeed places of authority persuade men to do many things which are not approved of God; and great vigor of soul is needed, in order to use authority aright. For as he that is deprived thereof, practises self restraint, whether with or against his will, so he that enjoys it is in some such condition, as if any one living with a graceful and beautiful damsel were to receive rules never to look upon her unchastely. For authority is that kind of thing. Wherefore many, even against their will, has it induced to show insolence; it awakens wrath, and removes the bridle from the tongue, and tears off the door of the lips; fanning the soul as with a wind, and sinking the bark in the lowest depth of evils. Him then who is in so great danger do you admire, and do you say he is to be envied? Nay, how great madness is here! Consider, at any rate (besides what we have mentioned), how many enemies and accusers, and how many flatterers this person has besieging him. Are these then, I pray you, reasons for calling a man happy? Nay, who can say so?
But the people, you say, hold high account of him. And what is this? For the people surely is not God, to whom he is to render account: so that in naming the people, you are speaking of nothing else than of other breakers, and rocks, and shoals, and sunken ridges. For to be in favor with the people, the more it makes a man illustrious, the greater the dangers, the cares, the despondencies it brings with it. For such an one has no power at all to take breath or stand still, having so severe a master. And why say I, stand still and take breath? Though such an one have never so many good works, hardly does he enter into the kingdom. For nothing is so wont to overthrow men, as the honor which comes of the multitude, making them cowardly, ignoble, flatterers, hypocrites.
Why, for instance, did the Pharisees say that Christ was possessed? Was it not because they were greedy of the honor of the multitude?
And whence did the multitude pass the right judgment on Him? Was it not because this disease had no hold on them? For nothing, nothing so much tends to make men lawless and foolish, as gaping after the honor of the multitude. Nothing makes them glorious and immoveable, like despising the same.
Wherefore also great vigor of soul is needed for him who is to hold out against such an impulse, and so violent a blast. For as when things are prosperous, he prefers himself to all, so when he undergoes the contrary, he would fain bury himself alive: and this is to him both hell, and the kingdom, when he has come to be overwhelmed by this passion.
Is all this then, I pray you, matter of envyings, and not rather of lamentations and tears? Every one surely can see. But you do the same, in envying one in that kind of credit, as if a person, seeing another bound and scourged and torn by innumerable wild beasts, were to envy him his wounds and stripes. For in fact, as many men as the multitude comprises, so many bonds also, so many tyrants has he: and, what is yet more grievous, each of these has a different mind: and they all judge whatever comes into their heads concerning him that is a slave to them, without examining into anything; but whatever is the decision of this or that person, this they also confirm.
What manner of waves then, what tempest so grievous as this? Yea, such a one is both puffed up in a moment by the pleasure, and is under water again easily, being ever in fluctuation, in tranquillity never. Thus, before the time of the assembly, and of the contests in speaking, he is possessed with anxiety and fear; but after the assembly he is either dead with despondency, or rejoices on the contrary without measure; a worse thing than sorrow. For that pleasure is not a less evil than sorrow is plain from the effect it has on the soul; how light it makes it, and unsteady, and fluttering.
And this one may see even from those of former times. When, for instance, was David to be admired; when he rejoiced, or when he was in anguish? When, the people of the Jews? Groaning and calling upon God, or exulting in the wilderness, and worshipping the calf? Wherefore Solomon too, who best of all men knew what pleasure is, says, It is better to go to the house of mourning, than to the house of laughter. Ecclesiastes 7:2 Wherefore Christ also blesses the one, saying, Blessed are they that mourn, Matthew 5:4 but the other sort He bewails, saying, Woe unto you that laugh, for you shall weep. Luke 6:25 And very fitly. For in delight the soul is more relaxed and effeminate, but in mourning it is braced up, and grows sober, and is delivered from the whole swarm of passions, and becomes higher and stronger.
Knowing then all these things, let us shun the glory that comes from the multitude, and the pleasure that springs therefrom, that we may win the real and everlasting glory; unto which may we all attain, by the grace and love towards man of our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom be glory and might, forever and ever. Amen.
