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 On Harmony of Thunder Orthodox podcast: What would St. Basil the Great tell you to do if you and he were standing in the produce section of your local supermarket? Find out about the spiritual feast the two of you would have on this week's Harmony of Thunder.
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Harmony of Thunder, program eleven, St Basil the Great Haexeramon, Homily 5
You've heard me say before on Harmony of Thunder that a good sermon will have a memorable summary sentence and will inspire the listeners to do something, and I stand by my attitude in this regard. However, every once in awhile a preacher likes to compose a sermon that is, well, poetic, which has no summary sentence. It may be a celebration of something, a commemoration of a person or event, or simply an inspirational description of the world and of the splendid gifts God has given to us. I hope you heard my program for Pascha, where I examined the sermon of St. Epiphanius for Great and Holy Saturday. That sermon is a prime example. St. Epiphanius described, in brilliant and hauntingly realistic words, the destruction of the power of hell by our Lord while He, in earthly terms, lay in the grave. St. Epiphanius didn't want you to do anything, didn't want you to remember any quotes of the day – he just wanted you to listen and to feel the overwhelming joy of the resurrection swelling in your heart.
This is the attitude I hear behind the fifth sermon in St Basil's Hexaemeron, entitled “The Germination of the Earth.” This is a remarkable sermon, because a normally austere and severe saint almost seems to take a break from challenging and convicting his listeners in order to encourage them to simply take a good long look at the beauty of God's creation. Listen to this line: “A single plant, a blade of grass is sufficient to occupy all your intelligence in the contemplation of the skill which produced it.” And later, “What shall I say? What shall I leave unsaid? In the rich treasures of creation it is difficult to select what is most precious; the loss of what is omitted is too severe.”
Hi, welcome to Harmony of Thunder, where we explore and enjoy the rich tradition of Orthodox preaching. I’m your host, Fr. David Smith. Each week, Harmony of Thunder chooses a sermon from scripture or from the works of a saint and we spend our time together looking at the style, the illustrations, and the spiritual message of the preacher.
Lord Jesus Christ, through the prayers of Your Most Pure Mother and of all the saints, bless your Holy Orthodox Church with great preachers and people who want to hear them. Amen.
One can almost hear the same attitude that St. Basil has in his fifth sermon from the Hexaemeron in the present ecological activities of His Holiness Patriarch Bartholomew, am I right? There is a fascination with the order of creation, but more, with the wonder of creation. But this is a fascination that leads to faith: “Let the earth bring forth.” (In saying this, St. Basil was quoting scripture – I'll start again) “Let the earth bring forth. This short command was in a moment a vast nature, an elaborate system. Swifter than thought it produced the countless qualities of plants. It is this command which, still at this day, is imposed on the earth, and in the course of each year displays all the strength of its power to produce herbs, seeds, and trees. Like tops, which after the first impulse, continue their evolutions, turning upon themselves when once fixed in their centre; thus, nature, receiving the impulse of this first command, follows without interruption the course of ages, until the consummation of all things.”
Do you hear how the preacher introduces a completely different element into the paragraph as an illustration? This is a great preaching technique. All that we see occurring in nature happens at the command of God, or rather, happens as a result of the command of God made at the beginning, and St Basil tell us that this is like a top. You wind up the string, let it fly, and it spins seemingly of its own accord. When I first read this sermon, dear listener, I was struck by the word “evolution” in the quotation I just read. I love how that word introduces an even more striking illustration to the modern ear – let me read the sentence again: “Like tops, which after the first impulse, continue their evolutions, turning upon themselves…” and so on. Is that a typo? Should it be the word “revolutions?” No way! I'm glad the word evolution is in that sentence, because the whole theory of evolution comes from people who cannot understand the simple truth that the top was set into motion by an outside force! That the top doesn’t spin itself! As G. K. Chesterton says in the opening to his wonderful book The Everlasting Man, “It is really far more logical to start by saying 'In the beginning God created heaven and earth', even if you only mean 'In the beginning some unthinkable power began some unthinkable process'. For God is by its nature a name of mystery, and nobody ever supposed that man could imagine how a world was created any more than he could create one. But evolution really is mistaken for explanation. It has the fatal quality of leaving on many minds the impression that they do understand it and everything else; just as many of them live under a sort of illusion that they have read the Origin of Species.”
I have to tell you that today, dear listener, I'm reading quotations that make me feel like I should only read quotations, like nothing I could say could add anything worthy. Great idea for a podcast – just read quotations from saints and other writers.
But back to my original point. If it could be said that St. Basil the Great, in his fifth sermon from the Hexaemeron, is calling you to do something, it is this: look at the world around you and celebrate the beauty of creation and the love of the Creator: “I want creation to penetrate you with so much admiration that everywhere, wherever you may be, the least plant may bring to you the clear remembrance of the Creator.”
I'm looking now at an icon of St. Basil. Try to imagine with me what it was like to hear him preach. I'm sure, right off the bat, that he didn't joke around. But there is one passage in this fifth sermon where you can hear a smile in the words. Listen: “How does water become wine in the vine, and oil in the olive tree? Yet what is marvelous is, not to see it become sweet in one fruit, fat and unctuous in another, but to see in sweet fruits an inexpressible variety of flavor. There is one sweetness of the grape, another of the apple, another of the fig, another of the date. I shall willingly give you the gratification of continuing this research.” Can you see the smile on his face? Can you see his parishioners' smiles, as they realize that their bishop has enjoined them to explore the variety of tastes of fruit as a way of contemplating the Creator's gifts to mankind? What a great idea. Can you imagine St. Basil in a modern grocery store. Watermelons and bananas. Raspberries. Picking raspberries, after finding them in the forest in a secret place that seems only known to you and God. Blueberries the third or fourth year after you plant them, when they get used to the soil and start putting forth really good fruit. This is definitely a spiritual discipline I can embrace with gusto. Strawberries. My father grew them in our back yard, and he put netting over them to keep the birds from eating them when they were just getting red and ready to pick. But the birds would land on the ground and hop their way under the netting and eat until they were too full to hop anymore, and they would get caught in the net. And my dad would go and scold them and help them get untangled so they could fly away.
What a celebration of the glories of Creation is the fifth sermon of St. Basil – it summons up some good memories in me and I hope in you too. Join me next week when we look at the sixth sermon. The great saint has finished his poetry and his celebration, and jumps right back into the kind of preaching we normally enjoy from him.
Oh Lord God, Creator of Heaven and earth and all that is in it, help us to hear and heed the words of the great preachers of Orthodoxy, that we may glorify you with our faith and lives, in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, one God, Amen.
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